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Sunday's Sermon
Jan 27, 2008

1097
"Living by the Promise"
The Rev. Dennis Posno

I was walking through a downtown parking lot the other day
and I witnessed a common winter weather occurrence  ~
a driver attempting, unsuccessfully, to start his car.
The engine would not turn over in the cold.
As I walked past I noticed a sticker in the back window of his car.
It read:  HAVE A NICE DAY … SOMEWHERE ELSE.

And I chuckled to myself,
        thinking that the driver of that car
                would himself be wanting a nice day  ~  somewhere else.

And I thought of the children of Israel in Babylon  ~
        wanting to have their nice day …
                wanting a better life than they were experiencing …
                        and wanting it somewhere else  ~  anywhere else but there.

The children of Israel were in captivity in Babylon.
They were exiles in a foreign land.
They were strangers in a strange place.

They were not unlike their forebears who were held in bondage in Egypt
before Moses led them on an exodus to the promised land.

They were a long way from home … and they longed for home.
If they had been wearing ruby slippers like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz,
they would have clicked their heals together to be home.
But there were no ruby slippers in Babylon.

They were so troubled that one on them wrote in the psalms:
“By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion.
There on the poplars we hung our harps,
for there our captors asked us for songs,
our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”
How can we sing the songs of the Lord in a strange land?”
And just what was the Lord’s song?
        It was a song that proclaimed God’s steadfast love,
                for in their scriptures the psalmist had also written:
“Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
God’s love endures forever.
Give thanks to the God of gods.
God’s love endures forever.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords.
God’s love endures forever.”
But in the midst of this wanting to have a nice day somewhere else
and in the midst of not being able to sing the Lord’s song
a promise is found ~  one of the most glorious promises found in scripture.
They are powerful words.  The prophet Jeremiah wrote:
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord,
“plans to prosper you and not to harm you,
plans to give you hope and a future.”
Those words were written to these wanting-to-be-somewhere-else people.
But they weren’t somewhere else.  They were there.
And if nothing was going to change,
something within them had to change.
Somehow, someway, in the somewhere where they were,
they had to find the reason and the heart to sing the Lord’s song again.

Their world was upside down.
        Their present was troubling.
                Their future was bleak.
                        The times were confusing and insecure.
                                Doubt and fear were challenging their faith.
                                        It was to these people, in the midst of their troubles,
                                                that God’s promise was given.
It stands as radiantly in our day as it did in Jeremiah’s,
for the promises of God are from everlasting to everlasting.

A friend of mine served overseas during World War 2 as a chaplain
and those words found their way into his heart, and sustained him.

He was living in a world, along with many of you,
        where evil seemed more real than good …
                where the future, viewed through the eyes of the present,
                        did not hold much hope.

It was a time when war made enemies of friends …
        when death had reached its cold hand into millions of homes …
                when worry and fear were constant companions.

It was a time when the power of evil was so great that many wondered:
“Where is God in all of this?”

The promise found its way into my friend’s heart
and the God who had made the promise, sustained him.
And he believed …

God does have a plan and purpose for this world.
God has a plan and purpose for each of us.
Although much might attempt to derail it …
although much might attempt to defeat it …
God’s plan and purpose will unfold
and in the unfolding, will be fulfilled.

The day will come, in God’s great plan,
when the lion will lie down with the lamb;
and swords will be turned into ploughshares
and spears into pruning hooks;
the day will come when there will be no more war.

The day will come, in God’s great plan,
when God will wipe away every tear from our eyes,
and death will be no more;
neither shall there be mourning or crying or pain anymore,
for these things will have passed away.

That is God’s plan and purpose for the world.

Now let me talk about you and me and the times in which we live.

Although our times are different
        and although our circumstances are not the same,
                there are many who find themselves in a place
or in circumstances they don’t want to be.

Maybe it’s a troubled relationship…
maybe it’s tension in the workplace or at home …
maybe it’s too many bills and not enough paycheck …
maybe it’s living with unrealized or unrealizable dreams …
maybe it’s regret over yesterday that kills your spirit today …
maybe it’s fear of what tomorrow will bring.

Maybe it’s because life seems so unfair …
maybe it’s because there is so much bad happening in your life
and you have trouble finding the good.
And that nice day you’re looking for is somewhere else.

Whatever it is, it is life that hangs us up,
        and we feel like strangers, sometimes, in a strange land  ~
                at home, at work, or even in our solitude.
                        And we find it hard to sing the Lord’s song in this strange land.

I have always liked the story about the Roman Catholic priest
who was able to persuade a Jewish friend to convert to Catholicism.

After a time of instruction,
        when both felt he was ready,
                the Jewish friend asked the priest what he had to do formally
                        to become a Catholic.

And the priest said,
“Say three times: Once I was a Jew, now I am a Catholic.”
“That’s it?” the man asked.
“That’s all,” the priest said.
Well, he did it.
He said, “Once I was a Jew, now I am a Catholic” three times.
And it was so.

It was some weeks later that the priest dropped by
        to see how his convert was doing.
                It was Friday, and meatless Friday was still the rule.
        He rang the bell, walked in,
and to his surprise, he smelled chicken cooking.

He followed the smells to the kitchen
        and found the man labouring over the stove.
                When he chastised his newest convert
                        for eating chicken on meatless Friday,
                                the man replied:
                                        “Oh, Father, it really is okay.
                                                You see, I took the chicken like so,
                                                        dipped it in the batter three times,
                                                                and each time I did I said,
                                                                        ‘Once you were a chicken.  Now you are a fish.’”

It would be nice if things changed that easily.
It would be nice if by some magical incantation
our troubles or difficult circumstances
could disappear in a vapour.
It would be nice if we could click the heels of our ruby slippers together
and return to a place of safety.

But there is a truth about life:
        some things will not change without great effort …
                some things won’t change and will have to be lived through …
                        and the nice day we would like to have somewhere else
                                may not dawn for a long time, or dawn at all.
                                        These are the times in which we live
                                                and have to live through.

It is then that we need to claim the promise;
and with as much faith as we can muster, live by it …
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord,
“plans to prosper you and not to harm you,
plans to give you hope and a future.”

It is living by it in such a way
that no matter what we may have to live through
we can be enabled to do it with grace
because that promise is wrapped in the promise that
“God’s love endures forever.”

The Apostle Paul was able to live magnificently, despite his troubles,
because of the promises of God.
And because of it he would write:
“Never flag in zeal, be aglow with the Spirit, serve the Lord.
Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.”

Not long ago I was watching a documentary on Nelson Mandella,
the man who led South Africa from apartheid to full democracy.

When he was 44 years old he was imprisoned for 27 years  ~
        imprisoned because he wanted to tear down apartheid …
                imprisoned because he wanted to see his people free,
                        for they were exiles in their own land …
                                imprisoned because his dream was dangerous.

His release from prison, when he was 71 years old,
brought great rejoicing;
it also brought much anger and danger.
To many he was seen as a political saviour;
to others he was seen as a political threat.

When asked if he was bitter
towards those who had imprisoned him, he said no.
   He had learned, he said, that bitterness is a cancer
           that kills the spirit.

When asked what had sustained him all those years  ~
apart from the love and encouragement of his family and friends  ~
he said it was his dream:
his belief in the struggle …
his belief in the rightness of it …
his belief that he was on God’s side and that God was on his …
and his belief in the inevitability that it would succeed.

That dream, that noble purpose,
that confidence that God was with him in steadfast love
fed his spirit and made him even more determined.

Although he didn’t say it in so many words, his very being said it:
        that God had a plan and purpose for his life
                and for the lives of his people …
                        a plan to prosper them and not harm them …
                                to give them a hope and a future.

And it gave him courage to step into the day because he believed in tomorrow.

And we know what came to pass.
        Apartheid is no more.
                Free elections for blacks and whites were held 4 years after his release.
                        Oh, it is not yet a perfect place.
                                It is not yet a perfect time.
                                        But the better day, hoped and prayed for,
                                                is not somewhere else.
                                                        It is there.

There was a fellow who had forty five dollars
and he left town to make his fortune
after his girl pledged she would marry him
when he had accumulated $50,000.

When he returned seven years later,
        his girl raced into his arms and said,
                “How much money do you have now?”

“Fifty dollars,” he said.
“Fifty dollars?” she said.  “That’s close enough for me!” 

We don’t always live in a $50,000 world.
Sometimes it’s a fifty dollar world.
But as that young woman in love said,
“That’s close enough for me,”
and, seizing the moment,
embraced her man and rejoiced in his love,
maybe we should be saying:
“It’s not a perfect world.
But this is my world.
And this is my time.

It is finding the words and the voice to proclaim them
as we affirmed at the beginning of today’s service:

“In the highs and lows of life, in the joys and in the sorrows,
God is my help and my hope, my joy and my treasure.
I thank God for His unfailing love.”

It is finding the words and the voice to proclaim them
on those days when you really would like to have a nice day somewhere else:

“I stand in this holy moment to boldly say, ‘I believe.’”

It is finding the words and the voice to proclaim them:

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord,
“plans to prosper you and not to harm you,
plans to give you hope and a future.”
And claiming it.

 

SOLI  DEO  GLORIA 

 

 

SCRIPTURE
       
Jeremiah 29: 10-14                                                                        
This is what the LORD says: "When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place.  For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.  Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.   You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.
I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity.  I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile."
Romans 12: 11,12       
“Never flag in zeal, be aglow with the Spirit, serve the Lord.
Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.”