Our
church is positioned with open arms to our community, offering full
participation without exception in the life and ministry of the church,
reflecting the inclusiveness of
God's Kingdom as demonstrated in the love of Jesus. "Don't you think it's
time?"
"They that went before, and they that followed cried,
saying, 'Hosanna! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord! Blessed be the kingdom of our father, David, that
cometh in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!'"(Mark
11:9-10)
Hosanna is a prayer
of praise, a word that lets us pour our hearts out into an exclamation of a
whole wide range of gladness and hope and faith in what God is doing with us
and where he's leading us.
Hosanna! We praise
Him. We adore Him. We bear witness to Him. We find ways to express our
love for him. We can't just depend on our old clichés and Bible verses to do
that. Those days are fewer and farther between.
We have to find additional ways to express God's love.
Love is like water. If you block water from going one way,
usually it finds some other way. If there's even the smallest little channel it
can follow, it will. Water will enlarge its path and pool up somewhere else.
Love's like that. Love will always find a way somehow to express itself.
If we love God the way we think we do, then we're not going
to let any little thing stop our love from flowing. That's how we need to understand
our witness. God's love is in our heart, and our job as the witnesses to that
love is to let it flow through us. If it doesn't
flow one way, let it flow another, but just let it flow. Trust God's
love and praise him for it. Let that be our praise, the way our love flows
through the rocks and crevices and crooks and crannies of life.
Jesus was setting up a new and different community among all
the populations of the world. It was in
this world, but not of the world, and it had different
laws. It had a different vision and way
of operating. This community is God’s Kingdom. That means it's his vision, and
he’s the One putting it together. God himself is making this happen, and we get
to be a part of it today if we will.
God’s kingdom is a community that includes everyone. The
only people who are excluded from this
community are the people who exclude themselves. The Kingdom of God is a community of love and grace and
peace. People have all their different ideas and views and experiences, but
together in love, we work as friends and family to encourage and
strengthen and guide each other. We let each other change and reshape us
according to the image of God, in which we were
created. Everything else gets pushed aside, as this kingdom grows within
us and among us.
Jesus mandated that we love one another, as he has loved us.
By this everyone will know whether or not we genuinely
are his disciples, by how we love one another.
If you love like
someone else says to love, then you're their disciple. If you're following
someone else’s vision and ideas, then you're their disciple. But, if you're a
disciple of Jesus Christ, then you love the way Jesus Christ has loved you.
That's been our mandate ever since the night Jesus gave himself up for us.
Love
can build a bridge
Between your heart and mine
Love can build a bridge
Don't you think it's time
Don't you think it's time
(“Love
Can Build a Bridge” Words and music by
John Barlow Jarvis, Naomi Judd, Paul Overstreet.
©1990 Scarlet Moon Music, Inc.)
Don't you think it's time
to replace our walls of fear with bridges of love? Jesus was arrested,
spent the night being tortured, and gave his life for us at Calvary. His first words from the cross were, "Father,
forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). In the Resurrection, a great new community rose up with
him from the grave and began to form around his new law with this new people, his people. That's success.
That’s victory! Hosanna!
When we shout “Hosanna”
and when we praise the Lord, we're praying for victory. We're not looking to go out and get crushed.
We're looking to go out and to stand firm as the people of God in the law of
love. As a small congregation, we are uniquely positioned by the struggles we’ve
been through together. We may even be able to position ourselves
in stronger, fresher ways than some other churches are able to do.
We've been a church with open hearts, open minds, and open doors. Now we have the opportunity to be
the church with open arms. We can make it clear that God's love is here and
extended to everyone who will receive it. We’re here to welcome all who will come and be a part of our community of love.
That's a beautiful place to be spiritually. Christ is inviting us to take our place as a beacon of hope and salvation. He is
delivering us from sin and death into eternal life and restoring us to our
rightful place as His children, His heirs.
That's something for us to celebrate, stand firm in, and
build around. We are not constrained by
the gains and losses of each week or year. We are looking for the long-term
success and victory that Jesus demonstrated in His flesh. Let us show in our relationships the same love and acceptance going forward as the faithful people
of God. Hosanna! Don’t you think its time?
Derived from the sermon on Mark 11:1-11 preached March 25, 2018 at Briensburg UMC
Photo "Butterfly on Palm Frond" 2010 by Stephen Case, Pixabay.com.