Bless, O Lord, the words of my lips and the meditations of our hearts that they be of profit to us and acceptable to you, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen
A old children's story goes like this: One child asks another:
Would you forget me in an hour? No.
Would you forget me in a day? No.
Would you forget me in a month? No.
Knock knock. Who's there?
I thought you said you wouldn't forget me.
Today we heard the story of the covenant God made with Noah. It is a covenant where God promises that He will never forget us, nor any of the creatures that he made.
It is a covenant that promises that God will never again destroy the earth because of the sinfulness of man, and as a sign of this covenant - this promise - God creates the rainbow so that whenever it raining God and all of us here who see it will remember that promise.
The beautiful thing about this covenant, this agreement that God made is that is has no conditions upon it.
It is a covenant without any "if" clauses, csuch as "if you love me" or "if you obey me" or "if you worship me" or if you brush your teeth or help old ladies across the street - then I will be good to you!
No - the covenant God made Noah is an unconditional covenant. It is a covenant of love wherein God promises to remember us even if we forget him.
That is what God's love is like. He remembers us even when we forget him.
No matter what we have done - when we stand at the door and knock, God won't ask "who's there" he will instead open the door and welcome us in.
God can be grieved by us. We can make God sad and we can make God angry, but God swore to Noah that he would never be so angry that he would destroy the people and the world that he made.
Despite our sinfulness, despite all that we do to hurt each other and to hurt ourselves, God has promised not to abandon us, to not to forget us and seek our destruction, but rather to remember us and his love for us.
Indeed - God does remember us - and God seeks us out. He calls us to love him as he loves us.
No matter what we have done, God calls to us like a parent calls to his child, God calls us to turn around and try once more to be the person that we were born to be, and God reaches out his hand and tries to deliver us from the judgements that we set ourselves up for with our foolishness and our pride.
God wants to help us, not destroy us.
This is the meaning of the covenant sealed with a rainbow, and this is the meaning of all God's covenants with us.
Abraham was chosen by God to raise up a great nation, so that the world would be blessed by a Holy People. David's children were chosen by God to be Kings over Israel, so that one day the world might be saved by a Messiah. And Jeremiah was chosen to announce a new covenant, where God would place the Law in each person's heart and where each person might personally come to know God and his salvation.
That last covenant, the once announcement by Jeremiah, has been fulfilled, and each of us here is now privileged, if we so choose, to be a part of that covenant, a covenant that is signed by the cross of Jesus and sealed by our baptism into his death and resurrection.
God remembered the promise he made to Noah, and even though we have provoked God in a manner worse even than that of the people who lived before the flood, God has kept his promise.
God sent his Son instead of a flood to deal with our sin, and he died for our sin - the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God and to allow us to live well both now and forever.
Through Jesus - God remembers us. In fact through Jesus, God stands at our door and knocks, and he tells us
"Here I am. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me."
What then shall we say to this love of God, what shall we say about the signs of his love? The cross and the rainbow? The Bread and the Wine? What shall we about his knocking at our door what shall we say about his invitation to come and dine?
God wants us to say "Yes" to his love; He wants us to see the signs and wonders He has left for us; He wants us to open the door to our lives and let Him come in and do his work
- a work in which he makes us more and more like his son Jesus,
- a work in which he makes us holy, and saves us from our own sin, our own foolishness.
Recall today, as we begin Lent, my friends, the story of Jesus, and how after he was baptized he spent 40 days in the wilderness being tempted, and how, he then went into Galilee proclaiming the good news of God saying:
"The Kingdom of God is near, repent and believe in the good news."
God wants us to try our best to be like Jesus, He wants us to believe in His love, He wants us to know that He is near to us and ready to help us, He wants us to turn to Him in faith, and strive to lead a new life with Christ.
The word of the gospel, the good news, is that God forgives us our sin, that he remembers his love for us, and extends his saving hand towards us.
God's love for us is a marvel and a grace. But, as we begin Lent, let us remember that our forgiveness comes at a cost, that a price is paid for our sin, a price in pain and suffering, and that, as long as we yield to sin, as long as we yield to temptation, not only do we hurt ourselves and others - we hurt God.
What we can do as people who have heard Christ and accepted his invitation to believe in Him, in the saving love of God the Father, is to repent of our sinful ways and to struggle as best as we can - as did Jesus in the wilderness - to live a sin free life.
If the truth be told I think that everyone here has not struggled quite hard enough with sin, that we have sometimes given in too easily to temptation, especially in the simple things - the things like the temptation to gossip, or the desire to get just a little bit of revenge, or the desire to kid ourselves about our lifestyle and tell ourselves that it is really OK.
There is a story told about a man called Sam.
Sam wasn't make much headway with his diet. He was one of those folks who could resist everything but temptation. One day he came into the office with a whole box of freshly baked Danish.
When his friends questioned him about his diet he explained that really wouldn't have gotten the Danish if it hadn't been for God.
"What do you mean"? one of his friends asked.
"Well", he said, "as I was about to pass the bakery I prayed that if it were God's will for me to have these Danish today I would be able to find a parking place in front of the building. Sure enough I found a space right in front on the eighth time around the block"
Most of us have a tougher time with temptation than we like to think.
We try to tell ourselves that the things that we do, the little things that hurt others or ourselves, aren't really all that important or all that harmful, or that someone else is really to blame for them.
When we get angry, or feel terribly anxious or upset, and then yell at our husbands or our wives, or rebuke our children and slight our friends, we often tell ourselves that it is because of something that they did - that it is justified by the circumstances.
We do not like to think that maybe, just maybe, even when we have been provoked, that while our reaction is justifiable, maybe our behaviour is not.
We forget the lesson of the rainbow and of the cross, the lesson that tells us that even though we anger God, even though we do things that God cannot approve of, God still loves us, and while He calls us to live a better life, He does not push us away, He does not reject us, He does not condemn us.
It is a good thing I think, to cultivate the sense that we do not resist sin enough. I believe that this kind of humility, this kind of realism about ourselves, can only be pleasing to God.
Acknowledging our weakness in the face of temptation gives us a foundation upon which we can build a new life, for it is only as when we recognize our need, that we can be open enough to have our needs met.
Our sins arise primarily because we do not readily recognize the need we have to struggle with ourselves.
Most of the things we do that are harmful do not come out of some great issue which we must decide about, rather they arise out of the habits we have, habits that are comfortable and whose correction requires some effort.
A lot of what we do is like what we do with our old sweaters.
Old sweaters, even though they may be natty, even though they may be losing their shape and have the odd tear or run, are very comfortable, and we often wear them, even though there is new one is in our cupboard.
We say bad things about some people because it makes us feel good, because it makes us feel just a bit better than they are, and because it is easier to say what we say than to look for the good that may be in the person, and because it is easier to condemn them than to forgive.
We throw junk out our car window and add to the pollution of our world because it is easier to do so than to have to pack around garbage bags.
We use more of the world's resources than we have to because recycling requires just a bit more effort than we like to make.
We give into temptation, we hang onto our sinful ways, because no matter what we might say, we are comfortable with them.
The good news that Jesus announced is that God does not forget us, that His kingdom is at hand and we can enter if we desire to do so.
God loves us, God forgives us, and God calls us to his side and offers to us a new beginning in Jesus, a new life in Christ.
God calls us to be like Jesus, to struggle with temptation, and to hold firmly onto His word, this so that we might experience the blessings of a good life, and so that our world will not suffer so much needless pain and suffering.
This Lent I call you to examine your life, to look at all that you do, how you treat your family, and how you act at work or at school and ask yourself if you are taking the easy way, or if there is something you can do to be a more loving and caring person.
I call you to examine how you live. Do you do your best to be aware of the environment? Do you really struggle with what you use and what you waste?
And I call you to examine how you treat yourself. Do anger and fear constantly sweep over you? Does your daily walk take you constantly to extremes? Do you love yourself as well as God loves you?
God, my friends, has something better in mind for us all than that which we now do and experience.
God created this world to be good, and he placed us in a magnificent garden and gave us company and asked us to take care of that garden and each other.
God made us to keep company with Him, and despite all that we do to reject Him, and all that we do to harm each other and ourselves,
God reaches out to us and calls to us to come to his side and to love and enjoy the world that he has made.
No matter what we have done - when we stand at the door and knock, God won't ask "who's there" he will instead open the door and welcome us in.
Trust God to help you struggle with temptation and with yourself, and ask God for His continual forgiveness and eternal blessings to be upon you and the world that His son Jesus Christ died for.
The promises that God have made, the promises we see in signs like the rainbow and the cross, are forever; they have not been and will not be broken.
Accept those promises for yourself. Struggle with sin, and thank God for all his mercies. Amen
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Sunday, February 19, 2012
I Kings 2:1-12; Mark 9:2-9
Let us Pray - O Lord, in the light of your presence we turn our attention to your teaching, seeking what you want to say to us. May the light of your gospel so illuminate us that we may receive a double portion of your Spirit and the assurance that we are indeed your beloved servants. For Christ's sake we ask it. Amen.
I was at a meeting the other day when the treasurer handed the secretary an envelop. A bit later in the meeting the chairperson asked the secretary for some information - but the secretary replied that she didn't have that information. At the point the treasurer rose and said "yes - you do - it is was on the envelop I gave you."
The secretary replied, "Oh, I didn't know what that was - so I threw it away "
Everyone laughed - including me - but I was struck at the time by just how normal the secretary's actions had been.
Often when we encounter something which we do not know or understand we throw it away; or at the very least - we ignore it - we put it on hold - we neglect it.
So it is with stories like those we heard today from the scriptures. Many of us hear about visions of chariots of fire, of water being parted to reveal a path across a river, and of a man being taken up into heaven - and mentally shrug our shoulders and dismiss the matter as an idle tale.
Others hear about how Jesus was transformed upon a mountaintop, so that he shone as bright as the sun, and about how he is visited by two men - long dead, and say to themselves - that's all very nice, but what does it have to do with me - and then they go on about their lives as if these things had never happened,as if they never can or will happen.
Most sermons I have had heard on today's gospel reading ignore the experience that the disciples witnessed Jesus undergo.
Very little is said in them about the overwhelming brightness of Jesus' appearance, very little is made of the fact that Peter, James, and John saw Moses and Elijah talking with Christ and heard a voice from heaven.
Most of these sermons have in fact quickly passed over the wonder of the experience and go on to stress how Christians are called to come down off the mountain and serve in the valley below.
I find that to be a great shame.
I find it to be a great shame as well how so many of us ignore, neglect, devalue, or scorn the prophet's ecstasy, the dreamer's vision, and the worshipper's conviction that he or she has heard God speak.
Most of us are convinced that our faith is about doing good things, about showing love and care for one another, and it is so - this is what our faith is about.
But our faith is also about the yearning to see God and experience his power, it is about being touched by the Spirit and being moved by the voice of the Lord whispering in our ears.
Our faith is so rich - our God so good - that it makes no sense at all to limit what is possible for us to the dry bones of what we should or should not do each day.
Our faith is about entertaining angels, every bit as much as it is about seeking to comfort the afflicted and to heal the sick. It is about seeing visions of a new heaven and a new earth, every bit as much as it is about seeking justice and resisting evil.
It is about being refreshed by God, as much as it is about refreshing others in God's name.
A little boy, around the turn of the century, lived far back in the New Territories. He had reached the age of 12 and had never, in all his life, seen a circus.
You can imagine his excitement when a poster went up at school that on the next Saturday a travelling circus was coming to Hong Kong. He ran home with the glad news, and then came the question - "Dad, Mom, can I go?"
The family was poor, but the father sensed how important this was to the boy, so he said, "If you do your chores ahead of time, I'll see to it that you have the money to go."
Come Saturday morning the chores were done and the boy stood ready in best clothes by the breakfast table. His father reached down into his overalls and pulled out some money - the most money the boy had ever had at one time - and gave it to him. After the usual cautions about being careful the boy was sent on his way.
The boys was so excited that his feet barely touched the ground all the way to the town. When he got there, he noticed people were lining the streets and he worked his way through the crowd until he could see what was going on. There in the distance approached the spectacle of a circus parade. It was the grandest thing that the boy had ever seen. There were exotic animals in cages and bands and midgets, acrobats, and all that goes to make up a great circus.
After everything had passed by where he was standing, a circus clown, with floppy shoes and baggy paints and brightly painted face, came by bringing up the rear. As the clown passed by where he was standing, the boy reached into his pocket and got out the precious he was given that morning. Handing the money to the clown, the boy then turned around and went home.
The mistake that the boy made - is the same mistake we can make in our spiritual lives - we can end up settling for less than the real thing, for a portion - instead of for the whole, and all because we either do not believe in what God can do, or because we do not look at or understand what we have been given.
I did not know what it was, so I threw it away.
I believe the most common problem faced by members of most churches is not the fact that they spend too much time seeking spiritual visions and revelations - thereby neglecting the important truths and duties of everyday life in Christ, rather it is the fact that they do not believe in and thus are not open to the special moments, the special touches, that only God can give.
Some of the faithful say that people have no energy for living the Christian life because they do not get fed by the church - I say - some people are out of energy because they fail to recognize the food that is before them - because they fail to take and eat what God seeks to give them.
When I lived in England there was a weekly prayer meeting held at our church. Of the hundred or so adults that attended church every week, only about 15 or so attended this meeting.
There they sought spiritual food for their daily journey in the Lord. There they found it.
I remember one time when a guest preacher was present at the meeting.
We prayed for one another with the laying on of hands, we prayed for healings - for people to have the power to overcome some grief or suffering in their lives - for others to discover what God wanted them to do about a particular situation.
Finally my turn came to be prayed for - and I asked that all might pray that God would fill me with his Spirit - that he might make my faith come even more alive.
When the hands came down on my head and shoulders and the people gathered around me began to pray - I felt a energy go through my body like electricity, and I shook in my chair as the words of prayer washed over me, and then, in a moment of sudden silence, one word came strongly from the guest - a word came strongly from God - "You shall be used to do great things in my service."
To this day those words have stayed with me and shaped my thoughts - making me wonder what the greatness is - making me wonder - is it the power and glory like that of great evangelist or theologian, - or is it the greatness that was revealed by Christ as he went about as the servant of all, stooping down even to wash his own disciple's feet?
It was a moment that fed me and still feeds me - a profoundly spiritual moment.
My friends - I can't explain out to you what a holy moment is; nor can I tell you just how special and sacred events come to pass, nor can I even promise you that you will have such a moment if you only do this or that, but I can tell, and I do now tell you, that these moments are real, and that they come to us most often when we put ourselves in the way of them.
As another preacher put it one time You can't have a mountain top experience if you don't climb the mountain.
Elisha followed his teacher Elijah around the country despite Elijah telling him not to when he had his experience; he actively sought a double portion of the spirit that filled Elijah and was patient to receive it.
Peter, James, and John were obeying Jesus when they witnessed his transfiguration, they had climbed the mountain with him as he went to pray.
The sacred experiences that are recounted in the bible, the experiences of the divine that are recorded there, are still needed today - and they still occur today.
Some catch sight of God in the beauty around them, some glimpse him during a close encounter with death, some meet him in a special way during a period of suffering, others while they are praying at special gatherings or at worship.
Don't throw away those strange and mysterious experiences that have happened in your lives. Don't let go of those things that you do not understand or cannot explain. Rather meditate on them, delight in them, and use them as a source of strength for your time of service in the valleys below.
Oh how lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of Hosts! My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the Living God. Amen
I was at a meeting the other day when the treasurer handed the secretary an envelop. A bit later in the meeting the chairperson asked the secretary for some information - but the secretary replied that she didn't have that information. At the point the treasurer rose and said "yes - you do - it is was on the envelop I gave you."
The secretary replied, "Oh, I didn't know what that was - so I threw it away "
Everyone laughed - including me - but I was struck at the time by just how normal the secretary's actions had been.
Often when we encounter something which we do not know or understand we throw it away; or at the very least - we ignore it - we put it on hold - we neglect it.
So it is with stories like those we heard today from the scriptures. Many of us hear about visions of chariots of fire, of water being parted to reveal a path across a river, and of a man being taken up into heaven - and mentally shrug our shoulders and dismiss the matter as an idle tale.
Others hear about how Jesus was transformed upon a mountaintop, so that he shone as bright as the sun, and about how he is visited by two men - long dead, and say to themselves - that's all very nice, but what does it have to do with me - and then they go on about their lives as if these things had never happened,as if they never can or will happen.
Most sermons I have had heard on today's gospel reading ignore the experience that the disciples witnessed Jesus undergo.
Very little is said in them about the overwhelming brightness of Jesus' appearance, very little is made of the fact that Peter, James, and John saw Moses and Elijah talking with Christ and heard a voice from heaven.
Most of these sermons have in fact quickly passed over the wonder of the experience and go on to stress how Christians are called to come down off the mountain and serve in the valley below.
I find that to be a great shame.
I find it to be a great shame as well how so many of us ignore, neglect, devalue, or scorn the prophet's ecstasy, the dreamer's vision, and the worshipper's conviction that he or she has heard God speak.
Most of us are convinced that our faith is about doing good things, about showing love and care for one another, and it is so - this is what our faith is about.
But our faith is also about the yearning to see God and experience his power, it is about being touched by the Spirit and being moved by the voice of the Lord whispering in our ears.
Our faith is so rich - our God so good - that it makes no sense at all to limit what is possible for us to the dry bones of what we should or should not do each day.
Our faith is about entertaining angels, every bit as much as it is about seeking to comfort the afflicted and to heal the sick. It is about seeing visions of a new heaven and a new earth, every bit as much as it is about seeking justice and resisting evil.
It is about being refreshed by God, as much as it is about refreshing others in God's name.
A little boy, around the turn of the century, lived far back in the New Territories. He had reached the age of 12 and had never, in all his life, seen a circus.
You can imagine his excitement when a poster went up at school that on the next Saturday a travelling circus was coming to Hong Kong. He ran home with the glad news, and then came the question - "Dad, Mom, can I go?"
The family was poor, but the father sensed how important this was to the boy, so he said, "If you do your chores ahead of time, I'll see to it that you have the money to go."
Come Saturday morning the chores were done and the boy stood ready in best clothes by the breakfast table. His father reached down into his overalls and pulled out some money - the most money the boy had ever had at one time - and gave it to him. After the usual cautions about being careful the boy was sent on his way.
The boys was so excited that his feet barely touched the ground all the way to the town. When he got there, he noticed people were lining the streets and he worked his way through the crowd until he could see what was going on. There in the distance approached the spectacle of a circus parade. It was the grandest thing that the boy had ever seen. There were exotic animals in cages and bands and midgets, acrobats, and all that goes to make up a great circus.
After everything had passed by where he was standing, a circus clown, with floppy shoes and baggy paints and brightly painted face, came by bringing up the rear. As the clown passed by where he was standing, the boy reached into his pocket and got out the precious he was given that morning. Handing the money to the clown, the boy then turned around and went home.
The mistake that the boy made - is the same mistake we can make in our spiritual lives - we can end up settling for less than the real thing, for a portion - instead of for the whole, and all because we either do not believe in what God can do, or because we do not look at or understand what we have been given.
I did not know what it was, so I threw it away.
I believe the most common problem faced by members of most churches is not the fact that they spend too much time seeking spiritual visions and revelations - thereby neglecting the important truths and duties of everyday life in Christ, rather it is the fact that they do not believe in and thus are not open to the special moments, the special touches, that only God can give.
Some of the faithful say that people have no energy for living the Christian life because they do not get fed by the church - I say - some people are out of energy because they fail to recognize the food that is before them - because they fail to take and eat what God seeks to give them.
When I lived in England there was a weekly prayer meeting held at our church. Of the hundred or so adults that attended church every week, only about 15 or so attended this meeting.
There they sought spiritual food for their daily journey in the Lord. There they found it.
I remember one time when a guest preacher was present at the meeting.
We prayed for one another with the laying on of hands, we prayed for healings - for people to have the power to overcome some grief or suffering in their lives - for others to discover what God wanted them to do about a particular situation.
Finally my turn came to be prayed for - and I asked that all might pray that God would fill me with his Spirit - that he might make my faith come even more alive.
When the hands came down on my head and shoulders and the people gathered around me began to pray - I felt a energy go through my body like electricity, and I shook in my chair as the words of prayer washed over me, and then, in a moment of sudden silence, one word came strongly from the guest - a word came strongly from God - "You shall be used to do great things in my service."
To this day those words have stayed with me and shaped my thoughts - making me wonder what the greatness is - making me wonder - is it the power and glory like that of great evangelist or theologian, - or is it the greatness that was revealed by Christ as he went about as the servant of all, stooping down even to wash his own disciple's feet?
It was a moment that fed me and still feeds me - a profoundly spiritual moment.
My friends - I can't explain out to you what a holy moment is; nor can I tell you just how special and sacred events come to pass, nor can I even promise you that you will have such a moment if you only do this or that, but I can tell, and I do now tell you, that these moments are real, and that they come to us most often when we put ourselves in the way of them.
As another preacher put it one time You can't have a mountain top experience if you don't climb the mountain.
Elisha followed his teacher Elijah around the country despite Elijah telling him not to when he had his experience; he actively sought a double portion of the spirit that filled Elijah and was patient to receive it.
Peter, James, and John were obeying Jesus when they witnessed his transfiguration, they had climbed the mountain with him as he went to pray.
The sacred experiences that are recounted in the bible, the experiences of the divine that are recorded there, are still needed today - and they still occur today.
Some catch sight of God in the beauty around them, some glimpse him during a close encounter with death, some meet him in a special way during a period of suffering, others while they are praying at special gatherings or at worship.
Don't throw away those strange and mysterious experiences that have happened in your lives. Don't let go of those things that you do not understand or cannot explain. Rather meditate on them, delight in them, and use them as a source of strength for your time of service in the valleys below.
Oh how lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of Hosts! My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the Living God. Amen
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Deuteronomy 30:15-20 and Matthew 5:21-37
Bless thou, the words of my lips and the meditations of our hearts that they be of profit to us and acceptable to thee, oh our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
One day Abraham invited a beggar to his tent for a meal.
When grace was being said, the man began to curse God, declaring that he could not bear to hear his name.
Seized with indignation, Abraham drove the blasphemer away.
When Abraham was at his prayers that night, God said to him, "This man has cursed and reviled me for fifty years, and yet I have given him food to eat every day. Could you not put up with him for a single meal?"
On this Sunday just two days before St. Valentine's Day I want to tell you simply this - love each other.
Love each other - not with the love that depends on chemistry, mood, and feelings - nor even with the love that depends on the behaviour of others, but love each other with the kind of love that Christ refers to in today's reading from the Sermon on the Mount.
You know the kind of love I mean - it is the love that goes beyond what seems right according to the letter of the law, and enters into the Spirit of what God wants for us, the love that enters into feeding others, into healing others, into showing grace to others, into giving peace to others, the love that values others, regardless of who they are or what they have or have not done.
.
Someone once caught WC Fields reading the Bible.
"What are you doing?" asked the person.
"Looking for loopholes.", growled Fields.
With love - my friends - there is no loophole, no escape hatch, no clauses that say the deal can be revoked if this or that condition is not met.
Love is total - it is unconditional - or it is not love at all.
Think of the words of Jesus we heard read a few minutes ago. They were words addressed to a people used to compromising - to altering love's demands as they are found in the law of God so that those demands would be easier to fulfil.
You have heard it was said you shall not murder - but I say to you that if you are angry with your brother or sister - you will be liable to judgement."
"You have heard that it was said, you shall not commit adultery, but I tell you that everyone who looks with lust at another has already committed adultery..."
"You have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbours, but I say to you, love your enemies. and pray for those who persecute you..."
There are no loopholes to found in Jesus' words.
No compromises.
No deals.
No escape hatches.
What Jesus does is crystallize the issues involved in loving God and our neighbours so that we can know - without doubt - just where we stand, and exactly what we need to aim for.
Think about where you stand for a minute - Think about how you love others and ask yourself - is my love up to the standards set by Christ?
If you haven't killed someone - who have you called a fool? What emotion did you pour out upon him or her when you became angry with them? If you haven't committed adultery - and felt good about this - consider what you have wanted to do.......Or consider who holds a grudge against you because of something you did - something for which you have not apologized? Or again - what promises and vows have you broken and then justified yourself in doing so? When was the last time you criticized Chinese people from China for buying up all the baby milk powder, or expressed your dislike for the person who took the promotion that belonged to you?
Perhaps these are poor examples - but most of us you know love only our friends and our family - and we are not sure about our family at times....
We greet those who greet us.
We do good to those who do good to us.
We lend to those who will pay back.
We welcome those who welcome us.
As for everyone else - well - if asked, most of us have a reason for what we do, and an excuse for what we do not do.
What we aim for as Christians - is to break through the limitations of our excuses, we aim to destroy all reasons that we might offer to treat one person as less than another and to enter into relationships with each other that are based upon our equality before God.
An old pilgrim was making his way to the Himalayan Mountains in the bitter cold of winter when it began to rain.
An inn keeper said to him, "How will you ever get there in this kind of weather my good man?"
The old man answered cheerfully, "My heart got there first, so it's easy for the rest of me to follow."
The gospel of Jesus Christ teaches that we can meet all the demands of love that are expressed in the law in one way - and only in one way - we can do so if we our hearts go there first.
Today I urge you - let your hearts go - love God and love each other as deeply as you can.
When you do - you will find, no matter how many mistakes you may make on the way, that goodness and blessedness will blossom along your path, and all that God has planned will come to pass. Amen.
One day Abraham invited a beggar to his tent for a meal.
When grace was being said, the man began to curse God, declaring that he could not bear to hear his name.
Seized with indignation, Abraham drove the blasphemer away.
When Abraham was at his prayers that night, God said to him, "This man has cursed and reviled me for fifty years, and yet I have given him food to eat every day. Could you not put up with him for a single meal?"
On this Sunday just two days before St. Valentine's Day I want to tell you simply this - love each other.
Love each other - not with the love that depends on chemistry, mood, and feelings - nor even with the love that depends on the behaviour of others, but love each other with the kind of love that Christ refers to in today's reading from the Sermon on the Mount.
You know the kind of love I mean - it is the love that goes beyond what seems right according to the letter of the law, and enters into the Spirit of what God wants for us, the love that enters into feeding others, into healing others, into showing grace to others, into giving peace to others, the love that values others, regardless of who they are or what they have or have not done.
.
Someone once caught WC Fields reading the Bible.
"What are you doing?" asked the person.
"Looking for loopholes.", growled Fields.
With love - my friends - there is no loophole, no escape hatch, no clauses that say the deal can be revoked if this or that condition is not met.
Love is total - it is unconditional - or it is not love at all.
Think of the words of Jesus we heard read a few minutes ago. They were words addressed to a people used to compromising - to altering love's demands as they are found in the law of God so that those demands would be easier to fulfil.
You have heard it was said you shall not murder - but I say to you that if you are angry with your brother or sister - you will be liable to judgement."
"You have heard that it was said, you shall not commit adultery, but I tell you that everyone who looks with lust at another has already committed adultery..."
"You have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbours, but I say to you, love your enemies. and pray for those who persecute you..."
There are no loopholes to found in Jesus' words.
No compromises.
No deals.
No escape hatches.
What Jesus does is crystallize the issues involved in loving God and our neighbours so that we can know - without doubt - just where we stand, and exactly what we need to aim for.
Think about where you stand for a minute - Think about how you love others and ask yourself - is my love up to the standards set by Christ?
If you haven't killed someone - who have you called a fool? What emotion did you pour out upon him or her when you became angry with them? If you haven't committed adultery - and felt good about this - consider what you have wanted to do.......Or consider who holds a grudge against you because of something you did - something for which you have not apologized? Or again - what promises and vows have you broken and then justified yourself in doing so? When was the last time you criticized Chinese people from China for buying up all the baby milk powder, or expressed your dislike for the person who took the promotion that belonged to you?
Perhaps these are poor examples - but most of us you know love only our friends and our family - and we are not sure about our family at times....
We greet those who greet us.
We do good to those who do good to us.
We lend to those who will pay back.
We welcome those who welcome us.
As for everyone else - well - if asked, most of us have a reason for what we do, and an excuse for what we do not do.
What we aim for as Christians - is to break through the limitations of our excuses, we aim to destroy all reasons that we might offer to treat one person as less than another and to enter into relationships with each other that are based upon our equality before God.
An old pilgrim was making his way to the Himalayan Mountains in the bitter cold of winter when it began to rain.
An inn keeper said to him, "How will you ever get there in this kind of weather my good man?"
The old man answered cheerfully, "My heart got there first, so it's easy for the rest of me to follow."
The gospel of Jesus Christ teaches that we can meet all the demands of love that are expressed in the law in one way - and only in one way - we can do so if we our hearts go there first.
Today I urge you - let your hearts go - love God and love each other as deeply as you can.
When you do - you will find, no matter how many mistakes you may make on the way, that goodness and blessedness will blossom along your path, and all that God has planned will come to pass. Amen.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Isaiah 40:21-31; Psalm 147:1-11; Mark 1:29-39
Let us Pray - Lord God, Creator and Maker of us all, speak in the calming of our minds and in the longings of our hearts, by the words of my lips and in the thoughts that we form. Speak, O Lord, for your servants listen. Amen.
The story is told about how Satan called a worldwide convention of demons.
In his opening address he said, "We can't keep Christians from going to church. We can't keep them from reading their Bibles and knowing the truth. We can't even keep them from forming an intimate relationship with their saviour. Once they gain that connection with Jesus, our power over them is broken."
So let them go to their churches; let them have their Pot Luck Suppers and fellowship events, but steal their time so they don't have time to develop a relationship with Jesus."
"This is what I want you to do", said the devil.; "Distract them from gaining hold of their Saviour and maintaining that vital connection throughout their day!"
"How shall we do this?" his demons shouted.
"Keep them busy in the nonessentials of life and invent innumerable schemes to occupy their minds," he answered. "Tempt them to spend, spend, spend, and borrow, borrow, borrow. Persuade the wives to go to work for long hours and the husbands to work 6-7 days each week, 10-12 hours a day, so they can afford their empty lifestyles. Keep them from spending time with their children. As their families fragment, soon, their homes will offer no escape from the pressures of work!"
"Over-stimulate their minds so that they cannot hear that still, small voice trying to talk to them. Entice them to play the radio or cassette player whenever they drive; to keep the TV, VCR, CDs and their PCs going constantly in their home; and see to it that every store and restaurant in the world plays music constantly. This will jam their minds and break that union with Christ."
"Fill the coffee tables with magazines and newspapers. Pound their minds with the news 24 hours a day. Invade their driving moments with billboards. Flood their mailboxes with junk mail, mail order catalogues, sweepstakes, and every kind of newsletter and promotional offering free products, services and false hopes."
"Keep skinny, beautiful models on the magazines and TV so their husbands will believe that outward beauty is what's important and they'll become dissatisfied with their wives. Keep the wives too tired to love their husbands at night. Give them headaches too! Make them dissatisfied with one another so they begin to look elsewhere. That will fragment their families quickly!"
"Give them Santa Claus to distract them from teaching their children the real meaning of Christmas. Give them an Easter bunny so they won't talk about his resurrection and his power over sin and death."
"Even in their recreation, let them be excessive! Have them return from their recreation exhausted. Keep them too busy to go out in nature and reflect on God's creation. Send them to amusement parks, sporting events, plays, concerts, and movies instead. And when they do go out on the mountains or to the shoreline - get them do it on their day of worship - and make them so active in what they do there that they don't have time to pray, time to think, time to remember their God or thank him for his goodness.
"Keep them busy, busy, busy!"
"And when they meet for spiritual fellowship, leave them with troubled consciences. Crowd their lives with so many good causes they have no time to seek power from Jesus. It they must talk to God, make sure that they don't take time to listen to God. Soon they will be working in their own strength, sacrificing their health and family for the good of the cause."
"Do this and it will work!", Satan concluded.
"It will work!" His demons replied.
So they the convention ended. The demons went eagerly to their assignments causing Christians everywhere to have little time for their God or their families. Having no time to tell others about the power of Jesus to change lives and to meet their real needs.
I guess the question is, has the devil been successful at his scheme?
You be the judge!
Are you being drained? Are you failing to see what the point of it all is. Are you losing hope? Is joy harder and harder to find? Are you finding it harder and harder to remember the goals and the dreams that God has placed in your hearts? Are you feeling besieged from all sides and unable to get it together?
In today's Gospel reading we see Jesus on the Sabbath doing many things - he has already, as we can see from earlier paragraphs of the same chapter, attended worship at the Synagogue and there, during worship, cast an unclean spirit out of man and brought him healing. Then he went with his disciples to Peter and Andrew's home - and there he brought healing to Peter's mother-in-law. Later, in the evening. a huge crowd gathered at the door and Jesus healed many of the sick - many of the possessed. It was a full day. Very full. Very busy.
The next morning, very early in the morning - while it was still dark, we hear that Jesus got up, left the house and went to a solitary place, a quiet place, where he prayed. It must have been for quite a while, because we discover in the passage that Simon Peter and his companions go looking for him - and when they find him - they tell him that everyone is looking for him back in Capernaum - people with needs, people who want healing, people who want his touch, his word, his hope.
The passage concludes with Jesus telling his disciples - "Let us go somewhere else - to the nearby villages - so I can preach there also. That is why I have come." And so he does.
He travels through Galilee, preaching and healing and driving out demons - spreading by word and deed the good news of God's Kingdom - the news that God is near at hand, the news that God is coming to deliver his people, the news that God is forgiving, that news that God will raise up all who wait upon him, the news that God will give strength to those who turn to him; the news that God loves all people and wants everyone to draw near to him, everyone to repent and to believe in him, everyone to trust, to know, and to follow him so that he may shower them with the blessings that last forever, so that they may have peace in their hearts and live in peace with one another and with God..
And always - always, we find as we read the Gospel accounts - we see Jesus drawing aside from the crowds that gather to hear him and to be healed by him to go and to pray. Always we find Jesus leaving his disciples for a time and going to a quiet place by himself for a talk with God, for a time of waiting upon the Lord, for a time of developing his relationship - and maintaining his relationship with God - for a time of strengthening - a time of remembering - a time of being "re-attached" to the Father.
How about us? Do we remember why we are here in the first place? Do we recall the simplicity of what God wants of us? Do we recall the glory of what God has promised us? Do we recall how God has helped us in the past?
Do we remember where there is fuel for our tanks, food for our journey, supplies for our task, recovery for our soul, hope for hearts, and direction for our days?
Do we turn aside from the hustle and bustle - the fret and the worry - and allow God to inhabit us - to fill us - to restore us - to guide us so that we can do with those days what God wants us to do? So that we can be what God wants us to be? What God has made us to be?
The message of God for us today in the prophet Isaiah is precisely this.
It is a call to a people who are living in exile - in bondage - to take heart.
It is a call to them to remember who God is and how God has helped them in the past.
It is a call to them to come to God so that everything can be put into perspective.
It is a call to them to wait upon God, to listen to God - as well as to speak to God, so God can raise them up, so God can restore them to health, so God can unfold his plan for them, a plan in which their freedom is to be restored, their nation rebuilt, and their cup of suffering replaced with the cup of eternal joy.
In his address to the nation on the day of the Shuttle Disaster President George Bush quoted from this section of Isaiah as he sought to bring comfort to the nation.
As he spoke of the 7 men and woman who died in their quest to help bring people to get closer to the stars, he called everyone to remember the big picture - and how God cares for each one within it.
Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens. Who created all these? Remember that God brings out the starry host one by one, that He calls them each by name, that because of his great power and mighty strength not one of them is missing.
Not one of them is missing.....God knows each star by name. He knows us by name.
Why do you say, O Jacob, and complain, O Israel, "My way is hidden from the Lord; my cause is disregarded by my God"?
Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.
Remember what God has done - who God is - what God's purpose is.
He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Why did Jesus go the synagogue on the Sabbath Day? Week in and week out?
Why did he worship at the temple with God's people as well as keep the Law of God?
Why did he continually turn aside during his busy days of doing God's work, of preaching, and go to a quiet place and pray?
Why did he withdraw from his disciples and from the crowds to go up on the mountainsides - or into garden groves to wait upon God?
Might I suggest to you that he did this because that is what helped him keep on track? Might I suggest to you that he did this because that is what gave him strength? Might I suggest to you that he did this because without doing it - he could not have done all he did?
God has a purpose for us.
God will redeem us.
God will raise us up.
And when we hope in that. When we feed ourselves with God's word. When we allow God to speak to us - instead just us talking to him all the time. When we take time aside - when we take time to be holy - God moves in us to do what we cannot do on our own. God moves in us to give us the strength and the peace that lasts.
Recall with me the first verse and chorus of Psalm 91 again and think of what it says.
You who dwell in the shelter of our God, who abide in this shadow for life; say to the Lord, "my refuge, my Rock in whom I trust"
And I will raise you up on eagle's wings, bear you on the breath of dawn, make you to shine like the sun, and hold you in the palm of my hand.
Praise be to God who raises us up. May his Word - his Gospel - his promises - his direction be heard by you, be loved by you, be clung to by you, day by day. Amen
The story is told about how Satan called a worldwide convention of demons.
In his opening address he said, "We can't keep Christians from going to church. We can't keep them from reading their Bibles and knowing the truth. We can't even keep them from forming an intimate relationship with their saviour. Once they gain that connection with Jesus, our power over them is broken."
So let them go to their churches; let them have their Pot Luck Suppers and fellowship events, but steal their time so they don't have time to develop a relationship with Jesus."
"This is what I want you to do", said the devil.; "Distract them from gaining hold of their Saviour and maintaining that vital connection throughout their day!"
"How shall we do this?" his demons shouted.
"Keep them busy in the nonessentials of life and invent innumerable schemes to occupy their minds," he answered. "Tempt them to spend, spend, spend, and borrow, borrow, borrow. Persuade the wives to go to work for long hours and the husbands to work 6-7 days each week, 10-12 hours a day, so they can afford their empty lifestyles. Keep them from spending time with their children. As their families fragment, soon, their homes will offer no escape from the pressures of work!"
"Over-stimulate their minds so that they cannot hear that still, small voice trying to talk to them. Entice them to play the radio or cassette player whenever they drive; to keep the TV, VCR, CDs and their PCs going constantly in their home; and see to it that every store and restaurant in the world plays music constantly. This will jam their minds and break that union with Christ."
"Fill the coffee tables with magazines and newspapers. Pound their minds with the news 24 hours a day. Invade their driving moments with billboards. Flood their mailboxes with junk mail, mail order catalogues, sweepstakes, and every kind of newsletter and promotional offering free products, services and false hopes."
"Keep skinny, beautiful models on the magazines and TV so their husbands will believe that outward beauty is what's important and they'll become dissatisfied with their wives. Keep the wives too tired to love their husbands at night. Give them headaches too! Make them dissatisfied with one another so they begin to look elsewhere. That will fragment their families quickly!"
"Give them Santa Claus to distract them from teaching their children the real meaning of Christmas. Give them an Easter bunny so they won't talk about his resurrection and his power over sin and death."
"Even in their recreation, let them be excessive! Have them return from their recreation exhausted. Keep them too busy to go out in nature and reflect on God's creation. Send them to amusement parks, sporting events, plays, concerts, and movies instead. And when they do go out on the mountains or to the shoreline - get them do it on their day of worship - and make them so active in what they do there that they don't have time to pray, time to think, time to remember their God or thank him for his goodness.
"Keep them busy, busy, busy!"
"And when they meet for spiritual fellowship, leave them with troubled consciences. Crowd their lives with so many good causes they have no time to seek power from Jesus. It they must talk to God, make sure that they don't take time to listen to God. Soon they will be working in their own strength, sacrificing their health and family for the good of the cause."
"Do this and it will work!", Satan concluded.
"It will work!" His demons replied.
So they the convention ended. The demons went eagerly to their assignments causing Christians everywhere to have little time for their God or their families. Having no time to tell others about the power of Jesus to change lives and to meet their real needs.
I guess the question is, has the devil been successful at his scheme?
You be the judge!
Are you being drained? Are you failing to see what the point of it all is. Are you losing hope? Is joy harder and harder to find? Are you finding it harder and harder to remember the goals and the dreams that God has placed in your hearts? Are you feeling besieged from all sides and unable to get it together?
In today's Gospel reading we see Jesus on the Sabbath doing many things - he has already, as we can see from earlier paragraphs of the same chapter, attended worship at the Synagogue and there, during worship, cast an unclean spirit out of man and brought him healing. Then he went with his disciples to Peter and Andrew's home - and there he brought healing to Peter's mother-in-law. Later, in the evening. a huge crowd gathered at the door and Jesus healed many of the sick - many of the possessed. It was a full day. Very full. Very busy.
The next morning, very early in the morning - while it was still dark, we hear that Jesus got up, left the house and went to a solitary place, a quiet place, where he prayed. It must have been for quite a while, because we discover in the passage that Simon Peter and his companions go looking for him - and when they find him - they tell him that everyone is looking for him back in Capernaum - people with needs, people who want healing, people who want his touch, his word, his hope.
The passage concludes with Jesus telling his disciples - "Let us go somewhere else - to the nearby villages - so I can preach there also. That is why I have come." And so he does.
He travels through Galilee, preaching and healing and driving out demons - spreading by word and deed the good news of God's Kingdom - the news that God is near at hand, the news that God is coming to deliver his people, the news that God is forgiving, that news that God will raise up all who wait upon him, the news that God will give strength to those who turn to him; the news that God loves all people and wants everyone to draw near to him, everyone to repent and to believe in him, everyone to trust, to know, and to follow him so that he may shower them with the blessings that last forever, so that they may have peace in their hearts and live in peace with one another and with God..
And always - always, we find as we read the Gospel accounts - we see Jesus drawing aside from the crowds that gather to hear him and to be healed by him to go and to pray. Always we find Jesus leaving his disciples for a time and going to a quiet place by himself for a talk with God, for a time of waiting upon the Lord, for a time of developing his relationship - and maintaining his relationship with God - for a time of strengthening - a time of remembering - a time of being "re-attached" to the Father.
How about us? Do we remember why we are here in the first place? Do we recall the simplicity of what God wants of us? Do we recall the glory of what God has promised us? Do we recall how God has helped us in the past?
Do we remember where there is fuel for our tanks, food for our journey, supplies for our task, recovery for our soul, hope for hearts, and direction for our days?
Do we turn aside from the hustle and bustle - the fret and the worry - and allow God to inhabit us - to fill us - to restore us - to guide us so that we can do with those days what God wants us to do? So that we can be what God wants us to be? What God has made us to be?
The message of God for us today in the prophet Isaiah is precisely this.
It is a call to a people who are living in exile - in bondage - to take heart.
It is a call to them to remember who God is and how God has helped them in the past.
It is a call to them to come to God so that everything can be put into perspective.
It is a call to them to wait upon God, to listen to God - as well as to speak to God, so God can raise them up, so God can restore them to health, so God can unfold his plan for them, a plan in which their freedom is to be restored, their nation rebuilt, and their cup of suffering replaced with the cup of eternal joy.
In his address to the nation on the day of the Shuttle Disaster President George Bush quoted from this section of Isaiah as he sought to bring comfort to the nation.
As he spoke of the 7 men and woman who died in their quest to help bring people to get closer to the stars, he called everyone to remember the big picture - and how God cares for each one within it.
Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens. Who created all these? Remember that God brings out the starry host one by one, that He calls them each by name, that because of his great power and mighty strength not one of them is missing.
Not one of them is missing.....God knows each star by name. He knows us by name.
Why do you say, O Jacob, and complain, O Israel, "My way is hidden from the Lord; my cause is disregarded by my God"?
Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.
Remember what God has done - who God is - what God's purpose is.
He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Why did Jesus go the synagogue on the Sabbath Day? Week in and week out?
Why did he worship at the temple with God's people as well as keep the Law of God?
Why did he continually turn aside during his busy days of doing God's work, of preaching, and go to a quiet place and pray?
Why did he withdraw from his disciples and from the crowds to go up on the mountainsides - or into garden groves to wait upon God?
Might I suggest to you that he did this because that is what helped him keep on track? Might I suggest to you that he did this because that is what gave him strength? Might I suggest to you that he did this because without doing it - he could not have done all he did?
God has a purpose for us.
God will redeem us.
God will raise us up.
And when we hope in that. When we feed ourselves with God's word. When we allow God to speak to us - instead just us talking to him all the time. When we take time aside - when we take time to be holy - God moves in us to do what we cannot do on our own. God moves in us to give us the strength and the peace that lasts.
Recall with me the first verse and chorus of Psalm 91 again and think of what it says.
You who dwell in the shelter of our God, who abide in this shadow for life; say to the Lord, "my refuge, my Rock in whom I trust"
And I will raise you up on eagle's wings, bear you on the breath of dawn, make you to shine like the sun, and hold you in the palm of my hand.
Praise be to God who raises us up. May his Word - his Gospel - his promises - his direction be heard by you, be loved by you, be clung to by you, day by day. Amen
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