Time Loves a Hero

Now and What Happens Next

2012-01-22T13:16:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday January 22, 2012, the 3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Jonah 3:1-5, 10

Psalm 62:5-12

1 Corinthians 7:29-31

Mark 1:14-20

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

I have mentioned that alltranslation is interpretation, and from time to time I believe that thephrasing of one of our many English translations has an edge over the others. Sometimesthe difference is an important translation issue, where one word or phrase hasa significant difference over another. But there are other times when thedifference is just, well, a flavor issue. I like the way one translation soundsover another. It could be just the way the words flow. Sometimes it has to dowith language that gets modernized that just doesn’t sound right compared tohow we’ve heard it all our lives.

Our reading from the NewInternational Version begins “After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God.” The NewRevised Standard Version begins saying, “Now after John was arrested, Jesuscame to Galilee, proclaiming the good news ofGod.”

There is a real difference betweenbeing arrested and being put in prison; it’s a chicken-and-egg thing. You don’tget “put in prison” until after you get “arrested.” As far as the originalmanuscripts go, the NRSV’s “arrested” is textually correct while the NIV’s “putin prison” gives us insight that “being arrested” doesn’t. Saying that he wasput in prison tells the reader that John was not allowed the comfort of housearrest. He was locked up. This revelation helps us understand his plight in away “arrested” doesn’t. This is a real and important difference, but it isn’tthe main issue to me.

No, my issue is with the one wordleft missing from the NIV, “now.” That’s right, I’m taking issue with a conjunction.Textually speaking the word “now” is in the original manuscript so there’s noreason to leave it out, but that’s not my issue. In this case, the word “now” givesus a transition, a much needed transition and as the old song goes, “and, but,and or can get you pretty far.”[1]

So far, Mark’s gospel has given usthe beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. It begins withJohn’s proclamation, the declaration of his purpose in the gospel story. TheBaptism of the Lord comes next and is immediately followed by the wildernesstemptations. After these humble beginnings, Jesus is ready for his ministry. Itis time for our Lord to take his place in proclaiming the good news of God.

That little word “now” is theliterary signal that Jesus gets himself up and dusts himself off. It is themoment Jesus steels his eyes toward the horizon and sets his jaw toward thework he came to do. I love the word “now” because it separates Jesus from thetime that came before and puts him in the time that is to follow. It’s aboutnow and what happens next.

So what happens next? Jesusdeclares the time has come[2]and the kingdom of God is near. Beforemaking that proclamation you had better get yourself up, dust yourself off,steel your eyes and set your jaw.

Jesus makes his way to the Sea of Galilee where he begins to call his firstdisciples. Seeing Simon and Andrew he calls them from their boat to join him tobe fishers of men.[3]

They leave with Jesus immediately.Further down the shore, they see James and John on their father’s boat andJesus calls them to follow. They follow without delay.

That’s what happened next. Theycame. Together they have left boats, nets, catch, family, and business. Theyleft everything that connected them with the society they knew. They left theirfamily and friends. And they did this by nothing more than the word “come.”

Of course, not everyone is such aneasy sell.

The reading from Jonah is anotherexample of someone who has been called and prepared for ministry. What’smissing from our reading is how and why Jonah was so reluctant to undertakewhat God commanded. Of course as we all know how Jonah’s reluctance manifesteditself, he ran the other direction and eventually ended up in the belly of the greatfish. In truth, Jonah never really got over his reluctance, he just did what hewas called to do.

Finally, at the Lord’s command, Jonahreaches Ninevehand tells the people that in forty days the city will be overturned, andbecause of the size of the city it took three days for him to spread the news.That must have been a daunting task. Not only was he delivering bad news, ittook him three days to fully share it.

Then, something miraculoushappened. The people repented. The people declared a fast and everyone woresackcloth. The Ninevites believed God, scripture tells us so. What scripturedoes not tell us is whether anything would happen if Nineveh repents. Jonah’s message to the cityhas no mention of mercy upon repentance, only certain doom.

The city of Nineveh either hoped for mercy uponrepentance or they figured if they were going to be overturned in forty daysthey would worship the one who would overturn them.

Jesus tells the world to repent andbelieve the good news. Ninevehhears the word of the Lord, repents, and believes in God whether it’s good newsor not.

Henry Blackaby is the author of“Experiencing God, Knowing and Doing the Will of God.”[4] Inthis study, Blackaby says one of the keys to experiencing God is having what hecalls a “crisis of belief.”[5]Don’t let this phrase upset you. Blackaby does not mean that we are destined tohave times in our lives when we will believe and when we will not. This isn’twhat he’s saying.

Blackaby’s crisis of belief is“God’s invitation for you to work with Him always leads you to a crisis ofbelief that requires faith and action.”[6]The crisis has nothing to do with believing in your head. It has nothing to dowith believing in your heart. If fact Blackaby’s take on faith is in line withthe Hebrew word for believe and belief. Belief is nothing without action. Nowif that upsets you…

To Blackaby, you can say, “Ibelieve” all you want, it’s what happens next, where the rubber meets the roadthat it begins to matter. Blackaby and the Hebrew tongue are very comfortablewith James words that faith without works is dead.

In a recent survey from the BarnaGroup, a trusted name in church research, almost half of churchgoing Americanssay their life has not changed a bit because of their time in the pews.[7] Lessthan half say they sense the presence of God in worship weekly where one-fifthsay they have that experience monthly at most.

They report that people see thebenefits of church. People know the benefits of connecting with others in thepews and with others in other congregations. People know the benefits ofconnecting with in the denomination too. People know the benefits of faith andthe church, they just don’t experience it. To them, the rubber doesn’t meet theroad.

Barna tells the church that itcannot take for granted that just because people are in the pews that they willreap the benefits of congregating. Pastors and Sessions and everyone who leads thecongregation must be intentional about making worship and the Christian lifeworthy of Christ. We are to lead, not just show up and hope everyone follows,we need to lead. There is a group within the Presbyterian Church that feelsthis pull strongly, and they met last week in Orlando.

For more than thirty years, the PresbyterianChurch (USA) has been arguing with itself over just about everything you canimagine. We have weathered the “worship wars” and every sort of music fromorgan to piano to guitar to orchestras and bands both acoustic and electric. Wehave argued over modern music verses new music verses the hymns “we all knowand love.” We have argued over the liturgy and whether it is better to be “highchurch” or “let the Spirit roll.” We have argued over who should be eligible tobe considered as Elders and Deacons. We have argued over whether beingmissional means local or global. We have argued over what evangelism means andwhat it means to be evangelical. We have argued over the very word evangelical!

The group that met in Orlando had its genesisin a letter to the church last February. They have grown out of dissatisfactionwith the denomination over polity, mission, and evangelism priorities, or thisis how I interpret what they have written. I will say this too, I disagree withtheir positions on polity issues, officer eligibility and property. If you wantmore details on what I think about this, I would love to take some time to chatwith you after worship. But let me tell you where I do agree.

Leslie Scanlan, a reporter for thePresbyterian Outlook magazine made this report from the Orlando meeting:

It was of a boldchurch unafraid to take risks; one that makes disciples; one that takes thebest of Presbyterian history and tradition and points it in new directions.“I’m not really sure we have really dreamed for a long time,” said Ortberg, anauthor and pastor of Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in California. “I think God is calling us todream.”[8]

To this I say “Amen!” We mustdream. We must seek where the church is being called in every time and age. Infact, Henry Blackaby says “Amen!” to this too. Blackaby wants the church to followthe very specific example Jesus set. As Jesus watched to see where the Fatherwas at work and joined Him, Blackaby encourages the church to watch and seewhere Jesus is working and follow.[9]

Jesus doesn’t want us to sit inmeetings all day long, read demographic reports, consider action plans, and soon and so forth. First and foremost Jesus wants us to look for him. Jesus wantsus to see what he is doing. Jesus wants us to see where he is going. And Jesuswants us to follow.

Jesus said to Simon and Andrew,“Come, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Jesus called out toJames and John. All four followed immediately. They knew it would not be easy.They knew they were leaving important obligations at the wayside, and theyturned (another way to say “repent”) and they believed the good news.

It didn’t make their lives easier. Inthe end it made their deaths harder. Yet they followed. They did not alwaysknow where Jesus was leading and he led them in places and ways that they didnot understand. Throughout the gospel Simon Peter specifically put in histwo-cents about the way things should be done after Jesus says “Come, followme.” So this isn’t news when we do this today.

Like the disciples, we are calledas partners in Christ’s service. We are called as partners of Christ and calledas partners one to another within the congregation. We are called to bepartners in Christ’s service with other believers in the denomination and withother believers who are not our variety of believer. We are called as partnerswith those who agree with us completely and with those whose only similarity isthat they too are called as partners in Christ’s service.

Called as we are, we are called tobe partners. In service to God we are the junior partners to the Lord our God,but as partners in Christ’s service and not as slaves. We are to seek where Godis working and we are to follow. We sing, “Lead On, O King Eternal.” We arecalled to sing in worship and respond to the call and vocation the King leadsus to follow.

I believe we are called to do thistogether as a denomination, not as a bunch of special interest groups that seemnot just willing to split but actively seeking a fissure to cause a schism. Ibelieve we are better together than we are apart. I believe we are better whenthe entire denomination does not look like me. I’m enough me; I need people whoare not like me to show me things I wouldn’t see otherwise. As the theologianonce said, “I cannot be an ‘I’ without a ‘Thou.’”[10]

It is up to us, individually, as theSession, as the congregation, as the denomination, and as the Body of Christ toseek where Jesus is working and follow. Like Jonah we may still be reluctant,Jesus expects this. Yet we are called to follow.

Jesus has already said come. It isup to us to see the places he leads us to follow. It is up to us as the body tobe a part of what happens next. It is up to us to believe the good news of God,join the Christ, and follow making fishers of men.

[1] Yes,I’ve invoked “Conjunction Junction” in the Name of the Lord.

[2] This isanother instance of “translation anxiety.” I prefer the NRSV’s “has beenfulfilled” over the NIV’s “has come.” Been fulfilled is more mysterious as thework of God is mysterious.

[3] This isanother instance of “translation anxiety.” “Fishers of men” has been aroundsince the King James and is continued into the NIV and the New AmericanStandard Bible where the NRSV uses the gender neutral phrase “fish for people.”Fishers of men is more accurate word-for-word and frankly missing with one ofthe greatest phrases in the English language is a shame.

[4]Bkackaby, Henry T., King, Claude V. “Experiencing God, Knowing and Doing theWill of God.” Nashville, TN: Lifeway Press, 1990.

[5] Ibid,pages 19, 20, 22-25, 108-125.

[6] Ibid,page 20.

[7] “urvey:Half of Churchgoers Lives Not Affected by Time in Pews”, http://ethicsdaily.com/survey-half-of-churchgoers-lives-not-affected-by-time-in-pews-cms-19114,retrieved January 18, 2012

[8]Presbyterian Outlook, “A Bold Church Unafraid; Fellowship Casts Vision.” http://www.pres-outlook.com/component/content/article/44-breaking-news/12150-a-bold-church-unafraid-fellowship-casts-vision.html,retrieved January 19, 2012.

[9] Ibid.Blackaby, page13.

[10] KarlBarth channeling Martin Buber.

Jesus the Man, Jesus the Christ

2012-01-15T17:59:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday January 15, 2012, the 2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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1 Samuel 3:1-10

Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18

1 Corinthians 6:12-20

John 1:43-51

Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen

The oldest of the church’sconfessions is the Nicene Creed. Formulated in 325 and revised in 381, this wasthe church’s first attempt to define the very nature of the three persons ofGod. Among the things this creed defines is the two natures of Christ, thefully human and the fully divine. The creed says:

WE BELIEVE in oneLord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father beforeall worlds, God of God, Light of Light, Very God of Very God, begotten, notmade, being of one substance with the Father by whom all things were made; whofor us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate bythe Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and was made man, and was crucified alsofor us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, and the third day herose again according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sittethon the right hand of the Father. And he shall come again with glory to judgeboth the quick and the dead, whose kingdom shall have no end.

In this part of the creed arestatements that show us Jesus the Christ, Emmanuel, God with us. These phrasesinclude “only-begotten Son of God,” “Very God of Very God,” and “being of onesubstance with the father.” That last one is very important. It says as simply ashuman language can muster that the God who came is of the same Godly stuff asthe Father. If you will, they are cut from the same bolt of fabric.

It also tells us that Jesus washuman, just as human as you and I. Jesus was “made man,” “was crucified,”“suffered,” and “was buried.” These are things that can never happen to God whois not also human, corporeal. People are made human. Humans can be crucifiedand buried. Dare I say the fully divine God suffers when we dishonor our calland vocation, but I don’t think that is what the Nicene fathers were talkingabout. I believe they meant the particular suffering faced on Good Friday.

The church has been telling people thatJesus is fully human and fully divine for over 1600 years, but scripture,scripture has said Jesus is fully human and fully divine since John’s gospelhas been shared.

This first chapter of John’s gospelhas a wonderful structure. It begins with the words we love, “In the beginningwas the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in thebeginning with God.” In this timeless bit of time, we are told that He, theMessiah, the Christ, was in the beginning with God.

He was in the beginning with God.The power and the glory of God in the midst of all truth; and all three personsof God, different in person while same in substance, they dance together in aharmony that we will never fully know this side of glory. This is how John’sgospel begins.

Then the first day of John’s gospelcomes, coming as a day the way we measure them. On this day John tells theworld who he is and who he is not. Not the Christ, not Elijah, and not theprophet; he is the one who “makes straight the way of the Lord.” He tells thecrowd that he baptizes with water, the rest is for someone else.

On the next day, the second day,John sees Jesus. Jesus is that someone else. He is the light; he is the Lamb ofGod. He is God who walks the face of the earth. He is Emmanuel, God with us. Heis as the Nicene’s put it, “Very God of Very God;” and John tells his discipleshe’s walking by right now.

On the next day, the third day,John the Baptist was with two of his disciples and seeing Jesus cries out,“Here is the Lamb of God!” The disciples ask where Jesus is saying, Jesus says“come and see.”

Sound familiar? Don’t worry; we’llget back to this soon enough.

On the fourth day, Jesus findsPhilip on the hillside and says, “Follow me” and he does.

I speak of this wonderfulstructure. On the day that cannot be numbered, we hear of the Messiah, theChrist who is as eternal as the Father and the Spirit. For the rest of thechapter we see the man, Jesus of Nazareth who to the untrained eye is justanother wanderer on the banks of the Jordan. Only the Baptist sees more.Only the Baptist sees the full divinity of the man. The rest of the world seesonly someone his mother might know.

This is what is so wonderful! God,the God who creates, redeems, and sustains all creation is just out walkingabout. In the book of Job, Satan tells the Lord that he has been “going to andfro on the earth.” John’s gospel shows the Lord can play that game too.

As wonderfully as we walk throughthese doors, Jesus walked the earth. As ordinary as it was then and is now thatsomeone walks the Judean countryside, Jesus of Nazareth does the same. As commonas it is for us to chat with friends and take a meal, Jesus does this withJohn’s disciples.

People occasionally ask about thechurch calendar and ask about the seasons the church calls “ordinary time.”They ask how holy time can ever be ordinary. It’s really a good question too. Asordinary as it is for the fully human Jesus of Nazareth to walk the earth thistime is ordinary. As glorious as it is for the Christ, the Messiah to walk theearth, it is special and glorious. In God, the ordinary meets the extraordinary.

So on this fourth day, after Philipfound Nathanael, he told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in thelaw, and about whom the prophets wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” Inthis one little sentence, Philip tells Nathanael that he has seen the divineChrist, the Messiah. He says he has seen the one Moses wrote about in the law,and about whom the prophets wrote. In the Hebrew Scriptures, these phrases areused to describe the Messiah just like John uses “the Lamb of God” and “the Onewho is to come.”

Immediately within the same breath,Philip describes a man named Jesus. He tells Nathanael that Jesus was from thecity of Nazarethand his father was Joseph. Saying Jesus son of Joseph is like Robbie saying heis the son of a coal miner. It’s like Jade saying she is from the son of Kinney.It is like saying I am the son of Andre, or Andrew, or to move the language onestep further, It’s like saying I’m the son of a man.

In one breath Nathanael and therest of the world learn the truth of Jesus the Christ—that he is both a mannamed Jesus and the long awaited Messiah. Philip tells the world about Jesusthe man and Jesus the Christ; Jesus the fully human and Jesus the fully divine.And what’s the Messiah doing? He’s taking a stroll.

We don’t know what Jesus was doing.Scripture doesn’t tell us. But what we do know is that Jesus is not beingcompelled into the desert by the Holy Spirit to be tested and tempted for fortydays like the other gospels say. Jesus does not duel with Satan. Jesus is nottended to by the angels. In John’s gospel, the most spiritual of the four,Jesus is first presented as an ordinary average guy.

So how does Nathanael respond tothis ordinary average Messiah? He responds as people responded to folks fromthe Judean backwaters of Nazareth,he wonders what good ever came from there. You might as well ask what good evercame out of the backwoods of East Texas.

Well, Philip tells him that he mustcome and see. When the Baptist’s disciples asked Jesus where he was staying,Jesus told them to come and see. Now when Nathanael asks Philip what could evercome out of Nazareth,Philip invites him to come and see.

Approaching the Lord, it seems thatJesus saw Nathanael first. Jesus proclaims, “Here is a true Israelite, in whomthere is nothing false.” When asked how Jesus knew him, the Lord answered, “Isaw you before Philip called you.” This is when Nathanael declares “Rabbi, youare the Son of God; you are the King of Israel.”

When Nathanael hears the words ofJesus, he sees the Lord. He cries affirming Jesus is the Christ. This timeNathanael uses ancient Messianic formula language calling Jesus “Rabbi,” “Sonof God” and “King of Israel.” In a simple moment, Nathanael goes from callingJesus a “nowhere man” to proclaiming him the Messiah. All because he came andsaw.

Jesus points out that Nathanaelbelieves, he believes because he has seen the Lord and heard the word of theLord in the person of Jesus, but for him this is just the beginning.

He then tells all with ears to hearthat we will all see greater things than these, we will the glory Jacob sawwhen he had his dream at Bethel.We will see the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.

By the way, it’s no coincidencethat Jesus calls Nathanael a true Israelite without guile (in the words of theKing James and Revised Standard Versions) and invokes Jacob’s Ladder. The nameJacob means “ankle-grabber” or “usurper.” The name foreshadowed Jacob’s lessthan honorable actions, stealing Esau’s birthright and blessing among others.Because you see, Bethel, the Hebrew word forHouse of God, is not only where Jacob had received the image of the ladder, butit is also where the Lord changed Jacob’s name to Israel.At Bethel,Jacob received two of the Lord’s greatest gifts, a vision and a new name for anew mission.

I have mentioned before that inJohn’s gospel, Jesus calls the deceitful temple elite “the Jews.” But in thispassage he calls Nathanael a true Israelite. In John’s gospel we see those whoare filled with deceit are the heirs of Jacob’s less than honorable ways, butthose without guile are the heirs of the name of Israel.

The image of the ladder is filledwith mystery. It was mysterious when the Lord first showed it to Jacob, it wasmysterious when Jesus invoked it, and it is still mysterious today. One of thejoys of the Nicene Creed has this same element. Trying to describe themysterious nature of God, when the ancient Church Fathers could not create asimple definition they chose to describe mystery with mystery.

This is a lesson for ourdenomination today as we try to define the “basic tenants of the reformedfaith.” The more we move toward the law and a legal interpretation the furtherwe stray from the vision of angels ascending and descending. We move toward thelife of Jacob and away from the life of Israel.We move toward the guile and cunning of the temple elite and from the blessingNathanael, the true Israelite, received.

These are the words of the Lord. Bewithout guile. Be someone of honesty and integrity. We get to embrace the twonatures of the Lord, the fully human and the fully divine. How these naturesconnect is a mystery to us, and that should be fine.

These things are not for us to knowwhile we are here. Our call is not to understand them, to know them in ourheads. Our call is the same call given by Jesus to John’s disciples, the samecall given from Philip to Nathanael; to come and see.

Joan Osborne had a one-hit-wonderwith the song “If God Was One of Us?” The song poses the musical questions: “IfGod had a name, what would it be?” “Would you call it to his face?” and “If Godhad a face what would it look like?” But the big question was “What if God wasone of us, just a slob like one of us?”

Thanks be to God that the fullyhuman Lord has a name, Jesus, and except for being without sin he was one ofus. This is Jesus the Man.But we also testify that God is the holy unknowable Lord of creation. This isJesus the Christ, the Messiah, the one who was from the beginning of thebeginning.

Joy to the world, the fully humanfully divine Lord has come. This is who Nathanael meets today. Let us meet himtoo. Let us introduce him to our friends. Let us all come and see that man andChrist, the Lord is good.

Heaven Torn Open

2012-01-08T12:39:00.004-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday January 8, 2012, Baptism of the Lord Sunday and the 1st Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Genesis 1:1-5

Psalm 29

Acts 19:1-7

Mark 1:4-11

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

I have always been fascinated bythunderstorms. I’m sure growing up in the heart of Tornado Alley had somethingto do with this. Their power has always left me awestruck. Last week I saidthat I wanted a word that meant “awe with a bit of fear,” this word is alsohelpful for how I feel about tornadoes. When I was in college, my first major wasmeteorology; I wanted to forecast weather and especially thunderstorms.

As for why I chose a career inhigher education instead of weather forecasting, Calculus III and EngineeringPhysics destroyed me, I mean destroyed me. When people asked why I chose mycareer path I told them “Engineering Physics made me the man I am today.” Whenthey pointed out that my career had nothing to do with physics or higher math,I told them that they were exactly right.

These days, there are two reasonsI’m halfway collected during a big storm. The first is that we have betterinformation about storms and it is more available to people in the path ofstorms. The other reason is that Marie freaks out about storms more than I do.We can’t have both of us screaming like frightened children, so I suck it upand act like the calm one. In over fourteen years of marriage, so far so good.

I don’t know if I have ever reallyseen a tornado. I remember once being at the store with my sisters and seeingone on the other side of the Interstate while Mom went to get the car. HonestlyI don’t know if that’s a real memory or if I created it; could be either. Itcould have just been a big storm (which it was) and once I heard the sirens (whichI did) I thought I saw a funnel.

I was once on a Boy Scout campingtrip at Lake Perryin Kansaswhen a storm ripped through the reservoir. The weather guys said the winds wereblowing up to 105 mph. We took shelter from the storm on the troop’s old schoolbus. The bus wasn’t overturned or anything like that, but I know why you shouldnever ride out a tornado in a trailer. What I can remember was the fear and thenoise. The noise was outrageous.

This wasn’t the only tornado to ripits way across Lake Perry. In the late 70’s,the faculty and staff of the Emporia State University Library Science College,one of the most important Library programs in the country at the time, wascelebrating the end of the school year on the lake. While on the water, an East Kansas thunderstorm came up with little warning and droppeda funnel. The storm capsized the boat where the party was taking place. Manywere killed. It took nearly ten years for the University and the college toregain accreditation and begin to rebuild its reputation.

Living on the high plains, another tornadohot spot, we could see the skies boil for miles. One day, when the skies wereangry, Marie pointed out a cloud that appeared to be turning a color of greenthat should never be in the sky. Fortunately, I was able to point out thatbecause the land was so flat that the horizons were further in the distancethan she was accustomed. Those clouds weren’t bearing down on us, they wereover the city of Eads, Colorado, more than 30 miles north. That’slike us being able to see the skies over White Oak from here. That freaked herout almost as much.

It could have been a mess lastspring when the twister touched down four miles south of the interstate, fivemiles from our house. Marie and I watched the weather reports out of Shreveport and saw video from their Marshall tower cams. No funnels, but therewas a lot of boiling sky between the square and the south. We eventually wentto the closet with the weather radio. Of course the storm was a mess for thefamily who did lose their house.

Then there are the storms that reekhavoc over the earth. The Great 1999 Oklahomatornado outbreak lasted from May 3 to May 6, 1999 bringing violent storms to Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas, Texas, and Tennessee. On May 3alone 66 tornadoes broke out in Oklahoma and Kansas. The mostsignificant of these first touched down southwest of Chickasha,Oklahoma, and became an F5 before dissipatingover Midwest City.The storm tore through Bridge Creek, Oklahoma, Oklahoma City, Moore, Del City, TinkerAir Force Base and Midwest City,causing $1.1 billion in damage. Forty-eight people perished during theoutbreak. With estimates ranging from 66 to 74 tornadoes, it was the mostprolific tornado outbreak in Oklahomahistory.[1]

The Greensboro, Kansastornado of 2007 began forming on May 4 after 5:00 pm in the northeastern cornerof the Texas Panhandle, and strengthened during the early evening across theOklahoma Panhandle. It slowly organized itself as it moved northeast throughportions of Oklahoma, and then into Kansas. The firsttornado warning with this cell was issued at 8:35 for Clark County, Kansas,and the tornado first touched down that evening just after 9:00. This storm wasparticularly devastating because it is quite difficult to visually spot atwister at night.[2]

Most recently was the catastrophicEF5 multiple-vortex tornado that struck Joplin, Missouri in the late afternoon ofSunday, May 22, 2011. It was part of a large late-May tornado outbreak sequencethat ripped a path in excess of a mile wide during its rampage through thesouthern part of the city. It rapidly intensified and tracked eastward acrossthe city, and then continued eastward across Interstate 44 into rural portionsof Jasper and Newton counties in Missouri.

The insurance payout for thesestorms is expected to be $2.2 billion with some estimates as high as $3 billion—thehighest insurance payout in Missouri history and higher than the previousrecord of $2 billion in the April 10, 2001 hail storm which swept along theI-70 corridor from Kansas to Illinois. By July 15, 2011, there had been 16,656insurance claims.[3]

I give you examples of the heavensbeing torn open and the earth being ravaged. I give you examples ofdestruction, sorrow, loss, and death. In these images are shock, pain,devastation, and despair. There is sorrow and grief. Rent the skies? Rent yourclothes as anguish overwhelms conscious thought. Scripture tells us the HolySpirit intervenes and knows and takes our prayers even when they are onlymoans. It is in these times that we need the Spirit’s intervention.

In my own limited way, this is whatI think of when I think of “heaven being torn open.” We might see the skiesbeing torn and inflamed. The clouds being whipped into a frenzy from alldirections. We can see the funnels form behind wall clouds. We will be able tofeel the temperature fall. Lightning crashes to the earth with the rumble ofmighty thunder. We will see the effects of the wind as the grass, trees, andeven buildings pitch and moan. This is what I imagine.

But in the beginning…

“In the beginning God created theheavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was overthe surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw that the lightwas good, and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light“day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there wasmorning—the first day.”

In a time before there were heavensas we understand them, they were torn open. After these created heavens andearth God spoke the light into being. Before the sun and the moon were placedin the heavens to govern the day and the night, the heavens were created andopened that God created light, light that is good. This is how it all began.

I give you pain and anguish, Godgives us the heavens and earth. It reminds me of a conversation in C. S. Lewis’“The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” where the children had just learnedfrom Mr. and Mrs. Beaver that Aslan, the son of the greatEmperor-Beyond-the-Sea, was a lion.

“Ooh!” said Susan,“I'd thought he was a man. Is he quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous aboutmeeting a lion.”

“That you will,dearie, and no mistake,” said Mrs. Beaver. “If there's anyone who can appearbefore Aslan without their knees knocking, they're either braver than most orelse just silly.”

“Then he isn'tsafe?” said Lucy.

“Safe?” said Mr.Beaver. “Don't you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything aboutsafe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.”[4]

God is not safe. God is not like a tame lion. But God isgood.

Then “At that time, Jesus came fromNazareth in Galilee and was baptized by John inthe Jordan.As Jesus was coming up out of the water, he saw heaven being torn open and theSpirit descending on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are myson, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

I wonder what Jesus saw. I gave youmy opinion of what I imagine the heavens torn open to be, but is that what Jesussaw? He saw the Spirit descending like a dove. He hears the voice of theFather. In this moment in time, all three persons of God descend upon the Earthto give one fully divine fully human a message, “You are my Son, whom I love;with you I am well pleased.”

The heavens being ripped open isprobably not safe, but God is not safe. Still, God is good.

Now imagine what everyone else saw,the people of the Judean countryside and all of Jerusalem. According to scripture, they sawnothing special. Scripture tells us only Jesus saw what is written in scriptureas he was coming up out of the water. Only Jesus saw heaven torn open. Everyoneelse saw life its own self, business as usual.

As the line from the old song goes,“I hear the drums echo in the night, she hears only whispers of some quietconversation.”[5] Jesussees everything, the people saw nothing special. Maybe today, as we ordain anew class of Elders to the Session, some will see nothing special. For others,it will be life changing.

Let us all make life in Christ alife changing event. Like the heavens being torn open, not everyone will beable to see it. Those who do will not see it in the same way. So Lord hear ourprayers and transform us, even if our prayers are little more than moans.

[1] 1999 Oklahoma tornadooutbreak, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1999_Oklahoma_tornado_outbreak, accessedJanuary 7, 2012.

[2] May 2007Tornado Outbreak, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_2007_tornado_outbreak#The_Greensburg_tornado_family,retrieved January 7, 2012

[3] 2011Joplin Tornado, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Joplin_tornado, retrievedJanuary 7, 2012

[4] C. S.Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe New York: Collier, 1970, 75-76.

[5] “Africa” by Toto, to me, this is one of the greatest linesin pop music.

A Blessing

2012-01-01T17:03:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday January 1, 2012, the 1st Sunday after Christmas. Have a blessed new year!

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Isaiah 61:10-62:3

Psalm 148

Galatians 4:4-7

Luke 2:22-40

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

Blessings are a glorious gift, both to give and to receive. The book of Numbers has this blessing given by the Lord to Moses to give to Aaron to give to the nation of Israel:

“The LORD bless you

and keep you;

the LORD make his face shine on you

and be gracious to you;

the LORD turn his face toward you

and give you peace.” [1]

This peace from the Lord ends with the coda “So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.” So lovely, so wonderful, so glorious—the Lord’s words blessing you with the warmth and glow of his radiance shining; the promise of the Lord’s face turning toward you and giving you peace. The blessing, the very words of the Lord coming down and showing favor. Now that’s a blessing.

Sure, it comes from the Lord to Moses to Aaron to Israel, so they weren’t the first to get the word, but the word is meant for them, they are the people of the Lord. That’s the great priestly blessing of the Lord.

As much as it is a joy to bless, this is a blessing we cannot give on our own. This glorious blessing comes from the Lord alone and I say “Amen, thanks be to God!”

But let’s face it; in this day and time, in this economy, with political unrest not just outside the country but within our great nation, given what we know about this world and even scarier what we don’t know; some days the blessings are harder to find. The blessings are often hidden in the sin and sorrow of the world.

In this vein, let’s make something perfectly clear. Luke’s gospel, the source of our reading this morning, has no mention of the magi or their gifts. What it does have is Mary and Joseph offering either a pair of doves or two young pigeons as a sacrifice at the temple for the presentation and consecration of their son. Not a ram nor goat nor sheep nor calf, Mary and Joseph offer two small birds according to the Law of Moses.

We could say that the clinic has a sliding scale and they paid what they could afford.

This sliding scale meant the same thing then as it does now; the parents of our Lord and savior were very poor. There was no gold or frankincense or myrrh to offer at the temple. There was just enough copper in the coffers for them to make those zigzag trips across the Judean plain to make their sacrifice.

Those of you who are parents know about the sudden expenses that come with having children. Imagine being poor and having those expenses. Poverty makes everything in this life more difficult. I know for a fact that for some of us, that difficulty doesn’t take a leap to imagine. From experience you know exactly how the Holy Family was doing financially.

Henry Ward Beecher, a prominent Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, and speaker in the mid to late 19th century, said this about blessings:

If one should give me a dish of sand and tell me there were particles of iron in it, I might look for them with my eyes and search for them with my clumsy fingers and be unable to detect them; but let me take a magnet and sweep through it and now would it draw to itself the almost invisible particles by the mere power of attraction.

The unthankful heart, like my fingers in the sand, discovers no mercies; but let the thankful heart sweep through the day and as the magnet finds the iron, so it will find in every hour, some heavenly blessings.[2]

Beecher’s point is simple; blessings are often invisible to the untrained eye or inattentive soul. But with the right tools or, as was his point, the right attitude, blessings are all around us waiting to be discovered and celebrated. Luke’s gospel shares a blessing for all to hear.

The temple had its regulars and its residents, one regular was named Simeon. Simeon was a righteous and devout man “waiting for the consolation of Israel.” This could be translated that he was “looking forward to the exhortation of Israel,” but the New Living Translation takes a different tack. It says that he “was eagerly waiting for the messiah to come and rescue Israel.” I often say all translation is interpretation, and this one is a little far out as interpretation of the language goes, but it is spot-on as an interpretation of the situation.

Simeon’s blessing was the first heard by Mary and Joseph. Scripture tells us Simeon took Jesus in his arms and praised God, saying:

“Sovereign Lord, as you have promised,

you may now dismiss your servant in peace.

For my eyes have seen your salvation,

which you have prepared in the sight of all nations:

a light for revelation to the Gentiles,

and the glory of your people Israel.”

Scripture then tells us “The child’s father and mother marveled at what was said about him.”

Sometimes scripture has a wonderful sense of understatement, and after what had come to pass for Mary and Joseph over the past year, and especially over the past eight days, in my humble opinion “marveled” would be a start to describe how I felt. “Shock” would be a turn in the right direction. “Awestruck” would be closer but as for me I want a word that has a little more fear in it.

The other blessing at the temple came from the prophetess Anna. She finds the Messiah too. Where Simeon was led to the temple by the word of the Holy Spirit, Anna was all ready at the temple. Anna had spent the last sixty-four years in the temple in prayer and fasting. As a widow, without mention of children, she would have no other recourse than to go to temple and receive a portion of the widow’s share of the offering.

When she saw the baby Jesus, she saw more than just a newborn. Anna took the Lord in her arms and shared him with all who were at the temple looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem; she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child. Anna told them that the Messiah had come.

She acted in accord with Isaiah’s words, “For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent, for Jerusalem’s sake I will not remain quiet, till her righteousness shines out like the dawn, her salvation like a blazing torch.” The righteousness of the Lord of Zion and the Messiah of the world was in her arms. She called to the nations to see God’s righteousness so all kings will know Zion’s glory.

Paul tells us God walks the earth so that we might become sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty. We are no longer slaves but heirs to the Kingdom of God. Because we are the children of the Lord, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts so that we might cry out “Abba, Father” to our heavenly father.

Then again, as glorious as these blessings are, they come with something more. The blessing Simeon shares with Mary and Joseph is followed by a foreboding prophesy, “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too.”

If you want to read between the lines, “falling and rising of many in Israel” can be read as a foreshadowing. Being raised is another way to think of the crucifixion. This could be a prophecy of Christ’s life and death, and the lives and deaths of his apostles and disciples too. It also speaks to the grief of a mother losing her child in one of the most horrible ways the empire could devise.

Oh yes, Jesus, Mary and Joseph are blessed, but there is more. There is knowledge that along with great blessing, life will not be all wonder and glory. With life in a sinful world, God Incarnate, the Lord’s Christ will suffer and with him his people. Simeon was waiting for the consolation of Israel, the exhortation of Israel, he was eagerly waiting for the messiah to come and rescue Israel, but he also knew that with glory would come mourning. It’s the ultimate party killer of a blessing. Yes, you are blessed and you are a blessing in a cursed world.

So here is the truth that the Simeon shares, the salvation of the Lord’s Messiah has come to walk among us. God’s greatest blessing to humanity, the presence, the face of God is here now. There can be no greater blessing than this, Emmanuel, God is with us. Yet, in the midst of this blessing there is something sinister. God is with us and there will continue to be suffering. God will be one who suffers too.

How can we possibly imagine this? The Almighty God comes to earth and this child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel. God will be with us and God will be spoken against revealing the thoughts and motives of many. The Lord our God will even cause his own mother pain. Stereotypically the greatest fear of any Jewish Mother is that her son will cause her pain like a sword piercing her soul.

As great is the blessing so too as deep is the sorrow and pain.

Now and not yet, this is the way many theologians describe the coming and the blessing of the Lord. Yes, the Lord is with us. Yes our God was born, lived, was crucified, dead and was buried; and on the third day he rose again from the dead. The blessing has come, but pain will still be painful—even in the light of the blessing. Grief will still be harsh, even in the light of the blessing of the Lord.

This is our position in the world. Death has been conquered. Jesus lives! And pain still hurts. The pain and indignity of poverty experienced by the holy family still exists today. In a country where the greatest lie we can believe is that “we” are just like the rich and “they” are just like us, there is wealth beyond imagination and poverty beyond belief. This is true. Yet the words of Rabbi Abraham Heschel ring out in truth, “Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy.”[3] This is the cry of the prophetess Anna.

Anna doesn’t worry about her poverty. She has been without the general protections of her society since she was about twenty years old. Now, sixty-five years later, living in the temple so that she will have some protection, she finds her Lord, our Lord, and rejoices. She doesn’t worry any more about her position because she knows her savior lives. She sees life like the glass is no longer broken, but filled with living water:

It's all holy ground if we look with spiritual eyes.

It's all holy tastes if we eat with a spiritual mouth.

It's all holy sound if we hear with spiritual ears.

It's all holy smells if we breathe with a spiritual nose.

It's all holy territory if we have a spiritual touch.

Everything is holy if we feel with our spiritual heart.[4]

The truth that Anna shares is that even in a world where there is pain and strife, holy life is enough. Yes there will be pain. There will be sorrow. There will be heartache. There will be poverty. There will be injustice. But it is with those who writhe in pain, cry in sorrow, are broken by heartache, muddled in poverty, and trapped by injustice—that Christ lives.

Christ lives with those who need him, not with those who rely on themselves and their wealth. This is Simeon’s first prophecy. This is Anna’s prophecy. This is our call: live into all of life, the blessings and the pain, because Christ has come to share both with us.

So now, as our Lord once blessed his people,

The LORD bless you

and keep you;

the LORD make his face shine on you

and be gracious to you;

the LORD turn his face toward you

and give you peace.

Amen

[1] Numbers 6:24-26

[2] Henry Ward Beecher, found on HomileticsOnline.com, http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/illustration_search.asp?item_topic_id=1531, retrieved December 30, 2011

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid, Adapted from Jonathan Kramer and Diane Dunaway Kramer, Losing the Weight of the World: A Spiritual Diet to Nourish the Soul (New York: Doubleday, 1997), 305.

Light

2011-12-25T17:09:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday December 25, 2011, Nativity of the Lord Sunday. Merry Christmas.

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Isaiah 52:7-10

Psalm 98

Hebrews 1:1-4

John 1:1-14

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

I was up early this morning, before the sun rose. Of course that’s pretty easy to do on the fourth day of winter. Seeing the sun rise through the clouds reminds me of something special about the light, the light overcomes the dark.

This morning, the first light of sun begin to make its way across the horizon, sending off an ember like glow rather than streaking rays of brilliance. Soon though, more and more light began to cut through the clouds announcing the coming of the sun like the herald angels singing. Yes, dank dreary days like today can mute the power of the sun to the point that the street lights come on, but the sun will not be blocked forever. On that day, when the sun rises, the golden orb ascends the plain to announce the new day with resounding power and light.

Ultimately the light penetrates even the densest clouds. Our sun is 93 million miles away from us, and its heat and light announce new life on earth every day.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”[1]

When John writes “In the beginning” his words take us back to the first word of scripture. John’s words take us back to before the beginning, before any of what we know and imagine was begun. He writes of a time when all there was of our world was yet to be spoken. He writes of a time when the heavenly host is all there was. He writes of a time before this creation when the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit existed three-in-one. He writes of a time before the God’s own self, the Blessed Trinity created the likes of us.

Today John writes of that beginning all over again. John reminds us Jesus was with God in the beginning. And as God and with God all things were made through him. Nothing that was or ever has been made was made without him.

In him is the life and that life was then and is now the light of men. Truly, his life is not just the light of men but of all creation. On this Christmas Day, we testify.

How beautiful on the mountains

are the feet of those who bring good news,

who proclaim peace,

who bring good tidings,

who proclaim salvation,

who say to Zion,

“Your God reigns!”

We hear the Good News all creation longs to hear, longs to believe. The Good News that Christ is born is the Good News. The prophet Isaiah tells us those who bring good news, who proclaim peace, who bring good tidings, who proclaim salvation who say “Your God reigns!” upon the mountains have beautiful feet.

To have beautiful feet. Beautiful feet aren’t necessarily pretty feet. It isn’t a salon pedicure that makes feet beautiful; it is the word the feet carry. When sharing the word of God Incarnate on this Christmas Day, testifying as a witness to the birth of the Lord in the flesh, this is the source of beautiful feet. The beauty of our feet isn’t in their being, it’s in their bearing.

As we heard in our reading from Hebrews, God has spoken to us by his son whom he has appointed. God has chosen to come among us and walk as we walk, hope as we hope, and pray as we pray. The joy of this message makes our feet beautiful. Fully human and fully divine, Jesus came as a babe, swaddled by his mother and laid in an animal’s feed trough.

He comes with human feet and it is the holy message of the life carried by these feet Isaiah first prophesied. By our feet we continue to testify too, this is the source of beauty, grace, and peace of our feet. How beautiful are the feet that of those who bring the Good News of Christ the Savior.

Isaiah then tells us that the Lord has laid bare his holy arm in the sight of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God. Yet John tells us that the world did not recognize him. The world sees but does not recognize the light, even as it breaks through the horizons of life on this earth to shine. The light overcomes the darkness, but the darkness doesn’t even recognize that it has been overcome.

John testifies the Good News wasn’t obvious when this gospel was written. John’s gospel tells us that though the world came into being through Jesus, the world did not recognize him. He came to his own people, and his own people did not accept him. Those who saw the Christ, the Messiah did not know who he was.

When looking over this sermon, I don’t think I have done anything special. I haven’t given you a detailed parsing of the language, neither Hebrew, nor Greek, nor English. I haven’t blessed you with quotes from historians or theologians either. There is one reason for this; I don’t think it’s necessary. The grace and peace of these words carry a weight that if I tried to add “insight” would come up and rap me in the jaw.

Instead, this is all I want to share with you on this Christmas morning: Today Christ the Savior is born! The Good News of our salvation is that God came as the weakest of all, a babe born to a maiden; it is not just this humble beginning but from this humble beginning that all creation is made and all creation is redeemed. This is what we believe. This is the greatest gift we can share with one another and with the world. The world may not recognize it, but that does not make the Truth less true. Today we celebrate the birth of our savior.

My father was a photographer, and when I was growing up he had a dark room set up in a downstairs room. This room was between the laundry room, the garage, and the family room. It was a busy area. So whenever he needed to use his developing equipment, he was justifiably paranoid that someone would come downstairs and flip the wrong light switch, ruining his work. He would also have towels under the doors so that the light would not pour into the room from under the doors. It would not take much light to ruin a hard day’s work.

That is where I first learned the lesson that light penetrates the darkness. Even just a little from under the bottom of a door is enough to lighten a room.

John writes that Jesus is the true light, the light which enlightens everyone. And with John we testify that the light has come into the world. The light became flesh. And we testify today is the day of our fair savior’s birth.

We are to lift up, to exalt the one who is the Word and the light, the true light which enlightens us, the one who came and comes into the world. It is when we spread the good news through acts of kindness, and grace, and peace that we shine the light of God. A light that we cannot create, a light which is reflected by us.

In Miracles, C. S. Lewis has this to say about light: “We believe that the sun is in the sky at midday in summer not because we can clearly see the sun (in fact, we cannot) but because we can see everything else.”[2] We believe that the Christ is the true light, very light of very light, very God of very God,[3] and because of this light, we can see the world that he created. And when we reflect this light, it is not we who become visible, it is our Lord. Through peace, and good news, and salvation we are able to see Christ in the world. It is our duty to reflect this light so that our Lord may be seen in all that we are and all that we do.

[1] John 1:1-4

[2] Lewis, C. S., Miracles. Found in A Year with C. S. Lewis, Dec. 23 entry

[3] Nicene Creed

Lessons and Carols 2011

2011-12-24T21:42:00.000-06:00

This service was celebrated at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall Texas on Christmas Eve, December 24, 2011.

The Presbyterian Church Book of Common Worship does not have a version of this service. Since there are many different versions, I compared several different services and selected these passages and songs for the service. Since 2007 the service has continued to evolve with new looks at the service and the music with the input of new worship leaders. This year's service was revised with the assistance of First Presbyterian-Marshall's Music Director Al Key.

Anyone who would like to use this service is welcome, the prayers come from the Presbyterian Church Book of Common Worship or are things I have picked up from other pastors through the years. The homily is a personal composition. I welcome anyone considering using this service to do as I did, find several, compare, and see where the theology of the service takes you, then arrange your own.

Music this year was led by Elder Al Key and our organist/pianist Mrs. Georgia Dyer. Marie Andresen played the postlude on harp.

Prelude

Welcome

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
the love of God,
and the communion of the Holy Spirit
be with you all.

Good evening and welcome to this very special worship service of Lessons and Carols. All who come in the name of the Lord are welcome on this special, special evening.

Let us begin with the lighting of the Advent Candles...We light this candle as a sign of the coming light of Christ.

Advent means coming.
We are preparing ourselves for the days
when the nations shall beat their swords into plowshares,
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more.

The wolf shall dwell with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.

The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad,
the desert shall rejoice and blossom;
like the crocus it shall blossom abundantly,
and rejoice with joy and singing.

The Lord will give you a sign.
Look, the young woman is with child
and shall bear a son,
and shall name him Immanuel (God is with us).

The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness,
on them light has shined.

Let us walk in the light of the Lord.

Call to Worship
Pastor: The Lord be with you.
People: And also with you.

Let us pray...Holy Child, born of Mary in a barn, you identify with us in object humanity. You move among us with announcements of Good News when things look bleak; you give us a star on dark, lonely nights. Sing to us once more that, assured of your presence among us, we may forget our fear and embrace your gift of newborn life, to the glory of your holy name we pray. Amen.

Prayer of Illumination

O Lord our God,
your Word is a lamp to our feet
and a light to our path.
Give us grace to receive your truth in faith and love,
the story of the coming of your son Jesus Christ,
that we may be obedient to your will
and live always for your glory;
by his birth in Bethlehem and his death on Calvary,
We pray in His holy name. Amen.

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Homily--The Story--Rev. Paul Andresen

It is customary that when the word of God is read in Christian churches, it is followed by interpretation. Usually this is done through a message from the pastor. Sometimes it is done in drama or even in dance.

Tonight, we do something special. Tonight, we interpret the written word of God through song.

The Presbyterian Church (USA) Directory for Worship tells us “Song is a response which engages the whole self in prayer. Song unites the faithful in common prayer wherever they gather for worship whether in church, home, or other special place.”

So tonight, in this holy place, we will hear the story of the birth of our Lord told in Lessons and Carols.

Let us hear the word of God and let us respond in prayer and in song.

Isaiah 9:2, 6-7
Hymn: It Came Upon a Midnight Clear

Isaiah 11:1-4a, 6-9
Hymn: O Little Town of Bethlehem

Micah 5:2-5a
Hymn: Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

Luke 1:26-35, 38
Hymn: Angels, from the Realms of Glory

Luke 2:1-7
Hymn: Come Thou, Long Expected Jesus

Luke 2:8-20
Hymn: Angels We Have Heard On High

Luke 2:21-33
Hymn: What Child Is This?

Matthew 2:1-11
Hymn: O Come, All Ye Faithful

The passing of the Light of Christ.

John 1:1-14
Hymn: Silent Night, Holy Night

Charge and Benediction

Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.
As we celebrate His birth,
Let us celebrate new life in Him.

And may the blessing of triune God almighty,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
remain with you always.
Amen.

Hymn: Joy to the World!

Postlude: Joy to the World!

This Old House

2011-12-18T16:23:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday December 18, 2011, the 4th Sunday in Advent.

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2 Samuel 7:1-17

Psalm 89:1-4, 19-26

Romans 16:25-27
Luke 1:26-38

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

Today as in the ancient of days, there are two ways of looking at the word “house.” One way is as a building, the place we call home that has most of our stuff. But there is another that is more important historically, the house as a family, a clan, a people. If you are looking for a modern way of looking at houses as family, the English Monarchy is worth consideration.

Since 1901, the British monarchy has been led by the House of Windsor. The first member of the House of Windsor to ascend to the throne was King Edward VII. The Son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, his reign marked the end of the House of Hanover, Victoria’s family name, and brought on the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Albert’s family name. Edward’s son George V changed the family name to Windsor in light of anti-German sentiment at the onset of World War I.

Today the House of Windsor is led by Queen Elizabeth II. In a bit of anti-German sentiment at the onset of World War II, Elizabeth’s husband Phillip Battenberg from the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg adopted the Anglicized name Mountbatten so today the descendants of Elizabeth II who do not have royal title carry the last name Mountbatten-Windsor.

This family is the current ruling house of the United Kingdom. While there are no real governmental duties accorded the Queen, there is still a mystique about the royals which accords them a place in the nation. Not so long ago, this was not true. Not so long ago there was power in the monarchy that had not been contested since the Sixth Century when the first kings of England were rooted in the monarchs of House of Mercia. Many houses, but one land.

By the time of our reading in 2Samuel, King David must have had a sense of accomplishment. I’m not saying that he was full of himself, but by the generous blessings of the Lord God he had done many tremendous things in his short life. While a young man, the youngest son of eight, Samuel anointed him King in preparation for the day when he would assume that mantle.[1]

Later in 1Samuel David is described as being “skillful in playing [the lyre], a man of valor, a warrior, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence.” The man who shared these good words with King Saul added “and the LORD is with him.”[2]

I don’t have to tell you of the story of how while still a young man, not yet a king, David would slay the Philistine Goliath of Gath using a sling and a stone. To wed Saul’s daughter Michal, David defied death and presented proof of the slaughter of 100 Philistines in battle. When Saul tried to kill David, he spared Saul’s life and proved to him that he was loyal to his king not once, but twice.

After becoming King of Judah, David’s great success blossomed further. He defeated his enemies. He reunited the divided kingdoms of Israel and Judah. David established the capital of the united kingdom at Jerusalem and after repelling the Philistines yet again he returned the Ark of the Covenant, the very dwelling place of God on Earth, to the capital city. As the Lord directed, David constructed a grand palace of cedar. David defeated all of his enemies, united the people of Judah and Israel, and his Lord and continued to bless him.

In 2Samuel we read the words of the Lord, “I took you from the pasture, from tending the flock, and appointed you ruler over my people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from before you.” These, and many others, are the exploits the Lord brings to light.

This is just the beginning of the House of David. There will be many more successes. In this beginning of our reading, David begins to wonder what comes next for his house, his rule. His wonders begin with the fact that his house is a luxurious palace and the house of the Lord is a tent. His servant Nathan tells David to do what he pleases because the Lord is with him. (That pretty much sounds like something a servant would say, doesn’t it?)

Well, as we read the Lord isn’t seeking better accommodations. David is the last person the Lord needs to give him a hotel upgrade. The Lord has lived in tents and tabernacles so far and so far so good. The Lord doesn’t want David to make him a house, the Lord has selected David and the Lord will as the prophecy says, “make him a great house.”

Speaking about Solomon, the son who will be king after David’s death, the prophecy reveals, “He is the one who will build a house for my Name.” The Lord’s prophecy concludes, “Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever.”

So Solomon will build a house for the Lord. Solomon will build a grand temple. But first, the Lord will build the house, the Kingdom of David. The Lord does not promise the temple will stand forever, but David’s kingdom will be established forever.

One of the amazing truths of the faith is that the house the Lord builds to fulfill this prophecy is a young woman named Mary.

As for Mary, on the whole, we Protestants don’t really know what to do with her. Mary bore God into the world. How’s that for a concept? She bore God. It’s too big for me to get my head around. Jesus is coming, Advent means coming, and the virgin’s womb is where Jesus is coming from.

Ultimately, there is very little I can tell you about Mary. I can tell you that she was a particular person, the one and only. When we talk about the Virgin Mary, Mary the Mother of Jesus, we know who we are talking about.

We do know that she is a young woman. Frankly though, calling her a woman is a stretch. She was old enough to be married, but at the time the age of marriage for a girl was as young as ten. Mary was probably no older than twelve or maybe thirteen.

The next thing we know about Mary comes from her relationship to Joseph. Mary and Joseph were betrothed to one another. Being betrothed is more than being engaged, but not quite the same as being married. Joseph had paid the dowry to Mary’s family. If Joseph had died Mary would have been considered a widow. But they had not had their wedding banquet yet. And of course, their marriage wasn’t consummated. So all things considered, Mary was a normal, common young woman.

In this time, she was no different than hundreds or thousands of other young women. Presumably, she was getting her final instructions on how to be a good wife from her mother. She had learned how to keep house and raise children. If she was truly thirteen years old, there might be some relief in the house that she was not going to be an old maid.

She was one of any number of marriage age girls in Palestine; in this way I can tell you that she was nobody special. If those words have sent you reeling, I don’t blame you. I’m having more than a little trouble with how to say this. But Mary, Mary is nobody special. She’s common, she’s ordinary, and she’s selected: and this is the good news. That’s what makes her special.

God uses the most mundane of us all to come into the world.

Let me say that again, God uses the most mundane of us all to come into the world.

Pardon me for saying it this way, but she’s just a girl.

The only thing that is special about Mary is that the angel declared her that she is favored because the Lord is with her. She is not favored because of any thing she has done, or anything she will do. She is favored because God is with her. She is favored because of what God is doing with her and through her.

She had no idea what was happening, she was perplexed, troubled through and through.

So what does the messenger say next, “Fear not!” (Now, who’s going to believe that?) The angel calms her fears by telling her now, “you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”

Sound familiar? It should, it sounds an awful lot like the promise made to David. The house of David will find its eternal king coming from the house of a teenage girl’s womb.

Mary gives a great response here, allow me to paraphrase, “What, me? This cannot be happening, after all” she says, “I am a virgin.” But the angel tells her what will happen.

For Mary, the Spirit of God is coming to overshadow her. Overshadow is a very powerful verb. Overshadow literally means to block the light. Literally, the power of God will cover her like the moon eclipses the sun. The power of God will overshadow her and her son will be holy; and from this she will bear God into the world.

So here we are, in this house, this House of the Lord. Researching this sermon I found an old joke. A little boy was told that the church was the house of God. He went Sunday after Sunday after Sunday. Finally, one Sunday he said, “When is God going to move in?”[3] From the mouths of babes comes the wisdom of the ages.

Another way to ask when God is going to move in is like this:

“Are we willing to allow the Lord God to shape our lives in ways we never expected, wanted, or imagined?” Are we willing to say to the messenger “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

Are we willing to allow the plans of our lives to be interrupted for the messenger from the Lord? Mary said yes. Only by saying yes does Mary make a difference. Because of this yes, Mary’s song is heard and revered.

What is God asking us to do? As the Body of Christ in the House of the Lord, what is our call, our vocation? Are we willing to let God upset the apple cart of our life together? How do we respond when our plans to build the Lord a fine house are nixed? How do we respond when the Lord says we will be made a fine house instead?

Don’t worry about asking these questions, as Mary discovered asking God is fine. Asking questions is not bad, not listening to the answers is. The Lord will not put us into places we do not belong. The story of David shows that the Lord has plans for us. The story of the annunciation shows that the Lord supports those who respond to God’s call with encouragement and power.

This Old House is the glorious House of the Lord. As Christians we are members of that house. The House of David lays one of the foundational stones of the Kingdom of God. Mary the mother of Jesus is the house where the Lord Jesus is first fed and nurtured. We are physically in the house of the Lord and as the children of God we are members of the House of God.

It is said that history is made by people who show up. By showing up, by saying yes, Mary not only made history, but by the fruit of her womb she made the future. The question we are asked today and always is, “How do we respond for the Kingdom of God in the House of the Lord?” By willingly, voluntarily participating in the joy of creation, Mary brings into the world the one of power and majesty, the one who sits on David’s throne forever.

This is our lesson for today; none of us are any more or less special than Mary. Mary was called to be the one who brought God, birthed God into human existence. She was perplexed, she had questions, the only answer she got is God is with you, and she said “Here I am.” Jesus has come. Jesus is here now. Jesus will come again. Advent means coming. Will we say yes when he asks if we are coming too?

[1] 1Samuel 16:1-13

[2] 1Samuel 16:18

[3] HomileticsOnline.com, http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/illustration_search.asp?keywords=%22House+of+God%22&imageField2.x=0&imageField2.y=0, retrieved December 17, 2011.

Who John Is, Who I Am, Who We Are

2011-12-11T13:43:00.002-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday December 11, 2011, the 3rd Sunday in Advent.

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Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11

Psalm 126

1Thessalonians 5:16-24

John 1:6-8, 19-28

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

European cathedrals are some of the greatest pieces of architecture the world has ever known. These grand structures served many functions, more than what we think of when we think of the church. They were part worship center, part social place, and even part government center. Grand and majestic, you could see their splendor from a distance. Built upon hilltops their domes and spires met the pilgrim as if to say “welcome home my good and faithful child.”

Their interiors are just as breathtaking. All I have to do is mention the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and we can imagine what most of us have only seen in pictures. We can all imagine the wondrous works of Michelangelo giving their glory to God Almighty. From the iconic image of God giving Adam life to the prophets and the saints, since its creation during the renaissance the Sistine Chapel has been known as one of the greatest achievements in all of art.

Reading a book about preaching,[1] I learned about a painting behind the altar at the convent of the Antonites in Colmar. The Easter section of the painting features Christ stretched out on the cross, and alongside him Mary the mother of Jesus in the arms of the Apostle John and Mary Magdalene kneeling at his feet. There is also a small lamb holding another cross with the cup beneath its breast. Off to the side of this scene is John the Baptist, dressed in camel hair tied with a leather belt, holding scripture and pointing to Jesus. This is an apt image of the Baptist, the one who points to Christ. This, the author writes, is the essence of preaching: Pointing to Christ.

There is a simplicity in this reading from John’s gospel. John’s is often referred to as the most spiritual of the gospels. There are many miracles and signs found reading John’s gospel that we just don’t find in the others, but this reading isn’t miraculous, nor is it spiritual, it’s just plain and simple.

The scribes ask John who he is. While the New International Version isn’t so forward, many other translations are. The priests and Levites came from Jerusalem to ask John “Who are you?”

John begins by telling them who he isn’t. He isn’t the Christ, he isn’t Elijah, and he isn’t the prophet. (By the way, this vaguely named prophet is probably the prophet from Deuteronomy 18; the prophet who will be raised up from among the Israelites who will speak the Lord’s words.) He doesn’t identify with any of these holy references because these references all have messianic expectations and John has no personal messiah complex. Instead he identifies himself with the words of Isaiah. He is the one calling in the desert “Make straight the way for the Lord.”

This is who John is. John isn’t Jesus. John points to Jesus.

Social media has allowed us to share our lives with the rest of the world on unprecedented levels. One of the ways I connect with friends and colleagues is using a platform called Twitter. What separates Twitter from other social media sites is that it limits messages to 140 typed characters. Letters, numbers, spaces, punctuation—if you can say it in 140 characters you can say it on Twitter.

Twitter encourages you to describe yourself to the world, again using only a few characters. I describe myself saying, “Child of God, Husband of Marie, Teller of Tales, Fortunate Son.” I know that this isn’t a fleshed out description, but I also figure it’s not bad for 62 characters including spaces.

I am Marie’s husband, this week with Toni (Marie’s mother) visiting that role has been very important.

My entire family is known for stories and story telling so telling tales is one of the ways I describe myself. My older sister occasionally finds people who know my grandmother’s family from California, Missouri. One woman when discovering the family connection said, “So you’re one of those #$&! Hert’s. Well, it’s true and for better or worse I am one of those #$&! Hert’s. We have tales to tell and are willing to tell them.

The church, the denomination, calls me a Teaching Elder. This title has been recently been reclaimed by the church for what we used to call Ministers of the Word and Sacrament. There are many hats worn by pastors, but the one which I am perhaps best equipped to wear is this one, teaching, sharing the word of God with the people of God. When I look at who I am, when I look at what my role is, I move toward the image of John—I point to Christ.

This is important to me. When I talk too much about the denomination I suffer from navel-gazing. When I talk too much about myself I inflict a cult-of-personality on you, which is neither what you deserve nor what God expects. Some of this is necessary, because ministry is always carried out in the context of the community and its people; but if it is not first about God then it is about what Ecclesiastes calls vanity.

Today I began by talking about the great cathedrals of European because one of the pities of the church is that many of these great churches are little more than just buildings today. There is a history of worship and service that has been lost in the thousands of years since the death and resurrection. Many are simple tourist attractions that have little to do with their intended purpose. Christianity in Europe has been taking a beating over the past 100 years.

Where Christianity has thrived in Europe is in the countries we call the Eastern Bloc, the countries where Christianity and Christians were oppressed by the state. In those places the people needed the church; the people needed the community of Christ. In the more affluent places, places where the church seemed to be more of an add-on to life, it is declining.

This isn’t so surprising when you look at the heritage of the faith. In ancient Rome the Hebrews were troublemakers. The Christians were troublemaker’s troublemakers. One group was oppressed by the empire and the other was oppressed by the oppressed. This helps us look at who we are, who the church is today.

The Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow was the 218^th Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s General Assembly. Bruce had what he considers the enviable position that the conservative arm of the church thought he was too liberal and the liberal arm of the church didn’t think he wasn’t as liberal as he should be given his position. He considered it an honor that nobody thought of him as “their standard bearer.”[2]

He recently wrote an article called “Dear God, I Would Like My Presbyterian Church (USA) Back.”[3] One of the things he does is articulate what the each of the extreme branches of the church thinks is wrong with the other. He notes that one branch of the church misses the “Father Knows Best” era of American Christianity and in particular the PC(USA) while the other misses the wildly progressive era of change that was a highlight in the 1960’s.

Bruce doesn’t poo-poo the anger that either group feels. He doesn’t brush away their feelings with platitudes. He acknowledges that the church is changing. The body we call the church, the denomination in particular, is changing.

What Bruce points out is that “The Good Ol’ Days” is a trap. The church we identify as “ours” has never been “ours.” The Church of Christ is just that, the Church of Christ. It’s God’s church, it’s not ours. And as long as the church complains and debates the quality of witness it doesn’t have a witness to Christ, but only to itself.

As the church we need to remember in the changing seas of life, some things remain steady. For us, for the church these things include the community bathed in the waters of our baptism. These things include the feeding of the community by the body and blood of Christ, symbolized by good gifts of the bread and cup of the Lord’s Supper celebrated together in what we call Holy Communion.

We are called to remember Christ came to save and serve the world and we serve Christ by helping with this mission. We don’t save, but we point to salvation. We point individually as the people of God and we point together as the church of Christ; just the way John did 2,000 years ago.

So this is who John is. This is who I am. This is who we are. We are the people who point to Christ. We point to Christ who is coming. Advent means coming. We don’t do this with messianic expectations of our own. We do this because Jesus is the Messiah, Jesus is the Christ. Today in a sermon preview, the children and youth pointed to Christ in drama and song. Let us take their words and point to Christ in our word and action too.

[1] Willimon, William, “Conversations with Barth on Preaching.” Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2006

[2] Paraphrase from his introduction at a “Moderator Meets the Presbytery” event in Springfield, Missouri.

[3][3] Reyes-Chow, Bruce, “Dear God, I Would Like My Presbyterian Church (USA) Back” http://reyes-chow.com/2011/12/my-presbyterian-church/, retrieved December 9, 2011.

Green Light--Go!

2011-12-04T13:30:00.004-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday December 4, 2011, the 2nd Sunday in Advent.

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Isaiah 40:1-11

Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13

2Peter 3:8-15a

Mark 1:1-8

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

All of the gospels begin with a certain majesty. Matthew’s gospel begins, “This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham” followed by forty generations of ancestors from Abraham to Jesus. This list includes the Father of the faith and the patriarchs. It includes judges and kings. It takes us into the exile and returns us to the Holy Land. There is a sweep and a majesty that takes us across the ages and history of the people of Israel and Judah.

Luke’s gospel begins with what could be considered not just an introduction but a mission statement. “Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.”

Luke reminds Theophilus then and us today he has heard plenty of stories. Theophilus has possibly heard the gospels of Mark and Matthew along with at least some other collected writings. But Luke, the good physician, collects the writings he knows and the stories he has heard and collects them for Theophilus to hear.

But in this very reading from Luke’s gospel there is something hidden from a modern reader. Since not many of us speak Koine Greek, most of us probably don’t know “theophilus” means “God lover.” So Theophilus may not be the proper name of a person. Instead Luke may have intended this gospel for all God lovers everywhere. Now that’s majestic.

John’s gospel doesn’t begin with a genealogy or a mission statement, it begins at the very beginning, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.” So let’s give it up for John, it doesn’t get any more majestic than the very beginning.

Mark’s gospel, as majestic as it is, is comparatively Spartan, “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” That’s it. Mark’s gospel doesn’t begin with history or fanfare. There is no glorious genealogy of the people of God. There’s no holy mission statement. There’s certainly no cosmic verity being cast into holy writ like stars into the skies. There’s not even a “this is.” Mark’s gospel simply starts “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” That’s it.

As far as introductions go, my second grade teacher Miss Bedene would have expected more, but what’s there is packed with glory and splendor. With this simple introduction, Mark follows with the words of the prophet Isaiah not to introduce the Lord, but the man who will introduce the Lord, John the Baptist.

One of the joys of reading scripture, becoming immersed in scripture, is that when the language of the Word opens it opens like a rosebud. The word that is once tightly packed and protected opens to reveal such great beauty. The splendor of the rose opens beyond the beauty of its features and expands into its scent and even the feel of the silky petals. So too the splendor of the Word begins with the most common of words in scripture and opens far beyond the simple sum of its parts.

You know that I love the original texts, and I pray I don’t beat you over the head with them. I don’t use them to show off, I use them to try to open the scripture and open us to new and glorious interpretations of the Word of God. This comes into play when we talk about the beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Many other translations of this verse don’t use the word “gospel,” rather they use the phrase “good news.”

As far as the Greek translation goes, it’s six of one, a half dozen of the other, both are suitable translations. The Greek word when taken apart literally means “good message.” In the history of interpretation the word is translated as both “good news” and “gospel,” so that’s no problem. But in our dialect of the English language, when we talk about “the gospel truth” it means truth beyond question, truth beyond the shadow of a doubt. Using the words “good news” instead just doesn’t pack the same punch for our ears. Let me agree, the gospel is the truth, and when we speak the full truth, there is more than simple words of truth.

The gospel, the good news is more than a collection of words bound and placed in our pew racks. Beyond a collection of good words, the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God is the living breathing gospel. The good news is a proclamation. The good news is the declaration of the life of Jesus. The good news is the declaration of our lives.

Last week I mentioned a scholar who believes the gospel of Mark is well served to be read in reverse. Under this instruction, we are reading the last three or four snippets of Mark’s gospel today. We read John prophesying the coming of the Lord, the one who he is not worthy to stoop down to serve, the one who will baptize with fire and the Holy Spirit. We meet John not only coming as in the prophecy of Isaiah, but coming in the clothes and fashion of Elijah. Then just as soon as we are introduced to the fulfillment of the prophecy, we hear the words of the prophet Isaiah himself declaring the messenger who comes to make straight the path of the Lord.

By this reading of the gospel, we are left with what we call the beginning of our reading, but this scholar calls the grand conclusion of Mark’s gospel, “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ the Son of God.” If we decide to read it this way, our reading means something different. It’s certainly different from how we normally read this passage. It certainly is unsettling to read the gospel ending with the phrase “the beginning.”

Read this way, we prepare for the coming of the Lord in a brand new way. Advent means coming, but this coming is different. This coming is more like the one we heard about last week when we heard that this Advent, this Parousia; this coming is not just the coming of the baby on Christmas, but the final coming of the Christ in victory. The coming of this Advent is more than the coming of history; it is the coming of the future.

There’s an old children’s game called “Red Light/Green Light.” It starts with a person who is “stop light” the standing about fifteen feet from the other kids. The other kids go when they hear “green light” but have to stop when they hear “red light.” If they don’t stop, and if they get caught, they’re out of the game. The winner of the game is the first person to tag the “stop light.” The winner becomes “stop light” in the next round.

Reading the gospel and hearing “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God” is Mark’s way of telling the world the Lord has cried “green light.” We are supposed to go. It becomes our call to action. No longer is this a preamble to a reading, it becomes our charge, our vocation.

When we read “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God,” as the end of the gospel instead of the beginning, this passage becomes more than an introduction. It’s our summons to reach out to the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of Man. We are to reach out to the world with the love of God, the authority of the Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is the source of the good news, the news we are to share and the gospel we are to live.

It is our call to Christ’s new beginning, to be opened like a rosebud by the flower of the word. It is our call to not only let the world see the vivid color and beauty of the bloom. It is also our call to be a joy to our God and God’s good creation spreading the sweet smell of Christ where we live and breathe.

What comes next, what follows is the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God. This is the life we are to live. Two-thousand years after the birth of our Lord and Savior we are called to continue beginning the work he started. What comes through the lives of all Christians in every time and place is the beginning of God’s good news. What follows, what comes next; the life that we live, that too is the gospel.

The way we share the good news of Jesus the Christ is with our hands, with our hearts, and with our voice. This is our charge, our call, our vocation. This is only the beginning. This is the gospel truth and this is the good news. This is what coming means for us. This is Advent. Advent means coming. Come, O Come, Emmanuel.

Living into the Comma

2011-11-27T20:44:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday November 27, 2011, the 1st Sunday in Advent.

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Isaiah 64:1-9

Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19

1 Corinthians 1:3-9

Mark 13:24-27

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

Today is the first Sunday in Advent, and as we just heard, Advent means coming. This is the season when we prepare for the coming of the Lord Jesus into the world. In this month we will celebrate the breaking of the fully divine God of all creation into the weakest of all human forms, a baby born to a single mother in Roman-occupied Judea. We celebrate the Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords, coming in the most humble of ways. But our Gospel reading doesn’t really point to this coming, it points to another coming.

Advent is from the Latin word for coming, but there is another word that is used for the coming of the Christ, parousia. Parousia is from the Greek word for coming. Because of its appearance in John’s Revelation,[1] it is most often used when describing not the first coming but what we call the second coming of the Lord. Since it is Jesus himself who describes the coming of the Lord in this gospel reading, it makes sense that he is describing not the first, but the second coming of the Lord.

This coming is the source of our Christian hope.

Our hope is not that “things” will come to pass. Yes, Jesus tells us to learn the lessons of the fig tree. He teaches us that we know the signs of the times. We should know what is happening. But this, this knowledge and ability to interpret the signs are not our hope. Our hope is not in what is coming but who is coming.

We do not place our faith in events or in things. We don’t place our faith in stuff or the structures we build; we place our faith in Christ. By the power of the Holy Spirit we place our faith in Christ.

This faith we have is not in some God we do not know. As well as we can know on this side of glory, we worship the God in Christ we know. This is the Christ who came to minister to sinners and to the poor. This is the Christ who defended the widow and orphan and traveler. This is the Christ who opens the kingdom of God to all who come. This is the Christ who came to heal the sick, not rub elbows with the elite. This is the God in Christ who ministers to humanity not despite our sinful nature but because we are his children, the children of God. This is the God who sent his Spirit to be with us, to indwell us, to walk beside us, to give us strength and support until he comes again.

This faith we have is not that the kingdom of God has fully come. Our faith is that we see as Paul said through a mirror darkly. We have seen God’s peace and justice at work, but we know that until he comes again we will not know this peace and justice fully. I have described this as “now and not yet.”

Christ has come, and when he came he emptied himself of his Godly status, becoming subject to the principalities of this life. He became subject to death, even death upon the cross, but Christ conquered death. He allowed himself to be subjected to death so that he could defeat death. He became subject to human justice so that he could bring his perfect justice. Christ has come. Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.

Yet despite this victory in Christ, a truth we know has happened, we know that it is not fully realized in this world. We know death is defeated, yet we face the death of our bodies and our values in a dozen little ways every day. Christ has come. Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again. Still we continue to fight the battles Christ has won every day. The victory is won and the battle continues.

When we celebrate Advent we celebrate the coming of the Christ child, the baby Jesus. Today, today when we share this gospel reading we celebrate the Second Advent, the Parousia, the final coming in victory. Yes, we celebrate.

With this coming, with this coming in power, glory, peace, and justice, we do not ponder whether or not this will happen. The greatest hope we have is not if these promises will be fulfilled, but when. We are told that God’s word in Christ by the power of the Spirit will never pass away. We are told that this prophecy will come to pass. Our greatest Christian hope is that this will happen. True, we are not given an indication of when this will happen, but we are promised that it will.

Last week while talking about the sheep and the goats[2] I said, “It’s not up to us to decide who will be saved and who will not because Christ the King makes that decision.” In the same way, none of us knows when Christ will return. The son himself doesn’t even know, but we are not left to wonder if Jesus will come again, we are told he will. In the same breath we are told that he will, but not when. Last week I said “Taking time and energy [to decide who will be saved and who will not] ultimately distracts us doing what we are called to do.” In the same way, wondering when he will return also distracts us doing what we are called to do.

So we are warned to be on guard, to be alert. Like the old church sign says, “Scripture doesn’t say get ready, it says be ready.” Scripture teaches us to keep watch.

One New Testament scholar, a man whose main focus is the gospel of Mark,[3] believes that this gospel should be read backward. Story by story, it should be read from the end to the beginning, from the Resurrection to John the Baptist’s preparations for the coming. Our readings this Advent season reflect this. This week we read from a prophecy of the second coming. Over the next three weeks, we will read from the beginnings of Mark then John then Luke.

This reading shows us that Advent is a time of waiting. It’s a time of preparation. It is the time between when Jesus came and when he comes again. Our readings for Advent reflect this promise, and it reflects them in reverse. We start with the second coming this week and go to the first coming for the rest of Advent.

Last week Marie and I went to the cemetery and visited the mausoleum where Joe McDonald was laid to rest a couple of weeks ago. While I was there I recalled the wonderful stories about Joe’s life. I remember seeing everyone at the funeral home and here for the service. I remember seeing the tributes along with the pictures and scrapbooks. Standing at the wall I remembered the wonderful celebration of Joe’s life as we bore witness to the resurrection. (Service of Witness to the Resurrection is technically what Presbyterians call a funeral service.) There, at that wall, I gave thanks for the witness of his life and the promise of the resurrection.

As all of these glorious thoughts crossed my mind, one thing got stuck. Unless you knew Joe, or any of the saints whose names adorn the stones in the cemetery, all that you would know of their lives is summed up in a dash. Of the hundreds of people, family members, loved ones, and revered citizens whose last resting place is in Colonial Gardens cemetery; unless you know them from local history or in person, their life is summed up in a simple dash, a hyphen. That’s heavy lifting for a little hyphen.

One of the things we did in worship this morning is state what we believe using the words of the Apostles’ Creed. It wasn’t written by the Apostles’, but there is a historical element of the twelve in the creed. When it was written, it was envisioned that each of the twelve wrote one of the affirmations in the creed. So when we share our faith using the creed, it is as though we share the creed with the original twelve apostles and with all Christians throughout the ages.

Liturgy means “work of the people.” Reciting the creed, singing the Gloria and the Doxology, joining in confession and supplication, hearing and responding to the Word, these are just some of the elements that make up the work we do in worship. Worship, framed around the liturgy is our work. Stating what we believe is a part of that work, but there is something missing from the creed.

We say the words that shape our faith, yet we go straight from “born of the Virgin Mary” to “suffered under Pontius Pilate.” The creed takes us from the birth of Jesus to the Passion of the Christ, but speaks nothing of what happened in between. There’s only a comma. The entire life of Jesus of Nazareth, the life of the Christ is summed up in a comma. That’s heavy lifting for a little comma.

The Apostles’ Creed leaves the life and ministry of Jesus in a comma. It’s a shame that’s all there is, but if we were to begin to expand that comma we would have a creed as long as the gospels. John’s gospel even tells us that all of the works of Jesus could not be contained in that book, so in truth that comma can be expanded into something larger than scripture as we know it. So what is in that comma?

In that comma is life. In that comma is hope. Christ lives in that comma, we live in Christ. We are called to live into that comma. Our life and vocation is found living into the comma.

Today, Mark’s gospel invites us to consider the part of our lives that we find in the comma. The part of our lives we find in the hyphen. Looking at stone in the cemetery, all of the hyphens look the same, but we know this is not true. It is up to us to see where the Lord is leading us in this life. It is up to us to live into the comma and that is what makes Christians different from others in this life.

Walter J. Burghardt said, “Here is your Advent: Make the Christ who has come a reality, a living light, in your life and in some other life. Give of yourself… to one dark soul… with no conditions”[4] God leads us to make Christ a reality in our life and the lives of others. It is up to us to follow. It is up to us to live into our dash, to live into his comma.

Our reading from Isaiah tells of when the prophet spoke of the days to come. He spoke of the awesome things Christ does we do not expect. The first of these was God coming to earth. Today our reading, this first reading in Advent presents Jesus expanding Isaiah’s prophecy telling creation that he will come again. When he comes he will see the work of his hands in the work of his people. He will see his life as our living liturgy, his life as our work.

When we allow ourselves to be shaped by God as a potter shapes the clay; we live into the dash, we live into the comma. Advent means coming. Jesus is coming. Parousia mean coming, or more aptly coming back. Jesus is coming again. So let us be aware of both arrivals. The one we celebrate in about four weeks and the other which will come in God’s good time.

Together let us seek the word of God. Hear the word of God. Let us follow God’s word. This is how we do God’s work. This is how we live as God’s people.

[1] Revelation 22:20

[2] The Decider, http://timelovesahero.blogspot.com/2011/11/decider.html, retrieved November 26, 2011.

[3] The Reverend Doctor John Alsop

[4] Burghardt, Walter J., “Sir, We Would Like to See Jesus.” Paulist Press, 1982 in “An Advent Sourcebook.” Thomas J. O’Gorman, Editor. Chicago: Archdiocese of Chicago, Liturgy Training Publications, 1988, page 9.

The Decider

2011-11-20T15:17:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday November 20, 2011, the 34th and last Sunday of Ordinary Time. This day is celebrated as Christ the King Sunday.

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Ezekiel 34:11-16, 20-24

Psalm 100

Ephesians 1:15-23

Matthew 25:31-46

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

The Morrill Land Grant Act of 1862 set aside federal land in every state to establish a state university. The act required the universities to establish what we call today Reserve Officer Training Corps units. It also required instruction in agricultural, technical, and mechanical arts. The county extension service was also created under this act to improve agricultural and homemaking skills throughout the states. The Morrill Act created what we know as the A&M’s, A&T’s, and State Universities.

Because of the land donation, the law encouraged the universities to be built in rural and out of the way areas of the state. This helped reduce urban distractions that detract from higher education. Looking at the locations of the land grant schools in this region makes this point. Some of the fabulous cities which host these universities include College Station, Texas; Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Stillwater, Oklahoma; Manhattan, Kansas; Las Cruces, New Mexico; Auburn, Alabama; and the possibly aptly named Starkville, Mississippi.

Yet one hundred fifty years after the Morrill Act was passed, these university towns are among some of the most livable cities in America. Forbes list of most livable cities often include the land grant school cities of Madison, Wisconsin; Lincoln, Nebraska; and Fayetteville, Arkansas. The question of what shaped the quality of life in these towns is a chicken-and-egg thing; were these cities always livable or did the university make the city livable? The truth is that the university serves as a hub for business and industry and arts and leisure that make these cities livable. Without the universities these cities wouldn’t be destinations, they’d be the middle of nowhere.

Everyone wants to defend their alma mater, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but I ask: Would you want to go to College Station or Baton Rouge if it weren’t for the university?

There is one problem with the cities that host these universities. These small towns often end up with big city problems like poverty and crime. By the insulated nature of these communities and the university itself, these problems and others are often swept into corners and hidden. They don’t happen often, and that’s not bad news, but because of this lack of frequency first responders and law enforcement officials don’t have the experience their big-city brethren have.

Often, these issues are ignored hoping they will go away. A couple of weeks ago, these issues came together in a perfect storm of horror in at State College, Pennsylvania a former coach, at one time the heir apparent to become head coach, was named in a grand jury report concerning several horrible incidents of child abuse.

I won’t go into the full story as I know it; because not only do I not know the full story, but the full story hasn’t unfolded yet. Still, some things must be asked and answered. These questions include “Who knew what and when did they know it?” and “Who should have done what?” Pundits and parents are asking about the differences between fulfilling “legal responsibilities” and following “moral imperatives.” People don’t seem to be asking “Did this really happen?” In American jurisprudence this is important because every accused person goes to trial with the presumption of innocence. This question is also the reason people add the word “alleged” when specifying names and crimes.

There’s also an old expression for times like this, “There’s a special place in hell for someone who would harm a child like this.”

By the way, I’m not going into the similar controversy happening with the basketball program at Syracuse University because it is now just coming to light. That and the ‘Cuse doesn’t fit my “land grant school” motif.[1] This morning Marie asked me if coaches were becoming the new “Catholic Priests” and all I could say was “yes.”

So I want to reiterate this: I believe there is a special place in hell for someone who would harm a child like this. This is where we connect to our gospel reading this morning.

I have often undersold the story of the sheep and goats and that’s my loss. Jesus tells a wild, wild tale. Beyond a story, it’s in my opinion the wildest prophetic view of end times, the second coming and eternal judgment in Matthew’s gospel.

Our reading begins with the word that sets the stage for the apocalyptic prophecy, “when.” Using this definite adverb, Jesus begins by proclaiming this event will happen like it has already happened. “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory.” Jesus has told all of his disciples that he will come in his glory.

At this point, all of the nations come gathered; collected before Christ the King on his throne. There he separates the people just like a shepherd separates sheep and goats. These images are intentional. Jesus is referred to as the Good Shepherd in scripture so this is not an accident. In fact, these images sound a lot like our reading from Ezekiel. Jesus chose this image carefully.

The nation of Israel is often referred to as sheep. The Lord has had a special relationship nation of Israel since the beginning, since Genesis. These images and thoughts come together in verse 34 when King Jesus says to the sheep, “take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.”

This portrayal of the sheep is good as far as it goes. Matthew’s gospel was directed toward Jewish believers, but this particular prophecy also has an eye toward those who spread the word of the risen Christ and those who support those them. Those gentiles who support the Kingdom of Heaven, supporting the church and those who spread the Good News, they are also included in the sheep of this fold.

In this passage Jesus tells us that those who hear his voice work on behalf of his kingdom. This is true; the sheep of his fold are those who hear his voice and follow his commands. Those who love the Lord hear his voice and follow his commands. By this, some people say that we can be saved by works; some read this to say that if you’re good you will enter into the kingdom. We in the reformed tradition stand firmly against this. We are saved by grace through faith, and we demonstrate our faith in responding to God’s grace in word and deed. It is up to us to share the Good News of the risen Christ and support those who share the good news.

We need to remember that in the ancient of days there were those who persecuted Christians. There were Christians who are hungry and thirsty and there was no one to give them something to eat or a cool water to drink. There were evangelists who traveled to share the Good News who had no place to lay their heads. There were missionaries who were imprisoned for doing what the Lord called them to do. There were even rabbis who shared the difficult words of life, not just the popular ones, and they were cast aside because the message was too much for some to hear.

As true as this was then, it is just as true today. This passage is about the missionaries and evangelists who share the good news yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Even more so, it is for those who support them.[2]

What’s interesting about this passage is that everybody seems to be surprised to be included in either the sheep or the goats. Everyone asks “Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?”

The righteous and the cursed both ask this question. Both groups, the sheep and the goats, don’t recognize when they have served and when they have failed. In Matthew’s reading, nobody really knows which variety of livestock they will be lumped in. Neither group can tell. They just don’t know.

So, this gets back to where I began. I do believe there’s a special place in hell for someone who would harm a child, but here’s the rub, it’s not up to me to decide who the sheep are and who the goats are. No matter what I think, no matter how “well qualified” I think I am to make that judgment; it’s not up to me. With what happened at Penn State, I am not qualified to decide who gets to go to the “special place.” The responsibility for that decision has been given by the Father to the Son to decide.

Returning to scripture, the answer to “who judges the righteous and who judges the cursed?” are right in front of us. Verse 32 tells us “[The Son of Man] will separate the people one from another. Verse 34 then tells us “Come, you who are blessed by my Father…” Matthew’s gospel tells us it is the Father who blesses the righteous who are separated from the cursed by the King at the final judgment.

As for the others, Matthew doesn’t call them the evil or the unrighteous; he simply calls them “you who are cursed.” Jesus doesn’t say who curses them; he just says they are cursed. To say they are cursed by the Lord is to say a defendant’s guilt is caused by the judge. The judge only put the state’s seal on the proceeding.

Matthew doesn’t say the devil is the one who curses them either. The devil and the cursed will share the same punishment, but the devil can’t force anybody to do anything. Tempt, yes. Coerce, no.

There is no time when it is up to us to decide who are the sheep and who are the goats. It is not up to us to decide who will be with Christ the King in the Kingdom of God and who will be with the devil in eternal torment. This is up to the Lord. So if we don’t decide who’s a sheep and who’s a goat then what do we get to decide?

We are called to make choices for our lives and our families. It is up to us to choose how we live. It is up to us as parents and as the Body of Christ to raise disciples who are able to make good decisions. Are we to choose the life scripture calls us to lead or are we to go and do what we want? Are we to be tempted to keep our own agendas or are we to work for the good of God’s good earth? Are we to reject the great unwashed or should we remember that when we do for the least of people around us in truth we serve the Lord?

It is our choice, and as for me and this house, we will serve the Lord.

We come together today on Christ the King Sunday to declare that God is sovereign. We come and testify that Christ is King. One of the king’s responsibilities is to judge creation, and Matthew shows us this will happen. He doesn’t say when, he doesn’t go into all of the twists and turns of apocalyptic prophecy. Matthew simply tells us the Son of Man will come in his glory and when he does he will sit on his throne and judge. Nothing more, nothing less.

Matthew doesn’t say that the goats will be sent in the realm of the devil. On the contrary, we read that those who are cursed will be sent into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. The devil isn’t the king of this kingdom, he isn’t the king of anything. He’s just another soul writhing in agony. Christ is the King of all creation.

It is up to us to judge our own behavior. It is up to us to judge the behavior of others to say “this is a good role model.” It is up to us to judge the behavior of others to say “that is no sort of behavior for me, for a follower of Christ.”

Christ is the king, we are the servants. It is up to us to share God’s word with the world and support those who share the word. It’s not up to us to decide who will be saved and who will not because Christ the king makes that decision. Taking time and energy to make this judgment ultimately distracts us doing what we are called to do. It is up to us to feed the hungry and give a cold drink to the thirsty, to offer shelter to the sojourner, clothe the naked, and visit the sick and imprisoned.

By this we don’t earn our salvation. By this we participate in the salvation of the world. By this we decide to join in with God’s redemptive work in creation.

[1] Syracuse University has a historical connection to the United Methodist Church.

[2] “The New Interpreter’s Bible.” Leander Keck, General Editor, v. VIII, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995, page 456.

Consequences

2011-11-13T14:44:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday November 13, 2011, the 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Judges 4:1-7

Psalm 123

1 Thessalonians 5:1-11

Matthew 25:14-30

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

I have said before that the source of our readings every Sunday is something called the Revised Common Lectionary. Lectionaries have been around since before the beginning of Christian worship. A professor once told a class at Austin Seminary that when Jesus was in the synagogue reading from Isaiah, that was a lectionary reading for that day.

It makes sense, back in the day, finding a specific reading wasn’t anything like it is today. The Isaiah scroll would have been huge, and finding one specific reading within that huge scroll would have been both difficult and time consuming. So it makes sense that the scroll would have been open to that reading when it was handed to Jesus. It would have been open to that reading because that was the lectionary reading.

The Revised Common Lectionary is the second generation of lectionary readings used by Protestants. The first is still used extensively by Lutherans and Episcopalians while the revised version is used more by Methodists and Presbyterians. The lectionary splits scripture into three different years, one year assigned to each of the first three gospels. John’s gospel is sprinkled among all three years, especially in Advent, Lent, and Easter. With these gospel readings there are also readings from the Epistles, Psalms, and Old Testament.

I like the lectionary because it provides me a discipline of reading through the year. It makes me take a hard look at specific readings and keeps me from focusing on just what I think is important or interesting.

That being said, it has holes. One of these holes is that the Old Testament is just too large to fit in the lectionary. There are over 150 weeks within the lectionary, but still a full third of the psalms and a major chunk of the law, prophets, and other writings are missing. Today gives us one example.

Over the three year course of the lectionary, our Old Testament reading this morning is the only time the book of Judges is read in worship. We don’t hear the stories of Samson and Delilah. We don’t get to hear the glorious call of Gideon. At that, we don’t hear the meat and potatoes of the story of Deborah and Barak, just this introduction to the story, and that’s a shame.

It begins with Deborah telling Barak, “The LORD the God of Israel, commands you: ‘Go, take with you ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun and lead them up to Mount Tabor. I will lead Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, with his chariots and his troops to the Kishon River and give him into your hands.’” Glorious, isn’t it, but that’s not how it ends.

What comes up missing is Barak’s answer to Deborah, “If you go with me, I will go; but if you don’t go with me, I won’t go.” Deborah responds, “Certainly I will go with you, but because of the course you are taking, the honor will not be yours, for the LORD will deliver Sisera into the hands of a woman.”

This is how it happens too. In verse 17, after Barak and his army have routed Jabin’s army and Sisera is on the run, we meet Jael. She’s a lovely homemaker, the wife of Heber the Kenite. Sisera and Heber have done business in the past so Sisera thought Heber’s tent would provide safe haven. Not so much.

Jael covers Sisera with rugs to hide him. He feels safer. Sisera is thirsty so Jael gives him warm milk. He feels rested and falls asleep. But instead of hiding Sisera from his enemies, Jael kills Sisera with a tent stake through the temple. When Barak came looking for Sisera, Jael showed him where to find him, snug as a dead bug in a rug. Barak took the field, but a woman took the general of the army with rugs, warm milk, and a tent stake.

As I said, there are holes in the lectionary. We read the glorious prophecy that the army of the Lord will prevail under the leadership of Barak, but we don’t hear the consequences of his response, his defiance of God’s prophet. These are consequences worth hearing.

Our Gospel reading has its own consequences. Three servants, three slaves are trusted with the wealth of their master who goes away on a long journey. One slave is trusted with five talents, one with two talents, and the third with one. Each is given a very generous gift from the master. A few weeks ago we learned how much these are worth, so we won’t do that again. Let’s just say that these riches had value beyond imagination.

Let’s also remember that the master gave to each slave a number of talents according to their ability. The master didn’t burden the slaves with riches they were unqualified to handle. They had the faculties to work with what they were given. They were not given too much nor were they given too little. It’s the Goldilocks of trust, what they were given was just right.

The master’s trust was met with fulfilled expectations from two of the three slaves. The servants who were given five talents and two talents doubled their master’s trust. The servant who performed under expectation buried his treasure. It didn’t appreciate even one denarius in that hole.

Now, the master was away for a long time, scripture doesn’t say how long but in the history of the faith it is safe to say that “a long time” is a very long time. When he returned, the master settled accounts with the servants.

Those who doubled what the master gave received even greater in return. These servants were trusted with “a few things,” and anyone who can call even one talent “a few things” knows wealth far beyond my wildest imagination. In return for their faithful service, they are put in charge of many things and welcomed into the “master’s happiness.”

As you know, I look at several different translations to see how other folks render the scripture. In this case some translations say “enter into the joy of your master”[1] and another has the master saying “Let’s celebrate together.”[2] I’m not going to say that one is a more faithful translation or one is better. What I will say is that when you consider all of these translations together we get a glorious view of the master’s joy with these good and faithful servants and that is a wonderful thing.

The third, the one who was trusted with least didn’t live up to that much trust. He took the gifts of his master and put them in a hole in the ground. We need to remember that in the first century burying treasure in a hole in the ground was like an earthen safe deposit box. So if he wasn’t going to do anything with his master’s talent at least he did nothing safely. But where the servants who doubled their master’s talents were invited to share in his joys, this servant was given a different invitation.

This servant approaches his master with his dirty bag of treasure and says, “Master, I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your gold in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.”

In counseling there’s something called phenomenology. The simplest way I can explain it is that we create our own reality and respond accordingly. This servant feared his master and responded in fear. He felt the best he could do is return the talent unscathed. So how did that work out?

The master responds, “So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest. So take the bag of gold from him and give it to the one who has ten bags.” The servant who lived in fear, not despite his fear, was cast from his master’s sight.

As for the faithful servants, “whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.” As the master has already said, the faithful servants are welcomed share their master’s happiness. The third fearful servant, he was cast out of the presence of the master and into the darkness.

Oh, by the way, we don’t know, but perhaps the two other servants thought the same of their master. Their difference may not have been their opinion of the master, but their difference was their response. There are consequences we face in receiving and rejecting the gifts and talents of our Lord. We have heard them in Judges and we have heard them again in Matthew. God’s gifts are wonderful, and even more so are God’s rewards.

But there is one more consideration worth our attention. There is a question left unanswered in scripture I want us to wrestle for a moment. It’s a sensible question, it’s an obvious question.

What if the servant had lost his master’s fortune? What if not from theft or negligence, what if by circumstance and poor investing the servant had lost his master’s wealth?

It’s not as unusual as you might think. In this economy it’s probably more common than I think. In the past few years we can see how downtowns have turned over businesses. We can look at the Wall Street and banking debacle of a few years ago to see just how easy it is to lose five talents. Shoot, on Wall Street the losses surpassed hundreds of thousands of talents.[3] So how do we think this master would respond to losses if return of riches earned one slave a one way ticket to Weeping-and-Gnashing-of-Teeth-Ville.

Theologian Karl Barth once wrote that God created man in his own image and then man returned the favor. If we think our heavenly master would respond the same way a 21^st Century banker would react to a defaulted business loan we have committed the sin of creating God in our own image. What if the value isn’t in succeeding in the ways that we know using dollars and disciples and such? What if the value is in using the gifts? What if success is answering the call?

I believe that in the kingdom of heaven it is better to try and fail than to not try at all. It’s better to work for the kingdom and not see the results in our time than it is to see nothing and give up. I believe it is more noble to try and have faith that the master and the master’s talents are enough than it is to seek achievement in the short term that we can see and touch.

I believe it is more noble to have faith and use the gifts and talents God has granted us individually and as the body than it is to live in fear. Recently we read from Exodus “I the LORD your God am a jealous God,” so fearing God isn’t wrong. But if that is all, if that’s all we think of our Lord then we are guilty of using human economics, accounting, and legalism to define the power and the grace of God, and this is not our Lord.

Our Lord, the master of this parable, welcomes slaves to share in his joy. It’s humanly typical how the wealthiest and most powerful people in our world don’t welcome their servants to share in their joy. Our Lord offers his greatest gifts to us and simply demands we use them. Yes, the Lord is a fan of good stewardship (You knew this was going to be a stewardship sermon, didn’t you!), but the Lord measures our success in ways we cannot know.

It is better to use the time, talents, and treasure we have been given than not because even if it seems that we have lost all, we are not the judge of what losing all truly means. Ultimately, failure can be expressed in the old expression, “you can’t win if you don’t play.” We face the consequences of not living in God’s love, the God who shares the overflowing bounty of talents, who calls us use those talents.

So let us answer the call. Let us live into the best of our heavenly vocation with the talents God has given us. Let us share in the master’s happiness. Truly, the worst thing we can do is say, “No.”

[1] New Revised Standard Version and New American Standard Bible

[2] New Living Translation

[3] A $700 Billion bailout comes to about 350,000 talents of gold at $58/gram.

After Awakening

2011-11-06T14:32:00.000-06:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday November 6, 2011, the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25

Psalm 78:1-7

1Thessalonians 4:13-18

Matthew 25:1-18

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

Seminary is good about doing many things. One of them is turning the way a bunch of folks interpret scripture on its collective ear. One of those ear-turning things is that the scribes who wrote, copied, and edited texts would occasionally add stuff. Sometimes the additions were to make things more clear. Sometimes the additions were to advance an agenda. Sometimes the additions were to make the audience more comfortable with the word. You just heard me share one of those, verse 13 from our gospel reading.

This verse has Jesus telling his listeners to “keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.” Actually, this translation is better than the New Revised Standard Version’s which renders this verse, “Keep awake, therefore, for you neither know the day nor the hour.” “Keep watch” makes some sense, but “keep awake” makes very little sense to me in the context of this reading. To see what I mean, I want to take a close look at the differences between the five wise virgins and the five foolish virgins.

Let’s begin with the obvious things. All ten of the women were virgins, bridesmaids in other translations. They all waited for the bridegroom together; they all had lamps; and they all fell asleep. This is why translating the phrase “keep awake” makes absolutely no sense to me. Why make distinctions between the ladies with the phrase “keep awake” if nobody keeps awake?

What happened next is interesting though. When they all awoke, they trimmed their lamps. For those of you who have never trimmed a lamp it’s not difficult. There are several different types of ancient lamps and they all work on the same basic principle. There is a reservoir that contains the oil and the wick. The wick is snaked up through a hole in the lamp. The oil is then absorbed by the wick and the oil which burns when lit.

In both only a little bit of wick burns as long as there is oil in the lamp. If there is no oil in the lamp, the wick itself begins to burn. If the wick burns too long, the oil can’t get to the end anymore and it will need to be trimmed.

By the way, the word we translate as “trim” is translated other ways in scripture. Everywhere else in the New Testament, this word means to adorn or to put in order.[1] I don’t think this parable calls us to bedazzle our lamps, so we can ignore that one. But when it comes time to put things in order, to put all things in order, this is an important note for the translation and for our lives.

I bring this up because as both the wise and the foolish virgins fell asleep, they must have asleep with their lamps burning. If they hadn’t what follows next would not be an issue. The wise virgins had their things in order, the foolish did not.

When they fell asleep, their lamps were lit. When they were awakened they were either going out or had gone out. None of them had oil left in their lamps, but only the wise women thought to bring an extra flask of oil in case the bridegroom’s already late arrival was further delayed.

Well, you know how the rest of this goes. The wise virgins refuse to give the foolish virgins any oil because there may not be enough for them if they do. Then in a land that is two-thousand years removed from the 24-hour mini-mart the wise virgins suggest the foolish ones find an oil merchant and get their own.

What makes this obviously a parable, a story based in literature, tradition, and wisdom but not in truth, is that the five foolish virgins were able to find a 24-hour mini-mart where they did secure oil for their lamps. In real life the chances of finding such a merchant would have been between slim and none, but in the parable it happens. By the time they return, the bridegroom has closed the door to the foolish ladies. They were summarily rejected.

So the difference between the wise and the foolish has nothing to do with sleeping because both groups fell asleep. The difference is that only five woke up prepared and ready to go in the middle of the night. The difference between the groups was how they prepared before they fell asleep and then what they did once they awoke.

The difference is that one group came as prepared as an Eagle Scout on a weekend campout and the other was rejected by the bridegroom. So as I said, it’s not really a matter of “keep awake,” at least not as far as I’m concerned. When you get right down to it, I prefer the New International Version’s translation of verse 13 that says “keep watch” better than the New Revised Standard Version’s, but honestly, in my opinion, it could have be translated better.

Another way this could have been rendered is for Jesus to say “be in constant readiness.” As for the language, any of these translations; keep awake, keep watch, or be in constant readiness are suitable. But these phrases all mean slightly different things. What I like about “be in constant readiness” is that you can still be ready and grab forty winks. But if you are constantly ready, you will have oil in case the bridegroom is delayed.

You don’t need much extra oil, enough to fill your lamp one or maybe two more times. The crier will tell you when the bridegroom arrives; you just need to have enough oil to keep your lamp lit. The wise women did this, the unwise did not.

But another way this can be translated is that Jesus warned his disciples not just to be awake, but to be alive, to be fully alive.[2] Jesus wants more than warm bodies. He wants the church to be filled with people who are more than just awake. Awake is a threshold; alive, truly alive is what he wants the church to be.

Our Lord calls us to aspire to and to work toward the life He gives us and calls us to live; to be good stewards of the life, the world, and the gifts we have been given. Our goal, our call, our vocation is be the light of God in the world and to bring light into the world.

The most common way we bring the light is by doing good works. Praise God this part of the body of Christ does many good works in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

We have opened our doors for community worship services and for civic organizations. We share worship with the community not only every Sunday, but with fellow Presbyterians on Ash Wednesday and Maundy Thursday. We hosted a group that helps teach people valuable life skills including budgeting and meal preparation. We hosted the youth of the First Methodist Church from San Angelo and their presentation of Matthew’s gospel in the musical Godspell.

We work to fight hunger and do the work of the greater church, through the Marshall Food Pantry. We also make contributions to Presbyterian Disaster Relief and contributions to the Presbytery for mission. We give time and energy to many good causes for the glory of our Father who is in heaven. But there is more, oh so much more we can do and need to do.

One thing we all need to do more of is to share worship. Here’s an uncomfortable question, “When was the last time you invited someone to come and worship with this part of the body of Christ?” The Rev. Mike Nelson tells this story about this:

When I was interning at a Lutheran Church in north Minneapolis, I had the privilege of sharing an office with Bob Evans, a retired pastor who served our congregation as voluntary “evangelism consultant.”

One week he had an insert run off for the Sunday worship bulletin that simply stated, “Surveys show that the average Lutheran invites someone to church once every 14 years.”

At the bottom he asked the tongue-in-cheek question: “How many of you are past due?”[3]

This is just one way we can trim the lamps of our lives. Don’t misunderstand me, I know that inviting someone to worship may cost more than we will ever find in our bank accounts. Inviting others puts us individually and corporately on display. It puts us on the line to show that we worship and work for the glory of God in the world. What could cost us more than that?

This parable is loaded with many symbols. When this gospel was written these elements would have been important to all of its listeners. Jesus is known far and wide as the bridegroom. While not mentioned by name in this parable, the church is called the Bride of Christ. The wedding banquet refers to the anticipated Messianic Banquet; a great feast for the faithful in the age to come that was a feature in Jewish and Christian speculation about the end time.[4] Oil is often used in scripture and in worship to represent the Holy Spirit. Sorry, there isn’t a scriptural parabolic use of the virgin, but interpreters instead liken them to the members of the church who will be sorted like the sheep and the goats in the end times.[5]

The symbols are glorious and illuminating, but there is still that same old problem of reading parables like watching “The Da Vinci Code,” filling in scriptural allusions like watching Tom Hanks fill in the blanks of Dan Brown’s prose.

What we can say is that the kingdom of heaven will be like a great banquet. A banquet the Lord our God hosts when all of creation is put into order. When through the Holy Spirit we work to do God’s will, we work to help put creation into order.

Another interesting thing about the word English bibles translate as trimmed is that it comes from the same root word as the words for world, earth, and ultimately creation; the sum of everything here and now, all of the cosmos. In the common use of the word, it pointed to an orderly creation, a universe where all is beautiful.[6] So as the earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, all of what is good and ordered and created is from and for the Lord.

As we trim the lamps of our lives, we participate in making the orderly creation which God envisions. As we trim the lamps of our lives, we work to bring back toward Eden the creation our Lord began.

So this is our goal, this is our endeavor, this is our vocation; this is how we serve as good stewards over God’s creation. We let our light shine before others, that they may see our good works and give glory to our Father who is in heaven.[7]

[1] Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Gerhard Kittel, editor. Vol. III. Grand Rapids, MI, Eerdmans, 1965, page 867.

[2] gragorew, “A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature.” Revised and edited by Frederick William Danker, Editor, 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, electronic edition 2000

[3] HomileticsOnline.com, Timothy F. Merrill, Executive Editor, http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/illustration_search.asp?keywords=invite , retrieved November 8, 2008.

[4] Messianic Banquet, Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible

[5] New Interpreter’s Bible, v. viii, Leander Keck, General Editor. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995, page 450 and HomileticsOnline.com, http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/btl_display.asp?installment_id=93000101, retrieved November 5, 2008.

[6] Kittel, page 868-880

[7] From The Second Helvetic Confession, Chapter XVI - Of Faith and Good Works, and of Their Reward, and of Man's Merit, paragraph 6..

Homily for Joe McDonald

2011-11-05T19:32:00.000-05:00

The Service of Witness to the Resurrection was held for Mr. Joe McDonald. Mr. McDonald, a Deacon of the Church, passed peacefully in his sleep on October 21, 2011 at his home in Leesburg, Florida.

Our Old Testament reading comes from the book of Deuteronomy 33:27

The eternal God is your dwelling place,

and underneath are the everlasting arms.

Our Gospel reading comes from the Gospel of John 11:25–26

I am the resurrection and the life, says the Lord.

Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live,

and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.

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

When I asked a member of the congregation about Joe, he said that even in his mid-70’s, Joe was a young man. The people of Marshall remember seeing Joe leaving the city limits in 2004 behind the wheel of his black Ford Mustang convertible. I don’t know how Joe would have responded if he had heard someone ask “What’s a 78 year old man doing driving a Mustang convertible?” But from the stories I have heard over the past couple of weeks, I imagine he would have said something like, “Doing quite nicely, thank you.”

Rest assured, when it came time to retire that black Mustang, Joe got something more sensible, his next Mustang had a manual transmission. (What, that’s not more sensible?) When his joints began to betray him, he traded that one for a sporty Cadillac with an automatic. Born the youngest boy of a family of five, only his sister Judy following Joe in the birth order, his sense of humor was developed early in this family of pranksters. That’s the source of the joy of life that appreciated fast cars.

Please don’t allow my words to let you think that Joe is all play and no work, this is not my intent. Upon graduating from high school here in Marshall, Joe enlisted in the Navy at the age of seventeen. He served as a medical corpsman in the Pacific theater during those last bloody months of World War II through VJ Day and beyond. This honed his sense of duty, his sense of honor, his sense of right and wrong and put those things to work in life. I guess what I’m saying is that Joe played hard, but only after he worked hard.

Chatting with Joe’s sons, they instilled this in me with several sayings Joe shared with them. He made sure his children knew that it “doesn’t matter what you do, as long as you do it to the best of your ability.” To that end, Joe shared and instilled a sense of right and wrong and a solid work ethic in his children. He taught them that by hard work and perseverance all things are possible.

Joe worked hard, and he shared the joys of life with family and friends. As his children transitioned from youth to adults so too did his relationship with them. Later, it included sharing some Neely’s Brown Pigs and a taste of grain and grape. As his children became adults Joe cultivated an adult relationship with them, though never afraid to be the father when the situation arose. This love and devotion was never more demonstrated than with his wife, the former Dolores Goforth of Karnack, Texas.

Joe loved his wife and loved his life. Whether parasailing in Mexico or cruising the St. John’s River, or traveling extensively with Dee after retirement, Joe loved life and shared it with all around him, which brings me to one more story.

Those of you who entered on the North side of the building noticed three rugged crosses on the lawn. Joe built those for the church. It was a glory to God and a surprise to everyone else. These crosses aren’t built out of flimsy plywood either; they are made to withstand the elements of an East Texas springtime. They were built to stand from Ash Wednesday to Pentecost, stand in the name of our crucified Lord.

I find it wonderfully and gloriously telling that Joe didn’t build one cross, he built three. Here in this sanctuary you will see one cross, the cross of our Lord, and this is appropriate for the sanctuary. When Joe built the crosses he did more. Surely, Joe built the cross which represents the one that bore Christ on Golgotha, he also built the crosses which held the men crucified alongside Jesus.

Death is an enemy. Its specter is not the shadow God intended to have following us all of the days of our lives. Joe instead lived, and lived well. He lived as Deuteronomy demands, with the eternal God as his dwelling place, he lived underneath the everlasting arms of the Lord. He lived knowing and celebrating the Lord who said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”

He showed this to us and continues to show this to us in the crosses he built. Joe’s hands and Joe’s life testify that Christ’s victory over death comes to life upon the empty cross. Joe testifies that this promise is for all of us by building not one but three crosses. He built not just the cross of Christ, but the crosses we all carry everyday. He testifies to the resurrection and the promise of new life for all in Christ.

Joe shared his faith and values with everyone who he met. He shared his faith and values with every relationship. He continues to share his faith and values with the testimony of his hands and his tools, his children and their children. He shared these things with the world, but he shared nothing with strangers because he had never met a stranger. Steven and David told me that Joe would say “I may have been right, I may have been wrong, but I am not in doubt.” Relying on the promises of things unseen, this sounds like the textbook definition of faith. It sounds like a strong faith. It sounds like Joe’s faith. Thanks be to God.

------------------------------

Joe B. McDonald passed away peacefully in his sleep the night of October 21, 2011, at the age of 85 at his home in Leesburg, Florida. Born in Longview, Texas on February 24, 1926, to the late Charles Lee McDonald and Grace Sammons McDonald, Joe graduated from Marshall Senior High School, where he played center on a Maverick football team that included future NFL Hall of Famer Y. A. Tittle.

After his post high school stint in the Navy, Joe attended Southwestern Louisiana Institute, now the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. With the outbreak of the Korean War, Joe left college to join the U.S. Air Force where he served as a 2^nd Lieutenant. Joe returned to Marshall and worked for Thiokol at Longhorn Army Ammunition Plant in Karnack, Texas.

Joe married Dolores (Dee) Goforth on November 27, 1954 in Karnack, Texas. Joe and Dolores had three children, Stephen, Melissa and David. Joe served in various capacities at Thiokol, eventually becoming a safety engineer. He became Director of Safety at Thiokol in the late sixties and worked on projects diverse as the Saturn V rocket motor and the Pershing missile, as well as on the Gemini and Apollo rocket programs. In 1970 Joe accepted a position with Brunswick Corporation to be the Director of Safety at their Marion and Sugar Grove, Virginia plants, which manufactured both consumer and defense products. Subsequently he was transferred to Chicago, Illinois, where he became the Director for Safety for Brunswick and oversaw operations for more than thirty facilities located across the United States.

Joe returned to Thiokol in 1981. One of the highlights of his career came when he was chosen to participate in the elimination of the Pershing Missiles which he had helped build under the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (the INF Treaty) with the Soviet Union.

Joe lost his beloved wife Dolores to colon cancer in 1993. Joe continued to travel, often with his brother Jack and sister Judy and daughter Melissa. Joe moved to Leesburg, Florida in 2004 to be closer to his children and grandchildren.

Joe is survived by his sister Judy of LaGrange; son Steve and his wife, Cathy, and their son, Zachary of Orlando, Florida; daughter Melissa of Savannah, Georgia; son David and his wife Nancy and their children, Brandon, Bronwen, and Spenser of Tangerine, Florida and all the friends he made wherever he traveled.

and Still Being Reformed

2011-10-30T16:29:00.000-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Reformation Sunday, Sunday October 30, 2011, the 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Joshua 3:7-17

Psalm 107:1-7, 33-37

1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

Matthew 22:34-46

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

A few years ago, a friend of mine was an Associate Pastor at one of the big Presbyterian churches in Ann Arbor, Michigan. During a staff meeting one day, the Head of Staff was reminiscing and lamenting that the church, the denomination to which he was ordained fifty some years earlier just wasn’t the same anymore.

That would have been 1955. Since 1955 the Presbyterian Church has been a part of two reunifications and three splits. Women Elders had been around for 25 years, but the first women to be ordained as Ministers of Word and Sacrament were still a few months away. As this pastor reminisced, half of his Session was seated by women and close to half of the staff meeting were women.

On the cultural landscape “The Honeymooners,” “The Lawrence Welk Show,” and “The Mickey Mouse Club” all debuted that fall. There’s quite a difference between those shows and “The Apprentice: Martha Stewart,” “Nancy Grace,” and “How I Met Your Mother” wouldn’t you say?

Politically, it’s the difference between Presidents Eisenhower and George W. Bush. It’s the difference between the Soviet Union becoming the Soviet Union and the Soviet Union becoming Russia in an unwinnable war in Afghanistan. For the nation, it’s the difference between 48 and 50 states. We can lament or we can celebrate, either way the wind blows we must agree with this pastor, there have been a lot of changes in the last 50 years.

Simply, things change.

The gospel takes an interesting turn from what we have been hearing over the past several weeks. Jesus changes his audience from the temple leadership to the people assembled, and begins saying something that to our Christian ears sounds unlikely. “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in the Moses’ Seat. So you must obey them and do everything they tell you.”

After thoroughly trumping their every word, Jesus tells the people that the scribes and Pharisees are to be obeyed. After Jesus takes the wind from their sails, Jesus tells the people to do as they say.

Was Jesus saying that their regular teachings were good? Hardly likely. After telling the people to do as they say, he adds not as they do “for they do not practice what they preach.” Jesus tells the listeners that the teachers of the law and the Pharisees are in ministry for what it can get them. They sit high in the social order. They are given the places of honor at banquets. They are given the best seats in the synagogue, seats where people will see them. They are greeted in the square and treated with respect. Jesus makes them sound like the heads of the “Five Families” in “The Godfather” movies.

Jesus tells us that these men, in their positions of power and authority, are using the Moses’ seat for personal gain. They are using their position to exalt themselves. He warns the world that “whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”

As I said three weeks ago, “Jesus was there to tell them that times were changing.” Jesus was telling the world that leadership was not top-down, nor was it really bottom-up. As followers of Christ, we are called to follow the Lord in all that we do. We are called to seek the way of God in all aspects of our lives. We are called not to follow someone because they are charismatic or because they hold an office. We are to follow him.

So Jesus doesn’t hold up these Pharisees, these specific leaders as men whose works should be considered model behavior. Rather, he holds the office in esteem, and by virtue of their positions they should be obeyed. In the words of singer and author John Michael Talbot: “Jesus rebukes the lifestyle of the religious leaders of His day, but He honors their position of authority as those who occupy the seat of Moses, and says we must therefore be obedient to valid religious leaders.”

They should be honored by following what they say, but in a world where actions speak louder than words; their actions should not be followed.

Something that doesn’t get enough play in our churches is that there were four basic schools of Judaism at the time of Jesus. We have heard of the Sadducees and the Pharisees. The Sadducees were the leaders of the temple. They oversaw all of its operations and most importantly its finances. The Pharisees were the rabbis who were in charge of the local synagogues and served as interpreters of the law. There were also the Essenes, a group of Jews who chose to live separate from the rest of society, maintaining the purity of the faith. The final group was the Zealots who wanted the immediate overthrow of the Roman authorities and return the Holy Land to its rightful owners. If this required violence, so be it.

I mention this because it reminds us that Judaism wasn’t a single faith held together in a lock-step of beliefs. Judaism itself had its own sects, denominations if you will. Each of these sects saw something as more important and focused on it for the good of the faith. There were power movements, there were political movements, there was a purity movement, and even a rebellious movement.

What Jesus was calling for was renewal. Jesus announced not the end of their faith but its fulfillment. The prophet they had anticipated for over four-hundred years was with them.

But the renewal, the reformation he promised was nothing like they expected. Frankly, the new life Jesus promises is like nothing any of us ever expects. This is just one piece of the wonder and the glory of God, the grace and peace that is beyond our understanding. It isn’t something that can be contained by any particular sect. It is beyond any of our denominations.

A couple of weeks ago I said this, “Ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda; the church reformed and always reforming. This has been the call of the reformed churches since the days of Luther, Calvin, Knox and dozens of others. These words are being shared still in Sunday Schools, pulpits, and in seminaries. These words are important to what we understand as our specific place in the Body of Christ, the universal Church.”

There is another way to translate this statement which I prefer. “The church having been reformed is always being reformed.” It’s longer and not nearly as catchy, but it’s important for us. This translation maintains the Latin verb forms which focus on God’s work on the church. The church is not an active participant in the kingdom, it’s passive. This is important, from a grammatical point of view, it’s passive not active.

On this Reformation Sunday this statement comes to full flower.

Several years ago, Presbyterians Today published an article about that saying “ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda.” One of the things this article says is that this statement has been “appropriated in times of disagreement and pressed into the service of our own agendas. It is even sometimes wielded as a weapon against those who differ from us, as if to say, ‘My position is more reformed than your position!” Shamefully, this phrase and this argument have been used recently in Presbyterian circles. It has been used to spread not so much fear, though surely that has been spread, but more it has been used to say “My position and I are reformed and you and yours aren’t.”

The article gives a couple of warnings to the church. The first is that newer is not always better and the second that the church cannot reform itself.

Luther, Calvin, and the reformers were not advocates of “newer is better.” It was in fact their goals to return to a more ancient, more pure form of church life that was centered in scripture alone. Among Luther’s Ninety-Five Theses about the state of the church was that the church was selling absolution for sin in exchange for cash money. This may have been nothing terribly new, but compared to being saved by grace alone, it was new and it was not welcomed.

Then again, Luther, Calvin, and the reformers were not believers that just because it was old it’s good. They also recognized that change was important, but more on that in a moment.

As for the church being able to reform itself, this too is not so. As I said a couple of weeks ago, the phrase “ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda” is filled with verbs in the passive voice. They knew that the church did not reform itself but would need to always be reformed. God is the great reformer and the church is always the object of that reform.

The article then reminds us of the two reasons for the church needing to always be reformed. They are because of who we are and because of who God is.

The church needs constant reformation because we are human. We sin. I don’t say this to say we are Charles Manson/Tim McVeigh evil. I say this because we are human and cannot know what is good without God. We are human, we sin, and because of that the church as a group of human beings will lean toward sin. This is why we need God to be with us and why we need God’s reforming work in the church.

The second reason, is who God is, a living God. The living Lord our God created and continues to create. Church historian Edward Dewey notes that reform has a backward reference and a forward reference. I mentioned the “returning to more biblical, purer worship” reference in the words Luther and Calvin a moment ago, but there is a forward reference too. They knew that the world was changing. They also knew that if the changes being made were not Godly they would not be worthy nor would they last.

The article ends with this:

Ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda. This motto calls us to something more radical than we have imagined. It challenges both liberal and conservative impulses and the habits and agendas we have lately fallen into. It brings a prophetic critique to our cultural accommodation—either to the past or to the present—and calls us to communal and institutional repentance. It invites us, as people who worship and serve a living God, to be open to being "re-formed" according to the Word of God and the call of the Spirit.

Last year when Lisa and Sissy were painting, one of the things they did was find a bunch of old pictures, wondering if I would want some of them for my study. One that has been important was a picture from 1985, 25 years ago. It’s a picture of the Deacons, what the Book of Order calls “Servants of Compassion.” Along with fifteen other men are Mr. Glen Newberg and Mr. Melvin Staggs. They are standing right up here in the chancel and on the floor below. Every one of them is wearing a suit. As I look at the picture I wonder what they would think today.

When the picture was taken, Ronald Reagan was president, today it’s Barack Obama. I won’t do a full comparison of the television shows but as racy as “Dallas” was in 1985, by today’s standards it’s pretty tame. Earlier this month, the Presbyterian Church intentionally ordained its first openly homosexual minister. I’m sure the denomination has ordained a homosexual minister before, but this is the first time it was intentional and public.

I wonder what they would think of a pastor wearing robes and a stole instead of a suit. I wonder what they would think of a pastor with a goatee instead of being as clean shaven as they were.

I wonder what the church will look like in 25 years when I’m 75 years old, and again in 50 when I’ll be an afterthought in this world.

I wonder now reading verse eleven, “The greatest among you will be your servant.” We often read this as our call and our vocation. Those who are the greatest leaders are servant leaders. Now I believe this is true. I do believe the greatest leaders are servant leaders. But something more has popped up in my imagination.

I now see when reading this verse that Jesus wasn’t just teaching us how leaders need to behave, he was teaching us that this is how he behaves. Jesus the Christ is the greatest among us, fully human he is more human than we can ever hope to aspire. Fully divine, he is the greatest who has ever walked the earth. He declares here the simple truth that he is the greatest among us and he is the servant of all.

This is what I say this morning. Jesus the Christ is the greatest among us and the servant of all. We have been reformed and continue to always be reformed. We aren’t changing for the sake of change; we aren’t throwing out the baby with the bathwater. But neither do we glorify our humanly past at the expense of God’s future.

By this, I pray these men of 25 years ago and the reformers of 500 years ago will look at us and pray we continue to live in the way we are called: Saved by grace through faith to live into the fullness of our creator-and still creating-God. Because it is only by God’s good grace that we, the church, the body of Christ, has been reformed and is constantly being reformed.

Divine Priorities

2011-10-23T22:27:00.001-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday October 23, 2011, the 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Deuteronomy 34:1-12

Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17

1 Thessalonians 2:1-8

Matthew 22:34-46

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

In 2003, the British BroadcastingCorporation created a project called “The Big Read” to find the most popularnovels among British readers.[1]You may have seen a version of this on the internet or on facebook.[2] Currently,I’m reading #25 on the list, J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit.”[3] Writtenin the mid 1930’s for his children, “The Hobbit” is the story of the adventuresof Bilbo Baggins. In one of his many adventures, Bilbo finds the ring whichbecomes the center of “The Lord of the Rings.” “The Lord of the Rings” by theway sits in the top spot on the Big Read.[4]

Bilbo finds the ring in a goblincave where he has been taken prisoner. Eluding the goblins by the ring’s powerof invisibility, Bilbo finds a scary character named Gollum while trying tofind his way out. They meet at cross purposes. Bilbo wants Gollum to help himescape while Gollum wants to eat Bilbo where he stands. They decide to settlethe matter with a game of riddles.[5]The one who asks the stumping riddle gets what he wants.

Gollum goes first asking:

What has roots as nobody sees,

Is taller than the trees,

Up and up it goes,

And yet never grows?

Bilbo gets that one quickly, a mountain.After several rounds of riddles Bilbo asks:

A box without hinges, key, or lid,

Yet golden treasure inside is hid.

Gollum gets that one, an egg. Bilbofinally catches Gollum asking “What have I got in my pocket?” Not a properriddle, Bilbo gives Gollum three guesses, all of which are unsuccessful. Thisdispleases Gollum of course, since he loses his meal at the expense of what isnot a proper riddle he feels inclined to neither show Bilbo out of the cavesnor take him from the lunch menu. As I’m sure you know by now, if for no otherreason than he appears in “The Lord of the Rings,” Bilbo escapes and with himthe ring.

Riddles have long been a test ofwits, knowledge, reason, and wisdom. The Sadducees and Pharisees tried andfailed to trip up Jesus with little tests, tests shaped like the riddles Bilboand Gollum exchanged with one another.

The Pharisees riddled Jesus withquestions about taxes. Jesus tells them to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’sand render unto God what is God’s.[6]Jesus neither betrays the government nor the faith, a show of great wisdom.

Then the Sadducees asked Jesus a questionabout levirate marriage (which came straight out of Deuteronomy 25) and theresurrection (which didn’t) in an effort to trip him up on his knowledge of thelaw. Jesus tells them their riddle is ridiculous because they know neither thescriptures nor the power of God.[7] Inaddition, the Sadducees didn’t believe in the resurrection in the first place,so their question is a fool’s errand, an errand Jesus doesn’t go on.

So the Pharisees take another shot,this is what we hear today in our gospel reading. They ask, “Teacher, which isthe greatest commandment in the Law?” Like I said a couple of weeks ago, wedon’t know if the question is being asked as a trap or by a sincere follower ofthe faith seeking wisdom. Since I have called this a riddle you can see that Ilean toward the trap, but in truth we don’t know.

What we do know is that he givesthem more answer than they expected. “Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your Godwith all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’” This isthe first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love yourneighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these twocommandments.”

As I said, this is more than thelegal expert expected. The lawyer expected to hear what is known by Israelitessince the days of Deuteronomy as “Shema.” The confession of Deuteronomy 6:4 isa prayer that goes, “Shema Israel,Adonai Eluhinu, Adonai echad.” In English we say, “Hear O Israel, the Lord isyour God, the Lord is one.” What immediately follows in 6:5 is what Jesus saysto the Pharisees, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, andwith all your soul, and with all your strength.”

What a lovely prayer! This is thesort of prayer we need in our lives everyday. “The Lord is our God, the Lord isone. We shall love the Lord our God with all our heart, and with all our soul,and with all our might.” This is as Jesus tells the Pharisees “the first and greatestcommandment.”

Now for the bonus, Jesus tells thePharisees “And a second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” This isJesus quoting Leviticus 19:18. This is a scathing indictment against hisinquisitors. We talk of the Golden Rule, “Do unto others as you would have themdo unto you.” While not the intention, the Golden Rule can be met with benignindifference. “I’ll ignore you if you’ll ignore me.” Well, Jesus’ answer tellsus differently, we are to love one another, never treating one anotherindifferently.

Something else that comes upmissing in our English reading is that when Jesus says the second is like thefirst he is saying that they are equally important. Israelknew the Shema, and they knew how they were to love the Lord their God. ButJesus indicts them saying they have not fulfilled the requirements of the greatestcommandment. They may know the first part, but they lack in the second.

These confrontations between Jesusand the temple leaders are called controversy stories. The controversy stories arethe words of God that turned the world on its ear. These are the words wherethe Lord challenged the conventional wisdom of the temple and of the day andmade the world take notice that God was doing something new in the person ofJesus the Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is no wonder that theyare called controversies.

There is controversy in thePresbyterian Church USA too; the denomination I mean. One of these bru-ha-ha’sis whether we are a denomination that shares the word of God with the worldmaking new disciples or whether we are a denomination that seeks to do God’sjustice in the world. If you want to speak in the jargon of our denomination’stalking heads, they will say it’s the difference between being a missionalchurch and being a social justice church. It is a serious question and one thathas occupied the church for years and may for decades more. The people who askthese questions are quite serious about these questions and more serious seekingtheir answers.

It is the church seeking divinepriorities.

Well, here’s my take based on whatwe have just read. There is no difference between loving God and doing God’sgood works. There is no difference between loving the Lord our God and lovingour neighbor as ourselves. One is as important as the other. To do one and notthe other fails to carry the Word and work of God into the world. They must bedone together.

Jesus has said that one is asimportant as the other. When one or the other is missing something veryimportant is missing. The Epistle of James says faith without works is dead. Ifollow that saying good works without faith is rudderless. If we do as God desireswithout faith, it is by sheer luck. Neither is dependable. Neither helpsfulfill the Great Ends of the Church.

According to the commentary,“Leviticus 19,” the source of the call to love our neighbors, “offers anextensive vision of a world marked by just human relations and practical care.Jesus has demonstrated this vision in his ministry and has criticized theleaders for failing to do so.”[8]

Jesus finishes saying “On these twocommandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Jesus tells them that not onlythese two sayings together is the greatest commandment, he tells them thattheir entire faith is rooted here. Loving God and your neighbor; the essence ofthe written Word and the call of the Living Word, is the greatest commandmentof all.

Riddles, riddles, riddles. To endour reading, Jesus asks his own riddle. He begins like a good baseball pitchersetting up the pitch. He asks, “What do you think about the Messiah? Whose sonis he?” They said to him, “The son of David.” This is right, so far so good,but this is the set up, not the pitch.

Jesus reminds them David wasspeaking, singing filled with the Holy Spirit and the temple leaders nod. He asksthem, “How is it then that David calls [the Messiah] ‘Lord’? For he says,

‘The Lord said to my Lord:

“Sitat my right hand

until I put your enemies

under your feet.”’

Jesus focuses the question. Basedon this Psalm, Jesus asks, “If then David calls [the Messiah] Lord, how can hebe his son?”

Now, this isn’t a difficultquestion for Christians. With two-thousand years of scripture andinterpretation and worship and theology and education; we say with greatconfidence that Jesus of Nazareth, son of Joseph, son of David, son of

Judah

is the long awaited Messiah. Jesus is the Christ.

Jesus challenges the Pharisees to saywhat we know, that Jesus is Lord. This son of David is the Son of God and theSon of Man. Lo, they cannot. It may be hidden from them, or perhaps it isrevealed but denied. Maybe some want to sing Jesus is the Messiah while otherswould rather keep things as they were. It wasn’t perfect, but their situationin Roman controlled Palestinecould be much, much worse. Regardless, Matthew’s gospel shows the result ofthis riddle. “No one could say a word in reply, and from that day on no onedared to ask him any more questions.”

Riddles are a test of wits,knowledge, reason, and wisdom. Guided by a wisdom that surpasses allunderstanding, Jesus wins this riddle game. The Light of the World answers theriddles in the dark. The Pharisees don’t have the imagination or the gumptionor the wherewithal to follow Christ. We are called by God to use ourimagination, our gumption, our wherewithal as well as our obedience to followChrist in the power of the Spirit.

Jesus teaches us that we must lovethe Lord our God and our neighbor as ourselves. He teaches that loving God weare called to share the Word of God, the word written, living, and proclaimed,with all the world. He also teaches us this love is for the benefit of thecommunity and the benefit of the kingdom.

We are called to proclaim thatJesus is the Son who sits at the right hand of the Lord. We are to proclaimthat he is the Son of David from the line of

Judah

. He is the long awaitedMessiah, he is the Christ.

We don’t have to wait. Our call isto make sure that nobody else has to wait for the Messiah either. We are totake Christ into the world in Word and deed. One without the other is notenough, we must do both. It is our choice, it is our call. We must decide notto follow one of these divine priorities; we are to follow the one divinepriority.

As I said, I am reading “TheHobbit.” I’m about half-way though right now, but there are some things I know.For one, I now know how Bilbo came across the ring that plays such a centralrole in “The Lord of the Rings.” I also know that whatever adventures befallBilbo he will survive. I know this simply because I know he has to get back tothe Shire and his Hobbit hole one way or another.

As for what I know about the faith,I don’t know how the Triune God will use these words this morning, but I doknow this: By the power of the Holy Spirit, they will be useful. I don’t knowhow Bilbo will make it home, but I know he does. I don’t know how God’s workwill be done, but I know it will be. This I am sure.

To find out about Bilbo I have toread the book, one page at a time. To find out what God has in store for me, instore for us, I have to follow, one day, one moment at a time. In the book oflife, may all glory be to the Lord our God. The Lord is our God, the Lord is one.

[1] BBC.com,“The Big Read.” http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top100.shtml, retrievedOctober 22, 2011.

[2] On aside note, the facebook version does not match the true 2003 BBC list. Thefacebook list includes some things that are collections or groups of books anddo not meet the “book” criteria. The BBC list considered only individualtitles. The facebook version includes “The Chronicles of Narnia” which is acollection of seven titles and not a single book; hence, it did not make thetrue BBC list. "The Works of Shakespeare" was also on the list, but it is not a novel but a collection of plays and poetry. Follow the link above to see the original list. I don’t know howthis rates, but I’ve read 15 out of the top 100 and six out of the top ten.

[3]Purchased at Sow’s Ear Antiques and Books in Berryville, Arkansas.Thanks Dan. Support local businesses!

[4] Whilepublished as a trilogy, LOTR was conceived and meant to be published as asingle book. Narnia was always a seven volume series of individual books.

[5] FromTolkien, J.R.R., “The Hobbit.” Chapter 5 “Riddles in the Dark.” New York: BallantineBooks, 1937, 1938, 1966, 27^th Ballantine Printing, 1989.

[6] Matthew22:15-22

[7] Matthew22:23-33

[8] NewInterpreter’s Study Bible note for Matthew 22:39

Always Being Reformed

2011-10-09T15:00:00.000-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday October 10, 2011, the 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Exodus 32:1-14

Psalm 106:1-6, 19-23

Philippians 4:1-9

Matthew 22:1-14

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

One of the joys of cable andsatellite TV is that there are hundreds and hundreds of channels; and oncesomeone finds a program that works it is copied and spun off until there is achannel devoted to it. Sports channels began that way, so did the Fox RealityChannel until it went off the air. I’m waiting for “The Wedding Channel.”Somewhere, with all of the shows devoted to one bit of the wedding industry orthe other, there’s going to be one place where “Bridezillas” everywhere canhook up with the “Cake Boss” and then “Say Yes to the Dress.”[1]

It is the nature of the parable tohave several different kinds of truth in its words, this parable about awedding banquet is no exception. There is historical and cultural truth. Sincewe are not fully familiar with those times, we may not catch some of thosereferences. There is literary truth, because the parable as a form ofliterature contains truth in that context. There is also the truth ofinterpretation since there is nearly 2,000 years of analysis behind Matthew’sgospel.

So, let’s begin with the setting ofour parable, the king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. One of thehistorical things we need to know is that before a wedding celebration, days orweeks in advance, the guests would have received invitations delivered by theking’s slaves. This announcement would not have the precise time or day of thewedding feast though. Another bit of history we need to know is that at thistime weddings were not the timed to the minute thing they are today. It wouldtake some time for the king’s slaves to prepare the great banquet.

Our parable doesn’t say how manyoxen and fatted calves were slaughtered and prepared, but as it was a king whogave our parable’s banquet, we can imagine the number was substantial. Thelanguage tells us it was absolutely plural, so the preparations took quite awhile. The banquet master would get in touch with the priest to butcher theanimals. Then they would need to be cooked. How long does it take to cook notan ox but oxen? Just consider how long it takes to smoke a brisket an go upfrom there.

He would have needed the people whoprovided bread, spices, and other foods. And don’t forget the wine merchant.Since so many were involved in its preparation, the kingdom and all who wereinvited would know the feast was coming, just not exactly when.

Since preparing a wedding banquet wasa long and inexact process, there was a two-step invitation procedure. Thefirst invitation was sent so that the guests would know something was coming.The first invitation also made it so they would not be surprised when theslaves came with the “day of event” invitation.[2]

Another important historicalelement to this piece is that when the people say, “we’re busy” to the king’sservants; it means more than “we’re busy.” To reject the king’s invitation, ormore properly the king’s command, is an act of rebellion. To do it en masse isa sign of conspiracy.[3] Historically, no kingwould stand for this.

Parables are great, but these historicaland cultural nuances that the chief priests, elders, and Pharisees would haveknown are lost on us until we learn them. There are elements of truth in thehistory and culture of this story, but there is truth beyond history andculture.

Another part of the truth comesfrom the literary qualities of the parable. One of the key concepts of theparable is that it is not a true story. Even though as we have just heard,there is historical truth mixed in, this story does not reflect an actualevent.

So in our story, after the slavesreturn to the king mistreated and worse, the king wages war on those who rejecthim and his invitation. This part of the story should be a red flag that thisis not a true story. I ask what king would delay his son’s wedding and let his supperget cold to go and wage war on a city, his city? This is wonderfully epic,filled with dramatic exaggeration, and highly unlikely.

As a nation, our recent experiencewith “shock and awe” warfare shows there is no way to wage war and be home fordinner in any age. So in the realm of factual events, the battle described inthis story would not have happened. But in the parable we are given a clearlesson, we see that those who betrayed the king got what they deserved.

As literature, this parable bringsus a broad epic sense of scope which the story misses without its literary elements.It’s not that all pieces of the parable add up, but as a story, there is truthwithin the exaggeration.

As for truth found ininterpretation, there is much. This is the third of three parables Jesus spoketo the Pharisees, chief priests, and elders in the temple. Scholars say thefirst parable, the one of the two sons, focuses on John the Baptist and thepeople’s response to his ministry. The second, the parable of the vineyard,uses allegory to interpret Jerusalem’sfall as punishment for the leaders’ unfaithfulness. This third parable is afinal warning to the church of Jesus Christ to remainfaithful and not follow the footsteps of the Pharisees, chief priests, andelders.[4]

The history of interpretation givesus a chronological progression of stories warning the Pharisees, chief priestsand elders who rejected John; then rejected the prophets and then the Son; anda final warning that the church might never reject Jesus and the vocation hehas lain upon it.

Often, we speak of faith in termsof putting on new clothes. We talk of the church as being the bride of Christ.So a part of the history of interpretation leads us to be called to put onChrist as we join together with him as his bride.

The truth found in the history ofinterpretation is that while all are called, those who do not respond to thiscall are dealt with harshly. I am not saying that we are saved by works becausewe are saved by grace through faith. I am saying that there are direconsequences if we accept the Lord’s invitation and all we do is show upexpecting to be fed.[5] This judgment was truein the days of the prophets, in the days of Jesus, and it is true for us today.

Ecclesia reformata, semperreformanda; the church reformed and always reforming. This has been the call ofthe reformed churches since the days of Luther, Calvin, Knox and dozens ofothers. These words are being shared still in Sunday Schools, pulpits, and inseminaries. These words are important to what we understand as our specificplace in the Body of Christ, the universal Church.

There is another way to translatethis statement which I prefer. “The church having been reformed is always beingreformed.” It’s longer and not nearly as catchy, but it’s important for us.This translation maintains the Latin verb forms[6] which focus on God’swork on the church. The church is not an active participant in the kingdom,it’s passive. This is important, from a grammatical point of view, it’s passivenot active.

This means that we can do nothingon our own, it is only by God in Christ, it is only by our salvation. It isonly by our constant sanctification that we can make any difference at all. Thechurch exists only to do God’s work shaped by God alone. The church does work,but only under the authority of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The chief priests, elders, andPharisees seemed to have forgotten this. They thought they were the king, themice and the cheese[7] and they thought theyhad the world by the tail. They knew their positions were precarious, the Holy Land was under Roman rule, but they had the systemfigured out… as long as nothing changed.

Jesus was there to tell them thattimes were changing. Using three parables of judgment, Jesus shows us, historyteaches Jesus did not show them, Jesus shows us that there is peace and thereis grace, but it is not cheap. God paid a great price, suffering death on thecross to give us what we could never earn.

So like the guests who came to thebanquet, we are called to be transformed, reformed, and dressed in our own weddingrobe. If we are not transformed by God’s invitation truly we are in no bettershape than those who rejected Jesus 2,000 years ago.

Today Marla and Baby Elizabeth willput on that robe. Symbolically they will receive the sign of the beginning ofChristian transformation in the waters of baptism. They have been called andthey have chosen to answer. God honors the sacraments he institutes.

Our reading ends as Jesus says thatmany are called but few are chosen. While this sounds like a threat, it is actuallya promise. It sounds like a warning, but it is a goal. It is up to us to liveinto our baptism. It is up to us to remember these promises, the ones we madewhen we were baptized. It is up to us to remember these promises when we werebaptized as babes and someone made them for us. It is up to us to remember thepromises we have made as elders, sponsors, and members of this part of the Bodyof Christ. This is how we begin to remember our baptism.

Now it’s up to us, do we rememberand live into the promises of God or do we fade into the antiquity of the chiefpriests, elders, and Pharisees? Friends, let us go to the banquet and put onthe wedding coat of the Lord. Let us remember the waters of our baptism. Let usapproach God in joy and peace. Let us be reformed, and continue always beingreformed.

[1] Actually,it has been done, a couple of times; at least once as a TV channel and morerecently as in internet portal. So the idea’s out there, all it needs is alittle more traction and then it’s off to the races.

[2] The NewInterpreter’s Bible. Vol. VIII. Leander Keck, General Editor. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1995, page 417.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.pages 412-419

[5] Ibid. page419

[6] “Reformata” is the Perfect Passive form of the verb. This denotes actionperformed with future implications. “Reformanda” is the Passive Present formwhich means action is taking place on it, not by it.

[7] Title ofan old children’s book.

Bragging Rights

2011-10-02T13:32:00.001-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday October 2, 2011, the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 19-23

Psalm 19

Philippians 3:4b-14

Matthew 21:33-46

Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer.

There’s an inherent danger whenpreaching the parables. They seem like such well prepared self-containedsermons in themselves that most young pastors just take them at face value andpreach them to the congregation. I get to tell you this is true not justbecause I read it in a book,[1]but because I have committed the same error. How could you not? The chiefpriests and Pharisees did. Verse 45 tells us that when they heard Jesus’parables, they knew he was talking about them. Then again, I read it that waytoo.

They knew because they heard thestory like an allegory. Allegories are special kinds of parables meant to besymbolic narratives where one thing in a story lines up with something in reallife. This parable is almost always read like an allegory.

It begins with the landowner whorepresents God the Father. He plants a vineyard which usually represents thepeople of Israel. In thiscase it also represents the kingdom of God, but that comeswhen Jesus interprets the story. The things in the vineyard, the wall,winepress, and watchtower don’t point to anything particular, but it does showthat it takes real work to set up a vineyard.

The landowner hires farmers; theNew Revised Standard Version says these farmers were tenants. This points outthat the farmers have no property rights; they work the land, but have norights to the land or the crop.

When the harvest time approached,the farmer sent his servants to collect the fruit. This is different fromLuke’s version where the land owner collects only his share. Luke’s version ismore like the contracts negotiated with tenant farmers and share cropperseverywhere. Matthew’s reflects that the entire crop belongs to the landowner.There is no share for the farmers until the landowner gives it to them. This isa nod to the sovereignty of God. As I say before the offering, “the earth isthe Lord’s and all that is in it.”[2]This reading of the parable takes that very seriously.

The servants represent the prophetsof Israel, and like thesemythical servants, they were beaten, killed, and stoned.

The next verse is the fly in theointment to a real allegory. “Last of all, he sent his son to them. ‘They willrespect my son,’ he said.” While this thought works well for the story, Ihonestly don’t believe God the Father thought that for a minute.

The tenant farmers figure the landwill be theirs if there is no one left to inherit it, so after throwing the sonfrom the vineyard they kill him. This represents the ultimate death on thecross. Our reading takes place the day after Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, a day after the cleansing of the templeand removing the moneychangers. We know how prophetic these words truly are; asdo those who heard the gospel of Matthew, recorded some forty years after theseevents took place.

Jesus sets up the allegory,everything except for the discipline of the wicket tenants. How should they be disciplined?Jesus asks the chief priests and Pharisees for their input. “What will he do tothose tenants?”

Harsh judgment seems to be theorder of the day for Israel.Nathan and King David have a similar conversation about Uriah and Bathsheba.Nathan tells the story of a rich man who steals a poor man’s only lamb. WhenDavid says the rich man should repay the poor and repay dearly, Nathan tellsKing David, “You are the man.”

The temple leaders tell Jesus thatthose tenants are wretches who will be brought to a wretched end. Then thelandowner should turn over the plot to folks who will take care of business andlive up to the agreement. The New International Version says “tenants who willgive the landowner his share of the crop at harvest.” Other translations leaveout “his share” maintaining the integrity of the sovereignty of the landowner,the sovereignty of God.

Jesus tells them that in accordwith the judgment they have proclaimed they have set their own punishment. The kingdom of God will be taken away from them andgiven to a people who will produce its fruit. On either side of thisproclamation, Jesus indicts them using imagery from Psalm 118:

The stone the builders rejected

has become the capstone.

The LORD has done this;

and it ismarvelous in our eyes.

In a wild twist, Jesus revealshimself as the stone the builders rejected who becomes the cornerstone. Hetells them that they have two choices, fall on the stone and be broken or letthe stone fall on them and be crushed.

Not much of a choice is it. I wouldlove to say that Jesus is invoking Psalm 51 here, “The sacrifice acceptable toGod is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart.” I would love to tell youJesus is telling them that they can either be broken by the gospel or crushedwith it, but then I must also say that I can’t find any scholars who share thatpoint of view.

Even if I am right, the chiefpriests and Pharisees heard it in the worst way. This is the moment in theGospel that they decide once and for all Jesus must die, not for the sins ofthe people, but because he has rubbed the shine off of their apple.

In an allegory, my job would bedone. If I were treating this like a simple “x=y” story then my job would bedone, but to what end? There are a couple of good morals to take from thisstory, something like “Beware the judgment you pronounce, lest it fall uponyou.” Jesus is a fan of discipline and mercy—and yes not only can this existhand in hand but it must. The temple crowd would have nothing of that, theywanted blood. If this is what they want, then Jesus is able to give it to them.

But we must beware when we plugthings in “x” for “y.” When some read verse 43, they read it as Jesusprophesies that the Jews will be cast from the church and the gentiles will bethe new chosen people. There are some problems with this interpretation though,both having to do with audience.

We need to remember to whom Jesusis speaking at that moment. He is teaching in the temple, but like with lastweek’s reading, he is making his comments toward the leaders of the temple. Heis directly addressing the chief priests, elders, and Pharisees. This messageis not meant for the people of Israel,it is meant directly for the temple leadership.

Then the next thing we need tolearn is that what we read as “the kingdom of God will be taken awayfrom you and given to a people who will produce its fruit.” can also be rightlytranslated as “given to people who will produce its fruit.” It’s a subtledifference, but it’s important. I say Matthew is not identifying a differentrace of people who will receive the vineyard. He is saying “not these leaders”but “others” will be called to tend the Lord’s vines. This is important becauseof Matthew’s audience.

As we have said all year, theGospel of Matthew was written to the Jewish Christians. Matthew specificallyspoke to those followers of the Lord Jesus Christ who were educated in thesynagogue. He wrote to people who grew up knowing the law and the prophets.Because of this, we can be sure that Matthew’s gospel would have never disinheritedall Jews.

That would make another good moralto the story: Tread lightly, conventional wisdom may be neither conventionalnor wise.

This then, as Al might say, remindsme of a story from the bible. As the gospel gnawed upon me this week, ourreading from Philippians caught my attention. Preceeding this reading, someonewas bragging to the Philippians about their status as a teacher. They boastedabout their position in this life. Paul warns them this is not good.

Paul begins by telling thePhilippian people that if anyone has a reason to brag, he has their trump card.He was a Hebrew of status among other Hebrews, as a follower of the law he wasa Pharisee, as to his zeal he persecuted the church, as for legalisticrighteousness he was faultless. But whatever that meant in the world, it meansnothing compared what he gains as a follower of Christ.

Paul teaches there is nothing inthis world that compares to being a follower of Christ. Everything else isrubbish. Everything else is slag. We have no righteousness on our own, the onlyrighteousness we have is in Christ.

If we think we have bragging rightsbecause of this or that or the other, we don’t. The only thing any of us has tobrag about is righteousness in Christ.

To me, what is most important inour gospel reading is Jesus’ instruction to the leaders of the temple, in ourday to the leaders of the Church. We must remember that this message was to theleaders, not the rank and file. This one is for the upper command officers, notthose below full bird Colonel.

The farmers in the parable wouldhave had slaves themselves to do the hard work of tending the vines. Thisparable wasn’t for them, it was for their leaders—the tenant farmers.

This parable wasn’t for the peoplewho were at the temple bright and early to hear Jesus teach, it was for thechief priests, elders, and Pharisees who interrupted his regularly scheduledprogram.

Last month I ended a sermon[3]saying:

I don’t want anyone to think that I amindicting someone about a particular situation. I’m not. But let me say this,this sermon is not about you but it is for allof us. It is for the church. It is for the disciples. It is for the people ofGod. If that convicts each of us and all of us, that’s as it should be.

This sermon ends differently; thisparable isn’t about all of us but itis for some of us. It is for theleadership, in our case it is for the Session, committee chairs, teachers, and especiallyme. It’s for the folks in the denominational offices and it’s for the peoplewho lead groups that seek to influence the church. We must be wary when weapproach situations with what we know, because like those temple leaders we maynot know what we think we do. We must beware that what we think we know, whatwe are so proud of, is folly to Christ.

It is up to us. It is up to theleadership of the church to constantly seek the will of the triune God ineverything that we do. It is not good for us to lean exclusively into thewisdom of what we’ve always done. It is not good for us to look to a gloriouspast alone as a model for the future. It is up to everyone here today to hold yourleader’s feet to that holy fire.

If we could do as we have alwaysdone there would be no need for the Christ or the Holy Spirit, but we knowbetter than that. It is up to us not to brag about what we have been, but whatthat moves us toward in the future, a future of life in Christ in the Spirit. Letme just add this, if you think I am pointing a finger at you, please know theother fingers point back at me. Paul’s message for the church is right, ourbragging rights are in Christ alone.

[1] Long,Thomas, “Preaching the Literary Forms of the Bible.” Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1989, 87-106.

[2] Psalm24:1

[3]Andresen, Paul, “This Sermon Is Not About You.” http://timelovesahero.blogspot.com/2011/09/this-sermon-is-not-about-you.html,retrieved .September 28, 2011

The Company You Keep

2011-09-25T19:51:00.000-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday September 25, 2011, the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Exodus 17:1-7

Psalm 78:1-4, 12-16

Philippians 2:1-13

Matthew 21:23-32

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

One of the most important thingsfaith teaches us to do is speak truth to power. Power tends to take care ofitself. Power tends to take care of itself at the expense of those who fallunder the its scheming. Power tends to take care of itself at the expense oftruth. Remember the old expression “Power corrupts and absolute power corruptsabsolutely.” This is why truth must speak to power. In our gospel reading theTruth speaks to the power.

As we look at Matthew’s gospel, weneed to remember that Jesus may be the Truth, but in the ways of the temple andthe empire, he is nothing. We tend to approach Jesus from where we live, onthis side of the cross and the resurrection. We remember that in Matthew’sgospel there is no secret that Jesus is Lord. John the Baptist made this clearnot only the day before and the day of the Lord’s baptism; John made it clearto his mother in utero that Jesus is Lord.

There’s nothing bad about lookingat faith from this side of the resurrection. It’s our life, our experience, andgloriously it’s the root of our faith. But considering this reading from ourside of the resurrection, we miss things. We especially miss the Lord’s lack offormal earthly staus.

Historically, the events in ourreading happen the day after the triumphant entry into Jerusalem, the day after Palm Sunday. So thepast several days have been wild with preparations for the Passover; not justfor Jesus and the disciples but for all of Israel.Jerusalem had apopulation of about 40,000 people at the time and with an additional 200,000religious pilgrims and other visitors who were there for the celebration,[1]the city was being stretched to its limits. This stretching wasn’t unlike anyother Passover, but this time there was something more.

On the day before our reading,Jesus rode into town on the back of a donkey. He rode into town as palmbranches covered the road and cloaks covered the animal. The people wereshouting and praising the Lord and the One who comes in the Lord’s Name. Thiswas a cause of some concern. In an occupied territory, it’s never good news forthe invading force when the people’s fervor reaches a fever pitch.

So while this is happening, Pilatecomes to Jerusalem.Like every other political leader he never travels without his entourage andhis party was large and well armed. The Passover was traditionally a time ofpolitical uprising in Palestine and this yearthere was talk of a new prophet in the hills north of Jerusalem. So like any good Roman prelate,Pilate came ready for trouble.

Pilate would be readyfor the nearly quarter-million residents and visitors and the rabble theycarried in their wake. There would be more than enough soldiers, there would bemore than enough arms, and Pilate rode at the head on his war steed to showthat he meant business.[2]

Caught in the middle ofthis were the temple elite, the chief priests and the elders. There were caughtbetween the people, the faith, and the Roman overlords who allowed them to keeptheir positions of power and authority.

Rome had a couple of overriding rules for thelands they conquered. The first was “Caesar is God.” The next was “Keep payingthe tribute.” Another was “Keep the peace.” As long as those were met, Rome was happy and thepeople were allowed to live. This was true even about faith and religion. Thepeople of Israel could keeptheir faith as long as the rules were followed.

So Jesus comes into townand the people are with him. This isn’t good because the Roman authorities withtheir invading armies are never happy when huge crowds invoke the name of a godwho is not Caesar. This put the chief priests and the elders in a pickle,because if riots broke out they would be held accountable as the leaders of theconquered peoples.

Then, as if that wasn’tbad enough, when Jesus came to the temple he ran out the money changers beforehe left the city for the night. This brought joy to the blind, lame, andchildren while it took bread from the mouths of the temple staff. Much liketoday, the offerings to the temple provided for temple leaders, workers,musicians, custodians and so on. So driving out the money changers is likeclosing the temple bank. If you ever want to upset a chief priest, tell themthey aren’t going to get paid because some country Rabbi from the backwaters ofNazareth and Galileeupset the apple cart.

We can assume the templeleaders were well informed; but more than smart they were sly. It was the onlyway to balance their responsibilities in their setting as they saw it. Becauseof this cunning, John called them a brood of vipers on the banks of the Jordan. Itwould be wrong for us to think that they did not know what John’s prophecymeant and how it pertained to Jesus. They would have known what happened theday before as Jesus entered Jerusalemtoo. We can assume they had a finger on the pulse of the people as well as theRoman garrison. It would be the only way they could survive, especially inthose tenuous times.

To give us an idea ofthe Lord’s mindset, let’s remember that Matthew reports he cursed and killed afig tree on his way into town that morning. Jesus was ready for anything too.

So our reading beginswhen Jesus comes back into town and begins teaching at the temple before theleaders make it to the office. They begin their day asking “By what authorityare you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?”

I think we have an ideaabout the mindset of the chief priests and the elders. If they weren’t upset,they were at least nervous. They might have asked this question out of theirnerves, or perhaps out of awe, or they might have even asked out of hostility.

Anyway, they have theformal authority. The temple especially is under their authority. They have everyright to ask this question. But the tide changed with Jesus’ answer.

So Jesus answers like atrue rabbi, with a question. “Sure, I’ll answer your question if you answermine first: ‘Did the baptism of John come from heaven or was it of humanorigin?’”

Now they’re in troubleand they know it. The huddle of Rabbis looks like a football defense deep inits own territory. They discuss their options. If they say “it comes fromheaven” he will ask “then why don’t you believe?” If they say “its origin ishuman” the people will have their heads. The people love Jesus, they love John,they know the prophecy; so the prophets can’t take that chance.

On top of that, the peoplecan take either of these answers to incite a riot against Pilate; and that’snot going to work for the people who are trying to keep a lid on civil unrest. Sothey do the one thing they hope will keep the peace. Nothing.

If they won’t answer hisquestion Jesus won’t answer theirs.

As I said earlier,looking at this from our side of the resurrection misses some very importantthings. One is that we know the answer to this question. He could have answeredtheir question saying the authority comes from my father. He could say theauthority comes from God. He could say that he is God and has the authority.Jesus could give them a straight answer to their question but he doesn’t.Instead, he unites himself with John. If the temple elite considered Jesus tobe a country Rabbi, then comparing himself to John made him the ultimateoutsider.

Jesus identifies himselfwith the prophet of the wilderness. John ran around the countryside of the Near East wearing camel hair and a leather belt. Asclassy as that sounds, good fabric choices and all, what he was wearing was acamel skin poncho tied around his waist with what was left from long ago.

If Jesus was from thehinterlands then John was from Mars.

On the day before, onPalm Sunday, who was with Jesus? Was it the temple elite? No, they were toobusy taking care of business to meet the Lord they had long expected. Was itthe Romans? No, they were busy with their own parade. Was it the bankers, nothey were busy making change—two doves for a penny, five for two.

Jesus came associatingwith John, the prophet of the wilderness. Jesus was with the blind, the lameand the children; those who have no one to stand for them in the society thatwas Israel. Jesus was withthat fifth dove, the one that was of no account to the moneychangers or templeelite.

Jesus emptied himself ofhis heavenly power to maintain his heavenly place. He could have taken hispower and shown the chief priests and elders all about his authority. He couldhave told them all “I AM” but he didn’t. He didn’t invoke his name or his poweror his peace to the powerful. Jesus made his stand with the people nobody withany power or authority would stand with. The fully-human-fully-divine JesusChrist did not announce his authority in a fully divine voice; he chose thefully human instead. He chose to be among the people who needed him the most.

Jesus didn’t aspire tothe authority that places him at the center of earthly power. Instead, hechooses to identify himself with the weak and the marginal. He identifieshimself with the poorest of the poor. He stands with those who cannot stand forthemselves.

Paul tells us that weshould follow Christ’s example in this self emptying sort of love. He describes how we should follow Jesussaying:

Let the same mind be inyou that was in Christ Jesus,

who, though he was inthe form of God,

did notregard equality with God

assomething to be exploited,

but emptied himself,

takingthe form of a slave,

beingborn in human likeness.

And being found in humanform,

he humbled himself

and became obedient tothe point of death--

even death on a cross.

He chooses not to standwith those who stand without external authority. He chooses not to stand with Rome and the Caesar whodeclares himself God. He does not stand with the temple leaders who playpolitics that would made modern leaders blush. He stands with those who aremeek and humble. Paul tells us this is what we must aspire to.

Jesus then tells us itis better to do the right thing than to say the right thing, this is one of theways to read the parable of the two sons. By their answer at the end of verse31, the chief priests and elders know this is true. Yet as Jesus sounsympathetically tells them, it is those who repent and follow, even if theyare the most reviled members of society, they will go into the kingdom beforethese men of high esteem. The poor know Jesus at his most human so they can seehim at his most divine. They have repented.

They followed theChrist. The temple leadership did not.

Years ago, New York Lifeused the slogan, “The Company You Keep.” It was their way of saying that if youwant to be successful in money management then you should follow their lead,their advice. (Given the state of the economy over the last twenty years, many investorsdid much, much worse than New York Life.) But as Jesus shows us, this is notthe most important company we can keep. Jesus is telling us though that thecompany we keep is very important.

Some will be seduced bythe finer things of this life; the good seats at banquets, the first cuts ofbreads and meats from the temple offerings, a place in the affairs of politics—thetrappings of earthly power. John preached the way of righteousness and thesinners believed. Despite (or maybe because of) their knowledge, the leadersdid not. The leaders knew all of the words and none of the actions.

Jesus spoke the Truth tothe powerful, telling them to repent, to turn from the ways of the world. Jesusidentified himself with John and the weak and the poor. He keeps their companybecause they have chosen not to be salves to this world but to be sons anddaughters of the kingdom of God.

Jesus, the God who wouldalso be a man showed us something better. He took the form of a slave, beingborn in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself andbecame obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross. He chose us to behis company, we must do the same.

[1]Rollefson, John, “Feasting on the Word, Preaching the Revised CommonLectionary.” David L. Bartlet and Barbara Brown Taylor, Editors. Louisville, KY: Westminster John KnoxPress, 2010, page 154

[2] Ibid.

Whatever Is Right

2011-09-18T14:06:00.002-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday September 18, 2011, the 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Exodus 16:2-15

Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45

Philippians 1:21-30

Matthew 20:1-16

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

Through our ears, our modern ears,this parable is odd. So let’s start with something very important, this is aparable. The differences between the story and historic custom will make thatclear.

Historically, when looking for daylaborers, an overseer would go to the town square and would select all of thelaborers he would need for the day’s work. The overseer would be skilled inknowing the job and the number of people needed to do the work. At the end ofthe day, the overseer, probably with a household treasurer of some sort, wouldpay the men and send them on their way.

In our parable, it is the landownerwho goes to square to hire laborers. Unlikely. He not only goes out at sunrise,he goes out again at 9:00 am, noon, 3:00 pm and again at 5:00 pm. Highly unlikely. It’smore likely that the landowner would have either been at the square solving theproblems of the world like ancient landowners did or been busy making moredeals like modern businessmen do.

Further, the simple fact that there wouldstill be men waiting to be hired one hour before quitting time doesn’t ringtrue either. They would have either found work or not expected to work that daybecause, as I just said, the overseer gets all of his workers at sunrise.

Now, as there are some facets ofthis parable that don’t ring true, some of the details are dead solid perfect. Theday was long; the work day started at 6:00 am and ended at 6:00 pm, generallyfrom sunrise to sunset. There would still be enough time to get the staplesneeded before heading back to what passes for a home to these migrant workers.Very few had families so the single denarius would keep them marginally fed andsheltered.

Last week I said that the denarius wasa living wage, in truth it is just barely a living wage. It would not be likethe wages of an average household in Marshalllike I said last week. It would be more like living on $11,000, poverty level.It is said that the life of a day laborer was short and hard, some things neverchange.

So if we have established one thingabout this parable, it is that Jesus was telling a story, a story with a lessonfor the disciples to understand. A story that would have some elements that wouldring true to every one of his disciples and some that would be outrageous. Thisis what we need to take from this parable first, it is a parable, it’s not “rippedfrom the headlines” like Wednesday’s premier of “Law & Order: SpecialVictims Unit.”

This is actually a good thingbecause let’s be honest, I’m just as miffed that the men who only showed up foran hour got the same pay as the men who worked hard all day long. It goes withour mindset; an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay. You work twelvehours, you get twelve hours worth of pay. You pick so many bushels of grapes orsheaves of wheat or hundreds of widgets you get paid for that much work. It’s what’sright.

I know when I was young, andsomebody on Thursday said the same thing, I thought the next day would be areal bad day for the landowner; nobody would want to work all day for him everagain! He could get all of the “one hour labor” he wanted, but all day? No way.

These are just more reasons we needto look at this as a parable and not as a true story.

As far as I’m concerned paying forthe work done, not paying for standing around is right, and I suspect many ofyou feel the same way. Shoot, even the workers who put in a full day thought itwas unfair. This is not the way of the parable.

But then again, I’m looking at thisfrom my modern point of view. I come from the point of view of a man who oncemanaged a business that had a half-million dollar annual revenue in the late80’s. I managed employees in the private and public sectors, and did it with apoint of view that comes from having a Bachelor of Science in Business degree.Even with a degree in College Student Development, I am still inclined toprocess budgets and create spreadsheets like the business student I once was.

I notice I’ve just spent the last fewminutes going on about what this parable is not. It’s not a real story. It’snot based on fact. It’s not “ripped from the headlines.” It never has been andprobably never will be taught in business school. We are not familiar withanything like it.

This is the point of view that isfamiliar to most of us, but there is another. In his 1996 book “Santa Biblia:The Bible through Hispanic Eyes”,[1]Justo Gonzales notes that this parable elicits surprisingly different reactionswhen read to typical, middle-class audiences in America compared to Hispanicaudiences. Gonzales says:

These are people who identify with theproblems of the field workers. They understand the laborer who travels in hispickup truck trying to find work with little success, or, even if he findswork, he is standing around waiting until the job materializes.

At the end of the parable when the landownerpays the wages, the Hispanic congregation applauds when the laborers who workedfor only one hour get paid a full day's pay. They are not confused by this, butunderstand that the people looking for work and who have been waiting for workneed a day's pay to survive. They rejoice, then, at the grace that is notcontrary to justice, but that flows with justice. They are paid what they needand deserve rather than the wages they might have been paid had society'sconcept of justice prevailed.[2]

According go Gonzales, Hispanic migrantworkers going from farm to farm to look for work at the will of the master understandsgrace in ways that stereotypically Presbyterians do not. Sorry about using astereotype, but it applies here. Statistics show that most Presbyterians liveat an income level that is above the national average. We are more likely to bethe overseer than the migrant.

Still as we know all too well about statistics,“numbers don’t lie but numbers don’t bleed.”[3]Statistics speak to a people, to a nation; but they can never portray thesituation of an individual.

Getting back from the caveat and ontothe main point, on the whole we don’t experience the grace of God fashioned inthis parable as much as we experience what we would consider it being wronged bysomeone who gets more than we think they deserve.

I can speak for myself, when I wasyoung my dad worked for TWA, Trans World Airlines. He lost several promotionsbecause of concessions made to labor unions in contract negotiations. Just whenone labor union would settle and he was back in line for promotion, bam, here’sthe next waiting to take what would ultimately come from him. He was quite unhappyabout the situation and that made the little boy in me upset too. So I getthis.

Maybe for me the first point isthat I don’t understand the actions of the landowner. Based on the values Ilearned as a young boy at my father’s knee and a young man in college, itdoesn’t seem right. But there is one thing I can say I understand about theparable. Something we can all understand is that it’s the landowner’s right todo whatever he wants with his money, his land, and his crop. If he chooses to giveeveryone the same pay for unequal work then that’s up to him.

Jesus asks “Are you envious becauseI am generous?” Well, maybe the answer to that simple question is yes, I am.

But there’s another old expression,a prayer if you will, that would work for his situation. “Lord, please give me whatI need and not what I deserve.” Based on our reading from last week I mentionedthat we commit $2 billion worth of sin against the Lord while we commit (basedon my adjusted figures) a paltry $7,000 against one another. In that parablethe Lord forgives greatly and expects us to forgive one another too.

This week’s reading provides uswith the idea that it doesn’t matter when we come to the party, the reward isthe same. This is one of the many ways to imagine grace.

It’s combining these two readingsthat makes me stand up straight. We owe a debt to the Lord that is as great asthe value of the whole Dallas Cowboys Football Organization, and even though wecannot repay such a debt we are forgiven. Today we see that not only are weforgiven; but regardless of when we come to the table we are given this day ourdaily bread.

Sounds familiar, “Give us this dayour daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” You see,daily bread isn’t the request for quail and manna from our Exodus reading. Weshould never look to return to the fleshpots of our own little Egypt’s wherewe trade our personal slavery for full bellies. Our prayer is for what we needto get us through the day—each and every day. The Lord’s Prayer doesn’t handleour 401(k) or other wonders of wealth. In the Lord’s Prayer we’re just like aday laborer in the name of the Lord asking not asking for all we want and more,but for just what we need.

Our debts are forgiven as weforgive our debtors, and last week’s reading made that painfully real when themaster sent the unforgiving slave to prison and torture. This week we learnthat the master, the landowner in this parable, will do with what is his as hepleases.

Maybe, just maybe that is the pointof this parable. The Lord God works in wonderful and mysterious ways, ways thatare far more generous than we could ever hope or imagine. It’s easy tounderstand why we aren’t that generous. Economists tell us that economics isthe study of the use of scarce resources. Whenever we look at a parable ofJesus that includes money, it is our habit to look at the wealth like a scarceresource that will ultimately dry up. That’s our world, that’s our economics.

The glory of God is that the denariiof the parable will never run out. In the kingdom of God,the landowner will never run short. People will come daily and there willalways be enough. That’s the glory of God.

That is what makes God socompletely different than us. God’s grace and God’s mercy know no bounds. Asour parables teach us, our wisdom, our forgiveness, our ideas of what’s rightpale next to the Lord’s.

As for the interpretation at theend, “So the last will be first and the first will be last,” I’m not sure howwell this fits. Yes, those who came last were paid first and vice versa, butthere is something more important. Those who came to the master, the landowner,all received what was right. Whether you were hired at sunrise or at 5:00 inthe afternoon; whether you have lived your life as a disciple or came to faithlater in life, all who come receive the full day’s wage.

It was pointed out to me this weekthat those who came later, those who came only with the promise that they wouldbe paid “whatever is right” showed more faith. Those who came later came to thevineyard with no specific promise of wage, they only knew that they came withthe promise of whatever is right, whatever is just. They weren’t promisedwhatever is fair, they were promised something different and something better.They were promised what is right.

No, this parable is outrageous forour ears. In the day and time we live in it seems more like welfare than wage,but grace is the promise. We are promised whatever is right, whatever is just.Thank God we receive this instead of what we deserve.

[1] Gonzales,Justo, “Santa Biblia: The Bible through Hispanic Eyes,” Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996 pages 62-63.

[2] http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/illustration_search.asp?keywords=fairness+&Search=7&imageField.x=0&imageField.y=0

[3]Walkenhorst, Bob, “Too Many Twenties.” From “The Rainmakers” CD “Skin”

What We Remember

2011-09-11T14:30:00.000-05:00

This sermon was heard at the First Presbyterian Church in Marshall, Texas on Sunday September 11, 2011, the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time.

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Exodus 14:19-31

Psalm 114

Romans 14:1-12

Matthew 18:21-35

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen

I guess I don’t have to remindanybody what today is. Al mentioned it during the announcements and I eventouched on it in my greeting on this somber day. Vicke even brought it up lastweek during her Children’s Sermon. One of the things she asked was if 9-11 fellon Monday or Tuesday ten years ago. I was the first to say Tuesday. I knewbecause I knew exactly were I was when the news started to make it out to theCentral Time Zone.

It’s easy for me to rememberbecause it was my second week in seminary. I was sitting in the Rev. Dr.Kathryn Roberts’ Introduction to the Old Testament class, a class that met onTuesdays and Thursdays, and we were covering the Hebrew alphabet. As we werelearning our “Aleph, Beth, Gimel’s” a buzz started to rise in the hallway. Itwas louder than usual, but it was my second week in seminary, so what did Iknow about normal?

My first inkling about what wasgoing on happened when I went to the financial aid office. Glenna Balch, the seminary’swonderful Director of Financial Aid, was listening to the news playing on herradio. Sorry folks, live audio internet streaming was still in its infancy andlive streaming video was embryonic; if you were at work and there was no TV,you depended on the radio. I was her office for a while and did some paperworkwhile listening to what was going on in New York. The overwhelming feeling I had is that this iswhat it must have been like listening to H.G. Wells’ “War of the Worlds” live onthe radio on October 30, 1938.

For those of you who are notfamiliar with 70 year old radio dramas, “War of the Worlds” was the brain childof Orson Welles who was also director of the Mercury Theater of the Air. Itbegan like any regular music program would begin, with the announcer welcomingthe audience and a band starting the show. Suddenly, the music program isinterrupted by breaking news. The news was that the earth had just been invadedby Mars. It wasn’t until the show’s fortieth minutes that the focus went from whatwas supposed to be the radio news broadcast and onto the narrator and his story.

In a time before television, radiobroadcast not just news and music, but comedy and drama shows too. Breakingnews was also a part of the day because of the rise of Hitler and the war in Europe. To a listener who thought it was just a normalmusic show, it sounded like a global tragedy was breaking loose in the swampsof Jersey. Welles’ show was on CBS Radio andbroadcast nation-wide, and because it had no commercials the fake news reportssounded like real news reports. It caused pockets of panic around the country.What was meant to be a scary story for Halloween became an even scarier story.

As I told Glenna, listening to thenews was like listening to “War of the Worlds,” except that this time it was real.

I went home and went to Marie. Shehad already been in the hospital twice since we moved to Austin three or four weeks earlier, so I knewshe would be fragile. We just sat and watched everything unfold on TV.

I’ll admit it; I suspect you arethinking more about where you were on 9-11 than listening to me at this moment.That’s fine, I was hoping to open a door to a moment of remembrance. I know fora fact that my story is not more important than yours.

I went down this road becausehonestly I had trouble knowing where to go with our readings from Romans andMatthew.

Matthew gives us a parable withcommentary tacked on the end for good measure. Peter asks how many times weshould forgive. His offer of seven sounds overly reasonable to an Old Testamentscholar. Seven is forever connected to blessings and curses, so to forgiveseven times rather than curse for seven generations is quite generous.

So when Jesus tells him “No, notseven times, but seventy-seven times” he’s blowing the Law of Moses andconventional wisdom completely out of the water.

The parable itself is about a manwho seeks patience to repay his debt but will not show the same to his fellowslave. The scope of debt is expressed in a way that we don’t relate to becausewe don’t know the conversions. To put it in perspective, 100 denarii is 100days worth of wages to the average laborer. Based on the average income for a householdin Marshall,that would be somewhere around $20,000. A talent weighs a little over 75pounds. Since the debt would have been measured in gold and given the spotprice of gold on Monday when I ran this little computation, 10,000 talents wouldcome to just over $2 billion.

The king forgives a debt that is soincredible that none of us could scarcely fathom. One example we can begin to geta grip on: This week Forbes magazine reported the Dallas Cowboys are worth$1.85 billion.[i] Soimagine being forgiven by Jerry Jones for losing the entire Cowboysfranchise—lock, stock, and stadium. Funny, I don’t see that story ending thesame way as that part of the parable.

As for $20,000, that’s a new car;and not one with a ton of bells and whistles either. We have a grip on thatkind of debt. It’s not cheap, but it’s doable.

The king forgives, he doesn’t granta reprieve he cancels the full debt. The king forgives more than we could everhope or imagine. But the man who receives such grace cannot extend it to hisbrother, his fellow slave. The king is generous, but he also has an eye to what’sright, even if that eye is focused in anger. If you can’t forgive then you willpay the same price you assigned your brother.

Marie and I were watching “TheChildren of 9/11” on NBC Monday night. They were interviewing children whoseparents were killed in the World Trade Centers, the Pentagon, and on UnitedFlight 93. One of the girls, maybe about 13 years old said even if 1,000innocent Muslims came and apologized to her for killing her father, she wouldnot forgive. She could not accept the apology of a nation for deeds of a few. Thiswas followed by a young girl whose father, a Muslim, also worked and was killedat the World Trade Center.She said that she could never understand how Islam could be so warped to maketheir action an act of faith. She could not understand.

Now, I won’t pass judgment on theyoung girl who lost her father and cannot forgive. I don’t expect a thirteenyear old to have a faith that can move that mountain. She’s thirteen! She losther father in the premier national tragedy of our country! She was a spectacleof media for months and now years after the fact! These are not the makings ofrepentance from anger and delivery from grief and sorrow.

Our reading from Romans teaches uswe are not to pass judgment on those whose faith is weak. We are not to castaway someone just because of judgment on “disputable matters.” The New LivingTranslation says this more cleanly, “Accept other believers who are weak infaith, and don’t argue with them about what they think is right or wrong.” Iknow not to reject the thirteen year old girl who does not have forgiveness inher heart today. She’s known the most horrible sorrow a girl or boy can knowand she’s had it for three-quarters of her life. I can pray one day she willforgive, but I cannot and will not blame her for how she feels, especially nottoday.

There’s something else in Romansthat needs to be addressed today. Paul writes, “One man considers one day moresacred than another; another man considers everyday alike.” In a way we startedour worship today saying that today was different from last Sunday and will bedifferent from the next. We say this because there is something in the fiber ofour nation that says this day is different.

There is a story that a member of aBaptist church asked his preacher why they didn’t celebrate Lent (the season ofpreparation for Easter). The preacher told him that they don’t celebrate Lentbecause we are an Easter people. To this preacher every day is just as specialas any other, every day is a celebration because since the resurrectioneveryday is Easter. This is how we are called to live our lives, we aresupposed to live like everyday is the resurrection because everyday we live inthe resurrection.

Despite being someone who likes thecalendar that gives us Advent and Christmas, Lent and Easter, I like this story.We should live everyday like it’s theday of the resurrection. So here’s the question, is today a special day orshould every day be just a special? Paul doesn’t answer this question.

He does say “He who regards one dayas special, does so to the Lord… For none of us lives to himself alone and noneof us dies to himself alone. If we live, we live to the Lord and if we die, wedie to the Lord. So whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For thisvery reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord ofboth the living and the dead.”

In short, it doesn’t really matterwhether we consider this a special day or another special day as long as wegive thanks to God. “Every knee will bow and every tongue confess to God.” Bythis, each of us we will ultimately be held accountable.

In the eyes of some, this is where thechurch fell short as the people of God on 9-11. Will Willimon is the PresidingBishop over the North Alabama Conference of the United Methodist Church. Along with hisnumerous other gifts and talents, he is a renowned preacher. These are histhoughts about this 9-11:

For the most powerful, militarized nation inthe world also to think of itself as an innocent victim is deadly. It was arare prophetic moment for me, considering Presidents Bush and Obama have spentbillions asking the military to rectify the crime of a small band of lawlessindividuals, destroying a couple of nations who had little to do with it, inthe costliest, longest series of wars in the history of the United States.

The silence of most Christians and the giddyenthusiasm of a few, as well as the ubiquity of flags and patrioticextravaganzas in allegedly evangelical churches, says to me that AmericanChristians may look back upon our response to 9/11 as our greatestChristological defeat. It was shattering to admit that we had lost thetheological means to distinguish between the United States and the kingdom of God. The criminals whoperpetrated 9/11 and the flag-waving boosters of our almost exclusively martialresponse were of one mind: that the nonviolent way of Jesus is stupid. All ofus preachers share the shame; when our people felt very vulnerable, theyreached for the flag, not the Cross.

September 11 has changed me. I'm going topreach as never before about Christ crucified as the answer to the question ofwhat's wrong with the world. I have also resolved to relentlessly reiteratefrom the pulpit that the worst day in history was not a Tuesday in New York, but a Friday in Jerusalem when a consortium of clergy andpoliticians colluded to run the world on our own terms by crucifying God's ownSon.

My way of paraphrasing what Willimonis saying is that in the shadow of 9-11 the phrase “God and Country” has become“Country and God.” He says that in the shadow of 9-11 the people of God setaside the cross for the flag and this is the failure of the church.

I thank God everyday that I live ina country where not only am I allowed to praise God, I am allowed to praise Godas I am called to praise God. I thank God that our nation is protected by menand women who are volunteers, who have chosen to offer themselves to protectall of us. I thank God that I am allowed to pray for the civilian and militaryleaders who create the policy they help implement. I thank God I am allowed topray that our political leaders are worthy of the respect shown by ourmilitary.

But there one thing we need to takefrom our readings that if we don’t we won’t be Christ’s church.

God saves. Our God saves; and oneof the things God expects us to do in return is to have mercy, to forgive oneanother. To take our parable a little too literally, God our King has forgivenus $2 billion worth of sin against the Lord and asks that we forgive acomparatively paltry $20,000 worth of sin against each other. All the while, weare called not to judge poorly those who cannot forgive because their faith isweak.

We are called to forgive becausehumanity’s sin against God is greater than the sin we can commit against oneanother, even the sin a group of 20 terrorists perpetrated against thousands ofindividual people, their families, and this nation. Maybe that’s the hardlesson of 9-11 for the church. Humanity’s sin against God is greater than oursin against each other. God forgives, God saves, and so we are called toforgive too. This is what we are called to remember.

Some people call today “Patriot’s Day” and I want towave the flag, shoot, I approved the bulletin cover. But that is not myvocation, not from this pulpit. My call is to raise the cross. My call is likethat of John the Baptist and point to Jesus. My call is to exalt Christ aboveanything the world will try to put along side him. This is not easy. I pray forthe strength to proclaim Christ over exalting a nation, even, in my opinion,the greatest nation on Earth. As we remember the victims of 9-11, let usremember the one who saves us all first.

[i]Associated Press, “Dallas Cowboys Most Valuable NFL Franchise,” http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/6941473/dallas-cowboys-most-valuable-nfl-team-forbes-list,retrieved September 11, 2011.