Grace to Believe

Grace to Believe: Isaiah 65: 17-25; John 20: 1-18

[SLIDE 1] [SLIDE 2]The other day, while having lunch with a friend, I sat for a while in the sun outside of the restaurant. Having low Vitamin D, the warmth and the vitamins felt good on me even as I burned a bit. Seeing the arrangement donated for Easter with the gorgeous daisies and sunflowers welcoming in summer made me smile a bit this morning. The Easter lilies, however, still made me sneeze. In a world that is topsy-turvy, volatile, overly connected, an often hard to understand, we need these things that ground us, center us, and remind us of God’s grace and love in our lives. 

Easter does just that for us. It grounds us back in the very basics and starting point of our faith. It brings us back to the very joyful fundamental of what we believe.[SLIDE 3] In Christ, and his life, we find our own hope and our lives. There are a lot of ways we can re-center ourselves and reconnect back to God when life seems to pull us a hundred thousand different ways. For some it’s gardening and getting their hands dirty in the earth and creation. For some it’s music, and the beautiful melodies stirring the soul. Some love their pets. Some love a good dinner and favorite food. Some love crafting. And some folks just need to sit on the couch and completely dissociate for a few hours. 

We are promised that God is always with us. But all too often, when we become overwhelmed and overburdened, we can forget to abide in God’s love and God’s presence. In essence, we don’t lose faith, but we forget to stay close to the source of our life and our holy guide in this life. It’s easy to get a bit lost in the weeds when life throws too many things at us. 

[SLIDE 4] Even the disciples struggled with the waiting period of Holy Saturday and understanding what Jesus had taught them all along. When Mary arrived at the tomb on the third day, they found it empty. No stone, no body, no guards, nothing, nada was there. She, Peter, and the other disciple all assumed that Rome, the leading elders, or someone else had illegally snatched Jesus’s body and desecrated his resting place. She even cries out to the disciples that someone or some group had stolen his body. 

[SLIDE 5] But when they entered the tomb, it wasn’t a crime scene. The linens were there, the face cloth was neatly folded. It wasn’t a body snatching; it was a resurrection. And it was only at that point, John’s gospel tells us, that the disciples understood what Jesus meant. All the times they heard and experienced Jesus’s words and prophecies, and it was only when they saw with their own eyes, the most fundamental part of Jesus’s work, did they fully understand and believe. 

We have the benefit of their testimony and writings. We have the benefit of looking back and deciphering what Jesus said in the whole context. For the disciples, belief was a moment by moment understanding. For us, it’s the big picture that we can understand from start to finish. But we must still have the grace to believe and have faith in this work of love. 

That’s why we have to come back and center ourselves here. Be it sitting or walking in God’s creation, hearing and experiencing life around us, taking time to simply be still, we all have to find our way back to this starting point: belief in Christ, who offers life and hope through an understanding of sacrificial love. How do we take time in life to intentionally bring ourselves back to this starting point of faith—to the life-giving resurrection that so defines what we believe? 

[SLIDE 6] I have had more than a few people tell me recently that the worry about what kind of future is being left for the next generation. There’s a lot of talk about the turmoil in the world, stretched resources, how different life is now. But I’ve learned a couple of things. First, I think almost every generation says that, and it’s true just the same for every generation. Life changes and becomes different and hard to understand as we get older. But I have also learned that there is, along with all that change, an unchanged truth. A co-worker had a baby this week. Yesterday we all got an email showing mom and a very healthy and beautiful baby girl. 

Whatever is going on in the world around us, does not change the hope and love seen in that image of new life and the love of a new mother. And I believe, must believe, that even as God has cared for us for centuries, loved us, helped us, and tended to us in spite of ourselves, God will continue to do that for this new little baby and beyond. Grace is found in believing, almost recklessly, in God’s wisdom, power, and strength to love and lead humanity through until the end of time. 

But our hope and belief go even beyond this, for in resurrection, Jesus offers us an understanding of life and love for all time. Isaiah talks about a new heaven and earth, where peace and God’s justice reign. The sufferings of life will be unknown to us. No death at young ages will come. No invaders to plunder and destroy. No misfortune, no struggles to work, peace, love, and comfort will reign in that time. We must, if we are to have any hope at all in this life, we must have the grace in life to believe in the Kingdom of God. That is both in life everlasting and the work of being God’s people here and now. 

[SLIDE 7] A friend of mine loves to cook and bake. She’s one of those rare individuals who is gifted at being able to do both. Most folks either cook or bake, but it’s a rare skill to do both. You can tell if it’s been a rough week because there will be cakes, pies, breads, pastries, casseroles, and culinary concoctions galore. The thing is, though, she eats really simple: fish, chicken, and veggies. Beyond tasting for quality, she doesn’t eat much of what she fixes. And yes, I clarified she’s not secretly poisoning us. She does, however, give most of it away to folks when they have a rough week, visiting family, a new birth, an illness, and things like that. 

If you ask her why she does all this, she will tell you that she feels closest to God when she has her hands crammed in a mixing bowl with a dirty apron and flour covering her and the kitchen. One time she laughed and said, “I’m a modern-day Martha, I guess. I’d never be able to sit still at Jesus’s feet. This is how I know God. It’s my version of being still.” She would also tell you that she prays every single cake, pie, meatloaf, casserole, and candy helps someone else see God’s goodness in their life. 

For me, Good Friday was that moment. I got to hang out at the church all day, setting up the sanctuary and getting the elements of worship ready for that night all while humming “Nearer My God to Thee,” which also worked out perfectly for when I fell off the step at the Communion Table. It was a moment to be grounded again in the work of worship, to come back to the idea of death, life, and life everlasting that is so important to our faith. 

[SLIDE 8] Where and how do we bring ourselves back to the beginning? Easter is both a reminder to us that one day we will rise up and be with Christ and that we must come back to the very fundamental point of faith: a Savior who offers hope and love to a people who don’t necessarily deserve it. What helps you to ground yourself, and when was the last time you engaged in that? When we come back to the empty tomb, we are reminded over and over again that every part of life is not in vain, for we can have the grace, and even the audacity, to believe in a life-giving God. [SLIDE 9] And so we proclaim our good news. The Lord is risen! He is risen indeed, hallelujah! [SLIDE 10]

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1170915824361866/

Grace to Accept Tragedy

Grace to Accept Tragedy: Job 1: 20-22; John 12: 1-19

[SLIDE 1] If you follow me on social media, you’ll see the grand tragedy of my Thursday. As I sat in my office with lunch spread before me, I meditated on how Jesus turned the water into wine. [SLIDE 2A-B] In front of me was a salad. And no matter how hard I prayed, the same Jesus who turned water into wine would not turn that salad into a bacon cheeseburger and fries. And for a few moments, my faith was truly tested in this tragedy of sad lunching. Now, obviously this is a joke, but in many ways, Palm Sunday is a full-scale tragedy. 

[SLIDE 3] The story of Palm Sunday reminds me of reading Greek Tragedies in Freshman English class. They explore human suffering, the consequences of fate, and the worst results of humanity’s free will. Palm Sunday presents a celebration—light-hearted, fun, and exciting. But the underlying truth is that betrayal, abandonment, injustice, hatred and malice, deceit, suffering, and even murder lurk in the shadows of this celebration. Many texts call this the Triumphant Entry. The reality is that it is a tragedy. But it’s a tragedy that leads to triumph. And at times we must have the grace to accept and live out a tragedy in life.

[SLIDE 4] Author and blogger Sarah Christmyer writes about the meaning of Palm Sunday, “To rephrase the old saying, Palm Sunday comes in like a palm branch, out like a cross.” It begins with a betrayal. In the Gospel of Luke, we are told that Judas goes to the chief priests and temple guard to betray Jesus. In Luke it is because Satan enters him. In Matthew it’s out of his greed and disgust at the breaking of the jar of perfume by Mary. In John, there is no explanation. Judas simply slips away like some shadowy figure caught up in wrongdoing. The effect is no different. Jesus experiences the betrayal of one of his closest, a disciple. 

Jesus also endures the misunderstanding crowd. On Palm Sunday he hears shouts and cheers hailing him as blessed and the King of the Jews. This had political and spiritual implications. It’s a blurry line whether they thought he was the return of a king like King David or the Savior of Israel. While they understood the wait for the Messiah, what they desperately wanted was a political powerhouse to overthrow Rome. That clearly was not Jesus, and just a short time later, they cry out for his crucifixion. On top of betrayal from Judas, Jesus experiences the cruelty from these people. 

It’s proof that the crowd utterly misunderstood who Jesus was. They didn’t make a commitment. They didn’t come in faith. They didn’t listen to his teaching as a spiritual wisdom. They didn’t want the holy. They wanted the political power. Blessed is the KING, not savior, not messiah, but the King of Israel. [SLIDE 5] We even read in our Hebrew Lesson of Job, who encountered tragedy. Like Jesus it only took moments for the happiness and celebration to be swept away in tragedy. The only one left in his family was his wife, who was far more of a curse than a blessing. 

[SLIDE 6] We often feel the same. Life seems to bring one tragedy after another. We face a friend or family member who is mad about something, and we don’t even know why. We can feel the pang of betrayal from loved ones or even our own bodies. We can feel misunderstood. We can experience loss. In so many ways, we face minor and colossal tragedies in our own lives that wound us, challenge us, and test our faith in ways we don’t want or expect. 

I counseled with a friend many years ago who declared that all of her life seemed to be going from one tragedy to another. It’s a harsh test of our faith when we so desperately want the miracle to come, but it doesn’t happen. We can often identify with Jesus in the garden, fervently praying that this cup would pass from him. Yet he knew that he had to walk the difficult path, or the lonesome valley, as the spiritual says. 

[SLIDE 7] But at times there is a glimpse of a light of hope. Mary, in our lesson, anoints Jesus with the essence of nard in an act of devotion. Now, often, nard was used for burial purposes. It would have been saved to anoint Jesus in his burial. Yet here, Mary pours out the whole jar, filling the entire place with the scent of the expensive perfume. As a pastor friend of mine noted, perhaps in all the time spent learning at the feet of Jesus, Mary knew and understood. There would be no burial perfume needed, for Jesus would not stay in the tomb. Her devotion here wasn’t just anointing Jesus with the expensive perfume, it was in her listening, her understanding, and her discipleship in believing what Jesus had said to her. 

[SLIDE 8] The difference in the story of Jesus and old school Greek and Shakespearian tragedies is that when the tragedy hits, they just end. But Jesus continues to write the story into a finale of hope. He endures the betrayal, abandonment, suffering, injustice, all of it. Palm Sunday foreshadows a tremendous amount of suffering Jesus must undergo. But none of it is tragic, all of it is redemptive. 

One of the things we do most as humans is look for some kind of meaning to the struggles and tragedies we go through. I’ve heard people say, “Don’t waste your trials,” or they talk about lessons learned in life’s tough times. After years of pastoring, I’ve concluded that some trials may contain a lesson. But sometimes, living in a world that is sinful and selfish leads us to endure tragedies, trials, and suffering that may not have a lesson in it. It’s simply a struggle in life. 

A good friend of mine has been fighting bladder cancer for several months. She went for her checkup after completing chemo, and they discovered a second tumor on her brain. It’s not metastasized. It’s a whole different cancer. She’s facing a very complex operation to remove it. I cannot believe that the God who loves us and redeems us sent that to her just for some simple lesson to be learned. The God of the Old Testament is nothing like what we experience as people whom Christ has loved and redeemed. We are told plainly, God is love. 

The human experience is often difficult and filled with good periods as well as periods of suffering. In the good times we offer God praise and thanks. In the tough periods of life, we are drawn closer to Christ who was well-acquainted with suffering. Instead of finding some educational justification for suffering and struggle, look to Jesus. His final word on all of human suffering is hope and life. It is redemption for all of us. Sometimes there is nothing that can make our struggles any better or easier. There wasn’t much that could make the cross easy for Jesus. But we know that no matter how hard life is we rest on God’s promises. The story of our struggling and suffering ends in hope. 

What’s needed from us is the courage to follow Jesus. Judas betrayed him. The disciples fled when the guards came to arrest Jesus. All of Job’s friends and his wife turned on him and blamed him for his own suffering. But Mary not only had the courage to believe, but she also relied fully on what Jesus had said as truth. She knew that the burial perfumes would not be needed because Jesus had taught that death was never a final word. Tragedy would not reign in Jesus’s kingdom. She dumped out the burial ointments as an anointing of Jesus for the work and suffering he would do, and the hope he would bring. 

[SLIDE 9] On Palm Sunday, the crowds lay their palms and cloaks before Jesus welcoming him as King of the Jews into the heart of Jerusalem. But just a short time later, they turned on him, calling for his unjust death and suffering. In our own hearts and lives, we make way for Jesus to be a part of our lives. But we too face the same question, will we have the courage to follow him, or will we turn and follow the crowd? Good Friday is coming. What will our choice be? [SLIDE 10]

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/697347279376543/

Grace in Life, Death, and Eternal Life

Grace in Life, Death, and Eternal Life: I Kings 17: 17-24; Selections John 11

[SLIDE 1] The other day, I was reading an article from Polly Green in a magazine about aging. [SLIDE 2] She took up surfing at the age of 50 and thoroughly enjoyed it. She recounts a conversation with a man on the beach while she was sipping her morning tea. He was an older gentleman looking at her in her surfing gear and asked, impolitely, how old she is. Her reply was 52. She writes, “His jaw dropped, and he said, ‘I thought you were seventy. You have really bad skin!’” She adds that this is not the first time this has happened. So instead of being bothered by it, she decided to start telling folks she was 85 so they think she’s doing incredibly well for her age. 

[SLIDE 3] We have a bit of an obsession in society with looking and being young. It’s especially bad for women, but I’m starting to see the aging angst catch up with middle-aged men as well. I think, perhaps, that’s a wrong focus for us. Obsessing over youthfulness is not the direction we need to go as God’s faithful. Now you don’t have to have a praise break every time a new wrinkle or grey hair shows up, but God is a God of life, wisdom, and growth. We see in our lessons for today that God gives us grace and strength in life, death, and in eternal life. 

[SLIDE 4] We read in I Kings that the widow who has helped Elisha loses her son to an illness. He was a young son, and as many would say, too young to die like that. The even greater unfairness of it is that he and his mom survived the famine in the land. It looks like God brought them through the famine just to cruelly snatch her child away with little explanation. But our God is a God of life, not of death, not of misery and suffering. We suffer and struggle in a broken world, but God is the presence of hope in spite of that. Though death doesn’t care about youth or agedness, God can bring life in any situation. 

Here, God restored the widow’s son to life. Too often we focus on turning back the clock, forgetting that every minute is another gift of life from God. Do we fill up each moment of life with the goodness of God, or do we constantly search for the things in the past that have come and gone? God calls you to live life here and now, not meander back to places you’ve been already. If you live in a youth that has passed and time that is gone, you will miss all of the blessings and good work God has for you now, when you are wiser in life to do them. 

[SLIDE 5] In our Gospel lesson, we read the heart-rending story of how Lazarus dies. This family is familiar in the gospels, providing us the stories of Mary and Martha, the anointing of Jesus’s feet, and here, the resurrection of Lazarus. Now Lazarus was not one of those who died for a split second then was revived. No, when Jesus came to town, Lazarus had been dead for four days. He was not just dead; he was very dead. And yet Jesus called him out of the tomb as if death was nothing at all and had no power whatsoever. 

Martha and Mary, I’m sure, were a bit bothered by Jesus. Though Facebook and Instagram didn’t exist in those days, all sorts of news and gossip travelled faster than I would think is possible. So I am convinced that Mary and Martha knew Jesus delayed his journey to them allowing Lazarus to die. Perhaps that is why Mary stayed inside. Martha seems to have just been trying to make sense of it all. What they witnessed, though, was the greatest testament to God’s power to bring life from death in the whole of the Bible. 

[SLIDE 6] It’s also a bit of a foreshadowing of Jesus’s work on earth. Some churches get a bit to hyper-focused on the cross and the crucifixion. Christ’s work here on earth was not to die, but to bring life and hope to a humanity that didn’t have that. The gift of grace we often hear about isn’t a bloodied instrument of torture, it’s an empty tomb where hope for humankind walked out alive and holy bringing life and the hope of eternal life to us. 

So, the question to us is this: if God is a God of life and hope, then what do we do with our lives while we are here? Like Elisha, like Jesus, we are to bring life for those who feel stuck in the tomb, or hopeless. There are a few ways we can do this. First, when the widow’s young son died, Elisha advocated for him before God. I spent Friday at a small conference in Norcross. It was for advocates, clinicians, and professionals working to help those who have experienced family violence and domestic violence. One of the things we talked about was this idea of coercive control where an abuser exerts a form of mental control over the victim, which makes it hard for the victim to advocate for herself. 

[SLIDE 7] Just like these advocates speak up for and help these women who are victimized by someone who should love them, we must be advocates in our own communities. Many struggle to speak for themselves, fight when needed, and stand up in difficult situations. Many may be too tired or sick. We have a calling to give a voice to those who are weary or voiceless, just like Elisha pleaded the widow’s cause before God until life was restored to the young boy. 

[SLIDE 8] We must also be agents of healing and hope just as Jesus was in the Gospel lesson. There are many joy-filled parts of the job of a pastor. I love dedicating a child to God. I love baptisms, weddings. I especially love celebrating the Lord’s Supper each week with its powerful reminders. But my absolute favorite thing is visiting with folks and helping them feel comforted, or smile, or even laugh in tough situations. Sharing in a funny and uplifting story or reminder, can make the dreadful a little easier in life. 

Each of us has the ability to minister and comfort or even bring hope in a dark situation when someone needs it. Some of that comes from our ability to be present here and now. If we live in the past and don’t look to the work of now and tomorrow, then we’ve gained all this wisdom for nothing. Both Jesus and Elisha made it a point to be present in the immediate moment with the widow and with the sisters when they were grieving and hurting. The widow was stuck in the past believing that God still intended to kill them all for past sins, and Martha looked too far into the future talking about the last day. In both instances God sent a prophet and a Savior to remind that God can work in the here and now to bring hope and life in dark places. 

Our calling in life is to bring a little light and a little hope into someone’s life. But also, we must be willing to embrace the hope and life encouragement that others bring to us. In life we are sometimes the strong one lifting up and helping others, but sometimes we are the vulnerable ones who need an Elisha or Jesus to comfort and get our lives back on track. 

[SLIDE 9] This week, I had the displeasure of…yet again…straining a tendon in my foot and heading back into the boot. Thursday night I was a bit miserable, but a good friend of mine, knowing how annoyed I was, came over and brought his two incredibly sweet dogs to visit. One hour of sitting at the dog park and playing with those two sweet, fluffy dogs made my struggle much, much lighter. 

[SLIDE 10] Many of us cringe when we think of aging. The idea of wrinkles, grey hair, getting a bit slower, and all the jokes about age doesn’t exactly excite us. But as we live each day here on earth, we can find ways to build a closer, better relationship to the God who loves us through the Savior whose suffering and power over death gives us hope and life. As we grow, gain experience, and hopefully grow in wisdom, may we use what we gain to share that hope and life with others in our world. There are people all around us who are vulnerable. May we be the light of hope that they need to be made whole. 

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1020888169372175/

Grace in Humbleness

Grace in Humbleness—Psalm 131; John 13: 1-17

[SLIDE 1] There is a guy on YouTube named, The Detail Geek, who films himself cleaning the dirtiest cars imaginable. [SLIDE 2] He lives in Canada and owns his own detailing shop. He films every single aspect of the cleaning from the outside, to floor mats, to the inside parts and provides tips and links to cleaning merchandise. One might think this is boring at best, perhaps? Who’s going to sit and watch 20-minute videos on the details of detailing a car? Well, he has 3.81 million followers on his YouTube channel, so the answer is 3.81 million people enjoy watching half hour videos on car cleaning. He has branded his own product line and secured lucrative sponsorships, all while filming a slow, mind-numbing car wash. 

But we have a fascination, as a society, with dirty and undesirable jobs. There are videos of deep-cleaning dirty homes on social media. [SLIDE 3] Hoarders on A&E was an award-winning show about people living in abject filth with condemned homes. It went way beyond just general clutter. There’s 10 seasons of a show called “Dirty Jobs” with Mike Rowe. We are fascinated by these things, but I don’t know anyone much who is clamoring to actually sign up for these jobs. It reminds me of an old saying, “Most people prefer to have their feet washed than to be the one washing feet.” 

[SLIDE 4] I think I can understand that. Last year on Maundy Thursday, I remember somehow being voluntold to do the foot washing part of the service. And here I thought I would only play the piano. At the end of it, the water was dirty and there was sock fluff floating in it. It’s gross, but there’s a point. Most folks felt uncomfortable with the whole idea, and no one was willingly going to be the one doing the foot washing. They even had to voluntold a couple of folks to line up to have their feet washed for fear no one would do it. Also, lesson learned that warm water is much better for this than cold-cold water. 

[SLIDE 5A] When we think of Jesus, Christ, Prince of Peace, King of Kings, Savior of the World, we think of Christ on the throne. We find it easier to identify with the Jesus of power and strength or the Christ of glory and heavenly hope. [5B] It’s very hard to imagine Jesus, the Son of God, kneeling on the floor, washing the dirt off of feet like the lowest and most humble servant would. I’m sure it was just as uncomfortable for his disciples as it was for us on Maundy Thursday feeling a bit exposed and vulnerable with something that upends the norm we’re accustomed to. 

Part of what makes this scene so difficult is truly understanding how different this truly was for all involved. In our society, we would never see the CEO come and do filing for the mail clerk. We would never see the leader of a megachurch wash the feet of the drug addict hiding in the back. We would never see a President picking fruit in a field with a laborer (unless it was a publicity stunt). We expect those who are high and might to be exactly that: high and mighty. 

But remember the prophecies even before Jesus was born from Isaiah 40, “Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill brought low. The crooked places shall be made straight and the rough places smooth.” In a world that lived and died according to position and hierarchy, Jesus came to bring grace to all of humanity: the leper, the unclean, the Samaritan, the avoided Gerasene. Though he interacted with the highest officials and most prominent in Ancient Judea, his miracles and his greatest blessings were given to the least of these. His healing, his help, his blessings, his grace is almost always seen in his interaction with those whose others wouldn’t go near. 

And if you read the Parable of the Good Samaritan, the Lost Sheep, Pharisee and Tax Collector, and Wedding Feast, you’ll see that Jesus also exalted the least of these, the outcast, and humbled of society in his teachings. The beauty of that is we are included in that same grace. Pretty much all of us would have been the Samaritan or Gerasene, and none of us would have been a person of prominence if we lived in Ancient Judea. That Jesus offered grace to those outside the small circle of the Temple faith is what includes us in this incredible, redeeming love. We would not be the good, upstanding folks. We would also be the outcast, and unclean. 

[SLIDE 6] And here, in this lesson, Jesus says, “And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet.  I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.” Jesus calls on them, and on us by extension, to follow his example. This doesn’t come easy, though, does it? We’ve been taught and trained to work towards perfection and not humility. We’ve been taught that being humble is weak and undesirable. 

All of society and life tends to teach us competition: schooling, work and promotions, sports, games with friends, even in some ways eating at a restaurant is a competitive sport. Yet nowhere in life are we taught how to kneel down and wash the feet of someone who is of lesser status than us. But Jesus, our example, both washed the feet of his disciples and suffered on a cross, humbled, serving, and in some ways humiliated. 

[SLIDE 7] Pope Francis is a very good example on this. Prior to him, the foot washing ceremony of Maundy Thursday was only a ritualistic act. Most prior pontificates would wash the feet of male priests only within the Vatican itself. Pope Francis changed this. He has held the ceremony in women’s and men’s prisons, elder care homes, with refugees, and with people who are not Christian and have no faith at all. And each and every time, he tells them that God loves and forgives them. Now imagine if the Pope himself can wash the feet of a prisoner, what a microdose of humbleness in the rest of society can do for the world. 

Too many people want to be served and never stoop to wash the feet of others. What could we accomplish if everyone decided that they would have just a bit of humbleness instead of feeding into the power grab that fuels a sinful world? Now compare the Pope kissing the feet of prisoners in Rome while washing feet on Maundy Thursday [SLIDE 8] to the images and reports of Bishop Marvin Sapp instructing the deacons to secure the doors of the church and holding the congregation captive till they cough up $40,000 in tithes. I guess the Lord loveth a cheerful giver, but the church can still work with false imprisonment. 

[SLIDE 9] The whole of this gospel story is designed for Jesus to show that being his follower means living humbly, in service to others or to God’s house. If you want to be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven, then you must make yourself the least. One of my favorite mundane tasks of serving the church is cleaning the silver from time to time at the communion sink. There’s something so satisfying about watching the black tarnish come off and the beautiful, clean silver shine through. I’ve thought about making YouTube videos on it like the car detailing guy, but I don’t think it’s nearly as exciting for the masses. 

If you ask what following Jesus looks like, it’s this: polish the silver, talk with someone who is anxious, help someone when they are struggling, use your skills and talents to make life just a little better for someone in some small way. Jesus didn’t change the world by washing the feet of his disciples, but he did give them a new perspective on what it means to be a leader in faith. Jesus said to them, “I have washed your feet, now you ought to wash one another’s feet. I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.” May we have the courage and wisdom to hear those words and live them in showing God’s grace.  [SLIDE 10]

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/10001367766563668/

Grace for the Guilty

Grace for the Guilty—Jonah 3; John 8: 1-11

One of the things I have learned in playing uncle to a toddler on Fridays is just how bold they really are. A toddler will look you right in the face while doing the very thing you just said 4 times not to do. And the sad part is that some of them never grow out of it! Here’s one of my favorite examples. My office has experts in different areas of criminal law. An attorney called one of those experts the other day for advice. After my co-worker provided well-thought-out advice, the caller said, “Well, I disagree with that. I think it’s this instead.” My co-worker replied, “Well, why did you call me if you just wanted to argue and know it all anyway?” A friend of mine once said in a sermon, the whole of this gospel story is summed up in one lesson: don’t come at me with your obnoxious. 

Here in the Gospel of John we see just that…an obnoxious ploy to trip up Jesus. As they interrupt Jesus’s teaching, the Pharisees and scribes bring a woman out right in front of the crowd and claim to Jesus that she has been caught red handed in the act of adultery. She should be stoned. What does Jesus say? Jesus sees this for what it is. They have brought no witnesses. There is no testimony. She’s not offered the ability to defend herself. And for that matter, Mosaic law held that BOTH the man and woman engaged in adultery are to face the death penalty for their actions. This isn’t a legitimate accusation and trial. It’s a vicious ploy to ruin her life and discredit Jesus’s teaching. So, what does Jesus say? Nothing. 

Jesus stoops to write in the sand. What he wrote is not important. It may have been something profound, or it may have been doodles. The important part is that in doing this, he is ignoring their questions, even as they relentlessly continue to ask him over and over. Herein Jesus gives us a wise lesson: don’t engage with foolishness. In fact, Jesus never answers their question about the woman and her alleged sin. He challenges them instead that the blameless one should cast the first stone at her. 

In the law, we have something called the doctrine of unclean hands. It’s a very old legal concept that you cannot accuse someone of wrongdoing if you too have been engaged in the wrongdoing. I’ll give you an example. In 1988 Rev. Jimmy Swaggert had to tearfully apologize on television for certain sins taking place in a motel room that involved a woman and some money. Likely this would never have been known had he not publicly feuded with another minister, Marvin Gorman, and outed him for an affair. Don’t call someone out for the very sin you’re doing. The religious leaders were clearly convicted of their guilt. They left this poor woman alone with Jesus, and not one stone was cast in her direction. 

Jesus finishes writing in the sand, and then he addresses her.  In the exchange, we learn that the accusers are gone, and with no one left to condemn her, neither does Jesus condemn her. But, it’s quite possible she’s not wholly innocent. Jesus says, “Go and sin no more.” Jesus was not sent into the world to condemn it, but to bring salvation to a people are guilty. You see, Jesus already knew her heart. He didn’t have to accuse, humiliate, question, condemn. He knew her heart, and all he had to do was release her in grace. It’s highly likely she was guilty, but Jesus came to bring grace, not punishment. 

This idea of grace becomes more difficult when we know how profoundly we have been wronged. Look at Jonah. He fled from God’s calling because he knew the depths of God’s mercy, and frankly, he didn’t want Nineveh to experience it. He didn’t think they deserved it. And, as enemies of Israel, he wanted them to pay. When he finally goes and takes God’s word to Nineveh, his worst fears are realized. Verse 10 tells us, “When God saw what they had done and how they had put a stop to their evil ways, God changed his mind and did not carry out the destruction [that had been] threatened.” 

There are people in life who are going to do wrong to us. There are some we may even consider enemies. There may be in your life a person or persons that you want God to smite, or you want to bring into the public forum and have stoned just like the woman in the Gospel lesson. But if God’s grace is given to us, then God’s grace must be given to them as well. And as God’s people, followers of Christ, we are called to offer grace as well. 

The religious leaders they wanted this woman stoned. The law demanded it, and they knew they could get two for the price of one: stoning an adulterer and trapping Jesus in legal and theological quandary. Don’t be mistaken, people may come for you with stones ready to cast or a challenge to make you look foolish in life. There are plenty of folks like the religious leaders of Jesus’s day out there ready to make life hard, and some of them are actual religious leaders. Yet in every moment, guilty though we may be, when we come to Christ, we are given grace, not condemnation and judgment. 

The harder part is when we find ourselves holding the stone in hand, red faced with anger, and vengeance on our hearts and lips. Throwing the stone is easy, and dare I say, probably satisfying. Grace is hard. Grace requires us to allow God to work through us instead of doing things how we want to do them. On our own, I don’t know that we can easily choose to show grace. That has to be something that comes with God’s help in life. 

A friend of mine once said that if you want to understand grace, watch how your dog acts. If you are gone for a lone time, they are overjoyed to see you return with kisses, jumping, and tail wagging. If you are late feeding them, they are happy with you just the same. If you forget a walk, they may get antsy and tear some things up, but they still come and curl up with you. When you are sad, they try to comfort. When you are happy, they rejoice with you. If you accidentally step on a tail, they graciously accept when you pet them and apologize. At every one of those moments, the dog could bite the fool out of you, and you might well deserve it. But more often than not, they simply love you anyway. 

Now, if a dog can offer us that kind of grace, even when we may not deserve it, how much more capable are we, with our intelligence and ability, to offer grace to others in this life? If we want to be most like Jesus in this life, then we must offer grace to those who don’t deserve it just the same as those who do. For Jesus’s work of death and resurrection was done for those who love and follow him, and those who don’t. It’s a gift offered to both groups, as hard as that may seem to be. And it’s grace, pure and simple. 

Our Gospel lesson gives us three strong lessons in grace, even for those who are guilty. There are times our accusers will come for us, hoping to publicly shame and humiliate us, and may even stand ready with stones to cast at us. When the accusers come, go to Christ. In him there is no judgment or condemnation, and we can find grace when our hearts are turned from what is wrong. There are times people will come to challenge us with questions and situations that may trip us up in life, but when the people challenge us, ignore the foolishness. Maybe you can even write in the sand while they go on and on. 

And finally, there are times we will be holding the stone to cast at somebody else, and they may truly deserve it. But if we follow Christ, we must lay the stones down and choose the path that Christ would take. Christ went to the cross, so that all we have to do is lay down the stone. So in those moments when you have a choice with the stone in hand, remember Christ’s grace for you, and do the same. 

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1194899242028770

Grace for an Outcast

Grace for an Outcast—Deut. 10: 14-22; John 4: 1-26

[SLIDE 1] Many years ago on Antiques Roadshow, a man came in with a simple blanket. [SLIDE 2] It was not the brightest, best colors, but it was good weaving, and it matched the southwestern United States style. He said it was given to his family by Kit Carson, a well-known American frontiersman, and had been sitting on the back of a chair, somewhat forgotten in the scheme of his living room. The appraiser, however, advised the man that it was one of the earliest types of Navajo weaving, a chief’s blanket, made in the 1840s, and one of the rarest artifacts of Navajo history. In 2002, the blanket was worth over half a million dollars. Another man with a similar blanket sold his for almost 2 million in 2016. It’s hard sometimes to see the value in what we have, and it is equally as hard to find something of value. 

In life, we often struggle to see the value in what we have. In our Gospel lesson, Jesus encounters the woman at the well. [SLIDE 3] She is a Samaritan, a person whom a Jewish person like Jesus should not interact with by law and social custom. Samaritans were Jews who intermarried with Assyrian pagans long before this Gospel lesson. Their bloodline and religious practices were mixed with that of the pagans. Verse 9 tells us that Samaritans refuse to have anything to do with Samaritans. In Jesus’s life she would have been an outcast, socially unacceptable to talk to, and certainly no one from whom Jesus should receive a drink of water. She probably thought this was a set up or a cruel joke. 

[SLIDE 4] In the exchange, she talks about Jacob’s well, and its historic significance to the people. Both Samaritans and Jews are descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In many ways, the well was almost sacred to the Samaritans because of the connection to their heritage. Jesus changes her perception, though. He tells her he offers the living water—life giving hope. In essence it’s a baptism, not just a drink from a well. Jesus offers her grace in the same way he offers grace to all. She may not be able to see the value of what she has sitting right in front of her, but Jesus sees the value in her, even when others don’t. 

[SLIDE 5] While serving a Lutheran church, they started every service with a prayer of confession that said, “O Almighty God, merciful Father, I a poor, miserable sinner, confess to thee all my sins and iniquities,” and it finishes with, “and justly deserve thy temporal and eternal punishment.” I struggle with that sentiment in light of Galatians 3:26-27, “For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes.” Despite the ways we may mess up, God sees the value in us and welcomes us to the family calling us “children.” God does not use miserable and wretched, outcast. Instead, God calls us beloved children. 

The Samaritan woman knew she was with a prophet, but didn’t realize until the end of the conversation, that she was, indeed, with the Son of God. She didn’t recognize the value of what was right in front of her. Sometimes we also miss this. In the struggles of life, we often feel like an outcast, or like God has abandoned us. A friend of mine said that we always want to be Jesus in the story, but here, we are much more the Samaritan woman: worried, alone, and feeling ashamed of ourselves in some way. But she knew about the hope in the Messiah, and that day she met him face to face. In our times and places of feeling like the outcast, we must remember that we too can encounter Jesus in our lives and find grace for all the places we feel are wrong. 

[SLIDE 6] But we must also see the value in something new. Samaritans had a strong reverence for Jacob’s Well given its historical significant and longevity. The Samaritan woman asks Jesus point blank, “Do you think you are greater than our ancestor Jacob who gave us this well?” Jesus was offering something different. He wasn’t bringing her a literal drink of water, but instead, he was offering her a baptism of new life. Jesus didn’t come to offer a literal upgrade in drinking water. This isn’t like going from Deer Park to Smart Water. It was spiritual. Jesus was offering her a renewal and cleansing of soul and spirit. She didn’t realize just how amazing this new offer from Jesus was. 

Likewise, the Israelites in Deuteronomy struggled to re-find their covenant with God. Much of the book is Moses re-teaching the people of their covenant and relationship to God before they enter the Promised Land. Moses called them away from their stubbornness and hard-heartedness and into a relationship with God that exists in righteousness, justice, and mercy. They often struggled because they got too comfortable living as outcasts, wanting to do it their own way. You have to remember, their forebearers watched God part the Red Sea, then still turned to idol worship. We can be comfortable living as an outcast, but it will always hold us back from God’s grace in our lives. 

It’s often easy to live on the outside, in doubt, worry, anger, ambivalence, and all the other attitudes that keep us on the margins of God’s grace. But just as Jesus made it a point to talk to an outcast at the well, so too, does Jesus make it a point to seek us out when we are feeling the most lonely and vulnerable. God never stops offering us love, grace, and welcome into that family of faith. The only one who keeps us on the margins is ourselves. We leave old wounds to fester. We focus on the struggle and forget God. We hold on to something that keeps us at a distance from the one who loves us. It’s almost as if instead of being an outcast, we’ve cast ourselves out. But God’s love is unending, and God’s welcome is vast. And nothing will take that away from us. 

But there’s also another side to this as well. Whom do we hold on the margins of faith and keep as outcasts? If I were to make a list of things and people we don’t like, our society would probably write a list a mile long. We are trained to keep a barrier, to hold the undesirable on the margins, and to say that some are just going to be outcasts no matter what. Yet, Jesus didn’t keep that barrier with the Samaritan woman. Not only did he engage her in a way that was shocking to her, he offered the same hope and grace that he offered to his Jewish brothers and sisters. She might have been hated and an outcast, but Jesus didn’t care. She was also a child of God for him to love just as much as the next person. 

[SLIDE 7] One of you sent me the news story on a fraternity at Clemson University. The school has a program to teach life skills to young people with disabilities. Historically, the young folks in that program had never been integrated with the general student population. But one young man with Down’s Syndrome wanted to be a part of a fraternity. It was an amazing moment when he got a bid from Phi Kappa Alpha. The men in that fraternity talked about how this young man brought a new-found sense of joy and brotherhood to the experience. The following year six fraternities and five sororities all accepted special needs students from the life skills program, bringing a new-found sense of friendship to those who were previously living as outcasts in their own university. 

[SLIDE 8] Jesus proved both that we don’t have to relegate ourselves to the margins because God loves us and calls us children of God. But God also calls on us to break down the margins. Just as God found us and drew us in when we were the Samaritan woman, the outsider, so too, must we show love and grace to the Samaritans in our lives. It reminds me of the old poem by the poet Edwin Markham, “He drew a circle that shut me out- Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. But love and I had the wit to win: We drew a circle and took him in!”

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/2939286496231148/

Grace for Us All

Grace for Us All—Exodus 10: 21-29; John 3: 1-21

[SLIDE 1] A friend of mine from many years ago grew up in Sulligent, Alabama.[SLIDE 2] The town peaked in number of residents in 2000 when 2,151 persons were counted among those who lived there. The town has one stoplight that works 65% of the time. One could describe it as a town that time forgot. When she and I met, it was at a program for history students in Princeton, New Jersey, and I remember when we traveled into New York one day. [SLIDE 3] She stood there in shock unable to absorb the vast difference between Sulligent and the Big Apple. 

For those who have spent their formative years in small town America, the city can feel almost overwhelming at times, incomprehensible in so many ways. But the reverse is true as well. To those who have spent most of their time in the city, small towns feel almost suffocating or claustrophobic. But both highlight how incredibly different and diverse our nation and its people really are. I think sometimes living in our routine causes us to forget just how broad Christ’s declaration is here in John 3: “For God so loved the world.” 

[SLIDE 4] But to understand just how powerful Christ’s words are, we need to back up and consider his exchange with Nicodemus. The man is a Pharisee, a religious leader, a respected man of the Temple. He comes to Jesus and spills the truth. They know that God had sent Jesus to teach, and they are aware of his miraculous signs. Remember this as we journey to the cross. Jesus knew from this encounter just how evil the religious leaders’ malice was. They knew he was sent by God, and had him killed not because he was wrong, but because they didn’t like what he said. 

Nicodemus would have been well-versed in the more mysterious elements of the faith. Pharisees believed in the resurrection of the dead and the existence of an afterlife. They also believed in angels and spirits. Sadducees, however, did not believe any of this. Nicodemus would have been no stranger to teachings of spiritual things that don’t always make sense in the world we live in. But here, Jesus baffles him with his teaching. Jesus tells him about being born again. Jesus tells him about being born of the spirit and not of human birth. But Nicodemus doesn’t understand. “How are these things possible?” he asks Jesus. 

It would be easy to imagine Nicodemus walking away confused, defeated, and still not understanding what Jesus meant. Nicodemus could have gone back to his easy life chalking up all of Jesus’s talk to a bunch of nonsense. But he doesn’t. Nicodemus sticks by Jesus. We hear again in John 7 that Nicodemus subtly defends Jesus to the Sanhedrin, reminding them of Jesus’s right to defend himself. And we hear in John 19 that Nicodemus helps prepare and bury the body of Jesus after the crucifixion along with Joseph of Arimathea. Nicodemus may not have understood, but he most certainly felt a holy presence in Jesus. 

Perhaps the most startling thing for Nicodemus, though, was Jesus’s words in John 3:16 and beyond. They’re some of the most famous words to Christians everywhere: For God so loved the world that God gave the only begotten son, so that everyone who believes will not perish but have everlasting life. This is followed up with the words that Jesus was not sent to judge the world but to save and redeem the world through his work. [SLIDE 5] 

Nicodemus and other religious leaders believed that this kind of grace from the Messiah was specifically unto the Jewish people. But Jesus offers a different vision, one that is much more expansive and inclusive of those whom he loved and desired to know grace. When Jesus said those words about people loving darkness rather than light, we often interpret it as sinners, thieves, killers, and the like. My mom’s Congregational church growing up was decried as evil because they had dances for the teenagers and dancing was still frowned upon. All manner of darkness, you know. 

But here, Jesus is speaking to a religious leader. Living in darkness is rejecting the truth of Christ’s love and making Christ in our image instead of us being transformed into his image. Despite how judgy we can be sometimes, we are called to a work of teaching grace not nitpicking sins. I saw a bumper sticker once that said, “If God didn’t send Jesus into the world to condemn it, I doubt God sent you.” And like most bumper sticker theology, it stuck with me. 

Sometimes I think our view of “God so loved the world” can be too narrow and not quite as awe-inspiring as Christ intended it to be. It’s easy for the church to get stuck in a rut. Churches tend towards looking, thinking, and being the same. But Jesus never intended that level of sameness or that narrow of a group of the faithful. Indeed it takes the togetherness of people from all different walks of life, backgrounds, upbringings, socio-economic backgrounds, and all other differences to truly understand the depth of grace. 

It’s easy to have love and grace for those exactly like ourselves. But it gets a lot harder when we are confronted with understanding that God so loved the world, when we see and experience the whole world. Our lives, our actions, and our words tell this story of God’s love for an entire world. Whether we like it or not, when we claim a faith in Christ, we become an example—and people will watch to see if we act like Christ, or if we act in self-interest. Love is easy for those who are easy, but the question is can we offer love and grace to those who make it far more difficult to be loved. Can we love even if are ridiculed for it? 

In 1953, America was having a bit of a revival of faith. Church attendance was at it’s highest in decades, and over ¾ of the people claimed some kind of Christian faith and church association. But 1953 was still a very segregated time in the United States. And yet, it was in 1953 that a young pastor dared to be the first to take down the barriers separating white and black folks at his gospel meetings. He infamously said to the ushers at that event, “You can leave those barriers down, or you can have the revival without me.” He was friends with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke publicly against apartheid in South Africa, and even took heat for allowing black and white people to mix at his altar calls. This man was Rev. Billy Graham. [SLIDE 6] He took “God so loved the world” seriously, at a time when for many that meant a white or black world. 

It is no mistake that he often used “Just As I Am,” a verse of which says, “Just as I am - Thy love unknown has broken every barrier down; now to be Thine, yea, Thine alone, O Lamb of God, I come!” God’s love broke every barrier down between us and God, and between one another, so that we can tell the good news of God’s love to the world. Though we may not all understand one another, we can all love one another through the grace that Christ teaches us. [SLIDE 7] 

I want to leave you with the poem by John Birch, “This Is Love,” which tells of just how God so loved the world: 

This is love.

[That] you spoke words of comfort,

walked with the unclean and unloved,

shared wisdom, bread and wine,

brought healing into lives

and challenged the status quo.

This is love.

That you spoke the word of God,

walked a painful road to the Cross,

shared living water, bread of life,

brought Salvation to the world

and died for the sake of all.

This is love.

It is a seed sown in the ground,

which germinates,

blossoms and spreads its sweet perfume.

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1632078554086368/

Seeing the Change

Seeing the Change—Exodus 34: 29-35; II Cor. 3:12-4:2

[SLIDE 1] Sometimes, change is hard. But sometimes, I’m incredibly grateful for change. For instance, vintage recipes that needed to change. No one should ever show up to the potluck with [SLIDE 2] salmon mousse festooned with peppermints in a horseradish sauce. Nor should you bring [SLIDE 3] tuna and Jell-O pie,  [SLIDE 4] ham and bananas hollandaise, or [SLIDE 5] whatever perfection salad is. I am, at times, very grateful that change happens, and that potato salad is no longer encased in a miracle whip Jell-O mold to be served. 

In our lives of faith, there has to be change as well. Now, some folks hear change, and they think that means rolling out a rock band at 9:00 and the pastor untucks his shirt then uses Gen-Z lingo in the sermon. But I don’t have the rizz to do that, straight no cap. When we talk about “change” in our lives of faith it is less about cosmetic updates and more about the growth within. There should be a maturing in the Christian who seeks to follow Christ more closely and live out what God has called us to each day. 

[SLIDE 6] In our Exodus lesson for today, Moses is returning to the mount for a new covenant between God and Israel. This comes on the heels of the broken first covenant where the people were worshiping a golden calf. We hear that Moses’s entry into God’s presence changes his likeness in a very permanent way…a way that makes it hard for the people to look upon him. This is no small matter. Moses is one of only very few people in the Old Testament who got to fully experience the presence of God in this way. Moses, the one who doubted himself, becomes both leader and prophet as he hears God’s words in God’s presence, then translates them to God’s people. 

There’s not really a good explanation for all this. The description of Moses’s face and the face covering don’t really translate well to English. We’ve gotten it as close as we can understand, but the word for “veil” is only used this one time in the Bible. Paul clears up a bit of the mystery, but this is one of those parts of the Bible where something miraculous occurred, that we really cannot explain in human terms. It’s holy. It’s the magic in faith that makes this more than a philosophy. 

[SLIDE 7] But one thing to keep in mind is that God’s presence, makes all of creation different. For Israel, Moses was the mediator between them and God. God’s word through Moses helped to bring a rebellious people into a covenant with God. But what helped tremendously was this shining radiance from Moses’ face. It is described as them seeing a glimpse of God’s glory shining from Moses. And God’s glory was so overwhelming to behold that it shocked and scared the people. 

Paul’s words in II Corinthians pick up on this theme of the radiance of God’s presence found within God’s people. For us, a Moses figure is not needed. When the Temple was created, it had a veil between the outside, and the holiest place of God’s presence. During the crucifixion, that veil was symbolically torn. Our faith and belief is that we have access directly to God through our faith in Christ. We don’t need Moses to go up on a mount, get instructions from God, and bring them back down. God speaks directly to and with us, leading us in a very close and personal way each day of our lives. 

[SLIDE 8] One thing, however, is not different. We, too, shine this glory of God in our lives. It should be a bit startling, and bit unnerving to people, but in a holy and loving way. When people see us and encounter us, they should see that glory in us as we strive to live for God. Paul encourages the Corinthians, and through the letter, us, to never give up. We are to reject shameful deeds and underhanded dealings. We are called to trick or deceive others. We are called on not to distort the word of God, especially for our own benefit. We are to tell the truth in all things, and in doing so, whether people like what they hear or not, they know we are honest with them in what we say. 

[SLIDE 9] People see God in our lives when we do small things and big things—fixing sandwiches for those who are hungry, a call to someone who is struggling, prayer for those hurting, and love to those who feel lonely. In each of these things, we reflect the presence and glory of God to others who may not have seen it in a very long time. A friend of mine has two signs in her office. She deals with cantankerous people all day long. The first one says, “Be kind, always.” The second one says, “It costs $0 to be kind.” She will be the first to tell you that she doesn’t always live up to it, and that’s why we apologies and repentance. But she has those signs in front of her every day as a reminder when she finds herself in a truly difficult spot with discussion and confrontation. 

Paul tells us that wherever the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Now typically we think of freedom as the permission to do something we’re usually not supposed to do. My best friend’s toddler thinks of freedom as the freedom to stay up past his bedtime on Friday. We think of freedom as not having to choose the chicken and broccoli and indulge in the cheeseburger because it’s a cheat day. We think of it in our nation, perhaps mistakenly, as getting to do whatever we want. But for Paul, freedom was something different. 

Freedom meant release from the bonds of an old, failed way of doing things. If the people wanted to know what they should be doing, they needed to wait on Moses to get an instruction from the Lord and return with it. Freedom, for Paul, was not something, some caveat, some exception we create. Freedom was a gift that frees us to be what God created us to be. Martin Luther said freedom was found in service to others. It removes the selfishness of freedom, the selfishness that often leads us to dark and lonely places away from God’s glory, places that require us to focus on power and cunning to achieve instead of grace and faith. 

[SLIDE 10] Growing up, I was taught and came to believe that my responsibility to faith stopped when I believed. We pretty much only heard sermons about getting saved and not much beyond that. Belief is absolutely essential, yes, but our faith offers so much more to us, to God, and to this world. Moses didn’t just come to the people once, he regularly brought a word from God to the people. The same is true for us. Faith offers us the opportunity to grow each and every day, all throughout life. We’re never too old, too far gone, too advanced to stop growing in knowledge, wisdom, and in a closer relationship to God each day. 

What do people see when they see us? What first comes to mind? Do they try to avoid us because we are so difficult and obnoxious that it’s impossible to be around us? Do they see someone who is sad and a little lost in life? Or do they see the glory of God and the love of Christ Jesus shining forth from us with hope, love, and grace for all? I’m sure at times we are all difficult. I’m sure at times we all have sad days. But in the end, it is the hope of Jesus that should win out because nothing else in our lives compares to this. 

Sometimes I think we are afraid of change. It’s not the unknown, the different, but the fear of what we may lose, of memories that may become only memories. But I make you a promise, when God is the author of our change, we never lose, we press on to something better, greater, and filled with more of God’s glory. [SLIDE 11] If you never want change, then I dare you to eat tuna-onion, miracle whip, lime Jello-Pie…or perfection salad. [SLIDE 12] But just as our technology, culinary, and aesthetic tastes change and grow, so too should we grow in faith. Friends, God is leading us, so may we be ready to follow with that glowing presence of faith shining forth from us.

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1347519413341816/

The Difficult Side of Love

The Difficult Side of Love: Gen. 45: 3-11, 15; Luke 6: 27-38

Some days you just want to throat-punch a person who is driving you nuts. There are days where you may daydream of good paybacks to people who did you wrong. From time to time, you may revel in seeing karma take care of someone who has been problematic for a long time. A friend of mine told a story of how a co-worker was causing her all sorts of problems. This person was mean, fake, and often back-stabbing. My friend said she turned it all over to God, and at Thanksgiving, when the mean co-worker’s family was all gathered at her home, the septic tank exploded sending sewage blasting through the toilets and showers in her house. My friend said, “Poo-head got what she deserved. God is good, all the time.” 

Now, I may not be the greatest Biblical expert in realm of theology, but I’m fairly sure that taking delight in the suffering of people you don’t like is not a gospel message. Jesus tells us that we must love God and love our neighbors as ourselves. We hear those words that God so loved the world. And in the midst of all this Christian teaching on love, we sometimes come to a point where we say, “I’d rather not.” Six days this week I chose love and peace, today I want to choose violence. 

My friends, we come to the difficult side of love. Jesus takes us down a pathway of difficulty in what it means to love. God, we have no problem with. Most friends and family we can find love for even if it’s from a safe distance. We can have this general Christian love for the world based on what Christ teaches. But here we come to the really hard part: enemies, those who hate us, undesirables, irritating people, the crude, the unkind, the obnoxious/horrible/miserable folks society has to offer us. And Jesus again tells us, “Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you.” And to that statement, we all offer a collective, “But I DON’T WANT TO!” 

It is, however, this peculiar behavior of Christ-followers that makes us stand out as so different from the world. Whereas the world has a retribution-minded attitude, God’s faithful live in a place of constant and unending forgiveness. Life will train you to believe it is true that you should do unto others exactly as they have done unto you, OR, do unto others before they can do it to you first. That’ll set them right. But Jesus teaches a very different way of life, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” This way of life is incredibly different from human intuition or natural inclination. 

This is what makes God’s people stand out—their presence for love in this world—a love that is all-encompassing and expansive. Our calling is to be the people who bring the presence of Christ forward into a world that can be cruel and difficult. Very few people truly adhere to this calling that we love friend and family equal unto enemy and adversary. Jesus viewed enemies, not as something to crush and defeat, but as humans to love and bring into the sacred fold. The great Maya Angelou said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” 

Jesus taught and advocated for followers who made people feel safe, restored, made whole, healed, and blessed. That’s what makes a difference in people’s lives. In a world consumed with money, self-interest, politics, and turmoil, the measure of our trust in Christ is how much we show Christ to others in our lives. Jesus tells us not to judge others, not to condemn others, to always forgive, and to give what we can. If we expect God’s blessings, we cannot be cheap in blessing others in return. 

In some ways this section of Luke makes us feel a bit put upon, or vulnerable, maybe even at times a bit guilty that it’s not something we want to live up to. I remember talking about this scripture with a friend, and he said, “Well I just don’t really agree with that. Giving without a repayment? Loving people who are mean to you? And frankly not everything is forgivable.” I gently reminded him that his argument wasn’t with what I was telling him, but what Jesus actually said in the gospel. The hardest place to find ourselves in faith is seeing what Jesus said and reconciling it with, “I just don’t like or agree with that.” 

If we claim to be followers of Christ, though, we have to remember that Jesus went willing to a cross to love and redeem those who followed closely, and those who mocked him to his face. He went to a cross for the thief that had faith and the one who cursed him. He went to the cross for Peter, the rock on whom the church was built, and Judas, who sealed Jesus’s crucifixion with a kiss, handing him over to his enemies. The question is not and never who Jesus went to the cross to redeem and save, but who is willing to follow him in taking up their own crosses? That’s much harder to answer.

I think Joseph is an excellent example here. The parallels between Joseph’s journey and Jesus’s are strong and likely intentional. Joseph was betrayed by those closest to him and trafficked to a foreign country. He was made to work as a servant, or more accurately, a slave, in a foreign home, and betrayed again by his owners lies. He was wrongfully jailed and left to be forgotten. But in one miraculous moment, he is redeemed and placed in a position of power and glory. The parallels are there. 

In the story we hear today in Genesis, Joseph is encountering his brothers again, the very ones who betrayed and sold him into servitude and trafficking to Egypt. As one of the highest commanders in Egypt, Joseph could have exacted his revenge in the most vicious and incredible ways. He could have made his brothers pay dearly for their betrayal and cruelty to him. Their very lives, and indeed the lives of their families, were in Joesph’s hands, and he could have gotten sweet revenge. 

But Joseph was a man of God, who followed the God of mercy and forgiveness. Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Forgive those who have wronged you. Joseph knew that because God had blessed him so abundantly, he could not turn his back on God and give in to his most evil instincts toward his brothers. We see in both the story of Jesus and Joseph signs of forgiveness and love. Judas gave Jesus the kiss of betrayal and death even though Jesus shared communion and his holiness with Judas. Joseph kissed his brothers in love and forgiveness. In the end, Joseph was blessed, and Judas left this life with guilt. 

Following in the way of Jesus is hard, and this is the most difficult side of love we will ever see. But too many things live in our heads rent-free. Too many wounds, unforgiven wrongs, judgments, silent condemnations, stingy moments, anger at enemies, too much of this lives in the hearts and minds of humankind. Love, be generous, judge not, condemn not, and begrudge not anyone in your life. In that way, people will see Christ living and shining forth from you. 

We must also, though, be prepared to deal with the times people don’t love us, harbor anger at us, judge us, condemn us, hate us, curse us, even if we are unaware the depths of hard feelings in another human’s heart. As Christ’s followers, we must live up to and be changed by the forgiveness, grace, love, and mercy we receive. In all times and situations, the burden stays on us to show Christ’s love and grace in all times and situations, no matter how hard it may be. Our victory in this life is found in our ability to seek out Christ and live out Christ in every situation. 

Some days, faith is harder than others.  We may feel just a little bit petty, angry, and “judgy.” We may hope God engages in a little cosmic karma and blows up the septic system of our enemies. I had a friend who said, “I don’t wish evil upon my enemies, just a long series of inconveniences.” I had another person say to me one time, “I do pray for my enemies. I pray that they see Jesus face to face…today.” But the measure of us as followers of Jesus is not how we treat those whom we love easily, but those for whom it is very hard to love. There is nothing more clear and certain that when Jesus says to us, “Do to others as you would like them to do to you.” When we encounter the difficult side of love, may we always turn back to Jesus to lead the way.

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1361192348381505/

Woe? Whoa!

Woe? Whoa!—Psalm1; Luke 6: 17-26

[SLIDE 1] The great televangelist Jesse Duplantis recently theorized that if you want Jesus to return early, [SLIDE 2] try to give more donations to your pastor. His more literal quote was, “Jesus has not returned because people have refused to donate enough money.” His net worth is around 20 million. He calls poverty a curse. [SLIDE 3] Other prominent minsters have asked for private jets, large homes, one even praised God for a member giving the preacher a Bentley as the member’s dying wish. There are many who believe that in this life wealth is the end goal of the gospel. There are also many for whom the gospel takes a backseat to their love of money and power. [SLIDE 4]

The Sermon on the Mount in Matthew is a true lesson in comfort and encouragement for people who feel the sufferings and oppression in life, especially because of their faith. In Luke’s gospel it is known as the Sermon on the Plain. Here we see a fiery Jesus who looks and sounds like an old school fire and brimstone preacher. Matthew’s gospel focused on a Jewish audience who would have been suffering spiritually with the oppression of the day, so it’s written to bring comfort. Luke’s gospel is written for a gentile audience, who need to be called to a place of repentance for their love of power and wealth, and taught how to be a generous and loving follower of Jesus. 

We first hear from Luke that Jesus performed many miraculous healings including healing from diseases and casting out evil spirits. And he did so for everyone who was there. One of the most beautiful things about our gospel stories, and especially this one, is that Jesus never turned someone away. Whether they were impoverished, unclean, sick, possessed, a pharisee, or an oppressive ruler, Jesus never turned anyone away. He offered healing and spoke the same words of love and grace to all. 

In 2022, it was estimated that the United States has a combined total of $137.6 trillion in wealth, making us the richest country on earth. In 2024, Cole Schmidtknecht [SLIDE 5] died from lack of an inhaler for his asthma when the cost rose from $66 to $539. If you google deaths from cost of insulin, you’ll see dozens of news articles on 20 something year olds dying because their insulin was over $1,300. One of them is Alec Smith, age 26. [SLIDE 6] Many of you have talked about being unable to get medicines or afford them because the price was so extreme. In a country where we have over 100 trillion in wealth, people die from being unable to afford basic medications. I wonder what the Jesus who healed everybody who came to him in Luke’s gospel for today would say about that?

[SLIDE 7] Jesus then teaches the people: blessed are the poor for the kingdom of God is yours, blessed are the hungry for they will be satisfied, blessed are those who weep for they will soon laugh. Whereas Matthew’s Beatitudes focus on spiritual poverties, Luke makes it more concrete: the poor, the hungry, and the sorrowful. The truth is neither one is exclusively accurate. There are times when we suffer because we have nothing. There are times we suffer because, even though we can afford what we need, inside our spirits are hurting. There are times when people will suffer from the physical problems that come from living on a broken earth. But there are also times our spirit and soul will feel malnourished, beaten up, broken, and hurting. There are times we will weep because we’ve experienced loss, and sometimes, we weep and have no real idea why. And in every single one of those situations, Jesus offers a blessing. 

In many instances that blessing is us, the ones who follow Jesus. What makes this scripture hard is that Jesus doesn’t stop with the blessings, he adds curses: sorrows awaiting the rich, sorrows awaiting the fat and prosperous, sorrows awaiting those praised by crowds. In the older translations, the warning is even more dire, for it says: Woe to you who are rich, woe to the full, woe to the laughing, woe to those spoken well of. And when we hear that we think, “Woe? Whoa!” [CLICK FOR TEXT]

I was once asked, “So when Jesus says, ‘Woe to the rich,’ what kind of number are we talking about here…half a million, more?” I don’t think that’s how it works. You have to jump to Matthew to understand what Luke is trying to say. [SLIDE 8] Matthew picks up on this theme and says you cannot serve God and money. The letter to Timothy echoes the theme telling us that the love of money is the root of all evil. It goes back to that age-old question, who or what do you worship? 

[SLIDE 9] Too many people seem to think that faith is a road of ease and wealth. A friend and pastor once told his congregation, your faith in Christ is not at all like winning the lottery. Instead, it’s more like the greatest retirement plan you can get for your work. We do the work of Christ here on earth for the treasures stored up in heaven awaiting us when our time on earth is done. That doesn’t mean God WON’T bless us, but that should not be our expectation. As another friend said, “Faith won’t bring you a new Ferrari, but it will bring you hope for eternity. 

[SLIDE 10] When I was preparing for this sermon, I saw a funny comic. It’s a picture of Jesus teaching and it says, “I want you to be rich, so naturally the more faithfully you adhere to my teachings, the wealthier you will become…oh and you should then give that wealth to the super rich pastor who shared this teaching with you.” And the title under it says, “Things Jesus Never Said.” [SLIDE 11]

Faith is not always an easy road, and it never has been. It won’t make you world-rich. It won’t make you necessarily popular. Jesus even gave us a very clear warning that we may just have to be blessed in the midst of hatred and persecution. But when you travel with Jesus by your side, you can feel in that holy presence, how much easier life is and how much hope you can have for every tomorrow. 

I like how the Psalm for today comforts us. There is joy and hope in following Jesus instead of giving in to the pathways that lead us into wickedness, evil, and false gods which manifest as a gospel, but lack in anything holy. For those who are steadfast in following God, they live like strong trees at the riverbank holding fast and being fruitful in any circumstance. 

The journey of faith is not about the private jet, the gifts of millions, fancy houses, the Bently, and so forth. The journey of faith is about connecting people closer and closer to a God who loves them and to Jesus whose redemptive work saves us and whose presence leads us. Luke reminds us that our work in the name of Jesus is about lifting up those who are broken, feeding the hungry, and caring for the poor. It’s about making sure we are present with the persecuted, and take a stand for what is right in every situation. 

The Psalm tells us that those who remain close to God are like strong trees by the riverbank, nourished, and fruit bearing year after year. Faith may not bring you the greatest things in this life. You may not wind up miraculously rich. You may not have all the security you want from all troubles. You may not find the most peaceful life here. The struggles and troubles of life will continue to be present with us, just as it was the disciples, and Jesus. But in walking with God, in letting our lives be part of this fabric of faith in Christ Jesus we find a hope that outweighs any trouble here on earth. We find a hope that is timeless and eternal. In Christ the woes of this life become the hope of eternal life. And that makes it all worthwhile.

Worship Service Video https://www.facebook.com/fccmacon/videos/1289029392212954/