t3h msg

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Berryville, Arkansas on Sunday April 6, 2008, the 3rd Sunday of Easter.

Acts 2:14a, 36-41
Psalm 116:1-4, 12-19
1Peter 1:17-23
Luke 24:13-35

This sermon mentions a bulletin insert. This is the text of the insert:
Dad@hvn, ur spshl. we want wot u want &urth2b like hvn. giv us food & 4giv r sins lyk we 4giv uvaz. don test us! sAv us! bcos we kno ur boss, ur tuf & ur cool 4 eva! K?

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.

In your bulletin is a lavender sheet of paper, take a moment and look over it. Tell me the truth, does it look just a little like gobble-de-gook to you? If this looks like gibberish to you, and unless you’re a teen, a college student, or the parent of one there is no reason it shouldn’t, it’s because it is written in Short Message Service abbreviation script, a common way to format cell phone text messages. [1]

In text messages, grammar goes out the window, numbers and odd characters are used for letters, and punctuation is used in ways that would have given my second grade teacher Miss Bedene[2] a heart attack. Because of a keyboard so small it can only be operated with thumbs and a screen so small the display is at most six square inches[3] (and my phone’s display is only about 1.25 square inches) and a message size of 160 characters, an entirely new dialect of English is evolving.

A few years ago, the online Christian magazine “Ship of Fools” sponsored a contest to format a familiar prayer in SMS script in 160 characters or less; the maximum length of a cell phone text message. Matthew Campbell from York College in the UK submitted this winning entry. Do you recognize it yet? Believe it or not, it’s the Lord’s Prayer.

The “literal” translation of this text message is: “Dad in heaven, you are special. We want what you want and earth to be like heaven. Give us food and forgive our sins like we forgive others. Don’t test us! Save us! Because we know you are boss, you are tough and you are cool forever. Okay?”[4]

It’s not the King James, is it?

Beginning in 2004 there has been a UK advice forum called “Text Talk” providing a new voice and a new way to ask for help. “Text Talk” offers information on a wide range of issues, including counseling, housing, substance abuse, and careers with guaranteed immediate response. In the first nine months of operation, 200 young people, many of them boys, accessed the service.[5] And let’s be honest, anything that can help boys ask for help is a good thing.

Short Message Service text, it’s not the King James English, but then again that’s the point, isn’t it?

We can say what we want, but there is a new slang, dialect, lingo, jargon of language coming along; just like a new jargon has come along with each coming generation; the way language has evolved since long before King James.

Peter raised his voice and addressed the crowd. “This Jesus God raised up, and of that all of us are witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you both see and hear. Therefore let the entire house of Israel know with certainty that God has made him both Lord and Messiah, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

Israel is the Lord’s promised people. The nation has had a special, intimate relationship with the Lord since the days of Abram. And now Peter indicts them, convicts them of crucifying Jesus, the one whom God has made both Lord and Messiah.

The people are cut to the heart by the actions of their people and words of the disciple. They ask, “What shall we do?”

“Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ” Peter commands them, “so that your sins may be forgiven.” Repent, and be baptized for this promise is for you, for your children, and for all who fall away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him.

This is new to Israel. They had awaited the coming of the Messiah since the days of the prophets and now he is crucified. But now, through the risen Christ, the nation of Israel—and by Israel all people—are given the gift of forgiveness of sins by the grace of God almighty.

The language of sin and repentance is dicey. It has always seemed to me that when people start talking about sin, there is a tendency to either talk about the sins of others or sins the speaker tries to hide from the world.

The March 12 issue of the “Washington Post” includes this little tidbit from a speech titled “The Need for Both Passion and Humility in Politics.” Quoting theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, the speaker said: “Driven by hubris [a fancy word for arrogance], we become blind to our own fallibility and make terrible mistakes.” The speaker was former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer.[6] Spitzer decries hubris and then is brought down by his own. I can’t decide if this is prophetic or ironic.

As tempting as it is to point at the arrogance of others, Paul warns us against this in Romans. After a laundry list of sin, Paul reminds the church of Rome that when we pass judgment on another, we condemn ourselves because we are doing the very same things.[7]

So when both Peter in Acts and Paul in Romans talk to the church about sin they make this one point, there is no one without sin, there is no one without the need of repentance. To say that someone else needs to repent shows all too well that our world is broken, when we judge the sins of others, we condemn ourselves.

So what does Peter mean when he tells the assembly to repent? Peter is telling the people that they need to feel remorse; yes this is one of the things he is telling them.[8] But remorse alone is nothing. Sorrow might be a normal reaction, but it can hardly be our only reaction. Shame is worthless to the people and to the Lord. So if sorrow and regret are incomplete and shame is not the way to respond, how should we react in repentance?

Even more than remorse, Peter is telling them to be converted. He is telling them to turn from the ways of the law and to the ways of peace and grace through the Lord.[9] And he is telling them with their repentance, they need to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.

As Peter told the people to be baptized, today we are called to remember our baptism. Dr. Stan Hall wrote, “Teaching and washing or washing and teaching, at the core of the assembly in the name of Jesus, signifies gospel appropriated by faith.”[10] Teaching and washing, word and sacrament together are at the heart of our worship and have been since the beginnings of the church. The word informs us and the baptism washes, just as it washed the three-thousand in our reading from Acts.

Dr. Hall goes on to say that the corporate confession and absolution says we begin from our baptism. In this sacramental washing we experience new birth in the name of Jesus Christ. In this way the three thousand in Acts were washed and made clean of the sin of the nation of Israel. Notice I say nothing about any particular individual’s sin. Peter was dealing with Israel’s sin, as an Israelite himself; Peter who denied Christ, Peter who would become the rock of the Church; even he needed to atone for the sins of his nation.

Peter said, “Repent and be baptized.” This is a new language, a new way of communicating with one another. In the waters of our baptism in the corporate confession of sin, we come together a community of the Lord our God. We are washed and made clean. We are called to remember this bath as we confess the sin of humanity, the church, and ourselves, not for guilt and shame, but to remember that we have been born anew and washed in the waters of our baptism.

Baptism is the foundational sacramental element of coming together in the community established by Jesus Christ. Continued feeding of the faith is also needed.

Luke’s gospel shares the story of two men, Cleopas and his friend traveling to Emmaus. Jesus, not recognized by either man, asks them what they are talking about. He might as well have asked one of us if it has rained lately,[11] the two men were flabbergasted. Hadn’t this lone traveler heard? Doesn’t he know?

The three reach Emmaus. Jesus was walking on when the others invited him to stay the night. The day is nearly over, they said, come and stay with us. Together at the table Jesus took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. When they received the food he blessed, their eyes were opened and they recognized him.

When they received the food he blessed, their eyes were opened and they recognized him. In this simple supper of bread and cup, the same supper we celebrate today, this sacramental, sacrificial food; in this food the men were restored from despair to hope. Hope that though he was crucified, Jesus lives and continues to live.

In this same breaking of bread we are fed and nourished in the gracious gifts of God.

In Acts, Peter was teaching the nation of Israel that something new was happening. At Emmaus, Jesus showed the two that though he was crucified, he still lives and will be with them eternally to provide the bread of faith and the cup of salvation.

Something new was happening. The elements of water and grain have been around forever. But in Jesus Christ they became something new. Today we celebrate the sacraments in remembrance and in confidence.

“Dad in heaven, you are special. We want what you want and earth to be like heaven. This new text, this new dialect, is a new expression of the ancient truth. It may seem unusual to us, but no more so than baptism did to Peter’s assembly or Jesus’ blessing over dinner did to the travelers to Emmaus. We are invited to join, and remember this in the water of our baptism. We are invited to come to the table and taste and see that the Lord is good.

This new message is the same message Jesus and Peter shared with their listeners, it is the same message the Lord continues to share with us and it is the message we share with the world, and that’s why I titled this sermon “The Message.”

[1] The title of this sermon is a combination of two abbreviated message formats. “t3h” is the word “the” in Leet Speak. In Leet (short for “Elite”) Speak numbers often replace letters and order of letters is often changed. “msg” is Short Message Service Script for “message.” SMS is often a phonetic language.
[2] My second grade teacher, died in the Hyatt tragedy in Kansas City Summer 1981.
[3] My estimate of the size of an iPhone screen based on specs found at http://www.apple.com/iphone/specs.html retrieved April 3, 2008.
[4] Txt Tlk, Homiletics Online.com, http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/btl_display.asp?installment_id=93000057, retrieved April 2, 2008.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Century Marks, Irony of It All, “The Christian Century” Vol 125, No 7, April 8, 2008, page 8. Spitzer is the former governor of New York caught patronizing call girls.
[7] First person reformatting of Romans 2:1 (NRSV)
[8] “Metanoeow”, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd Edition, Revised and edited by Frederick William Danker based on Walter Bauer's Griechisch-deutsches Wörterbuch zu den Schriften des Neuen Testaments und der frühchristlichen Literatur, sixth edition, ed. Kurt Aland and Barbara Aland, with Viktor Reichmann and on previous English editions by W.F.Arndt, F.W.Gingrich, and F.W.Danker. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000
[9] Ibid
[10] Hall, Stanley R. “Essential Tenets of Reformed Worship?” Theology and worship occasional paper no. 10, PC (USA); Louisville, KY., page 17
[11] According to Weather Underground it has rained 13.4 inches since March 1. This is much higher than usual.