There was this couple who had found a great place to live. It was basically a park-like estate, maybe in South Carolina, and in exchange for rent-free living, the couple took care of the estate. The estate had many berry bushes and gardens already planted, there were fruit trees of all types, and there were no utility bills for them to pay. So they spent their time tending to the gardens and trees and had a wonderful time. The owner had a single rule – don’t mess with the fruit from my prize tree, a one-of-a-kind tree that was the owner’s pride and joy. He reserved the fruit from that tree for his own table.
Unfortunately, one day, they ate a couple of fruits off of the prize tree and the owner found out, because he counted the fruits every evening. And so, the owner kicked them off the estate and they both had to go to work at McDonalds. They had lost their wonderful jobs and now they had to pay rent and utilities and live in a little cramped one-bedroom garage apartment, working 60 hours a week just to pay the bills. And furthermore, the woman became pregnant shortly after they got kicked off the estate. She eventually had two sons, they grew up, got into an argument one day and one of them killed the other and became a fugitive.
And you think you’re living in terrible times!
Of course, some of you have guessed that I’ve just retold the story of Adam and Eve.
Ever since our ancestors got kicked out of the Garden of Eden, people have lived in terrible times. Imagine living in a world without electricity, a world where they only heat you could get is by cutting up trees and burning wood – and you only have a hand axe. Imagine living in a world without telephones, without television, without the internet. Imagine a world without automobiles, without grocery stores, without jobs other than farming. Imagine living on 2 acres and trying to survive on that land with a shovel, an axe, and a pig. There’s no birth control. Glass is too expensive to buy, so you don’t have glass on the windows of your homes. Canning hasn’t been invented, the only fabrics you have are wool and cotton-based linen and leather. A pound of iron costs a week’s wages. The only fertilizer available comes from the pig or your neighbor’s cow. There is no such thing as insulation, as carpet, and you need to make all of your furniture from the wood on your land. Only one person in town can read. And there are no such things as toothpaste, deodorant, or toilet paper!
This, my friends, is the world of 99% of the world’s people up until about 150 years ago. It is still the world of 50% of the world’s people today, particularly in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, SE Asia, parts of Latin America, and most of Africa. And we in the United States just spent almost $2 billion on an election for an office which pays $1 million a year.
After almost every election, there are certain things that happen - things that always happen. Half of the voters are happy because their candidate won. You may be happy today. Or you may be sad today because your candidate lost. If you backed the losing candidate, about half of you will get over the loss very quickly and go about your lives, while about half will stay bitter, sniping for most of the next four years. That's what always happens. Whether or not you remain bitter depends upon how much you bought the politicians’ stories. The first story is this was the most important election ever – it always is, have you noticed? I found a photo from 2008, and much the same from 2012 and much the same in 2016 and each of them urged people to vote because "This is the most important election ever!" REALLY?
The second political myth that people buy from the politicians is that the President will actually change things in our world that will make a direct difference to our lives. And it simply isn't true.
After the election of 2008, I saw a couple of things happen that have affected me directly in my life. First, I was able to trade in my old van that had 284,000 miles on it for a new car, getting a $4000 trade-in value for my old van because of the cash for clunkers law instead of the $750 the van was worth in the blue book. This was positive.
Second, I noticed that the racial and sexual rhetoric during arguments in my seminary classes grew more intense on both sides. This was negative.
Now, I’ve noticed other things from that election affected people around me. I’ve seen a friend of mine, a very good doctor, sell his imaging practice to his local hospital because the new law almost forced him into it against his will. I’ve seen some improvements in the medical record-keeping at the hospitals and doctor’s offices, and I’ve seen the prices go up there because there is less competition. I’ve talked with coal miners who have been laid off and don’t see themselves going back to work, ever. And I’ve talked with people at the FBI who could or could not take vacation at certain times of the year because of temporary budget fights.
The reason we don't have extreme effects is because our government system is much larger than the Titanic and turns much slower than it ever did. It takes decades to make significant changes – unless there is a clear and present danger, such as the bombing of Pearl Harbor or a 9/11. Then, our system reacts in a week, declaring war and appropriating the funds. But those times are very few and far between.
Most of the changes that happen in our world because of a change of President are subtle and rarely affect us directly. "But what about the economy?" you might ask. To be honest, the recent recession had its roots in credit law changes made in the 1990’s, which were supported by both parties. "But what about wars?" you ask again. The vast majority of wars will happen regardless of which party controls the Presidency - our national interests will demand it. Can you imagine a Republican president ignoring Pearl Harbor or a Democratic president ignoring 9/11?
Most of the changes that happen in our world because of a change of President are subtle and rarely affect us directly. "But what about the economy?" you might ask. To be honest, the recent recession had its roots in credit law changes made in the 1990’s, which were supported by both parties. "But what about wars?" you ask again. The vast majority of wars will happen regardless of which party controls the Presidency - our national interests will demand it. Can you imagine a Republican president ignoring Pearl Harbor or a Democratic president ignoring 9/11?
Our attention on the Presidency is because we get bent out of shape by news reports we see on television, news which is intentionally made confrontational, news that is portrayed as apocalyptic because terrible, drastic news draws more viewers (and ad revenue) than “ho-hum” news, it draws more people to support the vocal politicians on the two sides of the issues, and it draws our attention into Satan's world and away from the really important things that happen in this world. Do you think your friend who just lost his wife really cares about the election? In reality, when we really think about it, a change of President rarely affects us significantly. It isn’t like we live inside the Washington Beltway, with our very jobs depending upon who is in the White House. Instead, our lives are influenced the most by the people close to us and how we interact with each of them.
Believing in the all-powerful nature of the President is believing in the wrong God, whichever your party is. It is the same mistake the Romans made - they believed their emperors were gods - and it is a mistake which will endanger your immortal soul. You can let the election results lift you up…or you can be sad about them. But don’t make the mistake in believing the hype that the Presidency has the power to change your life! That is giving a mere human far too much credit and power. Worship God…not any man or woman!
JRR Tolkien was a devote Christian and wrote books that expressed his mature Christian view of the world. His most famous set of books was The Lord of The Rings, and its prequel book, The Hobbit, books about a land where there is a tremendous conflict between good and evil going on – clearly influenced by the fact that these books were written during World War II and Tolkien was a professor of history at Oxford in England.
In the movie version of The Hobbit – the first of the three Hobbit movies – Gandalf, the kind and wise wizard, points out that Saruman, the leader of the wizards, believes that the world’s course of events is determined by the power of the powerful people in the world. But Gandalf points out that he has generally found that it is the little things, the daily acts of kindness and love done by ordinary people that determines the flow of good and evil.
I agree because this is scriptural – if we remember God is in charge and loves us, we defeat evil with every kind deed we do and every kind thing we say. Paul compared the speaking of Holy Scripture to a slashing sword in this low-level, daily spiritual warfare. When you speak Scripture, you are swing a slashing sword at evil!
Yet terrible times are coming. In our first reading, from Malachi, the prophet writes what God has said:
“Surely the day is coming; it will burn like a furnace. All the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble, and the day that is coming will set them on fire,” says the Lord Almighty. “Not a root or a branch will be left to them."
Yes, Christian. There are terrible times coming. But God reminds us that God protects His own. Malachi continues:
"But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays. And you will go out and frolic like well-fed calves."
Is it any wonder that the author of Psalm 98 cannot contain himself?
Sing to the Lord a new song,
for he has done marvelous things;
his right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.
The Lord has made his salvation known
and revealed his righteousness to the nations.
He has remembered his love
and his faithfulness to Israel;
all the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God.
Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth,
burst into jubilant song with music;
make music to the Lord with the harp,
with the harp and the sound of singing,
with trumpets and the blast of the ram’s horn—
shout for joy before the Lord, the King.
Let the sea resound, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it.
Let the rivers clap their hands,
let the mountains sing together for joy;
let them sing before the Lord,
for he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples with equity.
It is with this continuous praising of God, this outburst of happiness, this exuberant joy that we defeat the evil and depression around us! But even this joy, we must remember, is simply a foretasting of the joy of the future. There are great things the Lord has done – His Son has sacrificed Himself upon the cross for all of our sins, we are saved from God’s wrath when we believe and are baptized, but our joy is not yet complete, there is still more to come, the best is yet to come, and that hope for even better is what lifts us up today!
The disciples were looking with Jesus at the great temple of Herod, the Second Temple, a Temple that had taken forty years to build and was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. The Temple had precious stones all over, rubies here, topaz there, diamonds, agates, pearls, emeralds. There was much gold and silver. It glittered in the sunlight that day. And the disciples were looking at the Temple, talking about its beauty, when Jesus dashed some cold water on them.
“As for what you see here, the time will come when not one stone will be left on another; every one of them will be thrown down.”
It was like a group of us today, standing in the World War II memorial, looking at that beautiful monument to the men who sacrificed in that day, and our leader telling us that in a while it will be bulldozed over. Imagine standing there and someone credible telling you, “This monument will be bulldozed, the Washington Monument will be toppled, the Capitol dome will be smashed down, the great statue of Abraham Lincoln that you and your fathers and grandfathers fought to defend, it will all be destroyed one day."
And you know….it’s true! All those beautiful monuments, all those fantastic marble buildings, all those beautiful fountains will be destroyed one day. While it lasts, they help us to remember our Veterans, those men and women who fought valiantly for our freedoms, but one day it will all be gone, crumbled stone lying in the swampland near the Potomac River.
I think a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley says it well:
I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
(Ozymandias)
The disciples looked at the Temple, beautiful in the sunshine.
“Teacher,” the disciples asked Jesus, “when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are about to take place?”
Jesus replied: “Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time is near.’ Do not follow them. When you hear of wars and uprisings, do not be frightened. These things must happen first, but the end will not come right away.”
Then he said to them: “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven.
And you can just see the disciples standing there, thinking about the far distant future when trouble would come to their nation. They had lived through troubles some 20 years before when there had been riots and uprisings, just as many of us lived through 1968 and we lived through the Los Angeles riots, and we lived through the last year’s troubles in St Louis and Baltimore and Dallas, and we've lived through the riots and protests of the last week. It was so distant and far away. But now Jesus looked them in the eye, just as He looks us in the eye and says:
“But before all this, they will seize you and persecute you. They will hand you over to synagogues and put you in prison, and you will be brought before kings and governors, and all on account of my name.And so you will bear testimony to me. But make up your mind not to worry beforehand how you will defend yourselves. For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist or contradict. You will be betrayed even by parents, brothers and sisters, relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. Everyone will hate you because of me."
The troubles would come to them. Of the original Twelve disciples, all but John died a violent death, martyred for their faith and the Gospel they were proclaiming. Peter was even crucified upside down! Only John lived to be put on a distant island and he alone was allowed to live out his natural lifespan, to live into his nineties in peace, writing to us of a vision he had one day when the Holy Spirit took Him to Heaven in his far future and he wrote the book we call The Revelation of St. John, a disturbing book, an unsettling book, a book filled with fire and plagues and famine and wars – but with an ending that leads us back to joy. Jesus reminded his disciples that day overlooking Jerusalem, as He reminds us as we think about the city of Washington and a future when it also lies in ruins, just as Jerusalem was destroyed about 40 years after that day when they looked at the Temple in the bright sunshine. Jesus reminds us that only God and the eternal life God gives are permanent. All else will be destroyed. Jesus had more to say, though…
But not a hair of your head will perish. Stand firm, and you will win life.”
Yet they died violent deaths. Was Jesus wrong? No, for He was talking about the eternal life that comes from following Christ.
And so, the disciples that day began to realize that following Jesus wasn’t going to be one continuous traveling party. Following Jesus wasn’t going to be week after week of sitting in the pews, listening to great music and decent sermons. Following Jesus wasn’t going to be a movement of a million people led by a man in armor on a charging white stallion to change the world by overcoming the powerful armies of evil while the disciples safely walked in the middle of those million people, urging them to march on the capitol of evil!
No! Jesus planned to change the world, but He planned to do that by changing individual people in the world, by focusing upon the little, day-to-day things rather than upon the powerful. Jesus, you see, wanted a group of fishermen and farmers, a guilty tax collector, a failed revolutionary, some ordinary people to change how they treated each other for the better and that was how He planned to save the world! He was much more concerned with what these ordinary people did every day than He was about what King Herod did, what the High Priest did, and what the governor of the Roman emperor did. For it is not the great and powerful who change the world, but the everyday little deeds of kindness and helpfulness and politeness and hospitality and holiness of the ordinary people which decides what the world will be like.
You see, those who have the money and the power of gods on this earth do not have need of other people or know what other people need. It is those of us who have little power, little wealth, and great needs ourselves who know of the needs of the people near us.
So do not expect the government and those who run government to solve our problems. Our problems in this life are to be solved by us, by the wisdom we share every time we gather, by the love we show each other in practical ways – a woman washes her neighbor’s dishes, a man mows his neighbor’s yard, a boy takes the newspaper to the old lady’s door, a girl walks the old man’s puppy. As a group we provide some food for families in need, we watch a group of children so their parents can talk in private without interruption, we go Christmas caroling to our neighbors so those neighbors will know that at least someone remembered they exist.
We pick up the phone and call three people from the prayer list each week. We mail postcards to five other people. We listen to the lonely woman in the card aisle at Wal-mart and we invite her to our Wednesday evening dinner together. And so we work – and it is usually easy work, for it is work driven by the Holy Spirit speaking to our hearts and anytime we work according to what the Holy Spirit has told our hearts, it is good for us. We are not to be idle, simply listening to the Word of God without doing anything.
There is something, you see, about living the Christian life that changes us for the better. It is one thing to know all the doctrines of Christianity – it is still another thing to follow Jesus, for following implies action. In fact, Paul had some harsh words for those who simply waited for Jesus to return, snug and secure in their own salvation:
We hear that some among you are idle and disruptive. They are not busy; they are busybodies. Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat. And as for you, brothers and sisters, never tire of doing what is good.
Do you work for Christ? Or do you simply meddle in the work that others are doing for Christ? This can be real problem in churches, when more people see their role on committees as managing ministry rather than doing ministry. Instead, our committees are to be teams of people working toward a purpose, the purpose of changing the people in the world around us.
We often talk about changing the world. And we sit back and we look at the world and it is a big old thing! We feel like the ant must feel when he looks up at the huge three-story house that is newly built next to the anthill, preventing the ants from expanding their ant hill by overshadowing them. It is too big and too evil to change! And so, like the ant, we do little.
But the termite is different. The termite looks at that huge evil three-story house and realizes that it is full of food, indeed, it is made of food. The termite resolves that it will change the world near it, it will remove the house one bite at a time. And unless the homeowner shows up with termite spray, a very small termite nest will completely remove that house, destroy it, and it will fall down.
In the same way, we need to look at the evils in the world around us and realize that it is of such stuff that ministries are made. Do you realize that if there were no evil, there would be no need for any ministries? So stop thinking like an ant and start thinking like a termite, and start looking for how you and a group of friends can eat up the evil in the world around us.
Let me give you an example. In one church I know, a couple of women from the church went to the closest elementary school and asked them how they could help with homework, with an afterschool program, or with the needs of the children in the school. They found that the principal was always in need of help, so the three of them – the two women and the principal – cooked up some ideas.
The next thing you know, over the next year the church bought a dozen computers for the school, they were put in a room at the school, an afterschool homework group began, a dozen people from the church took turns one or two days a week, and about 40 kids began to see their grades improve. And many of the kids from the church began to bring their parents to the church because of the chance for those church people to meet the kids and parents at the school. And that elementary school moved from being the worst in the county to second best in the county over the next five years. Over the next few years, the property values in that neighborhood increased as the vandalism and crime rate dropped dramatically as those kids became teenagers.
Are their terrible times coming in this world? Yes. It is predicted by Holy Scripture. But until Jesus returns, we are not to be idle, we are to looking at what we can do to lead people into the Kingdom of God and out of the kingdoms of the world.
Have you thought about what this country would be like if over half the people who vote were regular church-goers, reading the Word of God and listening to the Holy Spirit as they made their decisions in the primaries and in the general election? There would be no close elections.
Believing in the all-powerful nature of the President is believing in the wrong God, whichever your party is. It is the same mistake the Romans made - they believed their emperors were gods - and it is a mistake which will endanger your immortal soul. You can let the election results lift you up…or you can be sad about them. But don’t make the mistake in believing the hype that the Presidency has the power to change your life! That is giving a mere human far too much credit and power. Worship God…not any man or woman!
JRR Tolkien was a devote Christian and wrote books that expressed his mature Christian view of the world. His most famous set of books was The Lord of The Rings, and its prequel book, The Hobbit, books about a land where there is a tremendous conflict between good and evil going on – clearly influenced by the fact that these books were written during World War II and Tolkien was a professor of history at Oxford in England.
In the movie version of The Hobbit – the first of the three Hobbit movies – Gandalf, the kind and wise wizard, points out that Saruman, the leader of the wizards, believes that the world’s course of events is determined by the power of the powerful people in the world. But Gandalf points out that he has generally found that it is the little things, the daily acts of kindness and love done by ordinary people that determines the flow of good and evil.
I agree because this is scriptural – if we remember God is in charge and loves us, we defeat evil with every kind deed we do and every kind thing we say. Paul compared the speaking of Holy Scripture to a slashing sword in this low-level, daily spiritual warfare. When you speak Scripture, you are swing a slashing sword at evil!
Yet terrible times are coming. In our first reading, from Malachi, the prophet writes what God has said:
“Surely the day is coming; it will burn like a furnace. All the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble, and the day that is coming will set them on fire,” says the Lord Almighty. “Not a root or a branch will be left to them."
Yes, Christian. There are terrible times coming. But God reminds us that God protects His own. Malachi continues:
"But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays. And you will go out and frolic like well-fed calves."
Is it any wonder that the author of Psalm 98 cannot contain himself?
Sing to the Lord a new song,
for he has done marvelous things;
his right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.
The Lord has made his salvation known
and revealed his righteousness to the nations.
He has remembered his love
and his faithfulness to Israel;
all the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God.
Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth,
burst into jubilant song with music;
make music to the Lord with the harp,
with the harp and the sound of singing,
with trumpets and the blast of the ram’s horn—
shout for joy before the Lord, the King.
Let the sea resound, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it.
Let the rivers clap their hands,
let the mountains sing together for joy;
let them sing before the Lord,
for he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples with equity.
It is with this continuous praising of God, this outburst of happiness, this exuberant joy that we defeat the evil and depression around us! But even this joy, we must remember, is simply a foretasting of the joy of the future. There are great things the Lord has done – His Son has sacrificed Himself upon the cross for all of our sins, we are saved from God’s wrath when we believe and are baptized, but our joy is not yet complete, there is still more to come, the best is yet to come, and that hope for even better is what lifts us up today!
The disciples were looking with Jesus at the great temple of Herod, the Second Temple, a Temple that had taken forty years to build and was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. The Temple had precious stones all over, rubies here, topaz there, diamonds, agates, pearls, emeralds. There was much gold and silver. It glittered in the sunlight that day. And the disciples were looking at the Temple, talking about its beauty, when Jesus dashed some cold water on them.
“As for what you see here, the time will come when not one stone will be left on another; every one of them will be thrown down.”
It was like a group of us today, standing in the World War II memorial, looking at that beautiful monument to the men who sacrificed in that day, and our leader telling us that in a while it will be bulldozed over. Imagine standing there and someone credible telling you, “This monument will be bulldozed, the Washington Monument will be toppled, the Capitol dome will be smashed down, the great statue of Abraham Lincoln that you and your fathers and grandfathers fought to defend, it will all be destroyed one day."
And you know….it’s true! All those beautiful monuments, all those fantastic marble buildings, all those beautiful fountains will be destroyed one day. While it lasts, they help us to remember our Veterans, those men and women who fought valiantly for our freedoms, but one day it will all be gone, crumbled stone lying in the swampland near the Potomac River.
I think a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley says it well:
I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
(Ozymandias)
The disciples looked at the Temple, beautiful in the sunshine.
“Teacher,” the disciples asked Jesus, “when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are about to take place?”
Jesus replied: “Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time is near.’ Do not follow them. When you hear of wars and uprisings, do not be frightened. These things must happen first, but the end will not come right away.”
Then he said to them: “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven.
And you can just see the disciples standing there, thinking about the far distant future when trouble would come to their nation. They had lived through troubles some 20 years before when there had been riots and uprisings, just as many of us lived through 1968 and we lived through the Los Angeles riots, and we lived through the last year’s troubles in St Louis and Baltimore and Dallas, and we've lived through the riots and protests of the last week. It was so distant and far away. But now Jesus looked them in the eye, just as He looks us in the eye and says:
“But before all this, they will seize you and persecute you. They will hand you over to synagogues and put you in prison, and you will be brought before kings and governors, and all on account of my name.And so you will bear testimony to me. But make up your mind not to worry beforehand how you will defend yourselves. For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist or contradict. You will be betrayed even by parents, brothers and sisters, relatives and friends, and they will put some of you to death. Everyone will hate you because of me."
The troubles would come to them. Of the original Twelve disciples, all but John died a violent death, martyred for their faith and the Gospel they were proclaiming. Peter was even crucified upside down! Only John lived to be put on a distant island and he alone was allowed to live out his natural lifespan, to live into his nineties in peace, writing to us of a vision he had one day when the Holy Spirit took Him to Heaven in his far future and he wrote the book we call The Revelation of St. John, a disturbing book, an unsettling book, a book filled with fire and plagues and famine and wars – but with an ending that leads us back to joy. Jesus reminded his disciples that day overlooking Jerusalem, as He reminds us as we think about the city of Washington and a future when it also lies in ruins, just as Jerusalem was destroyed about 40 years after that day when they looked at the Temple in the bright sunshine. Jesus reminds us that only God and the eternal life God gives are permanent. All else will be destroyed. Jesus had more to say, though…
But not a hair of your head will perish. Stand firm, and you will win life.”
Yet they died violent deaths. Was Jesus wrong? No, for He was talking about the eternal life that comes from following Christ.
And so, the disciples that day began to realize that following Jesus wasn’t going to be one continuous traveling party. Following Jesus wasn’t going to be week after week of sitting in the pews, listening to great music and decent sermons. Following Jesus wasn’t going to be a movement of a million people led by a man in armor on a charging white stallion to change the world by overcoming the powerful armies of evil while the disciples safely walked in the middle of those million people, urging them to march on the capitol of evil!
No! Jesus planned to change the world, but He planned to do that by changing individual people in the world, by focusing upon the little, day-to-day things rather than upon the powerful. Jesus, you see, wanted a group of fishermen and farmers, a guilty tax collector, a failed revolutionary, some ordinary people to change how they treated each other for the better and that was how He planned to save the world! He was much more concerned with what these ordinary people did every day than He was about what King Herod did, what the High Priest did, and what the governor of the Roman emperor did. For it is not the great and powerful who change the world, but the everyday little deeds of kindness and helpfulness and politeness and hospitality and holiness of the ordinary people which decides what the world will be like.
You see, those who have the money and the power of gods on this earth do not have need of other people or know what other people need. It is those of us who have little power, little wealth, and great needs ourselves who know of the needs of the people near us.
So do not expect the government and those who run government to solve our problems. Our problems in this life are to be solved by us, by the wisdom we share every time we gather, by the love we show each other in practical ways – a woman washes her neighbor’s dishes, a man mows his neighbor’s yard, a boy takes the newspaper to the old lady’s door, a girl walks the old man’s puppy. As a group we provide some food for families in need, we watch a group of children so their parents can talk in private without interruption, we go Christmas caroling to our neighbors so those neighbors will know that at least someone remembered they exist.
We pick up the phone and call three people from the prayer list each week. We mail postcards to five other people. We listen to the lonely woman in the card aisle at Wal-mart and we invite her to our Wednesday evening dinner together. And so we work – and it is usually easy work, for it is work driven by the Holy Spirit speaking to our hearts and anytime we work according to what the Holy Spirit has told our hearts, it is good for us. We are not to be idle, simply listening to the Word of God without doing anything.
There is something, you see, about living the Christian life that changes us for the better. It is one thing to know all the doctrines of Christianity – it is still another thing to follow Jesus, for following implies action. In fact, Paul had some harsh words for those who simply waited for Jesus to return, snug and secure in their own salvation:
We hear that some among you are idle and disruptive. They are not busy; they are busybodies. Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat. And as for you, brothers and sisters, never tire of doing what is good.
Do you work for Christ? Or do you simply meddle in the work that others are doing for Christ? This can be real problem in churches, when more people see their role on committees as managing ministry rather than doing ministry. Instead, our committees are to be teams of people working toward a purpose, the purpose of changing the people in the world around us.
We often talk about changing the world. And we sit back and we look at the world and it is a big old thing! We feel like the ant must feel when he looks up at the huge three-story house that is newly built next to the anthill, preventing the ants from expanding their ant hill by overshadowing them. It is too big and too evil to change! And so, like the ant, we do little.
But the termite is different. The termite looks at that huge evil three-story house and realizes that it is full of food, indeed, it is made of food. The termite resolves that it will change the world near it, it will remove the house one bite at a time. And unless the homeowner shows up with termite spray, a very small termite nest will completely remove that house, destroy it, and it will fall down.
In the same way, we need to look at the evils in the world around us and realize that it is of such stuff that ministries are made. Do you realize that if there were no evil, there would be no need for any ministries? So stop thinking like an ant and start thinking like a termite, and start looking for how you and a group of friends can eat up the evil in the world around us.
Let me give you an example. In one church I know, a couple of women from the church went to the closest elementary school and asked them how they could help with homework, with an afterschool program, or with the needs of the children in the school. They found that the principal was always in need of help, so the three of them – the two women and the principal – cooked up some ideas.
The next thing you know, over the next year the church bought a dozen computers for the school, they were put in a room at the school, an afterschool homework group began, a dozen people from the church took turns one or two days a week, and about 40 kids began to see their grades improve. And many of the kids from the church began to bring their parents to the church because of the chance for those church people to meet the kids and parents at the school. And that elementary school moved from being the worst in the county to second best in the county over the next five years. Over the next few years, the property values in that neighborhood increased as the vandalism and crime rate dropped dramatically as those kids became teenagers.
Are their terrible times coming in this world? Yes. It is predicted by Holy Scripture. But until Jesus returns, we are not to be idle, we are to looking at what we can do to lead people into the Kingdom of God and out of the kingdoms of the world.
Have you thought about what this country would be like if over half the people who vote were regular church-goers, reading the Word of God and listening to the Holy Spirit as they made their decisions in the primaries and in the general election? There would be no close elections.
Have you thought about how long the darkness that is running around the world would be held off here if the church were about the business of the church, doing the little acts of kindness, telling people every week about the love of Christ for all people, looking how to give practical help to people who are struggling? Have you thought about how many souls would escape hellfire and sit with you under the Tree of Life one day if you really decided to do all you could to help people understand who Jesus is?
Church, let’s remember who we are. We are the children of the Almighty God, adopted sons and daughters of the Kingdom. When was the last time you told someone of the great things our Father, the King has done for you? When was the last time you actually acted like a Prince or Princess of the Kingdom?
Awaken! It is because of the terrible times in the world, in our lives, that Jesus came to remind us of who we are and to reconcile us to our Father. And since He has done that, giving up His very life that we would become His brothers and sisters, shouldn’t we go out into the world and change at least our piece of it back into what it once was? A garden. A safe place. A world where even the lion and the lamb get along.
Some of you voted for Mr. Trump and are glad about the election. Be glad, but do not believe that Mr. Trump has more power than he actually has. Some of you voted against Mr. Trump and are sad about the election. You can be sad, but do not believe that Mr. Trump has more power than he actually has. Instead, all of us should remember that through Jesus Christ, we each have the power to change the world around us, through prayer and through those little acts of kindness and love where ordinary people determine where the good is and where the evil stops. Do your part!
Church, let’s remember who we are. We are the children of the Almighty God, adopted sons and daughters of the Kingdom. When was the last time you told someone of the great things our Father, the King has done for you? When was the last time you actually acted like a Prince or Princess of the Kingdom?
Awaken! It is because of the terrible times in the world, in our lives, that Jesus came to remind us of who we are and to reconcile us to our Father. And since He has done that, giving up His very life that we would become His brothers and sisters, shouldn’t we go out into the world and change at least our piece of it back into what it once was? A garden. A safe place. A world where even the lion and the lamb get along.
Some of you voted for Mr. Trump and are glad about the election. Be glad, but do not believe that Mr. Trump has more power than he actually has. Some of you voted against Mr. Trump and are sad about the election. You can be sad, but do not believe that Mr. Trump has more power than he actually has. Instead, all of us should remember that through Jesus Christ, we each have the power to change the world around us, through prayer and through those little acts of kindness and love where ordinary people determine where the good is and where the evil stops. Do your part!
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