Sunday, April 29, 2007
1st Peter 1:17-23
Rise and
Shine Campaign Consultant
I
can’t begin to tell you how wonderful it is to be back with you today. I love First Church and my memories of our Rise
and Shine campaign are some of my sweetest memories.
I’ll never forget when Bill Shewey greeted me
for one of my earlier follow-up visits with the words “welcome home, kid.” I always feel like I’m home when I’m here,
and I thank you for your spirit of hospitality and love. And love is our topic
today because our scripture calls us all to be, “Deeply Loving.”
Our example for “Deeply Loving” is of course
Jesus Christ as we seek to join in the resurrection conspiracy by remembering
during this Easter season the generosity and sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
Our scripture today includes both the
reminder of God's gracious relationship with us, and the call to responsible
living in the light of that relationship.
With the suffering, crucified Jesus as our
example, we are called to turn from our old ways, and to live lives of service,
loving God and one another “deeply, from the heart.”
The call of Christ is clear: The greatest commandment is to love God with
all our heart, soul, mind and strength, and then to love our neighbor as
ourselves. There is nothing more
important in life of a Christian than learning to love with all our heart,
soul, mind and strength – in other words, loving God and others deeply, from
the heart.
But where do we start? How do we make loving deeply a priority in
our lives?
I read several years ago in the book Who
Switched the Price Tags, by Tony Campolo, about a sociological study that
really helped me clarify my priorities and understand God’s call.
In this sociological study, 50 people over the age of 95 were asked one question: If you had it to do over again what would you do differently? There were a multiplicity of answers, but three, core answers emerged:
1. They'd reflect more.
2. They'd risk more.
3. They'd do more that would live on after they were dead.
1st - They'd reflect more. If we had it to do over again, these 50 people over the age of 95 said, we would stop and we would listen and we would think and we would consider with intensity the things we took for granted.
Sometimes we fail to reflect, we fail to focus on what is really important in and about life.
We fail to zero-in on and passionately experience the activities and moments that make up our lives. Most of our lives are spent in the meaningless passage of time.
All too few moments are truly lived.
Life slips by and we don't even realize it’s gone because we don't enter into it with the passion it deserves.
Let me ask you this: What difference has Jesus Christ made in your life?
Not just the life to come, but also the life you are living right now? What difference has Jesus made in your life? If that’s not worth reflecting on, I don’t know what is!
If Jesus can do anything for us, he can do this: He can create in us an awakened spirit and an appreciation of life that we have never had before. He can open our lives to the mercies and grace of God. Christ's presence equips us to enter life with passion.
Jesus came that we might have life and have it more abundantly.
Or as our scripture says today in verse 23, “You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God.”
2nd – They said they’d risk
more. If we had it to do over again,
these 50 people over the age of 95 said, we would take those risks that we
thought about, but didn’t take.
When I was at Auburn University, some friends and I talked about how much fun it would be to skydive one day. We did a lot of talking about it, but it seemed no one was going to actually do it. So, I signed up for the course.
I will never forget the feeling I had as that plane took off for my dive, or the feeling as I stepped out on the strut of that airplane with the equivalent of 80+ mph winds hitting my face or what a disaster I was at skydiving.
Now where I learned to skydive, what you were asked to do was to go up in this little itty-bitty plane, then they asked you to step out of the plane and hold onto its strut and put your feet on the wheel. Then, when they told you to let go, you were supposed to jump off of the wheel, and hit that parachute stance that you see on television. For some reason, my adrenaline was pumping quite a bit, and so when I jumped off that wheel, I hit…the side of the airplane…and it hurt like crazy!
And being a person who likes to exaggerate things a bit, I thought “Oh my goodness, I have left my hand in the plane.” So, I looked down at my hand, which was still there. But when you are skydiving, pulling your hand down is all it takes to make yourself unstable. So the next thing I knew, I was going head over heels in the air.
Since I haven’t been the only person who has been a disaster at skydiving, what they do is make every person, for their first several jumps, jump with a static line. That means the static line will pull your chute open if you don’t. Finally, the static line pulled open my parachute.
Needless to see, I was an absolute failure at skydiving.
But when that chute opened, and I looked down realizing I was floating in air, it was all worth it. Now I didn't keep skydiving, I didn't want to kill myself or anything, but I wouldn't give anything for that moment in time when I did something I always wanted to do, and others only talk about.
Isn't risk-taking one of the most exciting
things about life?
The people in the survey didn't talk about success or failure. Instead, they were more concerned with the times they were afraid to try.
I guess when you’re 95 years old, you realize that all those great successes, weren't such a big deal after all, and those failures, well, they weren't so bad. As they looked at their lives, the thing they would do differently was to risk more.
How many of us are going to live out our lives in quiet desperation because we are afraid to take risks?
How many of us have been tempted by God, in the best sense? Tempted to leave security. Tempted to follow the call of God on our lives? If being a Christian is anything, it is a call not to play it safe.
Being a Christian is living out the dreams and the visions God gives us, trusting God for the results.
Being a Christian is “to boldly go where no one has gone before.”
Because as our scripture says when it's all
over, we are not going to measure our lives by whether we succeeded or failed,
or by the silver and gold, possessions or money, or other perishables we
acquired, or by the "perfect" life we led, but by the risks we took
to live out God’s imperishable call on our lives, to love God and others with
reckless abandon, to love with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength, to
love deeply.
Nothing is sadder in life than the simple words, "what might have been." The spirit of God is within us, and he is challenging us to do exciting things with our lives, to do what no one’s ever done, to go where no one's ever gone, to be indispensable to the kingdom of God.
What’s the biggest step in faith you have ever made for God?
What’s the biggest risk you have ever taken for God? What’s the biggest sacrifice you have made for God?
Do, as these people over the
age of 95 would tell us to do - risk.
If the kingdom of God isn't worth risking for, then nothing is.
3rd – If we had it to do over again, these 50 people over the age of 95 said, we would do more that would live on after we were dead.
What do you want people to say when you're gone?
Do you want them to stand around and read your titles or share the difference you made in their lives? Have you ever done something that will live on after you? (repeat)
I heard the most inspirational testimony a few years ago. A man about 40-years old shared about how lost he had been most of his life but every day he would drive by Millbrook UMC in Raleigh NC, and look, and wonder if that church could make a difference in his life.
Finally, one day, he walked into the church and he said his life has never been the same.
He asked this question, “I wonder if the people who founded this church, knew that a hundred years later, someone like me would find the Lord because of their faithfulness and sacrifice?”
You may never know the difference your faithfulness and sacrifice will make for the kingdom of God but, if you follow God’s call on your life either today or generations later, someone will thank God for you and the difference you have made in their life.
Rise and Shine was and is that kind of sacrifice. I am so thankful for the opportunity I had to give to the campaign. I may never know the difference the gift I made to the campaign will make, I may never know the impact it made on someone’s life, I may never fully understand the imperishable blessing for the kingdom of God, but I know that my gift was born of my love for God and your special community of faith and there can be no greater gift than the opportunity to be “deeply loving”.
And throughout 1st Peter we find
this contrast between two ways of living. The self can be directed toward
perishable things—like silver and gold—or toward the imperishable
realities—Christ's redeeming act on the cross and the Word that proclaims that
act. Those who set their hearts on the perishable will perish; those who set
their hearts on what endures will endure.
I'd like to close today by reading a story that
illustrates the difference each one of us can make for our Lord if we only make
ourselves available to God. It's called
the Story of Teddy Stollard.
I know
about a teacher named Mrs. Thompson.
The first day of class, they were all there.
Mrs.
Thompson gave the speech that teachers always give, "I love you all the
same; you are all very special to me; I have no favorites." Teachers lie! Not only do they have favorites, but there are some kids they
can't stand, right?
Teddy Stollard was a boy she couldn't stand. He had a musty smell about him. His hair was always disheveled. His clothes were unkempt.
He always seemed to stare into nothingness. There was a blank expression on his
face. When she marked his paper, she
got a perverse delight putting X's next to the wrong answers. She put the F at the top of the paper with a
flair!
She should have known
better... She had his records. First grade: "Teddy is a good boy.
Shows promise in work and attitude but poor home situation." Second grade: "Works hard but is deeply troubled. Mother is terminally ill." Third grade: "Teddy is too serious, too morose, deeply troubled, falling
behind. His mother died this year. His father shows no interest." Fourth grade: "Teddy is a deeply troubled boy and may flunk unless
something happens."
Christmas came and all the children brought their
presents and piled them on the desk.
Teddy brought a present, and she was surprised that Teddy would even
bring a present.
It was wrapped in brown paper and held together
with scotch tape, and when she tore open the paper out fell a rhinestone
bracelet with half the stones missing and a bottle of cheap perfume that was
half used up.
The children began to giggle, but Mrs. Thompson
had enough sense to snap on the bracelet and put on some perfume on the other
wrist and hold it up for the children to smell. Taking a cue from the teacher, they all agreed it was lovely.
At the end of the day,
when all the other children had left, Teddy remained behind. He came over to the desk and said,
"Mrs. Thompson, Mrs. Thompson, you smell just like my mother, and her
bracelet looks real nice on you too.
I'm glad you liked my presents."
Then he left; Mrs. Thompson got down on her knees and prayed for God's
forgiveness...
The next day when the children came into that
class, she wasn't just a teacher who was going to impart information--she was
someone who was going to make a difference in the lives of children, a
difference that would live on after she was dead. She gave special attention to the children who were slow,
particularly Teddy, and she tutored him extra.
By the end of the year he had caught up with most
of them and was ahead of some.
Several years later,
she got this note:
"Dear Mrs. Thompson, I am graduating second
in my class, and I wanted you to be the first to know. Love, Teddy Stollard."
Four years later:
"Dear Mrs. Thompson, They just told me I will be graduating first in my
class. I wanted you to be the first to
know. The university has not been easy,
but I liked it. Love, Teddy
Stollard."
Four
years later: "Dear Mrs. Thompson, As
of today, I am Theodore J. Stollard, M.D.
How about that? I'm going to be
married in July, the seventh to be exact.
I want you to come, and I want you to sit where my mother would have
sat. You are the only family I have
now. Daddy died last year..."
Mrs. Thompson went to
the wedding, and she sat in the place where Mrs. Stollard would have sat. She deserved it, because she had done
something with her life that would live on after she was dead.
The
African missionary, C. T. Studd, summed
up a life of lasting meaning, purpose and joy this way:
"Only one life twill soon be past; only what's done for Jesus will last." (Repeat)
Let us pray.
Dear Lord:
Our brief lives will soon be over, but whatever we do for you has roots
firmly planted in eternity. Help us to
live lives that are worthy of your calling.
Help us to be “Deeply Loving,” so that you may be glorified in our
hearts and through our lives. In the name of our precious Savior, Jesus
Christ, we pray.