Persistence

Hosea 1:2-10

Colossians 2:6-19

Luke 11:1-13

There is an episode from the early years of the Simpson’s where Bart and Lisa Simpson want to go to a place called Splash Mountain, a local water park.  Homer, their father, says no.  Bart and Lisa ask again, “Can we go to Splash Mountain?” and Homer again says no.  And this continues on and on without a break.  Bart and Lisa follow their dad everywhere asking the same question over and over again in rapid fire succession. 

“Can we go to Splash Mountain?”

“No.”

“Can we go to Splash Mountain?”

“No.”

“Can we go to Splash Mountain?”

“No.”

            And finally, after what appears to be an entire day of hearing this question asked over and over again, Homer says, “If I say yes, will stop asking me if we can go to Splash Mountain?”  For Bart and Lisa, their persistence paid off.

            According to Webster’s Dictionary, persistence is defined as: to continue steadily and firmly in some state, purpose, or course of action, in spite of opposition or criticism; to last or endure tenaciously.  Did you know God wants you and me to be persistent people?  In fact, God wants us to be persistent in: 1) seeking after Him, 2) seeking after the lost souls of this world, and 3) seeking after the truth, justice and freedom for all. 

            How can we be persistent people of God? 

            In Luke, Jesus tells a story about a persistent neighbor late at night trying to borrow three loaves of bread.  Back then, there were no Holiday Inns or Hiltons or Westin Hotels.  Travelers would seek shelter from strangers in their homes often late at night.  Hospitality was a sacred custom in this region.  It was customary for the host to provide the best of the best for their guests.  This one neighbor has a guest, but no food for him to eat.  So he runs to his neighbor asking for help.

            We must also know in this day and age people’s homes were very small and rustic.  Often there was only one room for the whole family.  The floor was compacted dirt or hard clay.  The whole family slept together around a stove to keep warm.  And it was not uncommon, in the colder weather, for the family’s livestock to come into the house, too.  For the neighbor to get up and answer the door would wake everybody else up from their sleep.  But because the first neighbor was persistent, steady and firm, the man finally satisfies his request.

            Like the neighbor, we need to be persistent in our prayers to God.  We can’t expect God to just hand us what we need at the snap of our fingers or in the blink of an eye.  God will always answer our prayers whether it’s the answer we are looking for or not.  God will always answer our prayers in his own time and in His own way which doesn’t always match up with our idea of time or with exactly what we want or need. 

            Many, many years ago there lived a devout Christian man named George McCluskey.  When George married and started a family, he decided to invest one hour a day in prayer, because he wanted his kids to follow Christ.  Over time, he expanded his prayers to include his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.  Every day between 11am and noon, he prayed for the next three generations of his family.

            As the years went by, his two daughters committed their lives to Christ and married men who went into full-time ministry.  These two couples had four girls and one boy.  Each of the girls married a minister, and the boy became one.

            The first two children born to this generation were both boys.  Upon graduation from high school, the two cousins chose the same college and became roommates.  During their sophomore year, one boy decided to go into the ministry.  The other didn’t.  He undoubtedly felt some pressure to continue the family legacy, but he chose instead to pursue his interest in psychology.

            He earned his doctorate and eventually wrote books for parents that became bestsellers.  He started a radio program heard on more than a thousand stations across the country.  The man’s name – Dr. James Dobson.  Through his prayers, George McCluskey affected far more than his one family.

I’ve seen this in my own life.  I’ve seen my persistence in prayer move the hand of God.  I’ve seen the fruits of a persistent, consistent prayer life, one that I have been continually developing for many years.  And it’s a passionate practice each and every day of my life.  For many years I prayed for that special someone who would love and care for me and be courageous enough to be a pastor’s wife.  There were women in my past who clearly told me that they couldn’t see themselves as a pastor’s wife.  So when I met D’Anna nine years ago and she was excited and intrigued by my calling, I knew that God answers our prayers!  She is a definite answer to my persistent prayers as well as our three children.

And I want you to know that I am in persistent prayer over this congregation.  I want this congregation to be a place of spiritual growth and renewal.  I want this congregation to be a place of learning, spirit-filled worship, and discovery.  I want this congregation to transform people’s lives, to heal people’s wounds, and be a living sacrifice for the Gospel of Jesus Christ here in Kilgore, Texas and beyond. 

And why? 

I believe with God persistence pays off.  The Bible says, “Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.  For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who seeks finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened for you.”(Luke 11:9-10)   Our God, the one who knows us better than we know ourselves, will provide us with exactly what we and the world need.  So we must pray, we must pray with boldness to our Lord and he will answer.  The Bible says, “Do not grow weary in doing good, for in due time you will reap the harvest of the seeds you have sown.”

 Not only must we be persistent in prayer in our relationship with God, but we must be persistent in our efforts to reach the lost souls of the world.  The prophet Hosea lived in a period of history when the people of God had turned away from the one true God to worship other gods from other peoples, including the Canaanite god Baal. 

The Israelites were lost.  They were lost spiritually.  They had lost their focus, their direction, and their love for God.  They were distracted and preoccupied with the pagan culture around them.  And Hosea is the one who God has chosen to represent, to symbolize the broken relationship between God and his people, a broken relationship like the infidelity of a spouse.  The people of Israel are the bride of God and they have not been faithful and committed to their groom.  The Israelites were lost.

Like the Israelites of Hosea’s time, people today are lost.  I’ve seen people lost living in chaos and confusion.  I’ve seen people lost walking through the mall spending money they don’t have on things they don’t need.  I’ve seen people lost hiding behind false facades of success.  I’ve seen people lost enslaved to their own fears and anxieties.  I’ve seen people lost who don’t have the joy of the Lord, whose spiritual fountain has dried up, and who pursue material and worldly things rather than the God of the Universe who created everyone and everything. 

There is a world out there that is hungry, hungry for direction, direction today, hope for tomorrow, and the everlasting truth.  The world is dying for something, someone to die for.  And we have it!  We have the direction, hope, and truth the world needs, the world craves, that someone worth dying for, we have so much to share and tell about Jesus Christ, so why is it so hard for us to get out there and share what we have in Christ with the whole world?  Why do we squander our time with meaningless talk and mundane tasks rather than focusing on reaching the lost souls of this world?  We must be persistent in finding ways to reach out to the lost souls around us with the truth of Jesus Christ.

It’s unfortunate, but there is lost people in the Christian church, too.  I’ve seen people lost in our churches trying to do worship, fellowship and teach in the same way they’ve always done it.  I’ve seen people lost who come to church for their one hour to worship God each Sunday and then forget about God the rest of the week.  I’ve seen people lost in our churches who see volunteering in the ministry of the church as a transaction of one thing for another rather than volunteering as a selfless servant to serve out of love and faith in Christ Jesus expecting nothing in return.  And I’ve seen people lost in our churches when the church attempts to copy and emulate the latest cultural trends in order to help people know Jesus, only to find the secular culture in the church with an even greater influence, strength and power than before.  I believe the enculturation and domestication of the Gospel in the mainline Protestant church in America is the main reason why it is losing members, influence and shrinking in size.

We must be persistent in prayer in our relationship with God, persistent in reaching the lost souls of the world, and we must be persistent in seeking truth, freedom and justice for all people.  Paul in his letter to the church in Colasse in Asia Minor warns of false teachers who are polluting the truth of the Gospel with philosophies and empty beliefs based on human tradition and the stars and moon of the sky.  These practices included circumcision for Gentiles, adhering to rules on food and drink, and astrology.  They are teaching that if one is to believe in Christ, one must adhere to additional practices.  Christ only is not enough. 

Paul describes to the Colossians that, “for in Christ the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have come to fullness in him,” (Colossians 2:9).  This is to say that Christ is the complete, final and perfect sacrifice for the salvation of humanity.  We don’t need these other additional practices.  There is nothing more we can do to earn or obtain God’s grace, love, mercy and truth.  We don’t need to be enslaved to these worldly-based practices anymore.  Christ came to free us from the slavery of our mind, so we could have true freedom in Him. 

In Christ we are connected to God completely and eternally.  And Paul in his writing wants to encourage the Colossians to be persistent in this belief, to stand up to the false teachers, and be persistent in seeking the truth and freedom from slavery. 

And we must do the same.

Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Injustice anywhere, is a threat to justice everywhere.”  We as a community of faith in Christ must be persistent.  We need to speak up for the oppressed and the outcast; for the downtrodden and the desperate.  We can not, we shall not and we will not stand idle watching the world pass us by.  There is too much at stake.  There is too much on the line to stand back and wait.  This is why I am so glad this congregation leads our community every Saturday making meals for the poor and the hungry of our town.

Because, my friends, we know the challenges of our times will not go away on their own.  We know we can’t simply throw money at them hoping they will go away either.  It’s gonna take our time and energy as well as our resources to minister in Kilgore, in Texas and throughout the world.  These are extraordinary times to serve Christ to bring hope to the hopeless, faith to the faithless and love to the unloved. 

But we can’t stop there.  It’s something we need to work at for years to come.  When we are persistent in prayer and seek after the Lord, I firmly believe the Lord can do mighty works and wonders.  God wants to use each of us in a mighty way to the glory of his kingdom.  We just need to seek him in persistent prayer.

President Abraham Lincoln once said, “I have been driven many times to my knees by overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go.  My wisdom, and that of all about me, seemed insufficient for the day”.  When we surrender to God in prayer, we will receive the wisdom we need.  In prayer, we can guarantee the reality and sincerity of our desire only by the passion and persistence with which we pray.  When we pray, we are not requesting gifts from an unwilling God, but going to the one who knows our needs better than we know them ourselves and whose heart extended towards us, is the heart of unconditional love, eternal wisdom and abundant mercy.

            

Putting God First

Amos 8:1-12

Colossians 1:15-28

Luke 10:38-42

Putting God first: easier said than done.  Putting God first in our lives is difficult and challenging because we are busy people with so many distractions and influences vying for our attention.  The loudest, the boldest, the urgent ones tend to dominate our decisions. 

            There was a woman who bought a parrot to keep her company.  She took him home, but returned the bird to the store the next day. 

“This bird doesn’t talk,” she told the owner.

 “Does he have a mirror in his cage?” asked the owner.  “Parrots love mirrors.  They see themselves in the mirror and start up a conversation.” 

The woman bought a mirror and left.  The next day, she returned.  The bird still wasn’t talking. 

“How about a ladder?  Parrots love walking up and down a ladder.  A happy parrot is more likely to talk.” 

The woman bought a ladder and left.  Sure enough, she was back the next day; the bird still wasn’t talking. 

“Does you parrot have a swing?  If not, that’s the problem.  He’ll relax and talk up a storm.” 

The woman reluctantly bought a swing and left.  When she walked into the store the next day, her countenance had changed.  She exclaimed, “My parrot is dead.” 

The pet store owner was shocked!  “I’m so sorry.  Tell me, did he ever say a word?” he asked.

“Yes, right before he died,” the woman replied.  “He said, ‘Don’t they sell any food at that pet store?”

It is so easy for us, even with our best intentions, to get our priorities mixed up and out of order.

            The prophet Amos is speaking to the people of Israel during a time of great peace and prosperity.  However, the prosperity is only for a few wealthy people at the expense of the many because they have put their own needs and interests ahead of God.  God speaks through Amos a divine judgment to the people of Israel and Judah.  God addresses them as those who “trample on the needy” and “ruin the poor of the land”.  They are the ones who anxiously await the end of the Sabbath so they can get back to selling their goods, particularly wheat, and ripping off their customers.  And God describes their business practices as immoral.  They desire to deceive others by charging a high price for a small amount or size of goods.  To do so they “rig” their balances to deceive their customers.  In essence, the Israelites seek their own profit ahead of seeking God, his righteousness and justice.

            The Lord promises to bring these deceivers to justice by turning their “feasts into mourning” and their “songs into lamentation”.  There will be a famine on the land, but not a famine from bread or thirst from water, but a spiritual famine from hearing the word of God.  These immoral, self-centered deceivers “shall fall and never rise again.”  They will be lost wandering seeking the Lord’s instruction and guidance but they will not find it.

            These deceivers have turned away from God.  They have broken the covenant replacing their relationship with God with their own wants, desires, interests, and well-being.  Whenever we place a higher priority on pursuing our own wants and desires than on pursuing God, we are immoral.  This is not right and we need to do something about it.

            Mary and Martha are two sisters living in the quiet town of Bethany a few miles east of Jerusalem.  Jesus is looking for a quiet place to rest, to get away from the crowds of people, to visit with friends.  Mary and Martha are as much the same as they are different.  Martha is a dynamo of activity, a type A personality.  She’s a doer.  She was brought up to shower guests in her home with extravagant hospitality.  This meant cleaning up, giving the guests the most comfortable seat in the home, straightening the furniture, picking up things off the floor, and preparing a meal in a timely fashion.  On the other hand, Mary is less concerned with these details and demonstrates hospitality in a different way; a way that is less hectic and more present in the moment.  Mary sits with Jesus and listens to him intently.

            We know what happens next.  Martha is not happy with Mary.  She sees her “just sitting there” as laziness and an unwillingness to be helpful and hospitable.  Martha is resentful of her sister who is, in her eyes, not doing her part.  But you see, what we have here is clash in priorities.  Yes, they are both seeking to be hospitable to their guest.  Yes, they both care a great deal about their guest’s comfort.  But Jesus says, “there is need of only one thing” right now and Mary has chosen it.  In essence what Jesus is saying to Martha is this: thank you for your hard work and your hospitality and your kindness toward me.  I appreciate it.  But I need a different kind of hospitality and kindness from you right now like what Mary is doing.  I need you, Martha, to be fully present here with me right now.  All of you; come and sit and be present with me.  I want to be your top priority.  And he wants to be our number one priority, too.

            When I look at the world around us, it appears that we are going nowhere fast.  We are in a hurry to get things done, these “priorities” of ours, that we rush and rush around until our lives are no longer joyful.  Our minds are filled with “to do lists” of people to call, things to buy, and events to attend.  And in the rat race of life it is very easy for us to get off track putting our work, our play, our families, our friends, our own wants and desires in the driver’s seat of our lives rather than God. 

            I’ve heard it said time and time again that most middle-class Americans tend to worship their work, to work at their play, and to play at their worship of God.

            How can we change this?  How can you and I be agents of change not only in our own lives but in the world around us?  How can we put God first in our lives?

            First, we must be fully committed to God in Christ Jesus.  As our train journeys down the track of life, you and I are not driving this thing; we are not in the locomotive at the controls moving this train along.  If we are fully committed to God in Christ, we have given the controls over to Him.  We submit ourselves completely to God.  God in Christ is our number one priority before everything else.  And God directs us in the way we need to go.  Jesus in the gospel stories tells a parable about a rich young ruler who asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life.  He has kept the Law of Moses since he was a young boy and achieved great personal success.  But when Jesus says to him, “Sell all your possessions, give the money to the poor and then come and follow me”, the rich young ruler went away sad because he was unwilling and unable to give up his power and wealth.  The top priority of the rich young ruler is his wealth and power rather than submission to God.  Putting God first enables us to put our wealth, power and influence in proper perspective.

            Second, we must be fully committed to one another in Christ as a community of believers and as children of God. 

I believe we are all familiar with the Titanic and what happened to this ship.  Catering to the rich and famous, this luxury liner was advertised as unsinkable. On Titanic’s fateful night, many passengers were unable to enter a lifeboat because of the selfish, privileged passengers who felt no concern for anyone but themselves. The first-class passengers feared that added weight in the lifeboats would jeopardize their chance for survival. As a result, many of the ship’s lifeboats, which were made to hold up to 60 people, left the ship with only 15 people aboard.

Although there were enough lifeboats to save hundreds more, people were left stranded on the sinking liner. 

            We need to be committed to one another in Christ if we are going to be obedient disciples of Christ.  This means we do not leave anybody behind.  We do not keep certain people out of our community.  We do not live the Christian faith on our own.  We need God in Christ and we need one another;  for encouragement, Christian love, strength and more.  We need one another so we can be “a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people” to the world around us “in order that we may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (I Peter 2:9)

            This leads to my third point: we must be committed to the work of Christ in the world.  God in Christ is at work all around us.  Sometimes it’s hard to see.  So we must be the hands and feet of Christ in our neighborhoods, our workplaces, our activities and in our common daily interactions with others.  We’ve got a lot to share about Christ: “he’s the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible,…all things have been created through him and for him.” (Colossians 1:15-16)  In one sense this is very easy because the story of Jesus is the most amazing story ever told.  But it’s also so hard because it feels as if we are runnin’ and gunnin’ through life at high speed and do not have the time to do the necessary work.

Many years ago a seminary professor had a class of fifteen students who were preparing for the ministry. At the beginning of one of his classes, he distributed envelopes to the students with sealed instructions.

Five students received instructions to proceed across the campus without delay. The directions read, “You have 15 minutes to reach your destination. You have no time to spare. Don’t loiter or do anything else, or your grade will be negatively affected.”

The next five students also received instructions to make their way across the campus, but they were given 45 minutes to do so. “You have plenty of time,” their directions read, “but don’t be too slow.”

The last five students received instructions to get to the other side of campus anytime before five o’clock, giving them about five hours to complete the assignment.

What the students didn’t know was that the professor had arranged for several drama majors from a nearby university to position themselves along the path that led across campus. The drama students were instructed to act as though they were suffering and in great need.

One pretended to be homeless, in need of food and clothing. Another sat with his head in his hands, crying as if he had just experienced a terrible tragedy. Still another acted as if he were in desperate need of medical care.

You can imagine what happened as the seminary students tried to complete their assignments. None of the students in the first group stopped to offer any help to the “needy people.” Only two students in the second group did. But all five students in the third group took time to stop and help.

We live busy lives.  It feels like the world is in some big hurry but doesn’t know why.  Our busyness, if we allow it, can cloud our judgment so we mix up our priorities, and forget our commitment to the work of Christ in the world. 

Each of us, no matter what, needs to take time out from the busyness of life.  Dive into God’s Word, get in a small group bible study with other Christians, and take time to pray, to have routine conversations with God.  When we get all mixed up, we need to get our mind and spirit on the right track.

Over and over again I know this to be true: when God in Christ is your number one focus, your number one priority, God puts everyone and everything else in proper perspective. 

When we put God first, we get back on the right track.  When we put God first, we’re headed in the right direction.  When we put God first, we commit ourselves to Him, we commit ourselves to one another, we commit ourselves to the work of Christ in the world and our train is bound for a glorious and blessed destination. Amen.

Messy Spirituality: Dare to Care

Luke 10:25-37

Life is messy.

As hard as we try to dot all our “I”s and cross all our “t”s, some things get left undone. As hard as we try to tie up all the loose ends, one of those ends is bound to get away from us. And that’s okay. It’s what makes us human.

The same goes for our spiritual faith. Our spiritual faith is far from neat and tidy. None of us is perfect or complete by any stretch of the imagination. If we are honest with ourselves and others, each of us is a spiritual mess. A messy spirituality is a faith that most of us live but few of us admit. It’s a faith that is unfinished, incomplete and inexperienced. It is a faith that is under construction; a work in progress. It means that following Jesus is anything but neat and tidy; balanced and orderly. Our spiritual walk is complex, complicated and perplexing. Messy spirituality is the disorderly, sloppy, chaotic look of authentic faith in the real world. It does not follow a straight line; it’s mixed up, topsy-turvy, helter-skelter godliness. It turns us upside down for a ride filled with unexpected turns, bumps and even crashes. The good news for us is that Jesus is not turned off by our messiness because Jesus is the one who has messed up and ruined us. Because when you get to know the real Jesus of the Bible, the one who lived and breathed among us, your life will never be the same!

The parable of the Good Samaritan is so well known throughout Christian and secular circles. The Good Samaritan is a secularized saint. There are the “Good Samaritan laws”, for example, to protect individuals who assist a victim during a medical emergency. The law protects them from being liable from injury or death caused to the victim during a medical emergency. There are many hospitals, helping groups and civic awards all named for the Good Samaritan. In the secular world, a good Samaritan is someone who helps once a week at a local soup kitchen or delivers food baskets to the poor at Christmas time or sacrifices several Saturdays for building a Habitat for Humanity home. To the world at large, the good Samaritan is a “do gooder”. There is nothing wrong with this understanding, but it only scratches the surface. There is more to the parable than this. It’s deeper meaning is sharper, more shocking and a daunting challenge to each one of us. Let’s take a closer look at three key areas of the text.

I.

Understanding the scene of this story will help us understand it. The road from Jerusalem to Jericho is no walk in the park. It is a dangerous road. Traveling this road from Jerusalem to Jericho, a mere twenty miles, you descend 3600 feet in elevation. The road is filled with narrow passes, rocky cliffs, and sharp turns which made it an ideal place for robbers and murderers. You didn’t travel this road after dark and expect to make it to your destination.

II.

We must then come to know the characters of the story. There was the traveler. He’s a reckless rebel without a clue. Most people did not travel this road alone because of how dangerous it was. They traveled in groups, in caravans and convoys. There was safety in numbers. This man had no one but himself to blame for the plight in which he found himself.[i]

And there was the priest. He didn’t pause for one moment. He didn’t break his stride. He kept on going because according to the Jewish law if you touched a dead body you were considered unclean for seven days (Number 19:11). If he touched him, he could lose his turn for serving in the temple in Jerusalem and he wasn’t going to risk losing that great privilege. It was more important than showing compassion to someone in need.

And there was the Levite. Again, this is a dangerous road filled with the threat of robbers and murderers. They often used decoys to lure innocent travelers into their clutches; one would act hurt or play dead, so when a traveler stopped to help, the others would overpower him. The Levite’s motto essentially was “Safety first”. The Levite is looking out for number one, himself. He would take no risks to help anyone else.

And then there was the Samaritan. For the Jewish audience listening to this parable, they would obviously expect that the evil one has arrived. As you may or may not know there was a great deal of animosity between Jews and Samaritans in Jesus’ day. They did not interact with one another. They did not like each other. They did not play well together. They were enemies of one another.

It appears that the Samaritan of our text was not your average Samaritan. I think it’s fair to say that the innkeeper knew him and trusted him. His credit was good with the innkeeper. There may have been religious differences, but the Samaritan was honest and worthy of trust. I also think it’s fair to say that he alone is prepared to help. He showed the injured man mercy and compassion. He is more concerned with helping others than following the letter of the law. In the end we will be judged not by the creed we hold, but by the life we live.

III.

Every parable has something to teach us. The lawyer of our text knew the answers to his own questions. If he was indeed a strict orthodox Jew, he would have tied onto his wrist little leather boxes which contained key pieces of scripture: Exodus 13, Deuteronomy 6:4-9 and more. The answers to his question could be found in these boxes. The lawyer is working at setting up Jesus for a fall; to discredit him in public. His belief of what a neighbor is limits the scope of the word neighbor to their fellow Jews; gentiles not included.

IV.

So who is my neighbor, Jesus? Jesus’ answer has three parts.

First, Jesus commands us to help others, to show compassion, to dare to care, even when those others have brought this trouble upon themselves, just as the traveler had done. This reminds me of an incident over twenty years ago at the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles. A thirty-one year old woman, Sophia White, burst into the hospital nursery wielding a .38-caliber handgun. She had come gunning for Elizabeth Staten, a nurse whom she accused of stealing her husband. White fired six shots, hitting Staten in the wrist and stomach. Staten fled the scene and White chased her to the ER, firing one more time. There, with blood on her clothes and a hot gun in her hand, the attacker was met by another nurse, Joan Black, who did the unthinkable. Black walked calmly to the gun-toting woman, hugged her, and spoke comforting words.

The assailant said she didn’t have anything to live for, that Staten had stolen her family.

“You’re in pain,” Black said, “I’m sorry, but everybody has pain in their lives…I understand, and we can work it out.” As they talked, the hospital invader kept her finger on the trigger. Once she began to lift the gun as if to shoot herself. Nurse Black just pushed her arm down and continued to hold her. At last Sophia White gave the gun to the nurse. She was disarmed by a hug. It’s amazing what some compassion can do when you dare to care!

Second, any person of any nation, of any creed, of any orientation, of any religion who is in need is our neighbor. Yes, we must take care of our own with compassion and kindness. But we must also dare to care for others who perhaps are not like us in every way. We must dare to care for each gentle soul misplaced inside a jail; we must dare to care for the refugees on the unarmed road of flight; we must dare to care for the aching souls whose wounds cannot be nursed; for the confused, accused, misused; for the luckless, the abandoned, the forsaken and the outcast.[ii] Our help must be as wide as the love of God.

Albert Einstein once said about compassion that, “Our task must be to widen our circle of compassion, to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.” Philosopher, Physician and Nobel Peace Prize winner Albert Schweitzer also said, “Until he extends his circle of compassion to include all living things, man will not himself find peace.” We must dare to care.

Third, the help we share must be practical and not consist merely in feeling sorry for the person in need. Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia once told about a contest he was asked to judge. The purpose of the contest was to find the most caring child; the winner was a four-year old boy. His next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife of many years. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the gentleman’s yard, climbed into his lap and just sat there. When his mother asked him what he had said to their neighbor, the little boy said, “Nothing. I just helped him cry.” We must dare to care.

I am confident that the priest and the Levite felt pity for the beaten man along the roadside, although they did nothing about it. The path of compassion and care must be paved with more than just good intentions. Real, authentic compassion and care is based on real action and is fueled by the love of God. We must dare to care.

I believe that true compassion comes from the God in the form of love. I don’t always feel it. I don’t always recognize it. When I feel like I’m not loving or caring, then I have to reach out to Jesus and ask Jesus to speak the words of love that I no longer have the strength to speak. I do it because I believe that this kind of love says that you really matter to me just because you matter to God. It is the clearest expression of the command to love your neighbor as yourself. And, in this day and age, I think it’s the essential picture of compassion. Let’s dare to care, no matter the cost!

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[i] William Barclay, The Daily Study Bible Series: The Gospel of Luke (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1977)

[ii] Chimes of Freedom by Bob Dylan, Copyright © 1964 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1992 by Special Rider Music

Bearing One Another's Burdens

Galatians 6:1-16

Today is our final look at Paul’s letter to the Galatian churches. Throughout his letter, Paul has developed the theme of freedom; freedom from the law of Moses, freedom to be forgiven by God in Christ, freedom to become who God created us to be. When he has spoken of the law, it’s the Law of Christ; that is, Love. This morning we conclude with the final chapter of Galatians, chapter six, verses 1-16. Listen for and hear the Word of God.

In this concluding chapter, Paul addresses what freedom in Christ looks like in community. He is telling the Galatians how to structure their community life and wrestle with what true community is. Paul states that they are each responsible for one another. There is a mutual responsibility among community members to take care of others as well as themselves.

If you have ever played a team sport or played a musical instrument in a band or ensemble or sung in a choral group, you know what it takes to be a member of a team or group. At their best, team members exercise the freedom to care for one another, build one another, share mutual responsibility, build trust with one another and work together for a common goal. If any part of the team, band or group doesn’t show up; doesn’t practice their part; doesn’t exercise the freedom to be a part of something bigger than themselves, the team becomes just another group of individuals blowing aimlessly in the wind.

You’ve probably heard all the clichés: “There is no “I” in team. “None of us is as smart as all of us”. “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” “Many hands make light work.” The late baseball great Casey Stengel once said about teamwork, “It’s easy to get good players. Getting’ em to play together, that’s the hard part.”

What does it mean for you and me to be teammates; to be responsible for each other? What do effective Christian teammates do, and how do they keep from getting burned out while they're doing it? Paul offers the Galatians and us an instructional guide on how the Christian life can change the world:

I.

As teammates in Christ, we are able to recognize what's wrong. If we are wired into the Holy Spirit, we seem to inherently know something is wrong in the life of another person or a community, detecting "transgression" as well as pain (v. 1). Such ability can certainly lead to judgmental, self-righteous indignation, which causes a lot of outsiders to refer to us as believers in Christ with a hint of disdain and contempt.

Paul isn't suggesting here that the Galatian simply point out the wrong in their neighbors; instead, they are to do so while simultaneously pointing out what's wrong in themselves. It's not with a spirit of vindictiveness or accusation that we point out the wrong we see, but do so with a "spirit of gentleness." We know that we aren't blameless, either, so when we see the sin of others we also recognize our own sin. Indeed, Paul says that we need to "test our own work" before we can scrutinize the work of others (v. 4). We shouldn't be "tempted" to think that others are worse sinners than we are; rather we know that everyone, including us, needs to be "restored" to a right relationship with God and others. We as teammates in Christ are thus humble and gentle observers of human brokenness and work to make the broken whole (v. 1).

II.

As teammates in Christ, we are called to bear one another’s burdens. We get an idea of what Paul means by this term back in 5:13-15, where Paul urges the Galatians to "become slaves to one another" through love (v. 13). In fact, says Paul, the whole Jewish law is summed up in one of its commandments: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." This is the same law that Jesus sums up in the Gospels -- a rendering of the Jewish "shema" from Deuteronomy 6, along with a law from Leviticus 19:18. We love God with everything we are, and then, because we love God, we love our neighbors as we love ourselves (Matthew 22:36-40). The law of Christ is the law of love, and love does not place obligations on others. Instead, we help to alleviate the struggles of others by "bearing one another's burdens" (Galatians 6:2).

In his book Iacocca, Lee Iacocca once asked legendary football coach Vince Lombardi what it took to make a winning team.

“There are a lot of coaches with good ball clubs who know the fundamentals and have plenty of discipline but still don’t win the game. Then you come to the third ingredient: If you’re going to play together as a team, you’ve got to care for one another. You’ve got to love each other. Each player has to be thinking about the next guys and saying to himself: “If I don’t block that man, Paul is going to get his legs broken. I have to do my job well in order that he can do his.”

“The difference between mediocrity and greatness,” Lombardi said, “is the feeling these guys have for each other.” On an effective team, in a healthy church, each Christian learns to care for others. As we take seriously Jesus’ command to love one another, we contribute to a willing team.

So, how do we "bear the burdens" of others without becoming weighed down and crushed ourselves? How can we be a good, effective teammate in Christ? Some of the people we know in our church and in our community have a lot of burdens -- economic, emotional, spiritual burdens, just to name a few -- and taking them on can be exhausting.

The phrase that's often used these days to capture that problem is "compassion fatigue." According to the Compassion Fatigue Awareness Project, caregivers can become so overwhelmed that the stress of caring for someone can lead to the caregiver having his or her own health and emotional problems, engaging in substance abuse to mask feelings, and failing to perform basic self-care. Compassion fatigue is especially prevalent in helping professionals like medical personnel, law enforcement and clergy, but anyone who is carrying the burden of another can suffer from it.

On the surface, then, it seems like Paul is replacing one obligation with another that can affect the body as much as, if not more than, circumcision or any of the other requirements of the Jewish law. Paul seems to recognize this because he has to remind the Galatian Christians to "not become weary in doing good" (v. 9 NIV). How are we going to pull that off?

A life that relies solely on our own efforts isn't going to amount to much. Paul uses the word "flesh" to describe a life that is devoid of any ability to do good on its own -- a life that leads to "corruption" of not only the soul but the body as well (v. 8). In 5:20-21, Paul lists a bunch of symptoms of trying to live life in the flesh, many of which can be the result of compassion fatigue as much as outright sinfulness.

III.

Paul's solution to the life of the flesh isn't simply a prescription to do more, or be more religious, or fire up the willpower to do better. Rather, Paul proposes a completely different kind of life that is lived in the Spirit: a life that isn't dependent on the meager reserves of our own resources and abilities, but a life that is animated, dominated and motivated by the Holy Spirit. The life of the Spirit gives us a wealth of reserves from which we can begin to do good all day every day.

We can learn a lot about teamwork and living together in community from watching geese in flight. For one thing, people who share a common direction and a sense of community get where they are going more quickly and easily because they rely on the strength of one another. Second, people with as much sense as a goose will stay in formation and accept help when it is needed and will also offer help when others need it. Third, geese instinctively share the task of leadership and do not resent the leader. Fourth, when a goose is sick, wounded or shot down, two others drop out of formation to follow it down to earth to protect it. They remain with the wounded bird until it is well or dies. Relying on one another, willing to give and receive help, sharing leadership and sticking together can happen when we live in the Spirit.

When we live our lives in the Spirit, we begin to bear the "fruit" of that life in the Spirit in 5:22-23 -- love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness and self-control. These are the necessary resources we need to restore hope, forgive people, bear burdens, and do good. These resources only emerge from nurturing a relationship with God on a daily basis, remembering that we cannot change the world unless we ourselves are being changed by the Spirit through prayer, studying the Word with the help of good teachers (6:6), and other internal work through which the Spirit plants and brings forth fruit.

And once that fruit is in us, it will begin to create seeds of its own that can be spread. If we are broadcasting these resources, like a sower broadcasts seed, then we will reap a bountiful harvest of good that characterizes the eternal life and purposes of God (6:8). We do well because God is willing and doing good for the world: a good that, in the end, will reap a harvest of redemption for the whole creation (6:9).

IV.

Sometimes it seems like the task is overwhelming, but we're not called to fix everything at once. We are called to action to do good and what is right. We begin by being Christ-like with our neighbors, not by knocking on their doors and showing them how amazing we are, but by offering a hand of help to those who need it. We offer a word of grace in a world that seems to only offer condemnation and ridicule. We bring a wealth of good spiritual fruit rather than throwing rotten fruit at others. The life of faith is all about representing the law of Christ one day at a time.

Let Freedom Ring!

Galatians 5:1, 13-26

Our study of Galatians continues this morning as we move into chapter five. Throughout his letter, Paul has developed the theme of freedom; freedom from the law, freedom to be forgiven by God in Christ, freedom to become who God created us to be. Paul now shifts from the theological to the ethical. He always ends his letters in this way, on a practical note. He doesn’t leave you hanging in the clouds. Paul always brings you back to earth. After traveling through the lofty places of thought, Paul is able to reduce it all to something that the ordinary person can understand and do. I will be reading from chapter five, verse one, then I will pick up reading at verse thirteen through the end of the chapter. Listen for and hear the word of God. (read Galatians 5:1,13-26). This is the Word of the Lord.

“For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” (5:1) We Americans love to celebrate Independence Day. Thomas Jefferson's bold assertion that each individual has an "inalienable right" to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" still sounds sweet to our freedom-loving ears. Despite the imperfections and foibles of our political system, we still enjoy tremendous economic freedom, political freedom, religious freedom, personal freedom and communal freedom. But we must be careful that we don't define the freedoms we enjoy so much solely as "freedom from" -- forgetting that the real test of freedom's value is how we use our "freedom to."

Paul's caution to the Galatians likewise reminds us that sometimes our greatest liberation can be found in our commitments; in our freedoms to. There is our freedom to gather together for the benefit of others, our freedom to love and serve each other and our freedom to express our feelings, concerns, hopes and aspirations for our community, neighbors and friends. Remember that the same philosophers and statesmen who boldly announced this country's "Declaration of Independence" were also the ones who worked long and hard to craft our Constitution -- a document that sculpts our freedom along the prescribed guidelines and responsibilities necessary to make freedom work -- our freedom to govern, to serve, to defend, to protect, to honor and to be loyal.

The Fourth of July is Thursday this week. It is a good time to celebrate the paradox at the center of the Christian faith: We are most free when we are most bonded. Through Jesus Christ's supreme example of freedom in service, we all become the most free when we bind ourselves to Christ. He freely divested himself of his divinity so that he could make the ultimate sacrifice for our sake and for our freedom.

We must take care not to confuse this freely offered liberty for doing whatever we want to do. Suppose a sky diver at 10,000 feet announces to the rest of the group, "I'm not using a parachute this time. I want freedom!" The fact is that the skydiver is constrained by a greater law- the law of gravity. But when the skydiver chooses the "constraint" of the parachute, he is free to enjoy the exhilaration.

Former Cowboys Head Coach Tom Landry said, “Most successful football players not only accept rules and limitations but, I believe, they NEED them. Players are free to perform at their best only when they know what the expectations are, where the limits stand. I see this as a biblical principle that also applies to life, a principle our society as a whole has forgotten; you can’t enjoy true freedom without limits”.

God's moral laws act the same way: They restrain, but they are absolutely necessary to enjoy the exhilaration of real freedom. The long list of what Paul calls in Galatians "fleshly works" is what results when we let our freedom “to” ... become freedom “from”.

Freedom to love becomes ... fornication. Freedom to worship becomes ... idolatry. 
Freedom to serve becomes ... factions. 
Freedom to inquire becomes ... enmity. 
Freedom to discuss becomes ... quarrels. 
Freedom to disagree becomes ... dissension. 
Freedom to thrive becomes ... envy.[i] 

The political and personal freedoms we celebrate every Independence Day always remind us that with great freedom comes great responsibility. For our freedom to "work" we must be good citizens -- we must vote, pay taxes, obey the laws, respect property, be loyal and keep the peace. The freedom we enjoy every day of our lives as Christians demands of us only two things -- faithfulness and love. Despite the long list of fleshly "works" versus spiritual "fruits", Paul takes care to preface these itemizations with a single reminder: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Galatians 5:14).

Writer Oswald Chambers once wrote, “Freedom is the ability not to insist on my rights, but to see that God gets his.” Christ's mandate of freedom through service reveals that the only way to achieve happiness is to love and serve others. Pursuing happiness, focusing solely on the self and its personal pleasures, will never bring genuine joy or the fulfilling happiness of peace. When we pursue happiness for the self, it is like looking for the ending point of a rainbow -- as soon as you think you've reached the end, your perspective changes, and the rainbow's end has moved again.

Loving ourselves was not the goal Jesus had in mind for us when he freely gave his life for our salvation. We can't hold out a hand to our neighbor when our arms are wrapped around ourselves. The love Christ calls us to is agape love, a sacrificial love bonded to Christ, and therefore cannot be self-directed. Only when offering ourselves in sacrificial service for others will we run headlong into the "happiness" we thought we had to pursue. The movement of the Christian life is from self-centeredness to centeredness in self to centeredness in God.

When do you feel better about yourself? Do you feel better about yourself after a long, admittedly restful afternoon as a "couch potato" watching football games or after a long, admittedly exhausting afternoon coaching a Little League game? Do you feel better about yourself after whipping up one of your favorite desserts in the kitchen or after delivering it to a shut-in member of your church? Do you feel better about yourself after a special "night on the town" or after an evening serving a mom and her children families in need with Longview Interfaith Hospitality Network?

Christian apologist Joseph Parker found himself listening to a "self-made men" tell the story of how he became a "self-made man." After his presentation was over, he remarked to Dr. Parker, "What did you think of my story?" To which Dr. Parker replied, "My dear man, you have just relieved Almighty God of an enormous responsibility."

"Self-made persons are a truly powerful argument against the use of unskilled labor. Self-serving is an oxymoron! We are neither human enough, nor divine enough, to serve ourselves, and in the end, if that is what we use our gifts for, we will come up empty" (J. Walter Cross, "When One Plus One is More than Two").

On this Fourth of July, as we celebrate the birth of our nation and the great experiment in democratic rule, we remember Christianity is the only true democracy, because in a true Christian state everyone would think as much of their neighbor as of themselves. Christian freedom is not a license to do anything you want. It is for the simple but tremendous reason that the Christian is not a person who has become free to sin, but a person who, by the grace of God, has become free NOT to sin. And the fruits of the Spirit are the outward signs of that amazing freedom.

In the words of the great George Matheson poem, "Make Me a Captive, Lord, and Then I Shall Be Free."




[i] Bob Kaylor, Senior Writer for homileticsonline.com, and Senior Minister of the Park City United Methodist Church in Park City, Utah.