Persistence (Fourth Sunday of Easter)

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The Resurrection of Jesus created a big problem for the first Christian disciples!  We usually celebrate the Resurrection and think about all the good things about Jesus’ rising from the dead: Sin is forgiven; death is no longer the end; and joy replaces sadness.  All of those things are true, and they were true for the first disciples as well.

But the Resurrection of Jesus also meant that the disciples were now called to continue to follow Jesus into the future.  At first, that probably seemed just fine.  But as the weeks wore on, it became clear that following Jesus wasn’t going to be like it was before.  Jesus occasionally appeared to his disciples in bodily form, but not often.  And as the story goes on, Jesus makes it clear that NOT seeing Jesus in bodily form is going to be the “new normal.”

Yet Jesus still called his disciples to follow him.  Jesus promised to be the Good Shepherd who would guide them forward.  Jesus promised to be with them always, even when they couldn’t physically see him.

But how were they supposed to follow Jesus when they couldn’t physically see him in front of them?  How were they going to listen to the voice of their shepherd when they couldn’t hear him speaking like they had heard him before?  How were they supposed to know where to go when Jesus wasn’t physically leading the way?

This was the new problem the Resurrection presented.  And it was an even worse problem for new-comers to the community who may not ever have seen Jesus before his crucifixion.  How were new disciples to come to know Jesus, to hear Jesus and to follow Jesus into the future?

At least as Luke tells the story, the early Christian community in Jerusalem decided that the best way to do this would be “to devote themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”  It’s a short and seemingly normal sentence at the beginning of today’s first reading.  And it’s not full of miracles and wonders, so we may be tempted to pass over it pretty quickly.  But this sentence is, I think, one of the keys to understanding how at least one early Christian community listened for the voice of Jesus and followed him into the future.

The first thing to know about that sentence is that we translate the verb in English as “devoted.”  The believers were “devoted” to these things.  It’s not a wrong translation, but in English the idea of being devoted sounds like something that’s just pious and spiritual, and which you do in your heart.  But the Greek verb really is much more than that.  It means that you persistently DO something.  It’s an active thing that you never stop, in spite of everything else that’s going on.

And this means that, in spite of everything else that might be going on in the lives of those early believers, they persistently kept up with:

• The apostle’s teaching – that is, they never figured they knew all the important stuff; they kept trying to listen, to learn and to understand more deeply.  And this was because they understood that the apostles, even though they were fallible people, were people through whom Jesus was speaking to them.  They could listen to the voice of their Shepherd through the apostles’ teaching.  And that’s why they were “devoted” to the teaching – it wasn’t a cult of personality around any individual apostle…

• Fellowship – Jesus called people to be his “flock” – that is, they were part of a community, and so they realized that following Jesus couldn’t be a private, spiritual experience.  They had to care for and nurture the community they were part of.  And that nuture of the community – which is really what “fellowship” means – was something they had to constantly strengthen with one another…

• The Breaking of bread – over the centuries, biblical scholars and commentators have debated whether this means “persistence in sharing communion” or “persistence in simply eating together”, but it probably means both.  As last Sunday’s Gospel reading reminded us, Jesus revealed himself and his presence through meals, and these early believers realized that persistence in doing that was one of the ways they opened themselves to the presence of Jesus, even when they couldn’t see him physically standing in front of them…

• Prayers – and this may seem hard to understand, because Luke doesn’t tell us “prayers for what” or “prayers in what way.”  But prayer isn’t first and foremost a heavenly petition for God to do something.  Instead, prayer is first and foremost about opening yourself up to listen to what God has to say to you.  It’s about entering into relationship with God, and by extension, being in relationship with those for whom you pray.  And the early believers seem to have known that if they were going to listen for the voice of their shepherd, and follow him into the future, it would mean constantly and persistently listening for the guidance of God in that kind of prayer…

Persistently keeping up with all of those things was how the early Christian community managed to follow Jesus, in spite of the stress and conflict that surrounded them.  In today’s first reading, it sounds like they didn’t have any of those problems.  Indeed, Luke makes it sound like they all got along great, and all the outsiders were really impressed with them!

But that clearly wasn’t the case.  The next few stories that Luke tells us about involve some of the apostles getting arrested and beaten up by the temple authorities; internal divisions within the early Christian community over stuff like giving; and even the first martyrdom for being a witness to Jesus.  All was not sweetness and light.  But that community survived, and even thrived, in spite of it all, because they were persistent in these basic, but vital, things.

And as we celebrate all the good things about the Resurrection, we also have the same problem as the first disciples.  We don’t see Jesus physically standing in front of us, or talking to us as we talk to one another.  And yet, Jesus is also with us, guiding us and leading us into the future.  And for us to be able to see, hear and experience the Risen Jesus in our lives, it’s also often the case that it’s helpful to be persistent in doing these same things that the early Christians in Jerusalem did.

That is, it’s more likely that we experience the presence and guidance of our Good Shepherd when we’re persistent in:

• Listening to the apostles’ teaching – and sometimes, that simply means digging more deeply into biblical stories that we’ve listened to for years, and not simply passing over the “kiddie version” we learned in Sunday School… (one of the reasons we’re going to have adult VBS this year, too!)

• Fellowship – part of being Jesus’ flock means being part of the flock!  And simply being together – even if it’s for fun like at the Cinco de Mayo party on Friday, binds us together so that we can support and care for one another when it’s not a party time…

• The breaking of bread – both in fellowship and at the communion table.  We were talking about “real presence” in the Confirmation class last week, and how in Communion Jesus is making himself real in our lives so that we can also make Jesus real in the lives of others; and when you’re not somehow experiencing the real presence of Jesus in your life, there’s really no way for you to be an agent of his real presence in the lives of others…

• Prayers – and this often scares and confuses people.  Folks don’t feel like they have the right words or “know what to say.”  But prayer isn’t about talking, but about opening yourself up to God.  It’s about lifting up others, even and especially when you don’t have the answer to what they need.  And sometimes, it’s like Paul says when he says that the “spirit intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words” (Rom 8:26) – it’s simply about sighing to God, asking “now what?” and being open to listening as you go about your day…

Many years ago, when I was having back problems, the doctor gave me a booklet of basic exercises to do.  And the booklet informed me that none of these exercises were new or particularly hard to do.  But it also said that doing them regularly was what would make a difference.  It said, “doing them only occasionally is unlikely to help!”

And this is the point Luke is making about “persistently doing” these things.  It’s in the persistence of doing things like listening to God’s Word, nurturing fellowship with one another, sharing in the meal and prayer that Jesus continues to guide us and help us.  It’s through those things that we more deeply experience Jesus’ presence in our lives. And it’s through persistence in doing such things that we become agents of Jesus’ risen life in the lives of those around us.

Amen.