Entertaining Angels

                                          Hebrews 13: 1-6

 

 

          Hospitality is almost a lost art. How often do you entertain guests these days? How often does someone drop in on you just to visit? What would happen if they did? Some of you can remember the days before air conditioning—when everyone had a front porch and it was used generously in hot weather because sitting on the front porch was cooler than sitting in the house. The fringe benefit of all that porch sitting was the natural hospitality and neighborliness that resulted from it. People visited more frequently. It was a natural thing.

          The Bible talks about hospitality. In fact, the Bible makes a pretty big deal about it. You know, hospitality has a lot to do with generosity. Are you selfish with your time, your stuff, your food, your hearth and home? Or are you generous? There’s a kind of openness that goes with hospitality. Open your hands. Open your hearts. Open your doors.

          Some people have hospitality as a spiritual gift. While it is not mentioned specifically in terms of a gift in the Bible, it is mentioned as something Christians need to do and it is mentioned often. The thing is, Romans 12: 13 seems to tell us that all of us need to practice it. In a litany of the marks of the true Christian, Paul ends his list with this sendoff: “and seek to show hospitality.”

          Here’s some Greek for you that you might find helpful. The Greek noun for hospitality is philozenia, a compound word composed of philos, which means affection and zenos, meaning strangers. So taken in its original context, hospitality is affection toward strangers. And Paul says that every Christian should seek to show that. It seems that hospitality is just another form of expressing your Christianity, but in this form, it is usually done in your home.

          Now, some people, probably lots of people, equate hospitality with being a good entertainer or throwing a lot of parties and get-togethers.  They might say that so and so is good at hospitality because he or she entertains and plans a lot and does things perfectly and serves, from food to party favors. I suppose that these attributes are a form of hospitality, but that’s certainly not what the Scriptures are getting at.

          Listen to what Peter has to say: “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace.” [1 Peter 4: 8-10]  In Peter’s world, hospitality is about service; the kind of service that pours forth from the love experienced through the grace of God. Peter reminds us that while each of us may have different gifts, all those gifts can be used in the framework of hospitality.

          There’s not much question in my mind that hospitality has to do with food. In Acts 2 when the early church is literally being formed, Luke tells us that the believers “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” [Acts 2: 42] The gospels are littered with stories of the disciples breaking bread together. Of course, there is the example of Jesus himself. When the time came for him to sacrifice himself for us, he commemorated that time with a supper, his last supper, in which in an act of unbridled humility and hospitality, he knelt and washed the feet of the disciples. When he appeared to the two men on the road to Emmaus, Luke tells us that his true identity “was known to them in the breaking of the bread.” [Luke 23: 34] In John’s Gospel, Jesus says goodbye to seven of the disciples on the shore of the Sea of Galilee over a charcoal fire with fish and bread for breakfast.

          The evidence is unmistakable. There is vulnerability and intimacy in having someone over to your house or your campfire. If you don’t believe it, go camping and see how many friends you make over an open fire. It’s hard not to be neighborly when you’re sitting in someone’s kitchen or den or roasting s’mores over a campfire. Food certainly helps, but there is more to it than that. Home and hearth offer the opportunity to be real in the place where we are most real.

          I’m wondering how life might have turned out for Rahab if she had not opened her home to that Israelite advance team in Jericho. Rahab showed courage under fire and hospitality in the bargain, and the lives of her and her family were spared. I’m wondering how life might have turned out for Boaz if he had not had the hospitality to share his crops with the gleaners of his fields. One of those gleaners, a Moabite woman, a foreigner, would become his wife—and the great-grandmother of King David.

          It’s a popular thing these days for churches to appoint a welcome committee. People are picked who are good at being friendly and they are assigned to do that to visitors. What does that do to the rest of us? Do we leave it up to the professional welcomers? Are we at liberty to ignore? What does it say to the visitors when they come back the next week and they are welcomed by the same people? Being hospitable is not a job description. It’s a way of sharing your Christianity with others.

          I’m also wondering about the account in Genesis 18, where three men come to the door of Abraham’s tent. Abraham senses that they are important and he acts accordingly. And yet, he does not know who they are. A meal is hastily prepared, and Abraham and Sarah show them the best hospitality they can on short notice. It turns out that those three men were the Lord himself and two of his angels. [Genesis 18: 1-15] That meeting turned out pretty good for Abraham. You just never know who will drop in when your door is open and so is your heart.

          Remember the conversation about the sheep and the goats, about how they will be separated? Strangers are fed and clothed. Sick are visited. Those who do so find themselves in the favor of God. Those who don’t, suffer God’s wrath. When they inquire about how they ministered to Jesus, they are answered in this way: Inasmuch as you did it to the least of these my brethren, you did it unto me. [Matthew 25: 40]

This brings us to our scripture for today. It is an echo of those other scriptures  from the pastor of Hebrews that tells us the ultimate reason for hospitality. It is the breath of God, from him to us to the strangers in our midst. It is our way of un-strangering them.

There is a story about this group of Mennonites in the Midwest who were pretty closed about their lives and religious practices. As fate would have it, some Hispanics moved to town. As they had no church in the area, they began to attend the Mennonite church. There was a language problem, but eventually that began to be bridged. Eventually, in the public prayers, their stories began to surface: the hardship they had faced, the prejudice they lived with, the obstacles they had to overcome, the prayer lives they practiced. Strangers became friends, and the people found that they had much more in common with these strangers than they had ever thought possible. It changed the politics of that church. The chasm between stranger and friend is almost always bridged by story. Listen, really listen,  to someone’s story and then try to treat him like a stranger.

Hebrews 13, our passage for today, implores us to “let brotherly love continue.” It calls upon us all to “not neglect to show hospitality to strangers.”  And it reminds us that, in the same way that Abraham came to find out, sometimes we are entertaining angels unawares.

Who’s that knocking at your door?

Made Straight to Glorify

                                          Luke 13: 10-17

 

 

          At the local deed registry, it became necessary to make a rule about filing deeds. Before the recession, so many deeds were being filed that the registry couldn’t close on time. They had to process every deed that came in before 5PM. To do so kept the staff working well past closing time. In order to alleviate the problem, a rule was made. After 4:30, nothing would be clocked in. Deeds could be examined for recordability and left there to be recorded, but nothing would be done until the next morning. The rule helped the staff accommodate the volume and still go home on time. Then the recession came and the volume went to nothing. But still the rule stayed in effect. You could be the only person standing at the window at 4:30 and still, your deed would not be recorded until the next day. The rule is still there today, even though the need for it has completely disappeared.

          If you think that’s silly, listen to this: In Quitman, Georgia, chickens are not allowed to cross the road. In the state of North Carolina, it’s illegal to sing off-key. And in Rhode Island, you are not allowed to sell toothpaste and a toothbrush to the same customer on a Sunday.

          What do these and many other such laws and rules have in common? For one thing, I suspect that at the time they were made, there was a somewhat legitimate reason for them.  For another, there is now no question that such laws are just plain silly.

          The Jews had silly laws in Jesus’ time as well. They had laws for purity, laws for sacrifices, laws for the Sabbath. The Mishnah is a piece of Jewish rabbinical literature. It is the first major writing of the Jewish law carried over from oral tradition. The Mishnah lists 39 different laws concerning the Sabbath. Those laws could be extreme. For instance, to pluck a gray hair from your head was considered work and violated the Sabbath. You could spit on a rock but not on the ground. Spitting on the ground made mud and mud was mortar. Making mortar is work. That violates the Sabbath.

          Get the picture? What started out as a conscientious effort to keep the law of God turned into a silly demonstration of over-zealous rule-making. In today’s story from Luke, Jesus takes aim at one of those rule-makers.

Jesus is in the synagogue teaching on the Sabbath. A woman is there in the audience. She has what Luke described as a “disabling spirit.” She had had it for 18 years. It caused her to be bent over. We don’t really know what this disabling spirit was, but obviously it manifested as a physical disability. Now we all know that next, we’re going to hear about Jesus working a miracle.  This woman is going to be healed. There is power in just knowing that, but to pay attention to only the miracle and not to the lesson taught around it is to miss the blessing that Jesus has not just for that woman in the synagogue, but for you and me as well.

While Jesus is teaching, he sees this woman. She is bent over and cannot straighten up. Jesus stops what he is doing. He calls the woman over to him. First, he pronounces her free of her disability. Then, he lays hands on her. Luke says “she was made straight, and she glorified God.”

Now, the ruler of the synagogue is indignant. Jesus has violated the Sabbath. That is, according to the ruler of the synagogue, Jesus has violated the Sabbath by working. He laid hands on the woman. He healed her. Jesus is the healer so that is his job, and you can’t work on the Sabbath. The synagogue ruler actually proposed that Jesus confine his healing to the other six days of the week. But he didn’t have the nerve to say it directly to Jesus, so instead he said it to the people.

Do you know people like that? They don’t accuse you directly, but they turn to others and say their criticism and accusations, as if that were any less hurtful. Well, Jesus is not one to be accused, directly or indirectly. Jesus turns on the synagogue ruler and anyone else that may be siding with him and calls them hypocrites to their faces.  The way Luke tells it, Jesus’ explanation is a sort of word play on the terms “loose” and “bound.” Jesus says you loose a tethered animal from its bonds on the Sabbath and take it to water. And yet, you can’t do the same for a human being, a woman who is one of you, who is bound to Satan? And that because of a rule about not working on the Sabbath? Is a woman of God’s people worth less to you and your silly rules than an animal?

There is a story about a man who went bird hunting with a friend. The friend brought along his new hunting dog. Now this man was known to have a pretty critical nature.  He took a look at his friend’s new dog and said “that doesn’t look like much of a dog.” They walked through the forest until they came to a clearing by the lake.  A flock of birds was flying over and the hunters began to shoot. One of the birds fell into the lake. The little dog bounded forward and ran across the lake, his little frame barely touching the surface. He retrieved the bird and came back, still running over the top of the water. The friend looked to the man and said “What do you think of my dog now?” The man replied “Dumb dog. He doesn’t even know how to swim.”

Have you ever met someone like that man? Someone like the ruler of that synagogue where Jesus was teaching that day? They’re all around us. They are great at obeying rules or criticizing, but they aren’t very good at seeing the truth in front of their face.  The truth is that Jesus never broke the Sabbath. Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath. What Jesus broke were some silly rules, rituals made by men who never really saw the reason for the rules to begin with. Jesus never put ritual requirements above human need.

Don’t mistake the importance of this story. Jesus confronted small minded people with the big picture. That’s huge. If the church does not look at the opportunities for Christian service in this life in that way, the time will come when there is no mission to which to attend.  We have to see the big picture. That’s the long view that Jesus reminds of here.

But there is more. Jesus performed a miracle. In spite of the small minds with which he was surrounded, he rose to the task. He saw the woman, singled her out, and gave her the miracle she had probably thought could never happen to her. But it did, because Jesus saw her. And he didn’t wait, either. The synagogue ruler said in effect: “What’s one more day?” Jesus said: “It’s one day too many. Let’s loose her burden right now.”

The story is about a woman, but the narrative is about you…and me…and everyone who lets God see them. We may not feel it, but if we are not in line with Jesus, then we too are bent. We too are unable to fully straighten ourselves for the work to which God has called us.

Will you let God see you? Will you ignore all those silly rules from all those small thinking people and let Jesus pick you out? He will if you will just let him. Jesus called that woman over and said to her: “Woman, you are healed.” And she was. Luke tells us that she was made straight. Think beyond the physical disability of that woman in the synagogue. Think about all the ways you are bent over. There is nothing---nothing, that Jesus cannot heal. He can make you straight too. You just need to let go of the pride that holds you in place. It might have been going on for 18 years or even longer. Jesus doesn’t care.  He can loose you from yourself and whatever demons are in your life, and he can do it right now. There is no need to wait until tomorrow.

When that happens for you, don’t forget to do exactly what the woman did. Glorify God, for it is Jesus who can give you that peace you can’t find on your own, that healing which cuts to the heart of what ails you. Unfortunately, there are people who are never going to get that. Jesus even said that we have to have eyes to see and ears to hear. The gospel is not for everyone. But make sure that it is for you. Let him make you straight!    

Father of the Man

                           Genesis  18: 19,   Matthew 19: 13, 14

 

 

It’s time again. In just a few days, school starts.  Everyone who could has been on vacation to the mountains, to the beach, to Disney World. Everyone has bathed in the easiness and heat of the summer. The heat is still here, but summer is fading. If you don’t believe it, ask the teachers and teacher assistants gathered here with us. They went back a week ago to begin preparations for the coming school year.

Just a few minutes ago, we did a special blessing for the children and their backpacks now pressed again into duty. A few hours from now, we will all gather at the splash pad for one more fling at summer. But though the days of summer are still with us, thoughts are quickly turning to the beginning of another term of school, of the promise of a chill in the air, of the call to another year of learning in the classroom. For some, it will be their first time; for others, their last. For those in college, another step toward adulthood and jobs and responsibilities.  We are about to send our children off to learn. We are about to put them in the hands of others for hours every day. We kiss them goodbye and watch them leave the car or get on the bus and we entrust a major portion of our children’s lives to others in the hope and prayer that they will learn, that they will adapt, that they will thrive in that environment. But what we cannot do is to think that our job as parents is done. It has only become more complicated.

I was driving to the church the other day and was listening to public radio. A news piece was on about the move by some public school systems to have high schools teach a segment on the prevention of sexual violence. California has made it state law.  While the piece was airing, a mother in a nearby state called in to ask why such a course wasn’t taught in her state. She commented what a problem it was to have to teach such things at home, and didn’t appreciate the schools not teaching her children about why it is wrong to be sexually violent.

Whatever your feelings may be about the merits of such courses in the public schools, I hope your feelings about that mother are much more clear. She was actually advocating that the schools were the place to learn how not to be sexually violent, and that she would rather not be troubled with such a task.  Suffice it to say that such an approach is far from biblical.

In the 19^th chapter of Matthew’s gospel, Jesus has left Galilee and journeyed beyond the Jordan River to the region of Judea, where he is in the midst of a large crowd, preaching and healing. Pharisees are there and continue to test him. He offers comments about divorce and then children are brought up to him. From the text, we might suppose that the children are bigger than toddlers and younger than teens. They seem to be brought up by their parents. The disciples appear to be telling the parents to keep the children away, but Jesus overrules the disciples. Bring the children up, he says. Don’t stop them. Let them come to me. It was fairly common practice in that time for children to be blessed by a “holy man.” It was common practice for children to be brought to the elders during the Day of Atonement for “blessing, strengthening and prayer.” But Jesus went a step further. He said that “to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”  Here’s a teaching moment. When Jesus says “such” rather than “these”, he is opening the field.  He doesn’t mean children literally, but he does use children to help illustrate what he does mean, which is that one has to come to Jesus spiritually vulnerable, even innocent, if one is to be able to enter the kingdom, indeed even to grasp the meaning of the kingdom. Jesus said it again in chapter 18: “unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

So we send our children off to school and each year, they learn more about the world. They learn academically. They need those skills to get by in this world. They learn socially. They need those skills as well, but unlike academics, there will be learning that is unhealthy, prejudiced, biased, narrow, even just plain wrong. This is the collateral damage that we inflict upon ourselves in our education systems. There is no avoiding such exposure.

But the answer is not to hide our heads in the sand or to rest the presence or absence of our children’s ethics in what is or is not taught in the public schools. It is not the province of our educational system to teach ethics. Nor should we ask our schools to teach religious ethics. That is what the church is all about. That is why God devised and ordained family life as the cornerstone of relationships. The parents and the church cannot abdicate the teachings of Christian ethics and expect the church, much less their children, to survive.

One of my favorite poets is William Wordsworth. I have long since forgotten all the reasons I liked his work, but one line has stuck with me since senior English in high school. It comes from a poem entitled My Heart Leaps Up. It’s a short, simple poem about how Wordsworth has always felt joy when he sees a rainbow, a joy he has felt since childhood. He describes this long experienced feeling in verse this way:

So it was when my life began;

So it is now I am a man;

So be it when I shall grow old,

 

Then, Wordsworth makes an observation: The Child is father of the Man. Scholars argue about his meaning, but to me it is clear enough. Wordsworth is saying that as surely as events and behavior and experiences form one’s childhood, so too will they influence who that person becomes. What happens to the child is what makes him the kind of man or woman he or she becomes.

          Wordsworth is not unique in his sentiment. The book of Proverbs has something similar to say. “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”  The proverb reminds us that behavior is learned and that it starts early…as a child. It is founded on God’s covenant with Abraham, a covenant that every Christian parent should adopt. In the 18^th chapter of Genesis, as God debates whether to tell Abraham about his plans for Sodom and Gomorrah, God talks aloud about that covenant and says this in his pondering: “For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice…”

          It’s time to go back to school. That’s a good thing. But in the jargon of computer speak,  public school is an add-on, an app, to life. It is a place of learning, but not the place of learning. It cannot and should not ever assume to take the place of all the training and learning that takes place in the home and in the church. He has chosen us, parents, that we may command our children to keep the way of the Lord.

Children, listen to me. You’re learning all the time. You learn from teachers. You learn from your parents and grandparents. You learn from me. You learn from reading and fishing and playing and sports and even from your dog. Learning is your job. but there is another job I want you to begin to try to do. Please begin to learn to discern what is worth learning. What is discernment? It’s seeing with eyes of understanding, not just vision. When you see with discernment, you are making decisions about what is important. Not everything is. That poet Mr. Wordsworth learned early that seeing a rainbow made him happy. That’s worth learning.

Jesus taught us that children can see God the easiest. But you won’t stay children and you need to keep seeing Jesus in this world. As you grow, try to learn how to keep that which is pure and clean, and how to reject that which is ugly and will hurt you or others. It won’t be easy. But we will help you. We, your parents. We, your church. We, your friends.

Our prayer for you is that you learn to keep that which is of value to your life and to shed that which is not. No matter what you learn, if it means leaving Jesus behind, it’s bad teaching.

Are You Ready

                        Joel 2: 28-31a   Luke 12: 32-40

 

 

          It was called Operation Overlord, a term coined by Winston Churchill for the military operation that has come to be known as D-Day. It was the greatest land and sea invasion in the history of mankind. In the space of a month, over a million troops came ashore on the coast of France in the effort to liberate not only that country, but also Europe, from the grip of Adolf Hitler and Nazism.

          Some months before the invasion, Erwin Rommel, the great German general, was put in charge of defense of the French coastline.  He strongly believed that the Germans could only win the coming battle by repelling the Allies at the water’s edge. He saw the first twenty four hours as decisive. If the Germans failed to hold the coastline, the Allies would ultimately prevail.

          Some two thousand years earlier, the gospel of Luke narrates two stories told by Jesus. One has to do with the preparedness of those who serve. The other tells of a master who failed to keep his house secured from a thief. Matthew relates a parallel story in chapter 25 about ten virgins who are to prepare for a wedding feast and the bridegroom who will come to their door. Mark also shares the parable of the door keeper in chapter 13 of his gospel. These three stories all seek to warn us that we must live prepared for what may come without notice.

          Like the leaders who prepared for the D-Day invasion, the servants, virgins and the master of the house in these gospel stories prepare for the upcoming event. Each in his or her own way is charged with readiness. There is to be an event, a life changing, world-shattering event. There is no question that it will come. The question is when, and whether those who must engage will be prepared. Will they be ready for what comes?

In Mark, a doorkeeper is charged with the task of staying awake, waiting for the master of the house to return. In Matthew, ten virgins are to wait at the home of the groom for the wedding reception that is certainly to follow…and half of them are found wanting in the task while the other half are prepared. In Luke, the story is similar. The master is gone to a wedding feast and the servants are to wait for his return. Like Operation Overlord, the question is not whether, but when. In France in 1944, the appointed hour would only be known by the sighting of the expeditionary force. In Jesus’ parable in the book of Luke, that hour would be signaled by the return of the master from the wedding feast. By the time it is known, it is far too late to make preparations.

Luke’s second parable here talks about the householder and a thief. In this case, the owner must take measures to keep someone out, as opposed to the other stories where servants are looking to let someone in when he arrives. Don’t be fooled. The theme is not about open or shut doors, not about letting someone out or in, but about readiness; about being prepared. This is a message not just for each of us as individual Christians, but for our ministry together as the body of Christ, the church. Are we ready? Does the Christian walk of each one of us reflect that Christ can come tonight and knock on our door and be welcome to see us as we are? Does the ministry of this church say to all who would look our way, that God is on the premises and in the pews and present in the pulpit with the message that issues from it? If not, then we are like the master who opens the door to a thief rather than our Savior.

Operation Overlord was over a year in the making. Months before the invasion, soldiers began to gather all over that part of England. There were many details to be worked out, even down to building a fake army on the ground to fool the Germans. But when the time came, there was no turning back. Men and material came together as one as they fought their way onto the shore of France and gained a foothold never to be relinquished.

Seventy years later, we still remember the terms D-Day and H-Hour. They have come to symbolize that point in history when time seemed to stand still as the world held its breath. It was D-Day, the day when all the forces of freedom converged on the forces of evil in the world. It was H-hour, the moment when the invasion was launched, and regardless of weather or any other circumstance, the die was cast. It was too late to turn back.

Long ago, the prophet Joel spoke of a time when God will pour out his Spirit on all flesh. On that day, said Joel, your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Listen to what else Joel had to say:

          In those days I will pour out my Spirit.

          And I will show wonders in the heaven

and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke.

The sun shall be turned to darkness,

and the moon to blood,

before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes.

                                                                   Joel 2: 30-32

 

Joel prophesied about the same day to which Jesus alluded in his parables, a day when all shall be judged, when God closes the book on this great creation, settles all accounts and ends the age. On that day, the eschatological D-Day of creation, no one will be exempt. No one will have more time.

I have talked about a great moment in history because it may help illustrate what Jesus was saying. He talked in front of a multitude, but he seemed to be directing these lessons to his disciples. In fact, it even confused them enough for Peter to ask whether the parable was for them or for all. Jesus’ answer seemed to point toward believers and more particularly, religious leaders, for he ended this segment by saying that for everyone to whom much is given, much will be required.

Whether you understand preparation better by thinking about D-Day or by listening to Jesus talking about an absentee master or a thief in the night is up to you. No matter how you best understand it, the point Jesus made is just as true and factual today as it was on the beaches of Normandy in 1944. Jesus talked of the Day of the Lord, the day he knew that he would return. On that day and in that hour, whatever preparation has not been made will not be made.

I think about how many times in Scripture we are warned about the Day of the Lord. Joel talked about it. Daniel talked about the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven. Paul and Peter talked about it.  Jesus talked about it in each of the Synoptic gospels. Scripture teaches us that there will be a reckoning. And here we are reminded that, like D-Day, you are either ready or you aren’t.

Remember what General Rommel said? The first day would be decisive. Either the Germans would hold the coastline or the tide of the war would turn to the Allies. Rommel was prophetic. The Allies took the ground, and history has marked well what happened after that.  Long before D-Day, Jesus tells us the same thing about the end of history and, frankly, for the end that each of us will undergo personally. Be ready. You won’t get a second chance. When he comes, there will be no warning. The warning is now.

What are you doing with your warning? What are you doing with your time? What are you doing to be and stay prepared? What about your children? What about your neighbor? What if he comes tomorrow? What if he comes tonight? And even more poignant than that, what if your time comes before he comes again? Are you ready for your own D-Day?

In 1944, the Allies built a vast army and an armada of ships to take on the evil of Nazism. They drilled. They planned. They tried in every way to be prepared. Failure was not an option. They had to get it right. Today, our task is little different. We call our army the church. We call our armada the mission field. We are tasked with not only being ready, but with launching a war of goodness and love against the forces of evil in the world. We are not only the bride of Christ; we are also on the front line of witness for the message of Jesus Christ.

There is pressure in knowing that God can come tonight, that he will come without any more notice than we already have. But listen to this piece of good news from this same passage of Scripture:

          Blessed are those servants whom the master

finds awake when he comes. Truly, I say to you,

he will dress himself for service and have them

recline at table, and he will come and serve them.

                                                          Matthew 12: 37

 

Think of it. To the faithful, to the ready, our Savior promises us that not only will we dine with him…but that he will come and serve us! The banquet of life itself, served up to the servants by the Master himself.

          Are you ready?

God-Breathed

                     2 Timothy 3: 14-17       Isaiah 55: 10, 11

 

 

          Breath. You can’t live without it. Ever try holding your breath? The world record for holding one’s breath is over 22 minutes, but that involves years of training for free divers and entails actually changing one’s biology. For the rest of us mortals, 3 minutes would be considered extraordinary. When I was lifeguarding back in the previous century, I think my personal best was about a minute twenty seconds. I remember thinking that my chest would explode if I didn’t get air. It may be the most natural thing in the world, but it’s also the most essential. Without breathing, you will die. That’s the way we are built.

          But breath has more meanings than just the fuel for the lungs to digest and convert for transmitting all over the human body. It also means life force in a much older sense. It is that archaic sense of breath, that life force, that I want us to think about.

          In the Hebrew Bible, that which we Christians call the Old Testament, you don’t have to go far to find breath. The Old Testament word for it is ruach. It has three meanings: wind, breath and spirit. In Genesis 1:2, Ruach Elohim, the spirit of God, hovers over the face of the waters as God begins his creation. By the way, Elohim is a plural noun, so think of God even here at creation as Trinitarian.

          In chapter 2 of Genesis at verse 7, we read that God breathed the breath of life into Adam’s nostrils. Again, the Hebrew word is ruach, this time as breath. In Genesis 8 God makes a wind (ruach) to blow over the earth and make the floodwaters subside. Notice that whether the word is used as wind or Spirit or breath, it comes from God and it comes as a source of life. In the book of Job, Job’s friend Elihu tells him that “The spirit of God has made me; the breath of God gives me life.” Here, both spirit and breath are the same word, and they are life-giving.

          Breath. It is literally a life-giving force, and the Bible tells us that this force comes from God as spirit, as wind, as breath itself. The Greeks called this concept pneuma. It had the same range of meaning as ruach. That is, it could mean wind, spirit, breath. Think of all the ways we have inherited and applied that Greek word. We get pneumonia: bad wind. We use pneumatics to move papers through tubes or for lift gates or shock absorbers. All these words have to do with giving life to something or someone.

Pneuma: wind, spirit, breath. And in the book of  2^nd Timothy, Paul tells us that all Scripture is breathed out by God. Paul uses the word pneuma to express the same idea in Greek as ruach does in Hebrew. All Scripture is breathed out by God. Many think Paul actually made up a new word to express the concept. It is theopneustos (God-breathed) and this is the only place that this compound word appears in the Bible.

What is this Scripture that Paul is talking about? At the time Paul was writing to Timothy, the Old Testament was written, as were a number of books that later became part of the New Testament. Notice what Paul doesn’t say. He doesn’t say read my letters or read Isaiah or read Amos. He is referring to Scripture not as the work of men, but as the work of God, divine, God-breathed. The fact that he used men to write it down makes it no less divine and authoritative than it did to use Mary as the vessel to carry the Son of God into the world. Jesus was no less divine because he was born of a woman. Paul goes on to give us an idea of why we need the Scriptures. They help us to teach, to correct, and to train and be trained. They help us to become competent and equipped to do God’s work. They help us see God. At the time, Paul was probably talking to Timothy, but again, Scripture is God-breathed, and we all know that it reaches far beyond its originally intended target.

One of the ways we can constantly see the presence of God in the world is in the coming and going of the seasons of the year. In this temperate climate of the upper South, we experience four distinct seasons. Spring really does bring us warmer weather and flowers and the rain. Summer is hot and humid and a wonderful growing season for produce. Fall brings us the death of summer, falling leaves, cooler weather. And winter ushers in colder temperatures and snow. Isaiah talks about the same cycle in chapter 55. He talks about the rain and snow watering the earth to nourish it into seed and harvest. The water does not return, for it is sent to do a job. The very agents in the climate that cause its change also bring its constancy and its ability to grow and regenerate year after year. Cycles of change are also cycles of stability and certainty. Isaiah reminds us that God’s word is like the seasons of life. It goes out to its target not to return, but to plant and harvest. Isaiah says that it does not return empty. It accomplishes that for which it was sent. God’s purpose is met.

When Isaiah spoke those words, he spoke as an agent, a prophet, of God. It was only later that his words were written down. For generations they passed among the people in oral tradition. So God’s word was a spoken, remembered word. Later, those words were put down on scrolls by scribes. And hundreds of years later, God came to earth as living Word in the form of an incarnate Jesus. “So shall my word go out from my mouth, it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,” says the prophet on behalf of God. God’s word is like the seasons of life, always purposed, going forth and never returning empty, but rather doing that for which it was sent. God’s word is dependable. In his commentary on the book of Isaiah, John Oswalt says that “it is because what God says is the truth that the word will perform exactly what God intends.”

Isaiah tells us that God’s word comes not only in the written words of the prophet, but also in the incarnation of God’s Son, as both written and living Word abide within our hearts and accomplish God’s purpose.  Scripture is the written word of God, God-breathed. Scripture is the wind of God ushering in the change so needed in our lives. It is the spirit of God passing into our hearts and indwelling our souls. It is the breath of God upon us.

While God spoke through Isaiah to ordain the words of the prophets, and while God spoke through Paul to call attention to the reliable sources of revelation, he used both men to talk to each of us, that invisible body that Peter referred to as the priesthood of believers. Through the words of both prophet and evangelist, God reminds each of us who would follow him that there are many voices to hear, many writings to read on the road of life. In the middle of all the noise, surrounded by so many who would plunder our souls for their own gain, stands the Word of God. It is the sacred writings of the Bible and the living Word of the Son of God that must stand as our compass. We are all Paul’s protégés. We need not be named Timothy to be called to teach and witness. We need not be named Paul to be called to discipleship. We need not to be named Isaiah to know that the Word of God falls upon us as fresh as it did in the days of the prophets. We just need to do as Paul reminds us, to continue in what we have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom we learned it, to be acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make us wise for salvation.

At the end of the day, the Bible, the Incarnation, the passion, the resurrection, are not stories about God’s people. They are stories about God, God in three persons, and who God is. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, God comes to us and shows us who he is and how much he loves us.  God-breathed. That is the essence of Scripture. God-sent. That is the essence of its revelation. God-saved. That is the essence of his message. We just need to know where to find the truth.

Filling Your Spiritual Tank

                                       Colossians 1: 1-14

 

 

          I drove my last car for a long time, thirteen years. I drove it so long we became friends, at least as much as man and machine can do that. Ladies, as you know, it’s more than a little sometimes. Over time, I became acquainted with the nuances of my car and, of course, it became well used and developed some ways to talk to me. One in particular was the fuel pump. In an older Suburban, it’s a good idea to always keep at least a quarter tank of gas. My mechanic told me that if you let the fuel regularly go below that level, it seems to wear out the fuel pump. I accidently tested that theory a couple times. The mechanic was right. My car reminded me the hard way. It didn’t like running on fumes and it taught me to honor that.

          It’s pretty predictable how a car is going to act if the fuel pump is not working. No pump, no circulation. No circulation, no move. The car may as well be out of gas. It doesn’t matter what your agenda is for the day. The method of transportation you chose is now offline. Take a walk, hail a cab, but don’t count on your ordinary method to get here and there on the road without being nice to your fuel pump. In this case, that means always carrying keeping a bigger reserve in the tank. If you want to depend on it, you have to feed it!

          The apostle Paul didn’t start the church in Colossae, but he was well aware of it.  The church plant credit went to Epaphras, whom Paul referred to as a beloved fellow servant. Paul wrote to the Colossian church from prison in an effort to encourage the church and to engage them in the process of becoming unified in their celebration of Christ. From the beginning of the letter, Paul launches immediately into those issues of how to fill the spiritual tanks of the Christians in Colossae.

          First, Paul talks about faith, love and hope, familiar earmarks of Christianity and for Paul. He uses these terms together in 1 Corinthians 13, Romans 5, Galatians 5 and 1 Thessalonians 1. Here, the terms love and faith seem to stem from hope. Faith in Christ and love for one another are a result of “the hope laid up for you in heaven.”  That hope is in the here and now; the fulfillment of that hope lies in that which is promised and yet to come.

Hope is sort of like a full tank of gas. You know you can get there from here because you are equipped. You are ready for the trip because you have reliable transportation—the transportation of hope, the realistic expectation of that which will happen. And Paul says that hope is “laid up for you in heaven.” It’s like a heavenly layaway plan. This kind of hope is in no danger of being lost or taken away. It is held in heaven, away from all those things of earth which might damage it.

Many of us have been through gas shortages. Gas prices spiraled up. Supply seemed to go down, though we were never sure of what manipulations were really going on. Many of us learned to conserve, to consolidate our trips, to make our trips count, in order to get through the crises. But how many of you actually thought about giving up your car? How many of you sought alternative methods to get to and fro? I’m guessing that answer is none or next to none. Why didn’t you? Because you deem your car to be your mode of transportation. This is the way you navigate distance in life. Giving up your car was not an option. Right?

Well, if giving up your car is not on the table, then you must feed it. You must feed it fuel and water and fluids for it to continue to perform. Why would anyone think that maintenance of the Christian life would be any different? If you want it to work for you, then you have to feed and nourish it. You have to look after it if you want it to look after you.

It is the last chapter of John’s gospel. John, the beloved disciple, is describing the last things Jesus said that last day on the Galilean shore. Jesus asks Peter three times, “do you love me?” Three times when Peter answered yes, Jesus replied: “Feed my sheep.” Feed my sheep. It was a divine directive from Jesus to a disciple to put gas in the tanks of believers, to not let them run out, but to fill and refill until he comes again.

          How? How do we Christians keep our spiritual fuel tanks full? We need to be fed and refueled regularly. Paul gives the Colossians some good ideas for their time, and I can see just as much need and just as much relevance in our time as did the Colossian church. In verses 9-12, Paul prays a prayer of intercession for these Christians, and in doing so, he outlines steps of faith to be taken.

First, we need knowledge of God’s will. The Colossians had the Old Testament scriptures. They had the teaching of Paul and Epaphras. They had letters and stories of Jesus in circulation. And they had what Paul calls spiritual wisdom and understanding, that knowledge which comes through the heart when we listen and come into communion with the Holy Spirit. They had that knowledge that comes from God through Jesus on the wings of the Holy Spirit: heart-knowledge.

Next, and stemming from that spirituality, we can walk in a manner worthy of the Lord. We can adopt lifestyles that incorporate Christian values into who we are and what we do. No matter the circumstance, we are to practice honesty, loyalty, generosity, kindness and love as we go about our lives. They, our lives, are interwoven with the Holy Spirit and the witness and practice of the gospel.

Third, our behavior will cause us to bear fruit through our good works. We don’t have to try much on this point. If we have the heart-knowledge that Paul talks about and if we put it into practice by walking the walk, it follows that we will bear fruit. When Paul talks about bearing fruit, he’s talking about not just thinking good thoughts, but also doing good things.

Last, Paul tells us to increase in the knowledge of God. Again, there is logic to this.  We don’t have a bunch of rules to memorize.  We let God into our hearts.  We act out what we believe. We do things to show our obedience to God and his message for us. And in that obedient behavior, we grow in faith. We increase in the knowledge of God.

Paul ends his prayer by asking God for power to exercise patience, to claim endurance, and to do both with joy. Joy. Paul talks about power and patience and endurance, earmarks of testing and trials, and yet he calls upon us to do all this with joy, thanking God for the privilege to do it. And you know what. Paul is right. We should do all these things. We should ask for all this help. And we should thank God, for what he offers is nothing short of redemption, redemption from a life destined to end badly. But by the grace of God, we have lives to live gassed up, ready for the long haul, primed for an eternal destiny.

How do we fill that spiritual tank? Believe in your heart, walk the walk, do good for God’s sake, and increase in your ability and desire to do all these things.  Do these things in faith and love and they will take you farther than you ever believed you could go!

       Answering the “Why”

                                       1 Peter 3: 13-17

 

 

          Why? Why are some people so hateful? Why do we still have wars? Why do we have to suffer even when we are doing good? Why be a Christian? Isn’t it enough to be a good person? Isn’t it enough to just live and let live and not be so concerned with everything and everybody? Even if you’re Christian, can’t you just sort of get along and not make waves?

There are so many whys in this world. In this life, we will never have the answers we seek. Oh, we can get lots of answers. Ask a finite question and you can get a finite answer. Like how far is it to the moon or to the planet of Jupiter? The answers to those questions can be calculated. But if you ask the hard questions, like how old is God, no one can really give you a straight, calculable answer. We don’t even know how old the earth is, no matter how much the scientists posit otherwise. We can only guess. 

Why do you believe in God? And, by the way, which God do you believe in? Some people, like Buddhists and Hindus, believe in polytheism, the worship of more than one God. If you’re a Jew or a Christian or believe in Islam, you trace your lineage back to Abraham and to one God. Islam calls God Allah, which is Arabic for God. Same word, different language. All three religions believe in one God. One religion, Christianity, believes in Jesus as God’s Son. Judaism sees him as the greatest false prophet in a line of false prophets. Islam denies his divinity, but calls him a great prophet. So even though you believe in God, that God being the God of Abraham of the Old Testament, you still are only one of three world religions, which differ as to who Jesus is.

So we’re back to why do you believe in God. and in the case of Christianity, you can layer that up to Jesus and the Holy Spirit, because we Christians believe in a Trinitarian God. Well, regardless of which monotheistic (one God) religion one practices, there is no hard proof. Yes, Jesus is a historical fact. He lived on this earth. We know when and it’s documented. But what he did with his life? And death? And the resurrection? That’s every bit as much legand as it is fact. It can’t be proved, at least under the standards of proof applied today. . We have no photographs of his Ascension. We have no video, no audio, no proof other than the eyewitnesses who testified in the New Testament.

So why? Why do you believe in God, and if you’re a Christian, then why do you believe in Jesus? And what does that mean? “I believe in Jesus.” Well, that’s great. I’m sure that gives you a warm and fuzzy feeling, but what do you tell Joe Gizmo, who has never set foot inside a church and now is standing in front of you and asking why? Why do you believe in God, much less Jesus? What do you tell Joe?

In the book of 1 Peter, Peter is writing to some Christians in Asia---Galatia and other provinces—to people dispersed. What does that mean? Probably that they had been in Rome and other places closer to “civilization,” but that for various reasons they find themselves relocated, dispersed. Out there in the hinterlands, they may have been finding the Christian way a path harder to tread than when in the safer confines of a larger Christian population. They may have felt like “foreigners” in their own land when they spoke of their beliefs. Their new Christian habits may not have worn so well in the diaspora of Galatia and other parts of Asia.  

Peter reminded them that righteousness is a two-edged sword; that even though you receive a blessing for seeking to be righteous, right with God, it will come at a cost and that cost will most likely be suffering. If the suffering doesn’t come through ridicule or persecution or strife, then it will come in the form of living out a different kind of life from your friends. There will be times, more than a few, when your Christianity causes you to feel like a foreigner in your own country.

Think about the world today. Here in this rural community, God is still very much part of our lives. Even those who don’t practice Christianity understand to be respectful of those who do. All I can tell you is if you find that valuable to you, don’t think you will find it everywhere you go. Modern society, even here, is coming more and more to accept and even legalize principles and practices that are just plain inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. 1  It seems to me that we have become so fascinated with individual rights that tolerance trumps truth.

But the truth of today is that a lot of people don’t really know what the truth is. People say well, I have my truth and you have your truth. Not! Not when it comes to our belief system. There is only the truth, not your truth or my truth.

Peter says “always be prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” Peter is the Boy Scout of the apostles. His motto is Be prepared! How does your preparation show? When others start eating in the restaurant and you instead bow your head and hold hands, why do you do that? When the game announcer asks for a moment of silence, why do you pray? When children are fussy and your spouse is irritable, why do you religiously show up for Sunday school? Why!

Because you know about faith. Because you know about grace. Because you know, you know…about Jesus. How do you know? You have claimed some biblical promises and some biblical truths. And you live with and by those promises and truths. That is your preparation. That is your obedience.

What are some of the promises and truths that you can carry around in your toolkit for the Joe Gizmos of the world?

Here are just a few of my personal favorites:

          Theologian Karen Jobes says that First Peter “challenges Christians to reexamine our acceptance of society’s norms and to be willing to suffer the alienation of being a visiting foreigner in our own culture wherever its values conflict with those of Christ.” This is no time to be silent. We Christians must express our faith. We must witness to it, not just within the confines of a safe and friendly church sanctuary, but in the highways and biways of our communities. We must be ready, be armed with scripture and belief and then give our witness wherever and whenever the opportunity arises.

          Why do you believe in God? Do you know? Can you tell Joe Gizmo?  Arm yourself with some scripture. If you’re worried about what to say, write it down, put it in your wallet or your pocketbook. When the time comes, let God lead. You’ll do just fine! Say it humbly. Say it respectfully. But for God’s sake, say it!

Let us pray.

1 Karen H. Jobes, 1 Peter, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, Baker Academic, Grand Rapids, 2005, p. 5.