Visible Signs of Invisible Faith

Colossians 1:11-20

Christ the King

Year C

November 24, 2013

First Presbyterian Church, Clarksville

And

Harmony Presbyterian Church

The Reverend Dr. Robert Wm Lowry

                Most days I find Facebook an amusing annoyance. 

It is amusing how many people think I care what they had for lunch or how cute the cat was playing with the ball of yarn strategically dropped in the middle of the room while being filmed. 

It is annoying because as easy as it is to use Facebook to connect with friends, it is also an easy forum to get into a back and forth debate on any given topic from football to politics.

Earlier this week I was in a back and forth with a seminary friend who sees the world through distinctly different glasses than me.  Still, I know him well and know that he is a good man and a faithful pastor so theological debate with him is fun and even productive from time to time.  For an entire day, we had a debate going back and forth between Iowa and Arkansas and by the end we had resolved nothing other than the reaffirmation that after 15 years, we still don’t agree on many things.

As often happens with Facebook debates, the discussion prompted comments from some spectators who were reading along but not participating.  One of those spectators, a childhood friend, sent me a private message telling me that he was going to pray for me and my soul and ask that God forgive me for my wrongheaded opinions.  In what I know he intended to be a kind note, he basically told me that if I was not careful I was going to burn in hell and God was never going to forgive me. 

After the discussion ended in its usual stalemate and I got on with the rest of my day, I kept thinking about that note.  At first I was a little angry at the presumption that he thought that he knew the mind of God or the faithfulness or lack thereof of my relationship with God.  The more I thought about it though, the sadder I became until finally I settled in the place I still find myself this morning. 

I feel profoundly sad for him and for anyone who goes through life that scared of God. 

What, I find myself thinking, must it be like to go through life feeling like God is keeping score and waiting for you to trip up; feeling like God is anything but on our side. 

20 years ago there was a wonderful Far Side cartoon- remember those?  They were one frame drawings that in the simplest of terms offered profound commentary on life.  There was one I remember in particular.  A man in a white robe with a long white beard surrounded by puffy clouds is sitting in front of a computer.  On the computer screen was a man walking down a sidewalk next to a building and over his head was a piano suspended by a rope.  It was obviously being moved into an apartment in the building.  With a wry grin on his face the man, obviously meant to be God, had his finger poised over a computer key marked “smite.”  God, just waiting for the right moment to hit the button, let the piano fall and smite the man when he least expected it. 

I think that must be what God looks like to my friend.  The God of the smite button.  Just waiting and watching ready to reign punishment down at a moment’s notice.

There is certainly cultural currency to that perspective; the idea of a vengeful and unforgiving God ready to punish transgressions and dole out just eternal punishments for momentary misdeeds in this life.  That image of God makes it easy to divide the world into us and them; to delineate between those neighbors who are deserving of God’s love and therefore mine and those who are not.  That is without a doubt a popular theology of contemporary cultural Christianity.  That is an easy God to worship.

The problem I have is that I don’t find that God in the bible. 

I don’t find a grudge holding, smite button hitting, willing to forgive but not forget God. 

Yes, God is judge.  But that judge is just not vengeful.

Yes, God is the final arbiter of all things in life and in death.  But that God is the God of resurrection and salvation not death and anguish.

Yes, God gets angry with God’s people.  But that same God orders the banquet table set and the best garments brought out to greet the child who returns. 

I just cannot bring myself to believe that God is so petty as to hold grudges or so callous as to simply turn away from us.  I just cannot bring myself to believe in a God that…small.

A similar heresy was creeping through the community in Colossae.  The bold witness to the character of God that is found in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ had begun to wane in the young church.  Fundamentally the question was not one about whether Jesus was the son of God or the resurrection was real.  The question had to do with the nature of God.  When Messiah came into the world and shared in our human frailty; when Emmanuel, God with us, was born in the innocence of a child; when, as the hymn says, “joy of heaven to earth came down;” was that really God or just a reflection of God? 

In other words, in Christ did God really mean it?

Paul’s answer is simple. YES!!  Yes God meant it!

Christ was not God just dressed up with a people costume.  Christ was truly God come to earth taking on the reality and the pain and the frailty of true humanity.

            Far from being the God of the smite button and miles from being a God lingering in the dark waiting to pounce on our mistakes, in Christ, God is God for us.  Beyond the hurts, wants, worries, stresses, cares and fears of this world, God, in Christ, is for us.

            The day we celebrate today, the Feast of Christ the King, is the newest holiday in the church calendar.  It began in the 1920’s as a Roman Catholic celebration of the reign of Christ on the last Sunday in October.  In 1970, as this new day caught on among Protestants, it found its way to this day; the last Sunday before the first Sunday of Advent. 

            In a liturgical light it makes sense that we celebrate the reign of Christ today at the end of the liturgical year.  We end the year celebrating the reign of Christ as we prepare to come back together next week to begin our journey to the celebration of his birth.

            That is the liturgical and theological reason this day makes sense.

            There is another reason, albeit a somewhat ironic one given our text today.

            The celebration of the reign of Christ occurs on a Sunday with so many other things happening- Thanksgiving, Christmas sales, that last gasp of the semester before exams start- that this day almost goes unnoticed.  We set aside a day to celebrate the reign of Christ and we do everything we can to clutter up the calendar until the day is all but lost in the din. 

            You’ve heard the cliché about Christmas that we need to remember “the reason for the season?”  The same thing can be said about today.  We need to remember the reason for this day. 

Easier said than done, I know.  We all find ways to be busy this time of year.  In a stunning display of hypocrisy I am standing in this pulpit preaching about focusing on the meaning of the reign of Christ, while my to do list and down to the minute and cooking plan for 15 Thanksgiving dinner guests is on my desk and not far from the front of my mind!  Whether it is holiday meals, Black Friday deals, Holiday parties or determinedly avoiding all of the above, we are surrounded by distractions. 

And when we are so distracted; when our lives and our spirits are being drawn in so many directions, we all too easily do what the early Christians at Colossae evidently did, we begin to worship the image of a God who is easier to worship rather than the one who is revealed in Jesus Christ. 

When I am too busy to help my neighbor, it is easier to worship a God who is only concerned with some of my neighbors; the good ones.  When I am too distracted to notice injustice in the world, it is easier to worship a God who sees injustice as just desserts.  When I am exhausted by the demands of the world, it is easier to worship an undemanding God.

And when that is the God we worship; when we redraw the picture of salvation history from our own perspective; we fall victim to the same theological snare that caught the Colossians.  We lose track of the character of the one who reigns over all creation; God in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

We lose track of the reason we celebrate today; Christ is king- at the center of all creation, reconciling all things to God- Christ is king. 

            When we get distracted from Christ at the center, it is easy to lose track of the promise that Christ brings; God is for us.  And when we lose sight of God for us, it is all too easy to imagine that God is distant, apart or worse, against us. 

            That is the real tragedy of the Colossians, I think.  It is not their bad theology or their failure to fully comprehend the nature of Christ.  Those are not good, but they are not the most tragic thing to befall that community or ours.  More tragic than bad theology is…despair.

            Despair.

            The groaning of the spirit that cries out in fear and all too easily leads to hopelessness.  When we lose Christ at the center- when the eternal light of hope and promise and love and grace ceases to be the center of spiritual gravity of our lives, we despair.

            And in our despair, we fear.

            We fear being left behind.  We fear being forgotten.  We fear being left outside the radius of God’s love. 

            That is the deep tragedy of the theological heresy of the God of the smite button.  Despair. 

            When Paul writes his letter to the Colossians he has a simple recipe to combat that heresy and its accompanying despair.  It is right at the front of the letter in our reading from today.  Paul, who is no stranger to hyperbole and harsh language, says to his audience, the cure for what ails your spirit is…remember. 

            Paul writes in his letter the words of what is believed to be an early Christian baptismal hymn.

                        The Son is the image of the invisible God,
                           the one who is first over all creation,

                        Because all things were created by him:
                           both in the heavens and on the earth,
                           the things that are visible and the things that are invisible.
                        Whether they are thrones or powers,
                          or rulers or authorities,
                          all things were created through him and for him.

                        He existed before all things,
                            and all things are held together in him.

                        He is the head of the body, the church,
                               who is the beginning,
                                the one who is firstborn from among the dead
                             so that he might occupy the first place in everything.

                        Because all the fullness of God was pleased to live in him,
                                          and he reconciled all things to himself through him—
                                whether things on earth or in the heavens.
                        He brought peace through the blood of his cross. (CEB)

            The Colossians do not need a new lesson, they just need to remember what they already know from the promises of God. 

            Of all my seminary memories, time spent in class with Dr. Stan Hall is one of the best.  Stan was a good and compassionate man, a gifted teacher and a committed theologian of the church.  Stan taught liturgical theology- the theology of the church’s worship.  Without fail, when he led chapel, at some point in the service, Stan would come to the center of the chancel, stand behind the table, raise his hands in the air and say in his deep commanding voice…”remember your baptism, and be thankful.” 

            In the Reformed tradition, we say of the sacraments of baptism and communion that they are outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual grace.  Another way of saying it is that they are visible signs of the faithfulness of God. 

            I hear echoes of Stan in Paul’s recitation of the Christ hymn in Colossians.  Paul tells them, tells us, to remember the promise of baptism that God is not only with us but for us; that we are drawn into covenant and relationship not with a God who wishes us ill but a God who desires nothing less than all good things for God’s children.

            That God, the God of the baptismal waters, doesn’t have a finger poised over the smite button.  That God’s hands are far too busy gathering in the children of God; bringing them…us…ever closer to the promise of tomorrow. 

            I haven’t responded to my friend who wrote me the note…the one who seems so afraid of God.  Not yet at least.  I think the best thing I can do is to say two things to him.

            First, that I will pray for him as well.

            And second, that I hope he remembers his baptism and is thankful.  And filled with hope.

            After all, that is what we celebrate today. 

            The kingship of Jesus Christ who is hope summed up.

            Amen.

           

            

The Fourth Kind of Stewardship Sermon

1 Chronicles 29:1-20

November 10, 2013

First and Harmony Presbyterian Churches

The Reverend Dr. Robert Wm Lowry

                Surrounding Nelson’s Column at Trafalgar Square in London there are four giant plinths.  A plinth is nothing but a platform built of stone or concrete on which a column or a statue rests.  On three of the plinths in Trafalgar Square there stand great bronze statues memorializing the likeness and accomplishments of past leaders.  The fourth plinth, originally built to hold a statue of William IV on his horse, remains empty.  For more than a century and a half the grate plinth stood vacant as funds were perpetually unavailable to build a suitable monument. 

            About 15 years ago, the city of London began to commission artists to install temporary art that reflected the times.  One artist invited 2400 people to stand on top of the plinth one at a time for an hour each.  Another built a giant rocking horse.  The current installation is a 12 foot tall blue rooster. I’m sure it has some deeper meaning but it escapes me.

            Unlike its fellows in the square with their unmovable bronze monuments to moments in time, the fourth plinth reflects a particular vision of a particular time. 

            Stewardship sermons are much like the plinths around Trafalgar Square.  There are four basic stewardship sermons- three that never really change.  They are like those bronze statues.   The fourth, like the art on that fourth plinth, changes with each preacher and each congregation. 

            The first stewardship sermon has been preached since the first time the church needed someone’s money.  It is the fear sermon. 

            Give, or else.

            Give, or God will punish you.

            Give, or burn.

            I can’t preach that one.  I can’t preach it because I don’t believe it.

            The second stewardship sermon is almost as old.  It is the promise sermon.

            Give and God will give back.

            Give and you will be blessed.

            Give and God will love you.

            This is the sermon of the television preacher.  I can’t preach this one either because I don’t believe this theology either.  Plus, I don’t have the hair for television preaching!

            The third stewardship sermon is the guilt sermon. 

            I suppose we could just cut Sunday School.

            There are plenty of other churches who can help the hungry. 

            Give, because after all God gave you so much and you don’t want to seem selfish, right?  Can’t you give just a little back to God?

            This one I cannot preach because I have too much respect for you, for myself and more importantly for the gospel.

            So that leaves us with the fourth stewardship sermon.  Like the fourth plinth around the square, the fourth basic stewardship sermon changes based on who is preaching and who is listening.  Lacking the crutch of fear, guilt or promises of riches, the preacher who preaches this sermon has only two homiletical tools in his or her toolbox; the truth of the biblical witness and the trust of the community of faith.

            This morning, I am going to try to preach from the fourth plinth; I am going to try to rely on the truth of the biblical witness and the trust we share as a community of faith to share with you some thoughts on biblical stewardship and its place in our congregation.

            A first principle of biblical stewardship is this: we are all in this together even beyond the generations.

            When the time comes for David to turn over leadership of the nation to his son Solomon, David addresses the leaders and the people and invites them to join him in building the Lord’s house.  “Who else,” he says, “will volunteer, dedicating themselves to the LORD today?” 

            What is being built is a physical structure and David could probably have afforded to build it himself from his own treasury.  And to be sure, he gives generously toward the project.  By inviting the people to join him in giving, David is not trying to save some money.  He is inviting the people to join him in dedicating part of their lives- wealth, time, energy, talent- to the building of God’s house. 

            Giving to God was understood in the ancient near east as an opportunity for faithfulness not an obligation.  By inviting the people to join him in giving, David is inviting them to join him in faithful living.

            When we talk about stewardship here in this place- this church- we are talking about a shared investment in God’s house.  Over the last couple of years, this congregation has invested emotional, spiritual and, yes, financial resources in moving the church toward a joyous and hopeful future. 

            We are all in this together.  Generations built this building and gave us a strong heritage on which to stand, and now it is our turn.  We are all invited to share from our lives as we are able in wealth, time, energy and talent to the building of God’s house. 

            A second principle of biblical stewardship is motives matter.

            When he prays in thanksgiving to God for the generosity of the people, David says:

            “Since I know, my God, that you examine the mind and take delight in honesty, I have freely given all these things with the highest motives.  And now, I’ve been delighted to see your people here offering so willingly to you.”

            Stewardship is not coercive.  Or at least it shouldn’t be.  Stewardship is meant to be a reflection of our faith and how can a faith defined by grace and promise and hope be embodied in a stewardship of fear and coercion? 

            What David realized is that giving toward the work of the community of God is necessarily an act of faithfulness. 

            John Calvin defined faith as a “firm and certain knowledge of God’s benevolence toward us.”  Faith is not belief in a doctrine, a statement, a confession or even a particular definition of God.  It is faith in God’s faithfulness; it is faith that no matter what God loves us and abides with us; that no matter how far we may go, God is our everlasting companion. 

            When we give with both generosity of gift and generosity of spirit, our stewardship is a response in faithfulness to God. 

            We give out of faithfulness not fear;

            Compassion not coercion;                                         

            Promise not fear of punishment.

            Motives matter.

            A third principle of biblical stewardship is every gift is worth celebrating.

            As a community of faith, we come from vastly different lives and circumstances.  Faithful gifts come in as many shapes and sizes as there are faithful givers. 

            When the pledges have been received and the capital campaign to build the temple is over and David prays to the Lord, he uses the same word to describe each and every gift; abundance.  No one is singled out for being a better giver than another-not even David himself.  Rather, David celebrates each and every gift for what it is, a faithful contribution to the community’s collective response to God’s own faithfulness. 

            When we say that every gift matters, those words are more than marketing.  They are theological.  Saying that every gift, regardless of size, matters is a theological claim that God delights in faithful giving from each and every household. 

            Whether the gift is a mite or a million, an hour or a day, proofreading a bulletin or maintaining a website, however we give- whatever we give- it is right that we celebrate every gift as one of abundance. 

            There are many more principles and perspectives and ideas about stewardship in scripture, but for this community in this place I think those speak to who and where we are. 

            In our stewardship:

            we are in this together beyond the generations;

            we give out of faithfulness;

            we celebrate every gift as a reflection of God’s abundance.

            What then can we say about our lives together in light of these principles?

            From a practical perspective, one of the unhealthiest things a congregation can do is rely on one or two members to provide the money needed to run the church.  There is a saying among preachers that many churches are one or two strategic funerals away from insolvency. 

            We are not in that place.  To be sure we have some very generous givers whose lives allow them to give generously to the church and for that we can and should all be grateful, however we are not a church that relies on one or two families to keep the church solvent.  We really are all in this together and thanks to the generosity of past generations and the wise decisions of the session, we have a growing endowment that links the giving of past generations to the ministry of present ones.

            Now it is our turn.  As you prayerfully consider your giving for the coming year, I hope that you will think not only about how your gift will contribute to the work of the church today, but how it might help us build the church for the future.  We are all in this together; the church past, present and future.

            There is a saying among therapists that God has not made the person who doesn’t need at least a little therapy.  Along those same lines, God has not drawn together the congregation that couldn’t use a little more money.  Thanks to the diligent efforts of the session and some creative modeling of how we are going to be church together, we, unlike many of our peer congregations, have a balanced budget and we are able to meet most of our needs with the income available to us. 

            Among small churches, we have the unusual opportunity to frame our giving not in terms of saving the church from financial ruin but as an act of faith in the ministries we are building and the work we are doing together.

            Over the last year, we have begun to explore new ministry opportunities and ways to reach out to families with children, to reengage the university community and to reach beyond the walls of the church to partner with our community in meeting the needs of our neighbors. 

            Our stewardship is an opportunity to share in that ministry; to share in the faith that God has work for us to do in this place and at this time; work being built by this generation for coming generations.

            Pastors debate about the ethics of knowing or not knowing how much an individual or family gives to the church.  I fall on the “don’t want to know” side though I am not sure there really is one right or wrong answer.  I don’t know how much anyone gives and I don’t keep track of how much anyone volunteers.  Whether the gift is large or small in time or wealth or energy or talent, I trust that it is faithfully given and worthy of our celebrating.  I trust in our giving and have faith that it is done with a spirit of generosity.

            That is the comfortable part.  Now for the more uncomfortable part.  If you are going to squirm in your seat, now is the time.

            We do need more.  As a congregation, if we are to maintain the ministries we have and those we hope to build, we need more resources- of energy, time, talent and, yes, money. One of the difficult parts of being a church on the upswing is that our ministries often outpace our giving.  We have reached that tipping point where budgets and staff hours cannot absorb all the needs. We are victims of the realization of our own efforts.   

            We need all hands on deck. 

            I would never compare myself to David, but I will borrow a paraphrase of his words.  Together we are not building anything for ourselves, we are building God’s house.  No single one of us can build it alone.  It takes us all, giving in faithfulness and, together, celebrating the abundance God brings into our midst.  It takes each of us examining our lives and seeing where we might find a little more; energy, time, talent or money; a little more that we might faithfully add to the faithfulness of our neighbors-of the generations-as we celebrate every gift that is given to build God's house.

            There you have it.  That is the truth as I see it.  That is the honest view from the fourth plinth.  No fear, no promises of riches and hopefully no emotional manipulations.  Just the honest view from where your pastor stands. 

            May God open us each and every one to the spirit of generosity and, above all, fill us all with the joy that comes from joining together to build God’s house.  Because that is what real stewardship is:

            Joy.  In God.

            Amen.

Fire upon the Earth?

Luke 12:49-56

Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost Year C

August 18, 2013

First Presbyterian Church, Clarksville

And

Harmony Presbyterian Church

Dr. Robert Wm Lowry

            It has happened to all of us at one time or another.

            You are sitting around with friends or family and the conversation turns from vacations and stories about the kids to politics or some other equally divisive issue.  The conversation gets more focused, the voices more rigid, the tone more severe.  Eventually the atmosphere gets so tense you could cut it with a knife.  That is when someone asks the question.

            Every tense conversation has “the question.” It might change from group to group or family to family, but it is always there.  When the conversation gets tough, when the tension gets too high, when friendships and relationships are starting to strain, someone asks…”how about this weather we’ve been having?”

            Your question may be different.  In my family, we ask “what about the Cardinals this year?”

            No matter what your question is, that old stand-by to break the tension in polite conversation is always available: the weather.  The most neutral and neutralizing of questions.  Asking about the weather is like tossing baking soda on a grease fire.  It tampers the flames and tempers the situation.

            How about this weather we’ve been having?

            Living in a community visited by Jesus must have been a double edged sword.  On the one hand, this increasingly famous Rabbi was coming to our town- maybe even our street!  We like to think of the crowds being quiet and reverent and standing in rapt prayerful attention, but part of me things that someone as famous as Jesus must have caused at least a bit of a stir.  After all, he was the theological rock star of the early first century.   It might not have been quite as much bedlam as the Beatles landing at JFK on their first American visit or Justin Beiber coming on an arena stage to screaming throngs of teenagers.  But Jesus coming to town was a big deal.

            The other side of the equation, however, is the fact that what Jesus brought was more controversial than a mop haircut or saccharine pop lyrics.  When Jesus came to town, the status quo began to tremble.  What Jesus taught stood as a challenge to the assumptions about how the world works and how God works in and through the world. 

            What, I wonder, happened when one who heard Jesus teaching brought what they heard home?  “I was in the square today and heard this rabbi talking.  He says that the law is fulfilled in him.” How would his devout father who observes and respects the law of Moses reply?  What about the mother who spent the day preparing the kosher supper?

            Jesus’s teachings must have come into homes and families like a ticking bomb waiting to explode and exploit different opinions and perspectives in the same household.  Conversations around dinner tables after a Jesus question was dropped in the middle of the conversation must have taken a turn for the tense.   Let’s face it, there is no way to talk about Jesus’s teachings without things getting at least a little tense.  After all, most of us were taught that you don’t discuss politics, money or religion in polite company.  There must be a reason behind that advice.

            So when Jesus’s words started to make things tense, someone acting as self-appointed peacemaker would ask the question: “how about this weather we’ve been having?”

            Someone would turn the relief valve to let the tension out of the situation and give everyone a chance to get back to normal- to ratchet the passion down a notch- to  keep things from coming to the boiling point when a household is divided against itself- father against son and daughter against mother and…

            But wait.

            That can’t be right.

            I seem to remember Jesus saying something about that whole division of the family thing.

From now on, a household of five will be divided—three against two and two against three.   Father will square off against son and son against father; mother against daughter and daughter against mother; and mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law.”

            He knew that if we take that word home and live with it and wrestle with it and hold fast to it, the world as we know it is going to be turned on its head.  He goes on to say…

            “Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth?  No, I have come to bring division.”

            Jesus knew that his word would threaten and upset the status quo and he warns us from the very beginning that if we take it seriously- if we stand with and in his word- we may find ourselves in uncomfortable or even conflicted circumstances. 

            If just to drive the point home, Jesus even warns us about changing the subject back to the weather!  Why, he demands, do you keep talking about the weather?  Your heads are full of clouds and wind directions when what you really need to be talking about- really need to be thinking about is the Word of God revealed to you here and now.  Stop being distracted and start tending to the work of the Word of God.

            Left in the distant past, Jesus’s words stand as a reminder of the importance of not neglecting the message of and priorities of God.  They nudge us toward a greater willingness to draw near and hear God’s Word.

            But Jesus’s words never stay in the distant past.  They are right here.  Right now.

            Jesus’s message is not speaking to us from far away in the distant past.  And as is the case with Jesus’s words, they speak the truth. 

            And I think that is perhaps the most terrifying thing about this text. 

            Just as when he first said them, Jesus’s words often bring division and conflict and even discomfort.

            And just like the people who first heard them, we would rather talk about the weather than live in the midst of the tension of the Word of God.

            Jesus knew that and knows that so before we even have a chance to do it, he warns us away from asking the question; he warns us away from changing the subject.

            You will find my words disagreeable, he says, but don’t even think about bailing out to talk about the weather!

            This lesson from Jesus leaves us in a bit of a quandary.  He tells us that his word will lead to division and even rancor not just in the world but in our own households.  That doesn’t sound too pleasant.

            “Do you think I have come to bring peace to the earth?  No, I have come to bring division.”

            I was unsure how to get past my surface discomfort with this text until yesterday afternoon.  I was watching some news show- I cannot remember which one- and two commentators were blathering on about politics.  One was defending Congress saying that they were absolutely right and the President was absolutely wrong while the other one did the opposite.  Neither was willing to give any ground.  Neither was willing to even listen to the other one.  Neither was willing to see even a shred of truth in what the other had to say.

            It occurs to me that we tend to read this text from Luke through that lens; through the lens of our contemporary political divisions which present themselves as absolute, inflexible and intransigent.  We read this text as if Jesus is saying that households will be divided completely and in every way possible just like our modern politics are.

            On second glance, it becomes pretty clear that Jesus is not saying that at all.  He never says that father will square off against son because one of them is absolutely right and one is absolutely wrong.  That is how the church tends to read this text traditionally, but I am not convinced that Jesus is really saying that.  In fact that reading of the text seems to go against what scripture says about our comprehension of Jesus’s teachings and about God. 

            None of us can be absolutely right in our knowledge of God because none of us can know God absolutely.  Jesus is not warning us that only some will know the whole truth while others will know none of it.  What I hear Jesus saying here is that his word is so big, so vast that no one person can know it fully.  As Paul would later say to the Christians at Corinth, we all see through the glass dimly.

            The conflict Jesus brings is not simply conflict between those who see and those who do not see but between those who see but do not see the same thing.

            One of the persistent conflicts in the church is how to use our resources.  Some think the church should sell all of its property and use every dime to help those in need.  That is certainly a biblical notion- Jesus tells the wealthy young man to give away all that he has to the poor.  Others think we need to preserve our sacred spaces because the church needs a place set aside in the world for the worship of God.  That too is biblical.  When Jesus tears apart the temple it is because it is being misused not because it is unnecessary. 

            If living in the family of the church teaches us anything, it is that people of good faith can and often do disagree.  Two people may read the same words and find vastly different meanings.

            When Jesus tells the crowd that he comes not to bring peace but to bring division, he is acknowledging that at times his teachings will lead to differences of opinion that run deep and may even have the tendency to divide families over the interpretation of his word. 

            He knew that would happen and he makes no attempt to keep it from happening.  Instead, he warns us from doing what we so often do; change the subject.  When the sparks begin to fly and we risk lighting a fire in our midst, when we begin to disagree…

            … “how about this weather we’ve been having?”

            We throw some baking soda on the fire to keep it from getting out of control.  We douse the flames before they can get too big.

            Still, Jesus warns us against doing that; he warns us against avoiding the discomfort and even division that may come from his word and instead calls on us to lean and live into it.  Fundamentally this text is a call to courage amidst the ambiguity of a life of faith.  It is about recognizing that none of us has fully comprehension- full knowledge- full grasp of the Word of God or even the words of Jesus.

            It is telling, I think, that Jesus does not say that the household that is divided three against two is driven apart.  Father may rise up against son but the text says nothing about the father casting the son out of his home.  Beneath the visible division, there is an unspoken unity that exists.  Yes we may be divided over our understanding and interpretation of Jesus’s words, but we are still one family.  We may lack uniformity but, in Christ, we retain our unity.  We are still family.

            The limits of our own spiritual imaginations may drive wedges between us, but somewhere, perhaps deep down in the bottom of our souls, Jesus holds us together.  Since almost the beginning the church has been a house divided- East and West, Protestant and Catholic, Presbyterian and Methodist- you name it.  Yet from the beginning, the people of God though divided by doctrine and discipline are united in the unbreakable bond of Christ.

            This is a text about having courage in that bond- about putting our faith in that bond- about trusting that bond to hold us together even when our house is divided against itself.

            When we can learn to trust our unity in Christ and look beyond the discomfort in our own household of faith;

            when we quit changing the subject;

            when the living gets tough; when we stop putting out the fires of spiritual passion in our midst;

            we become the fire that Jesus came to cast upon the earth. 

            The fire of the Spirit;

                        the fire of the passion of the people of God;

                                     the fire of the word of God proclaimed and lived. 

            May the flames of the Spirit be fanned in our midst and may we, as a family in Christ, have the courage not to change the subject but in our unity in Christ share the light of that flame with the world.

            Amen and amen.

         

          

True Sabbath Keeping

Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost Year C

August 25, 2013

First Presbyterian Church, Clarksville

And

Harmony Presbyterian Church

Dr. Robert Wm Lowry

                In the 2000 presidential campaign, there was a short and now forgotten controversy surrounding the candidacy of Senator Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.  Al Gore chose Leiberman to be his running mate and the press began to write about him, his career and his life.

            What intrigued many writers the most was Leiberman’s religion.  He is an Orthodox Jew.  You would think he was the man from Mars the way some reporters wrote about the Sabbath practices of the Orthodox community. 

            As you may know, Orthodox Jews take a very strict approach to the Sabbath.  In addition to the religious requirements of prayer and ritual, many forego modern conveniences such as automobiles or computers while others, including Lieberman, take the command to rest from labor to the extent that they do not answer the telephone or open doors on the Sabbath.

            The controversy arose when reporters began to wonder what would happen if Liberman was to ascend to the presidency and, on the Sabbath, he was required to call the Kremlin in a crisis or enter his nuclear launch code in a computer or some other action that is strict Judaism forbade on the Sabbath day.

            Could an Orthodox Jew be President and remain faithful?

            Interestingly, that question was never asked about Baptist Al Gore, or their two Methodist opponents George Bush and Dick Cheney.  No one questioned whether or not a Christian would have trouble going to war on a Sunday- the Christian Sabbath.

            It took a while, but in the wake of the conversations about Leiberman, theologians began to ask, “have we lost a sense of Sabbath in the Christian world?”  Has Sunday become just another day?

            The short answer to the question is “yes.”

            In many ways Sunday has become just another day.

            I remember growing up and asking my mother why the beer, pantyhose and other random items were covered up and the grocery store on Sunday.  She explained “blue laws.”  Remember blue laws?

            With the exception of buying retail alcohol, there are few blue laws left in Arkansas. 

            Some other places still have them on the books, however; these laws designed to protect and defend the Sabbath; to keep it different, holy, set apart.

            You cannot buy a new car in Connecticut or a sofa in Bergen County New Jersey.

            You cannot sing vain or rowdy songs anywhere in New Jersey and in Pennsylvania you may not hunt unless you are hunting coyotes or crows.

            And good luck finding a single beer in most of the South.

            As time marches on, however, these laws are becoming more and more a thing of the past as Sunday takes its place as just another day.

            In truth, Sunday has been losing its cultural place for quite a while.  I remember as a child thinking that my great-grandmother was crazy for all of her old school Presbyterian Sabbatarian ideas about not going to the movies or mowing the grass on Sunday.  It has been a long time since Sunday was truly set aside in any significant way in our culture and certainly not during my ministry. 

            As long as I can remember in ministry, Sunday has been a challenge.

            So I have to confess some measure of sympathy for the priests in this story from Luke we have today.  When Jesus comes into the synagogue and labors, in flagrant violation of tradition, and heals the woman who has been ill for more than 18 years, he treats the Sabbath like it is any other day.  The Sabbath was supposed to be a day of rest- a day set apart from what you could do any other day of the week.  Jesus ignored that tradition.  He could have healed her on Friday or the next Monday or any of almost a week’s worth of days, but he came to the synagogue on the Sabbath and he worked.  Sure, he was working in his capacity as the one who brings miracles and healing rather than as a carpenter, but still he worked and to the priests that was a slippery slope.

            Once we start treating the Sabbath like any other day, it is going to lose all its meaning.

            One day Jesus is healing a sick woman and the next thing you know they will be selling socks and beer at Wal-Mart after church.

            It is a slippery slope when we start playing fast and loose with the Sabbath.  And the priests told Jesus that in no uncertain terms. 

            By the end of this short scene, Jesus has done what Jesus so often does.  He humiliates the priests and turns their world upside down and he does all of that by one simple action; he holds up a mirror to their lives and lets them see how foolish they have been.

            We don’t really know anything about the motives of the priests in this story.  It is easy to set them up as straw men and make them out to be the embodiment of true evil trying to stand in the way of Jesus’s ministry, but there is no evidence of that in this text.  In fact, they come across as pretty sincere.  All they want to do is protect the Sabbath from becoming just another day.

            Jesus, holding up the mirror to their lives, shows them the folly of what they are saying.  They may be trying to protect the Sabbath from becoming just another day, but in the meantime they have lost the meaning of it!  

            In the Old Testament, the command to keep the Sabbath is present in both Deuteronomy 5 and Exodus 20 accounts of the Ten Commandments.  Yet in each account, the reason for Sabbath keeping- the reason we set aside this time- is slightly different.  In Exodus, Sabbath is rooted in creation “because the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and everything that is in them in six days, but rested on the seventh day.”  Deuteronomy, on the other hand, roots Sabbath keeping in redemption. “Remember that you were a slave in Egypt, but the LORD your God brought you out of there with a strong hand and an outstretched arm.”

            Sabbath is about taking delight in both creation and redemption; in God’s bringing order to chaos and God’s redeeming that which is broken or lost.

            When Jesus goes to the synagogue and heals the woman, his act is an act of true Sabbath-keeping.  He both creates wholeness where there had been brokenness and pain and he redeems and restores the woman to health.  In this one act, Jesus embodies the truest meaning of Sabbath.

            But the priests cannot see it.

            They have become so wedded to the words- the letter of the law- that they have been blinded to the true meaning of Sabbath.  They work so hard to preserve it in name that they have lost track of why it is here in the first place.

            They were like modern day politicians who get worked up into a lather about whether a local celebration is called a Christmas Parade or a Holiday Parade.  Some get so worked up into a name calling frenzy about the word Christmas, they often lose the meaning of the whole season.  It is kind of hard to celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace while calling your political opponent a worthless, godless, hedonistic, atheistic, Communist!

            The same was true for the priests in the synagogue that day. 

            They had lost the meaning of Sabbath. 

            And when they admonish Jesus, he responds saying, “Hypocrites! Don’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from its stall and lead it out to get a drink?”  In other words, “are you really going to stand there and tell me that this woman’ suffering is less important on the Sabbath than your donkey’s thirst?!”

            It is difficult to take delight in creation and redemption while actively ignoring the needs of a child of God.

            In recent years, the church has taken more and more notice of how Sunday has culturally become just another day.  There is a movement within the church to resist those things that conflict with Sunday and especially with Sunday morning and the community’s time of worship.

            In some quarters of the church, there is active resistance to what is perceived as the war on Sunday which is an extension of the perceived war on Christmas.  There are fingers pointed and accusations hurled at soccer practice, homework, television and just about every other boogey-man around.  Every potential culprit is named.

            Except one.

            Not many of those fingers point back at the church.

            If we are really going to get a handle of why Sunday has become just another day, our time would be much better spent not looking for how the world is at fault, but by holding up a mirror to ourselves and our own habits of Sabbath keeping. 

            Put another way, we need to ask the question, why do we want people here on Sunday morning rather than reading the paper or playing golf or fishing or whatever else they might be doing?

            If the reason is that we would prefer to see more seats filled, or because we remember when there were lots more people here or because we want to be sure the church is still around in another generation or because more people means a better chance of making the budget, we’d better be prepared for that mirror that Jesus holds up because the picture looking back isn’t going to be pretty.

            If our whole reason for Sabbath keeping and Sabbath advocacy is the building up and preserving of what we have or value, we miss the point of Sabbath.

            If Sunday is important only because it is not Monday through Saturday, we miss the point of Sabbath.

            If we set this day aside out of a sense of obligation or even duty, we miss the point of Sabbath.

            Sabbath is not about fulfilling a requirement or preserving a church, Sabbath is about delighting and sharing delight in creation and redemption in God.  And when our Sabbath is about that- when our Sabbath is about delighting in God rather than rooted in anxiety about how many people come to church, Sunday takes on a whole different meaning.  Our preservation of this time set apart stops being about holding on to something we cherish and instead becomes a celebration of being held onto by the God who cherishes us!

            In the Jewish community, the traditional Sabbath greeting is “Shabbat shalom.”

            Literally translated, it means “peaceful Sabbath.”  However like so much of Hebrew idiom, there is much deeper meaning beneath the words.  Sabbath-shabbat- is not just a day it is an orientation of life toward delight in creation and redemption.  It is the orienting of our lives toward God.

            Shalom, though it does indeed mean peace, means peace that is found only in wholeness-completeness in God.

            Shabbat shalom translates as “peaceful Sabbath” but it means far more; “may you know wholeness in your delight in God.”

            “May you know wholeness in your delight in God.”

            The woman in the synagogue that day with Jesus certainly knew wholeness and the text tells us that the first thing she did when she straightened up was praise God- delight in God.

            She knew Shabbat shalom and all through Jesus’s touch.

            What made that day truly a Sabbath day was not the blind observance of rules by the priests and congregation, but Jesus reaching out to another and sharing the wholeness of God.

            The labor from which we rest on the Sabbath is our labor for a wage in the world.  On the Sabbath, we rest from that labor so we might focus on our work in the kingdom of God and there is no more pure way to live into the promise of the day of delight than by reaching out and sharing the wholeness and delight of God with another.  That is the purest way of honoring the Sabbath and the truest way of honoring God in this day.  When we gather on Sunday to worship God together we do not gather just to perpetuate an institution or to live up to an obligation.  We gather because we seek to share in the wholeness of delight that comes in Shabbat Shalom.

            John Winthrop’s sermon “A Model for Christian Charity” is famous mostly for his use of the image from Matthew’s gospel of a city upon a hill.  Far from describing the power of a nation as it has come to mean, Winthrop’s image of a society that shines like a city upon a hill is built on an ideal of sharing the promise of wholeness in God and delighting in God through our love for our neighbors.  Speaking to the community, he said:

We must delight in each other; make others' conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body.

The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as his own people.

For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us.

What Winthrop described as the model for Christian Charity, might also be called the model for Sabbath living because when we delight in each other; when we make others’ conditions our own; when we live as members of the same body, we cannot help but delight in the LORD and our very living becomes true Sabbath keeping.

            Shabbat Shalom Chevarim!

            May you know wholeness in your delight in God, my friends!  Amen.