Light 2021 Christmas Eve meditation

 Sermon Luke 2:8-16 December 24, 2021 Christmas Eve meditation Monica Gould @ NMPC & FMPC

Light

It is in the gospels of Luke and Matthew that we encounter the heavenly raid on earth through the rendering of God with us. The austere thrusting of flesh through flesh to be fully Emmanuel, wonderful counselor, prince of peace is how God chose to bring us the Light of life.

The power of God come to us through images of humanity makes us mesmerized and in awe of God so willing to be entrapped in his own creation of bone upon bone and sinew, and muscle and flesh.

No one saw it coming even though it had been foretold for 700 hundred years. It is still so unbelievable that we encounter the birth of the God who birthed us at the dawn of creation each Christmas as a miracle of love born fresh in our hearts.

The light of life comes to the shepherds in the gospel of Luke. In the gospel of Matthew it is the magi who witness and follow the star.

We ask ourselves how will we get to Bethlehem this night?

Will the angels come to us and announce the Savior’s birth?

Perhaps, like me, you have wanted a disturbance in the night by a grand company of angels making it abundantly clear that Jesus is here.

Each year I seek to draw closer and closer to the light, so I don’t miss out on anything. FOMO, I think is what they call it. Fear of missing out.

The shepherds would have completely missed out of the experience of the presence of Jesus if it had not been for the announcement of the angels. The angels thrust a spotlight from heaven upon the men and women in the field. It was unmistakable that something very heavenly and very God appearing was happening.

If only God could do that for us every year. To send out a spotlight from heaven and cast it down on our house, or in our car, or at our job-and scare the bejeebers out of us so that we’ll see the light and pay attention this time.

photo credit Megan Ames

Every night there is light in the sky to show us the handiwork of God. Every day there is light in the sky to remind us of the warmth of love. We have the sounds of the birds, the creatures, the sea, the storms, the wind, the soft breeze. We are surrounded by the power of God, by the love of God in every breath we take.

This is the good news told to us today.

It is the good news told to us tonight.

It is the good news we are given throughout all of life.

You see the darkness is always showered with light. We only have to have the patience to wait for the moon to rise or the sun to come forth.

So here we are again as God’s people witnessing the great light shatter the darkness announcing the good news. Jesus is here. God’ grace is upon us. There is joy and celebration as the light of life has come to live within us. Let us make haste to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place!! 

Be at peace. Amen.

Photo credit Megan Ames

Resources: NIB Luke. Original works and quotes of Monica Gould 2021. 

Balaam and the Talking Donkey

 Sermon Numbers 22:22-36 October 10, 2021

Balaam and the Talking Donkey

The story of Balaam’s donkey sounds more like folklore than a story from the bible. It seems like something we would watch on Veggie Tales. Or perhaps, it’s a bit more like Dr Doolittle. Talk to the animals. We wish we could.

if I could talk to the animals, just imagine it
Chatting to a chimp in chimpanzee
Imagine talking to a tiger, chatting to a cheetah
What a neat achievement that would be.

If we could talk to the animals, learn their languages
Maybe take an animal degree.
I'd study elephant and eagle, buffalo and beagle,
Alligator, guinea pig, and flea.

I would converse in polar bear and python,
And I Would curse in fluent kangaroo.
If people asked me, can you speak rhinoceros,
I'd say, "Of courserous, can't you?"

If I conferred with our furry friends, man to animal
think of the amazing repartee
If I could walk with the animals, talk with the animals,
Grunt and squeak and squawk with the animals,
and they could talk to me.

What a world it would be if we could understand all that we are going through throughout creation not just among humanity. God would be ever so thrilled to recognize his creation is seeking beyond its own understanding to be engaged with all its surroundings.

The story of Balaam and the donkey that finally yells out to him to warn him for the sake of his life is a remarkable story about how unaware we are of the world beyond our sight.

We constantly think the Old Testament is irrelevant to our life today. Yet, the Book of Numbers is a book that reminds us of our own wanderings in the wilderness of life. It consists of stories, laws, travel itineraries, instructions, worship, altercations, complaining, lots of complaining, lots of turmoil, and frustrations. The stories in Numbers provide a paradigm for communities of faith as they face situations that bring turmoil and especially challenging transitions-Harper Collins. Even the Apostle Paul points out in his writings that these things were written down for our instruction.

So, what is happening in this story that we can draw from to help us in our wanderings of faith?

Let’s start with Balaam. He is a professional prophet who makes money going around cursing groups of people at the king’s command. His actual existence and the existence of his profession can be found among different archaeological records. He has a weapon of words that he uses to hurl insults and warnings and threats to groups of people that the king feels is a threat to his kingdom. We might say today that this is ridiculous! How can words and curses have any effect on people? Apparently back then the prophet would curse a group by calling down fire upon them or sending a plague of boils or crying to the skies to close up the clouds and create a drought.

This brings me to consider the plague that is causing so much turmoil among our current world’s people through the war of words and curses across social media platforms. We’ve never been in a time when the words of others could cut so deep and could affect the life of another. Suicide has been directly linked to the cruelty of language across cyberspace. Perhaps there are still professional prophets out there today who choose to make money off the innocent unsuspecting participants.

Balaam’s job was to bring havoc among unsuspecting people. The Israelites are camped along the plains of Moab. They are traveling across the plains on their way to Canaan, to the Land of Promise. They have no idea that the king of Moab is afraid of them. They have no idea that their life is in danger. They have no idea that anything other than their daily travels as a group of wanderers is going on.

What’s even more remarkable is that they also have absolutely no idea of God’s intervention on their behalf. They are clueless to the lengths God goes to block the curse of Balaam. They don’t even know Balaam exists. God is putting roadblocks all along the path of Balaam to prevent any harm to come to his people. No matter what Balaam tries to utter, the only words that roll from his tongue are blessings.

It begs the question for all of us.

How much is happening around us beyond our sight to keep us safe. To keep us healthy. To keep us surrounded by all that is good. To keep us sheltered and warm. We are made aware of hurricanes days ahead of time and people are working overtime doing things we have no clue what they are to prevent any harm to come to us. We have no idea how many wars have been averted by our military interventions at the ground level that we will never learn about.

Our children sleep softly and warmly at night unaware of the all-night vigils their parents have held to streamline finances and budgets to keep the lights on. Our students have amazing classroom instruction clueless to the all-nighter their teacher pulled to make sure the experiments worked and the lecture made sense.

The miracle is that God is at work in realms beyond our sight and our understanding intervening against the evil that would seek to harm us.

God stands in the path with a flaming sword to keep us from harms way. Yet, even with warnings and signs, there are times we do not know, we do not see, we do not heed what is good for us.

Balaam’s error was his blindness to his mission. God had granted him permission to go to the king of Moab. But, when he went, God was angered that he would still follow through on a mission meant to hurt others. To save him, God put an angel, an adversary, in the middle of the road to block his travel to the king.

The donkey, the trusted animal of Balaam, saw what was before him.

Now the donkey had been Balaam’s animal of transport since he was a child. The writers put this tiny detail in the text to let us know that they knew each other very well. Donkeys live a long time. They are intelligent creatures. I’ve been told, they are kept in fields of cattle and sheep because they can sense danger earlier than other animals can. They can scare off foxes, coyotes, and wolves. They are worthy creatures. They are truly worth a song of thanksgiving. So, it is surprising that Balaam didn’t respond positively to his donkey when he halted in the road.

We are given people, critters, and other trusted beings in our life for a purpose. Yet, often the task before us blinds us from the wisdom offered to us by these wise ones. Perhaps, now is an opportunity for us to no longer take for granted that which we have been given.

Balaam was so blind to his task, he completely disregarded the one very trusted gift that was carrying him. Three times this dear donkey tried to save him. And three times he was beaten and yelled at all the more.

If we have people or dogs or cats or whatever that we love and trust, who are doing everything to get our attention, pay attention, it could save our life. Our task that we are so determined to be on could be the very thing that needs preventing. If we are so convinced that we need to push through the advice and the wisdom to the point of hurting the ones seeking to help; it might be the very sign we need to know that it is God seeking to save us.

Our prayer as we go through this week can be sung, Open m eyes that I may see glimpses of truth thou hast for me. Open my ears that I may hear voices of truth thou sendest clear. Open my mouth and let me bear gladly the warm truth everywhere.

God sent us Jesus as the visible truth for us to see and to hear as our living truthful companion on our path of life.

Our friends and our creation that surrounds us is not by coincidence. We are all guided on a path. We are given direction. We are all on a journey called by God to be partners in life and in love. This story has so many layers from which we may pull the lesson of God’s unwavering presence in times of challenge. We may learn that Dr Doolittle was right to learn to talk to the animals. We may learn not to take anything for granted. We may just enjoy a good story with a good ending. Let’ rejoice in the love we have together in Jesus, now and forever.

Amen.  

Resources: NIB Volume 1 Numbers; Harper Collins Bible Commentary; Henrietta Mears “What the Bible is All About”; Harper Collins Bible Dictionary

 Monica Gould. Sharing is permitted. Please send requests to reprint with permission to mongould@gmail.com

A Hot Mess-it’s Our Story

 Sermon Joshua 2:1-14; 6:15-16,20,22-25; 2 Thessalonians 2:13-16

A Hot Mess-it’s Our Story   

Our faith story is always told in ways of wonder and excitement. Our ancestors in faith are heroes and larger than life figures. We are in awe about who they are and how they have carried on the faith to us. They are champions. They are people of wonder for us to look up to. They are people of our story. It’s so important for us to get to know them. It’s so important for us to recognize the adversities they faced, their courage to overcome; their incredible faith; and their complete trust in the power of God to prevail.

What we don’t need to do though, is clean up the stories. We don’t need to sanitize them. We don’t need to embellish the nature of the characters who God chose to be our ancestors of faith. Because when we do that we deny ourselves from being not so perfect to carry on the faith for the next generation. If we could share the truth of the hot mess that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Rebekah, Moses, Miriam, Joshua, Rahab, the disciples, Mary, Joseph, Peter and all the others really were; then perhaps we’d be a little kinder, gracious, and loving to ourselves and our family as we walk this path of life with Jesus.

Rahab was a prostitute living within the walls of the city of Jericho. The city of Jericho still stands. Jericho and Bethlehem are within the walls of Palestine. Many Palestinian Christians live there. Jericho is a city that is over ten thousand years old. It is an amazing place filled with markets selling colorful cloth, souvenirs, delicious fruits and vegetables. They have preserved the site of the ancient walls. One can see layers upon layers of early civilizations. Looking down upon the archaeological site we can imagine the story of Joshua’s army marching around and tooting their trumpets until the walls collapsed.

With all that Joshua and his army did to prevail over this city on their way to the Land of Promise, it would not and could not have happened had it not been for the intervention of Rahab. She was a vulnerable woman of poverty. She was an unsuspecting woman. And yet she is the one who took the risk of her life for the sake of her family. She lied to the authorities about the where the spies were and where they were headed. She knew the ramifications of her actions would lead to death is she was caught. Yet, she knew her life and her family’s life would be in peril if she didn’t.

It begs the question, as to when is it ok to lie or to go against the system that has the power? It begs the question when is it ok to go against what you believe in for the sake of the safety of your family? It puts to the test the moral fabric of our way of life to determine the future for those who we love.

One of the essentials of our faith that states, “God alone is Lord of the conscience.” I honestly think if we really believe this we would be a lot better in the way we live as brothers and sisters in Jesus. We can relax as we disagree over issues inside and outside the church. We could trust that we all pray asking for the guidance of our Lord as we make choices and struggle through ideas and ideals. Life is hard! Yet, as we trust the Lord to guide us on our path, the one for our family, the one you, the one for me, the one for the church, we’ll discover being of like mind in Jesus opens us up to a variety of different paths.

If we think we were from an ancestral line of perfection we got it all wrong. Our perfection is in Jesus and only in Him. Thank you God! When the Ancestry lines became easier to research we discovered some exciting family history. Those commercials on TV show how intriguing the stories are that people found out. Ancestry.com has all kinds of ways to woo us into thinking that we'll discover the details of our family. Yet, those records don’t talk about the grandpa who had a hot temper. Or the gramma who ran a moonshine business. Or…

The writers of Scripture didn’t even sugar coat the incarnation. Jesus was born into a hot mess of family turmoil. We are the ones who make his birth story so angelic. God wants us to hang on to the truths around us for all of history. 

Yes, our nation’s leaders had and have flaws. But, when we learn to look at the cultural references to those times we don’t disregard their whole life as invaluable. Imagine if we did that to Mary the mother of Jesus, or David the king of Israel, or Peter, the apostle? We seem to have taken people’s lives and destroyed them over one act made 30 years prior or 100 years prior and judged them by today’s cultural standards.

Think about the fact that in the Bible there are so many things written that draw our frustration with war, with genocide, with patriarchal societies, with slavery, with false leaders, with paganism, with debauchery, with lying, cheating, stealing, and every commandment under the sun broken. And these were done by people GOD chose. They were ALL a Hot Mess!!

Which is exactly why it’s time we recognize the saints from whom we came. Because we are the saints from which our children and grandchildren will come. So, if we have some fear that we are too much of a hot mess for family to accept as a saint called by God to do the work of Jesus in the world, we can relax. God is the one who takes us and grabs us in the grip of grace and puts us on a path of purpose.

Neither Rahab nor the spies had any idea of how their interaction with each other was setting the stage for the lineage of the messiah.

The spies enter the city walls. Rahab hides them and protects them in exchange for the protection of her family. Her story is exalted in the New Testament in Hebrews and in James as one of a woman of faith who changed the course of the history of Israel. It is a reminder that it is God who chooses the most unlikely people to change the course of history. Rahab became the mother of Boaz who later married Ruth who became the mother of Obed, who became the father of Jesse and then David who became the ancestor of Jesus. All of us are worthy in the sight of God to be called to the work of salvation. In Jesus Christ we have new life, let us receive his grace and be on the move.

God chooses people who are not like us to move us in new directions and into new opportunities and lands of promise.

The opportunities lie within us now as we embrace our ancestors and the whole truth of their stories. Because every ounce of it is ours. We are on the next chapter of God’s story for the ones to come. Let’s be on the move! Blessed assurance Jesus is mine and yours and ours. Amen.

 Resources: NIB Joshua; Interpretation Joshua; NRSV Bible

The Cost of Faithfulness

 

Sermon Daniel 6:1-23 September 26, 2021

The Cost of Faithfulness

Once again, the bible sheds light on how the conflicts of this world are always present. The story of Daniel in the lion’s den is as relevant today as it was to the people in exile in Babylon. It is a story about how God’s faithfulness is present even and especially when laws, faith, and life collide.

There is a Christian song that has been a powerful testament to the struggle of the many changes in the church and the rapidly changing world. It encourages to stand firm in faith even when it collides with trends of the church, community, nation, or world. It is written by the Christian music group ‘4Him’. The song title is Future Generations. The first part goes: The signs are obvious, they are everywhere
All that we hear about is the gloom and despair
Too many would be prophets saying
It's the end of it all
…

So I won't bend and I won't break
I won't water down my faith
I won't compromise in a world of desperation
What has been I cannot change
But for tomorrow and today
I must be a light for future generations

If we could find a way to preserve our faith
So those who follow us
See the price that was paid
Then maybe when they question
What it's gonna take to survive
They'll find the strength to carry on
In what we leave behind

Daniel’s story reveals the wonder and miracle of God’s victory over death. It is a story that the people in exile clung to. It is a story the people of Israel carried with them into their future during more difficult times. It propels us toward Jesus who also was sent to his death and sealed with a stone. It reminds all of us of the salvation that God has for his people. God raises those who are in the deep and brings them to new life.

Against all odds God remains with us to get us through the adversities we face.

But, what about the times that make no sense? What about the wars? What about the murders, the abuse, the accidents? What about those who misuse power and those who manipulate justice?  What about the suffering we face at the hands of those who sin against us?

Daniel’s story reminds us that taking a stand makes a difference. It reminds us that God stood firm with grace with Daniel and through Jesus Christ and will continue through all future generations.

Because it is in those very moments when injustice seeks to destroy that we witness a God who overcomes the sin and dies with it in order to save it. Jesus went to his death, was raised up, and in his new life, we have new life in him.

God takes a stand for us when we can’t see it. God takes a stand for the sin even when all we see is the pit of lions. God takes a stand for us even when our men and women are going off to battle and we don’t know if they are coming back. God takes a stand for us when despair overtakes and overwhelms us.

No storm can shake our inmost heart when to the rock we’re clinging. Since love is Lord of heaven and earth, how can we keep from singing. The metaphor of the lion’s den and the tomb both point to the depth of the cost of faithfulness on our part and on God’s part.

Gary Sinise is an actor who played the lieutenant in the movie Forrest Gump. He has a foundation to reach out and provide opportunities for veterans. He recently said this at his speech at the 20^th anniversary of 9/11.  “I can most certainly say that what happened to our country on September 11, 2001 broke my heart and changed me forever. It forced me to rethink everything. What do I really believe? How do I want to raise my kids? What kind of example do I want to set for them? How can I use my good fortune to help? During this journey from self to service, along the way I’ve met heroic individuals whose actions left a profound effect on me.” A turning point occurred for him in the midst of tragedy. He chose to stand firm for the things that helped him answer the questions he had before him. For Gary it was the depth of patriotism that rose within him at the loss of so many on that day. It was his faith in God as he stood in prayer with his family at church that evening. It was in a moment of helplessness that he rose with determination to take a stand.

The story of Daniel sets the tone for those same questions for us as we live in this future generation. What are the stands we are willing to take in our journey from self to service?

Sometimes laws are made that trap the makers of the law more than those the law seeks to inhibit. Unchangeable human laws set the trap for the maker who is then held to a standard to uphold them even when there is evidence that puts more harm for the guilty than would ever be necessary. An example was the zero tolerance drug laws of the 90’s.

We know God’s law is absolute and unchangeable, but we have witnessed God is greater than his own law. Abraham was able to alter God’s actions. Moses was able to persuade God. Jacob was able to wrestle with God. Others were able to argue, bargain, and test God and challenge his immutable (absolute) laws.

Daniel’s story though is not about challenging God’s law but how his faithfulness to God’s law comes in direct conflict with the newly made king’s law. It is a testimony of the cost of faithfulness. He is placed in the position that if he continues his daily routine of praying three times a day, he will face death if he is caught. Daniel chooses to continue his routine without interruption despite the law. He doesn’t go out in public and protest. He doesn’t argue before the king. He does nothing publicly to challenge the law. He just quietly carries out civil disobedience in the privacy of his home. What was once legal has now become illegal. What is worse for Daniel is that those who wish him harm have invaded his privacy and called him out. The king at this point is full of grief as he discovers the impact of his new law. He calls on Daniel’s God to save him.

Daniel descends to the lion pit and it is sealed. The king despairs for Daniel. It is his conversion that becomes as much a miracle as the salvation of Daniel. The king spends the night in prayer and fasting and runs the next morning to find out if Daniel’s God has saved him. Daniel emerged from the pit completely unharmed. His faith in God had not only saved him but also the king. The king ends up making a new decree declaring that the living God of Daniel endures forever and his kingdom shall have no end. The king continues the declaration that Daniel’s God delivers and rescues, he works signs and wonders in heaven and on earth; for he has saved Daniel from the power of the lions. Jesus also could not be kept in the pit by a stone to seal it. Jesus rose from the grave and in him we have new life.

As we continue into this season of emerging and reuniting, we have had much time to ponder the things that matter most. It is important for us to choose the questions that will turn the tide for us as we seek God’s guidance to be faithful. How do we discover God’s call upon us as we move from self to service? We witness in Paul’s life how he met the conflict to his faith as a turning point that changed the course of his religious convictions to a stand for love and grace in Jesus.

Daniel and so many after him took a stand, a costly stand of faith. They did it not for themselves but for future generations. It is so wonderful to be among you and all you do for this community and set the example for others to do the same.

These final words of the song, “ Lookin' in the eyes of the children
Knowing that tomorrow is at stake
When the choice is up to them
Will they have the strength to say

We won't bend and we won't break
We won't water down our faith
We won't compromise in a world of desperation
What has been we cannot change
For tomorrow and today
We must be a light for future generations

We are walking in the light of joy and wonderful things are occurring around us. Let us continue to be on the move with them. Amen.

 

Resources: Interpretation Daniel-Sibley Towner; NIB Daniel-Daniel L. Smith-Christopher; Working Preacher Daniel Nov 29, 2020 Roger Nam; Gary Sinise Foundation-Garysinisefoundation.org

Stirring Hearts to Action

 

Sermon James 2:1-10; 14-17 September 12, 2021 Commissioning Sunday

Stirring Hearts to Action

Today is the official start to the church year as we rev up with activities. It sure does feel good to be back to planning and doing and being church in familiar ways.

James is revving up his church in chapter two telling them about how to act with the rich and the poor. He’s telling them to not be taken by glamor and glitz. He’s telling them about the folks who really matter. The poor, the vulnerable, the ones who are hungry need us to show them that we care. James puts grace to the test. He says if we say we have faith but don’t show it in our actions then our faith is dead.

Ouch!! We Christians have loved the grace card so much that it’s become our excuse for not doing stuff. We hide behind excuses of being too busy, or the need to care for ourselves because our lives are overwhelming, or we dare not go near crowds or strangers or people we don’t know because we may be hurt by them, or get ill, or…

We use those excuses and then comfort ourselves with the fact that we know God’s grace through Jesus Christ has been poured out upon us and therefore all is well. We have a tendency to use grace in the way Dietrich Bonhoeffer called it, ‘Cheap Grace.’ We’re covered by the grace of God and his love. We forget we belong to a community of believers. We belong to a community of faith. We belong to the body of Christ. And all that is bigger than ourselves.

If we read and reread James carefully we become aware of something so powerful and so important in the life of our faith and our faith community. That Grace, real grace lived out has substance.

This letter is filled with the ‘what’ of our love for Jesus. You see we are here today because we love Jesus. We are here today because we are curious to learn more about the Christian life. We are here today because someone dragged us out of bed and made us come. We are here today because we know we get food afterward. We are here today because there is this constant nudge in our heart that is stirring us toward something we do not yet understand; yet to be revealed. We are here today because we recognize that as the body of Christ gathers we are nourished and fed through word and sacrament.

James gives us the ‘what’ to do with our faith in Jesus. We can seriously ask ourselves when we said that we believe in Jesus and we made the commitment to follow him all the days of our lives, did any of us really understand what that looked like? I didn’t.

Well, it looks like the love commandment that Jesus gave us. Ok. But, how does that love commandment play out? How does it work when two children are arguing over the same toy? How does it work out when a husband wants to buy a lawnmower and the wife wants to buy a washing machine and they only have money for one and they need both? You could say the love commandment doesn’t play into a situation like this. But, it does.  Everything is spiritual. Everything is influenced through the love of Jesus in our life. Everything.

When our faith is fueled through the overpowering presence of Jesus in our everyday breath, it makes it easier to face the mundane of everyday. Authors have told us this. From recent Rob Bell statements in his book “Everything is Spiritual” to as far back as Brother Lawrence, ‘all things are spiritual even washing dishes.’

 

We hear about how we should read our Bible more to get to know Jesus more. But in today’s schedules that’s really a hard thing to ask. It’s also a hard question to know where to start. There are some really useful apps such as YouVersion Bible app. It has audible reading programs of the Bible and daily plans for devotions. On the YouVersion app it has segments that take off to videos and to kid podcasts that teach about living the life of faith as a kid. There is also the online version of Our Daily Bread and the Upper Room which are simple daily devotionals written by regular folks, not scholars with big words, a scripture and a prayer. Living the life of faith in practical ways needs practical tips.

It’s up to us as the church to help guide that process.

That’s why we’re really excited that we can do so many of our faith activities again in-person.

-I diverge for a moment-I must say that the amazing experience of not missing any of our mission goals even while in isolation or in hybrid worship is a testament to the way we value the words of James about putting our faith to the test with the works of good for others. This year we are spring boarding from our success with the youth leadership and providing opportunities for them on several more projects throughout the coming year.

I guess where I really want to go today is to speak to you from the heart. I want you to know that it’s less about the why we believe or why we come to church.

It is more about the what that brings us to church.

What draws us into a life of faith.

What excites us about living with Jesus.

Why forces us to analyze and dissect. Why throws us into a quandary of right or wrong. Are we believing in the right God.

Are we going to the right church.

Are we going to be ok.

But the what of our life puts us into the sacrifice of action.

The what of life and faith stirs our hearts into doing the work without agonizing over it. The what instead of the why takes away the worry and the anxiety.

 

When I was a teenager, I was searching for something beyond my comprehension. I knew I wasn’t satisfied with the way I was living out my journey of life. I had two very best, most precious and wonderful friends. They were devout Catholics. Their families were deeply involved in their churches. I remember I used to mock them for the waste of time it was for them to ruin perfectly good weekends going to mass.

They and two of their friends invited me to come with them to mass one Sunday. I did. And that invitation changed my life.

I stand before you today because my friends loved me enough to introduce me to a life of faith and a faith community who loved me as I was. They were not about the why I was there.

They were about the what.

They said come.

They said, just join us.

They said, we’ll go together.

They never bothered me with why I should go, or why I should believe, or why it was good for me.

They just said come along with us, my friend.

I responded to their invitation and they demonstrated in real concrete ways that they cared.  

 

This Jesus that came into my life during that time with my precious friends wasn’t a Catholic Jesus or a Baptist Jesus or a Presbyterian one. This Jesus was a real loving caring presence that took me to a place of faith.

I was stirred to a life of purpose that allowed me to think beyond myself and care about others. My parents had already instilled incredible strong values of  honesty, integrity, duty to country and fellowman. Those values translated into the love commandment of Jesus and helped all of life find its purpose.

As we go forward in this new Christian calendar year, let’s consider the ways our faith feeds us and excite us. Let’s begin to be fueled by the strength of who we are with one another. Let’s feel the fire of the Spirit at work within us.

James is stirring the hearts of the people of his church to figure out how to put that faith they believe into some practical action. Sometimes that’s what we’re asking for; some guidance on this path of life.

I’d like to offer you a few tips as you go from here today.

1. Be blessed.

2. Be assured that God loves you.

3. Don’t let guilt rule your life.

4. Take 30 seconds as a start to whisper a prayer asking Jesus if he hears you and then wait 30 seconds in quiet.

5. Breathe

6. Hear Jesus calling your name.

7. Say to Him, Here I AM.

8. Do one thing for someone else.

9. Do one thing for yourself.

10. Don’t go to bed angry.

11. Go to church-it doesn’t matter which church or where, but go to church. Enter into worship, pick up the hymnals, sing the songs, say the prayers-participate.

12. Ask for forgiveness-it doesn’t matter who was right or wrong-you both had a part in it.

13. Plant a tree, a flower, a bulb, a seed-start something new.

14. Don’t give up on anybody, including yourself, ever.

15. Believe in the resurrection-every day is Easter-a new beginning-God gave us new life, so let’s live it.

Friends, we are one in the Spirit, we are One in the Lord. Let’s be stirred to action in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Hope Despairs and Despair Hopes.

 Sermon Psalm 13; Romans 8:38-39 August 8, 2021

Hope Despairs and Despair Hopes.

 Today’s sermon comes to you again from Facebook. In response to my query on June 10th, “ …if you could choose the sermon topic, story, or verse-what would it be?” This week responds to: “Read Psalm 13 this morning, David’s interesting conversation with God. Given what our family has gone through in the last couple of years it prompted me to do some serious thinking. If you could write a sermon on Psalm 13 what title would it have? I responded, “Using Luther’s words, the title would be “Hope despairs and Despair hopes.”

 This psalm takes us down to the raw confession of our vulnerability before God and one another.

Who wants to do that at church?

 Church has been fun as we gather more and more in-person. As we offer more activities, it has been a great joy!

Church is a place where we can appreciate one another and rejoice together in the truth of God’s love. It is a place where we can sing joyous hymns and shout praises to the God who gives us life.

Being at church is so important in the life of faith. It is meant to be the place where we grow together through sorrow and joy.

There are times that the reality of the ambiguity of life and faith intersect.

We find ourselves in lament even as we praise God’s goodness to us.

We’ve all experienced enough sorrow and loss through this past year and a half that we really want to come to church and forget the painful parts of life. We want to put a Band-Aid on our pain and pretend that we are all ok. We want to come and leave the hard parts on the doorstep and walk into church with our masks on pretending we’ve all got it together. We want to come to church with our false selves because we think that being a Christian means we are cheerful and happy all the time. If we show up hurting and exposing our real selves people will look at us as if we don’t have enough faith. Jesus was always saying, “Oh ye of little faith to his disciples” and we think he’s saying that to us too.

 

Rachel Held Evans wrote a book called Searching for Sunday-leaving, loving, ad finding church. I’m in the process of listening to it and so much of today’s thoughts and next week’s thoughts are influenced by her story and her writing.

 

Listen to David in this psalm.

He is down there in the dirt from which he was made and is crying out to God.

He is accusing God,

yelling at God,

frustrated at God and

naked before God

with all his suffering and pain.

He wants God to act, to show up, to fix things.

That crying out to God is called lament. It is despair and sorrow finding expression. How long, is repeated four times. It’s confession to God of feeling abandoned, forgotten, dismissed is the depth of pain finding words and wanting answers.

David is confessing his inmost soul. He is unafraid to bare all before God. That is what confession is. It is to come unafraid and bare our soul knowing that the One who loves us bore us through the waters of baptism and claims us for his own. It is this one God who knows we are dust that calls us to confess everything.

Psalm 103 says, “As a father has compassion for his children, so the Lord has compassion for those who fear him. For he knows how we are made; he remembers that we are dust.”

 

Reading the psalms of lament makes us question the prayers we were taught in Sunday school. They were prayers that said nice things to God. We were taught kind and thoughtful and polite prayers. The psalms break that. They return us to the truth of our origin. We came from dust and we were molded by the hands of God. We were created from raw materials. This psalm of David returns to the recognition of the ashes of sorrow and begs the question of how long does sorrow and pain have to last.

It addresses God as the eldest son in the parable of the prodigal son. I have done all things right. I have lived a life of faith. I have been obedient. I have followed through on every action. How can this happen to me? Where is your love for me?

 

So, God, how long? How much can one person take of things being given and then being taken away? Do you have a remedy for this God or are they all cliché answers?

This psalm has been said to be an example of our faith. We have faith. And then tragedy comes. We wonder how long we must live with this. We pray to God to let us see him in all of this. We call upon God to show us what it all means and to answer our prayer. In despair we search for hope. And then through the process we come back to the trust that God is there and we find hope in our despair.

 

In Job he too cries out to God wondering what he had done to offend God to bring him such tragedy. Yet, Job seems to find a place in his story that he is able to praise God in the same breath that he laments. We may find an affirmation of our faith as we witness that complaint and praise go hand in hand for the psalmist. We can find comfort that in the seemingly contrary and contradictory actions of our conversations with God we are in full presence of the One who knows every hair on our head.

 

Church is meant to be a place where no matter how imperfect we are, we know that we are loved. We know that although we are still learning and growing, we have not and will not reach perfection. Church is that place where we can scream our doubts and holler out our despair and crisis of faith. Because at the core of confession is the grappling of wonder if God really exists to hear our prayer and respond. If we were honest with ourselves and each other about that one truth we might all want to be at church together.

In church we stand before God and one another baring our true selves and then realizing we are already covered through God’s grace. And that truth gives us permission to love on each other all the more. Really living as The Body of Christ.

 

If we reach back to our early childhood faith we can remember being told the story of Jesus sent by God to save the world from sin. We remember being in awe of the baby Jesus. Our little hearts believed that Jesus really did love us. Faith started to become real even as we prayed at mealtime and bedtime. We trusted our Sunday school teachers who encouraged us to say out loud that we believed that Jesus loved us and we loved him too. We said that we believed that Jesus died on the cross for our sin. We prayed that Jesus would forgive us for punching our brother and we wanted him to forgive us for pinching our sister. In those prayers our faith grew. And finally we knew in our heart that we wanted to be an active part of faith and join the church. We wanted to profess before everyone that we believed in Jesus and were ready to make the promise to serve him forever. And so we did. Those were years of comfort and belonging.

 

As rooted as we can be in our faith and as grounded as we are in our confessions, we all still have that place in life where we just walk away from all we know because, to be honest, this religion of love and grace can be too hard to believe in moments of crisis and despair. Especially when that despair won’t go away. How can we believe in Jesus who fixes us when we are still hurting? How can we believe in Jesus who forgives sin but we still sin? How can believe in Jesus when we think to lack faith and to doubt and to wonder if God exists is a sin?

 

Jesus came to save a sinful world. He came to bring wholeness and healing. He came to bring truth and mercy. He came with compassion and grace. He came to a world broken, messed up, cruel, conflicted, disrupted and destructive to offer something it had not yet lived into-forgiveness and salvation. It’s time for the church to remember that and be the place of sacred, safe, space again. It’s time for the church to be reminded that the psalmist spoke the truth of his pain and we can too. We can speak without judgment or fear or ridicule. If we could be as honest with each other as they are in AA meetings we’d all be the better for it. We need to let go of the idea that church is about perfect casseroles and pretty outfits, just so makeup and quiet children. Our young people today are not turned on by fancy screens and hip music or loud preaching or jazzy youth programs. They can see through fake personas, and they are not impressed.  If we really want the church of Jesus Christ to be real to the next generation we need to show them by leaving our masks at the door and being as honest as the psalmist. Hold on to the words of Psalm 13 as a reminder that no matter who or how we are God knows our inmost heart. God loves us. God lets us be ourselves at all times.  

 

It is so true that our hope reaches points of despair. And in our life we discover that despair returns to hope in great anticipation. Paul said, Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. And no song says it better than, “My life flows on in endless song, above earth’s lamentation…

Amen.

 

Quiet Strength

 

Sermon Psalm 103:1-18; Proverbs 23:19-25; Matthew 2:13-23 June 20,2021 Father's Day

Quiet Strength

The Scripture readings for today are to encourage us in our life as we live in relationship with others. Most of us grew up in some kind of family. We grew up in foster, adoptive, group, blended, or nuclear families. We can look to our heritage and find the people who impacted our life and who we admire for their ability to inspire us. 

Who are those people for you? Let’s take a few minutes today and think carefully about them. Perhaps they are still living or they have long passed. Yet, something about who they were in our life has been a force to steer and guide us even today.

Whatever they did, put an impression upon us that has lasted a lifetime. There presence in our life gave us life. A thumbprint of energy, guidance, imagination, intelligence, confidence, curiosity, joy, and laughter.

I would have to say that Joseph was that kind of man for Jesus. In the first two chapters of the gospel of Matthew, Jesus is born and is an infant without a voice in the narrative. Joseph also has no voice. The narrative teaches us about the obedience of a man caught in a circumstance that was more than awkward, it was downright dangerous. 

You know who Joseph is right? 

He’s the guy in the nativity scene that we can’t quite explain to our kids at Christmas. He’s the dad of Jesus. Well, he’s not really the dad. God is the dad of Jesus. But, then Joseph is the step-dad? God told Joseph to marry Mary just as they had planned and to obey God. So, Joseph without question, despite what all the neighbors, and all the relatives would say, took Mary as his wife even though she was having someone else’s baby. Yes, Joseph did that!

To be honest anyone who looks to Joseph can be impressed. 

They can look to him and honor him for his courage. They can look to him and be impressed by his integrity. For custom in those days was to stone Mary for having someone else’s child. A child out of wedlock was a penalty of death. And Mary was having a child out of wedlock and not even of the man to whom she was engaged. This was a nightmare that every family hoped would never come to them. And yet the holy family who we adore lived exactly that. It is important that we honor those who have had the courage to love, honor, and obey during the most unusual circumstances. To love children born without a voice of where they are born or where they are raised is the greatest of all gifts. Joseph is a man to be lifted up because he denied the customs of his day and chose to put love first.

Who are the people we know who put love above the rules, customs, or traditions for the sake of another?

Joseph had a quiet strength. Initially he didn’t know what to do. But, when the angel spoke to him he obeyed. He followed through with his vows to Mary. He followed through with the Roman law and went to his home town for the census. He followed through with care for his newborn son and named him Jesus, just as the angel had told him.

He trusted the presence of God in his life. He didn’t need to put on a fancy show. He didn’t need to place an ad in the paper about why he was doing what he was doing. He didn’t justify himself to his family, neighbors and friends. He just quietly listened to God and cared for his family. 

For all of today’s families who don’t quite fit the mold of what society deems a perfect family, we have the holy family as our example to know that there is no perfect family. 

The best ones are the ones ordained to come together as God calls them together-no matter how different from the norm.

Joseph had been raised in the faith of his fathers and his mothers through the generations. He knew the psalms and the proverbs. He knew to listen for God’s word to guide his life. All around him were people of faith. It is through their imprint that he developed his faith and strength in love.

When the angel of the Lord appeared to him, he remembered all the stories told to him of Moses and Abraham, Sarah and Hannah. He too could take heart in the word of God through the angel to love Mary, to love Jesus and to bring them to safety.

It’s hard to imagine though to hear a call in the middle of the night to flee to safety. The only time I could imagine a call like that would be in places along tornado alley. There are sirens and warnings and no time to tell others except to run to the safety of a shelter or room as quick as possible.

As a parent to have to run with your child to a place you’re not sure of in order to flee a certain conflict if you stay, I don’t know how Joseph made that decision.

I honestly believe there are moments in our life where we are caught with decisions that rely purely on our ability to trust God’s guidance. There are moments when the need to act outweighs the fear of inaction. The flight to Egypt was one of those moments.

Who are the people we know who have had the ability to guide us to safety, to reach out and lead us in another direction, to grab us by the arm and save us from the fire around us?

We can thank God for their ability to love us enough to take the time to raise us up and to bring us around to the place we ultimately belong.

Joseph stayed with Mary and protected Jesus in Egypt until the angel sent him an all-clear message. And when he heard the news he was guided to the best place to raise Jesus into adulthood.

Sometimes what doesn’t quite fit the norm for growing up turns out in the end to have been the right place all along. The Eastern Shore is one of those places people assume is not the best place. Galilee was one of those places. Galilee was no royal town for a messiah. Yet, Galilee was a place set up for a young boy to grow and learn among a community of people of quiet strength. Jesus grew up in a rural community where people cared for each other. People modeled behavior of love and acceptance for the young Jesus so when he entered into ministry he had been formed by the people of his village.

As the church we are the village for one another. Let us make sure our fingerprints are on the trees of one another. Let us show the community in which we live the quiet strength we have to live and grow.

Let us be for others in the same manner as those who we remember today for their impact on our lives through their quiet strength. Amen.

Resources: NIB Matthew; Working Preacher 2012 commentary; Max Lucado Before Amen;