Humble Heir

Sermon Genesis 15:1-12, 17, 18 February 21, 2016 Lent 2C

Humble Heir

Lent is a time of reflection and a time of opportunity. In Lent we intentionally choose to think about those who have influenced our life of faith. We take the time to think about all the people who have influenced our lives.

We think about how the courage and fortitude of others has impacted who we are today. We think about those people who mentored us, those people who changed the course of our lives just by being faithful to their principles and their understanding of what mattered.

We think about those who we know followed the call of God. Often the people that influenced us most were not the ones getting the accolades and fame, but the ones who quietly and humbly walked through life, steadfast and true to their calling.

                                         Who were or are those people for you?

Abram was the heir to all the promises of God for a future people. He was an heir to a promise that he would not see until the fourth generation. Abram was granted righteousness because he followed God, believed God, and listened to God.

Abram, we consider a humble man, not because he blindly obeyed, but because he had the courage and boldness to follow through even in the midst of uncertainty. He was promised much from God but remained as true as possible to who he was. He messed up, he did some dumb things, he wasn’t perfect, yet he kept going with the promise God had given him as his hope for the future. A future he was not sure he would see.

And so when God comes to him again in this chapter he begins to speak and ask questions.

Here is the question of faith for us:
Can a person who has doubts, and questions God be an example for us about faithfulness?
If a person asks questions about God’s plan and God’s actions in their life does this make them unfaithful?
If a person is in this situation are they having a crisis of faith?

This story of Abram-and perhaps many more Biblical stories-demonstrate for us that his journey is our journey and the doubts, the questions, and the uncertainty are not a crisis but an element of faith.

Frederick Buechner says, “Faith is better understood as a verb than a noun, as a process than a possession. It is on-again-off-again rather than once-and-for-all. Faith is not being sure where we are but going anyway. A journey without maps. Tillich said that doubt isn’t the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.”

 

Brian Peterson-Night Sky

As we look to this story of Abram we notice three elements of his faith as he converses with God.

1.       This first element of faith we witness is that God speaks and Abram listens.

In our time alone with God do we give God room to speak or are we the ones doing all the talking. Some of the ways we give room for God to speak is by sitting quietly with God’s Word and allowing the words from the text to sift into our minds. We pause and maybe we fall asleep, or maybe our mind wanders to all the distractions around us. Can we sit long enough with God to allow God to speak to us in the silence that surrounds us? If we like to fish or hunt or garden or cook or sew or knit or clean; can we allow the words from God to filter into those activities of our lives to offer us guidance and peace?

2.      The second element of faith we witness in this story is that God promises and Abram believes.

Abram trusts God’s promises. I think most of us trust God’s promises of love and life too. The promise of God that I believe Abram trusted was God’s power and presence. He recognized in hearing God that God was with him even in his questions and doubts. Abram knew God enough to ask God the how and even the why questions. He trusted God’s presence enough even to challenge God about God’s purposes. When we struggle to understand the direction or the course of life we are on, it only makes sense to ask God what this means and if there will be something revealed to help us know we are still moving in the right direction. We face many struggles and in our struggles we are faced with anxiety, fears and doubts.

I find it a comfort to be able to reach out to God and question it all.

It is not our lack of faith that puts us there but our desire to be faithful!

Show us God!

Help us see!

We read that Abram believes God after he is shown the stars in the sky.

But, is it the stars he believes, or the future, or the existence of God?

Somehow Abram finds assurance of who God is and who he is in this exchange of words and dreams. Yes, it’s in his exchange with God, his connection, his conversation, that he finds his assurance. In his exchange with God he is affirmed and that brings him to belief.

And perhaps when we exchange our doubts and fears with God we too can find assurance.

Hebrews 11:1 Says faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

3.      And the third element (I’m certain there are many more, but these we observe today), God commands and Abram obeys.

Abram doesn’t have answers to all his questions. he doesn’t have the details of the future spelled out for him and he certainly doesn’t have a blueprint, excel file, or map of where to go or what to do next. Abram doesn’t even fully understand what God meant.
But, he forged forward anyway.

These elements of faith sustain.

And so do the prayers of faithful people.

This past week as you know has been difficult in our family’s loss. Yet-we have been carried by your prayers as if being raised up on wings of eagles.

Prayers are our life blood.

And they hold me now as I try to talk about Abram and faith.

The thing that hurts is Faith is the name given to our granddaughter and in her loss,

Baby Faith-Tiny Feet

it hurts just to say it.

Perhaps, that is the truth about our faith and our walk with God

sometimes it hurts just to say it.

And sometimes it hurts to live it.

And sometimes it hurts to know its truth-faith in God is from everlasting to everlasting. And when we or I remember that, then
saying,

living,

speaking

Faith
is joy

and the hurt is mingled with wonder and love that fills our hearts with peace.

Faith is this mystery that carries us from day to day.

It is the hope we have in the promises given to us in Jesus Christ.

The promises of love to sustain through all things.

The example and person of Jesus Christ renews the promise that we are heirs to all God has for us.

In this Lent let us open our hearts and minds to listen, believe and be led forth not only for ourselves but for future generations.

Amen.

Resource: Feasting on the Word-Dan Debevoise; Wishful Thinking-Frederick Buechner. 

The Sign of Jonah

Sermon Jonah 3:1-4:4; Matthew 12:38-41 February 17, 2016

Ecumenical Lenten Noonday Services

The Sign of Jonah

What sign are you looking for? Is it a sign that Jesus lives? Is it a sign that there is purpose to your life? Is it a sign to give you direction of where you should go next? Is it a sign to let you know where you are? Is it a sign to know who or whose you are? What sign are you looking for?

In this season of Lent we spend time with signs and symbols remembering who Jesus is and the life he lived. We spend time looking to the cross and to Jerusalem remembering the sacrifice that Jesus gave so that we might have life in him through the grace of God poured out upon us. We spend time eagerly awaiting the miracle of Easter morn when we can say, “The Lord is Risen, Indeed!”

The signs are all around us this season;

the miracles,

the Word,

the palms,

the cross,

the bread,

the cup,

the tomb.

They are all here inviting us into an imagination of understanding God’s love for us.

The leaders in the time of Jesus had high expectations in their imagination of God’s love.

They hoped for another Moses, or Elijah.

They wanted great signs and miracles.

And Jesus let them know the sign they would receive would be the sign of Jonah-“the Son of man will be in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights.

The people of Ninevah will rise up in judgment of this generation because they repented, and see something greater than Jonah is here!” Something greater right here-in front of you!

Yet, even with the very words of Jesus,

 the sign of God’s love and mercy for the people of that generation wasn’t even noticed and even worse,

it was rejected!

Fast forward to today’s generation and we are no different!

We are still looking to the God of our imagination to say the words

we want to hear and

to look the way we want,

and to regard and respect only those people we regard and respect.

We need to hear about the sign of Jonah and the people of Ninevah and the unfailing love of Jesus.

Especially today!

God poured out love, mercy and salvation on a people that everyone loved to hate.

It would have been Jonah’s greatest joy to watch God destroy this wicked and evil people.

And yet, God went against Jonah’s ideal of God’s love and brought salvation to a repentant people.

Jonah was angry!

How angry do we get when God loves those we don’t?

How dare God love the people we love to hate! Who are the ones we want to see destroyed?

Who are our Ninevites?

Who is your Ninevite?

God doesn’t follow our ways.

God follows provisions of grace in every way and in every corner of the world.

And then Jesus, shows up with God’s love born in him.

Jesus carried forth that same love of God to Gentiles, Samaritans, Greeks and Jews, poor, and rich, tall and short.

Perhaps our Lenten discipline this year is to seek to know God.

But, not only know God

but to know the God,

not of our imagination,

but the God,

the One,

who loves those we do not.

Let us allow this God to grow in us and change us. Let us allow this God to grow in us and change us into a community where all can find a place of love and belonging.

Jesus sought to provide communities of love, respect, honor and belonging. And that is our invitation during this season too,

to seek to be like Jesus,

to offer community space where there is respect and regard for one another,

where there is joy and wonder

 of God’s most amazing imaginative love for us.

Out there, there is a lot of angry speech going on.

Out there, there is a lot of naming, and blaming.

Out there, there is a lot of dislike for the ‘other’.

Out there, there seems to be no room for love and belonging.

So,

in here,

in these pews;

Let us make a commitment this season,

to cease the ‘out there’ language

and to embrace the power of Jesus

to love beyond our imagination!

Let us allow Jesus

to challenge us to

go

beyond the signs

we expect

but to take us into places of respect and honor

that we have never gone before.

We need the opportunity to know who and whose we are and it can only happen in the safe, sacred, spaces we provide for one another wrapped in the loving arms of Jesus.

Friends, God’s promise of love to us is from everlasting to everlasting,

and no human imagination can change that.

Love freely given, freely offered for all to receive.

May the mercy, grace, and love of God through Jesus Christ fall upon us, now and forevermore. Amen. 

Five Seconds of Fame

Sermon Luke 9:28-36 February 7, 2016 Transfiguration

Five Seconds of Fame

Today the church calendar indicates that this is Transfiguration Sunday. Next Sunday is the first Sunday in Lent where we begin our journey with Jesus to the cross and the empty tomb.

Every year before we begin the journey with Jesus through the stories about his life, death, and resurrection, we return to this story of Jesus going to the mountain to pray.

This story about Jesus, James, John and Peter appears in three gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke. Jesus is on the mountain and the three disciples with him are tired and they doze off. We learn that Jesus is praying and during his prayer the appearance of his face changes and his clothes become dazzling white. Moses and Elijah show up and are talking to Jesus. Then the two men begin to disappear. Peter calls out to Jesus and recommends they build some tents so everyone can hang out together. As Peter is saying this, a cloud comes over them and the voice from the cloud says, “This is my son, my chosen, listen to him.”

Then poof, Jesus is by himself with the disciples. The cloud, the wonder, and all the glory is gone.

Jesus is back to being the Jesus the disciples have known from the beginning. But, something in the disciples has changed.

They have been transformed.

They have been changed forever.

They have experienced the unexplainable.

They have seen the glimpse, the vision of God.

This is the experience that everyone refers to when they talk about having a mountaintop experience of their own.

People are seeking experiences that change their lives;

opportunities to be transformed into new ways of being.

Some seek to find meaning to life by traveling the world

and then writing books about it.

Others are out there seeking fame

or glory

or a million likes

or a chance to appear on pop culture news,

or have a video or selfie go viral.

All are seeking & searching.

Perhaps it’s for that one moment of ‘five seconds of fame’.

Or perhaps it’s for thrill, or for need of purpose.

Back in the 60’s Andy Warhol said that all people would end up being famous for 15 minutes.

No one knew he would be a prophet; because with today’s social media there is constant hype about the tiniest and silliest of things.

-You could be on national news tomorrow based on one selfie or one twitter quote.

Imagine if Peter had had an Instagram account while he was on the mountain?

In today’s world it is no longer fifteen minutes of fame people get,

it is much shorter,

that’s why I say five seconds.

The glimpses of stardom or attention are just that.

Short lived and quickly forgotten.

Peter’s desire to make tents to hang out for a while was just a natural response to wanting the wonder and the glory of the moment to last.

It was an appropriate reaction to being in the presence of a holy moment.

It makes sense to want to honor and preserve our glimpses into the sacred.

But,

even the sacred

and the holy moments

can’t be held on to in ways of statues, or houses, or tents.

It’s as though those moments slip through our fingers

and we wonder why.

We want to relive and recapture the time when we saw the glow and the dazzle of God before us.

We seek to have this all the time and wonder what’s wrong with us when we don’t.

Those times in our lives when we enter into an experience of the sacred and glory of God, they change us.

There seems to be an awakening within,

a clarity of vision,

a sense of direction.

At these times our very being has the courage and the power to change the course of our lives.

These times we note as transformation.

We, like Moses, have stepped on holy ground.

We, like Peter, have seen the glory of God surround us.

We, like Jesus, have heard God call us chosen and child of God.

We have been dazzled by the presence of grace.

These moments are important to our story of our journey with God. That is why we come to the mountain again this year.

We have the opportunity together to remember our glimpse into the holiness of God. We have the moment in which we can remember that we have been transformed as Jesus was transfigured before our eyes.

We are witnesses to the mystery of God before us and God within us.

And so, with this dazzle still in our memory we have what it takes to go down the mountain and deal with the needs of daily life.

We will not be overcome or over whelmed by the pressures of the world.

We will be able to reach out and touch and do

because the One who can shine from glory to glory

is the same one who will shine through us

as we respond to voice that calls out our name.

We can and we will receive and be blessed. Jan Richardson is an amazing woman, artist author, and poet. She shares this Dazzled poem for us this year. Hear this blessing from Jan Richardson.

DAZZLING

A Blessing for Transfiguration Sunday

Believe me, I know
how tempting it is
to remain inside this blessing,
to linger where everything
is dazzling
and clear.

We could build walls
around this blessing,
put a roof over it.
We could bring in
a table, chairs,
have the most amazing meals.
We could make a home.
We could stay.

But this blessing
is built for leaving.
This blessing
is made for coming down
the mountain.
This blessing
wants to be in motion,
to travel with you
as you return
to level ground.

It will seem strange
how quiet this blessing becomes
when it returns to earth.
It is not shy.
It is not afraid.

It simply knows
how to bide its time,
to watch and wait,
to discern and pray

until the moment comes
when it will reveal
everything it knows,
when it will shine forth
with all that it has seen,
when it will dazzle

with the unforgettable light
you have carried
all this way.

- See more at: http://paintedprayerbook.com/#sthash.KCsKoSYI.dpuf

AMEN.

Resources: Feasting on the Word, Painted Prayer book.