10-10-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MEISTER ECKHART

 

     Twenty years ago on a Saturday night I was just about to head upstairs to get ready for bed when I heard the rumbling of a car with a bad exhaust system pulling up in my driveway.  The man who came to the door was passing through town, but he and his family were exhausted.    He wanted to know if I could put him up in a motel for the night.  I had a fund at my disposal with which I could do such things, so I called the motel and booked him a room.  Then he told me that his family was hungry.  Since there was nothing open at that time of night, I gave him    a loaf of bread, a block of cheese and some sandwich meat.  About the only thing I couldn’t   give him was a gallon of milk, since our son, Rob, would need that in his bottle in the morning.  The man thanked me and went on his way.  Several months later, he showed up at my church.  The Boy Scouts were meeting there that night and he found them first, so the scoutmaster led him to my office.  Again he needed food and gasoline, so I wrote him a voucher and sent him   on his way.  Later, the scoutmaster came to my office and asked, “What did that guy want?”  I said, “Oh, I’ve seen him before.  He just wanted a little food and gasoline.”  Then the scoutmaster asked, “Did you see what he was driving?”  I said, “No.”  The scoutmaster said, “He was driving a brand new Lincoln Town Car with the dealer’s tag still in the window!”  Ah,   some people have a profound sense of entitlement, do they not?

    Twenty years ago, people used to ask for 20 or 25 dollars.  Five or six years ago, they started asking for 100 to 150 dollars.  Now people ask for four or five hundred dollars without even batting an eye.  Not long ago a woman came into my office and said she needed help to pay off a delinquent gas bill so National Fuel would turn her gas back on for the winter.  I said, “How much money do you need?”  She said, “$2407.00.”  I helped her a little, but I did not pay for    all of it.  Some people have a profound sense of entitlement.  And most of us wouldn’t mind helping if people would at least show a little gratitude.

   About 10 years ago, I led a senior high school mission trip to rural Tennessee.  We did Habitat for Humanity-type work on a trailer home.  We put a railing on a large front porch that had been built by another group.  We crawled under the trailer and shored up the floorboards from underneath.  Some of the kids climbed on the roof and spread tar to keep it from leaking.  We put in a new kitchen floor.  Then we built a small back porch, but we ran out of time before we could build the steps.  I went into the trailer to tell the woman we were leaving because it was time for us to head back home and she said to me, “What’s the matter?  You can’t build steps?”  I said, “You know what?  I’m a minister, not a carpenter.  No, I can’t build steps.”  When the kids heard about it, they were incensed.  When we bend over backwards to do something for someone else, we just want them to show us a little gratitude.

     A similar thing happened to Jesus in the passage we read from the gospel according to Luke.  Jesus was approached by 10 lepers who cried out, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”  Jesus told them to go and show themselves to the priest.  While they were on the way, they discovered that they had been healed.  One of them, a Samaritan, returned to Jesus, fell on his face, and thanked him.  Jesus said, “Is there no one to give thanks to God except this foreigner?  Go your way.  Your faith has made you well.”  Jesus appreciated the gratitude.  We can presume that the other nine were still healed, in spite of their ingratitude.  The lesson here is clear.  We, too, are still called to help the needy whether they are grateful for it or not.  We do what we feel called to do as Christians, even if they’re not being completely honest with us.  I figure we do what we feel called to do and if they’re pulling the wool over our eyes, they’ll have to answer for that some day.  But the question I have for you now is this.  Which of the lepers are we most like?  God is the source of all that we have and all that we are.  Are we grateful to God for all that we have, or are we constantly in search of more?

     Gratitude is the hinge upon which the Christian faith turns.  The Christian church has always taught that God first loved us.  God sent his only Son that we might have the hope of salvation.  We are not faithful in order to gain salvation; rather, we are faithful because we have already received salvation.  And that’s why we take part in the life of the church.  We join the church and we worship God because we believe we can do more for the kingdom of God as a congregation than we can as individuals.  I guess the question here is this.  Is there really such a thing as spiritual but not religious?  Can we truly express our gratitude to God when we are not a part of the institutional church?

     Listen to this.  Many years ago, there was a man who just quit going to church.  After month or two, the minister decided to go and pay that man a visit.  The man welcomed the minister into his home, and the two of them sat in front of a large fire.  They didn’t say a word for the longest time.  They just watched the flames.  Then the minister took a pair of tongs and removed a glowing ember.  He set it on the side of the hearth.  The ember flickered brightly, then it just glowed, and then it died.  The man smiled, nodded his head and said, “Reverend, thanks for the powerful sermon.  I’ll be back in church next Sunday.” 

   Ladies and gentlemen, are we willing to be a part of the community of believers, or do we think we can make it on our own?  Are we willing to express our gratitude to God, or are we constantly in search of more?  Meister Eckhart was a 13^th century spiritual writer.  He once   said, “If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is ‘thank you,’ that would suffice.”

     A local minister recently said to his congregation at the end of a worship service, “Go home and write down something you want God to do for you.  Then just wait and see what happens.”  I would reverse his charge.  I would say, “Go home and write down everything God has already done for you.”  If you do that, I suspect you will find yourselves moved to express your gratitude.  And you’ll be well on your way to becoming the kind of Christian Jesus had in mind all along.  Amen.

 

10-03-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

ROW, ROW, ROW YOUR BOAT

     I have a good friend in this church who is likely sneaking up on 40 years of age.  He has a wife and two young sons who are well into their elementary school years.  Six or seven months ago his wife said to him, “We’re going to have a baby!”  My friend likely responded, “We’re going to have a what?  Lord, help us!”  That’s what we do when we’re faced with challenges     in life.  We appeal to God for his assistance.  Of course, I’m talking about Rick and JoLayne Green.  Congratulations to them on the birth of a perfect little girl just last week.

   Speaking of challenges in life, I came across some interesting data just the other day.  It seems our nation is now more than 13 trillion dollars in debt.  The debt increases at the rate of 4.06 billion dollars a day.  Each individual citizen’s share of that debt is more than 43 thousand dollars.  That means my family’s share of the national debt is more than 200 thousand dollars.  But hey, that’s better than the Volnas.  Their share of the national debt is nearly 300 thousand dollars.  In the face of data like that, what can we say but, “Lord, help us!” 

   The disciples were faced with a challenge in the passage we read from the gospel according    to Luke.  Only they didn’t say, “Lord, help us!”  They cried out to Jesus, “Increase our faith!”  What was the challenge the disciples were facing?  In order to discern that, we need to look at the passage that immediately precedes the passage we read a moment ago.  There Jesus calls upon his disciples to forgive.  He says that if a person sins against you seven times in a day,    and comes to you seven times for forgiveness, you must forgive him.  Perhaps the parallel passage in the gospel of Matthew is more familiar.  There Jesus tells his disciples they must forgive – not seven times – but seventy times seven.  Now Jesus is not telling them they only have to forgive someone 490 times and then they can exact their revenge.  What Jesus is really saying is that they must forgive in perpetuity.  Not an easy thing to do.  You see, when a person offends us, they actually owe us a debt.  It’s like we say in the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.”  Incidentally, someone once told me why Presbyterians say debts and debtors while Methodists and Baptists say, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,” or “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.”  The reason Presbyterians say debts and debtors is because most Presbyterians would rather have their debts forgiven than their sins!  Must have been a Baptist who told me that.  In any case, to forgive someone is to release them of that debt.  Now I’ve heard people say, “I can forgive, but   I never forget!”  That’s not what Jesus is saying here.  He’s saying, “Forgive and forget.”  We must release them of the debt in our hearts, in our minds, and in our souls.  That’s why the disciples cried out to Jesus, “Increase our faith!  We’ll need an increase in faith if we’re to do what you’re proposing.”

   Carlo Carretto was a 20^th century spiritual writer.  Regarding this issue of faith, he once wrote in his book, Letters from the Desert, “God has given you the boat and the oars.  It’s up to you to row.”  In other words, building faith is like building endurance or strength.  Say you want to run a marathon.  Do you immediately go out and run 26.2 miles?  No!  You start by running a block, then two blocks, then a mile, and so on.  You gradually build yourself up to run a marathon.  Or, say you want to bench press 500 pounds.  Do you start by putting 500 pounds on the bar, then dropping it on your chest?  No!  That would kill you.  You build yourself up a day at a time… gradually.  You get bigger and stronger as you work your way up.  Faith is similar.  God has given you the boat.  God has given you the oars.  It’s up to us to row.  It’s up to us to build our faith a little at a time.

   God gives us opportunities to build up our faith a little at a time.  Sometimes it happens when we’re behind the wheel of a car.  How do we respond when someone cuts in front of us before it’s their turn at a 4-way stop?  Do we yell at them, or do we smile and wave them through?  That’s actually a test of our faith.  One time when I was with my family and someone cut me   off in traffic I blew a gasket and called them a half-baked moron.  I don’t even know what that means!  It just came out.  Clearly I had failed my faith test there, hadn’t I?

   Or how about when we’re accosted by panhandlers in the city?  They always seem to find me.  Maybe it says “sucker” across my forehead, I don’t know.  Many years ago I was in Cleveland with my children.  We were going to a basketball game, I think.  Suddenly this young woman approached me and told me her sad tale of woe.  She needed bus fare to get home to Akron.     As she rattled on, all I could do was look at her boots.  They were nice boots, but they were quite well-worn.  Now I’d been to the bank that day, but all I had was twenty dollar bills.  I couldn’t give her a couple of ones or a five, I had to give her a twenty.  So I did.  She was very grateful.  Was she lying to me?  I don’t know.  But as Christians, we need to do what we feel in our hearts is right.  If they’re pulling the wool over our eyes, they’ll have to answer for that one day.  But we need to do what we feel compelled to do as Christians.  Telling them to get a job or enlightening them on how hard we work for our money is not the right attitude.  And if we help the poor on earth, trust me.  That will not count against us in the courts of heaven.

     God has given us the boat.  God has given us the oars.  It’s up to us to row.  The more we strengthen our faith with the little things in life, the better we’ll be able to handle the big things in life.  How does that old song go?  “Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream.  Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily life is but a dream.”  I would change the words to this: “Row, row, row your boat of faith so steadily.  Then you will find yourself living a life of peace and harmony.”  Amen.  

 

9-19-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

IS SOMEONE KEEPING SCORE?

       Ladies and gentlemen, there are certain questions that have plagued the mind of humankind since the dawn of time.  Now it could be that these are questions that simply cannot be answered.  In any case, here are some intriguing points to ponder.

·         Why is a round pizza delivered in a square box?

·         Why did Kamikaze pilots wear helmets?

·         Why is it that we put a man on the moon before we finally figured out that it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

·         Why is it that people say they slept like a baby, when babies seem to wake up about every two hours?

·         Why do people pay good money to go up in tall buildings, then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

·         If the professor on Gilligan’s Island was smart enough to make a radio out of a coconut, why couldn’t he fix the hole in the boat?

·         And last but not least, why is it that if you blow in your dog’s face he gets mad, but when you take him for a ride in the car, he sticks his head out the window?

    Ah, these are some of the questions that have plagued the mind of humankind since the dawn of time.  Yet on a somewhat more serious note, I have a perplexing theological question for you.  Are the things we do in this earthly lifetime simply the non-punitive exercising of human free will or is someone keeping score?  Again, are the things we do in this earthly lifetime simply the non-punitive exercising of human free will, or is someone keeping score?  Keep that thought in mind as we move on.

    Before we tackle the answer to that question, I need to lead you into the passage we read from the gospel according to Luke.  Yet in order to lead you into the passage we read from the gospel according to Luke, I need to paint a picture in your minds.  So sit back, relax, and feel free to use your imagination.

     Imagine, if you will, that you are the owner of a business.  It’s not a huge business, but it’s big enough to keep you and your family comfortable.  As the owner of the business, you soon develop other interests, so you hire a manager to handle the day-to-day routine.  This manager is in charge of making sure that the product is made, shipping is handled, billing is done, and, of course, payment is received.  Isn’t that about what you’d expect a manager to do?

    Eventually, however, it comes to your attention that your manager isn’t doing a very good job.  He’s often late to work and he shirks a few of his responsibilities.  Quality control of the product has lagged and a lot of your customers are very unhappy.  Thus, on a Friday afternoon you shoot him an e-mail telling him that you want to see him in your office first thing Monday morning.

     Now your manager may not be terribly effective, but he isn’t stupid either.  From the tone of your e-mail, he surmises that after your meeting with him on Monday morning, he may not have a job come Monday afternoon.  So he gets in touch with some of your customers who have un-paid bills.  One customer owes you, say, $100,000.00.  Your manager tells him to reduce his bill to $50,000.00.  Another customer owes you, say, $50,000.00.  Your manager tells him to reduce his bill to $30,000.00.  Now I’m no businessman, but that’s a pretty serious chunk of change for a small business to absorb, is it not?  What your manager is doing is looking out for number one.  Maybe one of those debtors will hire him when he finds himself unemployed.

    How would you, as the owner of that business, feel about the way your manager handled things?  I suspect you’d feel like he sold you out.  You’d be angry, you’d feel betrayed, and you’d very likely fire him on the spot, would you not?  My guess is the last thing in the world you’d do is praise him for his shrewdness.  Am I right?

    Well that is exactly what the master did in the parable we read from the gospel according to Luke.  Now before someone tries to read too much into this story, let me tell you exactly what a parable is.  A parable has often been called an earthly story with a heavenly meaning, and that may be true.  A parable, however, is not an allegory.  In an allegory, every character or part in the story is meant to represent something else.  For example, Jesus tells a story in which a sower went out to sow.  Some seeds fell on rocky ground, some seeds fell on the path, some seeds fell amongst the thorns, and some seeds fell on fertile soil.  Each of those seeds is meant to represent the word of God falling upon the minds of the various people who hear it.  That is what we call an allegory.  Everything in the story is meant to represent something else.  A parable is different.  A parable is a story told by Jesus that always contains a twist and a central meaning. 

   Case in point, the parable of the dishonest steward in the passage we read in the gospel according to Luke.  The master actually praised his dishonest steward for his shrewdness.  The parable reads almost exactly the same as the story I just told you.  There was a rich man who had a steward to take care of his property.  When charges were brought against the steward for squandering the master’s property, the steward went to his master’s debtors.  One debtor owed the master 100 jugs of olive oil.  The steward reduced his debt to 50.  Another debtor owned the master 100 containers of wheat.  The steward reduced his debt to 80.  Why did the steward do that?  He was looking out for number one.  He figured he was too old to take a labor job and he was too proud to beg.  So he ingratiated himself to his master’s debtors so that maybe they would take him in when he found himself unemployed.

     And what did the master in Jesus’ parable do?  He praised the steward for his shrewdness!  That’s the twist in the story.  Now Jesus doesn’t tell us what became of the dishonest steward, but we can presume he was allowed to keep his job.  In short, the twist of the story is that it appears as though the steward has been rewarded for his dishonesty.  Yet we still need to discern the central truth.

     Jesus tells us the central truth of this parable in verses 8 and 9.  The trick, however, is understanding what it means.  Jesus says, “The master commended the dishonest steward for his shrewdness; for the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the children of light.  And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth, so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal habitations.”   What on earth does that mean?    

     Let me state first of all that Jesus is not commending the steward’s dishonesty.  He is commending the steward’s shrewdness.  He was willing to do whatever it took to make his way in the world.  Jesus’ point is that what he calls the children of light – what we might call the chosen people of God – don’t seem to be nearly as creative or voracious in their attempts to please God.  Then Jesus adds, “Make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal habitations.”  That statement, too, takes a little unpacking.

     The gospel of Luke records Jesus speaking of dishonest wealth.  Luke is essentially calling all wealth dishonest or unrighteous.  In Luke’s mind, wealth is just bad.  Why?  Because wealth frequently becomes one’s central focus.  Luke believes that those who have wealth seem to be more concerned with the preservation of that wealth than they are with pleasing God.  Luke’s philosophies aside, I think what Jesus is really saying is this.  Money is not meant to be an end in itself.  Money is merely a means to an end.  Again, money is not meant to be an end in itself.  Money is merely a means to an end. 

   Once upon a time, there was a miserly old man who was dying.  He had obtained great wealth, but he had stepped on many a toe to get it.  Lying on his deathbed, he told his wife to put a large chest of money in the attic.  When his wife asked him why, he replied, “I plan to grab it and take it with me on my way up to heaven.” 

     Well, the time finally came when the old man passed away.  His wife quickly ran up to the attic to see if the chest of money was still there.  It was, of course.  “The fool!” his wife exclaimed to herself.  “I told him he should have put that money in the basement!”  Think about that one for a minute.

     Ladies and gentlemen, you can’t take it with you.  As Jesus said, money is not meant to be an

 end in itself.  Money is merely a means to an end.  That’s why Jesus says, “Make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it fails they may receive you into the eternal habitations.”  Jesus is saying in essence, “You can’t take it with you.  Make it serve eternal purposes while you’re here.”  As one biblical commentator put it, “The wealthy can help the poor while they’re here on earth, but the poor can help the wealthy in the eternal habitations.”  Do you understand what that means?  What that means is that someone IS keeping score.  Use your money to help others now because you may need them to vouch for you in heaven.

   Someone once said, “With great power comes great responsibility.”  Some attribute that quote to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, others attribute it to Spiderman.  In any case, what Jesus seems to be saying is that with great wealth comes great responsibility as well.  In fact that is part and parcel to why we formed churches in the first place.  Peter Steinke of the Alban Institute puts it this way in an article entitled, “Avoiding Mission Drift.”  He writes:

A congregation is a group of people who believe that more can be accomplished by joining with others.  They come together with a purpose.  To create more life, the people create a community of purpose…Mission is the expression of the church’s deep, abiding beliefs.  Mission provides the major standard against which all activities, services, and decisions are evaluated.  Mission is the preserver of congregational integrity.  It is about God’s love for the world, not about what I like or don’t like about my church.

     This church gives thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars to mission every year.  We support the Meadville Area Free Clinic.  We support Fairview/Fairmont low income housing.  We support missionaries in Africa, Thailand, and Ecuador.  We support the World Mission Initiative at the Pittsburgh Seminary.  We supply funds for Love, Incorporated – a local mission project – and I have a discretionary account to help people out as well.  The list goes on and on.  This church gives thousands of dollars to mission every year.  This church truly uses its funds as a means to an end, not as an end in itself.  You are a part of all of that.  You have good reason to believe that you have answered Christ’s call in this parable, in part.

   Of course, I might also mention that our pledges are currently $45,000.00 behind.  In all fairness, every church in this town is facing a similar dilemma.  Churches all across the country are in the same boat as well.  Of course, at this point we should also ask, “What does it say about the depth of our faith when so many of God’s churches are struggling financially?”  But my point here today is not to chastise anyone.  My point is to open eyes.  Ladies and gentlemen, there are givers and there are takers in this world.  I believe God is asking us to be givers.  The question is, what does God really expect us to give?  As 21^st century Christians, we want to know the bottom line.  How much is enough?

     The church has long advocated the practice of tithing.  Tithing is an Old Testament concept in which the Israelites were called to give 10% of everything they earned to the Temple or the synagogue.  Thus, for us to tithe, we are called upon to give 10% of everything we earn to the church as well.  Of course, the first thing people ask when they hear that is this: “Is that 10% of net or 10% of gross?”  I once heard a wise old minister respond to that by saying, “You get to 10% of net, and then we’ll talk about gross.”

     Now I may be shooting myself in the foot when I say this but, here goes anyway.  Nowhere in the New Testament is there designated a percentage of income that should be given to the church.  In the first book of Corinthians Paul says that giving should be, and I quote, “In keeping with income.”  In other words, some should be giving a lot more than others.  In the book of James it says that each Christian should diligently pray and seek God’s wisdom in the matter of tithing.  Yet perhaps Paul put it best in the second book of Corinthians when he said, “Each should give what he has decided in his heart to give – not reluctantly or under compulsion – for the Lord loves a cheerful giver.”  Let no one think they are being browbeaten about money today, because if your heart isn’t in it, no amount of money is going to save you anyway. 

     The lesson here is clear.  We have been blessed financially for a reason.  Part of that reason is to provide for our families.  Part of that reason is to share with others.  Ladies and gentlemen, attitude is everything here.  Do not give out of compulsion or obligation, but out of gratitude for everything God has done for you.  God knows what’s deep inside your heart.  After all, he’s the one who’s keeping score.  Amen.   

                 

 

9-12-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

REMEMBER YOUR BAPTISM AND BE THANKFUL

 

     Several weeks ago, I told you about how our oldest son was heading back to college in Iowa and we were taking our daughter to college for the very first time in Pittsburgh.  My wife and I were having a very difficult time with that.  Our youngest son, Travis, however, put a somewhat different spin on things.  He said to his sister, “Mariah, you’re lucky.  You’re going away to college.  I’m going to be stuck in the house with Mom and Dad all by myself!”  In thinking about his statement, it occurred to me that he’s going to be going away to college in about two years.  Two years from now my wife will likely be saying to him, “Travis, you’re lucky.  You’re going away to college.  I’m going to be stuck in the house with your father all by myself!”

 

     Since my daughter’s gone away to college, I’ve been a bit unnerved by some of the stories she’s told us.  She’s at Point Park University in downtown Pittsburgh, and she has a boyfriend   at the University of Pittsburgh in Oakland.  Apparently, she rides the bus from Pittsburgh to Oakland all the time.  As parents, don’t we wish we could somehow get inside our kids’ heads to help them make decisions?  You know, “Don’t go to that party!”  “Stay away from that guy!”  “Don’t ride the bus by yourself at night!”  Don’t we wish we could get inside our kids’ heads to help them make decisions?  We might be able to keep them from making a few mistakes. 

 

   God found a way in the passage we read from the gospel according to Matthew.  There we    see Jesus going to the Jordan River to be baptized by John the Baptist.  After John immersed him in the river, and Jesus was walking out of the water, the Holy Spirit descended upon him like a dove.  We know God the Father as God over and above us.  We know God the Son as God with us and for us.  We know God the Holy Spirit as God in us.  The sacrament of baptism is meant to symbolize three important things.  One, we are admitted into the church universal.  Two, we are symbolically cleansed of sin.  Yet perhaps most of all, baptism also symbolizes our reception of the Holy Spirit.  God has found a way to dwell within us, perhaps to keep us from making so many mistakes.  This was part and parcel to our early vision in this church.  We talked about how we’re raising a generation of young people apart from the church.  Thus, we’re raising a generation of young people absent the sacrament of baptism.  Can we not thus infer that we’re raising a generation of young people who are bereft of the Holy Spirit?  That, my friends, should scare the bejeebers out of all of us.  For without the Holy Spirit, human beings are capable of anything.

 

   The church thought this baptism thing was so important that they made it a sacrament.  A sacrament is an outward and physical act, instituted by Christ, with an inward and spiritual meaning.  The outward and physical act of baptism is the placement of water on the head.  To be instituted by Christ means that Jesus told us to do it.  And the inward and spiritual meaning has to do cleansing from sin, the church universal, and the reception of the Holy Spirit.  The church thought it was so important that they made it a sacrament.  Jesus thought it was so important that it was a part of the last thing he ever said to his disciples.  He said, “Go therefore into all the world, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have told you; and lo, I am with you always to the close of the age.”  Jesus told us to baptize and transform the world.  It seems to me there is a sincere need.

     For example, did you know that there’s a new movement afoot advocated by a group called the National Secular Society?  It’s called “de-baptism.”  What is de-baptism?  De-baptism is where you actually take part in a rite to undo your baptism.  Suppose you were baptized as an infant.  Obviously, you were baptized against your will.  Then as an adult you choose to reject belief in God.  Since you don’t want to be counted in any statistics that might identify you as a Christian, you go through the rite of de-baptism.  I’m not making this up.  Then, just the other day, I was in the Robinson Mall in Pittsburgh.  I saw a young man – he couldn’t have been any more than 22 – with a young woman.  She looked to be about 18.  They were pushing a baby stroller with a baby in it.  The young man was wearing a t-shirt.  I’m going to try to draw it for you.  I apologize for the fact that I’m not much of an artist.  But here was the t-shirt.  On it, it said, “No Religion.”  Then there was a big circle, and inside the circle there was a cross, and over the cross was drawn a line.  I was grossly offended!  I wanted to say something to that young man, but I stopped myself lest I say something I might regret.  But it made me realize how a Muslim might react to an International Burn-a-Quran Day.  If we feel called to evangelize the Muslims – if we feel called to baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit and to teach them all that Christ commanded – then maybe making them angry right off the bat is not the way to go.

 

     Where did the church go wrong?  Let me tell you a parable.  Once upon a time there was a dangerous seacoast where shipwrecks often occurred.  There was a little lighthouse there that was really nothing more than a hut.  When a shipwreck would occur, the lighthouse crew would jump into a little boat and go out to rescue the survivors.  Many of those who were rescued were very grateful, and they joined the little lighthouse crew.  Pretty soon, they outgrew their crude little hut.  So they built a much bigger lighthouse and added carpeting and stained glass windows.  Then they bought bigger boats and hired a crew to do the rescuing for them.  It soon became more of a clubhouse than a lighthouse.  Then one day, a great big ship was wrecked     off the coast there.  All the boats went out to rescue the survivors.  But when they brought them back, many of them were dirty, they spoke a different language, and their skin was a different color.  It really made a mess of their lighthouse, so some of the lighthouse crew decided not to do the rescues any more.  Others objected, saying that that was their mission.  Yet they were outvoted and were told that if they still wanted to rescue shipwreck survivors, they could build another lighthouse further down the coast.  So that’s what they did.  Yet after a while, the new lighthouse got big and fancy and didn’t want to rescue people anymore, so they stopped as well.  Then another lighthouse was built and the same thing happened again.  If you go to that shoreline now, you see lots of great big clubhouses.  Shipwrecks still occur, but now most of the people just drown.

 

     Has the same thing happened to the church?  Have we forgotten who and what we’re supposed to be?  Perhaps this would be a good time to reaffirm our baptismal vows.  There is a rather lengthy litany in your bulletins this morning.  In a few moments, we’re going to go through it.  Then you’ll be invited to come forward where you will have to opportunity to be anointed with oil.  Kate and I will make the sign of the cross on your forehead and say the words, “Remember your baptism and be thankful.”  You don’t have to come forward, but I really hope you will.  Let’s not let what happened to that lighthouse happen to us.  Amen. 

 

8-15-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MICK JAGGER

     Forty years ago, I wanted a mini-bike more than anything else in the world.  I made it very clear to my parents that that’s what I wanted as my birthday was fast approaching.  I remember talking about it with my friend Vince Landeck as we were riding bicycles.  I said to him, “I’ve been begging my parents for a mini-bike.  I’ve even been praying to God about it.”  Vince, ten-year-old theologian that he was, said, “You’ve been praying for a mini-bike?  Well then, you’ll get one for sure!”  I arose bright and early on the morning of August 4^th, 1970, expecting to see a mini-bike parked in the driveway.  Instead, I found a note.  It said, “Brian, we love you very much.  We just don’t feel you’re ready for a mini-bike right now.  Love, Mom and Dad.”  I don’t remember what I got for my birthday that year, but it wasn’t a mini-bike.  It was a real trial for my faith at the time.  I had prayed to God for a mini-bike, but somehow, God had come up short.

     Here we come to the contrast between faith and experience.  On the one hand, we’re led to believe that all things are possible with God, but on the other hand, we’re left disappointed when God comes up short.  On the one hand, we’re led to believe that God wants what’s best for us, but on the other hand, we’ve got Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones singing to us, “You can’t always get what you want.”  We have a contrast here between faith and experience.

     The question is, “Does God really want what’s best for us?”  When I was asking for a mini-bike and didn’t get one, I wasn’t so sure.  But listen to this.  Just the other day, I was sitting at the intersection at one of Meadville’s new four-way stops.  There was a car heading north, and I was the second car in line heading west.  As the car in front of me started to turn left, a boy came flying down the sidewalk on one of those motorized scooters.  He shot right out into the street.  Fortunately, the driver turning left saw him in time.  As I think about it, that’s probably exactly what I would have done on a mini-bike.  God’s preventing me from getting a mini-bike probably saved my life.  Perhaps in retrospect, I can indeed say that God truly wants what’s best for us.

     Have you ever prayed to God about a job?  Seven years ago, I was absolutely certain that I was going to a church in Hastings, Nebraska.  A friend of mine named Hal Shafer was a minister in Erie.  He was in this church for a presbytery meeting.  He called me and said, “I was just in your next church.”  I said, “Hal, their minister just left.  They won’t be ready to hire someone for at least a year.”  Well, the committee moved faster than I expected.  In fact, the day I left Salem to interview in Hastings was the day I sent my application here.  So I interviewed in Hastings and I was just sure they were going to offer me the job.  Then at the end of the interview they said, “Well, we promised this other guy that we’d interview him.  But he can’t meet with us for six more weeks.”  I was devastated.  I was just sure I was going to Hastings. 

     In the meantime, I met with a very impressive group of people from the First Presbyterian Church of Meadville.  As an aside, during the interview, I remember saying to them, “I hear it snows a little bit in Meadville.”  The committee members quickly said, “Oh, Edinboro is where it really snows.  We don’t get near the snow they get in Edinboro.”  I said, “No, no, I like the snow.”  They said, “Oh, well then you’ll love it here!”  I accepted the call to Meadville, even though I was certain we were headed to Nebraska.  I think of an old adage that says, “If you want to make God laugh, just tell him your plans!” 

     The move was particularly hard on my kids.  Salem was home to them and they really didn’t want to move.  Yet shortly after we left, the school system there collapsed.  A levy failed to pass and the state actually had to come in and take over.  There were no longer any advanced placement classes and sports were offered on a pay-to-play basis.  My kids have gotten twice the education they would have gotten in Salem.  I have to say that God really does have our best interests at heart.

     But does God have our best interests at heart when it comes to human suffering?  Butch and Nancy Brown were a farming couple in my first church.  They had four girls and a nine-year-old boy named Kent.  One day Butch and Nancy were out mending fences.  Butch told Kent to hop in the truck and go back to the barn to get some nails.  So Kent hopped in the truck and threw it into gear.  As he went over a little hill, he didn’t see his mother kneeling there.  He ran right over top of her. 

     She was rushed to the Intensive Care Unit at University Hospital in Iowa City.  We prayed and we prayed and we prayed for Nancy to get better.  I, for one, couldn’t make any sense of   the accident.  It wasn’t fair for Butch to have to raise those kids by himself, it wasn’t fair for those kids to grow up without a mother, and it wasn’t fair that Nancy wouldn’t get to see her kids grow up.  In the end, Nancy died. 

     I heard Chuck Colson address this kind of thing some time later.  He said, “Is it possible that there is an afterlife so great as to render our present human suffering inconsequential?”  Again, “Is it possible that there is an afterlife so great as to render our present human suffering inconsequential?”  Chuck Colson said, “I believe there is.”  And that’s the point of the resurrection.

 

 God does have our best interests at heart.  One day, we shall see our loved ones again.

 

     This is exactly the kind of thing the Apostle Paul is dealing with in the passage we read from the book of Hebrews.  They’re wrestling with this contrast between faith and experience.  Paul reminds them of the faith of Abraham and how God made of him a great nation.  Paul reminds them of the faith of Moses’ mother and how she put him in a basket in the Nile and he was rescued by Pharaoh’s daughter.  Paul reminds them of how the Hebrew people followed Moses out of Egypt and how the Red Sea parted and they walked across on dry land, but when the Egyptians tried to cross it, the waters collapsed on them.  He tells them of God’s faithfulness     to faithful people in the past. 

     Yet these very same people were seeing Christians persecuted unto death.  They were being faithful to God and they were losing their lives.  So Paul reminds them of the resurrection.  He says in essence that there is an afterlife so great as to render our present human suffering inconsequential.  God does have our best interests at heart.  So he urges them to keep the faith.  He tells them to run the race that is set before them.  They are called to remain faithful to God by being obedient to God.

     I suspect the Apostle Paul would say the very same thing to us.  When you encounter a contrast between faith and experience, trust that God does have your best interests at heart.  Perhaps God sees an outcome that we don’t see.  So run the race that is set before you.  Keep the faith by being obedient to God. 

     The problem is that sin gets in our way.  Sin is defined as separation from God.  The way I see it is like this.  Our obedience draws us closer and closer to God.  Sin is simply turning our gaze in the wrong direction.  All it does is distance us from God.  The problem is that we don’t know what sin is any more. 

     Author Timothy Keller puts it this way.  He says that we don’t live in a moral society.  Nor do we live in an immoral society.  We live in what he calls an amoral society.  A moral society has a clear understanding of right and wrong.  To be immoral is to consciously choose to do the wrong thing.  Yet we don’t have a clear understanding of right and wrong any more.  We do what we feel in our hearts we should do.  That’s what constitutes an amoral society.  For example, I’ll bet 90% of the couples I marry are living together before they are married.  We used to call that “living in sin.”  The Bible clearly says that that is wrong, but most folks don’t seem to have a problem with that any more.  That’s what constitutes an a-moral society.  We do what we feel in our hearts is right.  We let our conscience be our guide.  Yet how can we be obedient to God if we don’t know what God wants from us anymore?  We need to recover a sense of the Holy.  We need to learn what it says in the Bible again.      

     God really does have our best interests at heart.  Perhaps at times when we don’t get what we want, God sees something up ahead that he wants us to avoid.  Or, perhaps at times when we fail to get what we want more than anything else in the world, God resolves it through the resurrection.  So run the race that is set before you.  Keep the faith by way of obedience.  For it may be as Mick Jagger says, “You can’t always get what you want.  But if you try sometimes, you just might find…you get what you need.”  Amen.

 

7-25-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

REMEMBER MY CHAINS

 

   I had a very disturbing conversation not long ago; at least it was disturbing to me.  An elderly gentleman told me that he had raised his children in the church – they were there every Sunday morning – but now those kids seldom darkened the doors of the church.  I pointed out how the very same thing had happened in my own family.  My parents took my brother, my sister and I to church every Sunday morning, whether we wanted to go or not.  And out of that upbringing, I became a minister, but my brother and my sister have absolutely nothing to do with the institutional church.

   That elderly gentleman’s daughter was present for this conversation.  Suddenly she spoke up.  She said, “I don’t think you have to go to church to have a relationship with Jesus Christ.”  It took me aback a bit, so I replied, “Well, I guess I’m paid to take the opposite side of that argument.  I think you do have to go to church to have a relationship with Jesus Christ.  I mean, it was Jesus Christ who established the church in the first place!”  Apparently I set the woman off a bit, and we were absolutely not in a place where a theological debate was appropriate, so – as hard as it was for me – I decided to let it go at that.

     The question remains: Does one have to be a part of the church to have a relationship with Jesus Christ?  Is there really such a thing as “spiritual, but not religious?”  A November 2009 issue of The Week magazine featured a story entitled, “Losing our Religion.”  It focused on the rapidly growing numbers of religiously unaffiliated people in the United States and referred to them as the Nones – that’s n-o-n-e-s, not n-u-n-s.  They called them the Nones.  Typically younger than the general population, many Nones believe in God, but they’re really quite skeptical about organized religion. 

     The article quotes recent statistics that suggest that if this trend continues, scads of nonreligious young people will soon replace older religious people, and will account for fully 25% of the U.S. population.  A recent article in U.S.A. Today concluded that young adults born in the 1980s and 1990s – approximately 72 million people – want to make an impact and are socially conscious, but simply cannot relate to traditional institutional structures.  Precious few of these young adults see the church as a place to make a difference in the world.        

    Dr. C. Jeff Woods addresses this phenomenon in a book entitled, Congregational Megatrends.  He believes the church needs to make some significant “moves” if it wants to be relevant in the world today.  For example, the church needs to move from Tribal Education to Immigrant Education.  In other words, we cannot assume that the people who come to our churches today have any background in the Christian faith.  We must speak on a level that everyone can understand.  The church needs to move from Surrogate Mission to Hands-On Mission.  In other words, we need to move from exclusively paying others to do mission work for us to doing some of the mission work ourselves. 

     The church needs to move from Reasonable Spirituality to Mysterious Spirituality.  In other words, we need to help people not just to know about God, we need to help them to know God as well.  The church needs to move from Official Leadership to Gifted Leadership.  Too often the church has put people into leadership positions that do not fit their spiritual gifts.  But since we need elders and deacons and trustees, that’s where we try to put them, whether it fits their “giftedness” or not.

     The church needs to move from Segmented Programming to Holographic Programming.  In other words, we need to quit programming exclusively for one segment of the population – typically white, middle and upper-middle class families.  The world today is a little broader than that.  The church needs to move from Secondary Planning to Primary Planning.  In other words, don’t just throw together a program and say, “Y’all come.”  Make it specific.  Gear it toward parents of teenagers, or single adults, or those who are grieving.

     The church needs to move from Tribal Education to Immigrant Education; from Surrogate Mission to Hands-On Mission; from Reasonable Spirituality to Mysterious Spirituality; from Official Leadership to Gifted Leadership; from Segmented Programming to Holographic Programming; and from Secondary Planning to Primary Planning.  And last but not least, the church needs to move from Mass Evangelism to Relational Evangelism.

   Mass Evangelism focuses on the general population while Relational Evangelism focuses on the individual.  The principle means of church evangelism in the 1950s was simply opening the doors.  All you had to do was open up the doors and people showed up.  That is not the case anymore.  Today we have to build relationships with people and then we have to actually invite them to church.  Of course, as you’ve heard me say before, the average Presbyterian invites someone to worship with them once every 17 years.  But hey, at least we’re better than the Methodists.  The average Methodist invites someone to worship with them once every 24 years.  Ladies and gentlemen, those statistics are no longer acceptable.

   Of course, once we invite them, what will they see?  That’s where Relational Evangelism becomes even more crucial.  A number of years ago, when I was in Salem, Ohio, there was a mega-church that was forming nearby in a place called Greenford, Ohio.  It was called the Greenford Christian Church.  They boasted of 1200 people in worship on Sunday mornings and they built an 8 million dollar worship center.  They were reaching some of the unchurched people in the area, but for the most part, they were stealing sheep from established mainline congregations.  That did not sit well with a lot of us clergy-types.

   Once when I was at the gym, I was working out on the stair-stepper.  Next to me was a young girl – I think she said she was 20 – and we got to talking.  She was raised in the Friends Church, but now she attended the Greenford Christian Church.  I asked her, “What is the appeal?  Is it the contemporary music?  Is it the preaching?  Is it the brand-new worship facilities?  What is it that seems to draw people in droves?”

     The young lady replied, “For me, it was the sincerity of the people who were there.  They really seem to live their faith.  They welcome people who visit there and they really seem to care.”  In other words, she was looking for people who appear to live the life of faith they profess.  And once she found it, she had found a home.

   There you have it.  That’s Relational Evangelism in a nutshell.  A while back I quoted a theologian named Tertullian.  Regarding the growth of the Christian Church in the 3^rd century, he spoke of how outsiders saw the Christian faith.  Tertullian said that the outsiders said, “See how these Christians love one another, while we ourselves are ready to kill one another.”  Again, “See how these Christians love one another, while we ourselves are ready to kill one another.”  Ah, the more things change, the more they stay the same.  Perhaps the very same thing is true today.  If the church is to survive – if the church is to be relevant to a new generation – perhaps we, too, need to learn how to love one another.  The question is, how are we to do that?

    Perhaps the Apostle Paul has some advice for us in the passage we read from the book of Colossians.  The book of Colossians is a letter Paul wrote to the church at Colossae.  It was         a church he had not founded himself, but it was a church for which he cared very deeply, just    the same.  It is believed to have been written while Paul was in prison – not in Rome, but in Ephesus.  Keep in mind the fact that Paul was in prison when he wrote this letter.

     Paul had gotten word that the fledgling church in Colossae was in trouble.  They were being led astray by some kind of false teaching.  As Paul put it in verse 8, “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ.”  What on earth does that mean?  Apparently Christians in Colossae were being taught to worship angels who were represented   by certain stars in the sky.  It was somewhat similar to what we might call astrology today, only they took it seriously back then.

     So Paul calls the Colossians back to their roots.  His language is convoluted, to say the least, but the gist of what he says is this: “God made you alive with him when he forgave you of your sin, erasing the record that stands against you.”  Again, “God made you alive with him when he forgave you of your sin, erasing the record that stands against you.”  In other words, when it comes to our relationship with God, the slate now is clean thanks to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross.  And when our relationship with God is unblemished, our relationships with others can be unblemished as well.  That, my friends, is the point of the church in a nutshell.  Our relationship with God has been made white as snow, so now our relationships with others can be made white as snow as well.  We call this phenomenon reconciliation.

     Ladies and gentlemen, our sin is forgiven.  Christ died that our sin might be put to death once and for all, and he was raised from the dead that we might have the hope of life everlasting as well.  What have you done?  What sin have you committed?  What burden do you bear?   What guilt or shame do you carry?  Thanks to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross, God no longer holds that sin against you.  Now you are free to live your life as a child of God – loved and forgiven for all of the past – no matter what you might have done.

     Karl Menninger was an American psychiatrist who founded the Menninger Clinic in Topeka, Kansas.  He once said, “If I could convince the patients in my clinic that their sins are forgiven, 75% of them could walk out of here the very next day.”  Do you see how oppressive the burden of sin can be?  Do you see how vital it is that we come to believe – to believe in our hearts – that we are indeed forgiven?  The trick is, how do we get there?

     Let me tell you a story.  Some years ago, there was a woman in my church whose husband was dying.  He was in the hospital for six weeks before he died, yet neither I nor my associate went to visit him.  Believe it or not, that woman was somewhat upset with us.

     When we found out about it, we were devastated.  My associate went over to her house and said to her, “Don’t you remember the conversation we had in the hospital?  You must have been so distraught that you just don’t remember.”  He lied to her to get himself off the hook.

   I went over to her house to talk to her as well.  I discovered that she had not called the church to tell us that her husband was in the hospital.  When she signed in at the hospital as a Presbyterian, she naturally assumed that the hospital would contact us.  I told her that they no longer do that.  Thus, we had no way of knowing that her husband was even in the hospital.  Then, still, I apologized profusely for the oversight.  That woman forgave me.  I felt terrible for what had happened, but I confessed and received forgiveness.  My confession and her forgiveness restored our relationship.  Let me add, however, that she was none too keen on our associate pastor after that. 

     Sincere confession is what receives forgiveness, not lying to ourselves and others to get ourselves off the hook.  We are sinners in the sight of God, justly deserving God’s displeasure, and without hope except in God’s sovereign mercy.  Yet God acts with justice and mercy to redeem creation in the Person of Jesus Christ.  Therefore I assure you – all of you – we are a forgiven people. 

     This is what allows us to love God and neighbor.  This is what allows us to live the life of faith we profess.  No longer can we look at people as better or worse than us since all of us are sinners who have received the grace of God.  Now we can look one another in the eye and say, “The peace of Christ be with you.”  And that person can reply, “And also with you.” 

     In fact, let’s do just that.  I want everyone who is able to stand.  Remember that you are a sinner forgiven by the grace of God in Jesus Christ.  Now turn to your neighbor and say, “The peace of Christ be with you.”  And I want that person to reply, “And also with you.”  Let’s just do that for a minute or two…

     Now that’s Relational Evangelism.  But the sermon title, as you see in your bulletins, is “Re-member My Chains.”  You’ve got to be thinking, “What does Remember My Chains have to do with Relational Evangelism?  Let me explain.

   When preaching on a passage of Scripture, it is important to view that passage contextually.   In the course of my research this week, I read the entire book of Colossians.  At the end of the 4^th chapter Paul writes, “I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand.  Remember my chains.”  Why does Paul say that?  Is it because he wants to remind people that he’s in prison so they can pray for him?  That’s what most of the commentators say.  But I thought of something a little bit different.

     Paul says, “Remember my chains.”  Paul is in prison for proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ.  Paul has sacrificed his freedom to proclaim Jesus Christ.  And prisons 2000 years ago were much, much worse than they are today.  They didn’t have prison advocates lobbying for better prison conditions, I can assure you of that.  Paul has willingly gone to prison because what he has to say is that important.  In other words, this stuff matters.  Don’t think for a minute that this stuff doesn’t matter.  So does one have to be a part of the church to have a relationship with Jesus Christ?  I think Paul would answer that question by saying, “Remember my chains.”  Amen.         

7-18-2010 Sermon by The Rev. Dr. Brian K. Jensen

GINGER OR MARY ANN?

     Does anyone remember an old T.V. show called Gilligan’s Island?  The show only ran for three years – from 1964 until 1967 – and there was a grand total of 98 episodes made.  The show really made its biggest mark on T.V. audiences once it got into syndication.  It was a show about a group of seven people who went on a three-hour tour and ended up stranded on a desert island.  Every single episode, it seemed, focused on their valiant efforts to get off the island, only to be thwarted time and time again by Gilligan’s ineptitude. 

    An urban legend tells us that the idea for the show came from a Sunday morning sermon.  The show’s creator Sherwood Schwartz once heard a minister talking about who you’d like to be stranded on a desert island with.  The minister’s answer was Jesus, of course, but this got Sherwood Schwartz to thinking.  He thought about desert islands and the humorous situations that could arise from different people being stranded on one, and the rest is television history.

     In fact, a question referring to Gilligan’s Island has made its way into popular American culture.  There is a game that asks people to choose which of two options they prefer.  Hot dogs or hamburgers?  Chocolate or vanilla?  Fried eggs or scrambled eggs?  It’s an either/or proposition and most of us can answer the questions rather quickly.  The old Star Trek or the new Star Trek?  McDonalds or Burger King?  Clinton or Reagan?  Ginger…or Mary Ann?

     Obviously, that last question is probably aimed more at men than it is at women.  Someone told me that I need to be nonsexist in my reference to Ginger or Mary Ann.  But somehow, asking the question, “The skipper or Gilligan?” loses some of its luster.  Ginger was the sultry Marilyn Monroe look-alike, while Mary Ann was more like the girl-next-door.  Ginger or Mary Ann: which do you prefer?  In this context, it’s clearly an either/or proposition.

     It’s a game that popped into my head as I thought about the passage we read from the gospel according to Luke.  Jesus went to visit a couple of sisters named Mary and Martha.  They had a brother named Lazarus as well, but he’s not mentioned in this particular passage.  So Jesus and his disciples went to the home of Mary and Martha.  Imagine thirteen dinner guests showing up at your house unannounced.  Martha tried to play the consummate hostess.  She probably rushed around the house picking up whatever was strewn about.  Then she set about getting a huge meal together.  Martha was doing everything she could to provide for her guests.

    What was Mary doing?  Well, apparently Jesus sat down and started to teach.  Mary sat down at his feet and listened to what he was saying.  It didn’t take Martha long to notice that Mary was not helping her.  I can almost picture the scene in my mind: Martha, frantically working in the kitchen, trying to get the table set.  As she walks out into the dining room carrying a stack of plates, she slams each one down on the table and glares at Mary as she does so. 

   Finally, Martha lodged a complaint with Jesus.  She said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all of the work by myself?  Tell her then to help me!”  Jesus likely smiled, looked at Martha and said, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things.  There is need of only one thing.  Mary has chosen the better part.” 

   This is what got me to thinking about an either/or proposition.  Mary or Martha: which one would you rather be?  Or, perhaps better put, Mary or Martha: which one are you more like?  Martha was busy making preparations for her guests.  Mary was attentive to the primary guest.  Martha had chosen to DO, while Mary had chosen to BE.  Again, Martha had chosen to DO, while Mary had chosen to BE. 

     Jesus himself actually said that Mary had chosen the better part.  But think about it.  Only men think meals magically appear.  Didn’t someone have to get a meal together?  Didn’t someone have to set the table?  Didn’t someone have to straighten up?  Isn’t it perhaps true that both Mary’s role and Martha’s role were necessary? 

   If you think about it, Mary and Martha’s roles are similar to the tracks that the Eastern Church and the Western Church have taken.  In the year 1054 A.D., the church underwent what we call the Great Schism.  The Eastern Church became the Eastern Orthodox Church while the Western Church became the Roman Catholic Church.  Protestants wouldn’t come along for another 500 years.  The Church split primarily over what we call the Filioque.  Speaking of the Holy Trinity, the Eastern Church said that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father.  The Western Church said that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.  Filioque is Latin for “and the Son.”  That’s why the East and the West split in the year 1054 A.D.  We may think of that as splitting theological hairs, but they took their theology much more seriously 1000 years ago than we do today.

     But here’s my point about how Mary and Martha’s roles are similar to the tracks that the Eastern Church and the Western Church have taken.  The Eastern Orthodox Church tends to focus on being.  They emphasize prayer and their churches are filled with icons.  The Roman Catholic Church and Protestant churches in general tend to focus on doing.  That’s why we talk incessantly about mission.  The Eastern Church, like Mary, focuses on being, while the Western Church, like Martha, focuses on doing.  Is one better than the other?  Is this an either/or proposition, or is this perhaps a both/and proposition?

     I believe this is a both/and proposition.  I believe we need to learn how to BE, but I also believe that we are called to DO.  We learn to BE through worship and through prayer, and we DO when we work to make the kingdom of God a reality in our little corner of the world.  We are called to do both and both are vitally important.

     Listen to this.  Last week I did a funeral for a woman named Helen Truran.  In June of 1951, Helen and a friend were driving in a car in Columbus, Ohio.  They came across another car at a stop sign that contained two servicemen stationed at Fort Hayes.  One of those servicemen asked Helen where she and her friend were going.  She said, “On a picnic.”  The serviceman asked, “Can we come along?”  Helen said, “Sure!”

     The serviceman who asked Helen if he and his buddy could come on that picnic was Dick Truran.  They had their picnic in June of 1951.  By September of 1951, Dick and Helen were married.  It was all because Dick asked her, “Can we come along?” and she said, “Yes.”  What if she had said, “No?”  If she had said no, I can think of five children who would never have been born, not to mention countless grandchildren and great-grandchildren. 

     My point is this.  Do you see how important one little decision can ultimately be?  One seemingly harmless or simple decision can alter the entire course of our lives, not to mention the lives of countless others.  It is vitally important that we choose wisely.  So I say we need to learn to BE before we go out and DO.  Again, we need to learn to BE before we go out and DO.  In other words, we need to prayerfully discern who God is and what God wants before we try to go out and try to change the world.  Prayer necessarily precedes action.

   I recently came across a fascinating essay of sorts entitled “Lost Generation.”  It was written by a young man named Jonathan Reed.  It was written in response to a challenge by the American Association of Retired Persons to college students to imagine themselves at the ripe old age of 50.  This essay actually came in second in the contest.  I’d like to see the essay that came in first!  In any case, listen to an essay entitled “Lost Generation.”

I am part of a lost generation and I refuse to believe that I can change the world.  I realize this may be a shock but “Happiness comes from within” is a lie and money will make me happy.  So in 30 years I will tell my children they are not the most important thing in my life.  My employer will know that I have my priorities straight because work is more important than family.

 

I tell you this, once upon a time families stayed together.  But this will not be true in my era.  This is a quick-fix society.  Experts tell me 30 years from now I will be celebrating the 10^th anniversary of my divorce.  I do not concede that I will live in a country of my own making.  In the future environmental destruction will be the norm.  No longer can it be said that my peers and I care about this earth.  It will be evident that my generation is apathetic and lethargic.  It is foolish to presume that there is hope.

     Pretty depressing, wouldn’t you say?  Then the essay says, “And all of this will come true unless we choose to reverse it.”  Then when you reverse the lines of the essay, it reads like this:

There is hope.  It is foolish to presume that my generation is apathetic and lethargic.  It will be evident that my peers and I care about this earth.  No longer can it be said that environmental destruction will be the norm.  In the future, I will live in a country of my own making.  I do not concede that 30 years from now I will be celebrating the 10^th anniversary of my divorce.  Experts tell me this is a quick fix society.  But this will not be true in my era.

 

Families stayed together once upon a time.  I tell you this, family is more important than work.  I have my priorities straight because my employer will know that they are not the most important thing in my life.  So in 30 years, I will tell my children, “Money will make me happy” is a lie and “happiness comes from within.”  I realize this may be a shock but I can change the world.  And I refuse to believe that I am a part of a lost generation.

     That essay is really quite profound.  I have a sneaking suspicion, however, that it will never come true apart from worship and prayer and Bible study.  We first must BE before we attempt to DO.  For only God can provide the solutions to what ails our society.

     We were talking last Wednesday morning at the men’s breakfast at Perkins about what ails our society.  Our nation is fast approaching a debt of 14 trillion dollars.  The national debt increases at a rate of 4.15 billion dollars a day, and each individual citizen’s share of the national debt is $42,905.31.  Small towns all across America are collapsing as their industry gets shipped somewhere else.  And 69% of the Crawford Central School District is on the free or reduced lunch program.  I kept trying to say, “Where is the hope?  Where is the hope?”  Finally someone said, “The hope is going to have to come from the Presbyterian pulpit!” 

     All right, here’s the hope.  Only God has the answer to what ails our society.  Worship God in the hopes that he will not turn his back on us.  Study the Bible to come to understand what it is God wants from us.  And pray that God will somehow intervene.  Then we must do what we believe in our hearts God is leading us to do.

     Now back to the word game.  I read a story about someone who was playing that word game we talked about earlier.  You know, hamburgers or hot dogs?  McDonalds or Burger King?  The question was asked, “The Ten Commandments or the Beatitudes?”  Everyone quickly said, “The Beatitudes, of course!”  But a dedicated Catholic woman named Elizabeth refused to answer the question.  She said, “You can’t have one without the other.” 

     Elizabeth was right.  It’s not an either/or proposition, it’s a both/and proposition.  We must learn to BE and we must learn to DO.  We must turn to God first to find out who he is, who we are, and what he wants from us.  Then we must do what we believe in our hearts God is leading us to do.  So I ask you again: “Ginger or Mary Ann?”  Perhaps the best answer…is both.  Amen.