Reformation, Media

Larry V. Smoose

“Houston, We’ve got a problem here.” – Those words, spoken by James Lovell, Jr. are almost too casual and understated to portray the scope and seriousness of the problem as he, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise are sitting 240,000 miles from earth in the moon-bound space craft Apollo XIII.  But those words are now famous, and any time you hear those words, you know something or someone is in trouble. 

“Moses, we’ve got a problem.”  This time it was the voice of the Israelite people traveling through the desert and under attack by snakes.  When you hear those words, whether you are out in space or in the desert, or anywhere else, you have to decide how to respond.  Moses could have said, “All you people do is complain – how could you be so stupid as to let one of those snakes bite you?”  Just as Houston could have said, “What in the world did you guys do to our space craft – you better fix it or you could be in a lot of trouble up there.” 

The truth is that’s the way a lot of people respond to problems.  You gotta problem, which somehow you created or at least didn’t avoid, you better fix it.  It’s a judgmental attitude that is prevalent in current day culture whether it is poverty or debates about what to homeowners who took out sub-prime mortgages (when it’s too good to be true)or whether to rebuild New Orleans – after all, they built it on land that is below sea level.  “Houston, we’ve got a problem here.” 

Now the other way you can respond to a problem is the way that Houston did respond – they mobilized every person at the space center, they called in other astronauts, and they began to analyze the problem and try to figure out how they could get the crew safely home.  It’s the way the nation responded after 9/11, shutting down all airspace, mobilizing emergency personnel, and doing everything possible to save additional lives and restore a semblance of security. 

“Houston, we’ve got a problem here.”  But this time the words were not about a lunar space craft or a terrorist attack.  This time it was about the safety of the planet itself, about all of humanity.  And, like Houston and Moses had to analyze the problem, determine its scope and come up with a solution, that was the challenge this time as well.  Moses identified the problem pretty quickly, it was snakes.  God gave him the solution. Moses was told to form an image of a snake out of bronze and put it on a pole – somehow, only God knows how – those bitten by a snake could look at the snake on the pole and be saved.  

So what’s the problem that endangers our planet and all of humanity?  Let me see – the snake on the pole in Moses day meant that the problem was snakes.  Today, God gives us a different image – a man on a pole – ummm – snake on a pole – problem is snakes – man on a pole --  it seems as if the problem is . . . us. 

In the cartoon Peanuts Lucy once said to Charlie Brown, "Discouraged again, eh, Charlie Brown?" "You know what your whole trouble is? The whole trouble with you is that you're you!"

Charlie asks, "Well, what in the world can I do about that?"

Lucy answers, "I don't pretend to be able to give advice...I merely point out the trouble!"

The symbol of Jesus on a pole indicates that the problem with us is us --  But it also says  that Jesus is the solution.

In the next Peanuts cartoon Lucy speaks, "You know what the whole trouble with you is, Charlie Brown?"

Charlie answers, "No, and I don't want to know! Leave me alone!" He walks away.

Lucy shouts after him, "The whole trouble with you is you won't listen to what the whole trouble with you is!"

The solution begins with listening. If "you" are the problem, "you" can't be the solution. The solution has to come from outside yourself.

Often, rather than admitting, "I am the problem," we are more likely to confess that a few bad deeds are the problem: "I've lied, so I'd better stop lying." "I was driving to fast and I'll try to keep my speed down." (Why do I keep using car driving analogies?)  Whenever the problem is defined as doing something bad, the solution is simply to stop doing that bad deed -- or start doing good deeds. Salvation becomes nothing more than doing good things and avoiding the bad. Such a solution doesn't need Jesus -- or Jesus simply becomes a model of doing the right things. This watered-down, cheap salvation comes about when we don't see that we are the problem. The problem is not the things we do; we do the things we do because we are us -- sinful human beings.

So if the problem is us, what is it about us that we need to listen to?   For this, we have to go a bit beyond our Gospel lesson today, to verse 19.  “And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and the people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.”  Their deeds were evil.  Evil is a powerful word.  We tend to think of evil as terrorists, or rapists or child molesters, hateful, frightening people.  And the Greek word does mean someone or something that is “bad,” or “base,” or “vulgar.”  But it also means “petty, trivial, careless, thoughtless.” 

Mike Yaconelli, wrote an article called "The Tyranny of Trivia" in which he talks about the problems in the organized church.  He sees evidence of the problem with the church’s waning influence, its corruption, and its cultural impotence --  which tells us that something has gone awry. But, the question is, what has gone awry? What is wrong?   He says, “The problem with the church is not corruption. It is not institutionalism or something like the minister running away with a parishioner. Though, I would say those are problems we need to deal with too.  For Mike, the problem is pettiness. 

He goes on to talk about how in too many churches board meetings and committee meetings are dominated by complaints about names not being in the bulletin for donating flowers on the altar or the youth group leaving the kitchen a mess, or people leaving because they didn’t like the new youth director or (if we could get closer to home) pews being replaced by chairs or the organ moving from the balcony to the front of the church.  Pettiness has become a serious disease in the Church of Jesus Christ -- a disease which continues to result in terminal cases of discord, disruption, and destruction.  Now I can understand some of those complaints, but churches that are so preoccupied with the petty, don't spend time doing things that matter.  So, when we are bitten by sin, we must look to the man on the cross to be healed, and restored to do that which matters.

What does matter is the best known passage in the Bible – the little gospel – John 3:16. We know 3:16 by heart, and it comforts us, as it should with the assurance that God loves us.  But this is not primarily about us as individuals.  Verse 17 makes that clear – “God sent his son into the world not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.  That word “Saved” – can also mean “healed.”  So that the world can be healed through him.  Folks, there are sicknesses afflicting our world – hatred, greed, corruption, poverty, suspicion, fear and so many more. 

“Houston, We’ve got a problem here.”  During that space drama, and during the 9/11 crisis, a lot of people just watched everything unfold, they were spectators, curious, concerned about the outcome, anxious about what it might mean, but spectators.  But at the Space Center, at Ground Zero, others sprang into action, lives were at stake, a crisis was at hand and they were determined to be part of the solution.

What makes Christianity distinct is not personal eagerness for exposure to the public sphere, nor a desire to become big and powerful, nor a sense of its superiority over every other faith.  Rather it is its understanding that the church is only a means to the end, not the end in itself.  And, the goal that this faith envisages -- is the "healing" of the world, the mending of our torn and tattered planet – in acts as simple and yet profound as building a house in Chester, or educating youth and helping AIDS orphans in Africa, or bringing a nurse to the Navajo community at Rock Point, helping rebuild New Orleans, supporting World Hunger relief, having our youth expand their vision at a National youth gathering, or being a healthy, happy, active congregation of recovering sinners.

Houston, we’ve got a problem – those words can create despair, judgment, fear and paralysis; or they can stimulate a response by emergency workers, great thinkers, ordinary people who will not be spectators, but want to be in the action.  Reformation – God’s got a solution here and you – you sin bitten people who have looked up at the man on the pole and are now in recovery, are part of God’s action plan for healing the wounds of the world.  Amen.