Christianity: Use Only As Directed

 

James 1:17-27

                                                Isaiah 35:4-7a

                                                John 9:1-25

 

 

            There was a time when we had one of those cardboard sunscreens that you put in the windshield whenever you have to leave the car in the sun for a long period of time.  It blocks the sun and prevents the car interior from baking like an oven. In one corner of that cardboard shield was an odd bit of instruction in small letters. It read “Remove from windshield before operating vehicle.”

 

            Now you have to wonder how necessary that little nugget of wisdom is. I mean, are there actually people so stupid that, if that warning were not there, they would

start driving around with a big piece of cardboard blocking their entire field of vision?

 

            Those kinds of statements are known as disclaimers. It seems as though virtually every product has one these days—an instruction reminding consumers of the proper use of that product. The most common one is probably the phrase, “Use only as directed.”

You can find that on everything from toothpaste to power tools.

           

            Some of these disclaimers, like one on the cardboard sunscreen, seem so ridiculously obvious that we often wonder why they bother with them:

            A hair dryer includes a note that warns: Do not use while sleeping.

            An electric iron reminds us: never iron clothes on body.

            A tag on a child’s Superman costume reads: wearing of this garment does not allow you to fly.

            A chainsaw comes with a helpful reminder: do not attempt to stop chainsaw with hands. 

 

            Why do we have these “use only as directed” warnings? The reason, to put it bluntly, is that, yes, people really can be that stupid. People are constantly using things in a way that was not intended, often with tragic results.

            I know this because I have taken my turn being one of those people.

 

            When I was a boy, I was interested in track and field. I heard about an event called the hammer throw. Athletes spun around in a circle with the hammer and let it fly as far as they could throw it. That sounded fascinating. I went down to my dad’s work bench and found a hammer and went out into the back yard to practice. I was careful to aim towards the alley where there was nothing that I could hit and then gave it a try. What I didn’t realize was that when you are spinning around quickly in a circle, you lose track of where you are. When I let go of the hammer I thought I was facing the alley but I was actually facing the house. I watched in horror as the hammer made direct hit on the bathroom window.

 

            It’s safe to say that I did not use that hammer as directed.

 

            What we have in our scripture reading from James today is a disclaimer for religion. James reminds us that there is a right way to use the Christian faith and a wrong way. Being religious, says James, is not automatically a good thing. He says in 1:17: “If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless.”

Linda taught a group of high school students in a course called, “My Neighbors Faith,” where they studied other religions and denominations. As part of the program, guests from other places came in to speak, and that was followed by a visit to the house of worship. One fellow made a particular impression. He brought a towel and placed it on a stool. Then he arranged plastic cowboys and Indians on the stool. He spoke about how all the other Christian groups had fallen away from the true Word, and as he did so, he tugged on the towel and some of the figures toppled off. He kept going on this theme until only one figure remained, representing his church, the only true church still in existence.

 

Faith in God is one of the most powerful forces in the world. It has tremendous potential to do good. But as with any great gift, it can be misused, and when that happens, that power has tremendous potential for harm. It’s the same as with fire, painkilling medication, gasoline, pesticide, electricity, lasers. 

            They can all be used for good or misused for evil. The more powerful the gift, the greater the horror it can cause if misused. Faith is powerful, cautions James. Use only as directed.

            That pastor gave one of the most passionate witnesses of Lutheran doctrine you could ever hope to hear. He knew his stuff. And yet, if you asked the members of the class, they would tell you that of all the denominations and religions they experienced, his was the one that they wanted nothing to do with. Here was a guy with tremendous knowledge, ability, and passion. He could have built some marvelous things with the hammer he had been given. But he ended up throwing it through a bathroom window. Of all the guests, he did the poorest job of evangelizing because he ignored James’ advice. He did not use only as directed.

            We don’t have to scan too many columns of newsprint to see examples of people failing to use their faith as directed. The entire Middle East, Sudan, Sri Lanka are overrun with violence and destruction precisely because people fail to use their faith as directed. Instead of building a just and prosperous society, there are hammers flying through windows everywhere. The pain and heartache caused by misuse of religion was summed up by an anonymous graffiti writer in Lebanon who scrawled on a wall the hauntingly ironic plea: God save us from the people who believe in you.

            We don’t have to go overseas to see misuse of religion. We see it all around us, often by well-meaning people.

I was taught that the only ethnic or religious jokes I could tell were on my own background. So this joke is on Lutherans, although you could certainly fit others into this.

A man who had died was being given the great tour of heaven. They walked through a courtyard and into a large hall. Everywhere were celebrations and laughter. As they went down one hall, however, the guide asked him to walk quietly and make no sound. They passed a room full of people and moved back into halls and courtyards where there was more laughter and celebration and singing.

The new arrival asked what that silent stretch was all about. Who were those people who were not joining the great celebration.

      “Oh those are the Lutherans,” the guide said. “They think they’re the only ones here.

            How often is Christianity used as a weapon to dominate others, exclude others, to set ourselves up as better than other people? What do these verses from James say about militant, chip-on-the-shoulder Christians who try to use their majority muscle to impose their personal agendas on the rest of society?

            About Christians who claim to be so superior as human beings that they have all the answers to everything, if only the rest of those pitiful fools would wake up and listen to us? About Christians who view themselves as the sole defenders of truth and righteousness and have nothing but contempt for the contaminating riff raff of society? About using the Bible as a fool-proof manual for becoming rich or successful?

            And who among us has not been in those camps at one time or other? James tells us that when we do that, we are just throwing our hammers through windows, when what God wants us to do is build something useful. Use only as directed, says James.

            But how do we do that and still follow Jesus’ command to make disciples of all nations? Doesn’t that require us to be assertive? Exactly what are the directions for using our faith?

            The first thing we have to do is back up and remember the purpose of our faith. We can’t know how to use a product unless we know what it is for. The three Bible readings for today help us out with that.

            What are we supposed to be doing with our faith?

Isaiah tells us:

            Say to those who are of fearful heart, “Be strong, fear not.”

            Behold your God will come.

            Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,

            And the ears of the deaf unstopped,

            Then shall the lame man leap like a hart,

            And the tongue of the dumb sing for joy.

            For waters shall break forth in the wilderness,

            And streams in the desert;

            The burning sand shall become a pool,

            And the thirsty ground springs of water.”

 

James tells us, far less poetically:

            Religion that is pure and undefiled before God is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction.

 

The Gospel reading tells the story of Jesus healing a blind man.

 

            There is a common thread in all of them. In every case, the connection to God is used to build up, to bring relief, to make things new. To open up new possibilities. To burst the boundaries that keep human beings apart. To bring joy where there is sorrow. To spread the love of God throughout the earth.

 

            Does this sound like a form of humanism? That Christianity is only about doing good works? Where does evangelism fit into all this?

 

            The gospel reading for today provides a template for how that all works. The Pharisees are using their religion to exclude. Jesus doesn’t play exactly according to their rules and therefore he must be evil. They try to persuade the formerly blind man that his healing was a trick, a work of the devil.

 

            But they run into one of the great evangelists of all time. A man who knows how to use his faith as directed. This guy doesn’t pretend to have all the answers. He does not get into a debate with people who have no intention of listening. He does not answer their religious and philosophical arguments. He doesn’t claim to be better than they are, or even to be their equal in any way. He does not insist that they come over to his point of view. He does not try to shame them, browbeat them, cajole them, reform them.

 

            Instead, he clings to a simple statement of faith: “All I can tell you is this: I was blind and now I see.”

 

            What a difference that kind of evangelism makes! I’m not the expert or the guardian of the truth. I’m not better than you. I’m not going to insist that you be like me. There are an awful lot of things that I don’t yet understand. All I can tell you is this:

            Without God, I can’t see anything but darkness. Without Christ, I can’t see where I am going.

            With God, I am constantly seeing possibilities I didn’t know existed. I’m seeing a world in which love makes a difference. Where the eyes of the blind are opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped. Where the lame can leap like deer, and those of fearful heart, who are beaten down by life, the miserable and depressed, the hurting and suffering, can jump for joy. I see streams and cold springs and clear pools and green pasture where there was once only a burning desert of sand.

 

            And this gift of a new world is for everyone. Because of what Jesus has done, it belongs to you as much as it belongs to me. You don’t have to be part of it, but why on earth wouldn’t you want to be?

 

            I came not to condemn the world, says Jesus, but to save it, to share with it, to build it up. So why do we spend so much of our time condemning the world, throwing Christianity through windows? We are empowered in this church to build wonderful things if we use our faith in the way that God intended.