title: The Way: Walking Together

themes: following-jesus christian-community cheap-grace forgiveness consumerism scripture-reading

text:
**Scripture:** Matthew 18:19-20; Matthew 18:21-22; John 10:14; 2 Corinthians 2:17; Matthew 11:28
**Series:** 2020

> Opening a new series called The Way, the pastor uses Matthew 18:19-20 to argue that discipleship is following Jesus together, not alone. A personal story of climbing the wrong Colorado mountain solo frames the folly of self-sufficiency. He contrasts the church's costly grace (Bonhoeffer) with the cheap, well-marketed grace sold by a consumer culture that breeds fanatics and cacophonous distraction, and insists the church is a hospital for the weary, gathered around Christ rather than mutual affinity. Drawing on Matthew 18:21-22, he calls for radical forgiveness possible only by grace where two or three gather, and commends reading Scripture together through small groups and Bible studies, promising new on-ramps for everyone amid pandemic separation.

**Illustrations:** wrong-mountain-hike-colorado, unequal-roommate, church-hospital-for-the-soul, brand-fanatics-chickfila-apple, charles-ives-central-park-dark, bonhoeffer-cheap-vs-costly-grace, cheap-grace-social-media, nazareth-insignificant-town, pandemic-gathered-online

---

# September 6

## Matthew 18:19-20
“Again, truly I tell you, if two of your agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

There is a difference between walking together and walking alone. There is a difference between hiking together and hiking alone. When I lived in Colorado, I spent a lot of time hiking mountains by myself for the first few months of my stay. For the last few months, I always had a partner and the main incident that changed this was a hike in Central Colorado a little south of Aspen, there is a Mt. Wilson and I was excited to go there. There was a nice little entry hike to a beautiful mountain lake. I got to camp, where I camped before I climbed the summit. It was a lovely experience. I woke up early, about 5:00am, to get going. I had my head lamp on. I was ready. I had checked the map. I had checked the terrain. I was very experienced. I knew what I was doing. I started following the trail with my head down. When you are walking early in the morning and you are using a headlamp, you don’t really have your head up a lot because it is really dark. You want to keep your eye on the trail because you don’t want to lose the trail. And so, I kept my eyes on the trail. And so I kept on going. And at the same time, the trail started to go up a little more than I was expecting. Most of the trails that I had been on in Colorado were blazed only in the last 50 years, so they had used a lot of modern trailblazing techniques; especially switchbacks. But the angle started getting steeper and steeper and there weren’t any switchbacks. And so, when the sun finally came out, I realized that I was halfway up the wrong mountain.
And then, again, I made a decision because i was hiking by myself, that in hindsight was foolish, and I decided to keep on going instead of going back down the mountain in order to find the trail. I thought I was being more efficient going up the mountain. Once I realized my mistake, I was just going to go through it. I would get to the top of the mountain, and it looked like there was a nice ridge where I could walk over to the trail. I thought it would be a lot shorter to keep going, until I got to the top of the mountain and it was totally exposed on both sides with a ridge about the width of my hand. And the next mountain was a good ways away. Then I had to keep on going by straddling the summit of the mountain and shimmying for half a mile in order to get back to the right path.
Hiking alone is not always the best decision. I had been on dozens of climbs and dozens of hikes by myself until that moment, but it only takes one big mistake by yourself to realize the error and folly of your actions.
My brothers and sisters, we are starting a new series called the Way. Jesus says in John 10, “I am the way and the truth and the life.” The early Christians called themselves followers of the Way. As Pastor Matt preached last week about discipleship, and about being a viator, one of the Latin phrases he used: a person on the way. And so this series is going to be about what life is like on the way. Understanding discipipleship in that conceptual framework. That discipleship is not principally about discipline. Discipulus, in Greek, is a student. Someone who studies from a master. You learn by walking with Jesus. You learn by following the way.
Our Scripture for today comes from Matthew 18:29-20. “Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”
When Jesus calls us, Jesus calls us to life together with others, with other Christians, to live life fully in Christ and through Christ. Life together is not about efficient living, as anybody who has lived with other people knows, it is not the most efficient thing in the world to have other people in your life. You may be someone who is really good at doing the dishes and cooking food and taking care of yourself, and then you get a roomate and they have never cooked and never did a thing and they come into this living arrangement and they don’t really put in what they take out. And that can be challenging. There are very relationships in life where people put equal energy in all the time. I can’t imagine a marriage lasting where the couple is 50/50 all the time. Life ebbs and flows. Some partners go through rough patches and you have to help them. That happens with the best of relationships. It happens with all relationships. All friendships. There are ebbs and flows. There are times when some people are stronger and some weaker and you have to help each other and lift up each other. It is not about efficiency. It is not about getting to some idealized state. Sometimes, the church is presented as a place where people already have everything figured out, but that is a lie. The church is more like a hospital for the soul, for those in need of care and hope. Jesus says, “Come to me all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” When we pretend that we are not weary and not heavy laden, the church can fall into this temptation as if we are trying to sell something, like we are peddlers of an everlasting life tonic. That misses out on what is actually the heart of life together. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 2, we are not peddlers of God’s word, but people of sincerity. We are not trying to sell something. We are not trying to sell you on anything. This is why Paul goes on and on, throughout his letters, about the simplicity of his rhetoric. He has been trained in the best schools, he knows the best speech, but he doesn’t want to use it, because he wants to offer Christ as humbly and clearly as possible and that Christ is the one who transforms souls. The Holy Spirit is the one who transforms souls. Our rhetoric cannot do that. My speech alone cannot do that. The best sermon in the world can save no one. The power of the Holy Spirit working in the midst of the gathered body of Christ, whether we are gathered in person or whether we are as we are net, it is only Christ working in the midst of us that any life can change. That any person can be reborn.
As well, the challenges in life are not always as clear as walking up the wrong mountain. Very few times in life do you come upon an intersection and decide: right, left, straight. There are very few decisions that are so clear cut. Most of our lives, we have too many options, to many possibilities. I said earlier that church is not about selling something, we are not peddlers of God’s word, but there are a lot of people selling things. Most people are selling things. You drive in your car, and people are selling things. It is good to have an economy. It is good to have a marketplace but that doesn’t mean that we need all the things that are being sold. But everybody selling things wants us to need them. It is one thing to sell a product that can help you in your day, it is another to sell a need. People consulted to help create brand fanatics. You see this with Chick-fil-é and Apple Computers and Sports teams. This is the desire: to turn people into fanatics. Fanatics do not think straight. If you call someone a fanatic apart from a sports team, that is not really a positive description of them. We are being pulled, as people, in so many different directions. There is this wonderful musical term, cacophony where there is too much sound. It is that moment in the song when it is loud and you cannot distinguish the different instruments that are being played.
The early twentieth century composer, Charles Ives, has this piece, Central Park in the Dark, and it is composed in a way as if there are two marching bands crashing in to each other and they have different time signatures. It is stunning and loud and strange to hear this clash. This is what life can. We are offered cacophonous options. If you google, what should I do with my life, you are going to get 6 million results of options.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Lutheran theologian and pastor wrote a book that was first translated as The Cost of Discipleship, but was recently published as just, Discipleship, and on the very first page of the book articulates the difference between Cheap Grace and Costly Grace. And I think that that is so important. Cheap grace is the grace that is trying to be sold. Cheap grace is the grace that tells you everything you are doing is already great. You don’t have to change anything about you. You don’t have to love anybody you are not already loving. You don’t have to do anything you aren’t already doing. That is cheap grace, and we don’t want to imagine ourselves as practitioners of cheap grace, but we must be honest about the reality that it is offered in our world. Cheap grace is the grace that is sold. And, man, is it shiny. It is shiny and slick and the packaging is great. Cheap grace has a wonderful social media team and they are on top of it. Bonhoeffer contrasts cheap grace with costly grace, the grace of the way of Jesus Christ on the way to the cross. The grace that is willing to give up for others. The grace that is willing to change for others. The grace that is willing to seek holiness. The grace that is willing to seek the good of the other person more than my own good. That is the way that is offered. And that costly grace, in some ways, is costly because it is a grace together, it is shared together. It means, I need to gather together with people that I don’t agree with on every issue. That I need to gather together and not be afraid of that. It can be costly to be in a group of people and then politics comes up or how much people make comes up, where you went to college or if you didn’t go to college, and there is that nervous moment when you don’t know what is going to happen. And when you realize that we in the church need to be the church in a fearless way, that what gathers us together is not our affinity for each other, it is not just that we are so darn likable, it is that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. It is that God looked out on this world and saw the brokenness of this world, the world that God had created. God saw the brokenness, saw the disease and the strife and the pride and the sloth and all the ways that people were tearing each other apart, and all the ways that disease destruction were tearing the world apart, and God did not settle for that. But instead, offered God’s son, Jesus Christ, to be born of Mary. Born the son of a carpenter, in a backwoods town called Nazareth. He was born in Bethlehem, but he was raised in Nazareth. Nazareth wasn’t even on early maps. It was such an insignificant place. But that Son of God would grow up, would start a ministry. Would heal, would preach God’s word. Would offer light. Would call disciples to the way. And then he would turn his face to Jerusalem and walk faithfully, following his father’s will, all the way to the cross, but that is not the end of the story. Because after he was killed for love, after he was killed for being faithful, Jesus rose again, and we have this amazing reality that Christ has conquered death, that death no longer has the sting it once had over the world, and yet as Christians, we cannot just jump to resurrection. That is what cheap grace does. Cheap grace wants to jump ahead to the end of the story and pretend that Christ didn’t walk through the valley of the shadow of death in order to save us, and that this world still has a lot of valleys with a lot of shadows. And the reality that CHrist is more present in those valleys.
Not only does God call us to follow Jesus calls us together. Now, the thing about other people is that they are other people and other people make mistakes. Not you all, of course, not any of you, but other people. There are people who have stolen things. There are people who have not told the truth. Who have done not great things. Who have not followed through on what they said they were going to do. Who have hurt you. Who have hurt us.
Now right after this passage in Matthew 18, which is about church discipline, in verse 21-22, Peter asks Jesus, “How often should we forgive our brother who sins against us?” And Jesus says, “Not seven times, but seven times seventy times. We need to forgive again and again. We need to hold each other accountable in life, but we need to forgive and have mercy. Mercy is not an easy thing. Mercy is not a cheap thing. Forgving someone for hurting you is really hard. I honestly think that forgiving another person is impossible. And it only ever happens through grace, only through the miracle of God’s grace and presence with us. Where two or three are gathered, Christ is in the midst of them. And mercy is possible. Forgiveness is possible. Life together is possible. We are called on this way of discipleship not on the way of self-actualization, not on the way of hacking our bodies to make sure that we are at peak performance, because we are not always going to be at peak performance. There is going to be decline. There are going to be ebbs and flows. Life happens. But it doesn’t matter if you are an ironman athelete or if you can’t walk any more, you are a beloved child of God. And your value is not in what you do or what you know or who you know or how much you have, your value is firmly set in the foundation of Jesus Christ. You are a child of God. You are loved and you have purpose in this world. And you are called to be with each otehr.
The way of Jesus Christ is a way together. Only through Christ and in Christ can we be a part of the church, can we be a part Christians. Christinaity, faith, is not just for people who are set up and live on their own. One of the reasons why reading the bible together is so imoprtant is that sometimes when you read the bible by yourself, you can act like I did on that mountain and think you have it all figured out, and think you have all the answers, before you realize that you don’t. And we need to talk to each other. God speaks to us through the Bible, but we need to read it together. This is the importance of small groups and Bible Studies and reading scripture together. Only by grace can we see God speaking to us. That happens individually, but it is more likely to happen when we are together, when we can talk about it. We can see, we can journey, we can dig into God’s word together. God has offered you a way: a way of life and of truth by following Jesus.
Now some of you are already participating in Bible Studies and small groups, and that is wonderful. Some of you have a lot going on in your life and you can’t imagine what it would be like to add another committment. And we want to work with that. We want to make sure that studying the Bible and studying God’s word is not just for people with a little extra time in their life. And so, over the next few weeks, we are going to work through some different opportunities and different ideas and forms of bible study and small groups, and ways of gathering so that it is not just for people who have time, but for everybody. That all of us have an opprtunity to gather together, to read God’s word together, to walk on the way together. That following Jesus is a group activity. And as we go forward, we need to make sure that we are being a part of the church.
And so remember, my brothers and sisters, that you are loved. That you are forgiven, that you are called to be a part of the church together. You are called by Jesus Christ. You are here by Jesus Christ. Give thanks to God this day. And though we miss being together as we did before, let us be thankful for the times that we gathered in that way. And let us look in earnest anticipation forward to the day when we celebrate, when we will be able to gather fully, with masks off, when we will be able to hold each other, to lift each other up. To shake hands, to eat together, to do the things that we have not been able to do. Let us look forward to that. And let us now in this time and in this day seek ways of following the Way together. Let us seek ways of entering into God’s word together, of taking a step forward on the life of faith together. And let me help you on that journey, let Pastor Matt help you. Reach out to us. Seek the guidance of those whom you respect in faith. You are not alone.
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


site: sermons

title: Three Ways of Saying Thank You

author: Wilson Pruitt

church: bee-creek-umc

themes: gratitude-to-god presentation-in-the-temple circumcision-of-jesus covenant incarnation loving-enemies

text:
**Scripture:** Luke 2:22-40; Genesis 12:1-3; Luke 2:38
**Series:** 2020

> A Christmas-season sermon on Luke 2:22-40 (the presentation and circumcision of Jesus) that frames the Incarnation as an immeasurable gift we can never fully reciprocate. The pastor opens with teaching children to say thank you, then explores the immensity of God entering the covenant with God at Jesus's circumcision (quoting Milton and Chrysostom). He offers three responses of gratitude drawn from Simeon (hymns of praise), Anna the first evangelist (words of hope), and Catherine of Siena (actions of mercy, especially loving our enemies). The closing call, set within the twelve days of Christmas, urges the congregation to sing praise, share hope, and love the unlovable by grace.

**Illustrations:** teaching-kids-thank-you, manners-like-riding-bicycle, milton-upon-the-circumcision, chrysostom-christmas-sermon, simeon-song, own-nunc-dimittis-paraphrase, anna-prophetess, catherine-of-siena-dialogue

---

# December 27

Luke 2:22-40

It is important to teach our kids to say thank you. It is important for each of us to know how to say thank you. My kids are blessed each Christmas to have gifts from family members so they get to practice how to thank you. We have tried to frame manners as thinking about other people. We practice saying thank you and sitting down at the table because we care about the people in our life. Manners are habits, like riding a bicycle. The point of teaching our kids to do them when they don’t want to is so that they will practice saying thank you to the point that it is second nature to them. Manners are not about controlling our kids but teaching them ways of showing love. One of those ways is saying thank you. Every gift is not the most exciting and surprising but it is helpful to act as if it were, so that we can learn to see the gift not as the object in front of us , but the act of giving itself.

Yet what do we do when the gift actually is amazing? How should we respond to the greatest of gifts?

The first folks who respond to Jesus, the shepherds, don’t really understand what is going on. They are like, “this is awesome, this is cool!” This is what happens right after Jesus is born, but then Mary and Joseph take the infant Jesus to be circumcised on the 8th day. This is the point where Jesus enters the covenant of Abraham. It is an important thing. An essential thing, because before the circumcision of Jesus, he was not a part of the covenant even though he was born of the people of the covenant, but it is at this moment that the God who became human in Jesus Christ enters the covenant fully.

John Milton, the English poet and author of Paradise Lost, wrote a short poem titled Upon the Circumcision of the Lord,  and I want to quote a few lines from it.

> For we by rightfull doom remediles
Were lost in death, till he that dwelt above
High thron'd in secret bliss, for us frail dust
Emptied his glory, ev'n to nakednes;
And that great Cov'nant which we still transgress
Intirely satisfi'd,

Now, this is an immense thing that has happened. One verse but an immense event. God has entered into the covenant with God. To rehash the story, God makes this promise to Abraham, this covenant:

Genesis 12:1-3
> “Leave your land, your family, and your father’s household for the land that I will show you. 2 I will make of you a great nation and will bless you. I will make your name respected, and you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, those who curse you I will curse; all the families of the earth will be blessed because of you.”

This covenant is continued with Moses and the giving of the Torah, the Law, the Way on Mount Sinai. The way that is offered for people of the covenant to live a faithful life.

And then, at this brief moment of the circumscicion, Jesus enters into that covenant. God become flesh enters into the covenant with God. So now God is in covenant with God. In the language of Milton, it entirely satisfies that covenant. And we will see on the cross the ultimate satisfaction, but that is for another day. It is the immensity of this gift that we must begin to comprehend today. The immensity of this gift on Christmas.

In the early Church, Christmas was not a big deal. By the early church, I mean the first six hundred years. Easter was seen as the holiest of days. Christmas was not lifted up, until a preacher named John Chrysostom in the 7th century, celebrated it with quite a sermon. Here is an example.

What shall I say! And how shall I describe this Birth to you? For this wonder fills me with astonishment. The Ancient of days has become an infant. He Who sits upon the sublime and heavenly Throne, now lies in a manger. And He Who cannot be touched, Who is simple, without complexity, and incorporeal, now lies subject to the hands of men. He Who has broken the bonds of sinners, is now bound by an infants bands. But He has decreed that ignominy shall become honor, infamy be clothed with glory, and total humiliation the measure of His Goodness.

Okay, so what we have at Christmas is a gift we cannot possible recipricate. We cannot possibly say enough thank yous for it, and yet we try.

Today, we can look at three responses. Two from our text and another from the tradition. The first response is Simeon. He is a wise man. An elder, that many folks respected. He sees the child and responds with a song. This song has been song every night somewhere in the world since at least 516 AD and many nights before then. I wrote my own version recently

> All of my life, all of my life,
I was waiting for you, waiting for you
All of my life, all of my life,
I was waiting for you, waiting for you
And now I can sleep
And now I can sleep
> Lord let your servant go in peace
Lord let your servant go in peace
>
> For my eyes have seen the glory
of the coming of the Lord
For my eyes have seen the glories of the Lord

So we have this one example of Simeon who sings, who sings as a spontaneous response to realizing the gift that God has become human, taken on the covenant, taken on our sins, and is ready to live and satisfy the Torah fully so that we can enter into the bosom of Abraham, so that we can enter into the life of God.

Anna is the next one.  Anna was a prophetess who lived in the temple. She lived and prayed all day. She slept in the temple. She ate whatever was given to her. She prayed without ceasing. When Jesus goes to be presented at the temple, now she understands why she has been praying all of those years. Luke writes, “She approached at that very moment and began to praise God and to speak about Jesus to everyone who was looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.” Luke 2:38

Simeon sings praise to God. Simeon feels like he finally understands the point of his life. Anna shares anew the story of God and the redemption of God in the world found by the child Jesus. Both are attempts to say ‘Thank you’ to God. Neither of them fully reciprocates God’s gift. Yet all we can do is make these attempts. Both of these are good. One attempt to say thank you is that we worship. One attempt, one response to the amazing blessing of God in Jesus Christ, the amazing miracle of God taking on flesh at Christmas is to sing praise to God, to see ourselves and our lives fulfilled in Christ. Another is to share the good news as Anna did, the first evangelist. She is the first human to share about the redemption found in Jesus Christ.

And finally, we have, a few centuries later, a holy woman in Italy named Catherine, who writes about God becoming human. Catherine writes that we can never reciprocate Christ’s love for us. In a dialogue, she speaks to God, “I ask you to love me with the same love with which I love you. But for me you cannot do this, for I loved you without being loved.” And then God replies, “This is why I have put you among your neighbors: so you can do for them what you cannot do for me—that is, love them without any concern for thanks…and whatever you do for them I will consider done for me.”

 We are never deserving of God’s love, in the fullness of it. But what we can do, as a response to that love, is love those people in our lives that also do not deserve our love. What we can do is love our enemies. What we can do is love the people that we already don’t like. What we can do is love the people who annoy us and bother us and vote differently and act differently and look differently; the people we can’t stand. May we try to love our enemies, not because we are so awesome, but because God is so awesome. It is impossible on our own love our enemies. You cannot do it. I cannot do it. It is not a skill you can get. It can only occur in a life infused with grace, so today you have to ask for it, you have to ask for the spirit to come into your life to offer mercy in your life, because God has loved you undeservedly, you can go forth and love others.

So we have these three ways of saying thank you at the birth of Jesus: hymns of praise, like Simeon, words of hope, like Anna, and actions of mercy, like Catherine. My brothers and sisters, my hope for you in this Christmas season, and it will be Christmas until January 6. You know, the 12 days of Christmas start on December 25. The world likes to move away from Christmas as fast as possible, but we don’t have to.

And so on this third day of Christmas, let us try to respond in every way. Let us sing songs of praise, let us share words of hope with each other, let us seek to love people in our lives who are unlovable.

We cannot fully say thank you, what we can do is try. Let us take a step of faith this day to thank our Lord for his everlasting love.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

method: authored, not translated

license_apparatus: CC BY-NC 4.0


title: We Are God's Children, But We Are Not Finished Yet

themes: identity-in-christ already-and-not-yet christlikeness existence-of-god kenosis incarnation

text:
**Scripture:** 1 John 3:2-3
**Series:** 2020

> An Evensong message for December 20, 2020 on 1 John 3:2-3. Riffing on the childhood question 'what do you want to be when you grow up?' (be, not do), the preacher turns it into a question of ontology and identity. We are already God's children now, yet not finished; the most we can ever hope to become looks like Jesus, the carpenter from Nazareth who, in Charles Wesley's words, 'emptied himself of all but love.' Through God this self-emptying love is possible for us now, and the loves that do not belong in our lives need not remain. God is with us now.

**Illustrations:** supreme-court-justice-island-dream, rorschach-test, charles-wesley-emptied-of-all-but-love, carpenter-from-nazareth

---

# December 20

## Children’s Message
What do you want to be when you grow up?

God is not as concerned with professions and colleges as with your heart.

2 Dear friends, now we are God’s children, and it hasn’t yet appeared what we will be. We know that when he appears we will be like him because we’ll see him as he is. 3 And all who have this hope in him purify themselves even as he is pure.1 John 3:2-3

## Message
We are God’s children but we are not finished yet.
Questions we ask:

What do you want to be when you grow up? Not do, be.

Where do you want to go to college?
My plan:
Plan of being a Supreme Court Justice with an island on the Potomac or Chesapeake bay.

Some kids figure out they want to be teachers or doctors when they are 6 and go all the way through.

Who do you want to be when you grow up?
This question in English gets to the nature of ontology
What does it mean for us to be? How do we exist?

There is no ontological microscope, no way to see what the real really is.

For materialist, the question is avoided. The only thing that is is what we see.

What do you want to be?

John writes: Beloved, now we are God’s children.

Now, we are God’s children

The most that we can ever hope to be in this world looks like a carpenter from Nazareth born 2000 years ago.

Jesus can a Rorschasch test of sorts.

Charles Wesley hymn: he emptied himself of all but love.

That is possible for us through God. All those not loves in your life do not need to be there!

Beloved, now you are God’s children.

You can be this now. God is with us now.


title: What Are We Going to Do About It?

themes: advent-expectation simplicity-of-jesus-call following-jesus joy resurrection-changes-everything scarcity-vs-abundance prayer-without-ceasing

text:
**Scripture:** 1 Thessalonians 5:16-23; 1 Corinthians 15:32; Matthew 4:18-19
**Series:** 2020

> Fourth and final sermon in an Advent series on the Four Questions (Who, When, Why, What is coming), answering 'What are we going to do about it?' Pruitt contrasts genuinely complex things (gourmet recipes, a Buche de Noel, friction-stir welding) with the false complexity we manufacture to avoid admitting our brokenness and need for a savior. Jesus' call is radically simple: 'Follow me.' Paul echoes this in 1 Thessalonians 5: rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in every situation. Prayer is 'wasteful' and unproductive by the world's scarcity logic, but the in-breaking kingdom shatters that mindset. The full answer requires resurrection, even in Advent, illustrated through 1 Corinthians 15 and Flannery O'Connor's Misfit: if Jesus raised the dead, everything changes and there's nothing to do but follow Him. The closing call is to take a simple step of overflowing joy that expands to one's neighbor.

**Illustrations:** complicated-gourmet-recipes, buche-de-noel-yule-log, friction-stir-welding, jesus-calls-peter-andrew, desert-fathers-and-mothers, flannery-oconnor-good-man-hard-to-find

---

# December 20
## What are we going to do about it?
 1 Thessalonians 5:16-23

I like really complicated recipes. I like cooking. I enjoy cooking. If I use a recipe, I want it to be very complicated. Most of our cookbooks are from three-star and I have cooked maybe one dish out of the whole book, but the point of them is not to help prepare dinner on a busy Tuesday afternoon. Alina and I can handle that. We know what our kids like. We know what we like. We can work it together. But for special occasions, I like really complex recipes.
Here is a recipe for White Asparagus from the Alinea cookbook, which includes 8  different components.

Here is a recipe for Filet of Moose with red fruits from one of the Noma cookbooks, with seven components.

Here is a recipe for Halibut Acorn Truffle Celery from The Restaurant at Meadowwood Cookbook with seven components.

One of the dishes I like to make at Christmas is a Bûche de Noël, a yule log. I haven’t made one in a few years but I am doing it this year. I found a new recipe, and it is exceedingly complicated with all sorts of extra decorations that are totally unnecessary. There are a lot of steps and techniques, pastry things I have not done much of before.

Some things in life are super complicated. It does not mean that it is impossible to know them, it just means that it takes a little extra time. My father-in-law, is a welding and materials science engineer. One of his specialties is friction-stir welding on aircraft carriers and planes and things like that. Here is a diagram of friction-stir welding. You stick a piece of metal in two other pieces of metal and spin it. Maybe it is a little more complicated than that. What my father-in-law does is very complicated.

Sometimes faith and Christianity are presented as very complicated things. This complicated list of “do these things, don’t do these things.” Sometimes Christians present to our children that faith is all about the Thou Shalts and the Thou Shalt Nots. What this kind of presentation does is that it gets away from the complexity of the problem of the brokenness of this world, which we talked about last week, as well as the perfect simplicity of the solution that Jesus offers.

My friends, we are finishing our series this advent season on the Four Questions, on why this season is different. The first question was, Who is coming? Who is coming is Jesus. Messiah, the anointed one of God, God-with-us, who will make our paths straight. The next question was, When is he coming? We talked about how God’s time is different from our time and that we must not look to God to fit inside of our expectations of time in our chronos time, and that God’s kairos time, the event of God that happened 2000 years ago, is happening in the future, but also happens right now. All these three times take place together. Last week, we talked about why he is coming? We looked at the prophet Isaiah and the need we have, as well as the brokenness of the world. That even if we are the kind of people who refuse to admit that we are wrong, and refuse to admit that we have needs, in those ways, we are lying to ourselves. We are denying the power of God in our lives and in this world. Today, we are going to talk about the what: what are we going to do about it?

When Jesus comes to Peter and Andrew on the side of the Sea of Galilee, he says, “Lay down your nets and follow me.” This is not a complicated request that Jesus makes. We are the ones who make it complicated. Jesus speaks simply and directly: follow me.  It is not a complex thing. Jesus doesn’t offer a 60 page position paper or a 120 page contract, not like buying house. He says two words: follow me. The simplicity of the statement is radical and points all the way to the cross and all the way to Easter and resurrection and beyond. We see that the simplicity of God’s call cuts against many of the false complexities that we have developed in order to maintain our own position in this world. We complexify ourselves, not in the way of friction stir welding or in the way of Bûche de Noël, but we complexify ourselves by rationalizing the things that we refuse to change or refuse to admit about our lives.  We complexify it to deny the brokenness around us. We complexify it to deny the brokenness inside of our own heart, to deny our need, our continual need for a savior. Paul gets to it in a different way in 1 Thessalonians, one of the earliest books of the New Testament.
> Rejoice always. 17 Pray continually. 18 Give thanks in every situation because this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 19 Don’t suppress the Spirit. 20 Don’t brush off Spirit-inspired messages, 21 but examine everything carefully and hang on to what is good. 22 Avoid every kind of evil.

Rejoicing is not denying needs around us. Sometimes the world is so overwhelming that we feel like it is unfair to rejoice. And there are certainly ways of doing it falsely, just as there are ways to be indifferent to the suffering of others, but that is not what Paul is talking about here. Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In our rejoicing is our prayer. And so what kind of prayer? Is Paul saying that we should not do anything with our lives except pray? Maybe. Maybe there is someone who is called to that kind of life. In the early church,  the desert fathers and mothers were called to that kind of life, to go into the desert to pray without ceasing. To accept the radical simplicity of God’s call on their life.

But there is also a way to live a life in response to God that fills all the actions of our life, that bathes those actions in prayer. Not as a burden, though. And this, again, is a way that the church has strayed from what God has called us to  be. Prayer without ceasing is not a form of social control, or a way of making people feel guilty for what they haven’t done or what they feel they should do. But instead, to make prayer a part of a total life-response to the fact that Jesus is coming. That Jesus is coming soon because the world is in need, and we should rejoice, because the kingdom of heaven is here.

The in-breaking of God’s kingdom shatters the scarcity mindset of this world. Scarcity thinking makes us act only for ourselves or the people around us. It makes us seek productivity and promotion and worldly purpose. Prayer does not fit in this. Prayer is wasteful. Prayer is unproductive. Prayer is not about getting anything. There are some known health benefits to meditation and pray but if you prayer for the health benefits, who are you praying to?

Rejoice. Pray. Give thanks. These three actions are lifted up by Paul and not given a time limit. As well, they are not complicated. We can make them complicated. We can add clauses and rules and excuses, but at its heart, joy is a response to good news, thanks is a response to a gift, and prayer is how we rejoice and give thanks to God.

But if all we have are these abstractions or if all we have is Christmas, the child and the manger and the angels and wise man, then the rejoicing should cease because not much will have changed.

This is why we need the resurrection even in Advent. Easter isn’t just about a day in the springtime but the turning of the whole world upside down.

“What do we do now?” can only be fully answered in light of the resurrection. I think this is found most clearly in 1 Corinthians 15 and in Flannery O’Connor’s short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find. I think the heart of good news is found in this story of a serial killer and a family just trying to go on a road trip. Nothing is going right for the family and the grandmother is just nitpicking about everything. Nobody is good enough for her. And then they hear the news that this guy has broken out of prison and is on the run. Soon, the car breaks down. More tough times ensue which end with a conversation between the serial killer, called the Misfit, and the grandma.

> “Jesus!” the old lady cried. “You’ve got good blood! I know you wouldn’t shoot a lady! I know you come from nice! Pray! Jesus, you ought not to shoot a lady. I’ll give you all the money I’ve got!”
 “Lady,” The Misfit said, looking beyond her far into the woods, “there never was a body that give the undertaker a tip.”
“Jesus was the only One that ever raised the dead,” The Misfit continued, “and He shouldn’t have done it. He shown everything off balance. If He did what He said, then it’s nothing for you to do but thow away everything and follow Him, and if He didn’t, then it’s nothing for you to do but enjoy the few minutes you got left the best way you can-by killing somebody or burning down his house or doing some other meanness to him. No pleasure but meanness,” he said and his voice had become almost a snarl.

This is just like 1 Corinthians 15 where Paul says, if there is no resurrection of the dead, let us eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. But if there was, everything changes.

My brothers and sisters, this is what we can do about it. It doesn’t start with this super complicated and impossible set of rules on how to be good. It doesn’t start with an explanation like how to make a Bûche de Nöel, or how to optimally test fracture percentages in Friction-Stir Welding. You don’t need a seminary degree for this. It begins with the words of Jesus: Follow me. It begins with the words of Paul to Thessalanika: Rejoice always.

This day, take this step of joy that comes because of what Jesus has done. Take that step of joy that does not end in yourself but expands to your neighbor, expands to the people around you. The joy that you cannot contain. The joy that overflows from your heart. You are loved. You are forgiven. God is not done with you. May you step out this season to do the things to get ready for Christmas.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


title: What are we going to do about it?

themes: simplicity-of-jesus-call following-jesus joy resurrection-changes-everything advent-expectation scarcity-vs-abundance

text:
**Scripture:** 1 Thessalonians 5:16-23; 1 Corinthians 15:32; Matthew 4:18-20
**Series:** 2020

> The final sermon in an Advent series on the 'Four Questions,' answering 'What are we going to do about it?' Using gourmet recipes and friction-stir welding as foils, the preacher argues we needlessly complexify faith to deny the world's brokenness and our need for a savior, when Jesus' call is simply 'follow me' and Paul's command is simply to rejoice, pray, and give thanks (1 Thessalonians 5:16-23). The kingdom shatters scarcity thinking and makes prayer a wasteful, unproductive, total life-response. Drawing on 1 Corinthians 15 and Flannery O'Connor's 'A Good Man Is Hard to Find,' he insists the resurrection makes all the difference: it turns the whole world upside down and demands a step of joy that overflows to one's neighbor.

**Illustrations:** complicated-gourmet-recipes, buche-de-noel, friction-stir-welding, follow-me-galilee, desert-fathers-mothers, good-man-hard-to-find

---

# December 20 (Powerpoint)
## What are we going to do about it?

1 Thessalonians 5:16-23

I like really complicated recipes. I like cooking. I enjoy cooking. If I use a recipe, I want it to be very complicated. Most of our cookbooks are from three-star and I have cooked maybe one dish out of the whole book, but the point of them is not to help prepare dinner on a busy Tuesday afternoon. Alina and I can handle that. We know what our kids like. We know what we like. We can work it together. But for special occasions, I like really complex recipes.
Here is a recipe for White Asparagus (Slide 1) from the Alinea cookbook, which includes 8 (slide 2) different components.

Here is a recipe for Filet of Moose (Slide 3) with red fruits from one of the Noma cookbooks, with seven components.

Here is a recipe for Halibut Acorn Truffle Celery (Slide 4) from The Restaurant at Meadowood Cookbook with seven components (Slide 5).

One of the dishes I like to make at Christmas is a Bûche de Noël, (Slide 6) a yule log. I haven’t made one in a few years but I am doing it this year. I found a new recipe, (Slide 7) and it is exceedingly complicated with all sorts of extra decorations that are totally unnecessary. (Slide 8) There are a lot of steps and techniques, pastry things I have not done much of before. (Slide 9)

Some things in life are super complicated. It does not mean that it is impossible to know them, it just means that it takes a little extra time. My father-in-law, is a welding and materials science engineer. One of his specialties is friction-stir welding on aircraft carriers and planes and things like that. Here is a diagram of friction-stir welding. (Slide 10). You stick a piece of metal in two other pieces of metal and spin it. Maybe it is a little more complicated than that. What my father-in-law does is very complicated. (Slide 11)

Sometimes faith and Christianity are presented as very complicated things. This complicated list of “do these things, don’t do these things.” Sometimes Christians present to our children that faith is all about the Thou Shalts and the Thou Shalt Nots. What this kind of presentation does is that it gets away from the complexity of the problem of the brokenness of this world, which we talked about last week, as well as the perfect simplicity of the solution that Jesus offers.

My friends, we are finishing our series this advent season on the Four Questions, on why this season is different. The first question was, Who is coming? Who is coming is Jesus. Messiah, the anointed one of God, God-with-us, who will make our paths straight. The next question was, When is he coming? We talked about how God’s time is different from our time and that we must not look to God to fit inside of our expectations of time in our chronos time, and that God’s kairos time, the event of God that happened 2000 years ago, is happening in the future, but also happens right now. All these three times take place together. Last week, we talked about why he is coming? We looked at the prophet Isaiah and the need we have, as well as the brokenness of the world. That even if we are the kind of people who refuse to admit that we are wrong, and refuse to admit that we have needs, in those ways, we are lying to ourselves. We are denying the power of God in our lives and in this world. Today, we are going to talk about the what: what are we going to do about it?

When Jesus comes to Peter and Andrew on the side of the Sea of Galilee, he says, “Lay down your nets and follow me.” This is not a complicated request that Jesus makes. We are the ones who make it complicated. Jesus speaks simply and directly: follow me.  It is not a complex thing. Jesus doesn’t offer a 60 page position paper or a 120 page contract, not like buying house. He says two words: follow me. The simplicity of the statement is radical and points all the way to the cross and all the way to Easter and resurrection and beyond. We see that the simplicity of God’s call cuts against many of the false complexities that we have developed in order to maintain our own position in this world. We complexify ourselves, not in the way of friction stir welding or in the way of Bûche de Noël, but we complexify ourselves by rationalizing the things that we refuse to change or refuse to admit about our lives.  We complexify it to deny the brokenness around us. We complexify it to deny the brokenness inside of our own heart, to deny our need, our continual need for a savior. Paul gets to it in a different way in 1 Thessalonians, one of the earliest books of the New Testament.
> Rejoice always. 17 Pray continually. 18 Give thanks in every situation because this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 19 Don’t suppress the Spirit. 20 Don’t brush off Spirit-inspired messages, 21 but examine everything carefully and hang on to what is good. 22 Avoid every kind of evil.

Rejoicing is not denying needs around us. Sometimes the world is so overwhelming that we feel like it is unfair to rejoice. And there are certainly ways of doing it falsely, just as there are ways to be indifferent to the suffering of others, but that is not what Paul is talking about here. Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In our rejoicing is our prayer. And so what kind of prayer? Is Paul saying that we should not do anything with our lives except pray? Maybe. Maybe there is someone who is called to that kind of life. In the early church,  the desert fathers and mothers were called to that kind of life, to go into the desert to pray without ceasing. To accept the radical simplicity of God’s call on their life.

But there is also a way to live a life in response to God that fills all the actions of our life, that bathes those actions in prayer. Not as a burden, though. And this, again, is a way that the church has strayed from what God has called us to  be. Prayer without ceasing is not a form of social control, or a way of making people feel guilty for what they haven’t done or what they feel they should do. But instead, to make prayer a part of a total life-response to the fact that Jesus is coming. That Jesus is coming soon because the world is in need, and we should rejoice, because the kingdom of heaven is here.

The in-breaking of God’s kingdom shatters the scarcity mindset of this world. Scarcity thinking makes us act only for ourselves or the people around us. It makes us seek productivity and promotion and worldly purpose. Prayer does not fit in this. Prayer is wasteful. Prayer is unproductive. Prayer is not about getting anything. There are some known health benefits to meditation and pray but if you prayer for the health benefits, who are you praying to?

Rejoice. Pray. Give thanks. These three actions are lifted up by Paul and not given a time limit. As well, they are not complicated. We can make them complicated. We can add clauses and rules and excuses, but at its heart, joy is a response to good news, thanks is a response to a gift, and prayer is how we rejoice and give thanks to God.

But if all we have are these abstractions or if all we have is Christmas, the child and the manger and the angels and wise man, then the rejoicing should cease because not much will have changed.

This is why we need the resurrection even in Advent. Easter isn’t just about a day in the springtime but the turning of the whole world upside down.

“What do we do now?” can only be fully answered in light of the resurrection. I think this is found most clearly in 1 Corinthians 15 and in Flannery O’Connor’s short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find. I think the heart of good news is found in this story of a serial killer and a family just trying to go on a road trip. Nothing is going right for the family and the grandmother is just nitpicking about everything. Nobody is good enough for her. And then they hear the news that this guy has broken out of prison and is on the run. Soon, the car breaks down. More tough times ensue which end with a conversation between the serial killer, called the Misfit, and the grandma.

> “Jesus!” the old lady cried. “You’ve got good blood! I know you wouldn’t shoot a lady! I know you come from nice! Pray! Jesus, you ought not to shoot a lady. I’ll give you all the money I’ve got!”
 “Lady,” The Misfit said, looking beyond her far into the woods, “there never was a body that give the undertaker a tip.”
“Jesus was the only One that ever raised the dead,” The Misfit continued, “and He shouldn’t have done it. He shown everything off balance. If He did what He said, then it’s nothing for you to do but thow away everything and follow Him, and if He didn’t, then it’s nothing for you to do but enjoy the few minutes you got left the best way you can-by killing somebody or burning down his house or doing some other meanness to him. No pleasure but meanness,” he said and his voice had become almost a snarl.

This is just like 1 Corinthians 15 where Paul says, if there is no resurrection of the dead, let us eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. But if there was, everything changes.

My brothers and sisters, this is what we can do about it. It doesn’t start with this super complicated and impossible set of rules on how to be good. It doesn’t start with an explanation like how to make a Bûche de Nöel, or how to optimally test fracture percentages in Friction-Stir Welding. You don’t need a seminary degree for this. It begins with the words of Jesus: Follow me. It begins with the words of Paul to Thessalanika: Rejoice always.

This day, take this step of joy that comes because of what Jesus has done. Take that step of joy that does not end in yourself but expands to your neighbor, expands to the people around you. The joy that you cannot contain. The joy that overflows from your heart. You are loved. You are forgiven. God is not done with you. May you step out this season to do the things to get ready for Christmas.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


title: What Is My Sacred Story?

themes: sacred-story grace-not-merit hypocrisy stumbling-blocks treasures-in-heaven freedom-in-christ

text:
**Scripture:** Mark 9:41-50; Hebrews 4:12; Matthew 7:3-5; Matthew 6:19-21; Luke 19:1-10; Mark 10:17-22
**Series:** 2020

> Part of a series on the 'Sacred Story,' this sermon on Mark 9:41-50 asks each hearer to examine the story they tell about themselves and whether their life matches it. Pruitt contrasts moralism (judging others, performing faith) with embodied, grace-given faith, reading Jesus' hard sayings about millstones and cutting off offending limbs as a diagnosis of hypocrisy ('hypocrite' = actor playing a part). Using the MacGuffin/treasure-quest motif, he asks where our treasure is stored and presses the central image: the word of God cuts through the costumes we wear so we can live free, not be a stumbling block to others or ourselves.

**Illustrations:** rich-young-ruler-zacchaeus, speck-and-log, hypocrite-greek-actor, jason-golden-fleece, end-of-rainbow-treasure, pirate-treasure-map, oceans-eleven-heist, hitchcock-macguffin, two-edged-sword-word, costumes-we-wear

---

# What is my sacred story?
For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward. If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea. If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched. For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good; but if salt has lost its saltiness, how can you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.” Mark 9:41-50

How do you measure a year of your life? Can you measure your life in love? Do you measure it in your friends, your job, your family? Do you measure it in your successes? Do you measure it in your mistakes?

What is the story I tell about myself? Not, as we spoke about last week, in how we talk to strangers and introduce ourselves. But who am I to myself?

We are continuing in our series on the Sacred Story, looking through the Scriptures and thinking together and individually: what is our sacred story? And does our sacred story match our actions? Does it go all the way? Last week, we spoke about the connection between the parable of the rich young ruler and the story of Zacchaeus and I want to bring us that back to that again. I think it is so important to remember that the sacred story of the rich young ruler had a limit and his limit was his generosity. He was a righteous man up to a point, and then he stopped.

Zacchaeus, the sinner, sought the love of God, was seen by Jesus, was convicted of his sin, he did not put a limit on God’s transformation of his life. And he pledged to give of himself not just his time but his resources. He became a man of generosity.

Today is going to have a lot of questions because the answers must come from you. I cannot give you the answer. I cannot describe your sacred story.

Who are you? Where are you from? What matters to you? What impact do you want to make on the world? Who do people say that you are? You see, the questions are for you because it is your sacred story. We cannot control the stories of others. Even our children, we cannot control their stories. My sacred story is not your sacred story.

So often, in the general public, Christianity is seen as judgmental and prudish. As fixated much more on the behavior and actions of others than on themselves. This is what I refer to as moralism. Morals are good. Moralism is bad because moralism distorts the faith into a tool for social control, into being more focused on keeping people in line than on offering the life-giving love of Jesus Christ. It makes faith much more about being in a prison rather than being set free from captivity. The discipline found in the scriptures is never like the discipline of a prison. It is actually the abolition of that, it is what happens after captivity. It is what happens after slavery.

Moralism is the trap of judging others, of looking at the speck in our neighbor’s eye rather than the log in our own. Moralism, in fact, is not based on the bible. It is distorting and proof-texting and avoiding the overwhelming evidence of what Jesus actually talks about. Moralism makes people stumble because it is about tearing others down.

And so we must ask ourselves, does our story make us into a stumbling block for others? Do any of our actions lead others to stumble? Then that is not sacred.

Jesus gets to a tough reading in the Gospel of Mark.

> “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.

Then Jesus goes from the collective body to the internal person.

> If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life maimed than to have two hands and to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet and to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, tear it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and to be thrown into hell, where their worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched.

All of these are marks of hypocrisy. If your hand is causing you to stumble, it is not really your hand. And if your foot is causing you to stumble, it is not really your foot. It is a performance. Hypocrite comes from the greek word meaning ‘to play a part’ or ‘to act in a play’. Hypocrites are actors. They perform a scene and then go back and are themselves again. They wear a costume, a persona, then they take it off and go back to be themselves. A hypocrite is someone who performs one story and then lives another. The hypocrite is someone whose hand is not performing the works of love even though their heart tells them to. The hypocrite is someone whose eyes do not perform the works of love, even though their heart tells them to. There is a disconnect going on. Moralism comes out of insecurity. We judge others because we don’t want to judge ourselves. You see the speck in your neighbors eye because you don’t notice the log in your own, because there are no personal consequences. If I can fix you, that means I don’t have to fix me. If I can change you, I don’t have to change me. The question for us is not about the people next to us. What is your story?

Jesus puts it another way. Where is your treasure? Stories are often guided by treasure. Stories of mythology usually have a treasure at the end: Jason and the Argonauts looking for the golden fleece. There is a treasure at the end of the Rainbow. Pirates have their treasure map. Heist films like Oceans 11 have a treasure as a goal.

Treasures are usually MacGuffins. A MacGuffin is a term coined by Alfred Hitchcock that is an arbitrary object that is used to get the plot going. Like the falcon in the Maltese Falcon, or the Death Star plans in Star Wars. We have to find this, that is why we have a story.

But the world gives us MacGuffins in our lives. The world gives us goals to get us moving but they are ultimately hollow. What motivates you in the morning? What is our goal? What is the treasure we are trying to build and where do we keep it? Is it something that is stored in our house where thieves can come? Is it something stored in a bank where financial downturns can happen? Is it something stored in heaven, where neither thieves nor recessions can take it. Where is your treasure? What is your story? Are you wearing a costume for a performance?

Sometimes the desire itself is a costume. The desire to get away. The desire to mope. But apart from community, we are stuck with the costumes we wear and the characters we perform. Apart from the word of God, we are left with the costumes we wear. But as the letter to the Hebrews says, the word of God is a two-edged sword that cuts, that cuts through the costumes that society tells us we need to wear. The costumes that tell us what it means to be a woman. The costumes that tell us what it means to be a man. The costumes of our ethnicities. The costume of our cultural performance. The costumes that comfort us and keep us from love. The costumes that tell us that we are not the kind of people to act with those people. The costumes that tell us that we are not the kind of people who need help. The costume that tell us we are always the victim. The costumes that tell us that our story is about fixing other people. But the word of God cuts through that. The costumes that tell us that preachers have no business talking about money. When we live our faith God cuts through the costumes we put on for the world.

Sometimes there can be costumes of faith. The rich young ruler had a costume of faith. Moralists have costumes of faith. Judgmental Christians wear costumes of faith. They perform. They don’t embody it.

Our faith is embodied in seeking God. Our faith is embodied in remembering the mercy of God. Our faith is embodied in being fed the word of God, by looking to the Scriptures, in reading the Bible together, by talking to other people about what we believe in. This can be in a Sunday School class. This can be in a small group. This can be at dinner. What do you believe? What do you think God is even saying here? Cut off your hand? Is God asking me to cut off my hand?

No, God is asking you to take off your costume, to cut off the lie.

What is your sacred story. How do you measure it? What is your treasure? Where do you store it? This is a question for me, too, it is a question for all of us. We are all given an opportunity.

I hope you take the time this week to ask yourself: where is your treasure? What is your goal? I hope you take the time to talk to someone you trust about, maybe  someone you respect about it. What is your sacred story and does your life match your sacred story. Yours not mine, not your spouses, not your kids, how has God called you to live?

The word of God cuts through the costume. Don’t be a slave to your costume, live freely by the power of God. Do not be stumbling block to others. Do not be a stumbling block to yourself. Live free. You don’t have to put a limit on what God can do in your life. You don’t have to submit to the captivity of the world. We are given freedom by grace.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


title: What is our sacred story?

themes: body-of-christ church-membership stewardship rest-in-christ congregational-future shared-sacred-story

text:
**Scripture:** Matthew 11:25-30; Luke 18:18-23; Luke 19:1-10; 2 Corinthians 2:17; 1 Corinthians 12:12-27
**Series:** 2020

> Third in a series on the sacred story, this sermon moves from individual to collective identity, arguing that the church is the concrete body of Christ, not a fan club or fanaticism. Using Jesus' invitation in Matthew 11 ('Come to me all who are weary'), the pastor recounts Bee Creek UMC's founding history to show the shared, unfinished sacred story that belongs to no individual, and calls the congregation to faithful generosity and pledging for the church's future mission.

**Illustrations:** ut-basketball-fandom, siddhartha-hesse-out-wait, amy-laura-hall-duke, bee-creek-founding-history, resort-ranch-cleanup-dna, church-under-the-bridge-first-date, body-of-christ-members

---

# What is our sacred story?

Matthew 11:25-30

When I was at UT as an undergrad, I got really into UT basketball. We were good then (in a we weren’t in football. I remember sitting in the cotton bowl after a 65 to 13 thrashing, but the year before, UT made it to the Final Four. UT students had free tickets to basketball and they were all first come first serve. And I had recently read Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse, where there is a line about, “if you fast and you pray, you can overcome anything, because you can out-wait anyone” The lesson I drew from that was I could get really good seats for basketball if I came early.

So I started coming early to games in November and December. I did not have a lot of friends outside of the Wesley, but I met a lot of people at basketball games because I was so darn stubborn. I was there before them. I then I learned that folks camped out for conference games, which I could also easily do. I just brought a sleeping back and some PB&Js and I kept my spot behind the backboard. Over the weeks, I became friends with folks so even if I missed a campout, they saved me a spot. All of this culminated in a ride in the back of CRV to Denver Colorado for the first round of the tournament.

I was a big fan of UT basketball. I was a part of something. It wasn’t sacred but it was meaningful to me.

What does it mean to be a part of something? How can we be a part of something that is not superficial? What is our sacred story?

Friends, we are continuing our series on the sacred story. Our first week, we talked about what is a sacred story. We looked at the twin texts of Luke 18 and Luke 19. In Luke 18, the parable of the rich young ruler. A righteous man, a holy man who followed all of the laws of God. He asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life. And Jesus said, don’t kill, don’t steal, etc.. Then Jesus told him to sell everything he had and to give it to the poor.

And he walked away, sad, because he had many possessions.

Then, in Luke 19, we have the story of Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus the unrighteous man. Zacchaeus the sinner, who was more than just a wee little man. He was a criminal who stole from people and cheated them. He grew wealthy off of the backs of others, and yet, he saw Jesus and Jesus saw him. And Jesus said, Zacchaeus, I am coming to your house tonight. And Zacchaeus repented. He converted. He was going one way and he turned around because of God. And he made a pledge. Zacchaeus made a pledge. He made a pledge of restitution for those whom he had harmed. And he made a pledge of purpose out of gratefulness to the God who saw him and loved him.

Last week, we looked at our individual sacred stories. How my sacred story is different from your sacred story and how we each must discern our own story. How easy it is to fall into the temptation of hypocrisy, of wearing costumes, but that God cuts through the false costumes we wear to give us freedom to live authentic lives.

Today, we are talking about our sacred story. The collective body. What is amazing about Christianity is that we are all in the body of Christ. There is this overarching metaphor of the faith that is concrete. We are literally connected. This is one of the ways in which we believe in the Trinity, that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And that God is connecting us and drawing us together. God as the Holy Spirit draws us together further into the collective body of Christ. And we are not all the same in this. There are hands and there are feet, but a hand is not a foot. There are eyes and hearts and heads and we are together working for the purpose of God in this place.

And membership in the church is not about fanaticism. It is not about making a fan of people like UT athletics. It is not about deceiving people. As Paul says in 2 Corinthians, we are not peddlers of the word, but people of sincerity.

As Jesus says in the reading for today, I thank you God, because you have hidden things from the wise and revealed them to infants. The amazing revelation of Jesus Christ is not just for the wise and the rich and the exceptional. It is for the child, it is for all of us. To be a part of the church is not to be the holiest person you’ve ever met. It is not to be a super athlete of God,  but to be a humble child of God.

The collective body of Christ is not just this immaterial, etherial thing, it is a concrete reality. It is here right now. Bee Creek United Methodist Church. I want to take some time right now to share about the early history of this church.

In 2002, a group of families in the area organized to write a letter to the Austin District Superintendent, Robert Hall, about the need for a church in the area. Before I knew of the existence of Bee Creek, I knew Dr. Hall. His daughter, Dr. Amy Laura Hall, is a professor of Christian Ethics at Duke Divinity School. She is the principle reason I went to Duke for seminary. She came to talk to the Texas Wesley when I was a student. Only three people showed up, but all three of us ended up at Duke and one is currently on faculty. Pretty good rate.

Knowing Dr. Hall, I am not at all surprised by his support of the church plant and his work on the cabinet to appoint David Payne as the first pastor. Pastor David’s appointment began in June of 2002, fully funded the first year by the Methodist Church

The first meeting with Pastor David was June 16 at the Briarcliff Community Center. Pretty quickly, they wanted to think of a name. There were three names under consideration: Spicewood UMC, Pedernales UMC, and Hill Country UMC. Pastor David thought Pedernales would be good as a temporary name and the people agreed

During that fall, different small groups were organized and met in folks homes around the community moving towards a first official service on Palm Sunday of 2003 at the Resort Ranch off Pace Bend Road. As a wedding and party venue, Resort ranch was always booked on Saturday night, so members came early to sweep and pick up bear bottles in order to get ready for worship. That take care of business DNA has stuck with the church. We are not afraid to pick some cigarette butts in order to make sure worship is going to happen.

A property search was going on, targeting land off 71 and Pace Bend road, with the intersection right there, where the Paleface grocer and gas station is. With the land search continuing, the church was chartered on September 28, 2003, with 30 members joining that day. Chartering is a churchy word for transitioning a church plant into a fully functioning church with all the rights and responsibilities therein.

By the end of the year, though, plans for the property shifted and there was a church conference called to accept a donation of much of the land where we are now worshipping upon. The offer was accepted and the church quickly went in to action, purchasing a few more tracts to complete the campus, and then a work day was called to clear land for a tent service.

At this time, the church was having Alpha classes for new Christians and other small groups. They started supporting the La Senda orphanage in Guatemala and they were helping at Church Under the Bridge, a ministry in Austin that Alina was very active in for many years, and actually our first, first date was probably to worship service at Church Under the Bridge.

All this time, remember, the church is Pedernales United Methodist Church. A building committee was formed and in August of 2005, building plans were approved and the church name was officially changed to Bee Creek UMC and soon the ground was cleared.

Much more happened over the next 15 years than I can share on a Sunday morning. In 2010, the planting pastor was called to a church in the valley and Pastor Laura was sent and the church kept growing and meeting the needs of the community. And when the pandemic hit and Pastor Laura was called away, also to the valley, the church did not end, the church did not die.

The story of Bee Creek is not the story of this land nor is it the story of the clergy who have served here. The story of Bee Creek is the story of the collective body of Christ. We have been called by God not because we are qualified or talented. So often, we are called because we are weary and we are looking for some rest. We realize something is missing. We are restless. We are looking for a home in this broken world or looking for shelter through the storms of life. We stay because we have found rest.

> Come to me all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give your rest.

Come to me, all.

Jesus is calling us not as individuals but as a collective body.

It is our story not mine. It is our story in this place where God has been present to so many people and where God has sent out so many people and formed so many people. Our rest in God is not the end of our story but the beginning. We begin by resting together in the grace Jesus Christ. We then move into the world to act as the hands and feet of Christ.

It is our story of God here. Not mine. Not yours. No individual owns it.  And our sacred story is not finished. We are not completed. And the future of this church is not present yet. There is a future beyond the status quo, beyond the people in this room, or the people on our attendance rolls.

Our future is in the people in our community, the people out those doors who are tired and heavy laden and in need of rest. Our future is found in missions and ministry that have not yet been conceived.

What this means is that those of us who are here must stake a claim on the sacred story of this place. We wish to be a body that aligns our lives with the claims of this place and the call of God on our heart. In order to be the location of God’s mercies in the future, we must be faithful to God’s call in the present, remembering the grace that brought us here. Part of this means being a people of generosity. Not just the kind of people who respond in time’s of need (which is great), but the kind of people who pledge our resources because of what God has done for us, and because of our hope in what God is doing here.

Our story is not over. Not next year. Not in five years. Not in Fifty. God is making all things new.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


title: When will he come?

themes: chronos-and-kairos advent-expectation already-and-not-yet second-coming sabbath anxiety church-year-time

text:
**Scripture:** Mark 13:24-33
**Series:** 2020

> Second sermon in an Advent series on four questions, addressing 'when is he coming?' The sermon contrasts Greek chronos (linear clock time, born of factories and worry) with kairos (event-time, where memory and birthdays live), arguing that God's kairos doesn't displace us but includes us. Through worship, the church year, the already/not-yet of Christ's two comings, and sabbath rest taken for God rather than productivity, believers move from suffocating chronos toward serenity and prepare their hearts for Christ's coming.

**Illustrations:** gandalf-never-late, lake-time-work-time, synchronizing-watches, factory-synchronization-buzzword, ancient-sun-hours, sons-birthdays-memory, cyril-jerusalem-two-comings, archimedes-eureka, augustine-little-easters

---

# December 6
## When will he come?

					- Mark 13:24-33

What is the best time to come to a party? (Party Intro)

 The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien is a story of wizards and elves and dwarves and begins with a chapter called the Long-Expected Party, which is a call-back to the beginning of the Hobbit, which is an Unexpected Party.

And it takes place a while after the Hobbit and has this moment where Frodo Baggins, the hobbit and hero of the story, says, “Gandolf, you’re late.” And Gandolf says, “A wizard is never late, he always arrives precisely when he means to.”

Wizard time is different from hobbit time. Work time is different from lake time. Time moves differently when you are on a boat. Lake time is different from mountain time. Where you are effects how you think about time. As well, ideas about time and the importance of punctuality are different across cultures.

But what is the difference between our time and God’s time? My friends, we are continuing our series on the four questions. On these four basic questions of advent about why this season is different. Last week, we talked about who is coming. About who Jesus is and what it means that he is coming. We talked about how John the Baptist prepared the way for Jesus and how we don’t need to be the ones preparing the way. We are, instead, asked to get ready. This week, the question is when is he coming? If there is a guest who is coming to your house, you want to know when they are going to arrive.

But the concept of time is important for us to think about as we speak of when Jesus is coming. Most of us have time set by our phones or computers or smart watches. Everything is set for us. Daylight savings time is taken care of for us. We don’t have to synchronize our watches as they used to do in movies (3…2….1…go). But even 100 years ago, unless you were wealthy or worked in a factory, most time was set with the sun in a way comparable to the ancient world. You were able to work in the fields in the daylight and then stay up by candlelight but not too late, and then back at it the next day. The rise of factories and cities and trains led to the rise of clocks and watches. Synchronozation was the buzzword of business leaders in the 19th century, like synergy or core competency or ROI.

But for people of the land the sun still guided their sense of time as it did with the ancients. This is why, in much of the ancient world, the first hour was dawn, the 6th hour was noon, and so on. Everyday wasn’t twelve hours, but it was seen relative to the sun and the seasons.

This is what the ancient Greeks would call chronos, the root of chronological. Chronos is time that is next to each other like the ticking of the clock. Chronos is linear time, like a planning calendar. Every second moves forward. You cannot repeat time. There is no looking back.

For most of us today, chronos time has taken over all of living reality. All we have is chronos time. We have our schedules. We have our alerts. We have our days. Holidays don’t exist outside of chronos time. Holidays only exist to give people a day off from work or to give school kids a day off and teachers a chance to catch up with work and let them go to the bathroom whenever they want!

Chronos time can be suffocating. But it is also not God’s time. God’s time is kairos, another word in Greek that is often translated as time. But kairos is more like, “what a time as this!” Kairos is an event. One of the few kairos events in a broad culture is a birthday. Think now of your birthday or the birthday of someone you love. A child, perhaps, beyond the party or celebration. On Dominic or Ephraim’s birthday, I think back to when they were born (and I always try to give Alina a present on the boys’ birthdays because she is the one who did the work that day). I think back to when they were born and other parties and how they have grown and it all blends together. That is how memory functions in kairos times. Memory doesn’t function in chronos time. Memory doesn’t function as this discreet history of events. Memory functions like kairos: a smell, a touch, leads to a memory, leads to another memory. Memory jumps along our past in a way that is still informed by our present. Kairos time is the memory.

Advent, historically, has been a season when we look back to the time when Jesus came as a child but also forward to when Jesus will come again. As St Cyril of Jerusalem preached many years ago, “We do not preach only one coming of Christ, but a second as well, much more glorious than the first. The first coming was marked by patience; the second will bring the crown of a divine kingdom.”

We look to the past and look to the future in the same time. That is what we are celebrating this season. But we can’t look to the past or the future in chronos time. In chronos time, there is only the eternally present. So how do we move from chronos time to kairos time? How can we do that in our lives?

How do we move our time to God’s time? How do we make our time God’s time? It is important to remember that God does not displace us. Like Archimedes in the bathtub screaming Eureka! God’s time is not like water that molds around us. God is the source in whom we live and move and have our being. We are included in God’s future and in God’s time.

This is what Jesus gets to over and over again when he says that the Kingdom of Heaven is near. The kingdom of God is here. God is with us. We can live God’s time here in the present.

Part of that may look like the contrast between worry and serenity. Worry is a response to the overwhelming reality of chronos time. Worry is a response to all of the things out of our control. So much out of our control. So much that we cannot wrap our hands around. I think that there is a correlation between the rise of chronos time and the rise of worry. I include myself in this. But let us contrast worry with serenity, the peace that passes understanding. The peace that realizes that even in the midst of this chronos time, even in the midst of these obligations and struggles, we are living a part of God’s kingdom here.
This is why we celebrate worship on Sunday. Sunday transforms our time. St. Augustine called Sundays “little easters.” So we can remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ every week. And not just remember it in a distant past, but for us to enter into it again and again. This is why we have the seasons of the church year, so that we do not succumb so fully to chronos time. That we admit that there is a different time for the church. There is a different time for us. That the church is not just living in the present. That the church is not just planning for the future. We occupy the already and the not yet. The already, which is the promise of God fulfilled in the Christ-child. And the not yet, in the redemption and the new creation of all things. The already in that death has already been defeated on the cross, and the not yet, in that we still see suffering in this world. We still see brokenness and hurt in this world. Holding these together, we come together to worship the God of the past, present, and future, the Alpha and Omega.

Advent, as well, gives us a season to prepare our hearts for kairos time. To look inward. To talk among family: how are we living our lives? Have we succumbed to the flatness of chronos or can we restore those moments of kairos, moments of joy? How do we set aside time in our life not to be productive. This is the heart of sabbath. The idea of Genesis and the Ten Commandments is to set aside time not-to-produce. That you don’t have to constantly produce to be a good person. And that you rest not just to produce more, though that is how time off is usually promoted. There are a lot of clergy initiatives about taking time off to avoid burn out, but the Bible tells us to take time off not for ourselves but for God. Not to produce more later but to worship God now. The bottom line is not the bottom line. The bottom line is that you are loved. And just by existing you offer something amazing in this world.

Take the time this advent to look at yourself, look at how you are spending your time, look at how you are planning your future, and take the time to see where the spaces for God to enter into your life are, for an event of God to take place. God is here. Jesus is coming. We know when he is coming. He is coming soon. Let us get ready.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.


title: Where two or three…

themes: repentance confession-of-sin forgiveness prayer works-of-mercy humility christian-community

text:
**Scripture:** Matthew 18:19-20; Luke 18:9-14; Luke 21:1-4
**Series:** 2020

> Built on Matthew 18:19-20's promise of Christ's presence where two or three gather, this sermon draws almost entirely on John Chrysostom's homily on the paths of repentance. After opening questions about identity and purpose ('Who is there? Who are you? What are we doing'), it presents Chrysostom's five accessible paths back to God: condemning one's own sins first, forgiving the wrongs of enemies, fervent heartfelt prayer, far-reaching almsgiving, and a modest humble life. The tax collector and the widow's two mites show that humility and poverty are no barriers—everyone can walk these easy daily paths. Having learned to heal our wounds, we apply the cures and approach the holy table with confidence to meet Christ the king of glory.

**Illustrations:** chrysostom-five-paths-of-repentance, tax-collector-humility, widows-two-mites

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Where two or three…

Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” Matthew 18:19-20

Who is there? Who are you? What are we doing

A first path of repentance is the condemnation of your own sins: Be the first to admit your sins and you will be justified.

Another and no less valuable one is to put out of our minds the harm done us by our enemies, in order to master our anger, and to forgive our fellow servants’ sins against us.

Do you want to know of a third path? It consists of prayer that is fervent, careful and comes from the heart.

If you want to hear of a fourth, I will mention almsgiving, whose power is great and far-reaching.

If, moreover, a man lives a modest, humble life, that, no less than the other things I have mentioned, takes sin away.

Chrysostom

Would you like me to list also the paths of repentance? They are numerous and quite varied, and all lead to heaven.

A first path of repentance is the condemnation of your own sins: Be the first to admit your sins and you will be justified. For this reason, too, the prophet wrote: I said: I will accuse myself of my sins to the Lord, and you forgave the wickedness of my heart. Therefore, you too should condemn your own sins; that will be enough reason for the Lord to forgive you, for a man who condemns his own sins is slower to commit them again. Rouse your conscience to accuse you within your own house, lest it become your accuser before the judgment seat of the Lord.

That, then, is one very good path of repentance. Another and no less valuable one is to put out of our minds the harm done us by our enemies, in order to master our anger, and to forgive our fellow servants’ sins against us. Then our own sins against the Lord will be forgiven us. Thus you have another way to atone for sin: For if you forgive your debtors, your heavenly Father will forgive you.

Do you want to know of a third path? It consists of prayer that is fervent, careful and comes from the heart.

If you want to hear of a fourth, I will mention almsgiving, whose power is great and far-reaching.

If, moreover, a man lives a modest, humble life, that, no less than the other things I have mentioned, takes sin away. Proof of this is the tax-collector who had no good deeds to mention, but offered his humility instead and was relieved of a heavy burden of sins.

Thus I have shown you five paths of repentance; condemnation of your own sins, forgiveness of our neighbor’s sins against us, prayer, almsgiving and humility.

Do not be idle, then, but walk daily in all these paths; they are easy, and you cannot plead your poverty. For, though you live out your life amid great need, you can always set aside your wrath, be humble, pray diligently and condemn your own sins; poverty is no hindrance. Poverty is not an obstacle to our carrying out the Lord’s bidding, even when it comes to that path of repentance which involves giving money (almsgiving, I mean). The widow proved that when she put her two mites into the box!

Now that we have learned how to heal these wounds of ours, let us apply the cures. Then, when we have regained genuine health, we can approach the holy table with confidence, go gloriously to meet Christ, the king of glory, and attain the eternal blessings through the grace, mercy and kindness of Jesus Christ, our Lord.