Good Morning.

My name is Stephanie Friant. I am the Senior Adult Visitation staff person here. I backup Buck with pastoral care. That’s basically what I do.

Our first reading this morning is from Ephesians, Chapter 2, verses 8 to 10.

8For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— 9not the result of works, so that no one may boast. 10For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.

Our second reading today, I am going backwards, in the Old Testament, Psalm 73, verses 21 to 26.

21 When my soul was embittered,
   
when I was pricked in heart, 

22 I was stupid and ignorant;
   
I was like a brute beast towards you. 

23 Nevertheless I am continually with you;
   
you hold my right hand. 

24 You guide me with your counsel,
   
and afterwards you will receive me with honour. 

25 Whom have I in heaven but you?
   
And there is nothing on earth that
I desire other than you. 

26 My flesh and my heart may fail,

but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion forever.

Let us pray.

Gracious God, you have led us here this morning for me to speak these words and for all of us to hear them. As you are the ruler of our minds and hearts, help us to hear your word and let it move in us as you will. Amen.

When I was a junior in high school, I found myself as an exchange student sitting in this little German church. I still was not fluent in the language, never quite got there, but I was sitting there trying to make out the sermon and the prayers. Then it was communion. The pastor got up and I did not need to know what he was saying to know what he was saying. As he broke that bread and poured that cup, time and place changed. As we all ate of that bread together and sipped that wine, I wasn’t just in that room, a foreigner in a strange land; I was with Christ at his table. I was with my family across the ocean at our home church. I was here today, for in that moment, God really showed me, brought into my heart, just how connected we are in those simple gestures of love, in that simple ritual that we have been blessed with.

Now we all have our own faith stories. You may have had a conversion experience or, like me, your faith may have grown in stages. For some reason ever since Buck asked me to preach today, God kept tugging at my heart to share my faith story. Let me tell you, this is a leap of faith. I have already told a few of you here. To stand up here and put it all out, well, the short version, is both nerve racking and exciting. Throughout this last week, every time I asked God if I should be doing something else, he would somehow immediately respond and say, “Yes, Do it! I have put you on this path. Keep going.” So in order to keep going I wrote it all down. I will try to go off script, but… So, in preaching classes we learned two main rules in seminary. One, get your sermon from the Scripture; don’t pick your Scripture from the sermon. And two, don’t talk excessively about yourself. But three things convinced me to stray away from those rules. It is O.K. to talk about yourself if you don’t do it all the time and it is appropriate. I got the O.K. from Buck. But most importantly, God told me to do this. And if God asks, we do.

What reason would God have for me to preach about myself today? Well, it’s not just about me. It is about you. It is about us. It is about this church. So I am going to lay it out there and let God open your heart to hear what God wants you to hear. It may be different from what the person next to you is hearing and it might be different than what I even think I am saying; but I know God is in this today.

So, I have always been a Christian. I was raised in the Presbyterian Church. While I was not raised in a particularly religious family, faith in God was an unspoken requirement. My mother loves to tell everyone she meets about one incident when I was a toddler, that walking past the pastor’s empty office I looked in and said, “God isn’t here today.” Yet it wasn’t my family but God who brought the love of him into my life. God’s presence was something I had always felt and searched out. Around the fifth grade I remember looking out my bedroom window and asking God if he showed me the why and the how of all existence, I would do whatever he asked me to do. Well, at ten I could have not known what I would be getting myself into. God took me on my word. My faith journey has not been easy but I am thankful that God gave me the mind to ask for that bargain.

When I was younger I would never have expected to go into professional ministry. I wasn’t religious enough. I was a woman and being a woman in ministry is difficult. I was sinful with little hope of being perfect. I wasn’t smart enough. I hated public speaking. I have a horrible time at memorizing scripture. None of these reasons have really changed, but my relationship with God has. And God working in me has made all the difference. It has not been an easy road.

I was pushed out of a church at the age of fifteen for being competition with the pastor’s fourteen-year-old daughter. I have been lousy at jobs trying to fit into places I just wasn’t meant for. It took essentially failing a seminary class to realize that I just could not handle evacuating from Katrina as well as I thought I could. After commuting to Chicago for seminary and finding essentially the majority of three years apart from my husband, he gets a lot of brownie points for that, my husband and I will be paying off those school loans for decades to come. I could go on, but I think you get the idea. Life is never easy and I have never expected it to be. But my life has been easier than most and yet I have still asked God many times for a break; but he hasn’t given me one.

Yet, God has used all these opportunities to guide me and deepen my faith. While I didn’t like being diagnosed with a depression as part of my psychological profiling for the ordination process, it has been a gift from God to go through therapy and self-discovery as I would have never been able to bring an end to a miserable family inheritance. Moving from place to place and job to job has at times been discouraging yet it has exposed me to so much of God’s creation that I will always be thankful. Not knowing if I will ever be ordained, let alone what God has in plans for me, can sometimes be terrifying. I have learned to rely on God and know that God has always plans for me as long as I remain faithful.

While I have never had that conversion experience, my journey has been a series of steps. In the past six months my life has just clicked. God has brought me out of this huge wilderness and I am at peace. Now I am not saying that God is through with me yet, but I cannot, I can hardly describe the change that has occurred in my spirit and the changes in my life. I have been involved in sixteen different churches. I had to count that a few different times. Now my participation ran from a frequent visitor with a family member or a very active member or on staff. Now if you are trying to figure out the math, that is just over one church for every two years of my life. I moved around a lot and at times been active in multiple churches. Only three were non-Presbyterian and one was Presbyterian Methodist. So I have been around.

The churches have been in a variety of contexts and demographics. They have been in trouble; they have been going through change; and they have been growing. Mostly by chance, these churches have been predominantly theologically center or progressive. Then for college I graduated from a program where most of the professors saw religion as simply a myth and a tool for manipulation of the masses.

Then due to a number of circumstances I went to McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, a progressive seminary where I soon learned that I wasn’t as progressive as I had thought. See, in my language, the words I use in prayer, the heart I open to all those I meet with through my position here, is a person who has lived all over the place and stretching beyond the box that I was born into, but the same time predominantly using and hearing the language of liberals and progressives. My husband can attest to this because he is from a mostly Republican family.

Why am I sharing this? Trust me I am not exactly sure; but, it is to give you a little more background for what I am going to say next. See prior to the birth of my daughter, I was finally ready to accept that God’s message to me was that I needed to leave my job at another church. God had wanted me there but I had experienced what he had wanted me to experience and it was time to move on. I took the leap, leaving a job that both allowed me to continue to work in ministry and help bring home a bit of additional income just as another child was coming into our life. In my search for what was next, I went to speak with Pastor John Ward. He was gracious enough to speak with me. After talking about my situation, he said I should go talk to Buck. I don’t know what Buck thought of me that first meeting, but I am sure it wasn’t that bad since I am here today. From my side, I was impressed. I saw somebody who was real, who is faithful, who is tall, and someone who I felt God was calling me to get to know better. Yet from recent experiences I doubted if he was really who he seemed to be—you know, a little too good to be true. Plus, I wondered if a church like Faith, whose religious language on your website was so different than what I was used to, would accept me. I was hesitant but I felt God tugging on me to try it out. One Sunday I came to worship here leaving my husband and kids at home so I could check out the nursery first. Now I have been part of fifteen churches before this and visited over one hundred in my life, so when I walked into this church last spring, I knew this was the place I needed to be. A place God was calling me to. I felt a sense of peace, a sense of joy, of excitement, of caring. I felt the breath of the Holy Spirit entering in those doors, swirling around these hallways, and moving into the sanctuary. But even before the first note was played or word was spoken, before I actually even took a step into the sanctuary, I knew I was supposed to be here.

We soon started attending regularly as visitors. I had little thought of Buck taking me up on my offer to help but did think that somehow I would get involved. Then at the beginning of summer Buck asked if I would come on to assist him. I jumped at the chance. I am just so glad, so glad that I am here. Now first, Buck is just who he shows himself to be. I am so thankful to be inspired and encouraged by him and the bonus of working with all the other great staff and volunteers, and can I tell you this is one of the most organized churches that I have ever been to? Even if you think that’s unique, trust me… Oh, and that language on the website that I was scared of, well now I have been around it more and I am thankful for it. As we have mentioned before, the language of the conservative and progressive sides and what they focus on is rather far apart and they end up talking past each other. I can identify with that. Now that I have learned much more of the conservative side, I am so thankful to be able to articulate my faith in ways I had previously not been able to put into words. I can admit to still being in the process of integrating the new spiritual language into my vocabulary and having to ask for some clarifications but it is natural to me. In fact I find that I was often using it without knowing it. Yet, the most meaningful part of being here is you. I am so blessed to be able to get to know so many of you and there are still many on my list. To be able to be in ministry with people who have Christ in their hearts who are walking hand in hand with God is amazing. The wide ranges of experiences here in this congregation, the deep faith and thoughtfulness, the caring and discernment. I just do not know how to express it.

I do not understand God’s full plan for me and I do not even hope to understand all of it but I do know I am experiencing something new as I am coming home to who I am. But at this place in my life when nothing and everything has changed, when my heart is exploding with the Spirit, and you know that children’s song “Jesus Deep Down in My Heart” over and over and over in my head. I am a new creation in Christ and I am certain that this stage in my life would not have been born so easily or as completely had God not led me here to be among you.

So, why these texts today? The texts are rather straight forward and honest.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life.”

“I was stupid and ignorant… Nevertheless I am continually with you. You hold my right hand, you guide me with your counsel and afterwards you will receive me with honor.”

Our life, our faith, comes from God, not because we deserve it but because God created us for good. We were created to be with him. We can be stupid and ignorant. We can take the wrong path. If God is with us and it is through us that he will work. We just need to be open and honest with him, with ourselves and with each other so God can use us, guide us to fulfill his will. I am in complete awe. My whole life from teenage fights with my parents, to hiking up Mt. Sinai has been a journey, a God-blessed, God-directed and God-accompanied journey that has brought me to a place of unimagined spiritual beauty. I will say it again that God is not finished with me yet; in fact, I feel God working in me now towards something even more amazing. Yet I stand before you as I am—an undeserving, sinful, frail and limited human being with the love of Jesus down in my heart. Amen.

Well, let’s turn to our Scripture. It comes from the Book of Philippians, 2nd Chapter, and we are going to read the first 11 verses. So I invite you to follow along as we read God’s word for us this day. (Philippians 2:1-11)

1If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, 2make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. 4Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. 5Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, 

6 who, though he was in the form of God,
   
did not regard equality with God
   
as something to be exploited, 

7 but emptied himself,
   
taking the form of a slave,
   
being born in human likeness.


And being found in human form, 

 8 he humbled himself
   
and became obedient to the point of death—
   
even death on a cross.

9 Therefore God also highly exalted him
   
and gave him the name
   
that is above every name, 

10 so that at the name of Jesus
   
every knee should bend,
   
in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 

11 and every tongue should confess
   
that Jesus Christ is Lord,
   
to the glory of God the Father.

Alright! We are going to switch it up here a little bit. I am going to start with a quiz. I am going to show you an image on the screen and I want you to think about the first thing that comes to your mind, O.K. Are you ready?

Image: American Flag
Patriotism, America, yeah, exactly. O.K. Let’s try another one.

Image: Apple’s Corporate symbol
Do I hear “innovation” over there? O.K. innovation. Obviously that is Apple’s corporate symbol. Everyone came up with Apple? O.K. Let’s try another one.

Image: Scene of a train station or airport with lots of people standing around.
“Flash mob” I heard back there. O.K. good. “Travel” O.K. Let’s try another.

Image: U.S. Capitol Building
(laughter) Who is laughing at the Capitol? “Gridlock” O.K. that is probably very appropriate today. O.K. Let’s try another one.

Image: Nike Corporate symbol.
“Just Do It” Nike, O.K. One more.

Image: Picture of Hosts of Entertainment Tonight with Justin Bieber.
“Bieber Fever”. That’s right. This is a picture of the former host of Entertainment Tonight along with Justin Bieber. Folks, kids know who that is. Justin Bieber, O.K.
Just wanted to throw that in to see what we do with it. Who is the other guy? I don’t know. Does anyone know? He is the host but I don’t know what his name is. O.K.

Alright, images are an important part of our lives, aren’t they? Images are an important part of our lives whether they are corporate images, whether they are fashion images, whether they are spiritual images. We get bombarded with images all through the day, don’t we? I think our culture is becoming more of a visual culture rather than a verbal culture, as well as a result of it. When we think about the images that come into our lives they help us to remember the things that are important to us, like a wedding ring, or sometimes other images can help us remember things that are long forgotten or maybe even things that we would like to forget. Images are a part of our lives and in many ways they shape our thoughts and our ideas about the world. For some, they even help shape who they see themselves to be, in some ways. So like it or not, images and the ideas that sometimes come along with them in our thought life affect our relationship with Jesus Christ.

Images have the power to transform our lives to reflect Christ or to reflect anything but Christ. Our Scripture admonition today is that we would have the mind of Christ. I think that speaks right where each one of us live. But Paul even goes beyond that and he says that we are to have the same mind as Christ and in doing that it will bring joy into our lives. Joy. When I think about joy, it is more than just that emotional high. It is a character quality that is grounded in God and, in fact, is derived from God. I think joy can come into our lives in a couple different ways. One, it is to characterize our lives here on earth and in the here and now. But it also can anticipate what will be ours when we are reunited in heaven again someday.

We are going to focus just on that first part of joy today. So as we look at our text today, Paul is encouraging the Philippians to unity, of living a life that is worthy of the gospel. Unity is about having the same mind as the other believers around you. We see that twice in verse 2. As you look at the text you will see that. Paul ties that joy to seeing and hearing about the unity that is happening within the Philippian Church. So for Paul, unity brings joy, but it also brings joy to the Philippian Church, as well.

So I think one of the things we can say right out of the gate is that being united together brings joy. There is this connection between joy and unity. When people are united around the same common goal, the same common vision, it breeds enthusiasm, it breeds passion. People can get excited in being in that kind of environment. It brings them joy when that happens and that joy is from God and it transcends any kind of happiness.

So Paul is making a statement to call the believers to unity; but he then says to take that unity to the next level. To that next level is to have the same mind as Christ, he says in verse 5. He is saying that being united together of the same mind and make that mind the mind of Christ. In verse 5 when you look at it in the Greek, it is kind of a difficult phrase to translate because it is actually missing a verb in the last part of that sentence. But I think a couple of things can be said about it that I think are important for us to hold onto as we move through this. And one is that, you may even see footnotes in your Bible, it says some manuscripts say “have the same mind in you that you have in Christ.” The other thing I think we can pull out of this, another way it can be looked at, is by saying that this way of thinking must be adopted by you. This way of thinking is the same way of thinking that was adopted by Christ. As we think about that I think there are a couple pieces we can pull out of that. One is that we already have the mind of Christ. The mind of Christ is already in us and that is backed up by Scripture, isn’t it?

2 Corinthians 5:17, do you remember that? It should ring a bell. We memorized it about a year or so ago. Say it with me if you remember it.

2 Corinthians 5:17
If anyone is in Christ they are a new creation. The old is passed away, the new has come.
2 Corinthians 5:17

Part of our new creation, part of our new creatureness, is a new mind. I think it also helps us, that other part of it, helps us realize that having the mind of Christ involves our thought life, thinking like Jesus thought. Hold on to both of those ideas, because we are going to come back to them because I think they have implications for how we live that out.

So Paul is calling the believers in the Philippian Church to have the same joy that is his by being united together and being united by having the same mind as Christ. That mind of Christ is then revealed in the next few verses, verses 6 through 8. There we see the story of change and of personal decision. It is talking about Jesus. It says, “Jesus did not claim what was rightly his. Instead he took the form of a slave… He humbled himself…” He got down on his knees, boys and girls. And he became obedient. Jesus intentionally chose to turn away from what was rightly his and serve others. We know that that culminated in the ultimate act of service, of dying for us. I think I have said here before that the heart of God is the heart of a servant. In fact I know I have said that before. But I think that these verses also show us that the mind of God, and thus the mind of Christ, is the mind of a servant, as well. So not only is God’s heart of the servant, God’s mind is the mind of a servant. I think in the acts that Jesus lays out before us how our mind is to be like his, to have the mind of Christ then is to have the mind of a servant. The mind of a servant, when we have that, we see the unity grows but it is then taken to a deeper level. In emptying and humbling ourselves in service, what happens is we are actually lifting up those around us to a higher position than we are. We are putting them over us. As we lift them up, those folks that have been lifted up will then in turn lift others up. So we have this mutual lifting up of each other and that is how unity grows. That is how it builds. When it happens, that mutual lifting up, it brings joy to the community. When it is done around a vision, a vision of living a life that is worthy of the gospel, lives can be changed and the power of God is unleashed.

So let me bring that home for us now. One of the ways that we can bring joy into our present lives is by being united together by having that same mind as Christ and we know that the mind of Christ is the mind of a servant. So if that is the goal, to have the mind of Christ, how do we get there? How do we get there? Well I think the easy answer would be then to go and serve, right? That would be the easy answer. We could go; we could serve in the church; we can serve outside the church; we could serve here; we could serve there. We could serve until we are blue in the face. But the reality is that doesn’t mean we have the mind of Christ, because serving is the result of having the mind of Christ, not the means to having the mind of Christ.

I think the way to the mind of Christ goes back to verse 5 in our text. As this new creature in Christ that we are, one of the things that we said out of that text is we already have the mind of Christ, right. That is part of our new nature. So, just as our old sinful nature needs to be sanctified, that is a fancy word for being made holy over time by being faithful and obedient, so too our mind has to be sanctified. When that doesn’t happen, you can kind of think of it as we have a birthday present that has been given to us. It is wrapped up and with this beautiful bow. We take it and we put it in the corner of the room and we never unwrap it. You see the old ways of thinking have to be overtaken by new ways of thinking and that leads us back to how we think. And that is the other part of verse 5. Our way of thinking must be the same way of thinking that Jesus thought with. So if our mind is going to be sanctified, if we are going to actually take that gift and unwrap it, we have to think about how we do that. There are lots of ways to get at Jesus’s way of thinking. But I think it takes us back to where we started. We could go lots of different directions from there, but I want to take us back to where we started today and that is the images that we take into our mind.

Dallas Willard, a professor and expert on spiritual formation, says that “images and ideas are the primary stronghold for evil” in humans and in society. In other words, the images and ideas are where Satan focuses his energy to defeat God’s purposes in and with humanity.

Don’t you think that is true? I mean all we need to do is look at the images that get blasted at us every day. Don’t they simply reinforce Willard’s comments?

Vladimir Zworykin patented the television tube. Kids in the back, televisions were sometimes larger than this thick. They were made out of a big glass tube and this guy figured out how to do that and project a picture through it. He was looking at a color T.V. in 1981 and he said “The color is magnificent but it is awful what they are doing with the subject matter. I would never let my children close to that thing.”

And isn’t that true? Parents if you have children, I hope you already know about this and this is old news. Have you heard about a thing called “Adult Swim”? Adult Swim is adult-only programming on the Cartoon Network. It is the programming that they use from 9:00 p.m. in the evening until 6:00 a.m. in the morning. It is considered 18 and over in content. Some of the programming is stuff that you would see on like FOX, the cartoons and stuff from FOX. But they also have their own original programming as part of it and through it all, it is heavily dosed with sexual and violent content. Parents you should be aware of that if you don’t already know about that. It accosts our kids with no disclaimers, no ratings, no nothing. It is one of the ways images bombard us.

This last fall we started receiving at our home Cosmopolitan magazine. It was addressed to my son. We thought well John is probably not a big Cosmo guy. Just I’m guessing. We thought maybe one of his friends is playing a joke on him. We did a little follow up and it turns out that Cosmo is being sent to us because he subscribed to another magazine—I think it is ESPN. He is getting now Cosmo, free. Have you seen Cosmo lately? Have you seen the pictures? Have you seen the graphic on the cover? You don’t even need to open the cover. It is explicit! So explicit….and they are not the only one. There are lots of magazines like that to the point that I was just told this week that the CUB on 101 has a “family friendly” checkout lane for families that don’t want to expose their kids to these kinds of magazine covers.

Those are the images that are coming at us that are just out there for us to take in. One other that I think is probably a little older but you may be aware of it, is Abercrombie and Fitch, the young adult clothing stores. They have basically made it their marketing strategy to push the boundaries of the visual for publicity, as much as anything else. You walk into one of their stores and they have huge pictures that are taller than I am of various young people in various states of undress in suggestive poses. That is how they market themselves, to just create publicity.

But it is images that just bombard you. The toxic images that we are talking about when they are taken into our mind they are very slow to recede, very slow to recede, even when we seek to put our mind on things that would draw us to Christ.

The power of images! We have to watch over it and it points to the necessity of good thinking. Good thinking is not just thinking about good things. It is thinking clearly about solid information. I can think of no better place for solid information than Scripture itself.

There is an old song, a song that is old to the young folks, but I remember it, from the “Supertones.” Bill, you are probably the only one that remembers the “Supertones.” It is a song about standing in your faith and it says, “How will you stand if you don’t understand?” That is the line. How will you stand for your faith if you don’t understand Scripture? When we think of Ephesians 6 where it talks about taking on the armor of God to do battle with the forces of evil in our world and they say we are to “take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,” the word of God.

Scripture gives us good information and allows a person to think straight to be exposed to the mind of Christ because Scripture is the mind of Christ. Scripture is the place where the mind can engage in a process to search out what is true and what is not, what is worthy of taking into our mind in images and ideas, and what needs to be kept out. And when that happens, our mind can become transformed to a mind that more closely reflects the mind of Christ—a mind that values those around them and seeks to serve others. That is the mind of Christ and it unites and it brings joy into the community and the believers’ lives.

Let’s pray.

Mighty God, thank you. Thank you that you have already given us the mind of Christ. Lord we ask that you would help us to yield ourselves, to learn, to think solidly about good things, and to keep those things out of our mind’s eye that would drag us down. So Lord, watch over us, for Lord we desire to be your people, united together lifting one another up, encouraging and supporting; for, in that, we know we will experience your joy. Thank you Lord, amen.

Let’s turn to God’s word this morning. We are going to read out of John’s gospel, a pretty familiar passage. In fact, it is one of Jesus’s I AM statements and so we are going to be looking at it and then we will delve into it. Let’s start by reading John 15, starting in verse 1. I invite you to follow along with me. (John 15:1-8)

1‘I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine-grower. 2He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. 3You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. 4Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. 5I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. 6Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. 7If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.

God’s word for us this morning! I invite you to join me once again me in prayer.

Mighty and holy God thank you, thank you that you are here and Lord we ask that your Spirit would come in full to us right now that the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts might be acceptable to you. And that Lord, as a result, we might grow closer to you. We ask it in your name. Amen.

Well I want to state proudly that I am a graduate of Cal State University Stanislaus. These are pictures of the school as it looks today—it didn’t look like that when I went there. But, Cal State Stanislaus is located in the county of Stanislaus, California; and for those of you who are geographically challenged, that is about half way between Sacramento and Fresno. We were known as the Warriors but everyone around town knew us as Turkey Tech because of the large turkey farms that were part of the county’s agriculture. Agriculture is king in the central valley of California, and Stanislaus County is no different. It is known for its cheese and dairy, as well as its fruits and nut orchards and its wine vineyards. Did you know that Stanislaus County is home to Gallo wines?

Vineyards can be a wonderful sight when you look at them. They are beautiful. Long straight rows with control guide wires that help the vines grow straight, not a weed that is found. As harvest time nears you don’t see the grapes. That is because they are covered by the leaves from the vines so they don’t get burned in the sun. In Fresno County which is a little further south of Stanislaus they also grow grapes but they grow them for raisins. What they do is they cut the clumps of grapes off and they stretch out long rows of canvas between the vines and they actually just lay the grapes on the canvases and let them dry in the sun until they become raisins. But vineyards have a very different feel in the winter. The vine and the branches are exposed along the wires. The leaves are all gone.

As a result, it is trimming time. When the vine workers come in and begin to trim the vine for next year, you can see it is no small trim job. They cut back the branches almost to a stump; you can see that, knowing that the vines will need that much room for growth and for expansion and the grape production for the next year.

The vines are grown for one purpose and that is to produce the maximum amount of grapes. I think that is helpful for us as we begin to understand that in the context of our message today. Jesus is meeting with his disciples for the last time in Chapters 13 through 15 of the book of John. They share a meal together and Jesus tells them what is going to happen as they move forward. This is Jesus’ last time to impart to them what they are to be about after his resurrection. In other words, Jesus is giving his disciples their post-Easter marching orders. And their marching orders are to go and bear fruit. Jesus is kind of revealing his heart to his disciples at this point. It is the idea of going out into the world and bearing fruit. Bearing fruit is something that the disciples could understand, because they knew what vineyards were. They walked by them all the time and grapes are not considered an ornamental plant. When you look at them when they are flowering, the flowers are small and they are bred for one reason and that is to produce grapes, to produce fruit. So Jesus is saying to his disciples, “Your mission…..(I was going to add the line from “Mission Impossible”, but I won’t…) Jesus is saying “Your mission is to go and bear fruit.” Then in the context of that bearing fruit, Jesus begins to give them the nuts and bolts of how to produce the maximum amount of fruit, how to increase their fruit bearing potential, if you will. So Jesus is telling his disciples and now he is telling us that producing fruit, making disciples, is to be the focus of our lives. That is what we are to be about. Our disciple making ability is a direct result of who we are in Jesus Christ. So, in other words, it is a spiritual formation issue. How do we maximize that connection with him so that we can maximize our fruit bearing potential? So Jesus gives us some ways to think about that.

One of the ways that we can maximize our fruit bearing potential is by being pruned, believe it or not. Pruning applies to all the vines if you look in our text, doesn’t it? All the vines get pruned. Those that don’t bear fruit get pruned. Most experts think that Jesus was referring to Judas, the one that betrayed Jesus. But notice he also says that pruning applies to those who are bearing fruit, as well. So pruning is not an option for you and me and pruning does a couple of things. One of the things it does is it casts off the old. It cleans up those old vines that weren’t growing along the guide wires. It also removes the branches that have the disease in them, or have sickness in them. So pruning cleans up as well as cleans off for us.

Pruning also happens so that, why? …We can increase our fruitfulness. Pruning is not a haphazard job. It is done very carefully and in an orderly process by the vine growers. Why? …To produce maximum growth. When we look at pruning in our own lives, I think it takes a couple different forms.

One of the ways that pruning happens in our lives, I think, can happen through external circumstances, things like job loss, and illness at times, relational strife, moral choices, are all ways I think that God can use to prune us. But having said that let me also say that not every external circumstance that comes into our lives is a result of God wanting to prune our lives. But that is one of the ways that it can happen.

But pruning can also happen internally, internally as God speaks to us through prayer, through meditation, through Scripture reading, and the study of Scripture are all ways that God can show us where we need to be pruned. Because God is speaking into our lives, he is continually speaking into our lives, in different and varied ways. I think we will talk more about that when we get into February. But it is important for us to understand that God is speaking to us and we need to have those spiritual ears. Part of the words that he imparts to us at times is for our pruning, so we can bear more fruit.

All of us know that pruning is painful, isn’t it. Pruning causes us pain no matter what form it takes. That pruning is God’s desire to bring more discipline and more obedience into our lives, and that includes the totality of our lives—our heart, our mind, our will, our social interactions, our feelings, even our bodies are to come under God’s pruning, for his glory, for producing more fruit. So pruning is a spiritual formation process and, as painful as it may be, it is all about this idea of producing more fruit.

So pruning is one of the ways that it can happen. Another way that we can maximize our fruit bearing potential is by abiding in Jesus. That is the word that he uses here. Abiding in Jesus increases our fruit bearing potential. Abiding is not a word we use very often in language, is it? We don’t use that kind of language. So I think it has kind of a nebulous feel to us. I am not sure we exactly know what that means. So maybe a better way to think about it is to remain in something, or to reside in something is maybe a better way to understand it. It is all about speaking to our relationship with Christ. It speaks to lingering in Jesus, resting in Christ. Abiding is about being deeply connected to our source and drawing our nutrients from that source. And Jesus is our source that we are to draw our nutrients from. So as we abide in Christ, we build this ever deepening relationship with him. And out of that, God can bear fruit.

If you noticed in our Scripture, as well as when you look at a vineyard, when you look at a vineyard you can’t tell the difference between a healthy and an unhealthy branch. They look the same on the outside until fruit is produced or until disease takes over that branch and it withers and it becomes very obvious at that point. The reality is the same is true for you and me. My spiritual health or lack of spiritual health is not going to be evident to you at the beginning. But if I am not drawing my life from Christ, eventually my life is going to show signs of withering and it is going to be obvious to everyone in here. An abiding life, if we walk down that road, is going to put us at odds with the world, as well, because our world holds up that busyness is the sign of a healthy life. Busyness is a sign of a productive life. But I would add that busyness is a disease of a spiritual life and will ultimately lead to a withering life if it is not managed carefully.

A sign of a non-abiding life takes many forms but some of the ways that you can see that the withering is beginning to take place and you can check your own spirit with this. Things like, is there ingratitude in my life? Is there physical tension? Are there inappropriate behaviors or at least a desiring to think about inappropriate behaviors? …Or discouragement, or even being easily irritated? Those can all be symptoms that there is something wrong there and you need to begin to say “What is going on, God?” Abiding is about finding that quiet center from which we can live our lives. The spiritual disciplines, those things like solitude, fasting, prayer, are ways to feed our abiding life. For, it is in that quiet center that we meet Jesus and we can listen and find the answers to the busyness of our lives. So abiding is about letting Jesus form or, in many cases, reform our interior world. That only comes when we are quiet before our Lord.

So maximizing fruit production is about pruning, it is about obedience, and the final part of that is praying, praying. As a result of the pruning and as a result of the abiding, there is the creation of this intimacy in our relationship with Christ. Our hearts are being formed like Christ. So the prayers that we pray become Christ-centered prayers. They are about Christ’s heart. They are about Christ’s purposes. Then Jesus tells us that when you are at that point then ask away. Ask away and be bold! …For you are asking out of the mind of Christ, the heart of Christ.

So Jesus calls all of his disciples to bear fruit. Fruit comes from being pruned, which is applying discipline and obedience to our lives. It is about abiding. It is about being that intimately connected to our source, Jesus. And it is about praying, praying with the heart of Christ. Bearing fruit starts inwardly, inwardly in the spiritual formation before it begins to show itself out to the world. That inward spiritual formation is to be for all of us as the people of God, as disciples, as followers of Christ. But it is also to be for us corporately. It is to be for us as the Church, as well, for new growth in churches start when people turn their hearts to God. Over and over again when you look at revival history, it starts when people begin to pray and turn their hearts over to God. God’s Spirit comes and takes ahold of that and brings renewal, brings revival, brings new growth, new fruit to a church; because out of it comes new obedience and invigorating and persistent devotion. Jesus is teaching his disciples that growing new disciples starts with the hearts of the current disciples, and that is you and me, that is you and me.

We just heard about one hundred and twenty-five years this church has been around. As we begin the start of a new year we are talking about one hundred and twenty-five years for Faith, I think this in an opportunity for us to look to the future and saying God is preparing us for new growth. He is preparing us for new growth and his call on us as his disciples is to commit ourselves anew individually, as well as corporately, to new spiritual growth and obedience. As we take that to heart, God will maximize our fruit production.

So will you join me? Will you join me in that process of beginning the road of spiritual growth anew knowing that out of that God will bear fruit through us as we are faithful to him?

Let’s pray.

Mighty and holy God, thank you. Thank you that you are the one who can reform our hearts, who can reform our interior, who can cause us to live in obedience. Lord I pray that you will help us to do that. Lord may we take a moment and just say we want to be about that. We want to be about that for you. So Lord, in the quietness of the moment may we just once again commit ourselves to letting our hearts become yours, that our heart might become your heart, for out of that we know that you will bear fruit. Thank you Lord. Amen.

Well it was a few days before Christmas and two men whose families lived next to each other along the Oregon Coast decided they were going to go sailing while their wives went Christmas shopping. As they sailed out, they encountered an unexpected storm that came up quickly. The boat was being tossed about and they knew they were in trouble pretty quickly and so they began to make way back towards the safety of the harbor. As they were struggling to get back to the harbor, the boat ran aground. So the men jumped over the side and began to kind of free the boat to push it back into deeper water. As they were struggling with it they were probably up to their knees in mud. The waves were bashing against them and they were banging their heads against the side of the boat; and one of them turned to the other and said, “It sure beats Christmas shopping, doesn’t it?”

They were having a joyous time because it is a joyous season of the year, isn’t it? One author said that “Joy is like a hidden note in glass. Joy is tuning in to what God is doing around you, seeing the world through his eyes, picking up on his delight on us as his children. Anyone can find happiness for a while…” the author says. “Happiness depends on what is happening to you, but joy is different; joy is deeper. Joy is when your whole being sings because you have caught a glimpse of God at work. Joy can creep up on you and it can surprise you in unexpected places.”

Joy is what the angels pronounced to the shepherds because they had caught a glimpse of what God was up to and they couldn’t keep it to themselves. As a result, the shepherds found a blessing in an unlikely place that night. Mary took her new born babe and she placed him in an animal feeding trough—this child of whom the angels told Mary would be the Son of the Most High, that he would be great and that his kingdom and his throne would have no end. This child, most experts believe, was in a stable that was much more resemblant of a cave in a hill, filled with farm animals and most likely filled with the smell of manure-filled hay. Not exactly a place where you would expect a royal birth, but that is exactly where God wanted it. He spoke to the prophets of old. He said that this Messiah would be God’s own shepherd over His people. He would come and he would save his people from their sins. This child would be born in Bethlehem. The shepherds were the first ones to hear this good news that was proclaimed and they responded by going and seeing the incarnation of God himself. God in the birth of Jesus was blessing all of humanity in a very small out of the way place, a place that you wouldn’t expect.

It was Christmas 1930. A man had just lost his wife a few months earlier and he was lonely and he was heartsick; but he was mostly worried about his three daughters and what kind of Christmas that they would have. Well, Christmas morning came and they opened the presents with unusual excitement and merriment. When they opened the last gift, the oldest daughter, Catherine, said, “Dad, we know how much you miss Mama. We have a surprise for you.” Then they scampered off. You could hear from the bedroom “Close your eyes.” When he opened them, standing in front of him were the three wise men. Catherine said, “We have no gold for you.” The middle daughter, Sandy, said, “or myrrh” and the little one, Lucy, said, “or incense.” But they said in unison as they held their arms wide open “We bring you us!” At that point the father scooped up his daughters in his arms and celebrated the wonderful gift that they had given him.

An unlikely manger with a baby inside, God is saying to all humanity, “We bring you us!” God’s love given in the birth of his only Son who would come to die for our sins, who would be raised from the dead, so that we might live forever with God—this unlikely blessing of Christmas is found in a place that we would not expect. It is the Father’s love found in the newborn Babe.

Perry Bice turned off the engine but sat behind the wheel in his car. Parked in his driveway in front of him was a brand new wheelchair-accessible van, with a big red and gold bow across the windshield. Bice began to sob. 

”Why is Daddy crying?” asked nine-year-old Branson as he got out of the car because he’d already spied the trampoline and he passed the basketball goal as he ran by the wheelchair ramp that led up to the house. It was still early on Christmas Day, 2001. But already the Bice family had been blessed beyond their wildest dreams, thanks to a group of anonymous volunteers in the Kansas City area – the Elves of Christmas Present. 

The Bice family had seen more than its share of sorrow. In just a few short years, Perry’s engine had gone out on his car and the family house had burned down that he shared with his wife, Kathrine, and their children. And not long after that, he lost his job. 



But even deeper troubles were just around the corner. You see Kathrine’s mother died suddenly, tests revealed that she had a rare condition that helped the family unlock their own medical mysteries that they were struggling with. They were now finally able to diagnose what was wrong with the Bices’ youngest daughter, Rishonn: She had a genetic disorder, mitochondrial disease, a condition that can lie dormant for years – or take a life in weeks. 

Before long, the Bices learned their oldest daughter, Chambris, also had the disease. And then Mishayla also had tested positive. Two other children, Branson and Talaessa, were healthy. It turned out that Kathrine was the carrier. For the months that followed, the couple lived in a daze of grief, denial and sleepless nights. Three-year-old Rishonn died not long after she was diagnosed in 1999. 

At times, although Perry was a deeply religious man, he railed at God. But neither he nor his wife Kathrine was ever bitter. In fact, Kathrine says “We’ve found a God that cares for us tenderly.” They were grateful when about two weeks before Christmas they received an anonymous call from a man who would only identify himself as the chief elf who asked if he could bring some gifts to the children. Perry and Kathrine agreed; they thought it would be a nice surprise for the children. 

What the Bices didn’t know was that as soon as the sun set on Christmas Eve, an elf crew was dispatched to the little home the couple had just really struggled just recently to purchase; in fact, they’d closed two days earlier; and in doing that, they never received the keys because the Realtor was in on what the elves were up to.

So they descended on this house and the old carpet was pulled up, new rugs and floors were installed and twenty-six volunteers descended to paint the house from top to bottom. And a couple hours later, 26 more volunteers came in to put on a second coat. The carpenters nailed on the moldings and baseboards and a construction crew was on site to build that wheelchair ramp. Gifts were wrapped, and the trampoline was set up. 

A Christmas tree decorated with twinkling lights was brought in with ornaments on it, as well. An elf had donated a van that was in the driveway. Another elf donated mortgage payments for several months and others joined in to the tune where they had $17,000 worth of mortgage payments. Each month’s payment they put on a card and then hung it from the tree. Then there was one last loving touch—there was a little card with some script on it that they had placed inside the tree. It was given by an elf that owned a printing shop who kept it open to get it done.

Well at 6:30 in the morning on Christmas day as the light was beginning to illuminate the Christmas day ahead, the gifts were all finally ready. A rookie elf, a little eleven year old girl, was given the job of presenting the keys to Perry and his family. As she showed up at his door and handed him the key, he said, “What is this?” And she said, “A key.” He said, “What for?” She smiled and began to run away like a little phantom and she said, “Merry Christmas.”

Perry began to think, “Well maybe they left the gifts at the other house.” So they packed the car and drove over to the new house and when the family opened the door they couldn’t believe what they saw–the sun splashed walls, the fresh berber carpet and the tile. They drew themselves closer to the lit Christmas tree. Then they saw the mortgage payments hanging from the tree and they were overwhelmed. As Perry wiped the tears from his eyes, he stood back to kind of take it all in and they saw the little card inside. He went up to it and pulled it out. It was their last gift and it simply had three words on it: God Loves You.

Perry took that card and he smiled and shook his head. Then he put it right on top of the tree.

God loves you so much that he sent his own Son to die in your place so that you could live forever. It is the greatest Christmas gift that has ever been offered to humanity, and all we need to do is receive it. If you have already done that, then you have much to be grateful for this Christmas day and may joy fill your heart. And if you haven’t, the gift is still here. It is free for the taking tonight. So may you be blessed on this Christmas day as you give praise to our God our Father who has given us His Son, Jesus.

Would you join me in prayer?

Holy God, thank you. Thank you that you gave your Son in an unlikely place, in an unlikely way, to be a blessing for all of us. That is beyond our wildest imagination that we might have life abundant here on earth and know that our future is secure with you in heaven forever. Oh God, thank you for that wonderful gift. May our hearts swell with gratitude as we remember the birth of our Savior. Amen.

Luke 1:8-13

8 Once when he was serving as priest before God and his section was on duty, 9he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord and offer incense. 10Now at the time of the incense-offering, the whole assembly of the people was praying outside. 11Then there appeared to him an angel of the Lord, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. 12When Zechariah saw him, he was terrified; and fear overwhelmed him. 13But the angel said to him, ‘Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John.’

Well, he was a professional thief. His name stirred fear as a desert wind stirs the tumbleweeds. He terrorized the Wells Fargo stagecoach line for over three years and roared in like a tornado, in and out of the Sierra Nevada’s, even spooking the most rugged of frontiersmen. Papers from San Francisco to New York said his name was synonymous with the danger that was on the frontier. He reigned from 1875 to 1883 and he was credited with stealing the bags, as well as the breath, away from twenty-nine different stagecoach crews, all without firing a shot. His weapon was intimidation. His ammunition was his reputation. A hood hid his face and no one ever saw him. He was never able to be tracked, yet his presence was enough to paralyze those he came in contact with. So he never took a hostage. Black Bart was his name. The hooded bandit armed with his one weapon, FEAR.

Fear has prevented the most faithful followers of Christ from living anything like the joyous life that Christ desires for us. “Fear is the sand in the machinery of life,” one author said. Fear wants us to take our eyes off the mountains and settle for a dull existence in the flat lands. Black Bart, when he was finally caught and the hood was taken off, he wasn’t much to fear. His name was Charles E. Boles. He was a druggist from Decatur, Illinois. He was afraid of horses so he rode buggies to and from the robberies. He never fired a shot because he didn’t like guns and the gun that he had wasn’t loaded.

You can thank Paul Harvey for that story.

We are in week four of our Advent season. We are looking at stories around Christ’s birth and asking “How can we grow in gratitude from these stories?” Today we want to look at four stories, some we have looked at before, some we haven’t looked at this Advent season yet. But all four stories have one thing in common—they have the phrase “do not be afraid.” So we are going to look at those and ask “What can we be thankful for from these stories?”

We start today with the text that we just read, the story of Zechariah, and say, “What can we pull from this text?” Well, Zechariah was a priest. He was carrying on his priestly duties. He was a faithful man, and he was chosen to make offerings to the Lord. An angel appears to him—has that ever happened to you lately?—and the text says that “he was terrified and overwhelmed with fear.” Then the angel gives him a command: “Do not be afraid.”

Our next story comes from a little bit later in Luke, Chapter 1. It is a story of Mary with her visit from the angel. The angel visits Mary in this story and says that you are going to become pregnant and you are going to give birth to the Christ-child, to the Messiah, the one who will save his people from their sins. The text says that Mary was perplexed. A way to understand that is that she was agitated; and the angel responds with the exact same words, the exact same command: “Do not be afraid.”

Our next story is the one that we just saw, the angel visiting the shepherds on the night of Christ’s birth. The angel showed up before the shepherds and it says “the glory of the Lord shown around them.” And it says “they were terrified.” That is the exact same word that describes Zechariah. Then the angels say (you can say it with me…) “Do not be afraid.” …The exact same command that was given to Mary and to Zechariah.

And our last story, it is a story from Matthew. It is the story of Joseph. Joseph has just learned that Mary is pregnant and he is trying to figure out what to do with that. And the text says that the angel in this case appeared to him in a dream, and said, “…do not be afraid.” Now this one is not a command but it is the exact same words “…do not be afraid.”

So let’s step back and reflect on these stories and ask ourselves, “What do these stories have in common?” Well, first I think we can say that they all are stories of humans talking to angels, right? That would be one thing we could say. We could also say that the angels meant no harm when they appeared. They were simply carrying out God’s plans. We could also say, I think, that the humans all responded the same way, in a way that caused the angel to say “do not be afraid.” “Stop that fear right now, right here!” is what the angel is saying to them. And this phrase “do not be afraid,” it is one of the most common phrases that is used throughout Scripture for God’s instructions to his people. It can also be expressed as “Fear not!” or “Be strong and courageous” or even “you can trust me.” Why would God be telling us “stop being afraid” more than all the other instructions that he gives us? Why would he do that?

Pastor John Ortberg answers that question. He says that the reason that God tells us “not to be afraid” is not that he wants to spare us emotional discomfort, because usually the situation that they are in will lead them into more fear, not less fear. If you think about that, that is true in our stories today, as well, isn’t it? He goes on to say that the reason that God tells us “not to be afraid,” the number one reason, is that this is the number one temptation that we are tempted with to avoid doing what God asks us to do.

So here we have a story of God carrying out his plans to bring the Messiah to earth and some of the players in this story are confronted by the supernatural in their midst who tells them that everything is going to be alright. Everything is going to be alright. So what do we do with this? What do we take out of this that we could possibly be grateful for?

Let me give you a couple ideas. One of the things I think we can start with is the fact that God acts in our lives. God acts in our lives. God is not one to stand by and separate himself from his creation. He has a plan for human history and he is working that plan to completion. In other words, our God is actively involved in all the things of the world and of your life. God cares about what is going on in Iran right now. God cares what is happening to the gold workers in southern Africa right now. God cares about what goes on in the classrooms of North Minneapolis, of Hopkins, of Minnetonka, of Eden Prairie, and beyond that. God, who has the hairs on your head numbered, cares about your life. He cares about the tests that you may be taking at school. He cares about how your child is being supervised in childcare. He cares about your business. He cares about the conversations that you have. He cares about your health. He cares about how you show love to others. In other words, God is not removed from our lives. He shows up every day and he is faithful to us no matter what comes our way. So I think we can take from these stories the chance to acknowledge the goodness of God, the presence of God, and thank him for being with us. So I invite you to do that in this upcoming week. Think about one of the names for Jesus is Emanuel. What does Emanuel mean? It means God with us.

This is worthy of giving God praise, to thank him, giving him the due that he deserves. And on January 1st we will talk about that. We will talk about how God has been active in our lives, and you know what? I am not writing a sermon for that. You are. I want to invite you to come and share your stories. That is what we are going to do on January 1st. How has God been acting in our lives in the past year? So I invite you back.

I think that is one of the things that these stories tell us that we can be grateful for. Let me give you another. I think that we can be grateful that there is more to this world than we can see. There is a spiritual unseen world that is just as real as the world that we can see around us. And Paul says that we are in a battle not with this world that we can see, but rather with the spiritual forces that are a part of that unseen world. The battle is the one that ends up determining eternal life and sadly eternal death for some folks, eternal separation from God. For you see, there is a real devil. It is a real being, the devil, and he has real demons. He is at work in our world just like God is. While the battle continues between God and his followers, and the devil and his forces, the battle has already been won. The war is over. In Christ’s death and his resurrection from the cross, God has defeated Satan. And that defeat is already in process and you and I are part of that conquering army that is bringing about the kingdom of God in this world. It will be completed when Christ returns. I think that we can be thankful that in the midst of this raging spiritual battle that is happening around us that many of us, frankly, are oblivious to, there is nothing that will separate us from the eternal life that awaits us. Jesus tells us “you will have trouble in the world. You will have problems.” But then he says, “but…but I have overcome the world.” Christ has overcome the world. He has overcome the forces that seek to defeat us, that seek to cause us to continue to spiral out of control with things in our lives that we just can’t seem to lick. So this is an opportunity for us to say thanks be to God, for we need not fear even as we are engaged in battle with the spiritual forces around us for we do not fight alone; in fact, Christ fights for us.

So that’s another thing I think these stories point us to that we can be grateful for. And finally I think we can be grateful, we can be grateful to God that when we are confronted by fear, we have a God who is on our side for whom nothing is impossible, nothing. Remember God’s words, “Be strong and in good courage. Don’t be afraid.”

Pastor Yousef Naderkhani has good reason to fear. Last year in November he was sentenced to hanging for apostasy in Iran. This Iranian pastor was convicted of apostasy for converting from Islam to Christianity and encouraging others to do so, as well. As a result the court ordered him to repent of his Christian faith because he had been born a Muslim. The pastor responded, “To repent means to return. What am I to return to, the blasphemy I had before I had faith in Christ?” To which the judges replied, “To the religion of your ancestors, Islam.” Then Pastor Naderkhani said, “I cannot do that.” So today he remains in jail on appeal; but in the meantime his children and his wife have been threatened and arrested. His lawyer has been thrown in jail. But even in the midst of that, the house church that he started has over four hundred followers of Christ this day.

He faced his fear with faith. Faith is the antidote to fear. If “fear is the sand in the machinery of life,” then faith is the oil. A doctor at John Hopkins University says “I don’t know why worriers die sooner than non-worriers, but they do.” He said, “But I, who am of a simple mind, think I know.” He said, “We are inwardly constructed of nerve and tissue, brain cell and soul, for faith, not fear. God made us that way. To live by worry is to live against that reality.”

For faith to overcome fear, it must be acted upon. Look at the people in our story and how they acted on their fears, how they acted out in faith. Mary’s faith was, she said, “May it be as you have said. I will walk that road.” Joseph’s faith was to take Mary as his wife against all the social customs of that time that told him not to do that. And the shepherds, the shepherds went to see the child, the Christ Child. That was their faith. And when we don’t have faith, God’s plans are not thwarted. We are just not a part of them. Think about Zechariah, he couldn’t speak because he didn’t have faith.

So on this fourth Sunday of Advent, let’s thank God. Let’s thank God that he is active in our lives, that he has already won the spiritual battle, and that when we are confronted with fear we have help, God himself, as we put our faith in him. Even a little faith, faith like that of a mustard seed, can go a long way towards letting fear and worry not get the best of us. So let’s thank God for our faith.

Would you join me in prayer?

Mighty and holy God thank you that you are here and that you are present, and Lord we ask that in the midst of that that we would put our faith in you and that any fear we have for whatever is facing us in our lives would melt away. Give us the courage to act on our faith that in that we might give you the glory and give you the thanks for the grace that you give us. In your name, Amen.

by Rev. William “Buck” Day

Well we get to look at a piece of Scripture that we just heard about in our Sandbible. And that is a very good thing. So today we are going to be looking at the angel’s visit to Mary. So I invite you to follow along as we start in Luke, Chapter 1, verses 26 through 38.

God’s word for us this morning!

26 In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, 27to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.’ 29But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. 30The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 31And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus.32He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. 33He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ 34Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’35The angel said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. 36And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. 37For nothing will be impossible with God.’ 38Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her.

God’s word for us this morning! Once again, let’s ask God’s blessing on it.

Mighty and holy God, thank you, and Lord thank you for your word, for the gift that it is in our lives. I ask Lord that you would use it to quicken our spirits by your Holy Spirit to hear what you have for us today. We ask that in your name. Amen.

Well I want to start with some statements from some experts about what they thought the future would be. So, see if these ring true.

First one is: “I think there is maybe a world market for five computers.” Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.

“But what is this good for?” an engineer of IBM in 1968 commenting on the microchip.

“There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” Chairman of Dell Equipment in 1977.

“This is an interesting concept. It is well informed, but to earn better than a C, the idea has to be feasible.” This is a Yale University professor commenting on Fred Smith’s paper proposing a reliable overnight delivery service. He started FedEx.

“Who the heck wants to hear actors talk?” One of the Warner brothers in 1927.

“A cookie store is a bad idea. Market research says that Americans want crispy cookies, not soft and chewy cookies.” That was a response to Debbie Fields with her idea to start Mrs. Fields Cookies.

“We don’t like their sound, besides guitar music is on the way out.” Decca Recording rejecting the Beatles in 1962.

“Everything that can be invented has been invented.” U. S. Patent Office, 1899. (laughter)

“Louis Pasteur’s theory of germs is ridiculous fiction.” Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872.

And then finally, “640K should be enough for everybody.” Bill Gates, 1981.

Short-sightedness has caused us to maybe miss some important things in our lives. Think about how grateful we are that these people, in the face of the comments that you just heard, didn’t stop their work, didn’t get sidetracked and didn’t get put off by a little bit of doubt.

Well we have been talking about gratitude during this Advent season, and today we want to focus on this divine revelation with this young little girl and how she believes what she hears to be true. I love Mary’s response at the end and that is why I left it up (on the screen), where it says may it be as you have said. “Let it be according to your word.” Now if you think about that, that is not only an amazing statement from a young girl whose whole world is about to be turned upside down. You could even argue that she was so young that she couldn’t possibly understand all the implications of the angel’s pronouncement. But I think what makes this statement really amazing is that her words carry with it the choice to be grateful. We have been talking about gratitude over these few weeks as a choice. It is something we can choose to be grateful for or to be ungrateful for. A lot of what we choose there comes out of how we view our relationship with God. The more we understand our lives as a gift from and sustained by God, the more thankful we are going to be in the lives of those around us in response to God’s saving grace. Mary’s choice to be grateful at the angel’s pronouncement, even if when she knew what that would mean and for the child within her, is our quest today. I invite us to look at what Mary might be grateful for from this text as a result of the angel’s visit.

One of the things I think we can say right out of the gate about Mary, and I think it also applies to us as well, is that the Messiah, the child to be born to Mary, is a Savior that all of us can relate to as a person. This child while being holy, while being the Son of the Most High God, is also human, is also human and will be in all ways human in all the ways that you and I are. It talks about as he grew as a boy—we don’t know a lot about that from Scripture, from his childhood. He didn’t distinguish himself. Yet when we look at the prophecies concerning his life, particularly at the end of Isaiah, Chapter 52 and the beginning of Chapter 53, it says that his appearance and his upbringing was not one that you would expect of one who would come from royal bloodlines. You see that throughout his life. When he entered Jerusalem on that final day, on Palm Sunday, he rode on a donkey—not exactly a royal procession, was it? And in the New Testament, Paul tells us in Philippians 2 that Jesus came in the form of humans, in human likeness, and became an obedient slave, our Savior, our Lord Jesus came in the world as you and I do. He grew and developed in Mary just as a normal child would. He was born naturally and the best that we can say is that he had a normal childhood, that he learned a trade; because that is what boys did in his days, they learned their father’s trade, and he became a carpenter. He lived probably a regular adulthood for thirty years until he began his public ministry. And in that, Scripture also tells us that Jesus experienced everything that we experience. Think about that for a minute. All the joys, all the pain that we experience, all the heartbreak, all the mountain top experiences, Jesus has experienced that too. Think through the ups and downs of your life, Jesus knows about that. We have a Savior who can not only save us from our sins but is one who understands our lives, who understands the human experience. As we reflect on that, that is something to be grateful for. We have a God who is intimate with us. Thank you Lord, let us be grateful for that this Christmas season.

If Mary, as well as us, can be grateful for our relatable Savior, I think we can also be thankful that we have a God who keeps his promises. Joseph was not the only one who was from royal bloodlines. If you were to look at Mary and trace her ancestry back, she also came from the house of David. So she too had royal bloodlines. So Jesus really truly had royal bloodlines. The phrases that Luke uses in our text here, particularly in verse 32, we find parallels with those when God is talking to David about giving David his throne in 2 Samuel 7. In that passage out of Samuel, God tells David that he will have a great name, that he will have a throne for his kingdom, that he will be God’s Son and that his kingdom, his house, will be established forever. Now look at the parallels from our text that we just had. The angel tells Mary that Jesus will be great, that he will have the throne of his father, David, that he will be the Son of the Most High God, and that he will be king over the house of Jacob forever. What is happening here is that God is completing the promises that he made to King David so long ago and for all those who are looking for the coming Messiah, God is showing here. Here is the proof. I am acting on what I have said in the past. So we can be grateful that God acts on his words. And we can see that. Scripture is filled with the promises for us as the followers of Christ in all of our areas of life. So the question is how has God fulfilled his promises to you in your life? What does that look like for you?

Well I want to give you twelve promises that you can claim and that you can also be thankful for in this holiday season. I am just going to kind of zip through these for you and I will also say if you want a copy of these I can get you a copy of these as well. So, things we can be grateful for:

We can be grateful for God’s presence. He says “I will never leave you.” in Hebrews 5.
We can be thankful for God’s protection. He says, “I am your shield.” in Genesis 15:1.
We can be thankful for God’s power. He says “I will strengthen you.” in Isaiah 41.
We can also be thankful for God’s provision in that same verse from Isaiah 41:10. He says “I will help you.”
We can be thankful for God’s leading. He says “when he brings out his own sheep, he will go before them.” John 10:4.
We can also be thankful for God’s purposes. He says “I know the plans that I have for you, plans for peace not for evil.” Jeremiah 29:11.
We can be thankful for God’s rest. “Come to me all you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens and I will give you rest.” Matthew 11:28.
We can be thankful for God’s cleansing. “If we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9.
We can be thankful for God’s goodness. “No good thing will he withhold from those who work uprightly.” Psalm 84:11.
We can be thankful for his faithfulness. “The LORD will not forsake his people for his great name sake.” 1 Samuel 12:22.
We can be thankful for God’s guidance. “The meek he will guide.” Psalm 25:9.
And then finally:
We can be thankful for God’s wise plan. “All things work together for those that love God.” Romans 8:28.

We have a God who keeps his promises. He stands by his word. So we can take him at his word. And I invite you to do that. And as you do that, you will find gratitude growing from inside of you.

Mary as well as we can be grateful that we are also used by God; and again, I go back to this last response of Mary: “Let it be with me according to your word.” Let it be with me according to your word. That needs to be the cry of our heart. Mary’s response is this yielding submission to God’s will. She is saying, I will be your servant. I will do as you have said. She is being faithful despite knowing what is in front of her. First and foremost she has to tell her fiancé how she got pregnant supernaturally. That was probably a pretty easy conversation… In addition, the whole community would see that as the child began to grow within her, they would begin to scorn her and push her away; because, in fact, in that day for an unmarried woman to be pregnant, she could have been stoned by the community. Those are the things that she is facing, but she responds, “Let it be according to your word.” She was faithful to walk the road that was before her because she believed what God told her. And it was in her faith that God acted exactly as the angel said he would. A child would be born into the world. That child would become the Savior for all humanity, and Mary would be forever seen as the one who was faithful to that child.

How have you been used by God? Really, how have you been used by God? I hope you think about that in lots of different ways that you get used. In addition to Christmas being on Sunday, New Year’s Day is on a Sunday, as well. I want to invite you back for that day, as well. Because on that day we are not going to have a message, but what we are going to do is we are going to have the opportunity for us to hear how God has been using all of you over the past year. I am going to have the opportunity to say, “Tell me, how has God used you in this past year, to be a blessing to all of us as a community?” So I invite you to come back on January 1st to share how God has been using you; because I think as we reflect on God’s action in our lives, if we take that time of quiet reflection, we will be amazed at how God has used us in ways that we could never remember. So I invite you to take that time of remembrance to reflect on what God has done in your life.

There was a young boy, his name was James, and his desire was to become the most famous manufacturer and salesman of cheese in the world. He planned on becoming rich and famous by making and selling cheese. He began with a little wagon pulled by his pony that he named Paddy. After making the cheese he would load the cheese onto the wagon and he and Paddy would head out into the streets of Chicago to sell their cheese. Well as the months went by, the young boy began to despair. He wasn’t making any money despite all the work and the long hours. So one day he pulled over the wagon and the pony to the side and he began to have a conversation with Paddy. He said, “Paddy, there is something wrong here. We are not doing this right. I am afraid we have our priorities wrong, they are turned around somehow. They are not where they need to be. Maybe we ought to be serving God, placing him first in our lives.” So he turned around the wagon and went home that day and he made a covenant with God. He said he would serve God first and then would work as God had directed. Well many years later this boy was now a man and he was the Sunday school superintendent at North Shore Baptist Church in Chicago. He said, “I would rather be a layman in North Shore Baptist Church than to be the head of the greatest corporation in America. My number one job is serving Jesus.”

So remember that the next time you bite into a Philadelphia Brand cream cheese, or Maxwell House Coffee, or some Digiorno Pizza, or macaroni and cheese or Jello, or you take an Oreo apart and you eat the middle out. Remember this boy and his pony named Paddy and the promise that little James Kraft made to serve God and to put him first. I invite you this Christmas season to embrace our Lord that your heart might swell with gratitude as you remember that we have a Savior who is just like us, that we can relate to. We have a Savior who keeps his promises and we have a Savior who wants us to work alongside of him.

Let me pray for us.

Mighty and Holy God, thank you. Thank you for this day, thank you for the gift of your Son and the faithfulness of so many like Mary. Lord help us to once again remember that you have come to give us life. And Lord you work with us as we walk through our lives, you encourage us, you strengthen us, you uphold us in your strong right hand because you know our life and we will give you all the glory, in your name. Amen.

by Rev. William “Buck” Day

Well, we have two different Scriptures for us this morning. The first one is from Malachi, the 3rd chapter and it says: (Malachi 3:1)

See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts.

And then we turn to Zechariah’s prophecy towards the end of Luke 1: (Luke 1:76-79)

76 ‘And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High;
   for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, 
77 to give knowledge of salvation to his people
   by the forgiveness of their sins. 
78 By the tender mercy of our God,
   the dawn from on high will break upon us, 
79 to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
   to guide our feet into the way of peace.’

God’s word for us this morning! Would you join me once again in prayer?

Lord God, quicken our spirits by the power of your Spirit to hear what you have for us this day. As we turn once again to your word, let it dwell within us richly and not return void. In your name, Jesus. Amen.

Well a couple from Oklahoma decided that they needed some time off after a particularly icy winter, so they decided they were going to go to Florida. Because they both worked and because of trying to coordinate travel schedules, it was determined that the husband would fly down to Florida one day and the wife would fly down the next day. As the man checked into his hotel, he thought he would just send off an email to his wife; and, while he was doing that, he accidentally left off one of the letters in her email address and sent it without realizing it. Meanwhile in Houston a woman had just returned from her husband’s funeral. She went to check her email because she was maybe looking for some emails from some relatives. When she read the first email she fainted. Her son was luckily there and came in and found her on the floor, looked at the computer, and read this:

To: my loving wife
From: your departed husband.
Subject: I’ve arrived
Message: Just arrived, checked in. Everything is prepared for your arrival tomorrow. Look forward to seeing you. Hope your journey is as uneventful as mine was.
P.S. It’s hot down here. (laughter)

Well, it is the second week of Advent and we are preparing—not to go to Florida—but we are preparing the way of the Lord, today. In this Advent season we are taking a look at familiar stories, stories leading up to Christ’s birth and looking at them through the eyes of gratitude. Today we are looking specifically at John the Baptist’s role and what his father, Zechariah, said as he prophesized about him. It was interesting that we saw the Sandbible talking about Zechariah. This is when Zechariah was restored to his voice after John was born and this is part of the prophecy that he said. So you can see that John, from our Scripture, was to be a prophet. He was to be the first prophet on the scene in over four hundred years. It is interesting that the last prophet before John was Malachi. And that is why Malachi probably prophesized what he prophesized and we just read just a minute ago. Through it all John was to be a pointer. We have talked a lot about pointing this fall, haven’t we, pointing other towards Christ. And it is no different for John. So we want to take some time to unpack this and then ask what does that cause us to be grateful for, as we look at this text.

So John was to be the prophet of the Most High and to go before the Lord as a preparer, it says. But the question is what was he to be preparing the people for? Well, as you look at our text, he was to prepare them through the knowledge of salvation through forgiveness. He was about the act of preparing to help the people discover what was being offered to them through the coming Messiah. Because, when John came on the scene, salvation from the Jews’ point of view was freedom from the occupying countries that were a part of Israel at that time, namely Rome. But John was to open their eyes so that they could see that salvation was really freedom from the spiritual forces that enslaved them. John was about the business of helping them see the salvation with spiritual redemption not physical liberation.

Salvation was to come through the acknowledgment of our sins and then repentance that brings forgiveness. That is what Isaiah meant when he was quoted in John’s ministry where the mountains and the hills were laid low and the crooked were made straight. That is why Zechariah as he is prophesying speaks out of God’s mercy. Salvation is not a right; rather it is a gift that is offered to us out of God’s great mercy for you and me. John’s work was about helping us understand what is required in salvation. As part of that it also helps us understand that in salvation it revives us. Reviving is that act of restoring life. Think for a minute about a person in a dark, dank dungeon with no windows, in the cold and the dark; then all of a sudden the door opens up and the whole cell is flooded with light. This was the picture that Zechariah was unfolding for those who heard him speak that day—the idea of darkness and the shadow of death brings that image to mind, and that was an image that resonated with the people of Israel because they wanted that freedom from that foreign oppression. But John was going to also make known that that was also a picture of every person’s spiritual condition before they came to know the salvation that was going to be offered through the coming Messiah. The coming of Jesus, Zechariah tells us, would be like the first light of dawn breaking over the horizon. It would be breaking into every human heart that would ask for forgiveness.

So if salvation is about bringing light for those who are lost, the salvation this Messiah was going to bring, that John was going to point to, is also a light of salvation that directs our ways. “For a new day has dawned …and the light” it says” is to direct our feet in the way of peace,” peace with God, sometimes referred to as a comfortable communion because we are in a comfortable relationship with God. That is achieved when we have accepted the salvation that has been offered us out of God’s great mercies; for despite our sinfulness and our rebellion against God that causes the lack of peace, in fact, the war that we have with God, we have been extended the offer of peace, of a comfortable communion with God, and God is the one that extends that to us.

So Zechariah’s prophecy lays out the work of John, that he was going to point others towards salvation that salvation was going to bring life, it was going to bring peace. This is the work that God was going to be doing through the coming Messiah, through his Son, Jesus. So what do we take from that? What do we take from that that might stir our hearts in gratitude and thankfulness? Well, let me give us a couple different options to think about this morning.

John was a link. He was a link in the chain of salvation that God was unfolding through the person of Jesus Christ. John the Baptist, as we read about his life, was a prophet on the order of Elijah. Many people thought that he was actually Elijah that had come back from heaven and his words carried power because they were the words of a prophet. The words of a prophet always carried the words that were spoken by God. If John’s work was to help people repent because the kingdom of God had come, he called out religious leaders, he called them a bunch of snakes, and he told people to look for the coming Messiah. As we look at John’s ministry, it didn’t last long. He was arrested and beheaded by King Herod. But in the process of that he was a link in the chain, a chain that pointed many towards Christ. So for each of us, can we look through our lives and say that we were a link in someone’s life in coming to faith? Did we help someone come to the point where they made that commitment to Christ? And if we can say yes to that, there is much to be grateful for. But even if we can’t say yes to that, can we say that we have pointed others towards Christ whether it was through a kind word, a generous act or a simple prayer? God uses all of us to link those who are far from the faith a little closer to the faith. So we can all thank God for the way that God has used us to point others toward Jesus Christ.

Another way I think this text helps us to be grateful is that we can give God thanks by making room for God. Part of preparing the way is cleaning out the sin in our lives. That is what John came to do. Those things that displace God in our lives, we know the very first commandment is “you will have no other God before me”. God has a lot of competition in our lives because we have a lot of gods in our lives. They are not little idols but they are just as powerful. So part of it for us is to clean out those things that distract us from God that removes the peace that God intends for each of us when we are in a relationship with him. So as we do that it is a chance for us to be grateful for the forgiveness that we have received. So how has God been merciful to you? Has he given you the peace that comes from forgiveness? Thank God for that. Maybe take time to spend just between you and God and clean out that stuff, prepare the way for the Lord to come new in this Advent season.

Another area I think we can be grateful for is that God acts in unexpected ways. God does not leave us to walk through our lives on our own. At the right time and the right place God acted in our lives and in the course of history. He sent John to prepare the way and Jesus followed on his heels to bring the salvation that each of us needs. So how many times has God worked in your life? So John the Baptist was the one who came to point others towards Christ that in that we might know what salvation is and the life that comes with that and the peace, all because he pointed towards Christ.

Well, Edith Burns was a wonderful Christian woman who lived in San Antonio. She was a patient of a doctor by the name of Will Phillips. The doctor said that by far Edith was his favorite patient. Yet on this morning Dr. Phillips went into his office with a heavy heart and it was because of Edith Burns. Edith Burns had this habit of introducing herself by saying “Hi, my name is Edith Burns. Do you believe in Easter?” Then she would later explain Easter and what it meant; and as a result, many people came to faith out of that. The doctor’s head nurse, Beverly, first met Edith when she went to take her blood pressure and Edith started the way she normally did, “Hi, my name is Edith. Do you believe in Easter?” to which Beverly responded, “Of course I do.” Edith responded, “Well, tell me what you believe about Easter.” She said, “It’s about egg hunts. It is about dressing up. It is about going to church.” Over time Edith continued to press on her the real meaning of Easter to the point where she finally made a commitment to Christ.

Well, on this morning Edith came in and sat down with the doctor. As she looked at her friend, Dr. Will, she said “Dr. Will, why are you so sad? Have you been reading your bible? Have you been praying?” To which the doctor said, “Edith, I am the doctor. You are the patient.” Yet even with a heavy heart, he told her, he said “I’ve gotten your lab report back and it says you have cancer, Edith, and you are not going to live very long.” Edith looked at the doctor and said, “Why Dr. Will Phillips shame on you. Why are you so sad? You have just told me that I am going to see my precious Jesus, my husband and my friends. You are telling me that I am going to celebrate Easter every day. And now you are having a hard time giving me my ticket?” To which Dr. Phillips just shook his head in amazement.

So Edith continued regular visits to the doctor and one of them was the day after Christmas and on that day Edith didn’t show up. He got a call from Edith and Edith said, “I am moving to the hospital now. Will, I am very near home. Make sure you put women next to me in my room who want to know about Easter.” And that is exactly what happened. The women in Edith’s room many of them came to faith as they got to know Edith. Everyone on the floor, the patients, the staff, were all enjoying Edith’s presence; in fact, they changed her name to Edith Easter. That was everyone except, of course, the head nurse, Phyllis Cross. She wanted to make it very plain that she wanted nothing to do with Edith because she considered her a religious nut. You see, Phyllis had come from an Army hospital background and so she had heard it all, seen it all, kind of hard, kind of cold, played by the rules, just kind of do your duty. Well one morning the two nurses that were taking care of Edith were sick and Edith had the flu. So Phyllis had to go and give Edith the needed shots. When she walked in, Edith had a big smile on her face and she said, “Phyllis, God loves you, so do I, and I am praying for you.” To which the head nurse replied, “Well. You can just quit praying for me right now because I am not interested.” To which Edith said, “I am going to continue praying for you; in fact, I have asked God not to let me go home until you have come into the family.” To which Phyllis replied, “Well I guess you are not going to die then because that is not going to happen,” and curtly walked out of the room.

Every day Phyllis would go into Edith’s room and Edith would say, “God loves you, so do I, and I am praying for you.” Over time at one point Phyllis said that she was literally drawn into Edith’s room a way a magnet is drawn to iron. Edith saw her as she came in as Edith sat down on the bed, she said, “I am glad to see you today, Phyllis. God told me that today is you special day.” To which Phyllis replied, “Edith you ask everyone the same question, ‘Do you believe in Easter?’ You have never asked me.” Edith said “I have wanted to, but God has told me not to ask that until you asked. And now you have asked.” So Edith at that point took her bible and told Phyllis the Easter story of Christ’s death, his burial and his resurrection. As she finished she said, “Phyllis, do you believe in Easter? Do you believe that Jesus Christ is alive and he wants to live in your heart?” and Phyllis said, “Oh, yes! I believe with all of my heart and I do want Christ in my life.” So right there, Phyllis crossed that line of faith. She prayed and invited Christ to become Lord of her life. Phyllis said that was the first time she didn’t walk out of her room. She was carried out on wings of angels.

Well two days later it happened to be Easter and Phyllis came to work and she did some of her regular duties and thought that she would go down to get some Easter lilies to take up to Edith. As she did, she walked in the room she saw Edith laying in her bed, her bible in her lap, her hands on her bible and a smile on her face. But as she looked closer she realized that Edith had died. With that she looked towards heaven with tears running down her cheeks and she said “Happy Easter, Edith. Happy Easter.”

After that Phyllis left the room and she saw a couple young student nurses at a table. She walked up to them and said, “Hi, my name is Phyllis Cross. Do you believe in Easter?”

Let’s pray.

Lord God thank you, thank you for the gift of Easter that comes only through the birth of your Son, who knows all our ways, was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, who knows every temptation that faces us and gave himself up for us. Lord thank you that we have the opportunity to point others towards our Lord and our Savior. Lord let this season remind us of this great gift of salvation that you have given to each of us. We ask it in your name. Amen.

by Rev. William “Buck” Day

Once again, let’s go before God in prayer, shall we?

Lord, indeed we have come here to worship you, to bow down before you, to tell you that we love you. Lord, thank you that you are here and that your Spirit is among us. Lord we ask that this day you would speak to us, you would draw us close and give us what each of us need. Lord we ask that your Spirit would have full reign. In your name. Amen.

Well a school teacher asked her first grade students to draw something that they were thankful for. She thought about how little these students had—they came from a poor neighborhood— and what their pictures would look like. She figured the majority of the pictures would probably be around turkey and food. So she was surprised when she got a picture from one of her little boys named Douglas. It was a picture of a hand, a human hand. It was poorly drawn, but the real question was, whose hand was it? So all the children took the opportunity to guess whose hand it was. One child said, “Well, it is obviously the hand of God because he provides all the food that we need.” Another said “It was the farmer. The farmer grows the food, he plants the seeds. So this is the farmer’s hand.” No one could find out whose hand it was. So as the children went back to their desks and were working, the teacher came up behind little Douglas and asked as she bent over his desk, “Whose hand is that Douglas?” And he said, “Why teacher that’s your hand.” Then she began to recall frequently at recess she would take Douglas who was a little forlorn little guy and just grab him by the hand as she did so many other children. She never thought much about it. But Douglas did. Douglas was expressing his gratitude to his teacher the best way that he knew how. A thankfulness and attitude that sees this world as a gift that comes and relishes all that comes our way, whether it be good or whether it be bad.

In fact, one author defines gratitude as an intentional counting of blessings every day, every minute, while avoiding the belief that we need or we deserve different circumstances. The famous Christian author Richard Foster says that it is a decision to set our mind on the high things of life. Gratitude can be directed towards God, that is what we do in worship among other things; but it can also be directed towards people. But, if you notice, it is something that we choose to do.

One author actually called it the parent of all other virtues. If you think about that, it is a nice way to think about gratitude. For us who are followers of Jesus Christ, we have much to be thankful for, don’t we? Yet, it is very easy to forget that—to forget to give thanks, to forget to live a life of gratitude. So as we begin this Advent journey over these next few weeks, what we are going to do is we are going to look at some of the biblical characters of the stories leading up to Christ’s birth. We are going to look at them through the eyes of gratitude. So we start today with maybe a verse that is typically not considered an Advent scripture but it is one that we studied earlier this summer and it is in 1 Thessalonians. So I invite you to follow along as we read God’s word. (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)

16Rejoice always, 17pray without ceasing, 18give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

Three short commands and Paul speaks of them out of the overflow of gratitude. When gratitude is present in a person’s life, these commands do not feel like have to’s; they are more along the lines of “Duh! What else would I do?” Joy is the expression of gratitude because it is looking at the blessings rather than circumstances. Prayer is a demonstration of gratitude because of our continual conversation with God throughout the day and giving thanks for his gratitude for no matter what comes our way. If you notice the words “always,” “without ceasing,” “in all circumstances,” these are statements of God’s presence. He is always present, always able to work in our lives, no matter what the circumstances, and he works them “for the good,” as it says in Romans.

When we are obedient to these commands it will not only build gratitude into our lives; but it also acknowledges that God is sovereign and that we trust him and those acts will change us. That is one of the things that we will see over the coming weeks as we walk through this Advent season. I want to start with an illustration of that from an article that I read recently about a woman who was having trouble with her teenage daughter. Imagine that! A parent having problems with a teenager! …I have never heard of such a thing!

Well our story starts that this woman had a close relationship with her daughter while she was growing up. But as the girl grew into her teenage years, the conversations devolved into a briar patch of prickly feelings, stinging barbs, and angry outbursts. The mother felt like she couldn’t say a word without stepping onto a mine field. As a result the frustrations increased and the conflicts escalated. The relationships in the whole family began to be stretched, even the relationship between this woman and her husband. So the woman made a decision. She decided that she was going to cling to God in the midst of these challenges with her daughter.

Every time that she saw her daughter and got into a conflict or a difficult conversation, she grabbed onto God’s truth. She said, “God, thank you that you are with me. Thank you that you gave me this girl. Thank you that she is able to speak. God, thank you that she has a quick mind. God, thank you that the story is not over yet. Thank you for your presence with me.” She thanked God even when she didn’t feel like it, right in the middle of one of the fights. Over time she began to notice some results beginning to take place in her life. She began to see that the conversations with her daughter, she began to look at them as a challenge for ways that she could thank God in the midst of them. In the process of that she found that it distanced her from the emotions of that moment so she could respond to her daughter without the frustration. In addition she found that she was thinking more about God than about her daughter in the midst of that. It allowed her to see humor in the situations. As she thanked God for her daughter, she began to be able to see her daughter not just as her daughter but also as His daughter. Out of that, that practice of giving thanks, she found that she had more resilience and more elasticity in those moments rather than always being ready to snap. So over time she looked forward to her daughter coming home from school so she could simply lavish love on her.

This woman was obedient. She was obedient, and it produced an increase in gratitude in her life across the board. For you see, as we increase the amount of gratitude in our lives, we change. It is like the mustard seed. It starts small but over time it has the ability to grow and multiply way beyond what we can imagine. It changes. So gratitude is an important part of our lives with Jesus Christ. It is something that we need to cultivate, as well.

When you compare gratitude and then value in Christianity to the other religions of the world, gratitude does not carry that same level of importance that it does for us. It is mainly due to the way that they view God. They don’t view God as being personal, as being sovereign. They don’t see God as being inherently good; rather, they see God as being more fickle, more temperamental, someone that we have to figure out how to appease instead.

So we need gratitude in our lives. And we need to give gratitude to God, tell him thanks. We need to do that, not because God needs to hear that from us, he doesn’t, or that somehow we are going to make him happy if we give him thanks. That is not why we need to give him gratitude. Rather, a life that is filled with gratitude is needed to be spiritually healthy. The more our gratitude increases the more our spiritual health will increase and improve and that is what God knows and that is what God wants for us. Gratitude is a measure of our understanding and receiving God’s grace into our lives.

So here I will do my plug. That is why I think that as I look at all the things that happen in the life of the church and many believers, things like Unidos en Christo, sometimes it is called Cursillo, or TEC, which we just had here a couple weeks ago, or even the Charis ministry that works with people in prison, that is why it is so impactful in so many people’s lives. I believe that because it is an opportunity to increase our understanding as well as our experience of God’s grace in our lives. And we need that because the reality is that as humans, as a species, we are not inherently very grateful people. We are just not. When I think about that I always go back to the words that God told Moses about the nation of Israel how he said they were a “stubborn stiff-necked people.” And you know what? We are too. We too are stubborn and stiff-necked because we think we know best about whatever it is, we know the best way; because if we look at that we can trace that all the way back to the Garden of Eden. We believe we know better than God and we can make things happen on our own the right way, we think. The reality, the truth in that, is that God does not like our rebellion; in fact, he can’t stand it.

Every person who has ever walked the earth or who will ever walk the earth in the future deserves the same thing that happened to a group of Israelites in a place called Korah. If you are not familiar with it I invite you to go home and read about it in Numbers 16. It is as the nation of Israel is going through the wilderness, one of the great grandsons of Levi, as well as 250 other leaders within the nation of Israel, rise up and they create a rebellion against Moses. They challenged Moses’ authority. So God tells Moses “Just have them go and stand out in front of their tents.” So here are 250 leaders, all of their families, all of their relatives, all of their livestock, all standing out in front of their tents. God, at that point when they are standing out, opens the earth up; they fall into the earth; God closes it over them. That is what we deserve, folks. That is what we deserve. We deserve that same fate. But the great “but”, but the great but here is that God is rich in mercy. Mercy is not getting what we deserve. And because of God’s great mercy, Scripture tells us that while we were still sinners, while we were still due what was due those people in Korah, Jesus came and died for us. Jesus came and died for us so that we don’t have the same fate happen to us.

As that sinks in, that we didn’t get what we deserve, instead we were given something we don’t deserve. Gratitude grows. Gratitude grows. We need that gratitude in our lives. We need gratitude in our lives because it is, if you will, a spiritual thermometer for our spiritual health. So it is kind of a measure of where we are spiritually. But even beyond that, gratitude is the thing that we need to grow spiritually, to grow up. But gratitude is, as I said, a choice. It is a choice, because we can choose not to be thankful. We can choose not to pray. We can choose not to give thanks. And we do many times, don’t we? But what do we do when we want gratitude in our lives, we know the need for it; and yet, we are not experiencing it? What do we do then?

Well, because I said it was a choice, it means that possibly that there are other options that we are exercising that we may or may not even realize. So if you are in the boat today, where you are saying I want that gratitude, I want to have a thankful heart as we head into Christmas, see if these apply:

Maybe that lack of thankfulness in your own life is simply because you have never received grace into your own life. You are living without ever having asked Jesus Christ to be Lord of your life and asking him to forgive your sins. And if you have never experienced that kind of confession, and the forgiveness that comes with that, I invite you to do that. If you want to talk more about that, I will be down here after the service and I would love to talk with you about that. That is where it starts—experiencing the grace of God’s forgiveness in our lives.

Well perhaps you are not experiencing God’s grace because you are thinking about the idea of living before God requires that there be a level of acceptance by God based by what I do on my performance. And that is not the case. It is about what God did for us not what we do.

Well perhaps you are not experiencing grace because you are simply shut down to grace. You are so ungrateful that you can not accept the grace that is shown you or offered you as you walk through each day. It is almost as if you have a wall that has been built up around you that blocks any vision, any thought, any experiences that might bring gratitude into your life.

Gratitude requires obedience. It comes in small steps. It comes in small steps over time, just like the woman with her teenage daughter. We will see that as we step through the coming weeks. But until then, I want to encourage you to begin to take some small steps, small steps towards allowing gratitude to begin to grow in your heart. At this point I am going to unabashedly borrow things from our Stephen Ministers. Our Stephen Ministers are spending a whole year talking about gratitude. One of the things that they are asking all the Stephen Ministers to do is simply to record their thanksgivings, each day as they experience them. They gave them just a little notebook like this. I want to encourage all of you to do the same thing. I want you to take this, or something, maybe it is your journal, maybe it is just a scrap of paper or a napkin. It doesn’t matter. Then begin to write down the things that you are thankful for. As many as you have, whatever they might be. It is simply doing what Joanna was doing with the children. Write down what you are thankful for. Maybe you are thankful to God for a great sunrise, or closing a deal at work, or thanking God for the people that he has put into your life. Focus on God and then say, “Thank you God for_______.” And you fill in the blank. That is where gratitude starts—as simple and as easy as that. And as you do that, you will have an attitudinal shift over this Christmas, I believe, an attitudinal shift that will make this time more rich and more memorable for you as we once again move toward celebrating the birth of our Savior.

Would you join me in prayer?

Mighty and holy God thank you, thank you that you provide for us so richly and Lord help us to see that in many new ways in the coming days. The way your grace showers down upon us, that we might live with grateful hearts, with thankful hearts, not just on a holiday once a year; but it might be something that might be a part of our DNA as followers of yours, Jesus. I ask that for each of us this Christmas season and beyond. In your name, my Lord. Amen.

by Rev. William “Buck” Day

We do indeed thank our Father for being here this morning in our midst. We thank him for all the blessings in our lives and today I am starting by thinking about Scripture. So we want to look at our Scripture today. It comes from the book of 1 Timothy, the 6th chapter, so I invite you to follow along as we read the word of God today. (1 Timothy 6:17-19)

17As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, 19thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life.

May God bless the reading of his word this day! Would you join me please in prayer?

Father we do thank you. We do thank you for your word. We thank you that you walk with us every day and that you are with us. So this day, Lord, because you are here in our midst, we ask that you would speak to us through the power of your Holy Spirit what each of us needs to hear. So Lord we ask that you would be at work through these words. Bless them for your use, in your name, Jesus, Amen.

Well I don’t know if you noticed recently there was a little bit of a fanfare around the fact that the world has just celebrated the 7th billion person to inhabit the earth. That is a lot of people, isn’t it? I will tell you right now—I don’t know how many zeroes that is… O.K. I just don’t know. But it is 7 billion. When you look at our lives in relationship to the vast majority of people who live around the world, we would say, you know what? We are pretty well off. We are pretty well off when we look at ourselves compared to everyone else. Using the words that Todd Rasmussen used a couple weeks ago, he said, “The average salary of a person in Africa is 1 or 2 dollars per day. That compared with the average income of someone in the U.S. of 140 dollars a day. Now you may be a little south of 140 dollars a day in terms of what you make, but even if you are, you are well north of 1 or 2 dollars per day.

The great Methodist Pastor John Wesley said, “Whoever has food to eat and clothes to put on with something left over is rich.” Folks, we have been blessed simply because of where we have been born. That applies to most of us here. We have been blessed simply because of where we have been born. Scripture tells us that God makes both the rich as well as the poor. We fall into that rich category, folks. I don’t think there is any way to get around that even if we are between jobs, even if we have lost a ton of money in the stock market or real estate. Compared to everyone else in the world, we are rich. That is the bottom line. We are rich. Our Scripture, as we read it today, speaks to those who are rich. Paul is telling us to refocus on our wealth, refocus it and begin to think of it as an investment, an investment that builds a good foundation. Or if you like the words that Jesus used better, he says, “in things that last.” Our material possessions are not merely to be consumed self-consciously for our own use but we are to think of what we have as an investment to share with those around us. In doing that we are making an eternal investment in what God is up to. If you want to put it into another term, it is perhaps the ultimate notion of delayed gratification. In giving, in being generous, our Scripture says that this is what real life is all about, this is real life. You want to find out what real life is, you want to have an abundant life, you want feel good about your life, Paul says a real life is about investing in the things of God.

I think it is interesting as you look back through history how people of nobility viewed themselves. People who were born of noble birth centuries ago, those who were born into wealth, believed they were born into wealth with a responsibility, with a responsibility to be generous. They saw their wealth as a gift from God and they had been entrusted with the care of those around them. So the noble were generous out of duty to God. But over time the idea of generosity has changed. It has changed so that it is no longer seen as a product of position or duty but more of one of disposition. I think it is an opportunity for us here to recapture that idea of generosity as a result of position. The generous invest their lives in the prosperity of others.

I say that as a precursor because we have come to Commitment Sunday, this Sunday where we have the opportunity to give our pledges for the upcoming year to the work here at Faith. I say that because I want us to begin to think of our pledge differently. I want us to think about our pledge as an investment. You are investing in Faith’s future prosperity, rather than thinking of it that I think most of us have this idea that it is simply one more expense that we have to write a check for. Think about our own lives, our own household and how it runs and how many of us just spend money on stuff that we just know goes out and we are not sure what kind of return we are going to get with that. It is simply the money is gone and that is it.

Well, Faith Church is a work in progress for God’s kingdom. I am looking forward to the changes that are happening within us that are going to make us a thriving congregation one hundred and twenty five years from now. This church has been around for one hundred and twenty five years and next year we are going to celebrate our hundred and twenty fifth anniversary as a church over the course of the year. You will hear more about that as we go forward. But we want to be a church that is thriving a hundred and twenty five years from now.

One of the ways that we are going to do that for our time, it started with a thing called Renewing Faith; it started last winter and into the spring. Renewing Faith has been our guiding process to help us in this growth process and it is making a difference. I think it is making a difference. Have you seen how things are getting better around here? Have you seen what God is up to as you look around this place? Last month we had almost sixty-five people at a free movie night for families, and we are following up with those new families that came, trying to stay connected with them. Have you noticed the folks sitting up here in the choir? There are a few more of them, aren’t there? Have you looked around who is sitting next to you? Our attendance is increasing, a little bit, but it is increasing. We have more children involved in our children’s musical than we have had in a very, very long time. We are going to get to see the fruits of their work in the end of January. I am excited about that. We already have people coming up to Steve and going “When do we have auditions start for the next community theater when we put on the production of “Annie” in the summer? “Evening in December” is continuing to grow because we have been inviting folks. All I can say is come early to get a good seat. Our youth had a great mission trip last summer. Our staff is working really well together, as they are working to equip all of you to do the work of ministry. That is a shift that is happening in our midst right now. As you have been in here on a Sunday morning or out in the atrium or the information area, have you sensed the energy? Have you sensed the energy that is going on around here? It is not uncommon for someone to come up to me and go “Buck, I really like the energy that is going on here. This is exciting to be here.” And I just say, “Thank you Lord. Thank you Lord.” Because, God is up to something here. God is up to something in our midst. He is renewing us here at Faith.

So we have this opportunity now to say “I am with you God” to invest in what God is doing so that the work of growth can continue. So I invite you to invest. I invite you to invest knowing that what you give to God, God will bring a return on it on what he is doing here. When you think about well what should I invest or how much should I invest, God’s standard has always been the tithe. Giving of a tithe or setting apart ten percent of the first part of your income has been what has been the standard for God and for God’s people. The tithe goes all the way back to before Moses. Abraham it says gave a tithe to the priest Melchizedek. Jacob said, “…of all you have you shall give me, I will surely give ten percent back to you.” So, ten percent needs to be the goal for all followers of Christ. Now I know that not all of us are there. So what I have said and I will say it again, start where you are and slowly work towards that goal. As you work towards that, listen to the challenge that God lays out before his people from Malachi, Chapter 3. Follow along with me. (Malachi 3:10)

“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouses, that there may be food in my house. (and I love this) Test me in this,” (God is saying test me.) says the LORD of Hosts, “if I will not open for you the windows of heavens and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.”

Now is the time to invest in what God is doing in our midst, but not simply pledge what you did last year; but this is an opportunity for you to push yourself beyond and trust God more with what is going on in your life, to trust his faithfulness in your life. As you read that, what is the first step? It is on us. We have to take the first step to test God. So if we are thinking about our pledge as an investment in God’s future, it is also about God’s challenge to us to test his faithfulness. Then let me add one more wrinkle to that thinking, from Deuteronomy 16: (Deuteronomy 16:17)

“Every man shall give as he is able according to the blessings of the LORD your God which he has given you.”

In other words, our giving should reflect God’s blessings in our lives. Not just our financial blessings but the totality of our blessings. And that begs the question, doesn’t it, as we head into Thanksgiving week? How have you been blessed? How has God blessed you? How has God blessed your family? How has he blessed your home? How has he blessed your job? Your friends? Your church? As you reflect on that in your own life, I also have reflected on that in my own life, as well. If I think of how God has blessed me, I kind of start with what may sound like spiritually trite answers, but the reality is that they are in fact true blessings. As I think about my own life I think about the fact that God has saved my soul from eternal separation from him. That is a blessing that I am going to enjoy. The grace that he has given me in my life, the forgiveness that I have experienced. I look to Jesus as a blessing because he gives me an example of how I am to live in my world right here and right now. I think Scripture is a blessing that is given to us because it shows us the way to live abundantly and it is a gift, a blessing. And as I reflect on my own life, the blessings of my life, from a personal perspective, I think of my wife Leslee. We have had the pleasure of spending over twenty-seven years together and we have a son who is finding his way in life and I am proud of him every day. I have the privilege to serve in a church where people want to make a difference, they want to serve the world and they really care about each other. I serve with a staff that is a blast to work with. And best of all, I see Jesus working in me and working through me, and that humbles me to the core of my being, that I would be a vessel in his hand. That’s my pledge. That is my blessing. What is your blessing?

So as you think about your pledge, and what it means in your life, think of it in terms of an investment in God’s future, in what he is doing here at Faith. Think of it as a way to test God’s faithfulness to you, or think of it as a response to the blessings that you have received in your life.

So Faith Church needs your giving. It needs your giving. Our Missions Beyond Us team needs your generous giving so that they can make an impact in the world—not only with the funds, but with all of us also getting behind it, as well. That is what we talked about last week with Urban Homeworks. They need your generous giving. Our general fund needs your generous giving. We don’t want to have to walk down the road where we put “reduction” and “budget” in the same sentence anymore. We have to start looking at other things that need help—the building, we know the issues that are before us with the building. Maybe this is an opportunity for us begin to think about how we address those. So I am asking you to increase your pledge from last year. Faith Church needs your giving, needs your increased giving. But don’t give just because we need it here. There are also other reasons to give.

I want to give you, just so you know where I am coming from, why I give, why Les and I give. We give ten percent of our income to Faith Church. We give to others beyond that and I want you to know why we do that. First off I think it is because the Lord tells us to give. I think about it and I listen to Jesus. I use his example. He says it is more blessed to give than to receive. So I take him at his word of that, I take him at his word. When I look at his life, his life was all about giving, wasn’t it? He spent time with the widows and the orphans and the downtrodden. He gave food to the hungry. He healed the poor, the lame and the blind and the sick. He restored hope to the hopeless and he gave his life for mine. So I give.

I also give because I like how I feel about myself when I give. That is not a self-centered kind of thing. It is simply saying when I give, it feels good. How many of you when you have served at Feed My Starving Children after you have packed food for an hour, maybe an hour and a half, how do you feel when you walk out that door afterward? It feels good, doesn’t it? Or when you buy the gifts that are in these boxes (shoe boxes for Samaritan’s Purse), it feels good, doesn’t it? That is how I feel when I give to the Lord’s work.

I also give because I want to be obedient. Giving ten percent is not something that Les and I just started doing. It is something that we have had to grow into over the years. Each time as our income has increased and we have had to write those bigger checks because it gets harder, I know what you are experiencing, it gets harder. And I have had to have this conversation with myself and say, “Buck, what matters? What really matters? Temporal or eternal?” I think about the fact that obedience is a choice. Obedience is a choice. So I give.

I give because of God’s blessing as well as his protection in my life. God promises to be faithful to us if we are faithful to him. Malachi 3 clearly talks about that. I think about in my own life how God has kept me out of trouble over the years, all the places where I could have misstepped and he has directed me around that. I think about how he has protected our family and how he has blessed our family. Why would I not give to that? Why would I not give?

And finally I give because I believe in the vision and the direction of Faith Church. This church has been around for one hundred and twenty five years and I don’t think that God is done with us yet. I believe that God is leading us to a new place, a new place where we will draw closer to God and we will be more impactful for him in our community. That is why I give. Think about why you give. And as you think about your pledge, think of it as an investment, think of it as a chance to test God’s faithfulness, think of it as a response to God’s blessings in your life.

by Rev. William “Buck” Day

Well, our Scripture today comes from the book of Luke, fourth chapter. So I invite you to follow along as we read God’s word together this morning, starting in verse 16. (Luke 4:16-19)

16 When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:

18 ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
   
because he has anointed me
     
to bring good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
   
and recovery of sight to the blind,
     
to let the oppressed go free, 

19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’

God’s word for us this morning! Would you join me again in prayer?

Lord we do need you every moment of the day. And Lord, this day we ask that you would be with us in this moment, that you would allow us to hear what your Spirit has for us, Lord. So I ask that for us and that the words that I say will be acceptable in your sight. Thank you Lord. Amen.

Recovery is a funny thing, isn’t it? Any of you who have ever recovered maybe from a surgery or an injury, you know it is an arduous process; it is something that takes time to get over. In fact, I still have a cut on my leg that is from June that is still recovering. It takes time, doesn’t it? When we think about recovery from natural disasters it is no different at all. These are two pictures from the result of the tsunami and earthquake in Japan. The top one was right afterwards; the bottom one was just recently taken. Not much difference is there. Recovery is a slow process.

The same is true for the recovery from the tornado from May 22 in north Minneapolis. It too is still a work in progress. If you were to go through the neighborhood you would see that there are less and less blue tarps covering the roofs of the houses. I just read recently that the city of Minneapolis has completed repairing all the sidewalks that were uprooted by the trees that were turned over. So now the sidewalks are ready for the people to use again just in time for winter.

In our Scripture today it also talks about recovery. Jesus is talking about recovery. He is not just talking about a physical recovery, however. He is talking about an emotional recovery, a relational recovery, if you will, a spiritual recovery. Chad Schwitters is the Executive Director of Urban Homeworks. In his latest blog he says this: “Any recovery is never instantaneous and it is not done alone.” I think that is why I am so excited for this opportunity today for us to talk about our partnership with this organization, Urban Homeworks. It is a faith based organization that has firmly put its flag in the Twin Cities, saying “We are going to make a difference for Jesus Christ.” We as a church have committed ourselves to walk alongside this organization over the next few years, to significantly support this organization, not only with our funding that we will be doing as we make our pledges next Sunday, but also with human capital.

So today I want to give us an opportunity to maybe understand the whats and the hows of this idea of ramping up our partnership with Urban Homeworks—this investment that we are going to make, all for bringing about the glory of God. As we think about Urban Homeworks, at least for us up to this point, our commitment has typically been either swinging hammers or pulling up carpet or, as John Lundberg who was here in our Sunday school class this morning said, “laying flooring” because we are really good at that here at Faith. But our commitment goes beyond that. Our commitment is also about the process, as it says in our Scripture, “the recovery of the sight of the blind.” That is not just for those who maybe live in north Minneapolis, or those who live in a POD. You will understand what that word means, POD, P.O.D., in just a few moments. It is also about the recovery of the sight of those folks who live in places like Minnetonka and Hopkins, Chanhassen and Eden Prairie, St. Louis Park, and even those far flung foreign places like Eagan.

The recovery of our sight, to set free the oppressed, means that we too have to recover our sight. We have to be freed from our captivity. So this idea of partnering with Urban Homeworks is not just about what we can give them; but it is also about what they can give us, what we can learn from them, how we can be freed, how we can regain some of our sight. In other words, it is a two-way street that we are talking about in this partnership. That partnership as Chad alluded to only happens in the context of community, and community is what Urban Homeworks is all about. Look at the mission statement from Urban Homeworks. Take a look at it on the screen. “The mission of Urban Homeworks is to perpetuate the hope of Jesus Christ through innovative community development that produces dignified housing for low-income families, a strategic network of good neighbors and the redemptive development of real estate.” As you look at that statement, that statement is dripping with “community”, isn’t it? Urban Homeworks is all about trying to create community for all the people involved in it. It is really focused on three main areas: It is about rebuilding neighborhoods; it is about reclaiming hope; and it is about reconnecting with people.

Now I want to show you a short video that kind of gives you the breadth of what Urban Homeworks is all about. As you watch it, the thing I want you to watch for, is I want you to watch for this thing called a POD, P.O.D. (O.K., there will be a test on it afterwards….) …Because this idea of a POD is one of the keys to their work. So watch this video.

(Audio of the video)

Urban Homeworks is more than hard hat and hammers, it is more than rebuilding houses. We are about rebuilding neighborhoods, reconnecting people, reclaiming hope. Here is how it works. Urban Homeworks purchases distressed property in strategic neighborhoods. And while they usually are not much to look at, these houses are transformed into homes thanks to the time and talent of three groups of people—volunteers from churches, companies from community groups, come on-sight to help tear down walls, learn about urban neighborhoods and start to see the city with new eyes. The project sites provide the perfect venue for vocational training with partners like Tree Trust and Goodwill Easter Seals. Through their programs students earn a high school diploma while learning job skills and adults looking to start fresh grow in confidence and experience.

There are some parts of building a quality home that we just can’t do on our own so we partner with local professionals to finish the job. Since they are from the community, the money they earn locally is invested locally. These finished homes need people. Urban Neighbors are young Christian professionals given the opportunity to learn from living in the cities by volunteering time in their community and from the everyday interaction that comes with being an engaged neighbor. Our other renters are families of low income, making between $10,000 and $17,000 annually and are challenged to afford stable, consistent housing. Urban Homeworks is intentional in partnering with local social service organizations so that unexpected issues or expenses don’t disrupt housing stability. These partnerships allow Urban Homeworks to find solutions directly with families and organizations.

Justice at a core level is an economic issue. Forty to sixty percent of Urban Neighbors choose to continue living in the same neighborhoods when they complete their time as an Urban Neighbor. Urban Homeworks also offers the opportunities for families to control more of their own destiny through home ownership with PROJECT:Reclaim. In partnership with the City of Lakes Community Land Trust, families enhance their credit and prepare to purchase their own home over a two to four year time frame through required financial education and a contract for deed arrangement. Home ownership properties are strategically located in close proximity to the mixed income rental units in order to take community building even deeper. These areas of concentrated development are part of the people oriented development strategy or POD. A completed POD will include ten spots for Urban Neighbors to actively engage in their neighborhood, ten units of dignified rental housing for low income families and ten homes that have been taken out of foreclosure and put into the hands of home owners.

The work of Urban Homeworks is part of a much bigger picture where partnership is essential. It is the engagement of many different people that reweaves the community, where dignified housing is a reality, and genuine relationship growth is free to flourish. You are rebuilding neighborhoods, reconnecting people, reclaiming hopes.

(End of video)

Well, what is a POD? People Oriented Development. That is exactly right. By simply learning that, we have just recovered a little bit of our sight and maybe released a little bit of our captivity. As you watched the video, what was it that stood out to you? What was it? I will tell you from my perspective what stood out like a sore thumb, like it got hit by a hammer, was an overtly Christian organization that is working with—did you see the partners—they are working with political entities; they are working with social organizations; they are working with businesses; and they are working with other churches. That to me is significant. It is significant particularly when you overlay it, what we have been talking about for this last month, this idea of “walking across the room.” Here is an organization that is pointing people towards Christ. They are connecting with people they might otherwise not get connected with and they are making a difference. They are doing something positive for the kingdom of God. And from my perspective I am like “Yeah, that is what the gospel is all about.”

So let’s unpack that a little bit of what we saw here, real quickly. Urban Homeworks is about rebuilding neighborhoods. What they do, as you saw, is they take apartment buildings and homes that no one wants—for lots of different reasons. Sometimes it is because of foreclosure, usually. With the mortgage crisis, many of the landlords there were upside down with their mortgages just like many other people; so what they did was they just threw up their hands and they walked away from their homes that they were renting out. So as it goes into default and the bank takes over, guess what happens to the people that are living there. They get kicked out. All of a sudden you have an abandoned home and people who are looking to live somewhere else. With the tornado, when the tornado went through, one of the fears from the folks from Urban Homeworks was that a lot of these land owners would look at their homes that were partially or totally destroyed and they would just say, “Hmmm, I will take the insurance proceeds, tuck it in my pocket and I will walk away from the building” and let it go, let it become a scar in their neighborhood. And that is what has happened. So what happens then is the city is left to deal with that. The city has begun to work with Urban Homeworks because they understand what Urban Homeworks is trying to do. Many times they will sell their buildings that have been foreclosed, have been abandoned and are in rough shape, as you saw in that first picture, and they will sell it to Urban Homeworks for as little as one dollar, knowing that Urban Homeworks will then take it, turn it around, and make it good affordable, liveable housing for people. For example, last year the City of Minneapolis sold six buildings to Urban Homeworks in an area called Lovell Square for one dollar each, six bucks. By the end of the year, eighteen families and Urban Neighbors had dignified rental housing to live in. Isn’t that fantastic? That is good stuff!

Another example that gets told a lot around the offices of Urban Homeworks is that just north of their offices in North Minneapolis right off of west Broadway there is a three story multi-unit apartment building that they were able to purchase and in the process they rehabbed it. In the process of rehabbing it they got done and, as they were finishing up and as people were moving in, a couple of staff people were down in the basement doing some maintenance and those kinds of things, and they turned around and there were a couple of Minneapolis officers there. The officers said to them “You have to tell us what you are doing. You have to tell us what is going on here because you need to know that last year there were over two hundred and fifty calls for the police at this building. This year there were only twelve.” That is the difference that Urban Homeworks is making. They are about rebuilding neighborhoods—one home at a time, one POD at a time.

So Urban Homeworks is about rebuilding neighborhoods but it doesn’t stop there. It is also about reconnecting people. Because once a building has been rehabbed, now the hard work, in many cases, of building a POD really takes place. It is all about connecting neighbor with neighbor. It is about creating a liveable community where people want to be a part of what is going on there, where they can share their day-to-day activities in their lives together. That is where the Urban Neighbors come in. As you heard, it is usually young Christian professionals who will go in and they will live in usually the upstairs of like a duplex or a fourplex, and their job is to be a presence for good in the community, to share the love of Christ, to point towards Jesus.

Today, we have an opportunity to hear from a Urban Neighbor. I am very excited to have Alyssa Whitmore coming down and I want you to hear her story because it is a good thing. She has a little one with her today and that is fantastic. Alyssa, thank you for being here. Alyssa was telling me that she has been an Urban Neighbor for three years. So, Alyssa, tell us a little about your story, about how you became an Urban Neighbor.

(Alyssa)

I grew up in rural Wisconsin on a farm—I had a pony—like rural, super rural. I came to Minneapolis to go to school. I went to North Central University. So North Central University is in the Elliot Park neighborhood which is predominately populated by a West African population. So you have a small evangelical private Christian university saturated in a very high impoverished community. They encourage you to get to know your neighborhood and do a lot of service learning. Through that I was introduced to Urban Homeworks and was just really, as Pastor had said, really struck by the intentionality of the organization. They are not just out doing humanistic, like we are going to give good housing, it is important and it is meeting those needs; but it is very clear that they are about perpetuating the hope of Christ. I was really encouraged by that. So I started volunteering and when I graduated I needed a place to live; so I became an Urban Neighbor. It was essentially just, well, I need somewhere to go and I can’t live in the dorms anymore. But it has become a lot more than that for me.

(Buck)
I am sure it has, so tell us a little about what your learning has been in terms of what you have learned about community, what you have learned about the neighbors that you are living with now, even about poverty.

(Alyssa)

Definitely. My first two years I lived two blocks south of Broadway on Emerson Avenue and I took a year off and now I am back. We live about a block and a half further south, so I have always been in the same area. It has been really cool just to see some of the transition, as well as some of the stability in the neighborhood. It is a very diverse neighborhood. It is a little bit crazy at times but it is also really beautiful. I’ve learned that being part of a community is not just proximity. You have to be there. You have to be close to people to be community; but you have to be very intentional. For me to get to know my neighbors is a very intentional choice. Now that it is cold we don’t do this as much, but we have spent the last three months sitting on our front porch. We are in a beautiful fourplex that was rehabbed. Two years ago it was a drug house that was vacant. I saw it. We would pray for it when we walked by. Now we have the most beautiful front porch in the neighborhood and I have twelve foot ceilings, gorgeous hardwood. I mean, people are jealous of my apartment—which is really kind of fun. We have a single mom that lives below us and then we have two other families that live in our building. We have done a cookie day, and they have come over and just made cookies and hung out. I sit on the front porch with the baby and we talk to the neighbors and we get to know them and we just are there. It is not a big evangelical like—you need to know Jesus—we are just there and conversation happens and relationships are formed and I am able to say things like, “Well, we choose to live here because we believe that God cares about the poor and cares about the oppressed, and God has a plan and a purpose for this neighborhood.” And people are so thrown off by that. “You have a college degree and you live in North.” “Yep, absolutely, and I love it.” I have also learned that poverty is a lot more than just money. It is a mindset in its “Well, there’s no better,” or “there’s no more, this is what we get.” Being able to say, “You know what? I am the first person in my family to go to college. It’s doable.” And then to say, “You know what? Someday I am going to own a home and I actually want it to be in North. And just to kind of throw off the stereotypes and challenge even what people in the neighborhood think, ‘well, if I could just get some money and get out of the neighborhood…’ No, you know, it has been really eye-opening for me. I think I have learned probably more than I have given.”

(Buck)
That was kind of my last question, is just, what are you learning about yourself? How are you recovering your sight as it were?

(Alyssa)

Yeah, this year has been interesting for me because I am a mom now and I am not married which has been very interesting on many levels but one of the things that has been different is most of the Urban Neighbors are just out of college, so they are in the eighteen to twenty-two range. I am a little bit older than that. They are just working and trying to figure out life and integrate their faith into things. Not that I have it figured out, because I surely don’t, but I look a little bit more like the neighborhood now. I am a single mom and that is very common in North. We are not well-off, it is a little tighter of a budget; so I think people in the neighborhood have been a lot more welcoming to me and a lot more like “oh, you’re one of us.” Then they hear my story and they are like “wait, you’re not. What’s going on? We don’t know what to do with you.” So, I think I’ve learned that it is really easy for all of us to put people in a box. So trying to take the box off and see the humanity in everyone and see how I can help that and how I can bring hope into that. So, very humbling, but very exciting.

(Buck)
Well, thank you. We appreciate your story. (applause) Thank you Alyssa.

That is what it is about. It is about just engaging in life with folks. So that is part of the mission of Urban Homeworks, is this idea of reconnecting people in ways that are significant, in ways that matter. So if it is about reclaiming neighborhoods and about reconnecting people, it is also about reclaiming hope, as well. Bringing together low-income families with folks, Urban Neighbors like Alyssa, is part of the strategy. As you saw, it is working, putting trainees of the construction trade alongside pros in the trade so they can learn from each other, they can be mentored together alongside volunteers from churches. It is all about reclaiming hope. It creates an opportunity for each of us to learn from each other and in the process of that that is part of the regaining of our sight, just as Alyssa has experienced, that you know what? Now I get it a little more. And that is the process for each of us.

Last August a family was referred to Urban Homeworks from another group, another organization in north Minneapolis called the Northside Achievement Zone and they were ready to move into one of Urban Homeworks newly renovated duplexes. As you think of the thought of moving along with the all the joys and all the hassles that go along with moving into a new apartment, the mom, Annette, was pregnant and ready to give birth to her sixth child. Her due date was actually two days before the move-in date. Think about what she was thinking… As she was trying to mentally get into her mind, how am I going to be in a hospital with a brand new baby and move at the same time? How is that all going to go down? Well as they got to the moving day, the baby hadn’t arrived but the folks from the Northside Achievement Zone took time off from work to get all of her things out of storage and to move her into her duplex and get her settled in. She says that she was up to 4 a.m. that move-in date unpacking boxes. Tell me that isn’t a hopeful thing. Well, three days later she had a healthy baby boy. With the support like the organizations like the Northside Achievement Zone with Urban Homeworks it is this idea of moving people into a newly rehabbed home and giving them hope, hope that they maybe didn’t have before.

That is what Urban Homeworks is about. It is about the work of recovering our sight, not just with people in north Minneapolis or in south Minneapolis or in St. Paul—they are talking about how they can move into St. Paul, as well; but it is also the recovery of the sight for us in the suburbs as we work with them. So as we think about what this means to discover our partnership with Urban Homeworks, what will it mean when you turn in your pledge next week that is going to be included in the Beyond Us pledged for Urban Homeworks? What is that going to look like? What is that going to mean? What can we do with that? Well money will make a difference, for sure; but for this partnership really to flourish and be meaningful and helpful both to Urban Homeworks as well as to us, I think it is going to require more than just money. It is going to require more than money. It is going to require community. It is going to require people interacting with each other, learning how to learn from each other, caring about each other, helping each other.

So what could we do? What can we do here at Faith to strengthen that partnership? Well, we certainly could increase our volunteer work in their construction stuff, the kind of things we have been doing before. We certainly could do that. I know maybe there are some of you that like that kind of work that kind of enjoy working with your hands. There are regular opportunities to work with them in ways that are significant, very similar along the ways of Habitat for Humanity. But the reality is I know that a lot of us either can’t or would choose not to do that kind of construction work. That is the reality of where we are.

So what are some other options for us? Well, I know they could use help volunteering in their office. They have said that. Maybe we could bring treats to those who are working in the rehabbing houses. That could be an option. Maybe you have skills in finance or real estate that could be of use to them. That could be an option, as well. Or if we kind of zoom out a little bit and take a little larger picture, what is something else we could do that would be a little larger in size? What would happen if we were to say that we are going to take on a home or duplex and we are going to make that face? That we are going to underwrite it. We are going to help put it together. We are going to walk with the families that move into that and the Urban Neighbors. What would that mean for us? Or maybe even a little bigger picture. What would happen if we said, “You know what? Maybe there is someone here at Faith that could become an Urban Neighbor.” What would happen if we were to commission them and empower them and underwrite them to become an Urban Neighbor and say, “We want you to go the city and we want you to be our eyes and our ears. We want you to learn and come back and help us recover our sight. And in doing that, we are going to pay for your rent while you are an Urban Neighbor.” What would that do for them? What would that do for us? What would it do for Urban Homeworks?

Those are some of the things we want to be thinking about—coming alongside some of these young children, maybe they need school supplies, maybe that is an option. Those are some of the things that we want to be thinking about and dreaming about together as a church. Urban Homeworks is making a difference and we have the opportunity to partner with them, to make a difference. I have to tell you, every time I watch that video I get choked up inside because it is the right thing to do; not just because it is morally right, but because that is what I think Christ calls us to do and to be in this world.

Let me close with another quote from Chad, the Executive Director. He says, “The Work of Urban Homeworks is one of recovery (That’s what we’ve been taking about). It is working towards a more healed and a more whole life for me, for you, for the cities, the towns in the countysides in which we live (Yes, they are involved in those ways as well). Thank you for being a part of our story, for encouraging and making recovery happen.”

Folks as we pledge next week, I invite you to be thinking about not just the financial piece of it; that is important, but beyond that, as well, for the glory of God.

Would you pray with me please?

Lord, thank you. Thank you for Urban Homeworks. Thank you for their ministry. Thank you for the vision that you have empowered them with and the way they are living it out so effectively Lord. Lord we thank you for the opportunity that we have to help. And Lord, in our helping, we cry out, may we be helped, as well. I ask that in your name, Jesus. Amen.