Power & Wealth

Sermon Mark 10:17-31 October 14, 2018 year B Ordinary Time

Power & Wealth

As I was seeking or I should say, sifting through my books and papers for an opener related to power and wealth for this sermon, I ran across a book titled, “The Last Lecture”.

 A man named Randy Pausch, an engineer who taught at the University of Virginia, wrote a book based on his last lectures. 

In his introduction to the book he wrote this, “I have an engineering problem.” “While for the most part I’m in great physical shape, I have ten tumors in my liver…” Randy goes on to explain the purpose of his book. 

He asks the question of “How to live his limited time left in this life.” 

He explains the book is his way of talking to his children who were too young to understand the grown up world. He wrote, “Engineering isn’t perfect about solutions; its about doing the best you can with limited resources.”

This story in the gospel of Mark is about a man who comes to Jesus with an abundance of resources and wonders what he can do with his life. It is a story of perplexity that we all face. Where do we fit into the scheme of life? What are the questions we are to ask and what do we do with the answers we receive? This man wants to know how to inherit eternal life. I think we all want the answer to that question.

Jesus tells him to obey the law and learns that this man has been an obedient faithful man. This mas seems to be waiting for Jesus to tell him more. He seems to understand as he looks at Jesus that obedience to the law is not enough. He looks at Jesus waiting to be able to ‘do’ more.

And Jesus looks at him and loves him.

Jesus loves him.

Before Jesus says anything.

Before Jesus does anything else with this man.

Before Jesus judges or instructs, or gives advice…before anything….Jesus loves him.

If we could hang on to this before we go any further, we can learn a lot about who we are and how we are in this world.

Jesus loves us.

Before any instructions we get from God, Jesus loves us. Before any work we do well, Jesus loves us. Before any turning our back on the commands of God, Jesus loves us. Perhaps, that’s the most important phrase to remember today.

No matter what, Jesus loves us.

Jesus challenges this man to go. To sell. To give. And to follow. 

He is shocked when Jesus instructs him to do this. He is grieved deeply. It is clear he wants to be engaged with Jesus in some way. But, there is a part of him that cannot fulfill even one of the four actions Jesus demands of him. 

Go. Sell. Give. Follow.

When I began the final preparations for this text, I found it difficult to be preaching about someone with so much wealth when there has been so much devastation around us and people have lost everything. I had a hard time wrapping my head around what it looks like to lose everything. How can Jesus ask someone to give up all they have? And if they do, does it look like what these folks who have been through a storm where they are lucky to be alive? Gosh, I hope not.

We have heard about those in the tsunamis, in the earthquakes, and the hurricanes. I have watched the news over and over again as Hurricane Michael tore across the panhandle of Florida and even here on the Eastern Shore. These dear people have nothing left. They don’t even have a roof over their heads, no cars, nothing. It is too hard to imagine. I am stunned in thinking what this means for people and communities to try to move forward.

Where does what has just happened around the world fit into today’s lesson from Jesus? I struggle with the tension of it all. The situation of losing everything at the will of disaster or the situation of offering up everything to the will of God. What’s the difference if we end up with nothing either way?

Maybe it’s like Randy Pausch describes engineering-it isn’t perfect about solutions; its about doing the best you can with limited resources.” Our limited understanding of the words of Jesus now in the 21^st century only give us a glimpse of what he might have meant. 

We can only speculate. We only work with our limited resources to try to understand.

In this life today, how do we respond to demands and commands from the world in times of disaster? Are we able to let go of our limited resources for the sake of others? Can we offer a dime to the person homeless on the street? Are we able to cope with going on vacation when others in the family are struggling to pay their electric bills?

These are the questions that hit hard. And yet, that is exactly how Jesus is talking to this man in the Bible. Jesus is requiring this man to let go of the control of his life. That’s what go, sell, give and follow are all about. The storms that come along our way in life remind us all to well how we relinquish control of our possessions and even our life. We are not in control as much as we would like to think we are. And if we offer the control to the One who is the creator of the universe, the one who loved us enough to become one of us, perhaps this is where can begin to live the command to go, sell, give, and follow, just a little. Not because we are trying to earn something, but because we have offered the control of it to God.

Jesus turns the question around from ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ to the statement ‘for God all things are possible’.

 It is no longer about earning God’s favor, but receiving God’s love.

Perhaps, Jesus is trying to help this man and his disciples to understand the danger of wealth and how people proudly proclaim, ‘I did it my way’; ‘the self-sufficiency ideal’; which has a way of taking control and power that becomes all about the self rather than looking outward towards a relationship with others and the world.

This man is honest with Jesus when asked to go, sell, give, and follow.

He can’t do it.

He grieves over the fact that he can’t do it.

His heart wants to, but his head says no.

He is honest with Jesus and with himself.

He confesses before him that it is too much to ask of him.

He walks away grieved.

This story is a chance for our honesty to come forth too. It is our chance for transparency.

It is our chance to say to Jesus you are asking too much of me.

It is our chance to witness that even when we walk away grieved Jesus loves us and that never changes.

We all have a limited time.

Whether its five years or fifty years, we have to wonder how we live this life. Jesus is giving us a solution.

Offer this life to God.

In doing so, we will receive abundance here and forever.

When we let go of the worries of this world and this life we discover the treasure of heaven and the abundance of wonder here on earth freely given.

That friends, is abundant life.

To be loved. Always.

With God all things are possible.

Jesus loves us. Now and forever. Amen.

Reverend Monica Gould

PCUSA

Resources: Feasting on the Word; Working Preacher

Our Common Faith

Sermon Hebrew 1:1-4; 2: 5-12 October 7, 2018 World Wide Communion

Our Common Faith

Our opening hymn this morning was Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty. It is a hymn people know. I know because the congregation lets me know when we sing hymns that are unfamiliar. It’s uncomfortable to sing a hymn that we have to learn. But, this hymn we know it within our bones. It’s been around a long time, it’s easy to sing, and we like the words. When we sing the words it makes us feel pretty good.

The words tell a story. 

They tell us a story about God. 

The words tell us who God is; and how we respond to God because of who God is. God is merciful and mighty, God is holy, God is in three persons, God is evermore, God is perfect in love and power. All things fall down before God. Even if the darkness hides the glory of God, God’s glory is still there. 

That’s a lot about God in just one hymn.

That’s what our text from the letter to the Hebrews is like as we read it. 

It’s like a hymn. 

It tells us a lot about God. 

It begins very much the same way the gospel of John begins. It has words about God as if a creed of faith is being shared. The second chapter of Philippians has a creedal hymn as well. These moments in Scripture where we get a glimpse of how the early followers of Jesus sought to understand him and God are powerful testimonies of faith.

The hymn being sung by this unknown author of the letter, takes us back into the history of the prophets. God spoke to these prophets to speak to the people but then God chose a son to speak to the people, yet this son was not just a historical figure in one time and space. This son was also there in the beginning of creation with the reflection of God’s glory. Wow. Just wow. Not only are we hearing that Jesus was a real human sent down from heaven to engage God’s people as an example of God’s love and mercy. But, this same Jesus was there with God and also sustains all things by his powerful word. 

Now if you ask me that’s a lot of God speak. It’s a lot about a God way up there. But, perhaps, it’s really more about the God we have down here.

The God we have down here is a God who puts us into relationship with one another. The God who came down here is the thread that pulled all people back together from every corner of the world and every faith, color, oddness etc.

That God is still here.

We call him Jesus.

The work he did historically we have written in our gospels. We have a creed written about his healings, and his mercy, and his care for the widows and the poor. This creed wasn’t written until 1991. The Nicene creed that we read this morning is full of the substance of who and why God became flesh and dwelt among us.

It is full of the stuff that takes the historical 33 years of Jesus and expands his history from the beginning of time to the end of it.

The alpha and omega.

H. Richard Niebuhr says that Christ is revealed in our history as we view God through our experiences. Our experiences become our story and from our story we reason and interpret that which has value, to us such as economy, politics, and the human race. Niebuhr says we experience God, Jesus Christ, through our own inner history.

Our experience,

our story

becomes the thread

through which God

in Christ is revealed.

Roger Nishioka, a contemporary theologian, says that which we value is the thing that shows us authenticity. He says we want a connection with the God beyond ourselves that also binds us to the world in which we live.

How we encounter our relationship with God

in Jesus Christ is our story

to hold up to the scrutiny of others

and is one that has a need to be told.

Let’s take for example, as he does, the commercials on TV that grab our heart, the ones that deliver a message of unity and of relationship. The beer commercial with the Clydesdale horses, the coca cola commercials, even Cadillac cars have been coming out with ads that stir our hearts. Can our message of the church do that? Can our stories of our inner history with God do that?

Our faith in Christ is what drives us into history and into the world. The apathy that so many say they feel today was also happening in this church that this letter to the Hebrews is written. Can you imagine the church in the first century experiencing boredom? We thought that was just today. We thought the trouble we have with getting people excited about the church was a modern problem.

It’s not.

Apathy and boredom occur when we don’t know our story,

when our story can’t relate to the one around us,

when our story doesn’t come alive within us. 

We can’t make a story come alive within someone else.

The story itself has to be revealed within one’s own inner history.

We can’t force faith to be alive within another.

We can’t pressure anyone into the salvation history of God in Christ.

It doesn’t happen that way.

What we can do is sing the hymns, read the stories, tell of our encounters that have radically formed us and turned us on our heals into the world of faith.

The more we talk about how the powerful love of Christ came alive in us-

even if we don’t understand it we can speak it,

the more this becomes the experience of those who hear it.

These stories become the sustainers of the faith history.

The more we come together,

the more we listen to each others story,

the more we gather and sing,

the more these become part of our inner story.

In this way, faith is revealed,

Christ is seen,

and we become alive.

We come around the Table together. We eat the bread. We drink the cup. We do it together. God is here. And something is revealed deep in us.

We are changed forever.

God is at work. Holy, holy, holy, Lord God, Almighty. Amen.

Reverend Monica Gould

PCUSA

A Sprinkle of Salt

Sermon Mark 9:38-50 September 30, 2018 Ordinary Time

A Sprinkle of Salt

A sprinkle of salt on food is a good thing.

Sodium is essential for nerve and muscle function and is involved in the regulation of fluids in the body. ... Chloride ions serve as important electrolytes by regulating blood pH and pressure. It is excessive amounts that lead to poor health.

A sprinkle of salt is also good for healthy faith and practice.

We are on the road with Jesus as he is making sure his disciples understand what it will be like to be his follower after he is gone. And as he is teaching them they are experiencing real life practical ministry dilemmas. They are still trying to wrap their heads around how to live into being a servant that puts the least of these first in life. What does that look like? How does that work, we asked last week. Before these people of Christ have a chance to experiment this new ideal, they witness other people who are not part of their group doing things in the name of Jesus. They don’t know what to make of this.

John is confused; isn’t he the one following Jesus?

Aren’t John, James, Peter, Mary, and the rest of them with Jesus day and night.

Jesus is their teacher and not someone else’s. Who has the rights to the real Jesus anyway?

Perhaps, the most powerful proclamation from Jesus is here. No one has a corner on Jesus. No one has the claim to Jesus.

Anyone who does the simplest, kindest act toward another is proclaiming Christ and therefore is one of Christ’s disciples.

We live in communities scattered with churches of so many names. We have an obligation to one another to seek to understand and to work together for the sake of peace, grace, and love. Those who are faithful to the love of Christ, to his mission, to all he promises will find his peace fulfilling their hearts and lives.

We are people who live in community and need community.

It is what protects and supports us.

It is what shapes us and forms our faith.

In community we learn, we listen, we discover, we grow. In community we discover our identity, our gifts, our strengths. In community we find our safe space to share the things that frighten us and the things that discourage us. Perhaps this is why Jesus is so adamant about protecting the integrity of anyone who chooses to follow him, whether they are powerful, weak, accepted in society or not. And he is letting the disciple John know there needs to be many communities in the world in Jesus’ name.

The new community is taking shape as the new church in his name and his disciples are wrestling with what that really looks like. Today, here and now, in this 21^st century we are still doing the same-wrestling with the shape of the community of faith in Jesus Christ.

And that’s a good thing.

We are still people with some saltiness sprinkled on us to get us in the right balance of healthy faith. We are still people with grace filling us with peace to share. We are still claimed by God as children of God.

And because of this:

We are still wrestling with how we live this faith and what it looks like to others as we share it.

We are still wrestling with who belongs in the community of faith.

We wrestle between including people and excluding them.

We really struggle over many ideas,

we struggle over things like baptism and what is right.

We struggle over communion, and marriage, and ordination, and faith statements, and buildings, and worship.

So many things cause us to wrestle over the community of faith that Jesus is calling us to be.  

We come back to this text and we hear Jesus say, “Give a cup of water in my name, do a good deed in may name.” Return to the simple commands of practical faith. Do good.

Do not do harm.

Jesus is pretty harsh when it comes to how we treat others. When we study him in Scripture we discover he is intolerant of any abuse to anyone of any kind. And so he takes time to give some harsh commands to match his firm foundation of love, mercy and grace.

He uses the word scandalize. We translate scandalize from Greek to the word, stumble in English. Jesus is extremely protective of those who are marginalized and who are young and small or as he calls them, ‘the least of these.’ He would rather anyone in the community of faith be removed if they dare scandalize, create a stumbling block, for any of these people. It really calls us to task even today as to how we really need to be on guard with our actions and our words with one another. May we never do anything to scandalize another person, Jesus warns.

Jesus continues to talk about some rather gruesome things such as cutting off and poking out body parts. Jesus is not joking that the integrity of his community of faith should not threatened. He wants those who are tearing others apart with dishonor or deceit or disregard to remove their offensive nature by whatever radical means they can in order to be filled completely with mercy and love. Remember friends this is metaphorical not literal.

As a community of faith these instructions from Jesus give us opportunity to put ourselves in check on a regular basis.

All this brings us back to salt. Jesus continues to teach and train the disciples in the practical ways of ministry. His lessons for us are still the same. We are some seasoned folk. We have what it takes to dispel the stuff that would dare to scandalize others. We have what it takes to build a strong community of faith. We have been through some tough times and our faith has been tested in many ways.

We have the power of salt within us to face the world with peace.

Let us get out there and sprinkle a little salt. 

Amen.

Reverend Monica Gould

PCUSA