July 8, 2007: “It’s Not Fair!”

Sermon: “It’s Not Fair!”

July 8, 2007 – Pentecost 6 (C)

Luke 15:11-32 and Matthew 20:1 ff

 

Introduction: A Sad Story

 

I’m going to tell you a sad true story that happened to me once – final proof for me that life just isn’t fair sometimes. And I want to get a good “AWWWWW…” from you when I’m done. So let’s practice it, OK?

 

Back when I was younger, 4^th grade I think, Nintendo was the king of the video game world. Remember those NES machines with the little cartridges you put in the slot? Video games have changed a lot since then.

 

Well I had a friend, who I’d gone to school with for a while, who had a stash of games. He had TONS of them. And one weekend I had a friend coming over who really liked the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, so I asked Todd if I could borrow his.

 

He said no, and he never said why really. He had stopped playing it a long time ago. I also knew he had just gotten it back from lending it to someone else. I told him these things, and he still said no. He would not give me the game… even just for a couple of days.

 

So I fumed and fretted, I even cried, then I called back and asked again. All to no avail. So that weekend, all my friend and I could do was to sit around and stare at the walls.

 

OK, so we found plenty to do. But I never forgot that moment, when I expected to get the video game but didn’t. At the time, it was the most unfair thing I had ever experienced. And it still makes me sad today.

 

[this is the point at which you say, AWWWW…]

 

Fairness and Unfairness

 

CS Lewis, in his book Mere Christianity, states that fairness and unfairness are basic elements of human life. We are all born with a sense of what’s fair and just, and what is not.

 

No one has to tell my little Kaitlyn, at 15 months, that it’s not fair when Abigail comes up and snatches a toy she was playing with. It’s innate for her, and it is for us as well. We didn’t learn it from a book or a course on morality – we’re born with a sense of basic right and wrong that is universal to most all cultures. Lewis thinks this is proof of an “intelligent design,” though he wouldn’t use those terms today.

 

Life just isn’t fair sometimes. It stinks. And most often, it’s unfair in my direction! At least that’s the way I want to see it! And we HATE the unfairness of it – it grates at the very core of our being.

 

And so we spend a good bit of our time in childhood and adolescence trying to figure out how to come to terms with that fact. Somewhere deep inside we have this feeling that life ought to be fair, that all the scales out to balance out somewhere.

 

And how do we resolve it? Lots of ways:

• Sometimes we say, “they’ll get what’s coming to them eventually” – how many times have I thought this as someone nearly runs me off the road passing me on 360 or on the way to Blackstone? I always look for the State Trooper to catch them around the corner.
• Or maybe we try to put ourselves in the shoes of the other person – this is my favorite tactic lately. “He must really be in trouble to have to go that fast.” But even then, while this is a good and optimistic outlook on other people, it’s just as possible that this guy was just being careless and stupid.
• Finally, if all else fails, we can always pull out the “end-of-time card:”
  • Either, “He’s going to get what’s coming to him when he answers to God for that!”
  • Or, we fall back on this notion of “stars in our crown,” thinking that there are going to be “just rewards” handed out in heaven – a notion that, popular as it is, I have really found little scriptural evidence for.

 

Unfairness in the Parables

 

We’ve just read two stories that I remember from growing up in church, and thinking, “that’s not really fair, is it?”

• Luke 15 – This story of the prodigal son and the older brother (which, by the way, modern translations are beginning to call “the Compassionate Father” instead of the “Prodigal Son”)
  • Background: For the story of the brothers, the beginning point was the complaint by the Pharisees that Jesus was eating with all the “sinners” – tax collectors, prostitutes, and town vagrants. If he was so righteous, why would he be hanging out with THOSE kinds of folks?
• Matthew 20 – The parable of the workers who all get paid the same wages at the end of the day .
  • This parable comes after the encounter with the rich young ruler, who turned away when Jesus asked him to give up all he had. Then Peter pipes up and says, “you know, Jesus, WE’VE given up everything and followed you… what will WE get”

 

Jesus tells these stories in response to two real-life versions of the older brother complaining about someone else getting a reward!

 

So SURELY, we would think, this is place where Jesus will give us the answer! Finally, an answer to all the unfair things that happen in my life!

 

We may THINK Jesus is going to fix it. But while these are good parables and well-told stories, Jesus actually doesn’t do a thing to address the unfairness of the situations:

• At the end of the parable of the workers, he basically says, “God can be generous to whom he wants to be generous.”
• At the end of the parable of the compassionate father, he says, “You’re right, you’ve been here and been faithful. But let’s go celebrate this lost brother who has come home.”

 

Never in one place does Jesus “fix” it for us. He doesn’t come in at the very end and say, “now later, that younger brother got what was coming to him. His Daddy laid into him with the razor strap and grounded him for weeks.” He doesn’t say, “when those workers came back the next day, they got half the wages of everyone else.” He doesn’t even pull the end-of-all-time card – “he’ll pay for that when he comes before the throne of judgment.”

 

I remember being disappointed when I first sat down and studied these two parables a long time ago. Life just isn’t fair, and when Jesus tells stories like this, we want RESOLUTION. We have this notion that the coming Kingdom of God is going to make everything fair and just.

 

But Jesus stubbornly refuses to try and answer our question. So this parable Jesus told about the workers is usually ignored. And when we read about the prodigal son (or the compassionate father) we usually end when he’s put the cloak and ring on him and brought him in for the feast. We don’t like to be reminded that this black sheep son, who squandered all the family money and practically slapped his father in the face by asking for his inheritance before he died – this wayward, sinful boy got a feast fit for a king, while the ever-present, responsible, and trustworthy got no special treatment at all!

 

Getting Into Uncomfortable Sandals

 

I have a confession, and it’s probably one you could make as well. Like most of us, I secretly put myself in the sandals of the older brother. That also puts me in the place of Peter and the Pharisees. And those are uncomfortable sandals to fill.

 

And why are we uncomfortable? Let’s face it: we’re not mad at the prodigal son, are we? The brother was only a little mad at the prodigal – he expected as much from him. And the Pharisees expected the prostitutes and tax collectors to act the way they did.

 

No, Peter, the Pharisees, the older brother – they were mad at GOD. They were mad because God wasn’t making thing right like he was “supposed” to. Isn’t this our normal reaction when something unfair happens?

 

So we see that someone else was saying “it’s not fair” along with us – but it’s not the crowd we want to be lumped into! Here we are, the older brothers and sisters, arms crossed and feet tapping. We DESERVE an answer to this question! We have to make sense of this or the world may collapse around us. But God doesn’t give us the answer we want.

 

That’s when we have to remember that there are really only two characters in the story of the prodigal son – the Father, and the wayward child. And the main character of all these stories – the story of the prodigal son, the story of the workers, the story of Peter and the rich ruler, the story of the Pharisees and the sinners… the story of you and I – the main character is not YOU and ME – not the older siblings who were “wronged” in some way and wanted it to be made right.

 

The real main character is GOD – who was wronged in the most unfair way imaginable… and chose the path of love instead.

 

While we might like to imagine ourselves in the sandals of the older brother, NONE of us can really claim to be that way. Not one of us. Because every one of us has, at some point, been the prodigal son. I know, some of you might cringe at this, but let’s be honest – most of us have more in common with the prodigal. I know I do – and I can at least speak for myself.

 

We can’t step into the sandals of the older brother because that’s not where we belong. If Peter had stopped in his tracks and thought for a second before he wagged his finger at the rich young ruler, he would have realized – you know, just a few weeks ago Jesus called me “satan” because I was tempting him.

 

And if the Pharisees had stopped in their tracks before they wagged their fingers at the prostitutes and tax collectors, they would have come to the realization that would have saved them: We’ve done wrong too, because we love our religion more than we love the God we worship.

 

Another Kind of Unfairness

So before we get out our step ladder and climb up on our high horse, let’s look at an unspoken element that makes sense of the whole thing – at least to me…

 

Things DO work out in the end, all the scales ARE balanced in the end. But not in the way we want to think. We think a “whipping” is basically the way that these things work themselves out in the end – whether it’s a belt, or a ticket from a state trooper, or standing before the judgment throne.

 

But that’s not the point of any of it. In fact, in all our talking so far, we’ve missed the BIG POINT.

 

And here it is:

 

The big point is not how unfair it is that God accepts this prodigal son. The point is how unfair it is that God accepts ANY OF US AT ALL.

 

And it really IS unfair, if you think about it… God created human beings to love him and take care of the earth, and only a few days later they have done something he asked them not to do – they sinned. And it all went downhill from there. Murder, greed, jealousy, lies… and that’s just in the book of Genesis!

 

God’s people keep running away from God, and yet, God keeps accepting them back. He brings them out of Egypt and they complain in the desert, but he takes them back. They build a golden calf, but he takes them back. They chase after other gods, ignore the poor and helpless, sometimes even curse God to his face. But he STILL takes them back.

 

And in a final act to show just how much he will accept us, God sends his Son to live among us, to walk the hard and dusty roads with us – to love us and heal us of diseases we didn’t even know about.

 

And what did we do in return? We killed him. And we continue to be sinful and stubborn even today.

 

It’s just unfair, the way we treat God sometimes. And he could have chosen the path of revenge – lightning bolts from the sky and fire from heaven. He could have chosen the path of strict justice – wipe out the earth again with a flood or natural disaster.

 

If anyone can say, “that’s not fair,” it’s God. And if anyone has a right to finally slam the door in our face, it’s God.

 

But he doesn’t. He brings us back in the door, time and time again. Puts the robe on us for the 100^th time, gives us the ring again. Lays out the feast before us, almost a if we’d never been gone.

 

When God was treated unfairly, he decided to be “unfair” in return – but not in the way that we think of “unfairness.” He decided to be “unfair” and not hold the sin against us. He decided to forgive, decided to love. Love doesn’t have to play by the rules of fair and unfair – love has its own set of rules.

 

The Solution: What Can We Do?

 

So what can we do when life (or someone in our life) just doesn’t seem fair to us? Some people choose to be warriors, fighting back every time something happens. Some people have resigned themselves to being doormats, taking a beating over and over again.

 

But those aren’t the only ways, not the best ways. We can do something, something more powerful than getting even. We can do what Jesus did, what God does for us over and over again: Choose to love anyway.

 

Remember what Jesus says about how we react when life’s not fair? When someone hits you, turn the other cheek. If someone takes your cloak, give them your shirt too. If someone makes you walk a mile, walk another mile with them.

 

It sounds silly. It sounds weak. But look at how POWERFUL we become when we do things the world doesn’t expect when things aren’t fair.

 

During the Civil Rights movement, people who were opposed to segregation were urged to be calm, quiet and loving. The rest of the world expected them to riot, to shoot, to do awful things. But they didn’t. Instead, they chose a different path, and I personally think that’s the reason things changed. People didn’t know what to think!

 

And that’s what makes the gospel such a powerful message. No matter how unfairly we may have treated God, he chooses to take us in anyway.

 

Men, I know this is a hard word for us. It sounds like running from a fight. But it’s not. It’s Jesus’ way of doing something much more powerful than a fist could ever accomplish. Because when we strike back, we play into their hands – we act just like we’re supposed to. It’s when we do something DIFFERENT that people start to notice.

 

This is love, this is forgiveness – treating someone fairly even when they’ve been unfair to us.

 

Conclusion

So while I wish I could send you from this place to a world that is fair and just, I can make no such promises. And only God knows how things will work out in the end. But in the meantime, we have a job to do that’s hard, one that makes no sense to us or to anyone else.

 

But it’s the job that saves us. And it’s an act that will make folks notice.

June 3, 2007: “What’s the Big Deal With the Trinity?”

Sermon

June 3, 2007

Trinity Sunday (C)

 

Dancing is a beautiful sight, if it’s done right. Recently, our church has developed a ministry for our young girls who want to dance, giving them the opportunity to lead us in worship through their movements. I love to watch good dancers at work practicing their art. “Dancing with the Stars” has brought dancing back into the public eye, and I think we’ll see a lot more young people getting into different kinds of dance because of it. That’s a great thing.

What does this have to do with the Trinity? You’ll find out…

 

How do we talk about the Trinity? It’s one thing to give little illustrations like the one I used for the children’s sermon, but the fact is that this is an awfully hard concept to understand – and one that no one has completely gotten, even though there have been BOOKS and BOOKS written about it.

 

And why is it important to, anyway?

 

It’s not up to us to understand every nuance of the Trinity, but it does help us to understand where the doctrine came from and how it makes a difference to us today.

 

1. It describes the God we worship.

There is the idea that there’s less of a need for the Trinity today than there used to be, or that it was once more understood than it is today. I don’t think this is true. People have ALWAYS had trouble understanding the Trinity. In the days when Christians sadly killed other Christians who didn’t believe just like them, people were killed over this very doctrine.

 

There is also the idea that this doctrine was just made up out of the blue, or patched together out of a bunch of separate ideas. This would be easy to believe since, even though there are 120 or more references to the trinity in the Bible, there is no direct teaching on the Trinity to be found in all the scriptures. While it’s true that the doctrine was not fully developed until nearly 400 years after Jesus, this does not mean that it was thrown together on a whim. Far from it – the early Christians debated and argued over who Jesus was and what to make of the Father and Spirit for years and years before an agreement was finally reached.

 

Not just there for confusion – The Trinity wasn’t just put together because people wanted something confusing about their religion. Who on earth wants a complex, mysterious and baffling religion?! We are no different from the earliest human beings in our desire for a religion that is simple, easy to understand and to practice. No, this complex doctrine of three in one was not something people came up with to make Christianity more attractive – if anything, it has made Christianity less attractive over the centuries!

 

Doctrine describes experience – No, the Trinity came about, like many other doctrines, because people needed a name for something they had already experienced. The disciples were almost all Jews who believed in God long before they ever met Jesus for the first time. Yet, by the end of their three years with him, they had watched him perform countless miracles, suffer and die, and raise from the dead. By the time they saw their last of Jesus, these men had no other option but to believe that Jesus was, in some way, God himself.

 

Yet this “God himself” had gone out daily to pray to “God himself,” had even prayed with and for his followers. God praying to God? How could this be?

 

And this God, praying to God, promised that another Comforter would come and would remind them of all the things Jesus had said and done, would empower them to be his witnesses, would live inside them. And once that Spirit came, once again they had no choice but to understand that in some strange way God had come to live inside them too – not as Jesus, who had gone away, and not as the Father, to whom they still prayed and saw at work in the world. Here was yet a third “version” of God.

 

So what to do? First they had known God as someone removed and enthroned above. Then they had known God as someone who walked beside them. Then they had known God who lived within them. How to understand God in this way?

 

So the doctrine of the Trinity was born. Not because someone said, “hey, let’s come up with something really cool to make our religion different!” Not because Jesus had sat them down and given them a lecture about it. But because, like all of us, they struggled to find a way to express the things they had experienced of God.

 

Following the map – What difference does the Trinity make to us? According to C.S. Lewis, doctrines of theology like the Trinity make the same difference to us that a map makes. We look at maps of the Atlantic Ocean today, and we see a lot of blue with spots and typing on it. But while it seems simple to us, what’s actually represented on that map is something very different than a piece of paper with blue ink on it.

 

It’s one thing to look at a map of the ocean, and another thing to stand on the beach and look at it. It’s one thing to run your finger across the Atlantic ocean on your desk globe, and another thing to get on a canoe in Virginia Beach and strike out for England. Even though the map may look tame, the ocean is anything but tame. And the map will help us get from one side to the other.

 

And we have that map because every island dot, every beach, every trade route was tediously explored and mapped by sailors over the course of centuries. Now that we’ve been in space, we can make pictures of the world and make maps of places we’ve never been. But before that time, every map had to be made by someone going there – writing out and drawing their own experiences on paper for those who come behind them.

 

Relying on the experiences of our forebears – So in something that is so complex, so difficult to grasp, we find something that is absolutely essential. It would be silly (and suicidal) to hop in a canoe and head to England without a map and compass – we have to rely on the experiences and wisdom of those who came before us. It would be just as silly to set out to know a God without the wisdom of those who have experienced him before us. And those who experienced God before us have experienced him as Trinity.

 

Makes us distinct – The Doctrine of the Trinity makes Christianity distinct. No other religion has a God who is at once enthroned in heaven, walking and suffering alongside us as one of us, and living within us and empowering us to do his will. Whether you realize it or not, you

 

2. You don’t have to understand it to be able to appreciate it.

The older I get, the more I know that I DON’T know. I understand my limitations. And to me, the mystery of God, the vastness of our amazing God – is both frightening to me AND comforting.

 

While he was working on the doctrine of the Trinity, St. Augustine had a dream one night in which he saw a little boy on the beach. The by had dug a hole in the sand, and he had a spoon and was trying desperately to spoon the water of the ocean into the hole – which of course swallowed up the water within moments. An angel told Augustine: this is how it is with humans trying to understand God. Our minds simply cannot hold it all.

 

It’s frightening because, like Augustine, we come to realize that there IS something bigger than us. It’s incomprehensible, impossible to understand. As humans, we want things that are simple and things we can control (just look at modern science and technology). But God is neither. I think that might be why so many modern folks are beginning to reject the notion of God altogether.

 

But it’s also comforting.

 

As uncontrollable as we are, we can take comfort in the fact that someone IS in control.

 

As often as we face uncertainty, we know there IS someone who knows.

 

As small and inconsequential as we feel sometimes, there IS someone who cares for us.

 

As little as we can do, there IS someone who can do the impossible.

 

3. It is the whole reason we exist.

 

This is where it gets practical.

 

Think of the relationship between Father, Son and Holy Spirit as the kind that is developed in a true, loving marriage or a deep friendship. In some way that is indescribable, the two really do become one – they begin to complete one another’s thoughts, to understand the other and know what the other needs. There’s trust and honesty that overcome the normal walls we usually put up between ourselves and other people. The two people are still individuals, and yet they are together making a oneness that is bigger than their individual selves. It’s like we live in a dance – moving together to the same music, moving in the same directions, following and leading, working together and not apart.

 

Now, if you live in that kind of relationship – if you have that kind of marriage or friendship with someone – you know that it’s not an easy thing. In fact, it’s one of the hardest things we do because it requires us to live outside ourselves. And as wonderful as it is, for some of you it might be all you need – you might be perfectly happy if you could move to a deserted island with that person for the rest of your life!

 

But as satisfying as that kind of relationship is, and as hard as it would be to share it, imagine what it would be like if you could extend that relationship to include EVERYONE. What kind of place would our world be if we could all relate to each other that way?

 

Well, that’s exactly what has happened on a divine level. God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit have existed for as long as time has been. They have a perfect relationship of love and care for one another, understanding and knowing each other perfectly as One. And God could have stayed that way forever, never needing anything or anyone else. They have always existed in a beautiful dance.

 

And yet, God chose to make others. And not just to make others, but to offer those others a chance to join in the dance – those ‘others’ are you and me, in case you didn’t realize it. God made us in his image, and has given all of us the chance to join in that beautiful dance, the relationship of perfect love and care.

 

And rather than that ruining what was there (“three’s a crowd… or in God’s case, Three’s company and FOUR’s a crowd), the dance becomes even more beautiful because all of creation is joining in. And God’s desire is that ALL of creation might join in the dance at last!

 

Now you and I have a choice. We can work against the dance – step on toes, trip others up, generally move against the flow – or we can join the dance, and invite others to join as well. You can call it salvation, redemption, whatever you like. But when we accept God’s love, we join into that perfect relationship – and begin to extend that kind of relationship to others.

 

Closing

 

So this funny little doctrine of the Trinity turns out to be anything but trivial. It’s the whole root of who God is, and what God intends to do with the world.

 

Does it sound froofy and mysterious? It is. Does it sound confusing? It is. Does it sound campy and far-fetched? It is. And that’s OK. And despite all that, these are the basic building blocks of our faith – the truth of what others have experienced about God, and what YOU and I can experience about God.

 

So does the doctrine of the Trinity make a difference to you and to me? Absolutely. All the difference in the world.

May 27, 2007: “Great Expectations”

“Great Expectations”

May 27, 2007 – Pentecost Sunday

Acts 2:1-12

Introduction: Expectations

 

Expectations are powerful things.

 

Not too long after we first got married, Tanya and I learned that we have differing expectations in several areas. One of those areas is vacation…

 

Expectations are powerful things.

 

Making expectations is something all of us do. An expectation happens when you think ahead about an event or a conversation and form your own ideas of how you’d like that thing to go. Most of you probably had expectations when you came in to Sunday School this morning. Many of you have expectations for this worship service – maybe you expect to leave as a changed person. Maybe you expected to cry this morning. Maybe you have high expectations of my sermon.

 

Expectations play a crucial role in almost every kind of relationship we have. We have expectations for our marriages, and as a pastor and a sometimes-counselor, I have seen that expectations play a very large role in how well couples get along and stay together. Most often, young couples these days have unrealistic expectations of marriage that they get from TV, movies and love songs. They think that marriage is going to solve all their problems – they’ll suddenly be happier all the time, less likely to get upset, less likely to get angry at one another. We’ll agree on everything, and we’ll all live happily ever after. My spouse will ALWAYS be understanding, loving, helpful, sensitive, and right at my side when I need him or her. That’s a pretty tall order for ANY human being!

 

Expectations, the experts say, are an important part of management. If we want the best from those we lead, we have to EXPECT the best. If you’re expecting someone under you to act lazily and turn in poor performance, then it’s likely they’ll meet your expectations. But experts say if you expect the best from someone and treat them that way, then you’ll get the best from them. This generally holds true in all areas of life, I think.

 

Including parenthood… but parenthood is another matter all together. We have to expect the best from our children – but it has to be a REALISTIC best. We can’t simply expect them to excel at school, football, baseball, math, shop class, community service, gymnastics, music and art. That’s placing UNREALISTIC expectations on them. No human being is capable of the expectations we place on our children sometimes, and they know that. We wonder why they grow up to have low self-esteem and don’t want to do anything – all their lives, they’ve been expected to do too many things they simply can’t do.

 

But as powerful as expectations are, there’s something that’s even more powerful – UNMET EXPECTATIONS. When we expect a certain outcome, and did not expect anything different, we suddenly find ourselves disappointed. Unmet expectations can make us hurt and vulnerable. Our marriage doesn’t turn out quite as we’d expected – lo and behold, we DO fight, we disagree from time to time, and we’re not 100% happy all day long. Lo and behold, our children aren’t the top of every single activity we enroll them in. Lo and behold, my sermon is not what you might have expected it to be.

 

And it’s those unmet expectations that can maim our spirits for the rest of our lives. When our expectations are unmet, we can either change our expectations, deal with them, or harbor bitterness and anger over those unmet expectations. And that bitterness is lethal.

 

If we continue to have unmet expectations in marriage, something will eventually have to give. If we continue to have unmet expectations in our work, then eventually we’ll be dissatisfied and want to move on. If your boss continues to have unmet expectations for you, then it’s likely you’ll be looking for another job soon. If we continue to have broken expectations from our church, then eventually we’ll want to go somewhere else.

 

Human beings and human institutions will always let us down. Even when we have realistic and achievable expectations of people, they will let us down. And after a while, it makes us cynical, makes us stop trusting people. Or worse, it makes us start expecting the WORST in people and things – and those kinds of expectations are the most dangerous, because they’re the ones that we most often find fulfilled! It’s a cycle that just keeps getting worse and worse…

Expectations of God

 

What kinds of things do we expect from God? Have you ever been disappointed in God? One book that had a profound influence on me is called Disappointment With God, by the author Philip Yancey. And at first I was afraid to pick it up – after all, who wants to admit they are disappointed with God?

 

But I have been, many times. When I’ve prayed for someone to be healed and it didn’t happen, when I realized the impact that my parents’ divorce had on me. Like many of you, I struggle with sins and temptations that I would be better off without – but God has not chosen to answer those prayers either. I have found, like Job did, that I’m disappointed with God from time to time.

 

And that disappointment with God is not about God himself, but about my expectations of him. I have expected God to act in a certain way – to answer this prayer that I pray repeatedly, to reward me for doing something I ought to do, to punish me for doing something I shouldn’t have. And on those instances where I do not find God doing what I wanted him to do, it’s like a little dent is made in my faith. And after a long time, all those dents begin to add up.

 

And if we let ourselves go further and further down this path, eventually we end up with no faith at all. Sure, we believe in God. But we believe in a God who doesn’t hear our prayers, who doesn’t answer when he hears, who refuses to intervene in situations where only he can do something.

 

And here’s the thing – It’s OK to come to this place. It’s OK to find yourself there. We all do. Job did, and countless other biblical figures did too – Abraham lost faith when God didn’t give him the son he promised right away. David lost faith when God didn’t win a particular battle for him. Even Jesus cried out on the cross, “My God, My God! Why have you forsaken me?”

 

It’s OK to find yourself there. But it’s not OK to stay there.

 

Expectations of God

We have expectations of God, too. We expect God to act a certain way, to do miracles and to answer prayers. We expect him to fix things that are broken. We expect him to always give us a warm happy feeling when we come to him in prayer. Expectations were a big part of our discussion in the book of Job this spring – just what were Job and his friends expecting from God?

 

We have words in the Christian vocabulary for our expectations of God – faith. Hope. When we pray to God, we have FAITH that he will answer. When we or someone we love is sick, we have HOPE that God will work healing. When God has said he’ll do something, we have FAITH that he will do it – though sometimes we place unrealistic expectations on him to do that thing in a certain way or a certain time.

 

I’m not going to ask you to raise your hands if you’ve ever found yourself there. You know if you’ve been there sometimes – and it’s OK.

 

Pentecost

 

Looking back at the passage, I have to wonder what these disciples, these men and women, expected to happen while they waited. In the past two months, they have seen Jesus willingly march to Jerusalem where his enemies are waiting, preach bold messages right under their noses. They’ve watched as Jesus is arrested, crucified, buried, and raised again. They’ve watched him ascend into heaven with a promise that he’ll be back and that something good is about to happen.

 

And if we hadn’t heard the story already, what would WE expect, you and I? I think I would have expected something a little different than what happened that day – sound like a wind, a few tongues of flame hovering over people’s heads, some quick language learning… come on. Jesus did stuff lots more exciting than that! What about feeding all of Jerusalem with five loaves of bread and two fish? What about raising someone from the dead? What about all of the people of Israel suddenly being healed of their diseases?

 

But no. A little noise, a little fire, and a lot of preaching. And when it’s all said and done, we’re left asking the same question as those gathered there to hear Peter’s preaching: “What does this mean?”

 

But there’s a miracle here that we often overlook. And it’s a miracle that still happens today, over and over again.

 

There is a REAL and AMAZING miracle that takes place on that day of Pentecost – God changing lives, God changing hearts. The miracle is not the mighty rushing wind or the tongues of fire. The great miracle is not these men speaking in languages they’ve never learned.

 

The great miracle is this scared and huddled group of believers, locked for weeks behind closed doors, suddenly bursting out of the room and sharing their Good News with the world!

 

The great miracle is the hardened hearts of the Jews, who just a few weeks before had ordered Jesus to be crucified, suddenly responding in faith to the man they had had a hand in killing.

 

The great miracle doesn’t happen on the outside. It happens on the inside, where no one can see. But just like Jesus’ analogy of not seeing the wind but seeing its effects, so can we see the mighty effects of the Spirit’s work in their hearts.

Expecting God to Act

 

Sometimes our expectations for God are unmet. Sometimes he doesn’t answer that prayer, doesn’t send miraculous healing for that person. And then what do we do? We either have to change our ideas about God, or we begin to lose those expectations.

 

And eventually, we can end up cynical – thinking that God really doesn’t answer our prayers, that he’s not listening. Because of our broken expectations, we might think that God is actually out to get us, to do some harm to us because of something we’ve done. We can stop believing min miracles, stop believing in the power of prayer to change anything. It leaves our faith lifeless and useless. We suddenly believe in an impotent God.

 

And if we don’t see miracles around us happening every day, then maybe we need to change our expectations of miracles. Ever since Jesus left, those physical miracles – healings, feedings, natural phenomena – have been getting fewer and farther between. It’s not that God has stopped working miracles – it just seems he doesn’t do that kind as often anymore.

 

But here’s the key to what happened that Pentecost Day – those disciples EXPECTED God to do something. They may have expected him to do something different than he did, but they EXPECTED him to do SOMETHING. And because they were expecting it, they were in the right place and the right time when it happened.

 

God has the power to make the sun stand still, to part the sea, to shake the earth at its foundations. God has the power to heal the sick, to raise the dead, to feed the multitudes. God has the power to move the planets, to fling the stars into space. God has the power to work salvation on our behalf so that we can live in eternity.

 

But God also has the power to change the hearts of human beings. But have we forgotten to EXPECT him to do that?

 

How many times have we said of someone else, “That’s just the way they are, and they aren’t going to change.” We’ve trusted them too many times, and been disappointed too many times. We’ve see that they consistently do the things they are not supposed to. And so we write them off.

 

And “them” might be anyone – our spouse, our family members, someone who’s made themselves a thorn in our side… it might even be a whole community or a whole race of people. We come to a point when we stop believing it’s possible for them to change. And lo and behold, they DON’T change.

 

Or the “them” might be ourselves. Have I given up believing that God can change my heart and mind? Have I given up hope that he can cure me of the sinful problems I have? Have I given up hope that I can be any different than I am?

 

Have we given up hope that God can bring new people to this church? After all, everyone around here is “churched,” right? Are they really, or are we just excusing ourselves from our responsibility?

 

When we place those kinds of low expectations on someone, when we refuse to believe that God can change them or change us, we put ourselves in the awful position of judge and distant observer. Suddenly, we don’t have a responsibility toward them anymore. There’s no need to expect or hope that they will change. They won’t.

 

Imagine…

 

I want to try something with you. Close your eyes and imagine that person you think can never change – that person who you can’t trust anymore

 

Let’s imagine for a moment that they CAN change. Let’s imagine that no matter how many times they’ve broken our trust, no matter how many times they have hurt us, no matter how many times they have done the things they’re not supposed to do… let’s imagine that they can STILL change, even then. Would we treat them differently? Would we continue to share good news with them?

 

And let’s imagine for a moment that WE can change. Let’s imagine that we can wake up one morning and be free from that illness, that we could wake up and our bodies would be healed. Let’s imagine that we can walk out the doors of this church

 

Conclusion

 

We might be cynical about some of our human relationships, but we should NEVER be cynical about God. Because when we stop expecting God to do something, we miss it when he DOES. It’s not that God is bound up in our expectations of him. But we will miss what he’s doing because we’re not expecting it.

 

What do you expect God to do?

Aprils 29, 2007: “David Had a Shepherd”

“David Had a Shepherd”

Psalm 23

April 29, 2007 – Easter 1 (c)

 

This is a familiar passage, one that has brought comfort to many people. But it probably brought the most comfort to David, who wrote it. David wrote from his experience of God, from his own experience of life. And this is the image that he came up with for God.

 

Of course, no image for God is perfect – they always fall short. But David’s image endures because it is perhaps the best illustration of God that human beings have yet developed. I tried to come up with a better illustration that matched it, but of course, you can’t beat David!

 

And here’s the important thing about our view of God: how we see God determines how we TREAT God. David’s image is usually used for comfort, but there are things in here that are not always comforting. Since this is the best image, let’s compare David’s image of God to OURS, and see what we find.

 

David had a shepherd. What kind of God do we have?

 

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

 

Shepherds made sure their sheep had all their NEEDS met… not their wants.

 

Sometimes, we want to say, “The Lord is my doting grandfather, who gives me everything I desire.”

 

Sometimes we want to say, “the Lord is my waiter, who is there at my beck and call.”

 

But that’s not David’s God. David had a shepherd.

 

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters.

 

Sheep are generally unintelligent creatures, and shepherds had to lead the sheep toward the grass. But he could not make them eat, and he could not make them drink.

 

Sometimes we want to say, “the Lord is my mother, who sits me at the table like an infant and spoon-feeds me.”

 

But that’s not David’s God. David had a shepherd.

 

He restoreth my soul.

 

Sheep often relied completely on the shepherd for nourishment, comfort, and guidance. When a sheep was sick, the shepherd cared for it. But then he’d put the sheep back out and let it heal on its own – you can only care for someone so much, you know.

 

Sometimes we want to say, “The Lord is my mechanic – he fixes me up and sends me off to run myself down again.”

 

Or maybe, “the Lord is my doctor – I only go to him when I’m sick.”

 

But that’s not David’s God. David had a shepherd.

 

He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.

 

The word righteousness here means “right paths.” Horses and other smart animals can find their own way through difficult places. Sheep are not that way. Shepherds had to find a path for their sheep that was safe and kept them from harm. But ultimately, the shepherd could only lead – the sheep had to follow. He led them – he didn’t push.

 

Sometimes we want to say, “The Lord is my pilot. I’ll let him do all the work.”

 

But that’s not David’s God. David had a shepherd.

 

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.

 

The shepherd did his best to keep the sheep from harm, but sometimes things happened. Sometimes, they had to go through rough places. Even then the shepherd didn’t just whisk them away to another place! He didn’t take them out of the “valley of the shadow of death.” Instead, he reassured them and guided them with his staff.

 

Sometimes we want to say, ‘”The Lord is my hedge and my protector. He won’t let evil come near me.”

 

Or maybe, “The Lord is my bubble. If I’m really doing the right things, nothing bad will happen to me.”

 

But that’s not David’s God. David had a shepherd.

 

The way we see God will ultimately determine how we treat God, how we live our lives.

 

David had a shepherd. What kind of God do WE have?