In the Upside Down

Here First! John 20:1-10 and Acts 2:37-47

When all this is over, I’m getting myself a Starbucks. It’s been eight weeks since my last overpriced coffee drink, and I’m ready to break the fast. I know, in the grand scheme of things, my Starbucks fast is the epitome of “first world problems.” Truth be told, my family and I have gotten through this pandemic relatively unscathed. At least so far. We’re sheltering in place in our beautiful, although messy, new home, the boys are healthy and their teachers are supportive. Still, we are starting to miss the little things. The boys want to walk to the nearby candy store, I’d like to get a new tattoo, wander around Target, hire a babysitter, Dan would like to venture to some parks, refill his gin, and actually teach his students in person. 

It’s tempting to think that things will go back to “normal,” that all that’s been missing from our lives are the daily conveniences of Starbucks drinks, beer and liquor stores, and the daily routine of school and jobs and pizza delivery. And boy, after this is all over, the companies and the politicians and even the churches are going to come at us to cure what ails us. They are going to tell us that if we buy this product, if we claim this perspective, or vote for this or that politician, things will go back to normal. We’ll have everything we ever wanted and needed. Our desires will be satisfied. If we just open things back up, everything will be ok again.

But the truth is, things weren’t perfect before this pandemic happened. Couples were still bickering, children were still getting subpar educations, families were going hungry. Our church was still struggling. Politicians were still politicianing. After all this is over, whatever that means, every corporation and business and super pac and television station is going to tell us that they have the key to getting things back to normal, back to the way things were before. And we will be so desperate for “normal” that we’ll take the bait, we’ll buy what they’re selling, we will vote for the sound bite. We’ll pine for the “good ol’ days,” and we’ll forget the real suffering and struggle that was there before this pandemic came and turned everything upside down. 

But maybe, maybe the upside down is an opportunity for us to re-envision the world entirely. Instead of going back to the way things were, maybe we can write a new script. Like Noah and the ark, we can start over, make things new, try again, this time as justice and fairness and cooperation as our guideposts. Maybe there’s more to life than the next triple grande one pump vanilla caramel macchiatto. 

That’s the opportunity that presented itself to the disciples and their friends in our first reading today. Their whole world has been turned upside down. The impossible has happened. Jesus has been raised from the dead and has shown himself to them. He’s strangely and magically ascended in to heaven.  

The Holy Spirit has come upon them in a violent wind and with tongues of fire. Peter preaches to them. He tells them his story. And their hearts are changed. Their whole world has changed. Suddenly, the rules no longer apply. Death has lost its sting. A crucified prophet has been raised and become their Lord. The laws of physics have been defied. Nothing will be the same again. Everything has been turned upside down. They have found what truly satisfies, and nothing that can be sold or bought can compare. 

They have to re-make their life after the upside down. They have to reconstruct everything they knew before, because the after is so very different. So what do they do? How do they reconstruct now that their world has been deconstructed? 

First, their hearts are changed. They’re “cut to the heart.” Deconstruction and reconstruction start on the inside. Everything they know is now filtered through this change of heart. They enter in to the death of baptism and come up again, seeing the world anew. It’s a rebirth. It’s a starting over. It’s a pressing the reset button and a rebooting and a clearing of the cache. They keep it simple. They begin again, start their learning over, they make new friends and they eat together. They form a community. They share. They pray. These are blueprints for how to navigate the upside down.

And awe comes upon them. Somehow, they see with new eyes, interpret the world around them with new hearts, encounter life where they couldn’t or wouldn’t encounter it before. Miraculous things have happened, hearts are changed, and the upside down world becomes a new place for new possibilities, new opportunities, new perspectives, new hope. Enough to give them a feeling of awe. Amazement. Something has happened. Their allegiances have changed. They’re no longer placing their hope and their desires on what others can sell them, not on what they can buy, not on a picket sign or a political ideology,  but on a person, a life, a story, a community. 

That’s our opportunity and our challenge today. We are on the cusp of the upside down. It’s terrifying. And it’s a tremendous opportunity to remake and renew and restart. That’s what I love about our second passage for today. The sheep are invited to a whole new world. A world outside of the cosy sheep pen that they know so well. The thieves and the bandits enter in to the sheepfold by another way, not by the gate. They want to come in and keep you satisfied with how things are right now. But the Good Shepherd comes to open the gate for the sheep, to let them out, to give them freedom and a chance to explore and create. Thieves and bandits are those who deceive, who defy, who slyly convince, and maybe, just maybe, are those who do it without the sheep even realizing it.  

If the sheep take a moment to hear and recognize their voices, the sheep aren’t deceived; they know the sound of the true shepherd’s voice when they hear it.  But, are these thieves so sneaky, so deceptive, and have access to advertising budgets worth billions of dollars, so much so, that the sheep are tempted to accept what they claim to offer without even having to hear their voice?  Are we so used to expecting regularity and sameness, predictability and assurance, that we don’t even realize who we’re following?  Who are our bandits and thieves in our day?  Who should we consider to be false shepherds in our lives? What are the Powers of our day offering us, and what do we believe because of their influence? 

These are going to be crucial questions as things begin to open back up, as this pandemic passes over, as we try to return things back to “normal.” 

The thieves and bandits enter the sheepfold, but there is no mention of them exiting or leading the sheep anywhere.  In order for the sheep to go anywhere, there’s only one way out - through the gate.  So the thieves and the bandits are stuck inside the sheepfold, with the rest of the sheep. They’re offering the status quo. They offering the same muddy, trampled stall. They’re offering life as usual.. But the sheep would be gathered together in one place, trampling what little vegetation there would be into a slush of mud.  The sheep would feel safe there, but they’d hardly be nourished.  

And that’s why the shepherd would open the gate and let the sheep out to the pasture to graze, get a little fresh air, encounter new things.  The thieves of our day would be just as happy if we never went out that gate - if we just spent our days looking down, pawing at the mud, and consuming plenty of red dye number 40 and mono-sodium glutamate. The Shepherd offers real life in the upside down.

But.  The pasture is Out There. The pasture is the upside down. 

Jesus says that he came to offer us abundant life - but that life is not in the sheepfold with the thieves and the bandits. That life isn’t with the advertisers and the celebrities and the conservative or the liberal media.  

It’s out there.  Out there with the wolves, and the hot sun and the occasional thunderstorm, yes.  But out there with the cool breeze, the clean water, the nourishment that will bring us life.  Out there with the sticky and the sweaty and the forlorn and the lost. Out there with the funny and the creative and the vibrant and the exciting.

There is pasture OUT THERE.  Abundant life is OUT THERE.

We want to stay in here - where there are familiar slogans and the food tastes the same and everything is sweetened with high fructose corn syrup. Where we don’t have to do the work of defining ourselves - because the Powers of corporations and political structures and cultural assumptions will do it for us. 

 Do we want to be satisfied?  Eat a Snickers bar.  Do we want to feel “worth it?” Try L’Oreal products.  Do we want to “get more?” Get a T-mobile cell phone.  Do we want to feel valued among our peers? Get a PhD and a 4.0 or drive a Mercedes and make a six-figure salary.  

And these aren’t inherently evil things.  They’re just things that are tools, sometimes useful tools - but if we let them, they can claim to define us, claim to offer us things that they can’t really give us, and can make us feel complacent, completely content pacing our hallways, staring at the floor, wearing out the ground below us.  That’s not life; that’s just existing.  They’re things that are going to tell us that they can return things to normal. They’re going to tell us that they can fix our problems. Only they can make things “right” again. 

Following God is not easy.  There will be stones that trip us up, thorns that will tear at our ankles, and a wilderness that will make us seem lost. We’ll encounter painful relationships, we’ll fail, we’ll lose some money and trust someone we shouldn’t.  But, God promises abundant life - not a safe life, not a secure life, not a comfortable life - a life of joy and belly laughs and deep deep feeling. An upside down life. An unpredictable life.  And God promises to be with us through it all.  

But in order for us to experience this abundant life, we have to step out of that pen and get into the pasture. We have to reject the voices that claim to be able to fix it for us. We have to re-envision life anew, where we share what we have, where we learn from each other, where we eat together, and where we are filled with awe. That is life in the upside down. That is life turned on its head. That is the new life that is coming for us after all this waiting and uncertainty is over. It came for the first disciples. It will come for us.  May we all choose to follow the voice of the One who can lead us to an adventurous and abundant life.

Sure, I want things to go back to “normal.” I’m craving my predictable, reliable Starbucks. But what if there is something more on the other side of this? What if there is awe and amazement and a chance to be “cut to the heart?” What if? Let’s at least ask the questions. Let’s step out of the sheepfold. Let’s follow the Shepherd who will lead us through the upside down. We have the disciples to guide us. They entered in, they studied and prayed and ate with their friends. They shared what they had. And their numbers increased. 

Thanks be to God.