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| The Jesus Project #2: Why Satan Loves Churches |
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Conversation. It’s what we humans do with each other to communicate. We talk to one another. We also have an amazing capacity to forget almost everything we say and hear. Some of it, in my case at least, is a matter of bad listening skills. I don’t always pay attention to what people are saying. Sometimes the most important people in my life say things that I just don’t “hear”. There are other conversations that I really wish I could remember, but they are soon lost in the sounds and busyness of my life.
However, there are some conversations that I remember. Words spoken years ago in some cases, but they had such impact on my life that I still remember them almost word for word. For some reason, many of those have occurred on airline travels. Conversations with strangers; sometimes with people whose names I never learned. One in particular I remember from 1988. I was on a plane from Atlanta to Detroit. The plane was not crowded; I had a window seat and there was a man sitting in the aisle seat reading a magazine when I sat down. The plane had barely cleared the runway when he handed his magazine to me and asked me if I’d ever seen “that” as he pointed to the picture. It was an old car, the make and model of which I had no idea. He told me it was a Tucker. I later learned that the magazine article he was reading coincided with a movie that was released in 1988 called “Tucker: The Man and His Dream.” This stranger was more than willing to tell me about the car and the movie as our flight continued.
The conversation changed, however, when he began to inquire about my destination for the day and my background. No, I wasn’t flying to Detroit; that was an intermediate stop as I headed home to Portland, Oregon. “What did I do?” I was a teacher at a small private college. “What field?” “Religion,” I responded. “Oh,” he said, “what church?” “Church of Christ.” “Ah, the people who think they’re the only ones going to heaven. My father and my uncle haven’t spoken to each other for 30 years because of the Church of Christ. My father’s family was raised Baptist, and when my uncle married a woman from the Church of Christ, he had to convert. They haven’t spoken to each other since.”
Perhaps you’ve had those conversations as well. Or perhaps the bruises and beatings—spiritual, emotional, and even physical—have come through other sorts of experiences with church and supposedly churched people. Too many of us know first-hand the problems with “that Leprous Bride of Christ” that Rubel talked about last week. So why is it that our attempts to be the body of Christ in our time so often fail? Why is it that when confronted with the temptations of power and control over people, and sometimes even service to others, we humans don’t manage the circumstances nearly as well as Jesus did? Think for a moment about the temptations of Jesus when he was first driven by the Spirit into the wilderness.
Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over, he was famished. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’ ” Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And the devil said to him, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’ ” Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’ and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’ ” Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ ” When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.
Jesus immediately understood that solving his own hunger, even demonstrating his capacity to solve world-hunger, was not his prerogative; it is God’s. He immediately recognized the devil’s efforts to entice him to choose power and authority (the kingdoms of the world), or to demonstrate his divine superiority (jumping from the pinnacle of the temple) as denials of God the Father’s sovereign rule in his life. With his death and resurrection and the promised pouring out of the Spirit (Acts 2; cf. John 14-16, 20), disciples of Jesus were given that same presence which drove Jesus into the wilderness.
One cannot read very long in Acts or read through Paul’s letters without discovering that Satan wasted little time in trying to recover from his defeat at the cross. The first “scandal” in the church was a direct result of Satan’s efforts. When Ananias and Sapphira sold property and gave only part of the proceeds to the Apostles (while claiming to give it all), Peter confronted them with these words: “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the proceeds of the land?” From that time to the present, Satan has been working hard to strip the promise of Life from those already called by God.
(Note: The rest of this sermon can be heard on tape by contacting the Woodmont Hills church office. This series by Rubel Shelly and John York is being prepared for publication in book form)
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