Love

Isaiah 61:1-4;; 8-11; Luke 4:16-21
I remember helping my father with the Christmas lights.  I even remember one strand that if one was out or loose the whole strand was out.  I am so glad that strand did not persist in our yearly tradition, but it was not as easy as today.  Incandescent bulbs broke easily and they needed to be clipped on the tree.  So when Mindi and I started celebrating Christmas as a married couple I was happy to buy a strand of the new LED lights.  They were easy to put on and seemed to work well for the last 6 years and they worked perfectly fine the first night I put them up this year.  The next day half the bottom strand stopped working.  I changed the fuses and they still did not light. 
I thus went out searching for similar lights and I did find something compatible at the second store.  As a son of an engineer I was searching for a strand strung in a parallel circuit, not a series circuit.  It is fine if you do not remember this information from grade school, as a son of an engineer I have to remember certain things.  I will remind you the difference between these two type of circuits.  A series circuit the current of electricity passes through each circuit element without branching, thus if one element is disconnected (for bulbs burnt or loose) the current is disabled.  A series circuit also must share the voltage of the source, while a parallel circuit will have the same voltage draw of the source for each element is directly connected to the source.  This is why a parallel circuit light strand will stay let if one bulb is burnt out or loose.
So I, as my father’s son, looked at the box of lights for the words parallel circuit, and found the trademarked term “Constant ON” with a accurate definition of a parallel circuit, including two illustrations.  However, no where is it confirmed that the circuit was strung parallel, not even in parenthesis (I do like parenthesis).  I have no problem with the company trademarking a catchy term, but if they were going to take the time to define it on each box, I feel it would be a good idea to share the official term within the definition.  Do they really think we cannot handle the term “parallel circuit”?
I bring this up to demonstrate how terms meanings can be lost and or manipulated so easily in society.  And as religious people we also let some of our important words to lose their meaning.  Take for instance the word “love,” it is of great importance to the Gospel.  We use it between, family members and friends.  We say it to our children even before they understand language, and we use it to explain the feeling we have for them.  We use it also for pizza, paintings, and presents under the Christmas tree.  We are quite aware that feeling the word love varies as per the context.  However, the word love is used only for half of its Biblical meaning.  Feeling is important, but it is also used to refer to action. 
Isaiah’s prophecy is about action for those oppressed, broken-hearted, captive, mourning and more.  Jesus correctly states that the prophesy had been fulfilled in His reading, for Jesus is the incarnation of love.  It is not that Jesus has a warm and fuzzy feeling, but came to earth as a baby to preach, heal, teach, and most of all love us beyond understanding, to the point of death.  Isaiah’s words define the action part of the definition of Love, which is known as the Good News; Gospel. 
I believe the best explanation how the definition is feeling and action is when Jesus answers what the most important law is: 

He said to him, ‘ “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’ (Matthew 22:37-40)

Yes it is important to have a wonderful feeling for God and simultaneously love your neighbor as yourself.  As this is recorded in Luke, the neighbor is the Good Samaritan.  It is clear that we are not simply to have nice and warm feelings, but to do compassion and merci to express this love.  Just as Jesus tells us in Matthew 25 what we do to the least of these we do onto Him.  The one that loved us so much he went humbly to the cross.  This love is equally action, and we participate in the action of love we are in touch with the feeling for God with all our heart, soul and mind. 
As church, we are to love each other, as Jesus told Peter when Jesus asked him three times if Peter loved Him.  Peter would respond with affirmation and Jesus responded with a call to action; “…feed my lambs…tend my sheep….feed my sheep.” (John 21) And as a church we are not strung in a parallel circuit, we are strung in the old series circuit.  The light of Christ is more than powerful enough to light each one, but if one is burnt out or loose we are all affected.  Jesus is the strand itself, as He says He is the vine (John 15), but God does the pruning.  We must love one another and the neighbor for we are all interconnected.  God will fix and/or replace the burnt bulbs and loose ones, but we must realize we are strung together by God’s grace and love, and thus we shine Jesus’ love by our action of love, for Jesus fulfilled this prophecy and we are called to do the same:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
   because he has anointed me
     to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
   and recovery of sight to the blind,
     to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. (Luke 4: 18-19)

Sovereign Grace

John 17:1-26

Today’s scripture is part of Jesus’ farewell dialogue.  It is however, not to us, it is a pray to His Father.  We are privy to this very personal prayer on behalf of the disciples, and for those that would believe because of their witness, thus ourselves.  There is a great intimacy evident by this prayer.  It is also very pastoral for us as there is a petition to the Father God that we see His glory, we make it to heaven.  This is to happen because Jesus asks the Father God to protect the believers who are no longer of the world and to keep them united. 

This reminded me of a wonderful illustration.  There was an Admiral who decided to take the control room from the Captain of the USS Oklahoma.  The sailors in the control room all had their respective jobs.  One was on the helm, radio, radar, maps, etc.  They knew their jobs and even knew the way to their safe harbor. 

The night was foggy and dark, but the sea was not too choppy.  The ship headed their normal direction.  The admiral saw a light in the distance, and commanded the radio man to send a message that the ship change course.  The report back was that we are requested to change course.  This went back and forth a few times, when the admiral got up and grabbed the radio and barked into it, “This is the admiral of the fleet, I command you to move.”  A second later, the response was, “Sir, I humbly ask you again to change your course, as the lighthouse keeper for two months and I have not figured out how to move.”  The men and women in the control room held back their laughter as best they could.

See the ship represents the church, and it is important for everyone to be in the proper position.  Just as Paul pointed out in 1 Corinthians 12:4-7:

Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone.To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.

It is true that the admiral did not depend on the people that knew the way, but neither did they speak up when they knew what the light was.  It is important for the church to be together and to have us working together as our gifts are given.  It is certainly much easier to navigate the sea of the world together then alone in a small dingy.

The lighthouse is the grace of God that shines out on everyone, but it is important we recognize it as Grace.  The ship could have ran aground if the reality that the lighthouse was warning them was not realized.  Grace directs us and protects us from the “evil one.”  The lighthouse keeps us from hitting the rocky coast, it is the answer to Jesus’ pray to His father, that we be protected and unified.  The lighthouse and the ship.

The ship may move with our help, but it is truly the lighthouse that should direct its every move.  God is truly in charge, God’s Grace is Sovereign.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life. (Ephesians 2:8-10)

Paul sums it up well here.  It is Grace that saves us and directs us, and we respond by good work of the church.

Plumb Line

Amos 7: 7-9, Matthew 5:38-48

Jesus is asking us to not retaliate and to even go as far as to offer more to an enemy, to someone attacking you.  This is a hard scripture.  Jesus asks us to pray for our enemies, and love them.  I do not believe Jesus wants us to get on our knees and propose to an enemy, nor have warm fuzzy feelings for said enemy, but He is asking us to love them, just as God loves us.  We can pray that they will change their hearts and actions and that is certainly a fine and healthy prayer, but in this context I do not believe that Jesus is even upholding the Proverbs that Paul quotes (proverbs 25: 21-22)":

If your enemies are hungry, give them bread to eat;
   and if they are thirsty, give them water to drink;
for you will heap coals of fire on their heads,
   and the Lord will reward you.

In the Matthew passage Jesus is asking us to pray for our enemies so we may see them in God’s eyes, and to show them love.  We actually determine our enemies generally by who is outside our group.  Be it nation, religion, clique, for it is rare that we actually have someone who is specifically attacking another, without the support direct or more likely indirect from others.  When we see someone as God seems them, it is hard for us to act as an enemy.

A great example of a man that knew he had an enemy is that of Dietrich Bonheoffer.  See Dietrich watched as his church, the German Church, began to ignore the cross of Christ, so to be able to support Hitler.  Bonheoffer knew Hitler and his followers as an enemy, and despite his Christian ethics, felt a need to participate in an assassination attempt.  Eventually Bonheoffer was jailed.  Despite being an enemy of what we, as humans, considered to be one of the most evil leaders, Dietrich treated each of his captors with respect and compassion.  They may have locked him up and may be called on to execute him at any moment, Dietrich saw them as children of God.

The plumb line is being consistent and perfect like our Heavenly Father is perfect.  To understand this, I share with you my experience of plumb lines. When I was a child we lived in a relatively new home and thus my father, the engineer, would require shelves and the like to be plumb level, that is the plumb line was based of gravity.  And it worked.  I then went in my early adult life on a mission trip to Virginia, where we were to reroof, put up siding, hang doors, replace windows, and put up a ramp to the front door.  This group tackled this project in three days, and on one of the days I was helping with the ramp.  Well the building was old and leaning some, it was not obvious to the naked eye, but when we started considering putting the ramp on the house we realized if we made it plumb to the building it would look very slanted, and if we made it plumb to gravity it would look slanted in the opposite direction.  One of the elder contractors shared his experience, that in this situation you make the plumb line the average of the two.  Sure enough that worked well, after carefully cutting the dowels in a specific order about an 1/8th of an inch different from the proceeding one.   (We may had changed the design if we had more time or was aware of the plumb line issue previously).  It worked out aesthetically wonderful, and even allowed for the water to run off well. 

Jesus tells us that our plumb line is to not retaliate, to love and pray for our enemies, and thus as Jesus says:

…so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. …Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5:45 & 48)

This plumb line cannot be averaged with the world.  When we follow this line, it will be noticeably different then the world.  When we love as God Loves, we bring Heaven to Earth.

God's Weather Forecast

January 17, 2010

God’s Weather Forecast.

Matthew 5.43-6.5

‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.” But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax-collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

This text I choose for my first sermon because I had an overwhelming fear that I must be perfect. I looked up this text and first saw the line, be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. At first this did not help. How could I be perfect like God? Was not Jesus the only human that could be called perfect? What does Jesus mean here? Well if someone sticks simply on one piece of scripture without looking at the full context one can come up with strange ideas. First of all we know that Jesus was the only perfect human in the sense we generally think of as perfect. Jesus, fully human and fully divine, without sin fulfills our definition of perfect.

We so often think we have to be perfect, be it our family baggage, and/or society, and that gets in our way. It affects everything we do and if we worry about being perfect we try too hard or avoid doing it all together so we cannot fail. I know for myself I worry less about a sermon being “perfect” I am more likely to preach a Spirit filled good sermon (I can rip all them apart myself but that is my own issue to work on).

But as I wrote above God cannot be telling us to be “perfect” as we understand it in the vernacular, so back to the Bible. Jesus says “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” And earlier in the passage where is our heavenly Father mentioned? Most of the passage are commands to us, but God is present in this part, “he [God] makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.” So it has something to do with God’s weather. God sends rain on everyone, good and bad. For me it is Grace. Prevenient grace is the grace that precedes our decision to accept God’s call and salvation. Or better yet our ability to understand and hear that Jesus has saved us, as we are not active participants in salvation but active participants because of our salvation. This grace that is offered to us does require our free-will to accept, and thus I described it as opening up to collect such rain that follows this knowledge of salvation. It is as if you had a rain barrel to collect and thus share this Grace. Of course once it is accepted it is not Prevenient Grace but rather sanctifying Grace, or simply Grace. Anyways I heard that some in the congregation were ordering rain barrels on their mobile devices, I heard as a joke later (I hope a joke).

So we know it has to do with God giving grace upon the good and the bad. This grace before grace, but how can we be perfect like God, well if God is consistently offering this to all perhaps we most also be consistent like God. To be perfect in context of this scripture is to treat everyone as you would treat another, (like ourselves I would say but many of us our harder on ourselves then others). If we are consistent with those in the pews and with everyone we meet we will be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. This is not easy but it is important for someone may choose to start collecting in their barrel today or better yet may share some of the Grace they had collected. We tell our story by living it.