Thy Dross to Consume and Thy Scales to Remove
Jesus is trying to prepare the disciples and help them understand the meaning and purpose of his suffering, death, and resurrection. In a little while (the Greek word is micros) In a micro you will see me no more, and then after a micro you will see me. They don’t understand. So, Jesus tries another approach.
He says three things to the disciples:
1. You are going to mourn and weep, while the world celebrates….over the same thing.
2. You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy, like a woman in childbirth.
3. “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
Jesus said, “You are going to mourn and weep, while the world celebrates”….over the same thing. When Jesus dies, the disciples and his followers are devastated. All is lost. They left their lives, their livelihoods, their families, …to follow him. Now, they are afraid for their lives. They gather in secret in locked rooms. While the crowds who shouted, “Crucify him,” rejoiced and celebrated – it was a great show of power. The rebellion was put down. The disciples were cowering in fear – of them! What a rush!
Jesus said, “You will grieve, but your grief will turn to joy.” As the disciples hid in those locked rooms, surely they looked around and thought, this is painful. It’s going to be like childbirth, Jesus had promised. Your back will cramp and pain will radiate down your legs; it will take your breath away. The disciples had to wonder how could this grief could possibly turn to joy, and we know that in a micro, Jesus was there, in the room with them. Risen, holding out his hands and feet for them to touch and see. Like a mother counting her newborn’s 10 fingers and 10 toes – the pain washed away in a miraculous, overwhelming flood of joy.
And Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” Like an expectant mother celebrating Mother’s Day before the baby is born, Jesus knows that the pain of death on the cross is yet to be borne, and yet, he is able to proclaim the victory of the resurrection. I have overcome the world!
In his letter to the Romans, in chapter 8 that Becky read this morning, Paul shares a very similar message.
Jesus said, “You are going to mourn and weep, while the world celebrates”….over the same thing. And Paul writes, “If you live finding your pleasure in what the world rejoices in, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the ways of the world, you will live.” We learn what the world rejoices in from the very beginning. In the Garden of Eden, it’s independence. With Cain and Abel, it’s self over other; it’s mastery. At the Tower of Babel, they are building to make a name for themselves; it’s power. The world rejoices in independence, mastery, and power. But the ways of the Spirit are to depend on God, to put other before self, and to strive to bring glory to God’s name. God rejoices in dependence, humility, and community.
Both Jesus and Paul warn that the transition from the ways of the world to the ways of God is like childbirth, not just for the 12 disciples, or the followers of Jesus, or the church, but for the whole world. The whole creation groans. The pain has to crescendo to a global yowl before human beings will push for the new creation to be born.
And yet, we are able to offer ourselves as citizens of God’s new creation even now. My sermon title comes from the process of gold being refined, the dross, the impurity in the metal, has to be consumed in fire. But I found a much clearer illustration of what has to happen. There is a character in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia who goes through this birthing process. In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Eustace Scrubb – a selfish, greedy, self-centered boy – is exploring an island and spots the treasure studded lair of a dragon. Exploring the cave, he notices the gold glimmer of a beautiful bracelet, and unwisely chooses to clip it onto his arm. There, he falls asleep, and the birth pangs begin. Lewis writes that “He had turned into a dragon while he was asleep. Sleeping on a dragon’s hoard with greedy, dragonish thoughts in his heart, he had become a dragon himself.” The golden bracelet is pinching his engorged and scaly arm. The outside of Eustace now matches the inside. He becomes desperate to become a boy again, and in the book, Aslan, the lion who represents Christ in the Narnia books, comes to him. Aslan takes him to a well in a garden and tells him that he must be stripped and washed in the water if he is to be changed. So, Eustace starts scratching himself, and scales start coming off, and then, he scratches a little deeper, and his skin peels off in one big sheet. Feeling great, he goes to step into the water and sees that his foot is already covered in rough, scaly skin. He tries three times to remove his own scales, but they keep coming back. Then Aslan, the Christ figure, said, “You will have to let me undress you.” Eustace recalls, “I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty near desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it. The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off….Then he caught hold of me….and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment….After a bit the lion took me out and dressed me….in new clothes…”
We are covered in scales that we can’t remove on our own. Creation is in the midst of contractions, we feel the pain, we know the new creation is being born.
And Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” And Paul writes, “we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” What does it mean for us that Christ has overcome the world and that in all things God works for the good of those who love him?
It’s tempting to look for examples of painful times that ended better than we started. To claim that God orchestrated our break-up or our job-loss so that we would be at the right place and the right time to meet Mr. or Mrs. “RIGHT” or so that we could land our dream job. And God is certainly working in those situations, but that’s not what Jesus or Paul meant. It is not a failure of faith or of God when we find ourselves still searching for relationship or working just to make ends meet in a job we really don’t enjoy. What Jesus and Paul are saying is that our peace does not depend on our earthly circumstances. Our hope is not in what lies around the next corner for us in this life.
Jesus said, “In this world, you will have trouble.” Yet, our suffering can be used by God for good – it can change us, it can make us more empathetic to others, it can give us wisdom to share with others going through similar circumstances, and perhaps the greatest good that comes from our suffering is that it brings us closer to God – when we suffer, we realize we are not independent, we are not masters, we are not all-powerful – the scales are able to be stripped away and our dependence on God is revealed, we are humbled, and we come to know our need for community. When we lie down and let God strip away our scales and wash us in the water, when we allow God to use our suffering for good, we experience deep joy. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.