Sermon - Easter 2025 (2nd Cor 5) - The Bodhisattva

“And he died for all, therefore all have died…And he died for all so that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for the one who for their sake died and was raised.”

What?! Who talks like this?

This is how deeply spiritual people talk. And deeply spiritual people usually have something figured out. Some life hack. Because these sentences make total sense to someone like this. But the rest of us? No. this is someone who knows something we don’t know yet. Someone who has heard and seen things beyond the human realm. Someone who has knowledge of the deep things of God and the universe. 

The apostle Paul was a deeply spiritual individual indeed, and from what little we know of his life, Paul used to be something completely different and then in at least two dramatic visionary and revelatory events, he changed, transformed even. Most Christians remember the first: Paul’s conversion when he was encountered by Jesus in a blinding light. But there was at least one more—and he only mentions it once, in his second letter to the Corinthians. He is so cryptic about it, that he talks about himself in the third person when he discloses what happened. I’ve come to believe that Paul had an out-of-body near-death experience. He says that he “was caught up to the third heaven” and there heard unutterable things, including a dialogue with Jesus himself. 

James Tabor from “Paul’s Ascent to Paradise: The Apostolic Message and Mission of Paul in the Light of His Mystical Experiences” writes:

“Paul does not emphasize what he saw, but what he heard…and that was “unutterable words which are unlawful to speak.” The term “unutterable” basically means inexpressible…but Paul will not offer the Corinthians or later readers even a small hint…his ascent to heaven must have been the highest moment of his life—and it was and is the highest and most exalted revelation one could claim.”

If you’ve ever heard someone discuss a near-death experience, then you know how challenging it is for them to break it down into something coherent. Paul is many things, but coherent is rarely a strength. What is crystal clear is that the most important aspect of Paul’s experience was that it was an experience from and with the Lord.

You’ll have to read the puzzle for yourself in 2^nd Corinthians chapter 12. As for today’s text in chapter 5, Paul gives us a foretaste, reminding us of the resurrection and how “we once knew Christ from a human point of view, but no longer know him in that way.“

Being in Christ

Living as Paul taught us then begins with changing our vision prescription to something along the lines what I like to call “Easter Vision”—a way of seeing and knowing and living out Christ’s otherworldly love for others.

The first thing a person with Easter Vision realizes is that we have nothing to fear; the worst of it is already over; Christ died for all, therefore all died. Having already died, and living now on bonus time in Christ, we live in risen and raised fashion just as Jesus.

And how do raised people live? 

When we screw up and fall down, we rise. When we encounter hardship, we rise. When we see others falling down or encountering hardship, we lift them up.

The Bodhisattva

I’m currently reading “Living Buddha Living Christ” for our church book club, and the Buddhists and oriental traditions have a word that reminds me of this Easter Vision: bodhisattva.

Bodhisattva represents the principle of compassion, which is the healing principle that makes life possible. According to many Eastern religious philosophy, “life is pain, but compassion is what gives it the possibility of continuing. Embodying bodhisattva is to become one who has achieved the realization of immortality, yet voluntarily participates in the sorrows of the world.

It's remembering that Christ’s love urges us on—and grounds us, strengthens us, and raises us to new life. I don’t know about you, but keeping the clutches of the world’s sorrows from dragging me down is a daily struggle sometimes. I need reminding that I am raised. So I turn to music, and nature, and my family to keep the good vibes going, to keep, what modern spiritualists call, “a raised vibration.”

What lifts you up? What raises your spirit?  

I also try to laugh, at least once, every day. Sometimes I need a little help from social media from the likes of Instagram scrolling—my favorites include some good old fashioned 4^th grade humor like public flatulence pranks and fails or short clips of comedians like Nate Bargatze, Bill Burr, Conan, and Norm MacDonald, whose moth joke is the only one I’ve memorized:

The Moth Joke

The Mountain Story

But my spirit really soars whenever I witness extravagant generosity and courageous selflessness.  

I love seeing Christ’s love in action; when people sacrifice their comfort or success for the sake of someone else’s well-being—but the best of the best stories always involve an act of life in the face of death.

There’s a story of two Hawaiian police officers who were driving up this mountainous road on patrol one day–it was one of those very perilous but gorgeous mountain drives, lots of great overlooks. It was popular among the tourists and locals alike. One day they spotted someone standing on the other side of the railing that keeps cars from rolling off the side of the mountain. The officers raced over to the person and just as they jumped, the first officer grabbed hold–--but given the momentums of each, the officer tumbled and started to fall over the side of the mountain with the jumper. 

There they were, plummeting to their deaths together—a police officer risking their life with someone who despaired of life so much that their sorrows had overcome their will to live. But now that officer’s life hung in the balance too, a person whose everything had dropped away–--duty to family, to job, to their own life even--–all wishes and hopes for their lifetime disappeared, all because of refusing to let go of a troubled stranger. But then the second officer arrived and grabbed hold of his partner and raised both the jumper and the officer to safety.

Later a newspaper reporter asked the first officer, “Why didn’t you let go? You would have been killed, too.” The officer answered, “I couldn’t let go. If I had let that young person go, I couldn’t have lived another day of my life.”

Conclusion

The Good News—the Best News—of Resurrection Sunday is that Christ’s love never, ever lets us go. Therefore, In Christ’s love let us get up, get going, and see and act with Easter Vision; to embody bodhisattva and tend to the world’s sorrows with compassion, courage, and extravagant generosity; let’s leave a light on for whoever needs to talk and create laughter and joy, and lift spirits and good vibrations in the process. May you remember that no matter what happens, Christ’s love will be there to lift the selfless and the sorrowing alike, and now lives on, in you, and in me for He died for all, therefore all died. And he died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for the one who for their sake died and was raised.