Dreams and Realities

Sunday, July 24th, 2005
Pentecost + 10
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
1 Kings 3:5-12

5 At Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God said, "Ask what I should give you." 6And Solomon said, "You have shown great and steadfast love to your servant my father David, because he walked before you in faithfulness, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart toward you; and you have kept for him this great and steadfast love, and have given him a son to sit on his throne today. 7And now, O LORD my God, you have made your servant king in place of my father David, although I am only a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in. 8And your servant is in the midst of the people whom you have chosen, a great people, so numerous they cannot be numbered or counted. 9Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?" 10It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this. 11God said to him, "Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches, or for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, 12I now do according to your word. Indeed I give you a wise and discerning mind; no one like you has been before you and no one like you shall arise after you.

We were walking down the middle of the street. We could, since it was late at night, and there were no cars coming or going. The weather was mild, considering that it was the fall of 1985 in Oviedo, Asturias, Spain.

The Cantabrian Mountains rise around the city, run along about 300 miles of the north coast of the country, an extension of the Pyrenees, the mountains that separate France and Spain, and block most of the moisture-laden weather systems coming off the North Atlantic from crossing down into the heart of the country, which made for a very DRY central plain (contrary to the song from My Fair Lady), and a very WET northern hill country. So a light drizzle was almost a permanent fixture over the course of the year that I lived there.

Within a couple of months of arriving in Oviedo, I had signed up for Guitar classes and photography classes. Neither took a great amount of coaxing to get me interested, since I had wanted to learn guitar for at least the last 3 years, watching two of my roommates in college play and sing, and my father had given me the present of a 35 mm camera just before I left for training.

I figured, what better place to learn to play guitar than Spain, the BIRTHPLACE of the guitar? As things turned out, the man who ended up being my teacher was an American jazz guitarist from Philadelphia, named Michael Weiss, who was living in Oviedo and teaching English in a local private institute.

The photography class I signed up for was taught by a man who’d been born in Cuba, but had moved to Spain as a young teenager in the mid-to-early seventies. The class was made up of a mix of folks, some college students, some young adults who were just interested in getting a little more out of their cameras, and Lisa Hale and me. Lisa was the middle daughter of the missionary family I was working alongside. She encouraged me to take the class because SHE wouldn’t be able to take it by herself, since it would be letting out late at night, and she would have had to walk home by herself. If I joined the class, I could walk her home afterwards and her parents would be assured that she would be safe.

The mission church we were trying to grow had been planning a fall evangelistic campaign, to be led by one of the most dynamic speakers I have ever heard, Roberto Velert, who was at the time Pastor one of the larger churches in Barcelona. The last Sunday night before the campaign was to begin, we had a prayer meeting, specifically to pray for the campaign. Later that night, at my apartment, I asked God to give me specific opportunities to invite people to the campaign in a natural, unforced way.

I may have mentioned this about Spain at some point in the past, but at the time, the atmosphere in Spain – the religious atmosphere, if you want to call it that, was still very much in reaction to having spent decades under the rule of the dictator Francisco Franco being forced to abide the combined rule of the Catholic Church and the VERY Catholic – some would say even MORE Catholic – Spanish Government. When Franco died in 1976, and King Phillip began to move the country towards a much more open and pluralistic society, one of the first things to go was the artificially imposed allegiance to the Catholic Church, and with it most if not all receptivity to organized religion. When we spoke of an evangelistic campaign, it could not be couched in very religious terms. We made no apologies for having a faith-oriented purpose, but we chose terminology that would still accurately describe the nature of the meetings while still explaining what we were doing in a way that might appeal to people who would shut out anything that smacked of religion. We were very much about introducing people to the person of Christ first and foremost.

The campaign was scheduled to begin midweek, and the photography class met on Monday nights, so we would still be able to attend that class. If I remember correctly, it met from 9 or 10 at night until almost midnight. At that hour, there is a kind of bond that forms among people who might be trying to keep each other awake as much as trying to learn something about photography. At the conclusion of the class several of us headed off together, either walking to the same general area to our apartments, or just to accompany the rest of the group.

As we were walking along, Daniel, one of the guys whom I’d met in the class, struck up a conversation with me. More often than not, conversations with new acquaintances turned fairly quickly to the question of what I, as a citizen of the United States, was doing in Spain. It gave me any number of opportunities to explain why I was there, as well as providing a natural lead-in to invite whomever I was speaking with to whatever meeting I thought would be appropriate for them to come to. As Daniel and I talked, we walked along for several blocks. I explained that I was there working as a teacher for Lisa and her sister, as well as working with the little Baptist Mission that met a few more blocks away. He shared that he came from a non-practicing Jewish family (which in itself was something a little rare to find in Spain), and that he’d had some interest in protestant churches, but had never had the opportunity to be in one. I quietly told him that he’d be more than welcome to join us at our church whenever he wanted, and one or two of the others in the group chimed into the conversation to ask other similar questions about what differences there were between Protestants and Catholics. In responding to those questions we finally got to where I had to turn down my street, and after wrapping up the conversation I wished everyone a good night – and completely blanked on the fact that just two days from then we’d be holding conferences in a downtown meeting hall to introduce folks to what Baptists believed and practiced.

It is an oversight which to this day still causes me no small degree of regret and sorrow. The opportunity never again presented itself. Daniel didn’t continue the class.

Today’s passage has Solomon as a young boy – scholars say between the ages of 12 and 14 – talking to God in a dream. As we read, in the dream God asks him what he would like – what he would have God give him – as he becomes the King of Israel. In response, Solomon asks for wisdom to govern the people. God’s response is positive, so much so that he grants Solomon the wishes he DIDN’T make – if we read on in verses 13 & 14, God grants him riches and honor all his life, and, conditionally, if he will walk in God’s ways, God would lengthen his life.

I need to say, the portrayal of God as a wish-grantor makes me REAL uneasy. In saying that, though, I realize that I am reacting to a surface reading of the text, and need to move past it to what the text is saying to us today. So here it is: a couple of questions:

What of significance have you asked God for lately? I remember several years ago watching the wife of a televangelist ask the audience to pray to God for her eyes, because the makeup she was caking on was irritating them. That’s NOT what I’m talking about. Yes, we read about God watching over the sparrow, and providing for it, and we also read that we should ask whatever we wish of the Lord and he will grant it … but let’s take a cue from what Solomon asked for. Listen to God’s response again:

"Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches, or for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, 12I now do according to your word. …”

He didn’t ask selfishly. He asked for the greater good in mind, not his own glorification or enrichment. In that prayer there are echoes of what we will later find coming from the mouth of Jesus, when he asks for God’s will, not his own, to be done.

I love to listen to my children pray at mealtimes. They always thank God for the beautiful day and then they usually go on to thank God for what they have enjoyed so far or are anticipating enjoying – ‘thank you that we are going to get to go see a movie, or go swimming, or that we get to play video games…’ you get the picture. It is when we move away from mealtime and ask them to pray for other things - situations where someone is ill, or afraid, or going THROUGH something – that that the jewels really come out. There is, of course, some mimicry of what they’ve heard us pray at one time or another, but apart from that, the heart and the purity with which they ask is a lesson in the making for me just about every time.

Most of us are familiar with the saying ‘Be careful what you ask for … you might get it!’ As a warning for those who ask without thinking of the ACTUAL consequences of receiving that for which they ask. As with most sayings, there’s a kernel of wisdom being conveyed in it: it’s an entreaty to be intentional about what our goals are, and what our motives might be.

So let’s go with a hypothetical situation: suppose you are dreaming, and in that dream, God is asking you to name something – anything – and God will give it to you. What is your first, your gut response? Think about it. I thought about running down a list of possibilities, but I think by now most of us have run through a list on our own. Take an honest look at what came to mind. How many of those things you found yourself listing are centered on the Kingdom of God, and how many are centered on the Kingdom of Man?

Hear me say this: there is no shame in responding from a human perspective. We ARE human, and that is probably going to be reflected in those items near or at the top of that list – however long or short it might be. So how far down the list is the kingdom? This is not an exercise in goading you into thinking the ‘right’ thing. It’s not intended to make you feel guilty if the first things that came to mind had more to do with you than they did with God.
What we need to understand and be reminded of is that God has already given us our heart’s deepest desire in the person of Jesus. Whether we realize it or not, whether we acknowledge it or not, the gnawing emptiness can only be filled by the presence of Christ in our lives.

God spoke to Solomon in a dream. We have many other instances throughout the scriptures of God speaking through dreams – Joseph, Peter, Paul – it’s not an unfamiliar story, but are we willing to apply that story – that dream – to our reality? Are we willing to let God speak to us and give us dreams in which He shows us … what we are capable of IF WE ARE WILLING to submit to HIS will?

Does that prospect frighten you? Are you deterred by the fact that you are advanced in years? Scripture is full of instances of new careers starting late in life. Read the story of Moses and find out how old HE was when God called him to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt. At the other extreme, are you dissuaded by the fact that you might be YOUNG in years? Look at the story of a young boy named David. And even the story we’re studying right here today. Are you challenged by some disability? Again, Moses was terrified of speaking … especially in public, and Paul prayed three times for that figurative thorn in his side to be removed from his side – and it wasn’t. The point is, God honors willing hearts.

Jerusalem church did something historic this past Wednesday. We voted to endorse a candidate for ordination to the Gospel Ministry. Over the years, Jerusalem has done that many times. The distinct aspect of this last action is that the candidate in question was a woman.

Jerusalem is taking hold of those dreams. We are not stepping out into this because it is more common today that it has perhaps been in years past, but because we bear witness to the Biblical story and to what we have experienced in our own lives of God blessing both men and women for ministry.

So we ask God to raise leaders out from among us, and God has done that. God has granted our wish. We have responded to God’s faithfulness to us.

What we do with this opportunity will speak through the years to come to OUR faithfulness to GOD, and our willingness to live out those dreams he gives us in the face of realities that are crying for a savior, to live out God’s own dreams for the world he loved so much that he sent his own son to die for it.

Let’s pray.

The Kingdom is Like …

Sunday, July 17th, 2005
Proper 11a, Pentecost +9
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Matthew 13:24-43

24 He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; 25but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. 26So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. 27And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?” 28He answered, “An enemy has done this.” The slaves said to him, “Then do you want us to go and gather them?” 29But he replied, “No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. 30Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.”’ 31He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; 32it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.’ 33He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.’34Jesus told the crowds all these things in parables; without a parable he told them nothing. 35This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet: ‘I will open my mouth to speak in parables; I will proclaim what has been hidden from the foundation of the world.’ 36Then he left the rowds and went into the house. And his disciples approached him, saying, ‘Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.’ 37He answered, ‘The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; 38the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, 39and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. 40Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. 41The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, 42and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Let anyone with ears listen!

I love to read the parables. I love to think about them and turn them around in my head and view them from different angles and try to get at the core of them … except when they don’t seem to have one … or when the explanation that Jesus gives the disciples afterwards is a little too … thorny for my taste.

Parables have a way of illuminating for us what the Kingdom might look like, but they have an equally persistent way of unsettling us. That was the whole point, as near as I can tell, of why Jesus USED parables to begin with; for BOTH purposes.

Illumination is generally considered a good thing. There are times, I suppose, when what we discover to be the truth is not what we expected, and it turns into an unpleasant experience for a time. Perhaps on occasion that is what results in our becoming unsettled.

Spending twelve days in Chimalhuacan, Mexico, gave me a glimpse of the kingdom that I was hoping for, but couldn’t have prepared myself for, if that makes any sense.

In some ways it snuck up on me. Yes, I was in on the seminal conversation – the conversation that started the ball rolling that ended up in the trip happening, and yes, I followed the progress of the preparations, but there were other things going on all along. There were messages to preach, people to visit, errands to run, appointments to keep, and before I knew it, I had to pack my suitcases to get ready to go to Mexico. And it really felt like I dropped everything and went. Operative word being: DROPPED.

The kids had just finished school, Leslie was going to be staying here, Homecoming was fast approaching, Vacation Bible School had to be planned, meetings needed to be attended, and calls and emails returned, reports had to be made … whatever … it was just a mountain of stuff that had either not get done, or be put on hold … or entrusted to the care of others.

So we flew out of Richmond an hour and a half late, but still caught our connecting flight from Atlanta, and arrived in Mexico a little tired, but on time.

We stepped out of the car in front of the Manzano family home and into an experience that, to be honest, I am still in the process of processing.

I knew that before anything else, even before unpacking and eating, I wanted to walk down to Romualda’s house to greet her and let her know we were there and that the work was scheduled to begin the next morning.

And it was in that first greeting that Romualda set the tone for the rest of the two weeks we were there: welcoming grace and abundant gratitude. She was happy, of course, to see us. She said she couldn’t really believe we were there and that what was happening was really happening.

We stayed just a few minutes, to be truthful, probably a rudely short visit, but a lot can be excused if you’re a giant gringo who’s just flown a couple of thousand miles to be there. That fact came in handy a lot while we were there.

That night, late, the rest of the crew arrived from Tlaxcala, two hours away. Everyone was exhausted, so most of us were sound asleep within minutes of having greeted each other. Seeing the guys’ smiling faces and hearing their hearty hellos was pure joy.

The next morning we started early …

And the kingdom of Heaven is like …

A group of friends who leave their homes and drive almost three hours away to gladly, willingly build a building for a woman they don’t know, and do it without pay.

And the kingdom of Heaven is like …

The host and hostess of the group welcoming them into their home and giving up their bedroom and their children’s bedrooms so that the men who are there to do the work have a place to sleep.

And the kingdom of Heaven is like …

A woman who has so little she can hardly take care of her family, and yet finds the wherewithal to at least prepare a pitcher of refreshing fruit juice at least twice a day for the men as they work in the heat and the dust.

And the kingdom of Heaven is like …

A woman who spends the days preparing meals for the men as they work, ensuring that there is enough for everyone, and fretting about having meals that are nutritious and hearty, tasty and … varied, to not say interesting.

And the Kingdom of Heaven is like …

Spending 12 hours a day lifting bricks and mixing concrete with a shovel and carting dirt and rocks and sand in a wheelbarrow and putting together all the reinforcing structure by hand, piece by piece, and the work is TIRING, to be sure, but it is not exhausting, it doesn’t drain you, because what is coming out of you is not from you … and you realize that the effort that is going into the work is motivated in one way or another out of love. Not just love through YOU, but love through all the people back home. And it IS a directed love – love with a purpose, but it is also a diffused love – love that doesn’t necessarily have anywhere to go – except OUT. It is love responding to the opportunity, and it is love pushing through, stretching the fabric of this world thin, and letting the light from the Kingdom shine through.

The Kingdom of Heaven is like …

The laughing and joking and ribbing and earnest conversations that surrounded the worksite. The way in which the team treated each other, with respect and a gentility that spoke of the esteem in which each other was held, as well as an awareness of the spiritual aspect of the work being done. What we were involved in could not have happened apart from the Holy Spirit – from the prompting of the initial conversation through the raising of the funds, through the combination of circumstances that resulted in the makeup of the team that went to do the work, the fact of the presence of the Spirit was inescapable. And it permeated every day of our stay.

And the Kingdom of Heaven is like … coming home, and hugging and kissing and greeting, and being WELCOMED.

And the Kingdom of Heaven is like … riding in your car and having the whole family begin to sing along with the music on the radio … and it’s a hymn.

And the Kingdom of Heaven is like … walking into a committee meeting and everyone is smiling and laughing and getting along …

And the Kingdom of Heaven is like a group of adults who get together in the name of their kids and make a meal and deliver it … to NINETY SIX people … just because.

Their investment, the preparing and packing and buying and making and serving and taking are all a reflection of the Kingdom, of the fountain of love that flows and flows … even though they might be tired, doing it is a reward in itself. The give and take, the joking, the bantering, the laughter, is all exactly the same thing I saw in Chimalhuacan.

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

It means that we can really, truly FIND the Kingdom of Heaven if we look for it … but also – and more importantly, if we live it. Jesus told us that the Kingdom was HERE (motion to self) WITHIN US.

Let’s stop thinking of the Kingdom as being PURELY something distant and unattainable, something reserved for the life hereafter, and start living in it, recognizing that yes, we live in a broken world, where children are given incorrect medications and it scars them for life, and yes, husbands die unexpectedly, and yes, people live and die in hunger, and disaffected, angry people blow themselves and others up on a daily basis, but the only way that is going to change is one person at a time.

That’s a nice thought, and true, but what does it LOOK like?

Well, that is actually where it stops being nice all the time, and begins to look like work. Did you know that the Gospel can be hard work? And it can get messy.

When we were in Chimalhuacan, I took a queue from the guys and set aside one set of clothes and designated them ‘work clothes’, and changed into them in the morning before heading out, and changed out of them each evening after getting cleaned up. The shirt and pants ended up with some pretty nasty stains – from used motor oil that I used to paint the forms with so the cement wouldn’t stick to them, and torn in a couple of places where there hadn’t been tears before, and basically have become work-ONLY clothes now. If you see me wearing them you’ll know I’m doing something that can be pretty grungy.

What are the clothes we put on to do the work of the Gospel? We’ve got a list of them in Galatians 5: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. The difference is these clothes aren’t something you take off. Well, to be honest, sometimes we find ourselves having forgotten to display them or exercise them, but the heart of the Gospel is the heart of God: God’s son, Jesus. When you accept Christ you accept the gospel, and you begin to learn how to wear these clothes. Just like any new item of clothing, there’s a period when you’re getting used to how that particular item of clothing feels. It’s the same with Christ. You get used to his presence, his prompting; you become familiar with his voice.

But the Gospel isn’t just a set of beliefs, a set of ideas. It’s the active part of our life. Hopefully, it’s the driving force in our lives.

So how does something that speaks to the life hereafter also speak to life here and now? Through embodiment: by making our lives a living example of the life of Christ. There’s a term you may have heard me use before: incarnational witness. It is that same incarnation we refer to when we speak of Jesus being God incarnate – literally: God in flesh. When we take on the life of Christ we become Jesus incarnate.

And what did Jesus do while he was on earth? Ate with sinners and tax collectors, spoke to Samaritans, healed lepers (and in the healing, touched them, a big no-no of the day), confronted power with truth, and faced down the forces that would impose the injustices of the world as it is with the justice of the world that is to come, and is in the process of becoming. It wasn’t a task for the weak at heart, but it took those who were weak at heart and transformed them into … the body of Christ: the Church. And as the Church it is for us to live in the present with the hope of the future.

God calls us individually, but doesn’t KEEP us as individuals. The Church (read: Jerusalem) is to be what living in the Kingdom is all about. We are called to live in that hope, and we continue the work of the Gospel when we dwell with him, and in him, and in community.

Let’s pray.

Listen!


Sunday, July 10th, 2005
Pentecost +8, (Ordinary 15)
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. 2Such great crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat there, while the whole crowd stood on the beach. 3And he told them many things in parables, saying: ‘Listen! A sower went out to sow. 4And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up. 5Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil. 6But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away. 7Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. 8Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. 9Let anyone with ears listen!’ … 18‘Hear then the parable of the sower. 19When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart; this is what was sown on the path. 20As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; 21yet such a person has no root, but endures only for a while, and when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, that person immediately falls away. 22As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the lure of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing. 23But as for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.’

“Here, kitty, kitty, kitty. Here, kitty, kitty, kitty!”

We were sitting at KT’s Restaurant in Louisville last Saturday evening, after the celebration of Momma and Daddy’s 50th anniversary, with my nieces and nephews, aunts and uncles, my sisters and brothers in law, and Claude, my former housemate.

Hannah was regaling us with several jokes she’s learned over the last few months, and the folks sitting at the table were just eating it up. But that punch line just didn’t make sense.

The celebration earlier that afternoon had gone splendidly. There were over 75 people who came to congratulate my parents on the occasion, and there were people there who covered the entire 50 year span of their marriage so far. My sister Lolly and Tomy Janes, another MK who is working with her part time, had put together a computer slide show with music to accompany it, and it had been a big hit. The food was delicious, the company was excellent, and the overall celebration had just infused us with a sense of how much we had to be grateful for, and how many blessings we had been the recipients of, to let anything sour the remainder of the day.

But Leslie and I looked at each other quizzically, trying to figure out what was funny about what a canary says as it walks down a dark alley “here, kitty, kitty, kitty”. We laughed, but mostly at the silliness of the punch line, not so much at what made it funny. We couldn’t figure that one out.

The disciples, it seems, were always having trouble figuring out what Jesus was trying to tell them. Time after time, we find that comforting word that translates perfectly from Aramaic to Greek or Latin, German, and English coming from their mouths: huh?

Jesus does them (and us) a favor by going on to explain this one. The breakdown is fairly straightforward, the hard soil of the path, rocky soil, soil chocked by thorns, and good soil. But it bears noting that he seemed to be hoping that his listeners would actually do what he asked them to at the very beginning of the parable: Listen! In longer form, we hear Jesus say: let anyone with ears listen!

Jesus calls us to not just listen to the words that we find in scripture, but more, to listen to the SPIRIT that inspired them. To listen to the whisper of God’s voice, that insistent, persistent, ever-patient voice that calls us by name and invites us to join the conversation, to join the chorus, to add the individual distinctiveness of each of our voices and to blend into the song – whether in harmony or in dissonance – the song is made all the richer by the adding of new and different voices.

Sometimes we miss the invitation in the hustle and bustle of our lives.

Last night we ran over to Wal-Mart to pick up a couple of things we’d forgotten earlier, and as is usually the case on Saturday nights, we ran into several people we knew, both Hispanic and Anglo.

Two families stand out. The first, a Hispanic family, we’d not seen in several weeks, so to see them to begin with was a joy, and we greeted each other with hugs, kisses, and handshakes. In the space of a few minutes of visiting, most of the pleasantries were done with, catching up with how everyone’s work was going, and how the children were enjoying being out of school. As the conversation turned and seemed to be wrapping up, we began to say goodbye, we mentioned that we’d already run into most of the children in a different part of the store. We asked after the oldest daughter. The wife then told us that she had moved out of their house and moved in with her boyfriend. The news was simply stated, with a smile that was a little disorienting to see. So we asked how they felt about that. It was then that they shared with us in short, poignant phrases, their anguish at the situation.

The other couple, an Anglo family whom I’d gotten to know in the last year, struck up a pleasant enough conversation, but within the first couple of minutes I learned of their having left the church they’d called home for several years and had moved to another. That’s not that unusual, I’ll grant you, but it was in the telling that I noticed that even though they were moving on from the event, there was a shrugging, a turn of the head, something to indicate that it wasn’t exactly an experience they’d want to live through again anytime soon.

So it is with God’s invitation to us. We might miss it for all the distractions, for all the rocks and thorns, for all our hardened attitudes. Just like the sower, God comes and sows seeds in the soil of our lives. Soil is receptive, it has all the necessary qualities for life to flourish, but cannot create the lush growth out of nothing. Soil cannot will a watermelon or a zucchini. It can only do its marvelous work when it receives the seed.

What is it that makes our lives rocky soil, hard soil or soil choked by thorns, or good soil? Are there rocks in our lives that stubbornly refuse to allow the spirit of God to take root in us? That keeps us from opening up and taking in and nurturing … and GROWING that spirit within? Are we too intractable in our ways, are we so set on THIS being the way church is done that we miss the opportunity to be church in a different way, in a way that might be uncomfortable for us? Are we so thorny in our thinking that ‘this HAS to be the way it is, or I’ll not have any part of it’ that we miss that first short word from the Lord: “Listen!”?

The work of the church is to nurture the seeds God plants within, to water them with compassion and encouragement, to teach them in the way that leads to life. Perhaps that is why the root word for human is "hummus." We come from soil, "from dust we have come and to dust we shall return." If we are willing to bear the seeds of God, we shall also bear the hundredfold harvest.

Part of that hundredfold harvest is found in sharing, in community, in rejoicing together and in weeping together. Just as those two families invited us into their lives in their sharing with us last night, so God invites us into God’s own life by inviting us to listen, and not only to listen, but to act.

It is after all, sometimes critically important to listen.

A few minutes after she first asked the riddle, Hannah came back to the table, and gave us the full version. For lack of 3 words, a joke was lost: what does a five hundred pound canary say as it walks down a dark alley?

“Here kitty, kitty, kitty.”

I am not, of course, a five hundred pound canary, but the invitation does come to each of us:

Invitation to the Table

Come to this table,
not because you must
but because you may;

come not to testify that you are righteous,

but that you sincerely love our Lord Jesus Christ,

and desire to be his true disciples;

come, not because you are strong,

but because you are weak;

not because you have any claim on heaven's rewards,

but because in your frailty and sinyou are in constant need of heaven's mercy and help.

Come not because you are fulfilled,

but because in your emptiness you stand in need of God’s grace and assurance.

Come not to express an opinion,

but to seek the presence of God.

Come, sisters and brothers, to this table to partake and share.

It is spread for you and me that we may again know that God has come to us,

shared our common lot,

and invited us to join the people of God’s reign.

(Communion)

Into The Midst of Wolves

Sunday, June 12th, 2005
Pentecost +4
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Matthew 9:35-10:23

35 Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and curing every disease and every sickness. 36When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. 37Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; 38therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.’ Then Jesus summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to cure every disease and every sickness. 2These are the names of the twelve apostles: first, Simon, also known as Peter, and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; 3Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; 4Simon the Cananaean, and Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed him. 5 These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: ‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, 6but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. 7As you go, proclaim the good news, “The kingdom of heaven has come near.” 8Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment. 9Take no gold, or silver, or copper in your belts, 10no bag for your journey, or two tunics, or sandals, or a staff; for laborers deserve their food. 11Whatever town or village you enter, find out who in it is worthy, and stay there until you leave. 12As you enter the house, greet it. 13If the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it; but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. 14If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet as you leave that house or town. 15Truly I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah on the Day of Judgment than for that town. 16 ‘See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves. 17Beware of them, for they will hand you over to councils and flog you in their synagogues; 18and you will be dragged before governors and kings because of me, as a testimony to them and the Gentiles. 19When they hand you over, do not worry about how you are to speak or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given to you at that time; 20for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you. 21Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death; 22and you will be hated by all because of my name. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. 23When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next; for truly I tell you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

It’s been an interesting week. In part really, events over the last 48 hours, but in many ways, it’s been a memorable week.

As I’m sure most of you know, I will be flying out of Richmond in the morning to spend most of the day tomorrow traveling, but the following 10 days working on the Mission for Romualda, in Chimalhuacan, outside Mexico City.

When I first turned to the passage for this morning, it triggered the thought that maybe, just maybe, this morning was to be about what it means for me to be stepping out of what has become my ‘comfort zone’ in terms of ministry experience, and step out into something new, something untested, something … that I can get my hands dirty with -- LITERALLY.

You need to know something about me – something ELSE about me. As the time for this flight approaches, I’ve been thinking a lot about … mortality. About how fragile life is and about how many things could go wrong.

Friday, Leslie and I had just finished lunch, and while she went to pick up the kids from school, I drove on home to work on preparations for the upcoming time away. As I came down route 3, just up here at the bottom of the dip, where Foley Neck Rd. comes out, I saw a white van stuck in the ditch between the Queen’s driveway and our cemetery road, nose down. A woman was pushing against the front, while the driver of the van was trying to gun it out of the ditch. I came on down to this closer entrance, and turned back down the road and pulled in behind the other woman’s car and began to help. To make a long story short, we didn’t get very far. Just a few minutes later, a couple (the Balls) in a pickup truck pulled in and got out. They pulled a big chain out of the bed of the pickup and within a few minutes had managed to pull the minivan out of the ditch.

Somewhere along in there I had called Soozin to ask her if she was in a place where she could bring their small pickup to do the same thing, and after we got it out, I got back on the phone standing on the side of the road to let her know that she didn’t need to come. As my call was connecting, I heard a fairly loud “whump”, and looked to my left, towards Foley Neck, and saw a full-size white ford pickup barreling down on me, having slammed across the ditch with one of it’s wheels, just in time to take two quick steps back and let it pass in front of me by what seemed like just a few inches.

The truck kept going and ran down into the ditch that runs along route 3 in front of the cemetery, and finally came to a stop about 30 or 40 feet up the rise towards the parsonage. I ran up to the driver’s side to see if HE was okay, and as I did, the man’s wife stepped out of the passenger side, while he squeezed out of the driver’s side door – it was hard to open, since there wasn’t much room for him to open it with the truck kind of settled down in the ditch as it was.

It turned out that they were just returning from a dialysis session, and the man had suffered some momentary spell that kept him from driving the truck as it came down the incline towards Foley Neck. The husband of the couple that stopped to help with the minivan got in the truck and drove them the rest of the way home. I followed and then brought him back to his wife and their truck. We said our goodbyes and thank you’s and went on about our respective ways, but it was probably a good half hour if not a little longer before my heart settled down to a normal rhythm.

Then yesterday afternoon, I got a call from the ER over at Riverside Tappahannock, asking that I come over to interpret for a man who was involved in a single car accident up in Westmoreland County. There were 4 men in the car, heading from Manassas to Westmoreland State Park for an afternoon of fishing and relaxing by the water, when the car drifted off the side of the road onto some gravel, the driver overcorrected, and spun the car around, and ended up slamming into a tree on the other side of the road. The man in the front passenger seat was thrown part of the way out of the car and was caught between the car and the tree and was pronounced dead at the scene.

It would have been a normal workday for him, but the bricklayers he assisted had gone on a drinking binge on Friday night, and didn’t report to work yesterday morning, so they decided to take advantage of the unexpected day off to come down to the water and do a little fishing.

The man I was called to interpret for was the dead man’s brother. Within a few minutes of arriving at the hospital, I had to tell him that his brother had not survived the accident.

In a split second, the day had gone from being a relaxed getaway to a family tragedy.

Some of you may know Teresa Williams, from Beale Memorial, Hutt Williams’ wife. She was third on the scene, and stopped to help and ended up spending the rest of the afternoon and evening with the two younger men – both at the scene of the accident and at the ER in Tappahannock.

*****

Jesus chose twelve apostles, and then he sent them out to do work. This work was not religious in the sense of leading people to prayer and good works, but it was very religious nonetheless. The apostles were charged with changing people’s lives, removing the obstacles that kept people from living full lives. They were told to cure the sick, raise the dead, heal the leprous, expel demons. Their task, in other words, was to make a difference in people’s lives.

*****
Teresa was on the scene within seconds of the accident. I was called at about 4:15, left the house about 10 minutes later, and arrived at the hospital a few minutes before 5. It was about 5:15 when I was telling Juan that Polo didn’t make it. We left the hospital with the three men about 9 O’clock and drove the Garner’s Produce stand to meet up with Juan’s son Juan, HIS wife, the driver’s wife and a couple of other family members and friends who’d come down.

As we stood there in the dark, going over what was going to happen over the next few hours, and recapping the care instructions for Juan’s broken wrist, there were tears of both relief and sorrow. The younger people were all friends of Polo, the man who’d died, leaving a wife and 2 children back in Mexico. There was a palpable sense of relief, of course, in that THEY had been able to basically walk away from the accident with hardly a scratch.

In the course of the afternoon I’d had a chance to answer the men’s questions about who I was and what I was doing there. At the end of the evening Jorge, the driver, came up to Teresa and me, away from the others, and tried to express his thanks to us for what we’d done.

*****

What difference does our practice of Christianity make in the lives of people? Are the suffering and dying better off because we follow Christ? Are the hungry and homeless finding their lives improved because we follow Christ? Do children have a brighter future because we follow Christ?

It’s still early, but in the lives of those three men, I would venture to guess that what they saw in Teresa’s presence and manner, her joking and loving, and caring and hugging and crying … is going to make a huge impact on them. It is not for me to say what impact I might have had on them.

As we began to say goodbye, I explained to the rest of the family that I was a Pastor, and I asked them if it would be okay if we prayed together before they got on the road. As we stood between the cars and prayed, and cried and hugged I realized that though we may live our lives as unto God in a daily routine, it is in the times of tragedy and despair that we can make that light shine oh so much more brightly.

Let’s pray.

Love and Sacrifice


Sunday, June 5th, 2005
Pentecost 3
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton
Hosea 5:15-6:6, Matthew 9:9-13

Hosea 5:15-6:6

15I will return again to my place until they acknowledge their guilt and seek my face. In their distress they will beg my favor: 1"Come, let us return to the LORD; for it is he who has torn, and he will heal us; he has struck down, and he will bind us up. 1After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. 3Let us know, let us press on to know the LORD; his appearing is as sure as the dawn; he will come to us like the showers, like the spring rains that water the earth." 4 What shall I do with you, O Ephraim? What shall I do with you, O Judah? Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes away early. 5Therefore I have hewn them by the prophets, I have killed them by the words of my mouth, and my judgment goes forth as the light. 6For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

Matthew 9:9-13

9 As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth; and he said to him, ‘Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him. 10And as he sat at dinner in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came and were sitting with him and his disciples. 11When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, ‘Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ 12But when he heard this, he said, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 13Go and learn what this means, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.” For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.’

Yesterday, while driving up to Fredericksburg, I was listening to a program on National Public Radio out of Washington, and the program was ‘This American Life.” The program has a format that is infinitely variable. The producers apparently ask for people to tape their stories – the stories of their American lives – and send them in.

Yesterday’s was by a woman who had been raised in the Christian faith, and was visited one day by a couple of Mormon missionaries. In the course of their visit, she began to realize that some of the things they believed seemed a little “different”. That prompted her to begin to dig a little deeper into her own faith, her own scriptures.

Over the course of several months of attending Bible Studies led by her parish priest, the woman became less and less impressed with the stories of the Bible. As they delved into the New Testament, she began to find things in the life and words of Jesus that didn’t match the Jesus she grew up loving.

By the end of the piece, she came to the point of discounting scripture altogether, as well as the notion of God.

It was a terribly sad thing to listen to.

The truth of the matter is that there are parts of scripture that are difficult, to put it mildly. I think that’s why there has been such a controversy between people who WILL NOT take those passages literally and people who WILL NOT take the Bible as ANYTHING BUT literally.

Both sides of the issue have extreme and not-so-extreme proponents. I don’t really want to get into a discussion about inerrancy – a word that is nowhere in scripture and a term that the writers of scripture made no claim to. So let’s just leave it at this: there are passages of scripture over which we will disagree. Any two people in this room this morning, however much alike they think they may be, will most likely be able to find something in here (hold up the Bible) over which they disagree.

So my question to us this morning is painted with a broad brush: what is the overall theme of what we call the Bible, our Holy Scriptures? If you were asked to name the recurring theme of the Bible, what would you say?

Is it judgment? Is it the wrath of God? Is it genocide? Is it justification for slavery, or fraud, or rape, or the killing of women, children and babies, much less men? I’m asking because we can find each of those in the Bible.

We can talk all around them, and we can interpret them in figurative ways, we can dig into them and find the kernel of truth that still applies today on some conceptual level, and set aside the actual facts involved, sometimes. We can talk about differing cultures and changes in the understanding of the way the world works, and all kinds of things, but after all that is said and done, we still have the text. We still have the words. We still have the context and the passage, and the language that spells out on the face of it what becomes for us such a difficult thing to deal with.

So I guess my first question leads to this question: what is our Christian faith about? Is it about knowing the Bible inside and out? Is it about understanding it all? About being able to interpret it all? Is it about having all the answers?

I think Jesus was saying no.

Human nature hasn’t changed much at all, if any, in the two thousand years since Jesus walked among us. As we’ve seen in other passages on other occasions, Jesus was constantly dealing with people wanting to attain … whatever you want to call it – salvation, righteousness, redemption, holiness, by DOING something. At the time, it was meeting the letter of the law – following every jot and tittle and meeting the requirements of righteousness by offering sacrifices – animals, birds, grain, whatever.

Paul Colbert, an Episcopal Priest who serves two Filipino congregations in Las Vegas, says it this way:

Sacrifice is linked to judgment and correcting wrongs. At root, our theology shows us that while we were created good, we have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Reconciliation with God is needed to restore our relationship. The ways and means of that reconciliation are what continue to trip us up and often lead us further astray.

Biblical sacrifice of animals or other offerings was intended to be atonement to restore broken relationships, restoring justice and righteousness. Those of us in a modern or post-modern mindset balk at this concept as outmoded and too bloody. We also use the word "sacrifice" in different ways in our language, ranging from the traditional sense, to a voluntary yielding of something we value, to forcing someone else to yield what they value. With disagreements rampant in the church, various factions appear ready to sacrifice the opposing point of view or party. Ignoring Paul's description of us all being part of the body, we would sacrifice a limb thinking it has caused us to sin.

For Christians, the death of Jesus on the cross is the sacrifice that restores our relationship with God. Too often we have a hard time accepting that gift to us and continue to try and make our own sacrifices to earn favor with God. By accepting that gift of love and mercy, we can continue to act with love and mercy in our own lives. We can accept the godly judgment that comes our way, knowing that the mercy of Christ has restored the relationship.

We as humans are fundamentally uncomfortable with not knowing. How many times have you heard, or even had the thought yourself – after having had some diagnostic testing done – the test was easy, it’s the not knowing – the waiting – that is hard.

We would much rather choose to DO something – occupy ourselves – fill our days with busyness – even business that is in an altogether Holy endeavor, than to sit down and heed the words of Jesus to “go and learn what this means, “I desire mercy (or steadfast love in Hosea), not sacrifice.” For I have come to call not the righteous, but sinners.”

Let’s break that down: when Jesus quotes the passage from Hosea, he is quoting God’s words – God is the one that is saying “I desire steadfast love, not sacrifice”. God didn’t say “I require that in order to commune with me you maintain yourselves pure by doing thus and such, that you not eat pork, that you not walk more than so many feet on a given Sabbath, that you cook your foods ‘this’ way, that you do not touch people who’ve done this and this and that … “ No. None of that. God uses a relational term. God wants our steadfast love. He just finished saying that the love he WAS getting from the people of Judah was “like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes away early.” God loves us, and wants us to love back just as strongly – just as steadfastly.

So where does that leave Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

When we give up the idea that we can somehow attain that communion by SHOWING God how righteous we’ve been, or we are … by SHOWING God all the good we’ve done … we’ve missed the point. God wants our hearts to be fired by God’s love for us – and our love for God. God wants us to BE children of his. That’s all. Not that God wants us to STOP doing stuff – things get DONE that way – but God wants us to understand that he wants our hearts more, he wants us to BE in relationship with him MORE.

Let’s pray.

Question: Authority?

Sunday, May 29th, 2005
Pentecost 2
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Matthew 7:21-29

21 ‘Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. 22On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many deeds of power in your name?” 23Then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.” 24 ‘Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. 25The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock. 26And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. 27The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell--and great was its fall!’ 28Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching, 29for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.

There’s a white strip of plasticized paper on the rear left bumper of the little black Mazda 323 that is parked here in the back parking lot. By the time we moved here, the words on it were already faded away to nothing. The bumper sticker, when I first bought it and put it on, was a SLIGHT reflection of what I was dealing with at the time I bought it.

I purchased it during my last semester on campus at Southern Seminary. Though I lived on campus, I was not attending classes. I spent my time working, for the most part, and contemplating whether or not to start back to classes, and the further into that spring I got, the more I realized I would NOT be going back to classes. So everything was up in the air. My 5 year-plan to be back on the foreign mission field after serving as a journeyman was not quite working out as I had … planned it. I was faced with the prospect of really not knowing WHAT was coming next, much less where I would end up being in the next two years.

The words that have faded out were just two: ‘Question Authority’.

I had been an observer, over the previous ten years, and especially over the most recent three years, of the fracturing of the Southern Baptist Convention. The leadership that had gained control of the convention in 1978 was much more focused, much more intent on the concept of Pastoral Authority than Baptists had historically been up until then, where the hallmark had been the priesthood of the believer, and I was, frankly, skeptical, to put it mildly. Southern was still a place that allowed and even encouraged the free expression of dissent back then, and my bumper sticker was hardly radical. There were others that were a lot more … explicit in their views expressed.

I remember expecting to be questioned, if not challenged, about having it on my car, and being prepared to tell whomever it was that “it was either that or the bumper sticker that said “‘Stuff’ Happens”, so I went with this”. The thought process behind the calm exterior was at times fairly contrary, though it never got to an ‘in your face’ level, except on rare occasion, and with just a few close friends.

It struck me as odd that it wasn’t until six or seven years later that I was finally asked about what was up with the bumper sticker by some friends at our church in Virginia Beach. By then, I suppose I’d mellowed somewhat, so that first answer didn’t pop out, but the kernel of truth that made me put the bumper sticker on to begin with was still there. I explained that it was a call to be wary of accepting unquestioned authority, of blindly following someone or something because of a few key words or phrases, or ‘hot button’ topics chosen for their emotional appeal. It wasn’t, in my case, a blanket call to anarchism – the LACK of ANY authoritative structure – but a call to REASONED acceptance of authority, with a clear understanding by both parties that the authority came … what’s the phrase, “by consent of the governed” – something very fundamental in both our nation’s history and our history as Baptists.

In our text this morning, we find Jesus teaching about what it means to be true followers of his – true lovers of God and it can be a scary scenario. Think of it. Prophesying, casting out demons, doing deeds of power – in the name of God – and having it all come down to this – hearing him say “I never knew you – go away from me you evildoers.” The question then becomes “if not that, then what DOES it mean to be your disciples?” in our study on Wednesday nights, we’ve read of how Peter and James and John performed miracles in Jesus’ name, and just this past week we read of how Stephen did the same thing. So what is the difference? How can we tell?

The fact of the matter is, we can’t. We can’t tell genuine Christ followers from fake ones. There may be hints, there may be clues, but in all honesty, aside from outright confessions, there’s no way we can know what ultimately motivates someone to either really become or pretend to become a follower of Christ. There’s no way to know what’s going on inside someone else’s skin, inside their head, inside their HEART.

Here’s the word of … grace, yes, but the word of CAUTION as well:

We are not called to do that.

We are ultimately responsible solely for our own response to God’s call on our life. Yes, we are called to bear witness, we are called to live out our lives as Christ lives and the Holy Spirit acts through us, but as far as motivation goes, we are only answerable to God for what moved US to follow HIM.

We read a couple of weeks ago at the end of the 4th chapter of Acts of how Barnabas, sold some property that he owned and gave the proceeds over to the disciples to be distributed as needed among the followers of Jesus. In the very next sentence, at the beginning of the 5th chapter of Acts, we read of a man named Ananias and his wife Sapphira, who decided to do something similar.

Similar yes, but not the same.

They DID sell their property. They DID bring the proceeds to the community. But they kept some of the money for themselves and presented the donation as being the full price paid for the property. They did something good; they did something noble, helpful, and even selfless. But in the process, they lost sight of where the act needed to come from. They were looking for more than the simple gratitude of a needy group of people. They were looking for the recognition, the applause, and the adulation that can come when people do big things for good causes. And that was their fatal mistake. That was their house on the sand. When confronted with what they’d done, each of them died where they stood. Whether out of guilt or shame or some other element is not detailed, but the fact that they performed the act of charity and twisted it into something blasphemous was enough to stop them in their tracks when faced with the truth – in front of the very people they were trying to impress. THAT is what Jesus was condemning in the passage.

Our nation will be observing Memorial Day tomorrow. By definition, we will be remembering and honoring – appropriately so – the men and women of our armed forces who, following their orders from the chain of command, from those authorities above them, ended up surrendering their lives in the process of bowing to that authority.

We are not honoring the orders, what we are honoring is that giving. The selflessness shown in stepping into harm’s way for the sake of others. Sometimes, those ‘others’ were right next to them. On our bulletin board right through this door to my left are pictures of the D-Day memorial in Bedford, Virginia. Bedford sent 35 men in that single battle, out of a total of 21 who died that day, 19 were killed in the first 15 minutes of action. Those men hardly had time to even get off the transports, maybe they didn’t even reach the beaches. and probably had even less of an opportunity to make any headway against the defending forces at Normandy. And yet, they are honored. Not for what they accomplished, but for what they gave.

So what does that mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton? It is like that for us as followers of Christ as well. I was looking through the Sunday school register from 1948 that is downstairs in the history section last night. I turned to the back of the book, where the totals were listed. The numbers were not that dramatically different from the numbers we see today; slightly higher, but not significantly so. Offerings were not that much different either. Some would see that as a bad thing. Especially those who would preach that bigger is better. There is, of course, truth in the fact that in order to survive, a church must grow. I am not saying that I want us to stay just as we are now. I don’t think any of us want that. I would HOPE not, anyway.

But what we DO want is growth in truth, growth in trust, growth in fellowship, and growth in LOVE.

We have before us a monumental task in the fullest sense of the word. To honor those who’ve given their lives so that we could be HERE. Those who have given of their time and energy, who’ve followed that prompting, that still small voice, that breath of fire of the Holy Spirit telling them to invest their lives in this community of faith – not for what THEY will get out of it, but for what we, and our children, and their children, will get from it – a chance, an opportunity, the possibility to somewhere, someday have an encounter with the living, loving God who has the authority to call them into being, but who calls them by name and waits for the answer.

Let’s pray.

… Therefore …

Sunday, May 22nd, 2005
Trinity Sunday
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Matthew 28:16-20

16 Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’

The choir had been working toward the competition for months.

The children – nearly a hundred of them – all elementary age – had been looking forward to the trip all year to the amusement park – the place where the competition was held.

The day finally arrived, a perfect spring day – sunny and relatively warm – and they set out. Arriving at the school early that Saturday morning, they piled into the school buses and accompanying vehicles, and set out for the park. They were as excited at the prospect of riding the rides and playing in the water park as they were about competing.

They arrived at the park and they began to prepare themselves for the competition. The kids had been singing the different pieces to themselves and their families more and more as the day approached. They’d done well – extremely well – in the past, and were ready this time as well. Their director was an amazing blend of musical talent, professional expertise, and childlike silliness – all rolled into one.

The moment finally arrived, and the hardest piece – one that began with four young soloists: three girls and a boy– was due to begin. The young boy who had the voice, and the ability, and who had practiced hard, opened his mouth to sing his part and …


***

Turning to our text this morning, we find the disciples on something of an anticipated trip themselves. They’ve been in Jerusalem, the site of Jesus’ arrest, trial, crucifixion, death, burial and resurrection, and the place in and around which he’s spent the last almost two months teaching and spending time with them – POST resurrection. He’s appeared to them as well as to others – later references mention that the number of people who saw the resurrected Jesus was somewhere north of 500.

Although there were a few instances during his earthly ministry of Jesus’ taking time to actually ‘train’ the disciples – the sending out of the 70 is a case in point – most of their time was spent observing, listening, and trying – unsuccessfully most of the time – to understand what Jesus was showing and teaching them.

Aside from a couple of appearances, the bulk of that time that Jesus spent with the disciples and the other followers is undocumented. The Biblical record carries precious few details of what was spoken or of what transpired in those 50 days.

Imagine if you will, it was a rehearsal. More than a normal ‘get it wrong now and we’ll work out the kinks as we go along’ rehearsal, it was … more like a dress rehearsal, everyone off book and in costume, lights and sound and everything. Except for the audience, this is what it’s going to be like.

***

It was nerves, everyone agreed. It HAD to be. When the boy began to sing, the note he started off on was not even CLOSE to where he needed to be. There was really no way to disguise it, diffuse it, cover it up OR ignore it. He was just OFF. WAY off.

It didn’t look like they were going to make the grade this year. The coveted
‘Superior’ rating was finally going to elude them.

Then the miracle happened.

***

The disciples had seen what happened to Judas, who, torn with guilt over what he’d done, tried to return the blood money he’d been paid to betray Jesus. He’d finally chosen to end his life rather than live with the knowledge of what he’d done.

The disciples had also seen what had happened to Peter, who on some level similar to Judas, denied Jesus not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES on the night he was arrested.

But Peter had found redemption. He’d faced his weakest self, and Jesus was right there beside him. Jesus asked him three times if he loved him, and each time, Peter had affirmed that he did. It might just be a literary device that represents the spiritual resurrection that Peter experienced after his spiritual death, the mirror image that negates the darkest hour and those three denials that threatened to weigh Peter down for eternity, but they are, nonetheless, redemption.

***

He stopped the performance.

The choir director stopped the performance.

He knew, first off, that the error was one from which they could not recover. He also knew that he loved those children. He loved hearing their voices and watching their faces when they got it ‘just right’, the utter joy that came through working with them, and getting their attention, their hard work, their following his lead, down to the last note.

And he also knew that for the boy to not be scarred for life by the experience, he had to stop the performance.

The boy was so nervous he didn’t even realize he’d sung the wrong note. He was at first confused by the director’s action. The director turned to the Judges of the competition and spoke to them directly. He said “I’m not going to let this happen. I’m not going to let his nerves do this to him. You can take points away if you want, but HE CAN DO THIS.” In making that declaration, the director was saying in essence, “It’s more important to me that THIS BOY realizes that HE matters more to me than receiving a superior grade in this competition. We’re going to do this for HIM.”

He walked up to the soloist, stood behind him leaned in, and sang in his ear the notes the boy would need to repeat in order to begin again. Then he walked back in front of the choir, drew their attention, and signaled the soloists to begin again.

***

That’s where we are in the story – here in Matthew. It’s commonly referred to as “THE GREAT COMMISSION”. Just like it sounds, all three words capitalized.

It is Jesus leaning over behind the disciples and singing in their ears, “You know that Messiah you’ve been hearing and reading about all these years, the one who will come to set you free? Well, I’m the guy!” The one who has come to set you free from your anxiety, your pettiness, your pride, I’m the one who has been pointing to the loving creator for the last three years and saying, ‘God wants your HEARTS, not your performance!’ In the text, Jesus says – “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me,” And here’s what you do with that: BECAUSE I am – that’s what the ‘therefore’ means – ‘go for that reason’ – and tell people I love them – THEY MATTER SO MUCH TO ME THAT I GAVE MY LIFE FOR THEM – and God loves them – and they are not alone – and they never WILL be alone. You need to tell them that the Holy Spirit will always be with them.

***

And the boy NAILED IT. He opened his mouth and he hit that first note flawlessly. He carried through to the end of the solo and the audience went wild. They gave him a spontaneous ovation so loud that the rest of the choir could not at first be heard when they started in on THEIR part.

Even after having received the applause, it was a tough pill to swallow for the boy. He’d been known for riding others unmercifully when they made mistakes – whether in singing or baseball or at school. He was overcome with shame – at getting it wrong to begin with, and at the embarrassment of being singled out by the director – and at first he was sullenly closed off from the other children after the performance. But one of the chaperones called him over afterwards to speak to him. She told him that he had a choice to make. Only he had the power to make it a negative experience or a positive experience. He could sit and sulk and dwell on the fact that he sang it wrong, or he could concentrate on the fact that the second time he not only sang it correctly, he NAILED IT! He had the choice to take the experience for what it was – an incredible opportunity to learn how precious second chances are.

So how are you with second chances? Have you gotten one recently? Have you looked back and realized “there’s no way I’m going to recover from that”, only to be confronted not with the expected consequences, but a moment of reprieve – a moment of grace so pure that you understand there is something more going on here. It’s not just a bunch of words. There really is a God who gives second chances! And God’s leaning over and singing in your ear the note you need to begin again.

Let’s pray.

By The Spirit of God

Sunday, May 15th, 2005
Pentecost
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
1 Corinthians 12:3-13, Romans 12:6b-8

3Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking by the Spirit of God ever says ‘Let Jesus be cursed!’ and no one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit. 4Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; 6and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. 7To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 8To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, 9to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, 10to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. 11All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses. 12 For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. 13For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.

What is your gift? What is your spiritual gift? Is it one of those that Paul listed in this letter to the church in Corinth, or perhaps in his letter to the church at Rome (Chapter 12), where we read:

6We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; 7 ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; 8 the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.

Does the question alone make you uncomfortable? Does the topic set you on edge, wondering if you actually HAVE a gift to share, wondering if there is anything of value you could bring to the table?

Or are you at the other extreme of that particular spectrum, sure of your gift, or perhaps talents … whether you believe it is on loan from God or not, you are aware of your worth, and confidently and proudly stand forth, chest out, head held high.

How many of us have seriously taken the time to do a Spiritual gift inventory? Though I’ve not asked outright, my suspicion is that, if you’ve been involved in church at all over the last, say twenty to twenty-five years, if you’ve lived through what some have called the Charismatic Renewal, the chances are pretty good that at some point you’ve gone through some study of some kind where you’ve answered a series of questions and worked out some sort of formula or diagram that gave you an indication of what your spiritual gift most likely is.

The questions in your mind today may be ones that fundamentally trump the whole issue: What’s the big deal? Why should I need to know? And what difference does it make?

So let’s go with the first question: What is the big deal with spiritual gifts? We need to step back and consider the basic assumption first: that of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

IF you agree with the assumption that the Holy Spirit comes to live in you when you become a follower of Christ, then you go to the next step. If you don’t, then there’s not a lot of ground we might be able to call ‘common’ between us on the issue. So let’s stipulate, let’s agree on that as a basic assumption, for the sake of argument … or for the sake of getting through the next few minutes. J

What’s the big deal with Spiritual Gifts? The big deal is this: it is by the gift that we identify the presence of the Holy Spirit. There are arguments on whether or not these lists are exhaustive. They do slightly overlap, with the gift of prophecy being mentioned in both passages, but besides that, they seem to list different gifts. To be completely honest with you, I don’t know if they are exhaustive. My inclination is to believe that they are not, simply because I don’t like to put limits on how, when or where God will manifest God’s self. I speak here simply as an individual, not as one who has studied the topic in depth to any degree but the slightest. In other words, I believe there are gifts of the Spirit that are not mentioned here that do exist. It may in fact be a question of semantics – it might be that the words that I would choose to describe a particular gift would fall under one of those terms listed here as a subheading, and I’m simply not in a frame of mind to think that way. That can sometimes happen with words.

What’s the big deal? The big deal is that these are gifts God wants us to have – to use, not for our personal benefit, not for our personal gain, but for the uplifting and the strengthening – the common good – of the body of Christ – that is, the church – THIS church, Jerusalem Baptist, and through it, the Church … universal … the Church around the world, in all it’s glorious diversity of languages, and cultures, and forms and methods and colors.

Pentecost is symbolized by the color red, and the yellow and gold of the flame of the Spirit, but it might just as well be symbolized by the rainbow – it is, after all, the day we remember that the Spirit of God descended on ALL those who were gathered, and they began to speak in the languages of ALL the people who were visiting Jerusalem at the time of the feast of Pentecost, and they came from ALL over the known world. And God sends us into ALL the world to bear witness to him.

So I guess it is a pretty big deal.

Second question: Why should I need to know? That’s actually kind of tough to answer. There’s a part of me that wants to say “who wouldn’t want to know?” Maybe it WOULD be better that you not know your gift, that you go on about your business, living your life for Christ, and letting your gift show itself … naturally … in the normal course of events. As the need arises, the Spirit prompts you to move forward, say, into a situation that you’re really not sure why you are there, but to which for some reason you’ve been drawn. And then something happens and you say or do something that triggers a cascade of events that results in … everyone involved catching a glimpse of the Kingdom, unexpectedly, serendipitously, and coming away all the richer for it. Why should we at least try to have an idea of what our spiritual gift might be? I think maybe because we are called to be intentional in our living. We are called to be prepared to testify, whether by word or in deed, in that, I think we’re called to reflect God’s intentional movement in humanity to draw us to God’s self.

Last question: what difference does it make?

This is the one that you get to answer. What difference has this church made in YOUR life? What difference has being a part of THE church, wherever you attend, or if you attend occasionally or regularly, made to YOU?

Understand that what I am asking goes deeper than simply what difference has it made to your schedule of activities in any given week to walk into a building, meet with a group of people, hear a few songs and read from a passage of scripture and listened to someone speak on it on any given Sunday or weeknight.

What I am asking is this: assuming that you believe that following Christ involves some openness to the presence of the Holy Spirit in your life, can you honestly say that you have spoken, thought, or acted differently than you might have had you NOT at some point chosen to allow Christ to be Lord of your life?

The second part of verse 3, chapter 12 of 1st Corinthians:

No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit.

So it seems that there is one gift before all the others: the gift of faith. Faith the make that statement: “Jesus is Lord.” There’s a reason we have the candidate for baptism give their confession of faith before being baptized. It is a proclamation of the Gospel in three words. No qualifiers. Simply the full story: Jesus is Lord. And according to Paul, that cannot be said – and believed – except by or through the presence of the Holy Spirit.

For Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton, that means this: We rely ONLY on the Holy Spirit, not only as a person of the trinity, but just as significantly, through the Spirit’s presence in each other to serve as the SOLE provider of our strength, to be the encourager of our OWN spirits, to affirm us when we are unsure of ourselves, to surround us when we feel overwhelmed, and to comfort us when we are heartbroken.

Let’s pray.

Motherly Father, Fatherly Mother

Sunday, May 8th, 2005
Easter 7
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
Proverbs 31:10-15a, 20, 25-28, 30

10 A capable wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels. 11 The heart of her husband trusts in her, and he will have no lack of gain. 12She does him good, and not harm, all the days of her life. 13She seeks wool and flax, and works with willing hands. 14She is like the ships of the merchant, she brings her food from far away. 15She rises while it is still night and provides food for her household 20She opens her hand to the poor, and reaches out her hands to the needy. 25Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come. 26She opens her mouth with wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. 27She looks well to the ways of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness. 28Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband too, and he praises her: 30Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

E Frank Tupper was one of my theology professors at Southern. He also happened to be a fellow member at Crescent Hill Baptist Church while I was there. His was the first class I took in “the big room” next to the student lounge and above the old post office. It was a huge auditorium, really, where the seats and desks were arranged in an ascending arch going all the way to the back, where the sound and tech support desk was.

I had Introduction to Theology there with Dr. Tupper. He is from Mississippi, and loves country music. He used to quote Willy Nelson freely, both in class and from the pulpit. And had a sense of humor that always drew a laugh from most of those seated before him.

One of the earlier sessions we had dealt with basic language about God. Specifically, the use of the male pronoun “he” when referring to God, and the inadequacy of human speech to portray or address a transcendent God. The discussion revolved around the fact that God is neither male nor female, but that over the course of history, that “he” has become the common method by which to refer to God in the pronoun form. Dr. Tupper was intentional in mixing pronouns, or in eliminating them altogether, by using the word “God” again and again instead of using the pronoun. To be honest, it was cumbersome to listen to, as well as to use. There are times when it is just easier to use the commonly accepted forms when referring to God.

But the point was driven home to me through friendships with women whose stories made it sometimes difficult if not impossible for them to think of God in male terms, because of terrible things that had happened in their lives, and it is one I hope I don’t neglect. The morning that Dr. Tupper referred to God as neither Male nor female, but one whom the Bible describes as a ‘Fatherly Mother, and a Motherly Father’, was one of those times that I realized that what I’d just heard would probably stick with me for the rest of my life.

There are, of course, plenty of examples in the scriptures of God displaying attributes we generally associate with masculinity, but there are, amidst the images of an avenging, wrathful, angry God, images of a God who gathers his children under his wings, like a mother hen protecting her chicks, images of a God who sets a table for us in the presence of our enemies, or grieves like a mother who has lost a child. And there are images, those that have become so familiar and even the favorite to some, of a God who will do whatever needs to be done to rescue a lost sheep, or a God who wipes every tear away.

So our images of God trigger in our minds not only pictures of the men in our lives, but of the women as well. Can any of us here today recall a special Sunday school teacher who expressed her concern to and for us in such a way that it has made an impact on our lives ever since then? Can we point to some event when an aunt, or a grandmother, or a mother, or even a sister made a statement, whether in word or deed, which fleshed out what living by faith the life of Christ meant to the point where we have carried that with us for the rest of our lives?

You’ve heard me share stories of my mother, my Sunday School teacher, my aunts over the last couple of years. I don’t especially want to repeat them. I want you to picture in your mind such an event, or such a person, whether she was related to you or not, and acknowledge her … to God.

How many women in your life can you think of right now that you can thank God for putting there? How many of those events can you think back on and say to yourself, ‘yeah, God really was present there.’

I had the profound privilege to be present early Friday morning at the birth of Cesar Cervantes, born to Elvira at 3 AM at Mary Washington Hospital in Fredericksburg, 15 or 20 minutes after we got into the Labor and Delivery room (but that’s a whole other story). Elvira has another son, who is two, whom she left back in Mexico with her parents while she came here to make some money to support her family. She’d been told after HE was born that she’d be unable to bear any more children. So Cesar was unexpected.

The situation he has been born into is not an easy one by any stretch of the imagination. His father vanished shortly after finding out that he was going to BE a father. Elvira was taken in by a couple of her uncles and a cousin, and they have become both father figures to her and her cousin has already dropped into the role of doting uncle to Cesar.

I can’t say from here what kind of a mother Elvira will turn out to be. That has yet to be seen. What I can say is that motherhood comes naturally to her. She has a huge dose of common sense, which goes a long way towards balancing out any lack of education in her background. She is courageous, insofar as she chose to travel to this place so far from her home in order to support her family and her son, and she is honestly straightforward in her dealings with me. She speaks simply, doesn’t try to couch things in nice words when she is trying to get her point across. I think Cesar has a good chance. Just as he will have a strong mother, he will also have plenty of men who will be father figures for him. My hope is that, in the absence of the real deal, they, the family, will draw a balance. He will be exposed to both a fatherly mother and motherly fathers. Men who care for and tend to him as much as women would, who will show him the value of being part of an extended family, and women who model for him as much as men would what it means to be strong and self-reliant.

Speaking of families, our family of faith here at Jerusalem was blessed this past week in a way that might have gone unnoticed. Some of you may have noticed the National Day of Prayer flyer and sign-up sheet on the bulletin board in the hallway. Some of you who were here Wednesday heard me say that you could sign up for half-hour slots during the twenty-four hour period the day of prayer lasted, from Wednesday evening through Thursday evening. You also heard me say that signing your name wasn’t necessary in order TO fill a particular slot with prayer. I didn’t get a chance to check the sign up sheet until late Thursday evening.

There’s another image of God that we find in scripture, of the one who waits for us, the one who stays up and watches for us to come home. In a similar fashion, those persons who committed themselves to a dedicated time of prayer – whether they put their names down or not, were fleshing out that image of God in my mind. There were about six or seven slots filled, spread throughout the twenty four hours.

I caught a glimpse of God when I looked over the names. I’m not going to name them to you. They know who they are. But YOU need to know, as a congregation, that if we ever lose sight of a God who loves us like a mother loves her children and gives herself to them, or spends her time praying for the family of faith that we call Jerusalem Baptist Church, we will have lost a part of our souls.

So be thankful to God for the way God shows God’s self to us – whether through men or women, God is God, and God uses us ALL to make God’s presence known. But especially today, be thankful for the women through whom God has shown God’s self to you.

Let’s pray.

IF You Love Me

Sunday, May 1, 2005
Easter 6
Jerusalem Baptist Church, Emmerton VA
John 14:15-21

15 ’If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. 17This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. 18 ’I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. 19In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. 20On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 21They who have my commandments and keep them are those who love me; and those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them.’

The setting is in the hospital room where Debra Winger’s character, Emma, will soon be dying. The father, Flap, played by Jeff Daniels, brings the three children in for one last goodbye time with their mommy. The daughter, Melanie, is barely a toddler, so there’s no real understanding of what is about to happen to her. The younger son, Teddy, is probably 6 or 7, maybe a little older, and all he can do is cry. The oldest son, Tommy, is supposed to be maybe 10 or 11 years old. He is old enough to understand, old enough to hurt, and old enough to be angry.

What makes movies so compelling, I’ve come to understand, is the luxury of time and thought. Events are scripted, scenes are thought out and measured, each word weighed and pondered. The result is a portrayal of a life we WISH we could live. I don’t mean that we wish we experienced or had everything we see on the big screen or watch when we pop in a video tape or a DVD, but it is in the fullness of the thoughts expressed in supposed times of tragedy, stress, or calamity that we wish we could live. It’s the sense of “I wish I had thought to say something like that in … such-and-such a situation” … or … “why didn’t THAT come out of my mouth instead of the blank stare they SAW?” Emma, after saying goodbye to Melanie and Teddy, asks Tommy to stay behind. The younger children have both had their cry, Melanie cried mainly because Teddy was crying, but Tommy stood back, sullen, silent and withdrawn. When they are alone Emma starts to talk to her son, and it is one of those speeches that you rarely get to hear in real life, unless you happen to be very lucky, or very blessed. She speaks to him in a straightforward, reasonable tone of voice, and quickly lets him know that she realizes exactly what he is feeling and why he is feeling like that, and tells him that it’s okay to feel that way, that even though he is probably going to hate her for dying for a long time, he needs to know that it doesn’t change the fact that, HOWEVER he feels toward her, she will always, always love him. To be honest, I don’t remember if he breaks down and cries and falls on her bed hugging her or if I just remember that in my head, and he actually just stands there and looks at her in that somewhat coolly dispassionate way young boys have sometimes.

What stands out in my memory is that Emma was making the most of the time she had left with her family.

Jesus seems to be doing something similar throughout the 14th chapter of John.

He’s trying to pry the disciples’ heads open and pour as much of himself into them as he can. Last week we heard his words of reassurance telling the disciples that, even though HE wouldn’t be staying with them, he was going to prepare a place for them, where they, and by grace we, will one day join him.

In this second group of verses, he continues in the same vein, telling them again of what – and more importantly who is to come: the Holy Spirit.

As you may note from the title of today’s message, what struck me was that first two letter word in verse fifteen: IF. The great conditional conjunction.

Did you know that “if” can also be written with two f’s? IFF. It’s an abbreviation used in mathematical language, including Logic. I took a class in logic in college the same semester I started working as a night clerk. It was an Eight O’clock class. It’s a wonder I remember ANYTHING from it.

But IFF (spell out IFF) is the abbreviation of the phrase “IF and ONLY IF”. It signals a biconditional statement. In other words, the ONLY WAY that either of the two statements can be true is if the other is true.

So here’s a question: was Jesus using “IF” in a biconditional way?

If you love me, (then) you will keep my commandments.

In reading it, how much weight do you give that little word? Does it stop you, or do you read on to the rest of the verses, dwelling on the coming of the ‘Advocate’, the ‘Spirit of Truth’, the one whom you know because he abides in you? Do you hear him saying “the ONLY way you’ll keep my commandments is if you love me?”

What kind of a burden does that place on us? As believers, as followers, as imitators of his, as disciples, as ‘little Christs’ … do we take on the weight of that expectation unthinkingly, haphazardly, with little thought to the consequences of dropping that ball, or do we take it on knowing ahead of time that we are bound to fail at one point or another? That we are, after all, human, frail creatures of dust?

I think Jesus was presenting us with the goal, and at the same time letting us know that HE knew we wouldn’t always be there for HIM. After all, as we read last week in the last verses of chapter 13, he’d just told Peter that he would betray him three times before the rooster crowed that very night.

This is in the same conversation.

And that conversation continues today. Every time we read scripture, and open ourselves to the Holy Spirit’s guidance in our reading, we pick up that thread. Every time we enter into prayer we pick up that thread. Every time we extend a helping hand, share a kind word, of hope, of encouragement, of love, we are weaving that thread into the tapestry that is the glory of God, the body of Christ, on earth.

Jesus tells us that he will reveal himself to us and that in that revealing we will know that God is in him, and that He, Jesus, is in us, through the Holy Spirit. In some sense, that means we are witness, we are participants, in the trinity, not as equals, but as servants and disciples. We have a high calling. To speak grace and live love to a world that in truth, knows neither.

When we join together in prayer, we are communing not only with each other, but with the Holy Lord God. There is nothing more important for us to do but to spend time with the one who made us and loves us.

This Thursday, we have an opportunity to join with other people of faith across the nation and lift up prayers for the people, for the world, and for our future. Though there will be a meeting at Beulah Baptist Church that evening, it is not necessary that you attend. I’d encourage you to list your name on the sign up sheet for a half-hour session of prayer. You can do that from wherever you happen to be at that hour of the day. You don’t have to be here to do it. As we know, prayer can happen in any context.

What does that mean for Jerusalem Baptist Church at Emmerton?

It means we get to consciously, intentionally, purposely connect with fellow Christians in a concentrated effort to make a difference … perhaps in our world at large, but on a local level, and more specifically, on a personal level. We’ve heard or read the saying “Prayer changes things”. I think prayer mostly changes the one praying.

Let’s pray.