You and I, two weeks ago, were the Samaritan woman at the well. Last week we were the man born blind. And today we are Lazarus. We're in the tomb. We've all died. Under normal circumstances it's over for us. People outside are mourning. They are going to miss us. It's in the midst of that that Jesus comes alive. Not because he is the young man who is Jewish and his father were Mary and Joseph. He comes alive because he was sent here to be, and is, and always will be, the Son of God.

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Why do we come to church? We come to church so that we can praise God. We come to church so that we can thank Him for everything that He has given us. We come to church to find out more about Jesus and who he is and what he wants us to do. We listen to the Scriptures being proclaimed - all this to know more about Jesus and how we are to live our lives.

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We're at the well this morning.  What would Jesus say to each one of us about ourselves? No one else knows.  

He would say, “Just to let you know, I'm just not your ordinary person.  I am the Son of God. And I know you inside and out.”

It might be a humbling experience but it also might be an awesome experience.  You notice Jesus did not condemn the woman at the well.  Anytime he meets someone, he never condemns.   He's just a reservoir of love that keeps opening up new ways for every single person to capture what it means to stand on holy ground.  

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There are certain things in Scripture that we remember.  We always hear the same Gospel passage on the first Sunday in Lent so we all say, “Yeah, I remember. It's about the three temptations.” 

It is important for us to notice the first paragraph of today's Gospel reading.  Jesus is baptized in the Jordon.  The Spirit of God comes upon him, and within him, and he goes away to pray.   And when he prays - then he is tempted.  Then if you skip the three temptations and come down to the very last line it simply says, “For a time.”  Which means that Jesus was never going to be free of temptations, and you and I are not going to be free of temptations.

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What are the things that we hide?  What are the things that we put out for everyone to see?  We are sinners.  Jesus says, “That doesn't bother me, that's the way I made you.  I just ask that you don't hide from me, and I also ask that whenever you are going to do something in my name - do it with humility.”  

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Isaiah and Paul and Peter - they really are us.  They were afraid, they knew that something was going on around them, and that God was stirring up something.  With Isaiah, it was God speaking directly to him, and Isaiah thought he was unworthy.  That's why they took the coals to his lips, a sign that he was now free of all his sinfulness.  And he felt something.  And then he asks, “What do you want.”

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“What the world needs now is love, sweet love,
It's the only thing that there's just too little of.
What the world needs now is love, sweet love,
No not just for some but for everyone.”

This was written in 1965 by Hal David.  And some might ask, did he have his inspiration for this song from our second reading today from Corinthians Chapter 13.  Whether he did or didn't, there is no question St. Paul would say that he agreed with his sentiments.

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Over the past few years our children have been learning the habits so each one of them will reach their very personal best.  If you follow the habits you eventually will find your voice.  Tonight I want to talk about two of those habits and how they fit into our lives at home, at school and here where we worship.

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The Spirit of the Lord is upon me.  The Spirit of the Lord is upon all of us.  What does that mean?  Theologically we can say when we were baptized we were anointed with the Spirit and the Spirit came into us.  But for some of us that was a couple of years ago when we were infants.  That same Spirit is still upon each of us. And if you notice in the first reading Ezra stood up and read. In the Gospel reading Jesus stood up and read. And both of them said,  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me.”  Two thousand years later, I took another book and read, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon all of us.” 

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My brothers and sisters in Christ, John and Mary Wilson were redoing their home - especially the inside.  Their house was about 30 years old and they had always taken care of the outdoors as things came along.  But they had ignored the inside and things hadn't changed much in those years.  Now that their children were all out of the home with families, or going to college, they thought this would be a good time to do something with the interior of the house.  To supplement that determination, they hired an interior decorator.

Everything was going along just fine until all of a sudden a question came up and John said, “No.”  The question was, “What shall we do with this picture of Jesus?  It's been hanging on the wall for thirty years. Can't we get something new to hang on the wall?” 

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