12-20-2009 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

THE PARADOX OF BLESSEDNESS

     Last Tuesday afternoon, our Lunch at First group was privileged to hear our own Kevin Dill perform a Christmas concert on the organ.  He played moving and complicated pieces from Samuel Wesley and Nicolas-Joseph Wackenthaler and Johann Sebastian Bach.  Now let me add that Kevin’s wife, Sonya, was there with their eleven-month-old daughter, Clare.  After Kevin had performed a particularly moving piece and a majestic silence filled the air, little Clare stood up in the back of the sanctuary and cried, “Da Da!”  It was the perfect ending to a Christmas concert.

     Children are such a blessing.  Kevin and I got to talking about what happened at the concert the next morning.  It reminded me of when my own kids were little.  I told him of a time when my wife and I were in a Wendy’s restaurant with our children in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.   I’m going to say Rob was seven, Mariah was four, and Travis was probably two.  We told the kids to clear the table before we left.  So Rob grabbed one napkin, ran over to the trash can, and put it in.  Then Mariah grabbed one hamburger wrapper, ran over to the trash can, and put it in.  Then Travis grabbed one French fry sack, ran over to the trash can, and put it in.  They were laughing with glee as they discarded one item at a time.  To my wife and me, they seemed to be making quite a scene, so we discreetly tried to hush them up.

     About that time, a very elderly man ambled over to our table.  I think he sensed our consternation.  He looked at us and said, “These are the best days of your lives.”  Then he turned and walked away.  We had no idea who he was, and we never saw him again.

     He was right, you know.  Those probably were the best days of our lives.  If I could go back to the days when our children were young, I’d do it in a heartbeat.  Like I said a moment ago, children are indeed a blessing from God.  But is there more to a blessing from God than meets the naked eye?  Could it be that there’s a purpose behind our blessings from God?  Could it also be said that there’s a paradox of blessedness?               

    Listen to this.  Ten or fifteen years ago, I was involved in a conversation with three other guys.  Brock was the young man who was about to marry my wife’s niece, Kim.  Jeremy was a nephew who had recently gone through a very bitter divorce.  And Ron was friend of the family who’d been married for twenty or twenty five years.

    Brock, the young man who was about to be married, was experiencing what we in the business call “cold feet.”  It happens a lot to young men and young women about to be married.  They start to wonder if they’re doing the right thing.  Jeremy, the young man who’d recently gone through the bitter divorce, talked about how awful marriage can be.  His wife had cheated on him and he told us his sad tale of woe.  Ron, the man who’d been married for twenty or twenty five years, also talked about how awful marriage can be.  He felt his marriage had grown a bit stale, and he told us his sad tale of woe.

     I felt I needed to stand up for the institution of marriage – not just because I was going to perform Brock and Kim’s wedding – but also because I really believe it.  I told them that I wouldn’t trade my marriage for anything in the world.  It’s a partnership – ideally, it’s a loving partnership – and I can’t imagine going through life any other way. 

     Of course, they all made fun of me and told me what I was full of, but I can’t repeat that here.  Then I talked about the kids.  If it weren’t for our marriages, we wouldn’t have those kids.  Even Jeremy, the one who’d gone through that bitter divorce, but who had a daughter whom he loved very deeply, had to agree.  But Ron looked at me and said, “Those kids will disappoint you one day.” 

     “Those kids will disappoint you one day,” he said.  I knew there was something behind what Ron was saying, but he didn’t go into it there.  I later discovered that his oldest son had a drinking problem.  Then one night, two of his boys were out on the town.  They’d gone home, but the oldest one wanted to go out again.  His brother went with him because he was in no condition to drive.  As they barreled down the road to their next destination, the older brother missed a turn in the road.  As the pickup truck they were driving careened off the pavement, he was thrown from the vehicle and died instantly.  His younger brother was badly injured, but he managed to survive.

     “Children are a blessing,” I had said to Ron, and he said to me, “Those kids will disappoint you one day.”  Perhaps there is more to a blessing than meets the eye.  It brings to mind a phrase from a poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson that dates from 1850.  He once wrote:

            I hold it true, whate’er befall;

            I feel it, when I sorrow most;

            ‘Tis better to have loved and lost

            Than never to have loved at all.

     Is it better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?  I can’t answer that question because – thank God – I have not loved and lost.  Some of you do know the answer to that question, and I’m sure it’s a painful thing to even think about.  It brings to mind the paradox of blessedness.  Children, for example, are a tremendous blessing.  But isn’t it a paradox when things don’t turn out the way you planned?  How difficult it is when the source of our greatest joy turns out to be the cause of our greatest pain.

     In the passage we read from the gospel according to Luke, we get to see the paradox of blessedness first hand.  Mary has been visited by the angel Gabriel – the angel who told her that she had been chosen to bear the very Son of God.  Then, shortly after that event transpired, she took a trip to visit an older kinswoman named Elizabeth.  Who was Elizabeth?  She was the wife of a priest named Zechariah and she, too, was carrying a child.  The child whom Elizabeth would bear was none other than John the Baptist. 

      When Mary came to visit Elizabeth, the child leaped in her womb.  Then Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb…And blessed is she who believed there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to   her by the Lord.”

     Children are a blessing, are they not?  Elizabeth proclaims to Mary how blessed she really    is.  The New Testament Greek actually uses two different words to describe Mary’s blessedness, although they mean similar things.  The first word is, heulogaymenay, which means, “provided with benefits from God.”  The second word is, makaria, - not macarena, makaria – which means, “blessed, fortunate, or happy…as in the privileged recipient of divine favor.”

     Mary was blessed.  She was the privileged recipient of divine favor.  Yet consider how William Barclay describes her blessedness in his commentary on the gospel according to      Luke.  Speaking of this very encounter with Elizabeth, he writes:

This is a kind of lyrical song on the blessedness of Mary.  Nowhere can we better see 

the paradox of blessedness than in her life.  To Mary was granted the blessedness of being the mother of the Son of God.  Well might her heart be filled with a wondering, tremulous joy at so great a privilege.  Yet that very blessedness was to be a sword to pierce her heart.  It meant that one day she would see her son hanging on a cross.       

     That, my friends, is what we call the paradox of blessedness.  Mary was blessed with the honor of carrying and raising the very Son of God.  Yet she was also – dare we say “cursed” – with the agony of seeing that same Son die a bitter, brutal death.  What a paradox her state of blessedness turned out to be.  The source of her greatest joy would ultimately become the cause of her greatest pain.

     Biblical commentator William Barclay notes that to be chosen by God so often means at one and the same time a crown of joy and a cross of sorrow.  That’s what the paradox of blessedness is.  The piercing truth is that God does not choose a person for a life of ease and comfort and relaxation.  God chooses a person for a task that will take everything they’ve got within them    in order to bring it to bear.  In other words, God chooses a person in order to utilize him or her for a greater cause.  Again, God chooses a person in order to utilize him or her for a greater cause.    

     I think of the parable of the talents Jesus once told.  You know the story.  A man went on a journey and to each of his servants he entrusted a measure of his property.  To one man he gave five talents, to one man he gave two talents, and to one man he gave but one.  The man who received the five talents went out and made five talents more.  The man who received the two talents went out and made two talents more.  But the man who received the one talent buried his talent in the ground. 

   As you recall, the man who made five talents was rewarded by his master.  The man who made two talents was rewarded by his master as well.  But the man who buried his talent in the ground – the man who gave the master no return on his investment – was chastised and cast from the land in which they dwelled.  God represents the master in the story, and God expects a return on his investment.  God expects us to use our God-given talents as well.  And from those who are entrusted much, even more is expected.

     I recently came across a story called The True Spirit of Christmas.  I don’t know who the author is.  Listen closely just the same.

While shopping for a present for my niece, I spied a little girl poring over Barbie dolls with her father, a roll of money clutched in her hand.  Each time she saw a doll she liked, she turned to her father and asked if she had enough to buy the doll.  Of course, each time her father said, “Yes.” 

 

Then I noticed a little boy wandering nearby with his father.  The two were looking at Pokemon toys.  The boy also had money in his hand, but it looked to be five dollars or less.  In contrast to the little girl, he was told, “No,” nearly every time he showed a toy to his father.

 

Meanwhile, the little girl had chosen the Barbie doll she wanted.  But before she went to the register to buy it, she noticed the little boy and his father as well.  By this time the little boy had a book of stickers in his hands and was looking sorely disappointed.

 

The little girl thought for a moment, then returned her Barbie to the shelf.  She chose a Pokemon game instead, and raced to the checkout counter.  After she paid for it, she whispered something to the cashier, who took the toy and put it in a bag under the counter.  When the boy got to the cashier, the cashier congratulated him on being the store’s 1000^th customer, and presented him with the game from under the counter.  The little boy’s face lit up as he exclaimed, “This is exactly what I wanted for Christmas!”

 

As they left the store, the little girl’s father asked, “Why did you do that?”  The little girl said, “Didn’t grandma and grandpa want me to buy something that would make me happy?”  Her father said, “Yes.”  To which the little girl replied, “Well, I just did.”

 

     “Out of the mouths of babes,” the old adage goes.  The author concludes, “As I watched her skip out of the store, I felt privileged to have witnessed the true spirit of Christmas.”  I’d say there’s one who used her God-given talents very, very well. 

     In this, the Christmas season, we anticipate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ.  God has given us the best he had to give.  Because of Jesus Christ, we are the blessed recipients of the forgiveness of sin and life everlasting.  Can you even begin to imagine what life would be like without them?  For without the forgiveness of sin and life everlasting, there is no ultimate hope.  Through Jesus Christ, we are the blessed recipients of the forgiveness of sin and everlasting life. 

     Yet as did Mary, we too experience the paradox of blessedness.  The gift of the Christ Child and the benefits of the Christian life are not things that are meant to be hoarded unto ourselves.  The gift of the Christ Child and the benefits of the Christian life are things that God intends to be shared with the world…especially in this season of Advent.  So I ask you now: “With whom will you share your bounty?  With whom will you share Jesus Christ?”  Amen. 

 

      

 

12-13-2009 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

ZEPHANIAH’S SONG

 

     A number of years ago, I was at an event in Washington, D.C. called “The Festival of Homiletics.”  Those of us gathered there got to hear sermons from some of the finest preachers in the land.  There was also a very talented musician there who provided musical interludes between many of the sermons.  I was so impressed with his abilities that I actually tried to invite him to Meadville for one of our renewal weekends.  Unfortunately, he turned out to be a bit expensive for our humble tastes.  He wanted more than $4000.00 for a single weekend.

     Prior to one of the songs that he wrote himself, he talked about how frustrated ministers can become – so frustrated that they consider leaving the ministry altogether.  Then he sang his song about one such minister who contemplated leaving the ministry.  I don’t remember the song in its entirety, but I do remember one particular line.  The minister who considered leaving the ministry thought to himself, “I’d wind up flipping burgers…‘cause it’s the only thing I’m qualified to do!”  We minister-types roared when we heard that song because deep, deep down, we knew he was right.  A Master of Divinity degree – even a Doctor of Ministry degree – don’t qualify one to do much, other than serve a church or flip some burgers.

     I came to that stark realization here about six years ago.  The Presbyterian Women were holding an auction as a fund-raiser for one of their mission projects.  I was asked to make a contribution of some kind that could be auctioned off as well.  I couldn’t think of anything, so I offered to do a wedding.  When auctioneer Paul Huber came to my offer, I said, trying to make it seem to be of some intrinsic value, “You know, I often get anywhere between 250 and 500 dollars to do a wedding.”  Then Frank Smith asked, “How much does it cost to get married in the Methodist Church?”  Very funny.

     Now sitting in the audience that night were Marty Malone and his at-that-time unmarried daughter, Julie.  I don’t remember where Paul started the bidding, but there were no takers at $100.00.  There were no takers at 75 or 50 dollars either.  When the number dropped to $25.00, Marty Malone raised his hand and bought the wedding.  Yet as he did so, his single daughter, Julie, slunk in her chair and cried out, “Dad!”  But hey, a few years later we did that wedding, and I was honored to do so…for free!

     Apart from leading a church, what is a minister really qualified to do?  Diogenes Allen, a philosophy professor at the Princeton Theological Seminary, writes about a similar thing in his book, Spiritual Theology.  It seems his wife was a member of a silent auction committee for a school fair.  Various services were offered to the highest bidder, with the proceeds going to the school.  One person volunteered to examine investment portfolios.  One person donated an hour of legal advice, and one couple offered to act as waiter and waitress for a party. 

    The time came for Diogenes Allen’s wife to offer up something as well.  There was a noticeable pause, since everyone knew her husband was a clergyman.  Then, in a very matter-of-fact way, Mrs. Allen said, “My husband will give the highest bidder an assessment of his or her spiritual condition.”  Her well-meaning offer was greeted with an onslaught of laughter.  Diogenes Allen had this to say in the aftermath of what his wife endured.  He wrote:

Somehow it seems absurd to mention in a normal setting that people do have a spiritual

condition, let alone that it is possible to assess it as one would an investment.  Yet we    do care about how we are progressing in life, although we usually assess our progress    in terms of the ascent – or descent – of our careers.  We give far less attention to an assessment of the kind of person we are, the kind of person we can become, and the kind    of person we ought to be…according to God.

      Do we, in fact, have a spiritual “condition?”  And if we do, what is our spiritual condition?     I have a sneaking suspicion that all too often we’re inclined to tie our spiritual condition to the present state of our emotions.  In other words, if life is going well and we feel reasonably happy, then perhaps we feel our spiritual condition is good.  On the other hand, if life is not going well and we don’t feel the least bit happy, perhaps then we are likely to feel that our spiritual condition is bad.  Yet emotions are fickle.  Emotions come and go and rise and fall like the tide.  Perhaps our spiritual condition should move a bit beyond the state of our emotions.  Because the fact of the matter is, there is a monumental difference between happiness and joy.  Again, there is a monumental difference between happiness and joy.

     Yet before we get to dissecting that statement, let’s take a look at the passage we read from the book of Zephaniah.  Zephaniah was one of what we call the Minor Prophets in Old Testament times.  Note that the only difference between a Minor Prophet and a Major Prophet is the length of his book, not the substance of his prophecy.  The book of Zephaniah itself identifies the time of his prophecy as coming in the days of King Josiah, which would have been between the years 639 and 608 B.C.  It was a tenuous time to be a prophet, and it was a tenuous time to be a Hebrew.

     The nation of Israel and its capital city of Samaria had fallen to the Assyrians some one hundred years before.  Now the nation of Judah and its capital city of Jerusalem were under threat as well.  Assyrian power was waning, and Judah found itself a vassal state to Egypt.  Babylon was on the rise, however, and would soon drive the Egyptians back into Egypt and overthrow the nation of Judah entirely. 

     Can you even begin to imagine the overall sentiment of the Hebrew people in times such      as those?  Should a nation like Babylon invade Judah – which it later did, of course – people would lose their homes.  Children would be subject to slavery, women could be subject to something much, much worse, and men would likely be put to death.  Families would be separated, livelihoods would be lost, and assets would be scattered.  I’m not sure we can even begin to imagine what life might be like under those conditions.  It would have been a very difficult time in which to live, to say the least.            

     Zephaniah, however, was most concerned with the spiritual condition of the Hebrew people.  It was a time of idol worship, and many of their priests had become idolatrous as well.  The people had begun to practice temple prostitution and were sacrificing their children to the so-called gods of the land.  Economic and racial injustices were rampant.  People had lost their faith in God and were practicing what Professor A.B. Rhodes calls practical atheism. 

     Zephaniah chastises these practical atheists in verse 12 of chapter 1.  Speaking on behalf of God regarding the coming Day of the Lord, Zephaniah cries, “At that time I will search Jerusalem with lamps, and I will punish the people who rest complacently on their holdings, those who say in their hearts, ‘The Lord will not do good, nor will he do harm.’”

     To the chosen people of God, God had become innocuous.  They said in their hearts, “The Lord will not do good, nor will he do harm.”  So you see, to the practical atheist the question was not whether God, in fact, existed.  They believed that God was there, but in their minds, he did not impact life…one way or the other.  That, my friends, is what we call practical atheism.

     Practical atheism is the belief that the Lord will not do good, nor will he do harm.  God may be there, but he does not impact life one way or the other.  Practical atheism was rampant in the days of Zephaniah.  The question is, is practical atheism rampant in our world today as well?

     I think of a recent presidential candidate.  He was running as a Democrat, but the man himself was a Roman Catholic.  Let’s just say that the Democratic Party and the Roman Catholic Church have somewhat different views on the subject of abortion.  The candidate was asked about that.  He stated quite clearly that he would not allow his personal faith to influence his public life.  That, my friends, is practical atheism.  When our faith in God has no impact on the way we live our lives, God is rendered innocuous.  I suppose could go on all day about practical atheism, but I think you get the picture.  Practical atheism seems to exist in our world today as well.

     Zephaniah chastised the practical atheists of his day.  He chastised everything that was wrong about his world from a faith perspective.  Speaking of a great Day of the Lord, he told the people that they would in time be judged by God.  You would think that Zephaniah would use scare tactics to get the people to repent and to live more Godly lives, and he did.  But in the passage we read from Zephaniah a few minutes ago, he made a promise on God’s behalf to those who repented of their evil ways – a promise to those who found a way in their hearts to be faithful.  We call it Zephaniah’s song.

     The prophet Zephaniah cries, “Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel!  Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem!  The Lord has taken away the judgments against you, he has turned away your enemies.  The king of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst;  you shall fear disaster no more.”  He concludes by saying, “At that time I will bring you home,   at the time when I gather you; for I will make you renowned and praised among all the peoples of the earth, when I restore your fortunes before your eyes, says the Lord.”

     What do you suppose the emotional state of the Hebrew people was in Zephaniah’s day?  They were facing conquest by the Babylonians.  They would lose their property, they would   lose their homeland, and they would be dispersed to other lands.  Do you think they were happy?  My guess is that they were not.  But then Zephaniah speaks of God’s final conquest and their ultimate delivery.  That’s where their faith would have brought them joy.    

     Which brings us back to the question of our own spiritual condition.  We talked about how we’re inclined to tie our spiritual condition to the present state of our emotions.  If life is going well and we feel reasonably happy, then we think our spiritual condition is good.  If life is not going well and we don’t feel happy, then we think our spiritual condition is bad.  Our spiritual condition must move beyond the state of our emotions.  Because the fact of the matter is, there  is a monumental difference between happiness and joy. 

     Listen to this.  Many years ago, the only survivor of a shipwreck was washed up on a small, uninhabited island.  He prayed feverishly for God to rescue him, and every day he scanned the horizon in search of a ship, but every day he saw nothing but water.  Eventually he managed to build a little hut out of driftwood to shelter him from the elements and to store his few possessions.

     Then one day after scavenging for food, he went back to his hut, only to find it in flames.   The worst had happened.  Everything was lost.  The man was stunned with grief and anger.      He looked to the sky and cried out, “God!  How could you do this to me?  You’ve taken away absolutely everything!”

     Early the next day, however, he was awakened by the sound of a ship that was approaching the island.  It had come to rescue him.  The weary but grateful man asked, “How did you know   I was here?”  The captain of the ship replied, “Why, we saw your smoke signal in the sky.”

     Sometimes our lack of present happiness can lead to our ultimate joy.  A couple of weeks ago I said in a benediction that after all my years of preaching and teaching, I can make two distinct statements about the Bible.  Number one, God is trying to get us to think of someone besides ourselves.  And number two, God wins in the end.  God always wins in the end.  Our personal happiness may be fleeting.  It can rise and fall with the state of our emotions.  Joy is different.  For beneath true joy lies a confidence that God has everything well in hand.  God does have everything well in hand.  I mean, if you think about it, that’s what the Christmas story is really all about.  Amen.