Matthew – Page 9 – Salvaged Faith

those silly lutherans…

Posted on November 12, 2008Leave a comment

In my small town, there are basically five churches: Presbyterian, Nazarene, Catholic, LCMS, and my United Methodist church. Outside of town there is a UCC church and an ELCA church that participate with us.

We have a fairly good relationship among all of the churches and together have a ministerial alliance that distributes funds for gas, food, lodging, etc. for those in need in the community.

I have been amazed to discover that the LCMS pastor in town has been one of my best mentors. There is at times very little that we agree upon, but there is plenty of grace in our relationship =)

This morning we got to talking about the lectionary passage for Sunday the 23rd. Neither of us would be preaching on the text, but we thought we’d discuss it anyways. I have always loved the passage from Matthew 25 on the judgment of the sheep and the goats, because, for me it was a reminder that we are supposed to live the gospel and not just speak it with our mouths. For the most part, we talked about how the works described are like the fruits of good trees, they are the natural growth or response of a person to the faith which is alive within. We could agree on that.

We got into a lively discussion and I was amazed to hear about how difficult it was to preach this text to their congregations. In Lutheran theology, there is a very fine pathway to tread between legalism and antinomianism and there is always the danger that the message will be interpreted in a way that causes you to “fall off the cliff” in either direction.

I got to thinking about the difference between that and Wesleyan theology. And the greatest difference is that we believe that the works described in the passage from Matthew – the feeding of the hungry, and caring for the sick, etc., are in and of themselves means of grace. We don’t believe that works earn us God’s salvation, but that they can open us to the grace of God poured out into our lives. Particularly in regards to sanctifying grace.

My Lutheran brothers (they were both male) on the other hand recognize more limited means of grace: the word, the “wet” word (baptism), the “eaten” word (communion), and the “shared” word – fellowship, bible study. And so the works described had the danger of negating the power of faith to save us.

Whew. Yet another day in which I’m glad to be a methodist.

D is for Daily Bread

Posted on September 21, 2008Leave a comment

So often when we read the passage about the day laborers, we hear it from the perspective of those who were chosen first and we think about how unfair it is that others have recieved what we have been promised. So today, let us open our minds to hear the gospel message from the perspective of the ones who were chosen last…

My name is Carla. And I am a day laborer. Each and every single morning I get up at 4:30 and I try to find something in the pantry to feed my son. He is twelve years old. But paying for his school supplies and getting school clothes has been expensive this year, so breakfasts aren’t quite as filling as they used to be. I get breakfast started, and then I go and wake my son up. It’s early for him, but we’ve got to head out early in the morning if I want to have a chance for work today. Luckily, the Home Depot where I gather with others each day has a shelter that they have put up… and the bus that stops in front of the store will take my son to school. It isn’t the best arrangement in the world and I worry for him, but it’s the only option we have. So we head out together, hand in hand.

Every morning, this is my routine. On weekends, my son stays with his grandmother, but every weekday, we head here together. And we wait.

This particular morning, I was tired. I was tired of waiting for work. The economy is particularly hard this year. Sometimes we pass a newspaper amongst ourselves, but you don’t have to read the headlines to know that things are tough. The numbers of foreclosures and record low homes sales are just that, numbers – we can tell every morning that there is trouble because there are fewer contractors and construction crews coming around to hire us. The landscapers I worked for last summer have gone out of business. Work was never really steady before – but now, it’s almost nonexistent.

In the last six days, I have only been hired once. That day, a contractor stopped by and we painted the outside of a woman’s house. Eight hours of work, eighty dollars. I bought groceries that night, so that my son would have food for breakfast.

This morning, I was hopeful. I was hopeful that work will come today. The electricity bill is due tomorrow and I prayed that I would have money to pay it. The last time our electricity was cut off, we had to stay with my mother-in-law, in her cramped little apartment.

About six o’clock, a man pulled up in a pick-up truck and said he had work! It’s a bit early for harvest, but he said that his fields were ripe and ready and he needed some help – it would be a full days worth of work. Well, all of our hands shot up in the air – of course we all wanted this job. But he couldn’t take everyone. He took Sam, who is probably the strongest of all of us. He took Mark who is young and fit and honestly a good worker. He took a few others, and I couldn’t help but notice that they were the ones who always get chosen first. The ones who as kids were always picked first for the game of dodgeball. All of them were promised $150 for their work that day… and I could only dream of what that would do to help my family out. But the truck pulled away and I wasn’t on it. I looked down at my son who was sitting on the bench behind me, and was glad that he slept through my disappointment.

Perhaps all of our hopes got up by that one landowner because there was a good spirit among us for an hour or so. The bus was coming soon, so I gently woke my son up and walked him over to the stop and got him on the right bus. And I went back to waiting. Another hour ticked by, and the lot of us were still standing there. One car pulled up needing a skilled electrician – and so two people were chosen… but not me. My husband was amazing with his hands – he knew everything there was to know about wiring and building… He died of cancer two years ago – the medical costs ate up all of our savings and I have little skills. I stayed at home with our son. When my husband died, we lost the house. We lost everything. This is our life now.

Nine o’clock rolled around and I looked up to see that old blue pick-up truck roll back by our shelter. It was the first man again – the man with the field. He said he could use a few more… that they were finding there was more work than he thought. So he looked us over. I tried to stand up tall. I tried to wipe the tiredness from my eyes. He chose five from among us. But I wasn’t chosen. They hopped in the back of his truck and headed out to the field.

About noon, my stomach started to grumble, but I couldn’t leave- not when someone might come by any minute looking for workers. Often a contractor would come by over the lunch hour and hire people for the afternoon. And sure enough, I heard the rumble of an engine pulling up. It was the same blue pick-up truck, the same man looking out at us from the driver’s seat. “I need a few more,” he said – “I’ll pay you what is fair… you three – climb on in.” He wasn’t pointing at me. He was pointing at the three Vietnamese immigrants who were standing together to one side. They climbed in and the truck headed out.

As the afternoon went on, a few of us started to filter away. Hopes were down – there just wasn’t going to be any more work today. My son’s bus didn’t stop until about 4:30… I might as well wait that long, you never know, right?

Every time a car passed us, we stood in anxious anticipation. But many of them were just customers of the store trying to get out of the parking lot. No one was looking for workers. We stood anyways – the same up and down over and over again. About 3:00, I was amazed to see that same old blue pickup pull over to the shelter. He looked at all of us, almost with a look of pity, and hopped out. I have a bit more work – he said gently – I know it’s late, but I’ll pay you what is fair for the few hours that are left. There were seven of us left – but the truck was full of supplies and not all of us would fit. He took three.

At least I would get to wait for my son, I thought, trying to see the silver lining in all of this. But after five days of no work, the silver lining was dull and grey. I dreaded having to tell him yet again that there was no work today. I just wouldn’t be able to face him if we had to pack up a bag and move in with his grandma again. We can take care of ourselves, right mom? He had said the last time. I’m starting to think that it’s just not possible.

My son’s bus came and he hopped off and he looked around – I could tell he was hoping I wasn’t there. It wasn’t a long walk back to our apartment and he had made it countless times before. If I wasn’t there, it meant we would have a hot dinner tonight when I eventually made it back. But there I was. Under the shelter. He looked straight at me, and then turned to head up the street.

I wanted to run after him, to yell at him for disrespecting me like that, but I felt nothing but shame. Shame that I couldn’t support us. Shame that there wasn’t enough food in the cupboards. Shame that he saw me for what I truly was. Worthless. I wanted to go home, but I couldn’t face him. Not yet. And there were still a few others under the shelter – also dreading heading home with nothing in their hands. So I stood there and waited.

Not fifteen minutes went by, and I started to hear the familiar chug of an old engine. I figured that the farmer was starting to bring people back in from his field, so I thought nothing of it – but when the truck got closer – I realized it was empty. He slowly pulled up to the two of us who were left and leaned out the window. “Why have you been standing here all day?” he asked. It seemed to me like a dumb question – so I spouted back before I could bite my tongue – “Because no one hired us!” I looked away, not wanting to see his response. It seemed like a long three seconds – like a lifetime was passing by – and then he spoke again. “Hop in – I’ll take you out to the field.”

He didn’t say anything about pay – and it seemed ludicrous to go out and work when the sun would be setting in a few hours, but I looked at John next to me, John who only has three fingers on his left hand because of some construction accident a few years ago, and he shrugged. “C’mon,” he said, “at least we can feel like we have done something today.” So we climbed in the truck.

We got out to the field quickly. I was amazed at what I saw – bushels and bushels and bushels of the biggest grapes I had seen in my life. I was so eager to work that day I never stopped to ask what kind of fields the man had. And it didn’t matter, work was work. We hopped out and he pointed toward the bushel baskets – “all of them have to be loaded,” he said – just pitch in where you can.

With the whole lot of us, loading was quick work. We piled the baskets high in a nearby wagon, so that the tractor could take them to the processor. An hour went by before we knew it, and the job was done. The man who owned the fields gathered all of us up together and thanked us for our work. Then he called over to his foreman and handed him an envelope. Pay time.

The foreman called John and I up first and handed us each three crisp fifty dollar bills. My mouth dropped open and I began to stutter. “Umm, there must be some mistake,” I said – “This is too much money… we’ve only been working for an hour.”

“What did you get?” someone called out behind me, and I showed him the bills. But the foreman looked at us and simply called out, “Next.”

Group by group, the workers came forward, amazed at what we had received and I could tell, they were expectantly hoping for more. But by the time that first group – the six who were picked early that morning – we began to realize that he was paying everyone the same amount. Everyone walked away with $150 – the amount that first group had been promised.

Sam, the big guy, was the first to speak up. “Hey, now what’s going on here?!” he yelled – “how come all of those guys got the same amount as we did – we’ve been working here, slaving in the sun all day long?”

I was sort of wondering the same thing… To be honest, I would have been grateful for just five or ten dollars – something to take home, something to feed my son with.

The owner of the vineyard came forward from where he was leaning against his old blue truck – “Am I doing you any wrong,” he asked? “Didn’t I promise you $150 this morning? You have been given what you were promised, but I choose to give to even these last ones the same amount – am I not allowed to be generous with my money?”

I felt undeserving, I felt unworthy, but I clutched those bills tightly in my hand the whole way back. I was nothing but grateful. Grateful for the hope this brought to my family. Grateful for the chance to work at all. Grateful that I would be able to go home to my son and bring something to the table for dinner. Grateful that we would be able to make it another month with the electricity. Simply grateful.

I bought a hot loaf of fresh bread and a couple cans of beef stew to take home – the rest would be saved for the bills. My son was surprised when I walked in carrying a grocery bag, he looked up and for the first time in a week, I saw him smile.

I warmed the stew up on the stove and set the table before us, bowls of stew for each and the loaf of bread set proudly in the middle of the table. My son came over and I started to say grace like I usually do – with the Lord’s Prayer.

Our Father, who art in heaven… hallowed by thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread…” I paused. For half a second I paused and realized what I was saying. The warm yeasty smell of the bread between us rose up and filled my senses. “Give us this day our daily bread…” I began again – but couldn’t go on. My eyes watered up and my son squeezed my hand and finished the prayer for the both of us.

That prayer had always seemed so simple, so meaningless – like something that we just said because we were supposed to until tonight. As my son dug into his stew and ripped a chunk off of the bread, I started to think about what that landowner did for me today. While he taught us all something about money and being generous – while he taught me today that even being one of the last ones chosen, that I was still worthy of that money, he also showed me what God’s grace can look like.

I thought about the Hebrew people out there in the desert, wandering around… completely dependent upon God. And I thought about how anxious they were, how scared, so scared in fact that they forgot about all of the miraculous and amazing ways that God had rescued them from Egypt. But God took care of them. God promised that he would provide, and each day gave them the gift of heavenly manna – their daily bread.

Did they deserve it? Probably not after all of their grumbling. Did I deserve this feast tonight? Definitely not. But what I realized today is that God doesn’t give us what we deserve – God gives us what we need. They didn’t have to be rescued and I didn’t have to be picked today… but I was and they were – and that in and of itself is something to be grateful for.

And I’m not talking about just money. I’m not talking about just things. I’m talking about life itself. Give us this day our daily bread – give us this day our daily dose of grace. Grace doesn’t come in sizes. I don’t get less grace because I’m a widowed single mother who doesn’t make it to church every Sunday. That pastor down the street who wears the fancy stole doesn’t get more because he stands up to preach every Sunday. I don’t get less grace for all the times I have doubted or decided to rely on my self rather than God. And those people who have believed since they were infants don’t get more. Grace can’t be measured. It is simply given and given abundantly.

Tonight I tucked my son into bed and I read my nightly devotions. Some nights I don’t quite get to them because the day has been too long… but tonight, I felt like I wanted to spend time in God’s word, to simply spend time with God as a sign of my gratefulness. I opened up the bible to Philippians: Paul wrote there, “For me, living is Christ and dying is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me…. I know that I will remain and continue with all of you for your progress and joy in faith, so that I may share abundantly in your boasting in Christ Jesus… only live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ – stand firm in one spirit, strive side by side with one mind for the faith of the gospel, and don’t be intimidated by your opponents.”

Life in the flesh means fruitful labor – it means working every day to live a life worth of the gospel of Christ.

B is for Bound Together

Posted on September 7, 2008Leave a comment

When I think about this very difficult passage from Matthew today I’m very aware of the fact that there are some things in this life that only a mother could say to you – some things about ourselves that we will never hear unless they come from the lips of someone who unconditionally loves you.
As we think about that – I want you to watch this clip from the movie, “Spanglish.” In this film, Deborah, played by Tea Leoni is the wife of a simple and carefree chef. Deborah is a bit self-absorbed and blames everyone but herself for her problems – a trait which has led her straight into an affair. Her mother, played by Cloris Leachman decides to step in and confront her about it.

(watch clip)

In my family, and maybe in yours, we call these sorts of talks “come to Jesus” moments. Those times when someone has strayed from the path and really need someone to let them know – to hold a mirror out in front of them and to help them to see what they are doing wrong and how they are hurting themselves or others.

When we look at this text from Matthew however, Jesus isn’t talking about our family lives. He’s talking about how to treat one another in the church. And the truth is we have a really hard time figuring out how to put these things into practice as a congregation. Our churches today, are not places where we feel comfortable having hard and truthful conversations with people. It is much better to pretend like a problem never existed, or to quietly remove yourself from the community than to get real with someone about a problem between you or an unhealthy situation.

I think part of the reason why we do so is because churches today – and by churches I mean the groups of people who come together as church – aren’t bound together. I was watching the Hawkeyes play yesterday morning, and in truth, congregations have much more in common with football fans than with the kind of community Christ is calling us to be in the scriptures. We are brought together by our common love, football in one case, worshipping God in the other, we sing/chant/cheer together, we pray together, but when the game is over and after we have had our coffee and cookies or hotdogs, we head home – back to our lives.

There is little if any sense of obligation to one another, much less accountability in many churches today, and, honestly, our church is one of those places. We don’t have a history of successfully handling conflict amongst ourselves – in fact, leaving the community, just not showing up, has been the most common way of dealing with problems in the last decade. I’m not sure if this is because we aren’t willing to say that there is a problem, or if it’s because when we voice a problem, we aren’t listened to – but in either case, the kind of relationships Christ calls us to model are not being lived out.

So we have to do is look at what it is about a family member, or even a best friend, that helps us to hear and respond to them when there is a problem.

And I think the real difference between those people we listen to and the church today is a sense of commitment. It truly takes unconditional love and unwavering concern for the kind of intervention and reconciliation that our passage from Matthew calls us to. The big question for us today is what kind of church would we have to become for Christ’s words to become a reality?

The answer I believe comes from recent Applebee’s commercials. Maybe you have seen them – the ones where a young man is sitting on a bench with headphones on, eating a sandwich and texting his friends. The “spokesapple” as it is affectionately called, encourages the young man to have a face to face conversation with his friends around the table. “Together is good” is the new theme the restaurant is trying to convey.

Now, whether or not you have seen the commercial, or eat at Applebee’s, the point is that we listen to the people we eat with. We care about the people we eat with. We want what is best for the people we eat with.

A friend of mine from Nashville has a family meal night with his family. While they are all very busy and the kids have school and extra-curricular activities and he and his wife work long hours – every Tuesday night they have a family dinner. Anyone else who happens to be around that evening is invited as well and for that one night a week they all sit around the dinner table together.

At the table – everyone has a chance to speak, and everyone is invited to share something about their week. Everyone is heard, everyone is listened to, and everyone has a place – even their youngest son who is 3.

The table is one of the most important images of the Christian church precisely because it is around the table that Christians are bound together. It is around the table that community is formed. It is around the table that the body and blood of Christ transform us into the body of Christ.

The hymn we just sang reminds us of that calling: Where charity and love prevail, there God is ever found. Brought here together by Christ’s love, by love are we thus bound. Let us recall that in our midst, dwells God’s begotten Son. As members of his body joined, we are, in him, made one.

We are in Christ made one. We are made one in our baptisms, we are made one in our commitment to this church, we are made one in the holy sacrament of communion.

And as a community of people who are not only brought together by Christ’s love, but bound together by that love, the rules of engagement with one another change. As Christ’s life transforms our community, then how we treat one another changes as well.

Monastic communities all across the world understand this and so when someone decides to enter their communities, they agree to live under certain rules. Rules about how to treat one another, about what to do when someone sins, and about the things that are and are not acceptable in the community.

What are the laws that we live by? What are the rules that govern our life together? Whether we want to admit it or not, whether we live it or not, when we become a part of the church, we promise to support the church – the community of Christ- through our prayers, our presence, our gifts and our service. And we promise to live a Christian life and to remain a faithful member of the body of Christ.

But perhaps the simpler answer is found in the book of Romans – where we are reminded of the greatest commandment – to love God and to love one another. Especially as we think about our life together- we must remember the command to love. According to the Jerusalem Bible translation of verse 10 – Love is the one thing that can never hurt your neighbor.

Philip Lawrence is the Abbot of the Christ in the Desert Abbey in New Mexico and he has this to say about our life in community:

“We must arise from sleep. We must be aware that it is this community in which we live. This does not mean that we think that things are perfect in this community. We must be radically honest about this. Our brothers and sisters are not saints… None of us is perfect; none of us follows every direction of the Customary or the traditions of the house perfectly.”

But you see, the thing is, when we do fail one another – when we do make mistakes, and we will – the instructions from Jesus that we find in Matthew are not designed to help us kick people out, but to help us love them back in.

Too often, we allow conflicts and problems to remain hidden, we fail to talk about them and we are not willing to hold one another accountable for the promises that we have made.

As a new minister, I know that this accountability piece is something that I too have to work on. All of our charge conference forms came across my desk the other day and again I was reminded that we have nearly 200 members and over 100 young people who have been baptized but who have not yet joined the church. That is over 300 people who are under the care of this church and yet we only have 50-60 here on a Sunday.

As the pastor who is about to fill out those forms, I feel a great burden to think about how to love those people back into our midst, rather than to simply let them slip away. And I am going to be putting myself out there this fall and in the coming year to hold myself and them accountable to the promises we have made. But this passage reminds me that this is a burden that we all share together.

When was the last time that you asked one of your brothers or sisters in Christ why they are neglecting their promises and aren’t giving faithfully? When was the last time that you asked a child’s parents why they were neglecting the promises they made by not bringing their young ones up in the church?

Those are not easy questions to ask! And perhaps you would not ask them in precisely that way. But for too long we have talked about people and their problems and their failings behind their back rather than reaching out and letting them know that we are here, and we want to be on this journey with them.

We treat one another as strangers instead of as brothers and sisters. And we believe that we have justification for doing so precisely in this same passage from Matthew for it says: If the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

We forget that we have all sinned. We have all hidden pieces of our lives from the light of day and from the scrutiny of others. And we forget that how Jesus treats tax collectors and gentiles is that he goes to them… and he eats with them… and he loves them.

Again here these words from Abbot Philip Lawrence:

“Perhaps one of the most important facets of our formation as monks is the process of acceptance that we are all sinners, that we are all imperfect. I must accept my brothers as they are, with their sinfulness and their imperfections and their faults–and my challenge is to love them just as they are. Also I must come to accept my imperfections and my faults and I love myself properly as I am. My challenge is to allow the Holy Spirit to change my life from within. I cannot change anyone else’s life, but I can ask the Spirit to change my life, to transform me. I can use my energies to fight against my own defects, faults and sins.”

That is all we can do. Love one another deeply – help to point out a fault or a wayward action – but then, even if that person will not listen – simply love them. Love them and pray for them. That is after all what the mother did in our movie clip. She spoke the hard truth and said her piece, and then she made sure her daughter’s seat belt was fastened =)

Love them and pray for them… That is something that I know we all know how to do here. This is a church that loves deeply when someone is in need. Whether a love one is dying or someone is simply having a tough time – this is a church that knows how to treat others as family – as flesh and blood – rather than as strangers. You never cease to amaze me with your outpouring of love… and so as we love one another, we must let that love continue to move us deeper into relationship, deeper into the tough questions and may the love of Christ that has brought us together, bind us together. Amen and amen.

A is for Acceptance

Posted on August 31, 2008Leave a comment

I told all of you last week that we were going to spend this fall exploring what the scriptures tell us about how to be the church. And so today we start at the very beginning – just like all of those kids heading off to kindergarten for the first time, we are going to learn our own ABC’s. And this morning we start off with A – A for Acceptance.

While that may seem like a strange place to start, the truth is that if we are going to be Christ’s church in this world – the hands and feet and voices of Christ to the world, then we had better figure out who it is that we are following! And as we learned just a few minutes ago – names matter!

We have seven or eight young people starting confirmation this fall and they are going to be learning what it means to Claim the Name Christian. What it means to follow someone named Christ. And what we are going to learn over and over again is that saying you believe in Christ and actually accepting and claiming that name are two very different things.

Accepting Christ means that we not only believe Jesus is the Messiah, it means we take on that identity ourselves. To accept something means that we take what is offered and we receive it willingly –our lives begin to look like the name that we have accepted.

This morning, our scriptures readings go hand in hand as we learn not only who Jesus is, but what his title, “The Messiah” means for our lives, and how then we can accept that name as a church in the way that we live.

In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus is having a conversation about identity with his disciples and he starts off by asking them a simple question. “Who do people say that I am?” After the disciples spouted off the answers of the crowds, Jesus asked the tougher question, the deeper question – “Who do you say that I am?”

For months, Peter had walked alongside Jesus and witnessed first-hand the miracles that took place. His own mother had been healed. Demons had been cast out. Hungry people had been fed. Sight was restored to those who couldn’t see. While the world was still struggling, the hopes of the prophets were beginning to be fulfilled. And Peter was blessed enough to have a front row seat to the glorious coming of God’s Kingdom. And so without hesitation, he answered Jesus question – “you are the Messiah.” And Jesus blessed him for having given this answer.

You are the Messiah – What exactly is “Messiah” supposed to convey anyways? We wrestled with this Tuesday night at our roundtable gathering and it’s a hard question. Messiah or masaich is simply a Hebrew word that means “the anointed one.” The interesting thing is that Messiah and Christ actually mean the same thing – one is just a Hebrew word and the other is Greek. When we think of children or boats being “christened,” they are being anointed, or have something poured upon them. Throughout the Old Testament, Messiah was used to refer to priests, prophets, kings of Israel and even foreign rulers who were anointed by God – set aside for a special task. Eventually the idea of “the Messiah” came to mean many things.

Especially in the prophetic writings, the Messiah was a long awaited king that would rule with divine authority – the one who would be anointed to “uphold the justice and righteousness” of the kingdom, a future King David. But when Israel comes under the authority of foreign rulers – first in exile and then later under Rome, some start to lose hope in a new king for Israel. Others take the idea of a Davidic king and claim that he will return at the end of days, the end of time. Some began to hope not for a political king, but a spiritual leader who would reform the people. As Peter walked and talked with Jesus all of these ideas and more would have been floating around. There really was no one Jewish understanding of what the Messiah would do or look like, when or even if the Messiah would ever come.

So although Peter called Jesus, the Messiah – we don’t really know what kind of Messiah he was looking for. Except that it was very different from what Jesus had in mind. As Peter comfortably felt he had figured it all out, all of a sudden, he began to hear Jesus say things that his Messiah would never say. Suddenly suffering, rejection, and death were swirling through his head and Peter stood up abruptly and motioned for Jesus to come and share a quiet word with him.

You see, Peter, just like we often do, already had his mind completely made up about who Jesus was and who the Messiah was supposed to be. But perhaps none of us have been slammed back into our places as fast as Peter was when Jesus looked him straight in the eyes and said, “Get behind me, Satan!”

When Jesus asked the question, “Who do you say that I am?” technically, Peter gave the “right” answer – he correctly identified Jesus as the Messiah. But what that name might mean for the ministry of Jesus was entirely unclear. Peter’s own preconceptions and his personal attachment to this man – his teacher – overshadowed his ability to fully accept that Jesus had set his face towards the cross. While the name was right, Peter’s expectations for the Messiah were not.

The question really is not about a name or a title, but about what we mean by it and how we use it. And so Jesus has this conversation with his disciples and with us, so that we can get past our false expectations and get to the heart of who Jesus really is.

Barbara Brown Taylor describes in her book, The Preaching Life her own doubts and struggles about the identity God, and sees those doubts and mistakes as opportunities for growth. She writes:

Did God fail to come when I called? Then perhaps God is not a minion. So who is God? Did God fail to punish my adversary? Then perhaps God is not a policeman. So who is God? …every time God declines to meet my expectations, another of my idols is exposed. Another curtain is drawn back so that I can see what I have propped up in God’s place – no, that is not God, so who is God? … Pushing past curtain after curtain, it becomes clear that the failure is not God’s but my own, for having such a poor and stingy imagination. God is greater than my imagination, wiser than my wisdom, more dazzling than the universe, as present as the air I breathe and utterly beyond my control. That is, in short, what makes me a Christian.

This is what is going on with Peter. He was looking for a Messiah who would save him here and now, who would elevate him, who would give them all liberty without the struggle. And to be honest, in many ways that is how we have painted Jesus in our culture today – just say these simple words and believe.

But accepting Christ is so much more than that! Accepting Christ is to take his life and make it our own. And that is why this conversation with the disciples was so important.

Jesus knew that he had been anointed by God to redeem all people, to bring the Kingdom of God here to earth… but he also knew the only way to get there was through the cross. This conversation was a reality check for their ministry. The moment that Jesus begins to speak of suffering and death marks a radical shift in the lives of these disciples, as they are asked to leave behind their prior conceptions and expectations. They now find themselves following someone who will be a failure in the eyes of the world. And yet they are asked to follow anyways.

As a church, we are called to accept that name for ourselves. We are called to take up our crosses and follow this Messiah who asks us to give up everything – our lives, our pasts, our expectations – give up all of our lives in order to take on, in order to accept the new life that Christ offers. The question of Jesus’ identity is not a riddle from the past, but it is a calling for any who wish to be disciples of Christ. His identity must come to shape our own.

And perhaps what is even more difficult is that his name should shape our lives more than any of the other names we identify ourselves by. More than our family names, more than our race, more than our nationality. Christ’s name should guide our actions… if we truly accept it.

As Paul writes to the church in Rome, that is the question of the day: How should we live now that we have accepted Christ? Last week we heard him say that as the body of Christ, as the church, we should not live lives conformed to the world around us but that we should be transformed by the mind of Christ, and then he gives us this beautiful and challenging list of ways to do so. Things like “love from the center of who you are – don’t fake it.” “Don’t quit in hard times, pray all the harder.” “Bless your enemies, don’t curse them under your breath.” “Don’t hit back, discover the beauty in everyone.” “If you see your enemy hungry, go buy that person lunch, if he’s thirsty, get him a drink.” (all from the Message translation of Romans 12:9-21)

Almost every single one of those things are unbelievably difficult. They fly right in the face of everything that our society tells us, every way that our world believes we should live. And yet maybe they are the cross we are to bear as a church. As our roundtable group discussed, we realized that these ways of living require us to give up our instincts toward revenge and getting even, force us to let go of a dog-eat-dog mentality. They represent a fundamental friction between the ways of the church and the ways of the world – whether it’s business or politics or education or even family life.

As a church, maybe the cross we have to bear is to so live our lives after the example of Christ that we ourselves run headfirst into that friction. We take risks and put our lives on the line for the Christ that we have accepted.

One example of this is the act of simply taking someone in to care for them. As four women gathered around the table Tuesday night, we talked about how risky that is in today’s world. To love as Christ loved and without question allow someone in need into our home is not something society would tell us is safe or smart. We’ve heard on the news a hundred stories about people who extended hospitality to strangers and who were later found murdered on the side of the road. But extending hospitality to strangers is exactly what Christ did and what he calls us to do. Too often we allow the fear of what might happen, or even what will happen, keep us from accepting the way of Christ.

In college I was a speech and rhetoric major and so I have been very excited about all of the political conventions. And so Monday night, I listened to Michelle Obama speak and I heard her say

And as I tuck that little girl and her little sister into bed at night, I think about how one day, they’ll have families of their own. And one day, they—and your sons and daughters—will tell their own children about what we did together in this election. They’ll tell them how this time we listened to our hopes, instead of our fears. How this time, we decided to stop doubting and to start dreaming.

This time, we listened to our hopes instead of our fears. This time, we decided to stop doubting and to start dreaming. Take those words out of the political context and just think about them… This time we listened to our hopes instead of our fears.

We have to stop being afraid of what will happen to us if we truly accept Christ and follow him and we have to hope that if we truly follow Christ, the world will be transformed. We have to stop letting our fears and our doubts get in the way of the gospel. We have to put it all out there, take risks, and together step outside of these walls as the church. The let the servant church arise, a caring church that longs to be a partner in Christ’s sacrifice, and clothed in Christ’s humanity. Amen.

Hammers and Nails

Posted on August 24, 2008Leave a comment

This morning, I want to tell you a story about a carpenter who worked for his father’s construction company. One day his dad called Junior into the office and said, “Junior, I’m putting you in charge – total and complete charge – of the next house that we build. I want you to over see the whole job from ground up and order all the materials – nails, 2.4’x… everything.”

Well, Junior quickly got to work on building the house that his father had designed. For months before the groundbreaking he studied the blueprints and checked every specification. Then he pulled together a team of dedicated and hard-working people. While he knew that this was something that he could easily do on his own – that wasn’t the way that Jesus worked. And so he brought each individual to this team because of something special that they offered – because of some gift or talent that they had. Joe was the type of guy that made sure everyone else knew what they were supposed to be doing, so Jesus made him team leader. Julius had a special talent for putting up drywall. Sue knew how to pour a fantastically level foundation. Fred was married to the local lumberyard owner and so they would have access to the best materials.

Junior brought his team together and told them – I have given you everything that you need to build this house. You have been blessed with the skills you need to make it work – but you have to work together. I have specifically brought each of you here because together you can do more than any of you could do alone. You need one another to make this happen. So as I start to build this house – each of you have an integral role to play…”

The team eagerly got to work on this great project. They were so willing to follow the guidance of their leader Junior. But after a few weeks of great work, there began to be problems among the team. Steve, who was on the crew that brought food for everyone each day stopped showing up. Megan was a part of the team because of her precision hammer work, but she spent all of her time laying tile. The guy who was supposed to order all of the cabinetry tried to cut some corners and ordered much cheaper material and only half as much as was needed. Pretty soon, others on the team got busy with their families and the rest of their lives and started showing up only every other day. Some stopped showing up at all.

Junior looked around at the jobsite – half finished, and in desperate need of help – and thought… we can still do this.

The truth of the matter is this story about Junior and his construction project isn’t a story about a house at all. While Junior may have been brought up to be a carpenter, he has a much bigger calling that has taken over his life. You see, Junior has another name and another purpose for this thing that he is building… His other name is Jesus and his plan is to build a church.

This church that Jesus has in mind, this church that Jesus is building in reality has nothing to do with 2×4’s and levels and hammers and everything to do with the people that he has called together to build it. Not some hypothetical Steve and Megan – but you and me.

If we go back to our scriptures and look at the word which is used for the church in our bibles – the word is ecclesia – which literally means the “called out ones.” Each and every single one of us has been called out, called here to this place in order to BE the church that Christ is building. In essence, we are the 2×4’s, we are the nails, we are the foundation, the supporting structure, the insulation, the windows, the doors – we are the church.

In our gospel reading this morning there is a lot going on, and we will talk about Peter’s whole declaration that Jesus is the Messiah next week… but as a result of that, as a result of someone finally “getting it” – Jesus, in essence, begins his task of building the church – laying the foundation for the Kingdom of God that he has come to proclaim. He looks at Simon, whose nickname of Peter, or petra in Greek literally means rock and he says, “On this rock, I will build my church!”

It’s almost as if he is telling his friend, You are going to be part of the foundation of my church and nothing is going to stand against it.

Here is this guy Simon Peter, who countless times in the gospels makes mistakes and lets Jesus down and seems to fail in every way possible. And Jesus decides to make Peter the foundation of the church? Sounds a little like our carpenter was using shoddy materials, doesn’t it?

No, because Jesus is the one building this church and Jesus has the ability to take all of our mistakes and all of our weaknesses and all of our failings and when he puts us together with one another, when he strengthens us with the Holy Spirit, when his flesh and blood is poured into this project – nothing, not even death will overcome this church.

In the book of Isaiah we hear a glimmer of that promise. Isaiah speaks to us God’s word when he says, “look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the quarry from which you were dug. Look to Abraham and to Sarah… for he was but one when I called him, but I blessed him and made him many.” (Isaiah 51:1-2)

Who were Abraham and Sarah out of the multitude of people in the world? Nobody really. Nothing entirely special. They had their own faults and weaknesses. But they are the stuff from which our heritage has come and God took their lives and blessed them and made something great out of them. All of it is God’s work, not our own. This church that we sit in today is God’s church, not our own. All of us here may think we are a part of the First United Methodist Church – a church that some of your parents and grandparents and great-grandparents helped to build – but no, you are a part of God’s church, a church that Christ has built through all of them and now is continuing to build through all of you.

The difficult part is letting go enough for Christ to do his thing! And by letting go, I don’t mean sitting back and watching it all happen. I mean letting go of our ideas of what this church should look like, who it should include, and where it is headed. Letting go of all of the “good old days” talk and all of the “we shoulds” and “we shouldn’ts.”

Paul wrote to the church at Rome and sent them a beautiful systematic and theological account of what Christ has done. And he talked about God’s grace and God’s mercy and how we have an opportunity to respond to the grace that has been given to us and he writes in the passage we heard this morning (this from the Message translation): So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him. (The Message, Romans 12:1-3)

More common translations of the bible ask us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice to God – or taking our whole lives, everything about them, our jobs, our families, our passions and hopes – all of it – and placing it before God so that God can bless our lives and transform them and use them to build his kingdom.

The amazing thing here is that God is not asking us to lie down and give up everything… This is not a sacrificial end, but a sacred beginning… Jesus tells the disciples “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. (Mt 16:24-25) A pastor friend of mine was also working on her sermon and wrote words so beautiful I just had to borrow some of them – because you see, we are supposed to be living sacrifices! Which means like Isaac and his father Abraham, we crawl off the altar, and start living, letting God’s hands shape our lives, pound us into shape, pour us out, fill us up. “You can live your life so that God can do something with you.” (http://faithinflipflops.blogspot.com/)

And the thing is, just like the workers who were called together by Junior – each of us has some part of our lives that God wants to use. Each and every single one of us has been graced with gifts and talents and personalities and passions that no body else has. And because together – all of us running around as living sacrifices- make up this living, breathing, moving Church – we need everyone to play their part.

Peter Gomes is a professor at Harvard Divinity School and he once said that “the church will never be any better than we are.”

I believe that is completely true. Because we are the 2×4’s and the nails and the drywall and the windows and doors and insulation – we are the church. And if we let ourselves wear out, if we put aside our best materials and only bring to the church second-rate lumber, if we cut corners and take the easy way out, then we are a weak house built on a poor foundation.

We are called to Be the church! And it takes all of us, living in partnership with one another to make this happen.

You see, the thing about the church is that it isn’t some country club that you belong to – a membership in an organization where you can pay your dues and show up for meetings once and a while. The church is a community of people who follow Christ with their whole lives! And that is a tough and challenging and beautiful and joyful and rewarding thing!

Because if you look around this morning- you will find all sorts of other people who are on this journey with you. Think of them as the other 2×4’s that support the church with you – think of them as the nails that hold us together – think of them as the windows that will fit perfectly into the holes cut for them that help us to see the world outside of us. We all have a place; we all have a purpose here.

Hear again these words from Paul in the book of Romans: So since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ’s body, let’s just go ahead and be what we were made to be, without enviously or pridefully comparing ourselves with each other, or trying to be something we aren’t. If you preach, just preach God’s Message, nothing else; if you help, just help, don’t take over; if you teach, stick to your teaching; if you give encouraging guidance, be careful that you don’t get bossy; if you’re put in charge, don’t manipulate; if you’re called to give aid to people in distress, keep your eyes open and be quick to respond; if you work with the disadvantaged, don’t let yourself get irritated with them or depressed by them. Keep a smile on your face. (The Message, Romans 12: 5-8)

It takes all of us to be the church. And as living sacrifices, the church needs all of our prayers, presence, gifts and service. Yours and mine.

Sometimes it’s hard to remember what it means to be the body of Christ, to be the church in the world today. In many ways, the church, both ours and the church universal, have allowed themselves to be more conformed to the culture around us – the attitudes, the expectations, the focus on growth at all costs and on financial success – rather than to be transformed by the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.

The best way that I know how to start to strip away all of those things that get in the way, those things that look more like the world than like Christ, is to start back at the beginning – to go back to the basics and look at what it really means to be the church.

So in the next weeks and months, we are going to wipe our slates clean and start fresh. Now, this doesn’t mean that what we have accomplished in the past is worthless… think of it this way. I have a friend who used to run at least 3 miles every single morning. It took her a long time to build up to that, but she did it. At some point though, all of the other things in life began to take priority in her schedule, got in the way, and her running days ended. She still thought of herself as a runner, but she had stopped practicing the art. Like her, we need to shake off the dust, limber up our joints, and start practicing again. Unfortunately, if she went out there and tried to run 3 miles cold, she would have some problems – she wouldn’t make it and she just might give up. Just like she needs to start from scratch, with shorter jogs, building up her endurance, so we need to gradually open up our lives and let Christ in – let Christ transform us from the inside out.

As we do so, each week we will look at one way that Christ calls us to “be the church.” One simple way that we can start being the church again. One step at a time. Little by little, Christ will work on us, Christ will form us and shape us, little by little, Christ will build this church. Amen and Amen.

Throw Me a Bone Here!

Posted on August 17, 2008Leave a comment

Some days, I think that my cat Turbo secretly wishes to be a dog. He does things that are at times very odd for a cat – like wanting to have his belly rubbed or playing fetch. He also is very good about communicating to us when he is ready to play because he walks into the room with a toy firmly in his mouth and meows… Mraow!

The thing is, our lovely, adorable, little Turbo never wants to play when WE are ready to play. It’s always in the middle of writing a sermon or in the middle of a really intense part of a movie that he shows up ready to go. And he doesn’t make it easy for us either. You see, Turbo likes to stand just outside of the reach of our arms – about four feet away from wherever we are sitting and he drops his toy and looks at us. It’s like he’s saying… “Come and Get it!” Get up and come over here. Drop whatever you are doing and pay attention to me!

Sometimes, I think that its rather annoying. Sometimes I really just wish that he would go away and find someone or something else to play with. Because I have other more important things to focus on. But he stands there near me, with that cute little mraow! And pretty soon, I can’t help but give in.

How many of you have pets in your family? Whether they are big or they are small, whether they live outside or inside, pets are in 63% of American households. I was curious to find out a little more about all of these pets and found estimates from the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association that Americans own approximately 73 million dogs, 90 million cats, 139 million freshwater fish, 9 million saltwater fish, 16 million birds, 18 million small animals and 11 million reptiles.

That’s a lot of animals!

The thing about pets is that they have this amazing ability to make us better people. According to a pet therapist, “Love is the most important medicine and pets are one of nature’s best sources of affection. Pets relax and calm. They take the human mind off loneliness, grief, pain, and fear. They cause laughter and offer a sense of security and protection. They encourage exercise and broaden the circle of one’s acquaintances.” (http://www.sniksnak.com/therapy.html)

This morning, we hear a very different sort of story from Matthew about a how a woman who was callously called a dog – widened the circle of God’s love for Jesus, for the disciples, for the church itself, all in a conversation about table scraps.

And so as I thought about those two things together: about how much I love my cat and how sometimes he really pushes me to the limits and challenges me to move beyond what I am doing, about how he helps me to love more – and about how much that woman was hated and yet how she pushed the boundaries of the gospel and helped Jesus to love better – I got to thinking about table scraps and ever-widening circles. Table scraps and ever widening circles.

First of all, a little background on this passage of scripture. Jesus is walking around with his disciples way out on the border lands of Israel – out by Tyre and Sidon. Now, this would have been like venturing into Iowa State territory for these disciples…. If they were Hawkeye fans that is. People talk funny out there, people look different (okay, well not all that different), but there is definitely some long held animosity between the people of Israel and the people “over there.”

Before they realize it, this woman comes up to them…. And not just any woman, some crazy, foolish Canaanite woman, who starts yelling and begging and pleading with them to heal her demon-possessed daughter. I can just see the disciples now… are you sure that your daughter needs the help… because you are kind of freaking us out!

And then Jesus – the one who is always supposed to have the answers and who models to us how to treat others – surprisingly just ignores the woman. Doesn’t even bother to give her the time of day.

Now, if I were a disciple, and I saw Jesus ignoring someone – I’m not quite sure what I would have thought. It probably seemed like an affirmation of their worst thoughts and assumptions about this woman. It probably seemed like they were way too good to stop and pay attention to this persistent, annoying woman who was starting to make a scene. And so one of the worked up the courage to tug on Jesus sleeve and said… “Let’s figure out some way to ditch this lady… she’s getting on our nerves!”

Now, in most of our scriptures about Jesus, here is the point where Jesus would very firmly put the disciples in their place – take care of the woman’s concern – no matter who she was – and they would be on their way. Hopefully with the disciples having learned a very important lesson. Whenever I read this passage from Matthew, I am ready and waiting and longing for Jesus to give those hooligans a talking to.

But he doesn’t. We don’t know what is going on inside of his head, but he says something very strange to our ears – even today. Jesus says, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” I was sent only to the Jews – that is my mission, that is my focus, that is what I am going to do.

And this woman, this Caananite, certainly wasn’t a Jew. In the gospel of Mark she is called a Syro-Phoenecian woman, but whatever way you look at it, she was definitely not included in the bunch Jesus had in mind. If you remember all the way back to Moses and the promised land, all the way back to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob… the Israelites were promised the land of the Caananites – the land of these people – to live in, to have as their inheritance from God.

Probably the best way that I can communicate to you the kind of racism, hatred and animosity that existed between these people is to think back about a hundred years to the way that Native Americans were treated in our country. Although they lived here long before Europeans ever set foot on the continent, those who came believed that this land of America was our promised land. It was a gift from God and a place where we could grow and live and love. But what came as a result of that was the demonization of a whole group of people – who were seen as nothing more than mongrels and barbarians and dogs to the white culture.

So imagine that kind of history between them, with those kinds of walls dividing this Canaanite woman and Jesus and his disciples, not to mention the fact that he is a man and she is a woman…. knowing that she is not included and not welcomed – this woman drops to her knees in an act of worship and begs Jesus… Lord, Help me.

Scott Hoezee, a biblical scholar wrote in his reflection this week that Jesus’ “ministry is a kind of extended heavenly feeding. (In the previous chapter Jesus fed bread to 5,000 people. Immediately following this morning’s story he will do something similar feeding bread to 4,000 people. Jesus is the bread of life.) And so, this woman is asking for a place at the table, but Jesus, chillingly, relegates her to the floor of life. ‘It’s not right to toss perfectly good bread meant to feed the children to the dogs.’ Jesus calls her a dog. It’s a kind of slur, an epithet, and the disciples no doubt approved.” (Scott Hoezee http://cep.calvinseminary.edu/thisWeek/index.php)

Jesus has just denied this woman what she wants, what she longs for. He has not only done that, but he has insulted her in front of all of these other people.

But what I love about this woman is that she never backs down. She is quick and witty, she rolls with the punches that are thrown at her and she boldly speaks back. “Okay, so you want to call me a dog? Fine. You say that as a dog I don’t deserve the food off of the table. Fine. But you know what? Even dogs get the leftovers from the table. Even dogs get the crumbs that fall under the children’s feet. Even dogs deserve that… so, c’mon! throw me a bone here Jesus!”

Table scraps and ever-widening circles.

Edwin Markham once wrote a quick little poem called Outwitted that describes for me what is going on here. It goes:

He drew a circle that shut me out —
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in.

We drew a circle that took him in… table scraps and ever widening circles.

We don’t know why Jesus initially excluded her, except that he felt like he had a mission to preach the Kingdom of God to the Israelites. So in a sense, he had drawn a line – a boundary – he had placed a limit on what he was willing or able or felt called to do. He had drawn a circle that shut her out.

But then this woman had the wit and the courage and daring to flip his statements on him and to draw the circle big enough so that she was not only included, but that others could be included as well.

In our Roundtable Pulpit discussion this week, we talked a lot about the table scraps – the crumbs from the gospel feast that are leftover or fall to the floor. Jesus is of course talking about himself, and his ministry and his calling to find and feed and care for the children of Israel. But even as he does so, as he goes out into the world teaching and preaching, there will be others around who will benefit also. They might have been eavesdropping as Jesus preached the Sermon on the Mount. Maybe they were the neighbors of someone who was healed. Perhaps they saw the multiplication of the loaves and fishes – were on the outskirts of the crowd as the food was passed around. In any case, there were numerous people who were not of the Jewish faith and heritage, who were receiving the gospel. Whether or not Jesus was talking directly to them.

We don’t know if Jesus knew this all along and he was just acting out the kind of transformation he wanted his disciples to embody, or if Jesus really did learn and grow as a result of his conversation with this woman.

What we DO know is that after she had drawn the circle bigger – by having the courage to say that even she, a “dog though she may be”, had the right to eat the table scraps – Jesus had nothing but praise and willingness in his heart toward her.

“Woman! You have GREAT FAITH!” He cried out. Like she had won a prize at the fair he made sure that everyone around him – Jew and Gentile alike – knew that this woman, this Canaanite, this nobody who he had but moments ago unkindly called a “dog” – was not only faithful, but that her plea for help would be answered. Immediately, we are told, her daughter was healed.

Here is the talking to I was waiting for! Here is the moment when this woman and Jesus partner up to stretch all of our hearts open just a little bit farther. And as they do so, they challenge all of us to think about who we are ministering to out in the world.

You see, it’s easy to get caught up in a mission. It’s easy to get caught up in one defined goal. But if we aren’t careful, we allow that one thing to so define our work in the world that we have in fact drawn a circle. We have built a wall and we have imprisoned the gospel. Because, although we may think we know exactly who should be included in our ministry, we have to remain open to whomever God sends our way. Because as Taylor says, God [is busy] rubbing out the lines we have drawn around ourselves and calling us into the limitless country of his love.

Dan Nelson writes that “Even Jesus, who presumably has diving authorization for his limits” – you know, that whole “I was sent…” thing – Even, Jesus “allows those limits to be stretched by another’s necessity. In other words, the rule here is that there is no rule, only a creative tension between our finite capacities and the world’s infinite need.” (http://sio.midco.net/danelson9/yeara/proper15a.htm)

Our finite capacities and the world’s infinite need.

Jesus as fully God never stopped being aware of this woman’s need and he never stopped loving her. But Jesus as the person who was also fully human was very aware of his limitations – of the demands on his time and energy. And maybe in this situation he had some of his priorities mixed up, but the love and the mercy were always there.

That’s the message that we get from our Romans text this morning. Paul is here writing about whether or not the love of God changes – if people can ever fall out of their standing with God – if we can ever be rejected. And his message is simple: NO. You see, as many times as we turn our back upon God’s grace and mercy, God never turns God’s back upon us. God is always there, waiting to take us back in and longing for each one of us to turn to him.

In the Old Testament, Israel was chosen, not because they were the only ones that God loved, but because they were to be a beacon to the nations – they were charged with the task of making God’s name known throughout the world. God’s vision and God’s love was always universal in scope – but that love began in just one corner of the world with one group of people.

As Paul writes Romans, he is living in a world in which his own people – those lost children of Israel that Jesus kept talking about – have rejected Jesus as their savior. They are like ungrateful children who take the bread that has been graciously set on the table and throw it on the floor.

And ironically – Paul says – their disobedience, has allowed all of us to gather up the crumbs and has allowed all of us to enter into a life with God.

The Message translation of the Bible has this wonderful way of sharing that message with us and it reads:

There was a time not so long ago when you were on the outs with God. But then the Jews slammed the door on him and things opened up for you. Now they are on the outs. But with the door held wide open for you, they have a way back in. In one way or another, God makes sure that we all experience what it means to be outside so that he can personally open the door and welcome us back in.

God makes sure that we all expedrience what it means to be on the outside, so that he can personally open the door and welcome us back in. The reality is, all of us have disobeyed. All of us have turned our backs on God at one point in our lives or another. All of us are as unworthy as the disciples thought that Canaanite woman was to receive God’s grace.

And yet it is offered anyways.

And it keeps being offered in ways that stretch us and stretch our hearts and stretch the gospel around the world. In our final hymn today, we will sing in the second verse the following words:

Wider grows the kingdom, reign of love and light;
for it we must labor, till our faith is sight.
Prophets have proclaimed it, martyrs testified,
poets sung its glory, heroes for it died.
Forward through the ages, in unbroken line,
move the faithful spirits at the call divine.

Forward through the ages, that love of God has gone. Forward through the ages there have been people both shut out and pulled into that glorious kingdom by our actions and by our words.

We are finite and there are limits to what we can do – but never should we put boundaries around the gospel. Never should we try to determine who is and who isn’t worthy. Because our boundaries will never be able to contain the vastness of God’s love and mercy.

Three Simple Rules: Stay In Love With God

Posted on July 20, 2008Leave a comment

http://sermon.net/swf/mpp.swf

Sermon Text: Psalm 119: 105-112, Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
Hymns for the Day: Stay in Love with God

Two weeks ago, we began exploring together the three simple rules of a Wesleyan community. These were the rules that Wesley himself taught and encouraged his classes and societies to follow – rules that would help them to grow in their faith and to become stronger disciples of Jesus Christ.

When we talked about the first rule – to do no harm – we talked about the ways we are freed from our old lives and from our old ways when we begin this walk with Jesus. We held onto the passage from Matthew, “Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. My yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Doing no harm is not about a list of Don’ts and rules that are impossible to follow – it is about trying our best to live our lives aware of how we hurt others (knowingly or unknowingly) – and then, with the grace of God, trying to live differently. Doing no harm is about laying down the burdens of past guilt and pain and starting a new with the yoke of Christ, who promises to lead us and to teach us.

Last week, we explored the second rule – to do good – and we did so by exploring the parable of the sower. In this parable of Jesus, the sower could really be more like a foolish farmer – because he scattered his grain everywhere – on the path, in the rocks, in the weeds and finally on good soil. While it sprouted in many of those places – only in the good soil did it bear fruit. So we talked about the importance of tending our lives, of becoming the kind of people in which the word of God could not only be planted but grow. We become good soil by taking care to pull the weeds in our lives – the worldly cares that distract us, and by carefully rooting out the rocks – those people and situations which lead us to turn our backs on God’s word. And we also remembered our call to cultivate and nurture goodness in other people’s lives as well – through loving them, caring for them, and sharing our hope and joy.

This week – we listen for the last rule. In the General Rules, this third command is to “attend upon all the ordinances of God,” but in his book Three Simple Rules, Bishop Ruben Job reframes this third command as “Stay in Love with God.”

Those may sound like two very different things – but today we are going to look at how taking time to worship with a community, to pray, to study the scriptures, to fast, and to gather around the Lord’s Table – are about love – and about sustaining a relationship with the God who first loved us. Doing each of these things on a regular basis – making them habits and practices of our lives – is how we respond to God’s love for us… they are how we uphold our end of the relationship.

Now, I wouldn’t call myself a relationship expert by any means, but in just two weeks, my husband and I will celebrate one full year of marriage. One full year of living with those promises to love, honor and cherish each other. One full year of “for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer.”

Now, we have learned many things over the years of our relationship, and this year of married life has been no exception. The thing is, when you are in a relationship with someone – you constantly have to work on it! There is always a give and a take, always the necessity to listen and to speak the truth of your heart, always the opportunity to grow.

A few months ago, Brandon and I finally settled into our routines around the house. And you know what – they become just that – routines. We each knew what was expected of us, and set about to do our business. But the thing was, distance started to grow between us because each of us was off in our own little world – doing our own thing.

One day, when Brandon had finished mowing the yard, I told him thank-you for his work. Thanked him for standing outside in the hot sun and getting that job done. I was kind of surprised at myself that I hadn’t thanked him any of the other times he had mowed. I started to wonder when the last time I HAD thanked him was.

And you know what… later that week, he thanked ME for putting the dishes away. And we sat down and talked about the fact that it really does make us feel loved and appreciated to hear those words… and promised to keep saying thank you for the little things. Instantly, we felt closer and more connected than we had in a long time. All because we took the time to share the love that was there.

And that’s true of any relationship. We too easily take our love for granted and forget about what our partner, our sibling, our children are doing and who they are, and we need to stop sometimes – no, we need to stop often – and take time to work on our relationships.

I believe Wesley has this third rule here because the same is true of our relationship with God. We need to work on it. We need to stop taking God’s love for granted and really explore and listen for what God has done for us… is doing for us, and then we need to share our own response of love.

In the scriptures this morning, we catch glimpses of what God’s love for us is like. Matthew shares with us five very short and very different parables about the kingdom of heaven… Or as Larry Patten rephrases it – the Realm of Love.

You see, the kingdom that Jesus is talking about isn’t some far off place, or even a heaven that awaits us after death – but about “the time when all of humanity will be governed by God’s love.” (John Shearman – www.seemslikegod.org). This Realm of Love, Jesus tells us, is like a very tiny, insignificant seed that is planted into the ground – but that springs up and grows as large as a tree! It is a seed that has already been carefully placed in our lives –love that is growing for us and in us.

This Realm of Love, this time of living according to God’s love, is like a small measure of yeast that is hidden inside the flour for the daily bread – yeast that will miraculously transform that loaf from a flat, lifeless lump into fluffy, fresh, abundant bread. The yeast too is like the love of God, hidden within us, growing and transforming our lives and the whole world.

Jesus goes on to say the Realm of Love, is like a man who sees something shining in the midst of the muddy field. And so he makes his way to that small glimmer of light, only to find a precious treasure buried there in the ground. And he covers that precious treasure back up and goes to sell everything that he has – all of his possessions, all that is nearest and dearest to his heart, so that he can buy that field and obtain that treasure for himself. That’s what God’s love is like…

This Realm of Love, this time when all of us will live according to God’s love, is also like a business man, a seller of fine jewels, who finds the one perfect pearl, and sells all that he has – ships, stores, buys out his employees, even sells his own house in order to have this one precious pearl.

These are just glimpses of God’s end of the relationship. The lengths that God goes to – the care with which God plants the seeds of love within us and waits patiently for them to grow.

Paul makes it all very clear in the book of Romans – “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” And Paul says so with utmost confidence, because he knows the lengths that God has gone to in order to reach out to his children. He testifies that God the Father is so on our side, so willing to do anything for a relationship with us, that he did not even spare his own Son – gave even a part of God’s-self up, in order that we might be a part of the family of God. God sees all of us, sees each and every single one of you as a precious treasure hidden away or as that precious pearl that is without cost – and is willing to give up everything in order to show you how much you are loved.

This third rule – to stay in love with God – is about how we respond to that love. And this third rule is what really separates us as followers of Christ from the rest of the world.

Because, you know there are many good and honest, hard-working people out there who try their best to do good and who avoid the temptation to do evil. And I have known enough of these good and honest and loving people to know that they can do so without acknowledging God, without the church, and in many cases denying that either of those things are needed.

And there are many people in this room right now, and I would be the first to admit that at times I have been one of them, who are just trying their best to lead a good and faithful life, and they know what God asks of them, but can’t seem to find the time (or make the time) for all of these things God calls us to do.

Perhaps the prime example is a phrase we have all heard – and probably even said ourselves at some point in our life: I don’t need to go to church on Sunday – I can worship God in my own way. I pray, I read the Bible, what do I need the church for?

I’ll admit, I have said those words myself, and there are some things true about those statements. Yes, we can worship God outside of the church and outside of Sunday mornings. Yes, we can worship and praise God on our own. But – God also calls us to a public – a corporate – relationship with him.

In his book, “Being Methodist in the Bible Belt (A Theological Survival Guide for Youth, Parents, and other Confused Methodists),” F. Belton Joyner shares why we need to worship with others. Not only does it provide accountability in our journey of faith – helps to keep us on track… but it is how we acknowledge that we are a part of the Body of Christ – that we need others and that this journey is not just our own. Public worship reminds us that we follow a God who has called a people into being – not just individuals. Public worship is also a time to confess that we have done things that break the unity God desires for us –that we are not yet living in that time when God’s love rules all of our lives. (55-56)

Not only do we need each other to worship God fully, but, in all honesty – those times when I fell out of the habit of attending church regularly… I also tended to fall out of the habit of praying and studying the scriptures. It is hard to maintain those practices and disciplines when others aren’t there to sustain you in that journey. And when we let go of things like fasting and reading the bible, gathering together at the Lord’s Supper – they we also tend to take our relationship with God for granted.

Bishop Job reminds us about how Christ modeled how we should live, writing:

We can accuse Jesus of many things, but we cannot accuse him of neglecting his relationship with God. He must have learned early how important it was to stay close to God if he was to fulfill his mission in the world. He must have learned early that there was a power available to live the faithful, the fruitful, the good life and that this power involved staying connected, staying in touch, staying in love with his trusted Abba. He found not only his strength and guidance but his greatest joy in communion, companionship with his loving Abba.(56)

God was willing to give up everything to have a relationship with you. God has been reaching out, yearning for you to not only stay in love with him, but to deepen your relationship with him. Henri Nouwen writes “[Jesus] whose only concern had been to announce the unconditional love of God had only one question to ask, ‘Do you love me?’” (In the Name of Jesus, pg 36-37).

Do you love God? And if you do, are you willing to do what it takes to sustain the relationship? Are you ready to choose today to say yes and to faithfully open yourself up to God’s love? He is waiting with opens arms… Do you love me? Do you?

Three Simple Rues: Do Good

Posted on July 13, 2008Leave a comment

http://sermon.net/swf/mpp.swf

Sermon Text: Psalm 119: 105-112, Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
Hymns for the Day: For the Beauty of the Earth, Thy Word is a Lamp, Stay in Love with God

This morning, we have the chance to explore Wesley’s second rule… Do Good… but before we do – I have a quick pop quiz for you all… Who remembers what the first rule is? Who remembers what we talked about last week?

That’s right… Do No Harm… Last week, we began this short series by talking about the things that we should avoid if we want to keep our hearts and our minds and our bodies focused on the Kingdom of God. And while the list of “don’ts” in our faith can sometimes be discouraging – we were also comforted by the notion that Christ will teach us and guide us – that his yoke is easy and his burden is light.

This week – our general rule is to do good. And we get the chance to explore our rural roots as we think about what it means to not only do good – but to become good soil. Matthew’s parable of the crazy gardener – the one who threw seed everywhere – on the path, on the rocks, among the weeds and finally in good soil – helps us to understand what kinds of things we need to cultivate in our lives for the good news of God to grow.

I love these parables of Matthew – probably because I love the earthiness of them. I love the fact that they make you think about getting your hands dirty. You see, even before we moved back to Iowa, I knew that one of my top priorities wherever I would land would be to plant a garden. Planting a garden – putting roots into the ground – meant a lot to me for quite a few reasons. First of all, it makes me think of my paternal grandparents – my Babi and Deda. Deda passed away in October of 2006 and almost all of my memories of him are walking around with a shovel and tending their rather large gardens. And then whatever came out of the ground, Babi would prepare and we would eat fresh or canned fruits and vegetables whenever I was at their house. I wanted to plant a garden because I wanted to grow things like they did and then eat the fruits of my labor. Let me tell you, there is NOTHING like a tomato fresh from the garden.

I also wanted to plant a garden because it meant that I was putting down roots. From the year 2000 and on, I moved a total of twelve times. Every summer it seemed like I was moving to a new place and in all of that time, the longest I stayed anywhere was two years. I remember at one apartment in Nashville, a place where I thought I might stay a while, I planted flowers alongside my windows. But I moved before they ever came up. Putting down roots – finding a home – and claiming your little spot of the world – it feels important to me somehow.

I’m reading a book right now called “A Blade of Grass.” It is set in the southern part of Africa and much of the book has to do with the tension between African natives and the Dutch farmers that have settled their lands. One of the characters in the book, a young woman named Tembi, takes seeds from a fruit that her father has sent her and carefully dries them and then plants them in a secret place on the farm. It is her little corner of the world – a place where only she knows about – and with deep care, she travels there every day to water the ground, to nourish the seeds, and to watch them grow.

I am the daughter of farmers. And that yearning to grow things lies within me.

Actually growing things – that can be a different matter all together!

This spring, I started with the flowerbeds in front of our house. I got some beautiful flowers at Marge’s and set to work in the beds. And spent all afternoon breaking apart the soil, digging holes, and getting things just right. And the flowers have grown – right along with the weeds. And there just doesn’t seem to be enough time in the day to tend those little flower beds – to pull the weeds and to water the flowers and to take care of the soil the way it should be taken care of. But the flowers are growing.

In the backyard, there are two patches in the middle of the yard designated for growing things (besides the hostas which I have left alone for the most part). One is a patch of flowers and weeds – that I can’t tell the difference between and so they simply grow as they wish… and the other is a bare patch of dirt right next to them.

Oh, I had grand intentions for that little plot of dirt. My neighbors can attest to the many afternoons I spent pulling out the weeds that I had started growing there, using the claw to break up the clumps, and raking out all of the roots that had made their home in that little patch. So many hours and days spent in that little patch of ground to make it suitable for growing. To turn it into good soil. And then, no time to actually plant anything. My sister in law started a whole bunch of seeds growing for the two of us – but when the floods came, and we weren’t sure if we would get up there to see them, she planted it all in the garden behind her house.

All of that work this spring has reminded me about what it takes to become “good soil” – to be the kind of people in which God’s word takes root and becomes fruitful. It takes WORK to become good soil. Just like the ground needs to be tilled, weeded, watered and cared for – so our spiritual lives need to be tended… it doesn’t happen all on its own!

While we can sit around and just wait for the Holy Spirit to do its thing and plant seeds of love in our lives, if we aren’t a little bit proactive, then we run the risk of becoming like all of those other types of soil – in which the gospel didn’t bear fruit.

You see, some of us just sit on the path and don’t take any risks at all. Doug Dauenbaugh reminded me that a path is made by many people traveling the same patch of ground over and over again. On Babi and Deda’s farm, cattle were always kept in the pasture and I remember as a child following those cow paths to get to the creek or the back fields. The problem with being a “path person” is that you kind of have one purpose – to be walked upon… and whatever seeds fall upon you are easily picked up and taken away by the breeze, by a bird, or by the wheels of whatever truck happens to be passing by. “Path people” have a sort of one track mind – one way, one purpose, one truth and everything else just fails to stick.

Then there are people whose soil is crowded with rocks. As Matthew explains this gospel, these are people who may joyfully embrace the love of God into their lives, but the ground that they live in is not a place where seeds can grow – and when trouble arises, the new growth quickly fades. During my time in Nashville, I had the opportunity to take a class at Riverbend State Penitentiary and one of the inmates there knew that he was a “Rock Person.” He had grown up in a very troubled home, a troubled neighborhood and town really and no matter where he turned, he was led into a life of crime. In prison, the gospel had the chance to grow within him – but he was saddened by the thought that if he returned home – back to that rocky soil – everything that he had learned about God might fade away. He told me that he didn’t want to go back home – but that he wanted to find a place to make a fresh new start. Many of the children in our communities have this sort of experience – and they experience the awesome power of God’s love at camp or at vacation bible school and their lives are on fire – but then they return home to families that won’t support their new found faith or friends who don’t understand.

Third we have the “Weed Person.” I think that if we are honest with ourselves, this is where many of us are. Matthew claims that the weeds that inhabit this soil are the cares of the world that crowd out the word of God in our lives. Remember those two weeks we spent talking about priorities – about how hard it is to choose God above everything else and to in some cases have to weed people, activities, even things we love out of our lives? This is exactly the kind of soil we are talking about… this is the kind of soil that lives in my yard. And while you aren’t even looking – over night even – cares of all sorts can start to grow and take on roots and pretty soon your good soil starts looking mighty crowded. Pretty soon, your life starts to look like my backyard – where in that one patch I can’t tell which green things are weeds and which are flowers…. Mostly because the flowers aren’t in bloom. And I have to ask myself… would they be blooming – would they be bearing fruit, if some of those other weeds had been pulled out and if they had been given the room to grow?

This brings us to the “good soil.” When John Wesley wanted his flock to “do good” he meant an active good – he meant that he wanted them to lead lives that were busy with doing good things and taking care of one another. In the General Rules for the Societies, these types of things include caring for our neighbor’s bodies and souls. They include things like helping one another out in the community of faith. All of these things are about tending and nurturing the soil, not only of our own lives, but of those around us as well – tending and nurturing the whole community of faith.

In Reuben Job’s “Three Simple Rules” he thinks about a number of ways in which we try to limit the expansiveness of this “do good” rule. And perhaps here is where the garden metaphor limits us. Because Job reminds of Jesus command to do good to everyone: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.” (Luke 6:27-28) … not just those who live in a small and carefully tended part of our lives. Job writes: “every act and every word must pass through the love and will of God and there be measured to discover if its purpose does indeed bring good and goodness to all it touches.” Every act and every word!

Maybe instead of becoming the good soil of a garden, we are to become like compost or fertilizer that is added to other soil – spreading good to everyone we meet! And especially when we think about compost, we are talking about something that must be constantly nurtured and turned and stirred up to have its true impact. Just like weeds can spring up in the soil overnight – we cannot be content with giving a few hundred dollars here and there to charity or to the church… doing good is an active, life changing way of being. Becoming the good soil is not about becoming a Christian and then coasting through life… it is about becoming a Christian and then constantly, consistently, growing into the likeness of Christ.

We do good to others and seek the goodness of God not for some reward… not because our works will get us into heaven… we do good because we desperately want to love and honor God. We do good because we want to become like Christ. We do good and love others, because we were first loved by God and all of that goodness is simply overflowing within us. But it doesn’t happen all by itself. It takes work. Hard work. And sometimes it means that our hands need to get a little dirty. But when we make “doing good” one of the rules by which we live – we will not only find ourselves traveling in Christ’s footsteps – we may actually get to see Christ in the faces of those we serve. So let us do good – let us seek good in our own lives, in the lives of our neighbors, and for the whole world – Let us not only become like the good soil – bringing forth fruit, but let us help good soil to be nurtured in other places in the world so that the love of God might flourish there as well. Amen and Amen.