(Homily for Gayton Road Christian Church's Worship on May 13, 2018)
Whom Would You Say Is Living the Life?
You’ve heard the expression, I’m
sure: Living the life.
Whom would you say is living the
life?
Maybe you’d say it’s someone
who’s wealthy, who lives with every comfort and convenience imaginable, who
owns several homes and can fly to any one of them on a whim.
Or maybe you’d say it’s someone
who’s famous, someone who rubs shoulders with the powerful and the prominent,
who oversees charities and big events, whose every photo looks perfect, someone
who is always achieving his or her goals.
Or perhaps you’d say it’s someone
who is wandering the world, backpacking across Europe, mountaineering in the
Andes or the Himalayas, learning new languages and discovering new cuisines and
making friends on every continent.
Living the life. Some say it’s riches and comfort. Others say it’s fame and
achievement. And still others say
it’s experience and awareness.
Thousands of years ago, King Solomon left nothing to chance and tried
all three. If you look in the
second chapter of Ecclesiastes, he explains that he amassed great wealth and
sought out every pleasure; he achieved greatness and surpassed everyone in his
prestige; and he experienced all there is to experience.[1] He was trying to living the life. You and me, we are not as fortunate as
Solomon. But my guess is that like
him we too have tried—do try—to live the life in at least one of these three
ways.
The Life of the Age to Come
At first glance, our scripture
today has nothing to do with living the life. All we read about in our English translation is “eternal
life.” The idea of “eternal life”
is a cornerstone of contemporary Christianity. And I think it is a tragic one. Because by talking about “eternal life,” our faith often
forfeits the present. To us,
“eternal life” means the life that begins when we die. But it has nothing to say about the
life we’re living right now.
In fact, however, those words
that are translated “eternal life” have everything to do with the life we’re
living right now. In the Greek,
the words are zoe aionios, which
means more literally the “life of the age to come.” It refers less to duration (eternity) or to a later time (in
the by-and-by) and more to a quality of life. Zoe aionios, the
“life of the age to come,” is talking about living life in the age of God’s
rule, which is to say, the age when love and forgiveness and trust and peace
reign. Jesus, you may remember,
called this the kingdom of God, where the poor are blessed and the mourning are
comforted and the stranger is welcomed and the hungry is fed and the lonely is
embraced. And he said it’s coming
soon. He even said it’s already
among us.
So eternal life is not later, it’s now. It’s not there, it’s here. Eternal life is about a quality of life
that Jesus invites us into immediately.
It’s not about life after death but a kind of life now that, if you
would believe it, is even stronger than death.
The Homeless and Persecuted Judean—Living the
Life!
Our scripture today follows up
its declaration of eternal life with this explanation: “This life is in the
Son. Whoever has the Son has the life” (1 John 5:12). Your Bible may just say “Whoever has
the Son has life,” but in the Greek it includes the word “the”: the life. And that gets me to thinking: for us faithful, maybe
“eternal life” is just another way to say “living the life.” And living the life is just another way
of saying living like Jesus Christ.
Today’s writer is adamant that
the testimony of God is in Jesus Christ.
In other words, if you want to know who God is, look at Jesus. If you want to know what living the life looks like, look at Jesus.
But that’s foolishness, isn’t
it? For thousands of years—since
the time of King Solomon—living the life has meant money and comfort, or fame
and achievement, or tasting and experiencing all that life has to offer. And let’s be honest, Jesus would not be
a poster boy for any of these things.
A homeless Judean wandering the countryside, raising eyebrows, receiving
threats until the day he is crucified?
Who would look a person like that and think, “Yes, now that’s the
life!”?
Mothers, Teachers, and More—Living the Life!
Of course, the same question
could be asked of folks in our world today who do not have it easy but whose
dedication nevertheless testifies that they are living the life, folks like
mothers and teachers and other nurturing figures in our world. A mother who changes her baby’s diaper
when he poops, wakes up in the middle of the night to be with him when he
cries, feeds him food that he’ll spit back out over God and everybody—who would
look at a person like that and think, “Yes, now that’s the life!” A teacher who learns the vernacular of
her students so she can relate to them, who channels wild juvenile energy
everyday into constructive projects, who shows care and bears with and forgives
even the most disobedient student in her classroom—who would look at a person
like that and think, “Yes, now that’s the life!”
It would be even crazier,
wouldn’t it, to call that kind of life “eternal life”? And yet that kind of life bears
resemblance to what our scripture calls the life. It looks like the kind of life that Jesus lived, a life of feeding the hungry,
tending the sick, showing love to the left out.
Many Christians use Jesus as a
substitute. “He did all that
stuff, including the cross, so that I don’t have to.” But our scripture today proclaims otherwise. In Jesus, we have God’s testimony to
what living the life really looks like.
Jesus shows us the life of the age to come, eternal life, the kingdom of
God—call it whatever you want, but know that this is the life. And we catch glimpses of the life and
even experience it ourselves, as mothers, as teachers, as peacemakers, as
bread-sharers.
Indeed, that seems to be what the
writer is trying to communicate today.
Our scripture concludes with this exhortation: “I write these things to
you…so that you may know that you have eternal life” (1 John 5:13). So that you may know that you already have eternal life, the life of
the age to come, the kingdom of God.
It starts now, here. You
are already living the life—as mothers, as teachers, as open-housers, as
table-sharers, as teddy-bear-carers, as whatever follows in the way of
Christ. The life is not in wealth
and comfort, recognition and achievement, experience and self-indulgence. As King Solomon would come to say,
these things are “vanity” and “chasing after the wind.” The life is in Jesus Christ, in living
like he did—in living for others.
And this is the life that, if you
would believe it, is even stronger than death.
Prayer
Loving Christ,
Who lived the life
And lives it still—
We desire to join you
In the life of the age to come.
Open our eyes to see
How we are already there;
Not in power, pride, or possessions,
But in living for others.
Cheer us on and gladden our hearts,
That we might live the life
More deeply,
And share your joy.
Amen.
[1] Biblical scholars
concur that Ecclesiastes was likely not written by Solomon. The common attribution results from
Ecclesiastes 1:1, where the writer identifies himself as “the son of David.”
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