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[MUSIC PLAYING] [MUSIC] [MUSIC] ♪ There's no place like home ♪

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♪ I feel like I'm in a song ♪ ♪ Now I feel like I'm in a song ♪ ♪ Feel like I'm in a song ♪ ♪ Now I feel like I'm in a song ♪

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♪ I'm in a song ♪ ♪ And it sounds so wrong ♪ ♪ And it makes me cry ♪ ♪ You are dead ♪

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♪ You can't shake off my demons ♪ ♪ I'm your son ♪ ♪ Sin of peace ♪ ♪ Don't let this harmless past ♪

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♪ Sin of peace ♪ ♪ Don't let this harmless past ♪ ♪ Sin of peace ♪ ♪ No breakfast for his feet ♪

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♪ Till he's no breakfast for his feet ♪ ♪ No breakfast for his head ♪ ♪ No please no breakfast for his head ♪ ♪ No please no breakfast for his head ♪

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♪ He who comes to meet me now ♪ ♪ Is a witness of His past ♪ ♪ I'll be gone in the last day of day ♪ ♪ But still I'll be yours ♪

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♪ Where shall I be ♪ ♪ When you come this way ♪ ♪ When you come this way ♪ ♪ I'll be here for me ♪

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♪ Come this way ♪ ♪ When it's all so dark ♪ ♪ Will it make love to me ♪ ♪ Where shall I be ♪

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♪ Where shall I be ♪ ♪ Where shall I be ♪ ♪ That shall not be taken away ♪ ♪ From the grave ♪

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- Amen, amen. Brave new world. Many years ago, Roy Otley wrote a book entitled "New World Coming" in which he articulated the hopes

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of the disadvantaged and the deprived. He envisioned a new day, fresh with opportunity and achievement. Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World, in which he saw radical changes occurring. He anticipated a new experience in which people would enter into a new age if they had the

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courage to enter it. And it's said of Alexander the Great that he died at the age of 33 and he wept because he had no more worlds to conquer. The scripture which is the basis of our text

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is concerned with this world and the world beyond this world. These two worlds are represented by two political parties during Jesus' day,

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the Sadducees and the Pharisees. Sadducees were primarily concerned about this world. They were really in that sense, they focused on what's happening now in this world.

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Not on the future, but on the here and now. So they confined their scriptures, so to speak, to the first five books of the Bible. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy.

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This was their Bible. And what God had to say to us, they said was in those five books, all God had to say to his people.

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There was a rather narrow view confined to this world. There was no world beyond this world. On the other hand, the Pharisees were a religious party that believed in the resurrection. He believed not only in this world, but that there was a world beyond this world.

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Jesus is brought into a conversation that involves both of these worlds. He's asked a question by a Sadducee that focuses on this world. It's a rather tricky question because they present to him a situation where there is a woman who has had seven husbands.

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She was a much married woman, to be sure. She had seven husbands. Now we often say that seven is a symbol of completeness. So her life was indeed complete.

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She had seven husbands. And each one of them died. She outlived all of them. She was a mighty woman.

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God lived all seven of the husbands. And after all of them died, she died. And the law of Moses, the custom was that whenever there was a death,

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the person was to marry the next of kin, as long as there was a next of kin, and they had run out. And the question was to Jesus, "Whose wife will she be in the resurrection, in the world

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beyond this world, whose wife will she be?" She's had seven husbands, and now she is dead, and whose wife would she be? Now here's a Pharisee asking about whose wife

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would she be in the resurrection. The Pharisee doesn't believe in the resurrection. This shows you how tricky this question is. And there are others who, possibly in this audience,

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who are Sadducees who believe in the resurrection, and so either way he goes, he is a is on the horns of a dilemma. I particularly remember when I was a candidate for the trustee of the Austin Independent School District

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and you brought to the TV station, and you come to the TV station and they ask you a question that they had possibly been thinking about for hours, days, or weeks, but you had to answer right then that question. They thought they had trapped Jesus.

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And they asked this question, a question about whose wife would she be. There's a story of a man who had two wives in the course of his life.

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One was named Millie and the other one was named Tilly. He lived with Millie 40 years and she died and he lived with Tilly for the years, and she died. And they wanted to know from him,

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who did he want to be buried beside? Do you want to be buried beside Millie, or do you want to be buried beside Tilly? He said, "Put me in the middle."

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(audience laughing) He said, "But tilt me toward Tilly." (audience laughing) Now Jesus realizes that this is a rather tricky question.

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And he responds by giving the answer that we have as the basis of our message. that this is not a question that is to be determined by the resurrection.

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Because in the resurrection, there will be neither marriage nor the expectation of marriage in the resurrection. So it's a new world that one enters in the resurrection,

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a new world, not the same as this world. When one becomes a child of the resurrection, one enters a new world. It's a brave new world.

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Plato described his new world as the republic. Jean-Jacques Rousseau described his new world as a social contract. But this new world that Jesus speaks of

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is a world beyond this world, which is completely different from any of these worlds described by the philosophers that I have named. The early settlers came to this country seeking a new world. They wanted to create here on these shores what they called the kingdom of God on earth.

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But there was a flaw in the world that they sought to create, because while they championed the cause of freedom, many of those early settlers were slaveholders. So there was a fatal flaw in their new world. The world that Jesus is talking about in the world of the resurrection is a world that is not a monarchy,

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not made according to the political structures of this world, not a democracy with certain political structures, not an autocracy, but a new world that is the kingdom of God, a world that is expressed in the resurrection.

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And this world is a world that God himself creates. It's a brave new world created by the one who is the sovereign of the universe. God is in the business of creating a new world.

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He created a new world when he stepped out on space and looked around and said, "I'm lonely. "Make me a world." And he fashioned a new world.

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He spoke and said, "Let there be light." And there was light. Darkness rolled up on one side and the light stood shining on the other.

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God was at work creating a brave new world. But something happened to that world. You know the story of the Garden of Eden, how Adam and Eve sinned and were driven out of the garden.

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And God has prepared for the fateful a brave new world. for the faithful a brave new world. And the passport to this world is love. That's the simul bonum

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of the Christian life, love. The question is how do you love? How do you love? Do we have that love that runs from heart to heart and breast to breast?

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Do we have that love that embraces others no matter what they do? Do we have that love that is unconditional? Do we have a brave word that expresses it like the kingdom of God in our life, the rule of God, a brave new world. Martin Luther King said it takes strength to love.

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And I want to add to that it also takes courage to love. It really takes courage to love. To embrace all sorts and conditions of humankind. It takes courage, a great deal of courage.

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I recall how I felt about the events of September 11th. First, there was a feeling of anger. So many innocent people who just left home, you know, expecting to have a good day at work and to come back home.

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And they didn't live to have that experience. And I talked to so many people and I asked them and they felt angry. They felt they wanted to really get revenge.

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And if most people are honest, that's a very popular way to react to that. But do we have that love that enables us to embrace those who seek to destroy us?

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Can we say, you don't hear people going around saying, I love the Arabs, or I love the Muslims, or I love the Islamic people. We don't hear a great deal of that.

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'Cause that's not the popular thing to do or to say in such a time as this. So one has to be brave. One has to be brave.

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Whenever one sheds the cause of peace and justice and freedom, there has to be love, there has to be courage,

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There has to be strength. I remember the late James Farmer, who just passed away a short time ago, who was identified with the peace movement during World War II, and he came to our college campus, and he reported that people were throwing eggs at him and all sorts of things because he was

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championing the cause of peace when we were at war, it takes a great deal of strength. Takes a great deal of courage. And it takes a great deal of courage.

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One has to be brave to enter this world as we see people who take that step. It's a step of bravery, it's a step of courage, it's a step of strength.

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When someone smites you on one cheek to turn the other cheek. Brothers and sisters, that takes courage. It takes a great deal of bravery.

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Those who usher in the radical changes that we have experienced in our societies, Many of them sat on lunch counters and had cigarettes put to them, burning cigarettes and all of that.

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And they went through all of that. That's courage, that's a kind of bravery that is not characteristic of this world. It's characteristic of another world.

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And so God has sent Jesus Christ to us who are here below. to take us to a world that is above. And he says over there in the book of John,

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you are from the world below, but I am from the world above, but he comes to this world below that we may get together.

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And he must take us on the journey to the world of the resurrection. The world of the resurrection is a different world. It doesn't have the limitations of this world.

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The one who comes as the resurrected one passes through walls and overcomes all of those difficulties. There were nail prints in his hands,

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but now he's able to show his hands. He's come to carry us to another world. And so the world of the resurrection, is beyond. Don't worry about

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whose husband she may be because it's a world beyond husbands and wives. It's a world of the Spirit. It's a world that God has created.

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You know, in the beginning we'll read that God's Spirit hovered over the darkness and hatched out a new world of things. And beyond this world, there is a new world.

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There's a new world. Our ancestors envisioned that world along with the apostle John. And they said, "I wanna walk in Jerusalem just like John."

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That God has a new world. This world is a world of suffering. This world is a world of pain. This world is a world of sorrow, but in that new world,

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there's no more pain, no more crying, no more sorrow at New Jerusalem. That's a world beyond the resurrection. Thanks be to God that he has arranged for us

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to live beyond this world to the world that has no end. As we sing the hymn of invitation, we extend the privilege of the church, the privilege to accept Jesus Christ

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as the Lord of your life, the privilege to be children of the resurrection that's ours through him. And we invite you to come.

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As a candidate for baptism by letter, Christian experience or restoration, we invite you to become part of the family of God here at Ebenezer as we sing,

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Just As I Am, Without One Plea. ♪ Just as I am ♪ ♪ Without one plea ♪ ♪ By that ♪

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♪ Oh, say it for me ♪ ♪ And then shall be it become to thee ♪ ♪ Oh, Lamb of God, I come ♪ ♪ I come ♪

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♪ Just as I am ♪ ♪ To be a guide ♪ ♪ A wandering star ♪ ♪ To the earth ♪

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♪ And to this faraway land of God ♪ ♪ I come, I come ♪ Just as I am, He is with me about, living within and says without problem, "I am." ♪ Of God, I come ♪

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♪ I come ♪ ♪ Yes, there is I am ♪ ♪ God wills me to be ♪ ♪ His servant ♪

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♪ His servant ♪ ♪ His love can build you high ♪ ♪ Believe for Him, our God ♪ ♪ Our God ♪

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(sniffles) ♪ Our God ♪ - Amen. - Amen. I want to call attention to one other announcement.

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The city of Austin Capital Metro Partnership, along with the Federal Transit Administration, invite you to attend a workshop at the Convention Center on Saturday, November the 17th, from 8.30 AM to 3 o'clock PM.

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That's at the convention center, I say again. And they're asking for input on station locations. And this is very critical, where the stations are going to be. that those of us who will ride it.

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This is critical, those connections between the community and the transit system that will be held, I'll say again, Saturday, November the 17th from 8:30 to 3 o'clock at the Austin Convention

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Center. I have a few of these programs with someone left here at the church, just a very few, if anybody wants one. That you have created a world beyond this world, the world of the resurrection.

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We thank you that we are children of the resurrection, that we will have fellowship with you not only now, but hereafter. Grace, mercy, peace be with you from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

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Amen. (upbeat music) [BLANK_AUDIO]