System Failure Is Not the End

System Failure Is Not the End

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

November 25, 2018

At Bethany Presbyterian Church, Zuni, Virginia

Luke 21: 5-19

Ezekiel 33: 23-29

For Audio Podcast of this sermon click here

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.

 Christ the King Sunday. . . the end of the church calendar. . .

does it paint the proper picture? Is

Christ the King future—ie at the end, or is Christ the King now. . .

⁵ When some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God, he said, ⁶ “As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”

⁷ They asked him, “Teacher, when will this be, and what will be the sign that this is about to take place?” ⁸ And he said, “Beware that you are not led astray; for many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and, ‘The time is near!’ Do not go after them.

⁹ “When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately.” ¹⁰ Then he said to them, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; ¹¹there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.

¹² “But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name. ¹³ This will give you an opportunity to testify. ¹⁴ So make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance; ¹⁵ for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. ¹⁶ You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, by relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death. ¹⁷ You will be hated by all because of my name. ¹⁸ But not a hair of your head will perish. ¹⁹ By your endurance you will gain your souls. ^[1]

Luke 21 seems to be completely about what we call Armageddon, the end times, at least it seems to be. Apocalypic writing is what it is, and you see it throughout the gospels, in the letters of Paul, in Revelation of course, but also in the Old Testament, especially Daniel, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and Jeremiah.  It sounds scary. The language is scarty. It has a ton of difficult imagery. It's harsh. It's intense.

“Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; ¹¹ there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven. ^[2]  

When we hear texts like this we think, Revelation and Armageddon, and it scares us, and here it's out of the mouth of Jesus, so it all seems so much more real, being in the Red Words and all, and whether we like to think it or not, whether we like to admit it or not, these things seem to surround us daily. Maybe it's not as bad as all this, or maybe it is, maybe things are spiraling out of control, and that it's harder now to be a follower of Jesus than it ever was before, but truth be told, it isn't easy to be a follower of Jesus any time, and truthfully it never has been easy. Throughout the 2000 years of Christianity every generation has felt that they were on the brink of "The End," With people pointing to passages like this as proof, looking at our world, and many times they use that trumped up fear to extend their control through fear. It happens again and again, and there is great danger in this type of thinking.

Now let’s talk about context, and the reality of the Gospel of Luke, the picture it paints of what following Jesus is like, certainly has not been an easy walk through the park. Take a look at the Gospel of Luke and read it anew, you can see that it makes some significant demands on the life of discipleship, and comes at quite a cost. It describes

an inside and out complete conversion of action and intention,

a complete give away all your stuff,

and your heart,

total submission of will, following towards a complete sacrifice of self for others,

and not just friends but even enemies.

So with that story as preface to this passage, and the betrayal and crucifixion following fast after, the images of this passage are gain some perspective, and though the images are similar to an Armageddon type scene, or an Old Testament prophetic destruction type scene,  at the beginning I said seems, seems to be like Armageddon, seems, so before we jump to conclusions, and its been a big college football kind of weekend, so let me quote Lee Corso, from College Game Day, and say, "Not So Fast My Friend." The world of this passage does seem to be on the brink, but of what? Is it the end? Before we jump to scary conclusions, that tend to enslave us to and through fear, instead let us take a look at the details to get to the bottom of what is going on here, and what it really means, and what it is saying to us in our context, we may find that it is not pointing towards the end of the world at all. . . we may just find that it's much more intense than that.

First off, lest we get blinded by the imagery, let's look at the question that Jesus is responding to. They are speaking about the temple, how beautiful it is, how large the stones are that it's built of, and how it has beautiful gifts on it "dedicated to God," so the people say, and Jesus says, "⁶ “As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.” This temple and these gifts, "dedicated to God," though they claim to be, will fall apart. Then the people ask him, ok well when will all this happen? So Jesus is responding to a question about the temple and within the context of it being taken down and destroyed. Now is the temple in destruction the same thing as Armageddon? If so, then it all happened already, the temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. and was only rebuilt, and not as a temple but as a mosque over 600 years later in 691. So yeah, if we are to take this literally, the temple did come down, but it was not the end, you know at least not in a final sense, of the end, you know THE END, thanks for coming. Again, though as is typically the case in the Bible, there is danger in strictly literal interpretations.

Ok, so let's dig deeper into context. . . a figurative understanding of the temple could be more applicable. If you look at what directly precedes this passage, you see Jesus in conflict with officials of the temple, Sadducees and the Scribes. You see in earlier scenes in Lukes Gospel, Sadducees, seeking to catch Jesus in a trick question, and then also in chapter 20, Jesus speaks directly and harshly about the scribes saying:

⁴⁶ “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes, and love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, and to have the best seats in the synagogues and places of honor at banquets. ⁴⁷ They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.” ^[3]  

So Sadducees and Scribes, both temple officials, both proud, both using their positions for themselves, both giving Jesus a hard time, both included then in the coming destruction of the temple. Does Jesus simply mean that these guys will soon get what is coming to them, that the tradition that they represent is coming to an end, and being replaced by what Jesus brings. Wouldn't that type of understanding fit, where Jesus claims that he will destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, which is typically understood as the Resurrection on the Third Day. The temple would be rebuilt, but in the hearts of Jesus' followers, the hearts of all people, broken down outside the walls of the temple, broken down walls that divide people, bringing people together, isn't this the heart of Jesus' message. It is similar to what Jesus tells the Sadducees in the last chapter when they are questioning him about who will be married to whom in the Resurrection, Jesus says, “Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.”, in other words, God is bigger than what you have built, and bigger than  your traditions, and bigger than those stone walls, and so God will bring them down because he can't be contained in them, no, God will be running loose in the world, not shut up in a temple and not a part of your control any more. Yes this interpretation makes sense.

And certainly attacking tradition like that would cause the divisions talked about, nations and kingdoms, and persecutions to follow. No one likes to be challenged, especially those in power, those of privilege, those who have been all but happy to rest on the traditions and exploit people based on those traditions. Once the rug starts to be pulled from under them they do typically fight back, and who to their opponents. But it appears that the system is broken and is in need of repair. The temple, supposed to be a house of prayer, but has been turned into a den of thieves. The religious leaders, who you would think would be excited about the coming of the Messiah, are not. The poor are being exploited by a system that is supposed to be building them up. Yes the system is broken and needs to be fixed. Yes the system is broken, but Jesus when will it be fixed? Isn't this the question here?

Then come the bewares. Beware of imposters saying, I am he, the time is near. Here is the real danger of this passage, and those like it, and how often is it forgotten? How many times does a person come along, saying the system is broken, and I am the key, I offer solutions to fix it, to save people from the broken system, only to renew the broken system in some other way, the unintended consequences always leave a system still broken, and many times broken worse. Jesus says beware. . . of these quick fixes, these imposters with false solutions, saying the end is near. We call this demagoguery, and the demagogues are always in fashion. Stirring up fear, stirring up worry, promising that they have the only fix to the broken system. In this type of panic about the end, stirred up fears about the end, the demagogues, these false saviors, promise an end that is in their control, and that they are then authorized to bring about that end by any means necessary, all means are justified. People turn over their lives to them, their hopes their dreams, their freedom, and the broken system is simply sustained, or renewed even more harshly, not destroyed and rebuilt as Jesus promises.

He says that wars and insurrections may also take place, but to not worry. Because the end will not follow immediately, nation against nation,  what war was ever waged that was not supposed to end all wars, but they don't, they never do. But then Jesus says there will be earthquakes, and then famines and plagues, also great fertile ground for a demagogue to rise, all of these are often thought to be dreadful portents and signs from heaven, but remember from Elijah, that God was not in the earthquake, but rather a still small voice, not always the loudest voice, interesting. The right way is not always illuminated by the loudest voice. So all this will happen. . . and then the end will come. . . right, that is what you'd expect, but it doesn't say it. I kept looking forward for the end, but it isn't anywhere.

Instead he says, before this happens, you yourself will be persecuted, and arrested, turned over to the Synagogues, (that's an interesting one) and prisons, brought before kings and governors for my name. You'll get to testify, you'll get to stand up, I'll let you know what to say, but you'll be betrayed by your parents, relatives, even friends, and they may even put some of  you to death. . . You'll be hated, but not one hair upon your head will perish. . . whoa really, "by endurance you will gain  your souls. Did you hear the end? Me neither, rather endurance, strength, on-going trials. The end doesn't come. How interesting. . . Don't you see it. . . It's way too easy to write this passage off as an Armageddon, end times passage, way off in the future type deal, and it still may be that, but it doesn't talk about an easy and quick end, but rather a long arduous journey, where the ends are the false parts, the imposters, where the easy escapes are just aspects of the brokenness of the system trying to remain, like those threatened Sadducees and Scribes who lash out at Jesus and have him Crucified. But look at where Jesus goes in the passage following this one, here this:

²⁰ “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation has come near. ²¹ Then those in Judea must flee to the mountains, and those inside the city must leave it, and those out in the country must not enter it;²² for these are days of vengeance, as a fulfillment of all that is written. ²³ Woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing infants in those days! For there will be great distress on the earth and wrath against this people; ²⁴ they will fall by the edge of the sword and be taken away as captives among all nations; and Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

²⁵ “There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. ²⁶People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken. ²⁷ Then they will see ‘the Son of Man coming in a cloud’ with power and great glory. ²⁸ Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”^[4] 

Not the end, after all that, but your redemption. The word can also be translated, deliverance, payment of ransom given. Some things end, but the things that end are the broken systems, Jerusalem is what is destroyed. Those inside the city, that system, must leave it. It's over. We talk about the end as if it is something to be feared, something to be avoided, but the end doesn't come the way we think, it's simply a new beginning. When Jesus says that he is the beginning and the end, he means it. That's what it means to be infinite, what it means to be God. Infinite, literally means, no end. We sing it every week.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son :

and to the Holy Ghost;

As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be :

world without end. Amen 

I was thinking about this idea lately, especially as I was preparing for this sermon, reading this difficult text, but also, all over the place these days is the idea that the "Ends justify the means."

When we think the ends justify the means,

We mean the ends we think are imminent,

And in our control, but when do ends occur?

Rarely, if not never, especially when forever

Is the ever of beginning and the end

By any means necessary right, do this thing, cheat, steal, silence your opposition, whatever it takes. . . Do you ever think about cheating and whether it pays? Lance Armstrong is a casestudy in this idea in honor, or really lack thereof, and how cheating produced for him, money and glory, and fame, and riches, and is also money for cancer research, and all kinds of other things we would consider good, and we posed the question was it worth it to cheat. Most of us my say no it wasn't worth it because it all fell apart, you might make the case for in the moment that it was good, but yeah it all fell apart. That's an ends justify the means situation. . . and if time stood still after he won his tour de frances, we would see it different, but time didn't stop, rather it went on, the end was merely an illusion, time went on and his actions came back to haunt him. Steroids was a similar issue in baseball, records being broken, heroes created, money pouring in, the popularity of the sport at a high, but then time marched on. . . There are other stories similarly problematic all over the news. . . questionable means  they may be positive things, they may be sellable as ends justifying the means, but as we see again and again, the ends don't come because they aren't in our control for one, and that there is just no such thing as an end, other than Jesus and he instead offers redemption and deliverance, just like God has done since the beginning. Instead the pendulum of power just swings back and forth. . .

This isn't the first time that Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed. Check out Jeremiah and Lamentations, Jerusalem's destruction is well documented, but then read Ezekiel, let’s look there, since I chose it as t Old Testament lesson, you’ll see systems failing and you'll see who is still in control if there was any doubt.

²³ Then the word of the Lord came to me: ²⁴ “Son of man, the people living in those ruins in the land of Israel are saying, ‘Abraham was only one man, yet he possessed the land. But we are many; surely the land has been given to us as our possession.’ ²⁵ Therefore say to them, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Since you eat meat with the blood still in it and look to your idols and shed blood, should you then possess the land? ²⁶ You rely on your sword, you do detestable things, and each of you defiles his neighbor’s wife. Should you then possess the land?’

²⁷ “Say this to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: As surely as I live, those who are left in the ruins will fall by the sword, those out in the country I will give to the wild animals to be devoured, and those in strongholds and caves will die of a plague. ²⁸ I will make the land a desolate waste, and her proud strength will come to an end, and the mountains of Israel will become desolate so that no one will cross them.29 Then they will know that I am the Lord, when I have made the land a desolate waste because of all the detestable things they have done.’

History didn't end then, nor did it in A.D. 70 when the Second Temple was destroyed, nor will it when we stand to trial and are persecuted, or we suffer loss, or get we discouraged, or even when we die, instead through enduring all those things do we come not to the end, but to a beginning beyond our broken systems that we build trying again and again to stave off the end, but the only things that end are those broken systems, and they all do eventually, for they are only the illusion of reality, just as Jerusalem is the illusion of God. When it has all come to pass, and systems fail, God remains, and offers redemption.

Tracing Blessings

Tracing Blessings

A homily delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

November 18, 2018

Bethany Presbyterian Church, Zuni, VA

Matthew 6:25-33

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside our minds

Help us to be more than our lives

            For your eyes show us the way

            Your mind knows the truth

            Your being is the life.

Amen. 

²⁵ “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink,  or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? ²⁶ Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?²⁷ And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?²⁸ And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, ²⁹ yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. ³⁰ But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? ³¹Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ ³² For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. ³³ But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. ^[1]  

Happy Thanksgiving to all. I hope that this week brings for you, all of you, happiness, time spent together with friends and with family, a chance to take a break from it all, at least for a day, and to give Thanks. Blessings also for those of you who will be giving of your time to serve. This holiday, Thanksgiving, especially, can bring out the very best in us, because I do think that gratitude is central to what it means to be human, and such a child of God, but my question for this evening is, "How often do we find ourselves unthankful, ungrateful, and even sometimes bitter, when we have that hard to deal with combination of expecting more and getting less?" It is this that seems to blind us to the truth about what we truly have and what we have been given.

Let's think for just a moment about our expectation. What are the things in our world that we simply expect to be taken care of. We simply expect it, we wake up in the morning, and we go through our day and things are happening all around us, but we don't even notice them. We are so insulated from the truth that surrounds us at every moment, that we have these unconscious expectations.  We expect them, and so we are not thankful for them.

Bill Engvall, a comedian best known for his work with Jeff Foxworthy and that Blue Collar crowds, sums this idea up nicely when he's talking about losing his luggage on an air flight, he has this bit where he points out the silly way people tend to state the obvious, and he thinks they should have to wear a sign that says, I'm stupid, so he goes down to the lost luggage place, says hey yall lost my luggage, and the lady there, he says bless her heart, says "Has Your plane landed yet?" Which he replies with, "no princess I'm having an out of body experience," and his familiar refrain of "Here's your sign", but then he says something poignant,

he says he didn't want to be too hard on her because as he says, "People in lost luggage never have a good day, no one ever comes by there to say, "hey thanks got my bags," instead all they do is catch grief all day. Isn't that true, a perfect picture of the fact that we don't thank folks for the things we expect. Most of us don't even realize there are "lost luggage" people until we need to use them.

We don't even notice the things we expect there until they are gone. Electricity and heat, and the convenience of grocery stores, and shopping malls, and the internet, and cell phones. Ask the folks who were so struck by hurricanes how important electricity is to their lives, but did they feel as thankful for it in those months leading up to it? So quickly it's gone, and we notice finally what we miss. We have all these things and we are dependent on all these things, but because we expect them, we rarely show our gratitude.

Do we even know where they all come from? Do we know the intricate process that brings power to our house so that we can heat our rooms, store our food at cool or freezing temperatures and then ratchet up the stove to extreme temperatures to boil our potatoes so we can mash them and swerve them up for our guests this Thursday? Do we know where our potatoes come from? Do we know the loving hands that planted the seed, row upon row upon row, somewhere in the middle of Idaho? These are the unthanked strangers to which we owe so much, but on the flipside we are also those same unthanked strangers for other unknown strangers because the services we provide throughout the world, the lives we live, they make an impact as well, though many times we also are blinded to the fact that our lives really do matter, from the big things we do to the small.

As a teacher for 16 years I always asked myself, did I do a good job, and at the end of the year we would send a new group of seniors off into the world to go impact it, but the ripples of impact spiral out from us and we don't always see how they become manifest, sure we see that would see graduation day, and maybe hear one or two stories from college, but what's beyond? I think they call it the butterfly effect, that a butterfly flapping its wings in Africa can be the breeze that starts a hurricane. How are our actions effecting people? And are they thankful for what we give? Should they be?

But these are questions for another day, because this week we focus on the things that we are thankful for. Our Gospel passage talks about the gifts that God bestows upon birds, lilies, and grass. Now I know that it's a metaphor, but let's think about it literally for a moment. I think it is always important and good reading to understand the literal before jumping to the figurative. Would you be thankful for something so simple as what birds eat, the clothes that a lily wears, the monotone green of the grass's fall ensemble? Or do we expect more? But what is more exactly? What do we mean by more? Clothes, cars, stuff, whatever the guy next to us has, or our neighbor down the street, or those in the next tax bracket up, is that what we mean by more? To the birds God provides food, to the lilies water and sunlight, the same for the grass, and then they in turn provide their natural gift to the world. Would it require a lowering of our expectations to be truly thankful for the sunlight, water, air, and food that give us life, each breath, relationships, each day, a loving, sustaining, nurturing, providing, redeeming, forgiving, constant, saving God or would it instead take a change of focus? A look beyond the secondary sources back to the original source of all things. That is what we do this one week of the year. We try to reconnect, if just for a moment, to the source of our lives, so that we can be truly thankful for them.

As I was looking for a good way to transition out of this and into the week, I came across a quote from the Celtic Saint Columbanus. . . a major figure in Celtic Christianity of Ireland and Scotland. He wrote:

If you want to know the Creator, understand created things. . .

How about that for a change of focus? Seeing things in the world, not to learn about them, but to know through them something about God. . . People, events, even the way that the natural world is, the way animals are. . . ask yourself, how does the migrating bird know where to go? And posit perhaps that the same God who guides his path, may just guide ours as well. . . and be grateful, both for the guidance, but also for the amazing clue he left for us in nature. . . and give thanks for both of them.

As you know I was an Offensive Coordinator of the football team during my time at Blue Ridge School, and it was just this weekend 3 and 6 years ago where we won the state championship, and I was inundated with the memories on facebook this weekend of those experieces. What an amazing days they both were! The first one we won at home, and it was sweet as it was my first. Afterwards we had a small team pizza dinner bought for us by the parents of the players, also very cool. But as we were about to start I put on my pastor panic thought, what if they ask me to pray? Absolute panic, who do I thank, who will I forget, etc. etc. But it got me thinking, how many people have created in some way the success that we had yesterday. Obviously the boys with their hard work and the other coaches and I had a deep role, but who shaped us, who shaped each player, every one of our experiences, all of our relationships, good and bad, all of them have created the individuals that won that game yesterday, and the hand of God was in all of those relationships.

And I know this is just one example, but every blessing in our lives is like that as well, so instead of counting our blessings this week, I want us to also try to trace them. It is a good exercise to try to trace the amazing people who have touched us, and the amazing providential system that God sets up to provide all of the glorious blessings of our lives. I opened this evening talking about electricity, heat, and air conditioning, and those glorious potatoes from that unknown farmer our in Idaho. It's fun to trace our blessings from person to person, but it is also worthwhile to trace your blessings back to God.

Seeing the way that God provides for all of our needs, in ways so beyond our expectation that the very idea of expecting mocks God, for God gives ever so much more than what we can fathom, ever much more than what we can expect, ever so much more than what we can even understand, even the challenges, the struggles, the adversity, all of it is being worked out as a blessing to us. May we be ever and truly thankful. Amen, which truly means, may it be so.

Therefore

Therefore

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

November 11, 2018

at Bethany Presbyterian Church, Zuni, Virginia

Romans 12: 1-8

Deuteronomy 7: 1-11

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.

As I said last week. . . Paul transition to reaction to grace. . . Doxology. . .

Our response to God’s grace, must begin with Awe, Wonder, Mystery, Humility, Reassesment, and finally Praise!

But then as the way is often with Paul, he moves from praise to life

And he begins our reading for this morning with a special word. . . Therefore

And it isn’t a tight therefore, relegated to here, but instead is the therefore that responds back all the way to the beginning

In Sonnet’s its called a volta – that changing moment

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

   So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

   So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

You can hear it there in the – but they eternal summer, and it fits the rhyme scheme

I’ve written many of these-- class

It seems each time I walk into the cafe

I always seem to be the last one there

And then despite the hard work of the staff

The food that’s left just seems so poor and bare

The dregs of food burnt edges hard and brown

Just cold and bland with tasteless fatty grease

And when I try to choke a salad down

The wilted lettuce tastes like bark from trees.

But then I stop to think how hunger feels

Remembering how much I have been blessed

Not having to be worried ‘bout my meals

And how their pain’s much worse than how I’m stressed

And so when I am tempted to complain

I think instead about another’s pain.

Why do the Redskins always seem to stink

No matter how the season starts or ends

Builds faith beyond what our minds should think

Because we’ve seen repeated and consistent trends

They raise your hopes and then just let them fall

With trades of major size and seeming scope

They look as if they know how to play ball

Then lose and lose and dash all of our hope.

But something makes me think each time next year

It may be diff’rent and we’ll win a game

And that my hope again supplants my fear

That this season will not too end in shame.

This is the prayer of every Redskin fan

And is the pressure on coach Shanahan.

So this is the volta, of Romans and everything up until this point is captured in the Volta

Think back now to every sermon I’ve given since I started this journey through Romans, They are all on the table.

So if you’ve caught any of them. . . if you can remember anything from any of them

Basically they all come down to wrestling with the idea that grace has been given through the cross, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. . .

And now he turns and says therefore. . . and we’ll get to that in a minute

But there are many therefores in the contexts of scripture, probably the biggest is found throughout Deuteronomy, when you see Moses in his last sermon. . .

Since Exodus – Therefore

Here  is Deuteronomy 7. You can hear that language. . .

7 When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations—the Hittites,Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites,seven nations larger and stronger than you— ² and when the Lord your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally. Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. ³ Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, ⁴ for they will turn your children away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.⁵ This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah poles and burn their idols in the fire. ⁶ For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.

⁷ The Lord did not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples. ⁸ But it was because the Lord loved you and kept the oath he swore to your ancestors that he brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the land of slavery, from the power of Pharaoh king of Egypt. ⁹ Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments. ¹⁰ But

those who hate him he will repay to their face by destruction;
    he will not be slow to repay to their face those who hate him.

¹¹ Therefore, take care to follow the commands, decrees and laws I give you today.

Paired with Therefores often in Deuteronomy is “So that’s”, for example Deuteronomy 4:1

Now, Israel, hear the decrees and laws I am about to teach you. Follow them so that you may live and may go in and take possession of the land the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you.

There are 62 so that’s in Deuteronomy

So that you may follow

So that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen

So that they may learn to revere me

So that you do not become corroput

So that you might know that the lord is God

So that it may go well with you and your children

So that you may live long. .  .

You get the idea. . .

Deuteronomy has 62 so that’s and only 10 therefores

Whereas little Romans has 21 therefores

Though there are a bunch of so that’s in Romans – there are only two that are connected to our actions and the future. . .

so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

 so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.

Hope! God’s action vs. our own.

So what’s the difference between a so that, and a therefore. .. in our own context

“So that” looks forward to try to shape the future with the actions of the present

“Therefore” looks backward and whatever is seen it reacts to in the present

I wrote this poem this week, to get at this idea a little closer

So that my teeth don’t rot, I brush them twice a day

So that my heart won’t stop, I put the salt away

So that my kids don’t hear, I watch the things I say

So that it rains tomorrow, I might do my dance this way

There are so many “so thats” it seems I hold control

But in grace it’s all the “therefores” which make me truly whole

I am a child of God, therefore I’m always in his hand

I live in the world he made, therefore I’m under his command

Despite my sin he’s steadfast, therefore I don’t fully understand

He sent to us Christ Jesus, therefore now I can truly stand

Do you get the difference. . . and this distinction is important, perhaps the major difference between Deuteronomy – and Paul as a Pharisee, and Romans and Paul as the Christian Missionary.

Paul has spent 11 chapters talking about what God has done for us. . . and now Chapter 12 opens

12 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. ² Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

³ For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. ⁴ For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, ⁵ so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. ⁶ We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith; ⁷ if it is serving, then serve; if it is teaching, then teach; ⁸ if it is to encourage, then give encouragement; if it is giving, then give generously; if it is to lead, do it diligently; if it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully.

What is a living sacrifice? And what is a therefore sacrifice?

He sent to us Christ Jesus, therefore now I can truly stand

Living Sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, is true and proper worship

Whole versus holy –

Do not conform to the pattern of the world?

                        

Renew your mind – to be able to find God’s perfect will

What is your gift?

Do that wholly and fully to the best of the ability God gave you. . .