"It's Inevitable: Generations"

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

 

It's Inevitable: Generations - Exodus 13: 17-22; Acts 16: 1-5 - May 6,2012 - Cicero United Methodist  Church - Everett J. Bassett

I read about a young woman who was trying on dresses in a store, and at one point she said, "I can't wear this dress. It makes me look like I'm forty years old." And a much older woman across the store overheard her, and hollered out, "That's exactly what I'm looking for. Hold that dress!"

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Today I want to talk about, and in fact to celebrate, the perspectives of the generations, and how blessed we are to live in an intergenerational world. In the last few sermons, I've been looking at stories from the middle of the Book of Acts, the Book in the Bible that describes the trials and triumphs of the earliest Christian preachers. And in these stories we see the apostles dealing with many of the things that inevitably come up in any human undertaking. The first inevitable things is change - we're always dealing with changes in life. Then we looked at another sure thing - disagreement; whenever humans are involved, sooner or later they have to learn to deal with disagreements.

            And today we add another item to the list of inevitable things - generations. It is a given in this life that generations come and go, and that at any given time we are in the presence of several generations. We talk about that many places - about Boomers and Busters, Generation X and V, the Silent generation, the Greatest generation, the Millennial Generation, and so on. What we don't always appreciate enough is how blessed we are to have all these generations interacting at any given time.

For example, we are always in the presence of the generations before us. The author Maryanne Robinson put it this way: “... every single one of us is a little civilization built on the ruins of any number of preceding generations." We see that recognition again and again in the Bible. I love the detail in this morning's Old Testament lesson about Moses leading the Hebrew people out of slavery in Egypt. It's easy to overlook, but I think it's very important in the story - how during that great exodus, when the Hebrew people had to flee for their lives, and leave most everything behind, one thing they did carry with them was the bones of their ancestor Joseph - a powerful reminder that they came from someplace; they had a history behind them. And even though now this great new thing was happening, they were still rooted in that history -- carrying with them generations before. And throughout the Old Testament that legacy of the ancestors is held close. God is always doing new things, but he is still “the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob," tying to the patriarchs, and without saying it, the matriarchs, of old.  That was a great source of strength for the Jewish people, and still is.

And then it's just as remarkable that the New Testament, about to describe all the new and glorious  things that are going to take place with the coming of Jesus Christ, begins in Matthew 1 with the list of  generations, all the way back to Abraham, as if all of these past generations are coming along for the ride. The Letter to the Hebrews, in chapter 11, has a list of the many great leaders from the past, calling them our "cloud of witnesses" who inspire us to "run with perseverance the race that is before us." In the Apostles' Creed we say that we believe in the "communion of saints," the great family of generations, past, present, and future who gather around the Lord's table with us this morning. But "cloud of witnesses" and "communion of saints" are pretty abstract ideas. This connection we have with past generations is much more personal than that. We recognize it in the next few weeks by the celebrations of Mothers' Day and Fathers' Day. And, of course, we recognize it with joy today on Golden Christian Sunday, where we celebrate some of our very favorite people, the senior citizens in our midst. Many of them have done the heavy lifting for. Christ in the last few decades of this church's existence, and are the reason we are able to be here today. And we are grateful. Now that I'm often asked if I am a senior citizen (I'm just four months away from getting that $2.50 discount at the movies) I
appreciate our Golden Christians all the more. One of them said to me, "I've still got a lot on the ball; I just don't feel like bouncing it quite so often." I'm beginning to understand that. And since we all know that growing older is not for sissies, we have so much to learn from our Golden Christians about doing that well. They bring us the gift of so much experience. But even more important, the generations before us anchor us, keep us from going adrift in crazy new notions. Yes, change is inevitable. But we are also planted in a great tradition, and the voices of past generations keep us grounded in faith.

I heard a story about a woman and her little grandson who visited the zoo. There was a local artist there who was doing face-painting of animal paws on the children. The little boy got in line. It happened that his face was covered with bright red freckles, and when he got to the head of the line, the artist, without thinking, blurted out, "You've got so many freckles, there's no place to paint!" The little boy was mortified, and walked away embarrassed. His grandmother was upset too, so she took him aside. "I love your freckles," she said, touching his cheek. "Do you know that when I was a little girl, I always wished for freckles?" "Really?" he asked. "Really;" she said. "Why, I can't think of anything that could be more beautiful on a person's face." The little boy smiled. "I can," he said. And then he put his fingers on her cheek and said, "Wrinkles." That little boy has a great gift - the guiding love of his elder. He'll appreciate that more and more. We celebrate the presence of the generations before us.

We also are in the presence of the generations that are to come - and that, too is a great blessing. We love wrinkles, but we also love freckles. What an incredible joy it was to celebrate Youth Sunday last week, and be led so beautifully by our young people, and then to celebrate Golden Christian Sunday today, and the wonderful contributions of our older members. It is so amazing to be in a church where all generations are present, growing, and serving the Lord together. We are blessed. It is a blessing that the apostle Paul seemed to realize in this morning's scripture lesson from Acts - one of the first intergenerational moments in the church.

Through the first part of the Book of Acts the generations are not a factor. We really have no clue of the ages of most of the early apostles - they are simply colleagues in this new Christian venture. But in Acts 16, the movement becomes intergenerational with the introduction of Timothy. Timothy was very prominent in the church, especially in connection with Paul, a co-writer, a representative, an emissary - but also, according to Paul, "my loyal child in the faith," or "my beloved and faithful child in the Lord." There are two letters to Timothy in the Bible, presented as letters from Paul to his protégé, and both refer to Timothy's young age. "Let no one despise your youth," says I Timothy 4: 12, "but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity." We're supposed to learn from the young ones, as well, and certainly that continues the intergenerational spirit of Jesus, who dearly loved to be around children.  But just as clearly, that was more than just about fun. He placed a child in the middle of the disciples, and said, "Unless you become like this little child, you cannot enter the kingdom of God." Our children and youth are teaching us something essential about faith, and in turn we have the joy of mentoring them, and watching them grow by the wisdom of the elders in the church.

But we also know that there is, in this inevitable mixing of the generations, both pain and hope. The pain comes in the realization stated so many times in the Bible, that the sins of the fathers and mothers are visited upon the children, even to the third and fourth generation. If we read that as a statement of God's judgment, it rings with unfairness. Why should my children and grandchildren have to suffer because of my sins? But we can also read it as a statement of inevitable, painful fact. Of course the sins of the forefathers and foremothers are visited from one generation to another-that's the deep painful truth. For example, as we were challenged to consider by Dr. Murphy a few weeks ago, what will our grandchildren do if we don't face the fact of global warming, and the depletion of the earth's resources?  Or what will they think about the huge debts we're leaving them, and the inequities and social ills that persist? Those realities, along with the realizations of some of the effects of our own personal decisions on our children are part of the pain we carry in our lives.

But there is also great hope in the exchange between generations. Youth Sunday certainly represents that hope - a new generation standing where other generations have stood, singing songs of faith. A different beat, and a little louder, perhaps, but the same love for Jesus Christ. What a great reminder that the Holy Spirit is alive and well, and the faith is in great hands. And the generations continue.

This valuing of the generations - past, present, and future - is one of the great lessons from the Native American tradition. This certainly was deep in the spirit of the Ceremony of Repentance toward Indigenous Peoples that took place a week ago Friday at the United Methodist General Conference in Tampa. In the service, acknowledgement was given of the dreadful history of genocide of Native people by European settlers in America, a crushing example of how the sins of the forefathers and foremothers devastated future generations. Our Methodist churches were deep in the center of that shameful history, and this act of repentance, and a vow to begin a long process toward justice for indigenous peoples, is a tiny step in that history, but at least a step. Hopefully we'll take many more.

There were many reminders of the presence of the generations, and how honored that presence is in Native life. The wisdom and the respect of the elders was evident, something we lose so easily in our youth-obsessed culture. But also the responsibility to the generations to come. Let every action, says Native teaching, reflect an awareness of the next seven generations. Wouldn't we treat the earth differently, if that were truly our priority? Wouldn't we treat one another differently? Wouldn't we treat faith more seriously? Could we not strive that not only the sins of the parents are visited upon the children and the grandchildren, but also the wisdom, the dignity, the dreams of a just and peaceful world, and the resolve to make it so? Couldn't we pass those things along as well?

In politics these days it is not unusual to hear about "generational warfare." When I was growing up, we heard about the "generation gap," a claim that the young and the old could not understand each other, could not communicate. To whatever extent those separations are true, we are only fooling ourselves, and hurting each other. The fact is, we can't choose one generation or another. Generations are inevitable. We are all in this together. And in the reign of God, reflected in places like this church, that's a source of beauty and joy - something we cherish, and the Lord's Table is a great sign of that.

We will see that today, as we do every first Sunday of the month, as we come to this table. Above all else, this table represents the life that Jesus gave for each one of us - our source of forgiveness, salvation, and power. That's what this meal reminds us of, first and foremost. But it is a sign of many other blessings as well; and one of the richest is the diversity of God's people as they come here to share this common blessing. It is an open table, we believe, an open invitation. It transcends issues of age and ethnicity; it transcends differences of opinion and background; it transcends gender and sexuality; it transcends race and creed. God so loved the world that he gave his only Son. That's a love big enough for all that have gone before, and all that are to come. In the presence of such splendor it is tempting to think that we are not worthy to come. I've known some people to hold back with that very thought.  We are broken and imperfect, and doubtful and confused often. How can we come to the Lord's Table?

God's answer to that is perfect love - perfect, healing grace in the arms of Jesus Christ. Around this table none is worthy, but all are welcome. We are family - God's family. There's a great image of that on television these days, with Tom Selleck's cop show Blue Bloods, where this family is all interconnected through law enforcement in New York City, and they often rub against each other, and simmer with cross-purposes and disagreements. But in the end they all join around the table, where they are family - generations together, bonded by love and common purpose. You have a table like that too - a place where you are invited today. There are other places and other ways to meet Jesus, but this is the powerful way he himself started. Come to the table. The love represented here has been the nourishment of a whole cloud of witnesses before us. At the same time, the children lead the way, says Jesus. Maybe this is one of those times in your life when you feel adrift - uncertain, unconnected, in transition, in a spiritual desert - however you want to say it. Here at the Lord's Table you are part of a whole beautiful flow of humanity - created by God in God's own image, and redeemed from sin and brokenness by the Body that was broken for you, the Blood that was shed for you - a love that has spoken for centuries, and touches each generation anew. Let this be a moment of healing, of renewal, of hope for each of us. You are surrounded by a great communion of faith. They are all waiting with Jesus to sit with you here.

"It's Inevitable: Disagreement"

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

It's Inevitable: Disagreement - Genesis 13:1-9, Acts 15:36 -41 - April 22, 2012 - Cicero United methodist Church - Everett J. BAssett

"It's Inevitable: Change"

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

It's Inevitable: Change - Psalm 46, Acts 15: 1-2, 22-29 - Cicero United methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

"The Easter in You" Sermon for April 8

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

 

 

There is a famous ancient Indian story about a group of blind men asked to define an elephant.

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Each of them touched what they could. One man felt the elephant's leg, and said, “An elephant feels like a tree trunk." One felt the elephant's trunk, and said, "An elephant feels like a rubber tube." One felt the tusk, and pronounced an elephant much like a long bone. The one at the ear said that the elephant was like a wrinkled fan; one at the tail said, "No. An elephant is actually more like a rope." And so on. Of course, the lesson is that each of them was right. It all comes down to where you are standing.

 

I think the same thing is true of Easter. It is interesting to note how the Bible tells us about
Resurrection Day. Leading up to Easter, the story of the last week of Jesus' earthly life has a certain consistency, at least the way it is told by Matthew, Mark, and Luke. We know the story well, and we've retold it over the past week - the triumphal entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday; the Last Supper with the disciples; the prayer in Gethsemane; the betrayal by Judas; the arrest and trial; Peter's denial; the mockery and crucifixion of Jesus between two thieves. The details may differ somewhat from one account to the next - but the basic story was pretty straightforward, and obviously quite well-known.

 

But when it gets to Easter, the stories go all over the place. Yes, there is agreement that on the third day at least one woman, maybe several, went to see the tomb, and found something strange. But after that the stories take on very diverse character. I've seen accounts that tried to put them all together, and it gets pretty awkward - in order to fit all the different stories together, you have to have women making multiple trips to the tomb; or you have to have more than one road to the tomb, so one person misses another, and so on. It seems better to me to just conclude that everybody saw a different part of the elephant - that there were a multitude of diverse stories going around about the raising of Christ from the dead, and people held on to the Easter that brought them into the presence and power of the Risen Christ. And that was a different story for different people.

 

So what is the Easter in you? What is it about today that brings you power and hope? Perhaps
another way to ask that is, "Who are you in the Easter story?" There are, for example, three characters in this morning's scripture lesson, all with a different story. Perhaps we are one of these.

 

The first is Peter, who, the way John tells the story, is the first to go into the empty tomb. From what we know of Peter in the Bible, that should not surprise us - impulsive, bold, proactive. There is a lot more to Peter than what we see in this one episode. But let's look at him in this story as one way we can respond to Easter. Here's what we see: Peter rushed into the tomb, looked around, saw the cloths and the rolled-up napkin, and then - he went home. That's all we know. And that's one way to treat Easter. We don't know what Peter hoped to see in the tomb, but presumably something a little more spectacular than a couple cloths and a napkin. And so, he has little impact on this story.

 

So, this is one kind of Easter. Looking for bells and whistles. A spectacle. A celebration. This is the Easter of bonnets and parades and chocolate and eggs and bunnies and so on. For a lot of people, this is the Easter in them. And it's fun - I like those things too (I don't look good in a bonnet, but the other things are great.) At the end of that Easter, you go home. Life goes on. Not much changes. Nice church service. Lovely outfits. Back to work on Monday. And, eventually, disappointed. Shouldn't there be more fireworks? Shouldn't something stick to the bones a little more? Maybe that's what Peter wondered as he looked at those cloths and napkins. Is this all there is? Year after year? Why isn't my life more transformed by this Easter experience? That's one kind of Easter.

 

There's another kind, and it is represented by the other disciple in the story, presumably the disciple John. John's experience went something like this - he followed Peter into the tomb, and he saw the same thing Peter saw. But something more happened to him. According to the scripture story, this disciple went in, saw, and believed. That's the addition for John. He had a convincing spiritual experience. Something changed. And that is the real possibility of your Easter this morning. God could speak something profoundly new to your heart today. I can't encourage you enough to be open to that. Maybe it will come in a prayer time; maybe in a hymn or an anthem; maybe in a' preached thought; maybe in a friendly and encouraging word. However it might come, the possibility is real that God has something personal and powerful to do in your spirit today. You will enter, and see -- and believe.

 

But, we should notice, the end result was no different for John than for Peter - he simply went home. The experience, whatever it was, was a private one, and, as such, it was limited. Once again, I want to be clear that I am just talking about the character in this one Easter episode as a prototype of an Easter experience. If this was, indeed, the disciple John, he was by no means private in his spirituality - he was one of the giants of faith, preaching and writing powerfully. But as a character in John 20, he represents someone who had a life-changing experience and took it home with him. It has no lasting impact in the story. And the fact is there are a lot of people today who are very content with that limited, personal faith experience, as if the whole sum total of God's purpose begins and ends with us. But God has something much greater in mind today than our private faith experiences.

 

It's instructional to think about the stated purpose of The United Methodist Church. The purpose of the church, says our denomination, is "to make disciples for the transformation of the world." That's an important two-part statement. Yes, it says, God wants disciples who have a strong inner spirituality, an experience of the heart that convinces and transforms them. But by no means does it end there. God wants active disciples who are living faith out in a way that brings Easter hope and life into the world. We can't be that if we simply have a spiritual experience, and tuck it away, and take it home.

 

So I'm going to propose that if we truly want the fullest Easter experience we look to the third person in this story - we look to Mary Magdelene. Mary is notable in the story because of her absolute devotion and availability to God. She is not there for the thrill of something spectacular. She is not there for a religious experience that she can tuck away in her heart and keep to herself. She is the one who got up before daylight, and came to the tomb. And then, when the others went home, she is the one who stayed, available and devoted. Whatever was going to happen next, she would be there ready to respond when the Lord needed her.

 

As a result, a couple things happened. First of all, her experience deepened and deepened. The
vision inside the tomb had an interesting evolution. First there were burial cloths, one at the head, and one at the feet - that's what Peter and John saw. But then there were angels, one at the head, and one at the feet. And Mary was the one who saw that, because she was the one who stayed. But it evolved even beyond that. For next, there was Jesus - the personal encounter with the Lord himself. And again, Mary was the one who experienced that, because she stayed. Mary discovered what dozens of people find around here all the time as they take part in our church's discipleship program, as they make attendance at worship and prayer a regular part of their faith expression, as they stay available to serve the Lord. And that is, there is a deepening that takes place - an evolution marked by wonderful faith experiences, and encounters of the living Christ of Easter. That's another Easter path that's open to us.

 

And the second thing that happened, was that since she stayed, and waited for the Lord to appear, she became Christ's messenger. Jesus said to her, "Go to my brothers...”  and he gave her the words to say. And she ran to the disciples with the greatest message anyone had ever delivered: "I have seen the Lord!" Mary's Easter is a perfect fulfillment of that purpose statement: " ... to make disciples for the transformation of the world." She was the epitome of a devoted disciple, and she delivered a message that brought hope and renewal into the world.

 

So here are three Easters - one that looks for bells and whistles; one that stops at an inward spiritual experience; and one that makes a disciple ready to bring a transforming message to the world. There are some others. There is an Easter for doubters - the one presented by Thomas, who would only believe if he could touch the wounds of Christ. There is an Easter for those who have heavy hearts, like those travelers along the Road to Emmaeus, who struggled to recognize Jesus through their sorrow. There are others in the Gospels. Which Easter is in you?

 

It's an important question always - perhaps the most important question. But some would say our times cry out for an answer like few times we have known. Of course the jury is always out on this sort of thing, but many people are beginning to say that the first decade of the 21^st century is one of the worst we've encountered for a while. When it began we were all concerned about the Y2K thing that was supposed to mess up all of our lives. And when that didn't materialize, we breathed a sigh of relief. But one columnist I read not so long ago said that only meant that the deterioration came slow instead of fast, stretched out over the decade - as we encountered terrorist attacks, the near crumbling of our economy, political stalemate, scandal, and all the dark things we are so familiar with by now.

 

Those same observers of woe point out how interwoven religion is with all of that demise. The 9-11 attacks bringing religious conflict into the foreground; the terrible scandal of clergy child abuse; the mainline church battling incessantly over homosexuality. And again, it's all so familiar to us by now. So much so that we're hardly surprised when almost one out of six people claim no faith at all anymore. And Newsweek magazine, which annually takes a Christian spin for their Easter edition, takes an unusually negative spin this year, with a cover article entitled, "Forget Church, Follow Jesus." I'll confess that I'm not the only one who comes to some moments of despair at the direction of God's world, and the church's seeming inability to offer a relevant message in the midst of all of that hurt and pain.

 

But there's an Easter in me. A faith in the power of the Risen Christ. A belief in a Resurrection God who will not let things spin out of control. I have witnessed too much beauty and goodness in dedicated Christian people to believe that God is done with us. And I want to be one of those who stays. I am not content to see the cloths where Jesus once was. I want to see the angels who comfort those who weep in this world - and I do, day after day in the church and in the world. I listen to your words of hope, and I know the angels are still bringing the message. But I want to go even deeper than that. I want to be there when Jesus speaks my name, and declare with Mary Magdalene that this is Rabboni, the teacher, the Lord. And I want to find the ones who doubt and hurt and despair, to declare a life-giving message to them - Christ is alive! I have seen the Lord! I believe that's a message that can transform the world.

 

Friends, there is an Easter in each of us. And if we combine that with a determination to be among those who stand ready and available to serve, God can do powerful things - can bring hope to the world.

 

    Someone wrote that in this life we choose between a hopeless end, or an endless hope. I don't
believe God created all of this world, and each of us in it, for a hopeless end. We have Easter in us; Christ is Risen! May the Easter in you bring you endless hope -- the power and love of the risen Christ.

"Why Have You Forsaken Me?" Sermon for March 18. 2012

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Written by Kim Marsh

 

Why Have You Forsaken Me? -- Psalm 22; Mark 15: 25-37 - March 18, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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Jesus did such amazing things, and many of them resulted in convinced followers.

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He miraculously filled a net with fish, and Simon Peter was convinced. He drove demons into a heard of pigs, and the demon-possessed man was convinced. He healed a blind man, and the man went and told everyone what had happened - he was convinced. And, of course, the greatest convincer of all was Easter - the miraculous Resurrection. Millions upon millions have become disciples of Jesus because they experienced the living Christ of Easter - they were convinced.

 

But there is one man who became convinced in a totally different way, and I have always been moved by this man's one single verse in the Bible. He was a Roman centurion who stood across from the cross, perhaps the one in charge of the crucifixion. And he joined the ranks of those who were convinced, declaring of Jesus, "Truly this was the Son of God." And this man was convinced not because he saw Jesus perform some miraculous fireworks; and Easter, of course, had not happened yet.

 

On the contrary, this man was convinced because he saw Jesus at his worst moment, the moment the Lord cried out his frustration to God. On the surface, this was no moment of glory for Jesus. This was the moment when he was broken and pushed past the limit, and cried out with a loud voice, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" And the conversion of that Roman centurion means a lot to me, perhaps as much as any other conversion in the Bible. Because while I've seen some miraculous stuff along the way, the most convincing moments of faith for me have often come from being with people who had reached the end of their rope, and felt forsaken by God. And because of how those people held onto faith even in those desperate moments, I think I understand why that Roman soldier was convinced that day he saw Jesus die.

 

Before we get too far down that road, there are some disclaimers to consider. There are some strong traditions that say that this was not really a weak moment for Jesus. Since very early times in the church, there have been many who cannot believe that Jesus would be so human that he would reach such a moment of despair about God's apparent lack of action. So they have explained Jesus' words in different ways, ways more fitting for their image of the Son of God. There is, for example, a scriptural explanation. Jesus was quoting Psalm 22, which begins with those very words: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" So this was a very carefully crafted moment by Jesus to demonstrate that he was connecting with his Old Testament heritage. Or there is a theological explanation, having to do with the atonement for our sins. Jesus, this argument goes, was, at that moment, the sacrificial Lamb of God. All the sins of the world were upon him. And God cannot look upon sin. So, for that moment, the eyes of God had to be taken off His Son. Jesus, for the first time, was disconnected from his heavenly Father - and totally alone. That is a compelling way of looking at this. And perhaps arguments like that do
preserve more of Jesus' divine glory. I wouldn't argue against either of those explanations.

 

What I would say, though, is that with Jesus many things can be true at the same time. He was, after all, fully God and fully human. That's why we recited the creed today as part of our service - to remind ourselves of that paradox that is always at the heart of Christian tradition. As we said, Jesus was both “of God and Son of Man.”  And there is nothing disrespectful or dishonorable or heretical in suggesting that there, on the cross, was a human being who was pushed past the limit of physicl, emothional, and spiritual suffering, and who creid out, like human beings do, “My God, where are you?  Why aren’t you doing something?”  This is the one time I could find that Jesus doesn’t pray to God as Father - every other time he uses the term of family endearment. But he didn't feel that closeness here, so instead of Father or Abba, it's My God, My God. It also is one of just a handful of times that the Gospel writer shows Jesus speaking in his native tongue, which was Aramaic - "Eloi, eloi, lema sabachthani." At this time of great anguish, Jesus isn't using his formal teaching language; He reverts back to his childhood tongue to express the pain of his soul at feeling totally alone.

 

Does that diminish Christ's glory? Some think so, but at least one very unlikely witness, one Roman centurion, didn't. For there is glory in miracles; there is glory in Resurrection. But there is also glory in a Savior who loved us so much that he even travelled into the depths of despair with us. He even shared with us what is one of the most frightening and unsettling experiences we all encounter at one time or another - the silence of God. We believe, of course, that God is acting for us and speaking to us in many ways. But sometimes, in our experience, God does not act. And sometimes, in our experience, God is silent. We, can argue a fine point here, and say that God isn't really inactive or silent - it's just that we don't have eyes to see, or ears to hear. But either way, in our experience, there are times when the universe becomes a cold place, and believing in God at that moment takes an incredible act of faith.

 

I have witnessed that faith. I have been the Roman centurion standing as witness when someone has faced unimaginable suffering, whether sickness or grief or despair. And sometimes, just as with Jesus, the words flow out: "Where are you, God. Why is this happening?" But even then I know that this is not a cry of denial; this is a cry of faith. This is just as much a prayer as the shout of thanksgiving during better times. And there is glory in the act of holding on to faith even against every shred of evidence.

 

The people who passed by didn't have it. They laughed at Jesus, and said that if he was truly God's Son he would demonstrate that - come down from the cross and take over. But the Roman soldier, who had surely seen valor and courage in many battles, saw it in a whole different way that day -- in the way a man on a cross faced despair and desolation. And that centurion knew he had witnessed something different than he had seen anywhere else. This was the Son of God. We should appreciate what that man was putting on the line by saying those words. Rome's relationship with its citizens was not just political- it was a religious system of worshiping the emperor. So imagine for a moment the risk that centurion was taking, declaring Jesus the Son of God - the trouble those words could cause him, both in the respect of the soldiers he commanded, and the suspicion of those who commanded him. But at that instant, he wasn't thinking about that. He had seen something that moved his soul profoundly. He had seen the Son of God facing despair and death, and it changed that Roman soldier's heart.

 

Someone has said that life is what happens when you are making other plans. You picture your life going a certain way; you plan and you hope and you strive. But as often as not life doesn't play from the fairway; it plays from the rough. And we have to make constant adjustments to unforeseen circumstances, and some of them can be tragic; some can be devastating, and bring us even to the point of questioning Why?

 

Some of you are making those adjustments to life's hard turns right now. All of you know somebody who is. What do you do? Three things, it seems to me. First of all, you keep praying; even if the prayer is "God, where are you? What's happening? I don't understand." Read through the Psalms in the Bible and see how many times honest prayer takes the form of agonizing cries to God. Jesus quoted Psalm 22 - words of utter despair: Why have you forsaken me? Prayer is that kind of honest conversation with God, even when God seems silent. We keep praying, until our spirits can hear God speak again.

 

The second good thing to do when you are brought to despair by a hard turn is to stop and recall what you've learned about God over the years. The writer of Psalm 22, after he opens with the cry of despair, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" immediately recalls God's faithfulness in the past. "Yet thou art holy," he says, "enthroned on the praises of Israel. In thee our fathers trusted; they trusted, and thou didst deliver them. To thee they cried, and were saved ..."  If we look back, we'll realize that God has been there before, and God will be there again. None of us, even Jesus, escapes moments of discouragement and despair. But Jesus went on to say in absolute faith, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." That's the kind of trust the psalm-writer talks about.

 

The third thing we can do, besides praying, and remembering God's faithfulness in the past, is to help each other. A little girl asked her mother if she could go next door and help Mrs. Brown. Her mother said, "Are you going to help her clean her house? Or rake her yard?" "No," said the little girl. "She's missing Mr. Brown today; so I'm going to go over and help her cry." Sometimes we need to help each other cry. And that can come with words of assurance - God hasn't forsaken you; God is crying with you; God will see you through this. Sometimes it comes in tangible ways -- certainly our offering today for One Great Hour of Sharing, and all the work of the United Methodist Committee on Relief, represents that kind of caring we extend when people are in despair. So are the meals we bring when someone is going through a great loss, or the cards and visits and hugs that signify a caring church. Those are tangible reminders of God's love, and they are so important. But mostly it's just being there. Being God's hands and heart and listening ear. It's so important to care at those tough times.

 

I heard someone lament once that life is not fair. As soon as you think things are going good, it can change with the blink of an eye. And someone who I knew to be a wise person with great faith responded, "Yes. Life can change with the blink of an eye. But Hallelujah - God doesn't blink."

 

We believe that. So we keep on praying. And we remember God's faithfulness. And we help each other through. And lives are changed by the witness of that kind of faith. As United Methodists we have all pledged five things to God - our prayers, our presence, our gifts, our service, our witness. It's that last one - our witness - that some people don't like so much. When they think of witnessing for God they have pictures of the guy preaching on the street corner, or the Jehovah's Witnesses knocking on the front door. But many times, witnessing is something much more basic: it's about living through the ups and downs of life with trust and faith - even at your lowest moments - maybe especially then. People you would never expect see your faith and realize that they are in the presence of the very Son of God. I've been that Roman centurion, seeing that kind of faith in many of God's faithful witnesses; and it reminds me over and over that the story doesn't end there on the cross. There is Easter; hope returns; joy returns; and the power of the Living Christ will see us through.

 

"Behold Your Son" Sermon for March 11, 2010

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Written by Everett J Bassett

Woman, Behold Your Son - John 19: 23-27 - March 11, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church -
Everett J. Bassett

 Our Lenten Bible studies have been reflections on the words of Jesus from the cross, using material from United Methodist pastor and author Adam Hamilton.

 

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             And one of the things that struck me was in the very first lesson, when he talked about the cruelty of crucifixion, and what was actually happening to Jesus on the cross. I'm not one to dwell on the physical blood and guts reality of the cross, either in my devotions or in my preaching. But Hamilton's description made a point that has really touched me. When someone is crucified, it's the weight of the body constricting the chest that causes death. A person slowly suffocates. And for that reason, speaking is an excruciating undertaking. In order to talk, the person has to take the weight off, which means pulling down with the hands against the nails, or pushing up with the feet - again, against the nails. It would be brutally painful.

            And yet Jesus spoke seven times. Made that amazing, excruciating effort. I wonder if that
contributed to his quick death. Dying by crucifixion takes several hours. And the Roman soldiers get a little bored, or perhaps have a trace of mercy. Because what the scriptures tell us is that after three hours they approached Jesus and the two thieves to break their legs, and hasten the death. But when they got to Jesus, he was already dead, so they didn't need to break his legs, thus fulfilling the mandate that the sacrificial lamb - or, in this case, the Lamb of God - must be unblemished and unbroken.

            So we wonder, why speak at all? The mission was being accomplished. Jesus died for the sins of the world. The act of his dying accomplished that; it needed no words. The time to speak, from a human perspective, was in front of Pilate, when Jesus was being accused, and perhaps could have saved his life. But, of course, that wasn't the point then or now, when he was dying. Why the seven words?

            Two of the words, it seems to me, were cries of anguish: "I'm thirsty." And, "My God, why have you forsaken me?" They let us know that this was the death of a real human being - not some superhero, not some phantom, not some divine illusion in human clothes. This was the death of a man, a human person experiencing what all of us do, and the thirst and the anguish that accompanies suffering and death in this world. This was the tragic death of a human being who didn't deserve it.

            But two of the words remind us of the other reality here - the extraordinary nature of Jesus. It is the faith behind the words, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," that can help all of us face death with courage. And it is the triumphant finality behind the words, it is finished," that remind us that Jesus accomplished what he set out to achieve - the salvation of humankind. Jesus saw it through.

            So two words remind us of Jesus' humanity; two of his divinity and his great faith. The other three, I think, could remind us of his deep compassion. Three times, despite the pain and anguish it caused him, Jesus spoke up to take care of the people around him. For me, it helps to reflect on three arenas of caring reflected in these three words from the cross.

            The first arena, reflected in today's scripture lesson, is our family, our neighbors, and those closest to us. From the cross, Jesus expended precious energy to make sure his mother was cared for. It was an incredible act of love for Mary to be there in the first place. What mother wants to see her son go through that? As agonizing as it was for her, she was there, I have to believe, because she wanted to bring a reminder of human love to her dying son, no matter what painful images of her son's dying she would have to live with from that moment on. She had been told shortly after his-birth that it would be a sword piercing her soul someday, and now it was. And I can't imagine what it meant to Jesus to look down from the cross and see his mother there. "Woman, behold your son," he said. Some might hear those words and see a child turning to his mother for comfort. Some would hear a man expressing bitter irony to his mother, as if to say, "It's all come to this." But, it turns out, Jesus had a different purpose. It was about compassion. This event was not only death for Jesus; it would consign Mary to a brutally difficult life. She was a woman in her forties whose husband was dead, and now whose
firstborn son was dying. Those were her two layers of security in this world at this stage of her life. Without either of them, she was a prime candidate for a life of poverty, perhaps even what we would call of homeless life in today's society, or a life on the streets. So Jesus' purpose becomes clear when he speaks yet again, this time to his best friend John, and says, "Behold your mother." John understands exactly what Jesus is doing - transferring the care of his mother to his friend. And, we're told, from that time on, Mary lived with John and his family. Family, neighbors, friends - the first arena of caring.

 

            Last week, an Indiana woman named Stephanie Decker knew a tornado was approaching, and she and her children were in peril. So she took a comforter and tied her children together with it, and she laid them down in the basement of her house and laid her body over theirs as a shield. As a result, her children were not harmed, even a scratch, when the house was destroyed. Meanwhile their Mom Stephanie had to have parts of both of her legs amputated. She was totally upbeat as she talked to reporters about the survival of her kids. When they suggested she was a genuine hero, she said, "I'm a mom." Either way, we could call her an example of Christ-like love. Just as Jesus did, she protected her loved ones.

            Christ-like love cares for your family, your neighbors, your friends. Perhaps there would never be an incident where you would need to perform the kind of act of physical heroism that Stephanie Decker did. But that doesn't make it any less crucial to remind those closest to us that they are special, that we love them, that we are here for them. Sometimes it's easier to talk about kindness to strangers than it is about kindness to the people we live with and work with and study with and hang out with and too often take for granted. Hallmark makes a lot of money reminding us of that, but thank God they do. We can't show our love for those closest to us too much. Even as he was dying, Jesus gave us an example of that kind of family-love.

            But it didn't end there. Jesus also spoke to extend care to a total stranger - a thief on the cross beside him. The man had said to Jesus, "Remember me when you come into your kingdom." And Jesus responded, "Today you will be with me in Paradise." And last week's Bible study brought out the many excellent lessons that came out of those words. But again I am so touched by just the effort it took for Jesus to care for this man he had never met.

 

            We have seen many examples of the opposite. A woman collapsed in a New York hospital waiting room, and no one responded for forty-five minutes. When someone finally did, she was dead. It was all recorded on security camera. So was the situation in Washington, D. c., where a homeless man was attacked on the street, and hit his head on a car as he fell. In a few moments, I want to share part of a video that refers to that incident. The man lay there as people walked by, and when someone finally stopped, he had died. The nation was shocked; but those people who walked by looked no different from you and me on our way to an appointment. The shock value of Jesus' painful story of the Good Samaritan was that the religious people walked on by, and the hated Samaritan, the last one you would expect, was the one who showed Christ-like kindness to the stranger on the road. So as we reflect on the meaning of the cross during this Lenten season, Jesus teaches us to widen our lens of kindness, and be mindful of the people we encounter who long for an act of mercy, even if it's just a smile or a compassionate prayer.

 

             Kindness to those close to us. Kindness to strangers. Jesus taught those lessons right to his dying breath. But there was one other arena of kindness - this time for all humankind. It was in his words, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." This time, Jesus was taking care of all of us. For while those words of forgiveness could be for any or all of the parties who contributed to the physical death of Jesus on the cross, our faith tells us that it was for our sins that he died - the sins of all humankind since Adam and Eve. In fact, we are told, Christ-like love knows no boundaries, and is not only a personal love. It is also a general love for all whom God has made. This pushes compassion to the final boundaries. It fights any notion of a back-yard fence around caring. It would certainly be human nature to be inclined to take care of family and neighbors and friends first. In fact, it may be justified to spend the lion's share of our attention there: if we don't take care of those closest to us, who will? But Jesus says, "Don't stop there. Be concerned for the stranger you encounter in the marketplace as well." And there we might have compassion, especially if we feel some connection. The video I am going to share this morning has a portion I'm not going to share where the producers demonstrate that when a neatly-dressed woman collapsed on a busy sidewalk, people responded to help her within four seconds. When a scruffy-dressed man collapsed, 88 people walked past before someone helped. But let's say we are not one of those who walk past. Out of Christian love, we will try to help a stranger in need. Still Jesus says, "Don't stop there. God loves all humankind. God doesn't draw lines. So love even the people you will never see." It is very human to say, "Let's take care of our own first." But we need to remember that Christian compassion always pushes us onto a wider screen.
And of course resources are limited; but compassion isn't. And even if the best we can say is that
bumper sticker we see - Think globally; act locally - or, a more faith-based rendition - Pray globally; act locally - we still want to do whatever we can to see this world the way Jesus did, even when he was dying on the cross. Maybe especially as he was dying on the cross.

 

            Here is a picture of what that kind of caring might look like today:

 

            VIDEO - Adam Hamilton - 'What Would You Do?'

 

            People give something up for Lent. But how about taking on acts of caring for Lent? And how about using the pattern of the cross - caring for the people nearest to you? Then an act that expresses caring for someone you don't know - someone you encounter at work, or on the street, or in the store, or wherever. Then an act that expresses your love for all God's children - a gift to One Great hour of Sharing offering in a couple weeks, a daily prayer for a troubled nation on the other side of the world, a letter to your Congressperson on human rights for an oppressed group - the list is endless. What would be your act of caring? Our Missions team has placed a great challenge before us with a big thermometer in the Welcome Center to mark 2012 acts of mission in 2012. Wouldn't it be great to go half way up that chart during Lent? Fill out a paper on the Mission board today, or make a goal to report an act of kindness you do this week for next Sunday.

 

            And let all of us contemplate the gift Christ gave each of us at such great expense - the gift of forgiving, compassionate love. How will we carry that into this world so all will know how loved they are by the wonderful God who made them?

"Today You Will Be With Me in Paradise"

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

 

Today You Will Be With Me in Paradise - Luke 23: 32-43 - March 4, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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            Electronic communication is very handy, but sometimes e-mails can cause misunderstandings.

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For example, there was a man who lived in Florida, who heard that his sister up North was going through a hard time, and was very discouraged. He decided that the perfect thing for her would be a surprise vacation at his place, and so he went ahead and made the arrangements. He then sent her an e-mail to tell her what he had done. Unfortunately, he got careless with the cursor on his computer, and the message instead went to another woman, whose only brother, it turns out, had died many years earlier. So she was very surprised to read the e-mail, that went something like this:

            Dear Sis, I know you will be shocked to hear from me, but I've been down here thinking that this is the place where you belong. So I've arranged to have you picked up next Tuesday at noon. There's no point arguing, it's all been decided and done. And don't go overboard packing, you won't need much of anything down here. Can't wait to see you. P.S. Man, is it hot!

            There is a lot of fascination with the afterlife these days. People thinking about heaven and hell. There seem to be constant jokes about one place or the other. TV programs and movies are obsessed with zombies and vampires and ghosts and other versions of the half-dead, undead, not-quite-dead. There always seems to be a book or two on the bestseller lists that talk about what happens after life; and .as often as not, they stay on the list a good long time - Lovely Bones, The Five People You Meet in Heaven, and Heaven Is For Real are immensely popular. Some polls are starting to say that more people believe in heaven than actually believe in God.

            That being the case, we would wish that the Bible would answer a few more questions about heaven. It turns out there are not many concrete answers. What we have in the Bible are some beautiful images - streets of gold, saints in perpetual worship of God, a peaceable kingdom where the lion lies down with the lamb, a new heaven and a new earth, an eternal fountain, a great banquet, and so on. The few times Jesus was put on the spot to answer questions, like, If a woman had seven unlucky husbands on earth who all died tragically, whose wife will she be in heaven? or, can my sons sit in places of honor in heaven - Jesus essentially dismissed them as naive questions. We can't know that stuff now. Our earthly experiences don't really give us the frame of reference to even picture what heaven is like. Probably the best we can deal with are pictures and images and old hymns like "Beyond the Sunset," or new ones like "I Can Only Imagine." What will heaven be like? Where is it?

            So it is significant to consider the conversation Jesus had with the thief on the cross. They are key words to cherish for what they say about Jesus' understanding of the afterlife. The thief was truly sorry for the ridicule and scorn Jesus was enduring. And he asked Jesus to remember him when Jesus came into his kingdom. And Jesus said to the thief: "Today you will be with me in Paradise." Every bit of that statement, I believe, was intentional, and has something to add to our understanding.

            The first word is "today," and that is an important statement. There are many ways of describing the afterlife in the Bible, but if you had to summarize the most prevalent ideas, there would be two scenarios. The first was the belief for much of Old Testament times that those who died went to a place called Sheol, From what I can gather, Sheol was not particularly wonderful, nor particularly terrible. Though it is sometimes translated as "hell" in some Bibles, it really is pretty neutral. It is simply the land of the dead. A sleepy kind of shadowy place beyond this life. There's not much more to it.

            But as the centuries went on, another scenario developed, just a couple hundred years before Christ. And that is a belief in the resurrection of the dead. In this view, those who died went into the grave and slept, waiting for a dramatic Day of the Lord when the trumpet would sound, and the dead would be raised. There would be a Final Judgment, and those who had been faithful in life would go to heaven. This is the prevailing belief about death in most of the New Testament.

            It is important to notice that Jesus had a different view. What Jesus offers the dying thief is the assurance that God has something beautiful in mind - not some special day in the future, but "today."  Given the words of Jesus, when we are in one of those deeply profound moments where a loved one is leaving this earth, we can have absolute confidence that God is receiving them into the heavenly home the moment they depart from us. Jesus told his disciples on the night before he died, "If I go and prepare a place for you, I will return and take you to myself, so that where I live, there you shall live also." Zombie movies and ghost movies where the dead hang around are science fiction. They may be scary and fun, but they are not true. Our loved ones are with God in heaven today. That's what Jesus promised.

            The next word in Jesus' promise is "you" - Today you will be with me ... And that could be a reminder that the rewards of heaven are personal. There are some images of heaven in the Bible, such as in the Book of Revelation, that describe those who are there as a mass of saints all bowing down together to worship God. That's a beautiful image, surely with great truth. We will be praising God in heaven. But the image seems impersonal. It can give the idea that who we are doesn't matter. I think that is part of the appeal of books like Lovely Bones and The Five People You Meet in Heaven. They give the strong impression that there is an experience there that is uniquely yours. In The Lovely Bones, Susie meets all the other girls who were killed by the same man as her, and they try to understand together. In The Five People You Meet in Heaven, Eddie meets just the right people from his life to bring him peace. One teacher has observed that just as the question, "Will I get to heaven?" is important to many people, there is another that is just as important, and that is, "Will I still be me in heaven?"

            I think the answer to that must be No and Yes. It's No, because we are transformed. The petty, the mean-spirited, the frail, the mortal- those parts of us are gone, at least I think that's what the Bible means. In I Corinthians 15, the apostle Paul talks about it like we're putting on a new suit of clothes- the perishable and mortal will be gone. We will put on immortality and imperishability. We will be different beings, ready for eternal life. But Yes, we will still have the uniqueness which God placed in each one of us. I suppose this could be pushing the meaning pretty hard, but Jesus said, "Today you will be with me… " That is just as surely personal as the great words of Isaiah 43, where the Lord says: "I have called you by name; you are mine." Every one of us here today is a treasure in God's eyes; He knows us by name, and His love for each of us is personalized and eternal.

            And then I love the next part of Jesus' teaching to the thief: "Today you will be with me...” Heaven is where Jesus is. That is our best indication of what heaven will be like. What do we know about Jesus? We know that he brought God's love to earth in its most profound form. We know that he had a soft spot for the hurting and the lost and the forgotten. We know he took special joy in transforming sinners. We know he taught about peace and forgiveness. We know that he loved his heavenly Father with absolute dedication. We know he gave himself totally on the cross, and then rose from the dead in glory. And every bit of that we can expect to be true of the place where Jesus plans to reign eternally. Heaven is where everything the Jesus stood for becomes real. It will be a place of peace and joy, where forgotten ones are honored, and God's grace prevails.

            Someone sent me a story of a very sick man who received a visit from his doctor. The news wasn't good, and as the physician was about to leave, the man said, "Doctor, I am afraid to die. Tell me what lies on the other side." The doctor thought for a moment, and then said, "My dog came with me. He's sitting outside. Let me show you something." Then he opened the" door and called his dog, who came bounding into the room and went immediately to the feet of his master. The doctor said to his patient, "He's has never been in this room before. He didn't know what was inside. All he knew was that I was here, and when the door opened, he sprang in without fear. I know nothing about what is on the other side of death. But I do know this. I know Jesus is there, and that is enough." That is the assurance of our Savior: "I will come and take you to myself, that where I am, you may be also." “Today you will be with me in Paradise." I don't need to know what or where or when. I just need to know where Jesus is.

            And then the last word in Jesus' promise - Paradise. It's an interesting word, used very few times in the Bible. The more common word for heaven has to do with height. Heaven is somewhere up there. But the word for Paradise is rare - used only three times in the whole New Testament. And this word comes from the Persian word for "park," or "garden." And for people who read the Bible that could only refer to one place - the Garden of Eden. God created Adam and Eve and placed them in a beautiful garden. But Adam and Eve disobeyed God, and God had to expel them from Eden. And ever since then, humankind has had a deep inner desire to return to the garden - a homesickness that can never be filled in this life. That's how one teacher accounted for the fascination with heaven in human life - it certainly has something to do with desire to live; it may have something to do with fear of death. But even more than that, it has to do with the longing to go home - to find again the garden that we lost. That's what is promised when Jesus promised Paradise. We're going home.

            There is a story of a missionary who returned to the United States after a long ministry far away. He happened to arrive at the airport the same time as a Hollywood movie star, arid a huge crowd of reporters and fans gathered around and celebrated the actor. The missionary couldn't help but be a little bitter. He prayed, "Lord, I have served you for years in hard places. This man has made a couple movies, and this whole crowd is here to welcome him home."

            And the Lord replied, "My child, your welcome will come, but remember, you are not yet home."

            And we're not. We're still pilgrims through one small moment of our existence. The true home is not here, but in a place Jesus is preparing for us even as we gather here today - a place where we are known by name; a place where Jesus shines God's love everywhere; a place that can only be truly described as Paradise. Meanwhile, let this be our prayer - words that I have copied and keep before me to see every day - good words for Lent: "Lord, while you are busy preparing a place for me, prepare me as well for that place." I know I'm a sinner, just like the thief on the cross. And it's only by the grace of the cross that I'll be in heaven. But I pray I'll be ready to be with Jesus -I pray that what I do with my life now will be a preparation for that great privilege. May all of us live in that great hope.

"Father, Forgive Them" Sermon for February 26, 2012

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Written by Everett J Bassett

Father, Forgive Them - Genesis 9:8-17; Luke - February 26, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

Father, Forgive Them - Genesis 9: 8-17; Luke 23: 26-34 - February 26, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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His struggle to survive was highly publicized, and people prayed for him across the city. Prayers were answered, and he lived, but he was a quadriplegic, living the rest of his life attached to a ventilator, and wheelchair-bound. He described later his memory of waking up unable to move, speak, or breathe on his own. It was the beginning of a long battle back. "I have to tell you," he told a reporter, "when I have medical difficulties - and I've had quite a few -I shout a lot. I've had some very heated conversations with God." But then he makes a stunning statement: "But God played the greatest part in forgiving the young man who shot me." It turns out that for years after the shooting, McDonald corresponded with the shooter, a young man who grew up in bleak circumstances where he was taught that the police were the enemy. After the shooting, he spent over a decade in jail, and then died in a motorcycle accident shortly after being paroled. McDonald carries great sorrow about the course of the young man's life. But what about
bitterness? What about anger?

            McDonald has told thousands of people that he has forgiven his attacker unconditionally. "The world we live in," he says, "makes it difficult to feel love and forgiveness, not hatred and bitterness. I'm human. I struggle every day. Even now I'm struggling with life. Every day I have to forgive again - and again. Every time I speak about it, I have to forgive anew."

            I don't know of a thornier issue in spiritual life - and perhaps in all human relationships - than forgiveness. There are people who are absolute prisoners to bitter feelings toward someone that they can't forgive. Sometimes the person they can't forgive is themselves. And advice about forgiveness ranges far and wide. I've seen therapists on TV panels and elsewhere who insist that victims of terrible abuse should not forgive their abusers - they should hold onto their anger as a form of empowerment. Others say that until you forgive, you remain a victim of the crime - it still has a hold on you. Who's right? An episode of Criminal Minds depicts an absolute monster - a remorseless man who abuses and murders a multitude of victims. Seemingly unforgivable. But then we learn that he himself was a victim - systematically abused by his mother until he was twisted and vicious. Where does forgiveness fit in there? And the questions get deeper and deeper: Is there such a thing as forgive and forget? Can you forgive and still be angry at somebody? Have you really forgiven if you have to do it over and over again? Do you have to feel something to forgive? Do you have to tell the person? Can you forgive if the other person isn't willing to change? What does 'forgive' even mean?

            Apparently the disciple Peter wondered about some of these things. Maybe he had some specific wrongdoing in mind; maybe he was just asking a much-debated question. Either way, he showed both a lot of patience and a limited view of forgiveness. He asked Jesus, "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" It's a good question. Seven times would seem like a reasonably gracious number, wouldn't it? If they don't get it with seven chances, what good will eight do? But "Jesus said to him, 'I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.'" In other words, don't keep score. Be a person who simply forgives. Always. And we've talked many times about the very sharp teaching of Jesus about forgiveness - we pray it every Sunday in the Lord's Prayer - we can only ask God's forgiveness, says Jesus, "as we forgive those who trespass against us."

 

            We know in our hearts that it is the only way. All of us at some point have dealt with the power of bitterness to divide us from God. It can be like a demon that possesses us. Steven McDonald doesn't say it like this in the article I read, but I think it must be this knowledge that compelled him to seek to forgive the man who shot him - because of the shooting his body would never be free again. But if he didn't find a way to forgive, then his spirit would be enslaved as well. In fact, if you were looking for some definition, or some measure, of forgiveness, I would say it was this: You know you have truly forgiven somebody when their act no longer has power to enslave you. You have been set free to love again. You have been set free to pray, to love God, to love yourself. And if you get to that point, you know you have truly experienced a miracle of healing. And it may be, as McDonald teaches, that this is not something you experience one-and-done. It may be something you have to do several times a day- a prayer for the grace to forgive yet again. But whatever forgiveness means, when it comes, it is the most liberating gifts in the world -- a weight off the shoulders. And one of life's true miracles.  

            And, it turns out, it is one of the most Christ-like traits we could possibly desire. What else can we conclude from the way Luke tells the Crucifixion story-that there on the cross, when it would seem that all pretenses would be down, when the truth of Jesus' character would be displayed - in that moment of agony, it was forgiveness that came to his lips. "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do." Some have brought scholarly analysis to those words. For example, it is in Luke that we read these words, and of all the four Gospel writers - Matthew, Mark, Luke and John - Luke was the most worldly. And there are several spots where Luke wants to take the Romans off the hook for the death of Jesus. So some have said that his words of forgiveness from the cross were for their sake: forgive these soldiers; they are simply following orders and carrying out this sentence. They can't understand who it is that they have put on this cross.

            But whether or not that was part of Jesus' meaning, there is a deeper theology that goes to the very heart of our faith. Jesus is innocent. He is the Son of God. He is totally undeserving of this humiliating suffering, and this death. The weight that he is carrying onto that cross is not His own sin. It is ours. Yours and mine, and the sins of all humankind. As I sit and meditate on that, I never quite know how to bear it. Religious leaders plotted against Him; one of His own disciples betrayed Him; the civil court condemned Him; a Jewish king waved Him on instead of saving Him; a Roman procurator sentenced Him; a crowd of peasants shouted for His death; soldiers drove the nails that held Him in place. But my sin put Him there. And yours. If we really dwell on that, I don't know how we forgive ourselves.

            Except to realize that Jesus was all about forgiveness - even there on the cross. And forgiveness is a God-given miracle to break the power of sin. Jesus doesn't look out from the cross with accusing eyes; Jesus looks out from the cross with forgiving eyes. And we honor that gift by accepting it as the way for our lives also. Is there anything anyone has done to us that us worse than what they did to Jesus? Is there anything you or I have done that is so unforgivable, when Jesus Himself declared forgiveness as a gift for each of us from the cross? There's never a question of whether God has forgiven us, if our hearts are sorry. There's only the question of forgiving ourselves, and accepting the gift that Jesus gave, and then learning to be people of forgiveness toward others ourselves. And that means the power of sin and guilt has been broken, and we have been set free to truly live, to truly see others.

            Ellen Halbert was a person who gained that sight. As a young woman she was raped, beaten with a hammer, stabbed, and left for dead. Somehow she survived, but she was, of course, devastated. Later on she said, "f felt unlovable, untouchable, a throwaway person." At first she didn't report that she had been raped, feeling so degraded about it. But over time, a healing happened, and an inner strength surfaced. Eventually, she became an advocate for victims' rights, and walked beside many women who had been attacked, counseling them to claim their own strength. Then her work took her into an unexpected direction - she was called to tour prisons, and to talk with perpetrators as well as victims. Expecting to feel intense anger because of her own attack, she instead found herself feeling compassion. "I had (by then) worked with many victims," she said, "I had heard their suffering and their pain. I thought I would feel a lot of anger. (Instead) I ended up seeing that there are many other victims in the system ... 1 was overwhelmed by the wasted lives. I began to learn their life stories. I heard things that
boggled my mind - what parents had done to their children." There she talked about the man who had attacked her. "I think about him sometimes, about what will happen when he gets out. I think about when he was growing up. Wasn't there anybody to reach out to him?"

 

            The article I read didn't say anything specifically about Halbert's faith. But her attitudes and her actions are very Christ-like. The Bible tells us that Jesus had the same feelings when he saw the struggles of humankind, like sheep without a shepherd, and it broke his heart. And that compassion didn't waver even when they turned against him, even when they hung Him on a cross.· Who will reach out to them? Everything about Jesus was about that question, and He answered it with His own life.

 

            We are about to enter into the Lenten season, a time in the church year for deep personal reflection, and for acts of love. My sermons in the next few weeks will tie in with the Lenten Bible studies that will be offered four different times each week. The themes of those studies will be the words that Jesus said from the cross. If you haven't already done so, I urge you to sign up for the study at the Discipleship Board in the Welcome Center. And it is so fitting that we begin this Lent with the words of forgiveness from Jesus. Nothing takes us deeper into ourselves than the search for areas of our souls where we are held captive by bitterness over someone's act toward us, or by guilt for our act toward someone else. And nothing takes us closer to the heart of Christ than to hear His cry for forgiveness from the cross. As we move now toward prayer, I've asked Maury Black to share a musical rendition of the scripture with us this morning. Let us meditate on the words of our Savior, and the powerful love behind them.

 

Song - 'Father, Forgive Them' John Peterson

 

The blood of forgiveness is shed for us. Jesus came to set the prisoner free. Is this your opportunity to find new forgiveness in your heart? To accept again the gift of forgiving grace from the One who alone could bring God's mercy fully to bear by giving His life for you and me?

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"Down from the Mountain" Sermon for Feb 19, 2012

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

Down from the Mountain - Exodus 34: 29-35; Mark 9: 2-9 - February 19, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

            A man who was driving through rural New England stopped in a small town to get some gas.Wanting to make some conversation and get some local flavor, he asked the attendant what the town was like. The attendant replied, "Well, that depends. Do you mean what is it like to people like you who drive through to enjoy its "quaint and picturesque rustic charms?" Or do you mean what's it like to people like me who have to live in this dad-blamed, moth-eaten, dust-covered one-light dump?"

Read more: "Down from the Mountain" Sermon for Feb 19, 2012

"Five Acts of Grace: God is Guiding"

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

 

Five Acts of Grace: God is Guiding - Exodus 13: 17-22; Luke 4: 1-13 -- February 12, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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            What a great joy it's been over the first Sundays of this year to talk about the acts of God that form the foundations of a blessed life.

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First we talked about the great act of grace from the very first verse of the Bible - "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." God is creating, all the time. New things, new possibilities, new life, are always springing forth in God's world. This could be the first layer of your life-foundation - that you are a work of art, created by God, and newly created through your faith in Jesus. And God isn't done with you yet; you are constantly being created and re-created by God's love at work in the experiences of your life. What an amazing act of grace.

            But it gets better. The second act of grace is that God is always promising. We live in constant hope, because we live under the promise of eternal and abundant life in a world that one day will be completed, and will be the world of peace and justice that God intended for it to be. It's so easy to get cynical and negative, because forces in your life and in this world seem so powerfully destructive of what-is good and just. But just as God made eternal promises to Abraham in the very first book of the Bible, God has promised us that He will not turn from this world, and it will be fulfilled in God's time.

            And that hope is grounded in the third great act of faith on God's part - that God is always saving, always freeing, always healing His people. The early story that best represents this is the Exodus story in the second book of the Bible - God parting the Red Sea so that the slaves could go free. This salvation comes in the social, public realm, as people who are hopelessly enslaved are liberated. But of course, in our New Testament faith, it also comes in the personal realm, as you and I are saved from the slavery of sin through the life that Jesus Christ gave for us on the cross.

            Then last week Warren got to deliver the fine print. Yes, God is creating, and promising, and saving- how blessed we are by these acts of grace. But God is also commanding. This is what is represented by the Ten Commandments and the other laws that come early in the Bible. Obedience of God's holy law must be part of our faith foundation. Yes, we are set free by the saving grace of Jesus Christ - but not freed to follow our own self-destroying ways. Rather, we are set free to serve under the divine commandments. But even these are an act of grace, because as Warren pointed out - these are our rules for the road. They set us free. They outline the way of life that keeps us close to God's will, where we are taught to respect God, and creation, and each other. What a tremendous foundation for life.

            Today we conclude our list with one more indispensable act of grace on God's part -and that is that God is guiding. In some ways, this is the most mundane of the five acts of grace, the one that has to do with the day-in and day-out routines of life. Unlike the others, it is not tied to some spectacular event.

            Guiding has to do with forty long years plodding through the wilderness to get to the Promised Land. That's how long it took the freed Hebrew slaves to find their new home. To be sure, there were some dramatic events. But basically, it was just travelling, with God guiding the path. And, no offense, Moses, and all the others in charge, but you ought to check the warranty on that GPS. Even a slow crowd should be able to make that trip in a few months. But Moses took a circuitous route, to put it mildly. And it wasn't because, as I've heard some women claim, he was a man and refused to ask for directions. And it wasn't because of running into a bunch of road construction.

            Rather, it was about soul construction. God-was constructing the soul of a great nation. Think about it. When the Hebrews came out of Egypt, they had been slaves for centuries. What did they know about government or respect or even simple existence? Answer: not much of anything. They had a great leader, for sure, but they still started out as a grumbling, immature bunch, with so much to learn.  And the main thing they had to learn was that God was faithful. God was watching over them. So they grumbled that they didn't have any water - and God made it flow out of a rock! They grumbled that they didn't have any food - and God made it fall out of the sky! They grumbled that they couldn't defend themselves - and God gave them victory over their enemies. God taught them how to celebrate victory, and how to learn from defeat. Out there in the wilderness, God organized them into families, raised up leaders not only for the present, but for the future, tested their mettle, and gave them laws to discipline and govern them. It was a thorough lesson in life together. So when they finally, forty years later, arrived at the Promised Land, they were a coherent, experienced people. They had been tested and proven. And their leader Moses could step aside and send them across the river with confidence. That is the power of a journey guided by God.

            A devotional writer M. Louise Haskins wrote, "I said, 'Give me a light, that I may tread safely into the unknown.' (I was told), 'Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the hand of God. That shall be to you better than a light and a known way.'" That's what the children of Israel found as they left Egypt. They stumbled in the dark many times. But they put their hand in God's hand, and they learned to trust over time - and God sent a pillar of cloud to guide them by day -- to shield them from the heat of the sun - and God sent a pillar of fire to guide them by night - to light their way through the darkness.

            And so it is with us. We, too, are on a journey into the unknown. We, too, might wish that the way into the future would be better lit - that we might have a clear vision of where we are going, and how we are going to get there. But what millions of travelers have discovered is that it's not a clear picture or a light that we need - it's the trust it takes to place our hand in the hand of God, and to step out with Him into the darkness. That's the journey we're on - step by step with God, who promises that He will shield us from the heat of the day, and guide us through the dark of the night.

            And that's soul construction, too. God is building us, finishing us as the journey goes on. The sense in the Bible is that we are put to the test. Of course, the most famous test was when God challenged Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac. A second familiar case was that of Jesus, who, according to our scripture lesson, was led by God's Spirit into the wilderness specifically to be tested. That kind of testing goes on all the time in the Bible. And some of the tests, like those of Abraham and Jesus, seem almost cruel. And it's not so much that we have to pass the tests of suffering and temptation to be deserving of God's rewards. It's more about God using the tests that inevitably come to construct us. Because of the tests of life, we learn who we are; we understand ourselves, our strengths, our needs, our abilities. That's why the Hebrew people trekked across the wilderness for forty years. It's why Jesus fasted in the desert for forty days and nights. And maybe it's why our journey through life is not always a smooth stroll down easy street. While none of us would ever welcome senseless suffering, and certainly not some of the terrible experiences many people go through in this world, still we see over and over again that those bumpy times in life are the times when God does some powerful soul construction.

            I had a broken bone in my foot once - cast and crutches and the whole nine yards. And I've always remembered the doctor telling me that it would take some time and some discomfort, but in the end, that broken bone would be the strongest part of my foot. And I have thought of that often when I've been with people who were facing heavy trials, and seemed to have so much inner strength and wisdom. And it was there because they had journeyed through the wilderness with God by their side, and they had been tested and broken, and God had guided them through the soul construction. And now, even the part that had been broken had this great strength that had built over time.

            For me it's that journey over time that is the real experience of God. Sometimes, I'm afraid, we can miss that because we are looking for something more spectacular. For example, this last week Sharon and I stood in a place of awesome beauty - we were at Yosemite National Park, on a spectacular clear day. The unbelievable majesty reminded me of being on a mountaintop in the Adirondacks, or some of the other wonderful sights we can see. Unbelievable beauty. And I've heard people say, "If you can't feel God's presence standing in a place like that, there's something wrong." And for a while, I wondered if there was something wrong with me. Because while the breathtaking beauty fills my soul, and I certainly thank God for it, that's not the place that brings me closest to God. The place where I experience God most powerfully is in the daily journey of life, walking beside people who are on that same journey - people who have discovered how faithful God truly is.

            Or another example -- sometimes, when we think of God at work in our lives, we look for miracles. And we define miracles as dramatic moments when God steps in and does something spectacular. There are many of those things in the Bible - so many that we might get the idea that God does these things all the time. But those kinds of spectacular, nature-defying acts of God are actually pretty rare, I think. I believe in them, but I don't think you can count on them: they are not what God has promised. We are misled, perhaps, by the number of those unexplainable miracles we see in the Bible - every one of us can name them - the parting of the Red Sea, David killing Goliath, Daniel in the fiery furnace, Jesus walking on water, and so on. What we forget is that the Bible's story covers 6000 years. Extended over that stretch of time, these dramatic miracles are actually few and far between. There's a concentration of them when Jesus was here, but other than that, they are the exceptions in life.

            What is constant is the faithful presence of God through the day in and day out of life's journey through the wilderness. Those who strive to stay close to God, who follow the nudges of the Spirit, are guided and blessed and healed on the path, wherever it leads. And that is the true miracle. That's what the children of Israel realized when they finally arrived in the Promised Land - God brought us here. That's what Jesus realized when he was tested in the wilderness by Satan. God was with him, and could carry him through the test. It's what is affirmed again and again in the scriptures: 'Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life..."  "I will fear no evil, for thou art with me"  "... nothing in life or death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus." Those are the declarations of the miraculous grace that walks beside us through every moment of pain and glory. We can make it joyously through this journey because God is guiding us.

            This then concludes this series of sermons on five acts of grace - except for the response - yours and mine. It's the very nature of grace that it is not forced on us. It is offered. We're getting offers all the time - through the mail, through the Internet, through the television, in relationships. But there are very few things that are offered in grace. Most everything else looks for something in return - a business transaction, a vote, a favor, and so on. But the things of God are freely given: we are works of art by a God who is always creating; we are children of hope by a God who is always promising; we are redeemed and justified by a God who is always saving; we are given the rules of the road by a God who is always commanding; and we are accompanied on life's journey by a God who is always guiding, always nudging us the right way; always working for our good. How to respond to such a God?

            This was the question asked by the successor to Moses - Joshua, who, when the people had finally made it through the wilderness, and were now in the Promised Land, gathered them all together, and reminded them of everything they had learned about God in their journey - all the grace they had received - the faithfulness of God, that they had witnessed over and over. And then he ended with a simple plea, and a declaration. The plea was this: "....choose this day whom you will serve." The declaration was this: "...but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord." What about you?

"Five Acts of Grace: God is Guiding" Sermon for February 12, 2012

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Written by Everett J Bassett

Five Acts oif Grace:  God is Guiding - Exodus 13:17-22;Luke 4:1-13 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J Bassett

"Five Acts of Grace: God is Commanding" Sermon for February 5, 2012

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Written by Warren Covell

Five Acts of Grace:  God is Commanding - Leviticus 19:1-4, 9-18, 33-34: Matthew 5:17-20 - February 5, 2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Warren Covell

 

LAW AS GRACE

One of the sermons of the Rev. John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement in England, had three points to it.

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Congregations were very expressive back then and shouts of "Amen" and "praise God," and the like were frequently heard during the preaching. This was an actual sermon of Mr. Wesley's and the story, which is probably just that, goes something like this. The first point of the sermon was "Earn all you can," to which someone in the congregation cried out, 'Yes! Amen, brother!' A little later Wesley came to his second point; 'Save all you can," to which the gentleman shouted out even louder, 'Yes! Preach it!' Finally, Wesley came to his
final point; "Give all you can." The gentleman, silent for a moment, said to person next to him, 'what a way to spoil a perfectly good sermon!'

Everett Bassett is offering a series of sermons on God's "Five Acts of Grace," drawn from a section of Dr. Walter Bruggemann's book, Theology of the Old Testament.

The first act of God's grace was creation, and the affirmation that God is still creating. That's good. The second act of grace was even better; grace is found in God's promises confirmed throughout Scripture. The third was better still; God is saving, culminating in the coming of Jesus, the very meaning of his name being 'God saves.'

Today's act of grace is the kicker, God's act of commanding! Suddenly we seem to be confronted, not with the love and kindness (the grace) of God, but God with a sterner face, who makes demands, issues orders, establishes rules, laws; a commanding God who infringes upon our freedom. So we might say, 'What a way to spoil a perfectly good sermon series!'

In what sense is God's commanding or 'law' a means of God's grace?

Some would say that "gospel" trumps "law." John in his gospel states "The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ."¹  In this passage 'law' and 'grace' seem to be distinguished from each other.

The Apostle Paul saw the law as a preparation for the gospel. He says in his letter to
the Galatians; Now before faith came, we were imprisoned, and guarded under the
law until faith would be revealed. Therefore the law was our disciplinarian until

Christ came .......... we are no longer subject to a disciplinarian ................ ²

 

1 Gospel of John 1: 17
2 Galatians 3 :23-25

Children are faced with all kinds of 'commands' ('requests') from their caretakers which they may be inclined to resist (isn't "no!" one of the first words in a young child's vocabulary?). Some teenagers feel 'imprisoned" and no longer want parental "disciplinarians" to determine their actions. So they chafe under the rules of the house.

Certainly a rigid, slavish following of law takes the joy and adventure out of life. Seen as obligations that counter natural inclinations they seem impediments to our happiness and well being. I believe that is what Saul/Paul discovered in his strict Pharisaic interpretation of the law and the reason he discovered a new way of relating both to God and to his fellow human beings in the person of Jesus Christ!

But in our New Testament lesson this morning Jesus cautions us about too easily dispensing with law. "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill…³

In what sense, then, are God's commands a sign of grace?

Consider the analogy of the rules of the road. They limit my autonomy, my freedom to do as I please, but actually the rules of the road provide me the freedom and safety to travel from one place to another. I think of that when I'm traveling long distances with the thousands of cars passing me by at 50 mph (or more) and I'm traveling at the same rate of speed in the opposite direction. We follow the same rules, and that grants us the freedom to travel wherever we want to go, safely and quickly.

If I am inattentive or under the influence of drugs or alcohol and transgress one or more of those rules, my life and the lives of others are in jeopardy. If I habitually try to 'beat the light' or pass in a 'No Passing" zone, I am exerting my independence and 'freedom' but I'm also creating a situation that could lead to an "encounter of an unpleasant kind."

Trying to understand the intent of the law helps me to see it, not as a curtailment of my freedom, but as a means of enabling me and everyone else to move about freely, safely.

In this sense, then, the myriad of rules of the road actually give me the freedom to drive my car. In a similar fashion, God's commands are acts of God's grace, established for our benefit and foster our wellbeing. They bring order to our relationship with God and one another.

3 Matthew 5: 17

 

 

The "God who commands," then, is the same gracious God whose commandments are meant for our well being, our safety, yes, indeed, even our freedom to live in a world where we can live in peace and harmony. They bring order out of the potential chaos of human relationships.

The "BIG TEN" (Ten Commandments) defines our relationship with God (the first four) and our human relationships (the final six). When asked what the greatest commandment was, Jesus replied, to love God with heart, soul, mind and strength; and to love neighbor as oneself.

The seemingly endless lists of laws in Jewish Scripture are really extensions, expansions of the BIG 10, answering the question for the ancients: given the nature of God's creation, how am I to live to move from chaos to order (in my relationship with God) and in my relationships with my fellows human beings? How do I move from destructive self-centeredness, leading to exploitation and brutality, to fulfillment and well being for the whole human family? The questions are as vital today as they have been in the past.

I draw these thoughts to a close by a close look at an incident taken from the Gospel
of Mark (10:17-22):

" ... a man ran up and knelt before (Jesus), and asked him, 'Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?'" I'm convinced this is not just a question about the next life but includes this life as well. 'What must I do to enter into life as it is intended to be, now and in the future?'

Jesus said to him, ... "You know the commandments:
'You shall not murder;

You shall not commit adultery;
You shall not steal;

You shall not bear false witness;
You shall not defraud;

Honor your father and mother. '"

Jesus points to God's commands, mostly from the BIG 10. Matthew, telling the same story, has Jesus say, "If you wish to enter into life ... ", not distinguishing between the present and a future life. "If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments." There it is! To enter life, obey the God who commands, because it is designed for your own benefit and well being.

"And he said to (Jesus), 'Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth.' Obviously the man, even though he had obeyed God's commands as contained in Jewish Scripture, did not feel fully satisfied, had not found life at it's fullest, felt there was still something missing in his life.

 

"And Jesus looking at him loved him, ... " Only in Mark's recording of this story is this phrase present! "And Jesus, looking at him, loved him." Here is a person who had responded to God's grace in the Law, not only the letter but also the spirit of the Law, but he recognized that, somehow, that was not enough. Jesus' heart went out to him immediately!

It seems to me this is where all of us need to begin; to be responsive to the will of God for human life as it is identified in the commands of God. I would submit that is a kind of bottom line for the Christian, for all Christians, indeed, for the entire human race. Otherwise our Christian life is inclined to drift here and there without much focus. And that is tough enough! But beyond that is something more individual, more personal, something that fits one's very personal situation, that perhaps matches one's personal gifts.

"And Jesus looking at hi loved him, and said to him, 'You lack one thing; go sell what you own and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.' "

Jesus was able to see in this young man what was holding him back from the abundant life to which the Gospel of John referred. So he offered him the invitation to give his all to God and to follow the Master. That was the one thing he needed to do to enter the quality of life he so earnestly sought and longed for.

"At that saying his countenance fell, and he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions." The young man had another god that usurped the place of the Creator God-his possessions. "You shall have no other gods before (besides) me." I like to think that young man, to whom Jesus responded with such love, later, reflecting upon that invitation, became a disciple of Jesus. But we will never know!

I am grateful for the grace of God that comes to me in God's commands that guide me into a proper relationship with God, and a proper relationship with my fellow human beings, illustrated in the Scriptural commands of God and that challenge me to be open to the Spirit of God who reveals to my heart the one or more things I lack to enter into the life that is life indeed.

Five Acts of Grace: God is Saving

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Written by Everett J Bassett

 

Five Acts of Grace: God is Saving - Exodus 14: 26-31; Romans 5: 6-11-- January 29,2012 - Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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        A teacher asked some children in his class what they had done over the weekend, and several of them said they had gone to Sunday School.

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The teacher, who did not believe in. such stuff, decided to challenge the students. "And what did you learn in Sunday School?" he asked. "I learned about the Bible," one of the kids replied. "And do you really believe the Bible?" he asked. "My Sunday School teacher says it's all true," said the child. "Really?" said the teacher. "Well, what about the story of Jonah and the big fish? Is that all true?" "It's in the Bible, so I guess it's true," came the reply. The teacher couldn't let up. He said, "How do you suppose Jonah could survive in the belly of a big fish for three whole days?" And the child said, "I don't know. Maybe when I get to heaven, I'll ask him." And the teacher, playing Devil's advocate, said, "Well, what if Jonah isn't in heaven? What if he's in hell?" And the child was stumped for a moment, but then brightened up and said, "Then you can ask him."

 

        We inherit, in our faith, a strong tradition about final judgment - that there is a fork in the road after we die, and we go to heaven, or we go to hell. (Or, as one wise guy put it, you either get smoking or non-smoking - I'll take non-smoking, thank you very much!) Jesus told some very pointed stories about that fork in the road, and used strong images to describe hell -- a place of fire and brimstone, where there would be weeping and gnashing of teeth. And Christian followers ever since have argued over whether these descriptions should be taken literally or figuratively. Just last year, one of America's greatest preachers Rob Bell had a best-selling book entitled Love Wins, in which he explored the evidence in the Bible and concluded that hell could not be a literal place. There are plenty of other preachers and lay people who have very differing opinions about this.

 

        But whatever you think about whether there is such a place after we die, I would put this forward - there is such a thing as hell. And it is wherever we have separated ourselves from God. And whether or not it happens someplace else in the afterlife, it happens in this world all the time. It is possible, I absolutely believe, to experience heaven on earth. It is when we embrace God's love, and experience what the great hymn-writer Fanny J. Crosby called "a foretaste of glory divine." Even here on earth, we experience God's grace and peace and joy, and it is a taste of heaven.

 

        Well, so can we experience hell on earth, whenever we turn away from God and choose to live outside that promise of grace. Billy Graham once said, "I've never seen a person turn away from Jesus and be happy. I've never seen a person turn to Jesus and regret it." If you make that language a little more extreme, that's a way of saying that we experience heaven and we experience hell. And the difference is how we respond to God's love through Jesus Christ. Hell is bad news; but it is always matched by Good News - the best news of all. And that is that we have a Saviour who is literally dying to save us from hell. And that's because Jesus is the Son of God, the perfect embodiment of the loving God whose deepest desire is that we be saved.

 

        In our sermons these last few weeks, we've been talking about five acts of grace on God's part - five wonderful deeds we see of God in the very first stories of the Bible, that God is still doing all the time. They are a part of who God is, so they are constantly repeated in the course of human lives. First, God is creating - that is described from the very first page in the Bible and all the way through. Second, God is promising. Again, this was right from the very beginning, but it took special form in the covenant with Abraham that embraces all of humankind. And today we add a third wonderful act of grace, and that is that God is saving. All the time. God is a wonderful Saviour. And Jesus expressed God's loving heart to save perfectly. We see this as the ultimate continuation of last week's act of grace. God promises great things; and this week, as we talk about salvation, we are affirming that God delivers on His promises in ways more wonderful than we can ever imagine. And that has been true from the very beginning.

 

        Consider the greatest event in the Old Testament, the Exodus - God saving the Hebrew people by bringing them safely out of slavery in Egypt, through the Red Sea, and into freedom. It's a violent story, like many in the Bible; and nowadays people are tired of violence and more sensitive to descriptions like that of the destruction of the Egyptian army. But that shouldn't cause us to miss the main point of the story: 'Thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians." And as the Hebrews began to grasp the miracle of what had just happened to them, it wasn't only a celebration of their newfound freedom. It was a realization about God. The God who had rescued them had an amazing combination: on the one hand, God was powerful enough to rule over the sea, and take down the most powerful army on earth. But along with that, God had a heart to answer the cries of people crushed beneath the weight of brutal repression, and to respond in love and grace. If you asked those Hebrew people if God had the power and the love to save them from hell, they would say Yes without hesitation - they had been in hell, under the crushing load of Pharaoh's evil, and now, by the grace of God, they were set free.

 

            This willingness and ability to save wasn't just a one-time act on God's part - it is part of who God is. The Old Testament people celebrated again when the young boy David killed the mighty giant Goliath; when the walls of Jericho came crumbling down; when the exiled people returned to the Promised Land. A God of infinite power and a heart for the struggling and the lost. And then, the greatest act of salvation in all human history - in the fullness of time, God sent His own Son into the world to take on the name Jesus, which means "one who saves." And our faith teaches us that the death of Jesus on the cross was the greatest act of salvation and love ever.

 

        What we see over the span of the Bible is that God's salvation has both a social and a personal application. The social application is the main witness of the Exodus - the slaves are set free. This is the affirmation throughout the Bible that there are socials hells in this world - poverty, prejudice, slavery, hunger. These are places where God does not want the children of this world to live, and so, while the process is often agonizingly slow, God raises up prophets like Martin Luther King, Jr., or Lech Walesa, or Nelson Mandela, to remind us that God's salvation can change the face of the earth. Jesus wept when he saw the walls of hell surrounding so many in this world with poverty and prejudice and hopelessness. He knew that God wants to break down those walls. And when Jesus described the defining line between those who would go to heaven and those who would go to hell, it was about who fed the hungry and clothed the naked, and visited the prisoners - who helped God break down the walls of hell. We should not lose sight of the fact that when we take part in Hands4New York and bring our offering of food; or when we go down to Syracuse to tutor inner-city children, or when we petition government for just policies -- we are joining in spirit with a God who is always saving - whether the cry comes from a young girl who is trafficked from her home, or an older woman who is living on the street, or a boy who is relentlessly bullied in school- God hears the cry, and He responds with saving grace - often through you and me. We should always be ready for that opportunity to help God lift someone out of social hell.

 

        But there is also personal hell, the spiritual desolation that comes from sin. Sin is the great separator from God's full grace, and all of us fall prey to it. Earlier this year there was an incident at a girls' Little League game in Sarasota, Florida. A man ran out onto the field and punched the umpire who had just called his 7-year old daughter out. That would be embarrassing under any circumstances, but a reporter was present who recognized the man as the chairperson of the community anti-violence coalition. We can adopt all kinds of high-minded dialogue, and pride ourselves on our vigorous self-discipline. But sooner or later we prove the apostle Paul's lament that all of us sin and fall short of the glory of God. The minute we claim to have it all under control, something pushes one of our buttons, and the next thing we know, we've punched the ump, or called someone a name, or laughed at a joke that put someone down -and then ended up wondering, "Where did that come from? That's not the way I act and think - is it?"

 

        A mother told her 3-year old to tie her shoes. "I can't," said the little girl. "You can if you want to," replied her mother. "I can't want to," said the little girl. And that is the struggle within us. The old movie trick where someone has a devil on one shoulder, and an angel on the other, both trying to sway his thinking, is not so far off. We have both voices - the voice of right and wrong - speaking inside us.  And in this age of moral relativism, as often as not we don't even know which voice is which. And so we end up carrying around deep regrets for things we did and said, and deep uncertainty about what we should or shouldn't do, and guilt about addictions we can't admit, and hurt that we didn't know we could cause. And the spiritual isolation that results is a diabolical form of hell.

 

        But from the beginning of time, God has been lifting people out of hell. God has both the power to overcome the demons of this world, and the compassion to hear the cry of the lost and needy. And Jesus Christ is the perfect expression of God's saving love. Someone wrote that if we had needed knowledge, God would have sent a professor; if we had needed wisdom, God would have sent a philosopher; if we had needed organizing, God would have sent an efficiency expert. What we needed was to be saved from our sins; and God sent Jesus.

 

        And through Jesus, God offers you and me the wonderful gift of salvation; but, of course, it's only a gift if we receive it. And it only stays a gift if we keep receiving it, and make it part of us. Make it the foundation of our decisions and actions and relationships in life, so that before we decide, before we act, before we relate, the question we ask each time is, "What would my Saviour think about this? Because this is the One who rescued me from hell, and this is the One I have chosen to serve with my whole heart."

 

        I asked Jesus to come into my heart when I was a child. At the time, I had only the faintest glimmer of what that might mean -I just knew I had a passion for Jesus. And many times it has been something that I have pushed to the side – crowded out with other interests and concerns of life. But as we say so often in our prayer before Holy Communion, when we turned aside, and our love failed, God remained faithful. Again and again - most often through the rituals and people of the church, many times through beautiful signs in nature, or moving stories people share, or words of scripture that surface at just the right moment - again and again God invites me back to that first love, that first passion for Jesus Christ. And I am lifted out of a hell of my own making - not because everything in my life magically falls into place; but because of the spiritual joy and peace and strength I experience.

 

       I long for everyone to experience that. But I know my longing is tiny compared to God's. He loved the world so much that he gave His only Son. And I wonder ~- when is the last time you truly meditated on that amazing grace? When is the last time you surrendered to the loving gift of Jesus, asked him to be the Lord who prioritizes your life, invited that spiritual peace to take over your heart? Consider the simple truth of Romans 5:8: "God shows his love for us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us." That truth has broken down the walls of hell for more people than you and I could ever know- people trapped in terrible addictions, murderers on death row, people in all walks of life on the brink of spiritual despair. There is no barrier God wouldn't break; no sea God wouldn't part; no Son God wouldn't send - to save you from that despair. The cross of shame is now the ultimate symbol of love. Jesus carried that cross, endured the nails and the scorn, gave his life, so that you and I would have this opportunity in faith. Won't you accept the loving invitation to live for Christ who died for us all?

 

 

Five Acts of Grace: God is Saving - Exodus 14:26-31; Romans 5:6-11 - January 29, 2012- Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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"Five Acts of Grace: God is Promising" Sermon for January 22, 2012

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Written by Everett J. Bassett

 

Five Acts of Grace: God is Promising - Genesis 12: 1-3; Galatians 3: 6-8; 23-29 - January 22, 2012- Cicero United Methodist Church - Everett J. Bassett

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            A little girl asked her father, "Daddy, do all fairy tales begin, 'Once upon a time ... ?’”

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Her father said, "No, honey. Some of them begin, 'If I'm elected, I promise ... ^JJ1 That man may have been listening to too many presidential campaigns. The fact is, there is a lot of promising going on today. Certainly in politics. Certainly in advertising. A man was Talking with a mechanic, who said, "If I install this carburetor, you'll save 30% on gas. Then I'll change your transmission, and you'll save 50% on gas. Finally, these new spark plugs will save you 40% on gas." Then the man interrupted the salesman and said, "Hold on. If you do any more to my car, I'll save so much gas it will pouring all over my driveway." You can't believe every promise that you hear.

            And yet, when it comes to our faith, believing promises is at the very heart of who we are. It is part of the foundation of a blessed life. Two weeks ago I started a group of sermons entitled "Five Acts of Grace," and talked about how God is a God of action. And from the very first stories in the Bible, we can see five acts of grace that form the foundation of faith - not only for the Hebrew people of the Old Testament, but for the Christian believers in the New Testament, all the way through the generations to you and me. If we desire to live well in faith, these five acts of God form the foundation.

            Two weeks ago I talked about the first act, and last week Pastor Louise continued the thought - the first act of grace God is doing all the time is creating -creating a beautiful world, and creating each one of us in God's own image. Today we can add a second great act of grace to our faith-foundation - and that is that from the very beginning of human time, God has been promising. We see it very early in the biblical story - God promising Adam and Eve that they could live in the Garden if they avoided the forbidden fruit; God promising Cain that God's mark would protect him from violent attack; God promising Noah that the rainbow would be the sign that God would not send another flood to destroy life on earth. All these promises take place in the first few chapters of the Bible.

 

            But something special takes place when we get to Genesis, chapter 12 - and that is that God makes promises that encompass the destiny of the whole world for all of time. God makes them, as He does most anything, through a particular person, who then becomes the messenger to all people; and that particular person was Abram, later known as Abraham, who was specially chosen by God to receive this great promise. We have no clue just why God chose Abraham. We discover as we read the scripture stories that he was a great leader, but he was also a fallible human being. Above all he lived by faith, and so was able to receive the promise for Israel, and through Israel, for the whole world.

            There are four particular promises to Abraham that I want to talk about today as foundations for our lives. Each of them was specific to Abraham as it was given by God; but each of them widens out and intensifies and becomes more inclusive of all humankind as the Bible's story continues. Here they are:

 

            The first thing God promised Abraham was land. These are the first words we hear God say to Abraham: "Go from your country and your kindred to the land that I will show you." This was by far the most specific of all the promises; it was a particular land that God showed Abraham, a land that from that time forward is known as the Promised Land. Today it is known as Israel and Palestine, and, as we know, there is heated and violent disagreement over who gets to inherit that land.

            But the question for 21st century Christians is something wider, I think. It's, "In what sense do we inherit the promise of land?" And I'd like to propose that it is in what was the most central preaching of our Lord Jesus, and that is the Kingdom of God.  As followers of the biblical promises, we don't all hold title to a square inch of property over in the Promised Land of Israel-Palestine. What we inherit, said Jesus, is a different Promised Land -- the Kingdom of God - a place where God's peace and God's love and God's justice truly reign. Blessed are the poor in spirit, the meek, the peacemakers, said Jesus. They inherit a kingdom that is wider and more intense and more inclusive than any piece of earthly soil. And while we all have to stand someplace on this earth, if you are a person of faith in God, you occupy another land as well- the kingdom of God, where all the promises of God continue to have power. It is a spiritual realm beyond anything we currently see and know.

            Having said that, it's important not to simply spiritualize the Promised Land, as if good, hard earthly soil doesn't matter anymore. People have erroneously shuffled the Kingdom of God off into the future as a way of justifying unjust situations in the here and now. "Slavery and prejudice and war and greed and inequality are realities we have to put up with now, but don't worry - there's a Kingdom somewhere, sometime, where all will be put right. Your job now is to simply accept your lot in life so you can be rewarded later." That is not the way God intended His promise to be received. The fact that God promised Abraham real, tangible soil on this earth - a place where he could prosper and be safe - is a sign that what happens here and now is eminently important to God: God intends for His children- each one of them - to live in safety and abundance - and God charges all of us to work and pray for that place of justice and peace. So when Jesus spoke about the Kingdom, he described a place where love reigns, and the hungry are fed, and people do not live by the sword, and everyone has a place at the table. That's the Promised Land, and we shape our daily lives around that promise.

            A second promise God made to Abraham was children -- that he would have many descendents. Genesis 15: 5 says it like this: "(God) brought him outside and said, 'Look upward towards heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.' Then (God) said to (Abraham), 'So shall your descendents be.^’” This, of course, starts one of the great story-lines in the Bible, as Abraham says to God, "That's funny. Lord, your saying I'll have all these descendents, because (if you haven't noticed), the nursery is empty." And then follows the messy story of the slave girl Hagar and Ishmael and finally, Sarah having the child Isaac, and the great family line began. This, then, is a very specific promise made to a particular family. Abraham's family line, according to Matthew 1, goes down through David and Solomon and survives the exile in Babylon, and goes unbroken all the way to Mary and Joseph, and hence becomes the family line of their children, including the son God told them to name Jesus.

            But again, just as we don't live literally in the Promised Land, probably nobody here could claim to be literally in that blood line. In what way are we here in Cicero, New York, on January 22, 2012, heirs of the promise of descendents to Abraham? The apostle Paul pretty much settles that for us in his Letter to the Galatians in the Bible. Paul understands that that original promise to Abraham has been widened, and made more intense, and made more inclusive by God, and the common link that pulls it all together is faith. So here's what Paul writes to the Galatians: "Just as Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness, so, you see, those who believe are the descendents of Abraham."  In other words, it's not so much about a blood line anymore; it's about a faith line. He says it again a few verses later, at the end of chapter 3: " ... if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise." You and I were the stars that Abraham saw in the sky that night.

            And now we can begin to talk about that faith-foundation we're building, and God's acts of grace.  First we are created good and beautiful and blessed, each of us, in the very image of God. Second, we are heirs to the promises that God has been making from the beginning of human life. There are many people today who are living in dread, as if the other shoe is going to drop at any time. Maybe it's the economy that's going to get us; maybe it's the terrorists that are going to get us; maybe it's the devil that's going to get us. They live in fear, they vote in fear, they preach in fear - as if the message of the Bible is one of dread and worry. "Bad things are going to happen," says the Lord. That is so not the message of the Bible. Certainly there are some dire passages, born of hard times, when people could hardly see beyond the deep pain they were experiencing in life. But always, even in the darkest times, there was hope - there was confidence, because of the promises of God. And we are heirs of those promises. One of Shakespeare's characters described life as a "tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." That idea resonates with a lot of human thinking these days. "Life means
nothing. What's it matter what we do, or how we live?" But the Bible describes a different philosophy that says "We are the children of a great promise, made long ago, and unfolding with every step we take in faith. We walk not in worry and dread, but in confidence and strength, because we walk in faith in God." And what a difference that makes.

 

            This is very closely tied to the third great promise to Abraham and his children - God's presence. "Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield." The word used to describe the setting for the promises of God to Abraham is one of the richest words in the Bible - covenant. God entered into a covenant with Abraham - a sacred relationship built upon a promise. This was the guarantee that once Abraham received God's promise and responded in faith, Abraham would never walk alone again. Whatever happened, he would not be alone - God would be there. And that promise of God's presence is constant throughout the Bible. In Exodus 3, where Moses asks for some guarantee before he goes to confront the most powerful man in the world, God says, “I will be with you." That's the guarantee. In the darkest time in Israel's history, when all seemed lost and forever destroyed, God said to the prophet Isaiah, "Fear not, for I am with you." When the birth of the Messiah was announced to his earthly father, the angel said, "They shall call his name Emmanuel, which means, 'God is with us.’” And then Jesus, having died on the cross, risen from the dead, and now being ready to pass out of sight into heaven, gave these last words to his disciples: "Lo, I am with you always, even to the ends of the age." When the apostle Paul gave words of hope to people who, like him, were going through hard persecution for their faith, he gave this as the basis for persevering - "nothing in death or in life or in all creation ... will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." And finally, in the closing image of the Bible, when the place is described where every tear will be dried, and death and pain or no more, the Lamb of God declares: "The home of God is among His people. He will dwell with
them, and they will be His people; ... God Himself will be with them."

 

            What started as assurance to Abraham that his descendents would be shielded as they journeyed into the Promised Land was widened and intensified and made to include all people in a blessed assurance that we never walk alone when we walk in faith. Even in the darkest times, God has not forgotten us - God has not abandoned us. This is promised - that's what God does.

 

            And then there was one more promise that God made to Abraham, and that was that the nations of the earth would be blessed. It bothers me often how self-centered the expressions of faith can become. "Turn to Christ, and you will find happiness; turn to Christ, and you will prosper; turn to Christ, and you will have eternal life; turn to Christ, and you will be saved from hell." I believe there is truth in every one of those statements, though I believe they are all misunderstood, in some ways. But they are all self-centered statements. And they can mislead us into approaching faith with a "What's in it for me?" attitude. And maybe we have to pass through some of those assurances to get to the real purpose of faith. Because in the end, it's not about you and me. We turn to Christ to serve Christ, not ourselves. We turn to Christ to please God. And while it's not inappropriate to appreciate some measure of earthly prosperity, our real prayer is that the Good News of Christ will prosper. And that God will be pleased in what we do and say. And that someone's life will be made better and closer to God.

            So it's important that we not miss this in God's promises. Amid the promise of land and descendents and God's steadfast presence - this is promised to Abraham: "... you will be a blessing." This world will be better because you lived. There will be more light in this world, more love in this world, more hope in this world. Isn't that what you want to be the purpose of your life? That promise of Abraham widened out to the promise that Israel would be a light to the nations. And then it was widened and intensified and made inclusive of everybody when Jesus called twelve disciples, and before he was done on this earth said to the remaining eleven, "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations ... " That is the promise that every one of us can be part of this great thing God is doing, and so live lives of purpose and conviction, and lives that are a blessing to God and to others around us. That is called love, and it is what ultimately makes our journeys in this world worthwhile.

            There was a little boy who walked down the street with his hand clenched tight. When his friend asked him, he showed him that he was holding on to a nickel. He said, "I'm taking care of this ten cents." His friend said, "But you don't have ten cents; you've only got a nickel." And the boy responded, "Oh no. My Dad gave me this nickel, and promised to give me another one if I took good care of it. You are counting the nickel you can see; but you're forgetting to count the one I've been promised."

            Christian people are people who see, in every situation, not only what they already have, but also what has been promised by God, and that is just as real. And the combination of the two is enough to face any challenge in this life. It is enough to be the foundation of a blessed and beautiful journey. Remember as your journey continues: you are a citizen of the Promised Land; the Kingdom of God; you are a descendent of Abraham, and heir to God's promises; you never walk alone - you are shielded by the steadfast presence of your Heavenly Parent, who is always with you; and - best of all- you have all these things so you can be a blessing in this world. A disciple of Jesus, spreading Good News and Easter hope. Oh, what great joy God takes in you. What great plans God has for your journey of faith. It's a wonderful act of grace, that God promises you these things. And on such grace we can build a fulfilling and joy-filled life - pleasing to God, and a blessing for others.