Category: June 2017

“Two Constants”

Judges 10:10-16         Matthew 28:18-20

                   You have heard it more than once…probably heard it from your grandparents… and they probably heard it from theirs.  There are only two sure things in this life…death and taxes.  Sure…we’ve all heard it.

Today…I want to suggest to you that there are indeed two sure things…but they aren’t death and taxes.

You only have to turn to the gospels to learn that death is not a sure thing for those who believe.  John said it best in that verse that everyone knows…the New Living Translation puts it this way…”For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”

When we attend a funeral or memorial service…the final celebration of a person’s earthly life…it’s the celebration of that part of their life we have known on earth…and a sendoff to the next leg on their life journey…their eternal life journey.

Death is not a sure thing…not the real end.

There is reference to taxes in the Bible…but nothing that says taxes are or are not a sure thing.  In fact every tax is created by a group of people who have the ability to change their minds…and repeal those taxes…each and every one of them.  Now…I’m not going to bet the farm that I will see a day when there are no taxes…but I will say that taxes are not a sure thing.

But…history…and our own experiences tell us there are two sure things in our lives on earth…God’s presence always and everywhere… and the other is change.   Our Old Testament lesson from Judges should make that clear.  The entire book is about a time of change in the lives of God’s people.  It also tells us that God was always there…always there with them.

Judges is the story of God’s people and those men and women whom God sent to lead them because the people asked for human guidance.  The people said they weren’t certain they could live the old way…following God’s guidance without an earthly leader.  The words we heard from the book of Judges this morning came at a time that the Bronze Age was ending in the Middle East…a time of significant change in the way that people lived and worked.

Throughout the book of Judges there are stories of God’s people being conquered and made captive by a number of foreign peoples.  God listed some of them in his conversation with the distressed Israelites…Egyptians…Amorites… Ammonites…Philistines…Sidonians…Amalekites… and Maonites.  You can bet that under each of them the rules of the game changed for the Israelites…and if you accept God’s word…you know that he was there with them.

Stop and think for a moment…throughout your life there has been change…some gradual…some minor…some rapid and some radical.  And…God has been there with you.  If he hadn’t been there with you would you even consider being here today?

For me…there’s more than logic…there’s proof…proof through God’s revelation to me.  If it hadn’t been for God’s revelation and his presence I wouldn’t be here today.  Now, it wasn’t a burning bush experience like that of Moses…or a Damascus Road experience like Paul’s….or a conversation on the road to Emmaus like Cleopas and his companion.  It was people that God placed in my path.

I was an only and lonely child in a single-parent household…  lived with my dad…who had very little education and worked two jobs just to be able to pay the rent and put food on the table and clothes on our backs.  I seldom saw him and in that part of my life I knew of God in only two ways…as the first word of a two word curse…or as a vengeful…powerful being who would get me if I did something wrong.

I was 14 when I met God in a different way.  I worked part time at a restaurant with a man whose name was Richard O’Brien.  Richard had been raised in a Roman Catholic family…and told stories of a loving God.  Richard and his life partner… Patrick… also taught me how to love Shakespeare and his works.  They also told me how they had been made outcasts by the people in their church.  I started to question how a God whom they told me loved all of His creation could tolerate people who didn’t love all of God’s creation.

I have since learned it wasn’t God who abandoned Richard and Patrick.  It was people claiming to be God’s people who had abandoned Richard and Patrick.

A couple years later…working in a different restaurant…I met a man who was known to me only as Ace.  He was a Black man…who had learned to read at his mother’s side as she read Scripture to him from their family Bible.  He…too…spoke of a God of love.  He…too…spoke of being an outcast from the large church not far from his home…this time because of his race.  My questioning continued.

I have since learned it was not God who abandoned Ace.  It was people claiming to be God’s people who had abandoned Ace.

People who called themselves God’s people while demonstrating something other than love…helped my skepticism grow through my years in college to the point that I became a practicing agnostic…even though I attended a church affiliated university.  If someone had told me when I graduated from college that I’d be attending a church worship service…much less leading one…I would have laughed loudly at them.

For a number of years I went my merry…somewhat devilish way…through marriage and divorce…work that was glamorous but unrewarding…financial challenges…and some drunken Saturday nights…showing up in a place of worship only for a friend’s wedding or for a funeral…never considering that God was real…much less there with me.

At a birthday party for the husband of a co-worker I met Bob Miller.  I was 30 years old.  Bob and I talked about many things including our mutual love for racquetball.  We ended up playing racquetball at the local YMCA two or three times a week…then going to a pizza place for food, beer and more conversation.  After about six months of talking about many things except our work I asked Bob what his profession was.  He was the minister at the downtown Congregational church.  He invited me to visit.

I didn’t take Bob up on his invitation until the next Christmas Eve.  One of Bob’s parishioners had also invited me to the Christmas Eve service.  She was one of the three women I knew attended that church that I wanted to date.  I went to the service…and sat alone in a pew in the back of the church…my real hope was that one of the three women would show up and sit next to me.

The lights went down until it was entirely dark.  I heard a beautiful baritone voice singing “O Holy Night”…then a single candle appeared moving at the front of the sanctuary…toward the pulpit.  It was Bob who was holding the candle and singing.  As John Wesley put it in his journal…”My heart was strangely warmed.”   I began to attend Bob’s church regularly.  By the way…I never dated any one of the three women.

When it came time to leave that community in Iowa to move to Greenville…Bob suggested I check out a United Methodist Church.  I did…three months later…on the first Easter morning I was in Greenville.  I found a sign that pointed me to Aldersgate United Methodist.  I attended and was mesmerized by the preacher… Sinclair Lewis.  He was one of the finest orators I had ever heard.

I attended his church for several months…when one Sunday he announced that lay speaking classes would be held.  At the end of the worship service…as we were all leaving the sanctuary…I asked Sinclair to tell me more…four times I asked him.  Each time he would say only two words…”Just go.”  I finally realized I was holding up the line of those waiting to leave the church…and moved on…never knowing whether Sinclair was telling me he was sure the classes were the right thing for me…or he wanted to let others leave the church so they…and he could go to lunch.

I attended that training session and many more.  For fifteen years I served as a lay speaker…when in the spring of 2002 I was invited to speak to the men’s group at Buncombe Street United Methodist Church.  After speaking…the senior minister at the church…Doug Bowling…said “We’ve got to get you a church.”  After much protest…Doug convinced me to follow the process for becoming a local pastor…and here I am today.

Like the Israelites…I didn’t know it then…but God was with me on that rather circuitous path to where I am today…and there may have been moments when I even denied that possibility   But…now the truth is known…has been revealed

Look at your life. I’m sure that you will also be able to say that God was with you…even when it seemed he might not have been…when the changes were rough.

Today marks another change in our collective lives.  After today you will have a new minister in your pulpit.  She will begin the process of learning many new names and hearing many new life stories.  Just like I have been…she will be given the opportunity to serve you and your families…and the opportunity to make new friendships.  Know this…though there may be stumbles along the way… God will be with you and her all the way…through times of joy and the times of sorrow.

I thank God for being with you and me through our changes and thank you for allowing me into your lives.

If history and experience alone are not enough…hear once again the words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ…as Matthew has reported them…”I am with you always…to the end of the age.”

When Jesus gave the disciples that reassurance he also gave them instructions… instructions that are so important today.  “Go…make disciples.”

It is by following those instructions that you will assure God’s kingdom becomes reality…in this church…in our community…in our state…and in our nation.  You see…there are those who for their own misguided reasons…will attempt to thwart God… with complacency…with tolerance of injustice…with discrimination…with hate…with bigotry…with hurtful words…with violence.

A man of our lifetimes to whom all of that happened…Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. said it so well when he said, “Hate doesn’t overcome hate.  Only love can do that.”

And another…who suffered a similar fate…on our behalf…Jesus Christ…showed us how to love.  It’s up to each of us to GO!  Make disciples every day as you walk with God.

Just as he was with Richard O’Brien…with Ace…with Bob Miller…with Sinclair Lewis…with Doug Bowling and with me…Jesus will be with you and with Reverend Brenda Curtis every day… through all that changes.

“Reward”

Genesis 22:1-14          Matthew 10:40-42

Many years ago….back before Rush Limbaugh…Mike Gallagher…Ann Coulter and Hugh Hewitt…back when radio station talk shows were a service to the community…I had the privilege of hosting one of those shows in Dubuque, Iowa.  One day a lady called to tell everyone about some awful thing that was happening at city hall.  I told her that…as a reporter for the radio station I was in city hall every day for two to three hours…talking with everyone….janitors…the city manager…the mayor and many department heads.  I told her that I had heard the same rumor…spent several days and numerous conversations checking it out…and that I had concluded it was only a rumor.  She responded that she felt it was a “true rumor”.  When I asked her what made a rumor “true” she paused and couldn’t go further.

Sometimes the answers are clearer…even self-evident…when we ask the right questions.  Today…let’s ask two questions.

Who or what is your Isaac?

Whose shoes are you cobbling?

God was testing Abraham.  Abraham didn’t know that…but we do.  It’s right there in the very first verse we heard this morning.

Over the years Abraham had grown in his faith…grown to trust and to believe God.  He had been promised by God that his offspring would be great in number…greater than the grains of sand on the beach.  Abraham believed that promise.  Yet…God tested him.

What was God trying to find out?  God wanted to see Abraham accept God…not the gift that God had promised him.  Some might ask, “Why would God do this when God already knows?  After all God knows everything.

One commentator suggests it was done for God’s benefit.   He wrote…“We can agree that God knew ahead of time what Abraham was going to do.  But there is ample evidence throughout Scripture that God desires us to act out our faith and worship regardless of the fact the he knows our hearts.  God wants us to pray even though he knows what we are going to say and He might already have the answer in motion.  He wants us to praise him even though he knows how we feel.  God asks us to express our faith and love.  It is honoring to Him for us to demonstrate those things that He knows exist because it pleases Him.  That is what I mean when I speak of God’s ‘benefit”.

That seems plausible.  We all know that as much as our parents, spouses, and children know that we love them, it is important that it be said and demonstrated.  Head knowledge is not enough and is often less than satisfying.   Let us not be to God as the husband of twenty years was to his wife when she asked why he never told her he loved her.  His response was…”I told you when I proposed and it hasn’t changed since.”

God may also have wanted to stretch Abraham’s faith even farther.  Our faith grows…and strengthens over time.  It’s stronger today than when we first discovered God.  Yet…it’s not as strong as it will be as life stretches our faith through testing.  Growth in faith involves testing.  As life tests our faith it is stretched and thereby grows.  In his test  Abraham’s faith was stretched to the limit.  Because he held firm his faith has become the grandest faith example in history.  Trust God as you can.  He will give you so much more than you expected.  Then you will trust him even more.

Did you notice how truly deep Abraham’s faith and trust were?  He not only took no action to argue with God when he received the command to offer Isaac as a burnt offering.  Abraham knew that somehow God would bring them through this whole ordeal.  When he left the two young men with the donkey…Abraham told them to wait there while he and Isaac went to worship.  Abraham told the young men that “we” would return.

Life tests.  God wants us to show our love for him.  Who or what is your Isaac?  I have heard more than one person say…”that’s the toughest thing I’ve ever had to do”…as they held the hand of their dying spouse to the very end.  Yet…through that tough test God has taken each of them…and strengthened their faith…their belief in God’s promise of salvation and life eternal.

Who or what is it that God has blessed you with that you cherish?  Do you cherish that person…that thing…more than God?  The test will come.

Before asking the second question let me share a brief story written by H. L. Gee…a twentieth century British author.  “There was a lad in a country village who…after a great struggle… reached the ministry.  His helper in his days of study had been the village cobbler.  The cobbler…like so many of his trade…was a man of wide reading and far thinking…and he had done much for the lad.  In due time the lad was licensed to preach.  And on that day the cobbler said to him, ‘It was always my desire to be a minister of the gospel…but the circumstances of my life made it impossible.  But you are achieving what was closed to me.  And I want you to promise me one thing—I want you to let me make and cobble your shoes– for nothing—and I want you to wear them in the pulpit when you preach, and then I’ll feel you are preaching the gospel that I always wanted to preach standing in my shoes.”

This is another way of telling the story of what Jesus was telling his disciples in what has become known as the mission discourse…disciples like you and me.

We cannot all be prophets…or stand in a pulpit and preach and proclaim the Word of God. But the person who gives God’s messenger just a simple gift of hospitality will receive a reward as great as that of God’s messenger.

Even in this day of instant fame through the social media…we cannot all be seen by the whole world as righteous.  But…the person who helps a person to be good receives the same reward as the good person.

We cannot all teach the child…but in a very real sense we can serve the child.  We may not have the knowledge or skills to be in the role of teacher…but there are simple actions we can take to serve the child…without which the child cannot live.  Child here…does not speak only to the matter of age.   It is not the children’s Sunday school class of which I speak exclusively here.  There are also those who are children in the faith…perhaps who have not yet experienced our faith…though they are adults.  They need our service as well. For them…there is teaching that comes by our way of living…by our example…and by our words and touch…teaching that every person can give another.

William Barclay put it this way.  “The Church and Christ will always need their great orators, their great shining examples of sainthood, their great teachers, those whose names are household words; but the Church and Christ will also always need those in whose homes there is hospitality, on whose hands there is all the service which makes a home, and in whose hearts there is the caring which is Christian love.”

Let me close with one more story about my days in radio.  Though long ago this story should cause us to see testing and cobbling opportunities.

In the early 1970s Harry Chapin was a very popular American troubadour…a writer and singer of songs that were really stories.  The general manager of my radio station and I went to his concerts when his tour brought him to one of the local colleges.  Harry Chapin didn’t sing all that well…but his stories touched the hearts of many people who could identify with them.  Many of the songs were played on most radio stations.

In 1972 he released an album entitled “Sniper and Other Love Songs.”  The title song was a well told story…but it was never played on the radio…not our radio station…not any others.  It was the story of a young man who…in 1966…climbed to the top of the clock tower at the University of Texas in Austin.  He had been trained as a U. S. Marine sniper and carried several weapons to the top of the tower with him.  He began firing at people down below.  By the time the authorities got to him and stopped him he had killed 15 people, and wounded 30 others, two of whom died later.  It was the day America experienced its first mass shooting outside of combat.

Our general manager simply explained why he and his counterparts across the country didn’t play the song on the radio.  He said they knew their audiences wouldn’t want the violence.

Now, just shy of 51 years later, we awoke Wednesday morning to the news of two mass shootings underway…one in Virginia and the other in California.  They were the 147^th and 148^th such incidents in the United States in the first 165 days of this year.

And, what do the general managers of the radio and TV stations say about this violence.  They say their audiences want to see it.  They say their audiences want to see drama programs that depict violence.  Check the newscasts and newspapers and you’ll find there is some truth to the adage…”If it bleeds, it leads.” The booksellers will tell you their best sellers are books about violence.  And…we don’t have to go very deep into a day before we encounter someone with violent words or promises to pop someone in the nose.

While the U. S. has always been a rough and tumble nation…have we chosen to let violence become an accepted norm?  Or…can you and I cobble someone’s shoes today with love and with a rejection of violence?  That may be the test we are all experiencing today…a test won by faith and love…a test that will build our faith.

Look back on your Christian journey and you will see that God has stretched and grown your faith through testing…has asked you to give up your Isaac…to show your love for…and trust in God.  Tests will come again through which your faith will grow stronger.

Look around you today.  You will find that there are shoes to cobble…in your family…in your place of work…in your church…in your neighborhood.  Whose shoes will you cobble?

What’s the reward…the reward is stated so well in the words of a song popular a couple years ago…”When you lose yourself…you’ve found the key to paradise.”