Is there anyone here who watches American Idol? Good for you!!
A few weeks ago, the idol contestants performed the music of Michael Jackson,
and one of the songs that was performed that night, “The Man In The Mirror.”
was a hit for Michael Jackson when it was released in 1988.
This is a part of what he sings …
and, no, I will not be singing.
“Gotta make a change
For once in my life
It's gonna feel real good
Gonna make a difference
Gonna make it right”
And in his “gotta make a change” frame of mind, he sees a world
of misery
and sorrow
and hurt
and struggle …
a world with hunger
and poverty
and prejudice.
He sees a wounded world.
And in his “gotta make a change” frame of mind,
knowing that he’s gotta start with someone, somewhere,
this is what he says …
”I'm starting with the man in the mirror
I'm asking him to change his ways
And no message could have been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make a change …”
#1146 + We Must Be The Change We Wish To See In The World” + 2
Lenten Noonday Service + The Rev. Dennis Posno
|
Someone wrote:
“We cannot change what we will not confront.”
Think of that.
“We cannot change what we will not confront.”
As the song says,
“If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make a change …”
It seems to me that the Gospel call is a call to follow …
and in the following to take a look at ourselves
and allow the spirit of the changeless Christ
to empower us to change that which must be changed within us;
so that we can become, as Paul writes,
that new person in Christ.
And God knows, as we do, if we’re honest enough,
there’s lots of room for change within each one of us.
“If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make a change …”
To be the change in the world we want to see
something profoundly and deeply needs to change within us.
Let me tell you about one man who looked in the mirror and saw a man he didn’t like …
and went about doing something about it … and became a man ~ changed.
And because of the changed man he became
he worked tirelessly to bring change to his hurting world.
Thirteen days before his seventh birthday, in 1732, his mother died.
She had been his teacher … care giver … and friend.
After her death, with little formal schooling,
the young man went to sea with his father,
the captain of a merchant ship.
And from that day he began a decline into rebellion and degradation
that lasted until his mid-twenties.
#1146 + We Must Be The Change We Wish To See In The World” + 3
Lenten Noonday Service + The Rev. Dennis Posno
|
His wilful and wanton disregard for all that was right and good
led him into a life plagued with despair,
dangers at sea,
abuse,
public floggings,
destitution,
depression
near drownings
and miraculous escapes.
His misfortunes were largely the result of his own choosing.
On one occasion he became employed on a slave trader in North Africa.
He soon fell sick, was unable to care for himself, and nearly starved to death.
He was so ill that the slaves in chains pitied him,
sharing their meagre portions with him.
Yet, he still remained stubbornly wicked,
and in his degeneracy tried to influence others to live as he did.
While still a youth he became, almost inexplicably, the captain of a slave ship,
landing at least one load of human cargo in Charleston, South Carolina,
It is reported that at times he was so wretched
that even his crew regarded him as little more than an animal.
He seemed oblivious to the plight of the black slaves
chained in the hold of his ship.
That’s the kind of life this young man named John Newton lived.
As we reflect on that life, think of this:
if ever there was a wretch, he was …
if ever there was a lost soul, his was …
if ever there was blindness to the world around him, he had it …
if ever there was a man whose heart was hardened, his was …
if ever there was a man undeserving of anyone’s love,
never mind God’s, he was.
What he needed was grace that would bring him home to the heart to God.
#1146 + We Must Be The Change We Wish To See In The World” + 4
Lenten Noonday Service + The Rev. Dennis Posno
|
When he was twenty-three,
he found himself on a small island
off the coast of North Africa.
He had contracted an illness
that left him burning with fever, miserable, listless.
It was there that he looked hard at the man in the mirror.
It was there that he came face to face with God, and God’s grace.
It was there that he began to improve, both physically and spiritually.
It was there that his blind eyes were opened and his hardened heart was softened.
Two years later, he married.
During the next fourteen years, he studied for the ministry,
and in 1764, at the age of thirty-nine, became a minister in Olney, England.
When he was fifty-four, he published a hymnal “The Olney Hymns”
in which he included 281 of his own works, including “Amazing Grace.”
“Amazing grace,” he wrote, “how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found; was blind but now I see.”
This is why grace is so amazing:
it could embrace a man like John Newton ~
and became the way for God’s world to do something to his world.
As John Newton acknowledged before God his own miserable condition,
as he accepted God’s grace into his heart,
as he allowed that grace to work its way into every area of his life,
he became a man transformed by it:
he let God’s world to do something to his world.
But it is important to understand his transformation.
This man who once was blind could now see.
The slaves he had carried in the hold of his ship over those years …
those whom he treated as less than human …
they, too, were God’s children.
And so with William Wilberforce he worked tirelessly
to bring an end to slave trading and slavery.
#1146 + We Must Be The Change We Wish To See In The World” + 5
Lenten Noonday Service + The Rev. Dennis Posno
|
The redeemed man didn’t take this amazing grace for granted;
he used it for the redemption of others.
The man saved by grace through faith discovered that faith, without works, is dead.
The grace of God, which redeemed him, called him to bring that redemption
to the places where he lived and moved and had his being.
Our personal salvation may do wonders for us.
But to keep it personal is to miss the greater wonder, and the greater call.
For if, by grace, we’re found … and if by grace, we see … mark this:
as grace becomes the way for God to do something to our world
then that same grace must become the way for us
to do something to and for and with our world.
“If you wanna make the world a better place
Take a look at yourself and then make a change …”
And then, by the grace of God, “… be the change you wish to see in the world.”
SOLI DEO GLORIA
SCRIPTURE
2 Corinthians 5:16-20 (Today's New International Version)
16 So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! 18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: 19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God.
