BIRTH-PANGS

"This is but the beginning of the birth pangs" - Mark 13:8

Jesus is sitting on the Mount of Olives, across the valley from the Temple Mount, and before him rose up the great city of Jerusalem. The view from that vantage point was awesome with the temple standing in of its magnificence.  I've sat on the Mount of Olives twice, and I know what an incredible view it is today.  I can only imagine what it must have been back then!

A disciple remarked about the awesome splendor of the temple, and Jesus seized it as an opportunity to discuss events that were soon to come. He said that a time of great turmoil lay ahead. He said a day was coming when not one stone of that magnificent place would be left standing; a time when his followers would be persecuted; a time of the emergence of rivals and adversaries who would come and claim to possess the real truth; a time so filled with conflict that the very earth itself would shake from the tension.

Less than forty years later much of what Jesus described came to pass; the great temple reduced to a pile of rubble by the Romans.  Followers of Jesus were, as he foresaw, called to give testimony and persecuted and martyred. But even so, as difficult as he said things would get and did get, he described it all as "birth-pangs."

“Birth pangs” seems a strange and paradoxical way to describe a time of turmoil and persecution. How can that be?  Through the intense pain of a mother’s labor comes the greatest of all wonders, the birth of a new human life!  The creation of something new!

I believe that wherever God is born into the world there is often turmoil and conflict that accompanies God's arrival - not because God wants it that way, but because there is something in us and in the world that defiantly resists the birth of a new thing, and that defiance often causes pain.

When Jesus was born, King Herod was so intimidated, even by the prospect of an infant, that he had all the male children of less than two years of age in and around Bethlehem murdered!

When God is born into the world in whatever way, form, or manner there are always legions of adversaries who are going to resist and try to abort the birth of God - if they can – and, if we are honest, sometimes we are among those adversaries.

I believe the events to which Jesus refers in this passage are not merely one set of specific sweeping historical events, but rather events that recur over and over again - even within the context of a single human life.

You’ve heard the cliché, "No pain, no gain!"  In the past four years I’ve had a bunch of orthopedic surgeries, the latest being a new knee last May.  Through it all I've learned all about the "no pain-no-gain" philosophy.  Each surgery has required intense physical therapy as follow-up.  In case you have not had the experience, let me describe physical therapy for you.  The therapist moves and manipulates the knee (shoulder, etc) until the point that it hurts.  Then, the therapist moves it a little more.  Finally when you are ready to either cry or strangle the therapist, he/she mercifully lets up.

No pain-no gain."  The pain of physical therapy leads to the greater good of healing and wellness.  Apply that to personal and spiritual growth.  We all intuitively know that changing, growing and being transformed brings a certain amount of pain, discomfort and risk. Giving birth to something new does not come without physical, emotional, mental and spiritual costs.

Jesus painted a dismal picture for his disciples.  He didn't promise them success, popularity, power, status, wealth, security, or any of the things by which we normally measure happiness and fulfillment. However, lurking in the shadows of his bleak prognosis is the hidden gospel-truth about "birth pangs."  There is a promise buried away in all of the pain.  It's the promise that the pain and struggle that they would experience as his disciples, would lead to the birth of God in the world; the birth of God in their lives, and it would be worth the cost.  They would come to know a level of God's presence, purpose and fulfillment they could not come to know in any other way.

I believe that for any disciple of Jesus, (and that includes us) change and risk for Christ's sake are unavoidable, even necessary to experience the purpose of God in your life.  One of the most despairing human cries I ever have to hear as a pastor is, "That's just who I am.  Take it or leave it.  I can't change."   That is the biggest pile of unmitigated baloney that could ever roll off a disciple's tongue.   For what that attitude is really saying is that God is weak, impotent and powerless to lead your life out of darkness into light; to lead you out of old sinful ways into new life-giving ways; to transform you from an old creation to a new creation.  An attitude like that is nothing more that rationalization and self-justification to stay stuck wherever and in whatever you are stuck in!  An attitude like that would rather live spiritually handicapped with a limited range of spiritual motion than to risk and grow for Christ's sake. 

The late Mother Teresa was 38 years old and teaching geography in a convent school for the Loretta Sisters in Calcutta when she a new call from God in her soul.  It wasn't that teaching hadn't also been God's call, but she perceived that God was now calling her to a new thing that would require greater risk, greater sacrifice, and yes, even greater pain!  On September 10, 1946 while riding a train on her way to an annual retreat she suddenly knew to what God was calling her. She writes, "I realized I had a call to care for the sick, the dying and the homeless; to be God's love in action to the poorest of the poor."  When she returned she established the "Missionaries of Charity." The rest is history!

Right now at this moment God is calling every single one of us in this room.  Perhaps God is not calling you to Calcutta to care for the poorest of the poor, but who knows - maybe!   Nevertheless, God is calling you, and a part of that call is always a call to change; a call to transformation; and that's where the pain comes in, because we don't always want to change and be transformed.  We’re too afraid!  Too Stubborn!  Too lazy!  Too dogmatic!  We'd rather stay stuck. 

I knew a man who worked twelve hours a day, six days a week and then spent the rest of his life making home improvements.  He was a good provider for his family. He was devoted to his employer and considerate of his fellow employees. He was a good person, but he could not stop working! I suggested that perhaps God was calling him into a closer relationship with his family. His response was, "I know pastor! But there too many things I would have to change." Ah yes! Birth pangs!

 To what is God calling you? And believe me, God is calling!

It may simply be a call to bridge a gap with an estranged friend; but in that call is the invitation to let go of your need to always be right, or be in control. And that may be painful!

It may be a call to make a job or career change that your soul has been speaking to you about for a long time; but in that call is the invitation to risk and sacrifice in ways that make you uncomfortable and you know could cause pain.

It may be a call to a volunteer job or position in your church or community. A part of you feels the tug of God's call, but yet within that call is the invitation to risk failure or embarrassment perhaps?  

Maybe it's a call to be a different kind of husband or wife or parent or employer than you've been thus far. You feel that tug of God's call, but you know within that call is the invitation to make some changes that might require some healthy confession and setting certain issues of ego and pride aside - and that could be very painful.

 It may be a call to resolve anger and resentment that keeps flaring up in your life like a volcano.

I do know that with God's call is an invitation to change; an invitation to transformation - and, yes, it just may be painful. But it's not just any kind of pain. It's the pain of "birth pangs" for the promise is that through heeding God's call, God will be born again into the world through your life.  What mother here this morning would give back her child to not to go through "birth pangs?"     

We disciples are equipped and empowered with something that is unique to the believer - the cross of resurrection of Jesus Christ. Talk about birth pangs! Jesus not only took on the physical pain of dying by crucifixion, but he took into his soul the pain of the sin of the world. BIRTH PANGS?  Most definitely yes! It was through the cross Jesus was exalted as Lord and that salvation was accomplished for all humanity - even yours.

 God wants to be born again into the world, but it can only happen through people like you and me who hear his call and have the courage to risk the birth pangs of change and transformation.