The Faith of Abraham

Five years and a month ago, I found myself in Italy. My seminary required me to take a trip to another non-English speaking country so I could understand being in another culture. Of course, I’d lived with a Japanese roommate in college, and three-quarters of the physics students at WVU were born in other countries. For business reasons, I had traveled to Japan for two weeks and spent three weeks in Europe training distributors in England, The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, and France. I’d worked in two Japanese-owned companies, working every day with Japanese nationals. I had traveled to French-speaking Canada on business and to Mexico for two weeks with my high-school Spanish class. Saundra and I had spent four years hosting international students from China, Japan, Korea, Brazil, and Saudi Arabia in our home. When we lived in New Jersey, our best friends were from Norway and Taiwan. Yet, seminary didn’t think I knew anything about other cultures.

The seminary organized a trip for thirty seminary students, most of whom were older folks like me. Some were married couples, but I had to go alone because of the cost. I left behind my wife and family.

So in January of 2013, I found myself walking alone in the rain on the streets of ancient Pompeii on the slopes of Mt Vesuvius. Those cobblestone streets can be slick – the ruts are still there from the donkey carts of the ancient Romans who were killed when the volcano poured hot ash over the city in 79 A.D. just 9 years after the destruction of Jerusalem by those same Romans, those Romans who burned Jerusalem and tore down the great Temple in 70 A.D. The volcano's ash killed people in place, and the archaeologists who excavated the site poured plaster of Paris into the voids left after the bodies decayed, which allowed us to see these "statues" of these Romans, frozen in their last moments as the hot gases and ash caught up with them.

Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16; Psalm 22:23-31; Romans 4:13-25; Mark 8:31-38 

In January, the weather in southern Italy is rainy, with temperatures in the mid-50’s. That day I walked alone most of the day, looking at homes with beautiful mosaic portraits on their floors, with fountains in their living rooms, with baked clay pipes in their walls to lead the rain into cisterns and those fountains because in the summer, when the crowds come, the city is hot and dry. But that day, I was thousands of miles from home and I walked alone with a few stray dogs, occasionally running into a handful of Chinese tourists, and the Roman dead.

The homes were yellow and pink, with a bit of blue. Several corners in the city have counters with holes in their tops, just right for sitting ceramic soup pots on top of fire, the ancient version of a fast food restaurant – "which soup would you like today, friend?" But no one was there to make or serve the soup, - those counters had been closed for almost 2000 years. So I looked for a few minutes and walked through the drizzle to the ancient amphitheater, and then walked through the 10,000 seat stadium and out the exit past a group of ancient tombs, leaving Pompeii to the stray dogs and the Roman ghosts.

A few days later I spent an afternoon walking around Rome. The rain had stopped. There were far more people, people from all over the world walking past me. I started at the Coliseum, walked past various fountains, crossed the Tiber River, eventually found myself at the Vatican, and then ate supper in a Burger King. In one afternoon I had traveled from the time of Christ to the time of the Reformation up to today. And the buildings and homes were yellow and pink, with a bit of blue. I’m not really sure what has changed in Italy over the centuries – there are just more people around today.

When I stopped for lunch that day, I found that I was about fifty yards behind two female pastors from California that were with our group. They went to a lunch wagon where two men from Bangladesh were selling panini sandwiches. The Bengali men greeted them in English. When I walked up, they greeted me in Italian and held the entire conversation with me in Italian. I guess I had figured out how to blend in. The sandwich was terrible, bland, with no salt. I walked on.

I eventually caught the subway back to the hotel to find out that the main group had a run in with pick-pockets. No one bothered me, even though I was alone, far from home, wandering in a strange town by myself. It reminded me of a story from the Bible, a story about another man who wandered far from home.

The central part of the Book of Genesis focuses upon a man named Abram – his name means “exalted father”, and his half-sister, who is his wife – Sarai – which means “My Princess”.

Abram is born in what today is southern Iraq. He travels up the Euphrates River to southern Turkey, and then leaves his family, taking only his wife, his nephew Lot, and some servants and livestock. At age 75, he leaves because God tells him to move to the area of modern day Israel. So they walk.

There, Abram has a host of encounters with the people of the land as he wanders around ancient Israel, and he grows old – almost a hundred years old. Sarai, of course, also grows old with him. Abram gains wealth, mainly in the form of livestock and servants, but there is one thing missing in his life. Abram does not have a child. He has no son to pass on his wealth and his name to. He feels alone.

Now those of us that have read the Book of Genesis realize that in the early part of the book, there are many people who live much longer lives – 800, 900 years – than people live today. But Abram wasn’t looking at that. Although he lived much longer than people do today – he died at age 175 and Sarai died at 127 years of age – by the time he was in his nineties, he had pretty much given up hope of having a son. Even his name Abram – Exalted father – had become an ironic reminded of his infertility, his loneliness.

And then, as recorded in Genesis 15, God spoke to Abram one night. God promises to make Abram into a great nation, with descendants that number more than the stars he can count. And Abram believes God. And the Bible records that God credited his belief to Abram as righteousness.

God comes back to Abram when Abram is 99 years old, and changes his name to “Father of Many” – Abraham. He changes the name of Sarai – My Princess – to “Sarah”, which simply means “Princess”, but has the feel of a noblewoman who is almost a queen. And a year later, Abraham and Sarah have a son – Isaac. Now Abraham is happy – he has a son and an heir.

A few years later, God speaks again to Abraham. And this time, it is a frightening order. Abraham is asked to take Isaac, his only legitimate son and heir, and sacrifice him on top of a particular mountain. And Abraham moves to do it. He takes Isaac, some wood, some rope, and a knife and goes to the top of the mountain. Isaac asks him, "Father, where is the lamb?" Abraham replies that God will provide the lamb, hoping it will be another lamb, not the son that God has given Abraham. The old man builds an altar from stones, he places the wood, then he takes Isaac, ties him up and places him on the wood, and then Abraham lifts the knife.

And God stops him. God orders Abraham to stop. God knows that Abraham would have done anything God asked. Abraham then sees a ram stuck in the bushes, so he sacrifices the ram instead of the boy. Once again Abraham has trusted God and God has seen this trust and rewarded Abraham.

All of the three great religions of the west trace their roots back to Abraham. The Jewish people consider Abraham to be their most important ancestor. Christians consider Abraham to be the founder of the people who would eventually leave Egypt led by Moses. And Moslems also consider Abraham to be the father of Ishmael, Isaac’s half-brother – who is said to be the founder of the Arab people.

And Abraham is the source of the why the Jews are considered God’s Chosen People, for God made the promise to Abram/Abraham that his descendants would be a great nation, and would have the land between the Nile River and the Euphrates River.

But what is the basis for this greatness, this high esteem in which Abraham is held?

The Apostle Paul tells us.

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead.

Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. This is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.”

Abraham’s greatness comes from one simple thing. Abraham believed that God had the power to do what God promised – and that God had the integrity to do what God promised.

Abraham knew he alone didn’t have the power. He knew that Sarah was too old to have children. He knew he was too old to father a child. But he knew that God was capable and had the integrity to carry out any promise God made.

And so "God credited Abraham with righteousness. "

The word used, "credited" is an accounting term. You’ve run into it, perhaps with your bank or with a shopping account.

Abraham didn’t have any righteousness himself. But God gave a credit to Abraham’s righteousness account because Abraham believed God.

It was like Abraham had been $10,000 in debt, but because he believed God, God gave him a $20,000 credit, erasing the red ink and putting Abraham back in the black!

Did anyone force God to do this? No. God just decided to do this by God’s own free choice. It was a gift, it was completely God’s grace.

If there was anything that can be said about Abraham’s greatness, it was that Abraham believed in God and God’s promises – even when God’s orders were difficult, like the day he was asked to sacrifice his son.

Of course, the great thing about our God is that many years later, God went to that very same mountain, took God's Son, and sacrificed Him so that we could have a good relationship with God once more. Once again, God had provided the Lamb – this time, in the person of Jesus Christ.

And all we are asked to do to be credited with righteousness is to believe in the promises of God, to believe in the goodness of God, and to follow Jesus.

A few days ago, Billy Graham went to be with God. Those who are younger may not know much about Billy Graham, but Trinity Broadcasting often replays older televised sermons of that Graham spoke.

From 1949 to 2005, Billy Graham organized huge worship services around the world called “crusades”. A year before the event, the Graham organization would come to town and have meetings where they worked with any churches in the area that wanted to be involved – Baptists, Methodists, Pentecostals, Catholics, Presbyterians. The churches would receive training, volunteers would be lined up, the event promoted, huge stadiums would be rented out, local television time would be purchased, and people would bring their friends, neighbors, and relatives to the stadium or turn on the television.

There would be music – a thousand-voice choir and solo singers. There would be hymn singing. There would be prayers. Holy Scripture would be read – and then Billy Graham himself would preach, with a message that all we had to do was to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved from the eternal fire. And thousands of people would come down to the altar on the field, where hundreds of volunteers would pray with them and connect them to a local church. Telephone hotlines took phone calls from the television watchers and radio listeners.

The events would go on for three or four weeks, afternoons and evenings. And over the years, millions of people came to Christ. Thousands of young people piled into spray-paint decorated minibuses and criss-crossed the country preaching to other young people. Hundreds of people went to Christian retreat centers and thousands went to seminaries. New churches were founded around the world. Older churches experienced revivals.

But there were limits to what the Graham organization could do. On average, only 3% of the people in the stadium came to Christ at any particular service. Of course, that might mean 3000 or more people a night. Many never showed up at any church afterwards, like Titanic survivors lifted out of the cold water by people rescuing them who slipped and fell back into the water, never to be seen again.

And there were long term consequences. A many Christians began to believe that being saved was a one-time event – make the decision and that was it – you’d automatically wake up in Heaven one day. And many Christians also took Billy’s shorthand – “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ” – and shortened it still more to “Believe in God”.

And so many people got the idea that salvation comes when you believe in the existence of God.

But a more careful reading of the Old and New Testament shows us that there is more to it than a simple belief in the existence of God. 

Abram believed in God's promises and took action because of that belief.

Even Peter’s sermon in Acts 2 states; “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”

According to Peter, baptism is a key part of what we all need to do.

And Jesus seemed to speak often of a more strenuous path.

In our reading today, “Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.”

• It is not enough to believe in the existence of a god. 
• It is not enough to believe in the existence of the God of the Bible. 
• It is not enough to believe that Jesus lived. 
• It is not enough to believe in the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. 
• It is not enough to believe that Jesus is the Son of God. 
• It is not enough to come to church, even every week. 

These steps are not enough.

• For Jesus asks us to deny ourselves. 
• Jesus asks us to lose our lives for Jesus and the gospel. 
• Jesus wants us to give up our lives – our regular, daily existence, our trinkets, our comforts, our money, our time – and follow him. 

Abram heard God one day telling him to leave and move to a new place. Abram believed God and Abraham went as God commanded. And Abram’s belief in the promises of God was credited to him as righteousness. Notice that Abram’s belief led to action.

Today, when we stay in our homes, when we clearly hear God telling us to do something and we ignore God, when we put up the excuses that it is too soon for us, it is too late for us, it is too difficult for us, we have too many responsibilities, we’ve never had such responsibilities – we are not believing in the promises of God.

And so I ask you:

• Do you believe in the existence of God? 
• Do you believe in the existence of the God of the Bible? 
• Do you believe that Jesus live? 
• Do you believe that God so loved us that He sent His Son to die for us and be Resurrected? 
• Do you believe that Jesus promised that those who follow Him will be taken care of and receive eternal life? 
• Do you believe Jesus said, ““Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me?” 

If you believe all these things, then what are you waiting for? Why aren't you actively following Jesus?

Find a group of people to bring the gospel to and develop a strategy which fits you – it can be door to door, backyard bible clubs this summer, lurking in McDonalds, coffee shared in your home, a ceramics class, something online, an exercise and worship group like REFIT, a model train club, a grandparents raising kids group, a gun club, a quilting club, a crafting club, a musical group – it all works if people are contacted, prayers are said, scripture is read, and God and Christ are raised up in glory.

Garrison Keillor, the longtime host of A Prairie Home Companion, told Sven and Ollie jokes. Sven and Ollie are two men who are always getting into trouble. 

One day, they are out walking above the fjord, a deep glacial valley, when Sven slips and falls over the edge. Ollie looks down and there’s Sven, hanging onto a tree branch overlooking a thousand foot fall into the sea. Sven is yelling “Get a rope!, Get a rope! Get a rope!”

Ollie yells down – “I’m a-gone ta get some help!” - and runs for help.

Sven hangs on for dear life. He can hear nothing except the breakers crashing far below and some seagulls chirping. The wind blows...

Suddenly, Sven hears something above. He hopes it's Ollie with a rope. Sven yells,”Is that you Ollie?“

A voice comes booming down. “Sven! This ist de LORD!”

Sven yells back. “Really Lord?”

The Lord says calmly, “Sven, let go of da branch. I will catch you and save you.”

Sven thinks a couple of minutes. He looks down….and then back up.

“Lord, isa dere anybody else up there?” 

We've all had times when we looked for another way rather than the path God was guiding us onto.

We have the Lord who has promised to be with us if we will follow God’s Son. Why do we need anything else? Why do we need the comforts of the world?

After all, as Jesus said: “What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?”

Somewhere over the Rainbow

In the movie “The Wizard of Oz”, Dorothy lives in the dry, dusty, black-and-white world of the late 1930’s dustbowl Kansas. We know that Dorothy has had a rough life – She lives with her Aunt Emma and her uncle. Her friends are the old farm hands – and her little dog Toto. 

When God starts a change in our lives, God does a thorough change. God does not want you to improve by 10%, to be a 20% better person.

One day, near the farm, she meets up with a mean, hateful woman who doesn’t like Dorothy’s little dog Toto, so Dorothy returns to the farm, wanting to speak to someone about her hurtful encounter with the old woman.

But no one will listen. Not her Aunt, not her uncle, even none of the farmhands. No one has time to listen to Dorothy tell the story of her bad afternoon.

And so, in the magic of the musical, she sings:

Somewhere over the rainbow way up high
There's a land that I heard of once in a lullaby
Somewhere over the rainbow skies are blue
And the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true

Someday I'll wish upon a star
And wake up where the clouds are far
Behind me
Where troubles melt like lemon drops
Away above the chimney tops
That's where you'll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow bluebirds fly
Birds fly over the rainbow.
Why then, oh, why can't I?

If happy little bluebirds fly
Beyond the rainbow.
Why, oh, why can't I?

(lyrics from the movie The Wizard of Oz)

And then, the tornado, the whirlwind comes.

Genesis 9:8-17; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Peter 3:18-22; Mark 1:9-15 

Dorothy runs inside the house and is knocked out by debris. And in the movie – we’re not quite sure whether or not it is a real journey – Dorothy and Toto and the house fly off to the brightly colored land of Oz, and color enters our black-and-white world.

And that’s the way the world is, isn’t it?

We live in a dry and dusty, black-and-white world, a world where no one has time to listen to our problems, a world where people hurt us with words, a world where trouble lurks just over the horizon, gathering like a storm to destroy what stability we have – our families, our homes, our work – and the debris of the world comes crashing down on our heads and we are knocked down.

And then?

Do we fly off over the rainbow to another land, a land filled with bluebirds and beautiful flowers and beautiful magical people who always win the battles against evil?

It would be nice, so nice wouldn’t it, if our house would conveniently fall of top of our enemies, squashing them under its weight like the Wicked Witch of the East and allowing us to take those beautiful ruby slippers?

It would be nice, wouldn’t it, if, instead of putting us into jail, the people rewarded us like the Munchkins rewarded Dorothy for destroying evil – even if it was an accident?

And it would be nice, wouldn’t it, if our Scarecrow friends without brains became wise, if our cowardly Lion friends became brave, if our heartless Tin Woodmen friends developed big hearts, and if old con men Wizards stopped pretending to have all the answers and simply admitted that they were just old men filled with fear and trying to find a way home themselves?

But this appears to happen only in Oz, the land over the rainbow, and at the end of the movie – I trust you’ve all seen the movie – Dorothy wakes up in her bed in the farmhouse in Kansas, where everyone is okay and concerned about her and all is right in Kansas – except it is still black-and-white – though now sunny.

Rainbows are special to God, also.

...when God is ready to do something, it’s going to happen...

In ancient times, in our reading, God has finished with the great Flood. He sent water to cover the earth, and has given God’s worshiper Noah instructions – and time – to build the ark to escape the flood with Noah’s wife, sons, and daughters-in-law. God told Noah his plan to send a flood on the earth to kill all the people except Noah’s family. God gave Noah detailed instructions on how to build the ship, how to waterproof the ship, and exactly which animals to load aboard. 

Noah worked hard, even though he was over 500 years old, an old man, when his sons were born. Noah listened to his neighbors laugh at him, made the difficult decision to spend his years trusting in God’s plan even on sunny days because Noah believed God when God told Him to build. And then, one day, when Noah was 600 years old, the rain fell. And then, God closed the door and Noah was safe inside with his family.

Has God given you instructions for your life, for what God wants accomplished, for how you are to live your next couple of years? If you’ve been baptized and received the Holy Spirit, God is giving you guidance. The only question is whether or not you are listening to God – or prefer to dance in the rain that is falling in your life, like the unicorns in the old song. So many people prefer rainy days than listening to God speak to them about what to do, what hard work is required, what difficult decisions need to be made. Do you prefer the rain, or would you rather live in a dry ark while God pours the rain down on all those people who would not listen?

We know the story, how God gave Noah a seven day notice, how the animals came to the ark and loaded. Most came in pairs, two by two, but the clean animals, the one’s men and women could eat – they came in groups of 14, seven pairs, enough for plenty of food for the people. We know how it rained for forty days and nights, and how the ark floated away. The floodwaters lasted 5 months – 150 days – after the rains stopped, and the ark continued to float. And God took care of the ark and the people and animals inside it. God always takes care of his people.

Sometimes you get a bit of notice from God to “Get ready!” We’ve seen that over the years, I’ll tell you more about it later. We have to be ready when God tells us to get ready, He’s going to do something, for when God is ready to do something, it’s going to happen – are you ready, are you looking forward to what God is going to do or are you worried about what God’s going to do? The answer should depend on whether or not you’ve been sent to the ark or whether you’re going to be swimming, and if you’ve chosen to follow Jesus, you are being sent to the ark.

But there are people who God speaks to and they don’t listen. Yes, they’ve accepted Jesus as their Savior. Yes, they’ve been baptized with water and received the Holy Spirit. But they have been walking around in the mud of this world so much that they can’t hear the Holy Spirit telling them that the flood is coming because they prefer to slog around in the mud and the rain of the world and it covers up the still, small voice of God. 

After the rain in our lives stops, there is a period of time when we have to survive, when we have to last, when we have to trust God that God has a recovery plan.

Did you listen to God? Did you make the hard decision to do the hard work and build your ark – or did you decide to walk in the sunshine until the mud and the rain came, and now you can’t hear what God is saying to you, you can’t hear because of the rain pounding at you, the mud that’s dragging you down, the floodwaters that are right now rushing at you?

Those people in that day – they didn’t all drown that first day of rain. No, many of them ran for higher ground. But the rain kept coming. They ran for still higher ground. The rain kept coming down and the water kept coming up!

Some ran for the mountains, some found a little rowboat or a canoe or went and stood on their house roofs. And the rain kept coming down and the water kept coming up and it covered the roofs of their homes, and it covered the mountains, and the rain kept coming into the little rowboats and canoes and the people realized that they might not drown in their little rowboats and canoes, but they were going to starve to death because they had no food with them. Because unlike the ark, which had seven pair of each clean animal, the animals that could be eaten – those little rowboats and canoes didn’t have food. God had provided for his people. And the rain eventually stopped after forty days – almost five weeks of solid rain.

The ark floated on the water for a hundred and fifty days, five months. God didn’t speak to Noah or his family. God didn’t give them updates on the weather. They just had to wait, trusting in God, looking out the window at the water that surrounded them – no internet, no television, not even books were aboard. I personally think that that was when playing cards were invented...

No, I’m sure there was plenty of work on board with all those animals there, food to prepare, minor leaks to plug.

After the rain in our lives stops, there is a period of time when we have to survive, when we have to last, when we have to trust God that God has a recovery plan. And we have to wait. We have to wait on God. 

And after five months, the ark bumped into something and stuck. The water had gone down enough that they hit a mountain. But there was still nothing but water in sight. It was another two and a half months before land became visible above the water. After 7 and a half months on board the ark, the people could finally see land again. 

I know you’ve had some difficult times. I know you’ve had a difficult year. I know things look bad, that nothing is happening, that life is just going to be tough and you’re seasick from all the floodwaters. But God is leading you to the top of a mountain and God will show you the other mountains that you will climb one day if you will just trust in God and have a bit of patience in his plan.

Noah’s journey started on the 17th day of the 2nd month. The surface of the earth was not dry until the first day of the first month. And the mud that was below that crust had not dried until the 27th day of the 2nd month. And all the evil people had been destroyed, leaving just Noah and Noah’s family to start again.

When God starts a change in our lives, God does a thorough change. God does not want you to improve by 10%, to be a 20% better person. God doesn’t want you to become a quarter or a third better. God doesn’t even want you to become half better. God doesn’t want you three-quarters better or even 90 percent better. God wants you to toss away every bit of your old troubled life and become a new person.

Our problem is that we love so much of our old life. Do you love your old life?

Addicts love their old lives, too. They love their chemicals, their short-lived high, they love their friends who provide them with their chemicals. And those chemicals and friendship kill them.

• What do you love about your old life that God wants to wash away? What is killing you? 
• Do you love being angry? 
• Do you love hating certain people or politics or companies? 
• Do you love those man-and-woman made objects around you, those trinkets, those movies, those television shows, those sports? Are they slowly putting you to sleep, a slow death?
• Do you love having money to spend, your job, your home? Are they lulling you into a belief that the sunny days will continue forever, that the rain and flood will never come and wash you away?

Noah gave up everything he had except his family because God wanted him to live. If Noah had stayed with his home, his friends, his tools – Noah would have died!

And so Noah built the ark, went into the ark - and Noah came out of the ark and walked upon dry ground again in a world which no longer had wicked people.

Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: “I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”

So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.” 

Notice how many times God repeats the message about the covenant, a contract between God and people and all living things.

In the original Hebrew, the word our Bible has translated as “rainbow” is qesheth. (keh'-sheth).

Qesheth simply means “bow”, as in a hunter’s bow, a weapon. God leaves his great bow, his great weapon in the sky. God has put it up and is not hunting. He is at peace. Yet, God has a great weapon that can destroy the earth and the people if God were to change God's mind.

You may have noticed, it is after the storm that the rainbow appears. It is only after the storm that we are able to see God’s reminder to us of his promise – not before the storm. Why do you think that is so?

I think it is because God want’s us to remember His promises as the storm is coming toward us, to remember for the long term. We are to look at the storm barreling down upon us and say, “Don’t worry, God’s rainbow is on the other side. God promises to not destroy the world in a storm with water again. Don’t worry. God loves us. “

And then afterwards, there is the rainbow to drive home the lesson.

So just because you can’t see the rainbow before the storm – or in the storm – remember that the rainbow will be there after the storm. God’s got it. God knows the storm is there.

The Apostle Peter survived many storms in his life, including the one that weekend when Christ was crucified. Peter wrote

For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit.

After being made alive, he went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits— to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built.
Where were these spirits imprisoned? In Hell. Christ literally went through Hell for you and me and the folks that were disobedient before the Flood came.

Peter continues: In it [the ark] only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water, and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God.

Our baptism changes our conscience and makes us right with God.

And the water does more, as Peter says:

It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand—with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him.
Somewhere over the rainbow, Christ is waiting on us.

I promised to tell you a bit about how God sends us notice of changes.

When we were living in a home in Atlanta once, things were getting a bit rough in the neighborhood. A woman who was an active pagan worshipper lived in the cul-de-sac, and a gang of teens had begun to party there almost every night. Fights were breaking out, and we were becoming concerned about stray bullets flying into our home – But we were also wondering, is this a place to minister?

Saundra went to a meeting where the leader gave a talk based upon Isaiah 40:31

...but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

The speake focused upon the eagles and how the mother builds a safe, comfortable nest for her baby eagles, even plucking out her chest down to make a nice, soft nest. Then, when the eagles are ready to leave the nest, she removed the down and everything soft from the nest so the nest is just a collection of prickly twigs and it becomes uncomfortable. In this way the eaglets begin to move to the edge of the nest and eventually fall and fly away.

Saundra was listening to this intently. Was there a message for her? The women then said, “If your nest is uncomfortable, maybe it is time for you to fly!”
Saundra came home in tears and told me this, and within two weeks, we’d found a new home and moved in.

Then, a few years later, we were in Atlanta when another pastor preached on the same passage from Isaiah, and once again focused upon eagles. Within two weeks we were living in Marietta, OH after a successful house closing.

In Williamstown, Pastor Steve Gedon preached about the eagles, and a couple weeks later I received an appointment to two churches near St. Marys.

It seems that this is how God gives us notice of changes in our lives. Be alert – look to how God and the Holy Spirit are guiding you toward changes.

Noah was tipped off to changes outside the ark by his birds. First he sent out a raven which just flew back and forth over the water and returned. Then a dove flew out and returned since it could not find a place to land. Then, the dove came back with an olive branch, which told Noah the trees were still living, and now were uncovered. Then the dove left for good, meaning dry land was there. Be alert to the signs God sends us.

And then, two weeks ago, on Pioneer Club Sunday, the passage just came up as one of the readings. One of the children read the passage about eagles. Saundra and I also listened to T D Jakes preach a sermon on eagles. Saundra remarked – “eagles? Hm.”

And Sunday night, Mary Ellen Finegan, the District Superintendent, called me and said, “It is the intention of the Bishop to appoint you to Calvary and Mt Clare charge, effective the first of July of this year. “ So I'll be moving on to a new set of churches.

And so, let me close with this passage from Isaiah 40:

...but those who trust in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

And, may I say,

If happy little bluebirds fly
Beyond the rainbow.
Why, oh, why can't I?

Crossin’ Over Jordan

Our readings today center on Jesus, Moses, and Elijah, as well as their followers Peter, James, John – and Elisha.

Moses, you remember as the great prophet who led the people of Israel from Egypt, the man who brought the tablets of the Law down from God’s mountaintop, the man who had seen God just enough that his face glowed and people asked him to wear a veil to cover his face.

While the story of Jesus is central to the Christian story, and Moses is the central character in the founding narrative of Judaism, Elijah is less well-known than either Jesus or Moses, and Elijah’s follower Elisha is even less known than Peter, James, and John.

Today, I plan to tell the story of Elijah the great prophet of Israel. and his follower Elisha, who became a great prophet in his own right. It is important to understand the role these men played in the great drama of God’s interactions with the nation of Israel.

Let’s go back in time. We will go to a time after Moses led the people of Israel, the worshippers of Yahweh, out of Egypt, after Joshua led the people from the wilderness into the Promised Land by crossing the Jordan River, after the Judges led Israel, people like Samson, Debra, Gideon, and others, after Samuel anointed first Saul and then David as the kings of Israel, after King Solomon made Israel reknown throughout the Middle East.

After King Solomon died, there was a civil war in Israel. The Northern Kingdom, known as Israel, split from the Southern Kingdom based in Jerusalem, which became known as Judea. In Judea, the two tribes of Juda and Benjamin stayed loyal to the kings of the House of David in Jerusalem. In Israel, the ten tribes of the north split and became loyal to King Jeroboam, a former governor in Solomon’s kingdom.

2 Kings 2:1-12; Psalm 50:1-6; 2 Corinthians 4:3-6; Mark 9:2-9

About 45-50 years after the split, Ahab became king in Israel. His capital was located in Samaria, in the city of Shechem. King Ahab married Jezebel, a priestess of Baal and the daughter of the King of Tyre, who introduced and supported the worship of Baal in Israel. At Jezebel’s urging, Ahab builds a temple to Baal and brings into the country several hundred Baal priests to be missionaries. And then, she begins to kill the local priests of God, of Yahweh.

And then, in I Kings 17, Elijah the Tishbite from Gilead walks into Ahab’s palace one day. The word “Tishbite” may indicate he was from a town called Tishbe, or it may more likely be translated as “sojourner”, a person who resides temporarily in a place. So, perhaps we should call Elijah, “Elijah the wanderer from Gilead”.

And here we have a true name for Elijah, for he never settles down but moves from one place to another, living in the wilderness, being fed by crows, and then moving onto a town in the north for a while where he miraculously brings oil and grain to a starving woman and her son, and resurrects the boy when he dies. And the core part of his name, Elijah, means “My God is Yahweh”

That day, when Elijah walked up to King Ahab, he delivered a message: “As Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.”

In our English Bibles, you will often see Lord spelled LORD. Whenever Lord is spelled in a capitals, the underlying word is YHWH, pronounced “Yahweh”, the personal name of God which is “I am that I am”, as God told Moses at the burning bush.

So a man whose name is “My God is Yahweh” says, "As Yahweh, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.”
And then, Elijah walks out and apparently disappears. For a while, Ahab seems to have considered Elijah as a crazy old man, but then as the weeks and months go by without any rain, Ahab begins to seriously look for Elijah. But Elijah is off with the ravens and crows, being fed by them in a little canyon, and then Elijah is up near Jezebel’s home town helping the woman and her son, bringing the boy back to life.

No rain falls.

Consider the effects of no rain in a world with footpaths, without good roads, without railroads, without the ability to bring food in from far distances. We are blessed in the ability to bring food to our grocery stores from California, from Georgia, from Iowa, from Hawaii, even from Peru and Argentina. But donkeys aren’t a reliable way to transport food over long distances – especially when those donkeys are dying of thirst, just like the people and the plants are dying.

No rain fell for over three years.

Eventually, God told Elijah that it was time, and Elijah went to meet Ahab. Elijah told Ahab to gather the priests of Baal and meet Elijah on the top of Mt Carmel for a battle of the gods – Baal versus Yahweh. And Elijah also insisted that this be a public battle, with all the people of Israel encouraged to be there.

Mt Carmel rises over 1700 feet above the surrounding lowlands. For centuries, it had been a place of refuge for fugitives, and it was strategically placed near the border between Israel and the Phoenician cities from where Jezebel had come. The top of the mountain is relatively flat and there had been an altar to Yahweh there for centuries, but it had fallen into disrepair over the years.

The battle terms were very simple. Both sides would build an altar with an animal sacrifice. Then, they would ask their god to light the fire of the sacrifice.

The Baal priests got to go first. They built their altar, cut up their sacrifice, placed their wood. Then, they danced around and then cut themselves. But there was no response. After a few hours of no response, Elijah taunted them. “Shout louder!” he said. “Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened.”

Finally, evening approached without any response from heaven. Now it was Elijah’s turn.

Elijah asked some men to help him and he rebuilt the ancient altar to Yahweh with twelve stones, one for each of the tribes.

He dug a trench around the altar, big enough to hold about fifty pounds of seeds.

Then, he placed the wood and cut up the bull onto the altar. And then he did something amazing.

He asked some men to fill four large jars with water. He then dumped the water on the wood and the meat on the altar. He did this three times so twelve large jars of water had been dumped on the wood and the meat on the altar, the water dripped down and filled the trench around the altar that he had dug. Twelve large jars of water – one for each of the tribes. He had soaked the wood and the meat so that it was dripping wet.

At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: “Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”
And then fire fell from heaven and burnt up the wood, the meat, the stones, the soil, and even the water in the trench.

And the people? They fell on the ground, faces down, and began to chant. “Yahweh is God, Yahweh is God”.

And Elijah had the crowd grab the priests of Baal and put them to death. Elijah sent Ahab back to the palace to get supper, for he said he could hear heavy rain coming. And soon, the heavens opened up with a pouring, heavy, soaking rain and wind storm.

After she found out what was happening, though, Jezebel was rather upset and angry. She sent a messenger to tell Elijah that he was a dead man. So Elijah ran for the border, to the mountain of God in the south. And there, he spoke with God again.

God gave him a further three assignments, about selecting men to finish off Ahab. And one of these men, the man selected to be the next prophet, was Elisha.

Elijah found Elisha, put his cloak on Elisha and Elisha became Elijah’s servant.

Over the next few years, Elijah made additional appearances at the king’s court. Soldiers were destroyed by fire from the sky. And in one of these appearances, he is described as wearing hair clothes, and a leather belt – does that remind you of anyone else, perhaps John the Baptist? Is it any wonder people asked John if he was Elijah returned?

Eventually, Elijah pronounces doom on Ahab’s son and family – and they die. Now we come to our first reading. 

... the most valuable thing in the Universe that a man can possess is what possesses him – the Spirit of God.

Elijah’s time on earth is coming to a close. He heads toward Bethel, a town about twelve miles outside of Jerusalem on the road that leads into the Jordan Valley. Rather than have Elisha walk down the mountain which he’ll have to climb back up, Elijah asks Elisha to wait in the hill country, and not to come with him down the road to Bethel. But Elisha has decided to follow this man of God, the man whose name means “My God is Yahweh”. “As surely as Yahweh lives and you live, I will not leave you.” Elisha says.

So Elisha follows Elijah down to Bethel.

There, a group of prophets meets them. The prophets says to Elisha, “Do you realize that Yahweh is going to take your master away from you today?”

And Elisha knows. He tells them “I know. Be quiet.”

Next, Elijah tells Elijah, “Yahweh has sent me down into the valley to Jericho. Stay here.” It is about a 3000 foot descent down to Jericho into the Jordan Valley, 3000 feet down – and Elisha will have to walk 3000 feet back up.

But Elisha is loyal to a fault. “Nope, I’m coming with you to Jericho." "As surely as Yahweh lives and you live, I will not leave you.” Elisha says.

A group of prophets who lived at Jericho met them. Once again, this second bunch asked Elisha, “Do you realize that Elijah is being taken away by Yahweh today?”

Once again, Elisha responds, “I know. Be quiet.” It must have been very difficult for Elisha, knowing that he was about to lose his mentor.

It seems that everyone knew what was going to happen.  And well they should if they were listening to God’s Spirit speaking to them. That’s how people become prophets, after all. By hearing God’s voice and listening to it.

Elijah told Elisha once again, “Yahweh wants me to go to the Jordan River.”

Elisha responds, “Right behind you, Boss!” "As surely as Yahweh lives and you live, I will not leave you.” Elisha says.

This is loyalty. But notice that Elisha’s loyalty is not just to Elijah – His loyalty is to the mission, to the man who talks with God, and to that same God that Elisha know lives.

He is following the man who single-handedly returned Israel from the worship of a deadly, evil god who demanded infant sacrifice – to the worship of Yahweh, the God of Abraham, the God of Moses, the God of Israel, the God that sent fire from the sky.

And they came to the Jordan River. Where to cross the Jordan, the historic boundary of Israel, the river that God had dried up for Joshua and the invading army of Israel so many centuries before?

Fifty of the prophets from Jericho are watching to see what happens.

Elijah takes his cloak, rolls it up, hits the water, and the water separates so he and Elisha can walk across on dry land. Wow!

And the man of God, the man whose name means “My God is Yahweh” turns to Elisha, his servant, his follower who has stuck with him for years, the younger man whose name means “My God is salvation”. “Elisha, what can I give you before I go?”
Elisha responds, and asks for the most valuable thing he can think of. “Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit.”

And I’m sure Elijah smiles. For he says, “You have asked a difficult thing,” Elijah said, “yet if you see me when I am taken from you, it will be yours—otherwise, it will not.”

For you see, Elisha realized that Elijah had nothing material of importance. Indeed, Elisha realized that there is nothing important that is material. Instead, the most valuable thing in the Universe that a man can possess is what possesses him – the Spirit of God. And Elijah had a huge helping of that Spirit.

Elisha was greedy for the right stuff. His focus was upon God and God’s Spirit.

About that time, “a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. Elisha saw this and cried out, “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And Elisha saw him no more. Then he took hold of his garment and tore it in two.”

Elijah went to heaven in a whirlwind on a chariot made of fire drawn by horses of fire. And all Elisha could do is yell the obvious: “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!”

And Elisha saw him no more.

Elisha grieved. He grabbed his own robe and ripped it in half. He was upset, he was angry, he wanted the man back who had taught him so much about God, he wanted back the man who was filled with God’s Spirit.

Have you ever been there, standing as someone crossed over Jordan, wanting them back so selfishly because they were the one who treated you well, who taught you what was important in life, who showed you God’s love and leaked their Spirit all around and all over you because they were so filled with God’s Spirit that it simply leaked out of them?

Have you ever been angry because someone moved on, that wonderful person moved on in this life or went to Heaven? Have you wanted to rip and tear and shred things because you were so upset?

That was Elisha that day there beside the Jordan River, deep in the hot Dead Sea valley where salt had dried from all the tears the Jordan River had carried from Galilee, the lake of life hundreds of feet above and upstream.

Years earlier, Elijah had walked up to Elisha while he was plowing. Elijah had come from nowhere and just walked up to him and put his cloak on Elisha’s shoulders. And Elisha knew then and there who Elijah was, the Spirit that possessed Elijah, and that Elisha should follow the older man.

The young man had been plowing his fields with twelve oxen. His servants drove eleven of them and he drove the lead ox. But that was behind him now. So on that day, so many years ago, Elisha killed his oxen, he tore up his yokes and used them for the fire, he fed his workers and his family and Elijah and Elisha himself. And then he left his home, never looking back, because he focused his life on following and learning from this Spirit-filled man, the one whose name meant, “My God is Yahweh.” He left behind his idols of wealth and land and family – and focused upon God.

Given a choice, would you rather have your home or a double helping of God’s Holy Spirit? 

And so when Elisha settled down a bit that day, he saw that Elijah’s old cloak had fallen on the ground. And he walked back to the River, the Jordan River, and he asked, “Where now is Yahweh, the God of Elijah?” And half-heartedly, he rolled up the cloak and slapped the water of the river.

And the water split, leaving a path of dry land across the river! And he crossed over the Jordan River like Joshua had centuries before and entered the Promised Land once again.

The fifty prophets of Jericho who were watching insisted on searching to see if Elijah’s body had fallen to earth and Elisha finally, reluctantly, agreed to let them search. They searched for three days but could not find his body on either side of the Jordan River, there just north of the Dead Sea.

And then, almost 900 years later, Jesus led Peter, Andrew, and John up to the top of Mount Hermon, a very tall mountain north of Galilee, the mountain whose snowmelt feeds the living sea, the Sea of Galilee and gives it life even today.

And suddenly, at the top of mountain, Jesus changed right before their eyes. No longer was he wearing a dirty, grey-white robe, but that robe was glowing bright, filled with light, whiter than human hands could make it, and Jesus’ face was shining even more than Moses’ face had glowed so many years ago, and then they appeared – Moses and Elijah – and Jesus spoke with them. But Jesus had been transfigured – and the disciples were transfigured by their realization that Jesus was truly divine, truly the Son of God, God Himself in the flesh.

The three disciples were all scared, but as usual, Peter took out his nervousness by speaking. “Let me build shelters here – three of them – for You, Jesus, for Moses, and for Elijah.” Peter wanted to honor the three great prophets.

And Peter quickly realized his mistake, for God spoke out of the clouds surrounding them and told Peter to shut up and listen! “This is my Son, whom I love. Listen to Him!”

God called Peter's attention away from the great Moses and the great Elijah to God's one and only Son, Jesus. Jesus was the one to listen to.

And then they were gone and it was just Jesus, Peter, Andrew, and John again. And on the way down the mountain, Jesus told them not to tell anyone until He rose from the dead. But the three had been transfigured, deeply changed by the event, for they had seen Jesus as He truly is. God had shown them that Jesus was His Son.

My friends, there comes a time in our lives when we have to consider what we believe. Most Americans go through their lives believing vaguely in a vague god, a belief that makes them feel better, a general idea that one day when they die, they may become an angel or see Jesus or go to heaven. It is an easy belief, a life that allows us to have nice homes, nice cars, decent jobs, to live without much difficulty for twice the lifespan that most people enjoyed a hundred years ago. It is easy to believe - and not do anything.

But my friends, following Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean an easy life. Sometimes we need to make hard decisions – my home, my job, my career, my comforts – or a life devoted to God. At some point, we must also be transfigured by God’s grace and love. We must see Jesus as He truly is and accept what that means for our life and the choices we make from that point onward. It means we might have to give up something comfortable if we will really follow Jesus.

Given a choice, would you rather have your home or a double helping of God’s Holy Spirit?

Given a choice, would you rather spend your leisure hours comfortably at home or helping rowdy young elementary students come to know the love of God?

Given a choice, would you rather be an ordinary person – or an Elijah – or even one of the company of prophets that saw Elijah taken to Heaven? Would you rather be nameless? Or would you declare to your friends, neighbors, family, and everyone you meet: “My God is Yahweh”. “My God is Jesus”.

We think these are choices only God can make, and to a certain extent that is true, for God told Elijah to put his cloak on Elisha, Jesus told Peter and Andrew and John to follow Him, and God has put you in this world to step forward to do battle with the evil in this world. That is what He asks of all Christians. But too few realize this.

Now, the question is what choices will you make today, this week, this year? God is waiting for someone to step forward from his or her comfortable life and begin to change the world. And that someone is you.

Let’s Go Out!

It’s Super Bowl Sunday! Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!

After two weeks of build-up, tonight at 6:30 pm, the most important event in America will happen – two groups of men will face-off over a stuffed piece of pigskin to see which group can run, pass, and kick the ball to the end of an acre of ground more often. On this basis, great honor will go to either the Boston area or the Philadelphia area.

There will be great debates this afternoon over whether or not there is enough air in the pigskin. There will be great debates over whether the leader of the Boston team is too old. There will be great debates over whether or not Justin Timberlake will have a great worship service. And in the end, the silver pigskin idol will be passed into the possession of one or the other teams of priests.

Over a hundred million Americans will watch this worship service tonight, the greatest worship of the year.

Over a hundred advertisements will have been placed and viewed, with the greatest companies in America wanting to be associated with this religion of the pigskin.

Isaiah 40:21-31; Psalm 147:1-11, 20; 1 Corinthians 9:16-23; Mark 1:29-39

This religious service is so important that tens of millions of dollars have been spent on security, because it is recognized that people from another religion might try to attack the people who attend this greatest worship service of the most popular religion in America, the worship of the pigskin.

And in ancient times, God told His people that pigs were unclean, that their meat wasn’t fit to eat, and a great rebellion happened in Israel once because an outside king chose to roast a pig on the altar of the Temple.

It is like a great spiritual disease infects Americans this time of year. Church activities are changed, people who are normally very devout Christians suddenly are sitting on edge during the game, people who ordinarily show up promptly to work on Monday morning because they normally go to bed at 9:30 and get up at 5:30 stay up until 11 and stumble into work barely on time – and their bosses show up even later. It is a great disease that takes us away from the Living God and gives us the pigskin god. It takes us away from Christ.

Jesus’ leading disciple was Simon Peter. And Peter’s mother-in-law was sick in bed with a fever – something very serious in a time before antibiotics. She could easily have died.

That day, Jesus was coming to visit Peter’s family with his disciples. The Messiah was visiting Peter's home – and his mother-in-law was too sick with fever to come to see Jesus.

Have you ever been too ill, too upset, too distracted, too down-in-the-dumps to come to church to see Jesus? Have you ever been feeling so poorly you’d just as soon not get out of bed on Sunday morning? Perhaps you’ve lost someone, perhaps you have the flu, perhaps you’ve had a rough week, perhaps you’ve been traveling and you’re tired. You just feel like seeing all those people will be too much!

Peter and Andrew told Jesus about Peter’s mother-in-law and the way she was feeling. They brought up to the Messiah of Israel, the Savior of the World, the Son of God that Peter’s mother-in-law had a fever and had taken to her bed.

And that same Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, God the Son, cared enough about that one woman that he went to her, he took her hand, and he helped her up.

She didn’t have to reach out to Him – he went to her. She didn’t have to grab ahold of Him – He took her hand. She didn’t have to beg – He helped her up. The Son of God cared about this one woman. She could have refused his offer. But she didn’t.

And what happened?

The fever left her and she began to serve them. She felt better. She felt healthy again, she felt so good she served the Holy Son of God.

Now, you may say, “There it is, she had to serve them”, and you’d missed the point of the story, which was that now she felt so much better she wanted to serve.

Let’s face it.

There are two ways that people look at church. And it all depends upon how we look at coming to church.

Peter’s mother-in-law could have been a grouch. She could have said, “Simon, Simon, why are you bringing your friends over to the house. I’m sick! You’ll need to send out for fish and figs from Isaac’s delivery house! Go outside – eat outside and leave me alone!”

And some days, we look at all the people in the church and we think – “I don’t want to talk to them today. I’m running a fever – see, it says 99F on the thermometer – and I had some sniffles last night, I stayed up late watching television, I have homework to do, I have to clean out the linen closet, I need to get home in time for the pre-game show” and the truth of the matter is that somewhere along the line, we began to look at Peter and the other disciples and the work in the kitchen, we began to look at the people we run into as a burden, and we decided that church is something we are trying to squeeze into our schedule.

Or, we can recognize that the Savior of the world wants to see us, to hold our hand, to lift us up, to heal us, and He is giving us the chance to serve Him, to listen to stories about what He has done, to be in His presence! Is church a burden or a blessing?

Folks, if you are here looking at the people around you, looking at me, listening to the music we try to make, your focus is on the wrong thing, like all those people who did not come to church today but will be paying tremendous attention to the movement of that pigskin on that acre of grass tonight.

But if you have come to listen to how the Son of God has acted in the past, how the God that created the Universe is still acting, and how the Holy Spirit that dwells inside you wants to speak to you, your focus is right. And if you want to turn to that Son of God who has delivered you from certain agonizing permanent death to an eternal life which has already begun – your focus is right.

Later that evening, after the sun had set, people came to Jesus and brought many people who needed healing to Him. All night long Jesus healed people. He healed them physically, He healed them emotionally, and He healed their spirits. In the Greek language of the original, the word we translate as “heal” more accurately means, “made whole.”

Like a repair shop, Jesus made people’s bodies whole, He made their hearts whole, He made the minds and their spirits whole – for the first time in their lives. He gave them a mission – to tell of God’s love to everyone in the world. Now, they had what they needed to live a purpose-filled, eternal life full of joy.

For it is when we have encountered Jesus’ healing touch – and usually we need that touch many times, even weekly, even daily – that the rotten places in our souls that the world has touched with its diseased hands are removed and replaced with and by the eternal Spirit of God.

Mark points out that in many cases Jesus cast out demons. Like maggots, the demons need removed from our souls before Jesus can make us whole. And there are demons that want to destroy our souls – the demon of addiction, the demon of depression, the demon of hopelessness, the demon of worthlessness, the demon of loneliness, the demon of anger, the demon of control, and many others. They need to be cast out before we can be whole and so we need to ask Jesus to cast out these demons so we can be healed.

After a full night’s work, Jesus and the disciples got some rest, but Jesus got up early and went off by himself to pray. His disciples eventually woke up and followed him and found him and told him – “Everyone is looking for you!”

But Jesus said, “Let’s go to other villages and I’ll preach and heal people there, too.”

And that is what they did.

Now that Jesus has returned to Heaven, He has left his Holy Spirit with each of us, his followers. And now, the Church – you and me and all the other Christians – is to act as the Body of Christ and spread His healing to other places, other people, other villages. 

How are we doing?

Super Bowl Update: I clicked over to see the Super Bowl just after the game ended and watched the presentation of the Lombardi Trophy. 

Years ago, I was privileged to attend a bar-mitzva of one of my son's friends at the local synagogue. When the Torah was brought out (the scrolls of what Christians call The Old Testament), the Torah was paraded up and down the aisles, with each person in the congregation touching or kissing the holy scroll cases. It was the expression of devout followers of their respect and worship of the God that was revealed in those scrolls. 

Last night, I saw the same routine played out on national television as the victorious Eagles players kissed the Lombardi Trophy as it was carried to the platform for the presentation. 

Have we gone too far in turning our entertainment into worship?

The Power that Controls Spirits

It was about 8 o’clock in the evening when the man rang our back doorbell. My wife Saundra and I were sitting, watching television. It was a Friday evening. I went to the door and found a tall, thin man standing there, in his late twenties, looking like many of the men who stop at our door, heavily tattooed and wearing clothing that was too big for him. He hadn’t shaved in a couple of days and there was a strange light in his eyes. I had met him before, but I couldn’t remember his name.

“Pastor Brian, could you give me twenty dollars? My daughter is sick and my friend needs gas so we can visit her up at Ruby Hospital. Just twenty dollars.”

I asked him his name and he reminded me. I’ll call him “Jimmy”. He spoke in a very fast manner. I let him step into the kitchen.

“I can’t give you cash, but I can meet you down at the gas station in a minute.”

Jimmy’s eyes were jumping all around as he clearly was checking out the place.

“No, no. I just need cash. My friend will be over in a while to pick me up.”

Red warning signs were going off in my brain. 

Deuteronomy 18:15-20; Psalm 111; 1 Corinthians 8:1-13; Mark 1:21-28

“I’ll tell you what. Saundra, this guy needs to check on his daughter up at Ruby. Are you up to a trip?”

Saundra came around the corner. “Sure. Let me grab my coat.”

Sheer panic appeared in the man’s face. He quickly said, “That’s ok. I only need $10. “ His eyes flashed back and forth. His hands were shaking.

After a couple of more exchanges, he said he actually just needed cigarettes. And he left.

We met him many times afterwards, and eventually he opened up to me that he was addicted to meth. Like I didn’t know.

One evening, a few years later, Saundra and I took him to a treatment center. I’ve heard that Jimmy’s now in jail. We pray for him. He has several daughters. We especially pray for them...

And then, of course, there are those who are possessed by evil spirits. 

Our Gospel reading today speaks of Jesus visiting Capernaum. Capernaum was a decent sized town on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. When Saturday rolled around, Jesus went into the synagogue to teach.

And His teaching was different. At the time, most teachers hated to make strong claims. “Rabbi Gamaliel says this and Rabbi Hillel says that. You’ll need to make up your own mind.” And what was really frustrating was when you went to read something by Gamaliel or Hillel, they did the same thing, except they referred to men of the previous generation. Who could give a definitive answer?

Jesus did. Jesus taught as one who had authority. “You have heard it said “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”. But I say this.” And Jesus would give His answer as definitive.

Just then a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an impure spirit cried out,  “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”

“Be quiet!” said Jesus sternly. “Come out of him!” The impure spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.

What was this episode all about?

To our 21st century sensibilities, there are four groups of people who dominate the world around us. Each group has it’s own opinion about this episode.

First are the scientifically minded who don’t believe in spirits, ghosts, demons, or God. To them, this story is pure hogwash. Spirit possession is nothing more than mental illness, they say.

There are also many people in America who are fascinated by spirits, by ghosts, by zombies, witchcraft, magic, and devils. They tend to admit that this probably happen, but don’t think through the consequences of a man who could command a spirit to leave a man. After all, the stories and movies often show a priest or minister that can command an evil spirit to leave a person. But this group of spirit fans don’t consider why priests and ministers have this power over spirits.

There are also the mature Christian believers who have a balanced view, giving credit to scripture when it speaks of spirits, but not getting terribly caught up in the issue.

And then, of course, there are those who are possessed by evil spirits.

The Bible is filled with mentions of spirits, demons, angels, and gods. Yet, we can become confused about these. For different parts of the Bible appear to teach us different things about these supernatural creatures. Do they exist or not?

In the Old Testament, there are many mentions of other gods, particularly Baal and Asherah, who were worshiped by the people of Tyre, a city in what is now Beirut, Lebanon. Baal worship came to Israel because King Ahab of Israel married Jezebel of Tyre, who was a priestess of Baal and the daughter of the king of Tyre.

The worship of Baal involved the sacrifice of infants. The worship of Asherah involved tall, round poles and rituals that would be found in an X-rated movie today, for she was a fertility goddess.

Famously, as told in I Kings 18, the great prophet Elijah challenged King Ahab and the priests of Baal and Asherah to a public battle of the gods on Mount Carmel. The challenge was simple. Both sides would build an altar with sacrifice and pray to their god to set fire to the altar.

After many hours of chanting, dancing, and cutting themselves, the priests of Baal found no results. Elijah then prayed and fire came down from Heaven, setting the altar on fire and even boiling away the water that Elijah had dumped on the altar. And Elijah quickly had the people kill the priests of Baal.

So it seems that this evil god had no power at all. Repeatedly throughout the Bible, it is said that the idols in the temples of the other gods are mere statues, that they are gods created with human hands, that they are nothing more than artwork that men and women have carved, that other gods don’t exist. And this much is true. For there is only one Creator God, only One Being who is worthy to be worshiped. That is the Holy Trinity – God the Father, God the Son who is Jesus Christ, and God the Holy Spirit.

In fact, Paul wrote in our reading today from I Corinthians that

We know that “An idol is nothing at all in the world” and that “There is no God but one.” For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

There were many so-called "gods" sitting on shelves in homes and temples, and many statuettes and men called "lords", but there is but one God and one Lord.

Yet, in Ephesians 6, Paul writes:

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
We read where Jesus is tempted by Satan in the desert. King Saul meets with a medium who conjures up the dead prophet Samuel. And repeatedly, Jesus and the disciples run into men and women who are possessed by evil spirits or demons.

So do they exist or not?

Well, like Dorothy, we’ll have to pull the curtain back a bit, so we can look at the Great and Terrible Oz.

Scripture teaches us that the Holy Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit created the Universe. In John 1, we find that the Christ is the Word, the logos of God. And in Genesis 1, “Elohim” – a plural Hebrew word for God – created the heavens and the earth. The Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. Then God spoke – there’s the Word – and there was light. Creator, Word, and Spirit.

Genesis goes on from there to talk about Creation. And what amazes me about the whole thing is that something written down hundreds of years before Christ, a story of Creation that had been passed down to Moses by word of mouth, a story which has the order of Creation following in the same order that our geologists tell us, matches up so closely to the scientific narrative. What do I mean?

Around the world, there are many creation stories. The Iroquis tell us the world was created on the back of a giant turtle. The Japanese talk about a war between two gods and the body became the world. In India, a lotus flower springs up from a god’s bellybutton and becomes the world.

But the Bible’s story talks about the world being created from a formless void and then, light appears first. Just like the Big Bang. How did Moses know?

And then, the planet appears with the dry land consolidated and then plants, and then animals, and then finally people. How did Moses know?

But there were others created. God created the angels, messengers and servants of God. Satan led a rebellion and a third of the angels followed him to the earth where they ruled. But we need to understand something about angels. Angels exist at the boundary between spirit and flesh. Sometimes they walk around in a physical form, at other times they stand before the Spirit God the Father in Heaven – other times, they only appear to us in a vision or a dream. And therefore, the origin of evil spirits are the fallen angels.

These are the evil spirits. Evil spirits who possess people for their own ends.

I have a friend who was a missionary in Jamaica. Jamaica and Haiti and Brazil have substantial numbers of people who practice Yoruba, or voodoo, a variation of an ancient religion from the Nigerian area.

In this religion, people attempt to become possessed by various spirits. And according to my friend, they are successful. But the spirits are not good for the people possessed, for there are many spiritual forces of evil – but only one Holy Spirit of God.

In the Old Testament, the word “fool” is used as the opposite of one who is wise. To be foolish means to lack wisdom. And, as our Psalm today notes,

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;
all who follow his precepts have good understanding.

There are many people in this world who are foolish and do not have a fear and respect of the Lord. Instead, like children playing with matches and gasoline, they play with things they do not understand – nor are able to control.

And so people play with Ouija boards, they play with tarot cards, they look for crystal balls, they pretend to have seances, they delve into books on magic and witchcraft – not the magic of sleight of hand and mirrors and spring-loaded flowers stuffed up sleeves – but the magic that is dark and intended for power.

Is it just the chemicals? Or is there another force at work here?

C.S. Lewis pointed out that there are two opposite mistakes Christians can make about spirits and witchcraft and the occult and things that go bump in the night. First, we can assume that all these ideas are just superstitions, that there are no evil spirits, nor devils, nor dark magics. Our culture wants us to ignore this spiritual aspect of things. We are not supposed to look behind the curtain and find that behind the emerald curtain there are spirits working in our world, pretending to be things they aren’t, like the simple carnival huckster that became the Great and Power Wizard of Oz. Our culture would prefer we ignore the spiritual war that is going on. Did you ever wonder why?

The other mistake Christians can make is getting caught up in the study of these things, letting our curiosity hook us, reading books and watching movies that take us too close to the gasoline of evil. For too much investigation almost always leads to a desire to want to try, to see what it tastes like, to just have one potato chip.

And there are gateways into this evil.

Some are more obvious than others. The Ouija board, the mediums, the fortune tellers, the supernatural horror films – these lead us down into the nightmares. Oh, yes, the vast majority of mediums and fortune tellers are con artists, simply trying to take your money. But it is the real ones who are dangerous. King Saul died because, God’s Word says, Saul consulted a medium.

But the other gateway is when you let your mind become more open to evil thoughts and spirits, by lowering your guard. Alcohol, illegal drugs, even prescription pills can lead us to become easier to attack. Is it any wonder that those who hear voices, those who drink a lot, those who are involved with illegal chemicals are more likely to commit crimes, to harm others, to even kill others? Is it just the chemicals? Or is there another force at work here?

But consider – if our body can be infected with physical viruses that cause physical illnesses such as the flu, measles, chicken pox, or even some cancers – isn’t it possible that there are spiritual viruses that cause spiritual illnesses? It is interesting that over a third of the people treated at Monongalia  General Hospital for addiction are what are known as “dual diagnosis”, meaning they have an underlying mental illness. Isn’t it possible that the ancients were onto something when they defined certain mental illnesses as possession by evil spirits or demons, with the treatment requiring spiritual treatment?

Oh yes, there are many people, perhaps most people who have chemical imbalances in their brains that lead to their problems. Proper medical care helps in many cases. But for every person that medical drugs help there is another person that the drugs simply don’t help. Their problem isn’t a physical problem with the brain – it is a spiritual infection that can only be treated by an encounter with the Son of the Creator of the Universe.

The Bible is filled with stories of men and women who were demon- or spirit-possessed. We don’t like to talk about it because it is frightening. What happens if a spirit or a demon attempts to possess us late one night when we are alone in our room with the doors locked and the curtains drawn?

Look what happened in our Gospel story today.

A man in their synagogue who was possessed by an impure spirit cried out, “What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”

“Be quiet!” said Jesus sternly. “Come out of him!” The impure spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.

The people were all so amazed that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching—and with authority! He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him.” News about him spread quickly over the whole region of Galilee.

The Son of God controls even these spirits. Jesus is far stronger than any evil spirit. And if you are possessed of the Holy Spirit – you have within you the good Spirit of God.

By ourselves we are nothing. But with God’s help, we are protected against all things – if we ask for help. Our great weakness is that we often do not want to give up control to the Holy Spirit. Instead, we would rather flirt with those spirits that are around us…the spirit of addiction…the spirit of anger…the spirit of revenge…the spirit of pleasure-seeking...the spirit of laziness.

We would rather be led by a random spirit into a never, never land where we forget our lives than become part of the Body of Christ, seeking a full and productive and purpose-filled life. It is easy, for these spirits are deceitful while the Spirit of Christ is always polite, asking us rather than duping us, giving us the opportunity to decide rather than forcing us, walking with us rather than chaining us to an addiction. 

As long as they are alive, there is hope that they will find Christ and have Christ remove the spirit.

My friend Jimmy had given up his life to the spirit of addiction. He simply could not live his life anymore without having meth or pot or even heroin around. Feeding that spirit was the most important thing in his life. It had begun when he was young – about 10 or 12 years old – because men and women in his family, his neighborhood, men and women – teachers - he looked up to, men and women who parented his friends, who should have been taking him to church – they tried to ignore him, they left him on his own, they didn’t get involved, some even helped him find the supplies. And then, after a couple of years of smoking cigarettes, he tried pot, he tried alcohol, he tried meth, he tried heroin. He smoked, he took pills, he crushed and snorted the pills, he crushed the pills and injected them in his arm.

Each time, for just a while, that spirit let him feel really good for a while, a couple of hours. And then, the spirit said to him: “More.” And clamped the chains around his brain.

If you have a friend or relative that has fallen victim to one of these spirits, remember that Jesus controls even the spirits. And there is hope.

It is what the founders of Alcoholics Anonymous realized. They realized that there is a Twelve step process which is a spiritual process. 

1. We admitted we were powerless over [our addiction]—that our lives had become unmanageable. 
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. 
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him. 
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. 
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. 
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character. 
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings. 
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. 
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. 
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it. 
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out. 
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to others, and to practice these principles in all our affairs. 

© Al-Anon’s Twelve Steps, copyright 1996 by Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc.

Almost all twelve step programs use these same twelve steps. The only thing that really changes is the addiction that is the core of the problem. It might not be alcohol – it might be painkillers. It might not be drugs – it might be cigarettes. It might not be a chemical at all – it might be video games. It might not be gaming – it might be gambling or pornography or anger. It doesn’t really matter – the problem is a spiritual issue. The problem is that an evil spirit has taken control of part of your friend’s life and only a spiritual cure will keep her free of that spirit. And until that spirit is gone, the victim will lie and cheat and steal and skip work and do anything to feed that spirit – because the spirit has put the victim’s brain in chains.

So begin with prayer. Pray that your friend or relative will come to the first step – admitting that the addiction has taken over their life, that their life is out of control. As long as they are alive, there is hope that they will find Christ and have Christ remove the spirit. But until they work through these twelve steps, they are vulnerable to relapse. Most addicts relapse repeatedly. They must have the spiritual awakening, or they will not succeed in getting free. 

So until that awakening comes, we support them when they do good things and keep our mouths closed when they do wrong, for they know that they are doing wrong. We want to stay in their lives. We keep pointing them to Christ for their salvation. As long as they are alive there is hope.

And bring them to our Saturday evening AA group at Quiet Dell Church. 8 pm. You and them are welcome - and they don't care what chemical someone is addicted to. They only want to help people get free.

When Saundra and I took Jimmy to the treatment center, he handed over his needle and his tablets to the security guard. He was worried he’d be arrested. The staff assured him they were there to treat him and not punish him. After an hour or so, we left him and drove home.

A couple of months later, he showed up at my back door, looking terrible. “Pastor Brian, can you get me some lunch and some tennis shoes? Someone at the treatment center stole my old shoes.” I looked at his feet – he was wearing rubber galoshes. “And I need about $20 for my friend for gas for a ride to Ruby – my grandfather is in there and I don’t know how much longer he’ll live.” His eyes were jumping around again. Even though it was almost 90 degrees out, he was wearing long sleeves rolled down to cover his arms.

I remembered that his grandfather had supposedly died about a year earlier. I tried not to sigh too loudly.

I said, “Can’t get you any gas today, but I’ll get you some shoes and a hamburger.” 

Where there's life, there's hope.

Times are a changin’

John the Baptist was inciting a revolution. John was preaching with the Holy Spirit about how the powerful people in Judea were ignoring the plight of the poor, treating them as subhuman, raising themselves above the ordinary people around them.

Last week we heard how John the Baptist had several disciples. Among them were Andrew and Simon, as well as James and John, the sons of Zebedee. In addition, Philip and Nathanael were also hanging around with John the Baptist.

After John the Baptist pointed out Jesus as the Messiah, these six talked for hours with Jesus, and even followed Him back to Galilee.

Some time passed, likely a period of some weeks or months.

Eventually, John the Baptist was arrested on charges of preaching against King Herod.

And it was at that time that Jesus stepped out of the shadows. 

Jonah 3:1-10; Psalm 62:5-12; 1 Corinthians 7:29-31; Mark 1:14-20

Jesus walked down to the shore of the Lake of Galilee where James and John, Andrew and Simon were working on their fishing boats. They were casting and cleaning their nets, untangling them, taking the dirt and driftwood and trash and debris from the nets. It was the way they made a living. It was their lives.

Jesus simply said, “Come, follow me, and I will send you out to fish for people.” Or, in the King James, “Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men.”

They left their nets and followed Jesus. The nets weren’t worth it. Jesus was.

Taken out of the context of the other gospels, this episode from Mark is amazing. Jesus just walks up to these fishermen, says a sentence, and they walk away with Him. Either they were having a particularly bad day fixing their nets, or there was something wonderful about Jesus. Or was there something else?

A bit of all of the above.

It was a bad day because these men had followed John the Baptist. They had believed in John, that John was the man sent as a prophet to Israel to put things right again. They believed in John and his humbleness, so when he had pointed to Jesus as the Messiah, they believed John truly had the word from God on this. And it was a bad day because word had come to Galilee that John the Baptist had been arrested and they understood that this…just…wasn’t….right! It was a bad day.

And there was something wonderful about Jesus. After all, Jesus was the Son of God and John the Baptist had pointed to Jesus as the Messiah, the Savior to come. That day, as in all other days, Jesus had the power of God. If Jesus wanted to have Simon’s boat to follow Him, the boat would have risen above the water and followed Him onto the shore. There was something wonderful about Jesus.

But there was something else. These four fishermen already knew Jesus. They had met Him by the Jordan River with John and they had spent hours talking to Him. They had walked back to Galilee with Him, and they had already decided in their minds that this man was filled with the wisdom of the ages and was worthy to be followed.

So when the time came, they were ready…and they followed Him without question, leaving their nets behind. They understood that, with Jesus, “there are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” (C.S.Lewis)

Many years earlier, Jonah the prophet had been sent by God to Nineveh. Nineveh, which lies just across the Euphrates River from modern day Mosul in northern Iraq, the area which until just a few months ago was dominated by ISIS.

In Jonah’s day, Nineveh was the largest city in the world – and was considered to be the most evil city going. Jonah was sent by God to preach to the Ninevites that God was ready to destroy the city.

Nineveh was such an evil city, Jonah wanted the place destroyed by God. Besides, Jonah didn’t want to go to such an evil city – Jonah tried to catch a boat for Spain, which led to a storm and Jonah being thrown overboard to be swallowed by the huge fish or whale and to be spit up on the shore. Realizing that he couldn’t escape his mission, Jonah finally walked to Nineveh and preached that it would be destroyed in forty days.

The amazing thing about the story of Jonah is not the whale, but the fact the people of Nineveh, including the king of Nineveh, believed Jonah’s preaching.

They all fasted and put on sackcloth as a sign of their repentance for their evil, and for their humbleness before God. God relented and did not destroy them then. And then, after a few years, they returned to their old ways. Today, Nineveh is in ruins.

Can you imagine this happening in any American city today?

Of course not?

I can. I can imagine it happening. Because it has happened before, and we saw it nearly happen last weekend/

We saw it happen after 9/11. Our ink business was swamped with people who wanted to talk about God instead of ink in the weeks after 9/11. Our churches, if you remember, were filled to capacity. And then the people faded away.

This past week, Honolulu in Hawaii was hit with a false alarm about an inbound ballistic missile. By all accounts, people were shocked by the idea that their personal end might be coming soon. We’ll see if there is any lasting effect.

Sometimes, people need a shock to remind them that the world doesn’t just go on everyday like it did in the days before.

John’s arrest shocked his disciples and they were ready to follow Jesus. Jonah’s preaching shocked the people and king of Nineveh, and they changed their ways. 9/11 sent people back to church to find the God they normally left on the front porch and some invited God into their homes and hearts that day.

The times, they are a changin’ and the world will be different next year. Who would have thought twenty or thirty years ago that our presidential race would be between a former First Lady and a man famous for building gambling casinos? Who would have thought that a man who made his money owning coal mines would have been elected governor in West Virginia, the state with the most militant coal miner’s union?

Who would have thought that everyone would spend more hours each week playing – not talking – on a telephone the size of a book of checks than they spend watching television. Who would have thought that some of our most popular television newsmen, actors, directors, and producers would be unemployed because they had taken advantage of their positions and become overly aggressive toward the women – and in some cases men - around them? Who would have thought this would happen twenty or thirty years ago?

The next twenty years will likewise see change. Our existing world is melting like cotton candy in a child’s mouth on a hot summer day.

Even now, scientists are finding out that many cases of COPD are caused by a congenital shortage of a particular liver enzyme which increases the effects of cigarette smoke, and that may allow us to stop the progress of the disease quickly.

Even now, scientists are finding out ways of targeting cancer based upon the particular genetics of the tumor cells, which promises to give us treatments that kill the tumor without making us sick from chemotherapy.

Even now, engineers have developed three-dimensional printers that could allow you to print out a different set of silverware and plates each night for dinner, a Japanese style one evening and Louis XIV style the next, and then recycle the dishes for the next evening.

Even now, engineers have developed the ability to scan your knee bones and three-D print a replacement titanium knee that is the exact same size. Expect to see them late this year.

Even now, driver-less tractor-trailers are being tested to carry loads of goods on the Interstate highways, perhaps replacing 95% of truck drivers, just as 95% of typists have been replaced by the personal computer since 1980. And of course, we’ve heard that driverless cars are on the way.

Even now, software programs are being tested that help the doctor diagnose what is wrong with you.

Even now, automatic weed killing robots are working in the Salinas, CA lettuce fields as driverless tractors plant wheat in South Dakota and corn in Iowa, as orange picking robots work in Florida and cherry trees in Michigan are grown in twenty foot tall plastic tunnels to protect the cherries from frost and insects.

Even now, robotic assembly plants make windows and doors in a plant in North Georgia to custom built sizes, while hundreds of thousands of the little motors that move your car window are made by less than ten workers in a single plant. I've been in those factories.

Even now, an egg factory I’ve visited has a million chickens laying eggs that are never touched by human hands, the eggs move from the hens to be cleaned, are inspected by a machine vision system, loaded in cartons, cartons in boxes, and boxes onto pallets and then a single fork truck driver loads the pallet on the truck. But there are twenty women working every shift, 3 shifts a day pulling dead hens out of their cages and throwing them away. Otherwise? Three or four maintenance workers, a couple of supervisors, an accountant, and an FDA inspector operate the place.

Even now, four private companies are competing to put people into space again. One company plans to put a car into orbit around Mars in a couple of years to show what their rockets can do. Another company plans to send tourists into space later this year on a regular, paying basis. Another – based in The Netherlands – is planning to put people on Mars in a decade, and still another is planning on sending probes to the nearest stars.

NASA has already found over 2500 planets in other star systems, and several appear to just the right temperature for liquid water to exist on their surfaces, which makes them potentially inhabitable for people.

Over the next few years, the number of people who are retired will skyrocket. In 2025, the largest group of baby boomers will turn 65, and that means that there will only about 2.5 workers for every person on Social Security. Thank you to those of you younger than me! Yet for those who avoid early deaths due to chemical addictions – alcohol, nicotine, sugar, illegal drugs, prescription drugs – it is likely that we'll live into our 80’s or 90’s or even past a hundred years old.

When the world changes, our old ways of living must also change. John Wesley saw this in the 1730’s, and created the Methodist Societies because the huge churches around England were mostly empty. John formed groups to meet in restaurants, in union halls, in private homes, and built a few buildings, too.

Because the churches had become private clubs for the wealthy, John created groups of ordinary people who would come together to study God, to help each other kick bad habits, to support each other, and to, as John put it, “escape the wrath to come”.

The Apostle Paul saw the trouble that comes with change – and Paul saw that the world was changing faster than people expected. So Paul wrote about how to handle a changing world, a world that would soon end in the destruction of Jerusalem, the largest town in Israel. Paul wrote about the changing world two thousand years ago:

What I mean, brothers and sisters, is that the time is short.

From now on those who have wives should live as if they do not;
those who mourn, as if they did not;
those who are happy, as if they were not;
those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep;
those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them.

For this world in its present form is passing away.
Things change. 

During the time of John Wesley, around 1750, the number one drink in America was hard apple cider. By 1850, the number one drink in America was beer. By 1950, the number one drinks were coffee, milk, and Coca-cola. Remember Maxwell House and Folgers? Today, the top drinks in America are bottled water, coffee, and Coca-cola. What do you think the top selling brand of coffee is? Folgers - not Starbucks. As much Folgers is sold than the next three brands combined. Sometimes the change doesn't come as fast as we think.

But things change.

In 1965, almost everyone in America leased their telephone from the telephone company. It was a black cube of metal surrounded by plastic known as the Western Electric Model 500. You could throw it against the wall and then DIAL a call. Only their ugly black plastic shell could break – the phone always worked.

By 1980, everyone owned their own phone, and there were some wireless phones becoming available that allowed you to walk around the room and still talk. In 1993, I got my first car phone. By 2000, many people had cell phones. In 2007, the iPhone was introduced. Today, almost everyone has a wonderful smart phone, a computer in their hand, a phone that can break with a simple drop to the sidewalk. Things change.

In 1950, almost everyone attended a church. 90 percent of Americans claimed to be Christian, 3 percent were Jewish, 2 percent Moslem, less than 1 percent Buddhist or Hindu, and the remaining 4 percent claimed to be atheist or other.

Today, only 80% of Americans claim to be Christian, 3% are Jewish, 3 percent Moslem, 2% Buddhist, and less than 1 percent Hindu. About 10% claim "No religion".

Things change.

A few years or decades ago, you and I knew next to nothing about Christian belief. Then we understood and perhaps we were baptized at that time. we learned more and more things about Christianity. we got involved in the church, we may even have begun to teach or lead.

Now things are changin’ again. It’s time for us to seriously consider what we are going to do for the rest of our lives. Will we stay with the boats, tangled in our life-nets, dealing with our driftwood, our dirt, our trash, our debris? Or will we plunge into the world around us, learning how to use the power of God to change the world and fish for people to lead them out of the mud and grime and depression of the world?

Just one example of the grime and depression: Over 840 people in West Virginia died of opioid overdose last year. Most left children that need help. How could we help those children?

Paul tells us that the time is short.

Do you have a spouse? Work together for God’s mission.

Are you in mourning – let that go – the time is short. Soon enough you will join those you mourn for on the other side. Make this time count for something eternal.

Are you happy? Be happy, but act with the seriousness that comes from understanding the time is short. Don’t be happy today – LIVE happy and joyful every day by giving hope to those who have none.

Did you buy something this week that gives you pleasure? Like cotton candy, how long will it last? Will you outlive your car, your house? Who will get it when you are gone? Yet the man or woman or child you bring to God will be with you forever one day in Heaven.

Do you love using a tool in this world, a phone, a computer? Use them as tools and don’t become tied up with them. For this world in its present form is passing away.

What shall we do when things change? What shall we do when the world spins around us and everything we thought we could trust melts like cotton candy? What do we do when everything is breaking down and falling down and crashing down around us – our schools, our companies, our trust in our leaders, our media, our things?

The Psalmist wrote in our Psalm for today:

Yes, my soul, find rest in God;
my hope comes from him.
Truly he is my rock and my salvation;
he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.
My salvation and my honor depend on God;
he is my mighty rock, my refuge.
Trust in him at all times, you people;
pour out your hearts to him,
for God is our refuge.

It is in God that our souls find rest. Never in the things of this world, unless they be things which direct us to God. Never in the security of a job, a friendship, a bank account.

If you want peace and rest, hang onto God, for God is our fortress, our rock, our refuge. The Psalm continues:

though your riches increase,
do not set your heart on them.

No, not even the riches given by God are to be worshiped.

Only God. Only Christ. Only the Holy Spirit.

For these riches are what make a person truly wealthy.

When things change in your life – and they will change as the old world melts like cotton candy – the only thing you can count on is that Christ is there, saying, “Follow me.”

So why do we put our trust in everything else, but not in Christ?

Did your bank account ever sacrifice itself for you?

Did your employer die on a cross for you?

Did your iPhone drip blood that you might live?

Did all those pretty things in your home, those tools you have used so well, those friends in the world have the skin torn off their backs so you would be able to avoid Hell?

Jesus did all of those things for you.

And all He says is, “follow me.” And, as the Apostles found, He will give us everything we need. Eternally.

You know what you need to do. You know what He has asked you to do. Worship God, treat all people with kindness and compassion. Sacrifice for others. And tell others of Christ’s love. This is what it means to follow Jesus.

Of course, to follow Him means we have to give up the false security of everything else in this cotton candy world.

Or, for that matter, are we really giving up anything of real value?