Monthly Archives: July 2010

Who Will Work For The Lord?

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This was the last week that I was with the Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City United Methodist Churches.  They received a new pastor and he began the next week.  I was asked to lead the Mulberry and Alma, Kansas, United Methodist Churches for three weeks starting on July 23, 1995.

It was during this five week assignment when I would leave my apartment at about 5:30 or so in the morning and drive across Kansas back roads to Elk Falls for the 8 am service, then drive to Longton for the 930 service, then drive to Elk City for the 11 service and then finally back home to Pittsburg (a total of 185 miles) that I began to think that maybe I could do something in the ministry.

As it turned out, it was not to the full-time ministry that I was called but rather to be something of a 21st century circuit rider, filling the pulpits of the various churches in this district during the summer.  (see “How I Spent My Summer Vacation” and “On The Road Again” for summaries of 2008 and 2009.)  I am in the midst of a five week series of assignments that began two weeks ago at the New Milford United Methodist Church (“What does It Take”) and continued on July 4th at a combined services of the Fort Montgomery United Methodist Church and the United Methodist Church of the Highlands (“The Problem With Change”).  I will be at the Cornwall United Methodist Church this coming Sunday, July 11th (“Drawing A Straight Line”) and Hankins United Methodist Church (“Are We Watching The Same Game?” on July 18th and "To Build A New Community" on July 25th).  On August 1st, I go back to Ridges/Roxbury United Methodist Church and The United Methodist Church of Springdale (“Time Has Come Today”).

After I originally posted this, I got the request to go to the Van Cortlandtville Community Church on August 8th (“The Answer To The Question”)

So I began working for the Lord back in 1995 and I continue to do so today.  Here is the message that I presented to the Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City United Methodist Churches for the 7th Sunday after Pentecost, 16 July 1995.  The Scriptures for this Sunday (from the New Common Lectionary) were 2 Kings 2: 1, 6 – 14, Colossians 1: 1 – 14, and Luke 10: 25 – 37.

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The title to my sermon last week was "Are You Working for God?" I think that best represented what I was trying to say. The title of today’s sermon, which I feel best expresses the ideas brought forth in the script, is "Who Will Work for the Lord?"

In the passage from 2 Kings, we have the transition from Elijah to Elisha as prophet to Israel. The dramatic story of Elijah’s ascension to heaven in a storm constitutes the climax of the narratives about this mysterious figure. Of all of the acts of power associated with him, this is the one that has most intrigued readers and fueled speculation about the prophet’s character and eventual return. By the end of the OT period he had already been connected with the coming of the "day of the Lord", while later Jewish and Christian traditions associated him with the Messiah.

As we read some weeks ago, there were people in Jesus’ time who thought that Jesus was only Elijah returned to earth. But these people were thinking of Jesus in terms of the old church. Jesus was offering a vision of a new church, one not bound by the tradition of law but one responsive to the needs of the people.

And, the passage from Luke deals not only with the question that we as Christians must answer but with the question of how the church interacts with and in society. In teaching the lawyer about whom his neighbor was Jesus provided guidelines for how the church should continue.

A lawyer, or as some translations give it, a teacher of the law, engages Jesus in a scholarly dialogue. But the course of the dialogue changes from reaching eternal life to a question which is still with us today, "Who is my neighbor?"

In the first part of the dialogue and in the traditional sense, a neighbor is one who receives kindness, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself (my emphasis) (Luke 10: 27)

This is what the law required. But the law often times never told how one meets the requirements. That may be why the lawyer then asks "And who is my neighbor?" (Luke 10: 29)

The parable of the Good Samaritan points out that simply following the law does not always meet the requirements of the law. For while the two individuals who passed by the injured traveler did nothing wrong according to law which stated they should avoid contact with a half-dead person, they did nothing to help the individual. But the Samaritan, the one person that Jewish society shunned more than any one, was this person’s neighbor because he went beyond the law in providing aid to this individual.

In effect, Jesus was asking who did the work of the church. This, in itself, may be considered a revolutionary thought. No one had thought of the church in terms of reaching out to help their neighbors. Yet, in his message and in his actions, that is what Jesus tried to do throughout his entire ministry.

These were same questions that John Wesley struggled with for many years. He could not sit idly by and watch his church ignore the plight and conditions of the lower classes.

When you think of England in the 18th century, you might not be too sure that it is not America today. I have always wondered if Wesley were to come to America today if he might not thing it was England of his time. It was a time when more and more people were getting wealthy every day. Poverty in Wesley’s time was thought to be a reflection of one’s sinful life. If you were rich, it was because you had lead a good life. If you were poor, it was because you did not live the right kind of life. It wasn’t the church’s fault that people were hungry and homeless; that medical care for the lower classes was almost non-existent; that only the rich could afford to go to school. The conditions of the last few years have made me think that were Wesley to come back to America in the 1990’s, he would not see many differences. On the subject of poverty and one’s neighbors, Wesley said

"Has poverty nothing worse in it that this, that it makes men liable to be laughed at? … Is not want of food something worse than this? God pronounced it as a curse upon man, that he should earn it" by the sweat of his brow." But how many are there in this Christian country that toil, and labor, and sweat, and have it not at last, but struggle with weariness and hunger together? Is it not worse for one, after a hard day’s labor, to come back to a poor, cold, dirty, uncomfortable lodging, and to find there not even the food which is needful to repair his wasted strength? You that live at ease in the earth, that want nothing but eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to understand how well God hath dealt with you, is it not worse to seek bread day by day, and find none? Perhaps to find the comfort also of five or six children crying for what he has not to give! Were it not that he is restrained by an unseen hand, would he not soon "curse God and die"? O want of bread! Want of bread! Who can tell what this means, unless he hath felt it himself? I am astonished it occasions no more than heaviness even in them that believe." (From John Wesley’s sermon "Heaviness through Manifold Temptations")

John Wesley understood that a church and a nation which ignores members of its society could never expect to reach worldly success, let alone success in Heaven. Having accepted Christ as one’s personal Savior, you could not sit back and wait for the Glory of the Lord to come to you. You had to take the message of the Gospel, both in thought, word, and deed, out into the world.

It was through the Methodist Societies that Wesley and his followers that the first Sunday Schools were created. These schools, which became the foundation for our public school education, were offered on Sundays because it was the only time many children had the opportunity to come to school as they were working in the factories and mines the other six days. Here the Societies taught the Gospel and preached the Salvation of Jesus Christ.

What I have always found interesting in reading and following the development of the early Methodist Church is the reaction of the organized church, the Church of England. Instead of supporting the work of Wesley and his followers, the authorities barred them from using existing churches. This did not stop the Methodist Revival. Wesley and the other early Methodist ministers simply began preaching wherever they could find the space. If that meant preaching in the fields, they preached in the fields.

When we look at the world today, I sometimes think that we see much the same as Wesley did some two hundred and fifty years ago. The world is crying for a spiritual revolution. The actions of many people simply speak to a loss of direction.

Paul did not start the church in Colossians as he had other churches that he wrote to, but showed a great interest in what happened there.

Paul’s letter to the Colossians shows this personal interest in the people and is meant to warn them against falling back to their previous life style. He wrote that he and others were praying " that you may lead lives worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God" (Colossians 1: 10)

William Barclay, the writer of many commentaries, wrote

"As Paul grew older, he came more and more to see that what matters is individual people. The church is people. The church is not a kind of vague abstract entity; it is individual men and women and children and as the years went on Paul began to think less and less of the church as a whole, and more and more of the church as individual women."

Today, people no longer see the church in those terms but one which no longer cares about people and is indifferent to society. If the church is to have an impact on today’s society in more positive terms, it must respond in the manner that Jesus showed us. Elton Trueblood wrote

Because we cannot reasonably expect to erect a constantly expanding structure of social activism upon a constantly diminishing foundation of faith, attention to the cultivation of the inner life is our first order of business, even in a period of rapid social change. The church, if it is to affect the world, must become a center from which new spiritual power emanates. While the church must be secular in the sense that it operates in the world, if it is only secular it will not have the desired effect upon the secular order which it is called to penetrate. With no diminution of concern for people, we can and must give new attention to the production of a trustworthy religious experience. (From The New Man for Our Time, Elton Trueblood)

The people of Jesus’ time no longer heard a message of a Loving Father who cared for His children. Many people at that time probably did not even know that their God cared for them. The rules and regulations of the church made it impossible for them to do so. It wasn’t that they had left their religion but that their religion had left them. The message they did hear held no promise or hope.

But with Jesus and his sacrifice on the cross, the church began anew. As Paul wrote in his 2nd letter to the Corinthians:

"He (speaking of Jesus) is the one who has helped us tell others about his new agreement to save them. We do not tell them that they must obey every law of God or die; but we tell them there is life for them for the Holy Spirit. The old way, trying to be saved by keeping the Ten Commandments, ends in death; in the new way, the Holy Spirit gives them life. (2 Corinthians 3: 6)

The problem that one gets into by simply following the law is that you start putting limits to your actions. It would be the same as going through life with your fists clenched, unwilling to grab new opportunities as they pass by. As I close today, I want us to consider that statement from Paul. Can we live up to this standard; are we working for the Lord?

What Cost Freedom?

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This was the third in a six-week assignment with the Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City United Methodist Churches.

As it came on the 4th of July weekend, I was faced with a dilemma, one that I think many ministers, preachers, and lay speakers have.  How do you speak of freedom in a political sense in a church?  The problem, that I didn’t sense fifteen years ago when I gave this message but which I think is far too common today, is that many pastors and too many laity put God at the head of our armed forces.  As one general said a couple of years ago, our God is better than their God.  The only problem with this statement is that their God is our God.

Freedom is more than political or military superiority.  I wonder when we are going to learn that?

So, here is the message that I presented on the 5th Sunday after Pentecost, 2 July 1995.  The Scriptures (from the New Common Lectionary) are 1 Kings 19: 15 – 21, Galatians 5: 1, 13 – 25, and Luke 9: 51 – 62.

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What is freedom? That may be one of the most difficult concepts man has ever been asked to define. Freedom could be considered one’s ability to choose and guide one’s own life. To a sixteen-year-old, freedom is a driver’s license. Freedom to worship at a church of one’s choosing, our very presence here today, was one of the reasons this country was founded. I really think that the political debates that we listen to over the course of the next few months, nor matter what is actually said, will center on a definition of freedom.  (As I noted in “Another One” where I related a story about my life, this story is one that I have used in the past as well.  This was the first time that I put the idea of freedom into the context of turning 16 and getting one’s driver’s license.  I expanded the story on other occasions.)

What is the cost of freedom? That is the hidden question. As we have discovered at some point in time, becoming freedom does not come cheap. To the sixteen-year old, having a driver’s license means nothing if there is no gas in the car, or for that matter, if there is no car. When we leave home and are finally free, we find out that we must still pay the rent and utilities.

I grew up on Air Force bases in the fifties and sixties and the price of freedom was seen by the B-52 bombers that flew from some of those bases. As long as those planes sat on the runway with the bomb bay doors open, we knew we were safe. For those planes were the alert planes, scheduled only to fly if we went to war with the Soviet Union. The cost of freedom in those days was eternal vigilance.

But today, I speak of a different freedom. What is it to live a life without sin? But what is the cost of that freedom? As Paul has written, in Christ we have our freedom from sin. But that freedom comes with a cost. To some, that cost and the freedom it gains is not worth the price. Faced with the perils and unknown of the wilderness in front of them and the Egyptian army behind them, the Israelites were willing to go back into slavery in Egypt rather than being free and becoming their own nation. In Exodus 14: 10 – 14 we read

When Pharaoh drew near, the people of Israel lifted up their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they were in great fear. And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord; and they said to Moses, "Is it because there are no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us, in bringing us out of Egypt? Is not this what we said to you in Egypt, ‘Let us alone and let us serve the Egyptians?’ For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness." And Moses said to the people, "Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today, for the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be still." (Exodus 14: 10 – 14)

Many people often think that being a Christian is dull and boring. In terms of early America, all we have to do is think of the Puritans and the seemingly humorless life they lead. Perhaps the Puritans, as we think of their lifestyle, overdid it the structure of life a bit. But we must realize that freedom without structure is a hollow freedom. In seeking the fruits of freedom without concern many people find out that their life is empty and without purpose. Without a structure, we allow sin to invade our lives. That is why the Israelites would have gone back to Egypt; there they had a familiar structure. It was the covenant that God offered them that provided the structure of freedom that they needed.

When we choose freedom, that is, when we choose to follow Christ, we choose a path from which we cannot turn back. In the passage from Luke, Jesus set his eyes on Jerusalem. We know that look; we have all seen it in others. It is the look of single-mindedness, of determination.

Jesus knew that his mission on this earth would only succeed when He went to Jerusalem and that nothing was going to stop him from that journey. Not even a village which ignored him.

The signers of the Declaration of Independence knew full well that signing that document put them on a single path. If the revolution was a success, they would have a new country. If the revolution failed, they would be hanged by the British as traitors. To them, freedom from England was well worth that price. And when the time came, there was no hesitation on their part to sign that document.

When Elijah came to Elisha and made him the offer to be his replacement, Elisha’s first response was hesitation. He thought that he would have time to say good-bye to his parents. That, of course, is the natural thing to do. Still, faced with the rebuke from Elijah, Elisha went forward. Elisha’s act of burning the yoke, killing his oxen, and using the fire to cook the food for his workers was as dramatic a step as the flourish John Hancock used when he signed the Declaration of Independence. Having destroyed all that was his previous life; Elisha could now go forward as Elijah’s successor.

William Barclay commented that "To Paul, a theology was not of the slightest use unless it could be lived out in the world." To John Wesley, your life had but one direction when you surrender it to Christ. That is why Jesus told the young man that he could not bury his father. He was not being callous or unconcerned about Jewish tradition. But if the young man was to follow Him, that path must be his first priority. When you choose to surrender your life to Christ, there is no other path you can follow; there is no other task that you can undertake.

The cost of freedom today is simple. Commit our lives to Christ. As Paul wrote some many times,

"I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me" (Galatians 2: 20)

We are no longer slaves to sin; no longer are we prisoners to the sins of the flesh but our lives are centered on Christ and we can go forward knowing that our freedom is truly that. And a life in Christ serves us well in our work, be it the factory, the schoolroom, the desk, or the farm, and in our play. By living in Christ, God becomes a part of our everyday life and that is a reason to celebrate.

Another One

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This was the second in a five-week assignment with the Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City United Methodist Churches.

This was the message for the 4th Sunday after Pentecost, 25 June 1999.  The Scriptures from the New Common Lectionary were 1 Kings 19: 9 – 14, Galatians 3: 23 – 29, Luke 9: 18 – 24.  And yes, I have used the story about my brothers and sister many times.  This would be the first time I related it to the Gospel reading.

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I am the oldest of four children. When I graduated from high school in 1968, I immediately moved to Kirksville, Missouri, where I started (actually continued) my college studies. In 1980, when circumstances required it, I moved back to Memphis. In doing so, I surprised a lot of people who were not aware that Terry, Tim, and Tracey Mitchell had an older brother. Often times, when I would show up at a place with my brothers, the comment made was "You mean there’s another one!"

This response was often in surprise because no one expected there to be an older Mitchell brother. But I don’t think it was that type of response the disciples gave when Jesus asked them who people thought he was. I think that response was one more of resignation than surprise, "Oh yes, he is another prophet."

This apparent apathy from the general population also brought concern from other sources. When John the Baptist was in jail, he sent a message to Jesus. (Matthew 11: 2 – 3)

When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples and said to him,” Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?"

The people of Israel at that time were looking for a Messiah, one who could lead them out of their troubles. But the message Jesus brought to the people of Israel was not necessarily the message the people wanted to hear.

We often get confused when what we are looking for gets lost in the daily routine. Remember the last time you couldn’t find the house keys. The harder you tried to find them, the more frustrated you became. Consider Elijah. He is in a cave at the Mount of Horeb, having escaped Jezebel and the men hunting him down. Yet, when the Lord asks him why is there, his reply is one of confusion and depression. For all his work as a prophet, the people of Israel still left God for the gods of Baal. So God told him to stand on the mountain as He passed by. Yet though there was a great wind, an earthquake, and a fire, the Lord did not pass by.

Can you imagine what it was like when after the wind, the earthquake, and the fire, there was nothing but silence? To the writers of the Old Testament, the wind, earthquake, and fire were all signs of God; yet, in this passage, God was not in those signs. The message in the passage from 1 Kings is very clear. If our lives are not in focus when God is near, we can still miss him as he passes by.

The message that Jesus was trying to tell his disciples was very much the same message. Do not be looking for the apparent signs of fire, wind, and earthquakes but look around you at what is happening. As Jesus pointed out to John the Baptist,

…Go and tell John what you hear and see; the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me. (Matthew 11: 4 – 6)

To Paul, the message was clear. Paul wrote in Galatians that the law had been our disciplinarian, our guide and protector. In the context of what Paul wrote, a disciplinarian was not a teacher but a slave who guarded and supervised children. Having accepted Christ through faith, we are no longer limited by the law but given a freedom through our faith in Jesus Christ. Through this freedom, we have the capabilities of going beyond the obvious. Our protection is still there but with a freedom never before known.

Therein lays our problem. We are used to the law and cannot see the freedom that Jesus offers. But we must realize what faith means and what it requires. Faith is a trust and it requires a complete commitment from us.

Are we prepared to follow Christ as He asked his followers? Turn with me to Mark 8: 34 – 38.

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake and for the sake of the gospel will save it. For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. (Mark 8: 34 – 38)

This offer to follow Jesus offers us applies no matter who we are or what we are or who we would be. This message and offer was far different from anything the prophets might have said or done. It was also a message never given in the synagogue and it was accompanied by actions which showed there was a power behind the words. But instead of gloom, it was a message of hope and joy and a vision for the future.

What Paul wrote in Galatians, those verses that inspired Hymn #548 was the same message. When we come to Christ in faith, we all are one. This is not a statement of conformity but rather a statement that we are all in agreement about what we want our lives to be. The confusion that reined in the time of Jesus, the confusion that Elijah felt exits no longer when we allow Jesus to enter into our hearts.

We tell each other that Jesus loves us but do we show that love to others? Do we allow the Grace of Jesus Christ that is in our hearts, that warming of our souls, to be felt by others?

Today Jesus asks us the same questions he asked the disciples on the road to Caesarea Philippi: "But who do YOU say that I am?" (Mark 8: 29)

Hide And Seek

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As I noted last week when I posted "Are You Working For God?”, this series of sermons that I preached at the Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City United Methodist Churches were the first that I ever preached outside my home church.

This was the first in a five-week assignment while the conference sought to find a pastor for the churches.  One of the things that I did in this message/sermon was try and relate what was happening in the world today to what I found in the Scripture readings that I was using for that particular Sunday.

Scott O’Grady was the Air Force pilot that was shot done over Bosnia on June 2, 1995.  As I mentioned last week in my message “The Problem With Change”, if we do not find ways to make the passages of the Bible relevant to today’s world, then the Bible becomes a fixed document trapped in history.

So, here is the first message I gave in the role of long-term pulpit supply at the Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City United Methodist Churches on the 3rd Sunday after Pentecost, 18 June 1995.  The Scriptures from the New Common Lectionary are 1 Kings 19: 1 – 8, Galatians 2: 15 – 21, and Luke 7: 36 – 8: 3.

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I am sure that as a child or even perhaps as a parent playing with children, you have played hide and seek. For us, it is a pleasant game by which we can pass the time. For Captain Scott O’Grady, the game of hide and seek took on a little more serious meaning this last week. Shot down over Bosnia, he had to play hide and seek with the Bosnian Serbs who shot him down until such time that he could communicate with members of his combat air wing and arrange for his rescue. As has been noted by others all ready, the story of his rescue would make a very good movie-of-the-week.

What I found interesting about this rescue story was who Captain O’Grady thanked first when he came back to his airbase at Aviano, Italy. While he did thank the men and women of his wing for looking for him and to the Marines who went in to get him, the first person that he thanked was God, for giving him the strength to persevere.

The last point made at the Escape and Evasion school is that one should always keep the faith that he or she will be picked up. Captain O’Grady’s training provided him with the skills to survive but only through his faith were those skills of any use. For Captain O’Grady that faith was more than just a faith in the system but the knowledge that God would protect him, which is what he did. As Paul wrote in his letter to the Galatians, success comes not by living the law but by our faith in Jesus Christ. Only by our faith does following the law make living possible.

The passage from the Old Testament gives us another example of escape and evasion. In the passage from 1 Kings that we read, Elijah is fleeing from the queen Jezebel for having shown the prophets of Baal to be powerless against God and having killed them all. And now, as one might expect, Elijah is running for his life. But, as he seeks solace and security, Elijah also feels that he is not ready to be the servant of the Lord "It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors." (1 Kings 19: 4)

For a moment, his faith in God has lapsed and he is ready to die. But an angel of the Lord comes to him and provides him with enough food and water so that Elijah can travel to Horeb. In making this journey, Elijah retraces the path of the Israelites through the wilderness and comes to the place where Israel’s covenant with God was first made.

In effect God said to Elijah, "I am not done with you yet. You may feel that you are alone and helpless but I am still here and I will provide and protect you." That is the challenge that we face today. Do we have the faith that God will protect and provide for us? We need not be shot down behind enemy lines for this faith to be tested. How different would our lives be if we did not have faith in Jesus Christ?

Faith simply means trust. It begins with a conviction, knowledge that our righteous does not meet God’s standard. The law, as Paul tells us, helps us to discover this reality. Faith is not blind. It builds on authentic biblical facts, so it is not mere speculation. We stake our lives on the outcome. Faith is trusting Christ to prove his promise.

Look at verse 16 in Galatians again.

"Yet we know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law, because no one will be justified by the works of the law.

That is a personal commitment to Jesus. We can actually run to Him for refuge and to seek mercy.

It took a great deal of courage for that woman in the passage from Luke to come to Jesus and even more courage for her to wash his feet. In society at that time, a woman with her reputation had no chance of being seen in the Pharisee’s house; but her love of Jesus and her understanding of what he could offer her overcame any resistance she might have had.

As was noted in one of the books which I used to prepare for this sermon, just as the people at the Pharisee’s house were watching that woman, other people are watching us as we go through our daily lives. Do we show our loving worship of Christ? Have we given our reputation to Him? Do our actions each day show that we love Christ, just as He loved us?

We see — and who does not? — the numberless follies and miseries of our fellow creatures. We see on every side either men of no religion at all or men of a lifeless, formal religion. We are grieved at the sight, and should greatly rejoice if, by any means, we might convince some that there is a better religion to be attained, a religion worthy of God that gave it. And this we conceived to be no other than love: the love of God and of all mankind; the loving God with all our heart and soul and strength, as having first loved us, as the fountain of all the good we have received and of all we ever hope to enjoy; and the loving every soul which God hath made, every man on earth, as our own soul.

Those comments come not from me, but from John Wesley some two hundred and fifty years ago. But those words still hold true today. For if we do not love God first and show this love in our actions each day, how will we ever change the world in which we live?

Where would Elijah have been if he had refused the offer of food and drink from the angel? Where would we be if we refused to acknowledge the presence of Christ in today’s world and the love that He has for us. Will we continue to play hide-and-seek with the Lord?

The Problem With Change

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I am preaching at the combined service for the Fort Montgomery United Methodist Church (US 9W South, Fort Montgomery, NY 10922) and the United Methodist Church of the Highlands (341 Main Street,  Highland Falls, NY 10928).  The service is in Highland Falls at 9:30 and you are welcome to be a part of the worship.  The Scriptures for this 6th Sunday after Pentecost, 4 July 2010, are 2 Kings 5: 1 – 14, Galatians 6: 1 – 16, and Luke 10: 1 – 11, 16 – 20.

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If I were to say that the church today, be it an individual church of any denomination, the United Methodist Church as a whole, or the church in general, was in trouble, I doubt very seriously that anyone would disagree with me. While some individual churches are doing well, the general state of the church in this country is not very good.

For a while earlier this summer I was reading summaries of the Annual Conferences as they appeared on the United Methodist News Service link on the Methoblog. I discovered that three Annual Conferences in this area were ceasing operation and either forming a new combined Annual Conference or merging with neighboring Annual Conferences. I gathered from my reading of the various reports that there is still a decline in the membership of the United Methodist Church though I got the impression that the decline was slowing down. That data will take a couple of years to determine; data on church membership can be found at http://www.umc.org/site/c.lwL4KnN1LtH/b.6072819/k.2327/Membership.htm#decline.

But it is the view of the church outside the walls of the church that also speaks to the troubles of the church. There are those outside the church who see religion as just another superstition; they see wars fought by mankind in the name of God as evidence that God is an angry and a violent God. They hear the pronouncement of tired old men and conclude that the church today is sexist, repressive, and autocratic. They see a church seeking to control the minds of the people through ideology and ignorance. They see a church out of touch with reality.

And you know what? Many times, they are right. What was it that Paul wrote to the Galatians in today’s Epistle reading? Watch out for those who would impose a legal structure on you as a justification for what they did to Christ. See how they insist that you follow the law while they are free to do whatever they please.

When I look at the church in general, I see a church that is monolithic in structure, many times dedicated to the continuance of that structure. And it is not always a corporate mentality; it is the mindset and desire of the people in many individual churches to maintain the status quo, even in the face of impending doom. It is almost as if such churches are defiantly saying, “we have done it this way for two hundred years and we are not about to change now.” The only problem is that today, the sanctuary is barely full, there are virtually no young people in the congregation and Sunday school is often times a fond memory. There are a number of such churches in this district and, unless something is done immediately, many of these churches will be closing their doors in the next five years.

And yet there is evidence to suggest that the population of this area is increasing. I cannot speak to this side of the Hudson River and its population growth but I know that there is steady increase in population on “my side” of the river and it is in areas where there are United Methodist Churches. If there was ever a situation that mirrored the Gospel reading for today, it is now but to make the Gospel reading a reality will require change, change on the part of the denomination and change on the part of the churches in the area.

Now, I know what people will say when they hear the word “change.” If they don’t run out of the sanctuary screaming in panic, they say that they cannot change because and any number of excuses is given. I am reminded of the United Methodist version of a modern classic joke.

“How many United Methodists does it take to change a light bulb?”

“What! My grandmother knew Thomas Edison personally and she gave this church that light bulb and you want to change it!!”

If there is something that we fear more than fear, it is change. We have created a comfort zone in our churches today. When we come to church, we are insulated from the problems of the world and get a brief respite from them.

We have created a religion where God is our servant and is supposed to do what we ask rather than one where we are the servants doing what is expected of us because we are God’s children. We are like Naaman, who when Elisha told him to go wash seven times in the Jordan River, got angry and threw a temper tantrum and said, “I thought that he’d personally come out and meet me, call on the name of God, wave his hand on the diseased spot, and get rid of the disease.”

Naaman wanted a cure that reflected his stature and power, not a cure that was based on the person. He wanted God to be his servant instead of being the servant of God.

But when we do that, when we make God our servant, we become blind to the many ways that God can be working in the world. Putting God inside the church walls and keeping Him there makes Him exclusive, available only for the so-called chosen ones. And keeping him there provides a relief for those who fear radical change.

As some of you know I grew up in the South and I saw the effects of segregation. Now, I will admit that I don’t recall what many of the pastors preached back then but I do know that I went to the same Methodist church as George Wallace did when he was governor of Alabama in 1962. In retrospect, I never did understand how it was that any minister could, in good conscience, oppose the Civil Rights movement at that time. But many, both in the North and in the South did, and they still maintain those same conservative, exclusionary, repressive attitudes today. When you read about Jesus eating with sinners and you see ministers and congregants proclaiming that sinners are not welcome in their church today, you have to begin wondering what is going on.

I will say that I was fortunate because I was given opportunities to explore my faith and come to my own conclusions about the church, the denomination, my faith and my relationship with Christ. It is an exploration that has continued on to this day. Not everyone has been given the same and in so many churches where things are “fixed”, we see the people leaving.

There was a time when I thought Mount Moriah was a street in my home town of Memphis, Tennessee. And I never could quite figure out how Paul could be writing to a church in Corinth, Mississippi. And Shiloh was the place of the first bloody battle in the Civil War (surpassed later by Antietam and Chickamauga), not a place of peace or that the battle of Shiloh was named after the Methodist Church on the battlefield.

I grew up, as many of you did, with the King James Version of the Bible as the only available translation. But over the years, as I have heard many proclaim it to be the true Word of God, I have to wonder. What happened to the Aramaic and Greek translations of the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? If the Word of the Lord is fixed, why then have there been arguments about what books should be placed in the Bible?

If the Bible is to be the Living Word of God, then it has to be expressed as such. To hold to a 17th century translation with its archaic language is to say that the Bible cannot change. As I mentioned when I read the Gospel reading for this morning, I have been using a translation called The Message. I believe that it is a true translation of what Luke wrote but it is expressed in words that are easier to understand. In the for what it is worth category, someone came up to me after the service where I was preaching last week and asked me about some questions about that translation. She said that she was going to get a copy because it sounded easy to read and understand. Now, as a good old Southern boy, I would use Clarence Jordan’s Cotton Patch Gospels when I could. But the problem with that particular translation is that you have to be familiar with the geography of Georgia.

Our problem is that we do not understand what Christianity is about. Our understanding is based on a structure that came into play some three hundred years after Paul began his mission work. We see the church as more of a corporate entity, a business, than it was some two thousand years ago.

Then Christians were quite content to gather for worship, witness, and service wherever the world would give them the opportunity to do so. The church was designed to fit the conditions of the place. Church organizational structures were very ad hoc and the people were quite willing to take whatever space the world was prepared to give them.

When Paul wrote of the church (as he did in his letter to the Colossians) as being “in every place”, he did not mean that every village had a congregation. Rather, he meant that throughout the Roman world signs of witness to Christ as the Lord of the world had been raised.

If we are to bring life back to the church, if we are to bring the church back to life in society, then we must change things. We must change the way we see the church and that will require that we change what we know about the church, about Jesus, about religion and Methodism, about the world around us and the people who share this world with us. The church cannot be separate from the world if it expects to be a part of the world.

Why did Jesus send the seventy out into the Galilean countryside? Well, in part it was to prepare the countryside for the later work that He would do. But it was, I believe, also a sign to those who followed Jesus that they were expected to to do the work as well. And it is very important that we see that Jesus did not give the authority to continue the work until after they returned and only after He warned them not to let their success go to their heads. As Clarence Jordan translated that passage from Luke, “do not get all hepped up just because the devilish guys gave into you; you should be happy that you’re enrolled in a spiritual cause.” (From the Cotton Patch Gospels translation of Luke)

The church today is expressed in terms of a theology of glory, not a theology of the Cross. We must see our ministry as being one who promotes and tries to practice the compassion, justice, and non-violence that Jesus taught and demonstrated. (From the July issue of Connections) We must free ourselves from the world’s self-assertive ways and be more open to the surprising claims of God that press upon us through our neighbors and the world outside the walls of the church.

And don’t think that it can’t be done. Hear again the words of Paul written to the Galatians, “live creatively” and

Make a careful exploration of who you are and the work you have been given, and then sink yourself into that. Don’t be impressed with yourself. Don’t compare yourself with others. Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.

Don’t tell me that you can’t do it; that you can’t be creative. The fact that two churches are meeting together speaks of a desire to move beyond the routine of traditional worship. But also know that you cannot stop with one new idea. The curse of change is complacency, where one new idea quickly becomes the norm and a radical idea becomes the traditional way of doing things. Yes, that’s hard work and not all ideas are going to be good ones and not all good ideas are going to work.

But think boldly! If you don’t seek new ideas then you will quickly find yourself trapped inside perceived self-boundaries. Change is part of the journey, from where you were to where you are to where you are going. To stop seeking change is to stop the journey.

Consider this – where would we be today if fifty-six men had not gathered in Philadelphia at the end of June and the beginning of July some two hundred and thirty four years ago. Out of that meeting came a document stating that this collection of British colonies was going to try something new and radical. Those fifty-six men, the signers of the Declaration of Independence, fully understood that what they signed would either be a seminal document for the governing of people by themselves or it would be their death warrant.

Their signatures committed them to the process of independence. Without those commitments, the process would have failed.

We are called today to make a change in our lives. The problem with this change is that we are called to commit our lives to Christ and then open our hearts and minds to the power of the Holy Spirit. We are not required to do so but that is the problem. To not answer the call is to say that you wish your life to remain where it is and as it is; it is tantamount to saying that you wish your journey to end.

To answer the call is to begin a new journey with Christ, a journey of freedom and life.

Are You Working For God?

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This was one of my first sermons.  I was living in Pittsburg, Kansas, and was asked by the Parsons District Superintendent, Andrew Gardner, to cover three churches (Elk Falls, Longton, and Elk City) while he found a regular pastor for the charge.

At the time I began this assignment, I was still learning what it meant to be a lay speaker.  I quickly found out that preparing a sermon every week was a little different that what I was used to.  Hopefully, over the past fifteen years, I have begun to figure that out.

I used the New Common Lectionary while preparing this series so the Scripture references are slightly different.  The Scriptures for this 6th Sunday in Pentecost, 9 July 1999 were 1 Kings 21: 1 – 3, 17 – 21; Galatians 6: 7 – 18; and Luke 10: 1 – 12, 17 – 20.

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In my prayer guide is the following passage:

And so when we had a decision to make, we would open the Gospel at random, after having said a prayer, and then we did whatever was written, without adding anything.

This manner of action gave us a boundless liberty, and nurtured simplicity of heart with some solid food.

Another important element taking shape in the community we were forming was the primacy of faith instead of structures.

We felt ourselves to be a community in search of God, not a seminary for the priesthood.

What made us one was Christ, and the imitation of him gave meaning to the manner of living of each one of us.

There was the whole expression around us of the life of a simple Christian. (from I, Francis by Carlo Carretto, page 226 of A Guide to Prayer)

I think the writer was telling us that when we work in Christ and together, what we accomplish will be successful. This is the point made in today’s scripture. When we do something, we do it for the Glory of God. And we do it as a community working together for God.

When we work without God in our lives, we must be prepared for the consequences. Ahab was given the throne of Israel by God. His actions in taking Naboth’s vineyard went beyond the boundaries of the power of the throne. He used the power of the throne without realizing that it wasn’t his throne or his power to claim and he had to face the consequences. We all know of those who have let the power of the office they held blind them to their responsibilities. The same is true for each of us. When we do not recognize from where our skills and powers come from, when we do not acknowledge from where our resources come, we too will fail.

I think of two other situations that illustrate this idea. The first was a young Baptist preacher who described the first sermons he ever preached. He went into great detail about the preparation he put into the first sermon he was going to preach and how his congregation readily accepted those words of wisdom. So well did that sermon go that he said that he thought he had all come from him. So he did not work as hard on the next sermon which was a total disaster. Then he realized that it was not he who prepared the sermons but God and that when he forgot that, the result was failure.

The second preacher was John Praetorius, the pastor of the United Methodist Church in St. Cloud, Minnesota where I was a member. Throughout the year, John jots down ideas about sermons and scriptures that he wants to use and then in August, after much prayer, thought, and work, he hands out a worship book listing the scripture, sermon title, and hymns that he will use for the coming year. He might not work on the actual sermon until it is time but this approach gives him some ideas to work with during his preparation time. The amazing thing to all of this preparation is that when it comes time to actually prepare the sermon, the scripture and the ideas written down over the previous weeks fit into the situation that Grace Church was dealing with that week.

People would always comment on how the sermon really hit the point but John would always say that this is what God wanted said that day.

God is always there, working in our lives. And we must acknowledge that presence. Paul reminds the Galatians of that very point. In Galatians 6: 7, Paul writes "God is not mocked, for you reap whatever you sow. If you sow to your own flesh, you will reap corruption from the flesh; but if you sow to the Spirit, you will reap eternal life from the Spirit." Paul follows this with an exhortation to work for the good of all and a warning to those who try to get you to work for Christ so that they may take all the glory.

The hardest thing in the world today is working for Christ. The essence of Paul’s letter to the Galatians was that first, one cannot work for one’s own glory but for the glory of God. Second, it was the responsibility of the community to support each other in times of trouble and need. Paul was writing to the Galatians because their community was divided about how one worked for God.

In sending out the seventy, Jesus expanded the ministry beyond what He physically could do. He noted to each one of them to take nothing but to depend on the community in which they were. If the community were not to support them, they should go on. And note that when they returned, they rejoiced in the success of their mission because it had been in the name of Jesus. But as Jesus noted, they needed to be careful and understand that their success came through Jesus and if they celebrated as if it were there success, then they would be in trouble.

Though I have no way of telling, I am sure that the words community and communion have a common root. And in our celebration of communion we are celebrating that we are in the community of Christ. We also come knowing that our place at this table is through the grace of God and gift of salvation offered by his Son, our Lord, not by anything we have done on this earth. Our hope and prayer are that what we do today and tomorrow will focus on the celebration of Christ in our lives.