THE GOOD ROAD: OUR PARTNERSHIP WITH FIRST NATIONS

“The Good Road: Being Part of the Solution”

• 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 - read this text online here »

“You are either part of the solution or you are part of the problem.” Many will recognize this well-known statement. It originated in the tumultuous 1960s and is generally accredited to the late political activist and militant Black Panther member Eldridge Cleaver. Cleaver had a dramatic change later in his life when he became a believer and follower of Jesus.

There are two parts to the statement: one is positive and the other is negative. We can be associated with the problem – the negative side of any issue. For instance, many a company or organization or institution has found itself in difficulty for all kinds of reasons – some of its own making and some not. But the question is: how does it solve the problem? Will a new CEO or manager or employee be part of the solution or become another part of a growing problem?

Toronto is in the midst of an election process for mayor and new city councillors. Every candidate for mayor and city council has his or her particular slant on the problems related to Toronto and the larger area around the city – whether the issues are transportation and roads, the environment and the greening of the city, taxation, overpopulation, immigration, financial mismanagement, too many councillors, etc. etc. And they want citizens to know how they will contribute to the solution rather than remain part of the problem.

It is similar in the Church. We know now that the Church, unfortunately, has been part of a problem in the past we wish we had not shared in. We wish we were not part of a history of hurtful and even abusive relationships with other human beings – in this case, our Aboriginal neighbours – that continue to affect the lives of many people today. That’s why today’s message is titled “The Good Road: Being Part of the Solution.” I believe that going forward in our relationships with First Nations people today and in the future involves everyone -- certainly all of us who follow Jesus and, particularly, those of us who are part of The United Church of Canada. We all need to contribute in some way to a journey on the good road – a good road that moves toward a solution of hope, healing and reconciliation.

Rev. Tom Little wrote a brief letter that the United Church has included on its website as a resource for congregations to consider on this good road of healing [www.united-church.ca/aboriginal/schools/resources/trservice]. He outlined seven teachings given by the Creator. They are Wisdom, Respect, Love, Humility, Honesty, Courage, and Truth. Certainly these are values that Christians understand are at the centre of our daily living as followers of Jesus Christ. To follow the good road means we take seriously these values both as individuals and as a church community. Being part of the solution of hope, healing and reconciliation in our relationships with our Aboriginal neighbours means we ponder how we as Christians put these teachings into practice with one another.

Tom Little says the integration of these teachings with each other is significant. This integration connects to a wholeness that reminded him of the Scripture this morning – 1 Corinthians 12:12-27.

Being part of the solution to the effects of the mistreatment of children in residential schools run by some churches including the United Church no doubt has many possibilities. I will outline two ways to think about this.

First: “If one part [of the body] hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing.” That’s how The Message Bible puts the first part of verse 26 in 1 Corinthians 12. We now know the hurt our Aboriginal neighbours have experienced. While the church did not recognize this for years and most did not concern themselves with the terrible hurt at the time it was occurring, we have read enough and heard enough and seen enough now to understand and, perhaps, even feel within ourselves a little of that kind of pain.

Part of the process of our acknowledging the hurt and the pain our First Nations neighbours experienced and still feel … part of the process of acknowledging that we as a church community are intimately connected with our Aboriginal neighbours because of the troubled and difficult past we shared (albeit from very different positions) ... part of the process of our contributing to a solution of healing and hope and reconciliation ... is our participation in “The Apology to Former Students of United Church Indian Residential Schools, Their Families and Communities” as spoken by the Moderator of the United Church in October 1998. That apology is part of our denomination’s commitment to repentance and healing. It is one step along “The Good Road.”

Intentionally connecting ourselves as individuals and as the church community of Oriole York Mills with this apology and with the ongoing process of being part of the solution in various ways rather than being part of the problem -- or ignoring the problem -- honours and takes seriously God’s word in Scripture and the life and teachings of Jesus who is connected so intimately with the Creator. By taking these actions, we are on the good road of wisdom, respect, love, humility, honesty, courage, and truth. We are also saying we are willing to join our First Nations neighbours on a mutual and difficult yet life-affirming journey as we are able.

So “If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing.” Also, “If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.” That’s how The Message Bible puts the second part of verse 26 in 1 Corinthians 12. Surely we want to see our Aboriginal neighbours experience hope and healing and flourish in their lives! Surely we also want to share that experience with them in some way! So there are some steps we, as individuals and as a congregation, can take along this good road to help us be part of the solution of hope and healing in our relationships together.

1.  We can examine our own hearts for attitudes or actions that indicate prejudice. That takes humility, honesty and courage.
2. We can try to get to know our Aboriginal neighbours. Lynn Watt is championing this for us by attending and reporting on the “Reawakening the Spirit Workshops.” There are two other opportunities for this mutual communication in October and November that you might consider as a step for yourself. That takes respect, courage and a sincere seeking after truth.
3. We can learn more about the cultures of Native Peoples through reading and appreciating Native artists, painters and sculptors. Many of you may be familiar with the late Benjamin Chee Chee’s expressive paintings. I have brought two examples that have graced the walls in my living room for many years. This learning takes respect, genuine interest for others and a seeking after truth.
4. We can support the work of Native Peoples organizations in Toronto as well as other areas of Canada. For instance, Lynn Watt and Gail Cooper encouraged our congregation a year or so ago to support financially the refurnishing of an Ojibway school in the Pikangikum First Nation in Northwestern Ontario. That takes respect and loving concern for our neighbour.
5. And we can certainly pray for the healing and renewed strength and well-being of our Aboriginal brothers and sisters who have been so badly hurt in the past that their lives and the lives of their children and their communities are still affected today. We can pray for our own healing -- that our eyes be opened to the pain and suffering of the past and our hearts be filled with genuine concern and care for the future of all peoples, especially our Aboriginal neighbours. We can pray for the healing of our United Church. We can also pray for God’s guidance as we journey on the good road together – all of us desiring to be part of the solution of hope, healing and reconciliation. This will take wisdom, honesty, courage and seeking after truth – to understand it, to speak it and to live it!

So this morning in our desire to contribute to the good road solution of mutual hope, healing and reconciliation with our Aboriginal neighbours, we respond to God’s word on our hearts and spirits by participating in The Apology. You may listen or follow along in the bulletin as well if you wish:

The Apology to Former Students of United Church Indian Residential Schools, Their Families and Communities by The United Church of Canada:

From the deepest reaches of your memories, you have shared with us your stories of suffering from our church's involvement in the operation of Indian Residential Schools. You have shared the personal and historic pain that you still bear, and you have been vulnerable yet again. You have also shared with us your strength and wisdom born of the life-giving dignity of your communities and traditions and your stories of survival.

In response to our church's commitment to repentance, [the Moderator of The United Church of Canada] spoke these words of apology on behalf of the General Council Executive on Tuesday, October 27, 1998:

“As Moderator of The United Church of Canada, I wish to speak the words that many people have wanted to hear for a very long time. On behalf of The United Church of Canada, I apologize for the pain and suffering that our church's involvement in the Indian Residential School system has caused. We are aware of some of the damage that this cruel and ill-conceived system of assimilation has perpetrated on Canada's First Nations peoples. For this we are truly and most humbly sorry.

“To those individuals who were physically, sexually, and mentally abused as students of the Indian Residential Schools in which The United Church of Canada was involved, I offer you our most sincere apology. You did nothing wrong. You were and are the victims of evil acts that cannot under any circumstances be justified or excused.

“We know that many within our church will still not understand why each of us must bear the scar, the blame for this horrendous period in Canadian history. But the truth is, we are the bearers of many blessings from our ancestors and, therefore, we must also bear their burdens.

“Our burdens include dishonouring the depths of the struggles of First Nations peoples and the richness of your gifts. We seek God's forgiveness and healing grace as we take steps toward building respectful, compassionate and loving relationships with First Nations peoples.

“We are in the midst of a long and painful journey as we reflect on the cries that we did not or would not hear, and how we have behaved as a church. As we travel this difficult road of repentance, reconciliation, and healing, we commit ourselves to work toward ensuring that we will never again use our power as a church to hurt others with attitudes of racial and spiritual superiority.

“We pray that you will hear the sincerity of our words today and that you will witness the living out of our apology in our actions in the future.”

May this living out of our actions on “The Good Road” be so – and continue -- for you and for me.

Rev. Chris Miller
September 26, 2010

oympastor@rogers.com

OYM Oriole-York Mills United Church, Toronto

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Why Church? Reason: Real People

• Luke 16:1-9 (10-13) - read this passage online here »
• 1 Timothy 2:1-7 - read this passage online here » (The Message Bible)

Jesus has just finished telling one of his most endearing stories to some dutiful and moral religious leaders – Pharisees and other teachers who knew the laws and rules of their religion – and to his close followers as well. You know the story: we call it the Parable of the Prodigal Son or the Lost Son in the previous chapter, Luke 15:11-32. It is the kind of story that captures our hearts and imaginations because of the mercy, compassion and grace shown by the father to both of his sons – the younger one who callously betrayed the father’s trust and the elder one who exhibited cold and rigid self-righteousness. We love this story because the father receives them both with a moving, compassionate, all-embracing and reconciling welcome. And the Father Jesus was describing to everyone was God the Father who offers mercy, compassion, love and amazing grace to all.

Immediately after the prodigal story, Jesus told his close followers and the same dutiful and moral religious leaders another story. On the surface, this story about a crooked business manager doesn’t possess the same poignancy or heart-wrenching expressions of suffering and hope as the prodigal. When we hear these stories, our feelings are affected in different ways.

But when we probe the two stories further, we perceive some striking similarities:

• In Luke 15, the son threw himself on the mercy of his father.
• In Luke 16, the manager threw himself on the mercy of his master.
• Both son and manager had nothing to show for their lives, except misuse and desperation.
• Both son and manager betrayed a trust.
• Neither prodigal nor rascal (as Eugene Peterson calls him -- another word for someone who is dishonest or unethical) offered an excuse, or rationalization or extenuating circumstance for his behaviour.
• Neither prodigal nor rascal encourages us with their high morals.
• Neither story provokes us to good works.

And, yet, in both stories, we also see images of grace:

• The son is not banished from the family. That’s grace.
• The manager is not jailed. That’s grace.
• The father throws an extravagant party for the son. That’s grace.
• The employer surprisingly praises the manager. That’s grace.
• Both prodigal and rascal do not get what they deserve. That’s grace.
• Both prodigal and rascal do not reap what they sowed. That is also grace.

In both stories, there is another captivating similarity: at the end of each story we are left hanging. We wait to hear the ending and it never seems to come. We don’t know what the elder brother did. Did he join the party for his younger brother or not? We don’t know what happened to the crooked manager. Did he eventually go too far and get punished with jail time or not? I like Eugene Peterson’s insight at this point:

“The missing ending clamours for ... a resolution. We, the readers, the listeners, are pulled into participation in a world of grace.”

We want a good ending to a bad situation. We get an ending but it’s not necessarily what we expect. We expect righteous judgment and punishment for wrongdoing. I mean, surely the wronged father could have at least exercised tough love and had the son do some free labour or free community service – or something -- because he had wasted his life and his inheritance. But the father didn’t make him do anything. Surely the wronged boss was at least justified in trying to get his money back from the dishonest manager. But he didn’t make him do anything either. Peterson says:

“The stories leave us not with an agenda to do something to make up for whatever we have done wrong, but with an invitation to receive everything from the One [God] who wills our wholeness, our well-being.” [Eugene Peterson, Tell It Slant, Eerdmans, 2008, p. 101]

We are in the midst of a three week mini-series on the theme of “Why Church?” Last week, we talked about our being in church because our being in community matters to God, let alone to us. I’ll summarize this week’s theme this way: Why church? Because God understands humanity and has compassion for real people – very proper people and rascals, dishonest and honest people alike, streetwise and law-abiding people alike. And God gets involved in their lives if they will let him. Why church? Because Jesus wants us to hear his invitation of love and embrace God’s grace and salvation wholeheartedly. So he tells his followers and all who are listening some stories about real families in turmoil and about businesses with real crooks in them – stories about real people in a real world. And yet stories that invite the people he has always loved into a different kind of world than they have known – “a world of love and grace.”

The heart of the story of the rascal, the dishonest manager, is in these verses from The Message Bible:

“Now here’s a surprise [said Jesus]: The master praised the crooked manager! And why? Because he knew how to look after himself. Streetwise people are smarter in this regard than law-abiding citizens. They are on constant alert, looking for angles, surviving by their wits. I want you to be smart in the same way -- but for what is right -- using every adversity to stimulate you to creative survival, to concentrate your attention on the bare essentials, so you’ll live, really live, and not complacently just get by on good behavior.”

Let me put the story in context. If we see the story this way, I hope we will also sense God’s grace not only in the story but also for our lives too.

The manager manages real estate for his rich employer. Those who are in debt are farmers who rent land from the owner and pay their rent in kind (oil and wheat are mentioned). The master accuses the manager of financial waste and mismanagement and informs him he will be let go from his job. Note that the manager does not protest his innocence or make any excuses. His silence is an admission of guilt. He does not even try to get his employer to change his mind. Instead he tries to figure out what to do about his future.

As he deliberates about his next steps, the manager realizes something significant about his boss’s actions so far. In fact, these are key to understanding the story. While the manager is fired, he is not charged and put in jail. And, strangely, his boss doesn’t even require him to pay back the money he has taken. Dr. Kenneth Bailey, a former professor at the Near Eastern School of Theology in Beirut and an expert in the customs and culture of the ordinary people in Jesus’ day, comments:

“This servant has experienced two aspects of his master’s nature. [One] he is a master who expects obedience and acts in judgment on the disobedient servant. [Two] he is also a master who shows unusual mercy and generosity even to a dishonest steward. The thoughtful listener/reader of the parable would not miss either of these facts.” [Tell It Slant, p. 104]

So what will the sacked manager do? He quickly rejects both construction work and begging on the streets. Instead he devises a plan that looks as dishonest as his original embezzlement of the owner’s funds. But Kenneth Bailey offers another insight regarding the culture of the day:

[The manager’s plan] “is to risk everything on the quality of the mercy he has already experienced from his master. If he fails, he will certainly go to jail. If he succeeds, he will be a hero in the community.”

What is happening to the manager? He has entered the improbable world of grace. And here he even takes another chance by using his street-smarts to cut some deals for his own advantage in the way he has always operated. (He has not yet turned over a new leaf.) All of his life, up to this point, it appears he has lived quite successfully by his own wits and cunning. But then he got caught and suddenly that world has been shattered. Yet he encounters a new world of grace. And he takes advantage of grace. He takes advantage of his master’s mercy and compassion.

So far no one knows the manager has been fired. So, it wouldn’t be strange for the real estate manager to speak to the farmers about their debts. They would be people of good reputation in the community who had probably been associated with the owner of the land for a long time. They would assume the manager is acting on the owner’s behalf and the manager wasn’t going to tell them otherwise. The manager does his work quickly. He has to -- before the owner finds out what he is up to. He also has to be careful the farmers do not become aware of any deception because they would not likely go along with the manager’s scheme. They would not want the owner of the land to refuse to rent the land to them another year. Perhaps the farmers assume this new financial arrangement is a generous bonus for their good work.

The master is a very generous man. He didn’t punish the manager with jail or demand justice. He didn’t even ask for his embezzled funds to be returned or that the manager reverse the last-minute deals he made. He was generous in his mercy to the manager again – undeserving though he was. The master, Peterson says, “chose to pay full price for his manager’s salvation” [Tell It Slant, p. 105].

Does this sound like something you have heard before? Jesus’ story of the dishonest manager is really a metaphor for the amazing surprise of God’s generous grace to people – to us – who do not deserve God’s grace. Who would have expected the father in the story of the prodigal to be so gracious to his scoundrel of a son? Who would have expected God to accept such scoundrels into his loving presence? The religious leaders certainly did not. But Jesus is saying that God, in his love and compassion, gives us chance after chance to accept his mercy and forgiveness rather than ignoring him or taking advantage of his grace. Are we aware of this in our own lives?

I suspect some may have a tough time accepting this. And also, why ever does Jesus seemingly commend a crook for being so clever? Jesus was pointing out that some of the streetwise people – or “people of the world” who care little for God – use their wits to get by or to get rich no matter what it takes. But “people of the light” – of God’s light – should be smart too but in very different ways – in honest ways, in trustworthy ways, in ways that are right as verses 10 – 13 emphasize. This reminds me of what Jesus told his disciples on another occasion: “Be as wise as serpents and as innocent as doves” [Matthew 10:16, NRSV].

In the verses following the crooked manager’s story, Jesus comments on this story. Hear what he says from The Message Bible:

“If you’re honest in small things, you’ll be honest in big things;
If you’re a crook in small things, you’ll be a crook in big things.
If you’re not honest in small jobs, who will put you in charge of the store?
No worker can serve two bosses:
He’ll either hate the first and love the second
Or adore the first and despise the second.
You can’t serve both God and the Bank.”

And I might add: we can’t live both God’s way and the world’s way. We must choose. Our future depends on it!

Jesus was not praising the dishonest manager for his dishonest practices. In fact, Jesus speaks several times here about being honest or trustworthy. But as with the story of the dishonest manager, God in his grace also gives each of us opportunities to repent of our sin – more chances than we realize, more than we deserve. Do we ignore these opportunities to accept God’s forgiveness or do we recognize God’s gracious invitation on these occasions of our lives to respond to God’s love? The key in the invitation to receiving God’s grace is trust -- trusting in the generosity and mercy of God and not anything else.

I’ll finish with the following story. Financial expert Suze Orman, in her book 9 Steps to Financial Freedom [Three Rivers Press, 2000, p. 262], wrote about a Mexican merchant who sold parrots. They were not in cages. And they didn’t fly away. This fascinated Orman.

She asked the merchant: “Do these birds just love you so much they have no desire to fly away?”

He laughed. “No, I train them to think their perches mean safety and security. When they come to think this, they naturally wrap their claws tightly around the perch and don’t want to release it. They keep themselves confined, as if they’ve forgotten they know how to fly.”
She asked if this was hard to do.

“With little birds it’s very hard, sometimes even impossible,” he said. “It’s easy with the large birds.”

Orman wrote: “Suddenly a light bulb went off in my head. We are just like those poor parrots. We have been taught to clutch our money as tightly as we can, as if our money is the perch of our safety and security. Just like those parrots, we have all forgotten how free we really are -- with or without the perch. The more afraid we are, the tighter we hold on, and the more we have trapped ourselves.”

She then asked the merchant how he would go about “unteaching” this behaviour. “Easy,” he said. “You just show them how to release their grip, and then they can fly as free as they want.”

God’s grace is something like that. God’s grace releases our grip on whatever holds us back from living freely with God. The story of the crooked manager can help remind us to release our grip on anything that holds us back from trusting ourselves to the mercy and generosity and forgiveness of God. And that trust in God’s character of grace is really the very centre of the good news Jesus proclaimed to all.

May that trust be so for you and for me. Amen.

Rev. Chris Miller
September 19, 2010
oympastor@rogers.com

* I acknowledge my indebtedness to Eugene Peterson’s insights in his book Tell It Slant, pp. 99-108 for this message.

OYM Oriole-York Mills United Church, Toronto

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Why Church? Reason One: Community

• Luke 15:1-10 - read this text online here »
• 1 Timothy 1:12-17 - read this text online here »

Jesus loves community. He enjoys welcoming people. But not the normal “Hello and how are you” kind of greeting; more like a warm hug kind of reception. Jesus also enjoyed sitting down with people over a good meal, the setting for two of Jesus’ parables from Luke 15. As usual, context is everything, so Luke sets us up to hear the stories in this way:

“One day when many tax collectors and other outcasts came to listen to Jesus, the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law started grumbling, ‘This man welcomes outcasts and even eats with them!’”

There are two kinds of people listening to Jesus. One group is listening while enjoying a meal with Jesus. The other group is listening but grumbling that Jesus actually enjoys the company of people like tax collectors and outcasts. So Jesus tells both groups three stories – stories about a lost sheep, a lost coin and a lost son. We are going to focus primarily on the first two stories this morning.

Hear the stories again in The Message Bible:

“Suppose one of you had a hundred sheep and lost one. Wouldn’t you leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the lost one until you found it? When found, you can be sure you would put it across your shoulders, rejoicing, and when you got home call in your friends and neighbors, saying: ‘Celebrate with me! I’ve found my lost sheep!’ Count on it -- there’s more joy in heaven over one sinner’s rescued life than over ninety-nine good people in no need of rescue.

Or imagine a woman who has ten coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and scour the house, looking in every nook and cranny until she finds it? And when she finds it you can be sure she’ll call her friends and neighbors: ‘Celebrate with me! I found my lost coin!’ Count on it -- that’s the kind of party God’s angels throw every time one lost soul turns to God.”

These two stories of the lost sheep and the lost coin present the same truth but from two different viewpoints. The truth common to both stories is the loving attentiveness and the searching care God has for lost people. The difference is that, in the first story about the shepherd and the sheep, God’s attentiveness and care arise from the compassion God feels about the distress of people, no matter how it is caused. In the second story, God’s attentiveness and searching care arise from the value and worth of the people who are lost. That coin the woman lost – worth about a day’s wages – would probably be understood then as part of her dowry or part of her savings for her old age. It was valuable to her.

Consider this: In what group listening to Jesus do you place yourself? In the group of outcasts enjoying the meal with Jesus? In the group of religious leaders on the outside looking in and grumbling because Jesus shouldn’t be enjoying the company of the outcasts? Or are you in some other group? We will hear these stories differently depending on where we place ourselves.

If we place ourselves in the group composed of tax collectors and other outcasts of the time, I suspect these feel like great stories. If we believe we fit into someone else’s category of a “lost cause” but then hear Jesus tell stories about how God is the champion of the lost, well, talk about “Good News” for sure! And to hear there was even more joy in heaven with God over one rescued life than over ninety-nine good people in no need of rescue, well, let’s just call it joy heaped upon joy heaped upon joy. Because, as one person noted: “It turns out then there is no such thing as lost causes -- just lost and wandering people waiting to be found by God’s grace.”

Dr. Paul Wilson, professor of preaching at Emmanuel, quoted the following story [in Setting Words on Fire: Putting God at the Center of the Sermon (Abingdon, 2008, pp. 159-60)] from a sermon by Rev. Hugh Reid:

Allan (not his real name) came to me at my previous church in Hamilton, Ontario, wanting to be baptized. He was a child (or victim) of “the me decade” and felt compelled to leave home and family to find himself. And, of course, he lost himself, becoming a stranger to himself and to the world, wandering the streets of Vancouver trapped in a world of drugs.

One night he managed to get off the street for a night in one of the shelters. He crashed into the bunk, stared up at the ceiling, listened to the groans of others and tried not to be overcome by the odours of the strangers in the bunks around him. He didn’t know where he was and he didn’t know who he was but he wanted it to be over with. He even considered how he might take his own life.

He was shaken out of these thoughts when someone entered the room and called out a name from another world.

“Is Allan Roberts here?”

That had been his name once but he hadn’t heard it for some time. He hardly knew Allan Roberts anymore. It couldn’t be him being called.

The caller persisted, “Is there anybody named Allan Roberts here?”

No one else answered so Allan took a risk: “I’m Allan Roberts -- or used to be.”

“Your mother’s on the phone.”

“My mother? No, you’ve made a mistake. I don’t even know where I am. How could my mother know where I am?”

“If you’re Allan Roberts, your mother’s on the phone.”

Unsure what to expect, he went to the desk in the hall and took the receiver.

“Allan?” (It was his mother!) “It’s time for you to come home.”

“Mom, I don’t know where I am. I have no money. You don’t know what I’m like anymore. I can’t go home.”

“It’s time for you to come home,” she said again. “There’s a Salvation Army officer who’s coming to you with a plane ticket. He’s going to take you to the airport to get you home.”

She had not known where he was. She had just called every shelter and hostel for months until she found him.

Allan went home and, supported and loved by his mother who had never ceased to know him even though he had forgotten himself, and influenced and inspired by the faith that had sustained his mother’s hope and love, he began attending church services. Then one day he came to my office seeking to be baptized.

He did not find his own way to my office. A path, not of his own making, was made by the love that found him, that knew him better than he knew himself and that invited him, as Jesus said, to “Follow me.”

In Jesus’ time, the Pharisees and religious leaders were the group who grumbled about his welcoming people before they were really ready to be received. To them, these outcast should be all cleaned up and abiding by all the hundreds of religious rules first. These leaders would not have liked the stories about the lost sheep and the lost coin at all. They would not have missed how Jesus said there was more joy felt in heaven by God and the angels for the repentance of one of these lost outcasts than for them -- the respectable religious people who followed all the rules so they did not need to repent – or they thought they didn’t have anything to repent about. They also would not have missed the point about the elder brother in the third story of the prodigal or lost son. They knew Jesus meant that they were like the elder brother who refused to enter into the joy of the party God threw for his lost brother who was found.

Luke 15 is Jesus’ spiritual x-ray – for then and still for now -- penetrating and exposing the depth of our hearts. What do we feel when someone like Allan in Hugh Reid’s story responds to the love of God, who sought him through the persistent love of his searching mother? What does our response reveal about our deepest feelings and attitudes toward God and salvation?

One young woman – the daughter of a minister -- expressed her feelings this way: “Help me not to be OK just because everything is OK with me” [Nancy Ortberg, Looking for God (Tyndale, 2008), p. 31]. She was not someone who was an outcast or of doubtful reputation or a notorious sinner as some translations of Luke 15 indicate. She would certainly have described herself as one of the ninety-nine sheep or one of the nine coins safe and secure in the house – in God’s community of the church -- and not lost at all. She is like those of us here this morning who feel we are OK in God’s presence -- as we have felt OK perhaps for many, many years. But did this young woman realize when she heard Jesus’ stories that she had once been lost too? Did she recognize that, in fact, she had once been found by an attentive and searching God too? Did she remember that, when she had been found, there had been joy in heaven for her too? This young did come to understand that, in community -- especially in a church community -- if someone else is not OK, then things are really not OK with her either.

I don’t think the grumbling group Jesus talked to understood this. They looked at themselves and compared themselves to the outcasts and thought they were OK in God’s eyes. They should have compared themselves to God – to God’s holiness, God’s love, God’s goodness, God’s mercy and God’s justice. Then they would have realized they were not OK with God either. Then they would have heard God calling their names and been found too by the love and compassion of God in Jesus Christ. And then, as Jesus said, there would have been a celebration for them in heaven too!

I wonder if the problem with the Pharisees and the religious leaders Jesus spoke to was that they thought they were the only ones who were among the found – those whom God welcomes. But, in reality, their faith was hollow and empty. Those who don’t consider themselves sinners have much to ponder in the light of Jesus’ stories of the lost sheep and the lost coin. If they think only they are among the found of God, they won’t set off any joy in heaven or experience any real joy in themselves. Not like the way someone new to the faith – a newly repentant person – experiences joy and gratitude for God’s goodness.

I wonder also if we will only feel some of God’s joy and celebration that Jesus talked about -- over the gift of new life received by outcasts, by the lost and by wandering people such as Allan -- when we are able to admit we are all really the same. We are sinners too. Life-long church members and newly converted drug addicts, conservative followers of Jesus and more progressive folks whose views may differ from one another – we are all in the same boat really. We are all sinners who need to be found by God. And we all need to accept the same grace from God to hear the tune of sheer joy that is the Gospel – the Good News – of Jesus Christ!

So I wonder if one key to these stories is the recovery of the sense of joy of being welcomed into the love of God. Did the neighbours who were invited by the shepherd and the woman to celebrate do so? Did the elder brother in the prodigal son story ever go into the house and join the party with gusto and happiness? We don’t know. But what we do know is that key to our being able to take joy in the new life of lost sheep, lost coins, and lost sons and daughters is our ability to experience that same joy in our own life with God that we call redemption or salvation. Some might have a dramatic story similar to Allan’s while many others may be more like the young woman who lived a good life. For God’s grace is the same amazing grace extended to each one of us.

One more story about celebrating God’s grace in our lives and in the lives of others. It is a Jewish story that tells of the good fortune of a hard-working farmer. The Lord appeared to the farmer and granted him three wishes, but with the condition that whatever the Lord did for the farmer would be given double to his neighbour. The farmer, scarcely believing his good fortune, wished for a hundred cattle. Immediately he received a hundred cattle! He was overjoyed until he saw that his neighbour had two hundred. So he wished for a hundred acres of land. Again he was filled with joy until he saw that his neighbour had two hundred acres of land. But rather than celebrating God's goodness to him, the farmer could not escape feeling jealous and slighted because his neighbour had received more than he. Finally, he stated his third wish: that God would strike him blind in one eye. And God wept.

My friends, “Only those who can celebrate God's grace to others can experience that mercy themselves.” When we are truly amazed at God’s grace to us, then we will join God’s celebration in heaven and express his unrestrained joy here on Earth along with other lost sheep, lost coins and lost sons and daughters whom God has found!

May this be so for you and for me -- and for OYM too!

Rev. Chris Miller
September 12, 2010

OYM Oriole-York Mills United Church, Toronto

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God’s All-Around Care

• Psalm 139 - read text online here »
• I Samuel 3:1-10 - read text online here »

When we moved into our apartment condo almost 10 years ago, my mother also moved with us. But as Marg wrote in her journal about that move, “We left out a step in our condo search.” She called that journal entry “Up against a concrete wall.” Here is what she wrote:

We left out a step in our condo search. We did not take my mother-in-law to see the condo before we made the offer and it was accepted. We were disappointed when she was not as taken with the condo as we were for various reasons – [especially that we were so high on the 17th floor]. However, we still felt we had made the right decision. And we decided to put a doorway in between the smaller room and the bathroom to make it easier for her. This would be possible if this inside wall were not a main support wall and if it were not solid concrete. This idea [of a doorway] pleased her. It was an anxious time whether the condo people would let us do what we planned, if we could make it comfortable to please my mother-in-law and if my brother could do the necessary work.

In a dream one night, I received what was somehow identified as God's gracious message to me not to worry regarding all that was going on with the condo. The message: "I have it all figured out!" When my brother phoned the next day to tell me he had discovered the wall was solid cement, I remembered the message and did not panic. The message said God had it all figured out! So we decided to switch rooms, giving my mother-in-law the master bedroom with the bathroom a few steps away. But within a few weeks, after getting a walker on wheels, she decided she would rather have the smaller room closer to the living room. Now that she could get around better, getting to the bathroom in the middle of the night was not the same problem it had been in the beginning.

There are those who think God isn’t concerned about such details as concrete walls or how far it is to the bathroom – that those things are for us to figure out by ourselves. Why would God be so interested in such seemingly minor details when clearly God has much larger issues to be concerned with – such as human misery associated with poverty, diseases, war, natural disasters, etc, etc.?

If Psalm 139 were not part of the biblical witness and if Marg and I had not sensed that God was in fact concerned with my mother’s reaction to her new living quarters and with our anxieties about her being comfortable, I might be tempted to agree with that sentiment. But we do have Psalm 139 as well as many other biblical examples that reveal God’s all-around detailed care and compassion for human beings.

Psalm 8: “What are human beings, that you think
of them; mere mortals, that you care for them?
Yet you made them inferior only to yourself;
you crowned them with glory and honour.”

Isaiah 41: “I am the LORD your God;
I strengthen you and say,
‘Do not be afraid; I will help you.’ ” 

Jesus said: “And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow, he will certainly care for you.” [NLT, Matthew 6:30]

Jesus also said: “What is the price of five sparrows -- two copper coins? Yet God does not forget a single one of them. And the very hairs on your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are more valuable to God than a whole flock of sparrows.” [NLT, Luke 12:6-7]

And that take-charge disciple of Jesus, Peter the fisherman, wrote: “Cast all your cares -- all your worries -- upon God, because God cares for you!” [I Peter 5:7]

Perhaps Peter remembered David’s words in Psalm 55, part of today’s Scripture reading in Our Daily Bread: “Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you.” [verse 22, TNIV]

Psalm 139 is a remarkably compelling poem written by King David. The psalm concentrates our thoughts on the reassuring and awe-inspiring character of God. Because of who God is -- because of God’s character – we can, with the utmost of personal trust, cast all our cares – all that we care about – into God’s gracious hands.

What does Psalm 139 tell us about God? Psalm 139 affirms how God knows each of us with profound intimacy [verses 1-6]. Nothing we do or say or think escapes God’s notice. “O God, you have searched me and known me!” David says in verse 1. In other words: “O Lord, you have seen inside my heart. There is nothing about me you don’t know.” The psalmist does not say this in fear, or as he cowers before a bully, or in anger that his privacy rights have been violated; rather, he says this, as we shall see, with great joy and with a sense of wonderful security.

God knows our every movement. “You know when I sit down and when I get up” the psalmist writes in verse 2. And when we get up in the morning and when we lie down at night, when we walk into our home and when we walk outside, whether we get into a car or bus or the subway, or get on a plane -- God knows it. God sees our every movement.

God knows our every motive. The Message Bible puts it this way: “I’m an open book to you; even from a distance, you know what I’m thinking” [verse. 2b]. The beauty here is the image of a close friend and companion who deeply understands our emotions and motives, the details of our routine and whereabouts all the while reading our thought processes. Remarkable!

God knows our every moment. Again in the way The Message Bible puts it: “I’m never out of your sight. You know everything I’m going to say before I start the first sentence. I look behind me and you’re there, then up ahead and you’re there, too -- your reassuring presence, coming and going. This is too much, too wonderful -- I can’t take it all in!”

The psalmist makes astounding claims as he pondered the character of God. He says we are never – never -- out of God’s sight! God knows our every movement, our every motive and every moment of our life. The psalmist responds with wonder, amazement and the profound understanding that God’s reassuring presence of knowing us with such intimacy is too deep for words -- it is beyond his understanding. It is so much and so wonderful for David he says he can’t take it all in! Pause with me for a moment. We are in the presence of an awe-inspiring and wonderfully caring God. [pause]

As the psalmist affirms the mystery that God knows him so personally, so intimately and so thoroughly, he is also intensely aware that God is with him constantly, even in the extremes of life. “Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?” he asks in verse 7. These are not questions of finding a way to escape from God; instead, they are rhetorical questions said for effect. Because he knows the answer to them already! There is nowhere either he or any of us can go where God is not already there. Hasn’t he just said he is never out of God’s sight? The psalmist is affirming that God is with us constantly even in all the extremes of life – in the ups and downs, the highs and lows, the joys and sorrows, the great celebrations and the worst tragedies. God is with us through everything.

For instance, God is with us even in death. “If I ascend to heaven, you are there. If I lie down in the grave, you are even there” [verse 8]. That God would be in “heaven” is not surprising. However, for the psalmist to say God is “in the world of the dead” (that’s the Good News Translation) is a remarkable statement of faith because many of his fellow Hebrews believed that “sheol” or the land of the dead was outside God’s jurisdiction. But as God revealed himself more clearly through the prophets and as the faith of Israel developed, many began to realize that to confess God as the Creator of heaven and earth, as King of kings and Lord of lords, is to recognize that no person, no experience and no place can lie outside God’s domain.

One of the Scriptures I often read at a funeral is from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Christians in Rome. Listen to Romans 8:38-39 in the Good News Translation: “For I am certain that nothing can separate us from [God’s] love: neither death nor life, neither angels nor other heavenly rulers or powers, neither the present nor the future, neither the world above nor the world below -- there is nothing in all creation that will ever be able to separate us from the love of God which is ours through Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Link that thought with Jesus’ words in the Gospel of John, Chapter 14: “Do not be worried and upset,” Jesus told them. “Believe in God and believe also in me. There are many rooms in my Father’s house, and I am going to prepare a place for you. I would not tell you this if it were not so.”

There are some who wonder if there really is real, recognizable life after death. If there is not life after death, then these Scriptures – in fact, all of the Scripture -- makes little sense. It may make someone feel good to hear about God’s love at such a vulnerable time as a funeral. But I must admit I do not know what ultimate meaning there is if God’s love in Jesus Christ is meant only for this life but not for life with God after death. Jesus told us he is preparing a place for his people. God is with us even in death as the psalmist wrote -- and beyond death as Jesus stated clearly and often.

God is with us constantly. That also means distance is not an obstacle to God. “If I take wing with the dawn and alight at the sea’s farthest limits, there also your hand will be guiding me, your powerful hand holding me fast” [verses 9-10]. The essential meaning here is that God is with us “where the sun rises” and “where the sun sets.” In other words, God will lead us and help us no matter where we are. And God will “hold us fast” too. Isn’t that a wonderful thought!

Have you heard the joke about the man who wondered if he should start going to church? He decided to visit as many churches as he could around Canada. In his travels, he made an interesting discovery. In the entrance of every church he visited, there was a red phone with a sign that read “Phone Call to God.” In the churches of British Columbia, the sign read “Phone Call to God -- $20,000.” In the churches on the East Coast, he saw the same sign but the call was only $10,000. When he eventually visited a church in Toronto, the familiar red phone was there but the sign read “Phone Call to God -- $0.25.” More than a little confused, he asked the minister why the call was so much cheaper in Toronto than anywhere else in the country. The minister responded: “Son, you’re in Toronto now. It’s a local call!”

The truth is, distance is not an issue with God. Our prayers or calls to God are even free!

God is with us constantly. Even in our darkness, God is there, King David says. And when you read the psalms, you will see David experienced a lot of dark times in his life. Hear verses 11 and 12 in The Message Bible: “Then I said to myself, ‘Oh, he even sees me in the dark! At night I’m immersed in the light!’ It’s a fact: darkness isn’t dark to you; night and day, darkness and light, they’re all the same to you.”

Kenneth Wilson, in his book Have Faith Without Fear [Harper & Row, p. 54, 1970], told a story about when he was a child:

“That house in which we lived ... was three storeys high in the front and four in the back. The bottom layer was the cellar and the top was what we called the third floor, really a finished attic, the ceiling of which was cut into shadowed geometric shapes by dormer windows. Up there were two bedrooms, a hallway, and a mysterious storage room for trunks that always smelled of mothballs and history. Our family slept there because the second floor was usually rented out for a tenant to help pay the rent.”

Because he was the youngest child, Wilson usually had to go to bed first, braving that floor of dark bedrooms. It felt like a long way up the steps, especially because there was no electricity above the second floor. A gas light had to be turned on, then turned off once he was settled.

[Wilson wrote:] “That bed in that room on the third floor seemed to be at the end of the earth, remote from human habitation, close to unexplained noises and dark secrets. At my urging, my father would try to stop the windows from rattling, wedging wooden matchsticks into the cracks. But they always rattled in spite of his efforts. Sometimes he would read me a story, but inevitably the time would come when he would turn out the light and shut the door, and I would hear his steps on the stairs, growing fainter and fainter. Then all would be quiet, except for the rattling windows and my cowering imagination.

“Once, I remember, my father said, ‘Would you rather I leave the light on and go downstairs, or turn the light out and stay with you for a while?’... [I chose] presence with darkness, over absence with light.”

Even in the dark areas of our lives, God wants to reassure us that darkness is not dark to God. Night and day, darkness and light -- they are all the same to God. God still seeks us and God is with us no matter how dark it seems to us.

I said earlier that Psalm 139 is a remarkably compelling poem that concentrates our thoughts on the reassuring and awe-inspiring character of God. Because of who God is -- because God is all-knowing and everywhere present through his Spirit, because God is full of love and compassion for us as the psalms and all Scripture say again and again and again -- we can, with the utmost of personal trust, cast all our cares – all that we care about – into God’s gracious hands. And Psalm 139 also reminds us that God is our ultimate Creator. We are wonderfully made, says the psalmist. And so we praise God [verse 14].

It might seem surprising that the psalmist does not talk about the whole of creation in this psalm. He does not refer to the stars or the sun or the moon or the galaxies or even the universe as he does in many psalms. In this psalm, David refers only to the creation of the human body.

Saint Augustine once said: “People travel to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars. And they pass by themselves without wondering.”

That is something to truly ponder! Did you ever think that more wondrous than the stars that fill the vast expanse of space, the sun that shines and warms the earth, the moon that lights the darkness, the lightning that strikes with power, the thunder that roars and makes us jump, the snow that falls soundlessly, or the ice that freezes and hardens – more wondrous than all this is what we can see in the mirror! And what we see in the mirror is what is most important to God!

Most of us are familiar with the Gallup Poll. Its founder George Gallup once said: “I could prove God statistically. Take the human body alone: the chance that all the functions of the individual human being would just happen [by chance] is a statistical monstrosity.” Whether we would agree with Gallup or not is one thing. But as the psalmist pondered the mystery of God’s creation of the human body, he also exclaims again in wonder and awe at his inability to understand God’s ways. Hear the awe in the way The Message Bible puts verses 17 and 18:

“Your thoughts -- how rare, how beautiful
God, I’ll never comprehend them!
I couldn’t even begin to count them --
any more than I could count
the sand of the sea.
Oh, let me rise in the morning
and live always with you!”

My friends, don’t let a concrete wall or any other obstacles on the road of your life prevent you from responding to God’s compassionate care for you. God knows you intimately and thoroughly – more so than you know yourself! God is with you constantly, even in the extremes of your life. God has wonderfully made you. So if God pays such close attention to us, what would happen in our lives if we were to pay closer attention to God – if we listened attentively for God as we said in our call to worship – to the God of all creation who loves each of us so personally? Let us praise this breathtaking God. Wondrous are his works.

May this be so for you and for me. Amen.

Rev. Chris Miller
September 5, 2010

OYM Oriole-York Mills United Church, Toronto

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