Here is the manuscript version of my sermon from Sunday...
Article 17: Discipleship and the Christian Life – “true faith in Christ means…”
February 20, 2011
BMC- Matthew 7:13-14 & 2 Tim 2:11-12
Introduction: Transformation Cartoons[1]
As I thought about our article this week, one of the important themes I saw was that of transformation. In the midst of reflecting on transformation, I kept finding myself reminiscing about cartoons of my childhood and the role that transformation played in those stories. Now of course, sharing about these is going to date me a bit and many of you may not be at all familiar with these cartoons, but I found a commonality of transformation.
I began of course with the most obvious cartoon about transforming, The Transformers. Yes believe it or not, the Transformers originally appeared during my childhood nearly thirty years ago. They have resurfaced from time to time since then. You may be familiar with their most recent appearance in the live action movies with the third installment coming out this summer.
This was the story of robots in a cosmic battle for the universe. Autobots and Decepticons each vying for superiority end up on earth where the battle continues. While here, they take on earthly machinery disguises like that of semi-trucks and jet planes. When the time comes, they transform from their earthly shapes into powerful robots that battle for dominance. It was gripping TV for a kid in elementary school and still is for Elam as we re-watch a few of them together from time to time. In fact thanks to Elam’s uncle Phil; {put on Optimus Prime helmet and push voice button} Elam can actually be transformed into Optimus 
Prime and his voice can be changed to sound like Optimus. {Helmet off}
Then there were the Thundercats. They were a race of catlike people who escaped from the destruction of their home world of Thundera and landed on Third Earth. Once there, their values of justice, truth, honor, and loyalty compelled them to fight against the oppressive powers at work in their new home world.
The leader of the Thundercats, Lion-o, had a dagger, which contained the Eye of Thudera. When Lion-o found himself in a bind, he would do his thing with his dagger and it would transform into a full size sword. It would also send out a signal for help to his comrades. Through the transformation of his sword, Lion-o and the Thundercats were able to defeat the forces of evil that threatened life on Third Earth.
Another cartoon with a powerful sword was He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. Set in Eternia, Prince Adam was chosen to be the defender of Castle Grayskull and all of its magical power. Meanwhile, Skelator and his evil henchmen plotted to capture Castle Grayskull and use it’s power for evil.
In times of trouble, Prince Adam would take out his sword and proclaim, “By the power of Grayskull…I have the power!” This would transform him into He-Man, a barbarian like warrior who is said to be the most powerful man in the universe.
In each of these cartoons as different or similar as they may be, there is a common thread: that of transformation. In each case, the relatively ordinary goes through a transformation process to become extraordinary, to become more than what they would otherwise be in order to live out the values they professed. For the Transformers it was through mechanical reshaping. For Lion-o it was by the power of the Eye of Thundera in his dagger. For Prince Adam, it was by the power of Grayskull and his magic sword.
It is a common theme in these cartoons and perhaps a common theme of humanity. How many of us find ourselves thinking about how we can become better? How many of us dream of being transformed into that which we clearly are not but wish that we could be? Perhaps that’s why those cartoons were so popular when I was a child and why similar cartoons and shows like the many incarnations of the Power Rangers still exist today.
Whatever the reason for their popularity and regardless of how universal this desire for transformation may be, transformation is also a Biblical theme. Transformation takes place in the lives of many Biblical characters, is ever present in the gospels and is referred to many times in the epistles of the New Testament. While transformation for these cartoons involved mechanisms or magical swords, our article for the morning calls us to lives that reflect transformation that comes by the power of God.
Article 17 & Matt 7
We live in a culture in which much of Christianity believes that our faith is simply about belief and salvation. And our tradition affirms these realities but it also calls us beyond them to a life of discipleship, to a faith that is lived out in our everyday lives. Our article for today names this call to take up our cross and follow Christ. Some may be confused by this call as in this comic portrays a man in athletic clothes saying, “You said to take up Lacrosse and follow you…now what?”
This is not an easy path to take. It is not an easy road to travel. Our article calls us to walk Jesus’ way of suffering. And Matthew 7 describes our choice. We are to enter through the narrow gate and travel the narrow road. We are to avoid the wide gate and broad road that lead to destruction. Many go that way, but that is not the way that we are called.
We have choice here in what we do, but we also know that we are not able to follow this narrow road as we are or by our own power. We must depend on the power of the Holy Spirit and we must seek to be transformed into the image of Christ, conformed to Christ rather than to the world. “Be ye transformed” as Romans 12 and this comic of Optimus Prime preaching remind us. And in a world that bombards us with suggestive and coercive media on a continual basis, this is no small matter.
Thus we must be shaped by the Holy Spirit, scripture, prayer, and our body of faith, the church. When we are engulfed by calls to conform to the ways of the world, we are left with two choices. We can either remove ourselves from those seductive voices by isolating ourselves as the monastic movement has done. Or we can confront and counteract them by ingesting the gospel message through scripture, reconnecting with the holy through prayer and dwelling with the community of believers for positive peer pressure.
But let us not kid ourselves into believing that our internal transformation, our personal conformity to Christ is the goal of the journey or the end in itself. It is a beginning of our faith that bubbles up within us and overflows into the world around us, confronting the calls of the world to conform to the wide gate and the broad road. The reality is that our faith in Christ involves both salvation and discipleship. As our article proclaims, true faith in Christ means many things that move us beyond belief and into discipleship.
True faith in Christ means doing the will of God, seeking first God's kingdom, and acting for peace and justice rather than the use of violence. It means giving our first loyalty to God's kingdom, truth telling, chastity and loving faithfulness, treating our bodies as God's temples, and being compassionate. This is a life of faithfulness and this serves as a testimony to an unbelieving world. It confronts the calls to conform to the world and offers a different way.
Dallas Willard
Dallas Willard has written an important book, entitled The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1988). His thesis is very simple: “There is a way of life that, if generally adopted, would eliminate all of the social and political problems from which we suffer. This way of life comes to whole-hearted disciples of Christ who live in the disciplines of the spiritual life and allow grace to bring their bodies into alignment with their redeemed spirits” (241).
He points out that the word disciple is used 269 times in the New Testament. The word Christian is found only three times - and the first time it is used introduces the disciples (Acts 11:26). The New Testament is a book about disciples, by disciples and for disciples of Jesus Christ (258).
In fact, Willard believes that “For at least several decades the churches of the Western world have not made discipleship a condition of being a Christian. One is not required to be, or to intend to be, a disciple in order to become a Christian, and one may remain a Christian without any signs of progress toward or in discipleship. Contemporary American churches in particular do not require following Christ in his example, spirit and teachings as a condition of membership...discipleship clearly is optional.” (258-259) And so he concludes that “Most problems in contemporary churches can be explained by the fact that members have not yet decided to follow Christ” (259).
Jacob Hostetler[2]
This leaves us in need of models for discipleship. Many of you are familiar with the story of Jacob Hostetler and his family. You have either heard the story or you are a part of that extended family. Over lunch one day not too long ago, I learned that Ken Hostetler is a descendant. At our Wednesday night book study this week, John Roth referenced this story and I learned that David Hostetler is also a descendant.
Many of you know the story better than I do; but it seems that there are lessons in that family history for what it means for us to be disciples and to live the Christian life. Roth makes some of these observations in his account.
As Roth tells it, “In September 1736, Jacob Hostetler left the Palatinate in Germany and immigrated to the ‘new world’ of Pennsylvania, where they built a cabin, planted an orchard, and hoped to prosper. But the land he and others had settled had been taken from the native peoples only a few years earlier. One moonless night in the fall of 1757, Delaware Indians from the region surrounded the Hostetler cabin, intending to do harm. The oldest son, hearing voices, opened the door and was met by a gunshot. He was wounded in the leg. Immediately, the other boys grabbed their hunting rifles from the mantle and took aim at the shadowy figures outside. But just as they were about to pull the trigger, Jakob grabbed the guns and said, ‘It is not right to take another person’s life, even to save your own!’
“Oral tradition recounts numerous other fascinating details to the story. After the Indians set fire to the cabin, the Hostetler family, huddled in the basement, saved themselves from burning by dousing the flames with cider they had in storage. When morning came, they assumed that their attackers had left. But just as they were crawling out of the basement window, a young warrior spied them. He raised the alarm, and the Indians returned. Jabob’s wife, a daughter, and one of his sons were killed immediately, while he and two of his remaining children – Joseph and Christian – were taken prisoner. As they parted from each other, according to the story, Jacob admonished the boys ‘not to forget the Lord’s Prayer … even if you should forget your German language.’
“Adding to the poignancy and enduring power of the story is the account of their subsequent experience in captivity. The captured Hostetler boys reportedly adapted quickly to their new culture. Joseph was formally adopted by the Indians. His white blood ceremonially ‘washed out,’ he was redressed in Indian clothing and proclaimed by the tribe (in language that sounds suspiciously Biblical) to be ‘flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone.’ Christian was also apparently adopted by an older Indian man whom he came to love. After the old man’s death, Christian chose a younger Indian as his new brother.
“But throughout these events, the bonds of the biological family were not forgotten. In a daring move, Jacob escaped his captors and eventually returned to his community. Several years later, Christian suddenly appeared at the home of his Mennonite relatives, dressed as an Indian. Unrecognized, he announced in broken, scarcely recalled German, ‘Ich bin der Christ’ (my name is Christian), whereupon he was tearfully embraced by his family. Joseph, the second son, was finally released by treaty in 1764 or 1765. But only after ‘long hesitation’ did he decide to leave the Indian ‘customs and manner of living.’ He maintained a close friendship with the Delaware Indians for the rest of his life.”
In this story, we see themes of discipleship. When the family came under attack, the boys were ready to kill to save their own lives, but Jacob stopped them. He insisted that it is not right to kill someone even to save your own life. And in their parting, Jacob instructed his boys to remember the Lord’s Prayer even if they forgot how to speak their native language of German. We have spent multiple weeks reflecting on the messages of discipleship within the Lord’s Prayer.
Within this story we see themes of transformation. The boys that were taken were incorporated into the tribe. They were adopted. They learned the language and wore the dress of their new tribe. Eventually, they returned to their family; but it seems that they were never the same. They had been changed by their experience of being shaped by another community.
Conclusion
Though we live in our surrounding culture, we too are shaped by our particular community of faith. We are discipled and called to live a life that witnesses to the fallen world around us. Our faith begins with belief and salvation; but through the power of the Holy Spirit and the transformational power of scripture, prayer, and community we are changed. That change is an integral part of our faith and it demonstrates what true faith in Christ means as we live out our daily lives in the world.
And we have the sure saying from 2 Timothy that if we die with him we will also live with him and that if we endure, we will also reign with him. May God continue to form us and may we be empowered to live transformed lives in the world around us.
Amen.
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