American Evangelicalism would tell us that we need to be saved.  And many of the late 20th-century revival meetings were focused on doing just that: ‘saving souls for Jesus.’  Something that has always troubled me in this line of thinking was the unanswered question, ‘saved from what?’

The common, assumed answer is that we are to be saved from eternal damnation, from hell.  More philosophically, we could say that we are saved from being separated from God (eternally). But what if salvation means something else, something altogether different?  

What if salvation isn’t about being saved from something? What if, instead, it’s about being healed and restored?  The question then changes, healed to what?  Restored to what?  Redeemed to what?

Jesus' salvific act on the cross, I believe, is more about drawing us in and towards God, rather than preventing us from going to the Bad place.  Rather than moving from, we’re moving towards something.  Rather than escaping, we’re striving for.  It’s a little distinction, but it makes a difference.  It’s about restoring, redeeming and reclaiming humankind as the Good creation that we are. 

“Who do you say that I am?” Is the question that Jesus poses to his followers after hearing what the crowds are saying about him?  This question is as relevant today as it was then.  Who do we say that Jesus is?

For some, Jesus is a teacher, a moral guide, or an ethicist.  For others, Jesus is divine; the Son of God.  As Anabaptist/Mennonites, we confess that Jesus is both fully human and fully divine.  And so we might use words like Saviour, Redeemer, Lord to talk about Jesus.  What do we mean when we talk about Jesus today?  Who is it that we’re imagining?

Like God and like each person, Jesus has many different sides to their personality.  When we focus on one at the expense of another, we lose important pieces of the picture.  This reflection will explore some of the essential facets of Jesus, whom we confess as Lord.

How do we speak about God? We each carry an image of God with us. For better or for worse, this image of God shapes our relationship with God. For some, it’s the image of God as a father, a loving, caring parent. For others, the image of God as father evokes memories of a strict, judicial parent.

God’s Hebrew name is best translated as “I AM.” This is the name that God tells Moses from the burning bush. God is.

We're invited to imagine God in a variety of ways. It allows us to finish the sentence, “God is…” God can be breath and air, like the Ruach we explored last week, God can also a burning bush, God can be..., you fill in the blank. What are the different ways that we could imagine God? 

How do we talk about the “Holy Spirit”?  It’s one of those phrases that we use which can have multiple meanings.  God’s Presence, Holy Ghost, Breath of God, Fire, or Spirit of God, even the Spirit of Christ.  All are possible meanings for the “Holy Spirit.”

In Hebrew, it’s known as the Ruach Elohim.  In Greek, it’s Pneuma, or Spirit, Wind, or Breath.  But it’s also known by the name the Paraclete, which can mean the 'advocate', 'counsellor', or ‘helper'.

The “Holy Spirit” seems to be as wild as its nature, whether it’s manifest as tongues of fire, wind, breath, language, or even the burning feeling of love.

On Pentecost Sunday, we turn our gaze towards the “Holy Spirit” and consider this often-used and yet equally confusing name for the presence of God.

In the years following the crucial Jerusalem Conference, the early church tried to live into the radical inclusivity of welcoming both Jew and Gentile into God’s Church.  This transition has gone more easily for some congregations than others.  At the beginning of this letter to the Galatians, Paul writes about how the church struggled to live into the ideal of the Jerusalem Conference, where some followed Jewish purity laws and while others did not.

Paul reminds us that faith is about trusting God to do God’s work, specifically around God’s relationship with humankind.  God has already gifted us a good and right relationship, we know this as salvation, or justification.  God has done the work to restore our relationships with God.  Our job is not to earn this, it’s a gift. Rather, our job is to live in the light of faith.  Faith, for Paul, is an orientation of life, a life lived in trust in the love and grace of God.

The account of the Council of Jerusalem found in Acts 15 is an account of a crucial conversation which became the turning point for the followers of Jesus.  There was heated discussion about the inclusion of Gentiles into the newly forming faith.  There were also questions of what was required of Gentiles to participate in the newly forming faith.  The debate at the core of this passage is identity.  More specifically, how much church members weigh their religious identity.  The resolution to this tension for the Jerusalem Council was to see and hear how God’s spirit was a work in the church, drawing together the diversity of the church, to affirm everyone’s primary identity as a follower of Christ, beloved by God.

Wrath is the most obvious of the Seven Deadly Sins. Wrath is anger to the nth degree. Wrath blinds us. In the passion story, it is the wrath of humankind, not God, that kills Jesus.

Love, on the other hand, is the source from which all other virtues originate. Each of the Seven Deadly Sins is a perversion of love. Once love is transformed, it overcomes the power of Sin, misdirected love. And we find that all our virtues, this transformed love, point us to the call to live out the love of God.

Sloth is one of the more unassuming and nefarious of the seven deadly sins.  Sloth is indifference embodied.  Sloth does not love.  In the passion story, Pilate embodies slothfulness; when given the opportunity to act on behalf of love, he does nothing -- he literally washes his hands.

Alternatively, the virtues in opposition to sloth are joy and passion.  If sloth is being disconnected, joy is a dramatic connection to God.  If sloth is a lack of love, passion is love that gives our lives purpose.  To overcome sloth, we must reengage with God and with the world around us.

Gluttony is more than food, though it is often focused on food. At the root of gluttony is a fear is scarcity; that there won’t be enough. Gluttony is a misplaced hunger and a mistrust of God’s providence.

The virtue of temperance and the practice of ‘enough’ reminds us that what is available is sufficient—that there is enough. Scripture reminds us that we need not fear, for God provides all we need.