October 23, 2016 (full size gallery)
A "low" Sunday with only 34 in attendance. After a week of unseasonable temperatures in the 80’s we are down to more temperate fall weather for mid to late October.
"God’s Kids" (3rd grade and up) read the Genesis chapter on the Tower of Babel and made the towers out of cookies, marshmellows, M&M’s and other delights. The lesson fit in with the readings on humility this week.
Rather than building a tower up we spread out our contributions and support as Johnny Davis told us during the announcements and continuing our series on gratitude. He brought up our current ministries, Village Harvest, support for a family in Nepal and other dollars going out. This continues and supports the growth of the Kingdom of God and helps us imitate Jesus’ generosity.
One surprise this Sunday was a table full of cupcakes, thanks to a wedding that took place yesterday at Emmanuel Episcopal.
Today’s readings define lowliness and celebrate its virtue. Jeremiah speaks for God’s people, confessing their sin and pleading for God’s mercy. Paul looks forward to the reward of his many humble labors for the faith. In Jesus’ parable, two men come to pray but only the humble man leaves justified by God.
In both our epistle and Gospel lessons this week we can learn that faithful stewardship is a humble expression of our relationship with God and our need for God in our lives. We also hear of cultural struggles with faithful stewardship practice that require humble perseverance to overcome. It is in the perseverance of faithful stewardship and spiritual practices that we rely more and more on God and not ourselves, truly making God our God. Because, after all, stewardship is grounded on our relationship with God.
The sermon uses the metaphor of a fight. "We fight over ideas, over rights, over politics, over religion. " Paul talks about fighting the good fight. So what does it mean to fight a “good” fight? Is there any such thing?
"No question about it—Paul was a fighter throughout his life. When he first found out about the followers of Jesus, Paul fought them. Saul “was ravaging the church by entering house after house; dragging off both men and women, he committed them to prison" (Acts 8:3).
"But even after his conversion and his name change from Saul to Paul, Paul never quit fighting. What changed though, was what he was fighting for and what he was fighting against. Paul is now fighting for one thing, and for one thing only, and that is "Christ crucified." Because in Christ crucified, we come to see and understand God as compassionate, merciful, and righteous– Jesus, who suffered a violent death in order that we might live in hope of ending violence as a way of life forever.
"Paul realized that Christ crucified was the way that God leads us into resurrection and the eternal life of love for God and one another starting here and now, rather than to continue living in the endless cycle of violence and fighting that defines a great deal of human history. "
"And in addition to fighting for Christ crucified, Paul continued to fight against something. And that something was himself.Fighting the good fight means fighting against our inclinations to put ourselves, our wants, needs, and even our pleasures above those of anyone else. Fighting the good fight means to fight against the temptation to let our esteem for ourselves become the idol that replaces our esteem for God. "
In the Gospel, "The tax collector has fought a fight with himself and won it. He sees himself for who he is—a sinner. And because he can see himself for who he is, he can now see for himself who God is—God is merciful and compassionate– God loves him in spite of his miserable profession as a tax collector." We cannot be in right relationship with God if we are not in right relationship with others, leading others through expressing an ever deepening relationship with God and God’s people.
"But here’s the hope—that our fighting from this day forward will take on a different quality. That when we fight, we will be fighting no longer for ourselves, but for Christ crucified. That we will fight not to waste the violent death that Christ died on our behalf, but instead will follow in his way of peace, that we will fight to continue to do what is right, to love mercy, and that we will fight to get over tripping all over our self righteousness and pride so that we can walk humbly with God."