What Authority Guides You?

We experience many kinds of authority in our world.  A police officer, a teacher, a store clerk, a stoplight.  Each of these external authorities directs our actions with punishments and rewards.  Perhaps a rule book is the authority in a game golf or football, a recipe book an authority as dinner is being prepared.   We have hundreds of small authorities in our lives.

But what happens when you need moral authority or have an important life-question?  Who is your authority then?  A friend, a relative?  Your spouse? Someone at church?  Do you turn to a book, or the Bible? What authority guides your life when you have to make a difficult decision?

Will you pray with me?  “Dear divine Author and Authority, guide us, your people, this and every day.  Reveal to us the authentic authority of the spirit as it enlightens our own inner wisdom, and teach us to follow your authority through lives of love and compassion.  Amen.”

In our passage today from First Corinthians, Paul is instructing people in the church at Corinth in his understanding of moral authority.  He comes up with some surprisingly modern concepts.  Paul says moral authority varies with different people, and he offers an example.  Paul discusses the concept of meat that has been dedicated to idols.  In the ancient Roman world, most of the meat in the large cities was brought first to a temple and dedicated to a Roman God before it was taken to the markets and sold.  This was like a good luck charm for the meat, asking the Roman God to reduce spoilage and disease (and leaving a little bit to the priests for their “cut”).  Some in the church at Corinth thought this meant this meat dedicated to idols could not be eaten by Christians because it was “unclean.”  This was actually a very practical problem because almost all the meat available in Corinth had been idol-dedicated at some point before it came to market.

To all this, Paul responds by saying the pagan idols do not really exist (because there is only one God), so the idol dedication is meaningless.  Problem solved.  In other words, Paul says the since the idol is nonexistent and has no authority, that the meat is therefore okay to eat.  Of course, then Paul complicates things by saying that if weak people incorrectly believe in the authority of this idol, that strong Christ-followers must be careful not to feed into their misconception by eating the dedicated meat, because that may hurt the weaker people’s faith. 

Here, Paul says the authority of caring for one another is a higher authority than whether or not meat dedicated to idols is edible.  Paul says the needs of the community hold a higher moral authority than individual beliefs and needs.  Wow.  Somebody read this passage to Congress, quick.

Our passage today from Mark’s Gospel about authority takes a completely different direction, but comes to the same conclusion.  Here in the first chapter of Mark, Jesus has just begun teaching in the synagogue.  Mark says the crowds were astounded at Jesus’ teaching, for Jesus taught them as one having authority.  I want to stop right here and ask where Jesus’ authority come from.  Did it come from Jesus’ position in the temple?  No, Jesus had no official position.  Did it come from Jesus’ experience?  No, Jesus had no prior experience here at the beginning of his ministry.  Did it come from Jesus’ clothes or outward appearances?  No, Jesus was a very poor itinerant Jew who looked like all of the other poor Jews.  So Jesus must have gotten his authority from his education?  No.  So where did Jesus get his authority?  Well, after a careful re-reading the first chapter of Mark, we find that Jesus gained his authority from the baptism of the Holy Spirit in verses 10 and 11—remember when God said he was well-pleased with Jesus?  So Jesus’ authentic authority come from his relationship with the living God.  And the people could sense it.  They heard God’s authority from within the words and teaching of Jesus.

In this discussion of authority, we have identified two major types of authority.  There is external authority, which is positional authority.  A police officer has positional authority.  Just by being in the position and wearing the uniform, they have the authority of the badge.

But if you look around in your life, you will discover another type of authority in the people you know.  Some people exude authority from within them.  These are the people that folks go to for advice and counsel.  This is personal authority—inner authority.  We say these people act from the authority of wisdom without regard to their position at all.  So we have two types of authority: outer positional authority and inner personal authority.

So now, let’s ask what kind of authority the crowds around Jesus would have been accustomed to in their lives.  Roman soldiers, tax collectors, and the Temple priests all have positional authority.  This type of authority exists and enforces itself with force or cultural pressure.  The Roman overlords enforced their authority with threatened or actual force.  The Temple priests gained compliance with Jewish cultural rules by using cultural and moral force, and sometimes, with physical force. 

But Jesus’ personal authority is very different.  First of all, it astonishes the crowd.  So we need to ask, “Why were they astonished?”  Jesus’ teaching invoked the authority of the love of God and inclusive nature of the Kingdom of God.  Jesus did not use threats of violence.  Jesus’ authority was revealed though inclusion and love, not the usual positional authoritative use of threats and violence.  This was astonishing to the hearers because authority and force were synonymous in ancient times.  The authority of Jesus’ gentle inclusive love was unheard of; it astonished the crowds.  They saw and recognized Jesus as having authentic authority from loving God.

The second way that Jesus established his authority is shown by Jesus’ immediate actions in the last verses of Mark’s passage for today.  A man with an unclean spirit cries out to Jesus acknowledging Jesus’ authority, screaming, “We know who you are!”  And Jesus ordered the unclean spirit to be muzzled and to come out of the man.  Again the crowds were astonished by this authoritative action, saying, “What is this?  A new active teaching—with authority.”

So now, we have Paul saying unclean food is okay to eat, but only if it does not hurt the least among the church at Corinth, and Mark saying unclean sprits were rebuked from a man, all by the power of inner authority.  Paul shows personal authority protecting the least among the Corinthians.  Jesus showed personal authority to cleanse a powerful unclean spirit from the community.  And in both cases, the authority was backed not by force, but through a loving relationship with the living God.  Jesus and Paul spoke with inner authority arising from their relationship with God.

So, where does that leave us today in the United Church of Christ and Spring Glen Church on Annual Meeting Sunday when it comes to authority?  First of all, here we believe that each Christ-follower is their own authority before God.  We each interpret our own lives before our living God, and we believe that we clarify this interpretation and discernment when we worship and work together.  We cherish our diversity here, and we do not require compliance with any particular creed or doctrine.  We are all ministers before God according to the UCC Constitution; we are each free to worship God as we each see fit.  We also believe that Christ is the head of our church: not the Moderator, or the Pastor, but Christ.  Christ is the author and authentic authority here.  We are self-governed as a pure democracy; each member and every member has one discerning vote.  Our membership discerns everything this body does: every program, every worship service, every charity, every teaching.  Every dollar we gather, and every benevolence we reap, is solely determined by the members of this church.  We don’t gain a single penny from anywhere else.  We own this building, we completely fund every aspect of our church.  No one from the outside tells us who, how, where or when to do anything.  We decide ourselves, for ourselves.  Positional authority in this place is derived from, and is granted by, the membership in community.  Your lay leaders only act because you have granted them authority.  Although I wear this robe as a sign of the authority of my education, I also wear this stole as a sign of ordination, granted ultimately by this congregation.  I stand in this pulpit only because you have called and granted me the authority to speak. (Now whether you listen is entirely another matter!)  And we will gather in this space in just a few minutes to exercise the authority of your membership to set a new budget for the coming year.  All of the positional authority in this place is solely granted by your collective personal authority as members of this church.  And your inner personal authority comes from exactly the same place as Jesus’ and Paul’s authority did—from your relationship with the living God.  Our God is the source of our inner personal authority here.

So, we now recognize where our inner authority comes from, but does this authority guide us in our day-to-day actions in the world?  God has given each of us the spiritual authority as a Christ-follower to gather, pray, worship, work and live in the world as a child of God.  Our authority is exactly the same authority that Jesus and Paul had.  Our authentic authority as Christ-followers comes from our personal relationship with the living God. 

But, are we guided and de we live by the authority of God within us?  Do you contribute to the efforts of this gathering of God’s children?  Do you give of your time, talent and treasure?  Do you exercise your authority by actively participating in the life of this beautiful gathering of God’s children?  Do you live the story of Jesus’ love and compassion so vibrantly into your life that everyone around you says with astonishment that you are living a new teaching – that you are living with authority!  Let us live Christ’s love so deeply and powerfully into the world that people from miles around here will say of Spring Glen Church that they are astonished at our new teaching—with authority!  Let us meet today and live into our bold future with Christ’s love as our counsel, guide, and ultimate authority.  And to that we all say, Amen!