05-27-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

LIVING THIS SIDE OF THE CROSS: PART IV

    A good friend of mine passed away last week.  He was only 43 years old.  He leaves behind a wife and three children – a son in college, a son in high school, and a daughter still in elementary school.  He was diagnosed a few months ago with a highly treatable form of leukemia, and seemed to be on the road to recovery.  Then, something went terribly wrong.  He died in the hospital, surrounded by his family, on Tuesday afternoon.

    We have come, these days, to not expect such calamitous things to happen.  So many previously deadly diseases are now treatable.  Life expectancy seems to increase every year.  We all expect to live to a ripe old age.  So when such things do happen, we find ourselves at a loss for words.  We grieve deeply, and then we begin to question God.  “How can a loving God allow such things to happen?” we wonder.  “Why do bad things happen to good people…like us?”

    If any one of us takes the time to take stock of our lives, we will find that a great number of things have gone wrong.  Illness and injuries set us back.  Children don’t turn out quite the way we planned.  A husband or a wife turns out not to be who we thought they were.  The economy collapses and we wonder how we’re going to survive our golden years.  These are not things we typically bargain for, and when we believe we are following Jesus Christ, we expect them even less.  So when they do happen, our faith tends to falter.  “How can a loving God allow such things to happen?” we wonder.  “Why do bad things happen to good people…like us?”  Keep that thought in mind as we move on. 

    This is the fourth in a series of sermons entitled, Living This Side of the Cross.  The thesis of the series is pretty much summed up in verses 14 and 15 in the 4^th chapter of the book of Ephesians.  There the Apostle Paul writes, “We must no longer be children tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine.  But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head…into Christ Jesus our Lord.”  In other words, this is a sermon series on growing up in Christ.

    Four weeks ago, we talked about how the church is meant to represent the kingdom of God on earth.  We said that the kingdom is here…but not fully here.  Thus, could it be that the church we have is exactly what God intended when he created the church?  Could it be that the church we have provides the very conditions necessary for growing up in Christ?  While we live in a throwaway society these days, perhaps there are some things we shouldn’t throw away.  After all, the providence of God means that wherever we have gotten to – whatever we have done – that is precisely where the road to heaven begins.

    Three weeks ago we talked about living a worthy life.  A worthy life – a life that is truly growing up in Christ – is a life formed not in isolation, but rather, in community.  Christian maturity develops as we form friendships with the friends of God…not just the friends we prefer.  You see, God chooses to act and intervene in the world through us.  We see God acting in the world today when we witness the heartfelt convictions of those who serve him.

    A man named Walter Percy wrote six novels in which he made us insiders to the sense of alienation that he found so pervasive in American culture.  His name for this condition was, “lost in the cosmos.”  In other words, from a spiritual perspective, we don’t know who we are.  We don’t know where we came from, and we don’t know where we’re going.  We are lost in the cosmos.  This tends to be particularly true when things go wrong in our lives.  So Walter Percy wrote his novels to wake us up to our desperate condition, and to set up a few signposts to help us find our way.

    Believe it or not, the Apostle Paul knew a little bit about being lost in the cosmos as well, although he certainly would not have used those words.  Yet Paul also tries to wake us up to our desperate condition, and to set up a few signposts to help us find our way.  Paul does so, however, by providing an extensive witness to how God works in the world.

    In the passage I read from the book of Ephesians, for example, it all begins with God.  Paul fires off seven strong verbs that illuminate God’s way of working with us in the world.  The verbs are: blessed, chose, destined, bestowed, lavished, made known, and gather.  Let’s begin with the verb “blessed,” because I think that’s where our real questions lie.  After all, when we take stock of our lives, we find that a great number of things have gone wrong.  How blessed are we, really?

    In verse 3 Paul writes, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.”  That’s two “blesseds” and one “blessing” in a single sentence.  The Greek word for bless is eulogia.  We derive the word “eulogy” from this word.  Eulogia literally means, “a benefit bestowed by God in Christ.”  Yet there are times when we don’t feel very blessed, are there not?  Could it be that this is simply a matter of perspective?  Listen to this.

    A group of students was once asked to list what they thought were the present-day Seven Wonders of the World.  Though there were some mild disagreements, the following things received the most votes: 1) Egypt’s Great Pyramids, 2) The Taj Mahal, 3) The Grand Canyon, 4) The Panama Canal, 5) The Empire State Building, 6) St. Peter’s Basilica and 7) The Great Wall of China.

    After gathering the votes, the teacher noticed that one student had not yet finished her list.  So she asked the girl if she was having any trouble.  The girl replied, “Yes, a little.  I couldn’t quite make up my mind because there are so many.”  The teacher said, “Well, tell us what you have, and maybe we can help.”  The girl hesitated, then said, “I think the Seven Wonders of the World are: to see, to hear, to touch, to taste, to feel, to laugh and to love.”

    The room was so quiet you could’ve heard a pin drop.  Perhaps the Seven Wonders of the World are things we overlook as simple and ordinary…and often take for granted.  Perhaps the same could be said about our blessings from God.  If we could learn to dwell on the good things we have – instead of on the things we don’t – perhaps we would begin to see that.  We are indeed blessed by God.

    So first, Paul says that God blesses us.  He goes on to say that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him.  God destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ.  God bestowed grace upon us through the person of his Son. God lavished redemption and forgiveness according to the richness of his grace.  God made known to us the mystery of his will through our relationship with Jesus Christ.  And finally, God gathers up all things to him in Christ.

    There it is: your roadmap through the cosmos.  As Christians, we are blessed by God…chosen in Christ, destined for adoption, bestowed grace, lavished redemption and forgiveness, made to know the will of God through Christ, and gathered up to God in the end.  You are a precious child of God – created in the image of God – and destined for eternal life.  Don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise.  Thus, there remains but one thing left for us to do.  We must receive it.  We must receive God’s gift to us in Christ.  But how?

    On a blustery autumn day, a young man named Bryan Anderson came across an elderly woman standing beside her car on an old country road.  He pulled up behind her brand-new Mercedes Benz in his rusty, old pickup truck and asked her if she needed help.  Yet even with the smile on his face, the elderly woman looked frightened.  No one had even passed by – let alone, stopped to offer help – for over an hour.  And this man looked tired, poor and hungry.  “Was he going to hurt her?” she wondered.

    The young man could see that she was frightened.  He said to her, “I’m just here to help you, ma’am.”  Noticing that her left rear tire was flat, he said to her, “Why don’t you just wait in the car where it’s warm?  I’ll take care of this tire for you.”

    So the woman got into the car while the young man crawled under it and looked for a place to set the jack.  He got the job done – skinning his knuckles a time or two in the process, and getting pretty dirty.  As he was tightening up the lug nuts, she rolled down the window and began to talk to him.  She told him that she was from Philadelphia, and was only passing through.  She could not thank him enough for his kindness. 

    The young man just smiled as he put away the jack and closed the trunk.  The woman then asked how much she owed him.  Any amount would have been all right with her.  She had already imagined the terrible things that could have happened to her had he not stopped.  But this was not a chore to the young man.  This was helping someone in need.  God knows, there were plenty of people who’d helped him out in the past.  He had lived his whole life that way, and it never occurred to him to live it any other.

    He told her that if she really wanted to pay him, the next time she saw someone who needed help, she could give that person the assistance they needed.  Then he added, “And think of me – Bryan Anderson.”  He waited until she started her car and drove off.  It had been a cold and depressing day, but he felt good as he headed for home. 

    A few miles down the road, that elderly woman stopped at a small café for a bite to eat.  It was a dingy-looking restaurant, but it was the only place in town.  The woman went in and sat down, and the waitress brought a clean towel over so she could wipe down her wet hair.  The waitress had a sweet smile – one that even being on her feet the whole day could not erase.  The woman also noticed that the waitress was pregnant – very pregnant.  The woman was touched by the waitress’s kindness…and then she remembered Bryan Anderson.

    After the woman finished her meal, she paid the tab with a one hundred dollar bill.  The waitress went to get change for the woman, but by the time she got back, the woman was gone.  Then she noticed something written on the napkin.  It said, “You don’t owe me anything.  I have been where you are.  Somebody once helped me the way that I am helping you.  If you really want to pay me back, here is what you do: Do not let this chain of love end with you.  And under the napkin, the waitress found four more crisp one hundred dollar bills.

    Well, there were tables to clear, sugar bowls to fill and people to serve…but the waitress made it through another day.  That night when she got home from work and climbed into bed, she was thinking about what the woman had written.  How could she have known how badly she and her husband needed it? With bills to pay and the baby due next month, it was going to be really tight.

    She knew how worried her husband had been about expenses.  As she crawled into bed and he lay sleeping next to her, she whispered in his ear, “Everything’s going to be all right.  I love you, Bryan Anderson.”

    The issue at hand was receiving the grace of God.  The question was, “How do we do that?”  Maybe the way to receive God’s grace…is to simply pass it on.  Amen.

 

05-06-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

LIVING THIS SIDE OF THE CROSS: PART III

    Dietrich Bonhoeffer was an early 20^th century German theologian. He was educated at the Union Theological Seminary in New York City, and rose to become President of a theological seminary in Germany while he was in his early thirties. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a brilliant scholar.  He was also morally outraged by the tyranny of Adolph Hitler.  In fact, he was so upset by the atrocities committed by Adolph Hitler that he actually became involved in a plot to assassinate him.  The plot failed, and Bonhoeffer was arrested by the Gestapo.  He was executed a mere 23 days before Germany’s surrender in World War II.

    On that day – April 9^th, 1945 – a fellow inmate wrote: “Pastor Bonhoeffer held a little worship service that touched the hearts of all.  He had hardly finished his closing prayer when the cell door burst open. Two evil-looking soldiers came in and barked, ‘Prisoner Bonhoeffer, come with us.’  The words meant only one thing…the scaffold.  But as Pastor Bonhoeffer bid us goodbye, there was a light in his eyes.  He said, ‘For me, this is the beginning of a new life – eternal life.’”

    Like I said, Dietrich Bonhoeffer had a brilliant theological mind.  During his 24 months in prison he continued to work out his theological convictions.  In what was then referred to as the modern era, the consensus among theologians was that God had been pushed to the gaps of human existence.  In other words, God was only relevant in places where human logic and sound reasoning failed.  Why, it was almost as if God was being kept offstage in the play of human drama – until all was apparently lost – and then only lowered into the fray on stage in order to solve the unsolvable and explain the inexplicable.  According to the best theological minds of the day, God had been pushed to the gaps of human existence.

    Bonhoeffer wrote, “It is wrong to use God as a stopgap for the incompleteness of our knowledge.  We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don’t.  God wants us to realize his presence not in unsolved problems, but in those that are solved.”  What he proposed was what he called a “religionless” Christianity – a faith that looks for God in what we know, and not in what we don’t.

    Bonhoeffer’s reflections raise many important theological questions.  By no means did he deny that God has acted and continues to act in human history.  But he did reject the notion that God’s activity is only to be found in the mysteries of human existence.  Yet if God is not to be found only in the gaps – if God is not the hypothesis we only use to explain what reason cannot – does that mean that God does not intervene in human history at all?  What, then, does the Christian faith mean when it affirms that God acts or intervenes in the world as we know it?  Keep that thought in mind as we move on.

    This is the third in a series of sermons entitled, Living This Side of the Cross.  The thesis of the first sermon was pretty much summed up in verses 14 and 15 in the 4^th chapter of the book of Ephesians.  There the Apostle Paul writes, “We must no longer be children tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine. But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head…into Christ Jesus our Lord.”  In other words, this is a sermon series on growing up in Christ.

    Last week we talked about how the church is meant to represent the kingdom of God on earth.  We said that the kingdom is here, but not fully here.  Could it be that the church we have is exactly what God intended when he created the church?  Could it be that the church we have provides the very conditions necessary for growing up in Christ?  While we live in a throw-away society these days, perhaps there are some things we shouldn’t throw away.  After all, the providence of God means that wherever we have gotten to – whatever we have done – that is precisely where the road to heaven begins.

    It is generally believed that Paul wrote the book of Ephesians while he was in prison in Rome.  As it says in verse 1 of chapter 4, “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”  Perhaps the first question, then, is this: What does it mean to lead a worthy life? 

    Allow me to begin by citing the work of a great Methodist theologian by the name of John Wesley.  He taught what is now referred to as the Wesleyan Quadrilateral.  Although John Wesley never used the word “quadrilateral” himself, the Wesleyan Quadrilateral was nevertheless inferred from his work.  He taught that we lead a worthy life by building on the foundations of Scripture, tradition, reason and experience.  In other words, we base our decisions in life first on what the Scriptures say, second on what our tradition teaches, third on what our reason infers, and finally on what our experience tells us.  Scripture, tradition, reason, experience…in that order.

    My theory is that, these days, we have reversed the order.  We base our decisions in life first on what our own experience tells us.  Then we might consider reason.  Since we don’t really know what our tradition teaches, and now that biblical illiteracy is rampant, we hardly consider them at all.  How can we lead a worthy life if we don’t even know what a worthy life is?

    The Greek word Paul uses for worthy is axios.  An axios is literally a set of balancing scales; the kind of scales formed by a crossbeam balanced on a post, with pans suspended from each end of the crossbeam.  For example, you place a one-pound weight in one pan, and then measure out flour in the other pan, until the two pans are in balance.  Balance means to be in equilibrium.  So does a worthy life.  A worthy life is a life lived in equilibrium.

    The question now is: What are the two things that need to be in balance?  Paul says to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called.  Therefore, perhaps the two things that need to be in balance are these: God’s call…and our walk of faith.  Again, the two things that need to be in balance are God’s call, and our walk of faith.  For you see, when God’s call and our walk of faith balance…then we are truly growing up in Christ.

    A man who is probably the best preacher I’ve ever heard graduated from Wooster College in the early 1970s.  He became the senior minister at a large Presbyterian church in New Jersey while he was still in his twenties.  Trust me, that doesn’t happen very often.  About ten years later, he became the senior minister at one of the largest Presbyterian churches in the country, the Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church in Houston, Texas.  Not long after that, he became the senior minister at the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church in downtown New York City…one of the most prestigious pulpits in the world.

    That sounds like a man who was leading a balanced life, does it not?  He was clearly balancing God’s call upon his life with his own walk of faith...and with a great deal of success, I might add.  Then he hooked up with a seminary intern who was working at his church.  He lost his wife, he lost his family, he lost his church, and he lost his ordination to the ministry.  Then the husband of the woman with whom he had the affair sued him for a million dollars…and the church for three million more.  That’s what can happen when God’s call and our walk of faith fall out of balance.   

    God calls us to serve him, and then God equips us with the gifts we need to serve.  For example, I think of a woman who was appalled by the fact that there are so many couples who are not raising their children in the church.  Young people who grew up in the church now have nothing to do with it, and thus, their own kids have nothing to do with it either.  So she formed a group that gets together to pray for those kids – some of whom are their grandchildren.  The group is called Grandmas in Prayer.  And if God doesn’t listen to grandmas in prayer, I suspect he doesn’t listen to anyone.

    I think of another woman who was appalled by the fact that the high school no longer held baccalaureate services for graduating seniors.  So she formed a committee out of the high school’s senior council members to bring back the baccalaureate service.  She involved her husband as an advisor to the senior council, and she involved me as a member of the Meadville Area Ministerial Association.  Since her husband and I are both afraid to tell her no, we agreed to take part in the cause as well.  The baccalaureate service has been growing every year for the past 8 years.  Like I said, God calls us to serve him, and then God equips us with the gifts we need to serve.  This applies to each and every one of us.  And by the way, in case you were wondering, the word “retirement” is not in the Bible.   

    There is a catch, however.  God calls us to serve him, and then God equips us with the gifts we need to serve.  Note that I said, “God calls US,” and, “God equips US.”  In other words, this is not just a conversation between God and me.  Jesus is more than my personal savior.  This is a conversation God wants to hold with each and every one of us.  Thus, a worthy life – a life that is truly growing up in Christ – is a life formed in community.  Christian maturity develops as we form friendships with the friends of God…not just the friends we prefer.  In other words, if we are to grow up in Christ, we have to do it in the company of others who are responding to the call of God as well.  Whether we happen to like them or not…has absolutely nothing to do with it.

    Now back to the questions Dietrich Bonhoeffer posed at the beginning of this sermon.  He said, “It is wrong to use God as a stopgap for the incompleteness of our knowledge.  We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don’t.”  The question was, “What, then, does the Christian faith mean when it affirms that God acts or intervenes in the world as we know it?” 

    I think the answer to that question…is us.  God chooses to act and intervene in the world through us.  In fact, that may be the most convincing argument for the existence of God there is.  We see how God acted in the past when we read the pages of Scripture.  We see God acting today...when we witness the heart-felt convictions of those who serve him.  Amen.

 

04-29-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

LIVING THIS SIDE OF THE CROSS: PART II

    Jean-Jacques Rousseau…did I get that right?  Jean-Jacques Rousseau was an 18^th century   social theorist.  His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution, and the development of modern sociological thought.  In a book entitled Discourse on Inequality, he wrote:

The first man who fenced in a piece of land and said, “This is mine,” then found people naïve enough to believe him...that man was the true founder of civil society.  From how many crimes and wars and murders; from how many horrors and misfortunes might not anyone have saved mankind by pulling up the stakes or filling in the ditch and crying to his fellows: Beware of listening to this imposter; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itself to nobody.

    That is really quite profound.  Jean-Jacques Rousseau was a brilliant man, but Jean-Jacques Rousseau was not a humble man.  In the first pages of his final book, ironically titled, Confessions, Rousseau imagines himself having died and gone to heaven.  He approaches the heavenly gates with his head held high.   He carries a copy of his Confessions.  As he passes through the Pearly Gates all of heaven turns toward him. The heavenly host actually set their praise of God aside to listen to his story.  He boasts, “I have bared my secret soul, as God himself hast seen it.  So let the numberless legion of my fellow men gather round me and hear my confessions.  And may any man who dares, say, ‘I was a better man than he.’”

    Wow!  Now there was a man who was full of himself.  Contrast this scenario with the story of a man named Karl Barth. Karl Barth was arguably the greatest theologian of the 20^th century. His epic work was entitled, Church Dogmatics.  It consists of 14 volumes, and it is some of the most complex reading I have ever encountered.  Someone once quipped, “When Karl Barth dies, God is immediately going to take him up to heaven so he can find out more about himself.”  Such was the intricacy and complexity of Karl Barth’s writing.

    In his biography of Karl Barth, a man named Eberhard Busch quotes the great theologian speculating on his appearance at the Pearly Gates.  Barth imagines himself pushing along a cart full of books.  Yet the heavenly host does not turn to him for a reading.  Instead…they    laugh.  “In heaven,” Barth says, “we shall know all that is necessary, and we shall not have to write on paper or read any more.  Indeed…I shall be able to dump even the Church Dogmatics on some great heavenly floor as a pile of waste paper.”

    Rousseau dared to imagine that God and the heavenly host might be illumined by what he had to say. Barth understood that his mortal understanding of God – as great as it was – was still very limited.  Which of these two stories better captures your understanding of your own self-worth in God’s eyes?   Which of these two stories better describes your sense of your own standing before God?   If it’s the former, I think you may have a small problem.  If it’s the latter, congratulations!  You’ve been paying attention all these years.

    While we may have our standing before God in proper perspective, I’m not so sure we have our standing in the world in proper perspective. We have become an individualistic society. Ask a teacher.  If a child gets in trouble at school and his parents are called into the principal’s office to deal with it, who are the parents most likely to believe is at fault: their child…or the teacher?  Ask an employer. Many will agree that these days, a lot of people feel as if they are doing the employer a favor by showing up for work. As I’ve said before, there are two common phrases that pretty much sum up one of the greatest problems in our society.   One is the Burger King mantra: “Have it your way.” The other is a code by which many retail stores abide.  That code is, “The customer is always right.”  Those two phrases have helped to skew our perspective on our place in the world.  Perhaps we could even say that our world-view has become more Rousseauian than Barthian.  Keep that thought in mind as we move on.

    Last week we began a sermon series entitled, Living This Side of the Cross.  The thesis of   that sermon was pretty much summed up in verses 14 and 15 in the 4^th chapter of the book of Ephesians.  There the Apostle Paul writes, “We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro, and blown about by every wind of doctrine.  But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head…into Christ Jesus our Lord.”   In other words, this is a sermon series on growing up in Christ.

    When it comes to growing up in Christ, perhaps the place to start is the church.  Jesus Christ himself established the church through his disciples.  The church was called the body of Christ. 

The church is not Jesus, yet it is called to do the work of Christ in the world.  And many of the epistles in our New Testament were letters written to specific churches.  Case in point, the passage I read from the book of Ephesians.  The church in Ephesus was established by an eloquent Jewish preacher by the name of Apollos.  Paul initially stopped to visit this fledgling Christian congregation on his second missionary journey.  He met with them – there were only twelve of them at the time – and guided them into receiving the Holy Spirit.  Due to certain trying circumstances, he ended up staying with them for three years.

    Now most of the epistles in the Bible were written to resolve some particular problem that had arisen in the church. In Thessalonica some of the members of the church were sure that Jesus’ return was so imminent…that they quit working.  The Corinthians were squabbling about diet, sex and worship. The Galatians were regressing into tired old Jewish legalism and needed a thorough shaking up.   Like I said, most of the epistles in the Bible were written to resolve some particular problem that had arisen in the church. It seems as though there have always been problems in the church.

    The book of Ephesians is the lone exception. The book of Ephesians was not provoked by a problem. Ephesians may have actually been a general church letter that was circulated among several first century congregations.  So you see…the book of Ephesians works from the other direction.  It immerses us in holy and healthy conditions...out of which a mature Christian life can develop.  That is why it will be my primary text throughout the course of this series of sermons.

    The book of Ephesians begins with such peaceful eloquence. “To the saints who are faithful   in Christ Jesus,” Paul writes, “Grace to you, and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.”  It sounds so calm. It sounds so serene. It sounds so ideal.  And isn’t that the way we all want to experience church?  Yet IS that the way we all experience church?

    There is a quote from Eugene Peterson printed in the Silent Reflection portion of your bulletin this morning. He writes, “Church is the textured context in which we grow up in Christ to maturity.”  Like I said earlier, “When it comes to growing up in Christ, perhaps the place to start is the church.”  Then he writes, “But church is difficult.”  In fact, “Many Christians find church to be the most difficult aspect of being a Christian.”  Finally, he adds, “So many drop out.  There may be more Christians who don’t go to church, or go only occasionally, than there are who embrace it, warts and all.  And there are certainly plenty of warts.” 

    What has hurt the church more than the scandals involving Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart?  And need I mention the headlines some Catholic priests made a few years ago?  And then there are the endless arguments over the ordination of homosexuals…and the burgeoning debate over same-sex marriage.  Casual or superficial experience with the church can leave one with impressions of bloody fights, acrimonious arguments, blatant hypocrisy, and warring factions.   If the church is meant to be God’s advertisement to the world – if the church is meant to be a utopian community put on display so that people will flock to it, clamoring to get it...it has obviously become a piece of failed strategy.

    Yet the church is meant to be the core element for providing a human witness and a physical presence to the coming kingdom of God.  In other words, it’s all we’ve got.  As my systematic theology professor, Harold Nebelsick, used to say, “The kingdom is here…but not fully here.” Perhaps the question now...is this:  Could it be that the church we have is exactly what God intended when he created the church?  Could it be that the church we have provides the very conditions necessary for growing up in Christ? Could it be that God knew what he was doing when he gave us the church; this church?   Perhaps the answer to those questions depends on whether you are Rousseauian or Barthian.  In other words, is the church meant to please people, or is the church meant to challenge people to grow?

    I want you to listen to a story.  I don’t know who the author was, but one could assume that the person who wrote it is in his – or her – mid-to-late seventies.  In any case, listen closely.

    I grew up in the 1940s with practical parents.  My mother would wash aluminum foil after she cooked with it, and then reuse it.  She was the original recycling queen…even before they had a name for it.  My father was always happier getting an old pair of shoes fixed, rather than buying new ones. Their marriage was good; their dreams focused. Their best friends lived barely a wave away.

    I can almost see them now: Dad in trousers, a t-shirt, and a hat; Mom in a house dress with a dish in one hand and a towel in the other.  It was the time for fixing things: a curtain rod, the kitchen radio, the screen door, the oven, the hem in a dress…they were things we kept.  It was    a way of life, and it sometimes made me crazy.  All that fixing, saving and reusing…just once I wanted to be wasteful.  Waste meant affluence.  Throwing things away meant that you knew   there would always be more.

    But then my mother died, and on that clear summer’s night in the warmth of a hospital room, I was struck with the pain of learning: Sometimes, there isn’t any more.  Sometimes, what we care about most gets all used up and goes away, never to return.  So – while we have it – it’s best that we love it, and care for it, and fix it when it’s broken.  This goes for the kitchen radio, the screen door, the oven…and the hem in a dress.

    Yet maybe it also applies to marriages, to children with bad report cards, to strained relationships and even to churches.  We live in a throw-away society.  Yet maybe there are some things we shouldn’t throw away. Maybe there are some things that are worth fighting to keep. 

    God certainly feels that way about us. That’s why he sent his Son, Jesus Christ, in the first place.  So maybe we can let ourselves off the hook when it comes to that desperate question:  “Am I in the right place? Have I done the right thing?”  Sometimes we need to acknowledge   that we – or others – have made mistakes, and we must certainly try to learn from them.  But we should not foster the kind of worry that leads to despair.  We should not give up…on the church, on others, or on ourselves.  The providence of God means that wherever we have gotten to – whatever we have done – that is precisely…where the road to heaven begins.  Amen.

 

04-22-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

LIVING THIS SIDE OF THE CROSS: PART I

    Wendell Berry is an author, a poet, and what some have called a prophet of contemporary culture.  In a book entitled, What Are People For? he writes, “We think it ordinary to spend twelve or sixteen or twenty years of a person’s life – and many thousands of public dollars – on education.”  Yet we spend not one dime or give one thought to character.  Does character matter?  Could there be a kind of wisdom or knowledge that exists outside of what we might learn in school?

    Flannery O’Connor seemed to think so.  Flannery O’Connor was a 20^th century American writer. Her novels and short stories often reflected her own Catholic faith, and frequently examined questions of morality and character.  In a book entitled, Everything That Rises Must Converge, we meet a young man who has returned home to die…or so he thinks.  He is arrogant, pretentious, intellectually proud, and very well-educated.  On his deathbed, he decides he wants to see a priest; but not just any priest.  He pictures in his mind the dramatic content of his end-of-life conversations with an equally well-educated priest…a person of culture, as well as religion.

    Much to his consternation, however…instead of encountering a worldly, sophisticated and slightly cynical Jesuit priest – the priest of his imagining – the priest who actually arrives at his bedside is nothing of the sort.  He is short, he is portly, he is anything but sophisticated, and he arrives at the man’s bedside and introduces himself by saying, “I’m Fahther Finn – from Purrgatory.”  And instead of responding to the dying young man’s questions about the literary merits of James Joyce – or the significance of mythology behind the world’s great religions – the priest insists upon asking questions of his own.

    “So,” the priest asks him, “do you say your morning and your evening prayers?  You don’t, eh?  Well, you will never learn to be good unless you pray regularly. You cannot love Jesus unless you speak with him.  Do you have trouble with purity? We all do, but you must pray to the Holy Ghost for it.  Mind, heart, body, and soul.  Nothing is overcome without prayer.  Pray with your family.  Do you pray with your family?” 

    By this time, the proud young intellectual is fit to be tied.  He isn’t having the kind of conversation he imagined.  And at the suggestion that he should pray with his family, he shouts, “God forbid!  My mother doesn’t have time to pray, and my sister is an atheist!”  The priest responds, “A shame.  Then you must pray for them.”

    The conversation only becomes more tense from here on out as the young man attempts to steer the priest toward the more comfortable shores of the arts by saying, “The artist prays by creating.” To which the old priest responds, “That’s not enough! If you do not pray daily you are neglecting your immortal soul.  Do you know your catechism?”

    Here the young man feels as though he is on firmer ground.  He doesn’t need a catechism.  He is an intellectual – an artist – free to experience the world and form his own opinions of it.  “Certainly not!” he replies.  “I do not know my catechism.  I do not need my catechism.”

    The priest moves on relentlessly – not justifying, not explaining – just walking through the catechism.  “Who made you?” he asks.  The young man replies, “Different people believe different things about that.”  “God made you,” the priest says.  “Now, who is God?”

    The young man replies, “God is an idea created by man.”  The priest responds as if he hadn’t even heard the young man’s answer.  “God is a Spirit; infinitely perfect,” he says.  “Now…why did God make you?” The young man tries to deny the premise but the priest cuts him off. “God made you to know him, to love him, to serve him in this world, and to be happy with him in the next.”

    Exasperated, the priest says at last, “If you don’t apply yourself to the catechism, how do you expect to know how to save your immortal soul?” “Listen,” the young man says, “I’m not a Roman Catholic.”  “A poor excuse for not saying your prayers,” the old priest answers.  “But I’m dying,” the young man says.  “You’re not dead yet,” the priest retorts.

    After a turn in the conversation in which the priest instructs the young man on how to receive the Holy Spirit, the old priest leaves.  The last thing the young man hears the priest say, however, is a comment to his mother.  “He is a good lad at heart,” the priest says, “but very ignorant.”

    What strikes me most about this conversation is the confidence of the priest.  He knows that the questions addressed in the catechism – fashionable or not – are the real questions at the heart of life.  The old priest standing beside the young man’s bed, tenaciously asking questions that he callously brushes aside, reminds us of what faith looks like…and the contribution it can make to our character.  Questions, like some of the great questions in the catechism, remind us that going deeper means asking very tried and true questions…whatever the preoccupation of contemporary culture may say about what matters most.

    We think it ordinary to spend twelve or sixteen or twenty years of a person’s life and many thousands of public dollars on education.   Yet we spend not one dime or give one thought to a person’s character.  Does character matter?  Is there a kind of wisdom or knowledge that exists outside of what we might learn in school? I think the old priest in that Flannery O’Connor story would say that character does matter and that there is a kind of wisdom or knowledge that exists outside of what we might learn in school.  What do you think?

    Consider the passage that I read from the gospel according to John.  Jesus had been crucified on a Friday afternoon. Come Sunday morning, the disciples heard some wild reports from a few women who’d been to the tomb claiming that he was alive, but they were a bit unsure as to what to make of them. Then – suddenly – Jesus himself appeared to them. The only problem here was that Thomas – better known as Doubting Thomas – was not with them, and he refused to believe what the other disciples were telling him.  “Unless I see the mark of the nails,” he said, “and put my finger in the mark of the nails…I will not believe.” 

    One week later, Thomas got his wish. Jesus appeared to them again and said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see my hands.  Reach out your hand and put it in my side.  Do not be faithless, Thomas, but believe.”  Thomas immediately blurted out, “My Lord and my God!”  And Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and still believe.”

    Now after this event, the author of the gospel of John lays out the purpose of his book.  He writes, “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book.  But these are written…so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the Living God; and that through believing, you may have life in his name.”

    Here’s the quandary.  What does it mean to have life in his name?  Our Americanized gospel has come to interpret life in his name to mean eternal life, and that’s true.  But it means a whole lot more than that.  The Greek word translated “life” here is zoane.  It literally means life in the physical sense...of the supernatural life believers will receive in the future, as well as that which they enjoy in the here and now. Ladies and gentlemen, listen closely.  Life in Jesus’ name has to do with eternal life.  But it also has to do with life in the here and now...a life of grace and peace and beauty and holiness.  This is what the old priest was trying to tell the dying young man.  The question for us now, I suppose, is this: “How do we get there?”  How do we attain a life of grace and peace and beauty and holiness ourselves?

    I encountered a startling story in a book by Eugene Peterson entitled, Practice Resurrection.  There was a woman who grew up in poverty in Arkansas in a harsh fundamentalist atmosphere and abusive circumstances.  When she was eighteen-years-old, she escaped her home town and her family and fled to California.  It wasn’t long before she became pregnant.  She was ecstatic about this new life growing inside of her.  She had never felt more “herself.”  She had meaning; she had joy; she felt for the very first time as if she was taking part in the mystery of life.  While she was no longer religious in any conventional sense, she was convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that God had created and given this life that was within her.

    She gave birth to the baby.  It was sheer ecstasy, beauty and goodness.  And then, a few weeks later, she fell apart. She knew nothing about life. She didn’t know what to do. She was confused, bewildered, and without bearings. She had no idea what to do with a baby...and no visible means to support one. She started drinking and became an alcoholic. She went on to use cocaine and became an addict.  It wasn’t long before she turned to prostitution.  She spent the next twenty years on the streets of San Francisco, trying to keep herself and her son afloat.

    And then one day, she wandered into a church.  The church was empty, so she sat down and prayed.  And then it happened.  She didn’t know exactly how or why, but she knew that it had happened.  She had become a Christian.  Then it turned out that she was pregnant again.  This time around, she knew that she knew nothing about living…but she also knew that this time around there wasn’t going to be any hand-to-mouth existence on alcohol, drugs and prostitution. After poking around a bit, she discovered and embraced the Christian faith, and gave herself up entirely to Jesus Christ.  

    But do you know what she found most difficult from that point on?  American churches.  It’s not that she wasn’t welcomed. She was. In fact, she was something of a prize to the church. She was one who had been plucked from the underbelly of the world, and had been transformed, literally. What she found, however, was that these American churches seemed to know a lot about being born again in Jesus’ name.  The problem was that they seemed neither interested nor competent in matters pertaining to spiritual growth. They knew a lot about the life of Christ, but they weren’t very good at navigating life in Christ.  The people of the church were unable to help her as she struggled to live this side of the cross.  She was drowning in a sea of chaos, and there was no one there to toss her a lifeline.

    What do you think about that story?  Should the members of the church have been able to   help her in matters pertaining to spiritual growth, or is that something that’s pretty much the responsibility of the individual? Should the members of the church have been able to help her to live this side of the cross, or are we pretty much on our own when it comes to such things?  What it all comes down to is this: People are bobbing in a sea of chaos all around us.  Are we equipped, as Christians, to toss them a lifeline?  Or are we willing to simply let them drown?

    At our Lake Erie Presbytery meeting last Tuesday night, a minister friend of mine by the name of Harry Johns addressed the presbytery.  He said, “The church is one generation from death.” He said that when he used to make that statement as a young preacher he didn’t really believe it.  But now, as a retired veteran of fifty years of ministry, he sees it as a distinct possibility.  The church is one generation from death.

    Jesus transformed the world with but eleven disciples.  Judas, of course, betrayed him and was no longer counted among the twelve.  The way I like to look at that is this: Even Jesus could only keep eleven out of twelve happy.  That gives me consolation when people get upset with me. Ladies and gentlemen, we have nearly 1000 members on our rolls.   Don’t you think we could make a difference in the name of Jesus Christ in our community…if we only knew how?

    The sermon series we begin today is entitled, “Living This Side of the Cross.”  It has to do with spiritual growth.  As Howie read a moment ago from the book of Ephesians, “We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro, and blown about by every wind of doctrine.  But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head...into Christ Jesus our Lord.”  Join me over the course of the next few weeks.  We’re going to spend a little time exploring spiritual growth.  We’re going to spend a little time learning how to throw a lifeline.  We’re going to spend a little time...developing character.  Don’t you think it’s high time we did? Amen.

 

04-01-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

THE SUPERFICIAL SAGA: PART VIII

    In the year of 1970 – I suspect that sounds like ancient history to some of you, while it seems like only yesterday to others – in the year of 1970 a single man and a single woman on a college campus started living together…and it made national news.  You see, prior to 1970 it was illegal for a man and a woman to live together without the benefit of marriage. Today I’m guessing that at least 75% of the couples I marry are living together before their wedding day. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t bother to even ask any more.  I figure…at least they’re trying to do the right thing now.   We Americans have rationalized our way into believing that living together prior to marriage is a morally and socially acceptable practice.

      Biblical mores aside, I used to be able to say that living together prior to marriage greatly increased the odds that the marriage would end in divorce.  My theory was, “How do you go from a relationship with virtually no commitment to a relationship of the highest commitment?”  And there were statistics to back me up on that.  Then I read an article on the front page of The Meadville Tribune entitled, “Pre-Marriage Move-In No Longer Predicts Divorce.”  Essentially, it said that nearly 50% of all first marriages break up in the first 20 years. And living together first is no longer a factor in determining the success rate of marriage.

    Yet could it be that there is another factor that has contributed to the high rate of divorce in this country?  Could it be that there is something deeper than couples living together that impacts the success or failure of a marriage?  Keep that thought in mind as we move on.

    This is the eighth in a series of sermons entitled, The Superficial Saga.  It’s a sermon series on the seven deadly sins. We poke a lot of fun at sin these days. Truth be told, I don’t think we take sin very seriously.  Yet God takes sin seriously.  In fact, God takes sin so seriously…that he sent his Son to die on a cross in order to overcome it.  Sin is not a matter to be taken lightly, as though a person could saunter into God’s presence at any time, in any mood, with any sort of life behind them…and at once perceive God there.   No, the sense of God’s reality is a progressive and often laborious achievement of the soul; the soul that takes sin seriously and earnestly tries to dispel it.

    Six weeks ago we examined the sin of pride.  We determined that pride is a sin basically because Jesus said it was.  The secret to overcoming pride is humility.  And the key to humility is to approach God not as the big, self-sufficient, and self-reliant adults we pretend to be.  Instead, we approach God as little children: frail, empty, dependent...needing a gracious and loving God in the worst possible way.

    Five weeks ago we examined the sin of envy.  We determined that envy is cold-hearted and cruel.  From a theological standpoint envy is basically our own sense of dissatisfaction with the way God made us.  The secret to conquering envy is love.  And the secret to love…is to wish what’s best for someone else.

    Four weeks ago we examined the sin of wrath or anger.  We determined that anger is a normal human emotion that needs to be expressed.  Yet that anger needs to be expressed in the form of an offering to God.  In other words, we express our anger to God in prayer…and then leave it in God’s hands to rectify the situation.  The secret to conquering anger is forgiveness.  Forgiveness then breaks the cycle of anger that peace might rule the day.

    Three weeks ago we examined the sin of sloth.  We determined that sloth is essentially a spiritual apathy that stems from a sense of hopelessness about the world. The key to overcoming sloth is to remember that we serve God, not anyone else.  We are called to remain diligent in our tasks, and in our belief, that God’s kingdom will come to pass when all the world comes to serve God.

    Two weeks ago we examined the sin of greed.  We determined that all that greed gets us is a whole lot of stress and a much shorter life.  Greed says, “I want, I need, I’ve simply got to have.”  Charity says, “Thank you, God, for what I do have.” Thus, perhaps charity is just as much for us as it is for whatever charitable institution it is to which we choose to give.

    Last week we examined the sin of gluttony.  We determined that gluttony is weakness…and that weakness is the door through which the devil always tries to enter.  The key to overcoming said weakness is more a positive frame of mind than it is anything else.

    Today we examine the sin you’ve all been waiting for – the sin of lust.  As we saw in our passage from the first chapter of the book of Genesis, sexuality started out as a good gift from God. It says, “So God created humanity in his image; in the image of God he created them – male and female he created them.  God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply…and fill the earth.’”  In the first chapter of the book of Genesis men and women are seen as equals – both having been created in the image of God and charged to propagate the species.  It’s in the second chapter of the book of Genesis where things start to get messy...because that’s where we begin to make distinctions.

    The second chapter of the book of Genesis records another account of creation.  There we see that God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam.  Then God took one of Adam’s ribs and with it he created Eve.  And for the last six thousand years, women have been seen as being subservient to men.

    It started with their temptation by the serpent in the Garden of Eden.  For centuries, Eve was seen as the culprit.  She was the one that was tempted by the Serpent, and she was the one who led poor Adam astray.  Recent scholarship, however, has tried to get Eve off the hook.  Experts say that at least Eve was thoughtful about what she did.  Adam just did it.  As one woman said, “That’s just like a man…always thinking about his stomach!”

    I want to put a different slant on that story.  I want every married man in the sanctuary this morning to raise his hand.  Now, keep your hand up…if you think it’s a good idea to complain about what your wife puts in front of you for dinner. I don’t complain about what my wife puts in front of me for dinner. I’m afraid to!  That’s probably what happened in the Garden of Eden.  Eve put an apple in front of Adam and said, “Here.  Eat this.”  Adam knew better than to question Eve. So you see, I’m not letting either one of them off the hook. In any case, by the end of the story, when Adam and Eve are banished from the Garden, they are clearly at odds with one another.  And it seems we’ve been unable to see one another as equals ever since.

    Jesus weighs in on the matter, as well, in the passage we read from the gospel according to Matthew.  There he says, “You have heard it said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’  But I say   to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her   in his heart.”  Now granted, it would have been nice if Jesus had talked about women looking at men with lust as well, but the point remains the same. To look at a person with lust is to not see them as a person.  It is to see them...as an object.  Lust sees another person as an object for the gratification of its own lewd desires.  And therein lies the problem.

    But hey, that’s easier said than done, is it not?  We humans are passionate by nature.  It’s biological, for crying out loud!  But I submit to you that lust is not the same as love. Lust says,   “I can’t wait to see him again,” or, “I can hardly keep my hands off her.”  That’s what we call romantic infatuation.  Love is showing compassion even when you don’t feel very compassionate.  Love is continuing to give in spite of the desire to take.  Love is holding on when it would be so much easier to just let go.  Love is a mutual respect that is built upon years and years of hard work and sacrifice. You see, love is not something so fleeting as a fickle emotion.  Love… is a state of being.

    As I frequently say in my wedding sermons, love is bringing a beautiful, healthy child into a world full of pain because you truly believe your love can make a difference.  Love is watching that child grow up and decide to share his or her life with that of another.  Love is standing beside your spouse when they’re lying in a hospital bed…worried sick about what life would be like without them.  Love is sitting across the room from one another after the kids have grown and gone – perhaps not saying a word to each other – but looking at each other and remembering a lifetime of shared memories.  Love takes time because love is so much more than a fickle emotion.  Love…is a state of being.

    Now back to the notion of living together before marriage.  It seems as though it is now a proven fact that living together prior to marriage does not impact the success rate of marriage in any way.  Could it be that there is something deeper than couples living together that impacts the success or failure of a marriage?  I think there is.

    The general rule of thumb these days…is that after three dates, a couple is expected to sleep together.  And by sleep, I don’t mean sleep. So here’s what happens. A couple sleeps together, and the sex is good.  So then they move in together, and the sex is still good. Then they decide   to get married, and the sex is still good.  Then a few years down the road, the thrill wears off a little bit.  Suddenly a couple discovers that they’re married to someone that, a) they don’t really know, and b) they don’t really like!  Such is the fruit of a relationship built on lust.  Now that’s just my theory.   I’ve never read it or heard it anywhere.   I just think that’s what the problem is.   A relationship that is not built on mutual trust and respect is simply destined to fail. 

    So what have we learned so far?  We’ve examined the seven deadly sins.  And along with that, we’ve examined the seven holy virtues or the seven cardinal virtues.  The seven holy virtues are meant to counteract the seven deadly sins.  As I’ve mentioned in every sermon for the last seven weeks, the only way to conquer sin…is to replace it with something better.

    Yet truth be told, we will never be able to completely master our sin, no matter how hard we try.  If we could, then God would have sent his Son into the world for nothing.  So we have a bit of a conundrum here. On the one hand we are miserable, wretched, hopeless sinners in desperate need of the grace of God.  Yet on the other hand, we are the beloved children of God – more precious to God than life itself. 

    Martin Luther called this situation, simul iustis et peccator.  What that means is this.  We are both justified and sinner at the same time.  We are loved, accepted, redeemed and saved – and we are rebellious, deceitful, dishonorable and vile – at the same time.  Perhaps all this means… is that God isn’t finished with us yet. 

    My oldest son is going to have my hide for telling this story, but I’m going to tell it anyway.  About ten years ago, my son and two of his friends had a book of matches and some fireworks.  They were in a field and it had been very dry that summer.  Let’s just say that shortly after they left the area where they had been…six to eight-foot flames erupted.  A vigilant neighbor called the fire department and disaster was averted. Now in fairness to my son, he did not light the fire.  But as far as I was concerned, he was guilty by association.

    When I found out what had happened, I rounded up my son, Rob, and one of the other boys –   a boy named Neal – and drug them down to the police station. There they made their confession and essentially received a slap on the wrist.  As we were driving home, I said to the boys, “You got off easy.  The next time, you may not be so lucky.”

    I knew I had done the right thing when Rob immediately said, “There won’t be a next time.”  He learned from his mistake.  And Neal…Neal just rolled his eyes.  Ladies and gentlemen, my son is currently interviewing for acceptance into a pharmacy school.  Neal died last summer of a drug overdose.

    Did I love my son any less for his mistake?  No.  Did I love him enough to let him learn the consequences of his actions? Yes.  Maybe that’s what God is doing for us as well.  He loved us enough to send his only Son.  And he loves us enough to let us learn from our mistakes.  God’s not finished with us yet.  What will you make of your mistakes?  Amen.

 

03-25-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

THE SUPERFICIAL SAGA: PART VII

    My family and I moved to Meadville in November of 2003.  Prior to that, I served a church in Salem, Ohio for about seven-and-a-half years. I believe it was near the end of September of 2003 when I formally announced to the congregation that we would be leaving Salem.  I was surprised by how fast the news spread in the community.

    For example, it wasn’t more than a few days after I made my announcement in church that I was approached on the street by a young man I knew from the gym.  His name was Dominic Panzott.  Dominic approached me and said, “I hear you’re leaving town.”  I said, “Yes.  We’ll   be moving to Meadville, Pennsylvania.   It’s a tremendous opportunity and I’m really looking forward to it.”  He said, “Meadville.  Isn’t that where Allegheny College is?”  I said, “Yes, as a matter of fact, it is.”  He said, “Oh.”

    I was puzzled by his response, so I asked him, “Are you familiar with Meadville?”  He said, “Yeah.  I went to Allegheny College for a year.”  Then I asked him, “Well, what did you think of Meadville?”  He shrugged his shoulders and said, “Pretty boring.”  I said, “Dom, I’m raising three kids.  Boring is exactly what I want!”

    Now, those of you who’ve been paying attention know that the subject matter for today is supposed to be gluttony.  Thus, you’ve got to be wondering, “Why on earth I would begin my sermon with a story like that?” What has the relative boredom or excitement of Meadville got to do with gluttony?  Just keep that thought in mind. Hopefully it’ll all make sense by the end of this sermon.

    This is the seventh in a series of sermons entitled The Superficial Saga.  It’s a sermon series on the seven deadly sins. We poke a lot of fun at sin these days.  Truth be told, I don’t think we take sin very seriously.  Yet God takes sin seriously.  In fact, God takes sin so seriously…that he sent his Son to die on a cross in order to overcome it. Sin is not a matter to be taken lightly, as though a person could saunter into God’s presence at any time, in any mood, with any sort of life behind them…and at once perceive God there.   No, the sense of God’s reality is a progressive and often laborious achievement of the soul; the soul that takes sin seriously and earnestly tries to dispel it.

    Like I said, The Superficial Saga is a sermon series on the seven deadly sins.  The seven deadly sins are: pride, envy, wrath, sloth, greed, gluttony, and lust.  Yet along with the seven deadly sins there are what we call the seven holy virtues or the seven cardinal virtues. The seven holy virtues are meant to counteract the seven deadly sins. For example, the opposite of pride is humility. The opposite of envy is love. The opposite of wrath is forgiveness.  The opposite of sloth is diligence.  The opposite of greed is charity.  The opposite of gluttony is temperance, and the opposite of lust is chastity or purity. You see, the only way to conquer sin…is to replace it with something better.

    Five weeks ago, we examined the sin of pride. There we determined that pride is a sin basically because Jesus said it was. The secret to overcoming pride is humility. We determined that the key to humility is to approach God not as the big, self-sufficient, and self-reliant adults we pretend to be.  Instead, we approach God as little children: frail, empty, dependent…needing a gracious and loving God in the worst possible way.

    Four weeks ago, we examined the sin of envy.  We determined that envy is cold-hearted and

cruel. From a theological standpoint envy is basically our own sense of dissatisfaction with the way God created us.  The secret to conquering envy is love.  And the secret to love…is to wish what’s best for someone else.

    Three weeks ago we examined the sin of wrath or anger. We determined that anger is a normal human emotion that needs to be expressed.   Yet that anger needs to be expressed in the form of an offering to God.  In other words, we express our anger to God in prayer…and then leave it in God’s hands to rectify the situation.  The secret to conquering anger is forgiveness.  Forgiveness then breaks the cycle of anger that peace might rule the day.

    Two weeks ago we examined the sin of sloth.  We determined that sloth is essentially a spiritual apathy that stems from a sense of hopelessness about the world. The key to overcoming sloth is to remember that we work for God, not for anyone else. We are called to remain diligent in our tasks, and in our belief, that God’s kingdom will come to pass when all the world comes to serve God.

    Last week we examined the sin of greed.  We determined that all that greed gets us is a whole lot of stress and a much shorter life.  Greed says, “I want, I need, I’ve simply got to have.” Charity says, “Thank you, God, for what I do have.”  Thus, perhaps charity is just as much for us…as it is for whatever charitable institution to which we choose to give.

    Today we examine the sin of gluttony.  Gluttony is unique among the seven deadly sins in that it doesn’t seem to affect anyone but us.  I mean, if you happen to eat too much, who are you hurting besides yourself?  Of course, as we shall soon see, gluttony applies to far, far more than the mere intake of food.  But for now, let’s focus on the intake of food.  Eating too much these days is often perceived as a sign of the good life.  Case in point…where would the holiday of Thanksgiving be without the sin of gluttony? 

    Have any of you ever seen the television show, The Big Bang Theory?  Aside from the fact that – like far too many T.V. shows, it seems to be sex-obsessed – the writing is really quite clever.  It features three physicists with Ph.D.s, an engineer who only holds a Master’s Degree and a pretty girl across the hall who is an aspiring actress.  Leonard and Sheldon are two of the physicists, who happen to be roommates.

    In one scene, Leonard walks into their apartment with a large bag of Chinese take-out food.  He says to Sheldon, “I hope you’re hungry!” To which Sheldon replies, “Interesting. A friendly sentiment in this country, a cruel taunt in the Sudan.  It’s a lesson in context.”

    A lesson in context, indeed.  Eating too much in this country is often perceived as a sign of the good life.  Yet listen to what a woman named Francine Prose has to say about gluttony in a book entitled, Gluttony.  She writes:

One-third of all Americans, approximately sixty-three million people, are overweight. Fifteen percent of all American children are overweight.  Two hundred fifty thousand deaths can be attributed to poor diet and inactivity.  Fifty percent of cardiovascular disease is related to excess weight. We spend as much as fifty billion dollars a year dieting.  Laparoscopic gastric bypass surgery has become the new status surgery for the rich; more chic than a face-lift.  That fifty billion for diets is more than we spend on education, training, employment and social services. We Americans spend more on dieting than the gross national product of Ireland.

    Maybe gluttony does affect more than just ourselves.  Thirteenth century theologian Thomas Aquinas once said that gluttony was the devil’s bait for our first parents.  He’s referring to Adam and Eve, of course. As it says in Genesis 3, the forbidden fruit was a delight to the eyes and good for food.  Thus, tempted by the serpent, Eve took of the fruit and ate. Then she gave some of it to her husband, and he ate of it as well.  At that, sin entered the world.  Could we go so far as to say it was gluttony that brought about original sin? After all, Adam and Eve were tempted with food, and they failed the test.

    Now let’s consider the passage that Nancy read a moment ago from the gospel according to Matthew.  After Jesus was baptized, he was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.  Note, however, that it wasn’t until after he had fasted for forty days that the devil came to meet him.  Hunger was the door through which the devil tried to enter.  “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “command these stones to become loaves of bread.”  The devil knew that hunger would be Jesus’ weakest flank at this point in time…and that’s where he chose to strike. Yet unlike Adam and Eve, Jesus did not fail his test.  Jesus replied, “One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

    The passing or failing of temptation aside, I think these stories reveal what gluttony really is.

Gluttony is weakness.  And weakness is the door through which the devil always tries to enter.  The devil always worms in…right at the point of our most glaring weakness.

    I thought about this weakness as I read an article by Larry Peers entitled, The Problem Trap.  You see a quote from Larry Peers’ article in the Silent Reflection portion of your bulletin today.  He writes:

One of the primary kinds of stories that takes hold in a congregation and makes change difficult is what is known as the problem-saturated story, or one in which the focus is on who or what is or has been wrong.  You can recognize the problem-saturated story when you’re in a group where someone offers an example of how difficult or awful something is in the congregation, and before you know it the rest of us can’t help but chime in with more evidence for how truly bad and impossible the situation is. We can almost hear ourselves say – even if the words aren’t verbalized – “If you think that’s bad, let me tell you how it is even worse than that!”

    Weakness is the door through which the devil always tries to enter.  You’ve heard the term, “Glutton for punishment,” have you not?  How would it be if we coined another term here, because I think it truly applies.  How would it be if we coined the term, “Glutton for misery?” A desire to be miserable is a very strange weakness that a lot of us seem to have.  And the more we gripe and moan and complain, the more miserable we become…and the less likely we are to ever encounter a change for the better. It’s also the less likely we are to ever encounter God.    For you see, our incessant grumbling can quickly become a cancer.

    Such was exactly the case in the passage I read from the book of Jeremiah. The Hebrew people had been conquered by the Babylonians. Many had been deported from their homes in Jerusalem and forced to live in the city of Babylon.  The Hebrew people were none-too-pleased about that.  So what did they do?  They griped, and they moaned, and they complained.  And their incessant grumbling was quickly becoming a cancer.

    This is the situation Jeremiah was addressing. Speaking on behalf of God, he cried, “Thus says the Lord of hosts, to all the exiles whom I have sent into Babylon: Build houses and live in them.  Plant gardens and eat what they produce.  Take wives, and have sons and daughters.  Take wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage that they may multiply and not decrease.  Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you, and pray to the Lord on its behalf; for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”

    Did you catch that last part there?  “Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” In essence he was saying, “Don’t cave in to your sense of despair and hopelessness.”  He reminded them of who they were outside of the problem, and encouraged them to do what they knew how to do when they were not in exile.  These actions were the start of a new story.  Jeremiah was prophetically helping the people of Israel to re-author their story in the midst of exile.  In other words, bloom where you’re planted.  And you’re either a part of the solution…or you’re a part of the problem.

    I hear a lot of complaints about the church today.  I hear a lot of complaints about the city of Meadville, as well.  Why, it seems as though we truly are gluttons for misery.  Yet as Jeremiah said to the people of his day, so, too, do I think he would say to us: “Seek the welfare of the city and the church where I have sent you…for in their welfare, you will find your welfare.” 

    My old friend Dominic Panzott said that Meadville was boring.  To him, I suppose it was.  To me, it’s not boring at all.  In the end, I suppose it all comes down to what you make of it.  Amen.

 

03-18-2012 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

THE SUPERFICIAL SAGA: PART VI

    Haddon Robinson is the Professor of Preaching at the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary near Boston, Massachusetts.  He recently gave a lecture that somewhat highlighted the evolution of preaching.  More specifically, he said that the model for the preacher has changed.  For example, up through the 1940s and into the early 1950s, the model for the preacher was the evangelist. In other words, preachers were doing their level best to get people to commit their lives to Jesus Christ.

    In the late 1950s and on through the 1960s the model for the preacher became that of the Bible teacher.  Helping people to understand the Bible came to be the most important thing.    It’s interesting to note, however, that he never addressed the 1970s.  Apparently the 1970s was a lost decade of preaching.  In the 1980s and the 1990s, the model for the preacher became that of the therapist.  In other words…the task of the preacher came to be meeting the needs of people who were trying to be Christian, but who were still largely secular. 

    He is much more critical of preaching today.  He says, and I quote, “Sermons today are much more likely to be topical than expository…and many of the materials in the sermon come out of the behavioral sciences.  The aim of most sermons today…is not to explain the biblical text.  The aim of most sermons today is to connect with the listeners’ felt needs.” Then he adds, “The Bible is used as a way to get a divine imprint on what is simply good advice.”

    Ouch!  Is that what the preached word has become?  Is it simply good advice?  Or is the preached word still meant to be, by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, the word of God to a lost humanity?  Is the preached word still meant to be, by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, divine instruction on the way to live a godly life?  Is the preached word still meant to be, by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit, a means of grace by which one can draw closer to God?  Hey, I’m old school.  I still think theology is important.  Thus, I suspect you know what I think.   But just in case you don’t…let me tell you what I’m really trying to accomplish in a sermon.

    The goal, plain and simple, is communion with God.  All I’m trying to do is help you come to know God.  As John Calvin noted in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, “Without knowledge of self, there is no knowledge of God.”  Yet what do we see when we look at ourselves?  We see ourselves as sinful human beings and we see a great chasm between us and God.  Yet we also see a redeemer in the person of Jesus Christ: a redeemer who sets us right with God when we confess our sin and sincerely strive to repent, sincerely strive to live a better life, and sincerely strive to have a change of heart.  Perhaps John the Baptist put it best when he came to announce the arrival of God’s Messiah.  He cried, “Repent…for the kingdom of God is at hand.”  In other words, we need to change the way we are. Thus, the goal of preaching is not to make us feel good about ourselves.  The goal of preaching…is to inspire us to change.

    This is the sixth in a series of sermons entitled, The Superficial Saga.  It’s a sermon series on the seven deadly sins. We poke a lot of fun at sin these days.  Truth be told, I don’t think we take sin very seriously.  Yet God takes sin seriously.  In fact, God takes sin so seriously…that he sent his Son to die on a cross in order to overcome it. Sin is not a matter to be taken lightly, as though a person could saunter into God’s presence at any time, in any mood, with any sort of life behind them…and at once perceive God there.  No, the sense of God’s reality is a progressive and often laborious achievement of the soul; the soul that takes sin seriously and earnestly tries to dispel it.

    Like it said, The Superficial Saga is a sermon series on the seven deadly sins. The seven deadly sins are: pride, envy, wrath, sloth, greed, gluttony, and lust.  Yet along with the seven deadly sins there are what we call the seven holy virtues or the seven cardinal virtues. The seven holy virtues are meant to counteract the seven deadly sins. For example, the opposite of pride is humility. The opposite of envy is love. The opposite of wrath is forgiveness.  The opposite of sloth is diligence.  The opposite of greed is charity.  The opposite of gluttony is temperance, and the opposite of lust is chastity or purity.  You see, the way to conquer sin…is to replace it with something better. 

    Four weeks ago, we examined the sin of pride. There we determined that pride is a sin basically because Jesus said it was. The secret to overcoming pride is humility. We determined that the key to humility is to approach God not as the big, self-sufficient, and self-reliant adults we pretend to be.  Instead, we approach God as little children: frail, empty, dependent…needing a gracious and loving God in the worst possible way.

    Three weeks ago we examined the sin of envy. We determined that envy is cold-hearted and cruel. From a theological standpoint, envy is basically our own sense of dissatisfaction with the way God created us.  The secret to conquering envy is love.  And the secret to love…is to wish what’s best for someone else.

    Two weeks ago we examined the sin of wrath or anger.  We determined that anger is a normal human emotion that needs to be expressed.  Yet that anger needs to be expressed in the form of an offering to God.  In other words, we express our anger to God in prayer…and then leave it in God’s hands to rectify the situation.  The secret to conquering anger is forgiveness.  Forgiveness then breaks the cycle of anger in order that peace might rule the day.

    Last week we examined the sin of sloth.  We determined that sloth is essentially a spiritual apathy that stems from a sense of hopelessness about the world.  The key to overcoming sloth is to remember that we work for God, not for anyone else.  We are called to remain diligent in our tasks and in our belief that God’s kingdom will come to pass when all the world comes to serve God.

    Today we examine the sin of greed. Perhaps the most famous personification of greed can be found in Charles Dickens’ novel, A Christmas Carol.  I’m talking about Ebenezer Scrooge, of course. Why the very name “Scrooge” has become synonymous with the word “greed.”  In the novel, Dickens introduces Ebenezer Scrooge with these words:

Oh!  But he was a tightfisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge!  A squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner!  Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire…secret and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.

    When it comes to the sin of greed, perhaps there is no more appropriate description.  These days, we tend to view Bill Gates in a similar light.  I’ve heard it said that Bill Gates was once asked by a reporter, “How much is enough?”  To which Bill Gates replied, “You can never have enough.”  I’ve got to admit that I was unable to substantiate that comment.  However, I was able to substantiate a quote from one of Bill Gates’ predecessors in opulence…a man named John D. Rockefeller.  A reporter once asked John D. Rockefeller, “How much money is enough?”  Rockefeller replied, “Just a little bit more.”  That, my friends, is greed personified.

    I’m here to tell you, however, that it’s not just the Bill Gateses and the John D. Rockefellers of the world that suffer from the sin of greed. I recently heard the story of a girl who told her friend, “My mom is only happy when she’s spending money.  She went shopping every day until a thief stole her credit card.”  “Oh, my gosh,” her friend replied. “Did your father report the stolen credit card?”  To which the girl replied, “No.  He says the thief is spending less money than Mom did!”

    Now that’s not sexist!  That story is true of both men and women.  A recent survey indicates that the average American spends $1300.00 on credit for every $1000.00 they make. As someone once said, “People spend money they don’t have to buy things they don’t need to impress people they don’t even like.”  A lot of us suffer from greed.

    A lot of us may suffer from greed, but I don’t think anyone respects it or admires it.  Not long ago, woman named Kristen Clawbury announced to her friends that she was suffering from ovarian cancer. Her friends immediately rushed to her side to comfort her, to cry with her and to pray with her.  After a few months, she told her friends that the cancer treatments had not worked and that she was going to have to go out of state for experimental medical treatments that would not be covered by her insurance.  Her friends then got together…and held fundraisers that brought in more than $40,000.00.  Then they found out that it was all a great big scam.  The woman had cut her hair to make it look like she was undergoing chemotherapy.  She took the money her friends had raised and bought a car, went on vacation and had some plastic surgery.  At the ensuing trial, one of her friends said, “She had a disease even more deadly than cancer.  She had the disease of greed.”

    Is greed a deadly disease?  Consider the passage we read from the book of Acts.  It’s the story of Ananias and Sapphira.  Let me set the scene for you.  It’s shortly after that very first Pentecost and the apostles have established a church in Jerusalem.  As it says in Acts 4:32, “Now the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things he possessed was his own, but they had everything in common.”  In other words, in the first century church, they were into communal living. Obviously it did not work, and that is why we do not do it today.  But in the first century church, they held everything in common.

    A man named Ananias, and a woman named Sapphira, were a married couple who belonged to this first century Christian community.  Ananias sold a piece of property that belonged to him.  What he should have done is bring all of the proceeds to Peter and lay them at his feet.  Or, if he needed to keep some of the money for himself, he needed to be honest about that.  Ananias and Sapphira plotted to do neither.  Ananias brought a part of the proceeds forward and laid them at Peter’s feet...but he told him that he was giving all of it.  Peter somehow knew better and he said to Ananias, “You have not lied to us, but to God!”  And at that, Ananias dropped to the floor and died.  Not long after that, Sapphira came in before the apostles.  She, too, was questioned about the incident.  She, too, lied about it…and she dropped dead as well.  

    And you thought greed was no big deal.  Look, I’m not saying that greed is going to make you drop dead, but perhaps it can keep one from communion with God.  Perhaps it can keep one from finding inner peace.  Listen to this. 

    Once upon a time, an ambitious American businessman was standing at the pier in a Mexican costal village. A small boat with a lone fisherman inside puttered up to the pier and docked.  The businessman noticed several large yellowfin tuna in the boat and complimented the fisherman on his catch.  He asked the fisherman, “How long did it take you to catch those fish?”  To which the fisherman replied, “Oh, it didn’t take long at all.”

    Puzzled, the businessman asked, “Why didn’t you stay out longer and catch more fish?”  The fisherman said, “I’ve got enough here to support my family’s needs for the day.”  So the businessman asked, “Then what do you do with the rest of your time?”  The fisherman replied, “Oh,   I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, and take a siesta with my wife.  Then at night I stroll into the village, I sip a little wine and play the guitar with my friends.  I really have a full and busy life, senor.” 

    The businessman scoffed, “Look, I have an MBA from Harvard and I could really help you.  You should spend a lot more time fishing, and with the proceeds you could buy a bigger boat.  With the money you make from the bigger boat, you could buy a few more boats.  Eventually, you’d have a fleet.  Then instead of selling your fish to a middleman you could sell directly to the processor, eventually opening up your own cannery.  You would then control the product,   the processing, and the distribution.  You would then need to leave this little village and move   to Mexico City, then to Los Angeles, and eventually to New York City, where you could run your expanding enterprise.”

    The fisherman thought about that for a moment.  Then he asked, “Senor, how long would all of this take?”  The businessman replied, “Oh, I suppose you could do it in 15 or 20 years.”  “And then what?” the fisherman asked. The businessman laughed, “That’s the best part. When the time is right…you announce an Initial Public Offering, sell your stock to the public and become filthy rich.  You could make millions.”

    The fisherman asked, “Millions, senor?  Then what?”  The businessman said, “Then you could retire. You could move to a small coastal village where you could sleep late, fish a little, play with your grandkids, and take a siesta with your wife.  At night you could stroll into the village, sip a little wine, and play your guitar with your friends.”

    So what does greed really get us?  A whole lot of stress and a much shorter life.  The holy virtue that counteracts the deadly sin of greed is charity.  Perhaps that’s the reason for the divine mandate of tithing.  You know, people often cynically say that all the church cares about is money. Yet maybe God calls upon us to give because he knows that charity is the only cure for our greed. So maybe giving to the church isn’t just for the church’s sake.  Maybe giving to the church is for our sake, as well.

    Greed says, “I want, I need, I’ve simply got to get.”  Charity says, “Thank you for what I have.”  As 13^th century German mystic Meister Eckhart once said, “If the only prayer you ever said in your entire life was thank you…that would suffice.”  Keep that thought in mind the next time you see something you’ve simply got to have.  Amen.