So…
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Sometimes, as followers of Jesus, we are invited to step out of our comfort zones.
Of course, we like our cocoons. They are warm and safe. Well, at least they are safe from the possible threats we can’t see. But they also blind us to the possibilities of meeting new friends, doing things that are way beyond our comfort zones but might turn out to be really amazing, and …
They make it impossible to unfold our wings and become the amazing butterflies, the amazing spirit filled people God intends us to be.
I want you to think for a moment, what is one thing you would do if you weren’t hiding in that cocoon you have built for yourself? What is it we as a church could do, if we weren’t hiding in the cocoon we all gather in?
Now turn to your neighbor in the pew and tell them something you would love to do, or that you think the church could do, if we were not hiding from God’s spirit.
Some of you are a bit quiet! Perhaps the spirit hasn’t spoken to you yet? Or more likely, you are still doing your best to hide!
This week Sue took our neighbor and her three girls down to High Point State park to try both kayaking and paddle boarding.
One of the great gifts of being a kid is sometimes you have no idea what you should be afraid of, so you will try anything. And sometimes succeed, and sometimes fall off the board, but as many of us have discovered, falling off a paddle board at 6 or 9 or 12, is a lot easier than at 62.
So, one of the secrets of life, God’s life in you, the presence of God’s Holy Spirit, is to say yes to all of those “out of Cocoon” experiences early and often!
Because sometimes in life we get so cocooned up that we wouldn’t, couldn’t ever do what some others of our friends are doing with regularity for God’s kingdom.
Going to North Carolina to rehab houses of complete strangers. Going and finding Jen D’Esposito and saying yes to helping with the EMPOWERkids program or the new Youth program Jen and some others are dreaming up that will start January 1.
We have a friend at Loon Lake we just love. Odette is in her 80’s and she and her husband Gene live fulltime on the Lake. Gene was an architect and Odette was a supervising nurse of a Long Island operating room.
They are both smart, gracious and wonderfully funny. But Odette in particular is just a cocoon waiting to unravel!
Because she has decided she never wants to get Alzheimer’s disease, and so, she has decided to take all kinds of “out of the cocoon” classes and remain a butterfly.
First, she decided to learn Spanish – in her 80’s. Okay. Then, she decided that because she is a lefty and learned to knit as a lefty, that she should now learn to knit as a righty!
Who does that! I mean really! You know who does that – butterflies.
They come out of the cocoon and discover a whole new life that has amazing possibilities, including being able to fly.
BTW, I have this crazy idea for our children’s and youth programs. You’d never know it, but I have ideas! I know I come across as a mild-mannered preacher, but underneath, wild and crazy lives. And you should see my wings!
I have this idea, stolen fair and square from my crazy friend Rich Hong, of building the morning worship spot for EMPOWERkids program into a set that has, among other things, two towers made of furnace filters and carefully taped together for structural integrity, with multi LED par cans at the bottom’s shining up, ready to dance with multi colored light as the worship music blares during the EMPOWERkids opening.
Take that, you coffee swilling Café lovers!
And when on those Sunday’s at 9:30am, when the EMPOWERkids worship is upstairs, I would like the towers up here! Just saying. I actually like to dance. I dance badly, but the spirit don’t care!!!
Now, to be clear, I may be a butterfly, but anyone who knows me knows that a builder I am not, so which one of you is God calling out of your cocoon?
Peter was in a cocoon of a sort, although Jesus had made it clear that cocoons were, wel,l passé. They were nothing more than a temporary place of transformation. And the Holy Spirit had really made a mess of the cocoon, because joy, and power, and love and transformation were regularly blowing holes in them left and right.
But like some of us, even though we are really butterflies at heart, we do like to crawl back into the assumed safety of the chrysalis.
“Why”, Peter asks, “did you send for me”?
Peter, one of the great heroes of the New Testament, one of the great disciples and apostles, was still struggling, it seems to me, with what the Holy Spirit was doing, to all kinds of people, heretics like Samaritans, and proselytes like the Ethiopian, and even official persecutors like Saul.
But this, this was a step into territory even Peter was at a loss to understand, a Gentile and a Roman army centurion, a leader of the official occupation army in Israel.
Peter was being asked to do what no good Kosher man would do, go into a Gentiles house and sit and listen to his story. It was scary. It was dangerous. But it was also a moment where a butterfly filled with God’s spirit was needed.
Peter went in. Peter listened. Then Peter told the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection. And then…
Well, listen to what it says in Acts 10:44-48.
“While Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit took control of everyone who was listening. Some Jewish followers of the Lord had come with Peter, and they were surprised that the Holy Spirit had been given to Gentiles. Now they were hearing Gentiles speaking unknown languages and praising God.
“Peter said, “These Gentiles have been given the Holy Spirit, just as we have! I am certain that no one would dare stop us from baptizing them.”
Peter ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, and they asked him to stay on for a few days.”
So…
Sometimes God asks us to step up and out of our cocoons, so God can use us as the Spirit filled disciples he has made us, butterflies if you will, ready to make new friends and new disciples in all kinds of crazy places.
But only if you are willing!
Are you willing?
Amen!
Tuesday, August 27, 2019
Friday, August 23, 2019
Sermon from August 18
So…
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Lots of us, as I said last week, are willing to listen to God and to consider God’s claims on us. But we aren’t always willing, like Ananias, to get up and go and do and make a difference!
Not all of us are willing to go to Namibia and start an elephant proof garden. Or to New Bern North Carolina to rehab houses. Or go to Purdue for the Triennium with a bunch of crazy teenagers.
For some of us, even just making up bags of food for our local food scare families with our Deacons seems a step to far.
Our willingness is weak, partly, because while the Holy Spirit in us is willing, we are holding back.
Unlike Philip, the Deacon, who showed us two weeks ago how to get up and go and share your faith with even folks like the heretic Samaritans and then last week how to run a marathon while sharing your faith with an Ethiopian.
Now, like I said the challenges can be easier and harder. Teaching a group of kids in the EMPOWERkids Sunday morning program, isn’t too scarey, or shepherding around a group of teens to a corn maze and pumpkin picking? Really, that is pretty safe stuff.
But how about sharing your faith with a guy who has come to your city to hunt you down and take you to court, have you tried by the Sanhedrian, and possibly executed for believing that Jesus is the Messiah!
That’s why Ananias is a fascinating example of a true disciple.
Note, he isn’t flashy. He doesn’t appear in the gospel stories before this incident and never appears in the scripture story again. He is there just to do what God has asked him to do at that moment in time! Kairos, that sacred moment.
It has got to make you wonder, what is it that God is asking you to do?
What is it that you have been being prepared for that God is asking you to get up and go and do and make a difference?
It is easy, really easy to just do what you have always been doing. It is easy to not rock the boat of our simple faith. It would be just crazy to jump in and do the next hard thing God is calling us to do, because what if it stretches and grows your faith? Stretching hurts!
Recently I have been to see a Physical Therapist because my back was hurting.
When I bent over my back would catch and I would get this fiery sensation across my backside down the back of my leg and calf and leave me with tingling in my foot for maybe 15 minutes or more after I straightened up.
So the PT and the PT Assistant both made me stretch in directions that quite frankly hurt! Now, I realize that stretching is for my own good, but there is this deep-down human cry that comes into my brain that says if stretching hurts I shouldn’t do it.
But stretching has the power to relieve hurts. It untightens muscles and make flexible what wasn’t flexible. New freedom of motion follows and the possibility of new growth, and even relief from the pinching pain that debilitated.
But the only way there is to stretch and to hurt what hadn’t been stretched in a long time.
And as a somewhat unwilling participant, I might have been not working very hard on it! So Shannon the PT assistant reminded me of the PT motto, “feel free to hurt yourself so I don’t have to hurt you!” Okey dokey!
Stretch! Work harder! Go the extra mile so that you can grow, even if that means doing what is really hard! Even if that means going to see Saul.
Don’t be that comfortable disciple! Be like Ananias! Stretch! 😉
Ananias, is to talk with and care for Saul, a well-known agent for those who would persecute the church, of whom Ananias says, “Lord, a lot of people have told me about the terrible things this man has done to your followers in Jerusalem! Now the chief priests have given him the power to come here and arrest anyone who worships in your name.”
To which God replies, “Go!”
Don’t be that comfortable disciple! Be like Ananias!
Go and take the good news of Jesus to this man who has persecuted other disciples just like you, and help him as he struggles with his new found understanding of who Jesus is.
Stretching your faith is essential to having faith. Use it or lose it may not be completely accurate, but its close enough. You can forget how to ride a bicycle, and when you get on one after lots and lots of years, you can crash and need 10 stitches. Just ask Deb O’Connell.
Use your faith, stretch your faith, put it to work on a new adventure. Listen to the Spirit when it invites you to step out and step it up. Teach, lead, help, support, go, do, and be like Ananias.
Because, sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning. Like Ananias. Like you!
Are you willing?
Amen.
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Lots of us, as I said last week, are willing to listen to God and to consider God’s claims on us. But we aren’t always willing, like Ananias, to get up and go and do and make a difference!
Not all of us are willing to go to Namibia and start an elephant proof garden. Or to New Bern North Carolina to rehab houses. Or go to Purdue for the Triennium with a bunch of crazy teenagers.
For some of us, even just making up bags of food for our local food scare families with our Deacons seems a step to far.
Our willingness is weak, partly, because while the Holy Spirit in us is willing, we are holding back.
Unlike Philip, the Deacon, who showed us two weeks ago how to get up and go and share your faith with even folks like the heretic Samaritans and then last week how to run a marathon while sharing your faith with an Ethiopian.
Now, like I said the challenges can be easier and harder. Teaching a group of kids in the EMPOWERkids Sunday morning program, isn’t too scarey, or shepherding around a group of teens to a corn maze and pumpkin picking? Really, that is pretty safe stuff.
But how about sharing your faith with a guy who has come to your city to hunt you down and take you to court, have you tried by the Sanhedrian, and possibly executed for believing that Jesus is the Messiah!
That’s why Ananias is a fascinating example of a true disciple.
Note, he isn’t flashy. He doesn’t appear in the gospel stories before this incident and never appears in the scripture story again. He is there just to do what God has asked him to do at that moment in time! Kairos, that sacred moment.
It has got to make you wonder, what is it that God is asking you to do?
What is it that you have been being prepared for that God is asking you to get up and go and do and make a difference?
It is easy, really easy to just do what you have always been doing. It is easy to not rock the boat of our simple faith. It would be just crazy to jump in and do the next hard thing God is calling us to do, because what if it stretches and grows your faith? Stretching hurts!
Recently I have been to see a Physical Therapist because my back was hurting.
When I bent over my back would catch and I would get this fiery sensation across my backside down the back of my leg and calf and leave me with tingling in my foot for maybe 15 minutes or more after I straightened up.
So the PT and the PT Assistant both made me stretch in directions that quite frankly hurt! Now, I realize that stretching is for my own good, but there is this deep-down human cry that comes into my brain that says if stretching hurts I shouldn’t do it.
But stretching has the power to relieve hurts. It untightens muscles and make flexible what wasn’t flexible. New freedom of motion follows and the possibility of new growth, and even relief from the pinching pain that debilitated.
But the only way there is to stretch and to hurt what hadn’t been stretched in a long time.
And as a somewhat unwilling participant, I might have been not working very hard on it! So Shannon the PT assistant reminded me of the PT motto, “feel free to hurt yourself so I don’t have to hurt you!” Okey dokey!
Stretch! Work harder! Go the extra mile so that you can grow, even if that means doing what is really hard! Even if that means going to see Saul.
Don’t be that comfortable disciple! Be like Ananias! Stretch! 😉
Ananias, is to talk with and care for Saul, a well-known agent for those who would persecute the church, of whom Ananias says, “Lord, a lot of people have told me about the terrible things this man has done to your followers in Jerusalem! Now the chief priests have given him the power to come here and arrest anyone who worships in your name.”
To which God replies, “Go!”
Don’t be that comfortable disciple! Be like Ananias!
Go and take the good news of Jesus to this man who has persecuted other disciples just like you, and help him as he struggles with his new found understanding of who Jesus is.
Stretching your faith is essential to having faith. Use it or lose it may not be completely accurate, but its close enough. You can forget how to ride a bicycle, and when you get on one after lots and lots of years, you can crash and need 10 stitches. Just ask Deb O’Connell.
Use your faith, stretch your faith, put it to work on a new adventure. Listen to the Spirit when it invites you to step out and step it up. Teach, lead, help, support, go, do, and be like Ananias.
Because, sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning. Like Ananias. Like you!
Are you willing?
Amen.
Tuesday, August 13, 2019
Sermon from August 11 from Acts 8:26-40
So…
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Lots of us are willing to listen to God and to consider God’s claims on us. But are we willing, like Philip, to get up and go and do and make a difference?
Philip, you may remember was a Deacon, a Deacon who believed that all believers need to get busy sharing the good news with everyone. Not a real surprise, because our Deacons, at least, are crazy!
You may have heard we have a food pantry. And in the last two weeks our Deacons have purchased and moved 83 cases of food into our basement for folks who need food help, for a total cost of $166. They get stuff done, in Jesus’ name!
So, it should come as no surprise that a Deacon, Philip is doing it again!
Last week Philip was with Samaritans, the heretics who had rejected traditional Judaism, at the time of the split between the Northern and Southern Kingdoms of Israel. They, the Northern Kingdom, had created their own nation and their own version of Judaism and a separate capital city called Samaria.
They were roundly despised by traditional Jews, but Philip didn’t care.
He knew that the gospel was to be preached to everyone everywhere, and even though Samaritans were not welcome at the banquet tables of traditional Jews, they were welcome at the banquet feast of the lamb slain, Jesus.
Jesus had told his disciples, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And he said, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
So, that’s what Philip was doing! How about you?
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Philip then found himself in the desert. Not sure how that works, but there he was and there he hears a man reading from the Old Testament.
When was the last time that happened to you?
Keep in mind, regular folks in Philip’s day did not ride in chariots. This guy wasn’t driving the horses. He was sitting & reading. So, big chariot.
And that meant he was somebody big, important and powerful. And it was clear, God had prepared him and Philip for a conversation.
This is kind of like taking a stroll over to Micks’ Market to get Jeff a bacon, egg, and cheese on a hard roll, no salt, pepper or ketchup (just saying) and finding yourself standing in line next to, I don’t know, a huge celebrity, just as they just happen to say, “I wonder why a church would use the hasktags #tiedyechurch #comesharemypew #noruleschurch.
What would you do?
I hope you’d say, well…
“That’s my church, and I would love to tell you why!”
Of course, there are few things that make this man in the chariot a bigger deal. One, Philip had to run alongside a chariot to keep up, and two, he had to assume that this was a new potential disciple of Jesus, riding in a chariot.
Did you notice that the guy in the chariot doesn’t have a name? We assume that’s to make sure you notice three other things about him, that he was African, that he was a eunuch, and that he was reading a scroll of Isaiah that he had in his possession.
So, in reverse order, note this. God was already at work in this man’s heart. This man wasn’t carrying that scroll and reading it out loud for no reason. He was being moved by the Holy Spirit, just like Philip for this meeting and it’s outcome!
No matter where you go, no matter who you meet, as a disciple of Jesus, you must assume that God is already at work in the hearts and minds of our new acquaintances!
We do not meet people by accident. We meet people, new as well as old friends, by God’s doing. So, be prepared!
Two, he was a eunuch. In general, eunuchs were castrated males by intention or accident, who were often given responsibility to do intimate and extremely high-level work with females because there was no danger of impregnation. It is what it is!
And this man, we are told, was an ambassador for Queen Candace of Ethiopia. He had been in Jerusalem, possibly on a diplomatic mission. He was a top shelf diplomat, possibly someone interested in following Judaism, but because he was a eunuch, unable to participate in the Temple rituals, and to gain full acceptance as an Israelite.
But all that made no difference to Philip! Because he knew it made no difference to Jesus!
The Messiah had gathered with tax collectors and prostitutes, and fishermen, and shepherds, Gentiles, and Samaritans, and saw only their heart’s relationship to God.
Which is why his nationality, Ethiopian, and color, black, didn’t matter either.
Philip knew that what God loved was a heart open to God’s love, a life ready to be lived to make a difference, and transformed mind that rather than thinking about why God shouldn’t love someone else, marvels instead that God loves them, and that God has asked them to love others.
Philip climbed up into the chariot, one very big chariot, and shared with the Ethiopian the good news about Jesus, about Jesus fulfilling Isaiah’s prophesy, and told the Ethiopian that if he wanted to be a disciple, he was in.
And so, somewhere in the desert between Jerusalem and Ethiopia another outsider was invited inside through the waters of baptism!
In those waters, he become family!
Because…
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Amen.
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Lots of us are willing to listen to God and to consider God’s claims on us. But are we willing, like Philip, to get up and go and do and make a difference?
Philip, you may remember was a Deacon, a Deacon who believed that all believers need to get busy sharing the good news with everyone. Not a real surprise, because our Deacons, at least, are crazy!
You may have heard we have a food pantry. And in the last two weeks our Deacons have purchased and moved 83 cases of food into our basement for folks who need food help, for a total cost of $166. They get stuff done, in Jesus’ name!
So, it should come as no surprise that a Deacon, Philip is doing it again!
Last week Philip was with Samaritans, the heretics who had rejected traditional Judaism, at the time of the split between the Northern and Southern Kingdoms of Israel. They, the Northern Kingdom, had created their own nation and their own version of Judaism and a separate capital city called Samaria.
They were roundly despised by traditional Jews, but Philip didn’t care.
He knew that the gospel was to be preached to everyone everywhere, and even though Samaritans were not welcome at the banquet tables of traditional Jews, they were welcome at the banquet feast of the lamb slain, Jesus.
Jesus had told his disciples, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And he said, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
So, that’s what Philip was doing! How about you?
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Philip then found himself in the desert. Not sure how that works, but there he was and there he hears a man reading from the Old Testament.
When was the last time that happened to you?
Keep in mind, regular folks in Philip’s day did not ride in chariots. This guy wasn’t driving the horses. He was sitting & reading. So, big chariot.
And that meant he was somebody big, important and powerful. And it was clear, God had prepared him and Philip for a conversation.
This is kind of like taking a stroll over to Micks’ Market to get Jeff a bacon, egg, and cheese on a hard roll, no salt, pepper or ketchup (just saying) and finding yourself standing in line next to, I don’t know, a huge celebrity, just as they just happen to say, “I wonder why a church would use the hasktags #tiedyechurch #comesharemypew #noruleschurch.
What would you do?
I hope you’d say, well…
“That’s my church, and I would love to tell you why!”
Of course, there are few things that make this man in the chariot a bigger deal. One, Philip had to run alongside a chariot to keep up, and two, he had to assume that this was a new potential disciple of Jesus, riding in a chariot.
Did you notice that the guy in the chariot doesn’t have a name? We assume that’s to make sure you notice three other things about him, that he was African, that he was a eunuch, and that he was reading a scroll of Isaiah that he had in his possession.
So, in reverse order, note this. God was already at work in this man’s heart. This man wasn’t carrying that scroll and reading it out loud for no reason. He was being moved by the Holy Spirit, just like Philip for this meeting and it’s outcome!
No matter where you go, no matter who you meet, as a disciple of Jesus, you must assume that God is already at work in the hearts and minds of our new acquaintances!
We do not meet people by accident. We meet people, new as well as old friends, by God’s doing. So, be prepared!
Two, he was a eunuch. In general, eunuchs were castrated males by intention or accident, who were often given responsibility to do intimate and extremely high-level work with females because there was no danger of impregnation. It is what it is!
And this man, we are told, was an ambassador for Queen Candace of Ethiopia. He had been in Jerusalem, possibly on a diplomatic mission. He was a top shelf diplomat, possibly someone interested in following Judaism, but because he was a eunuch, unable to participate in the Temple rituals, and to gain full acceptance as an Israelite.
But all that made no difference to Philip! Because he knew it made no difference to Jesus!
The Messiah had gathered with tax collectors and prostitutes, and fishermen, and shepherds, Gentiles, and Samaritans, and saw only their heart’s relationship to God.
Which is why his nationality, Ethiopian, and color, black, didn’t matter either.
Philip knew that what God loved was a heart open to God’s love, a life ready to be lived to make a difference, and transformed mind that rather than thinking about why God shouldn’t love someone else, marvels instead that God loves them, and that God has asked them to love others.
Philip climbed up into the chariot, one very big chariot, and shared with the Ethiopian the good news about Jesus, about Jesus fulfilling Isaiah’s prophesy, and told the Ethiopian that if he wanted to be a disciple, he was in.
And so, somewhere in the desert between Jerusalem and Ethiopia another outsider was invited inside through the waters of baptism!
In those waters, he become family!
Because…
Sometimes God can use what looks to us to be a disaster, as a new beginning. Amazingly, God uses willing disciples to make that beginning.
Are you willing?
Amen.
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