Read the Lectionary Texts

How would you like to live…FOREVER?

Or, how would you like to LIVE…forever?

Which of the two will it be for you?

A musician friend of mine once told me that in John Stainer’s classic choral anthem “God So Loved The World”, there is a particular emphasis placed upon different words in the haunting three-time echo of the lyrics that bring the piece to a close. I have no idea if this is true or not because I am not a musician, but I want it to be true! The song closes this way:

“God so loved the WORLD.”

“God so LOVED the world.”

“GOD so loved the world.”

Each line reflects its own deep meaning just by virtue of emphasizing a different word.

How would you like to live…FOREVER?

Or how would you like to LIVE…forever?

This is, after all, the question that lies at the heart of Jesus’ conversation with the people in our scripture text from John 6. Jesus has said that he is the bread of life that came down from heaven and that anyone who eats this bread – which he says is his flesh – will live… FOREVER. Or is it, LIVE… forever?

The people are confused about this idea of eating Jesus’ flesh! I don’t blame them one bit! It sounds kind of weird to me, and perhaps you know that in the early days of Christianity, Christians were sometimes accused of committing the crime of cannibalism because of these very words about eating the flesh of Jesus.

Jesus ends the conversation by saying that the ancient Hebrews ate the manna bread that came down from heaven, but even so, they all died. Then he says, “…but anyone who feeds on this bread – meaning his flesh – will live…FOREVER.”

 Or maybe…LIVE…forever.

Which do you think it should be?

I don’t know if it strikes you the way it does me, but I am increasingly troubled by religion that places its emphasis on …FOREVER. In our day we’ve seen religious  fundamentalists blow up themselves and the innocents around them for the sake of gaining access to and some reward in the FOREVER. Meanwhile, the here-and-now is turned into misery.

Christian fundamentalists appeal to people to come to Christ for the sake of “going to heaven when you die.” The popular “Left Behind” series of books was built upon the idea that the ultimate question of life is whether you are among those who will be raptured out of this world to heaven, or are among the unfaithful who will be “left behind.” And Christianity as a whole has a pretty bad reputation around the world of being a religion that is so focused on heaven that it is often no earthly good.

Religion that is mostly about FOREVER is religion that needs to be questioned.

Many years ago – in that time when my own faith was more about living FOREVER than about LIVING forever – a little Sunday School kid came up to me and asked what people did in heaven.

Great question. What DO people do in heaven?

Do YOU know the answer to that question? Bounce on clouds? Play harps in the angel choir? Stand by the Pearly Gates to see who DOESN’T get in? Sit around all day NOT drinking beer?

There’s not any real conversation in the Bible about what people actually DO in heaven, although the book of Revelation describes heaven as a kind of gigantic worship service – sort of like today’s megachurches – except smaller. That’s pretty funny, huh?

So reaching for an answer to this little girl’s question, I went for the Revelation response.

“In heaven, people worship God,” I answered. “Heaven is like going to church and singing and praising and praying without ever stopping.”

She looked disturbed at the answer. And with a look of sheer innocence, she asked, “You mean, they go to church ALL DAY AND ALL NIGHT LONG?”

And right away, I knew I had lost another one!

Why would any eight-year old kid want to go to church FOREVER? They can hardly make it through an HOUR long service! Or, for that matter, why would anyone want to go to a church service that never ends?

Don’t get me wrong. I love church. I love worship. I love singing hymns to God, and praying, and praising and being in God’s presence.

But I love golf, too! And I want to go home today after the services are over and watch golf on TV. I don’t want to spend the rest of today worshipping. I want to watch Scottie Scheffler play great golf. Anyone here agree with me? Can I get an “Amen!”? And after the golf is over, I don’t want to come back to church and sing hymns all night long. I want to relax in my recliner and watch reruns of “Everybody Loves Raymond.”

Now you know I’m stretching the point, but please make sure you get the point: FOREVER without LIFE is not a forever worth waiting for.

John Shelby Spong put it so beautifully once during a question and answer session at our Stetson University Pastors School. Someone asked Bishop Spong – who was  more liberal than most liberals and further left than left – if he believed in an afterlife in which people know each other. We all pretty much figured what he was going to say.

But John Shelby Spong surprised us.

“Yes,” he said (my paraphrase), “I believe in an afterlife where people still know each other, although I cannot define or describe it. However, I cannot imagine an existence without Christine.”

He then turned to acknowledge his wife, and told us a story. His first wife Joan became mentally ill and was lost to her husband and children for fifteen years before she died of cancer. He spoke about the pain that his family experienced through those years, and the difficulty of being both father and mother to his children even while holding down great responsibilities in the church. He talked about the challenge of becoming a bishop and the controversy that always surrounded his radical interpretations of the Christian faith. He talked about feeling isolated and completely alone – until Christine came into his life. It was her love, Jack Spong said, that redeemed his life from despair. And since the time of their marriage on New Year’s Day, 1990, she has been his constant companion, encourager, lover, equal partner, friend, fellow traveler on the journey of life.

“I cannot imagine a world without Christine,” he said.

Can you imagine a world without the people you love, or the things that mean the most to you? Can you imagine a forever without LIFE in it?

“Whoever eats this bread will LIVE…forever!” Jesus said.

“LIVE…forever!” 

I’m sure Jesus was emphasizing the LIVING!

A bit later in this same Gospel, Jesus will say, “I have come that you might have life, and have it to the full!”

So how can you LIVE…forever?

Well, first of all, you’ve got to learn to LIVE!

If you ever walked into the last church I served, you would immediately be struck by all the LIVING going on! Greendale Dance Academy would be in full gear down in the basement; the church’s two candlepin bowling alleys would be filling the place with the sound of pins being struck and knocked down; the Recovery Group for people dealing with mental health challenges would be meeting up on the third level; the choir would be rehearsing on the second; some of the women would be sitting in the kitchen, making meatballs for the supper that night, and the cheerleaders would be practicing in Fisher Hall being careful not to knock down any of the wonderful science projects still displayed in the hall from that morning’s Science Fair for the elementary school next door. Seven days a week, twenty-fours a day – or so it seemed – that church was full of LIFE!

Someone, though, once said to me that she wished our church was more “spiritual.” I asked her what she meant. Well, she said that all that stuff going on in the church was just secular stuff and really didn’t belong there. What the church SHOULD be doing, she insisted, was having Bible studies and prayer groups and other “spiritual” things. Well – truth be told – those things took place as well at the church, but she couldn’t see them through the smoke of her obsession with the other things.

And right away, I understood her concept of faith. It’s a very popular one. Faith is about RELIGION, and not about LIFE. Faith is about leaving LIFE outside the door of the church and turning the church into a sort of religious spa where people can become more “spiritual.” Trouble is, that is not the faith of Jesus. The faith of Jesus teaches that true religion is lived out IN life and always produces life! Do you realize that most of the stories of Jesus are not located inside the religious institutions, but outside at weddings, community gatherings, at the seashore, in boats, on mountaintops, and in peoples’ homes where Jesus ate with tax collectors and sinners. Those who think the job of the church is to be “religious” or “spiritual” would be extremely uncomfortable with the lifestyle of Jesus.

God created life TO BE LIVED! And a very important part of LIVING…forever is taking hold of your life in every dimension and enjoying it as fully as you can, experiencing as much of it as you can, and squeezing out of every day every drop of LIFE that’s in it!

If you want to LIVE…forever, you’ve got to learn to LIVE!

And second, you have to learn to GIVE!

What Jesus said to the people that day long ago is extremely important. The bread of life that we are invited to eat is Jesus’ flesh which, he said, he will give for the life of the world.

Let me paraphrase: “To eat the flesh of Jesus is to embody in your own life sacrificial giving for the sake of others.”

The idea of Christian sacrifice is not as scary as it sounds. In fact, the call to sacrifice is one of the greatest compliments God gives to us. We are called to give ourselves to others BECAUSE GOD HAS FILLED OUR LIVES WITH GIFTS WORTH GIVING! And good gifts shared from me to you, or you to me, or from us to others are gifts that have a way of living beyond the moment!

When we cleaned out my mother’s apartment after her death, we came across a touching sight. Among her possessions was a little stack of cards. I went through them, one by one. They were notes sent to my mom by members of her church who knew that she was unable to get out anymore. Each one was a personal expression of love for her, along with a message that she was missed and prayed for. Interestingly, many of the notes were written by other people in the church who were also homebound. But this was their ministry. To send love notes to others.

And my mother had saved every one. And as I read those notes from over the years, I wept. Written long ago to my mom, they now touched the heart of her son.

When you give yourself away to others, the gift keeps on giving, outliving its own time, and stretching out toward FOREVER!

Learn to LIVE. Learn to GIVE.

And learn something important about heaven.

I wish I could have back that conversation with the little girl about what people do in heaven. I think I have come to understand that in the life of Jesus, we SEE what heaven is like!

In heaven, I think we’ll find:

• folks fishing on the lake
• climbing mountains
• having others over for supper
• taking care of each other
• people working at things they love to do!
• kids enjoying the wonder of new discoveries!
• parents raising great kids!
• cooks making wonderful meals to share!
• composers writing songs and musicians playing them!
• athletes stretching the limits of their capabilities!
• gardeners planting the most wonderful gardens you can imagine!
• engineers discovering the secrets of how the world is put together and getting to try it themselves!
• scientists probing the deepest mysteries of the universe!
• people loving each other and dwelling together in peace!

Heaven, I think, is so full of ABUNDANT LIFE – like the life we see that Jesus lived – that the people there cannot help but praise and worship the God who is the Source of all life. Yes, I think in heaven people DO worship God all the day and all the night long…because they have found the gift of LIFE…forever.

So go this week…and LIVE like Jesus.

Go and LIVE…forever!