"Saved"

Rev. Matthew Miller

FROM THE ACTS Acts 2:42-47 click here to watch the sermon "Saved"

I was talking to a colleague not long ago about sermon titles. He was of the opinion that sermons shouldn’t be titled until they were written- not finished, because sermons are rarely finished. Even when the preacher has said all that she, or he has to say, the hope is that the work of the Spirit in our minds and lives is ongoing. But I digress. I remarked how if that were the rule then none of my sermons would be titled because they are never fully written when the bulletin in your hands gets printed. Sometimes, the first words aren’t even on the page. So, my practice, as I’ve shared with some of you, is to chose a single word from the chosen passage of scripture as the title. I do it so there will be something to list, but I also do it as a kind of seed from which I hope a fully formed message of some meaning may grow. If you’ve ever been led in the practice of Lectio Divina, or spiritual bible reading, that’s a close approximation of how I choose that word. I read the passage and try to attend to what words jump out, or light up for me.  

Today’s passage has captured the imagination of believers in every generation, from those who have tried to replicate this communitarian picture of the church, to those who very much want to refute it as unique to its moment, but in no way a prescription for how believing Christians should live together today. That’s all well and good. But what caught my eye this time around the text wasn’t the wonders and signs, or the having of all things in common, or the selling of possessions in order to give the proceeds of that sale to whoever was in need. It wasn’t even all the time the spent together worshipping God and around the table sharing meals with one another, or the glad and generous hearts and the goodwill of all the people. All of that is lovely if a little disheartening to see how far church as it’s viewed and practiced has seemingly fallen. I’m tempted to dismiss all of this passage as the honeymoon phase of a relationship that has decidedly moved on. No, the word that caught my attention was one that gets a lot of play in biblical texts from Exodus to the Revelation. And that word is the title I chose for today before I ever began to write.  

“And day by day,” writes the author of Acts, “the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.” That word can be pretty loaded when it comes to talking about what we say we believe. And it means very different things to different people. So that whenever the topic of salvation comes up in religious and spiritual circles, I think it’s important that we define our terms. In the witness of God’s covenant people, the chosen tribes of Israel, salvation means rescue and deliverance. Depending on the story it can mean rescue from the waters of the flood, or famine in the land, or the enslavement to Pharaoh. In the book of Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego are saved from the fires of a furnace and Daniel is rescued after being thrown into a Lion’s den. The psalmist cries out for deliverance from sickness, despair, and humiliation at the hands of their enemies. But nowadays, in the popular imagination and in particular corners of the church, salvation has been reduced to a single narrative that ends with a person going to heaven when they die; a phrase that is utterly foreign to the pages of the bible but often taken as an article of faith. I’ve seen it referred to as “spiritual salvation,” which tracks actually. Because the image of some eternal afterlife reward has more to do with the Greek story of Elysian Fields and Plato’s idea of the immortal soul than it does with the prayer Jesus taught us to say asking for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in heaven, or the resurrection of the body that is at the heart of our faith and focus of this Easter season.  

According to that reductive narrative, the number of people who were being saved were those who had had their spiritual passport stamped for an eternal afterlife destination because they believed something that had been said. The only problem with that reading is that it completely ignores the rest of passage. In fact, I would suggest that that may be the point. If salvation is just something that happens later because we say we believe the right things now, then that is awfully convenient. It totally lets us off the hook of grappling with and living into the rest of it. If you’re tempted to roll your eyes when you read this passage about how super duper everything was, chances are that’s because you’ve spent some time in church. And by in church, I don’t mean the building, I mean with other people. Real human beings with all the faults and failings that come with that condition. If all I have to do to be saved is say the magic words, then I don’t even have to really bother with the messy business of trying to replicate the community as it is described in Acts. Then again, if we look to the Bible, faith as never been about giving the right answer. If anything faith is coming to the realization that we don’t have the answers for some of the most difficult things we will face: things like disasters that come out of nowhere and threaten to sweep us away, or oppressive systems of labor that advance the interests and egos of those at the top at the expense of those at the bottom, or the kind of hunger that gnaws at you- not just physical hunger, but the hunger for setting right the injustices of this world. These are all things that are often beyond our ability to control. And the threat that they pose to us can make us scared, and defensive, and combative and mean. Who, or what will save us from that? What can save us from the harm we cause and the hurts we endure? Who can save us from the kind of power that leverages the threat of annihilation as a way of getting whatever it wants?  

And then along comes someone who calls us out. Calls us to follow him, and then challenges our fear of scarcity by telling us to feed people from our own seemingly limited resources, only to discover that we have more than enough; that we are more than enough. In fact, all the limits we would set on who can be healed, or touched, or fed, or taught, or included, he blows right through and shows us that something better is right in front of us if we have eyes to see it. Not somewhere else. Later. But here. And now. Until he breaks though one last limit, the one we thought was inescapable, the one we fear more than anything else, the one that holds us captive. He conquers death itself and sends the Spirit of holiness to bring us together, to become something entirely new. When that Spirit gets a hold of us, we suddenly aren’t as concerned about what is mine and what is yours, but see the value of what is ours, together. We begin to care more about the needs of people than the things we have. We turn our eyes to God and to one another and find love and welcome through a meal shared and bread that is broken. And wouldn’t you know it, we find we are being saved by all of it. 

Saved by the one who breaks through every chain, fear, preconception, and category that would limit or define us. And saved by the signs and wonders that fill us with awe. Signs like a community that gives to one another and to those in need without calculating the cost. Wonders like trusting that who we are and what we have is more than enough to feed a world that hungers for community and connection and meaning and acceptance and love. More than anything, love. We find we are being saved from a world that would erase us, or flatten us, or turn us into nothing more than consumers to be counted toward the bottom line on someone’s annual report. We find that we are being saved from having to play the game that would make us chase after the worlds approval, gaining status at the expense of our own souls, we are being saved from that by the words of the one who already and always calls us, “beloved.” Who says, “you already belong because you are mine.” 

It isn’t about following some formula so that we can get the thing. Whether that’s saying a prayer or having all the answers, or doing all the “right” things we think we’re supposed to do. It’s about trusting in the one who has already given us all that we will ever need, the one who pulls us out of the graves of our own making and breathes into us the breath of life. It’s about trusting that each and every day we are being saved anew by a love that will never let us go.