What is Worth Saving? - How does the destruction of Sodom affect your life today?

Genesis 18:20-32; Psalm 138; Colossians 2:6-19; Luke 11:1-13

About a year ago, we finally sold our home in Ohio. This was the home where we brought 4 trailer and pickup loads of goods from our home and business in Georgia to about twelve years before. This was the home where three of our children grew up. This was the home where we accumulated the junk of a decade spent living in the country – fabric and materials for craft projects, furniture in need of repair. Boards left over from renovation projects, tools, extra fencing, spare shelving, old inventory from our ink business, toys that were outgrown, homeschool textbooks, orchard chemicals, broken shovels, a mower that needed a new pull-start, Christmas ornaments, a friend’s extra clothes stored until he returned from China, a cat-tree, a doggie bed, and tubs and tubs of paperwork from the business, seminary, two churches, and schoolwork. The kitchen and dining room items that were involved in entertaining 20 International students twice a month. Front porch furniture, rear deck furniture, flower pots. As well as an extensive library, beds, old computers and keyboards, couches, chairs, and desk and a George Foreman grill. You get the picture – your attic, your basement, or your outbuildings have all of those.

In Ohio, we had a 3000 square foot home with three stories and a basement, plus a one-car garage and a 2000 square foot warehouse building. And as you know from your own experience, these places all filled up to capacity, and then it was time to move to Quiet Dell to a ranch home with a basement. Thankfully, Jessie moved out in May before we came to Quiet Dell, taking most of her items to Alaska with her. Ian would move to China in September, just after we arrived. But still, the question arose: What was worth saving and taking with us? And what needed to be left behind?

We didn’t need the lawn tractors or the wagons or the orchard chemicals. We didn’t need the extra desks nor the 5 four-drawer file cabinets from the business. We didn’t need the twenty tubs of old invoices from the business, either. We burned those old papers. And we left most of the appliances behind. But that still meant deciding which beds to take, which furniture to take, which knick-knacks and fabric and clothing and tools to take. Which DVD’s do you bring along? From a lifetime – what is worth saving?

Our reading from Genesis deals with that question, except the question is posed from God’s perspective. Instead of what material things are worth saving, God decides: Who is worth saving?

Abraham’s nephew Lot had left him some years before and settled with his family in the town of Sodom beside the Dead Sea. Abraham remained high up in the hills to the west of the Jordan Valley, between modern Jerusalem and Hebron, grazing his cattle and sheep. As the years passed, word had spread of the terrible things which happened in Sodom – it was the custom of the men of the town to greet newcomers with a night of sexual assault – particularly newly arrived men.

And the Lord arrived where Abraham had set up his tent at the great trees of Mamre, near present day Hebron. These were huge oaks – one is still alive and is estimated to be 5000 years old. The Lord was walking with two angels. The three appeared as men – most theologians believe that the Lord mentioned is Jesus Christ 1600 years before his arrival as the Babe of Bethlehem.

Abraham gives exceptional hospitality to the men – water that they might wash their feet, he butchers a fattened calf, he gives each one a huge loaf of bread. They talk of Abraham’s future son, and then the Lord and the two angels are ready to walk onward, but the Lord decides to tell Abraham of his plan to destroy Sodom because of the evil of the city.

And Abraham immediately thinks about his nephew Lot and his nephew’s family. They are living in Sodom! And Abraham thinks about the plight of his nephew and his family.

Throughout history, good people have always thought about the good people they know who live in bad areas, in bad countries, in bad nations. During the World Wars, there were people of German ancestry who lived in America and in Britain who looked with fear as reports came back of the great bombing runs over Germany. People of Japanese ancestry, even people who had known Japanese students such as Admiral Yamamoto when they had attended American Universities, they were fearful of the fate of their Japanese friends during the Second World War. Men and women of Iraqi descent worried about aunts and uncles and cousins in Iraq while the rest of America cheered the bombing of Bagdad. Blacks in Dallas who had friends on the police force were fearful as the names of those killed and injured by the sniper were released. People who have friends in the south of France anxiously checked the names of the dead run over by the truck driver terrorist in Nice.

For in every conflict, there are people on both sides who are nice, pleasant, righteous men and women. In every war, we know of people whose only crime seems to be to be a member of the other group. Innocent? Perhaps. Guilty of the crimes that have led to the destruction or death of the town or country or those who look a particular way because of uniform, skin color, or language – doubtful. Not every person who lived in Germany during World War II was a Nazi. Not even most.

And so Abraham that day asked the Lord an important question. Abraham asked the question that all who will destroy towns or people need to be asked. Abraham asked the Lord – “If there are some righteous people in the town, will you destroy them with the wicked?”

Abraham starts with 50 people. In a town of some hundreds or thousands of people, will God destroy the entire town if He finds 50 good people in the town?

And the Lord says, “No, if I find 50 good people I will not destroy any of the town.”

And then Abraham begins to pin God down. What if there are only 45 good people? 45 Righteous people?

The Lord replies, “No, if there are 45 righteous people, the town will live.”

Abraham pushes again. What if there are only 40 righteous people? Will the town still live?

And the Lord says, “If there are 40, I’ll let them all live.”

And Abraham pushes the Lord to 30, then 20, then ten. Abraham believed in being persistent when He talked with the Lord. If there are even ten righteous people, will the Lord let the city live? And the Lord says, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.” Abraham’s persistence was rewarded by the Lord’s promise to him. Abraham had continued to knock at the door until it was opened to him and he was satisfied.

And then the Lord and the angels head to Sodom, while Abraham heads home to his tent.

That evening, the two angels arrive at Sodom and Lot invites them into his house for dinner and lodging. The angels say that they will sleep in the town square, but Lot, knowing what will happen, particularly to good looking men like the angels, Lot insists that they sleep inside his home.

After dark, the men of the town, both young and old, gather outside Lot’s house and demand that he send out the angels so the men can have their way with them. Lot says that the angels are under his protection. The men persist in demanding that the strangers be sent out to them. They grow louder and louder, angrier and angrier. Lot, under pressure, eventually offers his two virgin daughters to the loud, angry, chanting men instead. They may do whatever they want with his daughters if they will leave the men alone.

Folks, I’m continually reminded that we live in a Christian society in a largely Christian world. Things were not always the way they are in our town, our nation, for Lot is considered one of the good guys in this story, and yet, see how he treats his daughters that evening! When you think that our nation has declined, remember that it could be much, much worse without our undercurrent of Christian morality. When you despair, remember the bargain Lot offered the men of Sodom. Christianity has lifted us at least that far.

The men of Sodom angrily refuse the bargain and the angels pull Lot back inside. The men begin to try to break down the door, but the angels blind them, which gives the family peace for the rest of the night. The angels tell Lot to get his family and friends out of town because the town is about to be destroyed.

Lot spoke to the two men who were to marry his daughters, asking them to leave town with him, but the two young men thought he was joking. “What, your guests will destroy the town? The two of them and what army?” So Lot took his two daughters and his wife, leaving behind everything that wasn’t important. At least the mother and daughters respected their father enough to follow him. After speaking to the angels, they all took just what they could carry and ran for another small village several miles away. They left their home behind them with untold furniture, clothing, food, livestock, decorations. They only took what was really important.

And as they arrive there in the tiny village of Zoar, the angels push the button. Missiles rain down on Sodom. The angelic B-52’s arrive, the nukes hit and burning sulfur falls on the town and on Gomorrah and on the vegetation of the area. And twenty miles away, Abraham sees the smoke of burning Sodom and probably wonders “What has become of my nephew?”

When we look at the story of the destruction of Sodom and really think about it, particularly when we look at the world around us, we wonder: “Will God destroy our country, our state, our town with missiles of burning sulfur?” “Will God allow us to survive?” “Has our country descended to the depths where God will visit and destroy us?”

We aren’t the first people to wonder this. Since Sodom was destroyed over 3600 years ago, people have looked around them and wondered: “Is the end near for my city, my nation, our world?” “Is God’s patience about to run out?”

And it is indeed a frightening thing to wonder about. I remember lying in bed one night during the 1980’s amid the crisis over the middle-range missiles in Europe, wondering if the alarms I heard were to alert us of incoming missiles – or just normal fire station alarms. For many people were worried that tensions had risen to a point of no return. Is there anything we can do to stop the destruction if God decides to send it to us? Of course not.

Yet there is another way to look at this story, a way that brings the story closer to home.

Abraham repeatedly asks the Lord if the presence of righteous people will protect the city. Perhaps Abraham wasn’t so sure that Lot and his family were righteous – after all, Abraham and Lot had argued in the past. And so Abraham may have been hoping that the mere presence of some other righteous people would protect his relatives. Most of us have relatives we love, but aren't sure are righteous.

Abraham uses the Hebrew word saddiq – righteous. The word has overtones of justice, the man who is just and fair in his dealings with others. Abraham was asking the Lord that if the Lord found just ten just and fair people, would he allow Sodom to survive? Abraham got the Lord’s promise, but were there ten righteous people in Sodom?

The next morning, Abraham got his answer when he saw the smoke. Ten righteous people were not left in Sodom. Yet Lot and his daughters survived. The angels gave them time to get to shelter. Most likely, it was Lot’s righteous protection of his visitors that gave him the opportunity to run and live.

And so, in our lives, is it possible that we have a bit of goodness in our hearts? Is it possible that we have ten parts of goodness in a city full of sin in our hearts? Is it possible that we will be saved if we have just a bit of goodness?

Jesus clearly believed that most people have some goodness in them. He pointed out that when our children ask us for eggs to eat, we don’t given them scorpions. He pointed out that when they ask us for fish, we don’t give them snakes.

Yet this bit of goodness that we have isn’t enough, for if there were enough goodness in the hearts of the people of Sodom, the Lord would not have destroyed the town. In the same way, something more is needed for us to be righteous enough to be saved by God. Like a scratched old table with a missing leg and two wobbly legs, is the one good, finely finished walnut leg good enough to take the table with you when you move? Or do you toss the whole thing – even with the good leg – into the trash or put it on the fire to be burnt? Will you be burnt to a crisp as happened to the people of Sodom?

Perhaps we can learn from Lot. What exactly did Lot do that evening?

Lot risked his life and his family for the two angels. Lot did not know they were angels until later – Lot simply understood them to be men. Strangers. Yet Lot tried to protect the men against the mob, knowing that this sacrifice would lead to trouble for him. Lot would probably have had to leave Sodom the next day anyway because of his goodness and his sacrifice.

And so perhaps there is something about living for others that is righteous. Perhaps this is what God is looking for. Perhaps we can’t be righteous without a sacrifice.

That night, Lot sacrificed his unity and friendship with the men in the village to help the strangers. That evening, Lot was willing to sacrifice his family to help the strangers. That evening, Lot was ready to make sacrifices for others.

And the next day, Lot lived.

Yet that day was not completely without grief for Lot. Lot, his wife, his daughters, the two young men betrothed to his daughters – they were all given the chance to escape. They were all warned of the upcoming destruction of the city. Yet we humans have a tendency to think that tomorrow will be just like today. Stop smoking or you will have lung cancer, and yet we keep smoking. Exercise more or you will have diabetes and so we eat another donut. Save money, for the oil booms come and go, and so we go ahead and buy a new dual-wheel Diesel pickup on credit.

The two young men laughed at the situation. They did not take seriously the angels’ warning. They did not listen to Lot and so they stayed behind and they perished.

The family was told to leave and not to look back. Yet, there is something in our human nature that wants to hold onto today so badly, to have the joys of yesterday so badly, to look back at what we are leaving behind that we cannot simply run for the hills when told to run. Lot’s wife looked back and she was turned into a column of salt. All the water in her body instantly evaporated and she was left behind, dead.

Lot trusted the angels, the men who spoke for God, and Lot’s daughters trusted Lot. And so they all survived the day.

As we progress in our walk with the Lord Jesus Christ, we all start out in the condition of Sodom, with a bit of good in us, for everything God created was good, but with evil running the show, for we are born in rebellion to God, a rebellion that began with Adam and Eve. We want evil, we desire evil, we beg to do evil.

One day, God sends us messengers who come to us and warn us of the coming destruction. We are told that our ways will lead to our death and destruction. What shall we do?

Will we completely ignore the message in our quest for evil, as most of the men of Sodom did that night?

Will we listen to the messenger and then laugh at the message, as the two fiance’s did?

Will we run for a good, safe land, but turn to look back at what we’ve left behind, because we love that city of evil so much that we are swallowed up by the destruction, as Lot’s wife did?

Or will we trust the messengers of God, striving to reach safety, striving to become holy, striving to find good and follow the commands of God?

You have heard that you only need to ask Jesus into your heart to be saved. You have heard that you need only “believe in the Lord Jesus Christ” and you will be saved. You have heard that following Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. All of these are true, for Jesus Christ claimed to be God. His death on the cross was the necessary sacrifice made for all of us – He knew we could not make the necessary sacrifices and so He made the sacrifice for us. And if we pledge to follow Him as our Lord and Master, then He has said we will be saved for eternal life, and a promise of Jesus is a promise made by God, a promise you can trust. How do I know?

Because after claiming repeatedly to be God, Jesus came back from the dead and was seen by over 500 witnesses, several of whom put their witness down on paper.

We who follow Jesus no longer need to worry if we are “good enough”, for the act of choosing to follow Jesus as our Lord and Master is sufficient for God to declare us “not guilty” of the crime of rebellion. God will not destroy us, for we are the righteous ones. If we choose to follow God’s Son, we are teachable, we can be repaired, we are now “good enough” to be saved.

Yet we still can choose in our own foolishness to do things which will destroy us. We can laugh at those who tell us to follow a path toward safety – the path of holiness, as the young men did. We can continue to stay in our old sinful and addictive ways. We can say, “Do you really mean that I have to give up gossiping and swearing and adultery and worldly ambition and all those other things we know that Christians are supposed to give up?” Yes, for you must leave the town of evil and head for the hills of holiness.

We can turn and look back at the attractions of our old life, loving the old worldly ways – as Lot’s wife did. And soon enough those old ways will grab us and hold us and we will become dry in our spirit and die looking back, missing our old life, but not willing to push onward toward the holy hills.

Or we can press onward toward a place of safety, learning to do good, learning to leave behind the destructive nature of the world, leading others with us to safety, as Lot did, leading his daughters to safety, climbing ever higher and higher into the hills of holiness.

And we must not forget one important aspect of this story.

Far away, on a hilltop to the west of Sodom, there was an old man, Lot’s uncle Abraham, who had talked with God about the salvation of the righteous people of the city of Sodom. The Bible does not record any further encounters between Lot and Abraham after the destruction of Sodom. Abraham may have died without ever knowing that Lot lived that day. Yet Abraham’s persistent prayers for the righteous in Sodom were undoubtedly important to Lot and his daughter' salvation. Who do you pray for? Your prayers may save a man, a woman, a family, even a town.

And so, as you walk along your path toward the holy hills, developing in your Christian maturity, walking on the path led by Jesus – What in your life is worth saving – and what should you leave behind?

What habits do you have that you should leave in Sodom?

What good habits do you have that you should bring with you on the road?

What friends, what loved ones do you have who would keep you to die with them in Sodom?

And what loved ones do you need to bring with you?

You know, we’re all ready with the answer to the easy question – if your house were burning and you could only take one or two things, what would it be? We’d all say our children, our spouse, perhaps our pet. A book of photos. That’s the easy decision.

But what parts of your personality will you leave behind in Sodom to be burnt to a crisp? What parts of your personality will you take to the land of God?

You’ll remember I started this sermon talking about how we accumulated objects in our house, our garage, our warehouse, and about how we had to leave many things behind when we moved away, how we burned many boxes of old papers as we left behind our old lives, our lives where we could live for God... or not, where we could still indulge in sinful habits, where we could always talk to our neighbors as though we weren’t any different than they were. But we burned our boxes and went full-time for God, because Jesus told us we needed to leave.

So why don’t you begin to burn those old habits you don’t plan to take to Heaven, beginning today, so you can run much faster when Jesus calls? For there may be little time left until the end comes.

Wisdom Through His Blood - Thoughts on Mary and Martha

Amos 8:1-12; Psalm 52; Colossians 1:15-28; Luke 10:38-42

There were two men talking at the house in the city.

“I’d like to interview her for my account”, the Greek said.

John replied, “I will take you to her house tomorrow morning early.”

And the next morning, they walked the three miles over the Mount of Olives in the early summer sun. At the top of the mount, they looked westward and down to Jerusalem, where the golden spires of the white stone Temple glistened beside the dark tower of the Fortress Antonia where Roman soldiers, like ants, marched about.

Down the other side, they came to the inn. A couple of lepers passed by on the other side of the road.

John said, “This place has grown up a lot since I was last here. She never let the weeds get this tall and everything was kept neat and in good repair. I hope she is ok.”

They looked around. Vines ran up trees and the sides of the house. Weeds and flowers grew randomly in the coolness under the big cedar trees. A stone bench along the path had fallen over. It looked like no one paid attention to the place anymore. John began to worry. Was the owner still alive?

They knocked at the door. A goat came up to them, looking for a treat in their hands. In the distance, children called to one another. The whole place looked and sounded deserted, not at all like the Greek had expected. But there were no festivals this week in Jerusalem – it was early summer. Between the heat and the demands of farming, few people traveled far from home.

“Let’s walk around back and see if we can find her. She may be in the garden,” John said.

They walked around the house. More goats were grazing in the lush grass under the tall cedars. A dozen fig trees were planted on the back, while the side was filled with an olive orchard. A hawk screeched over head as they walked through the high grass. A handful of pomegranate trees lined the path. Grape vines were twined around posts.

And then they saw her.

Bent over, using a wooden stick, she was digging around some beans. As she straightened up, she saw them.

“John! How good to see you!” The delight on the woman’s tanned face was clear as she spoke in Aramaic. She looked to be mid-forties in age – gray, slender, but strong. “You’re looking good for an old man! What are you, forty, now?”

“Yes, Martha. I’m forty-one. I’ve brought a friend who wants to hear your stories about the Master. This is Doctor Loukus, a brother in the Way from Troas in Greece. “

Martha turned to Loukus, effortlessly changing into Koine, the common Greek trade language.”I’m so happy to meet you! Another brother! It seems like the Way is spreading far and wide.”

“It is, Martha. It’s been what – 10 or 15 years since the Master left us?”

“It’s been eleven years. I know exactly how long its been. Why don’t you go into the courtyard by the well and I’ll get you some lunch.”

The two men walked into the courtyard and sat on a couple of benches in the shade.

John whispered to Loukas. “If she does like she did in the old days, we’ll have a seven-course meal here in a few minutes.”

A few minutes later, Martha joined them with a pitcher of warm goat’s milk, some pure white cheese, dates and fresh figs. A very simple lunch. Loukas raised an eyebrow to John. John shrugged and said, “Let me pray to God…”

After John gave thanks to God for the food, and they began to eat the snack, John asked her. “Do you remember the first time the brethren stopped by here with the Master?”

“Of course I do.” Her eyes went off into space…

“It was a cold morning. I’d just milked a couple of the goats, when Lazarus comes running around the house, and tells me that a band led by his old childhood friend Yeshua was coming. OH, I was so-o-o-o angry that no one had thought to run ahead. Here were about 30 people coming in and no notice, and Yeshua was such an important man.

“Of course, we’d heard about Him from the other travelers. People talk, you know. We’d heard how He’d just sort of appeared out of nowhere and started teaching and healing people and there were already rumors flying that He might be the Messiah. Of course, we’d known His family for years – His mother and father used to stop by here on their way to Jerusalem at each of the festivals. I guess that’s how Him and Lazarus became such good friends. Where was I?”

“Oh yes. Well, at that time, I prided myself on always having the best food on the road. I had a few minutes notice, so I had one of the servants get a fire going in the brick oven, and I made several huge pies,” she turned toward Loukas. “ I make this wonderful pomegranate pie, with raisins and honey and just a little extra barley flour put in it for a thickener…” She whispered conspiratorially.

“Well, I made those pies, and I had a servant kill a pair of lambs and meanwhile I’m grinding the peas into paste for the pine nuts and I look around and Mary is no where! Lazarus, of course, is welcoming our guests, and there is Mary, out among the men! I tell her I need some help in the kitchen and she comes in for a minute or two – I think she cracked a couple of eggs into a bowl – and then she disappeared again! And I had a reputation for big, fancy meals at this inn!

“So the lambs are roasting, the pies are baking, I’ve got six different vegetables cooking, and I’m trying to pour everyone water and there’s Mary. She’s just sitting at Yeshua’s feet, just rapt in attention at every word He says, while I’m trying to get food together for three dozen people on short notice!

“So I marched into the courtyard with a pitcher of water, turned to Yeshua and said, ““Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

“That’s what I told Him. I guess I was a bit angry that day – but I was so-o-o-o busy! Well, he just smiled up at me from his seat and said,

“Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one.Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

“and Mary just grinned at me!”

“That must have been very frustrating for you”, Loukas said.

“It was. And it took me a while, but I learned from it.” Martha sat there, remembering for a while. Her face filled with emotion.

“What did you learn? “John asked gently.

“It took me a couple of years to realize – I guess It didn’t really hit me until He was executed – I watched Him die - and then came back to us for that glorious month. I guess it was some wisdom I learned through His blood. Wisdom through His blood…

I really hadn’t realized it. But I had the Son of God at my house for supper that day. And I spent hours worrying about the food and the cleaning. I could have heard His voice speak; I could have asked Him questions; He could have told me what my life was all about. But I had so much pride. I felt that cleaning my house and cooking so many different foods was what I was all about.

“Now, I wish I’d spent more time asking Him questions about the Scriptures. I wish I’d spent more time listening to what He had to say. I wish I’d just spent more time looking into those beautiful kind eyes that had seen the Universe while He made it! Instead, just like He said, I was worried and upset about THINGS!

“Even that glorious Sunday morning after He was executed, I was in a hurry. I went to the Master’s tomb with the other women, and when He wasn’t there I hurried back home. But Mary knew that He was special all the time. She took time to wander in the garden, looking for Him, and so she got to see Him first that wonderful morning when He came back to us alive. I could have seen Him that morning…but I was in a hurry...”

The woman looked much older as she bowed her head. Tears ran down her cheeks.

“Since then, I’ve kind of let this place go, I’m afraid. I’ve tried to spend more time talking to Him and Father, and less time worrying about less important things like the meals and the property.

“Where is Mary, and where is Lazarus?” John wanted to change the subject.

“They’ve left for Cyprus. It wasn’t safe for Lazarus after the persecution began. I got a letter from them a couple of days ago…They’ve found a good place and they want me to join them. You were lucky to catch me here. I’m planning to pack up and leave next week – I’m leaving the inn to the lepers, for they need it more than I do….I’ll miss this place.”

Loukas nodded his head, “Yes, I thought I saw a couple lepers this morning during the walk. “

“Yes, there are several in town. In fact, another time Yeshua came to town, He ate at Simon the Leper’s home one evening. I catered the dinner. It was a couple weeks after He raised my brother Lazarus from the dead…”
...

We’ll leave those three sitting in the courtyard of the Inn of Bethany. Church tradition has it that Martha and Mary and Lazarus did move to Cyprus, where he became the first Bishop of a church there.

Martha’s sin was simple and yet it is widespread. It is the sin of busyness, the sin of focusing upon the world, the sin of materialism. The world is around us and every day we look around and see our homes in need of repair, and our pride tells us to keep the house neat. And so we paint – not because the house needs painting, but because we saw a new color scheme in a magazine. We buy new furniture, not because our old furniture is falling apart, but because we grew tired of the old furniture. We fix the fence – a fence that no longer keeps cattle in or out, because we don’t have cattle, but because someone might make fun of our broken fence. We get a new car – not because our old car is irreparable, but because the vinyl on the seats is getting old, and because there is a bit of rust around the bumper, and because we no longer have a car payment, so we can afford a new model.

We mow our lawns. Would someone tell me why we mow our lawns? Is it because three hundred years ago, some British Lords started keeping their lawns short so they could play cricket during the summer? And we just love the idea of a big, green lawn, and so most of us spend one, two, or even six hours a week keeping our grass short. We spend thousands of dollars on lawn tractors just so we can have neat, green lawns and that means we have to work harder and longer during our day jobs, spending our life’s precious hours and days keeping grass short.

My brother-in-law wanted green grass, really green grass, and so he fertilized his lawn. That lawn about killed him that summer as it grew three times as fast as before! He never fertilized it again! He had learned his lesson!

This time of the year, we start to look for clothing sales. We go shopping, looking for new clothes because we were in the habit of buying new clothes for the kids every July and August because they were growing, but the kids aren’t around anymore, but the sales are still there and so we buy more clothing for our closets that are stuffed full and then we take our old clothing and bundle it up and take it to the mission, and there are so many people doing this that they bundle up our clothes and sell it to a company in Canada by the container-load and they ship it to Africa and India and Bangladesh because we have to wear new clothes to show everyone else how good our lives and incomes are.

We buy things for our homes and then we dust those things. I had an uncle with dozens and dozens of Hummel figurines he had found at yard sales and auctions. He proudly said his Hummel collection was worth forty thousand dollars. Every week, he and his wife dusted that collection. One day my uncle was diagnosed with leukemia. A year later he was dead. My aunt sold the entire collection for about a thousand dollars the next year.

And we work to buy these things. We work our forty-hour jobs, we work extra hours, and then we come home and we work on our houses in the evenings and the weekends. Because we’ve always bought new cars and new clothes and new furniture, and we had to spend money on vacations, we have to stay busy, busy, busy and the dust collects on our Bibles since we don’t have time to sit down and read through the Gospel of Mark over the next two evenings, something I can read to you aloud in an hour or two.

Is it because our parents pushed us to stay busy? Was there a Martha in our house, upset if you spent time sitting down, reading? Was there a Martha who took you away from time with your toy cars or your dollhouse, who kept you from wandering the woods where you liked to listen to the bird calls and see the pattern of bright and dark on the leaves as God breathed on the tree limbs and made them move back and forth? Did you grow up feeling guilty if you weren’t moving? Are you afraid you’ll starve to death if you aren’t working, working, working?

For you see, it is possible to be like Mary and sit at the foot of Jesus. It is possible to re-arrange our lives so that, as Jesus said, “few things are needed – or only one.” It is possible to plan our life so that we stop buying, we cut our cleaning load in half, we cook three things for supper instead of seven. We cut our laundry by a third when we told our children to each pick a towel and to use that same towel to dry off two days in a row. After all, they just took a shower and are clean, right?

It is possible to mow only half of our property, to pay off our debts, to train our children to focus upon less extracurricular activities and more God, to become more like Mary and less like the young Martha. We simply need to decide that we will do it. We decide what is important – and what is not important. Hopefully, our choices are God’s choices.

I know how it is. When we lived in Atlanta, Saundra and I took turns working twelve hour days, from 9 am to 9 pm at our business. Our vacations were two or three days long. We ate fast food most days. The business – the busyness – had become my god.

We moved to Ohio in May of 2003, and that summer, almost every evening I sat on my new front porch and watched the Muskingum River run by as the sun set, the sky turned golden-orange, and the birds sang. And that was where God was able to talk to me about life and what was important – and what was not.

And so I changed. And five years later, I had a new kind of busyiness. I worked full-time as a teacher at Parkersburg Catholic High School. I taught two evening courses at WVU-Parkersburg. I had a full-time seminary load and pastured two small churches, so my busy was God’s busy, I was always in the Word of God, I was talking about God in the high school, I was preaching on weekends and leading Bible studies, and I spent every Thursday evening watching a movie or some television with my wife and kids.

And now, my life is filled with God, but I work hard to not be busy with trivial things. I talk to people about God, I write sermons about God, I read books about God, and I sit on my back porch when the weather allows and I look at the clouds in the sky that God made, and think about God. My wife and I travel to the hospitals together and we enjoy life, because we know that we are always learning more about the kindest, gentlest, most loving Being in the Universe, the Creator, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We are always learning more about who God is. And that is the only important thing in this life.

For you see, when we look at the other story about Mary and Martha and Jesus, the story where Lazarus died and came back to life…It was not the strident, accusing statement of the powerful Martha standing in Jesus’ face “LORD, if you had been here our brother would not have died!” It wasn’t that statement that really moved Jesus to bring back Lazarus.

It was the plea of the weak Mary on her knees saying the very same thing, except in a different way: “Lord, if you had been here our brother would not have died!” It was Mary’s plea on her knees while she was at His feet that really moved Jesus, that tore Him up, that led Him to walk to her brother’s tomb. It really helps, you see, to have watched the Son of God up close, to know His character, to know what is important to Him when our loved one is lying in the tomb.

So let’s clean out our closets and cupboards and lives and throw some stuff away. Plan to hold onto our cars another two years. Buy some wildflower seeds and scatter them over half our yards and plant only perennial flowers. Let’s give away our knickknacks. Tell the kids that they only get a single extracurricula activity this year. Let’s go home from work a half hour earlier and stop scheduling so many things on Sunday. Wear our clothes another year. Stop buying coffee and use the money to pay off our debts. Simplify our lives so we have time to breathe and sit at the feet of Jesus.

“Few things are needed – or only one.” Will you, like Mary, choose what is better?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnjeMwxFuBA

Johnny Diaz lyric video “Breathe”

Where are the Samaritans?

Amos 7:7-17; Psalm 82;Colossians 1:1-14; Luke 10:25-37

I want to focus upon two of our readings from the Word of God today. One is familiar; the other is a story rarely mentioned. These stories are straight from Holy Scripture, and as such, they carry the weight of God’s Word – God speaking directly to us about two related subjects. Let’s talk about the rare story first. Let’s look at the first reading this morning.

The kingdom of David and Solomon had been divided into two parts about two hundred years earlier. In the south were the large tribe of Judah and the small tribe of Benjamin. These two formed the kingdom of Judea, based in Jerusalem. The people of Judea worshipped at the Temple built by David – They had a high priest descended from Aaron, and many men from the tribe of Levi were priests in the Temple on a rotating basis. Eventually, the people who lived here would become known as Judeans or Jews.

In the north, in the land known as Samaria, there was another kingdom, the kingdom of Israel that was composed of the other ten tribes. They were ruled at this time by King Jeroboam II, they worshipped at Bethel and at Dan and in high places on the tops of the mountains. Their priests were men that Jeroboam appointed – they might be from any tribe, they might have been farmers or smiths or shopkeepers, their fathers and grandfathers might have been Levites – or not. Furthermore, many of the people of Israel worshipped Baal, a disgusting god that demanded infant sacrifice. They did not worship God, they did not worship at Jerusalem in the Temple, they worshipped evil itself and called it good.

And into this walks Amos the prophet.

Amos was not born a prophet. Amos did not ask to be a prophet. Amos didn’t ask to teach. He wasn’t highly educated. He wasn’t trained in seminary. He was a shepherd and he pruned sycamore fig trees. But one day, the Lord took Amos from his farming and herding duties and told him to prophesy to Israel, an entire nation of people, a geographic area the size of an American state. AND AMOS LISTENED! Amos left his herding and Amos left his fig trees and Amos walked north into the land of Israel and began to preach to people. What confidence! What trust in God! What an example of following God’s will! What did Amos tell the people of Israel?

7 This is what he showed me: The Lord was standing by a wall that had been built true to plumb, with a plumb line in his hand. 8 And the Lord asked me, “What do you see, Amos?”

“A plumb line,” I replied.

Then the Lord said, “Look, I am setting a plumb line among my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.

9 “The high places of Isaac will be destroyed
and the sanctuaries of Israel will be ruined;
with my sword I will rise against the house of Jeroboam.”

You see, when you build a wall, you hang a lead weight from a line – Plumbun was the latin word for lead – in chemistry the symbol for lead is still Pb. So a plumb line is a string with a lead weight on it. You hang the lead weight, the plumb line, and from this you can measure just how far each brick is from the line. If you keep them all the same distance from the line, you have a vertical wall that won’t easily fall over. But without such a plumb line, your wall will most likely be built on a very slight slant and fall over. The plumb line is your absolute standard for what is good and perfect and right.

The Lord had shown Amos that God had a standard for right and wrong, an absolute standard, and because Israel no longer followed the standard – in this case by worshiping at Jerusalem, lead by priests from the tribe of Levi, people worshipping other gods – God was going to allow Israel to be destroyed. The problem, you see, was that God demands attention be paid to God.

9 “The high places of Isaac will be destroyed
and the sanctuaries of Israel will be ruined;
with my sword I will rise against the house of Jeroboam.”
And so, Jeroboam’s priest at Bethel tells Amos to go south, to go home to Jerusalem and to stop preaching at Bethel.

But Amos, the former shepherd and fig-tree pruner, responds:

You say,

“‘Do not prophesy against Israel,
and stop preaching against the descendants of Isaac.’

17 “Therefore this is what the Lord says:

“‘Your wife will become a prostitute in the city,
and your sons and daughters will fall by the sword.
Your land will be measured and divided up,
and you yourself will die in a pagan country.
And Israel will surely go into exile,
away from their native land.’”

Twenty-four years later, the Assyrians came and took away many of the people of Israel into captivity in Assyria, what is now northern Syria and Iraq. Many more of the people fled south into Judah. Others fled the land, never to return. The prophecy of the shepherd and fig-tree pruner had come to pass.

Let’s fast forward almost 800 years.

An expert on Jewish law, an expert on Jewish religion, a man who understood very well what Judaism was all about stood up to question Jesus. He asked a fundamental, basic, very important question: “What must I do to inherit eternal life?”

And in typical Jesus fashion, Jesus answers the man’s question with a question. “How do you read the Law?”

The man answers: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

And Jesus applauds him! “Do this and you will live!” Jesus says.

For this is what God commands. We are to love God with all our hearts and with all our souls and with all our strength and with all our minds. And at the same time, we are to love our neighbors as ourselves. And so we look at the plain meaning of these commands and we realize with a sick feeling in the pit of our stomach what this would mean – we would need to spend our mornings studying scripture, we would need to spend our afternoons doing good deeds for our neighbors, we would need to spend our evenings talking with our neighbors about God. We would become religious fanatics, we would give away many of our material goods, we might even become preachers! And so we begin to look for the exits, because we realize that God is not asking us spend an hour a week paying attention to Him, Christ is not asking for a tenth of our income, God is not asking us to invite people to church once or twice a year, but God and Jesus Christ are both saying: Give your life to me! AND THIS IS WHAT THE TEXT SAYS IS NECESSARY TO INHERIT ETERNAL LIFE!

Let’s go back and read it a second time:

25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”
That’s tough talk. That’s really, really tough talk. That’s the sort of tough talk that only Jesus could give us and us listen to, because, you see, we’ve lived our lives around people who were lukewarm about God, our relatives have been lukewarm about God or even a bit cool to God, and even the people in the church around us have been lukewarm, but…

When you decided to get married, was your love at room temperature? Did you look at him or at her and say, “looking at him or her does absolutely nothing to me?” Or did you look at him or her and say, “what a hot girl” or “what a cool guy!” Room temperature love is no love at all, is it?

When you go out to eat at a restaurant, how many of you order room temperature ice tea? When you order a drink, how many of you order your Coke to be at room temperature? When you have a coffee, how many of you like room temperature coffee?

How about your meat? How many of you like your fried chicken to be served at room temperature? How many of you like your steak at room temperature? How many of you prefer your BBQ to be at room temperature? How many of you like ice cream at room temperature?

Why is that?

Because when a chicken is at room temperature for while, it is dead and beginning to rot. When a cow is at room temperature for a few hours, the cow is dead and beginning to rot. When a pig is at room temperature for a while, the pig is dead and beginning to rot. You can keep your meat cold and preserve it, or cook it hot and kill the rot-causing bacteria, but if you leave it at room temperature it will soon be worthless.

Why do you prefer to keep your love of God at room temperature? Luke-warm, not hot enough to kill the rot, not cold enough to honestly say, “I don’t believe in God”, but room temperature. The temperature of death and rot.

Oh I pray that your love of God would be hot and passionate, like the love of two people that leads them to get married! Oh, I pray that your love of God would be hot and sizzling, like steaks cooking on a grill on high! Oh, I pray that your love of God would be boiling hot like the water you just took from a whistling kettle on top of a stove!

The guy that has been talking to Jesus, he also can’t stand the plain meaning of Jesus’ answer – loving God completely and loving other people as yourself is too much for the guy. The guy couldn’t stop there. The guy, just like many teachers and professors and others who can’t just take a simple answer, decided that he needed to go another level.”And who is my neighbor?” he asked. He couldn’t just accept that anyone could be his neighbor. Instead, he wanted to define the word, he wanted to categorize the word, he wanted to very carefully split some hairs and come up with a way to decide who was a neighbor and who wasn’t a neighbor. He wanted to make it easier by narrowing down the number of people he was supposed to love.

You can almost hear the many ready to ask, “And so, if someone is living in the neighborhood, but only rents, is he a neighbor? Or if someone is a foreigner and has only been here for a month, is he a neighbor? Or if someone is visiting his Aunt Sally, but will leave next month, is he a neighbor? And what about his children? And what about the people who live in the hotel? And what about the people in the nursing home? And those at the campground? “And you can hear the questions and the exceptions developing and developing.

Jesus appears for a moment to change the subject.

Jesus tells a long story. It is the story of a man who travels from mountaintop Jerusalem down the long, steep mountain road down, down, down to Jericho by the Dead Sea in the Jordan Valley. He walks downhill through very rough terrain down over 3300 feet – more than three times the drop from the top of Seneca Rocks to the valley below.

And on the way down, suddenly from behind some rocks jumps out some robbers, who attack him, beat him, strip him and leave him to die on the road, like the way some people are attacked by life – they lose a job, they find themselves injured in a car wreck, their spouse runs off to be with another, and they are left alone on the highway of life. And the man lies there, bleeding out in a pool of blood, lying in the hot sun with no water, getting sunburned and baked and the flies are buzzing around.

A priest walks by, a Sunday school leader, a minister, a man who is holy and respected and works in the Temple on a regular basis. The priest is on important business, because all the business of a priest is important business, and when he sees this man he just walks right by because his time is too valuable, he has his own family to take care of and there might still be robbers around and so he walks faster and passes by on the other side of the road. He stays away so he won’t get any of the icky blood on him.

Soon, a Levite comes to the man lying bleeding in the road. The Levite is not a priest, a minister, but he could have been, his father or his grandfather was a priest, a leader in the Temple, a minister, but this Levite hasn’t yet been called to the ministry, yet he is important, because all Levites are important because they are good Jews, they know about God’s rules, and they attend Temple services once a week, and besides there are the king’s guards and the soldiers and the police and the rescue squad. It is their job to take care of people, they are the professionals, he is still waiting for his call, perhaps if he were a full-fledged priest he’d stop what he was doing and take care of the man, but he isn’t trained, he isn’t capable, he doesn’t know what he’d say or do and he walks on past.

And finally, along comes a man from Samaria. His ancestors had worshipped Baal, his family had worshipped God at Bethel, his family had been punished by God and taken away to another land and so he looked different, he spoke differently, he even smelled differently because he ate different food. The priest and the Levite looked down upon this man, the priest and the Levite and all the other good people from Jerusalem looked at this man and stayed away from him because his ancestors were mixed up about God and who to worship, and because he ate different food he was dirty and good Jews did not mingle with Samaritans, they were the wrong type of people, they were from across the tracks, they were foreign.

But this Samaritan sees the traveler lying there in a pool of his own blood, with the hot desert sun beating down on him, his bruises on his body beginning to form. The Samaritan doesn’t know this man, he’s never met him before, and this Samaritan recognizes that it could just as easily be the Samaritan lying on the ground for he had known verbal beatings as words were hurled at him. He had felt the hot desert sun beating down on him as he worked hard for a few coins. The Samaritan had bled pools of tears from his own body as he had fallen asleep many nights for the mistakes his ancestors had made, the mistakes that had sent Amos to his land with the dreaded Word of God. And the Samaritan took pity on the man in the road, recognized him as a fellow human, and lifted him up and put him on his own donkey, bandaging his wounds and putting disinfecting wine and healing oil on those infected cuts and abrasions, treating him as though he were a brother, a beloved servant or master, or as his neighbor friend.

And the Samaritan did not stop that day, but he took the man to a place of safety. He took the man into a safe, clean room at the inn, he paid for the room and food, he watched over the beaten man that evening, and then, because he really did have important business, he left the man at the inn, but not until he gave the innkeeper two days worth of wages, the equivalent of a couple hundred dollars, and a promise to pay for any additional expenses when he returned.

And Jesus asked the man in front of him that day, he asked the expert in the Law, the expert in Judaism, the expert on the Bible – “who was neighbor to the hurt man?”

Well the answer was clear, so the expert said, “The one who had mercy upon him.”

Jesus said “Go and do the same”.

And now for the real question. Where are the Samaritans today? Who today is a Samaritan in our world?

But pastor, in what sense to you mean? If you are talking about the Samaritans as the nice people who stop and help other people, then I’m one of them! Surely, if a man was lying stripped and naked, bleeding on the road, I’d stop to help him.

And yes, indeed, we have some Samaritans in this church. Two weeks ago, Terri Jo and Bud Boyer were visiting his mother out on Route 20 just south of the 20/57 split. There was a noise and a crash and they discovered that a motorcyclist and passenger had hit a deer and sailed over the hedge to hit the house. One rider was dead, the other rider was severely injured and was life-flighted out. Meanwhile, a woman traveling on another motorcycle simply broke down in tears. Terri Jo, who you may not know because she is so quiet and unassuming, stepped up, laid her hands upon the woman and prayed with her right then and there, giving her the help that the woman needed for her hurts and wounds. Terri even said that it was not her speaking, but God was speaking through her. Terri was simply open to giving help to another soul who was hurting.

A few months ago on a Sunday morning, Saundra called me because there was a homeless man at one of her churches who had asked to speak to a man, and there were no men at her church. I spoke to Gary Auvil briefly and Gary drove over and took care of the guy, taking him where he needed to go and even getting him some shoes.

Going back a little farther, Fred Waldron helped out his neighbor repeatedly. Eventually, that neighbor stopped his keystone bad habit and began attending church.

Do you listen to the call of Jesus to show mercy to others?

It is often difficult. The most difficult thing is to transition from our behavior as parents to showing mercy and grace to other adults. You see, we teach our children to stand on their own two feet, to take care of themselves, to be responsible, to be strong enough, work hard enough, and have a sound enough character that they don’t need to ask for help from anyone.

And then, when we find someone who needs help, our natural tendency is to scold them, to point out that if they had done things differently, they wouldn’t need help, this comes from not working hard enough to have a job with good health insurance, you shouldn’t walk along the highway by yourself, etc, etc. But that is not what the Samaritan did. He bandaged the guy’s wounds, he loaded him up on his donkey, and he took care of him, never expected a cent in return – or even thanks. He did it because it is showing love for your neighbor and that is the right thing to do.

But another way to look at the question of the Samaritan is this: Who is it that you think are evil, nasty people? Jesus did not pick the Samaritan out of the air as the hero of this story – the Samaritans were the despised, people whom God had punished because they worshipped the wrong god, the people Amos had chastised, the people God had taken away from the homes and villages centuries before, the people who had struggled and finally returned home, and who still refused to worship God at Jerusalem. Who, in your mind is your modern Samaritan?

Is it a man with Arabic ancestors? Is it a woman with a heroin addiction?

Is your personal Samaritan a Mexican, a Chinese, an inner city black? Do you despise those who are on welfare, do you dislike those who wear tattoos, or do you simply hate all politicians?

Some people can’t stand Republicans, some people can’t stand Democrats, some people dislike coal miners and some are angry at water truck drivers. Still others have a real problem with those who wear black makeup, some get upset with loud teenagers with spiky rainbow-colored hair and some simply don’t like anyone on the face of the planet.

But Jesus was very clear on this point and the Apostle Paul went back to it over and over again in his writings: God loves everyone, but everyone has sinned. Think about the one person you’d least like to eat supper with. Our command to love our neighbor includes everyone, each person, even especially the person you just thought about, and the biggest reason most churches don’t grow is because we don’t really love everybody, just those people who are like us, and we let the other people know that in the way we don’t really enjoy talking to them.

And yet, those other people have been injured on the highway of life just as you have, those other people have been beaten by other people, perhaps you helped with your words of scorn, and those other people have lain there in their pools of tears because of the damage that’s been done to them by the robbers of the world – the men and women who deep down believe that they have the right to take and use the garments of respect we wore on the highway.

Perhaps you’ve been a Samaritan. Perhaps you’ve seen travelers on the road beaten. Perhaps you’ve remembered when you were beaten on your life’s highway, and your heart went out to all who lie in the roadway because you have lain there yourself. Perhaps you went to bend down and bandage those wounds, to pour disinfecting wine and soothing, healing oil on those wounds, perhaps you went to lift up these folk and put them on your donkey, carrying them to a nice, clean, safe room at an inn.

Or perhaps you have been the robbers, the men or women who attacked and beat and robbed and stripped others of their self-respect, their life force and left them for dead. Perhaps you left others lying in the road, there to die in the hot sun. Who have you left behind in the world?

So who were you in this story?

Were you the priest, busy with important business of the church, perhaps struggling to decide whether or not you have time or money or even should help a particular person? Or were you a Levite, busy with important issues, thinking that there are other people whose job is handle these robberies. Were you the Samaritan, the good guy who bandaged the wounds? Or the Samaritan, the man or woman who has been kicked and beaten himself so many times you truly feel pity for anyone lying along the road. Or were you one of the robbers, beating up people and leaving them for dead, taking from them and demanding from them what they can’t give?

There is one more person in the story. There is the innkeeper.

Think about it. One day, this Samaritan – whom you can’t stand because, after all, he is a Samaritan,- he brings into your inn a naked, bleeding man who is at death’s door and demands a room. Then next morning, he gives you a few days pre-payment on the room and some food, and leaves the beaten man behind, promises to pay you any expenses, and leaves.

Innkeeper, what will you do?

Will you trust an unbelieving Samaritan? Will you follow the orders of a traveling Samaritan? Will you also take care of this man, whom the robbers have beaten, or will you turn him out onto the highway? After all, the robbers might have specially targeted this man, and they might destroy your inn if they find you are taking care of him.

Yet there is one thing which may guide your actions, one thought which goes through your head, one particular idea which goes to the heart of why you own an inn in the first place and why it is such an excellent inn. It is something another man said to you months ago, a man who was traveling from Jericho up to Jerusalem, a rabbi, a teacher, and what He taught: “Love God completely, and love your neighbor as yourself.”

A couple of months later, some travelers brought you the news. That rabbi had died on a cross. And you wondered if that rabbi’s death might somehow be related to the rabbi’s teaching:

“Love God completely, and love your neighbor as yourself”

Go and do likewise, oh Samaritan! For many lie like you beaten upon the highway of life.

The Work of the Disciple

2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Galatians 6:1-16; Luke 10:1-12. 16-20

As you are mostly aware, I have some kids. I want to talk about three of my kids today for a few minutes.

My son Ian is an academic. The only thing Ian loves more than sitting in a classroom is teaching in a classroom. Ian loves reading books, writing papers, taking tests, and gathering together what we would call “book-learning.” Ian is a historian. When he was seventeen, I once sneaked a peek at his computer to see what he’d hidden on it. I found books and books and books by ancient Roman historians. But Ian does not like doing things with his hands – he almost flunked pre-school because his scissor skills were so poor. He hated finger-painting. And Ian hates the great outdoors; he can’t stand camping – we’ve joked he’s happy only when the temperature around him is between 70 and 71 degrees.

My daughter Jessie is just the opposite. Jessie loves doing things with her hands and meeting new people. While she was in high school, Jessie got her Certified Nursing Assistant certificate. Now, living in Alaska, she has just become a welder and is working at a gold mine repairing the trucks and other heavy equipment. Jessie loves the outdoors; she lives in a cabin without running water and loves it. She likes taking long hikes and looking at moose in -30 degree snow storms. And she really can’t stand sitting still in a classroom. But she learns quickly.

Andy, whom most of you know, is a mix of the two. Andy loves classroom discussions, he loves writing papers, he loves his academics, but he doesn't like reading textbooks much. And Andy is also an Eagle Scout who teaches camping and wilderness survival and personal fitness – as well as chess. Andy loves his laptop computer – he even took it to Boy Scout camp so he can take an online class this summer when he’s not hiking or tent-camping.

I tell you all of this because our topic today is the work of the disciple, a word that is usually translated as “student”, but that translation drops an awful lot of the original meaning. For a better definition might actually be “apprentice”.

Jesus did not send his disciples into a classroom with four walls to study old scrolls filled with ancient theology – but He did teach them Old Testament scripture. Jesus did not hand his disciples textbook upon textbook explaining what Christianity was – but He did teach them by showing them who Christ was. Jesus did not give his students pointless role-playing exercises or ask them to do the equivalent of welding two random pieces of iron together – Instead, Jesus walked around the countryside with the disciples, showed them how to talk to real-life people and then talked to the disciples about what He had done. Just as a carpenter’s apprentice learns by doing, the disciples learned by watching and doing. And sometimes, Jesus gave them assignments for them to complete without Him as part of their training. Today, we’ll talk about one of those assignments…

…And so the disciples were walking along the road. The entire band was there – the Twelve, as well as the hundred and twenty loyal men and women, and even a large group of the crowd of spectators. They had been walking through Samaria, heading south, heading toward Jerusalem. But now they entered the land of Judea, the land ruled from Jerusalem, inhabited by Jews once again. And Jesus decided to change the way He was operating.

Jesus called the Twelve together and the hundred and twenty, those loyal people who were committed to the Jesus Movement, but, for one reason or another, weren’t yet ready for the intense training the twelve disciples got. The hundred and twenty included people with names that would become famous later on, men like Barnabas, who would bring Paul into the fellowship and travel with him on his first missionary journey. The hundred and twenty included Jesus’ brothers, his mother, and Mary Magdalene and Salome, and John Mark, a teenager who would later travel with Peter and write the Gospel of Mark. Perhaps Apollos was there, perhaps Stephen, perhaps Phillip the Evangelist, Mathias was definitely there, as was Barsabbas, also known as Justus, the eventual replacement and runner-up for the job of joining the Eleven after Judas Iscariot had killed himself. There were many more names, men and women who were very committed to Jesus, but weren’t quite included in the top Twelve.

Jesus calls them all together and picks thirty-five or thirty-six teams of two people each to go out into the villages nearby. Can you imagine being hand-picked by Jesus to carry His word into the world? There were pairs of men who were best friends, men who were brothers, men who didn’t know each other well before that day but who grew to know each other well that day. There were probably married couples, and there may have even been pairs of women, sisters, friends, who were sent out, for Judea in those days was relatively safe if you knew how to act. Who would you have as your partner if you were called? Imagine standing with your partner, gathered around Jesus.

Then, that hot morning on the dusty road in Judea, near the border with Samaria where the people the Jews hated lived, Jesus gave you instructions.

“So listen up, everybody!

“There is a big harvest out there, but we don’t have enough workers. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field, people like yourselves who love me and love Our Father. Our Father wants to bring people home to Heaven – that is the harvest!

“ Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. I know you don’t have much training, and there are people out there who will want to send you running. But you’ll do well. Now, do not take a purse or bag or even sandals – I don’t want anyone to have an excuse to rob you; and do not greet anyone on the road – stay focused upon your mission and don’t dawdle!

“Go into a village and pick a house. Some of you go to the Judean villages and some to the Samaritan villages. Knock on the door and introduce yourself, and ask if you can speak with them for a few minutes. When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ If someone who promotes peace is there, your peace will rest on them; if not, it will return to you. Some people you meet with will be gentle, friendly individuals – others will be paranoid nutcases, but that’s the way people are!

“ Stay there, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for you the worker deserves his wages. Accept their hospitality. Do not move around from house to house. One good conversation is enough for now.

“When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is offered to you.

“ Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ Listen to them and pray with them. Point out that God has sent you today because God cares for them.

“ But when you enter a town and are not welcomed, go into its streets and say, ‘Even the dust of your town we wipe from our feet as a warning to you. Yet be sure of this: The kingdom of God has come near.’ I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town, for God gave them a chance and they would not listen.

“Whoever listens to you listens to me; whoever rejects you rejects me; but whoever rejects me rejects him who sent me, and you know that God has sent me.”

Those were the instructions Jesus gave to you and the other 70 or so men and women who were sent into the villages. And so you walked through the dust with your partner, not even carrying a testament, but tasting the dust as you walked around the hill to the next village. What would happen? What would you find?

When the loyal men and women who had followed Jesus’ instructions returned, they had wonderful stories to tell. Some told of how they had talked to old women and prayed with them. Others told of how they had met farmers working hard that day and how they had given them hope that God would not forget them even when their farms were having trouble. Still others told of shopkeepers and smiths, of hard-working men and women – and of beggars who were barely living. And some told of terrible encounters with men who ordered them to leave – and others told of praying for demons to leave a possessed girl – and the demons leaving. And you had stories to tell, also.

Jesus heard all their stories and rejoiced. “I saw Satan falling from Heaven while you were gone, “ He said. “the enemy knows that the counterattack has begun, and he is worried.”

“I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. Keep up the good work!

“However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven. It is not the power that you have that is important. What is important is that your souls are saved and being saved because of your devotion to My work.”

And that evening, you and the other 70 or so slept well, for you knew that you were right with God and that you had found your purpose in life – to tell people about Jesus the Christ.

The work of the disciple, you see, is to learn to do as Christ did. Jesus Christ spent His days helping people and connecting them to God. Jesus did not spend His time explaining Christian theology to everyone He met – instead, He helped them and told them that God loved them. He forgave them. He looked for the damage in their hearts and souls and He did and said those deeds and words that would most heal that damage. And when He left the planet, His disciples explained how much He loved everyone to other people. His disciples loved people, they did extraordinary good deeds and they helped people understand that God does not hate sinners but wants to help sinners. The disciples explained that Jesus had died to take away the death that we all deserve for our actions and words, and the disciples led people into a good relationship with God.

And the hardest thing for every disciple to learn is this one simple teaching: "God does not have favorites." The first disciples were all Jews and they had to learn that God loves non-Jews too. The first disciples were mostly men and they had to learn that God loves women, too. The first disciples were adults and they had to learn that God loves children, too. And as time went on and on, every generation of disciples had to learn one more time that whoever you think you’re better than, God doesn’t love you a bit more – or less – than the person on the other side of the street or the town or the world whom you are looking down at in anger or disgust. This is perhaps the most difficult lesson to learn – that God loves us all and just like Saundra and I love Ian and Jessie and Andy and Heather and Hollie equally – tremendously, to the depths of our hearts – God loves you and the person beside you and the people you hate just as much – to the depths of God’s Being.

And it is our responsibility, it is our task, it is our work as disciples to accept that love ourselves. and then to love all people. Completely. As much as we love ourselves.

John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, one day called a conference together of all his preachers. It was the very first conference he called. At that conference, Wesley announced that the purpose of the conference was that “we might save our own souls and the souls of those who listen to us.” Loving others means we save our own souls first. And the best way to save your soul is to grow closer to Christ. And the best way to grow close to Christ is to walk with Him and introduce Him to others – as the first disciples did. They walked with Christ daily, watching Him work, listening to His words, and introducing Him to the people they met along the way.

And so, to you sitting here today, what will you do this holiday week? Will you speak of Vacation Bible School, will you speak of the Refit Exercise and Worship, will you simply speak of God’s Son, Jesus Christ and what you have learned about Him over the last three years? For Jesus is still sending people into the world – it is up to you to choose your village and the doors you knock on. It is up to you to spread the Word – Christ has died, Christ has risen. Christ will come again. Jesus Christ loves you and this can change everything in your life! It’s as simple as that!

So pick a partner, pick a neighborhood, pick a door, and knock.

Fruits and Excuses - What is Your Calling?

1 Kings 19:15-21; Psalm 16; Galatians 5:1, 13-25; Luke 9:51-62 

About fifteen years ago, a white-haired man from the new church we were attending stopped in to visit Saundra and me at our business, which was about a mile from the new church. It was the first of several visits that Jim made to us the last years we lived in Georgia. One of those visits was key for me.

I had begun to write my first book about Christianity, and I asked Jim to read the couple of chapters that I’d finished. Jim was very encouraging. But, you see, I had doubts at the time. I wondered if I had received the Holy Spirit at all – the previous church we attended, the church where I accepted that Jesus had saved me, the church where I was baptized – in that church, the official theology was that the actions of the Holy Spirit had stopped about the time that the Apostle John, the last of the original apostles, had died. And so I wondered – I had doubts about whether the Holy Spirit was speaking to me. And I asked Jim what he thought because the Reverend Jim Webb had pastured many churches in fifty-five years of ministry. I asked an experienced pastor if I was truly on track.

“There’s no way you could write what you’ve written unless you were listening to the Holy Spirit,” Jim said. And that was that.

We soon left Georgia and moved to Ohio. Another pastor, Steve Dennis, asked me to read the prayers, and the scripture – the job of what our lay leaders and lay speakers do. After a couple months of this, Steve, who had led pastoral training for his denomination, came to me after the service one day and asked, “I’m not sure how to ask this delicately, so I’ll just ask it bluntly. Have you ever considered the ministry?”

I had, and it was soon after that that I began studies for ministry. My calling had been confirmed by two pastors I respected.

A few years later, I was pastoring two small churches 30 miles from my home. I prepared a sermon every week and preached it twice. I taught two Bible studies on Tuesday evenings. I showed up once a month for a church-sponsored community dinner. And I visited people on Sunday afternoons. But that wasn’t my whole life. I also taught full-time at Parkersburg Catholic High School. I taught two evening courses at WVU-Parkersburg on Mondays and Wednesdays. And I took a full-time seminary course load, four or five courses a semester, and found time to watch a DVD with my family every Thursday evening. I was never bored!

The original disciples, eleven in number after the loss of Judas, were initially convinced that Jesus would return in a matter of months or years. But as those original Apostles aged, they began to look toward developing successors, looking for men primarily, but sometimes women – in particular Phoebe and Priscilla come to mind – you’ll find them in the book of Acts and the last chapter of Romans. The Apostles looked to find people who could and would spread the Gospel far and wide. And so they found men and women of talent, men and women who loved the Lord, men and women whose loyalties lie not with money and prestige and the other gods of this world, but who were willing to focus their lives upon saving their souls and the souls of those people they encountered as God brought them face-to-face with those people.

We see a pattern for this developing early, even before Jesus arrived on earth. Elijah was sent by God to name Elisha to be his replacement prophet, because Elijah was old and worn out. We remember Elijah, but when we analyze the deeds of the two men, Elisha did even greater deeds that Elijah had.

Elijah placed his mantel, his cloak, on Elisha, who was a wealthy, yet hands-on farmer – he was plowing with 12 pair of oxen and he was driving the twelfth pair himself. Elisha had been successful in the world, Elisha drove a Lexus, Elisha had a 4000 square foot home even in a country ruled by Ahab and Jezebel, a king and queen who worshipped false gods.

And Elisha, to his credit, stopped right there when Elijah put his cloak on his shoulders. Elisha slaughtered his oxen, cooking the meat with the plowing equipment and harness, and followed Elijah. To put it in a modern context, he scrapped and destroyed all his tractors that day, he killed his most valuable livestock, he burnt his customer list, he gave away his Lexus and his house, he melted down his computers and office furniture, he walked away from his family business, never, ever to return – and he made sure that there was nothing to return to. That is a commitment to God, my friends!

Years late, when Jesus is walking along, Jesus is asking people to follow him. What most people don’t realize is that the Jesus movement consisted of several groups of followers. There were the famous Twelve disciples, who received special teaching and were expected to teach and lead after Jesus returned to Heaven. Perhaps you are destined to be a successor to the Twelve, leading a congregation. Perhaps you have the ability to speak, the ability to understand what you are reading in the Bible, the ability to inspire other people to look at their gifts and passions and styles and walk closer to God. If you will, perhaps God has given you the abilities to become a full-time, starter on God’s team, working all week long to help people understand what Jesus taught and commanded. These people are committed to helping other people understand what God wants of us.

With Jesus, there was also the large crowd of hundreds and thousands of people who followed Jesus from place to place, watching and hoping to see miracles. Throughout history, there have been those spectators, like fans at a Mountaineer game, enjoying the spectacle of the church, the entertainment value of the show, the feeling of belonging that comes from sitting in the stands and cheering for the Mountaineers – or for God. When Jesus was winning, they came out in their thousands. They cheered His arrival into Jerusalem. But when the authorities turned against Him, they disappeared. Many went home – others even demanded Jesus’ crucifixion. They were spectators, consumers of religion, buyers of entertainment, looking to their needs rather than the needs of others. We still have many spectators in the church today. Most churches have a host of spectators. Are you a spectator?

But Christ did not intend Christianity to be a spectator sport. Jesus worked to get people on the field, playing the game, doing more than just watching. But Jesus only had three years – His time on this earth was short, and most people take longer than that to break free from the world and commit to following Jesus.

But. you see, there was a third group of followers of Jesus. There was also another group of about 120 men and women who followed Jesus closely, who provided financial support for the group, who listened closely to His teachings, who spread the word about His miracles, and who were committed to Him for the long term. They followed Him around the Holy Land, yet they weren’t in the first Twelve that Jesus called. We saw 70 disciples sent out 2 by 2 to announce the Kingdom was near. Most of them followed Him that day to the foot of the cross. Others helped bury Him. Still others went to find the empty tomb on that glorious Sunday morning.

These 120 people – men, women, teenagers - were present on the day Jesus returned to Heaven, and they were still together a week or so later when Pentecost arrived and the Holy Spirit came down and the crowd was once again drawn together. Many of them later appear in the Book of Acts and many of them are also listed in the final chapter of the Book of Romans, as Paul leads the Jesus movement to descend upon the capital of the Roman Empire to jumpstart the Church in that huge city. Perhaps you are destined to similarly become one of these committed people, men and women who spread the Gospel and do good works in their neighborhoods, their workplaces, their clubs.

Like the 120, perhaps you may not be ready to lead a church, but you are ready to lead a dozen or so people out of darkness and into an understanding of the love of Jesus Christ. Perhaps that is where you are. Perhaps you are the vital support staff, the trainers and coaches and scouts and the head of the concessions and the groundskeepers and all those other people who make sure the team on the field is functioning at peak efficiency. Is this who you are? For not everyone was ready to give up everything to become one of the Twelve. Yet many of these 120 eventually did give up their secular lives and went full-time for Jesus later in their lives.

And we also see in our Gospel reading that from time to time men would ask to follow Jesus. “Even foxes have places to sleep, but I don’t have a home”, He pointed out, reminding the men that the life of a prophet is a life on the road. We don’t just give up the chance to eat out at nice restaurants a couple times a week or some other minor comfort, we give up our homes. Is Jesus enough for you? Are you willing to move around wherever the Holy Spirit leads you so that your talents may be used to spread the Gospel?

Jesus asked another man to follow him, and the man said, “let me go bury my father.” In essence, he said, “I’ll follow you after my parents die.” He didn’t say “Let me go and have a party before I leave,” or some other trivial excuse. He was saying “I have to take care of my parents.” He had a serious life issue he was dealing with. But Jesus responded, “Let the dead bury their dead,” which meant – “the people who are not following me today are already dead. Follow me and have life. Which do you want – to stick with the dead or to have life with me?” Following Jesus is critically important.

In the 1930’s, many men and some women hopped freight cars to cross the country to find a new life, a life with hope instead of a life without options. As the train went passing by, each man or woman had to make a decision – the train was passing by – will you chose a new life or stay with your old life? The train is passing by. What is important in your life? The train is passing by.

Another man just wanted to go back and say goodbye to his family. Jesus was having none of it – “If you put your hand to the plow and look back, you aren’t fit for the kingdom.” In other words, are you ready to get to work or not? Do you look at your old life with regrets about leaving it, or is the new life attractive and interesting enough and eternally rewarding enough that you are ready to go forward now? Do you love Jesus and God that much?

Jesus understood that He had little time on this planet to teach and to minister. He understood that His time here was limited – and He knew just how much time He had. Jesus only had three years with us.

We, on the other hand, believe that we have plenty of time. We think we have much more time that Jesus – yet how many of us can guarantee that we will last through tomorrow? How many of you know whether or not Jesus will return this week or not?

Despite this lack of knowledge of our future, we have a tendency to put other life events in front of our ministry. “I’ll start in ministry when my children are grown. “or “I’ll start in ministry when I get my finances and retirement in order.” Or “I’ll start in ministry when I get married.” These are the excuses of younger people. I know. I made excuses and missed years of ministry because of them.

Older people are more sophisticated in their excuses. “I’m too old to start in ministry.” “I’ve been out of school too long for ministry.” “I’ve only got 20, 15, 10, 5 good years of ministry before I’d have to retire.” “I don’t want to leave my home to do ministry.” I also know these excuses. I made them too, and missed five years of ministry because of it. But my friend Jim was working for the Lord into his nineties. When Jim was 70 years old, he still had over 20 years of ministry ahead of him – years when he led people to Christ, years when souls were saved eternally because of Jim’s care, years when people like me chose to go into ministry because of Jim’s encouragement.

Does it really matter what our excuses are? The real issues that block us from ministry are quite simple:

Our comfort and our fear.

Let’s face it. Most of us are pretty comfortable in our lives and our lifestyles. We are basically paying our bills, we live in homes that only the wealthiest people in many countries could afford, and we are pretty much enjoying our lives. Our overwhelming fear is that our lives would change. We fear that we would be forced to drive a smaller, older car. We are afraid we’d have to move to a different town. We are concerned that we might have to meet 150 new people, like I did when I moved here, and we are afraid those people might not like us. We are afraid that we will meet messy people and their messy situations will make us uncomfortable. We love our comfort more than we love other people.

We know our current life and we like it. And so we let our comforts and our fears combine to override our concerns for lost souls. Here’s a simple check to see if you let your comforts and fears override your love for the lost – how many of you have invited someone who isn’t family, who you haven’t known for months or even years over to your house for dinner in the last five years? How many of you have invited Saundra and I over to dinner at your home? Are we that scary?

But Pastor, that’s just who we are. You pastors are a special type of person, you signed up for that sort of life, and we haven’t. We like our comforts and there’s nothing wrong with that. And we have fears, but this is a dangerous world and we see no need to bring non-Christians into our homes, especially when we have so many good Christian friends.

And you’re right on both counts. There is nothing wrong with liking comforts and the world is a dangerous place. And yet you place your souls in danger on both counts.

For you see, the flip side of loving our comforts is that we love our comforts more than other people – and Jesus didn’t tell us to love our comforts, but He DID say to love other people like ourselves. Part of developing as Christ asks us to develop is to love other people more and more. Will you stretch to love people more than your own comforts?

The flip side of fearing other people and the world is that we don’t trust God to protect us, we don’t believe God will take care of us, we don’t have faith in God’s goodness and ability. We really don’t have much faith in God. Part of developing as Christ asks us to is to put more and more faith in God to protect us. Will you stretch and learn to reach beyond your fears so you can grow closer to God?

And so, we have farther to go to develop in our Christian walk.

For a Christian should never love a comfort more than another person. One of the old saints wrote, “When a Christian has a pair of unworn shoes in his closet, he is stealing from the man who has no shoes.” Ouch! Our closets are full with shoes and clothes. Our homes have been feathered with comforts. When will our nests be feathered enough?

A Christian should never fear another person more than he has faith in his God. Especially an ordinary, run-of-the-mill person who is not threatening him, but simply is a man or woman or a family without a good Christian friend. We are afraid to just talk to strangers or have a coffee with them. It’s not like we live in a land where 2/3rds of the people we meet want to kill us and rob us! Yet, we’re afraid to invite a family that has lived beside us for years over to supper, because our house might not be clean enough or our food might not be restaurant quality.

How can we change? What is it that changes us into those special people who love others, who have constant faith in God, who choose to sell our homes and give up our good jobs and become ministers of the Gospel?

Paul provides us the answer in the fifth chapter of Galatians.

13 You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. 14 For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Indulging the flesh is another way of saying that we are concerned with comfort. We are not to be concerned with our own comforts – but we are to serve one another humbly in love.

And so we must practice loving others. Invite your neighbors over for a cookout; invite your friend over for lunch; mow your neighbor’s yard when they get behind in their yard work; wash that young mother’s dishes for her; fix your friend’s car; buy the young couple with toddlers a wading pool and watch the kids for a couple hours while mom takes a nap; show up with a complete meal for the family that has just traveled hours to visit a sick relative; offer to walk their dogs and pet their cats while they’re out of town on vacation. Stretch yourself and specifically work and practice loving new people, not just your kids and grandkids and nieces and nephews, but people you don’t know – or want to know.

Practice loving your neighbor as yourself. And learn to love in new ways. You may be really good at fixing your friends broken cars – try grilling them hot dogs. You may be really good at fixing church dinners – try taking care of three toddlers for a few hours. You may be really good at working at the food pantry – try delivering the food and talking for an hour with them about their children and grandchildren, and telling them about how God led you to our church.

Furthermore, Paul tells us:

16 So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

Following the Holy Spirit will keep you from hurting people and blindly following the Law. Following the Holy Spirit will keep you safe and guide you to do the right things. Listening to the Holy Spirit will tell you who needs help most of all. Be led by the Spirit – do not stay under the law.

How many of you would trespass into your neighbor’s yard? How many of you would trespass into your neighbor's yard to put out a fire on their back porch with a water hose? Most, right? Yet you have broken a law. You would break a law to save a house, right? But how many of us are willing to break laws of behavior that we have learned growing up to rescue a hurting soul from hell’s destruction?

Would you give our benevolence fund five thousand dollars from your retirement account that we might help people truly get cars repaired instead of just give people a tank of gas every month or two?

Would you buy a family a brand new computer so mom could get a job that would allow her to work from home with her children?

Will you sign up to help with Vacation Bible School because you want to serve, or will you tell us this fall that you didn’t serve because “no one asked me”? I’m asking you right now!

Would you give a man just out of prison a job mowing your lawn weekly so he’ll stay out of prison?

Would you take a few days and learn new computer skills so we could put recordings of our services on the Internet? I’ll teach you!

Would you write personal letters to people you don’t really know to cheer them up and lead them to Christ? One letter a week?

Would you spend a Saturday and build and paint a new sign for this church so people can find this church easier?

Would you drive around town putting up posters for events at the church? Would you contribute ten thousand dollars so we could put sermons on the radio? Would you spend a week planting flowers to beautify the church?

Would you write a letter to our District Superintendent, telling her that you are available to pastor a pair of churches with ten to fifteen people each, preaching twice every Sunday and visiting those people in those churches, teaching a Bible study and taking two, just two courses a year to learn how to be a better pastor for little pay? We have a shortage of pastors and the shortage will grow more intense over the next few years. Are you willing to leave behind the life you know, like Elisha did, and step forward for God? Or will you continue to follow the way of comfort, the life you understand, the life of the world and the flesh?

19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
To truly crucify the flesh, you must take action. You must leave behind your old life – you must step forward and truly belong to Christ Jesus by crucifying your own fleshly desires, your own desires for comfort. You must take your desires and hang them on the cross to die. Give them away, throw them away, drive them away. Let them die on the cross as Christ died.

Paul tells us to live by the Spirit and keep in step with the Spirit. And the best way to do this is to step forward beyond your fears, to step out in the faith that God is with you, to sprint where the Spirit speeds you rather than fall where the flesh flops you. John Wesley, when he convened the first Methodist conference of preachers, said that their purpose in gathering together was that they might save their own souls and them that heard them. Is your own soul saved?

Do you want to have love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control in your life? It happens when you trust God and listen to the Spirit, doing what the Spirit asks you to do. It happens when you decide that you can walk on a high wire without the net of the secular world to catch you, because you know that God will catch you even before you begin to fall.

Put away your excuses – God can handle every excuse if you are willing to follow the Spirit. Destroy your acts of the flesh – God can destroy the flesh and every evil act you can do if you will surrender your will to His. Instead of reaching for comfort, grasp instead for the fruit of the Spirit – and find life in those gentle whisperings of the Spirit, find love in those people you meet, find happiness and joy in watching God work.

Don’t look at the other people you’ve seen in ministry; don’t compare yourself to them negatively. Every minister has a different set of gifts; every minister is good at some things and so-so at other things. God is ready to act in your life and help you to succeed – if you truly believe that Jesus Christ is THE way, THE truth, and THE light.

And so, what is your area of growth? Where do you need to grow? Are you ready to love people more and your comforts less and move from being a spectator to support staff? Are you ready to love people in different ways? Are you ready to chuck all of the excuses into your spiritual waste basket and devote your entire life to serving God full-time? Only you and the Holy Spirit can decide, but if you want to talk about it, contact me. For Jesus is calling you into ministry – how will you respond?

Father's Day - What Makes a Great Father!

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.