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Have you ever thought of writing a
list of all the questions you'd like to ask God once you see Him face to face?
I thought about that on several occasions. I've thought about that when
I've read different scriptures but I kind of let them go… figuring there's
things I just need to trust in God with, and not be concerned about getting the
answers right now. Though I thought of that funny film, ‘Bruce Almighty,’ that
came out several years ago. Yes, it is fairly much a blasphemous film with a
lot of silly scenes, but I like that one scene where he gets tired of listening
to prayers and he makes a computer to answer all of them and of course a lot of
people wish to win the lottery and so forth and all chaos breaks loose.
Chaos is sort of the sub-theme
today. Chaos versus the calm. Currently chaos when it happens… we're
never calm. We don't trust much of anything and we become hopeless before the solution
magically pops up and abates our deepest fears. If it's spiritually, an
internal form of chaos, this society deals with it with drugs and
therapists. But just like those “Fabreeze” fabric softeners they just
cover up the stink, that's still there. You still have to deal with your
problems, and that's what we have in conversation here with a couple of our texts
is “girding up your loins and tough it out.”
I must confess I love the book of
Job. I've read it from the beginning to the end a couple of times already. It
is considered perhaps the most complex book in the Old Testament. It's not only
wisdom literature, but it is poetic in its grappling and suffering with why bad
things happen. The little tiny text we have this morning is almost humorous in
comparison to the whole entire dialogue after dialogue, that we have before
hand and after with poor Job. This man went through a lot. He had a lot of
terrible things happen. As we know, the story is that God had a bet with Satan
to challenge him, test his faith. Well let's just say that Job’s Faith was
tested to the breaking point. This snippet of scripture we have this morning is
now God's beginning answer to him. When I first heard this, it sounds like
God's kind of being a jerk to him about his suffering in his plight.
Maybe God had to be a little stern
with him to make him snap out of his despair and begin to grow in understanding
his faith? That's probably the biggest question though, that we have, that
doesn't seem to make sense from the problem of evil versus the problem of keeping
the faith, of being hopeful. Why did God make these things a condition of our humanity?
Is it purely a matter of the Fall that caused everything? That's a nice
convenient answer, I can live with that for now, I guess? But I think the
problem of bad things and suffering goes beyond Adam and Eve and the Fall.
Another way you could look at it, which maybe is a weak answer, and sort of a
silly one, but if we didn't have evil or chaos or turmoil in our lives… life
would be pretty damn boring! It'd be even more boring than sitting there in
your pajamas watching the football game on a lazy hazy Sunday afternoon.
We're always people though, who want
to have answers, period. We're not going to be happy unless we get the answers
to things. I counseled someone once who had to read the horoscopes every
day, had to look at the tarot cards every day, had to find out what was
happening in the future. They even had to have their dreams analyzed to say or
see what it was meaning or pointing to. They were in a much better place then,
how they dealt with things in the past. For in the past they had their
psychologist and their psychiatrist give the medications, words of comfort and
basically a delusion of calm amidst the storms of their life.
This was before they found God. How
much does that really change things? The answer truly depends on you where you
are on your journey. You probably get tired of those same words: Journey, hope,
peace, endurance… but this is what keeps us together. Job was pretty much tired
of hearing the “soliloquies” given by his amateur theologian friends to keep
encouraged and be faithful. He had had enough, and he started sharing that in
rebuking God. With Paul's conversation to the Corinthians this week, he's
had enough of them and he is trying to get them to understand what we've heard
before: “no pain, no gain” and just what do you think I've been doing, trying
to be your faithful pastor? Is Paul perhaps getting pastoral burnout here? We'd
hope not but it does happen. People who try to help other people are often left
to feel unappreciated and confused, is it all worth it? Is everything that's
been done and where you’ve gone so far, been worth it at all?
That's a scary sign of a lack of
faith teetering on the edge of despair. I truly hope to never be there. I have
a lot of faith in you that's why I'm here! But Paul was not feeling like he was
getting through to them at all. Just like perhaps, God was sitting in the cloud
waiting for Job to stop complaining, and his friends to stop trying to
sermonize, and give his two cents. With our friends and family in our everyday
life, we hate when people do that. No, we don't want your spare change, yet
alone sometimes what you think maybe words of comfort, grate upon us and
discourage us! Jesus in today's Gospel… it almost seems like a comical scene
once again with him having to just say it straight to them, to get them out of
there flux of thought.
Jesus had been busy all-day long. He
had been wandering all over the place, preaching, teaching and healing, and who
knows how many conversations and things were going on… the human half of Him
got tired. The human half of Him had to go on that boat and take a nap. And we
know how Murphy's Law of life works, we're just getting settled down, we want
to decompress sit there nice-n-cozy with a kitty cat on our lap and an iced tea
on our table tray… then the doorbell rings or the phone rings and people need
us. Jesus never got a break. People didn't leave Him alone and they sort of
didn't understand or perhaps didn't care that He had to take a rest occasionally.
And yes, maybe they had a legitimate excuse, because there was one heck of a
storm starting up which was getting kind of scary.
Storms can get pretty scary. I've
seen enough already the last 48 years in Illinois, that I don't care to see
again. I remember driving back from St. Louis and seeing the remains of a
tornado that had gone through a forest and literally there must have been a
half mile wide track where you can see the trees bent in one direction or the
other. Let me just tell you that was the scariest thing I had ever seen of
Mother Nature's brute force. So maybe the disciples had the right to have a cow
about the water coming in the boat and the tumultuous waves rocking their boat?
.... but the most important scene is coming up, this is basically where just
like Job, they start complaining to Jesus: “Hey wake up! Help us! You obviously
don't seem to care that we're going to die in this storm! How ungrateful and He
proves a point by saying to them— why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?
The words that are missing there, is that He perhaps, should have finished that
sentence or question with do you still have no faith, enough in me?
Having enough faith in something… We're
in an age that likes to question, challenge and belittle every little nugget of
faith that we have. So, when crisis and turmoil enter into our lives, it's
perhaps even easier for us to feel despair or not want to persevere. The signs
could be all around those that we know who are suffering as we speak. Sadly,
though, they never reach out for help or when they do reach out for help, it's
way too late. My cousin’s friend Nick was a part of his band years ago and was
always sort of the band’s comedian. He had a fantastic sense of humor and would
make you laugh to the point of crying, or when your stomach would start to hurt,
that's how funny he was.
I remember how much they used to
tease him about his love affair that he had with some woman years ago and he
had to write songs and he had to sing about her, all the time. He wrote so many
songs about her that it was ridiculous. They just thought it was a sarcastic
quip for his dealing with his troubled marriage, and lack of faith in being a
good father to his children. Only a year or so later, the tragedy that struck
my ears, would be to hear that his son would find him hanging in the garage. He
had killed himself. He never went through with that divorce. He never went to
go find the person he idolized to love, and he never gave closure and peace to
his teenage children. I really didn't know the man that well, but I know
when I saw his face in that casket, I burst out crying. My cousin just looked
at me bewildered and confused, but for that very moment, I felt the pain of
compassion in the lost hope, this man finally succumbed to.
Sometimes though, we just don't know
how to express our direct need, our plea to God for help. We don't know how to
cry to God without seeming ungrateful and without holding back the anger of why
things are the way they are. Taking the effort and making the effort,
actually needs some bold steps in between. It needs a time for us to be still
and know that the Lord God is with us. It is in one moment taking up the cost
of discipleship, and in the other, resurrecting in a beautiful hope that comes
when were at the very bottom of that valley. Prayer is our way of
building up strength upon that great foundation that is that little mustard seed
of faith in our hearts. Yes, it's another Sunday of “Faith X Faith squared.”
Faith is a Fickle creature, it has to battle between the sides of us that want
to be fabulous pessimists and martyrs... Job was at that point of
complaining, he had had enough!
But did he take anything truly to
God in prayer? He held it in tried to be strong especially when his friends
were going on and on in trying to help him. He needed a real answer. Contrary
to what many may think about prayer, prayer does release real answers and in
fact opens the heart to realize the miracles of God. Every Tuesday, I look
forward to my afternoon group of prayer in Pahrump. This is part of the
wonderful blessing of formation that happens for people who make that walk of
faith. A new friend of mine was very ill in the hospital with possible sepsis
do to a botched hernia operation. I not only went to go visit them right away
to pray over them of course, but I also intensely shared my prayer concerns
with my new friends in this prayer group.
The turmoil of my concern perhaps
exhibited maybe a little lack of trust, because I was worrying greatly.
Worrying too much, needing answers without having enough confidence and hope in
the self… Those are things that shorten people's life spans. I've probably
worried so much in my lifetime so far, that I’ve probably taken off a couple
years already. That's not a good attitude, but welcome to being human. It
shouldn't be an excuse, but then at times, when we don't have the answers, we
can't help ourselves. Paul had a couple things going on, that formed this
little snippet we have this morning, of yet another conversation with his wayward
Corinthians. He had a group of people, who not only were starting to go out
there and seek their own answers to having faith, but some of them started
listening to the false writings and easy answers of other people out there in
the early church world. Apollos was one of Paul's rivals, who actually you
could say was like the Joel Olsteen, we have today. He offered simple answers
and easy solutions to everything. He was a have your cake and eat it too
kind of health-wealth gospel preacher. And to a very worldly set of Gentiles,
as were the Corinthians, some of them like to hear fluff and easy answers.
I have paid a little bit of
attention to Joel Olsteen, not only I guess, marveling at the millions upon
millions of dollars he's making for his fabulous smile. I have wondered, when I talked with a couple
friends of mine in regard to where his theology is going, and the consensus is
that he circumvents the cross. What does that mean? He doesn't go there with
dealing with the trials and tribulations we have in our life and putting enough
encouragement out there for people to be enduring, to face those challenges
head-on.
God's Words this morning in Job,
should reveal the truth of how God wants us to take on the challenge of faith.
Verse two alone is unbelievable: “…who is this that darkens counsel by words
without knowledge?” Yikes! Okay God.... then He says to him— “…gird up your
loins like a man! I'm going to question you now, and you shall declare to me...”
These don't really sound like gentle words, but actually God is trying to have
a parent-child conversation with him. He knows that Job is a child of Grace and
promise even before His Son Jesus, will come to open our eyes with the hope of
the Resurrection. Jesus in today's Gospel kind of does the same
thing. He knows that the disciples are terrified about the storm and he said to
them: “Why are you afraid, do you still have no faith?” Jesus barely opens one
eye and shouts to the winds and sea— “Peace! Be still! The wind ceased and
there was a dead calm.
The new friend I visited in the
hospital, when I was praying over him, said the funniest comment to me: “You
seem to have such a calm demeanor…” And I guess I thought that was funny
because, I had so much on my heart that inside I definitely did not feel calm,
and I definitely did not really feel much peace… but I wanted to be there for
them. The Corinthians couldn't see, in both aspects of the word. They couldn’t
see all the work and all the suffering that Paul undertook for their sake, to
grow. This went beyond the Corinthians, since as you remember, Paul was this wandering
church planter and pastor to many congregations. The yoke of burden upon that
man's shoulders… I don't think we could, truly imagine. The power of that man's
Faith, however, was amazing! We should see ourselves in the place of the
Corinthians, as well as in the place of Job. Look how far we have come! ‘Be
still and know,’ that I am God… There is a beautiful Taize song that just says
that over and over and that is our prelude and postlude, this morning. Do we
say that enough or should I say, hear it enough in our hearts especially when
we have those moments of Chaos, stress, turmoil, anxiety and so forth in our
own lives?
In summary, if you need to keep those
lists of questions you have for God, in why things happened the way they did,
and where you are… Do that then, if it makes you comfortable. But I would
challenge all of you to never take God's Grace in vain but find hope in that
dark valley. Live into that hope as a strong, enduring disciple. Build upon
that great foundation of faith in Christ. Living into the New Nature is taking
on the challenge of “no pain, no gain.” God is here with us right now, keep
encouraged!
Let us pray,
Gracious Lord Jesus,
Help us to be strong when we are
weak, help us not to question, but to accept and move forward.
Help us to live in to all those good
things St. Paul tried to teach his Corinthians.
Help us to be truly children of
promise by persevering in love
And building a foundation upon a New
kind of knowledge
We ask these things, we lift these
things to Your ear— AMEN
June
24th, 2018; Fifth Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 7; Year B, SOLA Lectionary
Sermon
by: Reverend Nicole A.M. Collins
Psalm
124; Job 38:1-11; 2 Corinthians 6:1-13;
Mark 4:35-41 ||| RCL: Psalm 107:1-3, 23-32
The link below is to this sermon's delivery at First Congregational Church at 10am:
