Sermon 13NOV11
"All are Accountable in the Kingdom"
Matthew 25:14-30
There was a college in a certain Midwestern city and their football team was having a loosing season, so the coach was very nervous. By October the Alumni Association was in an uproar and were about to bear arms, then in November they lost to their arch-rival. At that, the coach received an email saying "The last train uptown leaves Sunday at noon, be under it". Football seems to be rather important doesn't it? We've seen some horrors come of that in the last week at Penn State. It was interesting to hear one commentator say "football was god at Penn State", so it must have been. Here was a sex abuse scandal that had been going on for a number of years. The coach seemed to have known about it, and overlooked it. The president of the university had known, and overlooked it. But, then there comes judgement day. It's horrible that we as parents have to worry about teaching our kids what is appropriate touching and what is not in this day and age, but there are predators out there. Sexual abuse and assault perpetrated upon anyone, but especially children, is a heinous crime. It seems though, in this instance, the university lost sight of their moral responsibility because their football program was so important to them. Finally though, at long last, after years of looking the other way; judgement came.
The lessons we've heard today from Zephaniah, 1st Thessalonians, and Matthew are about the last judgement. In Matthew we hear of the servant who took the one talent he was given and buried it, and because of that he is cast into outer darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. The last judgement isn't looked at as being a very "happy" time.
There was a tribal chief in Africa comparing Christianity to "ivory hunting". He said when you find ivory you know at the end of it there's always going to be an elephant. So here's Christianity where we have the "ivory" of the kingdom, but to get to it we have to first get past the crushing force of the "elephant" or the last judgement.
The word talent comes to us directly from the Bible, and at first it just meant a certain measure of a precious metal. Certainly as our Lord tells this story it is used to describe something of monetary worth, something that could be hidden or buried in a field and then dug back up. Through usage though, the word talent has grown larger than that.
There was a man who was visiting with a friend and he said; "Yesterday my wife asked for eighty dollars, the day before she asked for an hundred dollars, and today she asked for two hundred dollars". His friend asked "what in the world does your wife do with all that money?" He replied "I don't really know because I've never given her any".
The point here though is that our Lord has given us a great deal of talents. Whether in monetary terms, or in gifts and capabilities that we should be developing for the kingdom. We are called to invest those "talents" for our own good, and for the good of others. Whether it's monetary "talents", or "talents" in the form of gifts and abilities that God has given us that come from him; we're not tithing. Our Lord told us "Those who loose their life will save it, and those who save their life will loose it". Those who loose it, invest their lives and do something with their life. Trying to hold onto something, trying to save it to be selfish with it is not part of the doing of the kingdom.
There was an interesting scene in "All Quiet on the Western Front" where the nuns are singing in the hallway at the hospital. One of the wounded soldiers wants the singing to stop, so he takes his water pitcher and throws it into the hallway through the door. An inspector comes into the ward where the soldiers are and begins looking each of them in the eye asking if they were the one who threw the pitcher of water. Finally one of the soldiers speaks up and says "I'm the one who threw it, it was me" and the inspector looks at him and walks away and does nothing. The other soldiers, knowing the soldier who confessed wasn't the one who threw it, were surprised and asked him why he confessed. He told them; "The other day I took a lick to the head and they gave me a certificate saying I wasn't responsible for anything I do, and I've had a wonderful time ever since". Well, that's kind of the way we go through life; like we've took a lick to the head. We don't act like we realize we're held accountable for everything we do. To lead a really normal, productive life we have to have some sense of accountability outside ourselves; whether to others or to God. We have to be accountable for what we do.
There was a Viking Lord who sailed into a kingdom and discovered the rulers there were evil, they were taking advantage of the poor and weak. He defeated the rulers and gave the people their freedom. As Vikings are prone to do, he started preparing to return to sea. Some of his new subjects wanted to go with him, so he brought them aboard and allowed them to come with him. They sailed into an area with a climate the people had never been exposed to, and he took half of the people who had asked to come with him and told them he wanted them to stay on this island they had found. He left them supplies, materials, and plans and instructed them to use the materials and plans to build a wall around the island. So he departed with the other group and came to another similar island and left the other half of those who had asked to join him with supplies, materials, and plans with the same instructions; to build a wall around the island. The first group struggled with the task, they found it very tedious and laborious and finally agreed among themselves that the Viking Lord hadn't really meant for them to build the wall because they just couldn't do it. So they took the materials and each built fine homes for themselves. The other group experienced the same hardships and difficulties understanding the plans and making the materials work, but they were loyal to the command left by the Viking Lord. As they worked on the wall they found themselves becoming stronger, both as individuals and as a community. In the end, although not perfect, the wall was completed. Having never been in the southern climate they had no knowledge of hurricanes, but one evening in came the rush of the winds and the force of the waves and the hurricane blew in. The first group, who had given up on the task set before them and instead built for themselves luxurious homes, were destroyed; but those in the second group, who had been loyal to the command left to them by the Viking Lord and finished the wall, were saved. They applied themselves, they were loyal to what their lord had asked them to do. The wisdom was his and they received that wisdom and were grateful for it.
Have you ever heard the story of the stone soup? It's really more of a children's fable, but there is this group of soldiers traveling and they come into a village and ask the villagers to feed them. The villagers tell the soldiers that they have no food to give them. So, the soldiers get a big pot, fill it with water, and put a large stone in the pot. They build a fire under the pot and begin to stir the water. The villagers become curious as to what the soldiers are up to, so they start coming up to the pot and asking the soldiers what they're making. The soldiers tell them they're making "stone soup, and it's really quite delicious". The soldiers tell them though "you know it would be so much better if it had a little cabbage in it". Well, one family came forward and brought a head of cabbage. The soldiers kept telling the villagers how great this stone soup was, but that it would be even better if only they had a little onion. So, someone brought a few small onions. The soldiers continued stirring the pot and naming off all the things that would make this stone soup so much better (garlic, carrots, potatoes, turnips, celery, meat), and one by one people from the village came forward with a little of each to put into the pot. At the end of the fable we find both the soldiers and the villagers sitting down to share not stone soup, but what has become a wonderful stew made from what little each person had to contribute to the effort.
Dr. Karl Menniger (head of the Menniger Clinic) was approached once and asked "what should someone do if they're experiencing a nervous breakdown?". He said "Close your house and lock it, go across the tracks and find someone in need and help those peolpe out". I think the best thing about the final judgement is hearing the Lord say "if you've done it to the least of these, you've done it unto me", and there we are; accountable.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Monday, November 7, 2011
Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee.
Sermon 6NOV11
"Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee"
Matthew 5:1-12
The Beatitudes have long been considered a blueprint for Saint growing and Saint making. Of course, when we hear the Beatitudes on the whole we seem to come up short and think to ourselves "who in the world wants that kind of Gospel? Jesus take that away!". Who wants to be poor? Who wants to be persecuted for his sake? Who wants all these negative sounding things, of course they all aren't negative. There are some beautiful things in there, and many consider them to be some of the most beautiful words in the Scripture.
I recall during the Diocesan Convention before last (the last one was just yesterday); George Luck, one of the most respected priests in the diocese, made an interesting comment: "I really never grew to be a Christian until I came to engage the Beatitudes and to learn more about them". This was central in his spiritual growth; coming to grips with the Beatitudes. Not necessarily an easy thing to do!
One problem we have is we don't have a good word, so we use the word "Blessed", but in the Greek it's "makarios" and the Hebrew equivalent of that is "asre" which means "a joyfulness that cannot be taken away from you". There's no one that can take the sense of joy, the inner sense of peace that you have in knowing the love of the Lord away from you. No matter what the circumstances are around you, no matter if those around you are saying false things or whatever. This is an inner joy and peace that is God given!
Now some translations have tried using the word "happiness" here, but that word is kind of diluted isn't it? "Happy Hour", "Happy Days are Here Again", "Happy Talk", and Dee told me there's a new movie out called "Happy Feet"; but that word has a way of going up and down depending on our spirits. So even though it was used in the "Good News" translation; "Happy is the" instead of "Blessed is the" in the Beatitudes, it just doesn't quite work.
There's a really fine New Testament scholar in his commentary on Matthew who suggested using the word "Congratulations". It sounds a little strange to us doesn't it? It has to do with congratulations is more divine than human. God congratulates you on what's going on inside you; that keeps you closer to God in Christ in the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. Because we can never become holy without the Holy Spirit; that is the work of the Holy Spirit: to make us Holy, to make us Saints! Congratulations, according to the dictionary, has to do with "sympathetic joy on the part of the one who is offering the congratulations" and also a sense of being fortunate. No matter how it sounds or what the circumstances you feel fortunate.
When you think about it when you're on top of the world, when you're "happy go lucky", and all that wonderful stuff that we like to think about in this world and the pleasures that it brings; we can be farther from God than ever. It's when we're contrite, when we're meek, when we may be experiencing some kind of pain that we also experience the indwelling of God's Holy Spirit and much more strength and growth. So, these things can be good in and of themselves because they open us to the indwelling of God's Kingdom.
There is a Buddhist poem and riddle which is meant to teach that goes: There was a monk that was running from a hungry bear. The monk came to the edge of a cliff and the only chance he had to escape the bear was to jump off the cliff. As he was falling he grasped onto a tree root that was growing out of the cliff face and held on for his life. He looked down below him and saw a hungry lion that was waiting for him to drop. He didn't know what to do, and as he was hanging there contemplating his next move two gophers come out of the cliff face and begin eating on the root he's hanging by, so it looks like all is lost. As he's looking around for a way to escape he notices some strawberries growing on a small ledge next to him with one really large ripe strawberry hanging in the midsts of the plant. He reaches over and plucks the berry, puts it in his mouth and says "delicious". That's where the riddle ends. The point is that this blessedness that we hear talked about in the beatitudes, this joyfulness we experience is something that is for the here and now. At one point it does tell us that "great is your reward in heaven", but this feeling of inner peace and joy is something you experience now that makes your life worth living no matter what the circumstances are. You can have the hungry bear above, the hungry lion below, and the gophers eating at the only root you have to hold on to; but you have the sense of joy and peace because God is with you.
We are guaranteed the pursuit of happiness in this country, and there are a lot of people trying to pursue happiness. They may be pursuing the "blue bird of paradise" only to find out later that they've been following a crow all along. Many say "if we just had enough money, we would be happy". That seems to be the American Dream. People think that all their problems will be solved if they had "plenty of money", but some of the most unhappy people in the world are billionaires who don't know what to do with their money. Some have started to follow a beautiful path by just giving it away, and making their life's work to give away what they've spent their lives accumulating. It really is a beautiful thing. Then there is the pleasure principle. That brings happiness doesn't it? But, how long does it last? Those who find "happiness" in drugs. It won't be long before they find they have a monkey on their back, and that they are addicted. Addiction is one of the most difficult things to overcome. So, their life doesn't become happy; it becomes miserable. There are all sorts of ways we seek after "happiness".
There was a piece of correspondence found in "Dear Abbey" many years ago. There was a 15 year old girl who wrote in and said "I am unhappy. I don't have the best clothes in school. I don't get the telephone calls I want. I don't have the best friends in the world. I don't have all the money I need to spend in the mall.", and she goes on and on about all these things she doesn't have. There was a 13 year old girl who wrote back in response to what she'd read from this other girl and said "happiness is when you can walk, when you can talk, when you can sing, when you can hear. That is happiness. I feel sorry for this girl who is so unhappy, but she can do all these things. At thirteen, I can't walk but I'm happy". She was walking into the kingdom of God, even though she couldn't physically walk; because she realized the joy of having those things even though she had a major component in her life missing. So, even with the bear above, the lion below, and the gophers going at it; there is still the Joy of the Lord! Those who trust in Him can have a marvelous existence no matter what the circumstances are surrounding their lives.
C.S. Lewis wrote the book "Surprised by Joy". The book had a two part theme to it. Staring out, Lewis was a confirmed bachelor and a confirmed atheist. Then he meets a woman by the name of Joy, who is an American citizen living in England and she has cancer. She wants to stay in England to be treated there for her cancer, but the only way for her to do that is for her to marry an Englishman. Lewis says that he had a melting of the heart as a bachelor, and he married Joy. Their marriage lasted for three years until she died. But, during that three years of their marriage relationship he had a greater sense of joy than he'd had in all of his life. The other surprise was the joy of knowing Christ. He said "I'd been seeking after all kinds of things that I thought I needed in my life. I had expectations for this and that". He said that only after his conversion did he discover that real joy was a by product. You have your life committed to something, to God in Christ. There's a marvelous way, again no matter what the circumstances are, of having that inner peace and joy in knowing that the Lord is with you. That you can trust in Him.
There's an Hassidic tale involving a rabbi in a small community who was deathly ill. All of the Jewish community were talking among themselves worrying because this was the only rabbi they had, how were they going to get another rabbi out here in the middle of nowhere. So, they all decided to go to the synagogue and pray for their rabbi. Well, the town drunk goes up to the local tavern only to find that it's closed because the owner is at the synagogue praying for his rabbi. Some people pass him on their way to synagogue and chastise him saying "you need to be praying for the rabbi not worrying about getting something to drink". So, somewhat reluctantly, he follows them to pray. "Dear God, please let the rabbi get well so I can have my schnapps". Well, at the very moment he said that prayer the rabbi was healed, and the rabbi explained to the people: "no matter what you think of this guy; he was sincerely praying with all his heart, with all his mind, with all his spirit. He was trusting that God would give him what he needed". Now, we don't really want to emulate the town drunk, yet he was the only one who was sincere in his prayer, who was completely trusting in God that He would provide his needs. That's where we need to be in our lives in Christ. To be totally trusting God.
In Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" it doesn't say "Happy, Happy, We Adore Thee" does it? It says "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee". We are joy filled in Christ with the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee!
"Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee"
Matthew 5:1-12
The Beatitudes have long been considered a blueprint for Saint growing and Saint making. Of course, when we hear the Beatitudes on the whole we seem to come up short and think to ourselves "who in the world wants that kind of Gospel? Jesus take that away!". Who wants to be poor? Who wants to be persecuted for his sake? Who wants all these negative sounding things, of course they all aren't negative. There are some beautiful things in there, and many consider them to be some of the most beautiful words in the Scripture.
I recall during the Diocesan Convention before last (the last one was just yesterday); George Luck, one of the most respected priests in the diocese, made an interesting comment: "I really never grew to be a Christian until I came to engage the Beatitudes and to learn more about them". This was central in his spiritual growth; coming to grips with the Beatitudes. Not necessarily an easy thing to do!
One problem we have is we don't have a good word, so we use the word "Blessed", but in the Greek it's "makarios" and the Hebrew equivalent of that is "asre" which means "a joyfulness that cannot be taken away from you". There's no one that can take the sense of joy, the inner sense of peace that you have in knowing the love of the Lord away from you. No matter what the circumstances are around you, no matter if those around you are saying false things or whatever. This is an inner joy and peace that is God given!
Now some translations have tried using the word "happiness" here, but that word is kind of diluted isn't it? "Happy Hour", "Happy Days are Here Again", "Happy Talk", and Dee told me there's a new movie out called "Happy Feet"; but that word has a way of going up and down depending on our spirits. So even though it was used in the "Good News" translation; "Happy is the" instead of "Blessed is the" in the Beatitudes, it just doesn't quite work.
There's a really fine New Testament scholar in his commentary on Matthew who suggested using the word "Congratulations". It sounds a little strange to us doesn't it? It has to do with congratulations is more divine than human. God congratulates you on what's going on inside you; that keeps you closer to God in Christ in the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. Because we can never become holy without the Holy Spirit; that is the work of the Holy Spirit: to make us Holy, to make us Saints! Congratulations, according to the dictionary, has to do with "sympathetic joy on the part of the one who is offering the congratulations" and also a sense of being fortunate. No matter how it sounds or what the circumstances you feel fortunate.
When you think about it when you're on top of the world, when you're "happy go lucky", and all that wonderful stuff that we like to think about in this world and the pleasures that it brings; we can be farther from God than ever. It's when we're contrite, when we're meek, when we may be experiencing some kind of pain that we also experience the indwelling of God's Holy Spirit and much more strength and growth. So, these things can be good in and of themselves because they open us to the indwelling of God's Kingdom.
There is a Buddhist poem and riddle which is meant to teach that goes: There was a monk that was running from a hungry bear. The monk came to the edge of a cliff and the only chance he had to escape the bear was to jump off the cliff. As he was falling he grasped onto a tree root that was growing out of the cliff face and held on for his life. He looked down below him and saw a hungry lion that was waiting for him to drop. He didn't know what to do, and as he was hanging there contemplating his next move two gophers come out of the cliff face and begin eating on the root he's hanging by, so it looks like all is lost. As he's looking around for a way to escape he notices some strawberries growing on a small ledge next to him with one really large ripe strawberry hanging in the midsts of the plant. He reaches over and plucks the berry, puts it in his mouth and says "delicious". That's where the riddle ends. The point is that this blessedness that we hear talked about in the beatitudes, this joyfulness we experience is something that is for the here and now. At one point it does tell us that "great is your reward in heaven", but this feeling of inner peace and joy is something you experience now that makes your life worth living no matter what the circumstances are. You can have the hungry bear above, the hungry lion below, and the gophers eating at the only root you have to hold on to; but you have the sense of joy and peace because God is with you.
We are guaranteed the pursuit of happiness in this country, and there are a lot of people trying to pursue happiness. They may be pursuing the "blue bird of paradise" only to find out later that they've been following a crow all along. Many say "if we just had enough money, we would be happy". That seems to be the American Dream. People think that all their problems will be solved if they had "plenty of money", but some of the most unhappy people in the world are billionaires who don't know what to do with their money. Some have started to follow a beautiful path by just giving it away, and making their life's work to give away what they've spent their lives accumulating. It really is a beautiful thing. Then there is the pleasure principle. That brings happiness doesn't it? But, how long does it last? Those who find "happiness" in drugs. It won't be long before they find they have a monkey on their back, and that they are addicted. Addiction is one of the most difficult things to overcome. So, their life doesn't become happy; it becomes miserable. There are all sorts of ways we seek after "happiness".
There was a piece of correspondence found in "Dear Abbey" many years ago. There was a 15 year old girl who wrote in and said "I am unhappy. I don't have the best clothes in school. I don't get the telephone calls I want. I don't have the best friends in the world. I don't have all the money I need to spend in the mall.", and she goes on and on about all these things she doesn't have. There was a 13 year old girl who wrote back in response to what she'd read from this other girl and said "happiness is when you can walk, when you can talk, when you can sing, when you can hear. That is happiness. I feel sorry for this girl who is so unhappy, but she can do all these things. At thirteen, I can't walk but I'm happy". She was walking into the kingdom of God, even though she couldn't physically walk; because she realized the joy of having those things even though she had a major component in her life missing. So, even with the bear above, the lion below, and the gophers going at it; there is still the Joy of the Lord! Those who trust in Him can have a marvelous existence no matter what the circumstances are surrounding their lives.
C.S. Lewis wrote the book "Surprised by Joy". The book had a two part theme to it. Staring out, Lewis was a confirmed bachelor and a confirmed atheist. Then he meets a woman by the name of Joy, who is an American citizen living in England and she has cancer. She wants to stay in England to be treated there for her cancer, but the only way for her to do that is for her to marry an Englishman. Lewis says that he had a melting of the heart as a bachelor, and he married Joy. Their marriage lasted for three years until she died. But, during that three years of their marriage relationship he had a greater sense of joy than he'd had in all of his life. The other surprise was the joy of knowing Christ. He said "I'd been seeking after all kinds of things that I thought I needed in my life. I had expectations for this and that". He said that only after his conversion did he discover that real joy was a by product. You have your life committed to something, to God in Christ. There's a marvelous way, again no matter what the circumstances are, of having that inner peace and joy in knowing that the Lord is with you. That you can trust in Him.
There's an Hassidic tale involving a rabbi in a small community who was deathly ill. All of the Jewish community were talking among themselves worrying because this was the only rabbi they had, how were they going to get another rabbi out here in the middle of nowhere. So, they all decided to go to the synagogue and pray for their rabbi. Well, the town drunk goes up to the local tavern only to find that it's closed because the owner is at the synagogue praying for his rabbi. Some people pass him on their way to synagogue and chastise him saying "you need to be praying for the rabbi not worrying about getting something to drink". So, somewhat reluctantly, he follows them to pray. "Dear God, please let the rabbi get well so I can have my schnapps". Well, at the very moment he said that prayer the rabbi was healed, and the rabbi explained to the people: "no matter what you think of this guy; he was sincerely praying with all his heart, with all his mind, with all his spirit. He was trusting that God would give him what he needed". Now, we don't really want to emulate the town drunk, yet he was the only one who was sincere in his prayer, who was completely trusting in God that He would provide his needs. That's where we need to be in our lives in Christ. To be totally trusting God.
In Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" it doesn't say "Happy, Happy, We Adore Thee" does it? It says "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee". We are joy filled in Christ with the indwelling of His Holy Spirit. Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee!
Monday, October 24, 2011
Love Is a Verb!
Sermon 23OCT11
"Love is a Verb!"
Matthew 22:34-46
There was a psychology professor who lived in a neighborhood which had a number of children living in it. He had no children of his own, but he would often see parents disciplining their children, punishing them and perhaps even spanking them and he would say "You should love your children, not punish them". One hot Saturday he was put working on his driveway. He was resurfacing it where cracks and chips had appeared and getting it back into a smooth finish. After working all day in the hot sun, sweat pouring from his brow, he started back to his house to put his tools up and to relax. As he's putting his tools up in his garage he sees put of the corner of his eye this little boy walking through the fresh concrete that he'd worked so hard to get smooth and level. This got him furious. He stormed over to the little boy, grabbed him, and started to spank him. One of his neighbors saw what was going on and called out to the man, "Now doctor, you know you're supposed to love the child not punish him". The professor replied back, "I do love him in the abstract, but NOT in the CONCRETE!"
I think that's one of the problems we have with love. It's easy to love in the abstract, but when it gets into the concrete reality of loving particular people it suddenly becomes very difficult. I always get nervous when I hear someone say "I just love everybody". You could examine that person's life and find they probably aren't measuring up to that declaration of "I just love everybody". It's not easy to love. Some people are very difficult to love. I think this is one reason our Lord has put this is the form of a commandment. The two greatest commandments: "The first is you are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. The second is like unto it, you are to love your neighbor as yourself." That sums up all the law and the prophets! So, that we love is a commandment.
One of Bartlett's familiar quotations says more on love than anything else. She reads the definitions of love and they range anywhere from some kind of sentimental romantic "love" down to "love is not having to say you're sorry". You don't get much substance put of defining love. Love is something that happens; it's something that you do. In his book "The Practice of Love", Ashley Montegau asked a mother about her child and to define love, but she really doesn't know how to define it she just knows what it is. She may say "it's something that makes the heart leap with joy". He says in his book "you don't have to be a grammarian to know what love is, you just have to have a heart".
We had our grand-daughter over at our house last evening and I know what mothers are talking about; just to have this beautiful child around brings joy to our hearts. I think mothers feel the same thing. But not all of them do, do they? We've heard some horrid stories about children that are mistreated or even killed by one of their parents, or even both parents. The thing about love though is it's something you learn. You were either brought up in a loving home, or you weren't. If you were brought up in a loving home you will, most likely, pass that love on. Human beings were created to love, and to be loved; to receive love and to give love. If somehow we've missed out on learning what love is about we're probably in trouble in our lives in some horrible way.
There was a pastor who had a problem with one particular member of his congregation. This person was born to object. They objected to everything. Anything the Church decided to do, they would object to it; they would find something wrong with it. One day the pastor sat down with a friend and said "I know the Lord says we're supposed to love our enemies and our neighbors, but I don't know how I'm supposed to love this guy". The friend gave him a very wise response "You know, love isn't about fondness. Love isn't about loving someone who's lovable. Christian love is something that you just DO".
You know the "Golden Rule"? Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It doesn't say "feel" about others as you would have them "feel" about you. Love is something that we do; it's an "action" word, a verb. If you don't love, you don't do! You can say "I love everyone", then actually hate them by not doing! So often people don't see it the right way.
There was a Chaplain at a Roman Catholic girl's school. He would often have students come to his office for a "chat", but usually it was because there was some problem. So the girls knew if they had a problem they could go to the chaplain. One day this girl named Anne came to the office to chat. After a while she finally admitted to the chaplain what the problem was. She had a friend named Dianne who was on drugs and alcohol, her grades were going down, she was having trouble with her parents, she was loosing her friends, but she was such a good friend to this girl that Anne didn't feel like she could say anything bad to her. Other people were talking about her behind her back and putting her down, and Anne didn't want her to think that even her close friends were turning on her. The chaplain happened to think of something that Dietrich Bonhoeffer said during World War II. "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing". We heard from Leviticus today: "reprove your neighbor". If he's messing up reprove him, approach him! Some of the loneliest people in this world are the ones who are dealing with an alcohol or drug addiction, and they KNOW they need help. Your approaching them and talking to them about their problem may raise them up to the point that they seek the help they need. So, make the reprove. The greatest evil in this world is when good people do nothing. Look what horrible things have happened in history (for instance, in Hitler's Germany) and in our world today simply because good people DID NOTHING!
There was an evangelist who also wrote books. He was doing a preaching mission in a Mid Western town. In his books he liked to talk about the important people he'd met in his life. On this occasion he went to dinner that evening after he'd preached with a retired missionary. It was an older man, and the evangelist couldn't even remember his name. Through the evening the old man kept talking about his son Henry. The evangelist was actually getting bored with all this, but the man kept in talking about his son. He told the evangelist how Henry had tried his hand at journalism and failed, but one of Henry's friends had an idea about some new types of magazines. The old man told him "I had $600 dollars left in my life savings, but I gave all that to my son and his friend". The old man then told the evangelist "You may know my son, Henry Luce; he started 'Life', 'Time', and 'Fortune' magazines". The old man, the father was willing to believe in his son's ideas and dreams enough to make the sacrifice of his life savings. He didn't just say "I love my son", he put action, he put money, he invested himself behind his son; and it worked. That doesn't mean it'll always work, but the point is he DID SOMETHING with the love he had for his son.
Have you seen the movie "A Man and A Boy"? I think it got bad reviews, but I've seen it several times cause in like it so much. Hugh Grant plays the lead. It's an English movie, a little bit of a comedy; it's not romantic particularly. At any rate, Hugh Grant plays this individual who says through his lifestyle "I am an island unto myself". We know the reverse of that "No man is an island unto himself". We know the truth and the reality of the fact that no man can really be an island, but he seemed to want to act this way. His father had written some popular song, so he lived off the royalties of that song. He had a very nice apartment, could buy anything he wanted to, could eat where ever he wanted to, and he had all these wonderful things. Then comes along this little boy. He raps on his door and gains entry, the kid hangs around for a little while; but Hugh Grant doesn't really pay him much attention. The problem is the kid has a very bad home life. His mother has attempted suicide, or has talked about it in front of the boy. At any rate, the boy simply doesn't want to go home, so he comes to Hugh Grant's apartment. After a while he starts warming up to having the boy around; he even goes to a department store and buys the boy some very expensive athletic shoes. He says in the movie that when he bought those shoes it gave him a warm feeling in his heart like he was really doing something for this young man. The boy was being bullied quite a bit in school, and in the next scene the boy is standing in the rain at his mother's door and she asks him "where are your new shoes?". Someone had stolen them. Later in the movie Christmas comes around and the boy asks Grant what he does on Christmas. He tells the boy he usually buys a bottle and sits at home watching videos and getting drunk. Well, the boy wanted him to come to his home and spend Christmas with him and his mom. So he does. His mom wasn't happy about this and Hugh Grant almost leaves, but the boy insists "NO, I invited him, I want him here for Christmas". Grant admits later in the movie that sitting around that table he felt the warmth of Christmas, he felt the warmth of family; even though this wasn't the ideal family at all he had the first real Christmas that he'd had since he was a child.
This reminds me of C.S. Lewis' "Four Loves", where he talks about how if you're going to love you first have to be vulnerable. You have to be willing to put your heart out there. You may even have it broken, but if your not willing to do that then you can probably be an island unto yourself; but you wrap yourself up in your selfish images, you have no real relationships with other people. He says it's very much like putting your heart in a casket, in a coffin. It's very safe there. There's no air, there's no disturbance; your heart will not be broken, but your heart WILL change. It will become impenetrable. It will become unreachable. It will become unredeemable.
"Love is a Verb!"
Matthew 22:34-46
There was a psychology professor who lived in a neighborhood which had a number of children living in it. He had no children of his own, but he would often see parents disciplining their children, punishing them and perhaps even spanking them and he would say "You should love your children, not punish them". One hot Saturday he was put working on his driveway. He was resurfacing it where cracks and chips had appeared and getting it back into a smooth finish. After working all day in the hot sun, sweat pouring from his brow, he started back to his house to put his tools up and to relax. As he's putting his tools up in his garage he sees put of the corner of his eye this little boy walking through the fresh concrete that he'd worked so hard to get smooth and level. This got him furious. He stormed over to the little boy, grabbed him, and started to spank him. One of his neighbors saw what was going on and called out to the man, "Now doctor, you know you're supposed to love the child not punish him". The professor replied back, "I do love him in the abstract, but NOT in the CONCRETE!"
I think that's one of the problems we have with love. It's easy to love in the abstract, but when it gets into the concrete reality of loving particular people it suddenly becomes very difficult. I always get nervous when I hear someone say "I just love everybody". You could examine that person's life and find they probably aren't measuring up to that declaration of "I just love everybody". It's not easy to love. Some people are very difficult to love. I think this is one reason our Lord has put this is the form of a commandment. The two greatest commandments: "The first is you are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. The second is like unto it, you are to love your neighbor as yourself." That sums up all the law and the prophets! So, that we love is a commandment.
One of Bartlett's familiar quotations says more on love than anything else. She reads the definitions of love and they range anywhere from some kind of sentimental romantic "love" down to "love is not having to say you're sorry". You don't get much substance put of defining love. Love is something that happens; it's something that you do. In his book "The Practice of Love", Ashley Montegau asked a mother about her child and to define love, but she really doesn't know how to define it she just knows what it is. She may say "it's something that makes the heart leap with joy". He says in his book "you don't have to be a grammarian to know what love is, you just have to have a heart".
We had our grand-daughter over at our house last evening and I know what mothers are talking about; just to have this beautiful child around brings joy to our hearts. I think mothers feel the same thing. But not all of them do, do they? We've heard some horrid stories about children that are mistreated or even killed by one of their parents, or even both parents. The thing about love though is it's something you learn. You were either brought up in a loving home, or you weren't. If you were brought up in a loving home you will, most likely, pass that love on. Human beings were created to love, and to be loved; to receive love and to give love. If somehow we've missed out on learning what love is about we're probably in trouble in our lives in some horrible way.
There was a pastor who had a problem with one particular member of his congregation. This person was born to object. They objected to everything. Anything the Church decided to do, they would object to it; they would find something wrong with it. One day the pastor sat down with a friend and said "I know the Lord says we're supposed to love our enemies and our neighbors, but I don't know how I'm supposed to love this guy". The friend gave him a very wise response "You know, love isn't about fondness. Love isn't about loving someone who's lovable. Christian love is something that you just DO".
You know the "Golden Rule"? Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It doesn't say "feel" about others as you would have them "feel" about you. Love is something that we do; it's an "action" word, a verb. If you don't love, you don't do! You can say "I love everyone", then actually hate them by not doing! So often people don't see it the right way.
There was a Chaplain at a Roman Catholic girl's school. He would often have students come to his office for a "chat", but usually it was because there was some problem. So the girls knew if they had a problem they could go to the chaplain. One day this girl named Anne came to the office to chat. After a while she finally admitted to the chaplain what the problem was. She had a friend named Dianne who was on drugs and alcohol, her grades were going down, she was having trouble with her parents, she was loosing her friends, but she was such a good friend to this girl that Anne didn't feel like she could say anything bad to her. Other people were talking about her behind her back and putting her down, and Anne didn't want her to think that even her close friends were turning on her. The chaplain happened to think of something that Dietrich Bonhoeffer said during World War II. "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing". We heard from Leviticus today: "reprove your neighbor". If he's messing up reprove him, approach him! Some of the loneliest people in this world are the ones who are dealing with an alcohol or drug addiction, and they KNOW they need help. Your approaching them and talking to them about their problem may raise them up to the point that they seek the help they need. So, make the reprove. The greatest evil in this world is when good people do nothing. Look what horrible things have happened in history (for instance, in Hitler's Germany) and in our world today simply because good people DID NOTHING!
There was an evangelist who also wrote books. He was doing a preaching mission in a Mid Western town. In his books he liked to talk about the important people he'd met in his life. On this occasion he went to dinner that evening after he'd preached with a retired missionary. It was an older man, and the evangelist couldn't even remember his name. Through the evening the old man kept talking about his son Henry. The evangelist was actually getting bored with all this, but the man kept in talking about his son. He told the evangelist how Henry had tried his hand at journalism and failed, but one of Henry's friends had an idea about some new types of magazines. The old man told him "I had $600 dollars left in my life savings, but I gave all that to my son and his friend". The old man then told the evangelist "You may know my son, Henry Luce; he started 'Life', 'Time', and 'Fortune' magazines". The old man, the father was willing to believe in his son's ideas and dreams enough to make the sacrifice of his life savings. He didn't just say "I love my son", he put action, he put money, he invested himself behind his son; and it worked. That doesn't mean it'll always work, but the point is he DID SOMETHING with the love he had for his son.
Have you seen the movie "A Man and A Boy"? I think it got bad reviews, but I've seen it several times cause in like it so much. Hugh Grant plays the lead. It's an English movie, a little bit of a comedy; it's not romantic particularly. At any rate, Hugh Grant plays this individual who says through his lifestyle "I am an island unto myself". We know the reverse of that "No man is an island unto himself". We know the truth and the reality of the fact that no man can really be an island, but he seemed to want to act this way. His father had written some popular song, so he lived off the royalties of that song. He had a very nice apartment, could buy anything he wanted to, could eat where ever he wanted to, and he had all these wonderful things. Then comes along this little boy. He raps on his door and gains entry, the kid hangs around for a little while; but Hugh Grant doesn't really pay him much attention. The problem is the kid has a very bad home life. His mother has attempted suicide, or has talked about it in front of the boy. At any rate, the boy simply doesn't want to go home, so he comes to Hugh Grant's apartment. After a while he starts warming up to having the boy around; he even goes to a department store and buys the boy some very expensive athletic shoes. He says in the movie that when he bought those shoes it gave him a warm feeling in his heart like he was really doing something for this young man. The boy was being bullied quite a bit in school, and in the next scene the boy is standing in the rain at his mother's door and she asks him "where are your new shoes?". Someone had stolen them. Later in the movie Christmas comes around and the boy asks Grant what he does on Christmas. He tells the boy he usually buys a bottle and sits at home watching videos and getting drunk. Well, the boy wanted him to come to his home and spend Christmas with him and his mom. So he does. His mom wasn't happy about this and Hugh Grant almost leaves, but the boy insists "NO, I invited him, I want him here for Christmas". Grant admits later in the movie that sitting around that table he felt the warmth of Christmas, he felt the warmth of family; even though this wasn't the ideal family at all he had the first real Christmas that he'd had since he was a child.
This reminds me of C.S. Lewis' "Four Loves", where he talks about how if you're going to love you first have to be vulnerable. You have to be willing to put your heart out there. You may even have it broken, but if your not willing to do that then you can probably be an island unto yourself; but you wrap yourself up in your selfish images, you have no real relationships with other people. He says it's very much like putting your heart in a casket, in a coffin. It's very safe there. There's no air, there's no disturbance; your heart will not be broken, but your heart WILL change. It will become impenetrable. It will become unreachable. It will become unredeemable.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Render unto God that which is God's
Sermon 16OCT11
"Render unto God that which is God's"
Matthew 22:15-22
I Thessalonians 1:1-10
In one of Jack Benny's skits he was being held up by a robber. The robber with a pistol in his hand demands, "Give me your LIFE or your MONEY!". There was a long pause, and the robber getting quite nervous demands again "I said I want your LIFE or your MONEY!". Jack Benny looks at him and says "I'M THINKING, I'M THINKING!". That story illustrates two of the major decisions we make in our lives: What to do with our life, and what to do with our money.
What we do with our life often depends on how much money we have to decide what do to with, and I must make this parenthetical expression today. Occupy Wall Street; that movement is going across the nation and the world. We live in a nation and in a world where the rich are getting richer and poor are getting poorer. If you don't think the Bible has a lot to say about the poor and how we are to treat them, then I think you have not read the Bible; particularly the Prophets. This has to be a major concern. This is the seed of revolution! Some people don't even have a decision as to what to do with their money, because they don't have money to do anything with. They don't have food to put on their table for themselves or their children and the roof over their head is being taken away from them. This has to be a major concern. That's not what the sermon is about, but I had to say it. This has to be a major prayerful concern of all of God's people, it HAS to be.
As I said before, two of the major decisions in our lives are what to do with our life and what to do with our money. St. Paul, in our epistle today, spoke to the Thessalonians in a beutiful fashion about how they conducted their Christian lives. They are Holy examples in Macedonia and Achaia and others had heard of how they lived their lives in the Spirit of Christ with joy. Their lives were a Holy example, they were exemplary, it was a beautiful thing to see the way they conducted their lives in Christ. Then we get to the Gospel where, again, the religious authorities are trying to trip Jesus up. "Are we to pay tribute to Caesar?" The New Revised Standard translation says "emperor", which I guess is a little more generic. Our Lord says to them, "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto God what is God's". That sounds simple doesn't it? The image on the coin was that of the emperor, the image on US is God. When you are Baptized and Confirmed you are MARKED, you are sealed as Christ's own FOREVER! That's the image that we bear; the image of Christ, the image of God. Therefore, we owe EVERTHING; our body, our mind, our soul to GOD. And that's not always easy to accomplish, but there it is.
There was a court jester who had gotten in trouble with his Caliph in Baghdad, but during his time of service he had entertained his Caliph beautifully and given him many laughs and so on. Somehow though he had become cross wise with the Caliph, so the Caliph said to him "I am going to demand your life, but since you have served me well in the past and brought me so much laughter I'm going to let you decide how you are going to die". So the jester responds to him "Dear Caliph, if it is possible I would like to die of old age". We don't always have a choice in how we are to die, do we? We do have a choice in how we are to live though. Remember those two major decisions we have; what we are going to do with our life, and entailed in that is what we are going to do with our possessions.
There was a family that had it worked out quite nicely; that the man was, as it should be, the head of the household. Therefore he was to make all the major decisions and his wife made the minor decisions. So the man worried about the "big stuff" like American Foriegn Policy, and the wife decided where they were going to live and how they were going to spend their money. I don't know about your household, but in ours that's how it works; my wife makes those "minor" decisions while the "major" decisions are left up to me. Perhaps that's the way it should be, she's certainly better at the financial decisions. Sometimes I slip up and make unwise monetary decisions, but that's another story. Anyway, those decisions about our life and money follow suite together.
Luciano Pavarotti, the great operatic tenor, had a major decision to make about his life. He was good at two things, singing and soccer. What's interesting is his mother wanted him to be a soccer coach, and his father wanted him to sing. You would think it would be the other way around. He went to a teacher's college and graduated, was taught by one of the finest tenors of his day. The time came though that he had to make a decision about what he was going to do with his life. He went to his dad and told him "dad, I don't know what to do". His dad told him "son, you cannot sit between two chairs. If you try you're going to fall to the floor. You are going to have to decide which chair you are going to sit in." That's reminiscent of the words our Lord put to us: "I put before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose LIFE." Pavarotti chose to sing, and the blessing and the wonder that he was to the world of music is, perhaps, unsurpassed. Obviously he sat in the right chair.
Sören Kirkegard, the father of the existentialist movement also had a decision to make. He really would have preferred to be a father of another kind. He was engaged to a fine young lady, Regina Oleson. Early on though he broke off the engagement, because he realized his life had to be committed to writing, to philosophy, and to theology. He was going contrary to the philosophy and theology of his day in his expression of existentialism. He was saying the individual is of supreme importance; that every individual is at the center of God's decision making. That we all have to make our decision. So, Kirkegard made his decision and did not marry. He worked feverishly writing all his life and died at the young age of 42. In making the decision he realized that he would be going contrary to the thoughts of his day, and that if he had a family they would be exposed to the gossip and hatred of his critics. So his decision was for the benefit of the family that he "might" have had. He went on to talk about the importance of decision making; you decide for one thing, and therefore you do not decide for something else.
There's an "either/or" involved in our decision making, and we never know what exactly is the "right" decision. There's something called "cognitive dissonance"; it's when we make a decision and then don't know if we made the right choice. One that comes to mind is something I haven't had to do in a long time, and hope to never do again. Buying a NEW CAR. You go to the showroom, pick out this shiny new car, drive it home, and you're thrilled. Then you stay up all night wondering if you made the right decision, if you can make the payments, could I have gotten along with that old jalopy of mine. You experience cognitive dissonance. Kirkegard talked about that kind of thing; what you decide is what you will be, what you don't decide is what you won't be. He used a beautiful expression for that called "Leap of Faith". You've heard that expression. I remember hearing that back in seminary and it left a great impression on me.
An example of that comes from Antichous Epiphanies, who was a successor to Alexander the Great and wanted to occupy Egypt. The only problem was to do that he had to fight the Roman Legions. Before the battle took place, he and the Roman General had a conference to talk about what was about to happen. Antichous wanted to think about it, so they conversed for quite a while. Finally the Roman General drew a circle in the sand around Antichous and told him, "before you leave that circle I want you to make your decision". Make your Leap of Faith, that's a difficult thing to do.
Thomas Barkley was a marvelous Presbyterian missionary in Taiwan. Early on in his life he made his decision to follow Christ. At the age of 16 he was at the university of Glasgow. While he was there he wrote a statement out and titled it "My Decision". His decision was to give everything he had; his body, his possessions, his mind. Everything that he had he said "I commit to God". On every birthday from then until the age of 85, when he died, he would sign that commitment. This was found among his papers after his death and it had grown quite yellow with age. So, he had said to God: "I give you everything that I have", at the end of the statement he said "Your will be done, not mine."
"Render unto God that which is God's"
Matthew 22:15-22
I Thessalonians 1:1-10
In one of Jack Benny's skits he was being held up by a robber. The robber with a pistol in his hand demands, "Give me your LIFE or your MONEY!". There was a long pause, and the robber getting quite nervous demands again "I said I want your LIFE or your MONEY!". Jack Benny looks at him and says "I'M THINKING, I'M THINKING!". That story illustrates two of the major decisions we make in our lives: What to do with our life, and what to do with our money.
What we do with our life often depends on how much money we have to decide what do to with, and I must make this parenthetical expression today. Occupy Wall Street; that movement is going across the nation and the world. We live in a nation and in a world where the rich are getting richer and poor are getting poorer. If you don't think the Bible has a lot to say about the poor and how we are to treat them, then I think you have not read the Bible; particularly the Prophets. This has to be a major concern. This is the seed of revolution! Some people don't even have a decision as to what to do with their money, because they don't have money to do anything with. They don't have food to put on their table for themselves or their children and the roof over their head is being taken away from them. This has to be a major concern. That's not what the sermon is about, but I had to say it. This has to be a major prayerful concern of all of God's people, it HAS to be.
As I said before, two of the major decisions in our lives are what to do with our life and what to do with our money. St. Paul, in our epistle today, spoke to the Thessalonians in a beutiful fashion about how they conducted their Christian lives. They are Holy examples in Macedonia and Achaia and others had heard of how they lived their lives in the Spirit of Christ with joy. Their lives were a Holy example, they were exemplary, it was a beautiful thing to see the way they conducted their lives in Christ. Then we get to the Gospel where, again, the religious authorities are trying to trip Jesus up. "Are we to pay tribute to Caesar?" The New Revised Standard translation says "emperor", which I guess is a little more generic. Our Lord says to them, "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto God what is God's". That sounds simple doesn't it? The image on the coin was that of the emperor, the image on US is God. When you are Baptized and Confirmed you are MARKED, you are sealed as Christ's own FOREVER! That's the image that we bear; the image of Christ, the image of God. Therefore, we owe EVERTHING; our body, our mind, our soul to GOD. And that's not always easy to accomplish, but there it is.
There was a court jester who had gotten in trouble with his Caliph in Baghdad, but during his time of service he had entertained his Caliph beautifully and given him many laughs and so on. Somehow though he had become cross wise with the Caliph, so the Caliph said to him "I am going to demand your life, but since you have served me well in the past and brought me so much laughter I'm going to let you decide how you are going to die". So the jester responds to him "Dear Caliph, if it is possible I would like to die of old age". We don't always have a choice in how we are to die, do we? We do have a choice in how we are to live though. Remember those two major decisions we have; what we are going to do with our life, and entailed in that is what we are going to do with our possessions.
There was a family that had it worked out quite nicely; that the man was, as it should be, the head of the household. Therefore he was to make all the major decisions and his wife made the minor decisions. So the man worried about the "big stuff" like American Foriegn Policy, and the wife decided where they were going to live and how they were going to spend their money. I don't know about your household, but in ours that's how it works; my wife makes those "minor" decisions while the "major" decisions are left up to me. Perhaps that's the way it should be, she's certainly better at the financial decisions. Sometimes I slip up and make unwise monetary decisions, but that's another story. Anyway, those decisions about our life and money follow suite together.
Luciano Pavarotti, the great operatic tenor, had a major decision to make about his life. He was good at two things, singing and soccer. What's interesting is his mother wanted him to be a soccer coach, and his father wanted him to sing. You would think it would be the other way around. He went to a teacher's college and graduated, was taught by one of the finest tenors of his day. The time came though that he had to make a decision about what he was going to do with his life. He went to his dad and told him "dad, I don't know what to do". His dad told him "son, you cannot sit between two chairs. If you try you're going to fall to the floor. You are going to have to decide which chair you are going to sit in." That's reminiscent of the words our Lord put to us: "I put before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose LIFE." Pavarotti chose to sing, and the blessing and the wonder that he was to the world of music is, perhaps, unsurpassed. Obviously he sat in the right chair.
Sören Kirkegard, the father of the existentialist movement also had a decision to make. He really would have preferred to be a father of another kind. He was engaged to a fine young lady, Regina Oleson. Early on though he broke off the engagement, because he realized his life had to be committed to writing, to philosophy, and to theology. He was going contrary to the philosophy and theology of his day in his expression of existentialism. He was saying the individual is of supreme importance; that every individual is at the center of God's decision making. That we all have to make our decision. So, Kirkegard made his decision and did not marry. He worked feverishly writing all his life and died at the young age of 42. In making the decision he realized that he would be going contrary to the thoughts of his day, and that if he had a family they would be exposed to the gossip and hatred of his critics. So his decision was for the benefit of the family that he "might" have had. He went on to talk about the importance of decision making; you decide for one thing, and therefore you do not decide for something else.
There's an "either/or" involved in our decision making, and we never know what exactly is the "right" decision. There's something called "cognitive dissonance"; it's when we make a decision and then don't know if we made the right choice. One that comes to mind is something I haven't had to do in a long time, and hope to never do again. Buying a NEW CAR. You go to the showroom, pick out this shiny new car, drive it home, and you're thrilled. Then you stay up all night wondering if you made the right decision, if you can make the payments, could I have gotten along with that old jalopy of mine. You experience cognitive dissonance. Kirkegard talked about that kind of thing; what you decide is what you will be, what you don't decide is what you won't be. He used a beautiful expression for that called "Leap of Faith". You've heard that expression. I remember hearing that back in seminary and it left a great impression on me.
An example of that comes from Antichous Epiphanies, who was a successor to Alexander the Great and wanted to occupy Egypt. The only problem was to do that he had to fight the Roman Legions. Before the battle took place, he and the Roman General had a conference to talk about what was about to happen. Antichous wanted to think about it, so they conversed for quite a while. Finally the Roman General drew a circle in the sand around Antichous and told him, "before you leave that circle I want you to make your decision". Make your Leap of Faith, that's a difficult thing to do.
Thomas Barkley was a marvelous Presbyterian missionary in Taiwan. Early on in his life he made his decision to follow Christ. At the age of 16 he was at the university of Glasgow. While he was there he wrote a statement out and titled it "My Decision". His decision was to give everything he had; his body, his possessions, his mind. Everything that he had he said "I commit to God". On every birthday from then until the age of 85, when he died, he would sign that commitment. This was found among his papers after his death and it had grown quite yellow with age. So, he had said to God: "I give you everything that I have", at the end of the statement he said "Your will be done, not mine."
Monday, October 10, 2011
Take, Eat, Be Filled With God's Grace.
Sermon 9OCT11
"Take, Eat, be filled with God's Grace."
Matthew 22:1-14
The symbol or image of the "heavenly banquet" is found in both the Old and New Testament. In the Old Testament it seems to be talking about some future bliss when God's Kingdom would be revealed and realized, but when we get to the New Testament it's more of what we would call "realized eschatology". That has to do with somehow the future being present to us, and this is what Jesus is presenting to us in today's parable about the wedding banquet that's been prepared. There are those who find excuses, don't they, not to come. Benjamin Franklin once observed that those who are good at excuses are usually good for nothing else. So, these people were not worthy according to Jesus to come to the wedding banquet because they had refused the invitation, they had refused to come. So it's a judgement, as the parables we've heard the last few weeks have been, against the religious establishment of Jesus' day who refuse to receive the Christ; they refuse to come to the banquet. We find now the invitation is extended to the good and the bad by grace, it's a free gift. "You! Come and join in the wedding banquet". This is a parable of justice, but also a parable of grace.
There was a gourmand who had heard through the gourmet food "grape vine" that there was being served in a New York City restaurant a dish that he had been wanting very badly to try. The problem was that he lived in France, but this wasn't going to stop him from getting to this wonderful dish that he had been longing to try. So, he called the airport to book a flight, but there were no flights. All the flights to New York were full. Even this couldn't stop him though; he arranged flight on a private jet and scheduled a driver to meet him at the airport in New York. So he boards his chartered jet, flies to New York, meets the driver who drops him off right in front of the restaurant, he rushes from the car to the door and pulls on the door. The door won't open! He can see people inside dining and says to himself "I guess they've served their last meal of the day. I've missed out". So he left very cast down, crying because he wasn't going to get to try this wonderful dish that he had gone to so much trouble to locate. The problem is he didn't see that on the door was a sign that read "Please Push". That's how we are so often with God's Grace, the free gift that he offers us. Somehow we find it unbelievable, it's beyond our imagination. Somehow we refuse the invitation that is clearly before us, "Please Push, come on in!" God's Grace is freely extended to us, but somehow we have a way of refusing it and we miss out on the feast.
There was a missionary in Japan during the second world war who had been captured and was being marched to a new prison. As he went along, being elderly, he realized his mission in Japan was almost over anyway and he begged the guard who was marching along beside him to "Please let me fall into the ditch and die in peace". The guard says "MARCH ON!" Going a ways further he asks again to be allowed to fall by the side of the path to die, and again the guard says "MARCH!" Again a third time he pleads with the guard. This time the guard leans over to him and tells him, "We are almost to my grandmothers house, MARCH ON!" The missionary was quite perplexed by this and wondering what was going on here. When they neared the grandmothers house they stopped to take a break and the guard leaves and comes back with a hot potato I his hand. He reaches out and pushes it toward the missionary and says "Take, Eat". Then the guard says again "MARCH ON!" You may not think of a hot potato being a banquet or anything like that, but when I heard this legend I thought of the movie "Dr. Shavargo" and how on the train the peasants were boiling potatoes, after the movie I went home and had a baked potato because it sounded so good. The point being that the Grace that God puts before us in the time of our need may not seem like a "future heavenly banquet" or anything quite like that at all, but God's Grace is always available to us. We just have to reach out and accept it. Take, Eat, be filled with God's Grace.
There is a legend about a fisherman whose name was Aaron. He lived on a river, and labored very hard at his fishing. He was heading home one day really worn out, but Aaron was a dreamer. He dreamed about being wealthy. As he was walking along the way he stumbled upon a leather pouch that was kicked up by his foot, so he reached down picked it up and opened it. It appeared to be full of pebbles. He begins to daydream while casting these "pebbles" into the river. He said to himself "If I were rich my wife and I could have a big house", and he cast another stone. "If we were rich we could have servants", and cast another stone. "If we were rich we could dine sumptuously everyday on wonderful rich foods and vintage wine. We could live so well IF I were ONLY rich". He reaches into the pouch and pulls out the last stone as the sun comes out from behind a cloud and casts a sparkle out of the "pebble" and he realizes he has a valuable gemstone in his hand. In the bag were all these valuable gems which could have made him wealthy, but he's cast them into the river! How often in our dreams of wealth or success or whatever it is do we miss the fact that God's Grace is there for our needs? It's God's Grace that can fulfill us and make us joyous in the faith that we have.
There was a rather questionable "mystic" that lived in Oregon who got deported and left behind 90 Rolls Royces. That's a lot isn't it? He could probably compete with Jay Leno! He did leave one interesting saying: "Before, we are wise. After, we are wise. In between, we are otherwise". I think he had to mean that before we approach some day or some event in our lives we are rehearsing what we're going to do or say that day or at that event. Then we get to the event and do "otherwise". After the event is over we can be wise about it again, and think about what we could have said or done. The fact is though we didn't do it! That "in between" time is a problem time, isn't it?
Let me get a little personal. We had a cousin's gathering Saturday at our home. We decided we ought to get together before the next funeral, so we did. My family, by the way, is very religious; on one side Methodist and on the other side Baptist and they're there every time the Church doors are open, they're very observant of their faith. There were a couple of the cousins there I was a little concerned about in this regard. One of the cousins had married the son of a General from a Latin American country and had gone off and lived a pretty full life possession wise and so on. I performed the wedding between their daughter and new son-in-law in Dallas, before then they were in California getting their PHD's in mathematics when they asked me to perform the ceremony. I asked them to go to a Church there in California to get pre-marital counseling and so forth and see what happens. Well, they chose to go to Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. They LOVED it! Anyway, he called me up a few years ago to tell me he was going into seminary to become an Episcopal Priest. He's a Deacon right now, and in January I believe he'll be ordained a Priest. Maurice and Barbara (his father and mother in law) are both just confused by all this, they don't understand what's going on.
The other cousin who was there who I had been worried about was Jay. He had never been in the habit of going to Church, although his parents were going all the time. But this last Saturday he started talking to me about the Bible and it caught me off guard, I was wondering what was going on. He told me he had been reading a lot (about 27 books about religion, faith, and the Bible), and I told him how wonderful I thought that was. I asked him what had happened, and he told me that he had been without a job, he was in-between and didn't have anything else to do... "So I read the Bible and found out there were some wonderful things in there!" Then he started reading other books and he's going to a Bible study. WONDERFUL! In between he did something with the in between and hopefully Maurice and Barbara will find themselves in the in between and discover their faith as well. So, in the beginning we're wise. In the end we're wise. In between so often we're other wise.
"Take, Eat, be filled with God's Grace."
Matthew 22:1-14
The symbol or image of the "heavenly banquet" is found in both the Old and New Testament. In the Old Testament it seems to be talking about some future bliss when God's Kingdom would be revealed and realized, but when we get to the New Testament it's more of what we would call "realized eschatology". That has to do with somehow the future being present to us, and this is what Jesus is presenting to us in today's parable about the wedding banquet that's been prepared. There are those who find excuses, don't they, not to come. Benjamin Franklin once observed that those who are good at excuses are usually good for nothing else. So, these people were not worthy according to Jesus to come to the wedding banquet because they had refused the invitation, they had refused to come. So it's a judgement, as the parables we've heard the last few weeks have been, against the religious establishment of Jesus' day who refuse to receive the Christ; they refuse to come to the banquet. We find now the invitation is extended to the good and the bad by grace, it's a free gift. "You! Come and join in the wedding banquet". This is a parable of justice, but also a parable of grace.
There was a gourmand who had heard through the gourmet food "grape vine" that there was being served in a New York City restaurant a dish that he had been wanting very badly to try. The problem was that he lived in France, but this wasn't going to stop him from getting to this wonderful dish that he had been longing to try. So, he called the airport to book a flight, but there were no flights. All the flights to New York were full. Even this couldn't stop him though; he arranged flight on a private jet and scheduled a driver to meet him at the airport in New York. So he boards his chartered jet, flies to New York, meets the driver who drops him off right in front of the restaurant, he rushes from the car to the door and pulls on the door. The door won't open! He can see people inside dining and says to himself "I guess they've served their last meal of the day. I've missed out". So he left very cast down, crying because he wasn't going to get to try this wonderful dish that he had gone to so much trouble to locate. The problem is he didn't see that on the door was a sign that read "Please Push". That's how we are so often with God's Grace, the free gift that he offers us. Somehow we find it unbelievable, it's beyond our imagination. Somehow we refuse the invitation that is clearly before us, "Please Push, come on in!" God's Grace is freely extended to us, but somehow we have a way of refusing it and we miss out on the feast.
There was a missionary in Japan during the second world war who had been captured and was being marched to a new prison. As he went along, being elderly, he realized his mission in Japan was almost over anyway and he begged the guard who was marching along beside him to "Please let me fall into the ditch and die in peace". The guard says "MARCH ON!" Going a ways further he asks again to be allowed to fall by the side of the path to die, and again the guard says "MARCH!" Again a third time he pleads with the guard. This time the guard leans over to him and tells him, "We are almost to my grandmothers house, MARCH ON!" The missionary was quite perplexed by this and wondering what was going on here. When they neared the grandmothers house they stopped to take a break and the guard leaves and comes back with a hot potato I his hand. He reaches out and pushes it toward the missionary and says "Take, Eat". Then the guard says again "MARCH ON!" You may not think of a hot potato being a banquet or anything like that, but when I heard this legend I thought of the movie "Dr. Shavargo" and how on the train the peasants were boiling potatoes, after the movie I went home and had a baked potato because it sounded so good. The point being that the Grace that God puts before us in the time of our need may not seem like a "future heavenly banquet" or anything quite like that at all, but God's Grace is always available to us. We just have to reach out and accept it. Take, Eat, be filled with God's Grace.
There is a legend about a fisherman whose name was Aaron. He lived on a river, and labored very hard at his fishing. He was heading home one day really worn out, but Aaron was a dreamer. He dreamed about being wealthy. As he was walking along the way he stumbled upon a leather pouch that was kicked up by his foot, so he reached down picked it up and opened it. It appeared to be full of pebbles. He begins to daydream while casting these "pebbles" into the river. He said to himself "If I were rich my wife and I could have a big house", and he cast another stone. "If we were rich we could have servants", and cast another stone. "If we were rich we could dine sumptuously everyday on wonderful rich foods and vintage wine. We could live so well IF I were ONLY rich". He reaches into the pouch and pulls out the last stone as the sun comes out from behind a cloud and casts a sparkle out of the "pebble" and he realizes he has a valuable gemstone in his hand. In the bag were all these valuable gems which could have made him wealthy, but he's cast them into the river! How often in our dreams of wealth or success or whatever it is do we miss the fact that God's Grace is there for our needs? It's God's Grace that can fulfill us and make us joyous in the faith that we have.
There was a rather questionable "mystic" that lived in Oregon who got deported and left behind 90 Rolls Royces. That's a lot isn't it? He could probably compete with Jay Leno! He did leave one interesting saying: "Before, we are wise. After, we are wise. In between, we are otherwise". I think he had to mean that before we approach some day or some event in our lives we are rehearsing what we're going to do or say that day or at that event. Then we get to the event and do "otherwise". After the event is over we can be wise about it again, and think about what we could have said or done. The fact is though we didn't do it! That "in between" time is a problem time, isn't it?
Let me get a little personal. We had a cousin's gathering Saturday at our home. We decided we ought to get together before the next funeral, so we did. My family, by the way, is very religious; on one side Methodist and on the other side Baptist and they're there every time the Church doors are open, they're very observant of their faith. There were a couple of the cousins there I was a little concerned about in this regard. One of the cousins had married the son of a General from a Latin American country and had gone off and lived a pretty full life possession wise and so on. I performed the wedding between their daughter and new son-in-law in Dallas, before then they were in California getting their PHD's in mathematics when they asked me to perform the ceremony. I asked them to go to a Church there in California to get pre-marital counseling and so forth and see what happens. Well, they chose to go to Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. They LOVED it! Anyway, he called me up a few years ago to tell me he was going into seminary to become an Episcopal Priest. He's a Deacon right now, and in January I believe he'll be ordained a Priest. Maurice and Barbara (his father and mother in law) are both just confused by all this, they don't understand what's going on.
The other cousin who was there who I had been worried about was Jay. He had never been in the habit of going to Church, although his parents were going all the time. But this last Saturday he started talking to me about the Bible and it caught me off guard, I was wondering what was going on. He told me he had been reading a lot (about 27 books about religion, faith, and the Bible), and I told him how wonderful I thought that was. I asked him what had happened, and he told me that he had been without a job, he was in-between and didn't have anything else to do... "So I read the Bible and found out there were some wonderful things in there!" Then he started reading other books and he's going to a Bible study. WONDERFUL! In between he did something with the in between and hopefully Maurice and Barbara will find themselves in the in between and discover their faith as well. So, in the beginning we're wise. In the end we're wise. In between so often we're other wise.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
We Reserve the Right to Accept EVERYONE!
Sermon Summary 2OCT11
"We reserve the right to accept EVERYONE"
Matthew 21:33-46
"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." We all know how untrue that saying is. It probably was the result of a parent whose child had been hurt by something that had been said about them, and this is some consolation to the child as wrong as we know it to be. Home is a place where we have to be accepted isn't it? You go home they have to accept you, but we all experience rejection in the world and today's Gospel is about acceptance and about rejection.
Each year 4,500 young people between the ages of 10 and 24 commit suicide, and a lot of that is the result of bullying. It's a major problem in our schools and schools are having to deal with this increasing problem of bullying. A lot of it has to do with the Internet and so on which multiplies the problem, but this thing they call "sexting" really creates a lot of problems for young people. But, it is something that we have to be concerned about and it revolves around this same acceptance or rejection. Now if you go to school and you're a little different they're very likely going to pick on you. This one boy seemed to be handling it quite well; he was a high school student in Buffalo New York, and he was a gay young man, a gay teen (they are much more likely to commit suicide than the "normal" population of the schools). He seemed to be handling the bullying quite well, he even developed this t-shirt campaign (you may have seen or heard about) that said simply "IT WILL GET BETTER". You know, just hang in there things will get better... Then, a couple of weeks ago he was found dead near his home in Buffalo; he had committed suicide. I saw his parents the other day on the "Today Show" and his mother was wearing one of his t-shirts "IT WILL GET BETTER". She said her and her husband felt it necessary to keep the campaign going to encourage other gay teens that it WILL get BETTER.
Of course other students are victims of bullying as well, when I was in school "coodie detectors" (a folded piece of paper people would rub in your hair and then unfold to reveal a message of whether or not you had "coodies") was one of the popular forms of bullying. Today it's become "cyber-bullying", ganging up on someone on the internet and spreading rumors and gossip about them to the point that a young woman's reputation can be ruined and as a result SHE commits suicide. It's a HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE thing and it's not just the young people. There was another report on the "Today Show" dealing with a small town (about 4,000 people) called Mountain Grove where texting and the Internet had become a real problem because it was bearing gossip. Gossip about the local townspeople, and in that small of a town everyone knows who you are. There was a rumor started on the Internet about this older woman in town saying that she was running a "sex club". Then there was yet another rumor about one of the young women in town who was interviewed and she said "you know, it's something you just can't get away from. It's always out there in cyber space and you can't get away from it." So she said that she was moving because she just couldn't continue to live in that town any longer.
There was a young man who was applying to colleges and he had just gotten a letter of rejection from the Dean of Admissions. So he wrote a letter back to this particular Dean:
"Dear Dean,
I just received your letter of rejection to my application. I'm sorry to tell you that I cannot accept it. I've been rejected by four other colleges already, and that is beyond my limit. Therefore, I must reject your rejection. I hope this is not a great inconvenience to you, but I am planning on showing up for class registration and orientation on September the 18th."
He seemed to have a healthy way of dealing with his rejection, but we don't always do that, do we?
Of course, one of the most horrible rejections is loosing a job. How do you feed your family? How do you clothe them? How will you house them? You may loose your car, your house, your possessions all because you lost your job. There are too many people in this country today (and even throughout the world) who have lost their jobs, and that's a horrible rejection to have. There was this man who got up one Friday morning and announced to his wife "I'm going to work today and I'm going to ask my boss for a raise. I really think I deserve it." Well, toward the end of the day he finally worked up the courage to go into the boss' office and ask for the raise. Much to his surprise the boss said "You know what? I agree with you, it's time you had a raise and I'm going to give you one." So the man goes home very happy that day. As he walks into the house he notices the dining room has been set, candles lit, napkins beautifully folded, the finest china and silverware they owned were laid out on the table waiting for a feast... everything looked beautiful. He goes into the kitchen and announces to his wife "I GOT THE RAISE!" So they go into the dining room and sit down for a festive dinner. When he sits down at the table he notices a card folded and laying on his plate, he opens it and reads: "Dear, I knew you were going to get the raise. You deserved it, and these things are to show you that I love you." After they finished a festive and delicious main course the wife goes into the kitchen to bring desert and the husband finds another card that had fallen out of her pocket that read: "Dear, I'm sorry that you didn't get the raise. I know you deserve it, and I do these things to show you that I love you." So she was prepared to go either way. I think God deals with us in that same open fashion. You know our God is not a God of rejection, but of love and forgiveness and acceptance, and the prayer that we heard today had to do with those most tragic words we hear during Holy Week "He came unto his own, and His own received Him not." If anyone ever experienced rejection it was Jesus the Christ. Today's parable had to do with the vineyard being given over to "new tenants", and the early Church saw itself as being the "new tenants" of the Old Testament promises and the gift of the Christ as he comes to us in the New Testament and in the Church of Jesus Christ. So it's all about acceptance and not rejection.
There was a young Private in the Army who was in the habit of kneeling by his rack every night to say his prayers. Well, his Sergeant found this to be a ridiculous practice and would chide him for saying his prayers every night like that. One evening the Sergeant came in drunk and found the Private kneeling beside his rack praying, so he kicked the Private across the room. The next morning the Sergeant woke up only to find his boots at the foot of his rack and they had been meticulously polished to a fine gloss. So he walked over to the young Private and said "tell me something about this God of yours". The point is we go on with our witness even though we think we're being rejected having faith that out of the way we receive rejection, the way we handle the rejection might cause someone to come by faith to the God we know...this wonderful God of forgiveness and love.
Did you know today is Worldwide Communion Sunday? So many Churches that don't normally have Communion in their services every Sunday are having Communion today throughout the world. So we think of the rich and the powerful, the poor and the powerless, those people from every race and nation that come to the Lord's Table. It's the one place where we come no matter what our differences are, and we find ourselves in the hands of a loving and accepting God.
Out there in the world we may be broken by the rejection we experience. We know our God uses brokeness, doesn't he? The soil has to be broken before the grain can be planted. The clouds have to be broken before they can pour out the rain upon the vineyard. The grain has to be broken and ground before it can be made into bread. The grapes have to be crushed before they can be made into wine. So we come to the Table of the Lord in our brokeness and through the One who was broken and then Resurrected we find ourselves. Even though broken, there is the power of God to put us back together and make us whole again. We have those beautiful words from today's Gospel "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone". Even though we're by the world rejected, we are by God accepted and made part of that cornerstone which is Jesus Christ.
There was a sign in front of a Church in New Jersey that read simply: "We reserve the right to accept EVERYONE".
"We reserve the right to accept EVERYONE"
Matthew 21:33-46
"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me." We all know how untrue that saying is. It probably was the result of a parent whose child had been hurt by something that had been said about them, and this is some consolation to the child as wrong as we know it to be. Home is a place where we have to be accepted isn't it? You go home they have to accept you, but we all experience rejection in the world and today's Gospel is about acceptance and about rejection.
Each year 4,500 young people between the ages of 10 and 24 commit suicide, and a lot of that is the result of bullying. It's a major problem in our schools and schools are having to deal with this increasing problem of bullying. A lot of it has to do with the Internet and so on which multiplies the problem, but this thing they call "sexting" really creates a lot of problems for young people. But, it is something that we have to be concerned about and it revolves around this same acceptance or rejection. Now if you go to school and you're a little different they're very likely going to pick on you. This one boy seemed to be handling it quite well; he was a high school student in Buffalo New York, and he was a gay young man, a gay teen (they are much more likely to commit suicide than the "normal" population of the schools). He seemed to be handling the bullying quite well, he even developed this t-shirt campaign (you may have seen or heard about) that said simply "IT WILL GET BETTER". You know, just hang in there things will get better... Then, a couple of weeks ago he was found dead near his home in Buffalo; he had committed suicide. I saw his parents the other day on the "Today Show" and his mother was wearing one of his t-shirts "IT WILL GET BETTER". She said her and her husband felt it necessary to keep the campaign going to encourage other gay teens that it WILL get BETTER.
Of course other students are victims of bullying as well, when I was in school "coodie detectors" (a folded piece of paper people would rub in your hair and then unfold to reveal a message of whether or not you had "coodies") was one of the popular forms of bullying. Today it's become "cyber-bullying", ganging up on someone on the internet and spreading rumors and gossip about them to the point that a young woman's reputation can be ruined and as a result SHE commits suicide. It's a HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE thing and it's not just the young people. There was another report on the "Today Show" dealing with a small town (about 4,000 people) called Mountain Grove where texting and the Internet had become a real problem because it was bearing gossip. Gossip about the local townspeople, and in that small of a town everyone knows who you are. There was a rumor started on the Internet about this older woman in town saying that she was running a "sex club". Then there was yet another rumor about one of the young women in town who was interviewed and she said "you know, it's something you just can't get away from. It's always out there in cyber space and you can't get away from it." So she said that she was moving because she just couldn't continue to live in that town any longer.
There was a young man who was applying to colleges and he had just gotten a letter of rejection from the Dean of Admissions. So he wrote a letter back to this particular Dean:
"Dear Dean,
I just received your letter of rejection to my application. I'm sorry to tell you that I cannot accept it. I've been rejected by four other colleges already, and that is beyond my limit. Therefore, I must reject your rejection. I hope this is not a great inconvenience to you, but I am planning on showing up for class registration and orientation on September the 18th."
He seemed to have a healthy way of dealing with his rejection, but we don't always do that, do we?
Of course, one of the most horrible rejections is loosing a job. How do you feed your family? How do you clothe them? How will you house them? You may loose your car, your house, your possessions all because you lost your job. There are too many people in this country today (and even throughout the world) who have lost their jobs, and that's a horrible rejection to have. There was this man who got up one Friday morning and announced to his wife "I'm going to work today and I'm going to ask my boss for a raise. I really think I deserve it." Well, toward the end of the day he finally worked up the courage to go into the boss' office and ask for the raise. Much to his surprise the boss said "You know what? I agree with you, it's time you had a raise and I'm going to give you one." So the man goes home very happy that day. As he walks into the house he notices the dining room has been set, candles lit, napkins beautifully folded, the finest china and silverware they owned were laid out on the table waiting for a feast... everything looked beautiful. He goes into the kitchen and announces to his wife "I GOT THE RAISE!" So they go into the dining room and sit down for a festive dinner. When he sits down at the table he notices a card folded and laying on his plate, he opens it and reads: "Dear, I knew you were going to get the raise. You deserved it, and these things are to show you that I love you." After they finished a festive and delicious main course the wife goes into the kitchen to bring desert and the husband finds another card that had fallen out of her pocket that read: "Dear, I'm sorry that you didn't get the raise. I know you deserve it, and I do these things to show you that I love you." So she was prepared to go either way. I think God deals with us in that same open fashion. You know our God is not a God of rejection, but of love and forgiveness and acceptance, and the prayer that we heard today had to do with those most tragic words we hear during Holy Week "He came unto his own, and His own received Him not." If anyone ever experienced rejection it was Jesus the Christ. Today's parable had to do with the vineyard being given over to "new tenants", and the early Church saw itself as being the "new tenants" of the Old Testament promises and the gift of the Christ as he comes to us in the New Testament and in the Church of Jesus Christ. So it's all about acceptance and not rejection.
There was a young Private in the Army who was in the habit of kneeling by his rack every night to say his prayers. Well, his Sergeant found this to be a ridiculous practice and would chide him for saying his prayers every night like that. One evening the Sergeant came in drunk and found the Private kneeling beside his rack praying, so he kicked the Private across the room. The next morning the Sergeant woke up only to find his boots at the foot of his rack and they had been meticulously polished to a fine gloss. So he walked over to the young Private and said "tell me something about this God of yours". The point is we go on with our witness even though we think we're being rejected having faith that out of the way we receive rejection, the way we handle the rejection might cause someone to come by faith to the God we know...this wonderful God of forgiveness and love.
Did you know today is Worldwide Communion Sunday? So many Churches that don't normally have Communion in their services every Sunday are having Communion today throughout the world. So we think of the rich and the powerful, the poor and the powerless, those people from every race and nation that come to the Lord's Table. It's the one place where we come no matter what our differences are, and we find ourselves in the hands of a loving and accepting God.
Out there in the world we may be broken by the rejection we experience. We know our God uses brokeness, doesn't he? The soil has to be broken before the grain can be planted. The clouds have to be broken before they can pour out the rain upon the vineyard. The grain has to be broken and ground before it can be made into bread. The grapes have to be crushed before they can be made into wine. So we come to the Table of the Lord in our brokeness and through the One who was broken and then Resurrected we find ourselves. Even though broken, there is the power of God to put us back together and make us whole again. We have those beautiful words from today's Gospel "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone". Even though we're by the world rejected, we are by God accepted and made part of that cornerstone which is Jesus Christ.
There was a sign in front of a Church in New Jersey that read simply: "We reserve the right to accept EVERYONE".
Sunday, September 25, 2011
If you're gonna talk the talk, then walk the walk.
Sermon summary 25SEP11
"If you're gonna Talk the Talk, then Walk the Walk"
Matthew 21:23-32
For the last several Sundays we've been confronted with the parables of Jesus from the Gospel of Matthew. I use the word confronted advisedly, for the parables of Jesus have a way of shaking us up, of surprising us, of shocking us, of shattering our worldview and trying to remake the way we see things and the way we do things. So these parables are often shocking to us.
In today's parable Jesus is teaching in the Temple of Jerusalem and the religious authorities come up and say to him "by whose authority do you do these things?" So Jesus begins speaking to them about John the Baptist and the way they refused to receive him. He was out in the wilderness and those who believed his message were baptized, but somehow that did not reach into the temple and the religious authorities: THEY did not believe John. So you notice when Jesus puts the "onus" on them, the authorities do what people often do when they don't know WHAT to do, they start doing theology.
In seminary we would say we "do" theology, of course we would talk about theology it's not that we'd do anything about it. There is something about theology that's more than just talking about it. So these theologians know what to do, but they don't do it. So our Lord says to them: "that the prostitutes and tax collectors will be going into the Kingdom before you do; you have not heard, you have not repented, you have not changed your ways. Your theological thinking is stuck."
This parable is only told in Matthew's Gospel, and I think we can understand why when we realize that Matthew's Gospel was put first in the New Testament because it was a bridge between the Old Testament and the New Testament. The fulfillment of the Old Testament is expressed very well in Matthew's Gospel. It's a simple story isn't it? The first son is asked to go into the field to work, but he says "NO, I will not go", he's going to be disobedient to his father. After a while the father looks out into the field and sees that first son out in the field working. Now when asked, the second son says "oh, yes I'll go, no problem; I'll be in the field today", but after a couple of hours the second son is lying on the sofa watching MTV or whatever and not interested in going into the field AT ALL. Jesus asked which son did the will of his father. Obviously, the authorities realized the first son was doing his father's will, but somehow Jesus' point didn't sink in all the way.
One thing we learn in life is that it's not all about "head knowledge". We may know a lot about something, but unless we put what we know into practice we haven't really learned anything. For example, you can have all the instruction on dance that you want, even a great lecture on what the dance is and it's origins; but until you learn the steps and get out on the dance floor with your partner and are able to get into the rhythm of the music and put what you've learned into practice, you really haven't learned how to dance. Or maybe in literature class you have an assignment to read Shakespeare's "King Lear", so you read "King Lear". But that is a play so you really don't get into the story until you see it acted out on stage, but even then, through seeing it acted out, you don't have the same understanding of the Character King Lear as someone who is playing his part in the play. And so it is with religion. We may have read the Bible from front to back many times. We may have read all of the books on theology that have ever been written. We may have all of these wonderful sermons that we've heard or read, but yet somehow we haven't connected all of that to our lives. Until we put faith into practice we haven't really grasped what things are all about.
People will often ask me "what do you believe is a Christian?" like it's all about belief, that's all there is. But you see Jesus wasn't some philosopher who had this "system" that was all worked out: He taught, He preached; but the thing is he lived what he preached. Word and deed became one, there's no hypocrisy in Jesus at all. We can't say that about ourselves can we? If we examine ourselves we often find what we believe doesn't show forth in our lives. If people have to ask you what you believe, you may already have a problem. The early Christians lived their faith in such a way that people would say how those Christians have a love for one another. They saw it in their lives, they didn't have to ask them what they believed. The people knew they believed in something special and they wanted to be a part of that! So the conversions came about not so much by WHAT they believed, but HOW they lived. "Look at those Christians, how they love one another."
Well, we come to Church and a lot of times we sit here and listen to a lot of things. Scripture readings, hymns, the sermon... and we're sitting. Of course in the Episcopal Church we do have our religious calisthenics where we're up and down, we stand to praise, we kneel to pray, we sit for instruction. We're standing more these days in the Church, because that's more of a sign of action when you stand than kneeling or sitting. But when we leave the church we start concentrating on what a wonderful dinner we're going to have, or what restaurant we're going to, or where we're going to have brunch; not what happened to us in Church. The Eucharist used to end with the words "the mass is ended, go now and be the Church". That was an instruction to go out into the world and BE the Church. So it was a movement by the instruction from the Scriptures, through the Worship, to the nourishment of the Body and Blood of our Lord from the Table to BE THE CHURCH. We're strengthened to be the Church through Word and Sacrament so to carry that forth into the world. It's been said that the proof in life isn't so much about knowledge as action.
In C.S. Lewis' "Screwtape Letters" Screwtape's understudy, who is trying to learn how to be a devil, is told the best time to get to a new Christian is the first two weeks after their conversion. He tells his understudy that they've had this great spiritual high from their conversion and from accepting Christ as their Lord and they're really turned on, but within the first two weeks their "spiritual temperature" starts to drop...their not quite as on fire as they were. He instructs his understudy to tell the new convert to not worry so much about everything, to just relax and take all things in moderation; he tells his understudy this because he knows that this is no kind of religion at all and is in fact amusing to the tempters because once convinced of this they are assured a home in that new Christian and soon he will slip away happily out the back door. This is why we as Christians must always be calling on the Holy Spirit to renew us, revive us, and to keep our "spiritual temperature" high so that we are alive in Christ and will go forth to show His Glory in all the world.
"WORDS, WORDS, WORDS, THAT's ALL I GET FROM YOU!" according to Ms. Doolittle from "My Fair Lady" to her aristocratic suitor Freddy. He was very good when it came to TALKING about love, but fell short when it came to demonstrating love... Enfleshing love. I think that is what our Lord is saying to the religious authorities in today's Gospel: "You know all the theology, but you're more interested in respectability than in doing what you're called to do; to get out into the field and work. To repent and to get on about God's work". So He's telling us: "Love is to be enfleshed. Faith is to be made a reality in your lives." C.S. Lewis said once: "just being a good egg isn't enough, at some point you have to hatch."
"If you're gonna Talk the Talk, then Walk the Walk"
Matthew 21:23-32
For the last several Sundays we've been confronted with the parables of Jesus from the Gospel of Matthew. I use the word confronted advisedly, for the parables of Jesus have a way of shaking us up, of surprising us, of shocking us, of shattering our worldview and trying to remake the way we see things and the way we do things. So these parables are often shocking to us.
In today's parable Jesus is teaching in the Temple of Jerusalem and the religious authorities come up and say to him "by whose authority do you do these things?" So Jesus begins speaking to them about John the Baptist and the way they refused to receive him. He was out in the wilderness and those who believed his message were baptized, but somehow that did not reach into the temple and the religious authorities: THEY did not believe John. So you notice when Jesus puts the "onus" on them, the authorities do what people often do when they don't know WHAT to do, they start doing theology.
In seminary we would say we "do" theology, of course we would talk about theology it's not that we'd do anything about it. There is something about theology that's more than just talking about it. So these theologians know what to do, but they don't do it. So our Lord says to them: "that the prostitutes and tax collectors will be going into the Kingdom before you do; you have not heard, you have not repented, you have not changed your ways. Your theological thinking is stuck."
This parable is only told in Matthew's Gospel, and I think we can understand why when we realize that Matthew's Gospel was put first in the New Testament because it was a bridge between the Old Testament and the New Testament. The fulfillment of the Old Testament is expressed very well in Matthew's Gospel. It's a simple story isn't it? The first son is asked to go into the field to work, but he says "NO, I will not go", he's going to be disobedient to his father. After a while the father looks out into the field and sees that first son out in the field working. Now when asked, the second son says "oh, yes I'll go, no problem; I'll be in the field today", but after a couple of hours the second son is lying on the sofa watching MTV or whatever and not interested in going into the field AT ALL. Jesus asked which son did the will of his father. Obviously, the authorities realized the first son was doing his father's will, but somehow Jesus' point didn't sink in all the way.
One thing we learn in life is that it's not all about "head knowledge". We may know a lot about something, but unless we put what we know into practice we haven't really learned anything. For example, you can have all the instruction on dance that you want, even a great lecture on what the dance is and it's origins; but until you learn the steps and get out on the dance floor with your partner and are able to get into the rhythm of the music and put what you've learned into practice, you really haven't learned how to dance. Or maybe in literature class you have an assignment to read Shakespeare's "King Lear", so you read "King Lear". But that is a play so you really don't get into the story until you see it acted out on stage, but even then, through seeing it acted out, you don't have the same understanding of the Character King Lear as someone who is playing his part in the play. And so it is with religion. We may have read the Bible from front to back many times. We may have read all of the books on theology that have ever been written. We may have all of these wonderful sermons that we've heard or read, but yet somehow we haven't connected all of that to our lives. Until we put faith into practice we haven't really grasped what things are all about.
People will often ask me "what do you believe is a Christian?" like it's all about belief, that's all there is. But you see Jesus wasn't some philosopher who had this "system" that was all worked out: He taught, He preached; but the thing is he lived what he preached. Word and deed became one, there's no hypocrisy in Jesus at all. We can't say that about ourselves can we? If we examine ourselves we often find what we believe doesn't show forth in our lives. If people have to ask you what you believe, you may already have a problem. The early Christians lived their faith in such a way that people would say how those Christians have a love for one another. They saw it in their lives, they didn't have to ask them what they believed. The people knew they believed in something special and they wanted to be a part of that! So the conversions came about not so much by WHAT they believed, but HOW they lived. "Look at those Christians, how they love one another."
Well, we come to Church and a lot of times we sit here and listen to a lot of things. Scripture readings, hymns, the sermon... and we're sitting. Of course in the Episcopal Church we do have our religious calisthenics where we're up and down, we stand to praise, we kneel to pray, we sit for instruction. We're standing more these days in the Church, because that's more of a sign of action when you stand than kneeling or sitting. But when we leave the church we start concentrating on what a wonderful dinner we're going to have, or what restaurant we're going to, or where we're going to have brunch; not what happened to us in Church. The Eucharist used to end with the words "the mass is ended, go now and be the Church". That was an instruction to go out into the world and BE the Church. So it was a movement by the instruction from the Scriptures, through the Worship, to the nourishment of the Body and Blood of our Lord from the Table to BE THE CHURCH. We're strengthened to be the Church through Word and Sacrament so to carry that forth into the world. It's been said that the proof in life isn't so much about knowledge as action.
In C.S. Lewis' "Screwtape Letters" Screwtape's understudy, who is trying to learn how to be a devil, is told the best time to get to a new Christian is the first two weeks after their conversion. He tells his understudy that they've had this great spiritual high from their conversion and from accepting Christ as their Lord and they're really turned on, but within the first two weeks their "spiritual temperature" starts to drop...their not quite as on fire as they were. He instructs his understudy to tell the new convert to not worry so much about everything, to just relax and take all things in moderation; he tells his understudy this because he knows that this is no kind of religion at all and is in fact amusing to the tempters because once convinced of this they are assured a home in that new Christian and soon he will slip away happily out the back door. This is why we as Christians must always be calling on the Holy Spirit to renew us, revive us, and to keep our "spiritual temperature" high so that we are alive in Christ and will go forth to show His Glory in all the world.
"WORDS, WORDS, WORDS, THAT's ALL I GET FROM YOU!" according to Ms. Doolittle from "My Fair Lady" to her aristocratic suitor Freddy. He was very good when it came to TALKING about love, but fell short when it came to demonstrating love... Enfleshing love. I think that is what our Lord is saying to the religious authorities in today's Gospel: "You know all the theology, but you're more interested in respectability than in doing what you're called to do; to get out into the field and work. To repent and to get on about God's work". So He's telling us: "Love is to be enfleshed. Faith is to be made a reality in your lives." C.S. Lewis said once: "just being a good egg isn't enough, at some point you have to hatch."
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