Old Testament: Job 42:1-6
Gospel : Mark 10:46-52
Epistle : Hebrews 7:23-28
I am going to do something a little bit different this week and maybe tell you for the first time or remind you a little bit of the history of the Church of the Nazarene. I thought about this because in our Gospel reading this week, the blind man, Bartimaeus, hears that it is Jesus the Nazarene who is coming. In fact, throughout the Gospels and Acts, Jesus is referred to as the Nazarene and even his followers are called Nazarene in Acts 24:5. This is distinguished from what Jesus’ followers were called at Antioch--Christians. (Acts 11:26) To be called a Christian implies a Greek-speaking people. The Jews would have called Jesus “the Messiah”, not “the Christ.” We all know the story of Christianity and that eventually the Gentiles became the majority party of the Church and their terms become dominant, so much so that the New Testament was written in Greek.
Well, that was probably too much information about some of
the terms we just gloss over without thinking much about. But what does this have to do with why the Church
of the Nazarene are called Nazarene? Are
we more Jewish than Gentile? Probably not, but lucky for us, we know why the
founders of the church decided on “the Nazarene Church.” Joseph Widney, who founded the Church in L.A.
with Bresee and had actually been a president of USC, came up with the
idea. He said that the word Nazarene
symbolized “the toiling, lowly mission
of Christ.” It was the name that Christ used of Himself, “the name which was
used in derision of Him by His enemies,” the name which above all others linked
Him to the “great toiling, struggling, sorrowing heart of the world. It is Jesus, Jesus of Nazareth to whom the
world in its misery and despair turns, that it may have hope"[1]
This reminds me of
what is said in John 1:46 when Nathanael asks the disciple Phillip if anything
good can come from Nazareth. The Church of
the Nazarene was founded as a Church with a mission to help and minister to the
poor. One great story to reflect this is
the very beginning of the church and its official founding date. The first general assembly was held in Chicago
in 1907, but the churches from the Southern states weren’t able to come because
of money problems. So the next year, in
1908, the church moved the general assembly to Texas where all the holiness groups
could be present. This became the
official beginning of the Church. It is
told that Bresee said, “If the poor can’t come to general assembly, then we
will bring the assembly[2]
to them.”
This attitude of
the Church is revealed in other ways as well.
One of the historic reasons the Nazarene Church has banned alcohol is
because of the people it ministered to.
When you work with the poor and the homeless, you often come in contact
with those with drinking problems. I don’t
want to generalize this association and neither did the historic church; it
just comes out of experience. But, even
if the people are rich and alcoholics, the Church should be a place of support
and not one of temptation. Both in
Communion and in social events, alcohol should not be present to cause our
brother or sister to stumble. It is not
that drinking is a sin, but we follow Paul in 1 Cor. 6:12 and 10:23-24 and Jesus
in Matt 18:6 in making sure we don’t cause our fellow believers to sin or
stumble.
Like I said, this
week was a little bit different. Just to
wrap up the story of Bartimaues, Jesus does heal him. Bartimaeus is persistent in his calls for Jesus
to heal him and Jesus notices. As we see
in all the Gospels, Jesus has compassion on the poor and lowly in society and
because of their faith, they are healed.
I will leave this
week with an exhortation for you to examine your own Church and see how closely
they align with the historic Nazarene ideal, and I think, the ideals of Jesus. I will only make the point that it is a bit
ironic that we no longer seem to have the same ideals when it comes to general
assembly. Whereas Bresee was willing to
do whatever it took to take the event the poor, we seem unwilling to move it
outside the Unites States. Even with
technology as it is, we still refuse to give delegates who can’t travel the
ability to vote in the main convention.
We are making progress as shown in this article, but we have a ways to
go. (http://www.ncnnews.com/nphweb/html/ncn/article.jsp?sid=10005119&id=10011654)
May we continue to
grow in grace and love for our neighbors and those who are hurting and poor.
Grace and Peace.
Nice job again Alec, Dad
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