Statements of Faith; Acts of Trust

                                      Jeremiah 32:1-3, 6-15

 

 

          Ever notice that the Bible is a whole lot about choices? Noah has to ignore his neighbors and build the world’s biggest boat on dry land. Abraham has to choose to follow God, not only into a foreign land, but even to an altar where his son Isaac lies bound for sacrifice.  Moses has to choose God over common sense to go back to Egypt. Joshua gathers the people of God in the Promised Land and says “Choose this day whom you will serve.” Satan himself comes for Jesus in the desert and promises him the world. Jesus has a choice to make at the very beginning of his ministry. His choice will define what else will happen with that ministry. The Bible is a whole collection of choices made.

          The teachings of Jesus make it clear that all we have to do is choose God—choose Jesus—choose the gospel and salvation is our reward. There can not really be any doubt among Christians that we can’t earn our way. We have a choice to make. We can choose Jesus…or we can choose anything, anyone, else. Choices. They can save us…and they can destroy us. Every choice has consequences.

          Today, Jeremiah tells us a story about hope…and about choices. His story is about a land deal. We’ll come back to that. Right now, let’s talk about another story of hope. Reading Jeremiah brought a story to mind. There’s a film, about twenty years old now, called Hope Floats. It’s about a woman whose husband is unfaithful. She moves home with her daughter from the big city. Going back to the small town is tough on her. She has gone from the envy of all to the girl whose husband left her. She sees herself as a failure. The very fact that she does makes for a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. She wallows in self-pity in her mother’s house until one day, her mother sweeps in like a fresh breeze, throws open the windows, lets the sun shine in and says “Get out there! Get the stink blown off you!” Rousted resentfully from her self-pity, she begins the job of putting herself back together. On the way, she finds people still want to love her, still want to believe in her. She does indeed blow the stink off her and finds her way back from failure. She chooses to show faith, in herself and in others, and she makes her statement of faith, one step at a time.

          It is the eighteenth year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of mighty Babylon. It is the tenth year of the reign of Zedekiah, king of the southern kingdom of Judah. Though Zedekiah was king, he had been pretty much placed there ten years before by Nebuchadnezzar. He was the last King of Judah. Jerusalem is under siege. Within a year, it will fall and the people of Judah will be carried off into exile. Jeremiah is imprisoned. Zedekiah has called him seditious for his views. He is prophesying defeat. He is even advocating that the people should get used to Babylonian life, as they will be gone a long time.  He says that the king himself will be captured and taken to Babylon. In the midst of such doom and gloom prophecy which, by the way, was completely accurate, the imprisoned prophet of a people under siege from a vastly superior force takes some very interesting personal steps. He makes a choice of his own.

          Jeremiah’s uncle comes to see him about a piece of land. We need to set the scene here to get the real picture. First, Jeremiah is “shut up in the court of the palace guard”; that is, he is not accessible. Second, his uncle apparently doesn’t live in Jerusalem. Third, Jerusalem is under siege. Fourth, real estate prices have plummeted. This is the recession to end all recessions. So when uncle Hanamel shows up on Jeremiah’s doorstep and says he want Jeremiah to exercise his right of redemption and buy a field in Anathoth, which is several miles outside Jerusalem, Jeremiah says this: “Then I knew that this was the word of the Lord.” Say what? There’s no way this can happen. Jeremiah is under guard. Jerusalem is under siege. Judah is under attack. And uncle Hanamel shows up against all odds and wants Jeremiah to do the dumb thing of the day. Invest in a piece of property that almost certainly will be claimed by the invading army, to which Jeremiah says, this must be a sign from God. Isn’t it funny how so often, divine guidance comes riding in on the train of everyday life? The very presence of Jeremiah’s uncle at the court of the guard was the guidance Jeremiah needed.

          So what does Jeremiah do? He buys a piece of land. The man is under arrest and the wolf is at the door and he buys a piece of real estate. He tells his scribe Baruch to “take the deeds and put them in an earthenware vessel, that they may last for a long time.” We know that works, because of our discovery of centuries old manuscripts in 1948 in earthen pots. We call them the Dead Sea scrolls. Why in the world would Jeremiah do such a thing? He answers that question for us. “For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land” [v. 15].

          Jeremiah made a choice. He made his own personal statement of faith in God. He trusted God’s words and he acted in faith. In that act, he made a huge statement to those around him. The Babylonian armies were literally poised for the final assault on Jerusalem. Everyone knew that their method of conquest included dispersion of the population into exile. And Jeremiah bought a piece of land. What a powerful affirmation of his trust in God! What a statement of faith about the future of God’s people and God’s promise!

          When I was talking about this subject with my wife Cindy, she reminded me that in the early years of our marriage, and when our finances were stretched, when my business was thin and the cash flow was meager, those were the times that I was wont to show up with an unannounced semi-extravagant purchase.  It was my way of stepping out on faith, of saying to myself and to her that God would provide and that I just needed to have faith and keep showing up. I think Cindy got worn a little thin by those acts of faith, but she never really challenged me on it. As I look back, I realize that maybe that was Cindy’s act of faith in her husband…that she was also making a choice, a choice to support me even when my behavior might have looked a bit irrational.

          God is always coming through for us. Isn’t it nice when occasionally, we step way out of our comfort zone, like Noah, and Joshua, and Jeremiah…and come through for God. Jeremiah bought that field as a symbol, a symbol of his belief in God’s promise. Don’t you just love the Jeremiah’s of this world! They stand up. They refuse not to be counted. They act on their faith!

This church has done something a little like that. We have banded together as God’s people and said that we worship not as the culture tells us, but rather as the Scriptures inform us through the Holy Spirit. We too have made a choice. Now that the choice has been made, it is for us to live out that choice. But we have the words of the Lord to guide us, even from days of old. As God told Jeremiah that houses and vineyards would once again be bought in the land, we might feel his presence here today, saying to us in 21^st century context:

Trust me. I haven’t left. I never will. And no matter how bleak it may sometimes look, your future is bright and my promise is real. You are my children! Keep the faith!

When we hear such a message, from whatever source it may come, may we join with Jeremiah and say “Then I knew that this was the voice of the Lord.” May we trust in him and step out on that limb, build that boat, buy that piece of land…invest in that faith!            Amen.

 

 

     Written On Your Heart

                                      Jeremiah 31:31-34

 

 

          It can’t be fifteen years, can it? As I wrote the date into this week’s bulletin, there it was. 9/11. Though a full fifteen years have passed, that day is scorched into my memory as I am sure it is yours. The news. The planes. The incredible reality that our own passenger jetliners had been hijacked to use as bombs. Those massive buildings collapsing in lower Manhattan in a heap of steel, concrete and humanity. Thousands of lives lost. For me, that may have been the day when I would have been just as happy with delayed news coverage. There was no time to process the images coming on the screen. It was a front row seat to death happening in real time. I will never forget. Where have fifteen years gone? What have we learned from that day as a country, as friends and neighbors, as Christians?

The lessons we have taken from that day are both good and not so good. I remember the president saying the next day that 9/11 had forever changed the course of his administration. I remember hurting personally, hurting for basically total strangers to me except that they, like me, were citizens of this country. I cried that day. I cried for strangers, for loss, for the futility of it all, to see people choosing to jump to their deaths rather than to burn to death.

You may be sitting there thinking that you wish I wouldn’t be so graphic, that it was fifteen years ago and you would rather forget. But how do we forget images so powerful, so charged with hate and spite and fear and so many more deep emotions? Maybe we should not forget. Maybe we should remember. Maybe in that remembering, we can search for ways to make such things go away forever. It seems to me that we have to try as Christians to understand why. Where did that hate come from? What can we do to neutralize it? Where is God in such times?

The prophet Jeremiah lived in some crazy times himself.  He started his career as a prophet while still a teenager. Josiah was king and a good king he was. Jeremiah would see little of that. Over his forty year career, his ministry survived at least four more, evil kings, being taken as a prisoner to Egypt, watching as Jerusalem fell to the Assyrians, and later the Babylonians, during which his beloved people were thrown into captivity. Jeremiah experienced his own 9/11 and so did his people, in a much worse way that Osama Bid Laden and company caused the United States to suffer.   The people of God would labor through a seventy year exile.

Jeremiah is so famous now that it’s hard to believe that he had only two conversions of which we know. In forty years of ministry, only two people, his scribe Baruch and an Ethiopian eunuch who served the king, responded favorably to his preaching. And yet Jeremiah persevered, prophesying a return to favor with God and redemption of his people.

If we mark such days or events as 9/11 as catastrophic, as game-changing, as horror and meanness in world-class proportion, even then we must realize that our 9/11 must take its place in a long line, from the flood of Noah’s time to the exile of God’s people, to the Holocaust in Nazi Germany, to the genocide of millions in Rwanda in 1998.  In the history of the world, there are many 9/11s. They all cause unimaginable hurt. They all germinate from hatred and misunderstanding and intolerance.

It was 7:59 a.m. when American Airlines Flight 11 took off from Boston’s Logan Airport, 8:14 when United Flight 175 took off, also from Boston, 8:20 a.m. when American Flight 77 took off from Dulles Airport in Washington, and 8:41 when United Flight 93 took off from Newark. By 10:07 a.m., barely two hours later, all four planes had been turned into missiles of destruction by the enemy. And who was the enemy? Men without a country, a flag, men without uniforms or an organized army or navy. But they were not men without a cause. And their cause was every bit as religious and just to them as the pledge of allegiance is to us.  

Fifteen years later, we have taken recrimination against those responsible for 9/11. Bin Laden is dead. So are many of his followers. A war was launched on Iraq. These things are the natural outgrowth of attacks on our country. They are understandable and expected. Our country is safer than it was on this day fifteen years ago, but what do we know?? What have we learned?

Today, in Europe and in the United States, many call for the closing of our borders. Many see that as making us safe and insulated from the terrors of the world. And yet, we do commerce with that world, from China to the Middle East to Mexico. We want what they make, but not who they are. Their presence threatens us. 9/11 is still fresh in our minds.

Last week, Cindy and I gathered with her sisters and their husbands for our annual pilgrimage to the mountains to celebrate the end of summer and the beginning of a new season. Like many American families, we live in three different states and have different ways of looking at the same thing. Because I am now in ministry, conversation invariably turns to religion at some point. In the den of that mountain home, our views shared Protestant, Roman Catholic and agnostic leanings. We range from convinced to questioning to skeptical.  One struggles with the pummeling of his youth by those who believed without question and stifled inquiry. The questions now come in a torrent. Why believe the Bible? It’s a book. We have millions of books. Why do three great world religions all come from the lap of Abraham and yet differ on the importance of Jesus Christ? How do you reconcile hard science with the story of creation found in the Bible? Why do the Catholics have a different Bible than the Protestants? Why do the Jews, the people of God, reject Jesus? The questions came hard and fast and angry because when a kid once wanted answers, someone told that kid over and over to quit asking questions. And yet they are all good questions that the best of Christians struggle with at some level.

Where is the failure? It’s not with that little kid so many years ago, or today for that matter. It’s not with God; that’s for sure. The failure, if that’s what it is, might be called intolerance. It might be called fear. It might be called a lot of things, but what we can’t call it is understanding, or empathy, or tolerance, or dialogue…or even just patience.

In the thirtieth chapter of Jeremiah, the prophet hears the word of God from God himself, and God commands Jeremiah to write it down. So what follows in chapters 30 and 31 is what is commonly called an oracle, a repetition of the words of God by the prophet. And God says for the people to settle down in their captivity, to build houses and assimilate into the population, for it will be seventy years before they are allowed to return to their homeland. No wonder Jeremiah never won any popularity contests!

But Jeremiah had much more to say on God’s behalf, for God made a promise in chapter 31. We call it the New Covenant. It is a huge insight into the heart of God.  Gods says through Jeremiah:

I will set my law within them

I will write it on their hearts

I will be their God

They shall be my people

They shall all know me

For I shall forgive their iniquities

I will remember their sin no more.

 

Think about it. God had made a covenant with his people at Mt. Sinai. Moses brought down the law in two stone tablets. That covenant required two sides. You do this and I’ll do that. You obey and I’ve got your back. This new covenant isn’t two way. It’s one way. God is going to do it for us. It isn’t carved into stone. It’s written on our hearts.

          So God reaches out to the exiled people of Israel and says I love you so much that I will not let you get away. I will forgive and forgive and forgive. I will forget what you have done to me and I will come into your hearts and you will know me. Hundreds of years later, God literally came down the back steps of Bethlehem and grew up as one of us in order to fulfill that New Covenant. Jesus became the agent of redemption in a covenant that was articulated through Jeremiah in the midst of the exile of God’s people. Doesn’t God speak in mysterious ways!

          When we talk about 9/11, we have nothing on God. He sent himself, God the Son, to a hill of death. Yes he was a man…but His divinity in all its perfection climbed up on that cross as well. If all the sin of mankind was to be hanging in the balance, then it had to be God alone who was big enough to pay that ransom. It has been said that God’s plan of salvation rested between two rough-hewn beams of wood.

          That plan worked. God was there then. God was there at 9/11, crying for us as he cried for his Son. God is here now. He will always be here. The question for us is when we will notice. When will we notice that God doesn’t make wounds—he heals them? When will we understand that the answer is not to retaliate, but instead to invite someone to dinner?

          Men are about nation building. God is about surrender. Men are about pride and independence. God is about peace and love. It may sound like a hippie slogan from the 1960’s, but it still is true. We cannot get our world neighbors to understand us while we are killing them, or undermining their centuries old religious practices. We cannot get safe by isolation. How will they know God if they can’t see God in what we do, in who we are?

          I think that in this world in which we now live, there are no more Christian nations, if there ever were. But there are Christians within every nation. We need to stand up and show what is written on our hearts.

         Going to Jerusalem

                                          Luke 14: 1, 12-35

 

 

          A fellow decides to throw a party, a big party. He invites all the best people. When the time draws near for the party, people start begging out. They have legitimate reasons. What does the fellow do with all the preparations he has made?

          A charismatic leader rises up. Lots of people follow him. His twitter feed is full. His Facebook wall is covered. And then one day, he says be careful. Make sure you know if you can handle this. Following me is a tough gig.

           A farmer wants to build a watchtower so that he can protect his crops from thieves and wild animals. The tower is no small project. Does he have the time? Does he have the money?

A political leader convenes his cabinet. The country has been threatened with an act of war. How does he respond? Does he have the political will to finish what he starts?

These are not stories on CNN or Good Morning America. Although they could very well be on the six o’clock news, they are actually part of the gospel of Luke---stories used by Jesus to get people to understand the choices we face in life and the cost of discipleship.

Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem. Now, he’s been to Jerusalem before. Some think he went at least five times during his ministry alone. But this time is different. This time, Jesus is going to Jerusalem to fulfill the mission for which he came. Part of that mission was to live on earth as a man without sin, creating an example for us to follow. Mission accomplished. The other part of the mission lies on a hill called Calvary. The bridge to salvation, the road to reconciliation between God and mankind, that’s the reason that Jesus now travels to Jerusalem.  He has a date with a cross. Along the way, Jesus continues to teach. He teaches his disciples and he also speaks to the crowds that continue to gather around this rock star from Galilee.

It is the Sabbath. Jesus is having supper at the house of a Pharisee. Notice how Jesus tends to go where he will most certainly be provoked, because there is where he is needed most. Jesus tells the Parable of the Great Banquet, about the master who threw the big party and invited everyone who was someone. The time for the banquet arrives and people aren’t showing up. His servant goes to fetch some of the invitees, and the regrets start rolling in. One has a new real estate acquisition to check up on. Another has bought livestock and must tend to his new purchase. A third has just gotten married. And so the story goes. The servant gives his report to the master, who becomes angry and issues invitations to whoever is in the area, from the poor to the widows to the working stiffs. No pedigree is too small to be admitted to the master’s great feast.

Why does the master become angry over this state of affairs? After all, the folks we know about had good, sufficient reasons to stay away. Marriage was important enough to be exempted from military service in that day, certainly good enough reason to decline a banquet attendance. Every one mentioned has a good reason to be excused.

People from everywhere are then invited to the banquet. Poor, crippled, blind and lame fill the hall, and still there is room. People come in from off the highway, even total strangers. And the master says in v. 24: “For I tell you, none of these men who were invited shall taste my banquet.” Theologian Fred Craddock thinks that no longer is it the master in a parable speaking, but rather Jesus himself, saying to the Jewish leaders that now it will be the “unacceptable” of Israel and the Gentiles who are invited to the great banquet of salvation. It has become too late for those initially favored. In a great reversal of fortune, now the doors are open to the masses and the chosen are shut out.

Maybe Jesus was through with supper. Maybe he stepped out, excusing himself. Luke doesn’t say. At any rate, the next thing Luke tells us is that great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and addressed them. He says to them, this is not some big experiment. This is the real thing. If you want to follow me, you have to put that commitment above all else. Do your parents need you? Sorry.  Does your family, your church, your community, your wife, need you? Sorry. All those relationships and everything else is secondary.

Jesus gives examples. You don’t start a building project until you know the final cost. You don’t commit troops to battle in a war you can’t win. Now, Jesus knows his audience. It was neither the disciples nor the religious leaders whom he addressed. It was a great crowd that was fascinated with his mighty acts, but failed to grasp the significance of those acts. Jesus knew that many were only coming along for the spectacle of it all. Jesus warned them that while the reward of the kingdom is beyond magnificent, the cost of discipleship is high. Indeed, Jesus says that “any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.”

Why does Luke parallel these two stories? They don’t seem very related. One is told at a dinner, probably to adversaries, the other to a great crowd of hangers on who seem to side with Jesus, but don’t really know what to think. One is about the have’s losing out to the have-nots, the other about the have-nots being warned of a cost that is too great to pay. Is Jesus saying that if you once say no, you may be passed over?  Is this lesson of discipleship saying that if you dare to say yes, know that your life will be forever changed, that the cost will be higher than you might think? And Jesus talks about bearing one’s own cross. But Jesus has not yet gone to the cross. What is he saying? What is the common thread that Luke is weaving for us here?

The cross represented great suffering, the greatest known to man in that day. Taking up one’s cross could certainly have meant bearing up under the incredible burdens and hardships of life. And what about that common thread that unites these two divergent stories to different audiences? Well, whether you’re rich and going to a banquet or a farmer building a tower to watch your crops, there is a decision to be made and a cost to be counted. It’s not just the decision itself. It can also be the timing that is important.

Sometimes in life, we have to pick between the good choices and the best choice. There’s a saying you all have heard about friendship that sort of illustrates the point. It goes like this: A good friend knows all your best stories. A best friend has lived them with you. Do you see the difference? Do you want good…or best?

It’s easy to pick between good and bad, right and wrong. The better choice is clear. But what will you do when the choice is between good and best? There are points in our lives when picking the good thing may forever cast our fate away from the best thing. That’s why the master got angry at his invitees. They didn’t make the best choice, and it cost them dearly.

           Everyone who would be Christian is called to discipleship. In our lives, we have many loyalties: to family, to church, to community, to job. They are all important, all legitimate. But the claim of Christ takes precedence. Nothing comes before it. That claim redefines all other relationships, all other commitments.

          It is a big cost. A huge cost. For some, taking up the cross becomes much more than a figure of speech.  Know the cost and decide. It you wait too long, the door will close. If you say yes without understanding the commitment, you will only fail. Discipleship is not tricky. It’s just hard. What in life worth having isn’t! Nothing else, nothing else, carries the reward that comes from following our Savior!