Training Wheels For Life
Sermon
Hope Beneath the Surface
Cycle A First Lesson Sermons for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany
Object:
Another world, another day, another time. The bright sun cast its long dark shadows along streets filled with carts and animals, never once falling on automobile, trolley or McDonald's litter in the gutter.
Another world, another day, another time. Yet the sounds of people were there, even more evident without the sound of motor cars. The shouting of a young man, the call of an elderly woman, the bawling of a young child. But in the darkness of an entryway to a home on that busy street we see a door open, the top corner catching the sun's light as the door swings open into the fresh morning, smelling of wet dirt and dung.
An old but vibrant-looking man, dressed humbly, holds the door open as he asks questions of a diminutive lad pulling on trousers and pushing on cap with one hand as he clutches papers in the other.
"Come along now, or you'll be late!" urges the older gentleman, speaking those words so familiar to every day and time. And the youth behaves as have youth since the beginning of time on their way to school, busy about seemingly everything except for getting himself to school.
"Hi!" he shouts to a friend, waving. The older gentleman at his side swoops down and picks up the paper lost in the wave, and says the other words so ubiquitous over the eons. "I'm not going to tell you again, young man! Get a move on!" And down the street they go, the boy of ancient Palestine seemingly oblivious to everything except that which would make him late for school. Fortunately his family's hired servant was to see to it that he did, in fact, make it there punctually.
Who was this hired servant? The great Bible scholar, William Barclay, says that a Jewish household had a servant who was called the paidagogos, the one whose job it was to see to it that a family's children got their education and proper upbringing. It was not the paidagogos' job to give the children their education. Rather it was his job to see to it that the children got to the places of learning where their education could occur (Cf. The Daily Bible Series, Galatians and Ephesians, page 31).
A man who very likely grew up with his own paidagogos, Saint Paul, spent a good deal of precious parchment writing to the church at Galatia about one part of a Jew's upbringing, the thorough learning of the law. The term law held much more meaning than it does for you and me today. For the Jew it was that sacred bit of ancient scripture including the Ten Commandments and many other guidelines of faith and custom which the faithful Jew spent his or her life studying and trying obediently to follow. After many paragraphs of analogies and arguments, Paul says these words in Galatians 3:24: "... the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came ..."
You have heard me say that to be a disciple of Jesus Christ is not just to follow a list of commandments, to simply not do some certain things. This morning I want to balance that with a word about the still important role of the commandments.
Toward the end of the book of Deuteronomy Moses finished his long discourse explaining all the rules and commandments and rituals which the Lord had told him to share with the Hebrews before they entered into the Promised Land, the land of milk and honey. One of the Lord's final words through Moses was this: "I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live" (Deuteronomy 30:19).
It is true, one does not have life simply by obeying commandments. That is what Peter told the gathering at the Council of Jerusalem as the new Christian church was sorting out what Jewish laws and customs new Christians had to obey. In Acts 15:10, in speaking specifically of the custom of circumcision, Peter said these words: "Now therefore why are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear?" At their worst, when customs and rituals are compulsively followed in order to appease God, they can be a burden and can, in fact, be a wedge between someone and God.
However, I would like to remind us this morning that God's commandments can also be our paidagogos, the disciplinarian keeping us in a place where we can grow in our relationship with God. Remember, it was the paidagogos, the servant, who saw to it that the child was in school where he could sit at the feet of the teacher.
I remember an interview during the Olympic winter games in Lillihammer. It was with one of the leaders of the U.S. Olympics. He was asked about how much credit for the success of the United States' team should rightfully go to the individual athletes and how much should go to the development and training program, the structure which got them the training they needed. An interesting question. The answer, of course, was both. But without the plan and the structure, the individuals never would have been as prepared as they were in Lillihammer. The training structure provided a place within which the individuals could develop their talent.
Commandments. "You shall have no other gods before me. You shall make no idol. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Honor your father and your mother. You shall not kill, commit adultery, steal, bear false witness or covet anything that is your neighbor's."
Ten commandments. These are those parameters God has given us to enable us to be in a position to grow in our relationship with God and with our neighbor.
I like our lay leader's term, "training wheels." Are the commandments not our training wheels, enabling us to move forward in our walk with God and neighbor? The commandments are training wheels for life, the real life of faith in Christ. The commandments discipline us so we are prepared to take the next steps, steps of faith, a walk lived not from shoulds and oughts, but rather from gratitude, love and joy, the walk of a disciple of Jesus Christ, the walk of a forgiven prodigal returning home, experiencing at last the love that had been there all along.
This Lent may I suggest that we give ourselves a daily Ten C check? Let us be our own paidagogos, disciplining ourselves so that learning of God can take place. Let us review daily how we're doing in following the ten commandments. You can find them in Exodus, chapter 20. It could be that there are those times in our lives when we ache to know the Lord, but by breaking so many of the basic commandments of life we are in fact living in a barren land far from God, instead of sitting in God's presence.
Let us use those most basic of God's guidelines as training wheels, and let us use them for life.
Another world, another day, another time. Yet the sounds of people were there, even more evident without the sound of motor cars. The shouting of a young man, the call of an elderly woman, the bawling of a young child. But in the darkness of an entryway to a home on that busy street we see a door open, the top corner catching the sun's light as the door swings open into the fresh morning, smelling of wet dirt and dung.
An old but vibrant-looking man, dressed humbly, holds the door open as he asks questions of a diminutive lad pulling on trousers and pushing on cap with one hand as he clutches papers in the other.
"Come along now, or you'll be late!" urges the older gentleman, speaking those words so familiar to every day and time. And the youth behaves as have youth since the beginning of time on their way to school, busy about seemingly everything except for getting himself to school.
"Hi!" he shouts to a friend, waving. The older gentleman at his side swoops down and picks up the paper lost in the wave, and says the other words so ubiquitous over the eons. "I'm not going to tell you again, young man! Get a move on!" And down the street they go, the boy of ancient Palestine seemingly oblivious to everything except that which would make him late for school. Fortunately his family's hired servant was to see to it that he did, in fact, make it there punctually.
Who was this hired servant? The great Bible scholar, William Barclay, says that a Jewish household had a servant who was called the paidagogos, the one whose job it was to see to it that a family's children got their education and proper upbringing. It was not the paidagogos' job to give the children their education. Rather it was his job to see to it that the children got to the places of learning where their education could occur (Cf. The Daily Bible Series, Galatians and Ephesians, page 31).
A man who very likely grew up with his own paidagogos, Saint Paul, spent a good deal of precious parchment writing to the church at Galatia about one part of a Jew's upbringing, the thorough learning of the law. The term law held much more meaning than it does for you and me today. For the Jew it was that sacred bit of ancient scripture including the Ten Commandments and many other guidelines of faith and custom which the faithful Jew spent his or her life studying and trying obediently to follow. After many paragraphs of analogies and arguments, Paul says these words in Galatians 3:24: "... the law was our disciplinarian until Christ came ..."
You have heard me say that to be a disciple of Jesus Christ is not just to follow a list of commandments, to simply not do some certain things. This morning I want to balance that with a word about the still important role of the commandments.
Toward the end of the book of Deuteronomy Moses finished his long discourse explaining all the rules and commandments and rituals which the Lord had told him to share with the Hebrews before they entered into the Promised Land, the land of milk and honey. One of the Lord's final words through Moses was this: "I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live" (Deuteronomy 30:19).
It is true, one does not have life simply by obeying commandments. That is what Peter told the gathering at the Council of Jerusalem as the new Christian church was sorting out what Jewish laws and customs new Christians had to obey. In Acts 15:10, in speaking specifically of the custom of circumcision, Peter said these words: "Now therefore why are you putting God to the test by placing on the neck of the disciples a yoke that neither our ancestors nor we have been able to bear?" At their worst, when customs and rituals are compulsively followed in order to appease God, they can be a burden and can, in fact, be a wedge between someone and God.
However, I would like to remind us this morning that God's commandments can also be our paidagogos, the disciplinarian keeping us in a place where we can grow in our relationship with God. Remember, it was the paidagogos, the servant, who saw to it that the child was in school where he could sit at the feet of the teacher.
I remember an interview during the Olympic winter games in Lillihammer. It was with one of the leaders of the U.S. Olympics. He was asked about how much credit for the success of the United States' team should rightfully go to the individual athletes and how much should go to the development and training program, the structure which got them the training they needed. An interesting question. The answer, of course, was both. But without the plan and the structure, the individuals never would have been as prepared as they were in Lillihammer. The training structure provided a place within which the individuals could develop their talent.
Commandments. "You shall have no other gods before me. You shall make no idol. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Honor your father and your mother. You shall not kill, commit adultery, steal, bear false witness or covet anything that is your neighbor's."
Ten commandments. These are those parameters God has given us to enable us to be in a position to grow in our relationship with God and with our neighbor.
I like our lay leader's term, "training wheels." Are the commandments not our training wheels, enabling us to move forward in our walk with God and neighbor? The commandments are training wheels for life, the real life of faith in Christ. The commandments discipline us so we are prepared to take the next steps, steps of faith, a walk lived not from shoulds and oughts, but rather from gratitude, love and joy, the walk of a disciple of Jesus Christ, the walk of a forgiven prodigal returning home, experiencing at last the love that had been there all along.
This Lent may I suggest that we give ourselves a daily Ten C check? Let us be our own paidagogos, disciplining ourselves so that learning of God can take place. Let us review daily how we're doing in following the ten commandments. You can find them in Exodus, chapter 20. It could be that there are those times in our lives when we ache to know the Lord, but by breaking so many of the basic commandments of life we are in fact living in a barren land far from God, instead of sitting in God's presence.
Let us use those most basic of God's guidelines as training wheels, and let us use them for life.
