Ought Not This Woman?

Sunday, August 26th, 2007
Thirteenth after Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Luke 13:10-17

10Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. 11And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” 13When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the Sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the Sabbath day.” 15But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the Sabbath day?” 17When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.

What does Sunday morning mean to you? When the sun comes up and you rise out of bed, get cleaned up, dressed, eat breakfast and go through all the usual morning routines … what does the prospect of the day hold for you? Specifically, what did you wake up this morning expecting to find here this morning?

In case there’s any question, I don’t mean “find” in physical terms. I mean in terms of … for lack of a better word, relationships. Did you look forward to coming through the front doors of the sanctuary, or whichever door you came through? Did you look forward to seeing and greeting and speaking to your family of faith here at Jerusalem? Was your mind alive with the possibility of what God may have for you here today?

Or were your thoughts elsewhere? Were they on other issues, other concerns, perhaps a family member who is ill, or on the approaching school year and what that means for YOUR family… maybe your morning was dominated by the need to prepare for what your work holds for you this week. Please understand, there’s no criticism implied in the questions, it is simply A QUESTION. And it is one that I need to raise if for no other reason than to get us thinking about what we are THINKING.

I have to be honest with you. As I wrote this, I know where I was HOPING my mind would be come Sunday morning, but I have no way of knowing beforehand what in fact will be the case. There are any number of factors that play into that. Some Sunday mornings I consider ‘pure’ days … those are mornings when I wake up and feel confident in what I think the Lord has led me to prepare for the day. Other Sundays that feeling is … less apparent. There can be an exchange with the kids or with Leslie, or with anyone, really, that may throw things out of whack … I’m still getting used to that, even after four years. It may be an unexpected visit from one of our Latino friends, as has happened on occasion, or it can be in a quiet conversation here in the sanctuary or in the foyer, people sharing their pain and their struggles with what life has thrown them in the previous week makes for holy moments where the Holy Spirit joins hearts and communicates through hugs and tears.

I CAN tell you this: though it is more unsettling to be thrown a curve ball before the worship service, it is not as important to me how I feel going INTO the morning, because it is what happens at the END of the morning that makes the difference to the rest of the day, sometimes the rest of the WEEK, and on rare occasion, the rest of MY LIFE.

I wonder what the woman in our text this morning walked into the synagogue expecting that Saturday morning. I wonder what was occupying the lion’s share of her mind. I imagine that after 18 years, she’d gotten used to being in the condition she was in, insofar as that is possible – for someone to come to terms with any sort of chronic condition, having first experienced good health. From the description of her, it could have been what we know today as osteoporosis, or it might have been that she had severe curvature of the spine that worsened with age, the text does not tell us how old she was, but by using the word “woman” rather than “girl”, the inference can be made that she was not young.

We can safely say that this was not the first time that she’d been to church. From the reaction of the leader of the synagogue, it is likely that Saturday morning was not the first day that week that she had BEEN to synagogue. If the place was open for healing and other regularly scheduled activities the other six days of the week, I suspect that she had been there each day for at LEAST some of the day. It makes you wonder what she’d do when she came. Pray, I’m sure, but what? “Dear God, is today the day, or will I bear this burden yet another day?” Or did she pray with more passion, “WHY GOD??!! WHY ME??!! WHAT DID I DO??!! WHAT DID THEY DO??!!” Remember, in the Hebrew tradition, being afflicted with a malady, either an illness, or a deformity, or some other form of limitation, was understood to be a judgment from God for some wrong committed --- either by you or by your parents, perhaps, if it was bad enough, by your GRANDPARENTS. And you were treated accordingly, meaning, you were generally shunned, cast out, ostracized.

Jesus speaks to that understanding, but first, he raises a ruckus.

You see, he heals her. She didn’t ask for it, at least it is not recorded if she did. He just seems to see her and calls her over, lays hands on her and tells her

“Woman, you are set free from your ailment.”

Hmmm … funny that he would use that terminology – ‘set free’… like from a prison.

One of the most sacred times I spend with people as they approach death is that time when they come to terms with the fact that they are passing from this world into the next. When it is looked forward to – when they start to let go of things here on earth – either through the physiological effects of the body shutting down – loss of appetite, long periods of sleep, things like that, there is truly a sense that their body is keeping them back, and they are ready to move on – to another realm, a more perfect existence, where the body is not a hindrance.

But Jesus doesn’t usher this woman into ANOTHER realm, he makes her whole in THIS realm, he makes her body well. He gives her and the rest of the people at the synagogue that day a chance to approach a thin place in the veil … to catch a glimpse of the Kingdom of God made earthly reality. And what is the reaction?

Well, we’re given two; one on the part of the leader of the synagogue, the other on the part of the crowd.

The leader of the synagogue, the rabbi, generally a respected and honored member of the community, a pillar of it, if you will, seems to be set on what is allowed and what is not on any given Sabbath. He’s big on the ‘Hows’ of worship. He understands the intricacies of how far you can go before you break the law. He knows the number of steps you can take, the amount of weight you can lift, the foods that are allowed, that are not, and the people with whom you can associate – and not – in order to remain within the good graces of Yahweh, and therefore, remain acceptable to the rest of the community.

Jesus, seems to be unable to care LESS for the “Hows”. His focus is on the WHOs. Who is coming through the synagogue door? Who is sincerely seeking the will of God for their life? Who is earnestly eager to hear the scripture read, and open to listen with a new and different ear the words that are coming forth? Who is here that God has been prepared ME to encounter?

Does the Rabbi’s reaction strike you as nonsensical, or can you understand where he’s coming from? I’m not looking for one or the other answer, but I DO want to take a few minutes and talk about both possibilities.

First, the latter:

*I* CAN understand where he’s coming from, sort of. It took some thinking, but it makes sense.

You see, it’s about control and it’s about understanding, and it’s about being in the loop. It’s about clarity, and boundaries, and expectations. The leader of the synagogue has a routine, has a tradition, has a certain way of doing, seeing, and understanding things. It has become second nature to him. He is totally at ease in that world. He knows what comes next, he knows what is expected of him and most of all, he knows he’s “IN”. He’s one of the chosen people, one of the twelve tribes of Israel, or rather at this point, one of the remaining two. He knows what he (and everyone else, by association) is allowed and not allowed to do on the Sabbath. He’s spent his life working on perfecting that knowledge. He is wholly invested in that understanding, and wholly GIVEN to it, by virtue of his position in the town and the synagogue.

Now for the nonsensical view of the response:

WHAT WAS HE THINKING???

Did healings like this happen every day in first century Palestine? Did little old women who were so bent over that they couldn’t even stand up straight ROUTINELY walk in through the doors of the synagogue and a few minutes later walk out with their head held high, their backs straight as a rod??

This is about the improbable, the unpredictable, the indescribable, the unexpected, the counterintuitive; breathtaking surprises, gasps of wonder, followed by joyous laughter, and the fact that God is bound and determined to spring one on us every chance God gets.

It is about losing sight of the forest for all the trees.

Our friend the Synagogue leader got so caught up in the “How” of DOING religion – the trees – that he completely forgot the “Why” of doing religion – the forest. In terminology that may be clearer: he got so into ‘practicing’ his faith that he forgot the reason he’d acquired it to begin with. He was going through the motions with little or no regard for the motivation BEHIND the motions.

Understand me: the “motions” in and of themselves were not bad, ARE not bad. There is a place for order, for predictability, for security and for comfort in the living out of our faith, but if we lose sight of the REASON we are going through those motions to BEGIN with, we will justifiably be called hypocrites right alongside this man.

What does this mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton on August 26th, 2007? Are we in danger of losing sight of the forest for all the trees? Are we becoming so caught up in dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s that we forget to take in what the words – ALL THE WORDS – are saying? Every week we have an opportunity to be amazed. Every week we experience struggles and hardships and get pounded by any number of things – from within as well as without – that bring us to the brink of collapse, that have us so bent out of shape that we can hardly stand up straight. And suddenly, out of the blue, Jesus touches us and says, “You are set free from your ailment.”

How are we going to react to that touch? Will we receive it in wonder, or will we be stuck on the fact that it didn’t happen sooner, or later, or … slower, or in the way we expected it to, with the WORDS we expected it to, to the PEOPLE we expected it to?

My prayer is that we will always be open to the newness of God in our lives.

Let’s pray.

The World Was Not Worthy

Sunday, August 19th, 2007
Twelfth after Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Hebrews 11:32- 40

32And what more should I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— 33who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, 34quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. 35Women received their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured, refusing to accept release, in order to obtain a better resurrection. 36Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37They were stoned to death, they were sawn in two, they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented— 38of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground. 39Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, 40since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.

Can we truly imagine being thrown to the lions? Or being drawn and quartered, or sawn in two by a wooden saw, as tradition holds Isaiah was? Can we imagine being put on trial for our beliefs and be in peril of our lives for them?

Can we really say how we would respond … how we would react, if we woke up one day and there were jackbooted paramilitary police knocking down our doors and hauling us over to the regional jail because of what we gather here to do, and go out from here to live?

There are multitudes of ways in which our faith can be undercut, co-opted, and watered down … some blatantly and others surreptitiously, without our being aware of it … something as simple as allowing a whim to give us a ready excuse to skip church, or as stealthy as avoiding studying those passages in the Bible that make us uncomfortable, uneasy, or which don’t fit into our neat little boxes we try to put God in. We try to explain away stuff that makes us struggle with what we try to understand about God.

It is, after all, a heavy undertaking. The time we spend here, or at home, studying and thinking about … PONDERING … what scripture says about God, is supposed to have some sort of effect on how we carry on with our lives.

Juan Carlos Ceballos, the speaker at the retreat we just came from, who pastors a church in El Paso, Texas, and works at the Spanish Baptist Publishing House there, and who served as the Director of the Seminary in Ecuador, his home country, before moving here, reiterated for those of us attending the retreat in one of our sessions, the fact that there is a cultural influence on the Christian faith that worked its way in when the Christian Church became … accepted, once it became officially sanctioned, and that is the division between the study, or the learning of the faith, and the DOING of the faith. It is an idea that comes from the Greek philosophers – the idea that there is a life of the mind and another, separate life of the body. There is an implicit assumption on the part of those who engage in the life of the mind that it is a ‘higher’ form of living, that those who engage in a living by the labor of their hands are somehow ‘lesser’.

Hmmm … can we think of any examples of that in our society?

That dualism has worked its way into the church. Who is held in higher esteem, the Pastor or the custodian? What does our worship focus on as ‘the main course’? (The preaching?) The description of the services in the early church that we find in the book of Acts sets no hierarchy of importance between the singing of hymns, the joining in prayer, and the word of exhortation or instruction. So how has that worked its way into our traditions, and why?

Are we on some level separating our beliefs from our practices? In isolating the WORD from the living out of our lives, are we allowing ourselves, giving ourselves permission to, in some subtle, unconscious way to say ‘this (hold up Bible) is for the mind, for the spirit, but doesn’t always apply where the rubber meets the road?’

The thing is, we do not find evidence in scripture for the pursuit of the knowledge of God and Christ as a goal IN AND OF ITSELF, it is rather understood and expected and even … DEMANDED that knowing God, knowing Jesus PRESUPPOSES that our lives will in some way SHOW that relationship, DISPLAY that relationship, if you will. It is not ONLY an expectation that the custodian take time to study scripture and spend time in prayer and devotion, but also that the preacher spend some time scrubbing floors or dishes or painting or … whatever … that it not be ONLY the pastor who engages in visiting the sick and homebound, or leading a Bible study, prayer time, or mission trip, but ANY church member may be so prepared. It is a VERY level playing field when it comes to putting our faith into action, folks. We are ALL expected to do it!

So how does all that connect with the passage we just read?

Here it is: I tend to become intimidated when I even HEAR the name ‘Paul the Apostle’, or SAINT Peter, or James, or any of the folks named – Moses, David, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Obadiah … Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David and Samuel, Hudson Taylor, Adoniram and Anne Judson, Lottie Moon, Annie Armstrong, Dietrich Bonhoeffer … or even Alma Hunt – and I’ve MET her!!! She’s tiny!!! Stands up to just about my waist!

Why do I become intimidated? Because they have, over the years, become the giants of the faith, the trailblazers, the models whereby we pattern and live our lives … we tend to put these people on pedestals, because they lived (for the most part) so long ago, but also because we have become familiar with their accomplishments, or their sacrifices – even to the point of death. I could never imagine myself … and very few people I know … maybe one or two … being named in the same sentence with any of them.

And yet, let’s take a look at the rest of the passage … the people the writer goes on to describe – those who …

suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. 37They were stoned to death, they were sawn in two, they were killed by the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, persecuted, tormented— 38of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground.

Who were they? Fox’s Book of Martyrs chronicles the stories of many of those who gave their lives for the faith, and we could sit and read them and begin to feel smaller and smaller and more and more inadequate … and wonder and ask ourselves if we would have the courage to do the same if we were to be placed in the same circumstance … and somewhere deep down inside us there’s a voice that is saying ‘no, of course not! We would be crumbling … and we fall into a trap.

It’s a simple trap, it is just a thought process, but it is a trap still and all. It’s a trap that convinces us to believe that how we die is more important than how we live.

And while how we die will make a statement, it is how we live that will have the more lasting impact, I would dare say, and I would venture to say it is the harder of the two.

The writer of Hebrews again brings out the fact that those named in THIS section of chapter 11 as well as those named earlier, namely Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,

… All these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, 40since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.

So we have more examples of people who lived a promise they never saw fully manifested in their lifetimes. And yet, they did it – they LIVED IT – anyway.

What are we called to do, as followers of Christ? What are we supposed to BE while we toil and labor here on earth together? What CAN we become if we overcome our jealousy and pettiness, our narrowness of understanding? We can become the body of Christ.

What does that mean, to be the body of Christ? We can think of it in theoretical terms, in the form of a concept, but I think it’s actually pretty simple. What does a BODY do? Seriously, PHYSICALLY, what does a body DO? If it is not otherwise incapacitated, a body moves, walks, sometimes runs, lifts, turns, bends over, reaches up, reaches out, reaches down, rests, and works … it’s not such a theoretical undertaking, it’s not pure concept that we are talking about. It is a reality to put into ACTION!

The last verse of today’s passage gives us a clue, I think, of what we are a part of in a larger sense than just here locally … and the writer goes on to describe that in chapter 12. You’ve heard me mention it before – that cloud of witnesses. But what I’d like to draw your attention to here is where WE get included …

40since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect.

So that they would not, APART FROM US, be made perfect.

There’s the promise we are ALL a part of … God has provided something better … and in that “something better” we will all be made perfect. He’s just gone through this list of Giants of the faith, of people who stood up to Lions, and Kings, who turned the world upside down. And he’s talking to people who are being beaten down – by life, by circumstances, sometimes by their own choices. And he’s saying ‘here’s the promise! We will, along WITH THEM everybody that we put on that pedestal – we will all be made PERFECT! How can we grab a hold of that promise? How can we live out what it means to be a part of the body of Christ? It means, to a degree, we live in the future. There is an unhealthy aspect to that, but that is a separate issue. There’s a part of not living in the present … it is an invitation to live in the present as if it were the future. We are part of the Kingdom. We are part of bringing that kingdom of God into the world that we live in now, here, today. And in living out that Kingdom here today, we are walking into a future where the kingdom will be fully manifested. That takes faith, perseverance, that takes endurance, that takes constant encouragement, and encouraging – whether we give it or receive it. And that is why we are not alone in this – that is why God has called us to family, to community, to be one body with many parts.

Let’s pray.

Loving God, sometimes we struggle with the simplest things.
And then comes along this incredible thought: that you are one day going to make us perfect. And it is your promise and you have asked us to live in that promise. So while we struggle and strive FOR perfection, help us together be your functioning body, here in Emmerton, in Warsaw, in Richmond County, on the Northern Neck, in Virginia, the United States, and the rest of the world. Through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Our hymn of decision is number 287, ‘Take My Life, Lead me Lord’.
If you’d like to go ahead and open your hymnbooks to that
The invitation is to reflect, to decide, to choose.
To make yourself lead-able, to make yourself guide-able, to make yourself … what? To make yourself available to God.

Let’s stand and sing.

By Faith

Sunday, August 12th, 2007
Eleventh after Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

1Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2Indeed, by faith our ancestors received approval. 3By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible. …8By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. 9By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11By faith he received power of procreation, even though he was too old—and Sarah herself was barren—because he considered him faithful who had promised. 12Therefore from one person, and this one as good as dead, descendants were born, “as many as the stars of heaven and as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.” 13All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, 14for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. 16But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them.

“Truth or Dare?”

Even today, probably 30 years since I played that game the last time, hearing those words echoes with the weight of the near-absolute power that peer pressure carried with it in my adolescence. If you are familiar with the game, no explanation is necessary. If you are not, it involved making one of two choices, and following through on that decision no matter what the requirement.

The challenge question, “Truth or Dare?” was presented, and you had to choose one or the other. To choose the first, Truth, meant that you had to answer truthfully any question put to you by the challenger. To choose the second, the dare, meant that whatever you were challenged to do, you had to do … usually it involved kissing one of the girls. Oddly enough, it never seemed to be brought to anyone’s attention that that might be more of a challenge for the person RECEIVING the kiss than the person GIVING it.

We were bored preteens and teenagers, and when we got together, if the weather was such that we couldn’t be outside, there were only so many rounds of Spades, or Rook you could play.

In retrospect, the thing about the game was that you played with people you trusted, people you knew. When it came to be your turn, you had to know the person challenging you enough to know what they might ask of you – whether a truth question or a dare to do something. It’s funny, but even that game worked its way into the foundation of those relationships that are still there today. Although we may communicate only once or twice a year, in some cases even less frequently, my fellow MK’s and I formed a bond that allows us to pick right up from the last time we spoke and carry on as if no time has passed. It’s hard to describe, but it speaks to a sense of family that transcends the facts of time and distance.

I believe that was what the writer of Hebrews was pointing to in this recounting of the history of points of faith of Abraham that we find in the text today for the folks who were going to read this letter – both the direct recipients as well as those who’ve become the subsequent recipients over the ensuing centuries.

There is a commonality that we share with Abraham that transcends time and distance; that resonates with where we come from and where we are headed, and it comes directly from how much we act on – and in – faith.

We could ask ourselves, for example, what kind of faith it took for those one hundred and forty-four people to step away from the congregation at Farnham church and establish themselves as a separate congregation here?
In the act of separating, the reason being lost to history, even though it was probably painful in many ways, there was also a sense of hope in the future of that group, a willingness to take a risk and move forward, into uncharted waters, to see what God had waiting for them there.

What kind of faith did it take for those same folks to decide to build a new, larger sanctuary when the log building they were meeting in grew small? The log building was probably small to begin with, so it may well have been as much out of necessity as vision, but even in that necessity, there was, I imagine, a sense that God would continue to bless the faithfulness of God’s people.

We sometimes forget that Sunday School has not always been a part of our weekly tradition as Baptists. It is a relatively recent addition to the Sunday morning routine, having only come into common practice around the same time the Royal Oaks congregation constituted itself into a church, and the concept as a whole is only a few years older than the church itself, having been ‘invented’, if the word applies, by a man by the name of Robert Raikes in England, in 1780.

Who knows, the issue of a Sunday School may have even had a part in the formation of the church itself, and the subsequent decision to build the larger building.

What kind of faith was it that compelled the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the original members to decide to expand that original building, add classroom space to the front and back of the white frame structure?

There’s a wonderful passage in verse 13:

“All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them.”

Can you hear the faith in those words? (Read again) – but from a distance they saw and greeted them. To greet something or someone usually implies an act of welcome, an acceptance of that person for who he or she is, or that THING for what IT is. Here we are seeing a promise made by God to God’s people, and it was one that at the time was as yet unfulfilled. But the fact that it was unfulfilled did not stop Abraham and Isaac and Jacob from still living in the reality of the promise, living in the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen …

There’s a beauty in those last few verses of the passage that speak of what MIGHT have been the case, what COULD have happened, if Abraham and his descendants had chosen to look back on what they could be thankful for and chosen rather to focus on THAT rather than FORWARD, on what was to come – reading on:

“They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, 14for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. 16But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one."

We’ve talked of this before. How often do we remind ourselves in our youth that this earth is not, in truth, our home? It becomes easier to think of the earth in that sense as one grows older, and is facing one’s own mortality, but it is almost absent from our thinking when we are young and supposedly have our whole life ahead of us.

We DO have to suppose that we have most of our lives ahead of us, don’t we, in order to function in the life we have? But as Christians we need to always keep in the back of our minds the fact that our home is indeed away from here, with God.

Verse 15 caught me by surprise. As often as I’ve read this passage, it had not until now jumped out at me like it did this time: (read)

What do you suppose the writer meant in saying ‘They would have had the opportunity to return’? I think the writer is saying the story would have ended there.

We are creatures of habit, and we would much rather hang onto what we know than take on something new, something unknown. But what if that something is something that God can’t wait to show us? What if it is the next step in our walk of faith, in our “long obedience in the same direction”, as Eugene Petersen said?
Is our faith the same forward-looking faith as that of our forbearers? Is ours a faith that will accept the reality of the promise of blessing and presence and perseverance even if we can’t, from this vantage point, see it clearly?

Is that a TRUTH we DARE to embrace? Do we KNOW God enough, do we TRUST God enough, is our relationship TO God such that we won’t hesitate to open up to what it is God has planned for us, even if it makes us, in the short term, uncomfortable – because all new things do, after all?

The last phrase from verse 16 is both a promise and a warning.

"Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them."

Let it be so with us, to not be ashamed to follow God into this new and different land, into what we have not done before, or known before, because what is before us bears little resemblance to what has BEEN before.

We know human nature has remained unchanged, and we know also that the only true change in a person’s life comes through following Christ as Lord, and that MESSAGE will not change, but our method, our presentation of that message HAS to change if it is to be heard, if it is to be given an audience in the world that is changing around us every day.

Let’s pray.