Hearts and Minds

Sunday, September 26th, 2004
17th after Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
Luke 16:19-31

19 ‘There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. 20And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. 22The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried. 23In Hades, where he was being tormented, he looked up and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side. 24He called out, “Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am in agony in these flames.” 25But Abraham said, “Child, remember that during your lifetime you received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in agony. 26Besides all this, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who might want to pass from here to you cannot do so, and no one can cross from there to us.” 27He said, “Then, father, I beg you to send him to my father’s house— 28for I have five brothers—that he may warn them, so that they will not also come into this place of torment.” 29Abraham replied, “They have Moses and the prophets; they should listen to them.” 30He said, “No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.” 31He said to him, “If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.”’

The night before last there was a story on the news, I can’t remember which station it was out of Richmond, but it was a story about how someone had set fire to a 6 week old kitten. The kitten survived, and is being cared for, but what struck me about the news story was that, in the course of introducing it, there were at least three different occasions where the anchor or the reporter warned the audience that ‘some of the images included in this report are graphic, and may not be suitable for all viewers.”

Just thinking back over the last few weeks, it feels like I’ve been doing a lot of confessing from up here.

Well, I’ve got another confession to make:

This is one of those parables that make me real uneasy.

Why?

Because it is so graphic.

There’s a man covered with sores,
There are dogs licking them,
There’s a place of torment,
There’s agony,
And there’s that statement at the end …

The one that basically says ‘you had your chance … and you blew it’.

It makes me uncomfortable because it goes against my concept of an ever-redeeming, loving and patient God. But then, this isn’t so much a statement about God as it is about us as humans, is it? it is an aspect of life and faith that we need to be reminded of – that we mentioned a couple of weeks ago – there are eternal consequences for temporal – or earthly – decisions we make.

Just like that news story brought to the forefront of my conscience the fact that there are broken people in this broken world who would torture animals, seemingly just because they can, and go on about their lives, with little or no regret or sense of guilt about what they’d done.

I’ll admit, there is DEFINITELY a sense of ‘just rewards’ being meted out at the end of this parable, but it still causes some discomfort, when I stop and think about how wealthy I am, in relation to the millions of starving people in the world, as Leslie mentioned in her report to the RBA Executive Committee Thursday night, the estimated 1 billion people in the world who survive on less than a dollar a day, THAT’S when I start to feel uncomfortable.

While there is SOME reassurance in the fact that this was a PARABLE, and meant to be taken more as an object lesson rather than a literal description of what might await us at the end of our lives, the point is still … pointed.

The juxtaposition of a beggar, named Lazarus (and a named character in a parable was unusual, to say the least), and a nameless rich man, and how their lives were here on earth and what happens to them in the hereafter … it just makes for a disquieting story.

But then, that was the whole point, wasn’t it? To make the folks who heard it uneasy. To make them THINK about how they were living their lives.

Jesus has been talking to and about Pharisees in the passages that led up to this one, and his whole thrust has been to lay before them the fact that they do not practice what they preach. Hop back up to verse 13 in the same chapter:

13 No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth."
14The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all this, and they ridiculed him. 15 So he said to them, "You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of others; but God knows your hearts; for what is prized by human beings is an abomination in the sight of God.

Jesus was being his usual ‘in your face’ storyteller with these people. It doesn’t get any plainer than ‘YOU ARE THOSE’.

And yet, what happened in the end?

They crucified him.

What happened after he rose from the dead?

They denied that it happened. They completely and utterly turned their backs to it, and pretended it never happened.

It is not a new phenomenon. Modern day psychiatry has named it appropriately: Denial. It is a psychological response to an event or situation that is simply too much to accept. We know it happens on an emotional and psychological level. It happens on a physical level as well. Have you ever heard of ghost pains? It’s where amputees still feel sensation from a non-existent arm or leg, even years after it is gone.

On a spiritual level, it is no different. How often do we close ourselves off to the possibilities when we are confronted with a spiritual event that goes against what we are used to, what we are comfortable with, what we can understand and predict?

What does that say about our ability as humans to deny the truth? To reject a revelation so transformative, so radical, so completely opposite to what we perceive the world around us to be, that we would rather hide our hearts and close our minds, shut out the possibilities God has in store for us if we only give in, and give up this utterly senseless notion that we are in some way able to control how and when God is going to move in, through, and around us?

It is for us to be humble, willing and obedient, not self-important or boastful of having an inside track on God’s will.

So what does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

The obvious, of course: We care for those in our community who need caring for. We care for each other – within the congregation and without.

The trickier part is keeping our hearts and minds … moldable, impressionable, and teachable. We keep an eye and an ear out for the voice of God in a whisper, in a presence, in a passing comment. We check our vanity and our position at the door and enter into this journey as fellow pilgrims, helping each other along while all the time following Jesus.

Let’s pray.

Sheep, Coins, and the Kingdom

Sunday, September 12th, 2004
15th Sunday after Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
Luke 15:1-10

Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. 2And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, ‘This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.’ 3So he told them this parable: 4‘Which one of you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds it? 5When he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. 6And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them, “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.” 7Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. 8‘Or what woman having ten silver coins, if she loses one of them, does not light a lamp, sweep the house, and search carefully until she finds it? 9When she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, “Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.” 10Just so, I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.’

Let’s play a game.

Pretend that you are the lost sheep. You’re the one who wandered off, too busy with the grass in front of your face to realize where the rest of the herd was going – or where YOU were going, for that matter. You see, the grass just tasted sooo good, and you didn’t even lift your head once to take your bearings, to scout the territory, to take your position and check it against the rest of the flock. Now you’re who knows where, bleating, alone and afraid.

Have you ever felt like that? You going along, feeling pretty good about what you’re doing, and who you are, and you slip into automatic … and keep going and going … and suddenly you wake up one day and wonder how you got to the place where you find yourself? You look in the mirror and hardly recognize the face staring back at you.

We’ve heard the stories so many times, and they have always been ones that paint a vivid picture of what the love of Christ will do for us – we can expect him to leave the 99 and to come looking for us -- the one that was lost. He is the one who will turn a house upside down in order to find the one lost coin. We are SUPPOSED to identify with the lost item, aren’t we? It makes a statement about the experience of salvation.

It speaks to our nature before being found by Christ (meaning ‘lost’), and it also speaks to the esteem in which Christ holds each of us – how we are each worth his taking on the risk of going to find us where we are – individually, worth his life … as it were, in exchange for our own, and of his love for us.

But, what if you were the sheep and it wasn’t so much that you got lost as much as you CHOSE to NOT go looking for the herd?

In her book, stumbling toward faith, Renee Altson writes the following:

"i heard the shepherd coming a long way off. he was whistling."hey," he said to me. "i have missed you. i am so glad i found you.he extended a hand to wipe my tear-stained, dusty cheeks."come back with me," he said. "come back to the others.""no," i said.he looked surprised, but it did not change the immense compassion on his face."no," i said again. "i can't go back. i don't want to. i don't trust the other 99. i don't want to be hurt again. please don't make me be hurt again."the shepherd lay down on the ground next to me."okay," he said quietly. "i'll just stay here with you then . . . "

Renee’s experience was one that we wouldn’t like to discuss, or even sometimes acknowledge, but it is one that is a reality nonetheless.

Renee was raised in an abusive household. I won’t go into detail about how abusive, but if you can imagine the worst possible abuse, and layer on top of it a veneer of … church-talk, a home where lip service was paid to the Christian faith, but in which the practice was as far removed from true faith and providing a safe place for her as a young girl as heaven is from hell, then you’ve got something of the picture.

Let’s back up a little and go back to the text.

Jesus tells these parables when he overhears the grumbling of the Pharisees and scribes –

2… ‘This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.’

As we’ve seen, there was no shortage of reasons Jesus didn’t fit the bill … didn’t sit well with the religious leaders - the accepted religious establishment - of the day. He gave them plenty of reasons to complain about his methods, his practice, his purpose, because he put people before programs.

He turned the existing power structure on its head. He pointed out the glaring differences between what was being preached and what was being lived. He made it clear that it wasn’t what you said so much as how your life spoke about you.

To a crowd that was focused on the ‘how’, he was trying to point to the ‘why’. To people who were obsessed with propriety, he was introducing ‘spontaneity’. To an establishment that knew only the letter of the law, he was trying to show the spirit of the law, the Spirit of the one who called them into existence, into relationship, and into covenant with himself.

When you hear the parable of the lost sheep, who do you relate to? Do you identify more with the lost-ness of the one sheep? Do you sometimes wonder if you’re one of the 99, safe, in no need of being found?

Has your perspective on this parable shifted back and forth over the years, depending on how your pilgrimage is going? Do you identify in retrospect with the lost sheep? Do you hear the story and say to yourself “that USED to be me”?

Or can you take the story and do what Renee did, and stand up and say “yeah, I’m the sheep, but I’m there because I WANT to be there, not because I wandered away by mistake. The other 99 couldn’t or wouldn’t help me, but the shepherd came anyway. THAT’S why I’m not giving up on God; God never gave up on me.”

Renee’s Altson’s experience included a lifetime involvement in church, and not only church, but in a Christian school. Her story is one not only of abuse by a member of her immediate family, but of abuse in the form of negligence on the part of her community of faith. They would not listen to her pleas for help. They would not confront the possibility that what she was saying was happening was happening. In an interview, she says,

“when we are aware of our vulnerability and our weaknesses, we become aware of the undone-ness left in us. when i am vulnerable, i allow you to see the parts that jesus is still working on. you become a witness to the unfinished places inside; you see my imperfection. what we need to remember is that our weakness is our strength. our vulnerabilities are our gifts.”

So there were 99 sheep not in need of “finding”. Can we truthfully say that anyone among us is not in need of being found? Have we forgotten what it is like to be on the outside looking in? Have we ever truly experienced that? Have we ever found ourselves one of the 99 looking out at the 100th, the sole outsider, who doesn’t quite fit in, and leave them there, because they don’t fit our bill, they don’t look, sound, speak, or think like us?

Culturally, I think we as Americans are prone to want to fix things. We are a nation of people who measure success based on accomplishments. This is reflected in our level of activity, our degree of busy-ness. It’s not a bad thing, by any stretch of the imagination, but there are times when we lose something of what it means to just be … presence …

Renee speaks to that at the conclusion of the same interview:

"i think we like to fill in the spaces. we are uncomfortable with silence. we are disquieted by other's tears. we want to help but we don't know how. we would rather say something than nothing, we want to offer a tangible way of fixing things. sitting with another's pain or need causes us to become aware of our own pain and need. when we slow down enough, at any point in our lives, those things come ushing in. we hurry, we fix, we offer meals -- we do active things to keep our own minds busy, to not have to feel.

there is a holiness in simply being with someone in their pain."

So the question for us today becomes, are we so caught up in the ‘HOW’ that we forgot the ‘WHY’?

Are we ready to BE the people of God as well as DO the will of God?

Let’s pray.

How Much?

Sunday, September 5, 2004
14th after Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
Luke 14:25-33

25Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, 26‘whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. 27Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. 28For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? 29Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, 30saying, “This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.” 31Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. 33So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.

A youth group gathers for Bible Study in their church’s social hall. Shortly after they begin their study, it is suddenly interrupted by a masked group of gunmen, brandishing machine guns and pistols, slamming through the doors and screaming at everyone in the room to get on the floor. They continue to scream and terrorize the kids who minutes earlier were studying what it means to follow Christ. They then begin to question the faith of the kids: What do you believe? Who do you believe in? And then comes the question they were all dreading: “ARE YOU WILLING TO DIE FOR YOUR JESUS???!!!” They continue, screaming, “If you are, stand on that side of the room, UP against the wall!!!” Slowly at first, one and then another member of the group stands and, shaking, makes their way to the wall, some are in tears, some are praying, others are quietly making their way to the area. When all those who will have gathered against the far wall, the gunmen fall silent.

After a pause, they begin removing their masks, revealing themselves to be a group, not of terrorists, but of youth leaders. Their next question quietly reverberates across the room.

“Okay, you’ve shown you’re willing to die for Jesus, but are you willing to live for him?”

The first time I heard the illustration, it took my breath away. In youth, I think we tend to present faith in the starkest way possible: black and white, good and bad, life and death. Because that is, after all, what we are talking about: temporal choices with eternal consequences.

And here’s the hard part: that aspect of faith never changes. However much we moderate the presentation, the experience, the delivery, the CONTEXT in which we live out that faith, it is still, ultimately, an all or nothing proposition. I find myself uncomfortable with the thought. Not that I disagree with it, it’s not that at all. What makes me uncomfortable is the thought that I’m not being who I’m supposed to be. I’m not doing all that I’ve been called to do. That comes out in some aspects of the Pastoral ministry, but on a deeper, more universal level, it is a thought which I would hope all of us who call ourselves Christ-followers will at some point find ourselves wrestling with.

Wednesday night I shared the text reference with the group that was here, and read verses 25, 26 and 33 to them, and asked for prayer as I was preparing for today. The request was in all sincerity.

It is a passage that I think most of us who’ve either been raised in the church or have spent any time in regular Sunday School attendance or Bible study are at least vaguely familiar with.

The word that jumps out, of course, is ‘hate’. This is the prince of peace, the one who came to the world to save it, not to condemn it, speaking. What is Jesus telling us to do?? HATE our parents an brothers and sisters in order to follow him? What’s up with that?!? If we were to read with the understanding of the word in today’s modern English, there are very few subtleties, very few nuances to the word “hate”. We have a translation issue at work here. ouj misei ' – (not) hate - in this case, the term hate is used in a relative sense … interesting in light of the principal thrust of the passage as a whole - In first century Palestine, and probably as true today as it was then, to neglect social customs pertaining to family loyalties would probably have been interpreted as hate. Jesus was talking to his audience then and there. What he was saying has resonance throughout history, and speaks to us on as many levels today as it did to the people who heard the words coming directly from his lips.

The examples Christ gives are plain and simple. We still ask for a bid on a contract to build a building. That is part of what it means to be prepared, to set a budget, to plan for the cost. We hear of the casualty estimates that are worked up when Generals are facing the prospect of sending troops into harms way. That’s just the way things are done.

It is no different when we confront the prospect of following Jesus Christ. What Jesus tells us, though, is exactly what it will cost us to follow him. And the answer is: EVERYTHING.

We may not live in an area of the world where becoming a Christ-follower could cost us our family relationships, our jobs, or even our lives, but the specifics are not what Christ is so much concerned with. Whether we DO lose our possessions, our livelihood, our family, or our lives for the sake of Christ is not the point.

Jesus always went to the heart of the matter. And the heart of the matter in this case is not the possibility or even the probability of losing those things, though it became a VERY real and commonplace result for many Christian martyrs during the mid and late first century and into the second century.

The heart of the matter was that the listeners needed to realize up front that they would need to forego any claim those things had on their souls in order to turn it ALL over to Jesus as Lord of their lives.

What Jesus is asking us to do is to ask ourselves the question: who will you serve? How much does following Christ mean to you? No, that’s actually the wrong question. It’s not the following in itself that is at the heart of this debate. The right question is: How much does JESUS CHRIST himself mean to you, to us as a congregation? How much do we mean it when we sing “Wherever He Leads I’ll Go”, or “Have Thine Own Way, Lord”?

What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

In verse 33, we hear Jesus say,

‘None of you can become my disciple if you do not give up
all your possessions.’

While there are those among us who have done just that – given up everything in response to the call God placed on their lives, we need to understand that the call really doesn’t allow for any response OTHER than that from any of us.

What does ‘giving up all our possessions’ mean? My friend Jay Voorhees preached a sermon a couple of months ago on possessions – on being possessed as much as on possessing, and the point he made was this: what we consider ourselves to possess, to one degree or another possesses us.

Would you rather be possessed by the obsession with an object - a car, house, a career, a 40 inch plasma screen high definition television set, or by the Lord of life, the giver of all good gifts, the redeemer and savior of our souls?

In the words of Joshua,

“Choose this day whom you will serve … as for me and my house, we will serve the
LORD."

Let’s pray.