Greater Things

Mark 6:1-13

The blessings of God are plentiful and ready to be poured out on us! God's love is more than we can contain or comprehend. I would give the person credit if I could remember who said it but someone once said, “Saying that God's grace is sufficient for us is like saying that the ocean is sufficient for one clam.” God loves you and that's the truth but can that statement encompass the enormity of that truth? God's love is huge. We swim in it and are so used to it that we don't even notice it most of the time.

This past week on the 4^th a few of you were at the _______________'s for their annual party to watch the fireworks over Lake Michigan. I was struck and I heard some of you comment on the beauty of the lake and of the sunset. For those of us who don't see that every day, we are awestruck. What a beautiful scene. The sun was setting. The reflection of the sun on the water. The haze of the day making the light slightly diffuse. The unusual stillness of the air that day. It was something that grabbed the attention. It was the subject of conversation. For those of you who see that everyday, I am sure you can appreciate it but it is easier, I'm sure, to get other things done with out being distracted by its beauty. Familiarity can lead us to take a thing for granted. Even God's love for us.

Were going to have a baptism today; That's a good thing! In baptism we are participating in sharing God's love...God's grace. We will take take water, pray that God will bless and use it to pour out his grace on one of his beloved children.

Our actions are only minutely significant during the sacrament of baptism compared to the action of God at the same time. The mystery of God and the grace of God, God’s gift of blessing on us when we don’t deserve it, are the things that really matter. It is God that is continually calling us to join in an ever-deepening relationship. It is the grace of God that draws us to God, not the physical pouring of water. When we do those things we are partaking in the gift that God gave us. The gifts of his love and grace. God didn’t give us the sacrament of baptism to use as a tool, but as a way of sharing His love.

When a parent is moved to have their child baptized it is the work of God’s grace. When an child is baptized, that child may not have the memory of the event, but will have the blessing of God from the earliest time in their life. When we baptize, we are resting in the mystery of God and asking God to pour out blessings on that child, and we offer up our intentions as the body of Christ to nurture that child as to raise them up in such a way that they will come to know and profess Jesus as Lord on their own. But ultimately that relationship can only be between the believer and God.

The blessing of God is already here. It is our faith that allows us to receive it. God's love is already present. We may have not noticed it. We may have gotten used to it but God's love surrounds us and is pressing in like powerful flood waters.

Every year we hear about the Mississippi river flooding. Each community builds levies, walls of earth to raise the banks of the river, to protect their city from flooding. A year ago I lived in Ashley which is probably the flattest part of Michigan I have ever seen. There is a home owner there that has built a levy all the way around their house to protect it from the the water that has no place to go. If God's love and blessing is like flood waters then the levies we build that keep us from those blessings may be doubt and apathy that comes from familiarity.

In the scripture lesson today Jesus went to his hometown. He went to the place where it was familiar to him, and he was familiar to the people there. “I this not the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? Are not his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him...and he could do no miracle there except that he aid his hands on a few sick people and healed them and he wondered at their unbelief.”

Jesus is still Jesus the son of God. But in his hometown the people were to familiar with him to appreciate the blessing that he had for them and so they did not receive it. But later he sends out the disciples in pairs and scripture says that “they went out and preached that men should repent and they were casting out many demons and were anointing wit oil many sick people and healing them.”

They brought the message that Jesus sent them with and many was the number of successes. Where Jesus had limited success, the disciples had many successes. In the Gospel according to Luke it says that “A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher.” and again in the gospel of John it says, “Truly I say to you he who believed in me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater works then these he will do; because I go to the Father.”

Jesus intends for us to do greater things. Jesus as a man on the earth had limitations. Jesus as the everliving Lord of Life has no limitations. Jesus has empowered us with the Holy Spirit to be his body on earth; to tell people about the kingdom of God; To preach repentance and forgiveness of sin. We have to have faith to have the courage to go out and proclaim God's truth even though we may not know that the reaction or result may be. God prepared the hearers heart. God grants the gift of fiath to those who will hear the Good News about Jesus Christ.

We're gonna have a baptism today and that's a good thing. The family of God is growing. This little one will receive a physical sign of God's love. She is being initiated into the family of God. We are placing her in God's hands so that faith may be granted to her. We are participating with God in this act of Divine love so that she can make an apeal to God for a good conscience throguh the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We are not brought into the family of God merely for our own good. We are brought into the body to be obedient disciples. The whelming flood of Gods love flows through each one of his believers. We are the crack in the levy of apathy. Where there is complacency we will be the extravagance of God's love that gets people's attention. Where there is familiarity we will be the fresh voice of God's presence.

So how is it with you today? Is there familiarity and apathy in your spiritual walk? Let today be a day that you re-affirm your baptism and step into a new day of intentional, obedient faith to the God that has unending love for each of us.

 

I'm Not Sorry

There are some things I am sorry for. I am sorry that haven't been a better friend to those around me. I am sorry I didn't write those thank you notes to those who feel this is not only a nice thing to do but gesture that is absolutely expected (I must seem terribly ungrateful). I am sorry I didn't call pastor Harry when I knew he was dying (I hope when it is my time, my friends are less cowardly). There are probably many other things that I could come up with. I probably could fill volumes with regrets. However I won't. I don't think it will do any good. The only way it would help is if I could correct a wrong I have committed. If I have offended, please give me the opportunity to make the correction and I will.

There are things that I am not sorry for. I am not sorry that I served six years in the Reserves/Army National Guard. I enlisted not because I believe in global imperialism, or domination-by-strength or any foreign policy that any president may have laid out. I enlisted because I love my country. Not because I think we as a people are superior to any one but because this is my home. I saw that I had strength and ability and I wanted to lend those to the defense of the land that I love. I was willing to die for my country. During my time in service I didn't encounter any real negitivity about it expept for the occasional “you're crazy/I would never to that” kind of comments.As time went on and as I saw the prospect of starting and raising a family I realized that my life could take on a new purpose and so after my six-year enlistment I chose not to reenlist.

Some medals and ribbons I earned while serving.
I have them stored in the basement.

At Central Michigan University Where I was later majoring in Religion with hopes of going on to seminary, a retired pastor at a bible study for students mad the assertion that one cannot be a christian and wear a United States military uniform at the same time. I disagree. In fact that reminds me of another regret. I didn't challenge him on that point. I suppose it was out of a pseudo-respect I had for him. That was the last such bible study I attended.

My decision to serve in the U.S. Armed forces was an effort to be a part of something larger, nobler than myself. I did go on to seminary for similar reasons. I wanted to and still want to give my self. My heart, my soul, my strength and my intellect to the service of God.

I have been surprised to find more overt hostility to my position as a pastor than my service in the Armed forces. Which I can on some level understand. The most famous Protestant figures in American culture are often vapid pretty-boys with a product to sell rather than a message of new life. But that doesn't explain why I occasionally have people, who have never experience me in ministry or heard me preach lay all of their negative assumptions about Western Christianity at my feet. I want to demonstrate love, I want to strengthen relationships, I want people to be free of the things that hold them back. I just happen to believe that the best way to do all of that is through Jesus Christ, and for that. I am not sorry.

I went to the 4^th of July parade today wearing a Captain America t-shirt and a cross around my neck. for some reason patriotism and faith combine in my person. They are not dependent on one another. One does not have to have faith to be a patriot and one does not have to be a patriot to have faith. For its about giving my life for the things that I love and for that, again, I am not sorry.   

My little guys playing in Ludington's version of
Central Park.a small amount of green-space
in the midst of downtown.  

Power Generator

Mark 5:21-43

Jesus could feel the power leave him. In terms of electrical power: there was a load put on the system. When an electrical circuit is charged current is always looking for a way to equalize and find ground. When the atmosphere is charged with electrons there is a lightening strike at the quickest rout to the earth. God the father is the very source of power. The Father is the creator and originator of all that is. God speaks and things come into being. The raw, elemental, creative energy of God the Father is the basis for all that we experience with our senses. God the Father is the source of what we experience with our soul and mind.

You all know something about power and power generators around here. You have been living with the pump storage plant for the last 40 years or so. Drawing water out of Lake Michigan at night only to release it during peak power usage times to turn turbines to produce electricity that we all need. And Now here in our neighborhood we are surrounded by these nearly 500 foot tall wind turbines taking the energy of the wind that blows off Lake Michigan and converting it to electricity. The raw energy of flowing water and of blowing wind mediated through a devise to get electrons flowing so that we can have power in our homes and businesses.

Two nights ago a powerful storm rolled through West Virginia and over a half a million people in that state are still without power. One of the people I follow on Twitter is a pastor and she was listing places where people could go for emergency shelter. Another person I follow, from Colorado simply wrote a few days ago, “My state is on fire.” The first person saw the problem and used this social media as a tool to be a hep and a blessing. The second person I haven't heard from since and I am praying for him.

We know Jesus is the Word of God. In the Gospel of John it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was fully God. The Word was with God in the beginning. All things were created by him, and apart from him not one thing was created that has been created.

If God the Father is the raw input then Jesus is like the generator. All things were created through the Christ. And now by the power of the Holy Spirit the system is charged. Like an electrical system, the circuit is charge and is looking for ground.

Jesus felt the power leave him and he said, “Who touched me?”

The disciples where, like... “Come on Jesus, we're in a huge crowd. What are you talking about?”

They didn't get it. Jesus knew exactly what he was talking about. The woman who was suffering for so many years; The woman who was an outcast because of her condition; the woman who looked for help from so many different doctors and found none came to the end of her options, heard about this man Jesus and thought, “If only I could just touch his cloths I will be healed.” if only I could experience the presence of God in what ever minute amount I know that it would be enough.

You ever been there? To the end of your rope I mean. You found yourself with no where else to turn and you are out of options. I have. Its not a comfortable place to be. That is until you turn toward God and then its the best place in the world to be.

“Who touched my cloths?” Jesus said as he looked around the crowd that day. In fear the woman who had subversively sought out the blessing of God was now the center of Jesus' attention. And he said to her, “your faith has made you well. Go in peace and be healed of you disease.”

Jesus didn't go out that day seeking her out. Jesus didn't have her on his mind as someone to heal. In fact she received healing without Jesus' explicit consent. The thing is that Jesus wants all to receive healing and the is the conduit of God's love for all of humanity. He did seek her out. He did want her know that it was her faith that made the healing possible.

Scripture tells us and we believe that as Christ's Holy Church we are his body on earth. That we are charged with the task of continuing his earthly ministry of proclaiming that the Kingdom of God has come near and about repentance and forgiveness of sin. We are a like an electrical power grid that has been charged and powered. The raw energy of God the father has been mediated by Jesus and flows through all the earth as the Holy Spirit. We are given the task to take the power of God into the world and offer God's blessing to whom ever would receive it.

You see when Jesus was in the crowd that day and the felt the power leave him. He was on his way to the house of the ruler of the synagogue. His intent was to go and heal the rulers daughter but on the way this woman who touched his clothes were healed. In the midst of this holy distraction someone came with news that the man's daughter died. The ones that brought the news were telling the ruler that he need not bother Jesus anymore. But Jesus, paying no attention to what was said, told the synagogue ruler, “Do not be afraid; just believe.” He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John.

I think this is important. He left behind those who were bringing a message of no hope. They were telling the ruler that his daughter was already dead. That they should leave Jesus alone. When we are surrounded by people who encourage us to give up to have no hope then we need to move on. We need to move forward. Jesus headed to the rulers house. When he got there the house was understandably upset. Jesus said to them that the girl was not dead but asleep. They started making fun of Jesus. So do you remember what Jesus did...again. He left the nay sayers behind. He kicked them all out of the house! The only people that were allowed to stay were mom, dad and Jesus friends. They had no faith and were not helping the situation.

Brothers and sisters if you have people in your life who are telling you to have no hope and are leading you away from faith then you need to move on. Keep on moving forward. Keep on moving toward Jesus.

The people in today's scripture lesson that received healing were the ones who found themselves to be powerless and found restoration in Jesus.

We welcome back the youth and adults that went to Savannah Georgia on the mission trip. As the body of Christ, empowered by the Holy Spirit they were sent bearing God's blessing. They certainly blessed the people of Savannah. The thing is there are people that are receiving God's blessing because of their work that we wont know about until the next life. The powerful and the powerless alike witnessed the love of God in Jesus Christ through their work. I am sure that power flowed from God this past week. The mission team may or may not have noticed but I am sure that Jesus noticed.

Whether we are have earthly power like the ruler of the synagogue or are social outcasts like the woman in the crowd the only path to a spirit filled, power filled, God filled life is through trust in Jesus. Whatever power we think we have generated on this earth is nothing unless we are connected to the power of God through Jesus.

So how is it with you today? Are you starting with Jesus today or are you waiting to get to the end of your rope? Are you relying on your own power or are you filled with the power of the Holy Spirit?

As we celebrate Holy Communion let us understand this as a way of putting further trust in Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit to use us to bless this world.

Would you pray with me?