Baptist Preaching: A Global Anthology

30. Faith: A Path to Resistance or Escape Route

247 a b PARt VI LAtIn AmeRICA 30 Faith: A Path to Resistance or escape Route (Hebrews 11:38-39) Parrish Jacome Israel Baptist Church Guayaquil, Ecuador BIOGRAPHY Jacome was born in Guayaquil, Ecuador, and he is married to Toyi Grisel Espin. They have two sons, Gerald David and Parrish Andre, and a daughter, Ana Belen. Jacome has served as the pastor of Iglesia Cristiana Evangelica Bautista Israel (Israel Evangelical Christian Baptist Church) in Guayaquil, Ecuador, since 2004. Among the many positions in which he has served leadership roles, he has been president of the Ecuadorian Evangelical Baptist Youth and the Ecuadorian Baptist Convention. He is currently working toward a D.Min. at Fuller Theological Seminary, and he has studied at several public and theological institutions in Ecuador. Jacome has also served as the dean of the Ecuador Baptist Theological Seminary. SERMON COMMENTARY Jacome visits Hebrews 11 as a platform for a theological and philosophical look at the nature of faith. He begins with a reflection on faith and reason and then explores the popular uses of faith in everyday life. He goes behind the text to the situation of the first readers of Hebrews to explore the decisive choice they had to make: either to move forward in faith or to go back to legalism. He calls for a transformative understanding of faith as a way of life 248 Baptist Preaching that expresses itself in resistance to nonfaith as well as faith as escapism. The sermon expresses repeatedly the ethical dimensions of faith. Jacome starts with an aphorism from that Enlightenment man of pure reason, Ben Franklin, who juxtaposed faith and reason. Jacome quickly dismisses this argument, challenging faith to speak to science and confronting science with its misleading claims in the absence of faith. Jacome moves from “high culture” to the populist’s pragmatic use of faith language by politicians and businesspeople. Having cleared the table of philosophical and theological considerations, he addresses the text of Hebrews. Jacome gets behind the situation in the Hebrews epistle to explore the crisis of faith its first readers faced. Taking his cue from the nature of religious experience among the Jewish adherents to Christianity, he explores the necessity of an either-or decision that thrusts them forward with Christ, or causes them to relapse into legalism. It is by the right use of reason that those at the crossroads may see Jesus Christ as the fulfillment of the rituals, institutions , and writings of the Old Covenant faith. The preacher insists on the coherence established by the famed testimonies in Hebrews 11. These past persons of faith share a coherent experience that links Israel, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit with the contemporary community of faith. For this reason, the scriptural code of the sermon begins to emerge clearly as one of transformation. This text speaks to the current situation of the congregation and calls for a radical decision to identify with the same kind of faith.1 This message does not translate the text from then to now so much as it calls us to experience the claim of the same kind of faith. Jacome stays away from any scholastic definition of faith as simple fideism . He underscores the ethical coefficient of faith with such affirmations as “Faith is an experience that develops into a lifestyle.” He does not advance a positive theosymbolic code in this sermon. The outcome of a decision of faith is just as likely to consist of difficult experiences as of victorious experiences.2 The sermon reaches its diagnostic forte when contrasting faith as resistance to culture with faith as escapism from culture. Such escapist faith lacks authenticity because it removes its exponent from the real experiences of human life. Authentic faith does not escape but resists. Jacome ends the message with six staccato questions that serve as litmus tests for the presence of genuine faith as he has explained it in the sermon. His rapid, “Do not get tired, but resist” has a surprise quality that presents faith as counterculture. Part VI—Latin America 249 SERMON ANALYSIS Of Reid’s four voices of preaching, Jacome speaks in the testifying voice. He is seeking to engage listeners in a dialogue of Christian formation. This virtually takes the form of a roundtable discussion that visits the human situation, the individual believer, the faith community, and the text.3 Although Jacome does make assertive statements in the message...