22 September 2013 “A New Way of Life” Luke 16:1-13

 I know you have heard this, but I love to tell these stories.  

 Three contractors were touring the White House the same day, one from New York, another from Missouri, and a third from Florida. At the end of the tour, the guide asked them if they would like to bid on a project at the White House. “Of course, they replied in unison.”

 “We need one of the rear fences redone,” said the guide. “Why don’t the three of you each look at it and give me a bid.”

 The contractor from Florida got out his tape measure and pencil, and after examining the project said he could do it for $900. “That’s $400 in materials, $400 for my crew, and $100 profit for me.”

 The contractor from Missouri took the tape measure, pulled out a pad and pencil and came up with a $700 bid. “That’s $300 in materials, $300 for my crew, and a $100 profit for me.”

  Without hesitation, the New York contractor said, “I’ll do the job for $2,700.” “$2,700” exclaimed the guide. “You hardly even looked at the fence. How did you come up with that figure?”

 “It’s easy,” said the New York contractor. “$1,000 for me, $1,000 for you, and we hire the guy from Missouri to do the work.”

 The contractor from New York was shrewd, to use Luke’s terminology. Like him, Luke’s manager has what some would call astute business sense. He does not hesitate to devise a shrewd plan to save his future.  Unemotionally, yet rationally, he knows he is guilty. He squandered the rich man’s property. So he devises a quick plan to regain his place in the world and it seems to work

 I once applied for a job I did not really want. I applied to protect the status quo from another applicant I knew all too well. I felt that person did not have the right sensitivity for the position. The person was known to have a heavy hand and I felt the position needed a different approach.  Can you tell we did not always get along?

 As you might expect, I did not get the job. The person hired, that other person, was the better person given the changing make-up of the work place. We did not always agree on strategies after that, but we did manage to be civil and actually developed a new level of appreciation for one another.

 My relationship with that person soon became more important than my perceived effects on the workplace.  A similar importance is at work in this morning’s parable.

  Faced with the possibility of losing his position, the manager knew he needed a plan to secure his future. He had an immediate instinct to mobilize his resources, to recruit his master’s debtors who might eventually become his only friends.

 He enlisted them by drastically reducing their debt, thereby rallying them to a broader common good. His, theirs, and eventually, the rich mans.

 If we misinterpret Luke’s parable we may think Jesus is telling us that we should become worldly schemers. That is not the case. Jesus wants his disciples to look ahead, to mobilize our greatest resource and restore the one relationship that will make a difference in our lives, our relationship with God. That relationship is what is most important in our lives.

 Admittedly, our relationship with God is at times tattered and at times aloof. We have been entrusted with a great deal of responsibility as a disciple of Jesus Christ. We are to be faithful and obedient. We are to work for peace and justice. We are to feed the hungry and not judge our enemies.

 But, we have also received a lot. We have unearned blessings. We have grace from God. We have hope beyond ourselves. We have many gifts from God. Yet, we often mismanage them.

 In our mismanagement, God judges us. In that judgment we discover our shortcomings and, most distressingly, we feel God’s disappointment. We have separated ourselves from God by our thought or deed. We have been blinded by our own prejudices for the ways we think others should be and we have not seen them as children of God. We have judged others by our own set of rules.

 Despite our weakest selves, Jesus offers us hope. Again and again, Jesus offers us hope in his generous charity. For in Jesus Christ it is never too late for healing, for restoration.

 Restoration, we read in Luke’s gospel, is not only possible for us, it is highly probable. Rallying our resources is the key.

Perhaps before we even know we are hanging out too far and living our life away from God, God is mobilizing God’s eternal hope for us. God’s greatest resource for this mobilization to hope is his son Jesus Christ.

 Our greatest act of faith is to rally with Jesus to create a life rich in relationship with God and with one another in our world here on this little corner we call Genesis Presbyterian Church.

 In God’s goodness and grace, God has never stopped providing for us. We know that. God sent his son. Jesus came freely to restore our broken relationship. God’s grace makes us right with God. And through the faith we have, given to us by God’s love, we are made right with God.

  Neither the rich man nor Jesus is praising the manager for being a crook or a shady dealer. No, they praise him for his shrewdness, for the fact that he looks ahead and restores relationships for a future life.

 There is a call here for us to be at the labor of mobilizing our resources for faithful living. It is a call for us to know, at our core, what we need to do with our future. The future for our lives, our families, and this church. It is a call to rally those gifts, those resources, those passions for service God has given us that in our decision making we might above all else glorify God.

 Our manager this morning was preparing for his future, his life after. At some point we too see the need to prepare for our future, our life after. How might we begin that preparation? How are we to get ready for the future? The one that begins tomorrow and the one that never ends.

 Perhaps the familiar story of a fellow named Bob will help.

 Bob heard of a man who lost his job suddenly and unfairly. He and his wife began to pray for the man.

 One night Bob woke unable to sleep. A thought kept going through his mind: Give this man 10% of your wages. When Bob told his wife about his thought, they prayed about it and in the end decided that was what God wanted them to do.

 So Bob went to the unemployed man’s house and told him: “You do not know me, but God knows us both. This will seem weird to you, but here is a check for 10% of my wages. I will send you a check each payday for this same 10% until you find work again.”

 Many feel we are like Bob. Here at Genesis Presbyterian Church we serve those who struggled to find a safe place to worship, or have school, or practice for musicals. Many feel our mission and ministry as God’s church has come to life in our service to these people we may not know.

 Can we continue to give such a benevolent gift to them and to God? Can we continue to find a percentage of ourselves, from the places we are most protective, and give it to God?

 Most likely it is that percentage we hold on to in any relationship that keeps us from exposing too much love. Too much love that, if not held back, will make us vulnerable to being hurt deeply.

  We know Jesus did not hold back his love for others or his desire for a servant relationship and we know how deeply he was hurt. But, he lived his father’s will, not his own, and he lived to rejoice in heaven for such a life.

 This morning, God is waiting to hear our plan. Our plan for the future of our life here as God’ church. Our plan to continue God’s mission and ministry of serving those whom God brings to our campus. Our plan as we ask ourselves if we are truly doing all we can to serve all we can. God is waiting to hear our plan; our plan and God’s plan in one enduring relationship.

   Time and faith and our trust in God will tell, of course. For whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much. 

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.  

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15 September 2013 “Being Found” Luke 15:1-10

 We have all lived through it. We have struggled and worried and paced throughout the house. Where did I leave my glasses? Where did I have my purse? I have lost it. I cannot find it.

 In a favorite comic strip we have on our refrigerator, dad is looking for those lost glasses and he has several pair pushed back on his head. Mom is looking for that lost purse and it is there on her arm. The son proclaims, “you could not write stuff this weird.”  Yet, somehow, we live through it.

 We have also lived through another summer. We have struggled and worried and paced throughout the house. Where is our rain? Where are our cool days and nights? We have lost our rain forever. We cannot find a cool place to catch our breath from the heat.

 Then, they came. The rains! They found us mercifully just in time. And the mornings, they are a bit cooler with the wind seeming to come from the north. This is merciful news. But we want more. We want to know; now what? The drought is still around us. It is still 100 degrees some days. Now what?

  Our “now what” question seems to be the lingering truth we struggle with. When times are lean we ask, now what. When times are fat we ask, now what. I suppose we are seldom happy.

 This morning we heard the familiar stories of the lost sheep and a lost coin. Their owners knew what to do about their “now what” question just as surely as we do. When we feel lost or have lost something of value we do what Jesus said we should do. We “go after” that which is lost.

  It is as if we have a built in universal response for caring for what we consider to be of value. We desire it, we cherish it, we take care of it and when it needs us we fix it, or we replace it. If it is lost, why, we look for it with an energy from deep within, especially where our faith, our values, our resources, or our loved ones are concerned. We go after our things.

 From Jeremiah we read God was not happy with the chosen folk. God was not pleased with the Israelites. They were being foolish again. They were acting like immature children with no understanding. They were showing the world their skill in doing evil.

 The earth was filled with waste and void. There was no light in the heavens, the mountains were quaking, the fruitful land was a desert, and the cities were in ruins. The Lord had fierce anger in himself and said the earth shall mourn, and the heavens above will grow dark.

 Timothy offers a word of hope in the midst of this dark. Though we have been blasphemers, persecutors, and men and women of violence, Jesus, our Jesus, has judged us as being faithful. He has even appointed us to his service. How can this be? Someone thinks we are faithful! You could not write something this weird.

 In the midst of this new revelation we hear ourselves asking, “Now what.”  But this time we are different. This time we have a new motivation behind our “now what.” We are judged faithful and we are selected to Christ’s service and how we respond matters.

 Luke’s lost souls, once they realized what they had found called together friends and neighbors saying to them, “Rejoice with me.” Rejoice. For I have found my way from being lost to being found and needed and I say to you, it is time to rejoice.

 Yet, even after such a proclamation and even when we are living a rejoice-filled life, we wake to our circumstance and ask, “What now.” What do we do when the rejoicing dies down and we continue to find that more and more days feel like Monday.

 I know Monday is just another day. Yet, it seems it stands for something more sinister. Like having to work and toil for something or someone so distant from our sense of service to God!

 Jesus responded to having to go work for any figure of dominance and injustice with his resurrection. That is what Jesus did next. On his Monday Jesus rose to a new life, an eternal life. There was joy in the presence of the angels of God in all of the heavens at the coming of such a new life.

Must we then consider the possibility that we too must have a death and resurrection of sorts? Be lost first, acknowledging the truthful pain of being lost. Then release our fears, our trembling, our trepidation to be found, and finally, blessedly, be risen to a new life. Certainly, that is what believers do isn’t it? That is what we Christian believers want to do.

 We admit our sin because it is so obvious to us. We acknowledge we are found and saved, for our forgiveness and our salvation are also obvious. They are in the blessings of God’s grace felt and seen and known in our lives.

 Feeling God’s love and God’s grace, we too seek after the resurrection in our lives. We too seek after the resurrection that will create for us a joy with the simplest beauty and power of the rising of the sun each and every morning.

 Especially on Monday like Mondays. For then we have the chance to declare again and again to God and the world our faith, our belief, and our intention to live in relationship with Christ. For then we will freely and longingly look for others who have been lost like us. Where we will tell them they have been found in the good news of Jesus Christ.

 That is what we Christians do. We reach out to our fallen sisters and brothers and find them for Christ. Is that not what Jesus did for us?

  At the end of “A Tale of Two Cities” by Charles Dickens, there is an incredibly moving scene. The carts are rumbling through the crowded streets of Paris on the way to the guillotine. In one of the carts are two prisoners: a brave man who had once lost his soul but found it again and was now giving his life for a friend, and beside him a girl – little more than a child. She had seen him in prison and seen the gentleness and courage of his face. “If I may ride with you,” she asked, thinking of that last frightening journey, “Will you let me hold your hand? I am not afraid, but I am little and weak, and it will give me more courage.”

 So as they rode together now, her hand was in his; and even when they had reached the place of execution, there was no fear at all in her eyes. She looked at the quiet , composed face of the man beside her and said, “I think you were sent to me by Heaven.”

 What then do we, here to flounder along in the cart of life, with no apparent hand to hold, do now. What do we do with this Jesus who tugs so on us?

 You all know David Johnson from seminary. He suggests we should first consider three questions as we try and understand what to do next with this Jesus who has found his way into our lives. David’s advice, as you would expect, is so very practical.

 Ask, “What are my strengths?” “What do I care about?” And, “Who is my God?”

 In considering strengths consider Peter, in the Book of Acts, who met an unnamed and lame beggar who was asking for money. Peter said to him, “I have no silver or gold, but I give you what I have; in the name of Jesus Christ, walk.”

 That is our great strength. To give what we have. As David says, “If we have the courage to say ‘I give what I have,’ and then really give it, that will be the healing of the world.”

 Often people are amazed at our generosity. You all have experienced the good it feels to help another with your time, your money, a warm meal, a hand with a chore, a visit just at the right time. Sure, these things make a difference, but it is this giving from the heart that really matters.

 We will eventually have all our stuff given away. It is true, we cannot take it with us. But it is the giving nature of our hearts that the world will always remember.

 What then do you care about? This is another way of asking, “What are you going to do with your strengths, your abilities, your passions.” Like the church, we do not exist to survive. We exist to serve. You, each of you, exist to serve God and to serve one another.

 Your service has “parable” like power. You take on world hunger when you provide food for one person or one family who is hungry. You take on the world’s tendency towards discrimination and hate when you allow one person into your life regardless of color, religion, sexual orientation, their status in society, or their separation from society.

 We all have these passions for helping certain kinds of folks and being especially tender hearted to certain circumstances people find themselves in and we reach out to them. From our passion God does some of God’s best work.

 Finally, what God do you serve? This may be the hardest question of all. David reminds us, “The God we serve is not simply the Almighty. The God we serve is the Almighty-who-works gently; the Almighty-in-hiddenness; the One who triumphs through a cross instead of an army; the One who cares for the sparrow and the hairs on your head and the beggar at your gates; the One who overcomes giants with a child’s sling; the One who celebrates mercy rather than power, and justice rather than wealth.

 We serve the God who sent disciples out with nothing, to teach them that they lacked nothing; the God who fed thousands of people with a few morsels of food, to teach us that we do not live by bread alone.

 In serving this God we might experience delay, but we will never experience defeat. We might be disappointed, but only when we discover that we have been hoping for the wrong things. We might be sent to places we did not intend to go, and we might be doing things we did not think we could do, using that which we did not know we had.”

 This is the God we serve. This is the one sent to us by Heaven. This is Jesus, our Messiah, the one the Pharisees and scribes were grumbling about and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.”  Surely we hope Jesus is talking about us! We do not have the world market cornered with our sins. But, we do have a burning desire to be found.

 The Methodist pastor William Willimon has said, “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. It does not say that Jesus came to reward all the good church people for sitting through boring, pointless sermons. It does not say that Jesus came to pay tribute to all those who have never broken a commandment and feel good about it.”

 No, Jesus came into our world to save us and his effort was a success. With our repentance and an “Amen” on our lips we sinners do what God has placed in our hearts to do, we rejoice. We rejoice and we invite the world to rejoice with us. For someone has written the weirdest thing, “This fellow welcomes sinners” and there is eternal joy on earth, and in heaven, and in our heart and very being.

 Jesus Christ has written about our life. We are found. Rejoice. The great joy in heaven has found its way here. Rejoice.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.             091513.gpc

08 September 2013 “Same God” Luke 14:25-33

  It seems impossible, in the face of so many negatives, to find an encouraging word in this morning’s gospel. If we do not hate, if we do not carry our cross, if we do not give up all our possessions. These are hard words to hear for any who desire to be a disciple of Jesus Christ because we know we hate, we seldom carry our cross, and we certainly hang on to our possessions.

 It seems even more impossible to hear these words in the light of any hope we may have for our lives. In the light of our deep hunger for joy.

 One who offers a glimpse is the mystic, Julian of Norwich. She may well have been the Christian world’s eternal optimist. Her words of hope resonate with us; “All will be well. And all will be well. And all manner of things will be well.” She echo’s the prophet Jeremiah (7:23) who said, “Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people, and walk only in the way that I command you, so that it may be well with you.”

 The author Annie Dillard also sees hope . In her book, “The Writing Life,” she challenges us to define our desires for well-being. She asks, “Why are we reading (books), if not in hope of  beauty laid bare, life heightened and its deepest mystery probed? Why are we reading, if not in hope that the writer will magnify and dramatize our days, will illuminate and inspire us with wisdom, courage, and the possibility of meaningfulness, and will press upon our minds the deepest mysteries, so we may feel again their majesty and power? What do we ever know that is higher than that power which, from time to time, seizes our lives, and reveals us startlingly to ourselves as creatures set down here bewildered? Why does death so catch us by surprise, and why love? We will and always want waking. We should amass half dressed in long lines like tribesmen and shake gourds at each other, to wake up; instead we watch television and miss the show.”

There are those moments in a book when the author reveals a truth and names it. That revealing and naming touches us so deeply we find ourselves laughing out loud, or welling up with a tear because we hear for the first time the answer to our deepest longing to know and realize there is a name for what we had hoped.

 Such is our need this morning. We have read in Luke disturbing words that smother our deepest longings. It seems there is no hope in these words. Jesus shatters us with these stabbing blows, “Whoever does not hate your family, you cannot be my disciple . . . whoever does not carry your own cross, you cannot be my disciple . . . whoever does not give up all your possessions, you cannot be my disciple.”

 That just about settles it. Perhaps our only hope now is to just be left alone. Perhaps there is no reason at all to believe. To name truth using these words is not what we have ever hoped for. Why would any of us want to follow such a person making such claims?

 I believe, even given these words about hate and crosses and giving up stuff, there is reason to believe and to follow and I think you feel the same way. Just as Julian said, we do hunger that “all will be well.” We do hope “all will be well.” we do long for the truth that in our lives, “all manner of things will be well.”

 Hoping and wondering about the truth, even in our doubt, seems to go hand in hand with being a Christian at times. Near the end of Luke’s gospel even the apostles seemed to be in doubt.

 In chapter twenty-four, after the resurrection, Jesus stood among the disciples and spoke to them, “Peace be with you.” And he showed them his hands and his feet. Then, in verse forty one, “while in their joy, they were disbelieving and still wondering . . .”

 But, there is a reason to believe. Even in our disbelief and wondering our hunger for joy will not go away. Our hunger that “all will be well” does not diminish. Our hunger for God is real and primal.

  Where then, in this morning’s harshness, is there hope for that hunger, hope for that joy?

 Jesus is speaking to us about being in a loving relationship with God. A loving relationship, by its nature, requires total commitment to the other. Such a commitment demands a lot from us. Loving Jesus actually takes more than a lot. It takes everything we have.

 So, what does Jesus mean when he says, “Whoever does not hate your family . . . cannot be my disciple?” Consider how powerfully at odds this word hate is with God’s commandment that we love one another. Especially our neighbor as ourselves. Especially our enemy. We are taught to have faith, hope and love. We are taught the greatest of these is love. Loving others more than we love God does not create discipleship in us.

 We are, as believers, to love simply, yet powerfully. We are to even love the rascals in our lives. Or, perhaps, especially the rascal. The one who disappoints, the one who aggravates, the one we grind our teeth over, the one we walk away from. We are to love our families too. Only, we are to love all these a bit less than we love God.

 In Matthew 10:37 Jesus says, “whoever loves father and mother, or son or daughter, more than me is not worthy of me.” Here is the thing, Jesus does not say, “Do not love your father and mother, or son or daughter.” He says, if you love these folks, these things, “more than me” you are not worthy of me. If we consider our word “hate” as being in this context, as a degree of love we will understand Jesus.

 We love our grandmother more than we love pecan pie, for example. We love our dog or cat more than we love chocolate. Well, perhaps that one is in doubt. But you understand. Love does not hold equal meaning and feeling.

 What then does Jesus mean when he says, “Whoever does not carry your own cross, cannot be my disciple.”  This phrase is in the present tense. Here and now, we are to carry our daily responsibilities, pick up our problems, our burdens and fears, our crosses. We are to live with the reality of life and take risks.

 Embracing life and accepting our responsibilities requires we take chances. God does not want us to take those chances alone. We should pick up those crosses and follow along with Jesus.

 What may it then mean,” whoever does not give up all your possessions cannot be my disciple.” Here is a challenge to each of us to prioritize our life. To be loyal to God first, and to persevere in that loyalty. To know the difference between giving lip service to following Jesus and actually being a disciple of Jesus means we set everything else aside.

 Now, we need not set everything on the curb for the trash. But, we do not set everything on a pedestal either. The end game for us is to follow Jesus and not be distracted by all our distractions.

 The clear message this morning is this, our relationship with God needs to come first in our lives. If family or work or possessions come first, at the exclusion of God, we are living lives worshiping things other than God. That does not mean we are not to love and adore our relationships. It does mean we are to place God first in our lives.

 It may still be difficult to hear in these words a reason to believe in God. But believe we must. For the seed of a hunger that all will be well and all will know joy and live a life of amazement has been planted in each of us by our creator.

 We believe because if what Jesus taught is true, then joy and hope and forgiveness and salvation and life everlasting is at the core of our creation.

 John Ortberg has written, “If Jesus is right, joy was at the beginning. Joy was challenged in the middle. And joy will be restored in the end.”

 The wisdom of the author G. K. Chesterton creates a picture of such a God and the future in store for God’s creation that opens us to the possibility of a goodness that we can only hope will be true. It closes with a picture of Jesus and the hope for joy that should sustain us as we struggle to believe we too can be a disciple of Jesus Christ.

  To make his point, Chesterton tells the story of a child, any child, even the child in us, who has been sick, and our fear is we might lose that child, even our own life. Imagine that the doctors discover the truth, a simple operation will ensure life, will bring healing and joy.

 But, for a five year old like us this truth does not really take away our fear. What if the doctor is wrong? Won’t the operation hurt a lot? What if I never get well? My illness may come back. It has been with me so long.

 With this truth before us we cannot lightly dismiss the real fear our child has. We must offer compassion and understanding and love and  give assurance that all will be well.

 At the same time, our hearts are hoping with anticipation for joy. We want to believe, all will be well, that all manner of things will be well. Inside we are able to laugh and dance with the sheer truth of the joy that awaits us. An operation, a simple operation, and all will be well.

 This is the same truth that Jesus knows about. Jesus knows what awaits us when we become his disciple. We will be healed of our human afflictions, from sin, from our desperate struggle to survive.

 For God has a place for us in God’s kingdom. Jesus has come to offer compassion and understanding and love and gives us assurance that if we will love him even more than we love our families, and if we will carry our daily burdens, and if we will allow our possession to be less important than he is in our lives, all will be well. We who believe know this. Ultimately, all will be well!

 Chesterton writes, “Joy, which was the small desire of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the gospel’s towers in this respect above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His suffering was natural, almost casual. He never concealed his tears; he showed them plainly on His open face. Yet, He concealed something.

 He never restrained anger. Yet, He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all (humanity) when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something he covered constantly by abrupt silence or passionate isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when God walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth, His sheer joy.”

 Jesus knew, all will be well, and because he knew, all will be well. And, with God’s grace and God’s assurance, all manner of things will be well.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.  

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01 September 2013 “Beggars All” Luke 14:1, 7-14

 From most accounts, the kids and the teachers and the parents survived the first week of school. Like many of you, being responsible parents and grandparents we had to touch base. Part of touching base for me leads to the inevitable twenty questions.

 In our family I have a severe reputation for asking a lot of questions and I especially love the first week of school. It tees the questions up so easily.

 What is your teacher’s name? Are they nice? How are the other kids? Any homework yet? What about recess? What about the lunchroom? Think you’ll go back next week? You know, the usual inquisition.

 Typically my chance for the quiz comes around a meal. Meal gatherings offer the perfect setting for a good talk. The audience is captured because they are hungry and want to eat. It is actually a grand tradition in many families’ or gathering of friends. To be together is fun and, as a parent, or grandparent, or interested party, or even for a nosey neighbor, the table is an ideal place to find out about stuff.

 In Luke’s gospel, Jesus gathered for a meal at the house of a leader of the Pharisees. What struck me about the goings on there was the telling behavior of the guests. They wanted to find out about Jesus and they were watching him very closely. Almost too closely.

 Jesus had gone there for a social time, a gathering on the Sabbath to break bread, and the others were riveted by his presence and could not keep their eyes off him. He too had a severe reputation. Perhaps they had twenty questions to ask but lacked the nerve to ask even one. So they stole glances, keeping one eye in his direction as they ate and listened.

 We also know there was more at stake. People were talking about Jesus and the leaders felt threatened by his popularity and his larger threat to their power. So they invited him to dinner to check him out, to watch him closely. Of course, getting too close can be a dangerous  game. One which two can play.

 You may remember a post I read on Facebook from a newly married pastor. She confessed to the world, which is what you do when you make a post on Facebook, “Apparently I snore. Badly.” The discovery created a response from her new spouse that she reported went something like, “Alice, please turn over, you are going to make me deaf.”

 Our course, you can imagine the helpful advice she received from other Facebook friends. My favorite was from one who was enjoying this nuptial blockbuster entirely too much. She offered, “A sweet husband would say, sweet heart, yours is a rhinoceros-like purring.” A rhinoceros-like purring. Funny, but the gloves are off at this point. Being close is a dangerous game.

  Jesus is not immune to this game. There are off the chart responses when folks watch his life too closely. Throughout scripture, Jesus was watched very closely and some folks screamed and shouted for his life when he performed miracles, healed the sick, raised the dead, or broke the sacred law.

 This morning the leading Pharisees are watching Jesus so they might discover grounds for a charge against him. For his part, Jesus is not intimidated. Certainly he knew what they were up to. He knew it when he accepted the dinner invitation for he knew their true motivation. Ever confident, Jesus waited for his chance, “Oh, you want to watch me do you? Well, I’m watching you just as intently.”

 What Jesus saw was how guests were positioning themselves for the places of honor at the tables. They must have been falling all over one another to get that place up front, to sit as close to the leader of the Pharisees as possible. To find out about Jesus and what the bosses would do about him.

  Jesus also knows they want more. They are shamelessly seeking to be noticed. To be noticed as someone of importance.

 Just as shamelessly, they knew the game they played. They knew they would have to pay back their host for their preferential seating. This is how the politics worked. You scratch my back and I will scratch yours. You recognize me with a place of honor at your house and I will repay you by recognizing you with a similar place of honor at my house.

 So, there was high drama and there was a new player to contend with. Who is this Jesus and what is he up to? How can I sit closest to the action. Whose political back do I have to scratch to play? They were adept at the repeated payment and repayment scheme in that hall of power and at the head of any table in the region.

 Jesus, for his part, has all the evidence he needs to turn the tables and find fault with them. They are boldly transparent as they compromise again and again their own righteous indignation. They expose themselves undeniably as being on the wrong side of God and God’s grace and even God’s law. To be righteous is to be on the right side of God’s kingdom and they were anything but righteous.

 As these musical chairs game players exalt themselves they doom themselves to entrapment into their own vicious cycle of repayment. One that traps them in this world’s power games and loses for them any hope for God’s righteous salvation.

 I wonder if we too are trapping ourselves in some self-righteous way. We know Jesus is watching. What will he discover about us? What will his accusation be against us? Are we seeking honors, or attention for our deeds? Are we inviting the in-crowd into our lives so we will be seen with the popular kids?

 Jesus will have none of this. He has a completely different way for us to consider being righteous. Being righteous in his eyes that is. For him, we should be inviting into our lives the poor. The poor in fact and in spirit. The homeless. Homeless in station and place. Those down and out who have lost their way. Those with no political status. Folks not like us, in color or creed, gender or gender orientation, age or agelessness. Folks with a need for a safe place, like those living out their sense of ministry on our campus

 Are these the groups Jesus would have us be involved with? Are these the sort of people who are to become our friendship groups? Well, apparently so!

 If we insist on living the banquet life, we lose any real gain. If on the other hand we live in humility, living a life of service to others without thoughts of personal gain or comfort or possible return on our investment, then we will be rewarded as a righteous one.

  Humility seems so counterintuitive to our modern life. It is certainly the opposite of pride. Augustine considered pride the most basic sin, which he felt stood at the root of the fall.

  Many theologians see pride as the root of all sin. By pride they mean a defiant rejection of limitations and humanities proper place and, thus, our self-elevation into the divine.

 In the theology of Saint Paul, pride is the opposite of faith, since faith is the acknowledgment that one’s own life is a fragile gift. There is, therefore, no basis for boasting before God.

 We easily stand convicted, like those guests at dinner, based upon how we live our lives. For how we live our lives is what God finally sees. If our faith lies in something or someone, if our trust is grounded in something or someone, if our life is evident in something or someone, and that something or someone is not God, we may be asked to make room and move to the lowest place.

  Christianity is a faith that, inspired by the example of Jesus Christ, cultivates dependency and admission of need for a higher place. The Christian life is training in the art of dependency. Dependency on God’s grace. Dependency on that grace that brought a human, Jesus, so we might understand how we are to live as children of God.

  

 This is the faithful nature, our dependency on him, that Jesus wants to see from us when he watches us. This is the way a child of God is that first day of school. For then we can answer God’s twenty questions in a way that is pleasing to God. In a way that glorifies God.

 It is true, we are all beginners as followers of Jesus Christ. Every day we begin anew with our faith, learning with the newest newcomer, being led like the youngest child, being surprised every time by God’s grace, begging for God’s mercy and receiving it.

 Martin Luther was right to say, “We are all beggars.” He was right because standing in the dark we are all begging for the light of Jesus Christ.

 Before that light will shine, we must step out of our dark world and embrace those whom God has sent for us to serve. We must reveal our true self to the holy one who has cast his eye in our direction as we think of others before we think of self.

 Where seeing our humble faithfulness Jesus will gift us with his eternal love saying, “Well done my faithful servant, well done. Please, move up higher. Here, sit right here, next to me.”

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.   090113.gpc