Built by God

Pentecost 3 – June 9, 2024

Genesis 3:8-15
Psalm 130
2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1
Mark 3:20-35

In our very busy world these days it is easy to get caught up in the pressures of the world and we often try to live as everyone else lives. You know the routine. We have many names for it – keeping up with the Jones, peer pressure, or neighborhood rivalry. This is so much a part of our lives many movies and sit-coms have been made about it (mostly cliche). I am not completely sure why this is true but part of it comes from the fact that we compare ourselves to each other. Often times we do that because we are not always sure of who we are. So when we find someone who seems to have it all together we try to imitate their life thinking that, if we looked and acted like them, we would be like them. Usually that person does not have his or her life put together any better than you. We also are constantly being barraged by advertisement that has spent millions of dollars on figuring out how to make us desire things. Those spiels are often crafted to make you believe that if you are somebody you will buy this thing. I can remember the old Jiffy peanut butter ad, “Choosy mothers choose Jiff.” What mother wouldn’t want to be the one who gets the best for their child? I could mention many other examples but you already know this because, like me, you have often fallen for the lie and bought into it. 

In part, this is what our story in Genesis is all about. Instead of being content with who they were, Adam and Eve desired to be something else. Then, when they were confronted by their mistake they pointed to somebody else to blame. Even our story in the gospel has this theme. People were telling Mary and Jesus’ siblings that Jesus was mentally ill so they went out to restrain him not wanting the stain of mental illness on their family’s name. That is also part of what was going on in the Corinthian church. The members of the church started to rank God’s gifts to boost their individual self-image, claiming that one gift is more important than another. Paul disagrees with them telling the Corinthians that their lives were built by God. Their identity came from Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection not the gifts God had given them. Those gifts were to be shared. 

We are not alone in this never-ending spiral of desire and disappointment. It is part of human nature. Paul also understood this when he said that he does those things he does not wish to do and does not do the ones that he wishes to do. We all can get caught up in the world struggle with who we are and our own place in it. In fact many around us spend a lot of energy trying to convince us that their vision of what we should own, do, and be is the correct vision. But the world is not where our identity comes from. Our identity comes from God. All that the world offers to you is temporary. What God gives is permanent – grace and life through Jesus Christ. So when the serpent of our world comes to entrap you with it’s lies and deceits remember you have been built by God and made into a new creation through baptism. You are God’s.