Speak For Yourself!
Sermon
And Then Came the Angel
Gospel Sermons For Advent/Christmas/Epiphany
What do Richard Nixon and Shirley Temple have in common? While they may have shared many common interests and traits, isn't it true that neither one ever outlived their pasts? When Richard Nixon was buried behind the house that his father built, he went to his grave as the president that was forced to resign in the face of humiliation and scandal. Even amid his remarkable rehabilitation which included significant contributions to the world's conversation about public policy, Nixon may as well have had "Watergate" stamped on his forehead. He never outlived a disgraceful past.
The same is true with Shirley Temple, only in a different way. Shirley Temple sang and danced her way into the hearts of the world as a little girl with blonde curly hair. She lifted spirits, inspired generations of performers, and made people feel good about themselves. She was nothing short of a blessing, but to this day, despite a number of other accomplishments and contributions, she is remembered as a little girl with blonde, curly hair. Shirley Temple's past is wonderful, but she will never outlive that past.
It is very difficult to put away our pasts, and that goes as much for us as it does for people of public notoriety. Most all of us can think of some decision that we made that turned out to be the wrong decision, some situation that now we wish we had handled differently, or some act that we committed that we would never do again if we had the chance to live that part of our lives over. A man wakes up seven weeks into a new marriage and realizes he has married the wrong person. A woman invests 25 years in a career that she never really enjoyed, but now she fears it is too late to start over. A family who always wanted to enjoy the benefits of the city never got around to moving and now clouds of regret hang over their every gathering.
If there is something bad in our past, and there surely is in everybody's past, that is a high hurdle to jump. Near the end of every governor's term he or she may choose to grant pardons for certain criminals. These pardons may restore some civil rights, but not all of them. Even with some privileges restored and their debts to society paid, those people will spend the rest of their days trying to outlive the bad things in their pasts.
We know that convicted felons aren't the only ones who struggle to put past mistakes behind them. There may not have been any charges filed, but the girl who caused the wreck that killed the innocent people always will have to contend with those memories. The man may have lost control only once, but the memory of his open hand on his wife's face will haunt him as long as he lives. It is hard to put our pasts behind us.
Some bad things are well known and the news makes the rounds all too quickly. Some bad things are words and deeds and thoughts known only to us. The fact that our mistakes are lesser known does not make them less serious. As Tony Campolo says, "We need to be saved from those things about ourselves that would cause us to hate ourselves." Sometimes we are harder on ourselves than we need to be. Sometimes the people around us are not nearly as tolerant as they should be. Whatever the situation, it is hard to put away a past that has some glaring flaw in it. Yet, there is good news. God loves us. God forgives us. God longs for us to come to grips with whatever it is that is keeping us from full communion with God.
Sometimes we have made no mistake, but some visit from tragedy's storehouse has left us sad and angry and bitter. We can't explain some of the diseases, but we know what they have done to our lives. We are left without the ones we love and with a gaping hole in our lives. One man was accused falsely of raping a family member's friend. He was the victim of a sick world where people allege all sorts of things which never happened anywhere except in their own imagination. That man has experienced enormous pain, yet he made no mistake.
Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel has written over thirty books. Each one has been informed and shaped by his experience as a Holocaust survivor. They are powerful, moving books which merit our reading, but surely they are as much therapy for him as they are information for us. Wiesel's only crime was being born a Jew, but that alone forced him to watch family members and friends be tortured and killed. Yet, there is good news, even in those cases where we are not responsible for the pain in our past. We may never get over some things, but we can learn to live with them. God will be present as we begin to heal bit by bit. God will be the fellow traveler as we rise and continue the journey.
If you don't have anything in your past that is bad, if there isn't anything that you need to work through, then praise God, give thanks, and look out! Sometimes dealing with a good past is the most difficult task of all. A part of this passage is for those of us who can't think of any mistake or flaw or regret. People who can't think of any bad in their pasts are people who quickly lose sight of their need for God. It is easy to reach a comfort level where we convince ourselves that we already know what we need to know. Sermons become a form of entertainment or conversation starters, rather than a discussion about applying the words of scripture to our daily lives. It is easy to come to church because we enjoy it instead of coming because we need to be here. At one church's general assembly, which happened to coincide with the World Series, some people entered the sanctuary wearing headphones so they could listen to the game during worship. Such is life in the comfort zone -- scripture is intended for somebody else because we have heard it all before. In the comfort zone we can relax and draw upon the spiritual capital we have accumulated through the years.1 A good past is hard to overcome.
On the television show M*A*S*H, Dr. Charles Emerson Winchester III made it clear what separated him from everybody else. "I'm a Winchester," he was heard to say more than once. For him, it was his family name that made him superior to everyone else. Other people carry other burdens. One woman received her education at Harvard and found a way to work Harvard into every conversation. Congregations fall victim to the same problem. Churches become satisfied with their pasts to the point that they do not make the changes necessary to live in the present with the same degree of faithfulness shown in prior years. It's one thing to be proud of certain things, but it is possible to lean too heavily on a good past and live too scantily in the precious present.
In the great hymn "There's A Wideness In God's Mercy," there is the most wonderful phrase. One verse begins with good news for people trying to deal with some mistake in a bad past. "There is welcome for the sinner," the verse begins. To know that we are welcome to come back is often what leads us to come back. To experience that welcome, at home or church or work or among friends, prompts tears of joy. But then hear how that line continues. "There is welcome for the sinner, and more graces for the good." Those of us who think we are on the right track are the people who need that double dose of grace. We are the ones who depend too much on ourselves and lean too heavily on our own accomplishments. The people who have to deal with a strong and rich past need more grace, not less. We have to be convinced ever so gently of our need and then nurtured toward making God our center instead of making our center god.
That's what John the Baptist was dealing with in this lesson. In scripture's continuing assault on the religious people of the day, John the Baptist was completely unimpressed with the very thing that the Jewish people had built their lives upon. For the Jewish people, Abraham was more than a special ancestor. Abraham's life and faith had made provision for everybody who followed Abraham in the faith, even those who came along many generations later. To the "children of Abraham" belonged the favor of God, and the favor of God would never be taken from them.
Then comes John the Baptist. He tells them that just because they are children of Abraham doesn't mean that the requirements have been eased or that they can slack off. We hate to hear John the Baptist say that because we know how it translates to our situation.2 We can hear him now. "Just because you are members of the church, just because you give your weekly offerings, just because your great-grandparents were in this church, just because you are an officer, just because you are the minister, doesn't mean it is time to relax and take it easy and give in to this temptation of thinking this matter of being Christian is under control." In other words, don't presume your past has taken care of your present. Don't presume either way. Don't presume that your life is over if you have something bad in your past. Don't presume, either, that a good past is permission to relax.
The call to repent, to turn toward God, is for all of us to hear, and for us to hear over and over again. Wasn't it John's concern that people were taking their faith for granted, experiencing it secondhand through Abraham, and coasting in automatic pilot? And shouldn't that be our concern? There is more to see and hear and experience than we have seen and heard and experienced! Every day requires a renewed commitment to God, an increased awareness of God, and a greater participation in the ways of God. Every day calls us to engage our lives with the spirit of God. Others will contribute to our growth and understanding, and we will learn some things from our pasts, but responsibility falls on us to respond to the presence of the living God every day in a way that deepens our faith.
A friend tells of the Saturdays he spent going to football games with his father. The boy and his dad sat in sunshine and rain, wind and snow, and cheered for their favorite team. There was nothing like it. On the way home from the ball games, prior to the era of drive-through windows, they often stopped to get a bite to eat. The boy would stand at the counter and listen to his father give the order for their food. Sometimes the restaurant person would turn to the boy and ask, "And what for you today?" It was very comforting for the boy to point to his father and say, "I'm with him." Those were the days. The boy's father took care of everything and all the boy had to do was stand there and wait on his food. If anybody happened to ask, he could always say, "I'm with him."
At some point, we start answering for ourselves. It is frightening at first, and sometimes it is still frightening years later, but the call to repent is a call each person must answer for him or herself. The fact that we answered that call once doesn't answer for us today. It is not a matter of having to prove ourselves over and over, but a matter of daily confessing that we stand in constant need of the strength and grace of God.
When Jesus asked the disciples, "Who do you say that I am?" it was a pointed question aimed at each person. Jesus didn't ask, "Who did your grandparents say that I am?" The question was not, "Who does your church say that I am?" It wasn't even, "Once upon a time, who did you say that I am?" The question is present tense. "Who do you say that I am?"
Who do you say that I am? Isaiah responded, "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6).
Who do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matthew 16:16).
Who do you say that I am? John of Patmos said, "King of kings and Lord of lords" (Revelation 19:16).
This very day, regardless of what is in the past, Jesus asks, "Who do you say that I am?" This is our chance to speak for ourselves, to claim the faith, to experience the nearness of the kingdom firsthand, and to live our answer every day of our lives.
____________
1. William Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 1, Revised Edition (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1975), p. 47.
2. Douglas R.A. Hare, Matthew (Louisville: John Knox Press, 1993), p. 20.
The same is true with Shirley Temple, only in a different way. Shirley Temple sang and danced her way into the hearts of the world as a little girl with blonde curly hair. She lifted spirits, inspired generations of performers, and made people feel good about themselves. She was nothing short of a blessing, but to this day, despite a number of other accomplishments and contributions, she is remembered as a little girl with blonde, curly hair. Shirley Temple's past is wonderful, but she will never outlive that past.
It is very difficult to put away our pasts, and that goes as much for us as it does for people of public notoriety. Most all of us can think of some decision that we made that turned out to be the wrong decision, some situation that now we wish we had handled differently, or some act that we committed that we would never do again if we had the chance to live that part of our lives over. A man wakes up seven weeks into a new marriage and realizes he has married the wrong person. A woman invests 25 years in a career that she never really enjoyed, but now she fears it is too late to start over. A family who always wanted to enjoy the benefits of the city never got around to moving and now clouds of regret hang over their every gathering.
If there is something bad in our past, and there surely is in everybody's past, that is a high hurdle to jump. Near the end of every governor's term he or she may choose to grant pardons for certain criminals. These pardons may restore some civil rights, but not all of them. Even with some privileges restored and their debts to society paid, those people will spend the rest of their days trying to outlive the bad things in their pasts.
We know that convicted felons aren't the only ones who struggle to put past mistakes behind them. There may not have been any charges filed, but the girl who caused the wreck that killed the innocent people always will have to contend with those memories. The man may have lost control only once, but the memory of his open hand on his wife's face will haunt him as long as he lives. It is hard to put our pasts behind us.
Some bad things are well known and the news makes the rounds all too quickly. Some bad things are words and deeds and thoughts known only to us. The fact that our mistakes are lesser known does not make them less serious. As Tony Campolo says, "We need to be saved from those things about ourselves that would cause us to hate ourselves." Sometimes we are harder on ourselves than we need to be. Sometimes the people around us are not nearly as tolerant as they should be. Whatever the situation, it is hard to put away a past that has some glaring flaw in it. Yet, there is good news. God loves us. God forgives us. God longs for us to come to grips with whatever it is that is keeping us from full communion with God.
Sometimes we have made no mistake, but some visit from tragedy's storehouse has left us sad and angry and bitter. We can't explain some of the diseases, but we know what they have done to our lives. We are left without the ones we love and with a gaping hole in our lives. One man was accused falsely of raping a family member's friend. He was the victim of a sick world where people allege all sorts of things which never happened anywhere except in their own imagination. That man has experienced enormous pain, yet he made no mistake.
Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel has written over thirty books. Each one has been informed and shaped by his experience as a Holocaust survivor. They are powerful, moving books which merit our reading, but surely they are as much therapy for him as they are information for us. Wiesel's only crime was being born a Jew, but that alone forced him to watch family members and friends be tortured and killed. Yet, there is good news, even in those cases where we are not responsible for the pain in our past. We may never get over some things, but we can learn to live with them. God will be present as we begin to heal bit by bit. God will be the fellow traveler as we rise and continue the journey.
If you don't have anything in your past that is bad, if there isn't anything that you need to work through, then praise God, give thanks, and look out! Sometimes dealing with a good past is the most difficult task of all. A part of this passage is for those of us who can't think of any mistake or flaw or regret. People who can't think of any bad in their pasts are people who quickly lose sight of their need for God. It is easy to reach a comfort level where we convince ourselves that we already know what we need to know. Sermons become a form of entertainment or conversation starters, rather than a discussion about applying the words of scripture to our daily lives. It is easy to come to church because we enjoy it instead of coming because we need to be here. At one church's general assembly, which happened to coincide with the World Series, some people entered the sanctuary wearing headphones so they could listen to the game during worship. Such is life in the comfort zone -- scripture is intended for somebody else because we have heard it all before. In the comfort zone we can relax and draw upon the spiritual capital we have accumulated through the years.1 A good past is hard to overcome.
On the television show M*A*S*H, Dr. Charles Emerson Winchester III made it clear what separated him from everybody else. "I'm a Winchester," he was heard to say more than once. For him, it was his family name that made him superior to everyone else. Other people carry other burdens. One woman received her education at Harvard and found a way to work Harvard into every conversation. Congregations fall victim to the same problem. Churches become satisfied with their pasts to the point that they do not make the changes necessary to live in the present with the same degree of faithfulness shown in prior years. It's one thing to be proud of certain things, but it is possible to lean too heavily on a good past and live too scantily in the precious present.
In the great hymn "There's A Wideness In God's Mercy," there is the most wonderful phrase. One verse begins with good news for people trying to deal with some mistake in a bad past. "There is welcome for the sinner," the verse begins. To know that we are welcome to come back is often what leads us to come back. To experience that welcome, at home or church or work or among friends, prompts tears of joy. But then hear how that line continues. "There is welcome for the sinner, and more graces for the good." Those of us who think we are on the right track are the people who need that double dose of grace. We are the ones who depend too much on ourselves and lean too heavily on our own accomplishments. The people who have to deal with a strong and rich past need more grace, not less. We have to be convinced ever so gently of our need and then nurtured toward making God our center instead of making our center god.
That's what John the Baptist was dealing with in this lesson. In scripture's continuing assault on the religious people of the day, John the Baptist was completely unimpressed with the very thing that the Jewish people had built their lives upon. For the Jewish people, Abraham was more than a special ancestor. Abraham's life and faith had made provision for everybody who followed Abraham in the faith, even those who came along many generations later. To the "children of Abraham" belonged the favor of God, and the favor of God would never be taken from them.
Then comes John the Baptist. He tells them that just because they are children of Abraham doesn't mean that the requirements have been eased or that they can slack off. We hate to hear John the Baptist say that because we know how it translates to our situation.2 We can hear him now. "Just because you are members of the church, just because you give your weekly offerings, just because your great-grandparents were in this church, just because you are an officer, just because you are the minister, doesn't mean it is time to relax and take it easy and give in to this temptation of thinking this matter of being Christian is under control." In other words, don't presume your past has taken care of your present. Don't presume either way. Don't presume that your life is over if you have something bad in your past. Don't presume, either, that a good past is permission to relax.
The call to repent, to turn toward God, is for all of us to hear, and for us to hear over and over again. Wasn't it John's concern that people were taking their faith for granted, experiencing it secondhand through Abraham, and coasting in automatic pilot? And shouldn't that be our concern? There is more to see and hear and experience than we have seen and heard and experienced! Every day requires a renewed commitment to God, an increased awareness of God, and a greater participation in the ways of God. Every day calls us to engage our lives with the spirit of God. Others will contribute to our growth and understanding, and we will learn some things from our pasts, but responsibility falls on us to respond to the presence of the living God every day in a way that deepens our faith.
A friend tells of the Saturdays he spent going to football games with his father. The boy and his dad sat in sunshine and rain, wind and snow, and cheered for their favorite team. There was nothing like it. On the way home from the ball games, prior to the era of drive-through windows, they often stopped to get a bite to eat. The boy would stand at the counter and listen to his father give the order for their food. Sometimes the restaurant person would turn to the boy and ask, "And what for you today?" It was very comforting for the boy to point to his father and say, "I'm with him." Those were the days. The boy's father took care of everything and all the boy had to do was stand there and wait on his food. If anybody happened to ask, he could always say, "I'm with him."
At some point, we start answering for ourselves. It is frightening at first, and sometimes it is still frightening years later, but the call to repent is a call each person must answer for him or herself. The fact that we answered that call once doesn't answer for us today. It is not a matter of having to prove ourselves over and over, but a matter of daily confessing that we stand in constant need of the strength and grace of God.
When Jesus asked the disciples, "Who do you say that I am?" it was a pointed question aimed at each person. Jesus didn't ask, "Who did your grandparents say that I am?" The question was not, "Who does your church say that I am?" It wasn't even, "Once upon a time, who did you say that I am?" The question is present tense. "Who do you say that I am?"
Who do you say that I am? Isaiah responded, "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6).
Who do you say that I am? Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matthew 16:16).
Who do you say that I am? John of Patmos said, "King of kings and Lord of lords" (Revelation 19:16).
This very day, regardless of what is in the past, Jesus asks, "Who do you say that I am?" This is our chance to speak for ourselves, to claim the faith, to experience the nearness of the kingdom firsthand, and to live our answer every day of our lives.
____________
1. William Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 1, Revised Edition (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1975), p. 47.
2. Douglas R.A. Hare, Matthew (Louisville: John Knox Press, 1993), p. 20.
