1 Kings 19:1-19; Psalm 42; Galatians 3:23-29; Luke 8:26-39
Last weekend, as we all know, a young man in Orlando, FL chose to end the lives of almost 50 other people in Orlando. As our society does today, we quickly discovered that the victims were all of a particular group of people. At first, it appears to be a simple story – the young man was of a different group of people and so he slaughtered the men and women at the night club because they were of a different group. But as the week continued and we found out more information, we discovered that the young man may also have been of that same particular group of people. And so the story grew more complex. Now, we are confused. Why would a young, possibly gay Moslem man kill so many gay people in a bar?
Some would have us believe it was the easy access to a semi-automatic rifle. But that explains the “how” without explaining the “why”. Millions of people own semi-automatic weapons and do not kill dozens of people in a bar. Some would have us believe it was because the young man was following the call of ISIS to kill people in America. Perhaps it was – but this also seems too simple, especially because the young man had also expressed support for other Islamic groups which are at odds with ISIS. Some would blame the FBI for investigating him and deciding he was safe. Some would blame our immigration policies, except for the fact that he was born here, and his parents immigrated over 20 years ago. Perhaps he was just “unstable”, which I believe is the word that is being used today, where in an earlier time we would have called him “crazy”.
I have another explanation – evil exists in this world and has existed since the beginning of the human race. Damaged people have damaged other people throughout the centuries and passed on the rot of the soul that is sin and evil like rot moves through a container of strawberries, moving from one soul to another, rotting, rotting, rotting the goodness away. And the only cure for that rot is the close, personal attention of Jesus Christ applied to the rotting soul – and Jesus Christ, being Oh so very polite, will not work on your soul unless you give your permission. That is why so many souls are rotting today – and why, even here, we sit here in this building with rot eating away at our own souls – we are afraid to give Christ permission to cut out the rotten parts of our souls, to destroy forever the blight that entered the human race in the beginning with our choice of death over life, we are afraid to turn over our bodies and minds and souls completely to the surgeon who has the skill and wisdom and power to restore us to total health.
It is a fine line between the path we walk and the path the young man in Orlando chose. Only the unmerited graceful love of Jesus Christ has made the difference in our lives, that and our choice to listen, if only a little bit, to the Word of God and the voice of the Holy Spirit. It is only because our Father has shown us a better way that has kept us from walking that same path of darkness that leads into death and destruction. May our Father continue to guide us on a different path, keeping us walking in the light, leading us to joy and hope.
Today is Father’s Day. You know, the first Father’s Day was held on July 5, 1908 in Fairmont WV at the Methodist church now known as Central United Methodist. It was held as a memorial to the 361 men, 250 of them fathers, who died during the Monongah Mine disaster the previous December. Today, Father’s Day is celebrated throughout most of the world.
Being a father is both a simple thing and a difficult thing. The simple thing requires you to gain the cooperation of a woman, which can be a difficult thing, as most men will testify to. But to become more than a “baby daddy”, to become a good father, requires hard work. It requires stamina, endurance, courage, strength, and wisdom. Being a good father requires God’s help and it requires a spine that is strong enough to hold up the world – and flexible enough to bend down in humbleness and prayer.
Being a good father means you enjoy very short people who talk a lot and make a lot of noise – and it means that you are often alone, standing by yourself for what is right, standing against the winds and fires and earthquakes that would destroy your family, and it means lying still in the dead of night listening for the still, small voice of the Holy Spirit to guide you in answer to your prayers begging God for help. In short, being a father is not a job for the cowardly – but the job can turn the coward into a Congressional Medal of Honor winner.
In our readings today, we see men who act as super-fathers – they act in ways that all fathers have to act in lesser ways as life happens and their families grow. Let’s see what we can learn from Elijah the prophet and from Jesus today.
In the first reading, we see Elijah. The name Elijah means “My God is Yah!” or “My God is Yahweh”. Elijah has just stood up against King Ahab, Queen Jezebel, and the 400 prophets of Baal in the “Battle of the Gods” on top of Mt Carmel. After the prophets of Baal danced around their altar for hours with no effect, Elijah doused his sacrifice with water three times and then prayed to God to light the fire. Boom! Fire came down from heaven, the sacrifice, the wood, and even the water that had accumulated in a trench around the altar were burnt up. In the commotion that followed, Elijah had the people execute the 400 prophets of Baal. And then, the great drought that had enveloped Israel for three years was broken as a tremendous rainstorm drenched the countryside.
When word reached Jezebel, she sent word to Elijah that she would have him killed that night, so Elijah ran for the southern desert, the desert that covers the lower third of the modern state of Israel. Elijah ran for his life.
Exhausted, Elijah traveled a day out into the desert and fell asleep under a broom tree. An angel woke him and gave him a cake or loaf of bread and water. Elijah slept some more. Again the angel woke him and gave him bread and water, and in one of the great miracles, Elijah traveled on the strength of that cake and that water for 40 days and 40 nights until he reached Mr Horeb, the mountain where Moses brought down the tablets of the Law to the people of Israel. It was God’s mountain – as if any mountain is NOT God’s mountain!
(By the way, do you know what type of cake that was that allowed Elijah to travel 40 days and 40 nights? Angel-food cake!)
So Elijah reaches God’s mountain. He’s carried this tremendous burden of believing that he is the only righteous man left in Israel, and this equally tremendous burden of being a coward by running from Jezebel. And he is exhausted and reaches God’s mountain, Mt Horeb, the place where God the Father showed Himself to the people of God, and Elijah falls asleep in a cave.
When he awoke in the cave, the word of God came to Elijah. “Elijah, what are you doing here?” Indeed, throughout our lives, God asks us time and again, “What are you doing here?” at different points in our lives. Think about your life. “What are you doing here?”
Elijah said, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. I alone am left; and they seek to take my life.”
God’s answer was “Go out on the mountain and stand before Yahweh.”
And the next few minutes were perhaps the most terrifying of Elijah’s life.
It is a terrifying thing to stand in front of God, open and exposed on the mountainside. It is frightening to realize that God has the ability to literally blow you away with His breath, to break you into pieces with rocks thrown through the air, to crush you in an earthquake, to burn you to a crisp with fire. It is more frightening when you realize that because of your actions, your words, your betrayals of Him over the years, God has every reason to destroy you to keep you from further harming God’s Creation, from a further spreading of your soul rot to His creatures, His people, your own family. It is frightening and humbling when you realize that God is God and you are not. And this is something that all good fathers eventually realize, and that understanding is what makes them great fathers.
Elijah stood on the mountainside. A great wind came, an earthquake hit, fire flew all around, boulders bounced down the side of the mountain, but God was not in any of these. Only afterwards, in a great silence, Elijah heard a still, small voice saying, “Elijah, what are you doing here?” Elijah listened to that still, small voice and he answered the voice, saying once again, “I have been very zealous for the Lord God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant, torn down Your altars, and killed Your prophets with the sword. I alone am left; and they seek to take my life.”
Sometimes, as a father or a mother, we stand before God feeling alone. As the head of a household, biblically speaking, we are responsible not only for our own relationship with God, but also for the relationships of our other family members. It is a tremendous responsibility – and standing before God, answering the question – “What are you doing here?” can be very difficult. When you are awake in the middle of the night, praying to God, consider that question – “What are you doing here?” Will you be able to answer – “I have been very zealous for the LORD God of hosts?”
That night, alone on the mountain, Elijah faced God’s question without quaking. Elijah knew that despite his cowardice, running from Jezebel, despite his fear of being captured, tortured and killed by Jezebel’s soldiers, despite the hardships Elijah had to endure – the lack of water, the lack of food, the pain in his feet and legs – Elijah knew that here, standing before God, he had been very zealous for the LORD God of hosts and God would love Elijah for that. Elijah knew that God loved him.
Then the Lord said to Elijah: “Go, return on your way to the Wilderness of Damascus; and when you arrive, anoint Hazael as king over Syria.”
So Elijah began to walk toward Damascus, for he had faced his terror and stood on the mountainside, he had faced his fears and remained on the mountain, he had remained true in his faith and trusted in God. God had spoken to Elijah and Elijah had listened to that still, small voice, and talked with God. And God gave Elijah instructions, a new mission, a new purpose, a new life. Elijah, who had led the nation of Israel as a father through a dark time, was still on God’s good side and had a new mission – he only had to walk about 500 miles on foot to Damascus, but that was just a detail.
Will you face your fears, trusting in God? Will you listen to that still, small voice and speak with God? Will you follow the instructions that the voice of the Holy Spirit gives you?
Many years later, Jesus was leading his disciples around the lake, the Sea of Galilee. They landed on the southeast side of the lake, in an area which was inhabited by people who were not Jewish. We know this because they raised pigs, creatures which the Law of Moses forbade to all good Jewish people. Even today, Orthodox Jews will not eat pork.
When Jesus and the disciples arrived there on the southeast side of the lake, they encountered a genuine, demon-possessed man. After some back and forth, we find that the man is possessed by perhaps 5000 demons, the number of men in a Roman legion. You’ve heard of the hordes of hell? This was indeed a horde of hell, and Jesus had to face them down.
When you are facing the hordes of hell, it really, really helps to be God’s Son. And when Jesus stood up to these demons, they actually begged Him not to send them back into the Abyss. And so, He let them enter a herd of pigs grazing nearby. Suddenly, the demons left the man, entered the pigs, and the pigs stampeded down the hillside into the lake and were drowned.
Can you imagine that? Can you imagine standing up to hundreds or thousands of demons?
Yet that is what we fathers are sometimes called to do. In this world, there are many evils that will attack our families, and we are the ones who are called to stand up to the evil, standing supported by our faith in God, standing supported by only God’s love behind us to face down the evil, to chase away the demons, to defeat the enemy that would attack our family, our friends, our neighbors who are vulnerable to their attack. And we do not have the strength within us – yet God, OUR FATHER, does indeed have the strength as God stands behind us, supporting us, showing that God supports God’s adopted sons just as much as God supported God’s begotten Son Jesus.
For we have been adopted as God’s sons. We are God’s heirs. Always remember that when you are fearful, or feel hopeless or are facing down hordes of demons. YOU…ARE…GOD’S…SON!
Many of you have met my little dog Brownie – she is a 12-pound shih tzu. Now Brownie is a complete coward – except when she knows I’m standing behind her. Then, she’ll stand up to anyone and bark her head off!
Do you realize that God is standing behind you, ready to catch you when you fall, ready to lift you up when your knees buckle, ready to do whatever it takes to strengthen the relationship between God and you? God is here, with you!
And so Jesus appears to easily defeat the demons. And then the neighbors showed up. And what was their reaction? Was it “WOW! You cured that man that was demon-possessed?” No! They were more concerned that their pigs were dead, and so they asked Jesus to leave. They didn’t really care that much about the man that the demons had been torturing. And so the man wanted to go with Jesus, but Jesus told him to tell people what had happened to him, and so he stayed and began to tell people about Jesus.
One day, God will work through you to do something remarkable. And there will be people who will consider you dangerous, a trouble-maker, a bit odd, and they will ask you to leave. Maybe you’ll help someone get free of the demon of alcohol, maybe you’ll help someone break free from the demon of addiction. Perhaps you’ll help someone get free of the demon of poverty – may be it’ll be the demon of loneliness you’ll defeat. You might lead a person free from the demon of despair or lift them from the clutches of the demon of anger. But there is something you can count on – someone will be there to ask you to leave – it never fails. Someone will not be happy that Jesus has come into the neighborhood, into the house, into someone’s life.
But that is what OUR father wants us to do. Our father wants us to lead people away from the demons, and let the demons die with the pigs that they run to. And our father also wants people to tell the story of how Jesus freed them from bondage. Do you tell that story?
Paul pointed out in our Galatians reading that we were all under bondage, we were all under bondage to the law before Jesus came and freed us from our bondage. Only Jesus could have done what He did through His sacrificial death and then his resurrection. But since Jesus has done this, we each now have the ability to tap into His power and break free from bondage – and to help others free from bondage. But we have to recognize bondage in others for what it is.
Did you notice that the people Jesus met had actually put the demon-possessed man in chains? Rather than try to free him from the very real slavery to his demons, they had added chains to him.
Don’t we do the same to people who are suffering today? Don’t we add trouble to people who are already in slavery to chemicals, to anger, to ways of thinking that are messed up? Instead, shouldn’t we step in and help people get free from their demons instead of adding chains to them? For the men and women who do evil in this world are not the enemy – they are the victims of our real enemies – sin and Satan and death.
We worship Jesus because He set us free. We worship Jesus because He taught us how to be free, how to follow Him. We worship Jesus because we are now free to worship Him, we are able to be free from the chains our fellow human being put on us – chains of shame, chains of guilt, chains of fear.
And we worship Jesus because Jesus showed us the Father, His Father, Our Father, and taught us what fatherhood is supposed to be all about – a quiet power under control, filled with self-sacrificial love for sons and daughters, a steady source of stability in a chaotic world, a source of peace, hope, and love. This is the heritage Jesus has given us. This is the heritage Our Father has given us. This is the spiritual heritage you, as a good father, should give your family.
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