Sermon Illustrations for Proper 11 | OT 16 (2016)
Illustration
Object:
Amos 8:1-12
Success is wonderful. We love it. Surely we earned our success, right? We don’t have to give thanks for all we have earned through hard work. And so what if we are a little selfish and a little self-indulgent, using more than our share of natural resources and wasting the fruit of the land and our labors? That’s our business, isn’t it? Not so, says God. Not so.
Everything we have, everything we are, has its beginning in a blessing from God. We are born in the United States, in a first-world nation, through the grace of God. Through the grace of God we receive our intelligence or ability. Through the grace of God doors are opened for us. Through the grace of God we are in the place where we are, living the life we live, having what we have. Now, surely our efforts are important. Surely our education and our upbringing make a difference, yet even those come through the grace of God.
So the next time you determine that the venti non-fat sugar-free vanilla latte is more important than donating a little extra to the mission or buying lunch for the homeless person, or you judge the poor or the mentally ill, or you wish the person with a disability would hurry up and get out of your way, or you are tempted to park in the handicapped parking space -- pause and thank God for the grace and the blessing you have.
Bonnie B.
Amos 8:1-12
I confess that part of me likes eating at a buffet. It is pretty obvious why, I suppose. At a buffet you can get all you want of what you want. That’s got a certain appeal. You don’t have to worry about what to do with the irritating sprigs of broccoli that sit next to a juicy steak. After all, where can you have for the same meal a fresh salad, fruit, pasta, chicken, and, if you’re still hungry, pork ribs or soup? Food seems to be celebrated at a buffet. Everything looks really good. There are, though, some bad things about a buffet. One of the more obvious ones is that you can eat too much. Those places aren’t called “Gaze and Graze” for no reason! However, in general, I think the benefits of a buffet outweigh the risks.
In Amos 8 the Lord is using a food object lesson to instruct Amos what he is going to do. As we pick it up early in the chapter, we see a fascinating word play. The Lord showed Amos a basket of summer fruit. Whether Amos actually saw a basket of fruit or a vision is debated by scholars, but the intriguing part is found in the word choices. The Hebrew word for “summer fruit” (found in vv. 1 and 2) is similar in sound to the Hebrew word for “end” used by the Lord in verse 2. Both words are sometimes translated “ripe.” The thrust of the word play is that as the fruit in the basket has reached its peak and is left only to spoil and rot, so it is with Israel. The spoil is such that songs of worship become the wailing of grief and dead bodies fill the land. It is a brutal picture. The basket of summer fruit, ordinarily associated with the joys and provisions of the harvest, becomes a mockery. The pleasant memories of past harvest festivals it might recall are shattered by the decisive words “the end has come.” Because of their sin, the people of Israel were “ripe” for judgment.
It is a sobering reminder from the sweetness of creation that accountability matters.
Bill T.
Amos 8:1-12
There’s a joke here built around a simple Hebrew word play -- kayits (“summer fruit”) and kets (“the end”) sound the same. What do you see, Amos? A basket of summer fruit. What does the Lord show the prophet? The end of the world as we know it! The two words sound very similar, and the surprise of the pun is but a shadow of the surprise that will accompany the swift and sudden end we’ll face if we don’t change our ways. Amos forces us to live this change in perspective, from the innocuous way God’s people are looking at history, overlooking the plight of the poor and the needy and seeing only a basket of summer fruit, to the dangerous consequences of their unrighteous actions -- the fruit of their way of living will lead to a sudden and swift end. Funny? Maybe not. Good puns are not funny. You’re supposed to groan. And the prophet wants you to know that you will groan when the tables are turned.
Frank R.
Amos 8:1-12
God (and his prophets) likes to use illustrations! The basket of ripe fruit shows that it is time for the harvest. We may not be farmers, but I think we get the message. He follows this illustration up with the meaning “the time is ripe for my people.”
It doesn’t sound like a great time or a great harvest. It sounds like a disaster. It is like looking at a casket and knowing that our time might be coming -- in other words, “the end.” Yes, it can sound like a political speech in an election year: Away with the poor and turn things around so we can make more money! Why waste the sabbath if you can use the time for profit? It even seems to suggest that it might be necessary to do a little cheating with things like dishonest scales! It even goes so far as suggesting “buying” the poor for little -- like buying slaves. Today we can just use the poor, cheating them out of a reasonable salary. It also suggests selling junk (sweepings from the floor) to make a buck.
It sounds like everyone will suffer. Not just the poor, but everyone will suffer -- even the innocent!
If we have sinned as a nation and go to war, everyone suffers. Poor, rich, innocent, guilty -- all suffer! No group is singled out to avoid the pain. When the stock market crashes, everyone suffers. If your church burns down, all the members suffer.
But the famine God is talking about is a famine of hearing his word. That is the worst. Pray that our church and our country do not lose God’s word -- that would be the worst disaster!
Bob O.
Colossians 1:15-28
Biblical scholars suggest that this passage from Colossians was already being used in congregations as an antiphonal liturgical reading when it found its way into the letter to the Colossians. One side of the congregation began, “He is the image of the invisible God.” The other side responded, “The firstborn of all creation.” Back and forth the congregation recited this incredibly beautiful and complex Christological statement.
The time frame was probably shortly before the Year of Our Lord 70, and that early generation of Christians was already thinking deeply about the theological implications of the work and person of Jesus the Christ. Just as important, and perhaps even more surprising, is that their theological reflection was manifested in the worship of the church.
If Sunday morning religious broadcasting is indicative of what is happening in the 21st century, the claim to serious theological reflection cannot be made for the worship of the church today. Several praise choruses of “Jesus is nice, really, really nice,” followed by a sermon on how loving Jesus will make you happy, healthy, trouble-free, and rich falls far short of the Christological statement of Colossians 1:15-28.
R. Robert C.
Colossians 1:15-28
Kyle Busch began the 2015 racing season with a broken right leg and a broken left foot. This caused him to miss the first 11 races of the season. But he went on to win eight races after his return, including the Brickyard 400 at the famed Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Following his victory at Indy, Busch engaged in age-old tradition as his wife and young son looked on -- he kissed the yard of bricks that constitutes the track’s finish line. Regarding his victory, Busch said: “All the steps we took to get back into the race car were quite challenging. But once we’ve been back, I felt like I just continued right on my stride.”
Application: Colossians speaks to us on the meaning of sacrifice.
Ron L.
Colossians 1:15-28
A 2015 poll by Barna Research revealed that less than half (48%) of Americans of the millennial generation believe that Jesus is divine. This is in direct contradiction to this lesson.
The Larger Catechism, produced by the 17th-century Westminster Assembly, nicely explains why Jesus must be divine and human: “It was requisite that the Mediator should be God: that he might sustain and keep the human nature from sinking under the infinite wrath of God, and the power of death, give worth and efficacy to his sufferings.... It was requisite that the Mediator should be man; that he might advance our nature, perform obedience to the Law, suffer and make intercession for us” (QQ. 148-149).
But what sense does it make to say that Jesus is both divine and human and at the same time still One? The 16th-century Lutheran document the Formula of Concord reminds us of two images used in the early church that still make sense today: “The ancient teachers of the Church have explained this union and communion of the natures using similes of a glowing iron and a union of body and soul in the human being” (The Book of Concord [2000 edition], p. 510).
A piece of iron that’s on fire is two things (fire and iron), but nobody’s going to separate them. So it is with Jesus’ divinity and humanity -- all for the necessity of our salvation.
Mark E.
Luke 10:38-42
We are addicted to hurry. We rush around and do all the things we think we are expected to do and we fall into our beds exhausted at the end of the day, falling asleep as we begin to pray. We are addicted to being busy. It is a status symbol. It’s almost as if we compare our calendars to see whose is the most full of activities and appointments, as if our value were measured by how busy we are. Kirk Byron Jones, professor of social ethics and pastoral ministry at Andover Newton Theological Seminary, wrote a book titled Addicted to Hurry.
“When hurry becomes a chronic condition, when we run even when there is no reason to, when we rush while performing even the most mundane tasks, it may be said that we have become addicted to hurry. Thousands of us are addicted to hurry whether we admit it or not,” writes Jones. As we hurry we lose sight of those around us, of important experiences, of people, of our time with God. Maybe we need to be a little more like Mary, quietly reflecting on the Word of God, and a little less like Martha who is consumed by chores and hurry. We may need both in our lives, but I’m willing to guess that we spend less time in spiritual quiet than in hurry and busyness. Let’s change that.
Bonnie B.
Luke 10:38-42
Keep the main thing the main thing. We’ve all heard this advice in some fashion. Motivational speakers and consultants will all advocate for shutting out distractions and focusing on the thing that matters most. For some that I’ve heard in the restaurant business, that means doing chicken right. For those I’ve heard in the sports arena, it means focusing on the game and only the game -- that’s what leads to wins. What does it mean in our Christian lives?
There are a lot of good things that Christians do individually and churches do collectively. Some of the more notable are feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, caring for orphans and widows. All of these are scriptural things and important. I have to ask a difficult question, though. Is it possible to do all these good things and miss the main thing? I sense the puzzled expression on your face. Can we reach out to the hurting, poor, sick, and lonely, but do so without regard to Jesus? Hard to imagine? There are lots of agencies and government offices to do all of those things, but they do it apart from Jesus. The church is supposed to be different. When the government feeds the hungry, the hungry get food. When the church feeds the hungry, they should get food and an understanding of the Bread of Life. When an agency provides for the homeless, they get shelter. When the church reaches out to the homeless, they should get shelter and an understanding that Jesus has prepared a place for them for eternity. When the orphan gets help from the state, he gets a guardian. When the church ministers to the orphan, he gets attention now and the understanding that he has a heavenly father. All that we do in the Body of Christ flows from Jesus Christ and his love. We must first take in Jesus before we can do his work. Jesus and working for him equals ministry. Work minus Jesus equals, well, just work.
Bill T.
Luke 10:38-42
No, Martha was not a bad woman -- she was just trying to fix lunch for the gang. Her problem was that while she was working in the kitchen, her sister Mary was just sitting there listening to Jesus.
I have talked with some brothers of the cloth who complained that when they were praying and meditating or working on a sermon, their wife might call them when she saw them just sitting there: “Hey, as long as you are just sitting there, come and take out the garbage. I’m busy fixing treats for the church!” It goes without saying that that story can be turned around, and the husband sees his wife just sitting there meditating and calls her out to fix him a snack. In either case, it is true that the one sitting there might just be napping or watching TV and doing nothing productive.
This lesson illustrates the importance of determining what we should be doing. As I write this, my wife just now came and asked me to do something for her.
Life is full of choices. When we were kids, our folks would often tell us that our homework was the thing we should be doing -- maybe even before shoveling the snow!
How do we prioritize our time? Sometimes God’s timing is not the same as ours. It can be hard at times to keep our prayer time when if we peek we can see our desk or sink cluttered with things we need to do right now.
Sometimes we are right in the middle of reading a fascinating mystery story when other duties call out to us. There may be nothing more important at times, so we do what we want to do and are annoyed if someone interrupts us with some minor task -- minor to us! Is there any day in our life when we don’t have to make choices? Sometimes I put down what I am doing to help my wife -- because I love her. That was Mary’s choice. Of course, she loved her sister whose work was important -- but when she had to choose, she loved her Lord enough to obey him and make him her priority.
What is your priority on Sunday morning? Do you stay awake during the sermon? Do you greet all your brothers and sisters in Christ warmly? Did you wake your family in time to make worship? What is your priority when you are putting money in your offering for your church -- for the Lord’s work?
What about the rest of the week? Does the Lord come first in everything you think and do and say? He is always speaking to us.
Bob O.
Success is wonderful. We love it. Surely we earned our success, right? We don’t have to give thanks for all we have earned through hard work. And so what if we are a little selfish and a little self-indulgent, using more than our share of natural resources and wasting the fruit of the land and our labors? That’s our business, isn’t it? Not so, says God. Not so.
Everything we have, everything we are, has its beginning in a blessing from God. We are born in the United States, in a first-world nation, through the grace of God. Through the grace of God we receive our intelligence or ability. Through the grace of God doors are opened for us. Through the grace of God we are in the place where we are, living the life we live, having what we have. Now, surely our efforts are important. Surely our education and our upbringing make a difference, yet even those come through the grace of God.
So the next time you determine that the venti non-fat sugar-free vanilla latte is more important than donating a little extra to the mission or buying lunch for the homeless person, or you judge the poor or the mentally ill, or you wish the person with a disability would hurry up and get out of your way, or you are tempted to park in the handicapped parking space -- pause and thank God for the grace and the blessing you have.
Bonnie B.
Amos 8:1-12
I confess that part of me likes eating at a buffet. It is pretty obvious why, I suppose. At a buffet you can get all you want of what you want. That’s got a certain appeal. You don’t have to worry about what to do with the irritating sprigs of broccoli that sit next to a juicy steak. After all, where can you have for the same meal a fresh salad, fruit, pasta, chicken, and, if you’re still hungry, pork ribs or soup? Food seems to be celebrated at a buffet. Everything looks really good. There are, though, some bad things about a buffet. One of the more obvious ones is that you can eat too much. Those places aren’t called “Gaze and Graze” for no reason! However, in general, I think the benefits of a buffet outweigh the risks.
In Amos 8 the Lord is using a food object lesson to instruct Amos what he is going to do. As we pick it up early in the chapter, we see a fascinating word play. The Lord showed Amos a basket of summer fruit. Whether Amos actually saw a basket of fruit or a vision is debated by scholars, but the intriguing part is found in the word choices. The Hebrew word for “summer fruit” (found in vv. 1 and 2) is similar in sound to the Hebrew word for “end” used by the Lord in verse 2. Both words are sometimes translated “ripe.” The thrust of the word play is that as the fruit in the basket has reached its peak and is left only to spoil and rot, so it is with Israel. The spoil is such that songs of worship become the wailing of grief and dead bodies fill the land. It is a brutal picture. The basket of summer fruit, ordinarily associated with the joys and provisions of the harvest, becomes a mockery. The pleasant memories of past harvest festivals it might recall are shattered by the decisive words “the end has come.” Because of their sin, the people of Israel were “ripe” for judgment.
It is a sobering reminder from the sweetness of creation that accountability matters.
Bill T.
Amos 8:1-12
There’s a joke here built around a simple Hebrew word play -- kayits (“summer fruit”) and kets (“the end”) sound the same. What do you see, Amos? A basket of summer fruit. What does the Lord show the prophet? The end of the world as we know it! The two words sound very similar, and the surprise of the pun is but a shadow of the surprise that will accompany the swift and sudden end we’ll face if we don’t change our ways. Amos forces us to live this change in perspective, from the innocuous way God’s people are looking at history, overlooking the plight of the poor and the needy and seeing only a basket of summer fruit, to the dangerous consequences of their unrighteous actions -- the fruit of their way of living will lead to a sudden and swift end. Funny? Maybe not. Good puns are not funny. You’re supposed to groan. And the prophet wants you to know that you will groan when the tables are turned.
Frank R.
Amos 8:1-12
God (and his prophets) likes to use illustrations! The basket of ripe fruit shows that it is time for the harvest. We may not be farmers, but I think we get the message. He follows this illustration up with the meaning “the time is ripe for my people.”
It doesn’t sound like a great time or a great harvest. It sounds like a disaster. It is like looking at a casket and knowing that our time might be coming -- in other words, “the end.” Yes, it can sound like a political speech in an election year: Away with the poor and turn things around so we can make more money! Why waste the sabbath if you can use the time for profit? It even seems to suggest that it might be necessary to do a little cheating with things like dishonest scales! It even goes so far as suggesting “buying” the poor for little -- like buying slaves. Today we can just use the poor, cheating them out of a reasonable salary. It also suggests selling junk (sweepings from the floor) to make a buck.
It sounds like everyone will suffer. Not just the poor, but everyone will suffer -- even the innocent!
If we have sinned as a nation and go to war, everyone suffers. Poor, rich, innocent, guilty -- all suffer! No group is singled out to avoid the pain. When the stock market crashes, everyone suffers. If your church burns down, all the members suffer.
But the famine God is talking about is a famine of hearing his word. That is the worst. Pray that our church and our country do not lose God’s word -- that would be the worst disaster!
Bob O.
Colossians 1:15-28
Biblical scholars suggest that this passage from Colossians was already being used in congregations as an antiphonal liturgical reading when it found its way into the letter to the Colossians. One side of the congregation began, “He is the image of the invisible God.” The other side responded, “The firstborn of all creation.” Back and forth the congregation recited this incredibly beautiful and complex Christological statement.
The time frame was probably shortly before the Year of Our Lord 70, and that early generation of Christians was already thinking deeply about the theological implications of the work and person of Jesus the Christ. Just as important, and perhaps even more surprising, is that their theological reflection was manifested in the worship of the church.
If Sunday morning religious broadcasting is indicative of what is happening in the 21st century, the claim to serious theological reflection cannot be made for the worship of the church today. Several praise choruses of “Jesus is nice, really, really nice,” followed by a sermon on how loving Jesus will make you happy, healthy, trouble-free, and rich falls far short of the Christological statement of Colossians 1:15-28.
R. Robert C.
Colossians 1:15-28
Kyle Busch began the 2015 racing season with a broken right leg and a broken left foot. This caused him to miss the first 11 races of the season. But he went on to win eight races after his return, including the Brickyard 400 at the famed Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Following his victory at Indy, Busch engaged in age-old tradition as his wife and young son looked on -- he kissed the yard of bricks that constitutes the track’s finish line. Regarding his victory, Busch said: “All the steps we took to get back into the race car were quite challenging. But once we’ve been back, I felt like I just continued right on my stride.”
Application: Colossians speaks to us on the meaning of sacrifice.
Ron L.
Colossians 1:15-28
A 2015 poll by Barna Research revealed that less than half (48%) of Americans of the millennial generation believe that Jesus is divine. This is in direct contradiction to this lesson.
The Larger Catechism, produced by the 17th-century Westminster Assembly, nicely explains why Jesus must be divine and human: “It was requisite that the Mediator should be God: that he might sustain and keep the human nature from sinking under the infinite wrath of God, and the power of death, give worth and efficacy to his sufferings.... It was requisite that the Mediator should be man; that he might advance our nature, perform obedience to the Law, suffer and make intercession for us” (QQ. 148-149).
But what sense does it make to say that Jesus is both divine and human and at the same time still One? The 16th-century Lutheran document the Formula of Concord reminds us of two images used in the early church that still make sense today: “The ancient teachers of the Church have explained this union and communion of the natures using similes of a glowing iron and a union of body and soul in the human being” (The Book of Concord [2000 edition], p. 510).
A piece of iron that’s on fire is two things (fire and iron), but nobody’s going to separate them. So it is with Jesus’ divinity and humanity -- all for the necessity of our salvation.
Mark E.
Luke 10:38-42
We are addicted to hurry. We rush around and do all the things we think we are expected to do and we fall into our beds exhausted at the end of the day, falling asleep as we begin to pray. We are addicted to being busy. It is a status symbol. It’s almost as if we compare our calendars to see whose is the most full of activities and appointments, as if our value were measured by how busy we are. Kirk Byron Jones, professor of social ethics and pastoral ministry at Andover Newton Theological Seminary, wrote a book titled Addicted to Hurry.
“When hurry becomes a chronic condition, when we run even when there is no reason to, when we rush while performing even the most mundane tasks, it may be said that we have become addicted to hurry. Thousands of us are addicted to hurry whether we admit it or not,” writes Jones. As we hurry we lose sight of those around us, of important experiences, of people, of our time with God. Maybe we need to be a little more like Mary, quietly reflecting on the Word of God, and a little less like Martha who is consumed by chores and hurry. We may need both in our lives, but I’m willing to guess that we spend less time in spiritual quiet than in hurry and busyness. Let’s change that.
Bonnie B.
Luke 10:38-42
Keep the main thing the main thing. We’ve all heard this advice in some fashion. Motivational speakers and consultants will all advocate for shutting out distractions and focusing on the thing that matters most. For some that I’ve heard in the restaurant business, that means doing chicken right. For those I’ve heard in the sports arena, it means focusing on the game and only the game -- that’s what leads to wins. What does it mean in our Christian lives?
There are a lot of good things that Christians do individually and churches do collectively. Some of the more notable are feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, caring for orphans and widows. All of these are scriptural things and important. I have to ask a difficult question, though. Is it possible to do all these good things and miss the main thing? I sense the puzzled expression on your face. Can we reach out to the hurting, poor, sick, and lonely, but do so without regard to Jesus? Hard to imagine? There are lots of agencies and government offices to do all of those things, but they do it apart from Jesus. The church is supposed to be different. When the government feeds the hungry, the hungry get food. When the church feeds the hungry, they should get food and an understanding of the Bread of Life. When an agency provides for the homeless, they get shelter. When the church reaches out to the homeless, they should get shelter and an understanding that Jesus has prepared a place for them for eternity. When the orphan gets help from the state, he gets a guardian. When the church ministers to the orphan, he gets attention now and the understanding that he has a heavenly father. All that we do in the Body of Christ flows from Jesus Christ and his love. We must first take in Jesus before we can do his work. Jesus and working for him equals ministry. Work minus Jesus equals, well, just work.
Bill T.
Luke 10:38-42
No, Martha was not a bad woman -- she was just trying to fix lunch for the gang. Her problem was that while she was working in the kitchen, her sister Mary was just sitting there listening to Jesus.
I have talked with some brothers of the cloth who complained that when they were praying and meditating or working on a sermon, their wife might call them when she saw them just sitting there: “Hey, as long as you are just sitting there, come and take out the garbage. I’m busy fixing treats for the church!” It goes without saying that that story can be turned around, and the husband sees his wife just sitting there meditating and calls her out to fix him a snack. In either case, it is true that the one sitting there might just be napping or watching TV and doing nothing productive.
This lesson illustrates the importance of determining what we should be doing. As I write this, my wife just now came and asked me to do something for her.
Life is full of choices. When we were kids, our folks would often tell us that our homework was the thing we should be doing -- maybe even before shoveling the snow!
How do we prioritize our time? Sometimes God’s timing is not the same as ours. It can be hard at times to keep our prayer time when if we peek we can see our desk or sink cluttered with things we need to do right now.
Sometimes we are right in the middle of reading a fascinating mystery story when other duties call out to us. There may be nothing more important at times, so we do what we want to do and are annoyed if someone interrupts us with some minor task -- minor to us! Is there any day in our life when we don’t have to make choices? Sometimes I put down what I am doing to help my wife -- because I love her. That was Mary’s choice. Of course, she loved her sister whose work was important -- but when she had to choose, she loved her Lord enough to obey him and make him her priority.
What is your priority on Sunday morning? Do you stay awake during the sermon? Do you greet all your brothers and sisters in Christ warmly? Did you wake your family in time to make worship? What is your priority when you are putting money in your offering for your church -- for the Lord’s work?
What about the rest of the week? Does the Lord come first in everything you think and do and say? He is always speaking to us.
Bob O.
