A Place for Everyone

Chocolate is Missing

For all who exalt themselves

will be humbled,

and those who humble

themselves will be exalted.”

(from Luke 14:1,7-14)

Leave it to Jesus to turn things upside down. 

In this story, Jesus is encouraging low-status believers who are trying to negotiate their way through the complicated, oppressive Roman society.

There was a place for everyone, but everyone had to know their place.

Jesus, to help people understand what living in God's kingdom was like, often used the image of feasting. 

In God's kingdom, all are welcome no matter what your social or economic status is in society.

Jesus teaches how important humility is because practicing it points to God's mighty grace. 

It works like this.

One of the first places you can find me after worship is the refreshment table spread with all sorts of goodies.

First, I scan the table for Chocolate.

You may not call this table a feast, but I assure you there are all sorts of items on it. 

We've had French Toast with sausage links and syrup, or someone's special pie, or overbaked cookies, or donated Oreos, or quiche.

This is what God's kingdom is like, since person's social or economic status doesn't matter, everyone is welcome at the table.

All one needs to do is make choices and join the folks sitting together talking about their lives, society, or the world conditions.

This is fine for Sunday when hospitality is an expectation and a norm.

But the real test of our hospitality is practicing it on Wednesday in Walmart when no one is watching.

As Spirit-filled people of God we are different from the world because of our testimony.  

It’s how we handle life that shows the world what the God's Kingdom is like.

Freed from Ailments

When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said,

 “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” 

When he laid his hands on her, 

immediately she stood up straight

 and began praising God.

(from Luke 13:10-17)

Currently there are a lot of news reports about the law describing various actions, opinions, and projections about what will be the next event. 

Each report about the law seems to be based on a right/wrong principle without any middle ground for discussion.

This scripture from Luke got my attention with the phrase "free from your ailment".

It got my attention because I see the tensions in the news reports as an ailment from which our society needs to be freed.

Consider the woman for a moment. 

For eighteen years, she has viewed the world from waist level, she hasn’t been able to look anyone in the eye for a long time.

Probably, she is a faithful, law-abiding member of this synagogue since she’s there worshipping on Saturday, even with the effort it took attend.

Jesus sees her, stops teaching, calls her to him, tells her she is free from her ailment, and touches her.

She stands up straight praising God.

The well-intended synagogue leader reminds Jesus the healing could be breaking God's law.

Jesus points out that, in this instance, freeing the woman from her aliment takes priority over the law.

While I think God's kingdom may come before the news reports of freedom from our world's ailments, I am confident there is healing taking place.

I am confident of the aliments being healed because I see it every Sunday.

Folks arrive at church needing to be freed from all kinds of ailments weighing down their souls.

People with vastly different points of view, enter the church, and giving Grace priority, worship together.

Jesus touches our lives through singing, prayer, hearing the Word, and breaking bread at the Lord's table.

Because Jesus touches our lives, we stand up straight praising God.

Keep Your Eyes on Jesus

Looking to Jesus

"Let us run with perseverance 

the race that is set before us,

looking to Jesus 

the pioneer and perfecter of our faith"

(From Heb. 11:29-12-2 )

Helen H. Lemmel wrote this song while experiencing trying times in her life, one being blindness.

"Turn your eyes upon Jesus", one of my favorite gospel hymns, begins like this:

"O soul, are you weary and troubled?

No light in the darkness you see?

There’s light for a look at the Savior,

And life more abundant and free!

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,

Look full in His wonderful face,

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim."

At 55, Helen heard an impressive statement: "So then, turn your eyes upon Him, look full into His face and you will see that the things of earth will acquire a strange new dimness."

One biographer wrote that she said “I stood still and singing in my soul and spirit was the chorus, with not one conscious moment of putting word to word to make rhyme, or note to note to make melody." The verses were written the same week dictated by the Holy Spirit.

In other words, her eyesight was failing, but she saw Jesus in her singing.

One of my core convictions is that singing is the voice of a soul-conversation with God expressing our deepest needs and greatest joys. 

When we need perseverance because we're just hanging on, a song is a soul-conversation with God sharing the hope of enduring the race. 

To celebrate God's presence in our faith journey, a song of praise lets God know our deepest gratitude.

And certainly, being surrounded by a cloud of witnesses singing in a congregation on Sunday, is expressing hope in God's vision of a new creation.

So with them, we join Jesus, pioneer of our faith, with all the voices that have gone before and the voices yet to come singing of that hope in Jesus and God's new creation.

Fear Not

My Preaching Bible

“Do not be afraid, little flock,

 for it is your Father’s good pleasure

 to give you the kingdom."

"For where your treasure is,

there your heart will be also."

(from Luke 12:32-40)

Don't be afraid?

Looking around I see plenty to fear as violence erupts in our everyday lives, society, and the world. 

I see fear on the faces of children running from a school shooting and someone with a military rifle shooting into a crowded concert.

I've encountered the violence of racism, dealt with domestic and sexual abuse both physically and psychologically.

This hardly looks to me like the kingdom of peace God desires or promises. 

I know, Jesus' followers feared plenty from persecution by Roman authorities: destroying property, inciting hatred, imprisonment, to name a few.

I know, Jesus tells his "little flock" not to fear because God will be delighted in giving them the kingdom.

Sell your stuff, Jesus says, pack your bags, light your lamp, stay alert, the Master will invite you his table when he arrives.

In other words, be ready for God's call to Gospel action.

For me, my Preaching Bible is the spark lighting my lamp and counseling me to stay alert for God's call to Gospel action.

Jesus' stories, teachings, and life help me see Gospel action opportunities and increase my energy to act through healing, justice, love, grace, peace, etc.

Gospel action is courageously bringing our fears from our own experiences to Jesus knowing God will give you the peace of the kingdom you need.

I can assure you from my own experience, God is present receiving your fears then giving you your needed gifts for peace.

Listen Up People!

"Hear this, all you peoples;

give ear, all inhabitants of the world,

both low and high, rich and poor together.

My mouth shall speak wisdom;

the meditation of my heart

 shall be understanding."

(from Psalm 94:1-12)

One the many blessings of my Vermont ministry was a burial in Hope Cemetery, created around 1895, one of the most beautiful rural cemeteries in the world.

The 1918–1919 Spanish flu, along with Gray Lung, a form of Silicosis, increased the death rate and need for tombstones.

Realizing death could be right around the corner, many sculptors created a monument to display their skills. 

In other nearby cemeteries, I would gather with the family around a grave with only a temporary marker or a small stone with a family name and date.

The contrast was significant. 

Whether beautiful monument or simple stone, the "low and high, rich and poor together" were gathered in grief and mourning.

And so, God calls all  people to give ear, to listen to wisdom and understanding.

 

Listen, then, to Jesus' parable.

Jesus' parable of the rich fool teaches that secured life does not depend on possessions, but on trusting our life to God.

Jesus is saying the rich fool lost his soul to gain earthly possessions that will not benefit him in the afterlife.

The wise person is the one who is “rich toward God,” which means generous towards others in need.

Greed is the moral opposite of generosity. 

We worry about the future instead of trusting God, who holds the future. 

Greed destroys us, but generosity blesses us. 

Greed destroys as the rise of gas prices and inflation resulting from greed and unfaithful stewardship show as companies jack up prices more than necessary to gain unethical profit. 

This psalm and Jesus' teaching invites us to reflect on what we do with our possessions, which are God's gifts.