Preacher's Post

12?18: Surprising People

God is the God of surprises. But then, that shouldn’t surprise us.  God declared through Isaiah 55:8, "I don't think the way you think. The way you work isn't the way I work.”  Over and over again in the biblical narrative, God reaches out and uses the most unlikely people for His purposes.  They become part of the redemptive story by sheer grace.   There wasn’t anything that caused them to stand out in terms of skill or natural ability.  What is common to all is their availability and willingness to respond to the invitation to join in on what God is doing in that moment.

That’s why, of all the characters who become part of the Christmas story, the shepherds are my favorites.  By sheer grace they become the recipients of the greatest news imaginable.  Here’s how Luke tells the story to Theophilus, and through Theophilus, you and I.  Luke 2:8-20:

That night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep. Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord’s glory surrounded them. They were terrified, but the angel reassured them. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people. The Savior—yes, the Messiah, the Lord—has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David! And you will recognize him by this sign: You will find a baby wrapped snugly in strips of cloth, lying in a manger.” Suddenly, the angel was joined by a vast host of others—the armies of heaven—praising God and saying, “Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased.”

When the angels had returned to heaven, the shepherds said to each other, “Let’s go to Bethlehem! Let’s see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.” They hurried to the village and found Mary and Joseph. And there was the baby, lying in the manger. After seeing him, the shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child. All who heard the shepherds’ story were astonished, but Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them often. The shepherds went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. It was just as the angel had told them.

Mary responded to the angel’s astonishing announcement that she was to be the mother of the Christ child by asking that it be as the angel said it would be.  When the wise men saw the star in the East, they saddled up.  Joseph did exactly as the angel had instructed.  The Shepherds heard the angelic declaration that the child had been born that night in Bethlehem, so they hurried to the manger. 

To be part of God’s story has never required ability, but it has always demanded availability.  Our willingness to be responsive to the divine interruption, that signals God is up to something we don’t want to miss, has always and will always be the key for the life lived in alignment with God’s activity.  This is why “hurry” is so dangerous to our spiritual connection with God.  Hurried people aren’t sensitive to the signs that God is “in the room.”   When we’re too busy with our plans which lead to our “to do” lists, we neglect to pay attention to God’s plan for us.  While doing good, we miss the best.

I want to point our attention to not only the shepherds as unlikely stars in God’s story, but others more recently who paid attention and when God showed up, they were available.  I’ve had a wonderful time reading about three ordinary women who lived and played extraordinary parts in God’s on-going story.  I’m encouraged by their example that God using ordinary people to do extraordinary things isn’t an abstract concept, it’s the way things are in God’s kingdom.  My personal little Hall of Fame include Mary Slessor, Elizabeth Fry, and Corrie ten Boom.  What sets these women apart is their willingness to entertain God’s interruptions and God’s opportunities to participate in the story that ultimately counts.

Now for what’s on my desk…

Below is our schedule for the month of December.  Remember to invite your friends and neighbors to join us - 

Sunday, December 18: 

    9:00 AM / 10:45 AM—Annual Children’s Christmas Pageant

    2:00 PM / 7:00 PM—18th Annual Christmas Concert for La Luz – "News of Great Joy”

Friday, December 23

    7:00 PM—Blue Christmas Service:  Feeling down and blue and not in the Christmas spirit?  This is a service that celebrates the hope, but recognizes the struggle.  It is a candlelight service with communion.

 

Saturday, December 24 - Christmas Eve

All of our Christmas Eve Services are preceded by a very special “living nativity” complete with animals!

 4:00 PM / 5:30 PM—Family Christmas Eve Service with Live Nativity

 7:00 PM—Christmas Eve Candlelight Communion Service

Sunday, December 25 - Christmas Day

10:00 AM - One service only:  There will be no childcare or Sunday School this morning

 

Now you know what I know.

12/11: Surprising Circumstances

Following God’s way is easy, without pain and suffering.  Right?  Wrong!  There was a reason Moses argued with God and begged him to find someone else for the job of leading the people.  Jeremiah?  He claimed to be too young for such a hard job.  Joseph joined so many before and after him in following the road less traveled—the road that seeks God’s will and not our own. 

But somewhere along the way, there has grown up in the American church a theology that promises a softer easier life for those who seek God's way.  Everything just goes better with Jesus.  We get happier families, better jobs, nicer houses, healing when we’re sick, and then we die an easy death and we show up at the pearly gates ready for the live to come.  That’s not what Jesus promised, nor is it what God’s people have experienced down through the centuries.  Quite the contrary.  Struggle and suffering have been the norm for those living God’s way.   When Jesus had concluded his remarks in the upper room the night he was betrayed, he made a promise:  “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)  That for me says it all.  There is a very deep sense of peace when we’re in synch with God’s will and ways, and it’s that peace that sustains us through the trials and tribulations.  For as Scott Peck said so well in the opening line of The Road Less Traveled, “Life is difficult.”  And so it is.

12/4: Zechariah: God's Surprising Plan

I make plans.  I’ve always made plans.  If I’m asked to do something or I’m going somewhere, then I’ve got a plan.  If I’m going to be responsible for anything, I’ll make a plan.  As I’ve grown older and hopefully a bit wiser (hopefully), I still make plans, but I know now that plans are what I do until the real action starts, and from that moment on, plans are always changing and what I end up with is rarely anything like what I thought it would be when I made my initial plan.  What I’ve had to learn, often the hard way, is the old joke is true:  “If you want to make God laugh—tell Him your plans.”  But then that shouldn’t surprise me for way back in Isaiah’s time, God declared:

“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the LORD. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.  (Isaiah 55:8-9)

Eugene Peterson translates God’s message this way:  "I don't think the way you think. The way you work isn't the way I work." (Isaiah 55:8)