SCRIPTURE: Genesis 45:1-15
TEXT:15And he kissed all his brothers and wept upon them; and after that his brothers talked with him. THEME: God works through our circumstance to bring about God’s good. INTRODUCTION In the ‘good’ Garden of Eden, the fruit had been picked, bites have been taken and the dynamics of our relationship with God, the dynamics of our relationship with each other and the dynamics of our relationship with creation had been changed. The devastation happened so quickly and now, in our humanity, we are looking for someone to blame. Just like in the garden, “I wasn’t me, it was my partner,” “it wasn’t me it was the serpent.” No one fessed up and took responsibility for how they might have contributed towards the destruction. Blame will not stop the hurt, blame will not stop the displacement, the sorrow, or bring the dead back to life. Why do we think that if we can blame someone (other than ourselves) that we will feel better? To absolve ourselves from guilt. To find an enemy to bring down and destroy. To funnel our energy and focus away from our sorrow, grief, and the feelings we harbor. We do this over and over again, we look for blame, then move towards efforts of revenge. We fail to do the contemplative work of grieving, or figuring out what we are feeling, or admit responsibility of how we may have contributed to this situation. Relationships are destroyed in the process. SCRIPTURE When last we saw Joseph, his dreams were shattered. Sold by his brothers into slavery, an Egyptian official, Potiphar, buys him. Joseph is successful in the house of his master, a Captain of the guard, head of Pharaoh’s ‘secret service.’ Joseph is a system thinker. When he sees things, he immediately is able to see systems of how things work in relationship with each other. He is an organizer and knows how to get along with others. When he communicates his ideas, others appreciate his insights and values his observations. He lacks wisdom and is a bit naive, but he will learn with experience and God’s help. His dad Jacob saw this in him and favored him over his brothers. Potiphar’s wife saw this in Joseph, and found this attractive in this handsome young man. This landed Joseph in jail, being falsely accused. Isn’t it interesting when the perpetrator accuses someone else, of the exact crime they should be accused of, as a deflection? Our focus is diverted away from what we really should be paying attention to and this diversion has Joseph end up in jail. While in Jail, he organizes things there, interprets a few dreams and has developed quite a few trusted relationships. Long story short, Joseph ends up second to Pharaoh and manages Egypt through a terrible drought and famine. This famine is also affecting his family as they have traveled to Egypt to see if they can buy food here. This brings us up to speed with the passage for today, where after toying with his brothers, Joseph finally takes off his Egyptian mask to reveal who he really is. 3b “I am Joseph. Is my father still alive?” There is dismay, distress, and the hand of God, that preserves, persists, and calls us to participate in God’s mission of salvation. We can use who we are, our position, what resources we available to us, in a time such as this. But this is only this part of the story, the next part is to get his father Jacob to Egypt, and reconcile the brothers with kisses, weeping and talking. APPLICATION When we look back with eyes of faith, we can see the hand of God. That although we think we were on our own, God helped us navigate where we are. This is important because the story is not finished yet. This is for assurances so we can call and depend upon God in the situation we are currently in and benefit from God’s help and guidance as we move along the journey into the future. We don’t have to wait until later to appreciate God’s guidance, leading, wisdom, protection, provision as we activity live our lives. How does God help us to reconcile and reunite with those we have been estranged from? God is all about relationships. We must always move towards reconciliation and never revenge because how we treat each other is important to God. We are protecting ourselves from feeling grief and lost right now because there is so much to do. Navigating through the maze of paperwork and services takes persistent vigilance, but when we feel safe enough to let our guard down, we may find space enough to feel our sorrow and cry. Who is to blame for the fire in Lahaina? Is the electric company to blame for the freakishly strong winds? Is the homeless encampment to blame for power lines that swayed in the force of those winds and broke off. Is an arson to blame for the brush that grew in the place of groomed fields of sugar cane or pineapple? Who do we sue and for what? Higher electricity bills for everyone? We need to move away from a culture that punishes and move towards a culture that takes responsibility for our part for how we got to where we are, and build relationships, forgive offenses, and create productive solutions and communities. Joseph gave up his right to hurt his brothers as they hurt them and was able to see the works of God continuing the promise of Abraham, through Isaac, His dad Jacob and now through him. The community and the preservation of family was more important than getting even or destroying those who have hurt him in the past. CONCLUSION God is more about relationships than about righteousness. As humans we will always be in relationships of hurt, anger, discontent, frustration, and jealousy. If we can admit how we have contributed to this situation, then we can take responsibility for our actions and change what we did, our responses, our perception and apologize for that, to bring about some peace to our relations. Our Abrahamic family carried a lot of distress and dismay, because of how they treated each other. Sometimes even running for their lives from each other. But when they have the courage to have those uncomfortable conversations, they were able to talk and move on towards reconciliation, companionship, support, affection and caring in their relationship. Last week I went walking in the park. Around the field and the parking lot were 4 angry looking guys. We had to walk pass them to continue on our walk. One of the guys approached me about my walking sticks. I asked about the Lacrosse sticks the other guy had. Later he told me they had a run in because they wanted to exercise on the field but they did not have permission and was asked to leave. They were disappointed, angry, but were really nice guys. My first impression, just by how they were postering was “abunai!” Dangerous, as I watched one of our groups leave early through the parking lot. But after talking with them I understood why they were angry and my reaction towards them changed. We have to be willing to discover the hurt in people’s live so we can respond to them with understanding. And as people of faith, we will be able to help them see how God was a part of their story all along the way.
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SCRIPTURE: Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28
TEXT: 28b And they took Joseph to Egypt. THEME: God continues to allow us to dream. INTRODUCTION We are emotionally spent. We are physically tired. We are filled with unanswered questions that would not change the outcome of where we are today. When we think of the events of the fire in Lahaina we are overwhelmed. We don’t just feel one thing but legion for there are many. Starting this lectionary series focusing on food, table, and guest, it seems to have shifted as we turned from the Gospel of Matthew into Genesis. This week’s passage is about shattered dreams. Similarly, to the shattering of dreams we have experienced this week. Dreams are present in Genesis from the beginning with the unexpected guests who kept God’s dream alive in Abraham and made Sarah laugh. In the Feast of Tears, the Dream Sarah has for her son Isaac is threatened by Ishmael, but in the end God’s expansiveness is revealed through new dreams for Hagar and Ishmael. At Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac, the dream of our relationship with God becomes more defined with love over feats of devotion. God continues to break the Dreams of cultural convention as the second born gets birthrights and blessing because they want it. We mark those places where our dreams of God have been especially clear but realize that God is always present even when we are running from the consequences of our hurtful actions. SCRIPTURE The dream of God, passed on to Jacob is becoming realized through his many sons. Yet in his human ways, Jacob overtly favors one son over all of the rest. Joseph is the youngest yet is given a royal garment and does not have to work shepherding. In the passages leading up to this story God has also favored Joseph with dreams of what God will do, through Joseph. Being immature, Joseph is insensitive as he shares these dreams given by God with his brothers and uses them to brag or elevate his importance. Jealousy leads to hate and hate to bitterness and bitterness to violence. His dad asks Joseph to check on his brothers in the field and he goes, wearing his brightly colored show off clothes. As his brothers see him approach, blinded by jealousy and envy, they think that if they get rid of Joseph, then their father will be forced to love them more and plot to kill Joseph. “We shall see what will become of his dreams.” So, when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe…and threw him into a cistern, an empty well. Brothers and Cistern. Betrayed, incarcerated, stripped of status, Joseph is sold as a slave by his brothers to distant relatives on their way down from Midian to Egypt. These are relatives of Isaac’s half-brother Ishmael, that God uses to save Joseph. An ironic twist of fate where what was thought would take away from an inheritance from God, is used by God’s hand to preserve it. APPLICATION Instead of his brothers wanting the best for their brother, they become the destruction of his dreams. And yet the hand of the unseen God is at play, through these other descendants of Father Abraham, to further along God’s dream when Jacob’s children are behaving poorly. Where is God in the twist and turns of our lives? What has happened in Lahaina is a destruction of dreams. There is so much sorrow in all that has been lost. The devastation of an entire community. The loss of lives continues to grow. The hopes and dreams that have been betrayed. And yet there is no time to grieve our losses. We are in shock, but we have to move on because we need a place to stay, we need food, we need to recover what we need to survive, what we need to stay connected, to do what we need to prepare for the next steps. There has been a generous out pouring of generosity as displayed at the War Memorial Gym with the collection of food, water, clothing and the like. Volunteers just show up to stack, sort and deploy these needed necessities. Shelters are in schools, churches, homes, friends, and relatives. Accommodations are being made, driving in Kahului has heavier traffic. Shopping in the stores have crowds of stranger. Certain supplies are off the shelves in ‘good will’ efforts, leaving few for others who need these daily necessities too. I found myself a Kaahumanu Shopping Center with the parking lot full and every table, bench and chair filled as people gathered, to pick up some thing or service they needed, but stayed and found other refugees from Lahaina and shared their stories of escape, relocation, reconnection, grief and lost. Many with just the clothes on their back. Everything lost to fire. Loved ones lost to fire. This is not the hand of God punishing an evil people. This is how a captive people understood the situation they were in, but when we take responsibility for our actions, we can see how this was an unforeseen calamity. A convergence of freakish events caused by climate change, the perfect storm, high winds, fallen power lines, a runaway fire, drought conditions, and lots of dry fuel. There was no time, no warning, no respite, no escape for some. Lives were changed in an instant. Dreams cut short. And now we are looking for signs of God among the rubble. It could be in the distant Ishmaelite trader, who is a relative on my father’s side, and a half brother’s sibling’s children. CONCLUSION Shish Kebab is a dish of pieces of marinated meat and vegetables cooked and served on skewers. This comes from the Turkish word that means ‘a sword.’ A Middle Eastern/Mediterranean food, made of lamb (or other meats). I got this title because the boys were tending to their sheep. The pieces of meat are like unrelated events of dreams, broken dreams, families, broken families, betrayals, slavery, and the hand of God that is able to string us all together and hold us and work through the chaos. God holds us in our grief. Fuels us through the smoke, provides for us with gracious generosity, clears the clogged roads, and helps us to redefine our dreams for whatever God has in store next. We may not see God at this time, but God is there, even if it is in the form of a Midian, trader headed towards Egypt, willing to pick up a slave from some shepherds along the way. One of the things we can do, for each other right now, is listen to each other’s story, of how these stories of fire have affected their live Because when we listen to someone else, it helps them to process their grief, to let go of one dream and have the ability to discover a new one. And we need to tell our stories too, because when we tell our story, it helps us to process all of these changes in our lives and helps us see God in our midst, so we can begin to dream again. SCRIPTURE: Genesis 28: 10-19a
TEXT:15 Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you." THEME: God’s love is with us even when we are not perfect (selfish). INTRODUCTION So far in Genesis we have seen unexpected guest that have made Sarah (us) laugh at how absurd God can be. We have had Isaac’s baby luau where the after-party showed us the expansiveness of God’s love, extended to Hagar and Ishmael where more stories about God can be found. We will live in communities where practices and beliefs about God don’t match what we have discovered about God. Don’t sacrifice your children for a better life for yourself, but use the template of love we are developing about how God is, to understand the God of the Old Testament is the same described by the Apostle Paul. Last week we found that even if we are raised in the same household siblings, we can be very different from each other, in what they think and in what they prefer. That is okay, we don’t have to be the same, God loves diversity and God will always work with us. We inherit a lot of things from our parents, but one thing we don’t inherit is our faith or passion. The next meal that is our focus, was a repeat of the lost birthright stew, but this time, it featured a lovely venison stew, where more characters were involved, with more trickery, a slight of hand and conspiracy that bestowed the blessing of the future the family, upon the child impersonating the other. God can even work with that. SCRIPTURE Jacob is on the run afraid of his brother’s anger after impersonating him and getting their father to bless him instead of his brother. Jacob is running away as far and as fast as he possibly can. When darkness falls and he lays low, using the available stones as a pillow. Desperate, alone, in the dark, out in the wilderness, (remember Jacob is the twin that doesn’t like being outdoors in nature), exhausted, fearful, this is a thin place, where the separation between heaven and earth is permeable. Jacob has a dream of a ladder with angels ascending into Heaven while other angels were descending to Earth. Then God confirms the blessing Jacob acquired through unscrupulous means, by standing next to him and speaks. Jacob must have thought, “This is real. God is real. Grandpa Abe’s God is real, Daddy Isaac’s God is real. And now this God who is real is My God too. The promise made to Grandpa, to Dad, is now passed down to me. God will be with me, where ever I go and bring me back-to-back to this land. “ Jacob thinks it is the place that is special so he takes the stone pillow he had his dream on, and anointed it with oil. He marked the spot to remember it. Maybe he could reduplicate the experience again when he needed it. But if he listened a little closer, we would realize that it is not the place that is special, but God who has been through several generations, is committed to work with him in fulfilling God’s purposes. This is the beginning of a faith relation and a faith adventure for Jacob. APPLICATION The characters of this family are deeply flawed but God makes promises to them and travels with them. God confirms that their trickery, manipulation, favoritism, and deception does not disqualify them from God’s grace or love. No matter where they are in life’s journey, they are welcomed by God. What are the markers in our lives that indicate we are headed in the right direction with God? Humans were not created to be perfect. But when we aspire to such heights it is amazing. A ’10’ on the gymnastic floor exercise, free style snowboarding perfection, and hole in one. A flawless performance on the piano, we are on nerve because anything could go wrong and yet mesmerized as we witness what this person is accomplishing through hours of practice, natural talent, determinism, and drive. God wants us to do our best but does not expect perfection in our lives, except when it comes to relationships, and the only way we can achieve this is through grace, love, and forgiveness. We do not have to earn favor with God. We are people on a journey with God. This is real people, good, broken, ambitious, competitive people who love God and don’t love God who have a realization of God and live with this reality. Some with passion, some for their own advantage, some to get ahead, some just following the rules, some just because…and God, just because God loves us. No matter where we are on life’s journey God confirms that we are welcomed. confirms that God is in our lives. We have misconceptions about God and what it means to follow God. Last week a woman and her son knocked on my door. She wanted to share a verse from Isaiah with me about the evil world we live in with lies, deceptions, greed, and destruction. I asked if she was referring to Trump’s indictments, which made her laugh off script. She excused herself abruptly promising to come back. Clearly in control of our conversation and when they would show up again. If she had stayed, I would have talked about the good at creation and the incarnation. About how ‘we are not a problem that needs to be fixed.’ About God’s love for us not expecting us to be perfect but to take responsibility for our action and deepen in our relationship with God through the love of Jesus. These conversations always go better in my mind after they leave and never while they are firing scripture at me, rapid fire like ammunition, jumping from one context to another. CONCLUSION Our relationship with God can be seen as a journey. Wherever we go, whatever we do, there will be those time when we lay down and God will minister to us in our sleep. Those pillows will be markers of things we have learned, figured out, put in order, or rested for whatever may come our way. We could erect monuments to those encounters with God that indicate when we had felt especially close to God. The starting point of our journey of faith with God. The times when we were in trouble the most, those times when we had no answers for our behavior but just held by God. Whether passionate for God, not first in line, clever, God’s adventures are written in our lives and in the relationships, we foster around us. The communities we leave in our wake, are the markers of the presence of God. SCRIPTURE: Genesis 22:1-14
TEXT: 14aSo Abraham called that place “The Lord will provide”; THEME: God loves us. INTRODUCTION Amy Jill Levine, New Testament Professor at Vanderbilt University Divinity School recorded a series of lectures on the Old Testament Stories. She said something in these lectures that I’ve never heard before. In them she says that the books of the Old Testament were written during the time of Israel’s Babylonian Captivity, around 700 B.C. when a written language was beginning to emerge in Babylon. Up until then the Hebrews used an oral history to pass their stories down from one generation to the next. While captive in Babylon, their children were learning Babylonian stories, so they decided to write down their history. In doing so, they also took a few of the popular Babylonian stories and rewrote them with Hebrew themes. Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac is one such story, the details and characters of the story have been changed along with an added Hebrew twist. SCRIPTURE In stories, like a good joke, the characters and details can be change, from one telling to another, as long as the message or punch line of the story remains the conveyors of truth. I’ve always had problems with this passage, because from my New Testament perspective of the Old Testament, God does not test us, as we should not test God. But here it is, God wants to test Abraham. This passage begins with “After all this” What about the 25 years of waiting to have a child with Sarah and wandering and wondering around waiting for land and an heir? Wouldn’t God know of Abraham’s devotion already? This is my first hint, that the god in this story may not be the God that we know. The second hint is that God is about Love and relationships. The description we have of God’s love is confident in its self. Love does things to build someone else up, it is patience, it is kind, it is happy for others, it is humble, it is comfortable when others are given attention, it has respect for others, it is other-centered, it is tolerant of those who may be different, love forgives, love speaks the truth in ways that brings light, love protects, love trusts, love hopes and love is steadfast. (1 Corinthians 13: 4-7). I am going on a bit of a rant, then I’ll come back: Love does not play mean tricks on others for their own amusement. Love does not require proof of love but loves anyway. Love does not manipulate the people they love. Love does not sacrifice innocent people for their own ends. Love does not marginalize the helpless. Love is not violent. I’m back. The god (small ‘g’) portrayed here is not our God, but a Babylonian god, who sacrifices for favor, goes on heroic quests for favor, violently vanquishes foes for favor and is deeply flawed. It’s just that they changed his name to a capital ‘G’ for the purpose of retelling this story. This story was familiar to the first readers in Babylon, but with a surprise ending. This is a Babylonian story about child sacrifice. Two people go up the hill and one person comes down. (Amy Jill Levine, observes that in the retelling of this story, coming down off the mountain, the rewriters forget to name Isaac, so two people come down the mountain). The irony of this story comes in verse 14 when Abraham calls this place “the Lord will provide” because, God never required a sacrifice in the first place and it wasn’t God who was testing Abraham because God already knew where Abraham stood with God. But the punchline of this story is not to kill your kids so that you can have a better life for yourself. Don’t participate in the Babylonian practice of child sacrifice because everybody else is doing it. Trust in the God that loves you and the knowledge that God is there to help you, no sacrifice necessary. How many knives do you think this story took out of the hands of Hebrew fathers? This the point of the story. APPLICATION How is the story of Abraham and Isaac our story? Don’t make our God into a Babylonian god who vanquishes evil with the violent act of sacrificing his son for your life. Google is a wonderful resource, I googled the Babylonian Creation Story and came up with Cliff Notes of clashing Titans whose guts create the heavens and the earth, a cleansing flood that that was supposed to wipe out human beings except a husband and his wife survive. One god had to convince the other god with soft words that it’s okay. Then there was a fruitless search to the underworld for immortality. Sacrifice was used heavily to appease and solicit favor from powers beyond human control. But this is not how sacrifice work for the Hebrews, who already have the favor of God, being loved, and made in the image of God. Unlike the cosmic powers of the Babylonian gods, there is no form of justice that has to be balanced, paid back or satisfied. Our God is above any perceived cosmic force and does not answer to anyone. This challenges us to rethink what happens on the cross of Jesus and ask if God actually does require a violent sacrifice of God’s son to wipe away our sin? We already have favor with God simply because God never stops loving us. If this is so, then should we shift our focus at Easter off of the cross and focus more on the disturbance of the Resurrection? Focusing on life after death and what it means to live as resurrected people. CONCLUSION Don’t give up the God that you know for a god who tests us to see if we are worthy. When we realize that this is not our God, but a retelling of a story to keep us from sacrificing our children for our own selfish fears, then like at the end of Creation, we can enjoy a Sabbath time with God and each other. This story changes the punchline, not to kill Hebrew babies, but to be free in the gracious love of God and life. Don’t t get caught up in a God who is testing or judging us to see if we are obedient enough to deserve to be loved to life. If God is saying don’t kill your kids, then why would we think that God would sacrifice his Son to die violently as a payment for our sins on the cross. Could the twist to this story be; God loves us and gives up power, to show us a love that creates life in us beyond our death? God, through Jesus, shows us a love that forgives and is more powerful than any payment procured from a violent act. In fact, love is the only thing that can create immortality in resurrection. SCRIPTURE: Genesis 21:8-21
TEXT: 13As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring.” THEME: There are more stories about God. INTRODUCTION Today is the first Sunday that I am going to preach here then make my way to Iao UCC to preach. Christophe will meet me there and play the piano for Iao. Don’t worry I am not trying to take over their church or create a merge with our churches. Our three churches, Kaahumanu, Wailuku, and Iao are unique and minister to different segments of the Wailuku Parish. Merging our congregations would homogenize and pasteurize our ministries. But I do believe that there are somethings we could do in collaboration, with each other, that would support each other’s ministries and create new opportunities to do different things. I also need to say that the observations from today’s passage maybe different from what we may have heard, but that is part of a theological journey God has had me on. That is not to say that what we have believed is wrong, but for us to be open to understand this passage in another way. That is the nature of scripture, each time we read it we can discover something new. You don’t have to agree with me, just be open to a different observation. During this season of ordinary time or Pentecost, I decided to preach a series from the lectionary passages that have to do with food, guests, and tables. I lumped all of the gospel reading from Matthew first, and did the same with the passages from Genesis. So far, if there is any theme that seems to be emerging, it is that the community of God is for all people, all cultures, rich and poor, and even creeds. That’s just a simplistic way of saying, tax collectors and sinners are welcomed to sit and eat at Christ’s table. SCRIPTURE Genesis has us getting back to our roots. From the very beginning what God creates is “Good” not perfect. Perfection is unchangeable, divine, worthy of worship (that’s not us), but ‘good’ is changeable and has the potential for amazing improvement or terrible decline. We are certainly not worthy of worship. So then, we can understand the story of Adam and Eve not as the introduction of sin, but as a coming-of-age story of accountability. They are old enough to know better and are held to standard of being responsible for their actions, good or bad. The sin here is not disobedience, but not taking responsibility for what they have done and then blaming others instead of fessing up, and asking for forgiveness. Sin, contrary to popular belief, does not disqualify us from the love of God. God does not stop loving us until a worthy sacrifice pays the price of our disobedience. We are human, not perfect and expected to do good sometimes and bad at others. God would continue love us irregardless of our imperfections, just as we do with our children. If we, as humans can still love those who hurt us, shouldn’t God be able to do the same? This is exactly the story we have today with Abraham and Sarah. A beautiful segue to today’s passage. Abraham and Sarah finally had their baby, and Abraham throws a baby Luau. As the festivities play out, Sarah sees Ishmael (about 14 years old) playing with his younger sibling Isaac (about 2) and has a chilling realization, “Isaac’s inheritance, promised by God would somehow have to be shared with his half-brother Ishmael.” This is the same fear that Supremacists have about having to share the resources, land, opportunity, richness of our America with others. And so they keep systems of slavery in play and enforce immigration laws that make it restrictive for immigrants to become citizens of the Land of the Free, even though they are the descendants of former immigrants. This is what I love about the Bible. The Bible is not a record of our successes and victories, but a collection of our stories with God good and bad. In this passage we have to admit that Abraham was a slave owner and his wife a racist. Perfection is not a prerequisite for being the people in relationship with God, being able to grow, change, and be transformed by love is. God can forgive us so we can do better. Abraham loves Ishmael. He is part of his family, even if, as a result of his not fully trusting God. He is willing to live out the responsibility of his decision, until this ugly side of Sarah is revealed. Distressed, God comes to Abraham’s aide and tells him to do as Sarah asks, because it is through Isaac that offspring shall be named for him. As for Ishmael, God will make a nation of him too, because he is also Abraham’s offspring. If we stop here, one of the things we should get from this story is that there are stories about God from the descendants of Ishmael and his family, as well as from Isaac and his descendants. Stories of God’s works, guidance, protection, provision, healing, care and character from two streams. Then Genesis gives us the first story of God working at the beginning of the Ishmaelites. Abraham prepares a box lunch for Hagar and Ishmael; one bread and a bottle of water and sets them free into the wilderness. When the help from Abraham’s household is gone, Hagar is prepared for Ishmael and her to die. There are crying prayers of desperation that God hears. Their lively hood no longer dependent upon Abraham, but on God. God sends an angel. Whenever an angel says, “Do not be afraid” be prepared for something new and good to happen. A well is revealed as the outcasts are lifted up. There are God stories beginning in the lives and family of Ishmael and Hagar. APPLICATION We have a theological lens, that has been developed through our study of our stories of God in the Bible. We have our own stories, and case studies that challenge our concepts and theories about God. When we also have stories of others, that are undeniable activities of the Holy Spirit we have to reconcile a God who works in multiple cultures, people families nations and territories. What can we learn about God when we listen to other stories? A friend of mine has been involved in AA for several years. Southern Baptist in background, he knows the identity of the Higher Power like how the Apostle Paul talked to the Athenians about the UNKNOWN GOD (Acts 17). The people in this group do not say Jesus Christ or God but over the course of these meetings, their lives are transformed by the Higher Power. The Dali Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, have struck up a friendship. When Krista Tippet asked him about it on her pot cast On Being, he said, “Yes. Do you really think that God would say, "Dalai Lama, you really are a great guy, man. What a shame you're not a Christian.”?” “I think God is just thrilled because no faith, not even the Christian faith, can ever encompass God or even be able to communicate who God is. Only God can do that.” This leads me to what I heard our new General Secretary and President of the United Church of Christ say about the future of our church. She talked about intra church, where it is not enough for us to learn to be a broader community from other denominations, but that if we listen carefully enough, we can learn from other faiths, traditions, cultures, and beliefs. This is like learning more about the wisdom of God from the Dali Lama, or the Compassion of God from the Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, or the interconnectedness of God from the professor of anthropology at Princeton University, Agustin Fuentes. Be respectful of others. Have a holy curiosity. Ask questions, listen, and prayerfully run what you have heard through our theological grids, pray about it, see how it matches up with the stories in the Bible and what more we may have to consider. CONCLUSION We are far from perfect, There is so much more for us to learn, We do not own the market on God, only one piece. God has chosen to have stories in other people, faiths, cultures, and territories. If we listen to their stories, there is a good chance that our piece of the story may be illuminated by pieces of their story and we’ll have a better story about God. SCRIPTURE: Genesis 18:1-15, (21-17)
TEXT: 6Now Sarah said, “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.” THEME: God of surprises provides signs along the way to keep us on track. INTRODUCTION As an Ordinary Time, lectionary theme, we will be looking at the passages that focused on food, guest and table. We are moving from the Gospel of Matthew to the readings found in Genesis around the family of Abraham and Sarah. In today’s lectionary offering, we see three unexpected table guest who are an encouragement along their journey. SCRIPTURE This story has unexpected guests, thin walls, an overheard conversation, and laughter. Sort of how God sees things, orchestrating a chance meeting for encouragement, for those on a journey of faith and hearing just what we need to hear to continue on. Let me give us a back story. When God creates in the beginning of Genesis it is ‘good,’ with the potential for doing more good or not. We were not declared as ‘perfect’ beyond improvement or change, so being sinless was never an expectation of our goodness. So, the story of Adam and Eve in the garden is actually about coming of the age and taking responsibility for their actions. They are to fess up for their actions good or bad and bear their consequences. When they don’t, God does not stop loving them, but replaces fig leaf loincloths with garments of skins and teaches them how to farm. Later Genesis fills in more stories until we get to our ancestral family; Abraham and Sarah. They are given a promise of descendants as many as the stars in the sky, land and a nation, but they are old and don’t have any children. So the least they can do is to travel towards the land God has for them. Mamre is a stop along the way in that journey, when Abraham sees three men standing near him and invites them in for refreshments. He orders up a few veal gyros as they asked about Sarah. These strangers are an encouragement to Abraham and Sarah to keep on course and presents a tangible timeline of when a promise will be fulfilled. Although Sarah is on this journey too, when she hears their prediction, she laughs. Caught off guard, surprised, relived, and happy. On a study on laughter, found that what makes us laugh has elements of surprise, whimsy, and a turn towards the unexpected, caught off guard, we let out a chuckle. When what follows is a series of events that take us down a road of adventure, laughter, unstoppable laughter ensues. APPLICATION What surprises is God showing us through signs, words of encouragement, promises, visions from the past, or visitors? How do we see beyond what we think is possible, to something new, or unexpected? Jann and I met up with the group going to General Synod from Hawaii in SFO connecting to their flight to Indianapolis. We got in at 6 in the morning. Exhausted we checked into our hotel and fell asleep. Later that evening we met for dinner. My unexpected table mate was Andy Bunn, the Executive Director of the Hawaii Conference Foundation. He is a former attorney from ChunKerr, the firm we hired to help us with the Mission Grounds Affordable Housing Project. His former responsibility at ChunKerr was on sub dividing property for condos and his former protégé is our current attorney. I was able to ask him a few of our questions about the Site Control Document that the Council has been wrestling with. Basically he said that although the language seems to be talking about selling the property its is not and we are able to retain ownership of our property and section off a portion for this project. He has also offered to talk to our Council. This was a conversation over dinner that was an encouragement along the way of the journey we have been on. At the airport leaving Indianapolis, Dorothy Lester, our former ACM was on the flight. She was seated next to Robin Lunn, the former pastor of Makawao Union. I found out that before becoming a pastor Robin had been a structural architect. We had a discussion about different uses churches in the Salem Oregon area and how some churches in close proximity of each other are collaborating their efforts, to share and utilize resources like how we have been talking. I said to her, why didn’t we have lunch together while you were on Maui? She also was an encouragement along our journey so I got her email. CONCLUSION I mapped out scriptures and sermon topic that I wanted focus on before I left for General Synod. When I sat down to write this sermon, I felt like Abraham sitting on the porch of my tent, in a lawn chair, when strangers of encouragement suddenly arrived. The laugh I gave out was sort of gave out a kind of a ‘huh’ sound. A laugh of sorts that said, “We’ll see where all of this ends up.” SCRIPTURE: 1 Peter 4:1-14, 5:8-11
TEXT: 10And after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, support, strengthen, and establish you. THEME: The Resurrected Jesus is seen in those who do good. INTRODUCTION The resurrected Jesus is not found in empty tombs, but among the living. Today from 1 Peter we will see the resurrected Jesus in the lives of those who are engaged in Good trouble. The world is good but not perfect. The world has come to be the way that it is because some have figured to that this is the way that it should be. Sometimes it is good for a few at the expense of the many. The recent stories in corporate America have been about how CEO’s have recorded huge bonuses, while the income of the average worker has hardly changed. The distribution of wealth between the few rich and many poor is disproportionate and so workers at Kaiser, coal mines and the winters at movie studios have struck for their fair share of the profits. SCRIPTURE Peter’s addresses the church as they are going through fiery ordeals, cultural conflicts, moral dilemmas and financial hardships. The community of faith acts contrary to the communities they are in for the good of all. They do not worship the prevailing gods and could jeopardize their good favor with Rome. The second part of this passage are the supports for those who follow Christ and find themselves acting counter to the culture. Be humble, cast your cares upon Jesus, be alert those who are evil and are out to get you. Know that there are Christians in other places doing the same kinds of thing you are doing and are suffering the same things. Through it all, God will restore, support, strengthen and establish you. APPLICATION How can the church be a place where burdens are cast, we find restoration, support, strength, and are established? College was a struggle, new people, new place to live, strangers all around. I was displaced, away from home. Across the street from the dorms was Holy Cross Church, one of our UCC churches. I attended services there, volunteered at the youth group and met some pretty amazing people. It was about this time that someone shared 1 Peter 5:8 with me, 8Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour.” I felt my Christian life being attacked. This passage helped me realize that the devil, evil, active forces out there were out to get me, but I could be alert, be disciplined and not get eaten. I went to another of our UCC churches and these people practically adopted me. I volunteered with their Youth Group, they invited me to dinners. I helped prepare food for their moon festival that is the first time I saw someone use the bottom of a bowl as a stone to sharpen a knife. I showed up on Saturday to help them paint the preschool. I’ve never seen someone get so much paint out of a paint brush. They were a community of faith that let me be apart of them. I then was hired by another church to help with their youth group. These three churches were all very different from each other. The people they gathered were all from the same community, no more than a few miles apart from each other but very different demographics. Each church did the work of restore, support, strengthen and establish in their own way and I am appreciative of their ministry to me while I was at each. This has been my experience at every church I have been with since. Verse 10 says Christ himself will; restore, support strengthen and establish. And Christ has, with the works of salvation, love and grace. We are products of that, and Christ in us (the resurrected Christ) has us doing the same through the community of the church. CONCLUSION We may not be the ones lining the roads in protest, but we have people in our church who are (or know someone who is). During the Mental Health Professionals who struck there were many from the church who prayed in support of them. I didn’t know that there was an Artificial Intelligence (AI) app that could take what you have written and make it “better”. It rewords sentences, fixes grammar and spelling. I was asked to write an article for our Conference's newsletter on our church’s use of the Mission Grounds with the Affordable Housing Project. I sent my draft to a friend who ran it through an AI app and sent it back to me. Smooth. It made it much easier and clearer to read but it also left out some of the quirky way I put words together. This is one of the reasons they writers in Hollywood are striking. They are afraid that they may be replaced by ‘AI’ apps. They want protection for their jobs and be compensated for their intellectual property 9the quirky way they put words together and develop characters and themes). One of the writers on strike is from Hawaii, He said that his job is safe for now because he writes for comedy and ‘AI’ can’t do comedy. I sent a prayer out for the writers, their provision during these lean times and soften hearts of the few, that would share profits with the many. Christ uses the church to restore support strengthen and establish those who are engaged in Good Trouble to make a good world better. One last note. It was when I attended one of these churches in my college days that God sharpened my call to ministry. Sitting in the congregation I thought “Small membership churches need good pastors” maybe this is what God want me to be, a good pastor to a small membership congregation. I struggled to graduate from college. I did the same in seminary, and after about 20 years I decided I must be doing what God wants me to be doing. Now I am trying to figure out if God might be saying, “stop what you have been doing, let someone else have a change and move on to the next thing.” I might have to spend more time sitting in the loving arms of a good church to find out. SCRIPTURE: 1 Peter 3:13-22
TEXT: 21And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, THEME: INTRODUCTION When I first became your pastor, the scripture that was popular was from Proverbs 29:18, “Where there is no vision, the people will perish.” I was asked what my vision for Wailuku Union Church was. I said, “I don’t know, I haven’t been here long enough.” Even when I went to the Ecumenical Minister Meetings, they repeated the same passage. I didn’t think that coming up with a vision was my job. God was not speaking to me about the church. Were we going to perish? A few years later, we engaged in a process of discernment called the New Creation Initiative. We learned a few steps to discern the will of God. It included the reading of scripture, reading what the great minds of the church were writing, asking members what scriptures seem to be popping up, observing what God doing around us. As we shared and prayed with each other, we actually were able to come up with a few images of the church and what God was saying to us. SCRIPTURE It’s easy to get lost in all of the details of the passage. So one way to unpack it is for us to start at the end, with verse 21 21And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. From this verse we can see that there are two ways in which people try to approach salvation. The first way uses baptism to remove sin, as water removes dirt from the body. The right ritual or atoning sacrifice would win favor from an angry God. The second way is forgiveness from a loving parent God, which reconciles our relationship with God as described ‘as an appeal to God for a good conscience’. This is all that we need. Loving forgiveness is more than enough for our reconciliation with God to take place. The resurrected Jesus is seen in those who discern God’s will and are participating in God’s mission. When Jesus is seen as only sacrificing his life as a payment for our sin, it reduces our relationship with God to financial transaction of debt reconciliation. Salvation is not about being debt free with God. The goal of salvation is to be in relationship with the Creator of all things. When all we are looking for is a way for us to make things right with God, our Christianity can become selfish, self-serving and gives us a false sense of righteousness. We like a salvation that escapes death, saves ourselves, escapes the plagues of the apocalypse, but Jesus doesn’t shy away from suffering in order to bring us to God, this becomes uncomfortable for us. We like having Jesus dying on the cross as a payment of our sins but shouldn’t we be trying to follow his example. So don’t be surprised if we find ourselves suffering because we are doing what we believe God wants us to do. Now the first verse (13) makes sense, “… who will harm us if we are eager to do what is good?” Those who are evil will cause us to suffer. Those who are threatened by what we do for God because it will disturb what they have. As we discern the will of God there will be those who will push back against us, not understanding God’s mission, not wanting to change, not wanting to try something new, not wanting to use their resources in a way different from how we have used them in the past. Peter’s letter arrives to households that held slaves. We all know of the suffering that came from those who worked to abolish slavery, apartheid, racism, separatism, agism, gender-ism, sexism and other kinds of ‘ism’s’ that diminished the humanity of any person for any reason. Last week we discussed carrying the Lord’s name in vain from Exodus. It is about when we don’t behave in a way becoming of God, whom we represent. When we diminish others humanity, we are diminishing God’s image. When we move to correct that sort of behavior in our community, we are doing God’s work, but there are others who react because of a fear of a perceived loss, over the perceived good of sharing to make others whole. Then the last verse in this passage is brought to light, as Jesus is Lord, gone into heaven, at the right hand of God, ages authorities and powers subject to him. It’s not, ‘Jesus do this for me’, but me doing what Jesus wants. APPLICATION When we suffer, how do we know we are doing what God wants us to do or that we should stop what we are doing? This past week I was asked to consider being a member of our Conference’s Innovation and Engagement Missional Team. I told them that I had my own innovation and engagement project that I was working on here at Wailuku Union Church. Then I retold the story of how we got here, discerning God’s call. Coming up with our mission statement. The doors that opened and the doors that closed. The Parable of the Good Samaritan. Those born and raised on Maui given the opportunity to have an affordable place to rent to raise their families, as being the fallen traveler. Wailuku Union Church being the innkeeper in the retelling of this story. I told the story of how we sing new songs, try new things, have an environment where making mistakes is how we learn. We are small and have no business thinking about doing these kind of things, but have been at it for 20 years because we believe this is what God is calling us to do. I didn’t tell her that with each obstacle so far, we have navigated through them and we will continue until the project is complete or God tells us to stop. The fruits have been good; faithfulness, sharing, maturity, community, and love. We trust the process; God has brought new people at each stage to help us when we have needed them. We have been able to change our vision of this project as God continued to sharpen our vision. God continues to provide for our church even through the pandemic, no county fair income for several years now and rising cost. Our church community is on line and in person but it is the same congregation. We are open to learn what it will be like to be the church in the future. We are open to hear other ways to understand what being Christian is all about from an evolving theology and understanding of scripture. We are exploring how our three churches in the Wailuku Parish may be able to share our resources instead of compete against each other. God is still speaking. How about that? They asked if I’d be a resource for other churches to call. CONCLUSION The resurrected Jesus can be seen amongst those who are discerning the will of God. They are alive, changing, transforming, evolving. Discernment is what ‘an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ’ (21b), is all about. We want God to speak clearly, plainly, slowly and right away to us. But God does not (usually). God gives us enough to hang in there, a community to hold. Us in prayer as we wait, scripture for encouragement, but always answers in a timely manner. This is how we learn the rhythm of God and acquire a good conscience with God. SCRIPTURE: 1 Peter 2: 2-10
TEXT: 5like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. THEME: Stubbornly live Christ as our cornerstone but don’t be stoneheaded about it. INTRODUCTION Sometimes by the time sit down to work on the sermon; after Monday Night’s Bible study, condensing the essence of the passage into a story for preschoolers on Wednesday’s chapel time and coming up with a title for the sermon for the bulletin, I have forgotten what the title was. When I looked up the title ‘Amongst the Cornerstone’, the first word that came to mind was ‘Pa’akiki”. My slang Hawaiian translation of this word is ‘stonehead’. I have used this under my breath after a difficult conversation when the dominant culture was unsympathetic to my nonconforming ways, or When I have come up with another way of doing something but the old ways prevailed, or when my good humor, wisdom and experience was ignored for a less sensible way; “Pa’akiki” I said, under my breath, “Stonehead” I thought in fear that they would hear me, “Stubborn” that’s all there was to it. SCRIPTURE Today’s passage from 1 Peter is about taking our bearings, stubbornly from on Christ being our cornerstone. A cornerstone is place with precision, exactly where it needs to be for the rest of the building to be built. The rest of the stones are placed according to their function, shape, purpose, gifts, skill, talent, in relation to the cornerstone. At Preschool Chapel, we walked around the outside of this building looking at the different kind of stones that were used. I pointed out the cornerstone, square stones, rectangle stones, Key stone, oddly shaped stones, diverse but fit together for strength, endurance, beauty and the worship of God. Like the people who make up the church, not all of the same, but diverse, built into something strong, beautiful enduring for the worship of God. Living stones build together to form a community as a church. We all have taken the story of Christ in our own way and have adapted this story into our story. We are our own adaptation of how we live the Gospel of Christ. We are not finished (vs.2) but continue to learn, to be transformed, changed, edited, purged, built up, evolved, aged, matured, refined and created into the likeness of Christ. We take our bearings stubbornly from the cornerstone of Jesus and are creative in finding ways to build upon it in the world. Built into a spiritual house (vs. 5) of God’s people, are built into the Realm of God. APPLICATION On Easter, Mary Magdalene looked for Jesus in the tomb, but it was empty. The angel told her he is risen and to look for him amongst the living. 1 Peter’s encouragement is to see the resurrected Jesus in the lives of those who are “Pa’akiki” in living their lives connected to Christ. Measured by the cornerstone of Christ what are our lives like when Christ is our point of reference? In the middle of the cull de sac where I live, was a brass bench mark with the elevation, longitude and latitude coordinates imprinted on it. Since then, it has stolen. From this point of reference, a surveyor could find the various property lines of my neighbors, so we can all live peaceably within our boundaries. Christ as the cornerstone is the bench mark, the reference point from which our lives take their bearings. This is where this passage gets exciting because who Christ is influences who we are. Our identity is found in Christ as our cornerstone. Our relationship with God through Christ enables us to be closer to God than a priest is. We are children of God. A priest articulates a prayer, a request, a devotion, for a person to God. But as a child of God, we can go to God directly as a child does a parent. We don’t come to God to ask for favors, but we go to God for well-being, for fellowship, for insight, for presence, for comfort, for direction, to be held in loving arms. We align ourselves with God in the way we live for God, for ourselves and with our neighbors. God dwells with us. The language in this text uses the phrase” spiritual house” and “Zion”. These are places where God dwells (vs.5&6). It is interesting to note that God dwells among us. Earlier this week I was listening to a pod cast from Regent College interviewing Dr. Carmen Joy Imes where she addressed the passage from Exodus “using God’s name in vain”. The familiar interpretation of this is passage is not to use God’s name as a swear word. But it is more than that. If so, that would be in the realm of oath taking or lying, but as she looked at the Hebrew, she says that this has more to do with bearing God’s name in vain, as a representative or ambassador to the other nations. She sees, God’s name as something we carry, bearing the weight of God’s name to other nations. This theme, of caring the weight of God’s name is projected all throughout the Bible, even in First Peter. The chosen race is a mixed; made up of people from all ancestries. We are a Royal Priesthood, adopted children of God, who talk directly to God as a child does to their parent. A called People Holy because of our understanding of God and as ambassadors inviting other nations to join in. A nation not based on race, or on borders, but on our relationship with Jesus as the cornerstone of God. A Holy nation made up of many citizens from many nations called to be a people and recipients of mercy. CONCLUSION Cornerstone, made me think of those who were stoneheaded. We can get that way about what we believe about God and what it means to be a Christian. We are Pa’akiki about our belief in Jesus, the love of God for us, forgiveness, grace and the resurrected Jesus. This cornerstone of our lives is the bench mark that calls us to worship, build communities, pray for others, engages with God, grow our theology, follow Christ’s example and love others. In this day and age, theologians are looking at familiar scriptures with new eyes and discovering different ways for us to understand what God is saying through them. Like in Exodus, it is more than swearing, but how we carry God’s name that can be in vain. Our stubbornness is to follow Christ. There are some things that we thought we knew that we have to let go of in order to more fully align with Jesus’ words and example. Relationships are an important part of Christ as our Cornerstone. The practices of reconciliation; listening, forgiveness, grace, patience, self-control, compassion and caring are how we bear the name of God for all the world to see. We are not perfect by any means, but we are examples of graciousness as we live together, built as living stones into a spiritual house. Our transformed lives that make up the church and are a sign of the resurrected Christ living amongst the cornerstone. SCRIPTURE:1 Peter 2:19-25
TEXT: 19b being aware of God, 21bbecause Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, 23che entrusted himself to the one who judges justly. THEME: The Resurrected Jesus is seen in the lives of those who suffer for Christ. INTRODUCTION In this season of Easter, we continue to look for the resurrected Jesus among the living. In the first part of chapter 1 of 1 Peter, we were encouraged to see the living hope of the resurrection of Jesus transform our lives through faith. We see such faith in those who pursue protections for our children, advocate for the rights of those who have been marginalized, point out the inequality of the poor, gender, race, orientation, age and sex. The resurrected Jesus is seen in the faith of those who push against every kind of prejudice that segregates, demeans or diminishes the humanity of anyone. In the second part of this same chapter, we invoke a loving parent God, instead of a judging Father God. God forgives, nurtures, and loves us. We form communities of faith with others, while looking for new ways of being the church in the future. The church of the future may be sent out to where the people are instead of drawing them to our buildings. SCRIPTURE On this Fourth Sunday of Easter, this portion of the second chapter of 1 Peter can be summed up with three points, 1) be aware of God, 2) Follow Jesus’ example and 3) Trust ourselves to God’s ways. The ransom for our salvation and reconciliation, provides love and forgiveness enough for us be in relationship with God. After all relationship with God is the goal of any kind of righteousness. God gifts us righteousness through love, forgiveness, and grace. Being loved profoundly brings our lives the possibility of a change of heart, transformation and change in our world. The humbug part of this relationship, is that its influence can get us in trouble with how the world has chosen to behave. God’s perspective changes the way we see the world and thus the way we live. Ironically, this may also lead to our own ridicule, persecution, and suffering, as we participate in God’s mission of loving others. Just as Jesus’ love for us ended with his Suffering and Crucifixion. The letter of 1 Peter was an encouragement within the social economic structure which allowed slavery. The poor, as well as the heads of household were all part of the church. So, what is good for the head of the household in Christ, was also good for the rest of the members of that house, including the slaves. This created a dynamic to faith in God that found its application in and outside of the home. APPLICATION Living according to God’s ways sometimes puts us at odds with the powers that be, the Government, the law, organized religion, the way things have come to be, social norms, culture, hostile working environments, any kind of accepted discriminations and the like. How do we see the resurrected Christ in the lives of those who suffer? We all have our ideas of a perfect life. But when that is taken away from us, for whatever reason, we grieve. God meets us in those time of sorrow. The sorrow never goes away but somehow with God’s help we navigate through it. Those strong individuals that keep on going while suffering inside, reveal the resurrected Christ to us. They persevere today because Christ is risen from the grave. There are champions of the Civil right movement like noted Martin Luther King Jr., recently we have heard the stories of Senator John Lewis and how his faith inspired him to engage in “Good Trouble” to whittle away at those systems that hoped to keep black people in a place less than free, equal, valued, or respected. We are not so far removed from this history. The Key Note speaker at one of our Aha Pae’ainas was Ambassador Andrew Young, contemporary of MLK jr. I got to shake his hand. It was like shaking hands with history. Making all of those stories of the peace walks and protest for equality true on another level. Here is the man who was there. I had the same feeling when Allan Boesak, from South Africa, spoke at Keawalai in Makena, about anti-apartheid. He said oppressors had seen the wounds they were inflicted onto another human being for them to change. Sometimes it takes that kind of suffering for the light bulb to turn on and allow transformation of humanity and the divine to enter in. Archbishop Desmond Tutu told the story of a woman, where he said, “you are a God carrier’, another way of saying, you are made in the image of God. To someone who has been put down all of their lives, and to hear fresh, the word of God, is to be elevated with the truth of how special she is. All of these people have suffered, and suffer today because they love, have been loved by God, and suffered for others in their plight. Humans in general, like ‘the path of least resistance,’ where everything is as easy as it can be (for themselves, even if it means that they have to disrespect and disregard others). They are trying to escape all of the bad stuff, leaving it for someone else to deal with. The reality God gives to us is the path of peace, which will divide families, and set our hearts on fire to fight for causes that are not our own, we enlisted because of our love and compassion for others. Mother Teresa gave up her comfort, in service of her God, to care for those who no one wanted to care for. The resurrection of Christ is real because of people like these, because of people like us, because of people like you. I know some of the stories you carry, that you don’t tell others. Stories of struggle, suffering, shattered dreams, and depression, but you continue to live your lives humbly with God. God is there to help you, and lifts you up, encourages you, loves you and gives you hope for tomorrow. Christ in you, even while you are struggling, is the evidence of the resurrected Jesus among the living. CONCLUSION The evidence of the resurrected Jesus is not found among the tombs of a cemetery, but in the suffering faith of those who are living today. It would be so easy to give up or go another way, but we hold on to Jesus, the lover of our souls and press on. Christ risen from the grave is the reason they keep on keeping on. Christ is risen from the grave is the reason they endure and persevere, and hope for the future. Jesus Christ is resurrected, is their battle cry for truth, for others, for life. Our lives of faith are not void of suffering for what is right, to help others, to endure and be there for others. American Popular Christianity tells a different story of prosperity and ease, but more to the truth, is an empowering God who comes along side of us in our suffering and calls us to participate in work that will go against how to world has been, to become made more in line with the dream of God’s kingdom. |
Pastor robbSermons Archives
May 2024
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