Titled: "Holey, Wholly, Holy"
Based on John Ortberg's book: The Me I Want to Be
January 13 - Spirit
Job 41:1-34
Can You Catch a Sea Monster?
1 Can you catch a sea monster
by using a fishhook?
Can you tie its mouth shut
with a rope?
2Can it be led around
by a ring in its nose
or a hook in its jaw?
3Will it beg for mercy?
4Will it surrender
as a slave for life?
5Can it be tied by the leg
like a pet bird
for little girls?
6Is it ever chopped up
and its pieces bargained for
in the fish-market?
7Can it be killed
with harpoons or spears?
8Wrestle it just once—
that will be the end.
9Merely a glimpse of this monster
makes all courage melt.
10And if it is too fierce
for anyone to attack,
who would dare oppose me?
11I am in command of the world
and in debt to no one.
12What powerful legs,
what a stout body
this monster possesses!
13Who could strip off its armor
or bring it under control
with a harness?
14Who would try to open its jaws,
full of fearsome teeth?
* 15Its back is covered
with shield after shield,
16firmly bound and closer together
17than breath to breath.
18When this monster sneezes,
lightning flashes, and its eyes
glow like the dawn.
19Sparks and fiery flames
explode from its mouth.
20And smoke spews from its nose
like steam
from a boiling pot,
21while its blazing breath
scorches everything in sight.
22Its neck is so tremendous
that everyone trembles,
23the weakest parts of its body
are harder than iron,
24and its heart is stone.
25When this noisy monster appears,
even the most powerful
turn and run in fear.
26No sword or spear can harm it,
27and weapons of bronze or iron
are as useless as straw
or rotten wood.
28Rocks thrown from a sling
cause it no more harm
than husks of grain.
This monster fears no arrows,
29it simply smiles at spears,
and striking it with a stick
is like slapping it with straw.
30As it crawls through the mud,
its sharp and spiny hide
tears the ground apart.
31And when it swims down deep,
the sea starts churning
like boiling oil,
32and it leaves behind a trail
of shining white foam.
33No other creature on earth
is so fearless.
34It is king of all proud creatures,
and it looks upon the others
as nothing.
John 10:7-14
I tell you for certain that I am the gate for the sheep. 8Everyone who came before me was a thief or a robber, and the sheep did not listen to any of them. 9I am the gate. All who come in through me will be saved. Through me they will come and go and find pasture.
10A thief comes only to rob, kill, and destroy. I came so everyone would have life, and have it fully. 11 I am the good shepherd, and the good shepherd gives up his life for his sheep. 12Hired workers are not like the shepherd. They don't own the sheep, and when they see a wolf coming, they run off and leave the sheep. Then the wolf attacks and scatters the flock. 13Hired workers run away because they don't care about the sheep.
14 I am the good shepherd. I know my sheep, and they know me.
---
I want to start out today with a question: are you (w)hol(l)(e)y? Now, before you answer, think about it for a minute. Are you (w)hol(l)(e)y?
When the preacher asks you, of course, you think of a particular kind of holy. H-O-L-Y. When you hear "holy" in church you think of "Holy Scripture," or "Holy Spirit," or the slightly scarier, "Holy Ghost." We sang a verse of the hymn, "Holy, Holy, Holy." "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty!" God is holy. Jesus is holy. The Spirit is holy. That's some tough competition when you're asked, "Are you holy?" Compared to God in those three persons, blessed Trinity? I'm not holy. Compared to them, you're not holy. So, No. You're not holy. Hate to be the one to break it to you. Sorry.
But good news. There are other holies than the holy of holies.
Different context. Say, you're at the dinner table. You know, the flat place where you stack the mail. I know not everyone or every family eats there anymore. But pretend. You're at the dinner table, eating processed, high-fructose corn by-products. Not really eating, but shoveling. Ingesting. You're not tasting the foody-goodness. You're just staring off into the distance. You're vaguely aware that there are other sentient beings present, but that's not where your mind is. And your wife, or husband, or partner, or significant something (it's 2013), this person smacks the table and says, "Have you heard anything I've said?"
I know, it's preposterous, but try to pretend.
And, after you regain composure, you realize the answer's no. You haven't heard a thing. So, you do the only thing you can do. You fake it. "Of course I've heard every word! How can you ask such a question? But you're so above my level that it would help me if you'd summarize it all before I respond."
And even though you cover like a Navy SEAL, you know, deep down, you're not wholly (W-H-O-L-L-Y) in the conversation. You're not wholly at the table. You're not even wholly in the house. You're off. In your mind. You're re-living something from the past. You're imagining some preferred future. Your presence in the present is partial, at best.
In this context, wholly's spelled with a "w". Are you wholly present? Are you wholly there? Are you wholly paying attention? No. Of course you're not. You're not dubya wholy.
But good news. There's yet another kind of holy.
I don't know if you've been to the mall lately. Or if you've been in a school lately. Maybe you only go to church and then back home. And if so, good. But there are a lot of teenagers and college students and people my age trying to fool everyone into believing we're younger, wearing clothes that are really... holey. And if you've seen what I'm talking about you know I don't mean church-holy. I'm talking strategically placed, hand-cut by Chinese garment workers, intentionally bought with your parents' money that way, clothes with holes.
I know this makes me sound really, really old. Who am I to talk? I wear a black robe. Which in the 16th century was haute couture. I'm wholly un-holey when it comes to fashion.
Clothes are holey. Swiss cheese is holey. Spongebob's holey. H-o-l-E-Y, holey. And sometimes, people feel that way, too.
Do you feel like you've got big gaps? Like you've got big empty spaces in your heart? Like your spirit's missing something essential? In your ability to function and be the way, the person, you want to be, are you hol-ey?
Now.
I'm know I'm certainly not holy like the God in three persons. I know I'm not wholly present in a lot - ok, most - situations. But I'm a very, very holey (ey) kind of person. And I'll bet you are, too.
We all spend so much time trying to find fulfillment. Or, maybe it's better to say, wishing, for fulfillment. Or, maybe it's correct to say, angry, that we don't have fulfillment. Or depressed that we don't have fulfillment. Or anxious that we don't have fulfillment. We've got these big holes in who we are. In our spirit. In our heart. In our real vs. imagined self. And the holes keep us from being wholly who we want to be. They keep us from being holy like Jesus teaches us to be.
The series of messages over the next few weeks is about being holey, and about being holy, and about being whole in spirit, whole in mind, whole in time, whole in your relationships, and whole in community. It's about being wholly invested in being holy like Jesus means holy, instead of being holey like Swiss cheese.
If you want to get the most out of this series, you'll need to buy the book that a lot of it's based on. It's by John Ortberg, and called, "The Me I Want to Be." If you read the book, you'll see that there's absolutely no way it can be covered in a few sermons. We also have a Sunday School class studying it. They meet at 9:30, around the corner, near the children's classes.
I hope that you'll go to the class, or get the book, or get other books or audio about wholeness during these next weeks. It would be really cool if five weeks from now, when somebody asks, "Are you holy, H-O-L-Y?" you can say, "I guess a little more than I was a few weeks ago." I think we all want to find fullness of life, wholeness of experience, and the holiness of the Spirit. I want us to work together toward that goal.
---
Did you know that in the Bible, the word for Holy also means, Breath? It's an old Hebrew word, Ruach. And if you say it right, it sounds like what it means, Rooooaccch. Sounds like Papaw sneezing. Rooachh! It comes up like 400 times in the Old Testament alone. When you see the word "breath" in the Bible, you can substitute "spirit," and it still works.
In the Old Testament, there's the book of Job. Job makes all these complaints. And Job's really smart. He out-argues all his friends who come with quick-fix, dime-store, easy religious answers, like, "Well, it's all part of God's plan." And, "God never sends you more than you can handle." Job hears all the cheap religious junk and says, "Oh, please - don't make me barf." (I use a contemporary version.) And Job argues. He argues like the world's best lawyer. And he pokes holes in all the answers.
And after about 40 chapters of hearing all Job's arguments, God says, "OK, mister smarty-pants. Let's talk."
God says, "Where were you when the world was formed? Where were you when I made alligators? (And really, only God could come up with alligators.) And in chapter 41, there's this wonderful, lyrical, almost comical statement about God saying, "Look. I even made a sea monster."
[Whose] back is covered
with shield after shield,
firmly bound and closer together
than breath to breath.
When this monster sneezes,
lightning flashes, and its eyes
glow like the dawn.
Sparks and fiery flames
explode from its mouth.
And smoke spews from its nose
like steam
from a boiling pot...
That's so cool. Sounds like a dragon from Harry Potter.
Its back is covered with shield after shield,
firmly bound and closer together than...
and here's that special word...
Firmly bound and closer together than BREATH to BREATH.
Now, a sea monster's imaginary. We all know that. But how many of us try to be sea monsters? How many of us try to cover up the holes in our life, try to hide and protect ourselves, with shield after shield? Bound and closer together than.... our breath? Our spirit to our spirit?
How many of us put on the protective armor of our image, our imaginary self? How many of us put on the armor of fashion. Or put on the armor of activity? Or put on the armor of the best and finest complaints? Or even the armor of churchy holiness?
In one way or another, we all do. I do. You do. We keep the illusion of wholeness. Or, we keep the distraction of hol-E-Y-ness. We may have had the scales on us so long we don't even think about them anymore. We keep them pressed together, closer than our breath. We settle. We settle for being imaginary monsters, when we could be real. Completely, whole and real. Holy, like Jesus said to be.
---
In the gospel according to John, Jesus says, "I am the good shepherd." Jesus say, "I'm the gateway." Jesus says, "I am the good shepherd." Jesus is not an imaginary monster. (I want to pause there, because sometimes people think he is, deep down, an imaginary monster. He's not.) Jesus is not a pretend shepherd who's only in it for the money, or whatever else he can get from it. Jesus says, "I am the good shepherd," and, "I came so everyone can have life, and have it fully [wholly, completely]."
Jesus is the breath of life. Jesus is the fresh air of new life. Jesus isn't like the monster who's covered in armor. Jesus lays down his life for you, for me, for everyone. Jesus laid-down all his protective armor. Jesus lays it down so that WE can breathe new life, whole life, holy life, without wasting all our living and breathing trying to cover the holes.
In the Psalms, in Psalm 119, it says, "I am at the point of death. Let your teachings breathe new life into me." Jesus went to the point of death - and even beyond the point of death, so that you, so that I, so that everybody could have new life - new spirit - breathed into them.
But guess what? You're still the one who has to do the work. God put wholeness of life into you. God put a spirit of holiness in you. But you've gotta do the work of peeling off the armor and uncovering it.
---
Here's something I'd like you to try. It only takes a minute, so you can do it today, before life kicks in and you forget. Try this. When you sit down at the table with your family, say this to them. Or, when you stand at the mirror, say this to yourself. Say it out loud. It's short. It's memorable. Say this: "You are holy."
And if the people at the table say, "Why are you saying that?" you can tell them, "Because the crazy minister told me to."
Just, "You are holy."
And if they say, "I heard part of that sermon, so which kind of holy do you mean?" say, "All of them."
If you're talking to yourself in the mirror, same thing. All of them.
And here's why. But don't tell any of this to your people. Just leave 'em guessing. It's good for them.
Which kind of holy? All of them.
You are holy in that you're completely incomplete. You're kind of your own mythical character. How do I know? The Bible tells me so.
You're also holy in that you're wholly completely complete. You're a child of God. Already, and from your first breath. How do I know? The Bible tells me so.
And, you are holy in that you're one of the sheep for whom the holy Good Shepherd lays down his life. You're h-o-l-y because the resurrected Christ makes you holy. He shares his holiness with you. How do I know? The Bible tells me so.
It's good to tell yourself these things. But it's also good to tell the people around you. That's the spirit of where we're starting.
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