WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

Easter Sunday

March 31, 2002

Colossians 3: 1-4

His name is Marvin; he is probably a few years older than me. I first met Marvin my senior year at Northwest Christian College. Marvin was just starting in college because he had spent the last several years of his life at the Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem, Oregon.

In a book he wrote about his life, Marvin tells of his troubled childhood and youth – unloved, dysfunctional family. His life went down the wrong road, moving toward negative and destructive behavior. He was in and out of juvenile jail. He then ended up in the state pen. For some reason the judge was lenient on his third felony charge and only gave him an 8-year sentence. Yet, he reached the point where he was ready to end his life. He stood over a sink with a razor in his hand ready to cut his arteries and end it all. In desperation he cried out to God for help. He sensed a presence; he attended the Protestant worship service on Sunday morning; the chaplain worked with him, affirming God’s love for him. He wasn’t familiar with that kind of affirmation. One Sunday afternoon, Marvin, along with two other inmates, were baptized in an old porcelain bathtub in the infirmary. He went on to help start a religious men’s group called "The Master’s Men."

Marvin worked and got his GED and when he was released from prison he wanted to enter the ministry. The chaplain arranged for him to attend Northwest Christian College; Marvin graduated, married, went to seminary and became a minister in the Christian Church. One of the chaplains who helped Marvin was my uncle, Raymond Helseth, my dad’s twin brother.

Not many of us, if any, in this room can tell that dramatic of a story about God radically touching and changing a person’s life. I tell this story today as a reminder of what Easter is all about. My story is quite different from Marvin’s. I was raised in a Christian home, my father a minister; I attended church every Sunday, church school every Sunday, every VCS and church camp. My family, though not perfect, was a very caring, loving and supportive family where the love of Jesus was experienced every day. I, too, was baptized, but my baptism was not the symbol of a radical change in my life; rather it was the next step in my maturing faith as a young person. I had not been in trouble with the law; I was one of those good kids that tried to do everything right for parents and teachers. Baptism for me was taking on the faith that I had received from my parents and the church and claiming it as my own.

Whether we have grown up in the church or whether we have had a Marvin experience of radical change in one’s life because of Christ, or somewhere in between, we come to that point where we sense the Divine in our lives and we are a changed person. Maybe you are searching for that sense of the Holy today and that is why you are here. The Spirit of the Holy One has called us into a new way of living and being. As Christians, we proclaim the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead as the defining moment when life changed. The dynamic power of love and life as lived in Jesus Christ could not be killed; evil does not have the final say. God is proclaiming a new way of being, not controlled by negative and destructive, not by the hatred, bitterness and jealousy of broken relationships.

For the Apostle Paul, the act that most completely symbolized the radical change and transformation was baptism – that act of being placed under water and being raise up. For Paul, baptism acted out the death, burial and resurrection of Christ; in our baptism we proclaim to be a Christian. Yet, baptism also was a way to act out our death to an old way of life and being raised to a new way of living. Death to sin of the past and raised to newness of life. To Marvin it was the symbol of a radical change in his life – he experienced love and grace for the first time. It empowered him to completely change his life around. For me, it was my claiming what I had been receiving all my life.

The writer of the letter to the Colossians uses that image of baptism to speak of the lives we are to live as followers of Christ. We are buried with Christ and we are raised with Christ. As Christ died a physical death, he was raised a spiritual being; he wasn’t the same. So, in baptism we die to our old self with its values and priorities and are raised to a new way of living and thinking, seeking to live the mind and spirit of Jesus. In Colossians 2 he writes, "If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the universe, why do you life as if you still belong to the world" And in chapter 3, "Put to death, therefore whatever in you is earthly…" In our text for today, he writes, "So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above…"

Paul is proclaiming that we are already sharing in the resurrection. The resurrection is not some future event that takes place when we die; because of our faith and baptism, we are already sharing in the resurrection here and now. The power and sting of death has been broken and defeated. Sin, which separates us from God, has been taken away by Jesus. We will die a physical death and we naturally feel that grief, yet, as Christians, we have already been sharing in the resurrection; new life has already begun here on this earth. We experience that Reign of God in the fellowship of Christians in the church.

Eugene Peterson, in his recent paraphrase of the New Testament, states Colossians 3: 1-4 in this way, "If you are serious about living this new resurrection life, with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ – that’s where the action is. See things from his perspective."

But whether you have traveled the road Marvin traveled or the road I have traveled – or some road in between the point is the same. If we are serious about living the resurrection life – the life of Christ in us – then we need to act that way. What Paul is trying to say here in this letter, is that the resurrected life calls for a different way of thinking and living. Our baptism refocuses our life. There are different priorities, different values, different morals. There are ethical implications to being a follower of Jesus Christ. We are called to embody the very spirit of Jesus; his values, his morals, his attitudes.

It doesn’t mean that we are so "heavenly minded that we are worth no earthly good." It is not an excuse to escape responsibility, rather the opposite. Jesus Christ calls us to take on the very heart and mind of Jesus and live life in his Spirit. It is to so live the life of Jesus that the Reign of God can be seen on earth, that other people can see Jesus Christ in and through us.

We are called to approach our neighbors with love and compassion. We are to treat our family with respect. The environment is a part of God’s creation; how we treat the earth says a lot about our view of God. I was reminded of the difficulty of actually living this out this week when a church member came up to me and said, "We need to talk." How are Christians to act toward people who are acting in irresponsible and destructive ways? Write them off? I don’t think so. How are Christians to treat Afghans and terrorists? Bomb them off the face of the earth and call it justice? I don’t think so.

The questions are challenging and the answers even more difficult, yet it is the struggle that is important. Because of our baptism, because we claim the risen Christ in our lives, we are called to set our hearts and minds on God’s way, not the worldly way. In the waters of baptism we put to death attitudes and actions that destroy, divide, actions of selfishness, revenge and greed. We are called to "put on Christ," clothe ourselves with the risen Christ. Jesus said to love our neighbors as we love God and ourselves, and even to love our enemies and pray for those who bother us and even persecute us.

Easter is all about letting the Spirit of the risen Christ live and dwell within you. And when that happens, you become a changed person – not easy, not simple, no "walk in the park." Rather a challenge to embody the Spirit of Christ and let that Spirit work through you to address the issues of daily life.

The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed! You can see the risen Christ in the lives of those who have been raised with him. Look around you – you will see the risen Christ in the lives of Christians.