Sermons

Years ago, when I was in seminary, before I was called to my first church, I worked as a tennis instructor. Not that I was all that good or knew all that much about tennis, it was more the case that they needed a warm body to work with kids groups, and I fit the bill.

I also did some other work with adult beginners, so I figured I’d better broaden my tennis knowledge, lest they expose me as someone who didn’t know that much about the game. I had played tennis recreationally since college and had taken a P.E. course or two, so I knew enough to fake my way around the mechanics of the game. But I knew I was in trouble when a student informed me that he was about to play his first match and wondered if I could help him with a tip as to strategy. 

I paused for a moment, which to me seemed like an eternity. “What do I say?” “How can I get out of this without too much egg on my face?” I put on my most confident countenance, looked him in the eye, and said like I knew what I was talking about, “Do your best to get in a good first serve.” It just seemed to be the right thing to say at the time. “Do your best to get in a good first serve.”

The next week he couldn’t wait to give me a report. He had won his match. He was brimming with confidence. He was still alive in the competition. And he gave me all the credit for offering him a strategy that enabled him to come out on top.

I’ve often asked myself, “Where did that come from?” I really am not sure. Perhaps it came from those times in my life when I started out well on something and everything else sort of fell into place and when I didn’t, nothing seemed to work. Have you not found that to be true in your life? Have you not found that the first word that you speak, the first impression that you make, or the first step that you take in a particular direction are all so very critical to things working out as you want them to do? Not only is this true for us as individuals, it’s also true for us as a church.

That’s what Peter is contending for in this verse that I have read for you this morning. “If anyone serves, he should do it in the strength that God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ.” 

Peter’s first letter is thought to be something along the lines of an orientation manual for new Christians. Just like when you get a new gadget, you might like to browse through the owner’s manual to see how you can maximize its capabilities, so Peter offers insights and strategies to new Christians to help them experience the abundant life that faith in Jesus makes possible. 

Of course, in Peter’s day, it was more of a challenge to follow Jesus than it is in ours. In Peter’s day, Christians were subjected to persecution for their devotion to Christ. Caesar expected absolute allegiance from all who lived under Roman rule, and when followers of Jesus refused to do that, Caesar spared them no pain in his efforts to compel them to change their confession. And that is why this short epistle addresses head-on the very real possibility of Christians being subjected to persecution for no other reason than their insistence that not Caesar, but Jesus is Lord.

Peter begins his letter by reminding his readers of the living hope that is ours because of the resurrection of Jesus. He then offers them encouragement by assuring them that God has chosen them to be a people through whom He will work to establish Christ’s rule in the world. He seeks to comfort them with stories of how God            ‘s people faced worldly challenges in the past and how they triumphed over them. And in this section of the letter, he helps them to see that the battles Christians must fight with the powers and principalities will not last forever, but that one day Jesus is coming again to earth in power and glory to receive his church and to deal evil a mortal blow.

And the best part of all is that we as his disciples don’t have to just sit in the stands and watch this contest play out.  We are a part of it. We are involved in it. We are the ones through whom even now the Spirit of Jesus is at work to win the victory. Through our faithful exercising of the gifts God has granted us, we participate with Jesus in his triumph over the forces of evil. “Each one,” he writes, “should use whatever gift he has received (notice) to serve others.” In other words, the means by which we participate in the victory of Jesus is through our service – nothing more, nothing less.

What is it about our service that Jesus uses to attain his victory? Our service is the first thing people notice when they look for evidence that our faith actually matters in terms of everyday life.

Take this Saturday, a week ago, for example. On the Saturday of our “First Love” mission blitz, we had 480 people from our church involved in 55 various ministry projects. And this past week, it has been my joy to receive notes and letters and cards and expressions from so many of the people and organizations we served on that Saturday. Each expression acknowledges the heart of this church to make a difference in our world by meeting real need with the love of Jesus. Note after note reflects the gratitude people feel for a church that isn’t too busy or too callous or too self-absorbed to reach out in Jesus’ name. To a person they recognize that the reason we do so is because we are followers of him who by his own admission “came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Jesus uses our service, because our service mirrors his heart more so than anything else we do.

What perplexes me is not that followers of Jesus would choose to give of their time and their talents in service; I see the satisfaction that comes when people offer of themselves in that way. What perplexes me is that we don’t do it more.

Tom Long is a preaching professor up at Emory. At a recent worship workshop in a local church, he gave a lecture to the worship committee on how to plan meaningful worship experiences. After the lecture there was a question and answer period, and the first question came from a man who was waving his hand in the air, begging to speak his peace. “There’s one thing I can’t stand about our church’s worship,” the man said. “I mean it’s like fingernails being scraped across a blackboard.” Long assumed that the man was about to launch into a rant about gender inclusive language or newfangled hymns, politics in the pulpit or sermons on tithing. But what had stuck in his craw was none of those things. It was “announcements.” “I just hate it,” the man said, “when the pastor spoils the mood of worship with all those dull announcements.” And all around the room, Long said, heads bobbed in agreement.

How do you respond to a comment like that? Long said that he started out acknowledging the dullness of that aspect of worship and how most clergy offer them without any care or passion. But then he felt the need to point out how, dull as they are, details of the church’s institutional life are still highly important. And what do they take up in worship? Five minutes?

After the meeting, Long realized that he blew it. He didn’t give the right answer. He realized that what he should have said was that, properly understood, the announcements are one of those places in worship where the rubber of the church’s theology hits the road of everyday life. Indeed, it just may be that by moving seamlessly from “Holy, Holy, Holy” to a registration promotion for a community ministry like “First Love” may be the best way for the church to express one of its most basic convictions – that God has gifted His people to do the work of the Kingdom, and when people give of themselves in selfless acts of service, people begin to see that the church is about transforming the world for the sake of Jesus Christ, and in their own way, they praise God as the One from whom all blessings flow.

Are you willing to commit yourself to that way of life this morning? Are you ready to give of yourself in service out of the strength that God provides? You’re never too old or too young to make a difference. You’re never too uninformed or too inexperienced. As someone has said, “The greatest ability is simply availability. And without availability, any ability is nothing more than wasted ability.” Don’t waste the ability God has given you and lose the joy that comes from making a difference in someone’s life for Christ’s sake.

I love the story of the farmer who had lived a long and fruitful life. He had been the pillar of the community, always ready to be there for others, always ready to give a helping hand, never saying no to a reasonable request, and always willing to go the extra mile. In the course of his life, the man had derived enormous spiritual strength from serving. But his time had come for him to go to his reward. 

God sent an angel to whom the man said, “I can’t go know,” which startled the angel. “Some of my neighbors rely on me. The harvest was late this year and the Smiths need help gathering their crops. Please tell God that I’m not being ungrateful; I’d just like to put this off for a while?” So the angel departed.

Several years later, the angel came back and reminded the farmer that it was time to go. “It’s not possible for me to go now,” the farmer said. “We had a flood here and I’m needed to help folks rebuild their homes or they’ll freeze during the winter. Please explain to God that I must stay here and help, at least a little while longer.” And again, the angel departed. A year later the angel returned, and every year, on the basis of his latest explanation, the farmer asked for and God gave what amounted to a deferment.

Finally, extreme old age caught up with the farmer. He had done all that he could do and he was ready for the angel to come back for him. He prayed this prayer: “God, I suppose you think I’m ungrateful and maybe you got the impression that I don’t want to be with you. I do. I do want to be with you. It’s just that there was always so much to do, always so many ways to sere. So, God, I’m ready. Please send your angel back to get me; I’m ready to go.”

The angel instantly appeared. “I’m ready to enter the kingdom forever,” the old farmer said. To which the angel answered in a burst of laughter, “And where do you think you’ve been all these years?”

Who knows when our days on earth will be over? Only God does. But what we can know is that when we serve, God’s Kingdom comes and God’s will is done, on earth as it always is in heaven. That’s the first thing each of needs to get right, for a good first serve is the key to experiencing God’s victory here on earth and the unparalleled joy that comes from honoring Jesus with the gift and in the strength that God is so pleased to provide.

One of the less spoken but nevertheless core messages being articulated today is that in America “bigger is better.” You see it played out in everything from what we own to where we live to what we eat to where we do church. In almost every arena of American life, you’d be hard pressed to refute this accepted belief that “bigger is better.”

Truth be told, I have to be careful not to fall victim to it myself because there’s so much about it that seems obvious. If you have or give yourself to something that brings you joy, wouldn’t more of that something be a good thing? At first blush, you might answer “yes,” but the more you think about that question and its implications, the more you begin to see that the better answer is, “It all depends.”

For example, you can have a house that is too big to take care of or a car that is too big for you to drive. You can have a hamburger that contains too many calories for your own good or a class that is too big for you to succeed. You can even have a church that is too big for you to find Jesus.

That last example may come as something of a surprise to you. How can a church be too big? How can a church have too many people? Isn’t the church supposed to be making converts? Are you suggesting that church growth is a bad thing? I don’t mean to be sarcastic, but the answer to that question really is, “It all depends.”

Here’s my point. I’m all for reaching people. I would be the last person in the world to suggest that we ought to put a “cap” on church participation so that we turn people away once we arrive at that number. Nothing would please me more than to see this church have to create a third worship service to accommodate the scores of people God might send in our direction. So, please don’t hear me say that I think the church is “big enough.” I’ve been in some churches like that; they are not enjoyable places to be.

My point is that a great church involves more than mere numbers. A great church, among other qualities, possesses a dynamic where the people who make the church up are invested in one another and are committed to one another. A great church is a place where people get to know one another and are actually intertwined with one another. I’m not talking about mere social togetherness or even a place where you might be able to make friends. There are a zillion places where you can do that in Tallahassee. What makes for a great church is where your presence actually matters to someone else and their presence actually matters to you.

That’s what Jesus was calling for in this teaching we have before us this morning. Matthew 18 is a signal text in helping us to understand Jesus’ thoughts on community. Most of us know it as the “conflict resolution” text in the Bible. You know; if your brother sins against you, go to your brother….” But notice how that section of the chapter ends; it ends with reconciliation and agreement. “If any two of you on earth agree about anything, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.” And then it ends with this verse, which I take to be a word of great promise. “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.”

I take that verse to be a great promise because of how it calls us to look more seriously at the character of our relationships within the church. The key part of the verse is that we come together “in Jesus’ name.” In other words, inhabiting the same ecclesiastically intimate space for an hour two on Sunday morning is not what Jesus had in mind when he talked about people coming together “in my name.” I’ve seen plenty of people do that in the church, and their gathering has been nothing more than a “holy clique.” To gather “in Jesus’ name” means to join with others in living like Jesus lived and in giving of yourself along with them in worship, in serving, and in sharing. It means looking into the faces of others and seeing in those faces the face of Christ and then looking out into the world with those very same persons and having others see in all of you that same face of Christ. It means being bound to at least one other believer and yet, at the same time, having space in your circle for other believers to come in as well.

I would contend that the only way for today’s church to be able to experience this promise is by “getting smaller.” Again, I’m not suggesting a reduction in total number of participants as much as I’m talking about a connecting to one another by means of being a part of a small group.

Over the years, I’ve seen people come and go in the fellowship of the church. The ones who have stayed have inevitably been the ones who have found their place in the larger fellowship of the church. It may have been a ministry group or a music group. It may have been a prayer group or Bible Study group. It may have been a recreational group or a missions group. But the people who have come to see First Baptist Church as “their church” have without fail been those individuals who have come to join themselves with others “in Jesus’ name” and have sensed his Risen Presence in the process. Are you in that number? Have you found your place in this church?

I must say that I was concerned this past week when in the midst of a pastoral staff conversation, it became evident that there are some people in our church, some people you’d be surprised to know, who couldn’t say that they are in that number and have found their place in this church. These are not people who have been here for a short period of time or are people who come only on Christmas and Easter and maybe a couple of three Sundays in between. These are faithful participants. These are leaders. These are people who give of themselves in so many ways to make us a better church, but who nonetheless feel disconnected and detached and unable to experience the promise of Jesus’ presence when with two or three others they have gathered “in his name.” There are many challenges that this church may be facing today, but I don’t seriously know of one that is greater than the challenge of “growing smaller” and making people feel connected, because while it may be preaching and music brings people to a church, it is the sense of real community that keeps them there.

If you’re here this morning and you haven’t found your place in the life of this church, let me offer you some quick suggestions. In the first place, be a bit bolder. I know it’s hard to put yourself “out there” for fear of looking desperate, but I promise you that there are people in this place who are ready to receive you and take you in. A church doesn’t get to be 162 years old by shutting people out of small group participation. Be bolder in finding your place in the life of this church. Second, think broadly. Don’t limit yourself to specific persons or specific areas. While you might think that you can only fit in a certain place in the life of this church, that is not the case. No one is “pigeonholed” at First Baptist Church. Granted, we provide age-graded and interest-based options, but throughout our church there are groups with a diversity of ages and gifts and interests. We even have some square pegs that have fit rather nicely into round holes. There’s just no need for you to feel as if your options are limited; they are not. Think broadly about the place where you can belong. And lastly, show some patience and persistence. One of the most important lessons a person can learn in this life is that there are some doors that you have to knock on three or four times before they finally open, and you have to have some patience with the process before anything good comes about. If you give a small group in our church a try and at first it doesn’t feel quite right and not like the small group felt in your last church, stay with it and give it some time, and you may be surprised at just how close you get to be to what will become a special group of people to you.

Those are my suggestions to people here this morning who may be looking for their place in the life of this church. But I also have a suggestion for those who are here and have already found their place; just one suggestion. For the sake of this church, be open and accommodating. Remember how awkward it was to walk into a room full of strangers for the first time and wondering if anyone there would accept you. Remember the unparalleled joy of having someone catch your eye, point to the seat next to them, pat it with the palm of their hand, and invite you to sit next to them. Remember that and then replicate it, over and over and over again. Be open and accommodating.

It is an irony of church life that while small groups are absolutely essential to the church’s growth, most churches I know really struggle to get it right. And as a result, the presence of Jesus is never as evident as it should be. But when a church does get it right, the word gets out, people start coming in droves, folk get invested with one another in doing God’s work, and Jesus always seems to be in the middle of everything that goes on.

And isn’t that what you want to see happening in this place?

Wendell Berry is a unique individual who understands the importance of linking his life in community. A farmer/novelist, Berry has a unique image for the perils of trying to do faith alone. One day he was walking on the farm with a friend when they came across a plot of Maximilian Sunflowers, a nearly ten-foot tall plant that is native to the Midwest. The friend pointed out to Berry how one particular plant was growing alone, “disconnected” from the community of other plants. Berry pointed out how though the plant had grown very tall, it was clearly not healthy. The blossoms were thick and heavy, so heavy that the branches were starting to strain and break under the weight. Berry went on to point out how that in one sense the plant had succeeded as a solo plant. It was growing; it was tall. But it had failed in its intended purpose as a Maximilian Sunflower, where plants only thrive and give life as they grow in community.

I think you can see the application: God has created us so that we crave community. And Jesus promises that when we come together in his name, he shows up and we begin to thrive.

Kyle Childress is a pastor in Texas I knew back in seminary. For the last 20 years, he has ended every worship service with a ritual he picked up from another pastor friend. He tells the congregation, “Let’s take each other’s hand.” That’s not different from what we do here, is it? But then he tells them, “Now, look who you’re holding hands with, and hold on tight, because we’re going to need each other this week!” He says that when he first started that ritual, people sort of looked at him like, “What is this about?”   But the more they did it, the more it began to make sense. The more it began to feel right. The more they left worship with the blessed assurance that they had been with Jesus. And when a crisis would unexpectedly arise, as crises always seem to do, they would know how to respond. Most times, they responded by making a call to the person whose hand they had held the previous Sunday.

This is a big church, and there’s every reason to believe that it will get bigger. God is at work here in truly amazing ways. But that doesn’t mean that it will necessarily be a better church. To be a better church means that people sense Jesus showing up on a regular basis. Did you sense him here today? It really does all depend. It depends on your willingness to try taking a couple of people’s hands, because he has promised that where two or three come together in his name, he will be present, and with him will come the abundant life that all of us are desperate to know.

 

 

A friend of mine who serves a church in north Georgia sent me an email a couple of weeks ago about a skirmish that broke out the first of August in a church over in Mobile County, Alabama. Actually, to call it a “skirmish” is way too kind; the truth of the matter is that it was more of a brouhaha. 

The whole thing started when the pastor of the church decided that it was time for the minister of music to go. He called a meeting of the deacons and the decision was made to give the minister of music his walking papers, along with a severance check of $300. The minister of music didn’t think that the check was enough, and when he expressed his disagreement, a fight broke out between the two of them, at which point the minister of music pulled out a Taser gun and used it on the pastor. At that point, several of the church members became involved, including the minister of music’s mother, who ended up suffering a stab wound at the hands of a deacon. Deputies were called to the church and only after they arrived did things finally begin to settle down. And to top it all off, the name of the church was “the New Welcome Baptist Church.”

Does that sound like a church that you might like to join? Probably not. That would be a church that most of us wouldn’t touch with the proverbial ten-foot pole. And yet, as hard as it may be for most of us believe, that’s how far too many people feel today about churches in general, including our church. Too many people today believe that every church is full of people who are mean-spirited and judgmental and way too prone to cast insults and injuries toward one another. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve met over the course of my ministry who are staying away from church because they’ve been emotionally Tasered and relationally stabbed and are still carrying around the wounds of a church experience that didn’t work out for them.

I want to say, “Please don’t give up on church entirely.” “Please don’t lump all of us into the same category.” I want to say, “I remember getting food poisoning at a restaurant once, and though I decided to stay away from that restaurant, I didn’t give up eating out at restaurants all together.” I want to say all of those things and more, but I’m not sure that any of them would be convincing. What people are looking for is a place where folk are serious about being together and about encouraging one another and about loving one another. What people are looking for is a place where folk are on the same page and moving in the same direction. What people are looking for is a place where folk don’t just play church but are committed to being the church, and when people find a place like that, then that will be a church that they would be willing to join.

Paul was looking for the Christians at Philippi to become that kind of church. His letter to the Philippians reflects in part how much Paul was missing the friendship of fellow believers, languishing as he was in a Roman prison. As many of you know from personal experience, when something is taken away, you begin to understand its value better and you start to appreciate what you had a little more. As Paul was in prison, he was able to ponder more deeply the real blessing of Christian community, and so he wrote this letter to the Philippians in order to remind them of the joy they ought to be experiencing together before something happened that might take it away. “If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, and being one in spirit and purpose.”

As with so many of his letters, in this one Paul is pleading for unity. But by unity, he’s not suggesting that believers must see things the same ways; Paul would understand how impossible that would be. When Paul pleads for what he calls “like-mindedness,” he’s talking more about wanting the same thing and working for the same thing, which in the context of the church is always that which furthers the cause of Christ.

I’ve known churches that have been adamant about demanding agreement in theology and interpretation, and inevitably, those are the churches that are always the most prone to splits and splinters. The landscape is littered with them. But the churches that find their unity in Christ and in working together for his cause to be advanced are amazingly able to stay together and hold together. The churches that find their unity in Christ and their desire to grow in his grace and knowledge are precisely the churches that have a tie that binds them together that nothing in this world can sever.

It’s like the difference between a tree and a brush pile. There are some things the two have in common: they are made of the same material; they both have many branches. But there is also a crucial difference between the two that gives one life and the other decay. The tree grows by an internal principle of design. The brush pile is just a bunch of branches that have been lumped together. The tree is a work of God. The brush pile is a work of man. The tree is blessed with an organic unity. The pile is nothing more than a jumbled and confused heap. Sadly, not every church is like a living tree; some are just a group of people who have come together, sometimes because of things they have in common, like musical tastes or ethnic background or philosophical perspective.  But what make a church a place that people are moved to join is the presence of Jesus in their midst that takes a group of people who sing differently and look differently and even believe differently and forms them into a force for good that accomplishes everything he gives them to do.

Is that hard to understand? I think not. There are some things about church that are somewhat hard to get our minds around, but this is not one of them. This is not spiritual brain surgery. The truth of the matter is that what Paul is calling for here is something that is pretty simple – just come together to share and serve Jesus. And when we do that, then do we become the kind of church that anyone would want to join. 

Carlyle Marney was a great Baptist preacher of a previous generation. Something of a gadfly, which Baptists were once proud of being before we became so obsessed with power and popularity, Marney was once asked by a young minister if his church’s inconspicuous location was the reason his church wasn’t growing like he wanted it to. Marney replied, “Son, just start doing the work of Jesus, and you won’t have any problem with people being able to find you.”

Marney was right. As much as people today are cynical and skeptical of the church, when a time of crisis rears its ugly head, guess where those people are the most prone to go. It happens in this church every Sunday, and if I hear Paul correctly, when they do, rather than seeing them as nuisances or problems, if we see them as people whom God loves and for whom Jesus died and if we welcome them into our number, then not only will this church grow in number. Just as importantly, we will grow in becoming the church that Jesus needs us to be and that he is certainly calling us to be.

Is that not the kind of church that you want this church to be?

I love the story of the little boy who asked his father where he had been born. “I was born in Texas, son.” Then he asked where his mother had been born. “She was born in Louisiana.” Then he asked to be reminded where he had been born. “Son, you were born in Oklahoma.” You could see the wheels turning inside his brain. And finally, after thinking about it for a moment, he smiled and said to his father. “Daddy, aren’t you glad we all got together?”

We were born in different places. We’ve come from different backgrounds. We have different interests and different abilities. But if you’re a believer in Jesus, then you’ve been born again in the same way as other believers – through his broken body and his shed blood and your willingness to bear witness to the difference his presence in our midst always makes.

Aren’t you glad we all got together? Then let us share these elements that represent our life in Christ and let us experience the communion that Jesus promises when we invite him into our gatherings and let us be formed into a church that wants his will and works together for his will, for only that will make us a church that anyone would want to join.

We all like to joke about how our memories are constantly failing, but none of us has seen them fail to the point that it did for a British man whose story was told in one of those tabloid newspapers. The story began by offering “heartfelt commiseration to Dorothy Naylor of Plymouth, whose recent daytrip to Bridgeport was spoiled when her husband Oliver left her on the forecourt of an auto garage.” As the story recounts, poor Oliver drove some 70 miles before noticing that his wife wasn’t with him. “I couldn’t believe he had gone without me,” Mrs. Naylor was reported to have said to the reporter covering the story. “I usually sit in the back because I can move around more, but we still normally talk to one another along the way.” It seems that the couple, both of whom were in their seventies, had stopped at the garage to change a tire. When everything was completed, Mr. Naylor drove off and didn’t notice his wife’s absence until he had arrived in Bridgewater. He knew something wasn’t right when after stopping in town, he asked his wife, “Where do you want to get out?” When she didn’t answer, he turned around to discover that he had left her behind at the garage. When he returned to pick her up, he learned that she had already paid a mechanic to take her home. I wonder how that conversation went when Oliver finally got back to the house. One thing is certain – that is one mistake I would imagine Oliver hasn’t made again.

There are just some things you can’t afford to forget and some people you’d do well to remember.

My mother has an amazing recollection of people and their birthdays. But she also has a “cheat sheet.” She has this little booklet with the names and birth dates of family and friends, and about every month she will call me and say, “This month is Ashley’s birthday. This month is Quinn’s birthday. Go ahead and send them something.” And I’ll send it, but I’ll also make sure that they know it came from Mother. I want them to know that she’s the one who remembered.

Have you ever felt forgotten? I noticed a sign the other day at the doctor’s office that read, “If you haven’t been called in 30 minutes, please see the receptionist.” I don’t have to explain that one to you. Almost all of us have spent a morning or two in such an office waiting on someone to call. It’s not a good feeling, not a good feeling at all.

So, you would understand why God would have inspired Moses to offer this admonition to the children of Israel as they were preparing to cross over the river Jordan into Canaan, the Land of Promise: “Be careful that you do not forget the LORD, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.”

The call to remember is sprinkled throughout the book of Deuteronomy. Evidently, it was a word that the children of Israel couldn’t hear enough. And we understand why, don’t we? Life has a way of hindering our recollection so that if we’re not careful, one thing can get in the way of another thing, even a thing as important as a birthday or a medical appointment or a loved one’s physical presence.

In Israel’s case, Moses was most concerned that his people’s memory would become obstructed by their pending prosperity. In other words, Moses was worried that once the children of Israel got a taste of the milk and honey they was waiting on them in Canaan, God would be a distant memory. While wandering through the wilderness, they needed God. But once they were safe and sound in the Promised Land, why be bothered with God?

Don’t dismiss their reasoning. People today do it all the time. How many people have you known who have leaned upon God in their hour of need, only to dispose of Him once they were past their crisis? How many people have you known who once they experienced a windfall of some sort, forgot about God as the source of their blessing? We worry about running out of money and what that might mean for us. But shouldn’t we also worry just as much about the peril of becoming unduly prosperous because of how such prosperity tends to make one self-sufficient and more eager to acquire more?

I remember reading about a business executive who had just received a big promotion and was sharing the good news with his pastor. His assumption was that the pastor would be proud to know that he had received such an advancement, so he was taken aback when the pastor told him, “I will be praying for your soul.” When the executive asked what the pastor meant by that comment, the pastor explained, “I will be praying that your soul will be able to handle all the temptations that go with it.” I think that’s what Moses was doing when he gave this commandment. He was warning the people not to allow their impending prosperity to produce within them a spiritual amnesia. 

And that’s a good warning even for us today. The greatest threat that a congregation will ever face is the threat of spiritual amnesia. A church becomes so satisfied with itself that it forgets who it is and what God has called it to do. It forgets how God has brought the church to that place in time and that God still has much that He wants to do through them. 

On this Sunday after our Dedication Sunday, I feel strongly that this is the precise word God has for us to hide in our hearts. How easy it would be to settle in and coast after all that God has enabled us to accomplish, but now is the time to begin thinking about how we can employ these bountiful resources to do even more to bring His good purposes to pass. Now is the time to begin thinking about how we can serve and how we can share and how we can better reach out into our community in order to bring our community closer to God. In other words, the call to remember God gives content and purpose to everything we do as a church. Whenever we worship or witness or study or serve, the focus of such activity must be to move people closer to God. Otherwise, we’re just “Canaanites” in spiritual garb. Otherwise, we’re no different from other groups that might come together for encouragement and support, some of which serve good purposes but not necessarily purposes that advance the Kingdom of God. Therefore, the question that is before us today is the question, “How do we best remember?” “How do we make sure that we do not forget God?”

Some months ago, I came across a book titled Why We Make Mistakes. The book has a chapter on the mystery of human memory and why we remember some things and let other things slip by. The key to the mystery, according to the author Joseph Hallihan, is meaning. When it comes to remembering something or someone, meaning is king. Try as we might, it’s hard to force our minds to remember things we consider meaningless.   That is why people with great memories aren’t necessarily smarter than the rest of us. They don’t necessarily have a “gift” or innate ability that others of us lack. They’ve just perfected their memories by infusing people and places and things with some measure of meaning. They remember because something about that person or that place or that thing matters; it has significance.

Do you see the connection in terms of our relationship with God? If God matters, then we cannot forget Him. If we see every aspect of our existence as somehow connected to God’s purpose in our lives, then we cannot forget Him. If we recognize that our future depends entirely on our ability to stay grounded in the center of God’s will, then we cannot forget Him. The way we can be certain always to remember God is to see our little lives inextricably linked to His grand life and to the joy and fulfillment that such a lasting connection makes possible.

Most of you know the name Tony Campolo. For those of you who don’t, Campolo is a professor of sociology and an ordained Baptist minister. As such, it is not uncommon for students to ask him to perform their wedding. And Campolo is happy to oblige, but under one condition: he asks the bride and groom to agree to use the traditional wedding vows. Not surprisingly, he gets some pushback from couples for his taking this stance, and some couples get upset that they can’t put their own “stamp” on the ceremony. But Campolo is adamant about his position, and he does so for this reason: as the bride and groom go through the wedding ceremony, he believes that each married person in attendance is re-living his or her own wedding. And as the vows are exchanged, each person is silently, maybe even unconsciously, reciting their own marriage vows with them. In this way, Campolo is convinced, every wedding that he does reaffirms the marriages of all those persons in attendance.

That’s why it’s important for us to memorize passages of Scripture and hymns and praise songs and confessional statements. That’s why it’s important for us to repeat those expressions of our faith. The life of faith is not just about religious matters; it’s about relational matters. It’s about our ongoing response to God’s love for us in Jesus Christ and our need to keep growing in his mercy and grace. Otherwise, we might find ourselves in a circumstance or situation one day, where we turn to speak to God and discover He’s not there. Not because He has moved; He’s not there because we’ve left Him behind.

The future God has for each of us and for this church is bright and beautiful. And as you live into it, be careful that you always remember God as the source of your every blessing. Because of all the parties you have known, He is the One you simply can’t ever afford to forget, if for no other reason than you can be certain that he has not and will never forget you.

Like many of you, I grew up in a frugal time when every penny was pinched and every dollar was squeezed. Quite honestly, my father was a successful businessman and my family had as much as any of our neighbors, if not more. But you would have thought that we were one step away from the “poor house” by the way I was always being warned to turn out the lights. You could have convinced me that electricity ran $100/kilowatt hour the way my parents made sure that rooms stayed dark if no one was in them. 

But in fairness to my folks, there were other times when light was not to be spared. Whenever I was doing homework, my parents were always on me to make sure that I had good light to read by. Whenever my sister or I were working on a project, my parents always made sure that we had plenty of light to work by. And there was one other situation I remember when no light was to be spared. Whenever either of us was out and would be late coming home, I remember turning in the driveway and see the lights of the house on to welcome me back home safe and sound. In other words, there were some situations and circumstances when you couldn’t have enough light, regardless of how much it may have cost.

I actually owe my parents a lot, because they taught me the value of light. From an early age, I learned how light dispels the darkness and makes it possible to focus on the task at hand. I learned how light gives direction, clarity, comfort, and assurance. I learned how light is something that exists not so much for its own good, but rather for the good of the place and people for whom it shines.

Isn’t that what Jesus was emphasizing when he gave this teaching to “light their light shine?” As most of you know, this passage is a part of Jesus’ most famous teaching, his Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has just finished expounding on the last of the beatitudes, which deals with persecution, but now presses on regarding the importance of witness and mission. “You are the light of the world,” he said to his disciples.

I like to think that Jesus’ assessment of their value must have come across as somewhat staggering to the disciples. All things considered, they were pretty much a motley crew. They were hardly movers and shakers in their first century world. They were common people: fisherman and farmers and tax collectors and housewives. They were definitely not the kind of people you’d think would be able to move the world’s meter as much as an inch in the direction of God. And yet, Jesus saw something in them that they couldn’t see in themselves. Jesus saw passion and possibility. Jesus saw openness and anticipation. Jesus saw hearts that he could shape into a powerful force for good, and so he challenged them to be bold in calling the attention of the world to God’s place of priority in the affairs of men and women. “No one lights a lamp and then puts it under a bowl. He puts it on a stand and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men, so that they may see your good deeds and give praise to your Father in heaven.” 

This morning, we come together to dedicate our new and renovated facilities to God’s good purposes.  But what does that really mean? Does it mean that we set them apart as holy spaces where people may gather and learn more about what it means to be Christian? In part it does. Does it mean that we consecrate them as places of service, not just on Sundays and Wednesdays, but throughout the year, and especially during times of community gathering, such as the Winter Festival and Springtime Tallahassee? Yes, it means that as well. But it also means that we believe God has called us here to this location in the center of our community to bear witness to the abundant life Jesus has come to make possible, a life that dispels the darkness and allows people to see what really matters in our everyday existence and calls people who are anxious and uncertain in these harried times to know that there is a place to which they can come home, in the truest sense of the word. It means that we dedicate not only these facilities but also ourselves to carrying forth into our community the good news of God’s love in Jesus Christ and His desire to see us experience the best He has to offer. That’s what excites me most on this special Sunday in the life of our church – the combination of impressive facilities with impressive people and the limitless potential we have of what we can do to move people closer to God and in so doing, make our community a better place.

I have to confess that I was thrilled the other week when I saw an opinion piece in the local newspaper that mentioned our new project as an example of the positive changes that are happening in downtown Tallahassee. The article stated that our construction, along with several other projects in the downtown area, “enriches the public realm, frames the street, is built to a more human scale, handles parking appropriately, and (best of all) entertains the eye.” It was nice to see that someone had noticed what we have done and had considered it to be a contribution to the sense of vitality and promise we all want to see in downtown Tallahassee. I wonder at times if anyone knows we are here.

And that leads me to my main concern. What would thrill me more is if as a congregation we established ourselves as a community of faith where God shows up, where people are blessed, where hope is engendered, and were lives are changed for the better.   What would thrill me most of all is for people to know that not only is First Baptist Church here on the block that encompasses College and Duval and Park and Adams, but that we are “here for life.”

It can happen if you as a part of this church will commit yourself to letting your light shine. It can happen if you will positive and encouraging. It can happen if you will be hopeful and supportive. Too many churches today just curse the darkness. They rant and rave about all that is wrong with the world. I don’t know of anyone who disputes that point; I certainly don’t. But in my estimation, it is hardly the best word we can offer. The best word is not to curse the darkness. The best word is to bear witness to the light of God’s love in Jesus Christ. The best word is to point others to the life that God sent Jesus for us to know. After all, when the darkness has taken hold, what better time is there to offer some light?

Luci Swindoll is the sister of the more famous Chuck Swindoll. But she is accomplished speaker in her own right. She worked for Mobil Oil for some 30 years before transitioning to an executive position with Insight for Living, the radio ministry of her preacher brother Chuck. In one of her devotional pieces, she writes about a time a friend of hers was caught in an elevator during a power failure. You know how conversations go in an elevator. Most people say nothing to the others, until something goes wrong like a power failure, and then everyone starts speaking at the same time. That’s exactly what happened in this situation. Everything became pitch black. Panic set in and everyone in the elevator started talking, though no one was offering any real solutions. And then Luci’s friend remembered the tiny flashlight he had in his pocket. All he did was turn it on, and immediately, the fear passed away. Nothing had changed about the situation; they were still stuck with no power. But during the forty-five minutes are so that they were together waiting for the power to come back on, they talked and told jokes. They laughed and they sang. They experienced life together so that when the power finally came back on, they emerged from the elevator as different people.

I think Jesus is saying that’s what life ought to look like when his people are together, and more importantly, that’s what life ought to look like when his people go forth into the world. We don’t have to be important. The disciples Jesus was speaking to when he gave this challenge surely weren’t. We don’t have to be beautiful. The Bible says nothing about any of these persons’ physical appearance. We just have to be “on.” We just have to let the light of Jesus shine.

My parents were right. It costs to turn on the lights. This project cost us over 10 million dollars. But it was worth every penny. Using it to the glory of God will cost us our time and energy. But it will be worth everything that we give. After all, when we consider what God gave in Christ for us and our salvation, how can we do anything less?

So much is at stake, so many are uncertain. The darkness can seem at times overwhelming. And it would be if not for Jesus. What more can we say? Whatever it takes, whatever it costs, for Jesus’ sake, it’s time for us to cut on the lights.

Has it really been 10 years since that fateful Tuesday when phone calls were being made all over the country as a result of the attacks of 9/11? Time really has a way of getting away from us, doesn’t it, especially when something so life-shattering takes place. The days tend to run together so that ten years ago seems like yesterday. Consider how much things changed after 9/11. Intrusions such as metal detectors and travel regulations and the forfeiture of privacy rights are all just a part of the landscape of everyday life today. Whereas a decade ago, such matters would have seemed invasive and over the top, nowadays, we don’t even give them a second thought.

And yet, still in our heart of hearts, even as people of faith, there are lingering questions that every now and then manage to rise to the surface. “Why did God allow ‘9/11’ to happen?” “Where was God when terrorists took control of those planes?” “How can a good and all-powerful God allow such evil to gain the upper hand?” “Does God even see what’s going on here on earth?” “Is God paying attention?” On one hand, we feel guilty for contemplating such questions. But on the other hand, those questions simply give evidence of our need to find some measure of meaning in every circumstance and situation of life, even and especially in those circumstances and situations that on the surface appear to be meaningless.

Evidently, it is an age-old quest. Consider this verse that I have read for you from the prophet Habakkuk. In this verse, God’s prophet is taking God to task over what he perceives to be a massive injustice that God has let slide. A wicked nation has risen up against righteous Judah, and Habakkuk wants to know why such a thing happened and how long would it continue.

Who is this audacious prophet anyway? We really don’t know. The Bible gives no personal description of this brash and haughty soul. The context of his prophecy places him around the time of the prophet Jeremiah, when the people of God were facing the threat of destruction from the treacherous Babylonians. It was during this time period that things in Judah reached their gloomiest point and everyone was left wondering why God seemed to be sitting this conflict out.

To Habakkuk’s credit, he took the matter directly to God, which I find inspiring. Habakkuk’s bold address validates God’s acceptance of our protests. God does not chastise Habakkuk for speaking such words. God does not strike him down with a bolt of lightning. God, in fact, doesn’t seem to be disturbed in the least that Habakkuk and the people are bent out of shape at what seems to be about to happen. God simply allows Habakkuk to vent the people’s concerns and God takes those concerns upon Himself so that God’s people won’t have to be burdened with them anymore.

It seems to be an axiom of human development that every human being has to go through a stage where he must learn how to control his temper. For most persons that challenge first emerges at around two or three years of age – the “terrible twos.” Part of the role of parents is learning how to help their children negotiate that personality challenge. When I was coming along, the popular method was a good spanking, but in more recent years, the conventional wisdom has shifted to less punitive practices. For example, one practice is to put the child in “time out.” Just send the child to a place where he is cut off from the rest of the family until he’s had some time to calm down and think about the benefits of good behavior. But sometimes a parent doesn’t have that luxury when a child acts out and has to do something else on the spur of the moment. For example, have you ever seen a parent corral his or her child when that child is on the verge of losing it in public? Have you seen a parent wrap his arms around the child and just hold that child until the child is able to release all of his negative energy? Have you ever seen a parent just love her child into a state of calm and control when just minutes earlier that child was in a state of exasperation?

That’s what we see happening in Habakkuk’s prophecy. Habakkuk, whose name in the Hebrew means “clasp” or “embrace,” delivers the people’s complaint to God for a good two chapters, and God doesn’t seem to be threatened in the least. God listens. God attends. God waits patiently. And then God calmly and confidently assures the prophet and His people that nothing about their situation comes either as a surprise to Him or is beyond His control. In His time, good will prevail. He asks only that His people trust Him, which is precisely where Habakkuk ends up calling the people to land. “The LORD is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him” (Hab. 2:20). And in their worship, God’s people are caught up in a loving embrace that gives them the assurance that with God on their side, everything wrong will eventually be put to right.

My greatest concern over this tenth anniversary of what was undoubtedly one of the worst moments in American history is that we will wallow in grief and despair over the losses that so many suffered that fateful day. I don’t say that to minimize the loss of life or property or even our sense of security, all of which was ripped away from us a decade ago. I say it to remind us that our futures don’t have to be determined by past tragedies and how that, with God’s help, we can move past our disappointments and defeats by trusting in Him to be always working for what is best. Nothing in life can prevent God from fulfilling His good purpose, and when we trust in Him, nothing can prevent us from joining God in that good and gracious work.

John Buchanan is an editorial writer for the Christian Century magazine. I recall an article he did some months after 9/11 happened. People had recovered from the initial shock of those terrorist attacks to begin asking hard questions regarding what seemed to be God’s absence at that most difficult time. Buchanan acknowledged his understanding of how people with no faith might have asked such a question. But he could not and would not understand how that question might fall from the lips of those who claimed to be people of faith. For people of faith, the relevant question in times of tragedy is not so much, “Where is God?” For people of faith the relevant question is more, “How can I as one who believes in God mediate His presence?” “Where am I in such times, and how does my presence bear witness to the presence of God?”

In other words, I think of the many people of faith who were very much invested in the aftermath of the attacks of September 11, 2001. I think of the many who ventured into the areas of devastation to offer tangible help and hope and a sense of holy presence through acts of mercy, grace, and compassion. For that matter, I think of the many who venture into such places whenever such tragedy strikes. Even this past year, members of our church have gone to Alabama to help with disaster relief and to Haiti to help with reconstruction efforts, just as in past years, members went to Louisiana for the same purpose. People of faith go into such places to show how God can bring good out of bad and promise out of despair.

We know that because of Jesus, God’s Word became flesh and dwelt among us full of grace and truth. That Word was nailed to a cross and sealed in a tomb. But on the third day, that same Word was raised again to life as proof that nothing can stand in the way of that which God promises and which God purposes. That same Word was raised to life to assure us that there is nothing that can separate us from the love of God and that we are more than conquerors through Him who loves us and embraces us in that way.

Can you fall into the embrace of such a loving God this morning? And can you trust in Him not only to see you through your times of despair, can you also trust Him to help you see others through theirs? All it requires of you is your willingness to heed the same counsel the prophet Habakkuk gave his people: keep silence, be patient, be hopeful, and live by faith.

When I was growing up, I would spend a week or so each summer with my grandmother. I guess my mother needed the “time out.” My grandmother was a superb seamstress. Judy and I have a couple of quilts and bedspreads that she sewed back during my childhood. She also loved to do embroidery, and often did it while the two of us watched TV. For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, embroidery is a form of ornamental needlework that is done over a piece of cloth or other fabric. I would watch her work the needle back and forth, in and out, and because I was always watching from the back side, all of it looked like a bizarre and unruly pattern of lines and colors. None of it made any sense whatsoever. But when she would turn it over to show me what she was doing, from the front side I could see a work that was so beautiful it could take your breath away. And every now and then, she would even invite me to take the needle and join with her in crafting a design that would end up being nothing less than a work of art.

We live in a world that too often appears senseless and without purpose. But maybe that’s because we’re looking at it from downunder. What if we saw life as God sees it, and what if we took God up on His offer to work with Him to bring order out of chaos, rhyme out of wrong, and good out of evil? What if we were to become the means by which God made His presence known in the broken places and among the broken people of this world He so loves and through Christ is committed to redeeming?

 

Given the bleak nature of the job situation that so many are facing today, I feel somewhat guilty even addressing the subject of work on this Labor Day Sunday. The numbers of people who are either unemployed or underemployed cause me to wonder if perhaps this year I should opt for another sermon topic and save the topic of Christian labor for another year, when things are a bit brighter.

But as you can see in the bulletin, I’ve chosen to forge ahead, in part because there are a good number among us who are in fact gainfully employed or who are studying in the hopes of one day being gainfully employed. But I’ve also decided to speak to the subject because even if someone is unemployed or underemployed, there is still work to be done in either looking for a job or scouting out the prospects of landing an even better job.

Besides, most of us approach the topic of labor only from a utilitarian point of view. We see it primarily as a means by which we put a roof over our heads and food on our tables. And I would quickly acknowledge that there’s nothing inherently unchristian about approaching it in that way.

However, there comes a time in every person’s life when our work must become something more than that. There comes a time when we yearn to see the manner in which we spend the vast majority of our waking hours as involving something that is more fulfilling, something that is more substantive. There comes a time when we want to see our work resulting in that which connects with the work of God.

That’s certainly where Paul was coming from in his letter to the Ephesians. The city of Ephesus was a major commercial center during the first century world. In other words, a lot of work went on there, the most menial of which was work done by Christians. These believers were Gentiles by birth who had come to faith in Christ out of self-centered, self-indulgent way of life, and they were now being encouraged by the great Apostle to refocus their energies on things that made life better for others, especially for others who were in need.

The verse that I read for you this morning is one that, quite honestly, most Christians think doesn’t hold any application for everyday life today. Notice what Paul says. “He who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with his own hands.” Our first thought is that this passage must have originally applied to sticky-finger saints who thought that they could just pilfer what they needed off other believers. Maybe they took that business in Acts 4 about members of the church selling their possessions and giving the proceeds to others in the church to mean that they didn’t have to work, that they could live off the largesse of their brothers and sisters in Christ.

But wouldn’t you agree that there are different ways that people can steal from others? For example, people can steal away opportunities for making a difference by refusing to take advantage of opportunities whenever they come their way. They can steal away the chance to move someone in the workplace nearer to God by projecting a lazy witness or by wasting their time on frivolous and unproductive pursuits. They can steal away the chance to praise God by doing anything that is less than their best with the gifts and the abilities that God has graciously provided them. That is why Paul admonished these Ephesian Christians to use their work to engage in useful activities so that whatever came from it could be employed materially and spiritually and emotionally to do someone else good and all of it for the sake of Jesus.

I think that word is most definitely a word that needs to be heard today. For one thing, too many hold to the view that work is something to be avoided, as if everyday work were a curse or a penalty. The prevailing view is that all work is base and unspiritual. 

And while I’d be the first to admit that it is hard to cultivate a sense of wonder in the workplace because of the coarse and common elements found there, elements like efficiency and productivity and overhead and profit, I’d also be the first to say that if we restrict our pursuit of Jesus to religious times like Sundays and Wednesday nights, then we isolate the majority of our waking hours from the possibility of the Spirit using us to advance Christ’s cause and to serve God’s purpose.

What we need is a higher vision of how we can use those hours in a holier way. What we need is a better understanding of how we change the world for Christ’s sake through our work.

Perhaps the place to begin is with the old and reliable term, “profession.” I remember going through a Social Studies section in high school and talking about those jobs that constituted a “profession,” one of which was a minister. At the time, God was leading me in that direction and I remember thinking how neat it was to see a textbook that compared ministers to other professionals, like doctors and lawyers, people who receive specialized educational training that enables them to serve others for reasons other than mere material or business gain.

But then, growing up Baptist, I had always heard my ministers end every service with an invitation to those in attendance to come forward during the last hymn for the expressed purpose of making a public “profession” of faith. Was there any connection between the two usages? Were there any parallels between the purely sociological use of the word “profession” and the way I heard that word used each and every Sunday at the end of our church’s worship? I think you can see that there must be. I think you can see that there is something deep down within us that yearns to see our work as a means by which we “profess” our gratitude to God for the talents and abilities and our opportunities to use them.

Can you do that this morning? Can you begin to see your labor, whether you are paid for it or not, as a way of praising God and living out your “profession?” Can you use the means by which you spend the majority of your waking hours to commit yourself to being used by God to change the world through your work? If you will, then you will come to experience a sense of wellbeing in your life that neither position nor prestige nor any of the other sensations people normally associate with work can ever provide.

I understand that early in his career, the young author Charles Dickens was greatly discouraged. He had a wife and four children to support, with another child on the way, and Dickens was essentially out of a job. Plagued by self-doubt and mounting financial pressures, Dickens found it difficult to write and spent long, restless nights walking the streets of London.

As he talked by night with struggling street people, observing firsthand the social strains of child labor, poverty, and hopelessness, an idea began to form in his mind. The sights fueled his passion to help the poor and he began to see beyond his own problems. How could he make a difference? What did he have within himself to contribute to making a better world?

That next day Dickens sat down to write with a renewed zeal. He combined his newfound passion with his genius as a writer to create a small book that he hoped would change the world, along with his own situation. Six weeks later, he published the famed A Christmas Carol, an immortal story that at once became wildly popular and transformed public opinion. Some even connect the beginning of Great Britain’s social reform movement to the publication of Dickens’ book. And the best part of all is that Dickens, who became fabulously wealthy from that writing and other works that he would write, used a good portion of his money to lead the way in educating and reintegrating the poor into society through his Urania Cottage charity.

What was it that made the difference in the life of Charles Dickens and refocused what was to become a great career? It was the unique combination of natural talent, passion for a cause, and the call of his conscience to fill a great need in the world. It was a sense of “profession” and how his work might change the world.

What was true in the life of Charles Dickens can be true in your life. You can use every interaction and every opportunity to connect with God’s will and God’s purpose, and you can create a sense of wonder in the midst of your everyday life.

Today is a day of worship, a day when we praise God from whom all blessings flow, including the blessings of gifts and abilities. Tomorrow is a day to take it easy, a day to kick back and relax with friends and families and to take a respite from your daily grind. But then the next day, we get back to it – either going to work or looking for work or studying to be able one day to find a place to work. 

Don’t take the opportunity lightly and certainly don’t take it as not applying to your faith. Doing so would be like stealing from yourself. Your work is perhaps the best means for bearing witness to your desire to serve and praise God. Do something useful with what God’s given you, and with His help and by His grace, who knows, but that you might actually change the world.

In his book, Common Table, John Cowan, a human resources consultant and Episcopal priest, tells about a young priest friend of his who had taken over temporary responsibilities for one of the most affluent Episcopal parishes in the state of Minnesota. As a young priest who had been thrown overnight into the deep waters of parish ministry, he was totally clueless about so much of how that congregation went about its business. In particular, he was flummoxed over their parish meetings. On the surface, everything seemed just fine. But underneath, the young priest couldn’t shake this sensation that something else was going on in the congregation that he just couldn’t wrap his mind around. Unable to bear the tension any longer, he asked an older priest who had been a part of that parish for several years what it was that he was sensing but could not for the life of him name. The older priest responded, “Try the word fear.” And suddenly a light bulb went off in the young priest’s head. “That was it! Everything made sense if he took as his basic assumption that the vast majority of the members of his parish were scared out of their wits.” Granted, the members were well-to-do people. They were presidents of this and vice-presidents of that.  They were politicians and dealmakers. They owned expensive houses and vacation properties. They were movers and shakers in the classic sense of the word. But one mistake, one change in management, one more recessionary cycle, and the income that supported their way of life would cause them to lose everything. And so, as a congregation, they were mightily afraid.

I don’t know that you necessarily have to be on the upper end of the socioeconomic ladder to appreciate the fear that so many are feeling today. Truth be told, I can’t think of a better way to describe the “ethos” of our age than to speak of it as one that is awash with fear. 

The media doesn’t help. Everywhere you turn, someone somewhere is proclaiming gloom and doom. Someone is telling you that the end is drawing ever nearer. At one time such talk was the purview of preachers, but now everybody seems to be getting in on the act of telling us just how bad things are getting and why we have every reason to be afraid. The markets are tanking. The government is at loggerheads. Terrorists are gaining the upper hand. How do you even know that you can trust the person sitting next to you? Without question, fear certainly seems to have won the day.

But why really are we so afraid? I think it’s important for us to ask ourselves that question. Why is it that we have this chronic unsettledness deep down in our hearts that causes us to wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat? Might it be that the source of our fear is our realization that we are on the verge of losing control? Might it be that the reason we live each moment with this unsettledness in the pit of our stomachs is because we have come to see that so many of the handles that we held on to have been ripped away and we have nowhere else to turn?

If this morning, that pretty well describes what you’re dealing with in life, then do I have good news for you. There is a place you can turn. There is someone you can cling to. There is help and there is hope, and all of it comes in the person of Jesus.

That’s the point of the story I read for you today. This story of Peter walking on the water is at its core a story of hope. It’s a story of hope, because it presents us with the impossible – a man walking on water – and so, it inspires us with the prospects of how, like Peter, we might be able to overcome those challenges that in the course of our everyday life threaten to consume us.

As you read the story, the emphasis is on Simon Peter, and understandably so. There is so much about Simon Peter that so many of us aspire to emulate. He is bold. He is committed. He is unafraid to take risks and he is always ready to pull the trigger. He reminds us of the truth behind the saying that mistakes of passion are always easier to overcome than mistakes of inertia. In other words, it’s always easier to clean up the messes that you might make when at least you try to accomplish something than it is having to move beyond the agony of realizing just how much you missed when an opportunity came your way and you were simply too afraid to take advantage of it.

So, why doesn’t Simon Peter inspire us with the courage to take the risks we need to take to overcome the challenges in life that are sinking us by the second? I believe it’s because the story was never intended to have us focus on the example of Simon Peter. The story, as told by each of the Gospel writers, was intended to have us focus instead on Jesus.

I have been guilty of this mistake myself. Like many of you, I grew up hearing this story and from a very young age being told that the point of the story is always to keep our eyes on Jesus. But what happens as we get older is that we get away from that simple truth. We take a few risks and, lo and behold, they work out. We inch out a little farther onto the limb and the limb doesn’t break. We jump into the deep water and though we don’t necessarily float, neither do we drown. And after a little bit of that level of success, without ever noticing, we take our focus away from Jesus and we place it upon ourselves. “Look at me. Look at what I can do. Look at how far I can go.” And Jesus is nowhere to be seen.

Go back and look at the story with what one theologian (Paul Ricoeur) has called a “second naïveté.” The disciples find themselves in the midst of a serious squall some distance from the shore. It is the middle of the night, between 3 and 6 AM. Suddenly they see a figure coming to them from a distance. At first they take it to be a ghost; not a good sign, not a good sign at all. But then Jesus calls out to them, “It is I; do not be afraid.”

It is at this point that Simon Peter enters the picture. “Lord, if it is you, tell me to come to you on the water.” And when Jesus tells Peter to come to him, Peter does, and he walks on the water, until he sees the wind and notices the waves and becomes afraid and begins to sink. And at that point, he calls upon Jesus to save him, which, of course, Jesus does, but not before he upbraids him for having what Jesus calls “little faith.”

Here’s the point. We love to laud Peter for his boldness in jumping out of the boat. We love to point out how Peter took a mighty risk that the eleven other disciples certainly weren’t willing to take. But the truth of the matter is that even in jumping from the boat, Peter was still trying to be in control of the situation. Peter was still trying to manage his challenge. “Lord,” he called out to Jesus, “if it’s you, tell me to come to you on the water.” Peter wanted to be where Jesus was and know the power that Jesus knew. But what Peter failed to understand, until he found himself in a place beyond his control, was that the only way we are able to rise above the challenges of everyday life is to make sure that our faith and our focus are securely on Jesus.

Maybe that’s your story this morning. You’ve answered the call of Jesus to join him in the face of some precarious challenge, but somewhere along the way you started to believe that you could handle the situation on your own and you took your focus away from Jesus. Jesus helped you get back on your feet financially or relationally or in terms of your health or your studies, but now, you’ve come to believe that you can manage those situations by yourself, except things aren’t going as well for you as you had hoped. It’s time to “faith up.” It’s time for you to recast your focus on Jesus and call upon him to do in your life what only he is capable of doing. It’s time for you to trust yourself in that situation to Jesus and never make the mistake of ignoring him again.

Can you do that this morning? Can you fix your gaze upon Jesus in the face of whatever challenges you may be facing in the present hour? I’m not suggesting that you avoid taking risks. I’m not suggesting that you play it safe and stay in the safety of the boat; that’s not what this story is suggesting. When the storms are raging, the boat is not necessarily a safe place. When the storms are raging, the only safe place is to be in the presence of Jesus and to look to him for the power to see us through.

The story is told of a little boy who was playing in his back yard, when he discovered a house painter’s ladder leaning against the house. Of course, like most boys would do, he began to climb the ladder, rung by rung, higher and higher. The painter looked down and saw what was happening, and he knew that if the boy looked down, he would be terrified, perhaps panic, and fall to only God knows what fate. So, with a calm and cheerful voice, he spoke to the child these words: “Keep climbing, son. Keep climbing. Look up here to me and keep coming in my direction.”

Fortunately, the child listened and kept climbing, and all the while the painter kept talking and encouraging him. Finally, the boy reached the painter, never realizing how high and how far he had climbed. And when he did, the painter took the child in his arms and carried him back down the ladder to a place on the ground where he would be safe once again.

In the course of your everyday life, you may have come to find yourself in a place that you never imagined being. And you may have gotten there in faith and in response to the call of Jesus. But now, it’s gotten kind of scary and uncertain, and truth be told, you are deathly afraid.

You have a choice. You can focus on your fear or you can focus on Jesus. There’s no shortage of voices telling you to do the former – to focus on your fear – and far too few voices directing you to the latter – to focus on Jesus. For your sake, listen to the ones that are pointing you to Jesus. For while focusing on your fears will only distract you and cause you to fail, focusing on Jesus will strengthen you and sustain you and help you to do things that you never thought possible. And that, my brothers and sisters, is what the life of faith is really all about.

I have never been much of a gardener, though there have been times when I have given gardening my best shot. Through the years, people have given me plants and trees for special occasions and I have nurtured them right to the point of death. It’s either I give them not enough water or too much water, not enough sun or too much sun, not enough attention or too much attention. I’ve concluded that some people are just born with green thumbs and others of us are born with brown ones, and we “brownies” just have to rely on the “greenies” to make up for what seems to elude us, no matter how hard we try.

 

I have never been much of a gardener, though there have been times when I have given gardening my best shot. Through the years, people have given me plants and trees for special occasions and I have nurtured them right to the point of death. It’s either I give them not enough water or too much water, not enough sun or too much sun, not enough attention or too much attention. I’ve concluded that some people are just born with green thumbs and others of us are born with brown ones, and we “brownies” just have to rely on the “greenies” to make up for what seems to elude us, no matter how hard we try.

I remember my first foray into gardening. I was about nine or ten years old, when one day a light went off in my head that the seeds inside all of the good things I had been eating – apples and grapes and watermelon, were all placed there by God and were intended not just to be spit out but to be planted so that new fruit might come from the old. “How hard can this be?” I thought to myself. So, I went out into the backyard where all the basketball and baseball I played there had worn away a big bare spot. I dug a couple of holes, planted a few seeds, covered them back up, and waited for a harvest, which as you could predict never came.

Little did I know at the time that I had stumbled across a foundational truth not just in gardening but also in discipleship. You can have the best seed in the world, but what matters most is the soil in which the seed is planted.

That certainly seems to be the point of this parable that Jesus told, as recorded in the gospel of Matthew. Known popularly as “the Parable of the Sower,” Matthew’s version is a bit different from its counterparts in Mark and Luke because of how it emphasizes the conditions of the soil more than the ability of the sower. 

You know the broad outline of the story. A farmer goes out one day to scatter his seed. He is my kind of farmer. Evidently, he doesn’t worry about where he casts the seed.   There is an indiscriminate nature to his casting. He casts it randomly and haphazardly. But for Matthew, that’s not the real part of the parable we need to be paying attention to. What comes next is the important part for Matthew, the various places where the seed falls.

Some seed falls along the path, which is hard and beaten down. The birds come quickly and eat the seed up because the seed never truly gets planted. Some seed falls on rocky places, which also don’t have much soil. And though there is enough soil for the seed to get into the ground among the rocks and the stones, because it has so little depth, the seed springs up quickly but just as quickly is burned up by the scorching sun. Some seed falls among the thorns, which grow up alongside the seed and eventually choke the life out of it. But some seed falls upon good soil and generates a significant harvest – a hundred or sixty or thirty times the amount of seed originally sown.

I don’t think you have to be a biblical scholar to figure out what this parable intends for us to do. Having said that, I should also say that all parables from Jesus intend for us to do something. The tendency some people have is to look on Jesus’ parables and see them as sweet, little stories that he told to make a spiritual point. But the truth of the matter is that Jesus’ parables always contained a “sucker punch” of sorts – a challenging truth that sneaks up on you and confronts you with a question that many times can take your breath away. 

In this case, the question is, “What kind of soil are you?” Are you hardened and beaten down? Are you shallow and sort of stony? Have you found yourself surrounded by thorns and thistles and other unhealthy influences? Or are you making a difference for the cause of Christ? Is there any evidence that you reflect his presence in the places where God has planted you? Do you produce fruit that shows that you belong to Jesus? Do you “add heavenly value” to the people and the places God puts in your life?

These are absolutely essential questions, especially in these times in which we now live when more and more people look with some suspicion on the church. Many of us will remember the time when the church carried a measure of respect among society, even among those who didn’t consider themselves Christian. But that day has long passed, and if anything, people who are not Christian look at the church as being phony and irrelevant. The “phony” charge has always been something the church has had to deal with. I can’t remember a time when people didn’t explain their reluctance to come to church because there were too many “hypocrites” there. But the “irrelevancy” charge is a relatively new challenge, and one, quite frankly, that causes me no little emotional pain and distress.

How did this happen? How did the church go from being an influential presence in society one day to becoming an essentially useless one the next? One explanation is that we began “majoring on minors.” In other words, as the people of God we began giving our time and energy to things that were not necessarily “kingdom business.”   And I would agree. While the gospel of Jesus Christ certainly has political implications and humanitarian implications and economic implications, the gospel is not first and foremost a political or humanitarian or economic enterprise. It is instead, as I read the New Testament, a movement of people who are dedicated to following Jesus, as they love God and love their neighbors and invite others to join them in this life-fulfilling journey. 

Please understand that I am not trying to avoid conversation on what are the pressing political and humanitarian and economic issues of the day. What I am trying to do is to plead for a response to those issues that is distinctively Christian – a response that comes from a place where people dare to ask that questions, “How does this show our love for God?” and “How does this show our love for neighbor?” And if Christians don’t approach the pressing issues of the day from that place and perspective, then, pray tell, who will?”

Stop for a moment and look around at the crowd that has gathered here today. Think of the difference that even this group of people could make in all the places where God has put us if in those places we simply went about our business as if it were God’s business, loving Him and loving others. Think of the impact that the fruit of His Spirit might have through us as we unleashed into this world an outpouring of love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and faithfulness and goodness and gentleness and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23). Think of how this world could become a better place if justice rolled down like water and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream (Amos 5:24). Don’t you want to give yourself to something as great and as inspiring as that? I do.

How then do we get there? How then do we make sure that our souls are made up of the type of soil that receives the seed of God’s Word and makes something good come of it? Let me offer several suggestions.

In the first place, we must invite God to indwell us at all times. A truth in the parable that we can’t afford to miss is that the world is made up of hard places and rocky places and places that are rife with thorns and thistles. As people who follow Jesus, we live next to all of those places and the only way we can make sure that we don’t become like them is to be careful always to have hearts that are forever open to God. When you look in the Bible at the people who were able to do significant things for God – people like Noah and Moses and David and, of course, Jesus – all of them were people who lived openly before God. The moment that we cut ourselves off from God is the moment we begin to dry up and die.

And that leads to a second suggestion. We must also be willing to allow God to prune us of those things in our lives that keep us from producing His very best. If you pay attention to those who truly have green thumbs, they will tell you that in order to see something continue to flourish, you must always be working to prune away the sorts of branches or petals that hinder that something from bringing forth its very best. How many of us have failed to produce the yields that God wills to bring from us because of our reluctance to experience His pruning? If God takes something away – a dream, a desire, a possession, or a privilege – it may be because He knows that it is standing in the way of the something greater He desires to do.

And that leads to a last suggestion. We must be willing to be patient for God to bring about the harvest that only God can make possible. In other words, the only thing that may be preventing us thirtyfold believers from being sixtyfold ones or us sixtyfold believers from being one hundredfold ones is our inability to trust our lives to God for the long haul. The one consistent teaching the Bible gives us about the nature of God is that He never seems to be much in a hurry. “A day to the Lord is like a thousand years” (2 Pet. 3:8; Ps. 90:4). “The Lord is not slow to fulfill His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). That is why the Bible also says, “Those who wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength” (Isa. 40:31). There is always much to be said for not trying to get ahead of God.

You see, you are not consigned to remain the type of soil you may be today. If you’re bad soil, you can become good soil. And if you’re good soil, you can become even better soil. All that is necessary is for you to take the Word of God when it comes to you and then do something with it by the power of that Word that is implanted in you.

I love the story of the minutes of the local garden club that got published in the weekly news of their small town newspaper. The minutes read, “The day lilies we planted around the courthouse all died for the third straight year. The club voted unanimously to replant them and to adopt as our club motto, ‘To Dream the Impossible Dream.’”

Isn’t that the same dream that propels us – that the “kingdoms of this world might become the Kingdom of our Lord and Christ (Rev. 11:15)?   Some might think that impossible, and in our own power I’d say that it is. But with God’s power all things are possible so that even those of us who are brown-thumbed and, even worse, brown-spirited can through the grace of Jesus Christ produce a harvest – thirty, sixty, and if we are patiently and persistently faithful, one hundredfold.