If You Are (Ash Wednesday)

Matthew 4:1-11

March 5, 2014 (Ash Wednesday) • Portage First UMC

Identity is a huge issue today. Identity theft has become a growing concern and problem, with an average of 11.5 million victims each year in the United States alone. There are lots of companies these days who want to give us advice about how to “protect” our identity, how to make sure that no one steals our good name and, more importantly for some of us, our financial information. Proving your identity has also become important and, often, troublesome. When Christopher was getting his driver’s license a few years ago, it was fascination and frustrating just how much Cathy and I had to do to prove we were who we said we were…just so that he could get his license! I went, armed with what I thought was everything I needed, only to wait in line and find out we were missing a paper or two. After a second trip to the BMV yielded similar results, I went back home, took every piece of identifying paper I could find out of our safe, and hauled it all back to the bureau. “Now,” I asked as kindly as I could, “what is it you need?”

Identity is important. Identity is what sets us apart from every other person on the planet, as no two identities are exactly alike. We have our preferences, our likes and dislikes, our quirks and our follies. Our identity has undoubtedly been shaped by many different events and persons in our lives, but on a deeper level than that, our identity is shaped by the roles we have chosen as we have walked through life. My identity, for instance, is found in being a husband to Cathy, a father to Christopher and Rachel, and a pastor to this church. The choices I have made in life have led me to those identities. So when someone asks me who I am, those are the things that come to mind first. If someone asked you who you were, what would you say? What is your identity?

Even more than the identities I’ve already mentioned, I am also a child of God, a follower of Jesus Christ. In the New Testament, Paul often describes people who follow Jesus as “servants of Christ,” and in other places, we are called “sons and daughters of God.” But to know what that really means for our lives, we have to ask another question: who is this Jesus we say we follow? If we’re going to follow him, we ought to have an idea of who he is, what he’s like, and in what way he wants us to follow him. And that, my friends, is the biggest question of history: who is this man who, over 2,000 years later, people continue to be fascinated by? Who is this Jesus who continues to impact society in meaningful and unexpected ways, 2,000 years after being born in a nondescript backwater town, 2,000 years after being executed as a criminal in one of the outlying provinces of the Roman Empire? Who is this man? What is his identity? As former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice put it, “There has never been a more important question in the history of humankind” (qtd. in Ortberg, Who Is This Man?, pg. 8).

It is that question we’re going to look at during these next few weeks of the Lenten season. We’re going to consider, in worship and in small groups, the ways Jesus has shaped history, literature, culture and society. He has had, without a doubt, an inescapable impact on our world. So who is this man? And why does it matter? Those are the questions we’ll be looking at in the next few weeks, but tonight, we begin the season of Lent, in the desert with Jesus, as he faces the temptation to give up his identity.

Jesus is somewhere around thirty years old when he shows up in the Judean wilderness, far away from his home in the lush area around the Sea of Galilee. He comes here to be baptized. His relative, John (older than him by about three months), has been preaching and teaching in the desert, calling people to repent of their sins and to be baptized as a sign of their new life, of their new commitment to God. Then, Jesus comes, and John is surprised. He knows who Jesus is, and he knows Jesus has no sin to repent of. He protests for a moment, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” Jesus reassures him that he’s doing this “to fulfill all righteousness,” to set an example. That’s why he submits to baptism, to being put under the waters of the Jordan River as a sign of cleansing, of being washed clean. We still do baptism for the same reason. Baptism is a beginning. It’s starting a walk with Jesus. Baptism is not magical; it does not literally wash away sin and it does not take away our ability to sin. Baptism, rather, is a sign or an offer of grace, of God’s forgiving grace. It’s a reminder that God welcomes us, even before we are willing or able to live the life he wants for us. Baptism is a sign of who we are, our identity. No matter where we go or who we become, baptism reminds us that we belong to Christ. He has offered us a place in his family, if we will accept it. When Jesus is baptized, in fact, his identity is confirmed in a powerful way. A dove lands on him and a voice speaks: “This is my son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased” (4:13-17). In baptism, we are called to be God’s sons and daughters.

But baptism itself doesn’t change us. It starts us on the journey, just as Jesus’ baptism started him on the journey toward the cross. Instead, what shapes us into sons and daughters is our time in the wilderness. Jesus goes from the waters of the Jordan River out into the wilderness that surrounds it, and there he spends forty days and nights alone, praying, meditating on Scripture, walking, and not eating. That terrain, around the city of Jericho and around the Dead Sea, is forbidding. All you can see for miles is rock and sand and sun. It’s desolate, and it can get quite hot. In fact, being the lowest place on earth, you might even sometimes feel like you were near the gates of hell.

And so, in this place, near the end of his forty days, when Jesus is at his weakest, the devil comes to tempt him. Now, it has become fashionable to sneer at a belief in the devil. While one poll says that more than half (57%) of Americans believe in the devil, another poll focused exclusively on Christians found that 60% of Christians did not believe in the devil. Even more curious is that a majority even of those who did not believe in a devil still believed that demons could influence people. Some only find a “symbol of evil” here, and others become so focused on the devil himself that he becomes a distraction. That’s part of the reason why you won’t find this story in the new movie Son of God, because issues about the devil were outshining the story of Jesus (http://goo.gl/qmtgof). But you know, the only one who could have told this story to the disciples, who then later wrote it down, is Jesus. He’s the only one who was there. At some point, he obviously shared this story either in Matthew’s hearing or with someone else who then passed it on to the others (Carson, “Matthew,” Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 8, pg. 111). Jesus doesn’t tell them a force of evil came at him. Jesus says Satan, the accuser, the slanderer (cf. Carson 112), came to tempt him, and laid before him at least three temptations: the temptation to be relevant, the temptation to be spectacular, and the temptation to be powerful. All of these temptations are tied up in who this Jesus is, and all of them are set before him in such a way that he will forever be defined by what happens in the wilderness. God calls his sons and daughters to the wilderness, and there he shapes us into who we are meant to be.

The first temptation: to be relevant, to provide what we think we need rather than what is actually needed. The devil comes to Jesus, and I seriously doubt he had horns and a pitchfork. I would imagine he came in a subtle voice, a whisper, similar to what you and I hear sometimes. But Matthew says he came nonetheless at the point when Jesus was “hungry.” Can you imagine what an understatement that is? I mean, I know if I go without a meal or eat late, I can get a little cranky. Jesus hasn’t eaten for forty days. He’s beyond hungry. And at that moment of great need, the tempter comes: “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread" (4:3). You know how, when you're hungry, sometimes just the mention of food can make your mouth begin to water? No food for forty days…and now the mention of bread. Warm, freshly-baked bread, just out of the oven. If you are, Satan says. If you are… Whether or not Jesus is the Son of God is not really in question here. Satan knows he is. Jesus knows he is. What’s in question is what that means. If you are the Son of God, Satan says, don’t you have the power and the right to satisfy your own needs (cf. Carson 112)? If you are the Son of God, shouldn't you be relevant, and give yourself and the people what they think they need and want? Make bread, Jesus. Be relevant. Be now.

The temptation to be relevant is real in every generation. Is there anything worse today than being considered or labeled “irrelevant”? When we can throw someone or something into that category, we can ignore them or get rid of them, and the church has always wrestled with that reality. The issue is not about being current. The temptation is to change the message in order to “fit the times.” Give the people what they want, not what they need. And so we have churches and movements today that won’t talk about the cross, and stay away from Lent. Let’s not talk about suffering. Let’s not allow hurting people to intersect with our lives. Don’t upset people, don’t offend people, and only focus on what people want to hear, only focus on the positive. But that’s not new to our time and place. In the first century, Paul wrote to his young friend Timothy with this direction: “Preach the word…For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths” (2 Timothy 4:2-4). We may package the message differently; it might sound like an electric guitar or a video, but the packaging can’t be allowed to change the message. The temptation is to turn the stones to bread, to be overly relevant, to make what you think you need, rather than what you actually need. Jesus says to Satan, “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God” (4:4). The cure to relevancy is to return to the Scriptures, to feast on the Word of God. How else can we come to know this Jesus if we don’t encounter him in the Scriptures? How will you fight against this temptation during this Lenten season?

The second temptation: to be spectacular, to be noticed. The devil, perhaps in a vision (cf. Carson 111), whisks Jesus away to stand on the highest point of the Temple complex. He’s above everything in the holy city of Jerusalem. “If you are the Son of God,” Satan says, “throw yourself down.” Then he quotes Scripture (the psalms, to be exact) to “remind” Jesus that God the Father promised protection. The angels will come, Satan says, and catch you. Just throw yourself down, Jesus. Be spectacular. Do something everyone will notice. Do something that will make everyone notice you…if you are the Son of God, that is. Use your power to show off.

We face this temptation when we insist on being the best, being noticed, even when that means putting on a show to be seen. And I’m talking not only about our own personal lives, but also our life as a church. I’m one who insists that what we do for God ought to be done with excellence. I believe God deserves nothing less. But it’s a thin line we walk between excellence and “showiness,” between worship and performance. The question we have to always have in mind, no matter what we might be doing as individuals or as a church, is this: are we really doing this for God, so that God will be seen, or are we doing it to show off, so that we can be noticed? Jesus called his followers to be people who serve. On the last night before his crucifixion, he gathered his friends together for a meal. Tradition and custom said a servant would wash their feet as they came in for the meal, but no one wanted to do that. No one took the role of the servant because everyone wanted to be noticed. Even that night, they're busy arguing over which one of them is the greatest, over who Jesus loved more. And so Jesus gets up from the table, takes a basin and a towel, and washes their feet, one by one. He takes the role of a servant, and then has the nerve to tell them that's the same way they are to live in the world: as servants (cf. John 13:1-17; Luke 22:24-30). Servants don't get noticed. Servants don’t get accolades. Servants, generally, don’t become famous. Mother Teresa, a servant of Jesus, only became famous because the world never could quite grasp why she did what she did. Why give your live to serving dying people? She tried to explain it this way: “We cannot do great things in this world, we can only do little things with great love” (qtd. in Labberton, The Dangerous Act of Worship, [iBooks version], pg. 406). That’s the heart of a servant. That’s the heart of Jesus, facing down the temptation to be spectacular.

Why, then, does Jesus respond to Satan with these words: “Do not put the Lord your God to the test” (4:7)? Normally, we hear that as Jesus saying that him jumping off the temple would be a “test” of sorts, which God would either pass or fail depending on whether or not Jesus was caught. But I believe there’s something else going on here, because the Bible is clear that humility is something God desires to cultivate in his people. The temptation to be spectacular is the temptation to be something other than what God desires us to be. James, writing a bit later, would quote the book of Proverbs when he reminded God’s people, “God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble” (James 4:6; Proverbs 3:34). Don’t put God to the test, don’t try to see if he really favors or will bless the spectacular, the one who draws attention to him or herself. Instead, live as humble servants. How will you fight against the temptation to be noticed, to be spectacular this Lenten season?

The third temptation: to be powerful. This time, Satan takes Jesus to what Matthew describes as a “very high mountain" (4:8), which again points to this being some sort of vision, because there is no mountain in the world we know of from which you can see, as Matthew describes it, “all the kingdoms of the world" (4:8). He shows Jesus all the splendor of those kingdoms, all the beauty, all they can become, and all the power. This time, he doesn’t even use the words “if you are.” Instead, he goes right to the point: “All this I will give you if you will bow down and worship me” (4:9). Isn’t it odd that the devil would offer “the world” to the Lord and creator of it all? Doesn’t Jesus already own it? I mean, Paul told the Colossians, “In him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16). Yet, Jesus repeatedly calls Satan the “prince of this world” (cf. John 14:30). For now, he owns it, and Jesus has come to buy it back, to redeem it. What Satan is offering is a crown without a cross, a shortcut, power and authority without the removal of sin. All Jesus has to do is bow down and worship the devil, recognize his authority. That’s all. Just bend the knee. Is it any wonder that, later, when Peter suggests that Jesus can be the savior without the cross, Jesus responds so sharply. He even calls Peter “satan” (cf. Matthew 16:21-23; Carson 114) and tells Peter he has in mind only human concerns.

Well, we think, this temptation doesn’t bother us. We don’t want to bow down to Satan. That’s good, but we should also ask what we are willing to bow down to in order to feel or actually be powerful. What are the things we are tempted to put in the place of God? What are the things we do put in the place of God? Do we bow at the altar of money, working ourselves to the point of exhaustion just so that we’ll have more, because money is power? Do we bow at the altar of the next promotion, the next rung on the ladder, because position is power? Do we bow at the altar of appearance, or the altar of activity and busy-ness? What is it we let get in the way of worshipping God? All these things, the voice whispers, I will give you if you just bow the knee, just a slight bend, and it’s all yours. Do you hear the voice? How will you fight against the temptation of power this Lenten season?

In the wilderness, Jesus’ identity is formed, shaped, confirmed. The words spoken at his baptism become a reality in the wilderness. He is God’s son, and God still makes sons and daughters out of those who will persevere through the wilderness. Lent is a time of wilderness, a time for reflection, a time for spiritual growth and re-determining who we are as sons and daughters of God. It’s also often a time when temptation comes. Very often, precisely at those times when we best understand who we are in Christ the evil one tries to distort or destroy that identity (cf. Card, Matthew: The Gospel of Identity, pg. 45). The temptations may not be as obvious as they appear to be in this text, but they do come. Distractions, disappointments, shattered dreams, broken plans, threatening circumstances. For John Wesley, it was a literal storm that broke loose on the ocean as he was traveling back to England after a disappointing time of ministry in America. Wesley was already struggling with his faith, and in the midst of that storm, he felt fear rising. He wrote in his journal, “I went to America to convert the Indians; but O, who shall convert me? Who, what is he that will deliver me from this evil heart of unbelief?” The evil one will question and distort our identity in times like that, and for Wesley, it was only months later when he attended, “quite unwillingly,” a Bible study that he felt his heart “strangely warmed.” The fire of the spirit began to burn again in his heart, and he knew who he was: a child of the most high God (Jackson, ed. The Works of John Wesley, Vol. I, pgs. 73-74, 103).

Tonight, we stand at the edge of this wilderness called Lent, and we come to smear ashes on our forehead. Why do we do that? Does it make any difference? Well, in one way, it proclaims to the world that there is something different about you or me. But these ashes also represent our mortality. In dust we began, to dust we shall return. They remind us of our faith, that everything which truly brings life must first bring death. Resurrection only comes after the crucifixion. New life only comes after the death of the old one. Ashes are a sign, a symbol of our desire and determination to follow this Jesus, this one who turns from temptation toward the life God the Father has called him to live, even though it means turning away from everything the world thinks he and we ought to embrace. Are we willing to make that turn? If you are a child of God, that is your calling, to turn from the temptations of the world and to turn toward Christ. Let us begin this Lenten season with that as our sole desire, for he is the one who is the peacemaker, the one who came to reconcile us to God, to make all things new.

"Mount of Temptation," Jericho, Israel - June 2012

And At The End...

The Sermon Study Guide is here.

1 Kings 1:1-4; Luke 7:11-17

February 23, 2014 • Portage First UMC

All good things must come to an end, they say. Movies come to an end, gatherings and parties come to an end, and hopefully, we’re all praying especially this year, winter will come to an end. (We got a taste of that hope this week!) Even sermon series eventually come to an end! So this morning, we come to the end of our study of the life of David, but there is one more stop on the journey we have to make, because at the end, David dies. David’s life comes to an end, but even then, David is not yet done teaching us about what it means to live out our faith in real life.

Now, you may already be uncomfortable or wondering how long this is going to take today. Our culture, our world is pretty uncomfortable with death. We don’t even like to say the word. We have come up euphemisms, like “passing on” or “passed over” or “passed away.” Rarely do I hear people say someone died. It seems so stark, so abrupt, so final. And when it happens, we don't like to talk about it. We’ll send a card. But don’t ask us to really talk about it. Don’t ask us to really have to be present to the grieving. I think that’s why a book written several years ago became such a bestseller. The book was Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom, and it was later made into a movie. The book and the movie tell the story of Albom’s visits each week with Morrie Schwatrz, his one-time sociology professor, as Morrie was dying from ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease. As they visited, one of the realizations Albom came to was something that Armand Nicholi, a Harvard psychiatrist, put it this way: “Only when we are ready to die are we truly ready to live.”

Yet, there remains a persistent fear of death in our culture. We do everything we can to avoid it, sanitize it, ignore it or hurry by it. And we can do that with some proficiency until it’s our own death or the death of a close loved one we’re facing. Last fall, a film was released with Sandra Bullock starring as a medical engineer on a Space Shuttle mission who finds herself, through a series of circumstances, adrift in space, seemingly without any hope of rescue. In what she believes are her last moments, her character gives voice to her fear of death.

VIDEO: “Gravity” clip (“I’m afraid to die…will you pray for me?”)

Bullock’s character cries out for someone to be there, someone to provide help and strength in the face of death. No one wants to face death alone, and yet that’s what happens in the beginning of 1 Kings, as David is nearing his own death. So what can David teach us—not just about death, but especially about the ways we respond in the face of it, in the midst of it. These are important words for us. As you know, the first part of this year was a very difficult time for us as we had multiple funerals in a row. So how do we, as God’s people, face times like that? How do we help those who still grieve?

I want us to view this story through the lens of three people who are around David during this time: the servants, Adonijah and Bathsheba. And ultimately, we want to look at Abishag, someone who doesn’t say a single word in this story, but who is vitally important to helping us see our calling. First, though, let’s get the setting in mind. David, at this point, is seventy years old—maybe not “very old” by our standards, but it certainly was in his time. He has been king of Israel for forty years and six months, and the nation has gotten used to his leadership (cf. Dilday, Communicator’s Commentary: 1, 2 Kings, pgs. 27, 29). Except now, he’s not able to lead. This is not the David we are used to. David the giant-killer, David the warrior-hero, David the noble ruler, David the talented musician, David the man after God’s own heart. This David is now weak, unable to leave his bed (Dilday 30). This David is feeble. His circulation is poor, and he’s not able to keep warm (1:1), we’re told. Even in the relatively warm climate of Jerusalem, David is cold all the time. Now, that’s perhaps not unusual for a man of his age, but it’s noteworthy because it is symbolic of something deeper. A time of transition is upon the kingdom, and everyone seems to know it. And everyone deals with it differently.

For the servants, David’s age and poor health is a problem to be solved. After all, it’s their job to look after the king, to take care of him, to make sure he has what he needs. Their first solution is to pile on the covers, and yet David is still shivering. So they propose another solution: “Let us look for a young virgin to…lie beside him so that our lord the king may keep warm” (1:2). Now, we need to note one thing at this point in the story: David had many wives and many concubines or secondary wives. Where are they? Why are they not available to help care for the king, for their husband? Why do the servants decide instead to conscript a young unmarried woman to help keep the king warm? There are, undoubtedly, many reasons, but we should note that this was a traditional cure prescribed by ancient medicine. The Greeks believed you could transfer the health and heat of a young person into an aging person as a medical treatment, and Josephus, the Jewish historian, calls the servants “physicians” when he retells this story (Dilday 29). So what the servants propose wasn’t uncommon in that day. However, if you’re an older man in our society, I wouldn’t suggest you request this particular treatment!

You see, here’s the issue: to the servants, David is a problem to be solved. And often we treat the dying just that way. We may not say that, but we do it. We sometimes deal with death as a problem, because if it’s a problem, then we can see ourselves as useful, as someone to solve the problem. And when we get busy solving the problem, “we never have to look the dying person in the eyes, wipe her tears, listen to his confession, honor this life, just as it is” (Peterson, Leap Over a Wall, pg. 220). Sometimes, then, we approach the problem by sparing no expense in prolonging a life. Many years ago I ministered to a man who spent so long in the hospital that I didn’t even really remember why he was there. He wasn’t awake. He wasn’t responding, but the family couldn’t bear to let him go. They came, stood by his bed, but never really faced the reality that he was dying. He was a problem to be fixed, to be solved. Other times, we solve the problem by locking our loved one away in a care facility and forgetting about them. Now, I know there are times when nursing homes can provide so much better care than we can. Two of my grandparents found that to be true. In fact, to look at my grandfather when he was in the nursing home, you would have thought he was the picture of health, but that was because he was getting the care he needed in that place. My family, though, didn’t turn away, as so many do. I’ve been in nursing homes where people never have a visitor. No one calls, no one comes by, no one sends a card. It’s because they’re a problem to be dealt with, and the solution was placing them there. I don’t mean to sound harsh, but sometimes, we in our culture, forget that behind the “problem” is a person. A real person whom God loves. David deserves better than the way his servants treat him.

In the next section of 1 Kings 1, we find the second person to approach David’s imminent death, and that’s his oldest son Adonijah (1:5-10). To Adonijah, David’s death presents an opportunity to be seized. Adonijah knows that God had promised a dynasty for David’s family, and since the sons who were older than him have all died, he knows he’s next in line once his father dies. And he has the support of two of the most prominent people in Israel besides David: Joab the general and Abiathar the priest. He’s got the religious leadership and the military on his side; what could go wrong? So he declares himself king. After all, the nation needs leadership and David is not up to it. He invites everyone to a feast to begin his kingship—everyone, that is, except Solomon. We’ll get to Solomon in a moment. But the point here is this: to Adonijah, David is taking too long to die. He’s an obstacle to what Adonijah wants out of life. And so he basically treats David as if he were already dead and declares himself king. It’s a sadder repeat of what happened with the king’s other son, Absalom, when he tried to to steal the kingdom.

You see, David is a limitation to Adonijah, and so he pretends that David no longer exists. Today, we’re told we should push the limits, ignore the limits, do whatever it takes to get ahead, even if that means dehumanizing others. And so we sometimes treat people who are dying as less than human. We talk about them and not to them. We demand our own way; we demand the removal of all limits. Why do we think there is a such a push for human beings to gain control over both the beginning and ending of life? Because we think we ought to control the limits. Because we have begun to see people as objects or obstacles or limitations rather than as human beings whom God created. In a paper published in 1995, Pope John Paul II described this mindset as a “culture of death,” and that term is not used in a positive sense here. John Paul described it this way: “This culture is actively fostered by powerful cultural, economic and political currents which encourage an idea of society excessively concerned with efficiency.…A person who, because of illness, handicap or, more simply, just by existing, compromises the well-being or lifestyle of those who are more favored tends to be looked upon as an enemy to be resisted or eliminated. In this way a kind of ‘conspiracy against life’ is unleashed.” In other words, when people become objects or obstacles, when we fail to see the person (as Adonijah failed to see David), we are working at cross purposes with the world God desires. David deserves better than the way his son treats him.

The third person to enter the scene is Bathsheba, the wife David stole from one of his soldiers in that famous story. We don’t have any indication of what their relationship has been like, except for this story near the end. Bathsheba—also not invited to Adonijah’s coronation—learns what is happening, and she’s not about to put up with that. David's death presents Bathsheba with a responsibility to be fulfilled. She’s going to make sure her son Solomon ends up on the throne, not this pipsqueak Adonijah. And so Bathsheba goes to see the king—again, why was she not there in the first place? She’s his wife—one of them, anyway. Why is she not by the side of her dying husband? Because Bathsheba has become a woman of action, a woman in love with power and David is no longer where the action or the power is. He's a dying old fool, one she talks into passing his power to Solomon. She claims he made that promise to her, that Solomon would be king, although there is no textual evidence for such a promise (cf. Goldingay, 1 & 2 Kings for Everyone, pg. 9). It’s quite possible he never made her that promise. Regardless, she convinces him he did, and it’s not long before the befuddled David crowns Solomon as king. And soon after the new king is in power and the old king is dead, Adonijah finds himself dead as well. Bathsheba treats David as a responsibility. David deserves better than his wife treats him.

When David dies, no one mourns or laments him. He dies in the midst of a family squabble, and what could be more true to our life today than that? Funerals and death bring out the absolute worst in families. I have literally been in funerals where families cry and hug and mourn and pledge to be loyal to one another, and watched the very next day as they began fighting over what’s left. I’ve even been in situations where families were fracturing and only kept talking to each other until the patriarch or matriarch died. Then they had nothing to do with each other. When the loved one is only a responsibility, we’re once again dehumanizing the person and, if I can make up a word, de-grace-ifiying the death. No one mourns David. No one laments David.

Except a young woman named Abishag. Abishag is the young woman whom the servants find to serve and help David (1:3-4). She is the “miracle cure” they hope will restore the king. She has no ambitions to fulfill, nor is she there to be a plaything for the king. She only comes to serve, and she becomes a silent witness to the whole experience of David’s death. She doesn’t say anything. She is just there, quietly doing what is needed and helping to the best of her ability to keep the king warm at night. So when the servants won’t serve or don’t want to serve, when they see the king as a problem to be solved, Abishag simply serves. When Adonijah tries to claim his place as king, Abishag simply sits by and holds the hand of the real king. (And, incidentally, after Solomon is declared king by David, Adonijah asks to have Abishag as his wife (2:13-25), which most scholars think was yet another attempt to claim a direct link to David. It’s this request that gets Adonijah killed.) And when Bathsheba, David’s wife, comes to manipulate the succession of power, Abishag is there, quietly in the background. None of David’s wives are sitting with him, but Abishag is. As everyone in David’s family and circle of friends deserts him, Abishag remains there, “quietly and beautifully there” (Peterson 220) as a witness to the mystery and holiness of death. She is there as one who serves without any thought of herself. And she shows us our calling when we find ourselves in the presence of death.

There have been a few times where I have been privileged to stand on holy ground as someone passed from this life into the next, but the first time, I think, will always stand out. I had visited with this gentleman just a few days before, and while our family was in Indianapolis I got a call that they thought the time was near. Could I come over? I explained the situation, and his grandson told me they would be glad to see me whenever I could get there. So when we got home, I did go to the house and sat with the family, talked with many, and prayed with the man who was between here and there. People came and went, and his wife of over sixty years sat by his side. Somewhere around one in the morning, she fell asleep just briefly and I think he knew that. I was across the room, but I watched as he took his last, peaceful breath and there was no more. In just another moment, she woke up and said, “Oh, I missed it!” I assured her I thought he had waited for that moment, and we gathered again and prayed. It was a holy moment. That was holy ground, as he was able to be surrounded by those he loved in his last moments. I knew a pastor whose family gathered around his bed, just to let him know it was okay to die, and then they began to sing hymns, and in the middle of one of his favorite hymns, he took his last breath.

You see, those moments are holy because we believe death is not the end. The worst thing is never the last thing. I love the story in our Gospel lesson today about the widow at Nain. Do you know Jesus, the greatest preacher ever, never preached a funeral? In the Gospel story, he comes to town to find a widow’s only son—her only means of provision—being carried out to the cemetery, and Luke says “his heart went out to her” (7:13). Then he went to touch the boy and said, “Young man, I say to you, get up!” And the boy did. Jesus did the same with his friend Lazarus (cf. John 11), who was four days dead before Jesus showed up. But Jesus called him out of the tomb. Now, that’s not likely to be our experience, raising people from the dead. For one thing, Jesus was the Son of God. For another, he did those things during his ministry—before his own death. After the crucifixion, he did one better: he was raised from the dead and became the first promise for all who believe in him, a powerful reminder that the worst thing is never the last thing. For the Christian, there is yet more ahead. There is hope. There is life. There is something better, and because of that hope, because of that life, we can treat death not as an end or the ultimate tragedy but as a new beginning. That’s not to say we don’t mourn. But it does—or should—change the way we approach those who are dying and those who are grieving. We do not grieve as people who are without hope (cf. 1 Thessalonians 4:13). So what do we see in David’s death and, even more, in Abishag’s service that can guide and teach us, all these centuries later?

First of all, as we teach in our Congregational Care ministry, “death trumps everything.” When death is imminent or when death comes, it becomes the most important event on the agenda because it is the greatest fear that most people face (Lampe, The Caring Congregation, pg. 58). Please know that when your family is touched by death, we want to know about it so we can pray for you and so one of your pastors or Congregational Care Ministers can follow up with you. It’s that important. Abishag left behind whatever life she had in order to tend to David, to be a witness to his death. Now, some will say, she had no choice, and that very well may have been the case, but at the same time, these are servants who have found her, asked her to come, not the king himself. I’m assuming she could have refused his servants, but she makes no protest that we have recorded, because it’s that important. To be a witness, to share life. And even though she can’t stop David from dying, like the servants hoped she would, she remains present.

And by remaining present, she treats David as human being. The text says she “took are of” or, more literally, “cherished” the king. To Abishag, David is not a problem or a project, he’s not an obstacle or a responsibility. He’s a person, someone to be cared for and someone who has value. This is why I have such great respect for the ministry of hospice—and it is a ministry. For some, it may be a job, but every experience I have had with hospice in our county has been one in which the loved one was treated with dignity, as a human being. I’ve learned so much from watching those who work with hospice. You talk to the person, not about them. You touch the person, and you involve the family members in everything you can. Hospice will often care for people in their own home, but even if someone is taken to the hospice center because they need greater care, they are encouraged to bring reminders of their life, things from home. It’s so easy in our technological, sterile society to treat people who are dying as objects; we must resist that temptation because that person is someone for whom Jesus died, and even though their body here is shutting down, we believe there is a new body being prepared for them—a resurrection body, one prepared to live forever.

Abishag, we’re told, “waited” on the king. The word literally means “served” or “ministered to.” In other words, she did what was needed, without a word of complaint. When death comes, what is it you can do? I know the Methodist impulse is to cook something, to take a casserole or a crock pot of Italian beef to the home. Cooking and feeding people is a distinct Methodist spiritual gift! And that very well may be needed, although it might be better if you wait a bit and take it a couple of weeks after the death. Often families are overwhelmed with people bringing food for the first few days. Or, even better, ask what can be done. What does the family need? Do they need someone to walk the dog while they take care of details? Do family members from out of town need a place to stay? Do they need a driver to take them to appointments and such? Do what is needed, not what you think is needed, but what they need—and do it with joy. If we can’t do it with joy and without complaining, honestly, we’d be better off not doing it. If you simply do something because you feel obligated but you don’t do it with joy, you run the risk of adding to the burden of those who are in the midst of grief. So what can you do? And what can you do with joy? Now, I know as well as and maybe better than most that death is inconvenient. It never comes on schedule, and often throws off a whole lot of things that are planned for that week. But it doesn't matter. My response to a family who needs care during that time is always this: as a church, we will do whatever we can to be helpful. We will serve, and we will do it with joy.

And one more thing that comes, not from David’s story, but from my own experience. Do everything you can to prepare your family for your own death. I do many funerals in a year, as does Pastor Deb, and we can both tell you there are a lot of times when we sit down with a family to prepare for the funeral when we ask them to share some things they remember about their loved one. Or we’ll ask about favorite Scriptures, or favorite hymns. And because they are in the midst of grief, because the world has been turned upside down, very often they simply can’t think of things that would normally come easily to them. So I can’t encourage you enough to free your family up to grieve by preparing them. I tell everyone to do this, and few do, but this Saturday, we’re going to give you a chance to do just that. Congregational Care is sponsoring an educational event we’re calling “Celebrate Life” on this coming Saturday morning from 9-11 a.m. We’ll have some folks here to answer questions and to give information about elder law. We’ll have a funeral director here as well, and perhaps most importantly, you’ll have the chance to fill out a worksheet that will provide vital information in the event of your death. It will help your family because many of the things we ask of them you will have already answered. Now, many will think this is just for older people, but friends, none of us are guaranteed tomorrow, no matter how much we might want to deny it. I never imagined several years I would be attending the funeral of my college roommate, and yet I did several years ago. This is for everyone. Free up your family to grieve and make plans ahead of time by coming Saturday.

In everything, as we approach death, we proclaim hope. We believe in a God who raised Jesus from the dead, who promises life everlasting to those who believe, and who, in fact, begins creating that new life in us from the moment we trust in Christ. As South African pastor Trevor Hudson puts it, “Death, for us, is that moment of transition into a fuller and deeper experience of what we already know” (Renovare Book Club podcast, 2/2014). If we’ve walked with Jesus here, death is simply a change of location. That is our hope. That is our joy. That is why death is not an enemy. Paul put it this way: “The perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’ ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’…Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:53-57).

No one lived that to the end better than John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist movement. Wesley believed that the last act of God's grace in our lives is what he called “glorifying grace.” He phrased it this way: “Methodists die well.” And he not only preached that, he not only believed that, he lived that. Wesley was 88 years old, having faithfully preached the Gospel for so many years, and was growing weaker by the day. Near the end of his life, he wanted to send one last message to the world, so he called for pen and paper. A friend, Miss Ritchie, suggested that she would write it for him. Would he just tell her what he wanted to say? “Nothing,” he said, “but that God is with us.” He summoned enough strength to tell the twenty or so friends who were with him, “Farewell, farewell,” and he once again cried out, “The best of all is, God is with us.” He said that more than once during that time.

During the night, he was often heard to say, “I’ll praise—I’ll praise.” Many think he was trying to say or sing Isaac Watts’ hymn, “I’ll Praise My Maker While I Have Breath,” but he didn’t have the strength. And yet it was obvious his thoughts were turning heavenward. After a long silence, Wesley said, “Farewell,” and without another sound, he went to stand before his savior (Hattersley, The Life of John Wesley, pg. 397).

And, so at the end, David dies. His story ends the way every story ends, but it is not the end. The person we become here continues on, lives on. Because Christ lives, so shall we live. There is hope; the worst thing is never the last thing. So let us face the end with confidence and hope because the one who was there at your beginning will also be there at the end. The best of all is, God is with us.

The Biggest Part of Life

The Sermon Study Guide is here.

2 Samuel 22

February 16, 2014 • Portage First UMC

[22:1-7]

He is larger than life—17 feet tall, carved out of a single block of Tuscan marble. That block of marble passed through the hands of several different artists and even sat idle for twenty-five years before a twenty-six-year-old artist convinced the authorities to place the project in his hands. He was awarded the project over other more well-known artists like Leonardo da Vinci. And so without a model to rely on, Michelangelo carved the statue free hand. Often he would work in a frenzy, going for days without sleep. For two years, he chiseled away at this block of marble, and when he was done, he had produced one of the most enduring and well-known statues in history: David. The statue was originally intended to stand on the roof of the Cathedral in Florence, Italy, but most likely for political reasons, it was placed outside the Florence governmental palace, with its eyes glaring in the direction of Rome. Eventually, due to concerns about its preservation, David was moved into the Accademia Gallery in Florence, where Christopher and I were privileged to see it in 2010. David is huge, clearly larger than life. The statue depicts David preparing to fight Goliath, but the sculpture is larger than Goliath even would have been in reality.

And yet, one of the things that struck me about the placement of David was the hallway that leads to the grand exhibit. All along the hallway are some examples of what is called Michelangelo’s unfinished work. Together, these sculptures are called “The Prisoners,” because each of them depicts a human form that seems to be struggling to break free from the stone. As travel writer Rick Steves puts it, “Michelangelo believed the sculptor was a tool of God, not creating but simply revealing the powerful and beautiful figures [God] put in the marble. Michelangelo’s job was to chip away the excess, to reveal. He needed to be in tune with God’s will.” The Prisoners show us some of that struggle to find God’s direction. And so, these unfinished statues which flank the hall that leads to the perfect David in many ways represent you and me. Unfinished sculptures, all of us, in many ways, prisoners of our mortal nature struggling to break free to all that God intends us to become. And then, there’s David.

David, in later times, was understood to be the perfect king. But we know, as we’ve been looking at his life, that he was far from perfect in character, yet he becomes the standard by which every other king is judged. Why is that? What was it about David that allowed the people to see him that way? What was it about David that caused a young sculptor, centuries later, to picture him as the essence of human perfection? As we near the end of David’s life, we’re going to focus in a slightly different way today on David’s relationship with God, and in particular how he himself remembered it through the writing of a song of praise, preserved in 2 Samuel 22, which we will read through this morning.

In the first part of this psalm, which is also preserved with a few differences in Psalm 18, David uses all sorts of images to describe God. A good song of praise focuses on God alone. The longer David walked with God, the more he was able to see God working in his life, and the more he was able to notice God’s presence in the things around him. David grew throughout his life as a “God-noticer.” All the things he had been through—Goliath, Bathsheba, Mephibosheth, Absalom—all those things taught him, slowly but surely, that God was active and present in every moment of every day. And so he saw God as a refuge, as a stronghold, as one who would always hear his voice, as the biggest part of his life. David saw God as a rock. Now, we hear that and it doesn’t really surprise us. We’re used to God being called a rock. Maybe we grew up singing “Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me.” Maybe we’re familiar with Brenton Brown’s praise song, “God My Rock.” But it’s rather strange, some scholars point out, for David to compare the living God to a lifeless rock. Rocks may be one of the lowest things on the scale of creation. Rocks may be the furthest thing possible from God (cf. Peterson, Leap Over a Wall, pg. 207).

And yet, when you’re in Israel, where David lived, you can’t help but notice that there are lots and lots of rocks. You might hear on the news of people (children, even!) throwing rocks at soldier or tanks, and that’s because that's all they have. There are plenty of rocks! And far be it for me to second guess David, but I think that’s part of the point. The rocks are everywhere, just as David had discovered how God was everywhere. But there is, of course, more to the imagery, because ultimately David sees God as his protector and the firm foundation he could stand upon. There have been many times when I’ve stood on the edge of a mountain and looked down (making my wife very nervous!), and you realize that the difference between life and death at that moment is where you’re standing. Standing on the rock provides security, groundedness. One step the wrong way would result in death. God is a rock we can stand upon.

David's descendent, Jesus, once told a story about two men, one foolish and one wise (Luke 6:46-49). Maybe you, like me, grew up singing the song in Sunday School: “The foolish man built his house upon the sand…” When the storms came, the house fell because it had no foundation. The wise man, we’re told, built his house on bedrock, solid bedrock, and when the storms came, his house stood. David says God is like that. God is his rock, and the psalm invites us to make God our rock as well. God is the biggest part of David’s life, even when he’s not aware of it, because God provides him a firm place to stand. What about you? Is God your rock?

+++++++

[22:8-20]

[8:30]

One of my favorite stories is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis. In this first book of the Chronicles of Narnia, Lewis introduces us to four children who go through a wardrobe and end up in the enchanted land of Narnia. There, they learn about Aslan, who is the Christ figure in the story. They begin to ask questions about Aslan of some Beavers they’ve met. Is Aslan a man? “Certainly not,” Mr. Beaver says. “Aslan is a lion—the Lion, the great Lion.” “Then he isn't safe?” Lucy asks. “Safe?” says Mr. Beaver. “Who said anything about safe? ’Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He’s the King, I tell you" (Lewis 64).

[10:00 & 11:30]

VIDEO: “He’s Not Safe, But He’s Good” (Narnia)

[All Services]

That’s the image I get when I read this portion of David’s song of praise, because there’s lots of scary stuff going on in these verses. What is it like when the King acts? David asks (cf. Goldingay, 1 & 2 Samuel for Everyone, pg. 168). The earth trembles (22:8), there is smoke and fire (22:9), storms erupt (22:10-13), his voice is like thunder (22:14), lightning scatters his enemies (22:15) and “the foundations of the earth [are] laid bare” (22:16). It’s a dark picture. He’s not safe, David says. The Lord of creation can do whatever he wants with creation and in creation. David’s words caution us against treating God like a buddy. God is not our next-door neighbor. God is all-powerful and can do with us as he wants.

But that’s the other part of David’s song: he’s not safe, but he’s good. David remembers that, even in the midst of the storms of his life—and if we’ve learned nothing else over these last few weeks, we’ve seen how David often encountered storms, just like we do—but in the midst of them, God reaches down (22:17) and grabs ahold of David. As he’s experienced, God doesn’t remove him from the storms. He supports (22:19) and protects David in the midst of the storm. David might get wet, and his enemies will still come after him, but God is with him, the God who is not safe, but good. The God who, when all is said and done, will bring David (and us) into a “spacious place” (22:20) because he delights in us.

David’s focus here is on the ways he learned to trust, the ways he has learned to call out to God in good times and in bad and trust that God will be there because he’s good, because he has promised to be there. What we miss in the English translation is the way David images his life changing because he’s been protected and rescued by God. In verse 7, what is translated as “distress” literally means “a tight place” (Baldwin, 1 & 2 Samuel, pg. 287) in contrast to verse 20, where David says God rescued him and put him down in “a spacious place.” Have you been in a “tight” place? I mean, literally, a tight place? When we were as Sepphoris in Israel in 2012, for some reason I can’t quite recall, we climbed down into the water system they had developed for the city. It’s dry now, but there are these tunnels where the water would be collected and would flow into the city. And we wanted to walk the length of those tunnels—again, not sure why, because it never occurred to me that water doesn’t need much room to flow. It certainly doesn’t need the kind of room that a (at that time) 43-year-old American male might need! So there were places where it was tight, where we had to squeeze through. (Rachel didn’t have to, of course, but I did!) And when we got to the end, there was the place for the wide pool, out of which the city would get their water. We went from some very tight places into a spacious place, and there is a great relief that comes with that change.

But I’d bet you’ve been in some metaphorical tight places in your life. Too much month at the end of the money. An argument that seems to spell the end of a relationship or a marriage. A child who has gotten in trouble one too many times with the authorities. An employer who seems intent on finding something wrong with what you’re doing in order to fire you. Maybe the enemies have looked like bill collectors or unemployment notices or even a person you once loved, and as David describes the enemies gathering around him, you know what that feels like. And in every tight spot, David’s call to us is the same: cry out to God. Now, I’m not saying that in every situation God will miraculously give you more money or bring the spouse back or help you keep the job. Not every situation worked out the way David hoped it would, the ways he prayed it would happen. After his affair with Bathsheba became public knowledge, and the baby that was born became sick, David begged God to spare the child’s life, but the child died anyway. God doesn't promise to pull us out of the situation, but God does promise to walk through it with us. He’s not safe, but he’s good, and he will ultimately bring us to a spacious place. My experience is that rarely do the tight spaces widen the way I think they should, but when I look back, I can see that God has widened them just the way they needed to be, and that had things worked out the way I thought they ought to, I would have missed the blessing he had for me. If God is the biggest part of our lives, as he is in David’s life, then can we trust him to rescue us and bring us a spacious place? Can we trust the God who is good even when he’s not safe?

+++++++

[22:21-28]

Have you ever caught your child or grandchild with their “hand” in the proverbial cookie jar? Or you’ve found something you know they did but they wouldn’t admit it? “Who did this?” you might ask, and then comes the answer: “I don’t know.” Even when they’re holding the cookie and sitting on the counter, the answer is still, “I don’t know.” That’s the way I sort of feel about this part of David’s song. He’s gone from celebrating God's character to announcing God’s protection to reflecting on God’s power. But when you hear him say things like, “I have been blameless before him and have kept myself from sin” (22:24), you have to wonder if maybe David has gone senile in his old age, or if he’s forgotten things and events like Bathsheba and the times he was told not to count the people and he did anyway, or you wonder if he’s in denial, or maybe some publicist actually wrote this part of the song. But I think what’s actually happening here is that David is seeing his life the way God sees it.

Now, that probably doesn’t clear things up. Am I saying that God doesn't see our sin? No, not at all. But we are told that when we come to God with a sincere heart of repentance, when we come to God and ask for forgiveness, he remembers our sin no more. One of my favorite images for this comes from the prophet Micah. He writes this: “Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy. You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:18-19). And I heard one person once say that he puts up a “No Fishing” sign. When we come to God with a repentant heart, he chooses not to remember our sins. So David's exactly right. He can honestly say that he stands now in God’s presence without a blemish because he has been forgiven.

That’s hard for us to comprehend, because we don’t forget like that. We don’t seem able to throw the sins that were committed against us into the deepest sea, and if we’re really honest, we’re not even able to forget our own sins. At least I don’t; maybe you’re better at it than I am, but I can remember things way back that I wish I had never done. And that makes it hard for us “feel” forgiven. I would imagine that was hard for David, too, which is one reason he sings about it here. He needs that constant reminder that God doesn’t remember. God chooses to forget his sins.

So, for David, it’s all about God’s action in his life, all about God taking the broken pieces of his life and putting them back together, making his life better and stronger than it was before. In fact, I like the way Eugene Peterson translates verse 25: “God rewrote the text of my life when I opened the book of my heart to his eyes.” I work with words every day, whether it’s writing a letter or a blog entry or a sermon. Words are my stock in trade, and there are times when I find myself struggling to find just the right word. I can write a section or a paragraph and then find myself going back to delete the whole thing and start over. My hope is always that, when I’m done, it’s a better story or a better sermon than what I began with. That's not always the case, as you all well know! But David’s talking about God rewriting our story, taking out the paragraphs that are bad, the blemished sections, our sins, and putting in their place righteousness. As God rewrites our story, he develops our character into Christlikeness. In fact, for the Christian, we’re told that when we accept Jesus into our lives, when we ask for forgiveness from our sins, his righteousness is “imputed” to us (cf. Romans 4-5). That’s an old word that basically means what he did, we get credit for. When God looks at us, he sees Christ and his righteousness because he chooses to. He rewrites our story. And when God rewrites your story, he becomes the biggest part of your life. In all things, from that moment on, your life is meant to reflect the grace and mercy and forgiveness of Jesus Christ toward everyone. No exceptions. Everyone—because that’s who Jesus died for. And that’s a hard calling, a hard assignment.

No one knew that more than Corrie ten Boom, who as a young girl was arrested with her family for harboring Jews during World War II. She was one of the few who lived through the experience in Ravensbruck, released due to a “clerical error.” Out of that experience, ten Boom had the chance to speak all around the world. But it was after an event in Munich that she faced her greatest challenge. One of the guards she knew from the concentration camp approached her, thanking her for her message and the word of hope that our sins are at the bottom of the sea. “You mentioned Ravensbruck,” he said. “I was a guard there, but since then, I’ve become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I did there, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well…Will you forgive me?” he asked, sticking out his hand. And ten Boom struggled. She knew the truth of what she had said, but she also remembered the horror this man had put she and her sister through. “Help!” she prayed, and then told God, “I can lift my hand, I can do that much. You supply the feeling.”

So, woodenly, she began to lift her hand to shake this ex-guard’s, and at that moment, she said, an incredible thing took place. Here is how she described it: “The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes. ‘I forgive you, brother!’ I cried. ‘With all my heart!’ For a long moment we grasped each other’s hands, the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known God’s love so intensely, as I did then.” That’s what can happen when God rewrites your story and becomes the biggest part of your life. Have you let God rewrite your story?

+++++++

[22:29-46]

This next-to-last part of David’s song causes some folks to struggle a bit because it’s mostly about how God enabled David to kill people. It’s about the wars he fought, and he says, “I pursued my enemies and crushed them; I did not turn back till they were destroyed. I crushed them completely, and they could not rise; they fell beneath my feet. You armed me with strength for battle” (22:38-40). David gives God, the rock, direct credit for defeating his enemies. And of course, as we’ve read the David story, we’ve become used to battles and wars and fighting and killing. It is, truly, an integral part of David’s story. And it’s great that David recognizes he could not have done what he has done without God, but why this focus on bloodshed?

We have to consider the context. My Biblical studies professors used to say that a text without a context is a pretext for bad interpretation. It’s vital to understand the context and the situation in which these words were written, and for David, it’s a brutal, bloody time. It’s a time of war. He lives in the midst of Philistine culture and Canaanite morality, or as we would put it today, violence and sex (cf. Peterson 215). When archaeologists have dug up various cities, they find beer mugs that represent Philistine culture (we still use the word “philistine” to describe a vulgar or crass person) and they find fertility goddesses in the Canaanite cities. That’s David’s setting. And, if you think about it, his setting isn’t all that different from ours.

We don’t necessarily go to war with every society that threatens us, though we have become seemingly more warlike in the last couple of decades. But we do face enemies that threaten us, a context and a situation that seek to undo our faith in God. And I’m not talking about so-called governmental pressures or taking prayer out of school or threats to religious liberty, as real as those enemies might be. The enemies we face each and every day are more subtle and therefore more dangerous. The internet has made sin much more accessible to this generation than any other, and our kids face temptations every day to give into “what everyone else is doing.” For instance, there used to be a social stigma on someone who got involved with pornography; today, men and women alike find it online and easily become addicted. It breaks up marriages and destroys lives. Greed dominates our culture; we’re always being told we want and need more and more and more. When exactly is enough, “enough”? We had a involved discussion last week at Disciple about technology, and how it has come to invade and even at times control our lives. We have this battle at our home, that when it comes time for dinner, the phones get put away. And then it buzzes, and I try to tell the kids they don’t have to answer right away. But I’m guilty, too. Technology, which connects us in wonderful ways, also can become an enemy, destroying intimacy and connections. How many times have you been in a restaurant and watched a table of four all on their phones, not speaking to one another? Maybe the better question is this: how often has that been you? There are enemies that seek to destroy our lives; I’m sure you can name that ones that threaten you daily: pride, gluttony, lust envy, unrestrained anger…we could go on and on.

David’s point is this: without God’s help, we cannot hope to defeat the enemies that come against us, whatever the Philistines in our life look like. We do not have the strength to live this Christian life, the faithful life, on our own. We can’t do it—but God can. David puts it this way: “The Lord turns my darkness into light” (22:29). Where have we heard that before? Of course, the beginning of John’s Gospel: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5). Maybe a better way to say what David wrote is this: the Lord removes our darkness and replaces it with light. “By my God,” David writes, “I can leap over a wall” (22:30, NRSV). Will you let God fight your battles for you, defeat your enemies for you, each and every day? I know every day, even before I get out of bed, I find myself praying, “God, give me strength for whatever comes this day. Help me do what you want me to do this day.” And bit by bit, as the enemies are defeated, God becomes more and more the biggest part of my life.

+++++++

[22:47-50]

David’s main concern throughout this song, as in the other songs he wrote, is not bringing attention to himself or to his exploits. David’s main goal is to bring attention to God and what God can do, because, as I’ve been saying, God is the biggest part of his life. And so, in this last section, he lets loose in exuberant praise: “The Lord lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be my God, the Rock, my Savior!” (22:46). And then he sings more than he knows in verse 50: “I will praise you, Lord, among the nations; I will sing the praises of your name.” I wonder if David ever imagined that his words would be translated and, in nations around the world, people would still, millennia later, be using his words to worship God (cf. Baldwin 290).

Either way, there is little of life that goes unexplored by David, and in everything he realizes how small his life would be if it weren’t for God. You see, “ignoring or denying God doesn’t first of all make us make us bad; it makes us small” (Peterson 216). My daughter has the most interesting conversations at school, and since she’s not here this morning, I’m going to take a moment to brag on her. She came home one day this week and, as we were talking, she said, “I got in an argument with an atheist today.” I was intrigued and said, “How did that happen?” “I don’t know,” she said, “but this kid and I were arguing about believing in God. He asked me if I believe in God because I have to or because I want to, and I told him I want to, because it’s true.” She went on to recount the conversation, especially the part when the atheist boy claimed to know more about the Bible than she did. She wasn’t impressed. “Just because you know about the Bible doesn’t mean you know everything,” she told him, and I was rather proud of her for not giving up ground in the discussion. Then we talked for a while that afternoon about how a life without God is so small. She saw that in this boy, even. Not having any sort of belief leaves him empty, without hope. A life without God leaves us small. In contrast, Jesus said he came to give us life “abundantly” (cf. John 10:10). He came to bring us uncommon life, life that exceeds the boundaries, big life. And when you think about it, what could be bigger than a life built on a solid foundation that will not shake, trusting in the God who is good and who forgives our sins (even remembering them no more), and who fights our enemies for us? That’s a big life, when we allow God and invite God to be the biggest part of our life.

So, here’s what I want you to do this week. On our sermon study guide this morning in your bulletin, there is a circle on the back page. Just a blank circle. I want to invite you to an examined life this week, a David sort of “paying attention” life. Pay attention to what part God plays in your life. Now, I’m not just talking about how much time you spend reading the Bible or praying or going to worship. What part does God play in the decisions you make, in the way you interact with others, in the way you forgive those who have hurt you, in the ways you raise your children or your grandchildren? What part does God play in your thinking, in your entertainment choices, in the ways you fight against the enemies that threaten? And then use the circle to make a pie chart, to demonstrate, to the best of your ability, what part of your life is shaped by God. Then, I invite you to bring those back next week—you don’t have to put your name on it—and we’ll have a place to tack those up as a witness to how we’re seeking to live more and more the David life, a life where God is becoming the biggest part. Let’s pray.

O My Son!

The Sermon Study Guide is here.

2 Samuel 18:6-15; Matthew 27:45-54

February 3, 2014 • Portage First UMC

In the 1990’s, a political crisis erupted in the state of Israel, and while such things aren’t unknown in that part of the world, this one happened to center around a man who had been dead for centuries. Shimon Peres, then the Foreign Minister of Israel was accused of slandering this man’s name during parliamentary debate, and his words caused there to be three motions of “no confidence” votes against the government. Worse, it was an election year, and the coalition government was afraid that this controversy, over a man long dead, would have devastating effects on their chances, so they urged Peres to make a public apology. He would not, though he did say he did not intend the comments the way they were taken. The man he supposedly slandered? King David, Israel’s ancient monarch. His actual words, spoken in the debate, were these: “Not everything that King David did, on the ground, on the rooftops, is acceptable to a Jew or is something I like” (Goldingay, 1 & 2 Samuel for Everyone, pgs. 159-160). Well, I would agree with Peres. You probably would, too. As we’ve been looking at David’s story these last few weeks, we’ve discovered that, though he was without a doubt a great king and he was a “man after God’s own heart,” he was also very imperfect. He made mistakes, he sinned, he strayed away from God. In other words, he was human. He was a man who sometimes comes across as a great hero, or a great man of God, a warrior and a consummate leader. And at other times he is a cunning schemer or an incompetent procrastinator. David is the one who took on the giant Goliath, and he’s also the one who ordered the death of one of his soldiers so that he could take the man’s wife. He’s a puzzle, and in the story we come to this morning, we see that all to clearly, because in this morning’s passage, David has to deal with suffering—deep down suffering. The death of his son is only the tip of the iceberg.

As we know, David has certainly been no stranger to death, or tears. He’s no stranger to murder, to disappointment, or even to sin (Peterson, Leap Over a Wall, pgs. 193-194). And yet, nothing really compares with what he’s about to experience. When we left David last week, he was firmly established as the king of all Israel. When we pick up the story today in 2 Samuel 18, he’s fighting against a rebellion. How did we get here? The story really begins eleven years earlier. David had many children by multiple wives, but David seems to have not paid a lot of attention to what was going on in his household. Perhaps he’s too busy administrating the kingdom. Perhaps he thinks they’ll figure it out on their own. Perhaps he’s still trying to forgive himself for the mess with Bathsheba. Meanwhile, his children are growing up. His daughter, Tamar, is beautiful, and her half-brother, Amnon, notices her. In fact, he thinks he is in love with her, but he’s really just in lust with her. He lets his attraction consume his thoughts until he can think of nothing else. And then he rapes Tamar. And once he has gotten what he wanted, he sends her away. In fact, the writer of 2 Samuel says Amnon hated Tamar more than he had ever loved her (13:15). Tamar is a “desolate” woman (13:20), and then Absalom, Tamar’s brother, learns what Amnon did. So does King David, and he’s “furious,” but he doesn’t do anything about it. He doesn’t punish Amnon and he doesn’t seem to console Tamar. He just gets mad about it, but has no other response.

So Absalom takes matters into his own hands. Now, to be fair, he gave his father plenty of time to punish Amnon. Absalom plots and plans for two years, and then he brutally murders his half-brother. Absalom runs away, knowing he has done a horrible thing, and again, David does nothing. He wants to go to Absalom, but he doesn’t (13:39). For three years, Absalom lives away from the capital and his family. Three years in exile. Now it’s been five years since Tamar’s rape. Five years for Absalom to plot and plan and grow bitter.

After the three years, he is allowed to return to Jerusalem, but David refuses to see him. It’s not really forgiveness; it’s sort of a royal pardon. It’s an impersonal welcome, not a fatherly embrace (Peterson 196). For four years, Absalom lives in Jerusalem without seeing his father, without receiving any word of forgiveness. David would not give his son so much as a look. Maybe you’ve been in such a situation, where a family is broken over an action or a word carelessly spoken, where family members won’t speak to or see each other. Maybe the brokenness came from something even more serious, like abuse or criminal activity. Or perhaps you haven’t been in such a situation—if so, give thanks. A family is supposed to be the group that loves you no matter what, who cares for you when no one else will. To lack the support of your family is a devastating thing. If you haven’t been there, try to imagine what it would be like to be completely cut off from those family members you hold most dear, from the folks who have been there for you since you were born. That’s where Absalom is. Now, I’m not trying to excuse what he did, not by any means, but I don’t want to excuse David, either. David, who has been forgiven for crimes similar to what Absalom has done, now is determined to refuse his son what he himself has come to depend on (cf. Peterson 197). Did Jesus, perhaps, have this story in mind when he told us, “If you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins” (Matthew 6:14-15)? Day by day, David denies Absalom forgiveness and love; he even denies his son his presence.

And so, Absalom begins plotting again. He spends four years planning, scheming, working his plan, winning the hearts of the people, until the time finally arrives where he feels he has more support than his father. Word comes to David, “The hearts of the people are with Absalom” (15:13). Absalom proclaims himself king, and David runs. He runs, oddly enough, back to the wilderness where once he spent so much time running away from King Saul. And there, he is once again an exile. His son has taken the kingdom from him, some of his officials have betrayed him, and people have even thrown rocks at him as he left town. They stood on the ridge above the road and yelled at him, “Get out of town, you worthless old man! You’re a murderer! You’re a dirty old man! This is what God has done to you because of your sin! Get out!” And you have to wonder if the stones or the words hurt more in those moments (cf. 16:5-8; Peterson 198-199).

The rape of Tamar led to Amnon’s murder. Amnon’s murder led to Absalom’s exile. And David’s silence led to hardheartedness on all sides. Somewhere along the way, even after his encounter with God after the Bathsheba affair, David has once again lost track of God. Now, I’m not saying that his neglect of his relationship to God caused his suffering or his exile; there are plenty of people in our world today, plenty of preachers even, who would say such a thing. But that’s not the witness of Scripture. Rather, the message of the Bible is this: everyone is subject to suffering. I’d really like to be able to stand up here and tell you that once you come to Christ, you’ll never have to suffer again. I’d like to tell you that a right relationship with Jesus guarantees a pain-free existence. But to tell you that, I’d have to lie to you. Following Jesus, worshipping God, does not exempt anyone from suffering, from hard times. The last time I checked, believers are in automobile accidents just as often as nonbelievers. We get cancer at the same rate as non-Christians. Studies indicate that divorce breaks up Christian families at the same rate as non-Christian families. And, as Eugene Peterson observes, “When you hit your thumb with a hammer, it hurts just as much after you’ve accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior as it did before” (194). Suffering and hard times aren’t an impersonal fate or a cut-and-dried moral punishment, either. In other words, you can’t say to someone, “Well, you’re suffering because you sinned.” if we do that, we're like the folks who were throwing rocks at David. It’s not helpful, and it’s not true. The truth is this: our world is sinful and broken, and sometimes we do get caught up in the consequences of our own sin and sometimes we get caught in the sins of others. Suffering comes because of brokenness, and for anyone to try to draw a straight line between cause and effect is not helpful. Undoubtedly, David knows why he’s now living in Mahanaim (17:24), but he’s not gone there to look back or feel sorry for himself. He’s gone there to move ahead with his life and see what might come out of his suffering. Unfortunately, for David, the outcome is a mixed bag, because in the midst of his recovery, there will be yet more suffering.

David gathers his troops and goes out to battle against Absalom and his army. David himself doesn’t go—and it’s not like last time, where he’s bored and hanging around the palace. This time, it’s at the advice of his general, Joab, based on David’s value as the king. In other words, if they get you, David, they’ve really won. Let us fight for you. And so David agrees, but as they go out to battle, he stands at the gate and tells them all, “Be gentle with the young man Absalom for my sake” (18:5). What a strange command! After all David has been through, why would he tell them to take care of Absalom? Absalom is the enemy. He’s the one to be destroyed. He’s been undermining David’s rule for many years. He’s chased his own father into the wilderness. But remember, the wilderness is where everything else is stripped away, and we find we have only God to depend on. Once again, in the wilderness, David becomes more his true self, more the man God intends him to be. There, in the wilderness, in the midst of his suffering, David rediscovers compassion. “Be gentle with Absalom.”

It would be easy to look at what happens here and think of David as weak, that somehow compassion has made him a lesser man. But nothing could be further from the truth. Compassion takes a great amount of character, strength and courage. The word literally means “to suffer with,” to experience another person’s situation as if it were your own. For David, it means he understands—or is at least trying to understand—why Absalom has responded this way, and even perhaps take his part of the responsibility. Compassion means we might have to put aside our own desires, our own priorities—most likely even our own sense of what is right and wrong—and consider the situation of someone else. Compassion is more than feeling sorry for someone because they’re grieving or because they are hurting. Compassion is entering into their suffering. It’s Job’s three friends who come to sit with him. Do you remember the story of Job? He loses everything—his home, his children, his wealth, and then he gets a serious illness that causes him great discomfort. His wife tells him to curse God and die, but Job won’t do that. He asks why he should only accept good things from God and not difficult things. And then he has three friends who come and for a whole week, they just sit with him. They don’t say a word; they sit. They enter into his suffering. Compassion looks like that. Compassion looks like Mother Teresa, scouring the streets of Calcutta, India, looking for those who are dying, picking them up and bringing them back to her shelter so they can die with dignity. She took people no one else wanted, people no one else loved. Compassion looks like that. Compassion looks like medical personnel who ran toward the injured after the first bomb went off in the Boston Marathon last year. And compassion looks like a retired psychologist who lives across the street from Sandy Hook Elementary School. On the morning of the shooting in Newtown, he found six children sitting on his lawn. When he asked them what they were doing, one little boy said, “We can’t go back to school. Our teacher is dead.” So the man brought them toys and juice while he tried to find out what was going on. When a news reporter commended him later, he said, “Being a psychologist had nothing to do with it. I responded like a grandfather” (Yancey, The Question That Never Goes Away, loc 395, Kindle edition). Compassion looks like that.

And compassion looks like two men, sitting together one evening. One lost his son a number of years before, and the other has a daughter who is very, very ill. There are no answers, but compassion calls us to enter into the suffering of the other. Compassion looks like this.

VIDEO: “November Christmas: Dealt a Bad Hand”

“Be gentle with Absalom.” Compassion looks like that. Unfortunately, Joab is much more pragmatic than David is. When word reaches him that Absalom is caught in a tree, Joab goes after him. It appears that Absalon was riding through the forest where the battle is taking place, and somehow got his head caught in the branches. Most scholars think it was that his long hair, which he was very proud of (14:26), got tangled in the branches, while the mule he was riding kept going. And Absalom is left there, literally “hanging between heaven and earth” (Youngblood, “1, 2 Samuel,” Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 3, pg. 1019). His mule, his royal mount, leaves him behind, which becomes a symbol of Absalom losing the kingdom as well. Joab comes upon him and thrusts three spears into his heart, then he makes way for ten other men to come in and abuse the king’s son, making sure he’s really dead. The body is taken, then, thrown into a pit and covered with rocks. Today, outside the walls of Jerusalem in the Kidron Valley, there is a monument called “Absalom’s Tomb.” It sits across the valley from the Temple Mount, and in past times, it was the custom for Jews, Christians and Muslims to throw a stone at the tomb anytime they walked by. Now, the monument itself is empty; there is no body buried there. It’s also not the monument referred to in verse 18, as it was actually built sometime in the first century (Knight, The Holy Land, pg. 94), but the symbolism is still powerful. In spite of David's compassion toward his wayward son, people throughout the centuries have treated Absalom as a villain.

But David cannot. When word reaches him of Absalom’s death, the Bible says David was “shaken” (18:33). He goes into a private room and weeps, calling out, “O my son Absalom! My son, my son Absalom! If only I had died instead of you—O Absalom, my son, my son!” It has to be one of the most heartbreaking verses in all of Scripture, but it’s a cry that flows out of a compassionate heart. And I believe with everything that is in me that, in that moment, David reconnected with God, the God who had never left him, the God he knew to be faithful in all things. Why do I believe that? One, because at that moment, David is most reflecting the compassionate heart of God. He has entered into the suffering of the world, practicing compassion toward someone who really doesn’t deserve it. And two, because God knows what it’s like to lose a son.

In our Gospel lesson this morning, we read of the death of the Son of God. In Matthew’s account, there are all sorts of signs in the world that something is not right. As Jesus hangs on the cross—between heaven and earth—he feels forsaken by God the Father. When he cries out one last time, the curtain in the Temple that separated the Holy of Holies from the rest of the space is torn in two—from top to bottom. Tombs break open. Dead men rise and wander into Jerusalem. Can you imagine what that was like? “Didn’t we just have your funeral last week?” There’s an earthquake, and all sorts of things. God’s grief at the death of his son impacts the whole creation, so much so that one of the hardened Roman soldiers standing near the cross says, “Surely he was the Son of God!” (27:54). Now, you may want to quibble with me over the timeline and how time works with God, or what God knows ahead of time, but I don’t want to argue that with you. I only say this: the book of Genesis tells us that from the moment of the very first sin, God knows he will have to send a savior, to rescue the people, someone to crush the serpent’s head (cf. Genesis 3:15). So God knows what it’s like to mourn the death of a son.

And out of God’s great compassion, he comes near us in times of suffering. In fact, we learn things when we suffer we could not learn any other way. David is a different king because of the suffering and the hardships he’s been through over these years. You probably know people who have had priorities shifted because of difficult times. Suddenly, the cancer comes or the death happens and the job isn’t so all-powerful or all-important as we once thought. The crisis comes and suddenly we realize that much of what we value won’t last. So, as people who have been through times of suffering like David, how do we then respond to those who are going through it right now?

I spoke with a respected mental health counselor this week (okay, so it was my wife!) about how people generally respond in times of suffering, and there seem to be three general responses. There are those who are uninvolved, who stand on the sidelines and simply wait until it’s over. These are the folks in Jerusalem who didn’t really care who was king, as long as they didn’t have to get involved. So they supported neither David nor Absalom, nor did they learn anything from the experience. Compassion was not important, so they simply stayed on the side and made no difference to anyone. These are the folks who simply exist, who don’t care beyond their own world.

A second response is found in those who intensify the pain, the suffering. Sometimes these are folks who set out to intentionally do harm to another, but by and large these are the folks who say things they mean to be comforting but are not. In Congregational Care, we talk about eight things not to say to those who are suffering, and to be perfectly honest, a lot of times we say these things because we don’t know what to say. We’re uncomfortable with silence, and so we say things just to fill the void. As you heard in the video, sometimes people say things that even push people away from God. They don’t mean to; they mean to be comforting, but some things we say simply are not. Here are the eight things we go over in Congregational Care, along with a few somewhat cynical responses: “God must have needed him in heaven.” (Yeah, well, I need him down here.) “I know just how you feel.” (No, you don’t. And it’s not about you, anyway.) “God will give you another child.” (That is horribly insensitive. Even if another child is born, that will never fill the void of one who is lost.) “God told me he’ll heal you.” (Really?) “Time heals all wounds.” (Not always.) “God must me trying to teach you something.” (This is an incredibly arrogant thing to say, and it’s also patronizing, as if you know their life better than they do.) “If you do what I did, then you’ll be much better.” (And who made you the expert?) “My aunt Mildred had the same problem…” (And yet every situation is different, and every person is different.) We’re not called to package people’s pain or somehow explain away their suffering, as if we could (Bill, online article in CCM files). We’re called, instead, to learn compassion and to enter into the other’s pain.

That brings us to the third response: the ones who restore. Remember, the word “compassion” means to “suffer with.” To sit with the other person like Job’s friends did. To gather together with those who are hurting like the disciples did in the Upper Room after the crucifixion. The Gospels tell us that they went back to the last familiar place, the place where they had shared dinner together Thursday night, when Jesus was still with them. They came together, a bit in fear and more seeking comfort from each other. No one else knew really what they had been through. So they came together and offered compassion to one another. There is a “fellowship of sufferings” out of which, often, the most compassionate response can come. That’s why, as a part of our Congregational Care Ministry, we’re going to begin offering a series of classes that are aimed at different types and stages of grief. We want to create safe places where you can come together to find healing and hope. The first class will be starting in April—which isn’t as far away as you might think!—and will focus on a book called “Beyond the Broken Heart.” Compassion looks like people who help restore one another.

You see, compassion is not about writing a check or trying to make someone hurry through their suffering. The story of the Bible, from the Old Testament to the crucifixion of Jesus, is that redemption and healing and hope come not by going around the difficulty but by going through it. Compassion requires face-to-face contact, human contact, knowing someone else cares enough to sit with you, to listen to that story for one hundredth time, to pray for and with you. Our Congregational Care Ministers stand ready to be that person for you, to offer compassionate care. And compassion also sometimes comes in a sharp word from a trusted friend. Joab has been David’s general for so many years, and they have developed a relationship that’s rooted in deep trust. That’s why Joab can come to him and tell him he needs to pull it together. The troops are thinking of deserting because they hear him mourning Absalom, the man they have just risked their lives trying to protect David from (19:1-8). Now, Joab's words may sound unkind, but it’s really a compassionate and caring response. Joab knows he can speak this way to David because of the trust between them. Sometimes we need a Joab in our lives for all those times when we can’t see beyond our own suffering. Sometimes compassion looks like a sharp word, but if the word is spoken at the wrong time or without that deep trust, it can be devastating. The main goal in any act of compassion is to help us see how God can use even this, even our suffering, even our pain. God can use it. God didn’t cause it. God didn’t kill Absalom. But God can use our suffering, our hurt, our wounds. God can use even this.

Leo Buscaglia, who was professor of special education at USC, was once asked to judge a contest to choose the “most compassionate child.” The contest would be based upon stories of caring or service submitted by parents, relatives, or friends. Buscaglia read many stories, but the one he chose was a four-year-old child who lived next door to an elderly man who had just lost his wife. One day, he was peeking through the fence and he saw the old man in tears, so the little boy went through the gate, climbed up on the widower's lap, and sat there for a while. Later, his mother asked the boy what he had said. “Nothing,” he responded. “I just helped him cry.” Compassion looks like that. Let us pray.