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A Christian Church for Everyone
Treasure Valley Metropolitan Community Church
Boise, Idaho
Rev Robert C Cross
Each week, Pastor Robert shares the Scripture Lesson for the week proceeding
the Sunday service. If you would like to receive these weekly lessons, e-mail
and ask to be added to the e-mail list.
The following is a sample of such a lesson:
The Following are the lessons for Easter Sunday, April 23, 2000
Finding Easter courage and joy
Easter
Acts 10:34-43, 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, John 20:1-18 or Mark 16:1-8
"God is full of surprises and will do the unexpected."
ACTS 10:34-43
Prejudice is a powerful, sinister, yet sometimes unrecognized force.
Perhaps you can remember the first time you were its object. Perhaps it was
because you were a girl and were not allowed to play hockey with the boys.
Maybe it was one of the other hundreds of ways in which prejudice finds
expression. The important thing is how you felt. Perhaps demeaned, angry,
inferior, or dirty.
Both Cornelius and Peter had some prejudices to overcome in this story.
Peter had a lot of help, having experienced the powerful dream commanding
him to eat of animals his upbringing and religion told him were unfit for
human consumption.
On the other hand, Cornelius knew full well how the Jews despised and hated
his people. Perhaps that's partly why he at first fell at Peter's feet and
worshipped him (vs. 25). The experience of prejudice can be internalized
until one feels inferior to the other.
One of the things this joyous resurrection day may do, as it ultimately did
for Peter, is to show us that within the kingdom of God there is no room
for prejudice. The resurrection is for all people!
1 CORINTHIANS 15:1-11
The acid test of a saving faith for Paul, and apostolic preaching in
general, was belief in the physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus. To
reject that fact was to reject belief in the power of God. To reject that
was to be adrift in the world without hope. The significance of Christ's
resurrection was that it was the guarantee of ours. Because of their
proximity to the event, their strong feelings are understandable.
If, however, salvation is meant to be a universal possibility for people of
every place, every time, and every culture, then maybe there is something
else. Instead of one litmus test, perhaps it comes down to what you have
found to be "resurrecting," life-giving, or transforming in your own life
and experience.
The temptation is always to make our own experience normative and
definitive for everyone. We tend to judge other people's experience against
our own and try to mould them to ours. If Easter teaches us anything, it is
that God is full of surprises and will do the unexpected.
God wouldn't be God if it were otherwise.
JOHN 20:1-18
If you remove the role of women from the Good Friday-Easter event, the
story is dramatically impoverished and changed. The women were the ones who
stood by the cross and suffered with Jesus. They were the ones Jesus first
revealed himself to.
You would never know that from Peter's statement in Acts. Things are ever
thus. Often it's the women who provide the emotional muscle, as it were.
They courageously and loyally hang in when the men get discouraged and
disappear. Even on that Sunday morning, Peter and the other disciple looked
or went into the tomb, saw it was empty, and then went home. Mary lingered,
grieving, but determined to bring him back if only she could find him.
What is the difference? Was it only that the consequences for the women
would likely have been less severe had they been caught hanging around? Is
it because the experience of giving birth and mothering has given them a
greater stake in the preservation of life? A she-wolf or bear will
sacrifice their own life in the protection of their young. I don't know why
things are as they are, but I'm glad that they were there.
--Milton Schwartzentruber
*************************************************************************
Treasure Valley Metropolitan Community Church
Boise, Idaho
Rev Robert C Cross
The following is a sample of such a lesson:
The Following are the lessons for Easter Sunday, April 23, 2000
Finding Easter courage and joy
Easter
Acts 10:34-43, 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, John 20:1-18 or Mark 16:1-8
"God is full of surprises and will do the unexpected."
ACTS 10:34-43
Both Cornelius and Peter had some prejudices to overcome in this story.
Peter had a lot of help, having experienced the powerful dream commanding
him to eat of animals his upbringing and religion told him were unfit for
human consumption.
On the other hand, Cornelius knew full well how the Jews despised and hated
his people. Perhaps that's partly why he at first fell at Peter's feet and
worshipped him (vs. 25). The experience of prejudice can be internalized
until one feels inferior to the other.
One of the things this joyous resurrection day may do, as it ultimately did
for Peter, is to show us that within the kingdom of God there is no room
for prejudice. The resurrection is for all people!
1 CORINTHIANS 15:1-11
If, however, salvation is meant to be a universal possibility for people of
every place, every time, and every culture, then maybe there is something
else. Instead of one litmus test, perhaps it comes down to what you have
found to be "resurrecting," life-giving, or transforming in your own life
and experience.
The temptation is always to make our own experience normative and
definitive for everyone. We tend to judge other people's experience against
our own and try to mould them to ours. If Easter teaches us anything, it is
that God is full of surprises and will do the unexpected.
God wouldn't be God if it were otherwise.
JOHN 20:1-18
You would never know that from Peter's statement in Acts. Things are ever
thus. Often it's the women who provide the emotional muscle, as it were.
They courageously and loyally hang in when the men get discouraged and
disappear. Even on that Sunday morning, Peter and the other disciple looked
or went into the tomb, saw it was empty, and then went home. Mary lingered,
grieving, but determined to bring him back if only she could find him.
What is the difference? Was it only that the consequences for the women
would likely have been less severe had they been caught hanging around? Is
it because the experience of giving birth and mothering has given them a
greater stake in the preservation of life? A she-wolf or bear will
sacrifice their own life in the protection of their young. I don't know why
things are as they are, but I'm glad that they were there.
Prejudice is a powerful, sinister, yet sometimes unrecognized force.
Perhaps you can remember the first time you were its object. Perhaps it was
because you were a girl and were not allowed to play hockey with the boys.
Maybe it was one of the other hundreds of ways in which prejudice finds
expression. The important thing is how you felt. Perhaps demeaned, angry,
inferior, or dirty.
The acid test of a saving faith for Paul, and apostolic preaching in
general, was belief in the physical, bodily resurrection of Jesus. To
reject that fact was to reject belief in the power of God. To reject that
was to be adrift in the world without hope. The significance of Christ's
resurrection was that it was the guarantee of ours. Because of their
proximity to the event, their strong feelings are understandable.
If you remove the role of women from the Good Friday-Easter event, the
story is dramatically impoverished and changed. The women were the ones who
stood by the cross and suffered with Jesus. They were the ones Jesus first
revealed himself to.
*************************************************************************
