The Heart of the Matter

A sermon written and preached by the Reverend Scott D. Nowack on April 29, 2012

at First Presbyterian Church, Kilgore, Texas.

The Heart of the Matter

1 John 3:16-24

              I have learned over the course of my life that there are certain things I was not created to do with any level of competency.  This was especially true with sports.  In seventh grade gym class, we were introduced to the game of field hockey.  Our teacher explained the rules of the game and how to play.  With a field hockey stick in my hand, I found myself at midfield about to receive the opening pass from center.  The whistle blew and I began to move the ball down the field.  Somehow, someway, I was doing pretty well with this field hockey thing.  I passed everyone carefully controlling the ball with my stick.  Suddenly, just a short distance in front of me, I saw the goal.  As I prepared to take my shot, I tripped, fell flat on my face and lost the ball.  Turns out that little run was the highlight of my field hockey career.  It was all downhill from there.  As hard as I tried, I never became proficient at the sport.  I confess to you today that I am a mediocre field hockey player. 

            The same level of mediocrity came to be when I tried playing other sports like football, baseball, soccer, swimming, golf, and basketball.  My point is this: I could play all these sports, but I could not play any of them really well, that is, with excellence.  There hasn’t been a single sport at which I excelled.  I wallow in the deep valley of athletic mediocrity.

            It’s the same with the ministry and work of the church.  The church at large has a tendency to spread itself too thin doing things that the church doesn’t need to do.  The church gives a little bit here and there, but often fails to focus on doing one or two things really well.  We throw our hats into so many different rings that we aren’t effective in any one of them.  We lose sight of whom we truly are; who God created us to be.  As Christians, we need to focus our energy, enthusiasm and efforts on our core purpose, our true calling: to love one another.

You know, losing sight of who we are and what we’re called to do is easy in the hectic days we live in today.  How would you complete the sentence: “You know you’re living in the year 2012 when…”  I have a list of eleven endings to this sentence:

You know you’re living in the year 2012 when…
1. You accidentally enter your password on the microwave.
2. You haven’t played solitaire with real cards in years.
3. You have a list of 15 phone numbers to reach your family of 3.
4. You e-mail the person who works at the desk next to you.
5. Your reason for not staying in touch with friends and family is that you regularly lose your phone along with everybody’s phone numbers and email addresses.
6. You pull up in your own driveway and use your cell phone to see if anyone is home to help you carry in the groceries.
8. Every commercial on television has a Web site and a Twitter address on the screen.
9. Leaving the house without your cell phone, which you didn’t have the first 20 or 30 (or 60) years of your life, is now a cause for panic and you turn around to go and get it.
10. You get up in the morning and go on line before getting your coffee.
11. You are too busy to notice there was no #7 on this list.

Our busyness and hectic lives pull us away from what we are all about as Christian disciples.  Let us use our time to do what Jesus wants us to do, and do it incredibly well.

The first letter of John makes clear that our core purpose as Christians is to love one another. We see this love in what Jesus did for us, when he laid down his life for us, and we act on this knowledge when we lay down our lives for one another (1 John 3:16). The sacrificial love of Jesus is more than a nice idea and a noble concept.  It is, in fact, a pattern of behavior that is supposed to be displayed by us in action.  How does God’s love abide in anyone, asks John, who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? (3:17).

Short answer: It doesn’t. God’s love lives in those who see a need around them and try to fill it.

New Testament scholar Clarence Jordan captured the concreteness of this everyday love and compassionate assistance when he translated his Cotton Patch Version of 1 John 3:18:  “My little ones, let’s not talk about love. Let’s not sing about love. Let’s put love into action and make it real.”  That’s what John is talking about when he challenges us to love one another.

So why is it so hard for us?   

I think it is fair to say that most of us find it easier to argue with our political opponents than to love and understand them.  I think it is fair to say that most people are more comfortable taking a stand on abortion than taking care of a woman with a problem pregnancy.  I think it is fair to say most of us would rather write a check to a homeless shelter than spend an evening providing job counseling to a person on the streets.  Most of us find it so much simpler to define our religious duty in terms of attending church and making offerings, rather than doing the complicated and challenging work of feeding the hungry, welcoming strangers, clothing the naked, caring for the sick, and visiting the imprisoned.  Just as faith without works is dead, so it is with our love for one another.

The president of Compassion International, Wes Stafford, gave a great quote in the November 2005 issue of Christianity Today challenging the universal church with one way we can put love into action.  He says, “When churches understand the complexity of poverty and the spiritual battle at hand, the best place to start is small — with children.  Providing education gives a child practical knowledge and vision. Health care keeps them strong and growing. Social care enables them to play and relate to others in a safe environment. Salvation speaks to their priceless worth in the eyes of their Creator. Worth breeds hope, hope encourages effort, and effort leads to success and confidence. A life can be built on that foundation.”

Our world is in desperate need of a church that puts love into action and makes it real; a church that recognizes the spiritual battle in the hearts and minds of people in our society and rises up to meet it.  There are people all around us who are searching desperately and yearning for a community that practices what it preaches; a community that talks the talk and walks the walk of God’s love for all; a community that looks out for one another, cares for one another, prays for one another and eager to serve one another with the love of God.

For many years, UCLA basketball coach John Wooden defined team spirit as “the willingness to sacrifice personal interest or glory for the welfare of others.”

But something was not quite right to the coach about this definition. And one day it dawned on him what it was. It’s not the willingness, but the eagerness to sacrifice personal interest for the sake of all that truly defines team spirit. This spirit of eagerness, of excitement and possibility, is what we are called to display as we strive to love one another. If we are not excited about our lives in Christ how can we expect anyone else to catch fire?

Over 100 years ago, the Christian philosopher Soren Kierkegaard made the point that Jesus was looking for followers, not admirers; he wanted people who would walk with him, do his work, and serve in his name.

One of Kierkegaard’s own parables told of a man who was walking down a city street when he saw a big sign in a window that said, “Pants pressed here”.  Delighted to see the sign, he went home and gathered up all of his wrinkled laundry. He carried it into the shop and put it on the counter.

“What are you doing?” the shopkeeper demanded.

“I brought my clothes here to be pressed,” said the man, “just like your sign said.”

“Oh, you’ve got it all wrong,” the owner said. “We don’t actually do that here. We’re in the business of making signs.”  We don’t do these things, he was saying. We just talk about them.

And that, said Soren Kierkegaard, is often the problem in the church. We advertise ourselves as a place that is showing Christ’s love and doing Christ’s work.  But when people show up looking for real love and real Christian action, they don’t see it.  “Oh, no, we don’t love people here. We just talk about loving people here.”

If we are going to advertise God’s love, let’s practice God’s love.  Forget the political bickering and posturing!  Put aside the procedural menusha that bogs us down!  It’s time to reflect and act upon the core purposes we have as Christians: the abilities to believe in Jesus Christ and love one another.  And everything else will fall into place.

We, the church, need to get down to the heart of the matter: loving others in truth and action.  Let’s take a magnify glass, to find our calling and then carefully focus our energy and resources on the need that arises.  We can’t afford to spread ourselves too thin anymore.  Let’s find our niche, our calling, what God wants us to do; because we don’t want to become mediocre field hockey players.  Amen.