Thursday, August 30, 2007
10 Don't Tell Me!
"Don't Tell Me!"
Don't you hate it when someone loves you enough to tell you the
truth about something you don't want to admit to? Our Scripture today is
the perfect example - God, in his love, tells the Israelites and ourselves -
what we need to hear. Today we hear words of judgement - but why is
God giving them to us? So we can be saved from ourselves and our
wicked ways.
Now you may not think that you HAVE any wicked ways, but I
assure you, you do! Certainly our society has. In our society, people
cannot wait to make a buck on us! Buy a house and your mailbox will be
full of people wanting to help you. After I bought my present home I got
wonderful news in the mail - I could pay so much less each month if I
would just take their offer of a mortgage - they could reduce my mortgage
payments by more than half. I'm sure they could, but down the line I
would be faced with a financial crisis that could cause me to lose my
home.
Marketers stay awake nights trying to figure out how to get you to
buy things you don't need at prices you can ill afford with hidden costs you
would never think about.
A friend of mine known for being astute in financial matters was
asked to check an offer that a fellow got for a good price he saw on a
book he wanted AND, THERE WAS MORE - three additional books -
FOR FREE! What was wrong with this picture, the fellow wanted to
know. What was wrong with the picture came to light when my friend
called to inquire - "How much is the shipping cost on the free books?"
Answer: "$9.99 on each free book" The three free books cost $30 -
but that was not disclosed. You had to have sense enough to ask.
In our society, free books are not free. Lowering your mortgage
payments causes them to increase. "No interest and no payments until
next year" means you're going to get into all kinds of trouble down the
road - and it's always the poor that get poorer - that get taken advantage
of.
The people in the time of Amos who wanted to prey on the poor
couldn't wait for them to pray! They lamented that Sabbath rules and
Holy Day regulations kept them from preying on the pray-ers. They were
in need of a major make-over in the ethics department. So are we.
WE - you and I - may not be preying on people, but we may be
letting our society dictate how much we pray - that is P.R.A.Y.
For most Christians, church involvement has gone from "All
Aboard!" to "Smorgasbord" - meaning that Christians used to center their
life around the church and were "All Aboard" - onboard - for everything
that went on there - Sunday School, Sunday morning service, Sunday
evening service, Wednesday evening Bible Study and all sorts of committee
meetings in between, not to mention Men's Club, Women's Fellowship
and all that.
Then it went from "All Aboard" to "Smorgasbord" - where people
began to pick and choose among the events. The church had to stop
some events because no one attended them.
Our church, trying to keep up with the times realized this and
began putting all its efforts and finances into the Sunday morning service,
and tried to do it in a "Don't Be Bored" manner, offering professional
singers to amplify the sound and success of the volunteer choir. We
attended seminars that taught us to move the service along - no more
asterisks while latecomers are seated - no more waiting until the choir is
comfortably seated to begin the Scripture Reading.. People don't like to
wait. "Serve both elements of the communion at once" so the once a
month event doesn't's go "overtime."
But the fact remains that when your lives were centered around
the church, your lives were more altruistically inclined, your ethics were
informed by "What would Jesus do?" and living with your fellow Christians
taught you that we could all, indeed, "get along."
What is your life centered around now? Take a moment and
ponder that question.
We know that we are busier doing "something" than we have ever
been and our time saving devices have a lot to do with the fact that we
have less time than ever for ourselves.
It's true, I can e-mail a reply to someone in the blink of an eye
with a few taps on the keyboard of my computer - but how long does it
take to go through your email everyday?
But I wouldn't give up for anything the things you send me that
teach me things -
things that little children have learned - you can't baptize cats!
things that adults have learned - families are like fudge..mostly
sweet but with a few nuts.
things about growing old - forget the health food - I need all the
preservatives I can get - when you fall down, you wonder what else you
can do while you're down there - and that there are four stages of life -
You believe in Santa Claus
You don't believe in Santa Claus
You are Santa Claus
You look like Santa Claus.
Still, I'm glad that the computer company didn't build my car -
otherwise it would crash every now and then - the airbag system would
say "Are you sure" before deploying, and my warning lights would say,
"This car has performed an illegal operation." and if it stopped on the
freeway I would have to close all the windows, shut it off, restart it and
reopen the windows. to make it do what it's supposed to do.
And those computers that make such fast work of everything - did no
one every tell us how much time we would have to take trying to get it to
do what it is supposed to do. Did they tell us how much time we would
spend waiting for the computer to download, upload, reboot, or to print.
For some unknown reason, my computer will blink at me for about 10
minutes before it will acquiesce to printing a "Word" document. Fortunately,
I'm locked into Page Maker which prints its documents immediately unless
the document is extraordinarily memory intensive - like your bulletin cover
this morning - it's pretty, but it took awhile.
Well, you've had a while to ponder on what you center your life
around. I'm afraid to ask for how many of you the answer was "The
T.V.!" If I were a crueler ruler and not the fast pastor, I might ask how
many of you have declined to come to a church event, because there was
something on T.V. you just had to see. I have one word for that: TIVO!
Then you can select what you really want to see, you can fast forward
through the commercials and choose who gives you the news and avoid
those who say there is no spin attached.
God does not allow us to put our own spin on our lives....he tells
us like it is - and does so to help us, to heal us, to draw us to Himself. The
job description for God, is thankful, at a minimum, two fold - to judge us
and to save us - to save us from ourselves and our society.
Our first reaction when God judges us is DON'T TELL ME!
Our second reaction, after we ponder a bit, is DO TELL ME. Tell me
what I need to know about myself - what I am centering my life around -
what I am emphasizing with my life and what tools I need to us e to get
where I need to be.
Often with my Page Maker program I ask the computer to place
a picture in my document. But if you don't use the proper tool, it's not
going to happen, so I choose the proper tool very carefully.
One tool to insist on is to forsake not the assembly of yourselves
together with your church family - a family to be sure - like fudge - mostly
sweet but with a few nuts - but we're it.
A friend of mine has continued to attend my service club here in
Miami Beach even though he has moved to Naples - because he misses
us "nuts" as he calls us - the club there was too staid, too old in spirit - too
disinclined to do new things in new ways - he preferred us - sometimes a
little raucous, irreverent, and lacking in bureaucratic followthough. Now
this club is trying something new - meeting on Tuesday nights which will
rule out this nut and the Naples nut from attending. I have tried two clubs
since then - one was too snooty and the other was too absolutely perfect
- they did everything by the book - right out of the Rotary manual I'm
sure, but there was something missing - I would call it the family factor - I
didn't sense that presnet. Perhaps if I had attended for a longer period of
time.
We have the family factor here and some of us are nutty enough to
keep things interesting and we're always bugging you to help the poor - to
hang out at the homeless events - to buy toothbrushes and toothpaste and
all the rest.
A major tool for you and very hard to use on your own - the Bible
- the Bible is so complicated that it needs an interpreter. In our Sunday
morning class, that's me, but in addition we all learn from each other - not
just learning the Bible, but learning how the passages we read are to be
lived out in the daily experience. Just when people are really of an age
where they can really learn and understand about the things of God, they
give up Sunday School You can change that. We meet each sunday at 9
a.m.
And so, God calls us into question - asks us to examine ourselves
- where we are - where we're going - what we're centering our lives
around - standing ready to receive us , forgive us, embrace us.
It is very important for you to remember that God's forgiveness is
based on God's amazing determination to have a family - and he has
chosen us - nuts and all to be His Family. God made us, it is said,
because he loves stories - and boy do we have some stories for Him! But
at least we're not too snooty and we're not too good - too perfect - too
boring. There's no telling what we're going to do next or say next - hopefully
whatever it is will prove we have a sense of humor - like Elenor Roosevelt
who said, "I had a rose named after me and I was very flattered.
but I was not pleased to read the description in the catalog: No
good in a bed, but fine against a wall!"
or George Burns who said "The secret of a good sermon is
to have a good beginning and a good ending and to have the two as
close together as possible.
So I close with this illustration from Deb Sistare who worried
about how God would judge her grandfather - who seldom went to
church - perhaps because he had a secret - he had a drinking problem.
Shortly after his death Deb had a dream: "Grandpa was standing at
the bottom of a steep, pearl-white staircase that reached way into
the clouds. He gazed up at a huge angel who held out a satiny,
emerald-colored robe, open and waiting, it seemed for Grandpa
himself. When Grandpa headed up the stairs, he wasn't shuffling.
At the top of the stairs, the angel helped Grandpa into the robe and
tied the sash so the rich folds of material fell around him. Then the
angel took Grandpa's hand and together they disappeared into the
clouds.
Deb's grandmother was concerned about whether God
would receive her husband - welcome him. "He didn't go to church
much. I don't know if he asked God's forgiveness. I'm so afraid
he didn't go to heaven."
So Deb told her the dream she'd had. Her eyes filled with
tears and she said "He made it Deb. He really made it."
Deb said, "It was just a dream.
"Let me tell you something" her grandmother said,
"something we have never told anyone. One Sunday at church
where we were first married, your grandpa saw an angel standing
right on the altar. He said that angel was at least ten feet tall,
standing right behind the preacher and smiled down at him during
the service. And your grandpa said that angel was wearing the most
beautiful green robe - a robe that glistened like emeralds were the
words he used. 'When I get to heaven," he said, 'I want a green
robe just like the one that angel was wearing. ' What else could
that dream be but a sign from God that Grandpa is with Him?
What else, indeed. God sees our weaknesses and he loves us
despite them. He calls us to challenge them even as he prepares to welcome
us on our arrival. Don't Tell Me! No, DO TELL ME!
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)July 22, 2007 10:30 a, m. Amos 8:1-12
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
Don't you hate it when someone loves you enough to tell you the
truth about something you don't want to admit to? Our Scripture today is
the perfect example - God, in his love, tells the Israelites and ourselves -
what we need to hear. Today we hear words of judgement - but why is
God giving them to us? So we can be saved from ourselves and our
wicked ways.
Now you may not think that you HAVE any wicked ways, but I
assure you, you do! Certainly our society has. In our society, people
cannot wait to make a buck on us! Buy a house and your mailbox will be
full of people wanting to help you. After I bought my present home I got
wonderful news in the mail - I could pay so much less each month if I
would just take their offer of a mortgage - they could reduce my mortgage
payments by more than half. I'm sure they could, but down the line I
would be faced with a financial crisis that could cause me to lose my
home.
Marketers stay awake nights trying to figure out how to get you to
buy things you don't need at prices you can ill afford with hidden costs you
would never think about.
A friend of mine known for being astute in financial matters was
asked to check an offer that a fellow got for a good price he saw on a
book he wanted AND, THERE WAS MORE - three additional books -
FOR FREE! What was wrong with this picture, the fellow wanted to
know. What was wrong with the picture came to light when my friend
called to inquire - "How much is the shipping cost on the free books?"
Answer: "$9.99 on each free book" The three free books cost $30 -
but that was not disclosed. You had to have sense enough to ask.
In our society, free books are not free. Lowering your mortgage
payments causes them to increase. "No interest and no payments until
next year" means you're going to get into all kinds of trouble down the
road - and it's always the poor that get poorer - that get taken advantage
of.
The people in the time of Amos who wanted to prey on the poor
couldn't wait for them to pray! They lamented that Sabbath rules and
Holy Day regulations kept them from preying on the pray-ers. They were
in need of a major make-over in the ethics department. So are we.
WE - you and I - may not be preying on people, but we may be
letting our society dictate how much we pray - that is P.R.A.Y.
For most Christians, church involvement has gone from "All
Aboard!" to "Smorgasbord" - meaning that Christians used to center their
life around the church and were "All Aboard" - onboard - for everything
that went on there - Sunday School, Sunday morning service, Sunday
evening service, Wednesday evening Bible Study and all sorts of committee
meetings in between, not to mention Men's Club, Women's Fellowship
and all that.
Then it went from "All Aboard" to "Smorgasbord" - where people
began to pick and choose among the events. The church had to stop
some events because no one attended them.
Our church, trying to keep up with the times realized this and
began putting all its efforts and finances into the Sunday morning service,
and tried to do it in a "Don't Be Bored" manner, offering professional
singers to amplify the sound and success of the volunteer choir. We
attended seminars that taught us to move the service along - no more
asterisks while latecomers are seated - no more waiting until the choir is
comfortably seated to begin the Scripture Reading.. People don't like to
wait. "Serve both elements of the communion at once" so the once a
month event doesn't's go "overtime."
But the fact remains that when your lives were centered around
the church, your lives were more altruistically inclined, your ethics were
informed by "What would Jesus do?" and living with your fellow Christians
taught you that we could all, indeed, "get along."
What is your life centered around now? Take a moment and
ponder that question.
We know that we are busier doing "something" than we have ever
been and our time saving devices have a lot to do with the fact that we
have less time than ever for ourselves.
It's true, I can e-mail a reply to someone in the blink of an eye
with a few taps on the keyboard of my computer - but how long does it
take to go through your email everyday?
But I wouldn't give up for anything the things you send me that
teach me things -
things that little children have learned - you can't baptize cats!
things that adults have learned - families are like fudge..mostly
sweet but with a few nuts.
things about growing old - forget the health food - I need all the
preservatives I can get - when you fall down, you wonder what else you
can do while you're down there - and that there are four stages of life -
You believe in Santa Claus
You don't believe in Santa Claus
You are Santa Claus
You look like Santa Claus.
Still, I'm glad that the computer company didn't build my car -
otherwise it would crash every now and then - the airbag system would
say "Are you sure" before deploying, and my warning lights would say,
"This car has performed an illegal operation." and if it stopped on the
freeway I would have to close all the windows, shut it off, restart it and
reopen the windows. to make it do what it's supposed to do.
And those computers that make such fast work of everything - did no
one every tell us how much time we would have to take trying to get it to
do what it is supposed to do. Did they tell us how much time we would
spend waiting for the computer to download, upload, reboot, or to print.
For some unknown reason, my computer will blink at me for about 10
minutes before it will acquiesce to printing a "Word" document. Fortunately,
I'm locked into Page Maker which prints its documents immediately unless
the document is extraordinarily memory intensive - like your bulletin cover
this morning - it's pretty, but it took awhile.
Well, you've had a while to ponder on what you center your life
around. I'm afraid to ask for how many of you the answer was "The
T.V.!" If I were a crueler ruler and not the fast pastor, I might ask how
many of you have declined to come to a church event, because there was
something on T.V. you just had to see. I have one word for that: TIVO!
Then you can select what you really want to see, you can fast forward
through the commercials and choose who gives you the news and avoid
those who say there is no spin attached.
God does not allow us to put our own spin on our lives....he tells
us like it is - and does so to help us, to heal us, to draw us to Himself. The
job description for God, is thankful, at a minimum, two fold - to judge us
and to save us - to save us from ourselves and our society.
Our first reaction when God judges us is DON'T TELL ME!
Our second reaction, after we ponder a bit, is DO TELL ME. Tell me
what I need to know about myself - what I am centering my life around -
what I am emphasizing with my life and what tools I need to us e to get
where I need to be.
Often with my Page Maker program I ask the computer to place
a picture in my document. But if you don't use the proper tool, it's not
going to happen, so I choose the proper tool very carefully.
One tool to insist on is to forsake not the assembly of yourselves
together with your church family - a family to be sure - like fudge - mostly
sweet but with a few nuts - but we're it.
A friend of mine has continued to attend my service club here in
Miami Beach even though he has moved to Naples - because he misses
us "nuts" as he calls us - the club there was too staid, too old in spirit - too
disinclined to do new things in new ways - he preferred us - sometimes a
little raucous, irreverent, and lacking in bureaucratic followthough. Now
this club is trying something new - meeting on Tuesday nights which will
rule out this nut and the Naples nut from attending. I have tried two clubs
since then - one was too snooty and the other was too absolutely perfect
- they did everything by the book - right out of the Rotary manual I'm
sure, but there was something missing - I would call it the family factor - I
didn't sense that presnet. Perhaps if I had attended for a longer period of
time.
We have the family factor here and some of us are nutty enough to
keep things interesting and we're always bugging you to help the poor - to
hang out at the homeless events - to buy toothbrushes and toothpaste and
all the rest.
A major tool for you and very hard to use on your own - the Bible
- the Bible is so complicated that it needs an interpreter. In our Sunday
morning class, that's me, but in addition we all learn from each other - not
just learning the Bible, but learning how the passages we read are to be
lived out in the daily experience. Just when people are really of an age
where they can really learn and understand about the things of God, they
give up Sunday School You can change that. We meet each sunday at 9
a.m.
And so, God calls us into question - asks us to examine ourselves
- where we are - where we're going - what we're centering our lives
around - standing ready to receive us , forgive us, embrace us.
It is very important for you to remember that God's forgiveness is
based on God's amazing determination to have a family - and he has
chosen us - nuts and all to be His Family. God made us, it is said,
because he loves stories - and boy do we have some stories for Him! But
at least we're not too snooty and we're not too good - too perfect - too
boring. There's no telling what we're going to do next or say next - hopefully
whatever it is will prove we have a sense of humor - like Elenor Roosevelt
who said, "I had a rose named after me and I was very flattered.
but I was not pleased to read the description in the catalog: No
good in a bed, but fine against a wall!"
or George Burns who said "The secret of a good sermon is
to have a good beginning and a good ending and to have the two as
close together as possible.
So I close with this illustration from Deb Sistare who worried
about how God would judge her grandfather - who seldom went to
church - perhaps because he had a secret - he had a drinking problem.
Shortly after his death Deb had a dream: "Grandpa was standing at
the bottom of a steep, pearl-white staircase that reached way into
the clouds. He gazed up at a huge angel who held out a satiny,
emerald-colored robe, open and waiting, it seemed for Grandpa
himself. When Grandpa headed up the stairs, he wasn't shuffling.
At the top of the stairs, the angel helped Grandpa into the robe and
tied the sash so the rich folds of material fell around him. Then the
angel took Grandpa's hand and together they disappeared into the
clouds.
Deb's grandmother was concerned about whether God
would receive her husband - welcome him. "He didn't go to church
much. I don't know if he asked God's forgiveness. I'm so afraid
he didn't go to heaven."
So Deb told her the dream she'd had. Her eyes filled with
tears and she said "He made it Deb. He really made it."
Deb said, "It was just a dream.
"Let me tell you something" her grandmother said,
"something we have never told anyone. One Sunday at church
where we were first married, your grandpa saw an angel standing
right on the altar. He said that angel was at least ten feet tall,
standing right behind the preacher and smiled down at him during
the service. And your grandpa said that angel was wearing the most
beautiful green robe - a robe that glistened like emeralds were the
words he used. 'When I get to heaven," he said, 'I want a green
robe just like the one that angel was wearing. ' What else could
that dream be but a sign from God that Grandpa is with Him?
What else, indeed. God sees our weaknesses and he loves us
despite them. He calls us to challenge them even as he prepares to welcome
us on our arrival. Don't Tell Me! No, DO TELL ME!
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)July 22, 2007 10:30 a, m. Amos 8:1-12
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
A Sin With Your Name On It
"A Sin With Your Name On It!"
What is the "SIN WITH YOUR NAME ON IT?" We'll get
to that momentarily, but first I want to ask you why you think the Samaritan
stopped to help the wounded man. It's a fictional story, but patterned by
Jesus after incident after incident that happened on the rock road between
Jerusalem at 2,300 feet above sea level to Jericho which stood 1,300 feet
BELOW sea-level. In a little more than 20 miles, this road dropped
#,600 feet. Its circumstuitous descent with sudden turnings and
outcroppings made it the perfect place from which robbers could attack
anyone foolish enough to travel alone. It was called The Red Way and
The Bloody Way as the travel in Jesus story found out.
The wounded man was Jewish. The Samaritan was Jewish plus.
The Samaritans were those Jews who mingled their ethnicity with the
ethnicity of their occupiers through intermarriage. No one was hated more
by the full-blooded Jews than the mixed-blooded Jews - the Samaritans.
The term "Good Samaritan" was the perfect oxy-moron of their time!
They were not ready to hear from Jesus that the persons they hated most
were the neighbors God was calling them to love. We shouldn't be
surprised at them. Many of us are the same way.
The Samaritan man however, who regularly was a victim of hatred
and prejudice - who was used to being rejected and scorned just because
he WAS a Samaritan, could readily identify with the man - a Jewish man -
who had become the victim of hatred and violence.
Perhaps he had seen the priest and the Levite passing the victim
by because they had to scurry on to temple. If they stopped and touched
the him and it turned out that he was dead, they would be rendered
ceremonially unclean for seven days and not be able to serve in the temple
during that time. They were willing to put the claims of the ceremonial
above those of charity. The Temple and its liturgy meant more to them
than the pain and dire situation of the man struck down by bandits.
So why did the Samaritan man stop. Let's ask him: "I stopped
because I knew the man in the ditch could have been me. I come
down this road frequently. I know it's a dangerous way from
Jerusalem to Jericho. I looked at him in the ditch, bleeding, and I
knew, that could have been me if I had been here just 30 minutes
earlier.
I was outraged that somebody would do this to another
person. Somebody has got to show that this was not the way the
world was intended to be. This was my chance to stand up and be
counted. All the 'important" things that I had to do that day didn't
seem that important once I saw a man in such dire need. God has
blessed me with lots of material resources. I had a wallet full of
money on me. It was what God wanted me to do. Every person is
a beloved child of God - even this man who if conscious and
unharmed would probably be calling me names - but he bleeds the
same color I do and I had to help him. He's my neighbor!
Ironically, in one confrontation with the self-righteous "religious"
people of his time, Jesus was called a name - they called him a "Samaritan."
(John 8:48) The name was sometimes used to describe a man who was a
heretic and a breaker of ceremonial law."
But it was the "Samaritan" who refused to commit the sin that has
your name on it - the sin of omission! We omit doing the things we know
God wants us to do because we are not willing to make the sacrifice. Let
me illustrate as I like to do.
Clarence Jordan, the founder of Koinonia Farm, the interracial
community outside Americus, Georgia grew up in a prosperous family,
received a traditional theological education (a Ph.D. in Greek New
Testament from Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky)., and
known for his brilliance as a writer, was en route to becoming a professor.
Instead, he left seminary to establish an interracial community in
segregated Georgia in the mid 1950's. Opposition was not unexpected,
but it was led by his own people, the Southern Baptist congregation that
eventually excommunicated the whole Koinonia Community. The charges
leveled against them read: "Said members...have persisted in holding
services where both white and colored attend together."
The excommunication was followed by vandalism, cross-burning,
legal pressures, beatings, bombings, a comprehensive economic boycott,
and shootings by snipers who aimed at any available target on the complex.
Clarence turned to his brother, attorney Robert Jordan, for legal
counsel and asked him to become legal representative of the Koinonia
Community. Robert, who later served as a Georgia a state senator and a
Justice of the Georgia State Supreme Court, declined. "Clarence, I
can't do that. You know my political aspirations. Why if I
represented you, I might lose my job, my house, everything I've
got."
"We might lose everything too, Bob."
"It's different for you."
"Why is it different? I remember, it seems to me, that you
and I joined the church the same Sunday as boys. I expect when
we came forward the preacher asked me about the same question
he did you. He asked me, 'Do you accept Jesus as your Lord and
Savior?" "And I said, 'Yes'. What did you say?"
"I follow Jesus, Clarence, up to a point." "Could that point
by any chance be - the cross?" "That's right. I follow him to the
cross, but not on the cross. I'm not getting myself crucified."
"Then I don't believe you're a disciple. You're and admirer
of Jesus, but not a disciple of his. I think you ought to go back to
the church you belong to, and tell them you're an admirer not a
disciple." "Well now, if everyone who felt like I do did,
then we wouldn't have a church would we?" \
"The question," Clarence said, "is do you have a church?!"
Do WE have a church? Are you a disciple or an admirer of
Jesus? Have you been lead TO the cross only - or at times ONTO the
cross?
The Samaritan had a full billfold. So did you until your taxes went
up! Then your insurance bill exploded! And, if you're like myself, your
latest electric bill made you understand that the utility thinks you're made
of money and should pay for their losses from the hurricanes. On the
other hand, the insurance companies have forced us into such high
deductibles with their high rates that when we have damage it isn't covered
unless our damage is catastrophic. For the church this has meant that
unless our damage was 30 some thousand dollars, we could collect nothing,
yet our premiums were 44 thousand a year. Now we're self insured for
windstorm, and praying a lot harder. I would guess your story is not all
that dissimilar, but you're still paying your pledges to the operating of the
church and to the restoration of the sanctuary. You have gone to the
cross.AND you are on the cross. You are a disciple of Jesus, not just an
admirer. You have not committed the sin of omission - the sin with your
name on it - as far as your giving is concerned.
I would guess that the sin of omission that we most often are guilty
of, is that we are not as conscious and contributive as we should be about
things that are not near at hand - that are across the world away from us.
Sunday night, Dr. Baratta shared with us the plight of
undernourished and diseased children in the Philippines from when he
was there - I believe in the eighties - and took it upon himself to do everything
he could while in school there to save their lives and better their
circumstances. One person made a big difference.
But the country has not changed all that much. According to
member, Paul Brassington who goes to the Philippines several times a
year, he condition of the children i has not appreciatively changed. When
you consider what's happening to children and families in Darfur, and in
East Africa as well as here at home, you don't know where to begin.
That's how the sin of omission can creep up on us.
One of the reasons I have been such a loyal Rotarian is that its
helpfulness reaches around the world to the far-off places - helping people
who have no future unless Rotary helps them and helping talented, capable
young people who have a future to accomplish great things due to Rotary's
financial backing. Through Rotary you can send your money to inoculate
children against polio and other crippling childhood diseases, or to restore
sight to a blind person. Many people in the world are blind simply because
they have cataracts that preclude them from seeing. With just $75 a
Rotarian was able to pay for a cataract removel - to give sight to someone.
"What did you do today?" "Oh, I made a blind man see!" That's
a miracle!
When you give your money to this church, a portion of it goes to
our churches wider mission that foes to work minor miracles for people
worldwide. Some of that money goes to Church World Service which is
immediately on the scene at disasters and which has ongoing program -
one of the best of them is to provide clean, accessible water - a miracle to
them - but something we barely think about here.
To show you how insensitive and far removed we are from the
rest of the world's reality, Joe Moran, Regional Director of Church World
Service in the Carolinas tells this sotry of a faux pas of his when CWS
was being thanked for having brought water to a village. Joe asked the
logical question: "How far did you have to walk to get water before
our well was installed? " "We had to walk to the river, about 1 1/
4 kilometers from here" a woman answered. Joe said quietly to he
whispered to a colleague seated near him: "That's not too bad." The
translator heard it an translated it. The woman replied: "You're right,
that's not that bad at least not for us grown women. We're used to
it, but it's very hard for the little ones. You see, water's very heavy,
not to mention the fact that a lot of our children are sick - not to
mention that the river is downhill from here and the children had to
carry the water back up the hill - not to mention the fact that the
river water is polluted with schistosomiasis, guinea worm, and other
waterborne bacteria, so that once we'd hauled it back here to the
village, we had to do more walking to find firewood in order to boil
the water to make it safe to drink - not to mention the fact that
getting water from the river was dangerous for the children - the
river is crocodile infested. Joe says that even after 10 years have
passed - when he turns on the water in his kitchen sink, he thinks
of the villagers of Maziyaya, Malawi.
You can send money to Church World Service specifically
earmarked for CWS Water for Life/Water for All (Church
World Service, 28606 Phillips Street. P.O. Box 968, Elkhart, IN 46515-
9962)
I received an e-mail yesterday from Commander Angie Keith who
has arrived at Camp Eggers in Kabul, Afghanistan which is a joint base -
all four of our military services as well as other coalition partners from
Australia, Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand, Romania and Germany.
Her command's mission is to train the Afghan National Army and Afghan
National Police, and to assist with provincial reconstruction projects such
as school construction and road repair. Her first act was to go on a
humanitarian mission, dropping off food at a refugee camp for displaced
Afghanistan citizens - IDP's - Internally Displaced Persons. There are
pictures of her doing this on our bulletin board on the back wall of Hice
Hall.
But what am I doing to avoid the sin that has my name on it -
omission. What are YOU doing to avoid THE SIN THAT HAS YOUR
NAME ON IT? The world is just not as God intended it to be. There
are so many wrongs that need to be righted. It is time for you to stand up
and be counted - to head for the cross and to jump onto the cross and into
sacrfice and suffering as necessary. Only time will tell if you do.
Meanimte, may God bless you as you give it thought - and espoecailly
as, in the Name of Christ, you give it action.
AMEN!
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)July 15, 2007 10:30 a, m. Luke 10:25-37
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
What is the "SIN WITH YOUR NAME ON IT?" We'll get
to that momentarily, but first I want to ask you why you think the Samaritan
stopped to help the wounded man. It's a fictional story, but patterned by
Jesus after incident after incident that happened on the rock road between
Jerusalem at 2,300 feet above sea level to Jericho which stood 1,300 feet
BELOW sea-level. In a little more than 20 miles, this road dropped
#,600 feet. Its circumstuitous descent with sudden turnings and
outcroppings made it the perfect place from which robbers could attack
anyone foolish enough to travel alone. It was called The Red Way and
The Bloody Way as the travel in Jesus story found out.
The wounded man was Jewish. The Samaritan was Jewish plus.
The Samaritans were those Jews who mingled their ethnicity with the
ethnicity of their occupiers through intermarriage. No one was hated more
by the full-blooded Jews than the mixed-blooded Jews - the Samaritans.
The term "Good Samaritan" was the perfect oxy-moron of their time!
They were not ready to hear from Jesus that the persons they hated most
were the neighbors God was calling them to love. We shouldn't be
surprised at them. Many of us are the same way.
The Samaritan man however, who regularly was a victim of hatred
and prejudice - who was used to being rejected and scorned just because
he WAS a Samaritan, could readily identify with the man - a Jewish man -
who had become the victim of hatred and violence.
Perhaps he had seen the priest and the Levite passing the victim
by because they had to scurry on to temple. If they stopped and touched
the him and it turned out that he was dead, they would be rendered
ceremonially unclean for seven days and not be able to serve in the temple
during that time. They were willing to put the claims of the ceremonial
above those of charity. The Temple and its liturgy meant more to them
than the pain and dire situation of the man struck down by bandits.
So why did the Samaritan man stop. Let's ask him: "I stopped
because I knew the man in the ditch could have been me. I come
down this road frequently. I know it's a dangerous way from
Jerusalem to Jericho. I looked at him in the ditch, bleeding, and I
knew, that could have been me if I had been here just 30 minutes
earlier.
I was outraged that somebody would do this to another
person. Somebody has got to show that this was not the way the
world was intended to be. This was my chance to stand up and be
counted. All the 'important" things that I had to do that day didn't
seem that important once I saw a man in such dire need. God has
blessed me with lots of material resources. I had a wallet full of
money on me. It was what God wanted me to do. Every person is
a beloved child of God - even this man who if conscious and
unharmed would probably be calling me names - but he bleeds the
same color I do and I had to help him. He's my neighbor!
Ironically, in one confrontation with the self-righteous "religious"
people of his time, Jesus was called a name - they called him a "Samaritan."
(John 8:48) The name was sometimes used to describe a man who was a
heretic and a breaker of ceremonial law."
But it was the "Samaritan" who refused to commit the sin that has
your name on it - the sin of omission! We omit doing the things we know
God wants us to do because we are not willing to make the sacrifice. Let
me illustrate as I like to do.
Clarence Jordan, the founder of Koinonia Farm, the interracial
community outside Americus, Georgia grew up in a prosperous family,
received a traditional theological education (a Ph.D. in Greek New
Testament from Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky)., and
known for his brilliance as a writer, was en route to becoming a professor.
Instead, he left seminary to establish an interracial community in
segregated Georgia in the mid 1950's. Opposition was not unexpected,
but it was led by his own people, the Southern Baptist congregation that
eventually excommunicated the whole Koinonia Community. The charges
leveled against them read: "Said members...have persisted in holding
services where both white and colored attend together."
The excommunication was followed by vandalism, cross-burning,
legal pressures, beatings, bombings, a comprehensive economic boycott,
and shootings by snipers who aimed at any available target on the complex.
Clarence turned to his brother, attorney Robert Jordan, for legal
counsel and asked him to become legal representative of the Koinonia
Community. Robert, who later served as a Georgia a state senator and a
Justice of the Georgia State Supreme Court, declined. "Clarence, I
can't do that. You know my political aspirations. Why if I
represented you, I might lose my job, my house, everything I've
got."
"We might lose everything too, Bob."
"It's different for you."
"Why is it different? I remember, it seems to me, that you
and I joined the church the same Sunday as boys. I expect when
we came forward the preacher asked me about the same question
he did you. He asked me, 'Do you accept Jesus as your Lord and
Savior?" "And I said, 'Yes'. What did you say?"
"I follow Jesus, Clarence, up to a point." "Could that point
by any chance be - the cross?" "That's right. I follow him to the
cross, but not on the cross. I'm not getting myself crucified."
"Then I don't believe you're a disciple. You're and admirer
of Jesus, but not a disciple of his. I think you ought to go back to
the church you belong to, and tell them you're an admirer not a
disciple." "Well now, if everyone who felt like I do did,
then we wouldn't have a church would we?" \
"The question," Clarence said, "is do you have a church?!"
Do WE have a church? Are you a disciple or an admirer of
Jesus? Have you been lead TO the cross only - or at times ONTO the
cross?
The Samaritan had a full billfold. So did you until your taxes went
up! Then your insurance bill exploded! And, if you're like myself, your
latest electric bill made you understand that the utility thinks you're made
of money and should pay for their losses from the hurricanes. On the
other hand, the insurance companies have forced us into such high
deductibles with their high rates that when we have damage it isn't covered
unless our damage is catastrophic. For the church this has meant that
unless our damage was 30 some thousand dollars, we could collect nothing,
yet our premiums were 44 thousand a year. Now we're self insured for
windstorm, and praying a lot harder. I would guess your story is not all
that dissimilar, but you're still paying your pledges to the operating of the
church and to the restoration of the sanctuary. You have gone to the
cross.AND you are on the cross. You are a disciple of Jesus, not just an
admirer. You have not committed the sin of omission - the sin with your
name on it - as far as your giving is concerned.
I would guess that the sin of omission that we most often are guilty
of, is that we are not as conscious and contributive as we should be about
things that are not near at hand - that are across the world away from us.
Sunday night, Dr. Baratta shared with us the plight of
undernourished and diseased children in the Philippines from when he
was there - I believe in the eighties - and took it upon himself to do everything
he could while in school there to save their lives and better their
circumstances. One person made a big difference.
But the country has not changed all that much. According to
member, Paul Brassington who goes to the Philippines several times a
year, he condition of the children i has not appreciatively changed. When
you consider what's happening to children and families in Darfur, and in
East Africa as well as here at home, you don't know where to begin.
That's how the sin of omission can creep up on us.
One of the reasons I have been such a loyal Rotarian is that its
helpfulness reaches around the world to the far-off places - helping people
who have no future unless Rotary helps them and helping talented, capable
young people who have a future to accomplish great things due to Rotary's
financial backing. Through Rotary you can send your money to inoculate
children against polio and other crippling childhood diseases, or to restore
sight to a blind person. Many people in the world are blind simply because
they have cataracts that preclude them from seeing. With just $75 a
Rotarian was able to pay for a cataract removel - to give sight to someone.
"What did you do today?" "Oh, I made a blind man see!" That's
a miracle!
When you give your money to this church, a portion of it goes to
our churches wider mission that foes to work minor miracles for people
worldwide. Some of that money goes to Church World Service which is
immediately on the scene at disasters and which has ongoing program -
one of the best of them is to provide clean, accessible water - a miracle to
them - but something we barely think about here.
To show you how insensitive and far removed we are from the
rest of the world's reality, Joe Moran, Regional Director of Church World
Service in the Carolinas tells this sotry of a faux pas of his when CWS
was being thanked for having brought water to a village. Joe asked the
logical question: "How far did you have to walk to get water before
our well was installed? " "We had to walk to the river, about 1 1/
4 kilometers from here" a woman answered. Joe said quietly to he
whispered to a colleague seated near him: "That's not too bad." The
translator heard it an translated it. The woman replied: "You're right,
that's not that bad at least not for us grown women. We're used to
it, but it's very hard for the little ones. You see, water's very heavy,
not to mention the fact that a lot of our children are sick - not to
mention that the river is downhill from here and the children had to
carry the water back up the hill - not to mention the fact that the
river water is polluted with schistosomiasis, guinea worm, and other
waterborne bacteria, so that once we'd hauled it back here to the
village, we had to do more walking to find firewood in order to boil
the water to make it safe to drink - not to mention the fact that
getting water from the river was dangerous for the children - the
river is crocodile infested. Joe says that even after 10 years have
passed - when he turns on the water in his kitchen sink, he thinks
of the villagers of Maziyaya, Malawi.
You can send money to Church World Service specifically
earmarked for CWS Water for Life/Water for All (Church
World Service, 28606 Phillips Street. P.O. Box 968, Elkhart, IN 46515-
9962)
I received an e-mail yesterday from Commander Angie Keith who
has arrived at Camp Eggers in Kabul, Afghanistan which is a joint base -
all four of our military services as well as other coalition partners from
Australia, Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand, Romania and Germany.
Her command's mission is to train the Afghan National Army and Afghan
National Police, and to assist with provincial reconstruction projects such
as school construction and road repair. Her first act was to go on a
humanitarian mission, dropping off food at a refugee camp for displaced
Afghanistan citizens - IDP's - Internally Displaced Persons. There are
pictures of her doing this on our bulletin board on the back wall of Hice
Hall.
But what am I doing to avoid the sin that has my name on it -
omission. What are YOU doing to avoid THE SIN THAT HAS YOUR
NAME ON IT? The world is just not as God intended it to be. There
are so many wrongs that need to be righted. It is time for you to stand up
and be counted - to head for the cross and to jump onto the cross and into
sacrfice and suffering as necessary. Only time will tell if you do.
Meanimte, may God bless you as you give it thought - and espoecailly
as, in the Name of Christ, you give it action.
AMEN!
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)July 15, 2007 10:30 a, m. Luke 10:25-37
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
Guess What You've Got!
"Guess What You've Got!"
I was speaking recently with a man of American Indian extraction
who referred to "the elders." As I understand it the elders are the ones
who have been given leadership in the tribe.
Moses sent 70 elders out who were given a portion of God's
spirit and who with this spirit, helped Moses lead the people of Israel -
and for that he needed lots of help.
Moses sent out 70. 72 went out! Eldad and Medad took it upon
themselves to go out as well, and they prophesied like the others, much to
the consternation of many of them.
I think that whole part of the history of Israel explains why the
Gospel writer has Jesus sending out exactly 72 elders to do his work.
We should not think of elders as being older - only wiser - more
endowed with the Spirit of Christ than others - specially gifted - specially
called.
You are gifted with what happens to you while you are here in this
little church. . One man described what we do here this way: "On
Sunday morning, I walk into a world that is the way God meant it to
be. People are considerate of one another. Strangers are welcomed.
We pray for justice and peace. Our sins are forgiven. We all face
in one direction, and we worship the same God. When it's over, I
get in my car to drive home feeling so full of love it's unbelievable,
but by the time I've gone twenty minutes down the road it has
already begun to wear off. By Monday morning it's all gone and
I've got another whole week to wait until Sunday rolls around again."
What the man was missing was HIS mission to take what he found
at church with him as he goes back into the world of which he is a part.
Jesus tells all of us, his disciples - "What you have heard and seen
in me, do." Lawyers "practice" law. Christians should "practice" their
Christianity - for they - YOU - are called to practice what the preacher
preaches. (So is he!)
Even scarier we are called to "preach the Gospel to every
creature." "Gospel" we know means "good news." But what IS the good
news and how do we go about preaching it?
When I was a teenager and a new Christian, the church sent us
out two by two. I've had the experience of ringing doorbells praying that
nobody would answer! It was scary. It was scary because within myself
I knew that we were speaking church language to people who spoke the
world's language. "This will be easier" I thought, "when I figure out
how to communicate the church's gospel in the world's words - how
to make salvation make sense to the person who doesn't even know
he has any need of it!"
There are several Old and New Testament ideas of what salvation
is. And in all the generations since then, there have been many concepts
of "salvation" considered and proposed for our adopting.
What we know for sure is that Jesus' being here changed
everything - before, we were bound. Now we are free. But how was this
accomplished.
Did God demand a sacrifice for our sin, and Jesus made Himself
that Sacrifice? How good is a God who demands such? How good is
THAT explanation of salvation? Not good at all, according to author,
theologian and singer, Dr. Grace Brame who will be coming to speak to
us in March. In THIS view of salvation, she says, it is as if God says: "I
will send myself to earth in or der to pay myself back for the sins
committed against me. I will offer my human body to be destroyed
by the evil and greed of those thirsting for power over people, not
power for people. By bearing the cost of human death, I will redeem,
pay back, all those who receive me and believe' in my name. That
means that I, incarnate, will pay the required price I have set. I
must receive this sacrifice as payment before I will forgive and
before I will give life eternally."
How convoluted is that - there are convolutions on the
convolutions. According to Jesus, salvation was very individual and
personal. It varied from person to person. To the rich young ruler who
kept all the commandments, Jesus said there was one more thing he needed
to do - Jesus knew that the young ruler didn't have his riches, his riches
had him - and so what He had to do for his salvation was give his riches
away.
That's not what you have to do necessarily - it's whatever blocks
you from becoming the person God intended you to be - His Person.
"Salvation," as one Presbyterian minister put it, "is synonymous with
health and wholeness and personhood. To be saved means to
accept the forgiveness of God, to strive to be a loving, benevolent,
redemptive and forgiving person, and to live relatively free from
wanton sin, futility, hatred, resentment, and other infirmities that
inhibit wholeness."
Jesus, you see brings us life - Eternal Life now - not later on. Yes
later on as well, but more importantly NOW when it can made a delightful
difference in your daily life - giving you understanding and purpose,
excitement and joy. It begins with understanding that Jesus IS your
savior - as Dr. Brame says: "That He lived and taught and died as
God's love incarnate. He freed and frees us from our prisons of
attitudes and habits, healed and heals our hearts , minds, and bodies;
and he opens the door to the kingdom here on earth and beyond."
I am so fortunate that two of my friends, among a whole bevy of
others are now writing about the meaning of salvation. In addition to Dr.
Brame, Dr. John Killinger who has graced our pulpit in the past, has just
written a book, The Changing Shape of Our Salvation." In it, he
quotes another pastor as saying that "Salvation is something that
"enfolds" everyone from birth but needs to be realized before it
can become truly active in the person's life."
That's why WE'RE here, that's whey YOU'RE here. Dr. Killinger
quotes a United Methodist minister as saying that "Salvation is not a
Christian matter alone." Therefore, he believes, whatever we say
about salvation must be couched in language that would be acceptable in
other religions as well. "For me," he says, "Salvation means finding
oneself and a higher power, whether we call the higher power the
Creator, the Ground of Being, or whatever, and making peace with
both. It means accepting our imperfections and those of others,
and knowing that we are all created in love by a supreme being
who cherishes everyone...it means having a compassionate view of
all creation, and wanting to relieve the suffering of others. It means
that we are to be healers instead of destroyers." It means uniting
everything and not trying to set up divisions." This definition does
not rule out Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, or even non-religious persons.
This means that God is enfolding ALL of his people in Salvation.
Our job is to help them "realize" their salvation.
As one Southern Baptist person put it, "Salvation is the glue
that hold life together. It is a relationship with God that provides
meaning, opens the door to loving contact with others, and points
the way to moral stability. It is never a program or a formula to
remember and recite. Instead it is the force that holds all the
confluences of life together. (Did I say SOUTHERN Baptist? -
Good for him! - good for them)
One of my former parishioners, a Southern Baptist said "There
are Southern Baptists and there are Southern Baptists" She
definitely was one of the enlightened and joyous ones, that made everyone
appreciate the faith to which she subscribed. GUESS WHAT YOU'VE
GOT! - a calling!
When we think about our calling, and /or hear the Scripture of the
morning (from the 10th chapter of the Gospel of Luke) many of us get
clutched because we think it means we have to preach to, at, or in front of
people. Preaching the gospel for you should not be about talking, but
about being - about being the kind of person in whom others see the
Christ at work - incarnated - living - welcoming, healing - helping.
Bill Gates, who is devoting more and more of his time to helping
people around the world, in speaking to a Harvard graduating class, told
them that thirty years from now when they reflect back on what they have
done with their talent and energy, they would judge themselves on how
well they treated people a world away with whom they have nothing in
common but their humanity. He hoped that they would judge themselves
on how well they addressed the world's deepest inequities. It's important!
Hugh Downs said "To say my fate is not tied to your fate is like
saing your end of the boat is sinking.
Pam Kidd, a writer of devotionals in the Guideposts magazine
was asked by a misisonary there to write a story about the orphans and
street children of Harare, Zimbabwe. She went there and decided to focus
on a woman whom the chidlren called the bread and tea lady - she gave
them breakfast every morning. As Sue watched her at work, she took
God to task: "Lord, Is this some kind of cruel joke: Wy aren't you
helping this lady? Why don't you send someone?" There was
silence. Then she heard: "I did. I sent you." She heard her call. She
answered and made a difference, due to her concern for the children.
What I have come to see about the Christ over the years, is that
He is concerned about EVERYONE and wanting each and everyone to
respond God's spirit, knowing and accepting God's love and going forth
to express it in every way possible. As my friend John puts it, we go
forth "not to count converts like scalps hanging from our belts or to
pride ourselves in our dominance on the mission fields, but to help
people everywhere and in every culture to find the switches that
turn on the best that is inside the, saving the world from the
selfishness and prejudices and divisions that now cripple and destroy
it, and turning our planet into a holiday scene of bright lights going
on in everybody with everybody coming out into the streets to dance
and sing and celebrate love.
So here we are and here we go. We're here where the world is as
God is intended to me, and we go forth as elders in Christ's name to carry
what is here to what is there.
One who is not where our church is any longer lamented his
geographical plight. "I am so tired of being where my church is
not."
Our task is to take whatever our church is - and it IS very special - to
where it is not - individually - each of us a church in our own way.
I am a little church (no great cathedral)
Far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities
-I do not worry if briefer days grow briefest,
I am not sorry when sun and rain make april.
My life is the life of the reaper and the sower;
My prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving
(finding and losing and laughing and crying) children
whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness
around me surges a miracle of unceasing
birth and glory and death and resurrection:
over my sleeping self float flaming symbols
of hope, and I wake to a perfect patience of mountains
I am a little church (far from the frantic
world with its rapture and anguish) at peace with nature
-i do not worry if longer nights grow longest:
i am not sorry when silence becomes signing
Winter by spring, i lift my diminutive spire to
merciful Him Whose only now is forever:
Standing erect in the deathless truth of His presence
(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness
poem and punctuation e.e. cummings
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)July 8, 2007 10:30 a, m. Luke 10:1--11, 16-20
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
I was speaking recently with a man of American Indian extraction
who referred to "the elders." As I understand it the elders are the ones
who have been given leadership in the tribe.
Moses sent 70 elders out who were given a portion of God's
spirit and who with this spirit, helped Moses lead the people of Israel -
and for that he needed lots of help.
Moses sent out 70. 72 went out! Eldad and Medad took it upon
themselves to go out as well, and they prophesied like the others, much to
the consternation of many of them.
I think that whole part of the history of Israel explains why the
Gospel writer has Jesus sending out exactly 72 elders to do his work.
We should not think of elders as being older - only wiser - more
endowed with the Spirit of Christ than others - specially gifted - specially
called.
You are gifted with what happens to you while you are here in this
little church. . One man described what we do here this way: "On
Sunday morning, I walk into a world that is the way God meant it to
be. People are considerate of one another. Strangers are welcomed.
We pray for justice and peace. Our sins are forgiven. We all face
in one direction, and we worship the same God. When it's over, I
get in my car to drive home feeling so full of love it's unbelievable,
but by the time I've gone twenty minutes down the road it has
already begun to wear off. By Monday morning it's all gone and
I've got another whole week to wait until Sunday rolls around again."
What the man was missing was HIS mission to take what he found
at church with him as he goes back into the world of which he is a part.
Jesus tells all of us, his disciples - "What you have heard and seen
in me, do." Lawyers "practice" law. Christians should "practice" their
Christianity - for they - YOU - are called to practice what the preacher
preaches. (So is he!)
Even scarier we are called to "preach the Gospel to every
creature." "Gospel" we know means "good news." But what IS the good
news and how do we go about preaching it?
When I was a teenager and a new Christian, the church sent us
out two by two. I've had the experience of ringing doorbells praying that
nobody would answer! It was scary. It was scary because within myself
I knew that we were speaking church language to people who spoke the
world's language. "This will be easier" I thought, "when I figure out
how to communicate the church's gospel in the world's words - how
to make salvation make sense to the person who doesn't even know
he has any need of it!"
There are several Old and New Testament ideas of what salvation
is. And in all the generations since then, there have been many concepts
of "salvation" considered and proposed for our adopting.
What we know for sure is that Jesus' being here changed
everything - before, we were bound. Now we are free. But how was this
accomplished.
Did God demand a sacrifice for our sin, and Jesus made Himself
that Sacrifice? How good is a God who demands such? How good is
THAT explanation of salvation? Not good at all, according to author,
theologian and singer, Dr. Grace Brame who will be coming to speak to
us in March. In THIS view of salvation, she says, it is as if God says: "I
will send myself to earth in or der to pay myself back for the sins
committed against me. I will offer my human body to be destroyed
by the evil and greed of those thirsting for power over people, not
power for people. By bearing the cost of human death, I will redeem,
pay back, all those who receive me and believe' in my name. That
means that I, incarnate, will pay the required price I have set. I
must receive this sacrifice as payment before I will forgive and
before I will give life eternally."
How convoluted is that - there are convolutions on the
convolutions. According to Jesus, salvation was very individual and
personal. It varied from person to person. To the rich young ruler who
kept all the commandments, Jesus said there was one more thing he needed
to do - Jesus knew that the young ruler didn't have his riches, his riches
had him - and so what He had to do for his salvation was give his riches
away.
That's not what you have to do necessarily - it's whatever blocks
you from becoming the person God intended you to be - His Person.
"Salvation," as one Presbyterian minister put it, "is synonymous with
health and wholeness and personhood. To be saved means to
accept the forgiveness of God, to strive to be a loving, benevolent,
redemptive and forgiving person, and to live relatively free from
wanton sin, futility, hatred, resentment, and other infirmities that
inhibit wholeness."
Jesus, you see brings us life - Eternal Life now - not later on. Yes
later on as well, but more importantly NOW when it can made a delightful
difference in your daily life - giving you understanding and purpose,
excitement and joy. It begins with understanding that Jesus IS your
savior - as Dr. Brame says: "That He lived and taught and died as
God's love incarnate. He freed and frees us from our prisons of
attitudes and habits, healed and heals our hearts , minds, and bodies;
and he opens the door to the kingdom here on earth and beyond."
I am so fortunate that two of my friends, among a whole bevy of
others are now writing about the meaning of salvation. In addition to Dr.
Brame, Dr. John Killinger who has graced our pulpit in the past, has just
written a book, The Changing Shape of Our Salvation." In it, he
quotes another pastor as saying that "Salvation is something that
"enfolds" everyone from birth but needs to be realized before it
can become truly active in the person's life."
That's why WE'RE here, that's whey YOU'RE here. Dr. Killinger
quotes a United Methodist minister as saying that "Salvation is not a
Christian matter alone." Therefore, he believes, whatever we say
about salvation must be couched in language that would be acceptable in
other religions as well. "For me," he says, "Salvation means finding
oneself and a higher power, whether we call the higher power the
Creator, the Ground of Being, or whatever, and making peace with
both. It means accepting our imperfections and those of others,
and knowing that we are all created in love by a supreme being
who cherishes everyone...it means having a compassionate view of
all creation, and wanting to relieve the suffering of others. It means
that we are to be healers instead of destroyers." It means uniting
everything and not trying to set up divisions." This definition does
not rule out Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, or even non-religious persons.
This means that God is enfolding ALL of his people in Salvation.
Our job is to help them "realize" their salvation.
As one Southern Baptist person put it, "Salvation is the glue
that hold life together. It is a relationship with God that provides
meaning, opens the door to loving contact with others, and points
the way to moral stability. It is never a program or a formula to
remember and recite. Instead it is the force that holds all the
confluences of life together. (Did I say SOUTHERN Baptist? -
Good for him! - good for them)
One of my former parishioners, a Southern Baptist said "There
are Southern Baptists and there are Southern Baptists" She
definitely was one of the enlightened and joyous ones, that made everyone
appreciate the faith to which she subscribed. GUESS WHAT YOU'VE
GOT! - a calling!
When we think about our calling, and /or hear the Scripture of the
morning (from the 10th chapter of the Gospel of Luke) many of us get
clutched because we think it means we have to preach to, at, or in front of
people. Preaching the gospel for you should not be about talking, but
about being - about being the kind of person in whom others see the
Christ at work - incarnated - living - welcoming, healing - helping.
Bill Gates, who is devoting more and more of his time to helping
people around the world, in speaking to a Harvard graduating class, told
them that thirty years from now when they reflect back on what they have
done with their talent and energy, they would judge themselves on how
well they treated people a world away with whom they have nothing in
common but their humanity. He hoped that they would judge themselves
on how well they addressed the world's deepest inequities. It's important!
Hugh Downs said "To say my fate is not tied to your fate is like
saing your end of the boat is sinking.
Pam Kidd, a writer of devotionals in the Guideposts magazine
was asked by a misisonary there to write a story about the orphans and
street children of Harare, Zimbabwe. She went there and decided to focus
on a woman whom the chidlren called the bread and tea lady - she gave
them breakfast every morning. As Sue watched her at work, she took
God to task: "Lord, Is this some kind of cruel joke: Wy aren't you
helping this lady? Why don't you send someone?" There was
silence. Then she heard: "I did. I sent you." She heard her call. She
answered and made a difference, due to her concern for the children.
What I have come to see about the Christ over the years, is that
He is concerned about EVERYONE and wanting each and everyone to
respond God's spirit, knowing and accepting God's love and going forth
to express it in every way possible. As my friend John puts it, we go
forth "not to count converts like scalps hanging from our belts or to
pride ourselves in our dominance on the mission fields, but to help
people everywhere and in every culture to find the switches that
turn on the best that is inside the, saving the world from the
selfishness and prejudices and divisions that now cripple and destroy
it, and turning our planet into a holiday scene of bright lights going
on in everybody with everybody coming out into the streets to dance
and sing and celebrate love.
So here we are and here we go. We're here where the world is as
God is intended to me, and we go forth as elders in Christ's name to carry
what is here to what is there.
One who is not where our church is any longer lamented his
geographical plight. "I am so tired of being where my church is
not."
Our task is to take whatever our church is - and it IS very special - to
where it is not - individually - each of us a church in our own way.
I am a little church (no great cathedral)
Far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities
-I do not worry if briefer days grow briefest,
I am not sorry when sun and rain make april.
My life is the life of the reaper and the sower;
My prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving
(finding and losing and laughing and crying) children
whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness
around me surges a miracle of unceasing
birth and glory and death and resurrection:
over my sleeping self float flaming symbols
of hope, and I wake to a perfect patience of mountains
I am a little church (far from the frantic
world with its rapture and anguish) at peace with nature
-i do not worry if longer nights grow longest:
i am not sorry when silence becomes signing
Winter by spring, i lift my diminutive spire to
merciful Him Whose only now is forever:
Standing erect in the deathless truth of His presence
(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness
poem and punctuation e.e. cummings
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)July 8, 2007 10:30 a, m. Luke 10:1--11, 16-20
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
06 Failed Funeral
I've been giving a lot of thought to what I would like them to say at
my funeral. These are the words I would want to hear: "Hey! He's
movin'!" THAT would be THE FAILED FUNERAL which is the
topic of today's sermon based on Luke 7:11-17 where there was one -
the funeral failed miserably! Jesus comes upon a funeral procession
in which a widow's son and only provider is being taken for burial. He
tells the young man to get up - AND HE DOES!
The closest I can come to that in modern times, is to tell you
about Dr. Ritchie, who was a young medical doctor in the military who
himself took ill. They weren't able to save him and they pronounced him
dead . In true military efficiency, TWO doctors declared him dead, but
he woke up in the morgue! However, the most interesting part of his
"down time" (or I guess it was "up" time) was that Jesus took him on a
tour of the many levels of the afterlife - including one place where scientists
were working on some the console of some very complicated machine.
Ten years later, he saw the console as the new atomic submarine was
being pictured in one of our major magazines.
This should change for us the way we look at "heaven" - not as
some place where we sit on a could and do nothing - which would be
hellish in my opinion (!, ), but instead continue exciting lives in which we
learn and grow and develop from where we left off here - figuring things
out - inventing things. It makes me sort of want to go there, but not just
yet! "I have promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep" as
the poet put it so nicely. And while I travel those miles, I learn from this
story THE most important kindness to practice - compassion. (There
isn't one of us who hasn't ask ourselves how much compassion we REALLY
have when we sit at an intersection, studiously avoiding looking at the
person there - usually with a sign, describing in summary fashion the reason
for his or her plight. You know his real plight may be caused by alcohol or
drug abuse, so you are disinclined to act with compassion for what may
be a ruse and a way for someone to make a very good living by playing on
the very quality the preacher is always telling you to have. Life is not
easy! Darn those preachers anyhow!)
One well known preacher from years gone by, George Buttrick
was hard at work on a sermon while aboard an aircraft. A seatmate
asked him what he was working on, and when he said he was a
Presbyterian minister working on his Sunday sermon, the man said, "I
don't get all caught up in the ins and outs of religion - the Golden
Rule - that's my religion - "Do unto others as you would have them
do unto you!"
Dr. Buttrick asked, "And what do you do?" "I work at the
university," he said, "I'm an astronomer." "Oh" said the preacher,
"I don't like to get caught up in the ins and outs of astronomy.
"Twinkle, twinkle, little star" - that's my astronomy!"
All religions encourage us to be compassionate - like Jesus was in
raising the son of the widow - widows fared poorly in those times. In the
early church, special thought was given to the supporting of the widows.
Now, according to an aunt of mine - "The widows support the church."
(I guess turn about is fair play.)
In any case, compassion is paramount in the philosophies of all
religions. The philosopher, Schopenhauer called compassion "the basis
of all morality."
That's explained by Dr. Walter Brueggemann, a biblical scholar with whom
I almost studied. I missed him by a semester when he was teaching at
Eden Theological Seminary from which I got my most recent degree.
Dr. Brueggemann says that "Compassion constitutes a radical
form of criticism, for it announces that the hurt is to be taken
seriously, that the hurt is not to be accepted as normal and natural,
but is an abnormal and unacceptable condition for humanness."
He goes on to argue that we should understand the compassion
of Jesus not simply as his personal emotional reaction but as public criticism
in which he dares to act upon his concern in the face of the numbness of
the society he serves.
We are a society numbed by T.V. and obsessed with celebrity.
Have you checked lately with how many celebrities end up with extensive
coverage on CNN news - on national news?
Have you noticed how they put those stories toward the end of
their broadcast so that you have to wait until then to know what what's
happening - how someone is doing in jail - how they got out of jail - how
they got put back in jail. Celebrities deserve our compassion too, but our
major compassion and our attention needs to go towards being sure that
others are not hurt or maimed because some celebrity thinks they're above
the law and can bread any law and get away with it. Money should not be
able to buy that.
That was the widow's problem - she had no money. In addition
to losing her son - children are supposed to die after their parents, not
before. She lost her security. Her son was the only one available to take
care of her in her old age. Now he was gone. She had no retirement
fund. She had no pension plan, no social security. The loss of her son
meant a life of poverty, hunger, disease and an early grave. This was the
reason for the compassion of Jesus, and Dr. Bruggemann was right. Jesus
HAD to act because society wasn't. This hurt, he declared is not to be
accepted as normal and natural but as abnormal and unacceptable - a
failure - a numbness of society.
Society itself is in a funeral procession - its own. Let's just
hope we hear Jesus' words to "Get up!" We need to move. We need to
have A FAILED FUNERAL. Hey! He's movin'!
A new Board Member of the Counseling Ministry of South Florida
said that she is willing only to work with organizations that can be great -
which I interpreted her to mean - making a difference through their
embodied compassion.
For the church this means raising people up even as Jesus raised
up the young man - taking people from death to life.
Janet Hellner-Burris, now a minister, told of being brought from
death to life as a teenager by Mildred who she calls her "Santa Fe Mama."
She took me into her apartment when I had no place to live, simply
because I was a member of her church and a young person in need.
It didn't matter that she was a middle-aged black woman and I was
a young white hippie. She opened her home and her heart to me.
She adopted me and called me her daughter.
"A few weeks ago," Janet says, "I made a quick trip to
Sante Fe to see Mildred...who had been on my mind a lot these
past few months since her Christmas letter informed me that her
only son, Mike died of cancer. I wanted to see her and tell her "I
love you" in person.
When we visited that evening, she explained in more detail
Mike's battle with cancer. I felt her pain as tears filled my eyes. I
would have moved heaven and earth to take away that pain, but I
knew that I could not. All I could do for her - that what she need
most from me - was to sit and listen to her sorrow."
Jesus calls you today to think of the people around you in your
church in your work in your neighborhood who are bearing grief - grief
over divorce, sickness, disability, unemployment, moving a home, a child
leaving home, the end of a friendship, and perhaps, the death of a loved
one and to listen to them, support them - raise them up!
Allow yourself to be touched by the grief of others. Jesus was not
a professional mourner who was paid to cry for the widow and lead the
funeral procession. He was not a member of the crowd fulfilling a noble
custom of attending a funeral in deference to the family of the deceased -
he was just someone passing by who allowed himself to be touched to the
core of his being.
Christians - the followers of Christ are not those who believe a
certain thing or those who insist that everyone believe as they do - Christians
are those who allow themselves to be touched to the core of their being
by the little deaths that people around them experience on a daily basis.
A kindness extended at such a time can last a lifetime. A kindness at any
time can be memberable.
Let me illustrate as I like to do. Not all that long after arriving here
in the mid seventies, I took the members of our youth fellowship to Channel
10 as a learning experience. I believe it was 1979. When it came time
for Don Noe to do the weather report, we were asked to step out. After
all a group of youth like that could make unwanted noise during such a
broadcast. But Don Noe himself intervened with great kindness and
insisted that we be allowed to stay in the room - which was saying something
to the young people that they so much need to hear - that someone
believes in them - trusts them. Needless to say they were properly quiet
and respectful during the weather forecast.
To this day, I never see Don Noe giving us the weather without
recalling that kindness from decades ago. No wonder he's lasted, not
only because of his skill, and his obvious love for what he does, but
certainly because within himself he has "the basis of all morality" -
compassion.
THE FAILED FUNERAL calls us to have compassion - the
Hallmark of the character of the Christ himself. We remember HIS
compassion - and with our compassion we become memberable.
Let's get movin' and when it's time to be in our own funeral
procession, they're be all kinds of people there hoping to hear these words:
"Hey! He's movin'!"
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)June 10, 2007 10:30 a, m. Luke 7:11-17
"THE FAILED FUNERAL!"May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
my funeral. These are the words I would want to hear: "Hey! He's
movin'!" THAT would be THE FAILED FUNERAL which is the
topic of today's sermon based on Luke 7:11-17 where there was one -
the funeral failed miserably! Jesus comes upon a funeral procession
in which a widow's son and only provider is being taken for burial. He
tells the young man to get up - AND HE DOES!
The closest I can come to that in modern times, is to tell you
about Dr. Ritchie, who was a young medical doctor in the military who
himself took ill. They weren't able to save him and they pronounced him
dead . In true military efficiency, TWO doctors declared him dead, but
he woke up in the morgue! However, the most interesting part of his
"down time" (or I guess it was "up" time) was that Jesus took him on a
tour of the many levels of the afterlife - including one place where scientists
were working on some the console of some very complicated machine.
Ten years later, he saw the console as the new atomic submarine was
being pictured in one of our major magazines.
This should change for us the way we look at "heaven" - not as
some place where we sit on a could and do nothing - which would be
hellish in my opinion (!, ), but instead continue exciting lives in which we
learn and grow and develop from where we left off here - figuring things
out - inventing things. It makes me sort of want to go there, but not just
yet! "I have promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep" as
the poet put it so nicely. And while I travel those miles, I learn from this
story THE most important kindness to practice - compassion. (There
isn't one of us who hasn't ask ourselves how much compassion we REALLY
have when we sit at an intersection, studiously avoiding looking at the
person there - usually with a sign, describing in summary fashion the reason
for his or her plight. You know his real plight may be caused by alcohol or
drug abuse, so you are disinclined to act with compassion for what may
be a ruse and a way for someone to make a very good living by playing on
the very quality the preacher is always telling you to have. Life is not
easy! Darn those preachers anyhow!)
One well known preacher from years gone by, George Buttrick
was hard at work on a sermon while aboard an aircraft. A seatmate
asked him what he was working on, and when he said he was a
Presbyterian minister working on his Sunday sermon, the man said, "I
don't get all caught up in the ins and outs of religion - the Golden
Rule - that's my religion - "Do unto others as you would have them
do unto you!"
Dr. Buttrick asked, "And what do you do?" "I work at the
university," he said, "I'm an astronomer." "Oh" said the preacher,
"I don't like to get caught up in the ins and outs of astronomy.
"Twinkle, twinkle, little star" - that's my astronomy!"
All religions encourage us to be compassionate - like Jesus was in
raising the son of the widow - widows fared poorly in those times. In the
early church, special thought was given to the supporting of the widows.
Now, according to an aunt of mine - "The widows support the church."
(I guess turn about is fair play.)
In any case, compassion is paramount in the philosophies of all
religions. The philosopher, Schopenhauer called compassion "the basis
of all morality."
That's explained by Dr. Walter Brueggemann, a biblical scholar with whom
I almost studied. I missed him by a semester when he was teaching at
Eden Theological Seminary from which I got my most recent degree.
Dr. Brueggemann says that "Compassion constitutes a radical
form of criticism, for it announces that the hurt is to be taken
seriously, that the hurt is not to be accepted as normal and natural,
but is an abnormal and unacceptable condition for humanness."
He goes on to argue that we should understand the compassion
of Jesus not simply as his personal emotional reaction but as public criticism
in which he dares to act upon his concern in the face of the numbness of
the society he serves.
We are a society numbed by T.V. and obsessed with celebrity.
Have you checked lately with how many celebrities end up with extensive
coverage on CNN news - on national news?
Have you noticed how they put those stories toward the end of
their broadcast so that you have to wait until then to know what what's
happening - how someone is doing in jail - how they got out of jail - how
they got put back in jail. Celebrities deserve our compassion too, but our
major compassion and our attention needs to go towards being sure that
others are not hurt or maimed because some celebrity thinks they're above
the law and can bread any law and get away with it. Money should not be
able to buy that.
That was the widow's problem - she had no money. In addition
to losing her son - children are supposed to die after their parents, not
before. She lost her security. Her son was the only one available to take
care of her in her old age. Now he was gone. She had no retirement
fund. She had no pension plan, no social security. The loss of her son
meant a life of poverty, hunger, disease and an early grave. This was the
reason for the compassion of Jesus, and Dr. Bruggemann was right. Jesus
HAD to act because society wasn't. This hurt, he declared is not to be
accepted as normal and natural but as abnormal and unacceptable - a
failure - a numbness of society.
Society itself is in a funeral procession - its own. Let's just
hope we hear Jesus' words to "Get up!" We need to move. We need to
have A FAILED FUNERAL. Hey! He's movin'!
A new Board Member of the Counseling Ministry of South Florida
said that she is willing only to work with organizations that can be great -
which I interpreted her to mean - making a difference through their
embodied compassion.
For the church this means raising people up even as Jesus raised
up the young man - taking people from death to life.
Janet Hellner-Burris, now a minister, told of being brought from
death to life as a teenager by Mildred who she calls her "Santa Fe Mama."
She took me into her apartment when I had no place to live, simply
because I was a member of her church and a young person in need.
It didn't matter that she was a middle-aged black woman and I was
a young white hippie. She opened her home and her heart to me.
She adopted me and called me her daughter.
"A few weeks ago," Janet says, "I made a quick trip to
Sante Fe to see Mildred...who had been on my mind a lot these
past few months since her Christmas letter informed me that her
only son, Mike died of cancer. I wanted to see her and tell her "I
love you" in person.
When we visited that evening, she explained in more detail
Mike's battle with cancer. I felt her pain as tears filled my eyes. I
would have moved heaven and earth to take away that pain, but I
knew that I could not. All I could do for her - that what she need
most from me - was to sit and listen to her sorrow."
Jesus calls you today to think of the people around you in your
church in your work in your neighborhood who are bearing grief - grief
over divorce, sickness, disability, unemployment, moving a home, a child
leaving home, the end of a friendship, and perhaps, the death of a loved
one and to listen to them, support them - raise them up!
Allow yourself to be touched by the grief of others. Jesus was not
a professional mourner who was paid to cry for the widow and lead the
funeral procession. He was not a member of the crowd fulfilling a noble
custom of attending a funeral in deference to the family of the deceased -
he was just someone passing by who allowed himself to be touched to the
core of his being.
Christians - the followers of Christ are not those who believe a
certain thing or those who insist that everyone believe as they do - Christians
are those who allow themselves to be touched to the core of their being
by the little deaths that people around them experience on a daily basis.
A kindness extended at such a time can last a lifetime. A kindness at any
time can be memberable.
Let me illustrate as I like to do. Not all that long after arriving here
in the mid seventies, I took the members of our youth fellowship to Channel
10 as a learning experience. I believe it was 1979. When it came time
for Don Noe to do the weather report, we were asked to step out. After
all a group of youth like that could make unwanted noise during such a
broadcast. But Don Noe himself intervened with great kindness and
insisted that we be allowed to stay in the room - which was saying something
to the young people that they so much need to hear - that someone
believes in them - trusts them. Needless to say they were properly quiet
and respectful during the weather forecast.
To this day, I never see Don Noe giving us the weather without
recalling that kindness from decades ago. No wonder he's lasted, not
only because of his skill, and his obvious love for what he does, but
certainly because within himself he has "the basis of all morality" -
compassion.
THE FAILED FUNERAL calls us to have compassion - the
Hallmark of the character of the Christ himself. We remember HIS
compassion - and with our compassion we become memberable.
Let's get movin' and when it's time to be in our own funeral
procession, they're be all kinds of people there hoping to hear these words:
"Hey! He's movin'!"
Sermon Notes(Not edited nor proofed)The Rev. Dr. Garth R. Thompson Pastor, M.B. Community ChurchA sermon is a simple truth told by someone whobelieves it to people he knows and loves (Phillips Brooks)June 10, 2007 10:30 a, m. Luke 7:11-17
"THE FAILED FUNERAL!"May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our heartsbe acceptable in Thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer.
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