The pioneer of salvation

Hebrews 2:10-18

            “It was fitting that God, for whom and through whom all things exist, in bringing many children to glory, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through sufferings.”

            One of the illustrations that the book of Hebrews uses for Jesus is the pioneer of salvation. If you stop to think about it, a pioneer is a pretty great description for Jesus. Pioneers leave behind their home and comfort, eschewing the ordinary in the hope of something extraordinary. Pioneers take big risks and make sacrifices so that we might be called brothers and sisters (as it says in the 2^nd chapter of Hebrews).

            Throughout history, many people have been called pioneers: Da Vinci. Galileo. Curie. Einstein. In America, we have built a mythos around Daniel Boone, though it must be said that Boone’s quote about having to move on whenever he saw smoke from another man’s chimney because the country was getting too crowded might be the whiniest comment in human history. All of those folks (and many more) were and are pioneers of their fields. Since Jesus’ field is the human race, he is the ultimate pioneer.

            But it’s not all good. Part of being a pioneer is being despised in life (and not just Daniel Boone, who kind of deserved it). To defy what people expect of you is the quickest way to lose friends. To chance a better world will instill fear amongst those whose world is built upon things of the past. Many pioneers die for their cause. Jesus is certainly a big ol’ example of this. Pioneers are hated because they are a threat to the status quo. One of the reasons Jesus was hated was because he had the capacity to save. This is a strange part of the human condition; we tend to hate the thing we need most desperately. Our pride gets in the way and we forget an essential part of our humanity—we need a Savior.

            Instead, we too often sell ourselves on a narrative: We say that so-and-so is the enemy, and so often that so-and-so who we portray as the enemy is precisely the one who can make our lives easier. Our hate of the other paralyzes us from the kind of life we could be leading. It is not others who are keeping you from being who you were created to be; it is your own stinking self. Pioneers are the rare breed who don’t blame their failings on others but pursue something better. Jesus did. He pioneered a way of life free from fear, making us no longer slaves to death. I think that particular point is underplayed in the Christian church: We have absolutely nothing to fear from death any longer. We are slaves to it no longer.

            So many of us spend a disproportionate amount of our lives in fear—to death, which so often shows itself in the way the world is changing around us, reminding us that we are temporary. Then, that fear of our mortality leads us into wishing things were back how they once were. Remember when the church was filled with people. Remember when people were more respectful—when they didn’t have heads in their phones all day long—when they sat around the table for supper—or fill in the blank. Remember when... Every generation does this. Millennials are starting to do it with Gen-Z. Can you believe these kids don’t know what AOL Instant Messenger was? And they aren’t nearly enough into avocado toast. Crazy, amirite?

We can’t help it. We are forever comparing our present to the past and looking back fondly on things that were rarely as great as we remember them to be, while God is calling us forward. If Jesus calls us as disciples to follow, then we are walking behind the ultimate pioneer, and he’s pretty clear to not look back, even (dramatically) for family, and friends, and all the next most important things.

            I’m not saying we don’t remember and honor our past. We can still do that; we should still do that. We just shouldn’t live there. Jesus points us forward. Walk into newness.

            Ultimately, though, we cannot save ourselves. We cannot become Jesus, but we can absolutely walk in his footsteps. This is the work of the Spirit. It’s making all things new. Not every new thing is successful, and not all new things are good, but God finds us in the new things that are.

            In fact, God makes new things out of things we assume to be old. Have you ever been to the nursing home for worship? If you haven’t, you should really do it. We sing songs. We read scripture. It’s Sunday morning worship but more abbreviated, which some of you may love to be honest. Now, this might seem like a strange place to go in search of newness, but let me tell you: it’s new every time. The music brings the congregation to life. It makes them younger. We might imagine that they are going back and reliving something that once was, but that’s not it—not exactly. Instead, they are recalling a meaningful thing deeply embedded in their souls, but that song comes to life right now in the present. They aren’t re-living; they are simply living; and for some of them that’s the most alive they’ll be all week. God does new things, even (perhaps especially) when we are confronted with our mortality.

            We take trips down memory lane not to stay there but to inform our present and future with a new hope that we had forgotten. We sing songs we know to remind us of a future promise. We touch the past in order to leap into the future. We are called to be pioneers as Jesus was, knowing that he walked a road we can’t walk, but orienting our lives nonetheless toward a future full of hope. A pioneer won’t live forever but through Christ we have more to look forward to still.