Looking Back

Looking Back

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

June 30, 2013

at Gordonsville Presbyterian Church, Gordonsville, Virginia

Luke 9: 51-62

 Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside of our minds

Help us to be more than our lives      

For your eyes show the way

            Your mind knows the truth

            Your being is the life.

Amen. 

51 When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem.⁵²And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him;⁵³but they did not receive him, because his face was set towards Jerusalem.⁵⁴When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?’^*55But he turned and rebuked them.⁵⁶Then^* they went on to another village.

Would-Be Followers of Jesus

57 As they were going along the road, someone said to him, ‘I will follow you wherever you go.’⁵⁸And Jesus said to him, ‘Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.’⁵⁹To another he said, ‘Follow me.’ But he said, ‘Lord, first let me go and bury my father.’⁶⁰But Jesus^* said to him, ‘Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.’⁶¹Another said, ‘I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.’⁶²Jesus said to him, ‘No one who puts a hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.’ 

I've always been a child out of my generation. The first cd that I ever got, now I had a bunch of tapes and some records, but the first CD I ever got was the Nat King Cole story. I just loved Nat King Cole. I was introduced to him by his Christmas music, but then moved on to his other music, and so I remember wanting that CD for Christmas. One of the great songs on that CD was called "Looking Back." I can still hear it now.

Looking ba-a-ack over my life
I can see where I caused you strife
But I know, oh yes I know
I'd never make that same mistake again

Looking ba-a-ack over my deeds
I can see signs a wise man heeds
And if I just ha-ad the chance
I'd never make that same mistake again

Once my cup was overflowing
But I gave nothing in retu-u-urn
Now I can't begin to te-ell you
What a lesson I have learned

Looking ba-a-ack over the slate
I can see love turned to hate
But I know, oh yes I know
I'd never make that same mistake again 

Looking back over our lives, taking stock of who we are where we've come, all the steps along the way seems to be a big part about being human, but in this passage, Jesus says, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God."

A few years ago I heard a sermon on this passage. The pastor was seeking to grow his church by any means necessary. He wanted to make a bunch of changes to the service, to the way the church ran things, most of them were going to be unpopular with the current members of the church, but he thought that they would attract many more new ones, so he thought it was worth doing. So he used this passage to say, we must steam ahead, with our eyes on the prize, the goals of growing the church always in mind. He altered the metaphor a bit, by saying that if you are plowing a field you can't make straight plow lines without looking forward to a point in the distance and then and only then focusing on that point can you keep your plow lines straight. I always was a little bit disturbed by this take on the passage, especially since it had to do with a personal agenda, and then ramming it through and using the Bible to justify it, and silence any and all dissension, but I also had trouble with the metaphor itself, because focusing on a point in the distance may keep your lines straight, but what's in your way. If you are staring way in the distance and you hit a family of bunnies, or mice, or as Robert Burns wrote, in "To A Mouse, On Turning Her Nest up with the plow" "I'm truly sorry Man's dominion / Has broken Nature's social union," I'm sorry you are in the way, but I have to keep these lines straight. I have to accomplish my goals. The other thing that can happen is there is a big rock, and it breaks your plow. I bring this up to say that there is danger in only looking forward, there is a difference between always looking forward, and what Jesus is talking about here. There is a difference between looking back, and looking away from Jesus, away from God. You can be looking forward all day, with the straightest plow lines you could imagine, reaching personal goals, but be looking in a direction that is far away from Jesus, and so not fit for the kingdom of God. It is possible. Not looking back, does not mean blindly looking forward. It's funny that forward in this case isn't the opposite of back.

The Bible is full of illustrations and examples of what Jesus means when he says "looks back." In Genesis there is Lot's wife. While fleeing out of Sodom she looks back and is turned to a pillar of salt, remember it from Genesis 19. Jesus also refers to this event later in this gospel of Luke in chapter 17, saying, "

³⁰ “It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed. ³¹ On that day no one who is on the housetop, with possessions inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything. ³² Remember Lot’s wife! 

Again don't look back. Another time that people look back in this way is the Israelites after getting out of Egypt. How long was it before they start grumbling, rather than looking to God through Moses who had brought them out of slavery, through the Red Sea, even, that they begin to look back to Egypt and their former bondage with longing. Looking back to the past instead of the future because again like we talked about last week the unknown of the future is scary, more scary than the known past even if the known past is slavery or destruction.

And that is exactly what is behind for both Lot's wife and for the newly freed Israelites: Slavery and Destruction. Is that what is behind us when we turn to Jesus? Is that what we are looking back towards when we invariably seek to look back? In 1678 John Bunyan published his famous work, A Pilgrim's Progress. In that allegory, his character, a man named Christian goes on a journey of redemption. The town that he lives in is called the City of Destruction. It's this city he is fleeing from. He get's inspired by a man named Evangelist to leave that city, but his wife and children think he is crazy and do not come. Early in the course of his journey he looks back in a way, he is despondent about having to leave his family behind, and he gets caught in the slough of despond. In that bog, of sinking sand, and marsh, and swamp, he longs to be back at home, he longs for what he had, even though he knows that the city will be destroyed. Bunyan tries to capture the gravity of this morning's passage. The path of the Christian is difficult, but it is right, it is away from destruction. Bunyan's allegory seeks to describe the road that all Christians travel, and Jesus knows it as well.

It seems so harsh though doesn't it, when taken literally. All the guy in our story wants to do is say farewell to "those at his home." I just want to say good bye. Come on Jesus let me say good bye, but Jesus says, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God." That's intense. It's not like the guy asked for a week, or even another day, he just asks for a moment. And Jesus denies him it. Why? Is Jesus in that much of a hurry? What is it? Part of a clue may be in the rest of our reading for today. There are a couple of verses that stand out as just as intense. It talks about Jesus going through Samaria, but no one received him, because his face was set towards Jerusalem. It certainly suggests, that Jesus is completely focused on where he is going. So if Jesus is intense, at least he is consistent, he is following through on the same behavior he is demanding of his disciples. He's not just saying follow me, and do what I say, but follow me, do what I do, and we all know what goes on in Jerusalem for Jesus, Jesus carries the cross, as disciples we pick up the cross, would we rather look back? Another interesting point here, is he has many people seeming to want to follow him, and he is clear to them about the life that he leads, the lack of comfort. Don't expect a house to live in, for the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head. There is no mistaking it, following Jesus is not easy. It's uncomfortable, it pushes you far beyond your comfort zone, it alienates you from your old life, it is dangerous, and if that were not enough, it demands you leave without saying goodbye. Or does it?

In John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, after Christian makes it to the Holy City, in part one, there is part two, where his wife and family come too on their own journey. The goodbyes are only temporary, and by Christian leaving abruptly they are inspired to come, had he come back to get them, they would have instead convinced him to stay. Looking back, that moment's hesitation is enough to freeze us in our tracks, remember how Jesus knows us. He knows how humans prefer the known to the unknown, he knows that the moment's hesitation really means the choice to stay and not to follow. He knows that we have Lot's wife in us, and that we have the Israelites in us too. He knows that hesitation is the end of our following.

But then there is the alternative, and what Jesus wants instead. There is that old, well not too old, movie, at least not Nat King Cole old movie, When Harry Met Sally, where two friends slowly fall in love over a long period of time, but finally when they realize without a doubt that they are in love, Billy Crystal says to Meg Ryan, "When you finally realize you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want forever to start as soon as possible." That's love, and that's what the Kingdom of Heaven is. Notice that Jesus doesn't say, you can't follow me if you go say goodbye, notice that Jesus doesn't say no to the guy, rather he says this is what following means, its love, and love doesn't look back, and love is hard, and love requires sacrifice, and love requires everything you are, but love is what the kingdom of God is made of, and if you can't love that completely, you are not fit for the kingdom of God.

Now one could say isn't it love that wants to say goodbye, isn't it love that wants to bury his father. It may be, but it reminds me of another important verse from Jesus, Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God, and it's righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. Jesus is leading people away from slavery and destruction and into a world that is beyond our finite thinking of finality and limitation. Like the fact that Christian's wife and children make their way in the second part of Pilgrim's Progress, so too will others, others may follow you, love says they will. It's not about staying and convincing them to come with you, that never works, actions always speak louder than words don't they. Isn't that one message of Jesus' work on the Cross, doesn't that put to action what John 3:16 put to words, "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son" not just to become human, not just to teach and grow numbers of followers, but to die on a cross, so that people would truly know that God so loved the world without a doubt, an action of total sacrifice, an action of love, love doesn't look back, love seeks the embrace of the Almighty, it is destruction and slavery to look back and seek else. And why do we think anything else would suffice in the stead of love, it won't.

I started this sermon with Nat King Cole, and his song Looking Back is a song all about remembering regret, wanting for things to be different. Life with Jesus is all in all, wanting something else is preferring the slavery and destruction, he sings in that final verse, I have seen love turned to hate, but I know, oh yes I know I'll never make that same mistake again. Let us instead seek to follow Jesus, into the Kingdom of God where love does not turn to hate, let us go there without looking back. Amen, may it be so.

 

What Really Scares Us

What Really Scares Us

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

June 23, 2013

at Gordonsville Presbyterian Church, Gordonsville, Virginia

Luke 8: 26-37 

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside of our minds

Help us to be more than our lives      

For your eyes show the way

            Your mind knows the truth

            Your being is the life.

Amen.

 

²⁶ Then they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is opposite Galilee. ²⁷ As he stepped out on land, a man of the city who had demons met him. For a long time he had worn no clothes, and he did not live in a house but in the tombs. ²⁸ When he saw Jesus, he fell down before him and shouted at the top of his voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me”— ²⁹ for Jesus had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. (For many times it had seized him; he was kept under guard and bound with chains and shackles, but he would break the bonds and be driven by the demon into the wilds.) ³⁰ Jesus then asked him, “What is your name?” He said, “Legion”; for many demons had entered him. ³¹ They begged him not to order them to go back into the abyss.

³² Now there on the hillside a large herd of swine was feeding; and the demons begged Jesus  to let them enter these. So he gave them permission. ³³ Then the demons came out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.

³⁴ When the swineherds saw what had happened, they ran off and told it in the city and in the country. ³⁵ Then people came out to see what had happened, and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. ³⁶ Those who had seen it told them how the one who had been possessed by demons had been healed. ³⁷ Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear. So he got into the boat and returned.^[1]  

Fear is a funny thing. Heights scare me, and I thought it couldn't be any worse than being scared for myself, but it is tons worse watching Coralee or Clara, climbing around clumsily up high on something, a chair, a table, the swing set. I get dizzy; my senses are at the same time  heightened and so tense it would seem that they wouldn't function on command, like controlling my body, my mind, or my emotions is just at that moment impossible, total loss of control; and that makes it all worse. Another thing that gets me is fast small animals: snakes, mice, birds. Anything that seems quick, and their actions irrational. Again it's a control thing. Who knows when a mouse is going to pop out, and who knows where it will go in its panic. Again tension, heightened sense, irrational response. . . fear.

It's a crazy feeling, but one we seem to crave in some ways. There is an entire movie genre, a multimillion dollar industry that surrounds creating that feeling for people, or actually two. There are suspense thrillers and horror movies. They both seek to make us lose ourselves in a moment of vicarious fear, having all the reaction without the actual danger. It makes our hearts race, our skin crawl, our minds shutter in disbelief, we hold tight to the person watching with us, we hide our eyes, we yell warnings at the screen, we have nightmares that make us say never again, but then we always find our way back. Skydiving, bungee jumping are some other examples of this type of controlled fear scenarios people pay money to experience. What is it that makes people afraid? What do we like about fear? What do we hate about it? Why can we deal with fear in movies, in ways we can't in real life? What are the elements that instill fear? And are they always the same? Is it connected to the very idea of being human?

Coralee is an interesting case study. She loves Disney princess movies, loves Cinderella, and Ariel, and Belle, but her favorite is Aurora, also known as Sleeping Beauty. I don't know if you've watched it recently, but it gets pretty intense and pretty dark at one point. There is this scene that takes place after Aurora has pricked her finger and gone to sleep, where the evil queen Maleficent is in her black fortress, all the colors are purple, black, and eerie green, her demon henchmen are dancing around the fire in a demon satanic ritualistic type thing. It is a scary image, and we were worried that Coralee would be upset, that she would have nightmares, that we should turn it off, but she was completely unphased. She looked up and said, look daddy, are they dancing around the fire. She actually went outside later and danced around the fire too around our firepit in the back yard, she thought it was cool, like ballet class, a new dance step to learn. She had no sense that it was evil, no sense that it was creepy, no sense even that it was scary. It's made me wonder about what really scares us. Is it dark colors and dark music, and ugly horns and stuff? Are we innately adverse to stuff like that or is it learned?

This morning's Gospel reading is a story with some scary elements. Scary, because demon possession is scary. The thought that some evil being could enter into our bodies, ravage us, fill us with disease, control us, make us sick, make us act crazy. Which brings to mind another movie, The Exorcist, DeAnna finds that movie terrifying, and I thought it was somewhat boring. . . again why, what causes the difference? But back to our story. We have that kind a thing going on here. To me in a way preaching on or about a story with demon possession is scarier than the demon itself, but here goes.

A man of the city, who had demons, meets Jesus. The effect of the demons on the man it says is that he has not worn clothes for a long time, and that he makes his home not in a house, but in and around the tombs. He also had been chained several times, but would break the chains and return each time to the wilds. Now this man speaks to Jesus, not in his own voice but as the voice of the demon, and Jesus talks to the demon and sends him out of the man, he asks the demon it's name and it famously says, Legion, suggesting that there just isn't one demon in there but a whole host of them having a party in this guy.

They ask Jesus not be thrown back into the abyss. Now this is an interesting aspect, the demons don't want to go back to the abyss, suggesting that demons don't like the abyss either, fitting in with much of the fallen angels, being punished in Hell, aspect of who demons are. Or are they like Brer Rabbit in the famous Uncle Remus story, begging not to be thrown in the briar patch, secretly knowing that is exactly where they want to go. Jesus for some reason says ok, so instead of going back to the abyss they enter into the bodies of a bunch of pigs who are standing around. Then the pigs, filled with these demons, immediately run and jump off a cliff to their death like a bunch of lemmings and are drowned.

Could you imagine seeing that scene live? You'd think it would be the scariest thing you've ever seen. 20 times scarier than the exorcist. You'd think it would change your life, cause you to never sleep again, creep you out, make your hair stand up on end like you'd seen a ghost, but the people don't seem to be phased. It just says, the swine herders who witnessed it all, went in the town to tell people what had happened, more out of curiosity and amazement than fear it would seem, and people from the city come running to see for themselves. It was a crazy scene and the people want to see what all of the excitement is about, but when they get there something does frighten them, but it is not Legion, the crazy pigs, or any of that horrific suicidal pork stuff, instead it says, "and when they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons had gone sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid." Now they are afraid. Now, really? Now you're afraid, not because Legion and the demon crew were speaking crazy, begging Jesus not to go back to Hell, not because they possessed a bunch of pigs, not because those pigs, jumped in the water and killed themselves, none of that whole scene produces fear, only the formerly possessed man, restored, sitting at Jesus' feet, gives them fear. It even mentions it twice that, that is the source of their fear. It says after they saw how the man was in his right mind, that all of the people then asked Jesus to leave because they were filled with great fear.

Don't you find those details strange? If you were an observer from some unknowing world, knowing nothing about our world and the way it operates, what a demon is, etc., and you read that story, you would think that being possessed by demons, sleeping in the houses of the dead was normal, pigs running into the ocean to drown themselves is normal, and that sane people not possessed by demons is the strange, the bizarre, the exceptional. What does that say about our world, and the way we want it. It seems that the people prefer the status quo to healing. Everything was right with the world when that man was crazy, having him sane, is what freaks them out. Why?

It seems that there is something about human nature that fears change. Coralee is a great example of this, demons dancing around a fire produces nothing for her, but alter her schedule in any way and she loses it completely. I'm surprised we can't hear her now, the only reason this worked this morning, with DeAnna playing was that we talked to her about it all week, trying to prepare her for the change, that DeAnna would be sitting at the piano, not next to her on the pew. Change, change of routine, dealing with normal is easy, dealing with change freaks her out.

We're all like that to some extent. We prefer to sit in our regular seats, we go through our daily routines, we do things repeatedly over and over because they give us comfort, and to break from those makes us nervous and frightened. We follow traditions because they are safe, and the unknown scares us. Shakespeare called it, "that undiscovered country, bearing those ills we have rather than flying to others we know not of" not just of death, but of action, doing something, anything, by definition is new, is intimidating and scary, his character Hamlet, fears and hesitates throughout the whole play. Jefferson captured it in the Declaration of Independence, stating, "accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed." The comfort I think has more to do with control. Much like my fears I stated, about being out of control, control is what we crave, and losing it is what we fear. Our traditions, our status quo, our concepts of "normal," our being able to label the crazy guy crazy, so we can dismiss him and deal with it, that I can see the mouse, see the snake, prepare myself for their appearance, all have to do with our need to feel like we are in control, not necessarily to actually be in control, because we never really are, but to at least feel like we are. These things are our lovies, our special blankets, our insurance policies we kept them from childhood and we clutch them with everything we have.

It is this problem that we have with Jesus, it is for this very reason that these people kick him out of town. It's for this reason that Jesus was crucified. It's this reason that Jesus puts people off today. Jesus calls us out of that false safe zone, and into the new, which is as old as our world. It is actually just reality. We build around us so much false hope, that tearing it down shakes us completely. Religion is even a part of it to some extent, the comforting aspects of the safeness of church. If one aspect is out of place, shown to be lacking, proven false, does that mean it all falls, all our hope, all our safety, so we hold fast to so much, many traditions are based on this principle. Jesus seems to challenge it, he challenges the safety of our lives, he challenges the safety of our church, he challenges the safety of our safety mechanisms and says step back into reality, into the light, into life, into me.

It is for this reason that the beginning of the Gospel of John talks about preferring the darkness to the light. The darkness is known and safe, the light is different, new, unknown, an act of faith. And so again and again we choose the darkness because we know it, and Jesus comes to us shows us the light and we cower in fear from it, wishing it would go away. It is the shame of humanity and the sadness that surrounds sin. We choose to protect ourselves with things because we can touch them, rather than Jesus who deeply touches us, do you see the shift there in subject and object? Our doing versus Jesus' doing. . . Jesus screams fall to your knees and submit, for that is what they see this formerly possessed man doing, but we choose to do things on our own, no Jesus, head out of town please, we're in control here.

What would it look like to give up control to Jesus? I leave you with that question this week. I'm going to ask it of myself as well because I, too hold on and try to control aspects of my life. There is a lot of unknown in the answer to that question, but there are some things we can be sure of, it will be based in love, it will be based in the reality of our true created selves, and it will be beyond anything we can comprehend. Do you see the Holy Trinity at hand in those truths? Can we even fathom? God give us the strength. Amen.

 

 

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^[1]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 8:26-37). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

Envy: Equal and Enough

Envy: Equal and Enough

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

June 16, 2013

at Gordonsville Presbyterian Church, Gordonsville, Virginia

Luke 7: 36-50 

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside of our minds

Help us to be more than our lives      

For your eyes show the way

            Your mind knows the truth

            Your being is the life.

Amen. 

³⁶ One of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and took his place at the table. ³⁷ And a woman in the city, who was a sinner, having learned that he was eating in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment. ³⁸ She stood behind him at his feet, weeping, and began to bathe his feet with her tears and to dry them with her hair. Then she continued kissing his feet and anointing them with the ointment. ³⁹ Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw it, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what kind of woman this is who is touching him—that she is a sinner.” ⁴⁰ Jesus spoke up and said to him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” “Teacher,” he replied, “speak.” ⁴¹ “A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. ⁴² When they could not pay, he canceled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?” ⁴³ Simon answered, “I suppose the one for whom he canceled the greater debt.” And Jesus said to him, “You have judged rightly.” ⁴⁴ Then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has bathed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. ⁴⁵ You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not stopped kissing my feet. ⁴⁶ You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. ⁴⁷ Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” ⁴⁸ Then he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” ⁴⁹ But those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” ⁵⁰ And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.” ^[1]  

So on this father's day I'd like to start with my favorite quote from my father. I find that this piece of wisdom I remember and use more than any other from him. As an English teacher, or really as a teacher of high school boys in general, it just seems to always be applicable to all kinds of situations, so I find new opportunities to use it in new and effective ways. I'm not sure what Dad's source for it is, or whether it is original to him, but I always remember it. He said, "When you're explaining you're losing." It is true in so many different ways. Think about it, if you are telling a joke and you have to explain it you are done. . . joke over, won't be funny anymore. Usually starts with you saying, "Do you get it, then silence, so you try to explain and it just gets worse. Another application where I use it, probably the most often, is with my students about their writing, actually that isn't true, the first is when they come into class with an excuse, trying to explain away something they did wrong, but closely after that is with their writing, trying to get them to illustrate their points with proof and evidence rather than broad and vague explanations, I'll say stop explaining and show me the answer, show me don't tell me. I found this to be a common thread between this morning's Old and New Testament Lessons. Both Jesus and Nathan, instead of explaining the situation they illustrate the point so that David and the Pharisee convict themselves by their own reaction to the parable.

Let's look at David first: David and Bathsheba. David who has been given the throne, given the world, wants more, what he has just isn't enough. He lusts after another man's wife, and then arranges it so her husband, one of David's officers, Uriah, is killed in battle, removing him from the picture, clearing the way for David and Bathsheba to be married It is one of the most despicable acts in the Biblical narrative, and this one from a supposed hero, a supposed great pillar of Old Testament greatness, a supposed man after God's own heart. It fulfills Samuel's prophesy about what a king will do to the people. It fulfills the truths about how humanity's fallen nature handles power. It is truly awful. And Nathan calls David out on it, but instead of talking to him directly he offers a parable, a parallel story about a rich man who takes the prized lamb of a poor shepherd. David reacts angrily, having been a poor shepherd himself. He is angered by the injustice of the situation. He knows it is wrong, but here is where Nathan turns the tables, by opening David's eyes to his own sin, saying:

You are the man! Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: I anointed you king over Israel, and I rescued you from the hand of Saul; ⁸ I gave you your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom, and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah; and if that had been too little, I would have added as much more. ⁹ Why have you despised the word of the Lord, to do what is evil in his sight? ^[2]  

Nathan's like, was it not enough? You would have been given more, why did you take?

Jesus' parable is similar. He has been invited to this Pharisee, Simon's house, so Jesus goes, but while he is there, a woman of the city, a sinner, comes up behind him, and washes his feet with her tears, drying them with her own hair, kissing them, and anointing them with ointment she had brought. The Pharisee sees it, doesn't say anything out loud, but only to himself, saying, this man, speaking of Jesus, he can't be a prophet, if he were, he would know this woman is a sinner, and wouldn't allow her to touch him so familiarly. Now we don't know how Jesus knows what he was thinking, it could be that he could read the guy's thoughts, it could be that he read his looks, it could be that he simply assumes, but assumes correctly, because he addresses the man's thoughts as if he had spoken them aloud and much like Nathan tells the man a self convicting parable, illustrating what the Pharisee just couldn't see. He asks:

“A certain creditor had two debtors; one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. ⁴² When they could not pay, he canceled the debts for both of them. Now which of them will love him more?” 

The Pharisee answers, "I suppose the one for whom he canceled the greater debt," and Jesus says, "You have judged rightly." Then Jesus goes on to forgive the woman's sin, and showing how her reaction to him is more right. She is showing her devotion, whereas he is looking at others.  She is loving, he is judging, even if he is "judging" rightly. Then he finally says to him, "the one whom little is forgiven loves little," not hey  you need to love me, he can figure that out for himself, and to her he says your sins are forgiven. No further explanation is given. We don't know whether this Pharisee got it or not, but the other people at the table start grumbling, wondering who this is who forgives sins. Jesus doesn't stop to explain he goes on, and the chapter ends, episode over. Luke 8 begins with something else. Jesus seems to have understood my dad's advice, too. When you are explaining you are losing, so he doesn't explain he just acts and moves on, letting the actions speak for themselves.

Now maybe I should take Dad's advice here, or follow Jesus' lead, because talking about sin and human nature can get you into trouble, opening up the possibility of being a hypocrite, no problem there I am a hypocrite, and fall victim to these tendencies constantly myself, but I want to look into this story a little bit more anyway, and look at it how it parallels the David story. When I look at the situation of the Pharisee and the situation of King David I see the three E words that make up the title of this sermon. I see issues concerning the concept of what is enough. I see issues of equality. I see how those things work together to get at another E word, defining the sin we call Envy. Let's look at each of these.

Enough, David first. David is the king, David used to be a poor shepherd. There is a ton of upward mobility there. David overcame Goliath, against all odds. David overcame Saul against all odds, not because of David's great abilities but because of God and God's work in him. He is given all, but it is not enough for him. He wants more, and instead of going to God for more he takes it upon himself to get it, by any means necessary. What is it in us that makes us want more? Is there anything that can ever be enough? We look around us constantly and we see people destroyed by their desires. Nothing is ever enough. In our material culture, we need more and more things. . . have you seen the commercials? Bigger is better? Even little kids know it, whether it is the coverage that Verizon offers, or whether it is how much money you save with Geico. They use children in the commercials to show just how self evident the idea is to even the most simple and innocent of us. But the problem with big is it is a relative term, and if things are relative there isn't room for an absolute like, "enough." God should be that absolute, should be that enough, but is he for us? Or do we look elsewhere? Why?

Sometimes our notions of equal get in the way of our notions of enough. This is the key ingredient in Jesus' parable to the Pharisee. Jesus tells the Pharisee that he "judged rightly" when he said that the man forgiven more debt should be more pleased,  but is that necessarily true because it misses a key component of the parable. It misses the main point of the parable, blinded by the inequality, it is the Pharisees main problem, and I think it is ours as well if we "judge rightly" like he does. It makes me think about another of Dad's advice. When I was learning to drive, he said that it is not enough to be right in a car. "You can be right, but you'll be dead right if you are not aware of what is going on." Open your eyes and know what is going on. The Pharisee judges right, but he is dead wrong about the truth. He sees the two forgiven debtors in the story divided by the amount of their forgiveness, rather than seeing the bottom line in how they are equal. Very similar to the fact that he sees the differences between he and the sinning woman, rather than the fact of how they are in fact equal. They are equal in the final status, as people forgiven of debt. Does the Pharisee get this in the final analysis? That not only is the woman at Jesus' feet forgiven of her sins, but so too is the he. Does he get that when he sees this parable? Do we? Does he even see his sin? Do we see our own?

Do we get it when we see this parable enacted around us all over the place? When we see others get ahead? When we see others who are more talented? When we see others who have more stuff? When we see others who are more happy? When we see others who seem to have more spirituality? When we see others who seem to be more at peace? When we see others, others, others? Can we see the grace of God in our own lives while we are looking at the grace of God in others? God I hope so, but it seems not if we are worried about things being equal, blind to the fact that they are. Before Christ enters into us there never will be equal, in Jesus Christ we are forgiven, completely, this forgiveness is a real manifestation of God's love that is the only equality in the world, and it is enough, it is infinite, more than it doesn't exist, so it is enough. Is our conception and focus on the rest merely blinding envy?

David, he listens to Dad, when Nathan confronts him, he doesn't try to explain it away, instead he confesses, he says, "I have sinned against the Lord," and the tradition is that he then prays and writes Psalm 51, which we used this morning as a prayer of Confession, as we do weekly, and God hears his prayer, and "puts away his sin." Then in Luke' Gospel, we don't get to see how the Pharisee behaves in response to Jesus' parable, its left open as so many similar events in the Gospels are, because it allows us to insert ourselves. Are we the woman at the feet of Jesus or are we the Pharisee? I can't tell you which is the right person to feel connected to, but I can tell  you that it doesn't matter, they are both forgiven, and so are we, and to quote my father again, one last time, "Thank God for Jesus." Amen.

 

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^[1]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 7:36-50). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

^[2]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (2 Sa 12:7-9). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.

To Flee To

To Flee To

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

June 9, 2013

at Gordonsville Presbyterian Church, Gordonsville, Virginia

Romans 4: 13-25

 

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside of our minds

Help us to be more than our lives      

For your eyes show the way

            Your mind knows the truth

            Your being is the life.

Amen.

 

¹³ For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. ¹⁴ If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. ¹⁵ For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

¹⁶ For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, ¹⁷ as it is written, “I have made you the father of many nations”)—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. ¹⁸ Hoping against hope, he believed that he would become “the father of many nations,” according to what was said, “So numerous shall your descendants be.” ¹⁹ He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was already as good as dead (for he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. ²⁰ No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, ²¹ being fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. ²² Therefore his faith “was reckoned to him as righteousness.” ²³ Now the words, “it was reckoned to him,” were written not for his sake alone, ²⁴ but for ours also. It will be reckoned to us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, ²⁵ who was handed over to death for our trespasses and was raised for our justification. ^[1]  

We are so thankful this morning to have Harp with us. What an amazing message they have been sharing with us of joy and praise, both in their song and in their presence. There is nothing like music to communicate the vastness of God's infinite love and glory. Words never can do enough, and so music takes us further, closer, showing us deeper the truth of beauty and grace.

Early this week as I was putting together the parts of the service I asked Erick to send me the words to their Mendelssohn anthem. I decided immediately after looking at it that I wanted it to be the center piece of this morning's message. Take a look at the words as they are printed in your bulletin insert:

Lord, I flee to Thee for refuge; bow Thine ear unto my pray’r.
If my sins Thou shouldst remember, evermore must I despair.

But my trust is in Thy mercy: all my hope in Thee I place.
I will sing Thy loving kindness and the wonder of Thy grace.

 I was struck immediately by the idea of fleeing, and especially as it said to flee to, because I was sure that fleeing meant running away from. I even looked it up in the dictionary just to make sure, it said "to run away from, as if from danger" or "to run away from a person, place or a thing." Its synonyms are "evade, escape, avoid, shun, elude." Nothing about the word suggests the idea of fleeing to something, rather everything has to do with running away. Now there are plenty Biblical examples of fleeing from God, the most famous is Jonah, but there really are so many, our world is full of the phenomenon, it is kinda the nature of being fallen, so we have fleeing from down, but what does it mean to flee to something, and more importantly what does it mean to flee to God, does it always mean that we are escaping, evading, avoiding, shunning, and eluding when we flee to God, or is there more to it? What does it mean to flee to God? What is it for and what is it like? These are the questions of this morning.

Since fleeing means to run way from, what are the things we are running from most often when we flee to God? Pain, worry, doubt, and fear. . . these are some of the things, sure. Think for a minute about each of these. . . What are things that cause you pain? What are the things that cause you to worry? What are the things that cause you to doubt? What are you most afraid of?  What would it mean to run away from those and into the arms of God? Is it just an empty metaphor, something that existed in the Old Testament but not anymore? In Sunday School this month we are working through the Psalms. We've read the first 40 some of them this week, already there are many times where David, just like in this morning's anthem, describes God as his refuge. Most of the time he is referring to being protected from real physical enemies, political adversaries, foreign invaders, scoffers, and God offers him real tangible protection, absolute deliverance, and total security. Do we often think of God as a refuge in that way? Or do we instead see it as a mindset, and fleeing to God is fleeing in our minds to a better existence, looking at the world differently, is the truth about God simply defined by the way that we see things, and fleeing to God then would be seeing things in God's control, so we need not worry, need not doubt, and need not fear? Is that what faith is? Faith offers hope, and hope makes us think differently about the struggles that we face.

Some time back I downloaded on my kindle, G.K. Chesterton's book, All Things Considered, mostly because I had read some of his other books and liked them, and this one was a free download, being old enough to be outside of copyright restrictions. I was shuffling through my Kindle this week, looking for something to read, and decided to check it out.  It's basically a collection of essays, with his cleverly written thoughts on various subjects. One of the chapters/essays is called "Chasing Hats." It is about the way that we see things, challenging us to be romantics, Chesterton often does that being a harsh critic of the modern sense that everything can be explained scientifically. He talks about how the things that give us stress are usually things that can be changed if our mindset is different. He uses three illustrations: trying to push in a drawer that is stuck, trying to catch your hat when it has been blown off by the wind, and waiting at a train station for a train that is running late. The drawer  being stuck is a nuisance only because we don't see it as a challenge that we can rise to, a formative man versus the drawer struggle for dominance, seeing it like that makes it not a waste of time, but important. Next, the hat, how frustrated and silly a man looks chasing after his hat, bending down to pick it up, just as it blows further away. We feel foolish, he says because our mindset is wrong, it is not that much different from a spectator sport, a past time, he says it could rival the fox chase, and would be much better for the foxes. For the trains he tries to remind us of being kids, never stressed about waiting, because the adventure of being at a train station was interesting enough, that the difference is in mindset. What we think about the situation determines how it affects us. He tries to paint the picture that we are in control of our thoughts, and that if we could just think a certain way we would escape so much of the frustration, stress, doubt, and fear of our lives.

Is that what we do when we go to God? Is that our fleeing to God? When trouble rears its ugly head we think try to think that it is part of a larger plan, all for a purpose, evil being transformed into good. Yes, I think so. So often you hear that at funerals, so often we say that when someone gets sick, so often we think that when we have trouble with our jobs, or after 911, or when tragedy strikes, or catastrophe looms. We flee to a place where we can put the issue into some type of perspective. Is that what fleeing to God is, fleeing far enough away from it that we can see back to it with greater perspective and realize that when seen through God's eyes, from infinity, from the rest of the story, that it then would make sense. God gives existence a purpose, and we come into contact with that purpose by fleeing to him, mentally, viewing life from that lens of perspective, and it somehow lessens the effect of the struggle.

This may be true, and I think it is, but it is so only part of the story. It's the outsiders look at faith, isn't it? It is the glance at faith that says, "Oh religion is just the opiate of the masses," or "Christianity is an empty philosophy, just a world view to provide hope and a sense of security to the weak minded gullible fools of the world," or as Comedian Bill Maher put it, "We are a nation that is unenlightened because of religion. I do believe that. I think religion stops people from thinking." These are outside opinions of religion, and they may have a leg to stand on if fleeing to God only meant changing the way you think, looking at the world through God colored glasses. Sure it includes that, but it is also more. It must be because faith doesn't mean thinking something is true because it will help your perspective, to help you get through hard times, faith is believing that it actually is true, that fleeing to God is more than an act of the mind, but a physical fleeing into the arms of the creator, redeemer, and sustainer of this world.

I chose the text from Romans 4 this morning because it deals with the story of Abraham, not just telling the story, but Paul using it as an example of faith. Abraham leaves behind all that he knows, the safety of community and friends and the life he had always known because God told him to, told him to go out into the land that I promise you, and you will father a nation, forget that you are old, forget that you have no children, forget that  your wife Sarah has been unable to have children at this point, go, and I will bless you, and every one shall come to be blessed through you. Abraham goes, and his life is changed, not because he saw things in a different way, but because God made things happen. The Israelites in slavery, didn't just think about God, and become freed from slavery in their mind, able to take their minds off the sting of the task master's whip, no God delivered his people out of Egypt. Pharoah's army got drownded, Oh Mary don't you weep. Jesus didn't say, think of me when times get hard, no he said come take up your cross and follow me, I am the way the truth and the life, leave all that you had behind, do not be afraid, follow me, but low I'll be with you until the end of the age, and wonders befell the disciples. We can look back through history and see the workings of God.

Christianity is not a worldview and philosophy for the weak-minded and it is not solely based on a blind leap of faith. It is based in experience, both of the cloud of witnesses throughout the ages, but also our own. Look back at your own life you will see God at work. You have come to know and recognize God's work in your life, and he will continue to work, so fleeing to God isn't just a trick of the mind, but a step into the arms of truth, as much today as it was for Abraham, and Moses, and David, and the Disciples. It's not a philosophy it is a reality.

So how do we flee into reality, into the arms of God, our refuge and strength. Do we do so just by stepping into these walls week to week. I've heard that about Church, that going to church is fuel for the rest of the week. That you go to hear about God to escape and try to bottle enough escape up to go back into your week and get through it all. I've often wondered, if that is fleeing to God, why we wouldn't do it more often, why we wouldn't constantly do that, why we would only partially escape, once a week, rather than all the way flee. And that's really the point of using the word flee, fleeing must be all the way fleeing, when you flee you don't tend to go back, if  you do then you might use the word leave instead, fleeing suggests that back isn't an option. So All the way fleeing is it, and all the way fleeing is not a once a week thing, it's not a 21st century compartmentalized deal, it does not come ala carte. It also cannot be bottled up in a building or an hour timeslot, nor given labels and denominations because God isn't all those things. Instead God is everywhere. Look at the prayer of preparation poem:

If there had anywhere appeared in space

Another place of refuge where to flee,

Our hearts had taken refuge in that place,

And not with thee.

 

For we against creation's bars had beat

Like prisoned eagles, through great worlds had sought

Though but a foot of ground to plant our feet,

Where thou wert not

 

And only when we found in earth and air,

In heaven or hell, that such might nowhere be−

That we could not flee from thee anywhere,

We fled to thee.

Fleeing to God then is deciding to stop fleeing from God. It's to stop fleeing and to be, simply be what God made you to be, what God wants you to be, what you are. Then the rest is just a simple equation. If God is, If God is good, If God is omnipotent, then what more refuge can you need. Though the rains pour, though sickness threatens, though death looms, though wars rage, though security we build around us is fleeting, God holds you in the palm of his steadfast loving all powerful hand, and God's presence is everywhere, therefore To Flee To God is simply to be still and know. Amen.

 

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^[1]The Holy Bible : New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Ro 4:13-25). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.