This sermon was from a couple weeks ago. The Presbytery is focusing on becoming more missional. I think that is going to be important in the church. We are undergoing a huge sociological shift and the church needs to rediscover its roots and mission.

Text1: Isa 6.1-8
Text2: Luke 5.1-11
The 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C


“ONCE A FISHERMAN …”


When a person has done something for a very long time it becomes part of them. It can be an outlook on life, or something they have studied for a long time, or the work that they do in life, but it affects how they see things and what they do. The biochemist and science fiction writer Isaac Asimov mentioned this in one of his books. Take this word (you might want to write it out on your bulletin if you can): U-N-I-O-N-I-Z-E-D. What is it? Most of us would say “union-ized”, that is, having a union made in something, as in, “the company plant became unionized”. But he says, if you were a real chemist you would see the word as “un-ionized”, that is atoms that have no gained or lost electrons and have not become ions. What you have in mind determines how you see things. How you see things determines what you have in mind.
The reading from Isaiah is of Isaiah’s vision of God. He saw the Lord in God’s full glory with angels above. This vision of the Lord’s holiness made Isaiah aware of how far he was from this holiness and he declares that he is not worthy. The Lord sends an angel with a live coal to touch his lips, and his sin is taken away. Then God asks who will go for him, that is, who will be God’s prophet, and Isaiah can now volunteer, now that his sin is taken away. He sees God in a new way because of what God has done to him that changes what he is going to do with his life. God sees the need of the people for a prophet to go to them, now Isaiah sees it too.
The Gospel reading is of the time Jesus called Peter to follow him. There was a crowd at the edge of the Lake of Gennesaret that was pressing in on Jesus to hear him. He got into Simon’s boat and asked him to go out a little ways. He taught the crowd from the boat. Then Jesus tells the fishermen to go out for a catch. They are skeptical; they had not had a good night of fishing. But they do as he says and caught so many fish that they had to call for help because the boat began to sink. Peter knows that this is not an ordinary man, and, like Isaiah, feels unworthy to be in his presence. But Jesus does something like God does with Isaiah. He tells him not to be afraid because he will be fishing from now on for people. He becomes part of God’s plan for the world. But first, he is touched by God’s power.
It is a marvelous story. The first thing to notice is that Peter, the fisherman has been caught. His feeling of sinfulness marked his life when he met Jesus. But his sin is forgotten. He needed to meet Jesus. And he listened to Jesus because of that need. He was caught by being freed. He was freed by being caught. The other thing to notice is that while he has a new purpose, there is something that has stayed the same. He has lived with fish his whole life. Fish are his way of life. He and his partners have a new calling but it is a calling that fit fishermen perfectly. Until this incident they had been working for themselves, but now they will be working for someone else. They fed bodies but after this they will be feeding souls. Some of his life is going to change. He has been catching things all his life. Now he will be catching people for God. He is still a fisherman, but no longer just for himself. God is going to fish by using a fisherman. God is going to use who Peter is for a special purpose.
One of the challenges to the church is that we live in a time in which fewer people are claiming that they are Christians. Perhaps 60 years ago we could assume that everyone who lived around us was one. And so we are reminded from time to time that we need to continue to spread the good news about Jesus to those around us. We need to think like Peter will think in the years to come. How does a fisherman catch fish? Look for hungry fish. What do fishermen do? Spread their nets. That is how Peter will go about the task God has given him. How do we share the good news with others? That depends on what their needs are and what skills and opportunities we have which come from who we are and what we have done. The question is: Where has God put us?
What Jesus did for Peter and his words will continue to tug at Peter, continue to lead him, all the rest of his life. But first the change had to take place in him, before he could share it with others. Kent Nerburn in his book The Hidden Beauty of Everyday Life, talks about how we change how we look at things:
The sky above the park is alive with kites. It is a breezy spring day, and the children are out.
This is a rare occurrence, for kites live best where the spaces are great and the sky looms larger than the land, beckoning the children to look upward and send their dreams flying toward the heavens. Ours is a place of lakes and woods and deep winter snows. Children keep their eyes close to the earth, and send their dreams racing down rivulets of melting waters, or sliding across drifts, or skipping on stones across the shimmering surfaces of lakes.
But on rare days like this, when the sky is both gentle and playful, it calls to them and they take their kites to the open fields, the meadows, the parks, and the school yards and send them skyward to make a playmate of the winds.
Often they fail. These are not children practiced in the arts of the sky, and their kites too often spin out of control, whip crazily in the wind, and plummet heavily to the earth. Other times they never leave the earth at all, bounding fitfully on the ground behind as the children try to run them into the air on legs too short across fields too small.
But on this day, the winds are gentle and the sky is kind. The kites have risen, and the children stand at the ends of their strings, eyes skyward and attention rapt, mesmerized by this connection with the heavens that they can only dimly understand.

It reminds him of the words of Leonardo da Vinci: “Once you have flown, you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward.” Peter has seen something new in his life. He has received something he needed and this has made the greatest difference in his life. That is what he sees from now on, that is what he wants to share.
God’s plan is two fold. It is to change individuals and then to use those individuals to help others change. It is to send people to bring the good news of the Kingdom to those who need it around them. How do we find our opportunities? JoJo Jensen sees faith as the roots of the tree supporting our lives but also in another way. Early in life she saw how people can become involved:
A tree’s roots spread out, intermingling with neighboring trees, shrubs, and plants, lending strength, kinship, and balance to all.

I grew up on a street that was the most direct route to the local hamburger joint. It was the place to hang out and be cool, much as the mall is today. Teenagers raced their hot rods at breakneck speed up the street, much to the alarm of the neighborhood parents. With so many little kids running around, they were afraid someone would get hit.
The parents united to find a solution. Each homeowner placed a 4 x 4 piece of lumber in front of his or her house. They created the first homegrown speed bumps.
At first, the teenagers tossed the logs aside. Then they drove over them very slowly, which doesn’t really work for drag racing. Ultimately, they simply found another route to the burger stand. Problem solved, thanks to the interwoven roots of the neighborhood.
Building strong, deep roots takes time and genuine effort.

You have almost limitless choices to spread your roots, if you’re willing to put yourself out into the world.

You can sign your children up at the local pool, YMCA or YWCA, to take swimming lessons, and meet other parents as you enjoy watching your kids together from the stands. If you feel like extending your roots in a creative way, audition for a local play, or you can offer to paint the sets or create the costumes for the next production. If your need-to-help roots are calling for expansion, volunteer at an animal shelter or become a mentor to a child who could really use your attention and wisdom. The stronger you make your ties to the community, the stronger both you and your community become.

In just a few examples, she shows how people can connect with other people to share a common goal. It can be for some way to improve the community. It can also be to touch the lives of others. We have a calling to create a new kind of community, to be a part of how God reaches out to the world. To do that we need to find those who need what he have to share. We need to cast our nets.

Jesus went out to teach one day from a boat and called Peter to serve the Lord. Peter wasn’t the only one who was fishing. It was a good catch. He will be bringing the gospel to others. He will help them hear and follow God’s word as he did. Our calling is not the wind, or the desire to enjoy the outdoors, or even only to the betterment of our lives, but the high purpose of helping others find and become a part of the Kingdom of God. It begins first in us, in what God has done for us. Then it continues as we see life in a new way. “Who will go for us?” God asked. Those who have found a new life and new purpose will go. “Follow me” Jesus said. We will follow once we have been set free and want to help others find that as well. “Who will go for us?” The best answer is “We will.”

I am falling a bit behind in this blog. Here is the sermon for January 31, 2010. The readings were Jeremiah 1.4-10 and Luke 4.21-30.

“THROWING JESUS OUT”


Nobody likes bad news. There are various forms of it, ranging from news of catastrophe or tragedy to the difficult things people tell us, and it may or may not come as a surprise. Take this case, for example:
John McKay coached the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in their early, dismal days. They were so bad, when one reporter asked him about their execution, McKay responded, “I think it’s a good idea.”

Some take disappointing news better than others.
Jesus faced this problem of giving disappointing news early in his ministry. As you recall from last week, Jesus was in his hometown synagogue and read a passage from Isaiah that described his purpose—to bring good news to the poor, recovery of sight to the blind, and declare the acceptable year of the Lord. He said that that word from the prophet had been fulfilled that day. The people in the synagogue were pleased with his words.
Today’s reading picks up at that point. They recognize that he is from there—“we know his parents”—and Jesus anticipates their next thought. He said that they will quote him the proverb, “Doctor, cure yourself,” that is, use your profession and skills to take care of business at home and not just at work, and they want him to do for them some mighty works like they heard he did at Capernaum, but his answer is that prophets are not taken seriously in their hometowns.
To clear up any possibility of misunderstanding he tells a story from the past. Remember the prophet Elijah? He came to the widow at Zarephath in Sidon during the drought. He gave her an endless supply of meal and oil. Of all the widows in Israel he came to her. You can almost hear it: “What made her special?” And remember Naaman the Syrian? He was healed of his leprosy. Of all the lepers in Israel he healed him. They were not Israelites; they were not among the chosen people. “How could these people come ahead of us?” The hard truth is that God will help foreigners who believe over the chosen people who ignore the prophets. Prophets talk to people who have faith, to people who are listening. Those in their hometowns might have stopped listening long ago. Their reaction to this is great anger and they drove Jesus out of their town to throw him off a cliff when he passed through their midst and left them. They think that it is better to get rid of Jesus than to listen to what they don’t want to hear.
The truth sometimes makes people mad. We like to think of the Gospels as a friendly Jesus meeting friendly people, kind of like the Good Shepherd. But the truth about the truth is, that in the Gospels there are times Jesus told people things and they didn’t like it. We all have heard things we didn’t like to hear. It seems to me there are two types of bad news. There are things that happen to us out of the blue. Like disease, like aging, like bad decisions by people on Wall Street that end up by taking away your job. These are things that are out of your control.
And there is another type of bad news. There are things you could have done something about but didn’t and now you face the consequences. A person might behave belligerently and then lose friends. A person might squander money and then be in need. A person might not grow in job skills and then be replaced by others. The results of actions or inactions have caught up to you and are bad news. But the truth is that it was in your power to do something about them but didn’t. Maybe for some people this is a harder form of hard truth. Maybe because something was in your grasp and you didn’t do it. Some people see these things as coming out of the blue but they are not.
The reading from Jeremiah is God’s words to him. God’s plan for him began before he was born. He will to what prophets do, tell others what God has told him. That word from God will have great power. It will pluck up and pull down, destroy and overthrow, build and plant. His task is to bring that word to people for them to hear it or reject it. People are divided into those who hear the truth and those who don’t. And sometimes those who will not hear it will listen to or blame or become obsessed with everything but the truth.
It is amazing how much information we have available to us. Much of it in the news is about the ills of our world, nation, and region. There was an interesting study recently. They compared the diets of people in the categories of the things that cause health problems—fat, salt, calories in places that list those things in the food items and in places that don’t. There was little difference in the diets of the people who ate at the two places. Somehow just having the information available is not enough. Something more is needed.
The lives of the people of God are filled with God’s word. We can read it for ourselves daily. We hear it week in and week out in worship. The Spirit speaks to us within. The church is not always a place of comfort. Sometimes it is where we hear the truth, where God’s plans are made real to us. And yet, there is much that seems incomplete in the church, in our lives. 1500 years ago some of God’s people went out into the desert to live together as Christian communities. There are stories from those times that illustrate to us what faith is. Often one learns most from the older leaders of the community, called abbas. Here is one such story from Daily Readings with the Desert Fathers:
They said that abba Sylvanus had a disciple in Scetis, named Mark, who possessed in great measure the virtue of obedience. He was a copyist of old manuscripts, and the old man loved him for his obedience. He had eleven other disciples who were aggrieved that he loved Mark more than them.
When the old men nearby heard that he loved Mark above the others, they took it ill. One day they visited him and abba Sylvanus took them with him and, going out of his cell [, his room], began to knock on the door of each of his disciples, saying, ‘Brother, come out, I have work for you.’ And not one of them appeared immediately.
Then he came to Mark’s cell and knocked, saying, ‘Mark’. And as soon as Mark heard the voice of the old man he came outside and the old man sent him on some errand.
So abba Sylvanus said to the old men, ‘Where are the other brothers?’, and he went into Mark’s cell and found the book in which he had been writing and he was making the letter O; and when he had heard the old man’s voice, he had not finished the line of the O. And the old men said, “Truly, abba, we also love the one whom you love; for God loves him, too.’

It is in obedience that what we hear becomes real, becomes faith. If we are honest, that is, if we know the truth, we know that we do this imperfectly. The good news is that there is hope, as Andrew Attaway found when his daughter was frustrated at learning to play the violin. He noted her perfectionism and his advice to her was to learn the piece a few measures at a time. It reminded him of all his own shortcomings. But the message that stayed in his mind was that we can grow in love and Christ’s grace is sufficient for our lives.

The Gospel reading this morning might surprise us. Not all the people of Jesus’ time welcomed him. Not everyone heard what he had to say. And when he pointed that out to them, they wanted to get rid of him. Sometimes the truth can sting. But to refuse to hear it means that we are stuck living in the lies we make up. Jesus is the prophet, who like the prophets of old, has been sent by God to tell us the truth. What will you hear today that will change your life? What will you do that will set you on the road to following the truth?