Sunday, July 26, 2015

God Loves Leftovers: A Sermon Preached by the Reverend Rob Lee

God Loves Leftovers
John 6:1-21
July 26th, 2015
FBC|WJ

I don’t like today. I don’t like that this is my next to last Sunday with you all. Also, I don’t like leftovers, ask my family or my bread breakers small group and they will tell you I don’t do leftovers. But isn’t it funny, how God takes us precisely where we do not wish to go, and meets us there. 

Do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. These words have shown up in Scripture where the person or people receiving these words should probably have been quite afraid. Abram was told not to be afraid, Moses, Joshua, Samuel, Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Zechariah, the Virgin Mary, Joseph, shepherds in the fields keeping watch over their flocks by night are all told not to be afraid. We’re in good company with today’s lectionary reading.
Today we hear two very distinct stories in the Gospel of John. We hear of the five loaves and two fish, and we hear the disciples getting in a boat and having to face Jesus amidst the sea and the storm. Jesus says to them in the sea and wind and the rain, “Do not be afraid.” Now the funny part of it is, he says it while walking on water.
Jesus walking on water telling people not to be afraid; I wonder what he was telling them not to be afraid of, the storm or the fact that there was a human being out in the middle of the sea walking towards them. Do not be afraid. I think that’s easy for Jesus to say, I think it’s easy for the angels to say to those they encounter with news that changes the course of human history. But as with anything it’s a lot harder to be on the receiving end of that do not be afraid nonsense, right. In fact, if you tell people do not be afraid it might actually create more anxiety and fear in the culture in which we live.
So I wanted to ask you today, given the text we just heard what scares you most? What scares you the most in life? Is it death? Is it loss? Is it depression? Is it something that is too dark to even speak its name in this place? How have you dealt with that fear and anxiety and unrest in your life? These are all questions that we face on sometimes a day-to-day basis. And I think we can face them with dignity and with grace by weaving these two seemingly unrelated stories together.
12 baskets left over. That’s an abundant amount of leftovers. And I love how Jesus commands in verse 12 of the lectionary that we heard today, “Gather up the fragments leftover, so that nothing may be lost.” Nothing may be lost. God loves leftovers, and frankly these emotions of fear and anxiety and defeat over our earthly lives are things we’d like to leave in the leftover pile. But that, my friends is where God does God’s best work.
You see the funny thing about fear is that it has power over us, it controls us, it manipulates us into the thing that fear wants us to be or to feel. But there in the moments of the stormiest night the disciples had faced thus far Jesus comes and says to them, “Do not be afraid.” Jesus takes control of their fear by calling it as it is. And in so doing he frees the disciples to experience the warmth of his presence.
We too, experience this same phenomenon. We too experience the warming presence of a loving God in our most fearful moments. For in our most anxiety-ridden experiences God is showing up saying, “Do not be afraid, it is I.” God takes the fear that we’d like to leave behind and God confronts it head on. We too must do the same and follow in God’s footsteps
Now you might say to yourself that certainly can’t be true, preacher. I’m not sure about this God stuff anyway but to say that God meets us in our fear is preposterous. I hear what you’re saying because I too feel that sometimes when I am most scared I couldn’t be farther away from a living and loving God. But then I just have to remind myself to let Jesus walk on my water. Let Jesus trample out the fear and the despair and the heartache, and yes even death itself.
I’ve wondered about all the times I’ve been told not to be afraid. Certainly after car accidents and hospital visits warrant the normal exchange of encouragement not to fear. But I’ve also had to say this phrase, “Do not be afraid.” so many times this past week in every day affairs just to myself. You see this past week I’ve had to come to terms with my time coming to an end in this place and in Boone. I’ve been crossing off Boone Bucket list items with friends such as going to Tweetsie Railroad one more time and eating one more time at the Daniel Boone Inn before we all go our separate ways. I’m having to come to terms with leaving Stephanie here in Boone while I head to Durham, I’ve had to come to terms with saying goodbye to my friend Natalie who is moving to San Antonio, I’ve had to come to terms with saying goodbye to you all here in this place two Sundays from now.
But the other day as I was cleaning out and getting ready for the move I found a piece of paper that has been my guiding light for some time. I received this piece of paper around the time my friend Abbey died years ago and to this day it keeps popping up when I need it most. It has words such as these, “Do not look forward in fear to the changes in life; rather look to them with full hope that as they arise, God, whose very own you are will lead you safely through all things; and when you cannot stand it, God will carry you in his arms. Do not fear what may happen tomorrow; the same everlasting Father who cares for you today will take care of you then and every day. He will either shield you from suffering, or will give you unfailing strength to bear it. Be at peace and put aside all anxious thoughts and imaginations.”
Do not be afraid. Do not be afraid dear people of God because God loves leftovers like you and me. God loves leftovers because there is room for everyone at the table of grace. And there, at the table of grace we are more than leftovers, we are welcomed guests at a banquet fit for the children of God.
Do not be afraid. You all know how I have to deal with extreme anxiety. Ask Stephanie or my parents or anyone close to me and they know that even the slightest thing can set me off. But I’m learning, quite literally to practice what I preach and not fear the future or the past but to relish the moment we have been given. When we let Jesus walk on our water, it changes everything. It changes our perception of grace and that is precisely what we need. We need to see Jesus on the water for it is there that we realize that the Savior of the world can face the worst the world can throw at him and he can take it. Even if that means going to a cross Jesus took the brunt force of everything we could give him and shrugged it off three days later. So we can face our time and our place with faith and without fear because Christ is risen, Christ is risen indeed.
            When I was in middle school I went to a private conservative Christian School where my classmates felt it more fun to mess with this crazy Methodist church nerd than it was to play on the playground. One girl in particular had it out for me. She wanted to prove to me that everything that I knew to be true about a loving God was wrong. And I’ll never forget one conversation she tried to have with me. She told me it was a sin to fear. She argued that in Philippians, Paul commands us to not worry or fear anything. Now obviously I’d like to say I won that theological argument but I didn’t have an answer for her. I just thought she was right and that fear is something that should be avoided at all costs.
            That was until I realized Jesus himself experienced fear. Jesus knew what it was like the night before he gave himself up for us when he went to the garden alone. So Jesus knows and Jesus meets us in our fear and Jesus feeds our fear, with faith. Just as he fed those hungry masses millennia ago we are fed too. We are fed with the words and with the comfort that we are not alone. We are God’s. And in belonging to God, we are no longer leftovers but a chosen and cherished people. So maybe now, I can like leftovers, maybe now, I can appreciate today. Do not be afraid, do not be afraid. Amen.


Sunday, July 5, 2015

Dusty Prophets in Our Midst: July 5th Sermon Preached by the Reverend Rob Lee

A Sermon Preached by the Reverend Rob Lee
Ezekiel 37:1-14, Mark 6:1-13
July 5th, 2015
FBC|WJ

Will you pray with me?
            God of the prophets and saints, God of the martyrs and the sages, speak to me, speak through me, if necessary, in spite of me. Always beyond me that in everything you may be glorified by your Son Jesus Christ, who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns forever. Amen.

            They say that the fireworks of the 4th of July can cause trauma for those who are experiencing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. So much, that this year, there was a social media campaign to remind people to be considerate of those who have experienced emotional or physical trauma after being sent out to war and have to come home to hear bombs bursting in air.
I’m sure the prophet Ezekiel and the twelve that were sent out far and wide were feeling a little bit of emotional trauma or even PTSD after what happens to them in our lessons today. Ezekiel is told he is a prophet, and must go and prophesy to the dead dry bones of Israel. And likewise in Mark’s Gospel we hear of the disciples going out and taking nothing with them and proclaiming that the kingdom of God is at hand. This is a really great definition of a prophet: challenging the comfortable and comforting the challenged, proclaiming that the kingdom of God is at hand.
            This got me thinking a little bit this week about what a modern day prophet might look like. When I say the word prophet or prophecy I immediately as you might go to the Left Behind series or people standing on the street with placards across their chest saying that you’re going to hell in a hand-basket unless you say the sinner’s prayer three time each Tuesday morning before tea-time. When we hear the word prophet we think of someone or some concept that is dare I say a little off their rocker.
            But then we mention the prophets of old, when we think of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Malachi, Ezekiel, Amos, we see respect and dignity because these people heard the voice of God and acted. So let me propose to you that being a prophet requires three things.
            The first thing being a prophet requires is tough skin, ask any preacher who proclaims the word of God and then gets negative feedback after a sermon and they will tell you that to be a proclaimer of the Gospel message you have to have tough skin. To be a prophet in this day and age requires you to be able to take things for a grain of salt. It requires that you stand for what you know to be true about God and the community of faith and that you listen to the voice of God some times in spite of what the community around you is saying. We see this best in Mark’s Gospel when Jesus said, “If a place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake the dust off your feet as testimony against them.” Friends we need a few dusty prophets in our midst. At my home church of Broad Street United Methodist in Statesville there’s this one church lady who when I was interning there and was very obviously frazzled before the service would remind me to, “Wipe it away.” Don’t let anxiety over your message threaten what God might do through you.
            The second thing a prophet must possess in our day and age is soft skin. You might say to me, now preacher you’re getting a little off your rocker there yourself. You just said that prophets must have tough skin and now you’re saying that to be a prophet you must have soft skin? Why yes, dear friends, I am saying that to be a prophet in our time you must have soft skin. You must possess vulnerability and a soft-spot for the people who need it most. You must be willing to meet people where they are and prophesy to their dry bones. For in so doing you are offering them an encounter with Jesus Christ. You are reminding them that there is nothing in death or life, in the world as it is, or the world as it shall be, nothing in all creation that can separate us from the love of God. Now that requires you being willing to admit to the people that you have touched the wounds of Christ as Thomas wanted to, and Christ has touched your wounds. It requires you being honest about who you are and whose you are. It is imperative to be a prophet that you lay everything on the line, even if it risks you being an outcast, a social pariah, or even death itself.
            Finally, the third and possibly most important thing that being a prophet requires of you would be as Bishop Michael Curry would say, “You have to be a crazy Christian.” Bishop Curry, who was elected this past week as the 27th presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church has this to say about being a crazy Christian, “We need Christians crazy enough to believe that God is real and that Jesus lives. Crazy enough to follow the radical way of the Gospel. Crazy enough to believe that the love of God is greater than all the powers of evil and death. Crazy enough to believe, as Dr. King often said, that though “the moral arc of the universe is long, and it bends toward justice.” We need some Christians crazy enough to believe that children don’t have to go to bed hungry; that the world doesn’t have to be the way it often seems to be; that there is a way to lay down our swords and shields, down by the riverside; that as the slaves used to sing, “There's plenty good room in my Father's kingdom,” because every human being has been created in the image of God, and we are all equally children of God and meant to be treated as such.” You see Bishop Curry is on to something. If we’re going to speak with the authority of Elijah or Ezekiel we need the craziness of King David dancing or Daniel believing that prayer could shut the mouths of lions. If we’re going to heal, preach, and teach like Moses did in the dessert or like Jesus did in the Gospel then we’re going to have to be crazy enough to believe it to be true. You see being a prophet is more than prophesying to dead bones, it’s about believing in the resurrecting power of a God who can cause life to come to those dead, dry, bones. I mean those bones were really dry, they were dead and gone, yet the God of life and death can bring forth the beauty of life from even the driest of bones.
            This prophet stuff had me thinking of a prophet of modernity who called out the powers at be and said that they must change. The man had tough skin, yet was vulnerable to the weak and the enslaved: A man by the name of Frederick Douglass. Frederick Douglass was a former slave who became a black abolitionist and African Methodist Episcopal Zion preacher during the 19th century. You see on July 5th, 1852, 163 years to the day, Frederick Douglass gave a speech entitled, “What to the Slave is the 4th of July?” In his speech he categorically and singlehandedly tells a crowded group of New Yorkers a prophetic word about the church, this is what he said, “But the church of this country is not only indifferent to the wrongs of the slave, it actually takes sides with the oppressors. It has made itself the bulwark of American slavery, and the shield of American slave-hunters. Many of its most eloquent Divines. who stand as the very lights of the church, have shamelessly given the sanction of religion and the Bible to the whole slave system. They have taught that man may, properly, be a slave; that the relation of master and slave is ordained of God; that to send back an escaped bondman to his master is clearly the duty of all the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ; and this horrible blasphemy is palmed off upon the world for Christianity.” Now if you were a Christian sitting in that room 163 years ago you would feel the sting of those words no doubt, Douglass goes on to say, Let the religious press, the pulpit, the Sunday school, the conference meeting, the great ecclesiastical, missionary, Bible and tract associations of the land array their immense powers against slavery and slave-holding; and the whole system of crime and blood would be scattered to the winds.” You see what Douglass did? He called them out with tough skin, pleaded to them with a crazy notion and finally ends with vulnerability here at the end of his speech, “Allow me to say, in conclusion, notwithstanding the dark picture I have this day presented of the state of the nation, I do not despair of this country. There are forces in operation, which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. “The arm of the Lord is not shortened,” and the doom of slavery is certain. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope.”
            Dear people of God that’s what it means to be a prophet. It means laying down the sword and shield down by the riverside. It means calling for an end to the sins of this world and of the church. It means that in our time and our place we are called to be Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Abraham Lincoln, Peter, Paul, Andrew, Thomas, even a representation of Jesus himself. This, my friends is our solemn duty, and one we must not take lightly.
            In the Episcopal tradition there is a book entitled, Holy Women, Holy Men that commemorates the work of those well-known saints who have gone on to glory. Each person honored in that book has a prayer, and I’d like to pray the prayer that praises God for the work of Frederick Douglass as we close. May we pray together?


 Almighty God, whose truth makes us free: We bless your name for the witness of Frederick Douglass, whose impassioned and reasonable speech move the hearts of a president and a people to a deeper obedience to Christ. Strengthen us also to be outspoken on behalf of those in captivity and tribulation, continuing in the Word of Jesus Christ our Liberator; who with you, and the Holy Spirit dwells in glory everlasting. Amen.