THIS PASTOR’S VIEWPOINT I remember once, many years ago, watching a video of some Martha Stewart shows a kind church member had taped and loaned to me. She knew of my interest in landscaping and gardening, and these programs had a lot of Martha’s home gardens as well as (naturally) many of Martha’s other ventures. I probably don’t have to tell you that Martha has always been into a LOT of different things.
When the video was through I couldn’t help but wonder what she enjoyed doing best because, it seemed, almost everything she did was her “favorite” thing to do. For some reason, last week when I came up from a new garden I was making in back of our home I recalled this video. After cleaning up I sat down, opened my Bible and read in Luke 10:41- 42 this familiar passage when Jesus was in the home of Mary and Martha., “But the Lord said to her, “My dear Martha, you are so upset over all these details! There is really only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it – and I won’t take it away from her.”
Now for those of you who like and admire Ms. Stewart I’m not picking on her…but it’s certainly not difficult to see a “busyness” parallel between the two Martha’s although I have no idea what place religion has in her life. Actually, perhaps she really isn’t so different from most of us, just more public about her busyness.
In reflection, however, Martha’s kingdom (should I say queendom ? ) as we have seen, can come apart and be taken away from her, for in the final analysis, it seems to be composed of material goods. So also were the concerns facing the Mary’s sister Martha. It was these concerns Jesus addressed.
Martha’s table settings, flowers on the sideboard, the cooking on the stove, all of these were of little importance in the greater scheme of things. The table settings would soon be dirtied and removed, the flowers would wilt and the food eaten and gone.
The only thing worth being concerned about were the words of the Lord, for they could never be taken from Mary. In truth they would grow, and bear fruit through all eternity.
So, what’s most important to you? Are they the transient Martha things or the eternal Mary things? Are they of man and the earth or of God and eternal life? Important thoughts as we reflect on the true meaning of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection in this Lenten period.
Sermon for Sunday, March 27, 2011 BEGINNING AGAIN Ephesians 2:1-10 As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3 All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. 4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Two men are leaning against the office water cooler. One says to the other, “Say, you look depressed. What are you thinking about?” “My future,” his friend sighed. “What makes your future look so hopeless?” the first man asked. “My past,” he replied. Don’t you wish you could be a fly on the wall for the rest of that conversation! I’d like to know what regrets from that man’s past were stealing away his hope for the future.
Some years ago, there was a particularly sad letter in the Billy Graham newspaper column. Someone wrote: “I’m in my 80s and all alone, and I know it’s my own fault. I went through life being disagreeable and demanding that everybody do things my way, and all my relatives turned against me. Maybe someone will learn from my life. I wish I could live it over.”
One of our greatest fears is reaching old age and looking back with only regrets. Rev. Graham was compassionate in his answer, but he was also truthful. As he wrote, “One of life’s hardest lessons is that we cannot change the past.”
Louisa Tarkington spoke for many people when she wrote: I wish there were some wonderful place called the Land of Beginning Again, where all of our past mistakes and heartaches, and all of our poor selfish grief, could be dropped like a shabby old coat at the door and never be put on again.
Regret is a crippling emotion because it leaves us chained to the past. Regret provides the ammunition for the twin demons of shame and guilt. It erodes our self-esteem. It is the little voice that whispers in our ear, “Remember your failures, remember your foolish decisions. Remember the kind of person you were.”
The apostle Paul, of all people, understood the corrosive power of regret. As a devoted Pharisee, Paul, then called Saul had been a chief persecutor of the early Christian believers.
In the book of Acts, chapter 7, we read of the execution of Stephen, a young man who was arrested and stoned to death by the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council, because he preached so boldly about Jesus as the Messiah. Chapter 7:58 reads, “Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.” And Acts 8:1 tells us, “And Saul was there, giving approval to his death.”
Oh yes, Saul knew what it was to have regrets. In Acts 9, Saul has a life-changing encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus. Afterwards, he changes his name to Paul. When he tries to join up with the other Christians, they reject him at first. They know of his past. How can they be sure that he’s a changed man?
So Paul goes away for a time of discipleship. When he returns, he is ready to take on the mantle of leadership. And Paul becomes the most effective Christian evangelist in history.
Oh yes, Paul knows the power of regrets. But he also knows the indisputable power of Christ to change a person from the inside out. He knows the power that can change a man from a murderer to a minister. And so, Paul is not afraid to be honest in his letter to the Ephesians. “You were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient.” (Eph. 2: 1-2)
You were dead, how’s that for total honesty? Not just, “You were messed up.” “You were morally challenged.” “You were failing to self-actualize.”
No, Paul says, “You were DEAD through the trespasses and sins in which you once lived . . .” Let’s not kid ourselves about our fate before we came to know Christ. Jesus didn’t just come to help us reach our potential, or to make us nicer people.
Christian comedian Mike Warnke says, “Jesus didn’t come to make bad people good. He came to give dead people life!”
Paul is not reminding the Ephesians of their past to cause them shame. In fact, he sympathizes with them when he says in verse 3, “All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else.”
All of us once lived like that. We were all in the same boat. None of us is better than anyone else. So what do we do with our past? What do we do with our fears and failings and foolish decisions? What do we do with that accusing voice in our head?
Paul is only reminding us of our past so that we can rejoice even more in the present. … He writes in verses 4-7, “But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”
We were dead, but now we are alive! And not just barely-breathing-on-life-support kind of alive. We are made alive with Christ.
What does Jesus say about his kind of life in the book of John chapter 10, verse 10? “I have come that they may have life, and have it more abundantly.” Jesus doesn’t just give us back our old lives. He gives us a new life, an abundant life. And a life that only hints at the glorious riches of the heavenly treasure he has stored up for his followers.
On Sept. 12, 2001, Genelle Guzman-McMillan became the last person to be rescued alive from the wreckage of the New York Trade Center’s Twin Towers. No one understands how she was lucky enough to survive when more than 2,800 people who were in the same building at the same time died.
In a piece on survivors like Genelle, a reporter for Time magazine wrote, “Having cheated death they aren’t certain how to live.” What do you do when you were supposed to die, but instead you live? How do you go about shaping a new life?
Before the attacks on the World Trade Center, Genelle was living with her boyfriend, Roger. She cared a lot about her appearance, and about going out to dance clubs with her friends. Occasionally, she and Roger attended church; they were starting to question whether there was more to life than work and club-hopping. But while she was trapped for 26 hours in the rubble of the Trade Center, Genelle prayed fervently to God. She knows that he saved her.
After her release from the hospital, she and Roger married. They regularly attend church now. But for years Genelle did not return to work; she spent most of her time reading her Bible and watching television. Friends and family worried that Genelle was drifting. But none of them could deny the peace and strength that she has gained from her newfound faith in Jesus. Her priorities have changed. She believes that God saved her for a reason; she reads her Bible because she wants urgently to understand what that reason is.
I think verses 8-10 in this passage answered that question for the Ephesians, for Genelle Guzman-McMillan, for the 80 year old grandmother and her teen age grandson who were rescued last Sunday after eight days trapped in their destroyed home in Japan and for us: “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.” (Eph. 2: 8-10)
We didn’t deserve to be saved. We didn’t earn this new life. It was given to us, an unselfish gift that came from the hands of our loving and merciful God.
Verse one of this passage tells us that we were dead. Verse five tells us that we are alive. And verse ten gives us the reason why: to do good works. This is the purpose that God “prepared beforehand to be our way of life.”
So what do we do with our new life? We dedicate it to doing good works. Not just hit-or-miss efforts at charity, but good works as a way of life.
In 1999, best-selling author Stephen King was hit by a car while out walking near his home. The accident left him with severe injuries. In an article in Family Circle magazine (Nov. 1, 2001), King wrote that having a close brush with death taught him to contemplate the real meaning of life.
He said, “. . . I want you to consider making your life one long gift to others. And why not? All you have is on loan, anyway. All that lasts is what you pass on. Giving isn’t about the receiver or the gift but the giver. It’s for the giver. One doesn’t open one’s wallet to improve the world, although it’s nice when that happens; one does it to improve one’s self. I give because it’s the only concrete way I have of saying that I’m glad to be alive . . . ”
Look at that quote again: “I give because it’s the only concrete way I have of saying that I’m glad to be alive . . .”
Are you glad to be alive? Are you grateful for the grace and the mercy that God has shown you? Do you remember what you were before Christ saved you?
Then let that overwhelming sense of gratitude motivate you to good works. Pass on the love and mercy that God first gave you. As Stephen King wrote, “Consider making your life one long gift to others.” It is what our Savior did for us. It is what we are called to do for others.
In her memoirs, which she published in 1997 at the age of 98, Jessie Lee Brown Foveaux shares her advice about facing hard times: “You say you think life is like a big puzzle. How right you are, my dear. Life is like a puzzle, and the pieces fall into place each day, and the giant puzzle lasts all along life’s way. God will, if we ask him, give us the strength for whatever may come, so let’s put guilt and confusion behind us. Once we ask and are forgiven, we can start the new day with joy and accept the fact that we are all sinners saved by God’s grace. Then we can have a cheerful smile to light up our face to greet anyone we may meet anytime or anyplace.”
Can you put guilt and confusion behind you? Can you start the new day with joy?
You can if you accept the fact that we are all sinners saved by God’s grace. We were not made to live in the past, chained by our regrets. We were made for an abundant life of fellowship with God and service to our fellow man.
Let’s start living as truly alive people today. For today we are at another crossroads with Christ. Amen
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