What Are You Wearing?

Colossians 3: 9-17

            It’s Christmas. For me, Christmas always means new clothes. Beyond the customary socks and tee shirts, there is always something designed to freshen me up, to make me look more in keeping with whatever it is that I am supposed to be in keeping with. This year the freshening included a knit shirt in a new color and an over shirt. It’s not a sweater, but it goes over another shirt. That would be an over shirt, wouldn’t it? Any way, my understanding is that my clothes are too bulky and I need clothing that makes me look more trim. That may be asking a lot from a shirt in my case.

Thank God for my wife. Left to my own devices, I would wear nothing but one pair of blue jeans and one pair of khaki pants with a few knit shirts. They are my friends. I see no reason to go out without my friends. Men are bad that way. We never change. We just wear things out. Renewal is not part of our mantra.

          Sometimes though, renewal is precisely what is called for, and not just in clothes. Even when we find the right way to go in our lives, we still don’t follow it very carefully. We keep drifting off the new path, looking for something old and familiar. We keep wandering toward the next new thing, thinking it may be the answer we are looking for. It is precisely because of such thoughts that we need to keep getting renewed, particularly in our faith journey. Otherwise, we will sell out to the newest fad, the biggest box office draw, the best salesman, the most entertaining movement or event.

          Paul’s letter to the Colossians is perhaps the most Christ centered letter in all of his writings. It contains many descriptors of Christ. He is referred to as the object of the believer’s faith, the image of the invisible God, the creator of all dominions, the head of the church and the firstborn of the dead, to name only a few. The book has several themes, as Paul writes to the church in this small inland town about a hundred miles east of Ephesus. The Colossians have found some new material and it is leading them away from what they have been taught by Paul. Colossians should be read and studied with that in mind, but in this message, we will concentrate on a broader theme that is illustrated here, not just for the Colossians, but for believers in any time and place.

          We are just days on the other side of Christmas. We have spent weeks talking of the coming of the Christ child. We have looked forward to the memory of the Incarnation with all its familiar props: shepherds and angels and new songs from young and old; Mary and Joseph and the manger. And now, the “coming” has happened once again, though only as a celebration of that which we have learned to remember, almost as though it happened in our own memories. But even that has now passed once again. Now we are left with that warm feeling of the infant and the message he will bring, but we are again alone. We are in that vast ocean between the comings. He came. He will come again. What do we do when we are in the middle of the comings? How do we navigate steadily between the buoys and stay the course toward righteousness with all that sea of temptation and false prophets to throw us off course? Jesus has come. Jesus has gone. Or has he? Paul says not…that the nearness of Jesus lies in the way we live our lives. When we put away all those Christmas decorations, we are not supposed to put away the warm feelings that they inspired. Though the decorations are gone, the feelings they engendered should remain. The same is true of Jesus, with or without Christmas.

          Paul says that if you believe, then you too have been raised with Christ. I know that most of the time we don’t feel like that, but it’s true. That is, it’s as true as we let it become true. If we are born again, as Jesus talked about to Nicodemus, then we have begun to put earthly things to death. That is, we are changing our priorities. We begin to live for Christ and to use those earthly possessions and responsibilities as vehicles for witness instead of badges of bondage. We are to put away the selfish things of life and in their place, we are to adopt that unselfishness that Jesus taught us.

          Paul says to the Colossians, and to us, that we have put on a new self. That self is the new and improved model. According to Paul, it is a “one size fits all believers” suit. It is in God’s image. That new self puts on a compassionate heart. Hearts such as this come with humility, meekness and patience. They bear up under pressure. They carry one another. They even forgive. And last but by no means least, the new self puts on love, a binding love that makes everyone get along.

          In Colossians, Paul is more than likely trying to correct a group that has wandered away from their new found faith in Christ. Something even newer has come along and they are being swayed. Paul is trying to adjust their course. In the context of today’s message, I think his words also hold true as a measure for what we do with the Christmas message. While it is fresh in our minds, it is easier to think about peace on earth and good will toward men. While it is the season of giving, it is more appropriate to pick out a family or two to help out during Christmas. But what happens in January? Does the water bill that was paid by the church at Christmas now disappear? Do the needy neatly and conveniently disappear until next Christmas?

          At Christmas time, we put on our nice new clothes. At Christmas, we also put on the mantle of generosity as people and churches and institutions. But then, Christmas ends. What then? As if we did not already know, Paul gives us the answer: “Put on the new self…Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts…And above all, put on love.” These are the clothes of renewal. They are the garments of righteousness that set us apart from others. This is the way for Christians to dress. Paul goes on to remind us that we have inside clothing as well. He encourages us to let the peace of Christ rule in our hearts and the word of Christ dwell richly in us.

          It takes practice to wear the clothing of God, both inside and outside. In many ways, it does not come naturally. We want for ourselves. We are selfish by nature. Even when we are being unselfish, we often compartmentalize our generosity so that we can do it at our convenience. Wearing the clothes of the new self takes time and practice and being very intentional about why we do the things we do.  

           I think about the clothes that I was given this Christmas. They are very nice and tasteful and yet, if I am not intentional about wearing them, they will just take up space in my closet. They are not my old friends like my blue jeans and khaki pants. But…what if I wear them? What if I am intentional and what if I make it a point to wear these new clothes? They won’t stay new very long, will they? And with some persistence on my part, these “new” clothes will become my friends just like my jeans.

          Putting on a new self is like that. It won’t feel very comfortable until we break it in. But the more I put on love, the more it feels natural. The more I am compassionate, the less comfortable I am being selfish. That new self wears in and I am at home in my own skin.

          Philip Yancey and Paul Brand say this: “God with skin on. God in the flesh—with beating heart, healthy mind, and blood coursing through his veins. God come to earth in the skin of our humanity in order to bring the message that he is eager to relate to us, know us, understand us, intercede for us. This is Jesus.”

What will you wear this year? This month? This afternoon? What will you do when you settle down to watch your favorite football team on TV and someone in need knocks on your front door or rings you up on the phone. What clothes will you be wearing then? Will they be different from the ones you wear to church?

God put on our skin to be with us. He built a bridge for us that we could never build for ourselves. Even when he left us, he sent us a new set of clothing to wear throughout our lives. It’s called the Holy Spirit. From the moment we try it on, it changes us. It feels right, like an old friend. No matter where we are, no matter what we do or who we’re with, it never seems to be out of style.

What will you be wearing this year for him?

Let us pray

12/29/13

        Magnificat

         Luke 1: 39-55

            It is the fourth Sunday of Advent, the last Sunday of this season of preparation. We prepare for the coming, the coming of the Christ Child. The themes most commonly associated with advent are faithfulness, hope, joy and love or peace. Each theme helps us in its own way to anticipate, to think about what is happening. The Incarnation, the birth of the Son of God as a mortal man, is about to happen. It will change everything. It is the coming for which the people of God have so long awaited.

          Advent, the coming. What does it mean? Today, we look at another of the three hymns in the first two chapters of Luke. We have heard from Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist. Later, there is the Benedictus hymn of praise from Simeon, as he sees the child for whom his whole life has been served in waiting. Now, we pause to look at the Magnificat, a song from Mary as she praises the changes taking place in her body, in her life, in the lives of all who will follow this moment in history.

           Mary was young by any standard. Most scholars suggest she was a young teenager.  She was betrothed to Joseph to be married. She was not yet sexually active. She was naïve, young, inexperienced. She was a small town girl in a small town town. She was Jewish and obviously a pious Jewess or the Lord would not have chosen her. Her condition was not unusual for her time, but the events which were about to unfold had no precedent, no parallel. They still don’t. Only once in the history of mankind has God been born into our midst as a human being. Only once has God had fatigue, hunger, thirst, pain. Only once has God bled the blood of a man. Only once has God been a newborn baby. And it all started with little Mary, the small town girl from Nazareth with the big time blessing.

          Mary may have been a small town girl with little or no credentials, but she was no stranger to the law and the prophets of old. Her song borrows heavily in word and even theme from Hannah’s song in the book of First Samuel, where Hannah praises God for rewarding her prayers with a little boy who will become Samuel, one of the great judges of Israel. In fact, Mary’s song is loaded with references to the Old Testament. But Mary has more to say. She goes farther than Hannah. Mary understands her job. She is a vessel for the most important birth in the history of mankind. She is the caretaker for the Son of God himself. But Mary understands much more than that. Mary seems to understand that the roots of revolution are growing in her womb, that nothing will ever be the same. Listen to the words of this teenager.

“He has scattered the proud in the plans of their hearts,” she says. We have heard about pride before. We read about it in Proverbs. We know it as one of the so-called seven deadly sins. And Mary says that this newborn child will scatter the proud. Mary is speaking of a moral revolution where those of distinction have lost their position. Not only are they no longer able to justify their pride, but also they are scattered and unable to act in their superficial unity. They now will have the example of Christ as the Son of Man to use as their mirror and they will see themselves as they are. Pride withers in the sight of Christ.

“He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate,” says little Mary. Prestige and position, first cousins to pride, are now about to be vanquished. Now Mary is talking about a social revolution. In the days of Hannah, she was proud for her son as she saw him able to sit with princes. In the world that Mary sees, there will be no princes to sit with, as those from humble means will sit where princes once sat, not as the new rule, but as the obedient servants of our Lord.

“He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent away empty” Now Mary moves to articulate an economic revolution. From moral to social to economic, the world that her baby will usher in will be the upside down world of Jesus. Mary prophesies a world where Christian charity and generosity trump pride, avarice and greed. There is loveliness in her hymn but as theologian William Barclay reminds us, in that loveliness there is dynamite, for the coming of Christ and Christianity fosters a revolutionary approach that continues to change the world. All we have to do is look around. We are in church today to worship the God who once more reached down to redeem us on that Christmas morning so long ago. We are in church today because we seek that redemption in our own lives from the Savior that Mary so ably prophesied.

Does this sound like an innocent little teenager to you? Not to me it doesn’t. I know and accept that Mary was as pure and innocent as the driven snow. But she was certainly well schooled in her history and well visioned in her understanding of what Messiah was to be. Perhaps someone else wrote this and attributed it to Mary. Perhaps this is just the platform of an evangelist and Mary was the vehicle for him to get it said. If that were true, which we will never know, would it matter? The words are still brilliant. The thoughts are still revolutionary and revelationary in their import. But I have no reason to think that Mary did not say such things except that it may have been unusual for a young girl to have such vision. Well yes, it probably was unusual. But then, there was plenty about Mary that was unusual. How many women do you know who have been visited by the angel Gabriel? Mary was, and is, revered for a reason. God picked her as his vessel to make himself known to us as a man.

“My soul magnifies the Lord,” says Mary. “My spirit rejoices in God my Savior…holy is his name. And his mercy is for those who fear him.” Yes, his name is holy…set apart. Yes, his mercy is for those who fear, for those who have faith, for those who have hope, for those who have joy…for those who love him.

It is advent, the season of expectation. Let us join with Mary, the young girl, with Mary, the expectant mother, with Mary, the prophetess, with Mary, rocking that newborn baby as though hope itself rested in those newborn limbs. Let us, too, magnify the Lord. It is advent. He has come, he is coming again.

Let us pray.

12/22/13

    Giving Light; Guiding Feet

         Luke 1: 68-79

My name is Zechariah. I’m a priest. A Jewish priest. My wife is Elizabeth. We’ve been happily married for a long time. We were never able to have children. Until now. This has been by far the craziest year of my life. I’ve always tried to live by the Scripture. So has Elizabeth. We have prayed for many years for the coming of the Messiah, but that’s not news. My people have been offering up that prayer since the days of Isaiah. But a few months ago, everything changed. Boy, did it change!

I was on duty at the temple. It was my division’s turn. On that day, it was my lot to enter the inner temple to burn incense. I came inside to do my job and there stood an angel! You heard me. An angel! He scared me half to death. He said don’t be afraid. He said my prayer for a child had been answered, that Elizabeth was going to bear a son and that we should name him John. Right! I’m sorry. I mean I know this happened to Abraham and he was even older than me, but that was Abraham, the father of my people! I’m just an old priest. So I said to him: How shall I know this?

He didn’t like my answer. He said he was Gabriel and that he gets to stand in the presence of God. I guess he thought I was being impudent or didn’t believe him. Really, I was just dumbstruck. How many times do you get a chance to talk to an angel? I wasn’t prepared. And then I really was dumbstruck, because Gabriel struck me dumb for over nine months. I couldn’t talk, couldn’t say a word, until today.

Well, it happened just the way he said. Elizabeth conceived. Six months later her cousin Mary also got a visit from Gabriel. Her news was even bigger, if what she tells Elizabeth is true. She’s pregnant now too, just like Gabriel told her. Gabriel let her in on what is going on with my Elizabeth and soon after, Mary came to visit us. She and Elizabeth had this incredible experience. Elizabeth’s baby, our baby, leapt in the womb at the sight of Mary. It was quite a scene, watching them together. And that’s all I could do… just watch. Mary ended up staying with us for about three months, very close to the time that Elizabeth delivered our son. All the neighbors came by to congratulate us. I guess we’re quite a curiosity item because we’re so old.  They rejoiced with us for our good fortune.

Today, we went to the temple. It’s the eighth day after our son was born. Our tradition requires us to go there to have him circumcised. This is our way of visibly showing that we are people of the covenant. They started to name him after me, but Elizabeth spoke up and said to name him John. Everybody thought sure that was wrong because no one in my family has that name. Someone got a writing tablet and handed it to me. I scribbled on it to name him John. Right then, my speech was restored. The first thing I did was to bless God.

I guess between the strange name that had nothing to do with my family, the restoration of my speech and us having a child at such an old age, it was just too much for everyone to take in. We were the talk of all the hill country of Judea.  People thought the hand of God was on this child. They have no idea how right they were. The question on everyone’s lips was “What then will this child be?”

I know the answer. I was full of God’s Spirit and he gave me voice. I prophesied. It sounded like a poem or a hymn. Some people call it the Benedictus. I was so full of God’s Spirit that it just came pouring out.

First, I blessed God, and not just for me and Elizabeth, but for all God’s people. We have prayed for this for so long and now it’s happening. God promised to visit and redeem us. The prophets told us that our redeemer would come from the house of David and he will. That time is very near. Our salvation is near. We use the word horn to indicate power, because it reminds us of the power of the mighty rams and other horned animals that inhabit our land. He who my son will announce is the horn, the power, of salvation, and I know that he is on his way to us.

I sang about that mighty covenant given to Abraham by God himself; that he would deliver us from the hand of our enemies. He has done that many times for us over the centuries. No matter what we did, he always forgave us. But it’s been a long time that we have prayed for the promised king to come. This time, it is different. I don’t know the details, but I do know that our god keeps covenant with his people. The time is near when we will be able to serve him without fear, for we will be delivered. That’s what all those old scriptures and prophecies are all about, you know. There are a lot of stories and there is a lot of history. But the common thread that runs from the beginning to right this minute is that God keeps covenant with his people. God’s kingdom is about to be introduced. I can feel it.

I sang about my son, my blessed son John. I told them what I know in my heart, that he will be called the prophet of the Most High. He will go before the Lord. He will prepare his ways. He will set the table for who is to come. He will bring the knowledge of salvation to those of our people who will listen. Many of us have long thought that when Messiah came, he would be ushered in by the great prophet Elijah, the one whom God called up to heaven in a whirlwind surrounded by horses and chariots of fire. But now I know; it is not to be Elijah, but John. Can you imagine? My son, this little baby boy, will grow up to pave the way for our Savior. That means that after all this time, after all these centuries, Messiah is on the way! I haven’t said it aloud, but I’m thinking that my son will be a baptizer, getting people to turn from their selfishness to see the light that is coming.

While I was praising God and singing this song of prophecy, I began to see a new truth. The salvation that is coming lies in forgiveness… forgiveness of our sins by God, forgiveness of our neighbor by us, forgiveness from our neighbor to us. I began to see that it all comes from God’s tender mercy toward us. I never realized until now how glorious and powerful is that ability to forgive and be merciful. He truly is God if he can bring that to us.

As I sang my praise, I realized something else. I know that God has spoken to his people through covenant and I know that covenant was with Abraham. I always thought it was for us, the Jews. I’m sure that is still true, but it’s not the whole truth. Like the new truth of God’s forgiveness, I see a new truth about God’s people. God is like the sunrise, but so much more powerful. I see now that God gives light to all who sit in darkness. I see now that God brings deliverance to all who sit in the shadow of death. God’s light is the light of the world. He will guide us and he will guide us to the way of peace. I don’t mean peace that is just the absence of war. I mean peace that is the presence of faith and hope and understanding and righteousness. And now, I think I understand what God meant when he said that his salvation is for all his people. If we believe in him who is coming, if we believe the message of the Most High whom my son and others will be privileged to introduce…then…we are God’s people! We will be known to him not by the mark of circumcision, but by the mark of our faith.

What then will this child be, ask the people? He will be a messenger. His name will be John. He is my son, but he will belong to the ages.  He will never be forgotten, but even so, he is not the story. The great prophet Isaiah said this so many years ago:

Arise, shine, for your light has come,

and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you

For behold, darkness shall cover the earth,

and thick darkness, the peoples;

but the Lord will arise upon you,

and his glory will be seen upon you.

And nations shall come to the light,

and kings to the brightness of your rising.

Isaiah 60: 1-4

The story is about to be told and it will change the world

forever. For John will introduce us to him for whom the world has waited. He will introduce us to our Lord.

Who then will this child be? He will be as we can be. He will be a messenger of the coming of the Lord. Think about it. In no time, he will pass the torch to others. Our Lord will come, and with it the beginning of the end of the age. My son cannot tell everyone. We will need other messengers. Our Savior is coming and he has a message. Will you hear? Will you help?  

Let us pray.

12/8/13

The Promised Land

   Deuteronomy 6: 1-11

            Moving day. No matter how much preparation we put into it, we are seldom really prepared. Too much stuff. Too little time. Too far away. Too hard on the family. Being uprooted from what you know can be very disconcerting. We leave our families to follow our husbands and wives, who have been transferred to places far away and go to further their careers. We leave to make a new life because there is no work where we are. We leave because we are trying to escape from sadness or misfortune. We leave because we are trying to find happiness and good fortune. Moving day. It’s not for the fainthearted. Even a move across town can be rough.

          After forty years in the wilderness, the Exodus is about to end and God’s people stand poised to enter the Promised Land.  God’s people have wandered in the desert for a generation. Now they are finally at the doorstep of their new life. The book of Deuteronomy is essentially a large collection of sermons, apparently from Moses, as he prepares the people to cross into their new home. It has been called “farewell instructions for a nation.” In the twenty sixth chapter, Moses reminds the people once again how they got there and what they need to do to keep that memory alive. He inaugurates a tradition that is to be observed every year. He reminds these wandering nomadic people that they are descended from Jacob, a wandering Aramean who went down to Egypt. But God now has other plans for his people. He has delivered them to the Promised Land. It is not only the land promised to Abraham so long ago; it is also a land flowing with milk and honey. It is a land where crops may be grown. The wanderers are about to put down roots. And so Moses instructs the people to make a memory. He tells them to institute a ceremony that is to take place every year. This new agricultural society is to offer the first fruits of the land as a reminder that God has heard, that God has delivered, and that God has provided.

          Centuries later, a little band of pilgrims gathered together in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621 to celebrate having survived their first winter in America. A goodly number of them had perished, either on the voyage to this new world or through that first harsh winter, but now the first crops had been harvested and they were still there. They took time to celebrate their first year in another “promised land.” Like their predecessors in the land of Canaan so many years before, they brought their first fruits of the land to remember their deliverance from their harsh environment. Thanksgiving is a uniquely American holiday, but its roots are strongly religious and agrarian, just like the people of the Exodus. It is a blend of two traditions, that of religious prayers and fasting from the Puritans and that of rejoicing for a successful harvest, brought over to New England from similar festivals in ancient English traditions.

          Moses reminds the people that the land is an inheritance from God. It is God’s gift for them to live upon, plant and harvest. Moses repeats what is to become the refrain of the people of Israel. The verbs in this passage tell it all: We cried…the Lord heard…the Lord brought us out…the Lord brought us into…you shall rejoice…the Lord has given. In second temple Israel after the exile, the people cried and God restored them. In Jerusalem, God comes as Jesus our Savior. We cry, he hears, he gives, he restores.

          And here at the edge of the river Jordan, a historic crossing is about to be made. God’s people are crossing into the Promised Land. It will not be without bloodshed. It will not be without tears. But God had promised and God will deliver.

           At Plymouth in 1621, people had survived an Atlantic crossing in a boat called the Mayflower.  By today’s standards, we would hardly call it a ship. One hundred two people made the crossing. While eighteen women made the voyage, only four were left to celebrate that first thanksgiving. The Israelites had the desert. The Pilgrims had the Atlantic. Getting to the Promised Land is no cakewalk, even with God’s blessing.

          Where is the Promised Land? It can be different places for different folks. For the people of Israel the Promised Land wasn’t that far away from Egypt. It certainly was not a forty year journey. They had issues to resolve before God would let them in. For the people of Plymouth, they sailed for almost two months before they really left England. They started out with a sister ship, but had to make port twice for repairs before they left. Even when they did, they had to turn around after 300 miles to come back for more leak repairs to the sister ship. Finally they set out by themselves for a hard passage that ended up several hundred miles north of their original destination of Virginia. Did they miss the Promised Land and settle for something different? Hardly. But they did have to redefine their definition of where and what the Promised Land was to be. They had to leave that with which they had become familiar. Even slavery looked like a good idea to the Israelites when they got to the Red Sea.

          Brent Mitchell tells a story about lobsters. It sounds a lot like what Moses…and those Plymouth pilgrims…were getting at when they stopped to remember and celebrate the experiment they had undertaken. Mitchell reminds us that from time to time, lobsters have to leave their shells in order to grow. They really need the protection of their shells so that they are not torn apart, but they continue to grow. At some point, they have to leave their shell. If they don’t, their shell will first become their prison and later, their coffin, for growth is not an option, but the way of life to which they must adapt.

          For the lobsters, the tricky part is that brief period of time when they discard the old shell and during which they have to wait for the new shell to be formed. During that time, they are very vulnerable. They are without protection. It is a scary, uncertain time. For the lobster during this time, that old shell must have looked a lot like the shore of England looked to those pilgrims on the Mayflower, getting smaller and smaller until they couldn’t see it at all. All they could see was that gray ocean for as far as their eyes could see.

          We aren’t much different from the lobster. We may not be spending forty years wandering around in the wilderness, but there are plenty of deserts in the life of a Christian. We may not have to cross the Atlantic in a boat half the size of this sanctuary, but there are plenty of oceans to cross in the life of a believer.

          When Moses stood and gave his sermon to the people of Israel, he reminded them of where they had been and why they had left. When the Pilgrims sat down to that first harvest with ninety or so Native Americans who had befriended them, they took pause to give thanks for what they had survived and to remember why they had braved the change to come to America. They were looking for the Promised Land. To change and grow, we must sometimes, most times, shed that protective shell on which we have depended. It’s the only way to grow. That’s the cost of discipleship…stepping out, taking risks, accepting change. If we want to follow God, we will have to grow.

The Promised Land has lots of shapes and sizes, colors and tastes. For some it is by the sea. For others it is deep in the woods. For yet others it is a pew where we worship on Sunday morning. The Promised Land might be off the coast of Africa or inside the fence of our own back yard. For most of us, the Promised Land is probably not land at all, but rather a place in the heart that God takes us. Wherever it is, it is the place God has set aside for each of us to grow. It is the place promised to us by our Savior.

          And when we have those growth experiences, we need to stop and remember. We need to do as God’s people everywhere always do. We need to bring the first fruits to the feet of our Father. We need to rejoice in all that the Lord our God has given to us. We cried…he heard…he brought us out…he brought us in…we rejoice…and give thanks!

Let us pray.

11/24/13

Bread and Busybodies

2 Thessalonians 3: 6-13

            Ever been on a mission trip? There are always surprises. Sometimes, people come to Christ right in front of our eyes. Sometimes, nothing much seems to be working, but in every case, things happen, both to those who are served and to those who serve. Often, it takes time to see the evidence of the seeds that we plant. Christian leadership is not only a process of delivering truth; it also is an art form. It can be done effectively through the sheer will power of one, but it works better through the mutual cooperation of many. While he was still a general, Dwight Eisenhower used to demonstrate the art of leadership with a simple piece of string. He’d put it on a table and then he would say “Pull it, and it’ll follow wherever you wish. Push it and it will go nowhere at all.” 1

          Thessalonica was one of the strings that Paul had to learn to pull. It was a stop on Paul’s second missionary journey. Silas and Timothy were his companions on this three year trip to the port cities around the Aegean Sea. Paul preached there in the synagogue for three straight Sabbaths. Obviously, he and his companions had quite an impact, as they ended up having to leave town under cover of night. Their teachings were taken as a threat by local businesses and some of the local tradesmen wanted them run out of town.

          Although Paul preached in the synagogue, he obviously found time to preach to the pagan Gentiles there as well. Apparently, Paul succeeded in his efforts in Thessalonica, for the seeds of his ministry surfaced in the form of a church there, which was composed mostly of Gentiles. Paul’s first letter to that church is probably his first writing preserved in the New Testament.

In Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians, he dealt with some community issues. Some people were not working. They were waiting for the second coming of Christ. They were worried about what would happen to them if they died before he came. In his second letter, he again addresses some of these same issues. This time he is more forceful about what should be done. Even here, though, we can feel Paul engage in the push and pull tensions of leadership as he tries to help this new church.

Paul talks to the Christians in Thessalonica about idleness. There are people who are not pulling their load. Some of these same people are using that spare time to no good use. Paul calls them busybodies.  He says that if you are able to work and don’t, then don’t eat from the table where the church provides food. Either help to put it there or don’t partake.

Paul is not talking to those who cannot work. On the contrary, that is one of the ways in which the church served. It helped to provide food for the needy and less fortunate. This issue is not about work, but rather the willingness or unwillingness to work.  Paul reminds them of his own example. He talks about the time he was with them and his refusal to take money from them. He earned his own way. Elsewhere in Scripture, Paul has pointed out that it is his God-given right to be supported in ministry. [1 Cor. 9: 13-15, 2 Cor. 11: 7-9, 1 Thes. 2: 9] Nevertheless, he chooses not to exercise this privilege. He did not want to be a burden on the people he served.  Paul may have taken his example from Jesus himself. Legend has it that before his ministry, Jesus made the best ox-yokes in all of Palestine and that men came from all over the country to buy them.  So Paul says that idleness and Christianity don’t mix.  No work, no food. That covers one point in today’s passage, but Paul is not done.

Not only does Paul not like idleness, he also doesn’t like what these folks are doing with their new found spare time. These idlers are stirring the pot with gossip. Paul doesn’t like busybodies. He doesn’t like them so much that he tells his church friends to keep away from them. He still calls them brothers, so he is not dismissing them from the congregation. In fact, he talks directly to them in verse 12, saying that they are both commanded and encouraged to “do their work quietly and to earn their own living.” Why would Paul give such strong advice and yet not dismiss these people from the congregation?

Last week, a friend and neighbor of mine underwent a complicated surgery to remove a tumor from his brain. Examination of the tumor prior to surgery had indicated that it was growing, that it was invasive and that it was probably cancerous. But my friend is not a young man and such a surgery has risks. Why would he allow the surgeon to cut so close to the source of all his thinking, to the command center of his life? His decision was based upon the surgeon’s advice. Better to take the risks associated with the loss of some brain function than to allow the cancer to continue to grow and take over his ability to think.

Such was the case with Paul and the Thessalonian church. The idleness and the inevitable gossip that flowed from it were like a cancer on the congregation. Left alone, the situation would continue to deteriorate and the problem would continue to grow. Theologian William Barclay says that there may be greater sins than gossip but there is none which does more damage in the Church. Paul’s suggestions were like those of the surgeon. He advised cutting the idlers off from normal contact. But he didn’t go to extremes. Like the surgeon cut away the damaged tissue from the brain, so the idlers were cut away from the communication of the church. But also like the surgeon leaving the rest of the brain to function, the idlers were not cut off from the church itself. The cancer was their behavior, not themselves. They were not to be regarded as enemies, but rather warned as brothers, and Paul continues to refer to them that way.

How important was it for this action to be taken? In the case of a growing brain tumor, it must be cut away or its tentacles will reach out and co-mingle with good tissue. After awhile, you can’t tell the good from the bad. In the case of a group of idlers and gossips in a church setting, it is only a matter of time until they infect the healthy members of the congregation. Paul felt so strongly about this that not once but twice, he commands them in the name of Jesus Christ. This places his instructions in the strongest of language.

It’s a tough act to push someone away and yet do so in a manner that says they are not banished. It’s tough to accept the person while condemning his actions. It’s tough but it’s certainly doable. When our children get in trouble or do something out of line with what they have been taught, we don’t throw them away. But neither should we accept their behavior. To do so would be to put the proverbial fox in charge of the henhouse. Christian discipline is between brothers, ignoring anger, rejecting contempt and always acting in love.

Paul closes with an exhortation to the good guys in the church. He has chastened the idlers and the gossips. He has given advice as to how the situation should be handled. Now he turns to the faithful. Like the coach in the locker room at halftime, he exhorts and encourages. “Do not grow weary in doing good.” he says. That too is a tall order, but an order that we as Christians know all too well. The Christian life is not a sprint, but a marathon. We must never cease our efforts in Christ’s behalf. This is our act of love and it plays out on the stage of life in the ways we deal with our friends, our families and our brothers.

Do not grow weary of doing good. Do good to your friends. Do good to your neighbors. Do good to your family. Do good to that person who acted so nasty to you for no good reason yesterday. How can we live up to that standard? Easy! Do it in the name of Jesus Christ.

Let us pray.

11/17/13

1 1001 Quotes, Illustration & Humorous Stories, Edward K. Rowell, baker Books, 2006.

Sons of the Resurrection

Luke 20: 27-38

          Did you watch the Presidential debates last year? It’s not important whose side you were on. All that was decided last year at the ballot box. But the debates themselves were quite interesting, especially the second one. That was the debate that the sitting president pretty much blew. He was not well prepared and it showed. He didn’t measure his opponent or his knowledge well enough. In fact, the political scientists of the day said that if he didn’t recover in the last debate, that one event could decide the presidency.  

A similar point was hammered into me in law school. It was about trial law and it was this: In cross examination, never ask a question unless you already know the answer. That was a very good piece of advice. Every time I forgot it, I got reminded the hard way why I should have heeded that advice. I won about as many cases not asking the wrong question as I did asking the right question.

           Apparently some Sadducees in first century Palestine didn’t get the memo. Teacher, they say mockingly, Moses wrote the law. He said you have to marry your husband’s widow if he dies and you’re still single. He said you have to bear children with her. What happens when seven brothers marry the same woman and none bear children? Who is she with in heaven? The Sadducees were happy with themselves. They had come up with a riddle to stump the teacher.

          They had done it to the Pharisees. The Torah, the first five books of our Old Testament, was their bible. The passage they used was from Deuteronomy 25, which mandated such a practice. It required a brother to marry the widow of his brother to produce children, or seed.  No matter that almost certainly the practice was no longer used in Jesus’ day. There it was in the Old Testament law. The Sadducees paid no attention to the writings or the prophets. The recognized only the law. They did not believe in a bodily resurrection and they used that passage as one of their bases for denying the resurrection of the body. The Pharisees, who did believe in such a resurrection, had no comeback. If the law-fastidious Pharisees couldn’t give an answer, neither would Jesus.

          The Sadducees partially based their unbelief in some practical reasoning which went roughly like this: If there is a bodily resurrection, then we have our bodies in heaven. We must, therefore, have our relationships in heaven. That would include marriage. Marriage would include conjugal relations between spouses. For the Sadducees, the case of the seven brothers with one wife illustrated the sheer impossibility of sorting out such relationships, so bodily resurrection could not be true.  One can’t really fault the Sadducees for such reasoning. The problem is that it didn’t apply.

          Ever been around a know-it-all? I don’t mean someone smart and well prepared. I mean the kind of person who has some power and can’t be told anything. That person has all the answers. The Pharisees could be a pain in the side for all their legalism, but they were a religious body that rigorously studied all the scriptures of the time and cared nothing for personal gain. The Sadducees, on the other hand, were the ruling class of their people. They are mentioned only once by name in Luke’s gospel, but indirectly on a number of other occasions, for theirs was the sect from which came the high priests. They were very political and wealthy. They were used to being right because they wielded the power. The Sadducees were the know-it-alls of Jesus’ day, even more than the Pharisees.

So Jesus takes the priests to Bible school.  He talks of “this age” and “that age.” “This age” is the one in which we live, the one in which the Sadducees lived.  In this age, we marry and we are given in marriage. We have children. We have families. We die. “That age” is the age to come, the age in which, thanks to Jesus and the grace he brought to earth for us, we have one foot in the door, the age of the already, but not yet. As believers, we already participate in that life through our relationship with Jesus. The full expression of that life is yet to come. It awaits the promised second coming of our Savior and in that moment, our bodies, our resurrected bodies, will join our immortal souls in heaven. That is part of what awaits us in “that age.”

What’s it like to be in “that age?” Well, we don’t know a lot, but what we know is wonderful. Jesus tells the Sadducees and us that in heaven, there will be no marriage and no one given in marriage. There will be no death. He tells us that those who are resurrected from the dead…that’s right: Jesus refers specifically to the resurrection of the dead…will be equal to angels and sons of God, that we will be sons of the resurrection. These are not the revelations of Paul or Peter or John. They are not the predictions of some Old Testament prophet, as powerful as those testimonies and prophecies may be. They are the statements of Jesus Christ himself.

What is Jesus telling us? For one thing, he tells us that we cannot understand the character of heaven by understanding how things work on earth. Heaven is much more than a perfect earth. Heaven is not a daily string of 68’s on the golf course or a constant series of perfect shots at a 14 point buck or a size 2 dress figure. Heaven is wonderful, but the details are a mystery to us. Little has been revealed, and yet more than enough is known to make us hungry for it. We can infer from Jesus’ comments that earthly relationships, while instituted by God as one way in which we can begin to understand the love and character of our Creator, are not a barometer for heavenly relationships. On earth, we think of husbands and wives and brothers and sisters and children. In heaven, says Jesus, we are sons of God, sons of the resurrection. Does this mean that we will not recognize our loved ones? I doubt it. I just think it means that the most important, the most intimate, the most compelling, relationship, will be the one we each will share with our Savior and our God.

Back to the know-it-alls, the smug quoters of scripture. Jesus turns again to the Sadducees and in the same way he answered Satan in the desert, Jesus quotes Scripture to answer Scripture. He refers to the third chapter of Exodus, where Moses refers to the Lord as the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. This is not a history lesson. This is a pedigree. Jesus says further that God “is not God of the dead, but of the living…” What is the inference? Clearly, it is that the patriarchs are not dead. Yes, their bodies are at rest, but if God is God of the living and not the dead and if God is addressed as God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, figure it out. They may have changed state, but they are not dead! The Sadducees are silenced. The scribes, part of the Pharisaic sect, were so impressed that the Sadducees had been silenced that they actually complimented Jesus. They also quit asking questions.

Our Savior has never been without an answer for our questions. Sometimes, the answers may be out of this world, but he has all the answers we will ever need. What is heaven like? I don’t know. I just know that my Savior promised me that if I am considered worthy to attain to that resurrection, I will be equal to angels and I will be a son of God. That’s enough explanation for me.   

In the children’s praise song Heaven Is a Wonderful Place, Salty is asked if he knows anything about heaven. He says “Sure. I know that Jesus is there, and if he’s there it must be a wonderful place.” He sings a song adapted from Psalm 53:

Heaven   is   a wonderful place

Filled   with  glory and grace

All I wanna see is my Savior’s face

‘Cause heaven is a wonderful place.

“Then some of the scribes answered. “Teacher, you have spoken well.”

Let us pray.                   11/10/13

Lost and Found

Luke 19: 1-10

            Remember when you lost it? The engagement ring…or the class ring. Maybe you lost something with which you had been entrusted. Remember that initial panic? Then the systematic search with no results. Finally the admission to someone what had happened and then more searching. Most of the time there is a happy ending. After all, lost usually just means misplaced. As you re-trace your steps, eventually that which was thought lost is retrieved. It was never really lost…just out of place.

           My wife is forever bringing me stuff from the lost and found basket at her work. She always waits until it’s time to either throw it out or take it home. You know the story: “one man’s trash…” I really appreciate all those forgetful people. They have enhanced my wardrobe.

          Sometimes today, and in Jesus’ day too, “lost” is the word used to connote the absence of purpose or direction or conviction. Sometimes ministers and evangelists talk about saving the “lost.”  By implication, I guess that means that those of us who are not “lost” must be “found.”

I’m not sure that on occasion, one can’t be a little bit of both. I know I have days when my belief in God may not be in question, but about everything else is. Does that make me lost? I guess it depends on one’s frame of reference.

          Today’s frame of reference involves a big wealthy city, a small wealthy man, a sycamore tree, and a Savior. The bit players are the Pharisees and other doubters. The scene moves from street to dinner table. These are the props and players. The story is salvation: where it is, what it is and what it isn’t.

          We think of a person as lost when he or she has wandered away from God. That’s fair enough, although I think we ought to expand the definition to include someone who has never really been introduced properly to God. Like rings and other lost things, we might say that when one is away from God, then he or she is misplaced. If that’s the case, then taking our rightful place with God would amount to being found.

           There are lots of misplaced people wandering around. The situation is more complicated than it first appears. Sometimes, those misplaced people, those lost people, are sitting right down front in church. We don’t have a list of those who are found and those who are not. If only we had some way to know who is and who isn’t. Then we could be more effective in our witness. Actually, Jesus had something to say about that. In fact, he had quite a lot to say about it. We can find some of that advice in the passage for today.

           The first ten verses of Luke 19 are a multi-colored palette of themes. There is the universal appeal of the gospel (vs.2-4), evidenced by the crowd that continues to follow Jesus. There is the ethical problem of wealth (v.2). We have seen this before in Jesus’ encounter with the rich young ruler. There is Jesus’ “call” of a person in social disfavor (v.7). The religious leaders called these people “sinners” and criticized Jesus for frequenting with them. There is the very real presence of urgency in the way that Jesus goes about injecting God’s presence into the scene (v.5, 9). There are also sub-themes of necessity, joy and outreach to the poor. All the themes and sub-themes work together to tell this story of the little man in the sycamore tree, the seeker. They tell a story of how he finds Jesus, but the real story is how Jesus finds him.

           Then there is Verse ten, considered by many to be the key verse of Luke’s gospel. Jesus states the reason for it all. It is often said that if you want your argument to be remembered, then you must observe the rules of primacy and regency. Put more simply, people will be more likely to remember the first and last things you said.  Let’s apply that to this passage. Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. He came to seek and to save the lost.  Who was lost? Zacchaeus. Where was he? Lost in the crowd. Lost in his selfish life and pursuits. What did Jesus do? Seek him and save him. Why? To save someone. That’s the message of this passage, the message of Jesus. It is the message of salvation. Jesus says: “For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”    

Jesus talks about money a lot in Luke’s gospel. He talks about it more than he talks about heaven and hell combined. The subject of money comes up once every seven verses in Luke. Eleven of his parables (39 total) contain some reference to money.  Remember the story of the rich young ruler? He had a lot of money and he just couldn’t deal with giving it up. Or the story of the Pharisee and the tax collector praying together? The Pharisee was rich with pride and the tax collector’s riches plagued him to ask forgiveness.  Now we have Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector. This is a guy at the top of the financial ladder. And yet, Jesus is about to hand him the keys to the kingdom. You see, it’s not about the money. It never was. It’s about our attitude with the money. Are we generous with what we have or do we horde and protect it as if it were our salvation and security? How we answer that question will have a lot to do with whether we meet Jesus. I’m afraid it applies equally at every financial level. Ask the widow who gave her last penny. The fact that she had little did not exempt her from her responsibility to give of that with which she had been blessed.

          The thing that most captures my attention here is that Jesus is doing the seeking. While Zacchaeus is curious and is bounding down the street to climb the sycamore tree to get a better look at the local hero, we have no reason to think it is more than curiosity. We might surmise that Zacchaeus is probably more than a little dissatisfied with the way his life is turning out. He has every material thing he could want and it’s boring. It isn’t all it was cracked up to be. He has all this money, but no one respects him. He’s probably having trouble buying friends.

          But look at what’s going on with Jesus! He comes to the tree and he looks up and calls Zacchaeus by name. By name! This is Jericho, the City of Palms. It had aqueducts, a winter palace for Herod, even a hippodrome. This was a flourishing city with a large population. These two men did not run in each other’s circles. And yet Jesus calls the man by name. Not only that, he tells Zacchaeus to hurry, that he must stay at Zacchaeus’ house today! Zacchaeus may have wanted to see Jesus but Jesus wanted to see Zacchaeus even more.

           This is a classic example of Reformed belief, which reminds us that God is sovereign and that we cannot even reach for God until he has first reached for us. Before we ever make a move, God draws us to him. He plants the seed in our hearts. He reaches out to us. He activates that seed and then we receive him joyfully just like Zacchaeus.  Jesus tells us in John 6 that “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” Jesus has sought out and found Zacchaues. The lost is now found.

          The church leaders are grumbling. He doesn’t come to synagogue, they say. He is a tax collector, a sinner. Look at him. He makes a fool of himself, a grown man climbing a tree to see this Jesus. Everything is out of order. There are systems for this sort of thing. There are rules to be observed. No self respecting churchman would be caught in the house of a sinner! Jesus is a rule breaker, a regulation buster. He must be a fraud! And he most certainly can’t be successful this way!

          But Jesus was successful. He sought Zacchaeus and he saved him. Zacchaeus set new records for giving and doing penance for his past acts of selfishness. He went far beyond the requirements of the Jewish law.  Jesus called him a son of Abraham, not because he was Jewish, but because he was a believer and thus a spiritual descendent of Abraham.

It didn’t matter that Zacchaeus was a sinner. We’re all sinners. It didn’t matter to Jesus that Zacchaeus was not a churchman, that he was in a business known for cheating. It didn’t matter to Jesus what other people thought about his actions. It didn’t matter where or how they met. What mattered to Jesus was Zacchaeus. Jesus didn’t come to preserve institutions. He came to save people. What mattered to Jesus was that he had come to seek and save the lost. In that one afternoon, a man went from lost to found. Jesus sought him, Jesus found him. Jesus saved him.

Though the setting of this story is first century Palestine, it sounds all too familiar, doesn’t it. We sit in our pews and wonder why they aren’t full. And all the while, Jesus is walking around out there in the street. He still does that, you know. The history we read in Luke is most relevant when we realize that at some point we are the Zacchaeus’s, and that Jesus is looking for us, drawing us to his arms of grace. He seeks us, he finds us, he saves us.

I heard it said recently that the thing about grace is that it always finds us right where we are, but never leaves us where it found us. Doesn’t that make the hair stand up on the back of your neck! That’s Jesus. He’s calling your name. Hurry down from your perch wherever that might be, for he may be having lunch at your house today.

10/20/13

Fighting the Good Fight

2 Tim 6-8, 16-18

            He was only thirty nine years old when he was killed in a German concentration camp. Already famous in Christian circles for his profound writing, which included The Cost of Discipleship, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was in America when Nazi Germany declared war on Europe and Britain. He could have stayed in the United States, but he chose to return to Germany. Hitler had ordered the Jews expulsed from Germany and this meant that Jesus’ teachings would also be banned.  Indeed, Hitler ordered that the Church would become an agency of the state. Bonhoeffer returned to Germany where he worked underground to preserve the church. He helped to write the Barmen Declaration, one of the confessions of our church today. That declaration asserted that the Christian church could never become subject to the rule of any human government and that it answers only to Jesus Christ. Bonhoeffer lived his life…and ultimately gave it…for his belief in Christ and the church.

In the book of Numbers [28: 24], we find God instructing Moses on how and on what occasions to make public offerings. Such practices included drink offerings. These offerings were made daily as well as on special occasions. The drink offerings were wine and were used in conjunction with meat offerings. They were designed to remind God’s people that they owed their lives and livelihoods to him.

          In the book of Philippians [2: 17], we find the apostle Paul writing a very upbeat letter to his friends in the church there. He is most probably in Rome and under house arrest. He refers to himself in a sacrificial manner, saying that even if he may be poured out like a drink offering upon the sacrificial altar of their faith, he will do so gladly and rejoicing.

          The book of Second Timothy finds Paul much closer to the end of his life and he seems well aware of it. There is no more “even if” in his language. He is still in prison, but no longer under house arrest. He is in a prison cell and soon he will be martyred for the cause of Jesus. Now he says “I am already being poured out as a drink offering [4: 6]. Paul’s time has come.

Drink offerings offer us a vivid image of the meaning of sacrifice. In the time of Moses, they were used to sweeten the savory aroma of the best meat of bulls and rams brought to the altar to sacrifice to God. The first and best fruits were regularly offered to God as a sign of reverence and loyalty and trust. The best wine was poured over these sacrifices as a drink offering to complete the gift.

Paul uses this custom to describe his impending martyrdom. Twice in scripture, Paul refers to being “poured out.” The image is one of generosity, of a covering, of saturation. His offering is that of himself, poured out like so much more wine as an act of loyalty to God. It is not lost on us that the blood of Paul would remind us of the wine of an Old Testament drink offering. It is also not lost on us that Paul is not unhappy. Nor does he appear afraid. If anything, he seems almost eager for the next step.

Why did Dietrich Bonhoeffer return to Germany? Why did Paul continue to preach the gospel and get run out of city after city? Why do people intentionally put themselves in harm’s way? The answer is not complicated. We do so because we believe in the cause for which we sacrifice. We do so because we love. We do so because the reason for the sacrifice outweighs the sacrifice itself. Sometimes we do what we do as a pattern, like Bonhoeffer and the apostle Paul. Sometimes we do so out of reflex, like Mike Landsberry did last week in a Nevada middle school. He stepped into the path of a semiautomatic weapon wielded by a troubled teenager and it cost him his life. He was just another middle school math teacher until fate dealt him a choice. He could save himself…or he could stand in the gap. He chose honor. He chose sacrifice. He believed in the cause for which he made his sacrifice. He acted in love. Children’s lives were saved.

Psychiatrists tell us that people who lead the fullest lives seem to fear death least. Certainly the examples here would qualify in that respect. That includes Mike Landsberry, who had served two tours in Afghanistan as a Marine. Mike had no chance to think. He just acted out of reflex developed long before this particular event. He knew what he needed to do. He lived his life in such a way that when he was in a position to make a difference, he didn’t hesitate.

Paul has had plenty of time to contemplate and yet the result is the same.  He acts out his faith. In his advice to Timothy, he uses athletic metaphors to describe his fate. He has fought the good fight. He has finished the race. He has kept the faith, played by the rules, stood his post to the end. Paul’s life has been full. He has no regrets. He has lived the slogan he coined in Philippians: “to live is Christ; to die is gain.”

There is an old adage that says: to the victor go the spoils. Paul now claims his reward. He says that from here on there is reserved for him a crown of righteousness to be awarded to him by the Lord. Like the victorious athlete at the end of a contest, Paul looks forward to the crown, the trophy. Interestingly, Paul points toward a crown of righteousness as though he has not yet received it. Does that mean that Paul is not yet righteous? Does that mean that Paul is partially righteous; that in his death, he will cross over to full righteousness? It may even mean both. If we may compare Paul’s teachings on sanctification to this comment on righteousness, it would seem that in his earthly death, Paul will be elevated to a state of true righteousness that can only be achieved in his unity with God. Our earthly walk is a process of sanctification that is completed in our death and resurrection, for indeed, we will be resurrected. We have God’s promise on that.

In Paul’s final thoughts in this passage, he forgives those who have deserted him in much the same way that Christ forgives his persecutors while hanging from the Cross. Paul then gives credit to God for the numerous times that Paul has been rescued in order to bring the gospel to the Gentiles. Then Paul talks about his final rescue, where God will deliver him from every evil deed and bring him safely into his heavenly kingdom. It is a remarkable tribute. It is also a faith statement. Paul knows full well that his end is very close. He also knows that it will be painful. He fully expects to be executed and soon. And yet, Paul’s statements ring of optimism and faith of the highest order. Death holds no power over Paul.  On the contrary, he looks forward to his deliverance to God. He pays homage to God and gives God the glory for all that will happen. 

This is what we as Christians need to hear. This is what we as Christians need to be about. Like Paul and the heroes we have mentioned today, we need to fill our lives with all things good and righteous. We need to experience what it is to work for God, to commune with God. We need to train ourselves so that our reflexes will not betray us when we are tested. We need to remember that Paul’s life, while a great role model, is not unique. It is repeated daily by countless disciples of Christ all over God’s creation. The real question is whether you and I can be counted in that number.

Fill your life with the right things. Don’t wait for that moment when you might be asked to offer the ultimate sacrifice. Start now. Become an arm or a hand for your Savior. Extend yourself. Pour yourself out like a rich drink offering so that your love and your belief can be seen and heard by all those around you. 

The true fullness of God’s kingdom must wait for that day when we meet God in heaven, but the taste of it is here and now. Fight the good fight. Run the race. That crown of righteousness is for all who believe, so live…and live for Christ.

Let us pray.

10/27/13