While I Have Breath

 

John 16:31-33

June 23, 2024 • Mount Pleasant UMC

It was the final night. Most of them didn’t know, but he knew. And he also knew that he had so little time left to tell them the things that were on his heart, the things that they would need to know to be able to go on. Last words are important. Last words often tell you something about the character of a person. And so, as they are ambling along through the darkness of the Kidron Valley, Jesus shares many last words with his disciples, his friends, his companions for the last three years. More than anything, he wants them to believe, even when things get hard.

He was eighty-seven years old and had just preached in City Road Chapel a few days before. But now he was confined to his bed in the house that had been built for him next door to the Chapel. John Wesley had faithfully preached the Gospel for decades by now, and he had trained scores of preachers to carry on his work both in Great Britain and America. Many of his friends had crowded into the house and into his bedroom, and let me tell you, it’s a small room so I could imagine that it was a bit claustrophobic in that room. Nevertheless, the account his housekeeper wrote up said that the room was full of the presence of God. At one point, during the day, Wesley gathered his strength and called out, “The best of all is, God is with us!” More than anything, he wanted those gathered there to believe, even when things get hard (cf. Hamilton, Revival, pg. 137).

This morning, we wrap up our journey through the life of the Methodist founder, John Wesley. For the last few weeks, we’ve been looking at some of the things that were part of the revival in England that Wesley led because, as I’ve said several times now, I believe it’s possible that the hope for our future might be found in our past. In other words, if God did it once, he can do it again—probably not in the same way because the world is a different place. But, as we’ve discovered, the world is actually not all that different. We share some of the same stresses and challenges that Wesley’s world had. So perhaps we can learn from his experience as we face a world that seems to have lost its faith.

As I told you a couple of weeks ago, after his heart-warming Aldersgate experience, Wesley spent the rest of his life, the next 52 years, traveling wherever he could to preach the good news. He traveled over 250,000 miles, averaging fifteen sermons a week which comes to over 40,000 sermons overall (cf. Hamilton 99). He lived to be 87, which was a really long life in the eighteenth century, continuing to even preach outside at that age. Today, we have mandatory retirement at age 72, and I think Wesley would sort of laugh at that idea because, for him, as long as he had breath he was going to declare the good news of Jesus. His life had not been without trouble, having been banned from several pulpits early on in his life. When he was in a town where he wasn’t allowed to preach in the church, he would go was the market cross, usually at the center of town. He even had to do that in his hometown of Epworth, and though the cross is not there anymore, the base of it remains so I stood on it when we were there and attempted to preach. I was not as engaging as John Wesley, though! When he preached at the market cross in the town of Bolton, a large number of people gathered but they weren’t necessarily there to hear him preach. Instead, they tried to pull him down from the cross, and succeeded a couple of times. But Wesley just went back up and started to preach again. Undeterred, they began to throw stones, and others tried to push him down. In other places, he was “pelted with rotten tomatoes, manure, and stones, but he refused to give up” (Hamilton 126).

Jesus had said this would happen. When we are faithful, we should expect trouble. During their walk toward Gethsemane, after the last supper, Jesus wants to prepare his followers for what is to come. They don’t know, but he does, that the very next day he is going to be hanging between heaven and earth on a Roman cross and they will be scattered everywhere.  He has told them directly on several occasions but they haven’t been able to hear it. They’re not able to hear it this night either. Jesus knows they won’t really understand it until tomorrow, so he simply tells them, “In this world you will have trouble” (16:33). That is not the triumphant attitude we’re told we should have if we believe in Jesus. We’re told trouble should be an exception, that the follower of Jesus should always win the day. Some preachers have made a lot of money repeating that message. The we’re surprised when trouble comes and we complain loudly because we have to struggle. But do you know who is not surprised? Jesus is not surprised. He said it: “In this world you will have trouble.”

We don’t seem to believe Jesus because we ask the question over and over again: why do bad things happen to good people? And, though we don’t ask it as loudly, we also wonder why good things happen to bad people. Of course, we always assume we are the “good” people, when Jesus told us that no one is good except God alone (cf. Mark 10:18). Also when we ask those questions we are unconsciously affirming the doctrine of karma, the idea that good actions bring good results and vice versa. But karma is not a Christian doctrine. Remember when Jesus healed a man who was born blind? The disciples asked Jesus a “karma question:” “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus shot that thinking down right away: “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the word of God might be displayed in him” (John 9:2-3). In other words: you’re not thinking about this correctly (cf. Walt, Behold, the Man, pgs. 262-263) because karma is not Christian. In this world you will have trouble.

You know how people often say we should “claim” the promises of God from the Bible? This is one that no one wants to claim, but it’s a promise directly from the lips of Jesus: in this world you will have trouble. This is one of the last things Jesus tells the disciples, which means it’s pretty important and it’s something he really wants them to get. He doesn’t want them to think their life from here on out is going to be easy. In this world, as long as they are in this world, they will have trouble. J. D. Walt puts it this way: “We will get cancer. Untimely deaths will occur. Our children will endure trauma…people will be beheaded simply for their faith in Jesus. Trouble is the unfortunate feature and bitter fruit of the insanely complex, compounded brokenness of the whole fallen creation. It is not an indictment on the goodness of God nor on the faith of his followers” (263). In this world you will have trouble. Claim that promise. Believe it, because it’s going to be true. And the way we face the trouble determines what kind of a disciple of Jesus we are going to be.

So how were those first disciples able to move into the future? How can we? Because of Jesus. Because of the other promise he makes on this same night. You will have trouble, Jesus says. Guaranteed. “But take heart! I have overcome the world” (16:33). “Overcome” has become one of those words that Christians use but they don’t know what it means. Yes, the word Jesus uses means to subdue or to have victory over someone or something; “overcome” is actually a pretty good translation. However, when we use it we have this image of an Olympic athlete crossing the finish line moments ahead of his or her competitor, or we picture a warrior finally killing his last opponent, or we have other images of winning, triumphing, standing at the top of the heap, getting a trophy. But think about the context in which Jesus said this. He is literally hours from death. He will soon be arrested, brutally beaten and nailed to two pieces of wood. He will hang in agony for six hours while people ridicule him. His closest friends will abandon him; they will be no where to be found. Here’s the point: Jesus wins the battle not through military power or strength but through the power of suffering love. Jesus wins the battle by giving up his life. Jesus overcomes by his death. That’s what the book of Revelation says is true of his followers, too: “They triumphed over him [some translations say “overcame”] by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony” (Revelation 12:11). We overcome not by our own strength, but by the power of God’s love. That’s why the Old Testament prophet Zechariah wrote, “‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty” (Zechariah 4:6). The world’s trouble cannot defeat those whose strength is in the Lord.

It’s that mindset of true overcoming that most likely prompted Wesley to talk about “holy dying.” The way it’s often described is that Wesley said, “Methodists die well.” He wasn’t afraid to die and encouraged his people to approach death with hope and peace. He did so by helping people face the reality of death. It is going to happen, as long as Christ tarries. No one gets off of planet Earth alive. But we live in a culture that still tries to deny or ignore the reality of death. I visited a woman and her mother several years ago to talk about planning the mother’s funeral, and as the mother was sharing her thoughts and preferences, her daughter said, “Why haven’t you told me any of this before?” The mother said to her, “I thought you didn’t want to talk about it.” And that’s a reasonable assumption because we generally don’t. People avoid funeral homes and memorial services for the same reason; we don’t want to confront our own mortality. But a “good death” requires that we do so. Because, only then Wesley said, can we truly make peace with God. In one of his letters, he pointed out to the recipient that not thinking about death doesn’t put it off one single hour. Rather, not thinking about it denies us the chance to examine the state of our soul and, if necessary, to make things right. One physician told John’s brother Charles, “Most people die for fear of dying; but, I never met with such people as yours. They are none of them afraid of death, but [are] calm, and patient, and resigned to the last.”

However, Wesley was not obsessed with death, because he believed that the true secret to dying well was living well. With the end in sight, Wesley taught, it becomes obvious what is important and what is not. Furthermore he taught that life is a gift from God and should not be squandered on unimportant things. “Your single intention,” he wrote, is “to glorify God, in all your thoughts and words and actions.” When we are doing that, we have nothing to fear from whatever might come (cf. https://seedbed.com/dying-well-according-to-john-wesley/).

John Wesley knew his share of trouble from the world, but he also had the constant and strong presence of Jesus with him. And that carried him through to the end. His housekeeper and dear friend, Elizabeth Ritchie, wrote down what happened in that house on his last day. After he reminded everyone that God is with us, he rested again. A bit later, he began to pray aloud: “We thank thee, O Lord, for these and all thy mercies; bless the Church and King; grant us truth and peace through Jesus Christ our Lord forever and ever!” He was silent again for a while, and then he opened his mouth to try to sing, but all he could get out was, “I’ll praise…I’ll praise.” Most people believe the hymn on his mind was one by Isaac Watts, and the first verse goes like this:

I’ll praise my Maker while I’ve breath

and when my voice is lost in death

praise shall employ all my nobler powers.

My days of praise shall ne’er be past,

while life, and thought, and being last,

or immortality endure (qtd. in Hamilton 137).

Shortly after that attempt at singing, Wesley said, “Farewell,” and he went to be with Jesus.

But the revival that began with him, or rather with his heart-warming experience at Aldersgate, continued on—on both sides of the pond and eventually around the world. Though John Wesley was never actually a Methodist (he was a clergyman in the Church of England all of his life), it wasn’t long after his death that the Methodists separated from the larger church and became a separate movement. And it’s a movement that continues to today. On one hand, when we ask what the legacy of John Wesley’s ministry is, we only have to look around this room. You and I are part of a revival that began at eighteenth-century Aldersgate and continues into the twenty-first century.

But it’s no secret that the Methodist movement is facing challenging times these days. Squabbles over Biblical doctrine, over issues of human sexuality, over power, control and money have threatened our witness more than once throughout our history and continue to do so. (And, let me say, many of these issues are not unique to our part of the Christian faith; many churches are struggling with the same or similar issues these days.) So, after all these weeks, what can we learn from Wesley and the Methodist revival that might help us today?

Four things, rather quickly. First, we have a faith that combines head, heart and hands. In other words, our faith engages our thinking, our feelings and our acting. Wesley was a scholar and constantly studied the Biblical text as well as the traditions and teachings of the church. He was always learning and was well-versed in the culture of his day. But his faith wasn’t just an intellectual exercise. As we talked about when we “visited” Aldersgate a couple of weeks ago, his faith was strengthened by a genuine experience with Jesus. He felt his heart strangely warmed, and it wasn’t from last night’s tacos. In a moment, he knew Jesus loved him and had forgiven him and he spent the rest of his life begging people to know Jesus in that same way—personally, as a friend. But he also wasn’t content to keep his faith inside the church walls. He believed a genuine faith would make an impact on the world around him and so he lived out what he learned and what he felt Jesus calling him to do. Not only did that mean preaching for him, but he also, as I shared last week, visited the poor, the sick, and people in prison. He believed Methodist Christians should be involved in their community and should make a difference in the issues of the day. To this day, we seek to do that. Do we always get it right? Not at all. But we keep trying to listen to the Spirit of God and do what he says.

The second legacy Wesley left is an emphasis on holiness. John Wesley believed God had raised up the people called Methodist for one overarching purpose: to spread Scriptural holiness across the land. The word “holiness” sometimes gets a bad rap. People think someone who is holy sees themselves as better than everyone else, sort of a “holier than thou” idea. But holiness is simply living the way God would have us live. Holiness is living the way life is meant to be lived. It’s easy to try to make holiness into a list of “don’ts” or “thou shalt nots.” But I like to think of it in this way: if I would just do all the things God has told me to do, I wouldn’t have time to try to do the things he’s told me not to do! According to Hebrews, one of the main goals of holiness is to “live in peace with everyone.” Hebrews goes on to say, “Without holiness no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). It’s that important. 

And while we value holiness, we are not legalistic. If there is any word that rings loudest in Wesley’s teaching, it’s the word “grace.” Methodists are people of grace, believing there is a wideness in God’s mercy. God is not sitting in eternity waiting for us to mess up so he can zap us or erase our names from his book. Rather, he “wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). Are we going to mess it up? Yes, probably more than once. And every time we fail, every time we disappoint God, every time we fall short of holiness, God’s grace is there, ready to forgive and welcome us home. Jesus is always calling us onward, to become more like him, which is something we cannot do without his grace, his forgiveness and his mercy.

The final thing I want to highlight—and undoubtedly there are more we could talk about—is Wesley’s worldwide vision. You might remember that after he was turned out of preaching in most pulpits in England and was given no church assignment of his own, Wesley began, with the encouragement and guidance of fellow preacher George Whitefield, to peach outdoors, to be “more vile” and do what was so uncomfortable for him. Well, not only was it uncomfortable for him, it was absolutely against the rules of the Church of England. By preaching outside, he was breaking strict rules they had about entering someone else’s parish. In fact, when he wanted to preach in his hometown of Epworth and was told he could not preach in the church, he went outside to the church yard and stood on his father’s grave to preach. He said that small plot of land did not belong to the church but to his family and so he could preach from there. When people began to criticize his practice of preaching in parishes that “belonged” to other preachers, Wesley responded with these words: “I have now no parish of my own, nor probably ever shall…I look upon all the world as my parish…This is the work I know God has called me to do, and I am sure that His blessing attends it.” And from that mindset came the idea that everywhere we look, everywhere we go is a place in which we can and are called to do ministry. The world is our parish. That’s why we still say our mission is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of…not just Terre Haute, not just Vigo County, but the transformation of the world. The world! Any other goal, any other mission is honestly too small for a church like Mount Pleasant. The world is our parish, so let’s transform the world.

Can God do it again? Can God send revival into our broken and weary world? Of course God can, but he doesn't do it all by himself. He waits for people, men and women, who are willing and able to live differently and to take seriously the mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. He waits for people like John Wesley to say, “Here I am, Lord, send me.” We don’t worship John Wesley; we give thanks for John Wesley and we worship a God who can use imperfect men and women like Wesley…and you and me. So will we let him use us? Will God bring revival again? The answer, I believe, depends on you and me. What do you say? Let’s pray.