Sunday, February 27, 2005

I Samuel 17:4-11,23-37,45-50 - In the Name of the Lord Almighty

My freshman year in high school I found myself in a David and Goliath type situation. You know, where the challenger takes on the giant with no hope of success. But this instance was one where I was on Goliath’s side instead of David’s. I was a part of the J.V. Basketball team and we were going out to another team to play their only basketball team. They were a tiny school out in the San Juan Islands and they weren’t a part of our Basketball conference, and their team wasn’t a full season team, but a team that would play occasionally. As we began to play them we discovered that they were not very good, and we realized that it wasn’t going to be much of a game. I remember a couple of snippets from the game. Towards the end of the game, the other team was close to thirty points and our coach called us in and told us that any points they scored above thirty, we’d be running lines for each one. I didn’t think that was very fair cause I hated running lines. At the same time, we were close to 100 points and as the time clicked down we started playing hard cause we wanted to make that 100 mark, something that just isn’t done in J.V. High School Basketball. We started playing full-court press and playing hard and rough and we actually made it. The final score was something around 103 to 36.

The other snippet I remember is the other coach coming over and asking our coach why we had to play so hard at the end. This team wasn’t part of our conference, so stats didn’t really matter, and we could have been a bit more gracious with our victory instead of wallowing in our superiority. They asked for the game to have fun, they didn’t have delusions of winning, they just wanted an experience of playing someone. And we felt it was our duty to put them in their place.

I actually felt shame for the way we had behaved. We were acting like a great big Goliath, knowing that we were better than those who faced us and rubbing it in in such a strong way. Our beating them didn’t have any meaning to it and the only way meaning would have come out of this event was if somehow they could, despite all the odds, beat us. We were a Goliath and we trampled over David with glee. Unfortunately, this is often how David and Goliath stories go. Usually the Goliath wins. Occasionally, something miraculous happens and the David comes out as the victor, but this is quite uncommon. A true David win only happens when God is doing something miraculous.

I. Stories of Old

What is it about the story of David and Goliath that captures our imagination so well? It has almost become a cliché as a metaphor for the hopes of the underdog in our society. We may watch a game with a shocking upset and think of it in David and Goliath terms. Or perhaps, when we see a small business make it in a crazy marketplace. I’ve heard the Apple/Microsoft competition often treated like David and Goliath. Apple relishes their David role and Microsoft doesn’t seem to mind being the giant.

David, throughout his life, is the story of the underdog, the least likely of kings, the youngest son, the weak young challenger, the friend of the prince, who continues to find greatness, not in himself but in his trust in the Lord.

And the greatest underdog story of all is that of a young man, not fully grown who goes up against a giant. The young man is wearing civilian clothes, for the armor he is provided does not fit and will weigh him down too much. The giant is fully armored with a mighty sword, a strong shield and a huge spear as well as body armor to protect him in battle.

But little David doesn’t let this stop him. He picks up 5 smooth stones out of a stream and takes his slingshot, and he heads out towards this great Goliath. When Goliath sees David, he laughs and makes fun of David and of Israel. “Have you come at me with sticks?” he asks, “Send me a real warrior, a challenge worthy of me.”

But David comes to Goliath, and after their exchange of insults, Goliath comes at David to attack him, I’m sure he is expecting an easy victory. David runs up, pulls a stone out of his bag and slings it at Goliath with his slingshot. The stone hits Goliath in the forehead and knocks him right down, paralyzing him. At this point David comes up to Goliath and takes Goliath’s own sword and kills him with it, winning victory for the people of Israel.

David, the underdog, went in with nothing more than a slingshot and brought down the Philistines’ greatest warrior, and the hardest part of it was probably lifting Goliath’s sword out of his scabbard.

What an underdog story. What an example for us to follow.

II. Two ways to go

Now there are two ways to respond to this great story of a courageous underdog. One is to praise his courage and hold him up as an example of someone who did not give up but rather stood up for what was right and ended oppression by his actions. This response makes sense. It focuses on the courage it took for David to do what he did. It reminds us not to give up and not to fade away when faced with a challenge that seems too great for us. It reminds us that there are giants to slay in this world and maybe if we just believe in ourselves we might go farther than we ever imagined. This is a popular theme today. You find it throughout the movies that try to tell a good moral. They tell you that you are capable of more than you realize and if you just don’t give up, you will find that you are able to do more than you think. Again, this isn’t a bad message. It’s important that we not sell ourselves short. It’s important that we realize that God created us for more than just settling. Trust in yourself, that you might find the strength that you didn’t know you had. A good message, but not the message of David and Goliath.

For there is another way to respond to this story. This second way is to realize that it is not David’s courage that wins the day, nor is it a lucky shot with his slingshot. It is his trust in the Lord that brings victory.

David does not trust in the might of men. He does not trust in the technology of his day, the armor or the sword and shield. The things of men will fail in the face of the truth of God. David himself, when he addresses Goliath, talks about this trust that Israel and the Philistines have put in the weapons of war, but he knows that there is something much greater to put his trust in. He begins in verse 45 by saying, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the Lord Almighty.” In verse 47 he continues, “All those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves; for the battle is the Lord’s, and he will give all of you into our hands.”

David didn’t see himself as defeating Goliath with his slingshot. Instead, he saw God as the one who brought victory. David didn’t see any way that human armor or weapons could win the situation. Instead he saw God as the one who brought victory. David didn’t see himself as the hero at all. Instead he saw God as the one who brought victory. David didn’t start up a bigger defense fund or increase the army size. He didn’t put his trust in his people’s ability to fight. Instead he saw God as the one who brought victory.

And God did bring victory to David and to the people of Israel. The defeat of Goliath caused for there to be a rout as the Philistines fled back to their city. Israel won the day and won freedom for another stretch of time. The Philistines would be back, but for the time being, by trusting in God, the Israelites found victory and safety.

I think it’s important to notice that this victory wasn’t the last victory. God brought salvation to his people, he saved them from the threat, but this wasn’t their last threat, they would face trials again. And again, they would have to rely on God to save them instead of trying to do it themselves. Trusting God does not mean that he fixes all your problems for you. It doesn’t mean that everything will turn out fine. It means that you trust that God is involved in the process and he will bring you the victory you need in the way that you need it, but God isn’t in the business of fixing all our problems. So be honest in your trust and in your faith. Allow God to bring the victory, but don’t expect that his knowledge and yours are the same.

III. Another Underdog Story

God seems to really like underdog stories, for the story of David isn’t the only one in the Bible. Again and again, God takes the weaker person and uses them to fulfill his plan in a mighty way. We see two brothers, Jacob and Esau, in the Old Testament. God takes the schemer, the weaker of them and promises him that his descendants will make a great nation instead of giving this to the oldest son, Esau. God takes a prostitute in the town of Jericho, and uses her to help Israeli spies who go into the land. When Jericho is destroyed, she is the only survivor, and we discover later on that she is one of the descendants of Jesus, and of our hero today, David. Jesus takes fishermen and tax collectors and calls them to be his disciples, his followers, the founders of his church. When God decides he needs a great missionary to spread the gospel to the known world, he doesn’t take any of the followers who had been with Jesus, instead he takes a man who is out to kill and arrest Jesus’ followers for their beliefs, and Paul becomes the greatest of witnesses to the changing power of God’s love.

God continues to use the underdog throughout scripture, and I think there’s a mighty, theological reason for this. God wants it to be clear that it is his power that is saving his people and not the power of the individual he is using. It wasn’t Paul himself who became this great missionary to bring the gospel to the Mediterranean; it was God working through Paul. It wasn’t Jacob’s scheming that brought him the blessings that led to the beginning of Israel, it was God’s blessing upon him. And it wasn’t David’s strength or courage, or even his faith that brought Goliath down. It was God who delivered his people from the Philistines using David. David understood this and accepted it.

In the story of Jesus we have another story of an underdog doing great things. Jesus wasn’t religiously trained. He had the rulers of Israel stacked against him, and yet he taught and preached and brought people to right relationship with God anyways. God could have won the day with a political leader. He could have sent Jesus to raise up an army and conquer those who oppressed the weak. Future generations of Christians would try to do this, converting people to Christianity at the end of a sword. Forcing peace upon unwilling participants. But this was not God’s way. God chose to send his son to be a servant. God sent his son to die for and bring forgiveness to the oppressor instead of conquering them. It’s a different way of doing things. It’s not the way I would have chosen to do it. But God’s wisdom is greater than ours and God’s plans are much deeper than our understanding, and like David told Goliath, “it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves.” God saves by sacrificing.

David understood this, and David trusted that God could save his people from the Philistines in a powerfully unusual way; in a way that proved that it wasn’t David or the people of Israel that brought victory, but rather it was God. Are we ready to allow God to bring victory for us? It might not look the way we would expect. It might not make any sense to us at all, but he can bring us victory out of defeat. He can bring us hope out of despair. He can use the least likely of situations to bring glory to himself and to save us from those things that are oppressing us. So let us trust in the Lord and in his goodness and in his power. He is so able to bring that which we need, let us turn to him and receive it. Amen.

Sunday, February 20, 2005

I Samuel 16:4-13 - He Sees the Heart

Let me ask you, what is it like when you go shopping for clothes. Let me tell you that Lisa and I have totally different approaches. I want to get in the store and find something and get out. The key for me is to spend the least amount of time possible on the task and then run from the store with all my might. I’ll try something on that I might like, and if it fits I’ll purchase it and be done. Lisa, on the other hand wants to make sure that she has gotten the best deal and the best item. She will try something on. If she likes it she will reserve it and then go around to other stores and find their versions of the same thing and make sure that she gets the best one for the least amount of money. Her way guarantees that when she comes home with the item, she will be happy with it and it will serve her well, whereas my way leaves an opening for me to discover that I didn’t get everything I was hoping to get with my purchase.

We have distinctly different ways of choosing things. I know that this is a gender thing, and something that many couples realize, but at the same time we both think that there is something lacking in the way the other person does their choosing. Lisa worries that I am going to settle for something that isn’t what I really need because I don’t want to put the work into it. I wonder why it is that she spends so much time looking at things, then comes back to the thing she first tried on and gets it anyway.

Lisa and I have totally different ways that we go about making choices. It makes it difficult for us to go shopping together. I get exhausted by her shopping, and she has to put up with dragging me around as I get grumpier and grumpier each minute. Wouldn’t making choices be a whole lot easier, though, if we all had this same connection to God that Samuel seemed to have. Imagine as you went into a store and looked at things that you wanted to see, that you heard a voice from God saying to you, “No, that is not the jacket that I have chosen for you.” Imagine having to send the worker into the back of the store because God has shared with you that the item you need is actually not out on the floor at the time, but hidden in the back. Okay, maybe that’s just not the way it works. But perhaps we need to bring God into our decision making a bit more anyways. Of course, when you are making big decisions or decisions about things that have to do with your spiritual life, you turn to God for guidance. But perhaps we need to involve God in all our choices and decisions.

I. Heroes of Old

There is something about King David that sparks the imagination. Here we have a shepherd boy, one who is the youngest of his family, who is not thought much of. His importance is so low that when the whole family is called together for an important meeting, an important sacrifice with an out of town celebrity, he is left in the field. This is like having Glen Palmberg come to town and ask that your whole family comes and has a worship service with him, but you leave one of your children at home assuming that he isn’t important to President Palmberg. And yet, this same lowly shepherd becomes a great king. He becomes the king that all other kings are compared to. His time as king of Israel is the golden age of Israel. It is a time that ushers in peace, it is a time where Israel becomes great.

One of the first stories from the Bible that we learn as children is the story of David and Goliath, where David trusts God and not his own strength to defeat the enemy. Later in David’s life we find ourselves marveling at the friendship between him and his enemy’s son, Jonathan. We see the mighty fall when David sins and then we see David’s grief and repentance when he realizes the horror of what he has done. Mostly, with David, we see a wartime king who is forced to live the life of war, but in doing this, is able to bring peace to his land, establishing Israel’s place as a people, and ending a cycle of war that had been going on for hundreds of years.

But King David isn’t only famous for his kingly deeds. We also know him from his worship. He is the one responsible for many of the psalms that we find in the Bible. And we find psalms from him to fit every occasion. We find psalms of praise and psalms of joy. David knows who to credit with his victories and he constantly goes to God with thanksgiving. We find psalms of pain and psalms of anger. David cries out to God for help when he feels trapped and God rescues him again and again. We find psalms of confession and psalms of repentance. When David does sin, he goes to God and asks for forgiveness and pleads with God to have him back.

There is much in David’s life to inspire us. There is much that we can learn from him. We don’t all rule countries, but that is not the only thing that we can learn from David. We can learn the power that comes from turning to God in all things. We can learn what true repentance is all about. We can learn about what it means to trust fully in God. And we can learn what it means to have the heart of God. But before we learn all this, we, like Samuel, need to meet David, and discover that sometimes God finds leaders in the most unlikely of places, and sometimes God fulfills his will in the most unlikely of people.

II. Choosing by Sight

So, lets imagine you’re Samuel. The king over Israel, a man named Saul, has proven himself a phenomenal failure, a royal failure if you will. And God has told you that it is time for you to go find a new king. Now, of course, you don’t know what this new king is going to be, the importance that he is going to play, but you know that after the failure of King Saul, you’d better listen close to God and pick a king that the people will follow and who will lead them in the right direction. But, of course, you’re only human and therefore don’t always do the best job at choosing the right king. And so, you know the king is going to come from a certain family, but you don’t know which one. So you bring a family together: the family of Jesse. And you plan to offer a special sacrifice to God with this family, giving yourself a chance to see these men and choose the one that God has in mind for the next king of Israel. As you look at these seven sons of Jesse that are before you, you see strength and you see wisdom.

And so you ask that they pass before you individually so that you can choose the next king. The first son, Abinadab, comes by, and he is tall and strapping. He looks quite strong and is probably quite handsome. He stands out in a crowd. Surely this will be the man that God plans to make king. You’ve probably already taken out the horn of oil that you plan to pore on the head of the future king, but God stops you… this is not the man that I have chosen to be king.

The next son, Shammah, comes by, and you can see wisdom in his face. Surely this will be the man that God plans to make king. But again God stops you… this is not the man that I have chosen to be king.

All seven of Jesse’s sons, all who are here with you for this special offering, come and pass before you, and as each one comes, and as you think with each one, surely this must be the one that will be king, God lets you know that this is not the man that is to be king. Maybe God has made a mistake. All Jesse’s sons seem to be here, and none are to be king. What are you to do?

So you ask Jesse just to make sure, is this all your sons? Well, there is my youngest son, a mere shepherd and he is out with the sheep, but you don’t want to see him. He is young, a mere boy. And so Jesse has his youngest son brought before you, and the moment you see him you realize why God had made you wait, for this is David, and he is to be king. As David comes forward you realize that he is also strong and wise and handsome, much like his brothers.

III. God’s Choice

There is a key verse here, and it is verse 7: Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things human beings look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.

It’s a powerful statement that shows the greatness of God’s wisdom and perception. But you need to be careful with this, because it makes it seem like perhaps David wasn’t much to look at. But when David does show up in verse 12 we see that he was glowing with health and had a fine appearance and handsome features.

I grew up thinking that this story told of how God took the least good looking and least strong and made him king over his brothers who were much better at everything than him. I think I wanted to hear it this way, because I tend to like to root for the underdog. And having not ever been very good at sports, I like to think that perhaps being strong and handsome might actually be an impediment for greatness. But the truth here is much more profound than God playing favorites for the underdog.

All Jesse’s sons were strong. They were all healthy. They all could be king. David was the youngest of them, yes, at this time still a boy so you are looking more at potential with him than with the others, but in truth, by outward appearance they all were equally able to be king. So there needed to be something else to decide who would be king. I always took the moral of this story to be that appearances lie. But the moral is a bit deeper than that. This story isn’t trying to tell us that appearances lie. Instead it is telling us that appearances just don’t matter. Move beyond the outward completely and begin to look at the heart, as God does here.

This is not something that is very easy for us to do. We live in a culture that is very focused on outward appearances. It puts a lot of energy into telling us how important our appearance is. Outward appearance is pushed in commercials and on advertisements. We are told how we need to spend money making sure that we look our very best. The plastic surgery industry is making more money than ever as people choose to have surgery so that they will look better.

And we are guilty of this focus on the outward appearance here in the church. Do we look down on people if they don’t dress up for church? Do we allow our focus on the outward appearance to keep people from feeling welcome? What starts as a way to make sure that we are showing that we honor God has the danger of becoming something that keeps others away. It’s good to honor God. It’s good to show that. But God tells us that people look at the outward appearance, but he looks at the heart.

Don’t let yourself judge people by outward appearance, it just isn’t worth it. And as Samuel found out, outward appearance doesn’t give you any hint whatsoever as to what is inside.

Samuel is making a big decision that will affect the future of the country he is responsible for. And so Samuel allows God to make the decision for him. But I am convinced that the point of this story about Samuel is to tell us that all our decisions need to be put into God’s hands. I am convinced that we should look to God whenever we face a problem or a decision or a choice. This seems overwhelming at first, especially for God. Imagine trying to be involved in every petty decision that is made by every Christian. And I’m not saying that you are to ask God for a sign at each choice you make. God doesn’t micro-manage his people’s lives. But there is something to be said for involving God in your thinking process. There is something to be said for at least remembering God as you face the questions that this world puts to you. This is where the What Would Jesus Do movement came from. It was a concerted effort to involve God and Jesus in the decision-making processes of everyday life.

Unfortunately, it became a fad and lost its meaning fairly early on. As often is the case, when something becomes very popular it grows a life of its own and people don’t even try to understand what it is that they are doing with it. How many people wore What Would Jesus Do bracelets around without ever thinking about what Jesus would do. At the same time there were people who were touched by this campaign and started specifically including God in their decision-making. There is something about remembering God as you face choices in your life. If you truly believe that God is involved in the things of this world, then you have to believe that he has a certain way he would like us to live, and certain choices he would like us to make. So, like Samuel, let us turn to God for our answers and not try to figure them out ourselves. Let us look not at the outside but at the heart of each issue we deal with. And let us pray that the decisions we make, when we follow God and do as he calls, will bring as much good to those around us as Samuel did when he chose David to be the king.

Sunday, February 13, 2005

James 2:14-18- How We Live

Newspaper columnist and minister George Crane tells of a wife who came into his office full of hatred toward her husband. "I do not only want to get rid of him, I want to get even. Before I divorce him, I want to hurt him as much as he has me."

Dr. Crane suggested an ingenious plan "Go home and act as if you really love your husband. Tell him how much he means to you. Praise him for every decent trait. Go out of your way to be as kind, considerate, and generous as possible. Spare no efforts to please him, to enjoy him. Make him believe you love him. After you've convinced him of your undying love and that you cannot live without him, then drop the bomb. Tell him that you're getting a divorce. That will really hurt him." With revenge in her eyes, she smiled and exclaimed, "Beautiful, beautiful. Will he ever be surprised!" And she did it with enthusiasm. Acting "as if." For two months she showed love, kindness, listening, giving, reinforcing, sharing. When she didn't return, Crane called. "Are you ready now to go through with the divorce?"

"Divorce?" she exclaimed. "Never! I discovered I really do love him." Her actions had changed her feelings. Motion resulted in emotion. The ability to love is established not so much by fervent promise as often repeated deeds.

I. Belief and Life

We have spent these last two weeks looking at what it is that we believe as Christians. Two weeks ago we looked at the center of our faith; we remembered that God loves us and that Jesus died for us. We remembered that we are called to believe and follow him and in this we will find salvation.

Last week we looked at the importance of what we believe and we used the format of the Covenant Affirmations to point out what is important to us. We also realized that what we believe and what we do are very connected. We talked about the fact that what we believe affects the way we live and how we live affects what we believe.

And so we come to the action today. How are we to live as Christians? Once you believe the truths of Christianity, how does this affect what you do? And the best place to go with answers to this is the book of James.

We, as Covenanters, should have much affinity for the book of James, where we are told that it isn’t enough to believe right, your belief needs to affect what you do. How you live needs to be informed by what you believe. This is where we came from. We came from a church in Sweden that was a state church. At the state church, you were born into your faith. It was automatic and your actions, the way you lived your life had no meaning. And our Covenant ancestors felt that there was something missing in this. They felt that you needed to live out your faith. They felt that you needed to show your belief by what you did. And they were right.

There are churches out there that are very concerned that you believe a certain way. They want to drill right teachings into you so that you will know their theology backwards and forwards. They want to make sure you believe the world is going to end a certain way. They want to be sure that you understand exactly what it is that Jesus did on the cross and how that affects us, they want you to know the difference between justification and sanctification, two things that Jesus does for us. (If you want to know the difference, just ask one of the confirmation students). But we as Covenanters, and many other Christians say that there needs to be something more. You cannot give lip service to the right beliefs if you don’t live the right practices. Our denomination came out of a group of Christians who believed that there needed to be a personal commitment to the beliefs that are spouted. It’s not enough to say you believe, it’s not enough to call yourself a Christian, you have to live it.

And so we come to James 2 where it is spelled out for us so very clearly.

II. Faith and Deeds

“What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if people claim to have faith but have no deeds? Can such faith save them?” Now, of course, there is danger here. For we all know that it isn’t our deeds that save us but Christ who saves us, through faith. But true faith, true following involves living the life, walking the walk.

Brian McLaren, an evangelical author, describes it by saying that orthodoxy needs to be linked to practice. There is orthodoxy – right thinking, and there is orthopraxy – right practice of the gospel. And when we look at Jesus’ teaching we discover that he is much more interested in right practice than right thinking. Or maybe the problem is that we think you can have one without the other, when in truth the two need to be so put together that you cannot separate them. Right thinking – Love your neighbor as yourself. Right practice – Care for those less fortunate than yourself. Right thinking – God created this world and everything in it. Right practice – be stewards of all creation. Right thinking – Jesus died to save our sins. Right practice – share this good news with those around you. Right thinking – Jesus is Lord. Right practice – follow his will and his way. Right thinking – God answers prayers. Right practice – lift your needs before him so he can answer. Right thinking – Everything we have belongs to God. Right practice – treat the things you have as God’s and not your own. The list goes on. If the thinking doesn’t have the practice to go with it, do you really believe it?

Our beliefs need to influence our actions to be taken seriously. If you don’t act upon your beliefs then you probably don’t really believe. When Elijah stood on the mountaintop and called for God to send down fire to prove himself to the people, we know that Elijah believed that God could do this. When Peter told the man on the side of the road to get up and walk instead of giving him money, we know that Peter believed God could heal this man. For both of these as well as people throughout the Bible, belief is shown by action.

And yet we aren’t saved by our actions. It isn’t our deeds or our works that bring us salvation. But James makes it clear here in chapter 2. “Show me faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.” James is about putting your faith on the line. He is about letting it all hang out. Don’t let your faith be something that is just a shield to protect you from hell. Don’t let it be fire insurance that you pray and then let sit in your safe forever more. Instead, live out your faith; act out your faith; make it real. Youth today put it this way: don’t just talk the talk, walk the walk! Are you ready to walk the walk of faith?

III. Love Your Neighbor

Scott McKnight, a professor at North Park College, has written a book entitled The Jesus Creed. In this book he says that Jesus takes the Shema from the Old Testament and does something revolutionary with it. The Shema is the center of the Old Testament. It is that which the Jewish people of the Old Testament took to be the most holy truth, the deepest belief, the orthodoxy of what they stood for. The Shema states, “Here, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.” But the Shema, which is Deuteronomy 6:4-9, is not enough for Jesus, he needs to add another part of the Old Testament, Leviticus 19:18, which tells us to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” In his book, Scott McKnight says this is the center of Jesus teaching; it is the center of what Christian orthodoxy and Christian orthopraxy should be. Love God; love others! This is the center of the answer to the question how should Christians act. Yet, unfortunately, this is often not the answer we receive to this question. We often think being a Christian is about being stoic or being severe. We think being a Christian means you can’t have any fun. We think being a Christian means you have to continually show everybody else that you are better than them. Yet the center of Christian behavior is found in the Jesus Creed: Love God; love others. This is truly what it means to walk the walk. This is what being a Christian, this is what living the Christian life is really about. But how do we do that, how do we love God and love others? It’s so broad, it’s so nebulous; we need something finite.

And that is why we have the teachings of the Old Testament, the teachings of Jesus and the letters of the apostles. They were written to help us know how to love God and how to love others. And even more than that, this is why we have the Holy Spirit, to help us know how to love God and love others.

God gives the Ten Commandments: don’t kill, steal, commit adultery, covet or lie; honor God, your parents and the Sabbath. Basically, don’t live your life directed towards yourself. Instead, live it directed outwards. Don’t let yourself become curled inwards. Don’t focus first and foremost on your own needs. Now this is counter-cultural. It is not how our society tells us to live. It is not what commercials tell us is important. But it is what God calls us to. Instead of thinking of yourself first, God tells us to think of him and others first. Jesus is even more explicit about this in his teachings. He wants his followers to follow God the way that he did. Jesus didn’t care about his own needs in the way that others did. He didn’t worry about catching leprosy when he approached the sick. Instead he focused on the needs and hopes of those around him. This doesn’t mean that he didn’t take care of himself. But his life was focused outwards. He acted out his love for his Father by loving all those around him: the Pharisees and the prostitutes; the saints and the sinners.

We are given a moral code as Christians. There are things we are told not to do. There are things we are told that we are to do. But what you will discover is that if you start truly thinking outside yourself and focusing on this Jesus Creed. If you truly begin acting out that call to love God and love others, you will find yourself following that moral code that God sets before us.

The message is really so simple, yet we make it so complex. Is the thing you do glorifying yourself or is it glorifying God? Is the action you take about satisfying your wants or is it about reaching out to the needs of those around you? Are you going to live for yourself or for something greater than yourself? In the Old Testament, after Israel had entered the land God had promised them, their leader, Joshua, was preparing to retire, for the wars were over. And their leader brought them together and warned them that there would be much to distract them from God. There would be much that would call them away from God and find them focused on themselves. They would be wooed by other gods who promised to meet their whims. The false gods of the people around them were much easier to follow than their God. They could be bought off and they didn’t require loyalty. The people of Israel would be chased after by other peoples who encouraged them to focus on being self-reliant instead of relying on God. They would be tempted away from God by the people and culture that they would come in contact with. But Joshua told them that they had a choice. “Choose this day whom you will serve. Will you serve the God of your families, the God of Abraham, the God that brought you out of Egypt? Or will you serve the gods of the peoples surrounding you?” We have that same choice in front of us. Are we ready to serve God by loving him and loving others or are we going to be wooed by the society and culture around us that tells us the importance of taking care of number one. Are we going to live our lives working to shine Christ’s light on those around us or will we put all our energy into making sure we are comfortable. Joshua gave Israel the choice, but then stood up to be counted himself, “As for me and my household. We will serve the Lord.” Let that be our call. Let that be our promise. Let that be our commitment. We will serve the Lord. Amen.

Sunday, February 06, 2005

1 Corinthians 15:3-8 - What We Believe

If you had come to visit me in my dorm when I was in college, you just may have come across some most interesting sights. One day you would have turned the corner leading to my room and you would have seen me running down the hallway extremely fast and then throwing myself forward, kinda jumping forward into the air, and then crashing on my knees and actually really hurting myself.

You see, I had decided to question my assumptions, my beliefs. Something that it is good to do, especially when you are in college. So I decided to question whether God exists. No, this wasn’t a belief I needed to question. So I decided to question whether there was sin in the world. Again, no, not a belief I needed to question. The belief that I felt the need to question was the important truth that people cannot fly. You see, as a child, I had seen a loony tunes cartoon where Bugs Bunny and the Wily Coyote were just children and the Coyote was chasing Bugs around and they went out over a cliff and didn’t fall. Bugs pointed to the Coyote that he should be falling and the Coyote responded that he hadn’t learned about gravity yet. Bugs gave him a book that explained gravity as he stood there over nothing, he read the book, looked down, went uh-oh, and fell to the bottom of the cliff (the first of many times).

So I wondered whether the reason we couldn’t fly is that we believed we couldn’t fly. And so I felt the need to test this in a scientific manner in college. And thus, you would have found me running and jumping with all my might and then crashing into the ground and calling out in pain. I felt that if I held back in any way, it wouldn’t be a true test. And for any of you who want to repeat this experiment, trust me, we aren’t able to fly.

Whether I believed in gravity or not, it doesn’t make it any less real. Whether I accepted the truth of it or not, it was there, pulling me to the ground with all the grace of an elephant. So, my beliefs don’t matter to gravity. It’s going to affect me whether I believe in it or not. But my beliefs do affect me. If I truly believe in gravity then I will use it to my advantage, if I ignore it, I hurt myself.

In many ways our belief in God is much the same. It doesn’t affect him as much as it affects us. When we believe we will find ourselves coming in contact with him and working with him instead of against him.

What you believe affects the way you live, and how you live affects your belief. The two are connected, and it is not that one just leads to the other. They both influence each other. Let me give you an example of this. If you believe that God hears prayers, your life will be lived in a different way. If you believe that God answers prayers, your actions will show it. In believing these things, you will change the way you act; you will begin to pray to God because your belief tells you that there is something to be earned from this. But the opposite of this can be true also. You can begin praying to God whether you believe he will answer or not. And as you enter the life of prayer your belief will be changed, you will start to see God work and it will become harder and harder to avoid belief in the power of prayer. So today we are going to talk about belief in God. It will be a bit heady and intellectual, that’s what happens when you talk about beliefs. Next week we are going to talk about living the life of faith. But it is hard to separate these two because they are so very connected. So, today as I talk about what it is that we believe, I hope it connects to our lives, how we live. And next week when I talk about how it is that we are to live as Christians, I hope it connects to our beliefs.

The Bible talks a lot about belief. In 1 Corinthians 15:3-8 we hear one of the central beliefs of scripture mentioned by Paul: the belief in Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. Not only is the belief important but the fact that it is something that is shared. Paul, in this scripture connects his belief and what he is teaching with many who have gone before him. And therefore, today, as I talk about what we believe as Christians and as Covenanters, I want to connect what it is we believe, what we have seen, what we have heard with those who have gone before.

We as a Covenant Church have a document about what it means to be a Covenanter, what we think is important belief wise in understanding who we are. Our document is called the Covenant Affirmations and talks about the things we find important. These are central to who we are as a church, and therefore is something that it is worth us knowing, and knowing well. And so we are going to look at the five Covenant Affirmations this morning.

The first of the Covenant Affirmations is the belief in the centrality of the word of God. Covenant constitution tells us that the Holy Scripture, the Old and the New Testament, is the Word of God and the only perfect rule for faith, doctrine and conduct. We begin with the Bible. We believe that this is the Word of God. This is the place to turn when we have questions of faith. This is the place to turn when we need to know what to believe. This is the place to turn when we need to know how to live. This is why we have a sermon each and every Sunday, so that we can hear the Word of God and apply it to our lives. This is why you are encouraged to spend time in scripture yourself on a regular basis. Is the Bible central to your life? Is it the place you turn to with your questions and problems? Is it the place where you find answers? I know people will say that it’s an old book, the newest part of it is about 1900 years old. The oldest about 3500 years old. Does it really have anything to say to us today? Does it really deal with the issues and realities that we deal with? I believe it does. I believe that the Holy Spirit keeps it fresh and helps it to apply to each and every generation. I believe that this old book is a keeper. It is the place where God speaks to us the clearest.

The second Covenant affirmation is the belief in the necessity of new birth. We believe that you need to be born again. We believe that you need to accept Jesus into your heart, receiving forgiveness and eternal life from God. As covenanters we believe that there is a need for conversion. We are all called to reject sin and commit ourselves to faith. Now, this new birth is different for all of us. I have told you about my friend’s father whose conversion happened as he hung for his life over the side of a cliff. He had lived a rough life before and turned from this life to find Christ waiting for him. That is a very different story than mine, in which I cannot remember the moment I asked Christ into my life, for I was very young. But in both of these extremes new birth happens. In both of these instances, God offers new life and leads us down a path of faithfulness and obedience. Have you made this commitment to Christ? Have you been born anew? Are you living the life of a Christian, a child of God, a disciple? Being a disciple, being born again is more than just praying a prayer when you’re 12. It’s about following, it’s about giving control of your life to Jesus, it’s about repenting, turning and heading a different direction.

The third Covenant Affirmation is that the Church is a fellowship of believers. We think there’s something important that happens when God’s people come together. That relationship with God is important, but it isn’t just a relationship with God that matters. There’s something that happens when we come together as God’s people and enter into relationship with each other. We are all part of the body of Christ, whether we like it or not. Now, there are Christians who don’t see a need for Church. They figure that they can come in contact with God on that golf course just as easily as in a church building. We’ve all heard this said in some way or another. And as Christians and churchgoers, we often get upset at them for saying such things. But I worry that maybe it is true. Perhaps, because we haven’t been the body of Christ that we are supposed to be, they are able to come in contact with God better away from us. If so, then it is not them that need to change, but rather we who need to work better at being the body of Christ.

The fourth Covenant Affirmation is our conscious dependence on the Holy Spirit. We feel it is important to realize that we cannot do this thing we call Christianity on our own. We realize that we like to think we can make it by ourselves, and so we pray that prayer at camp and then think we can work out our own salvation by our own strength. We then come to a wall and cannot go farther. This is because we are ignoring the fact that Jesus promised us something, someone to help us in this call that he has given us. We are given the Holy Spirit. We aren’t expected to do it on our own. God provides for us in ways that we cannot imagine and the Spirit intercedes for us where we fall down. This comes from the covenant affirmations: “The early Covenanters in Sweden were linked by a common awareness of the grace of God in their lives. They spoke of the Holy Spirit communicating this warm sense of God’s grace to each one individually and directing them to a common devotion to God in Christ through the reading of the Bible and frequent meetings for the purpose of mutual encouragement and edification. They perceived the Holy Spirit leading them corporately to common mission and purpose.” You see how the Spirit is involved in each part of their lives: in their Bible reading, in their coming together as a church, in their call to salvation. Are we ready to let the Holy Spirit be involved in each part of our lives?

The fifth Covenant Affirmation is the belief in the reality of freedom in Christ. We believe that, as Jesus says in John 8, “if you continue in my word, you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” Jesus doesn’t offer us chains, he doesn’t offer us a life of structures and nitpicks and rules that we must follow to the letter if we expect to earn salvation. Jesus offers freedom. Now, Jesus offers this freedom to all his followers, but so often we ignore the freedom or take advantage of it. Jesus offers us freedom from sin, and yet we hold on to sin, unwilling to allow ourselves to be free from it.

This freedom allows us in the Covenant Church to sometimes disagree with each other about certain issues and yet live in communion with each other. We hold to the centrality of the basics, but we allow freedom of interpretation on other issues. Thus, we are willing to baptize infants or dedicate them. But freedom for its own sake is wasted. “Freedom is not for self-indulgence… but to serve and love God, in whom alone is found true freedom.” God’s freedom has a purpose to it.

The Covenant wants to add a sixth Affirmation this June at the annual meeting: something else that is central to who we are as covenanters. This sixth affirmation is our commitment to the whole mission of the church. We believe in the importance of the church’s mission. We have a purpose in this world. We have a place in this world. We weren’t just created to be separate from the world around us and build up walls to protect ourselves from them. Instead we are to have a relationship with them. And this relationship is to be two-fold. First, we are to share the truths with them that we find. We are to spread the gospel to them. We are to let them know about the God we serve. Second, we are to help them. We are to be a place where the poor and weak, the strangers and prisoners are cared for. Again, it isn’t enough just to have that vertical relationship with God, God wants us also to have lateral relationships with each other and with those around us. And again, we know that God doesn’t expect us to do this on our own, but rather sends us his Holy Spirit to help us.

So these are the things that we as Covenanters believe are important in following God. These are the things that are central to our understanding of what it means to follow and believe: that we place emphasis on the word of God, that we acknowledge the necessity of new birth in Christ, that we are committed to the whole mission of the Church, that we see the Church as a whole and as a fellowship of believers, that we depend consciously on the Holy Spirit throughout our lives, and that we remember that Christ offers us freedom. Hopefully these are things that you believe, and that you can enter into relationship with and get to know better. They are worth spending time with, as they have come down to us from our history as Covenanters. They have been prayed over as we attempt to explain what it means to be God’s children. So, know the covenant affirmations, and enter into them in a special way. As you begin to believe them you will find that the way you live will be changed.