Calvary United Methodist Church

Feburary 2, 2014

PERFECT FIT

Rev. Dr. S. Ronald Parks

Children’s Sermon Romans 14:1-4

This day is a gift from God, a gift to celebrate all that He has granted

to each of us, regardless of our age and station in life. We welcome

the children to the front of this worship space to celebrate God’s Good

News.

In answer to the question that most of the kids are asking, yes, we are

still talking about this! This is the fourth Sunday in a row we’ve

talked about Jenga blocks. Way, way back, four Sundays ago we

talked about the different rules that are in place and how it is that we

learn how to play such a game. Last week we talked about how to

make, for example, a different kind of game by taking one set of

blocks and coloring them so that we had something that was different

than what it was before.

And we talked about that being an example of a big word named

“segregation”. Segregation is when things that are different are kept

apart, right?

And when you put the things that are different together you have

something different and it is called “integration”. Integration, of

course, is when different things are not held apart, but when you bring

them together.

And when you bring different things together, you have something

called “diversity”.

Well, there is another form of Jenga that takes two games and com-

bines them.

Some of you ancient folks like me may remember a video game called

“Tetris”. Anyone? Anyone? Of course! Tetris was a game in which

different colored blocks came from the top of the screen down to the

bottom of the screen and your job was to rotate the blocks as they were

falling so they fit into the blocks that were already at the bottom of the

screen. And of course the person who was able to think fastest and ro-

tate the blocks so that they all fit together with no openings is the per-

son who won.

So, the people who build Jenga and the people who invented Tetris got

their heads together and figured yet one more way to squeeze yet an-

other dollar out of the American public and that is what we are all

about, of course.

Jenga-Tetris is a little bit different. There are 47 blocks in this game

instead of 54 and there are six different shapes that make up this tower.

Not only are there different shapes, but there are six different colors

and as you can imagine when you have that much variety and when

you put them all together you have something really cool.

The more differences that you bring together, the greater the diversity

that you have and the greater the diversity you experience, the closer

you come to understanding God. Really, that is a way that we can

think of God acting is to make the most diversity imaginable and then

bring it all together.

Paul shared something about diversity and about what it means to be

different when he wrote to his friends in a place called Rome. And this

is what he had to say. He said to them:

Welcome believers who don’t see things the way that you do. Now,

believe it or not, if you look around at these people here, they don’t all

think the same. And if you were to ask them questions, they would

disagree on stuff. So, we are not supposed to keep people who disa-

gree with us apart, we are supposed to welcome believers who don’t

see things the same as we do. Don’t jump all over them if they say or

do something you don’t agree with, which of course never ever hap-

pens in a church. Don’t pass judgment, something else that never hap-

pens in church; don’t pass judgment on their faith journey. They expe-

rience God their way and you experience God your way. Therefore,

let’s treat each other gently and with the love that God has shown to

us.

Think of it like this: if you go over to friendship break after the ser-

vice today, you will sit down at a table with other people. If you sit

down to share a meal with others, you are already experiencing diver-

sity because when you go through the line, you take what you want to

eat and you sit down and you eat off of your plate, because that is the

stuff you picked that you wanted to eat. But the person sitting next to

you, for example, may have skipped right over the cookies and gone

right to the carrots. Talk about differences, right? We are all guests at

Christ’s table. Just like everyone is welcome to go over to friendship

break and share in anything that is there and sit with whomever they

like, we are all guests at Christ’s table. So why should we criticize

someone for liking carrots instead of cookies? Why should we criti-

cize one another for the differences that our obvious in our faith? You

and I have no right to cross people off of the guest list that God has put

together. God invites and welcomes all people into His embrace. If

there are changes or corrections to be made, guess who is going to

handle it? God is going to handle it and God doesn’t need any help

from you and me.

The greater the diversity, the closer we come to understanding not just

the game of Tetris, but God Himself.

Now, there is another game that many of you will be participating in

some small way later on today. It is called the “Super Bowl”. Now,

who are we rooting for? (Seattle) Seattle.

You see, this is the point. One of the teams playing are the Denver

Broncos and if you look at the people who root for the Denver Bron-

cos, they are a rather interesting breed, right?

The other team in the Super Bowl are Seattle Seahawks. Believe it or

not they actually have bizarre looking fans also.

The reason that people dress like this to go to a football game, espe-

cially one as important as the Super Bowl, is they want you to know

that they are all in favor of segregation, at least for sixty minutes in a

football game. They want you to know clearly whose side they are on

and that is why they wear the outfits that they do. And anybody who

watches that game today, and I am not saying the people who watch

for the commercials, you guys don’t count. The people who watch the

game are choosing sides. If you are not going to root for somebody,

you probably are not going to watch the game. This is what segrega-

tion is all about.

But what I want you to do, what I want you to think of when you look

at Metlife Stadium in the Meadowlands of New Jersey this evening

and you watch the game, think about what it means to put all those

people in one place because that is the very definition of diversity,

bringing all those different people, even though they kind of line up on

two sides, bringing them all together and putting them in one place.

That is the nature of diversity.

There will be 82,566 different people in Metlife Stadium today, and

guess what? They are going to have 82,566 different points of view,

because they are all going to sit in different seats. So, if you are going

down the row what one person will see is slightly different than what

another person will see. And a person sitting in the first row of the 50

yard line who probably paid in excess of $10,000 for that ticket is go-

ing to see something different than the person sitting up in the clergy

section up in the nosebleed seats, right? 82,566 different points of

view and for once in a lifetime and never again will those 82,566 peo-

ple be in the same place.

They are going to be there for the length of the game and then at the

end of the game they are going to move on. They are going to go their

separate ways and they will never be together again. They may go to

every Super Bowl, but they are not going to be with those 82,565 other

people that they are going to be with this evening.

This place is kind of like the gathering that you will watch on the Su-

per Bowl this evening because this is a place of integration and diver-

sity.

In this congregation there are 1107 different people and in this congre-

gation there are 1107 different points of view. And that just counts the

people whose names appear on the membership roles of the church.

That doesn’t count the people who might be visiting or maybe attend-

ing here for a long period of time and never officially became part of

the congregation.

That’s fine and this morning we are together one time and one time on-

ly. You may have been coming to worship here since the congregation

was founded back in the mid-fifties, but the people around you this

morning; this is a one and done event, together for once in a lifetime.

We are here for worship and then we are going to move on.

The important thing for us to remember, as we are here this morning,

is that God has invited and welcomed every single one of us, even the

carrot lovers. Therefore, let’s treat each other gently, let’s give them

the gift that God has given to us and let God handle all the other differ-

ences that tend to separate us.

Thanks for sharing in our time this morning. Enjoy the game!

Message Mark 4:26-34

Not all of us have had the experience of being at sea when a storm

blows up; neither had John Wesley before October 14 of 1735. Wes-

ley, along with his brother Charles and two of the members of the Ho-

liness Club from Oxford University had been persuaded to make the

trip to America, in particular to a place called Savannah, Georgia.

They had been persuaded to go because they were told that there was a

vast number of individuals, many of the Native Americans, who had

never heard the Word of Christ and so it was in effect a mission, a mis-

sionary trip, to go and convert these individuals. So on October 14,

the ship, the Simmons, set sail. They were at sea for a number of

weeks and periodically storms would crop up that would make the

voyage a little bit uncomfortable, but nothing like what happened to

them on January 25 of the following year. They were now at sea for

virtually three and one-half months and Wesley, writing in his journal,

had this to say about the experiences of that day:

At noon, our third storm began. By four it was more violent than be-

fore and at 7 I went to the Germans. Now, who is Wesley making ref-

erence to? In addition to the 80 or so English individuals who were

part of the cargo, part of the manifest for that particular trip, there was

a group of German Moravians who were there. They were led by a

pastor named Augustus Spangenberg. And throughout the course of

the trip, the Moravians would gather several times a day to read the

scripture, to pray together and to hear the Word proclaimed and Wes-

ley, being an ordained priest in the Anglican Church, was curious

about their practices. You see, Wesley had already been identified at

Oxford as a bit of a fanatic. He would get his group together and they

would practice similar rituals, similar disciples on campus and that is

how we got the name “Methodists.” Their methods were so rigorous

and so disciplined that people used the phrase “Methodist” as an insult,

as a mocking, degrading name attached to Wesley and his friends. But

there was something Wesley noticed in the conduct of these Moravians

that fascinated him and that drew him back to them time after time.

He says “I have long before observed the great seriousness of their be-

havior.” Not that they were somber individuals but that they took their

relationship with God extraordinarily seriously. “In the midst of the

reading of the Psalm, the sea broke over the side of the boat. It split

the main sail in pieces and it covered the ship, pouring water down in-

to the hold. It was as if the great deep had already swallowed us up. A

terrible screaming began among the English while the Germans calmly

sang on. And I asked one of them afterward,” Wesley said, “’Were

you not afraid?’ And he answered ‘I thank God, no, we are not afraid

to die.’”

What drew Wesley to those Moravians was not so much what they

had, but what he didn’t and for two weeks after that storm he pondered

what was wrong with his faith. “Why is my faith so weak in the face

of adversity? Why am I so anxious about my own mortality? Why am

I afraid to die?”

As people who sit here this morning maybe having had a brush with

death or an experience that was in some way reminiscent of what Wes-

ley went through, no doubt this question is not foreign to us? Why is

my faith so weak? Did you know that the answer to that question is

exactly the same as the answer to the question that sort of formed the

basis for this sermon series over the last four weeks: Why do Chris-

tians disagree about everything? How can people who have basically

the same Good News as part of their identity and who are part of this

sprawling organization called the “church”, how is it that we can’t

seem to agree on big things and little things? Why is there such differ-

ence among us? The answer to that question and the question “why

does my faith seem so weak?” is the answer that Wesley struggled with

for the remainder of his life.

This is what he came to be, this was his operative idea, that we under-

stand God’s Word differently because inside of us there is this shifting

matrix or interaction of four factors, of four things that come somehow

from outside of us and also arise from within us. And how these

things combine in us in any given moment shapes our understanding

and our awareness of God’s presence in our lives. Wesley, as we

talked about three weeks ago, considered himself to be a person of one

book. Scripture is primary. It is the resource to understand God’s

Word. However, even Wesley, who confessed that the written words

of the scriptures reveal and are inspired by God’s Big Word, God’s de-

sign, God’s plan, God’s Word is always greater than the words that we

use to explain or to express it.

Wesley also held his place in the church, in the Anglican Church ini-

tially and then in the body of believers that came to be called

“Methodists”. He appreciated what it meant to be a believer among

many believers. And the way in which the tradition of the Christian

Church has passed down the great gift of God’s Grace. Christian tradi-

tion for Wesley is simply the passing on of God’s presence and the

proclamation of the gift of salvation in Christ and in his disciples as

you and I as the Body of Christ become Christ to everybody. It is not

only the Word, it is the Word made flesh in Christ and the Word con-

tinually being enfleshed in people, even those as imperfect as you and

I. And all of these resources in the scripture and all of these resources

in tradition, they were important to Wesley but he came to recognize

this: that’s how the Word is known to others. The stories in the Bible,

the letters of Paul, all the writings, that is somebody else’s story of

faith. And all the people around us, all the people who are here this

morning, all of those who have ever lived, who have defined for us

doctrine and polity and dogma, all of those people, the understood the

Word in their own way.

That is the Word as known to others, but what about the Word living in

you and in me? You see, owning a Bible and sitting in church doesn’t

make you a Christian. What makes us believers is the Living Word in

us. And because of that, because of the way in which we are as human

beings, we may agree on some things in the scripture and we may

agree on some things in tradition, but there is something powerful that

separates us and that is our individual experience of the Word of God.

Experience comes from a Latin root “experiencia”. It is where the

word “experiment” comes from. It is the act of trying something and

in that context; experience is the act of trying or testing something for

yourself. We love to do this, don’t we? Don’t touch the hot stove,

sssssssssssst. Don’t cross against the traffic (car noise). This is who

we are as people. We don’t take anybody’s word for anything, let

alone the written testimony of somebody who lived several thousand

years ago about the Almighty God. And all of these people who have

come before us wearing these funny wigs, all of these people and their

insights? Ok, they’ve got some stuff to share, but I want to test it out

for myself, I want to know it. I want to be aware of and participate in

that event or the process through my direct personal involvement. I

want to be on that ship and I want to feel what those Moravians are

feeling. I got to test it. I got to try it for myself.

Wesley was aware of the Words of God handed to him by others in the

scriptures and in tradition, but Wesley had yet to experience the Living

Word of God with the capital W. Now, I am not suggesting that Wes-

ley was a godless man and a fake. He was an ordained priest in the

Anglican Church at this time. But one of the persons, part of that Mo-

ravian tradition, one said to Wesley, “Preach faith until you have it and

once you have it, then you will preach it.”

Insightful stuff. Wesley knew the Word, but he hadn’t experienced it

and the Word comes to us personally in the experiences that God

grants us to share in the proclamation of the Gospel. Jesus said God’s

kingdom is like a seed sown in a field and, Brothers and Sisters, you

and I are the field. When the sowing is finished, the farmer walks

away. As time passes the seed sprouts and it grows. The seed of faith

in your life has taken hold and is growing. How does it happen, you

wonder. The sun, the rain, the earth, the seed, they all somehow to-

gether work and the farmer just sits back and watches and wonders and

when the crop is ready the harvest is taken. God’s kingdom is sewn in

the smallest of seeds, in the tiniest experience that you will encounter

in this day or that maybe has shaped you throughout your faith jour-

ney. In the smallest and in the largest of experiences, our faith grows

and is shaped and it grows so large that all can find shelter in it and un-

der it if we allow it to continue to be nurtured by grace.

Jesus always shared the Word in words and images. That is why he

tells so many parables, because he is trying to figure out how to take

this enormous truth and reduce it to something that you and I can un-

derstand, words and images that fit the experience and mature of those

who came to hear. Now I know that most of you listen harder to the

Children’s Sermon than to what I am saying right now. And all I have

to say about that is God is fitting the Word to your maturity and to

your experience. And frankly, I like it better too, because I am as im-

mature as the next person. And that is alright. I don’t apologize for

having more fun doing the Children’s Sermon than doing the “Adult

Sermon” because I think if you can’t find the Word of God with the

eyes of a child, all the words I could string together won’t make any

difference.

And then when Jesus was alone with his disciples, and by the way, this

happens after you leave here today, when he was alone with his disci-

ples, he explained everything.

That is what prayer is for. That is what meditation is for. That is what

being alone is for. Spend some time with Jesus by yourself and let him

explain it to you. And then, check that explanation with other believ-

ers. Come back together and share and discuss.

You see, Wesley was aware of the words of God, but Wesley had diffi-

culty experiencing the Word of God.

And so, in answer to the question “Why is my faith so weak?” two

weeks after that storm and three days after the ship landed at Savan-

nah, Georgia, Wesley found Augustus Spangenberg, the pastor of the

little group of Moravians, and he asked him exactly that question:

“Why is my faith so weak?”. Spangenberg responded with three ques-

tions. I put these questions to all of us because I think they are for

most of us the most important questions about our experience of God

that we’ll ever ask ourselves.

The first one is this: Do you know that you are a Child of God? Do

you know that God who made the heavens and the earth took time to

make you? Wesley’s response as written in his journal: I was sur-

prised by the question and I didn’t know what to say. Really? Wesley,

Oxford scholar, ordained priest, was surprised by the question “Are

you a Child of the Living God?” and didn’t know how to respond to it.

Yet, Wesley was the greatest proponent of prevenient grace, experienc-

ing the gifts that sustain us from the moment of our birth. Wesley

knew that God was always providing, always pouring out and yet in

that moment he didn’t have the conviction of faith to say, “Why, yes, I

know I am a Child of God.” These words of the Psalmist meant noth-

ing to him: “Oh, God, you shape me inside and out. You formed me

in my mother’s womb. Body and soul I am marvelously made. I wor-

ship in adoration for your hand holds all of creation. Like an open

book you watch me grow through all the stages of my life. All the

days of my life are prepared before I take my first breath. I will never

understand your ways, O God. Your wonders are more numerous than

grains of sands by the sea; therefore grant me one more gift. Let me

rise in the morning and live always in Your love.” Do you experience

life as a Child of God? Certainly Wesley did, but in that moment, his

words failed him and he had to think about whether or not he knew the

Word. Do you experience life as a Child of God? Priceless? Unique?

Gifted? Forgiven? That was the question Spangenberg asked Wesley

first.

And then he followed that up, after Wesley stood there with nothing to

say, with another one. Do you know that Jesus Christ has saved you?

Wesley’s response: “I know he is the Savior of the World and I hope

he died to save me.” Oh, man! Wrong answer, but honest, and truthful.

I know, somehow that this person is somehow savior of all but I’m not

sure about me. I hope he is the savior of me. Wesley, once again, un-

derstanding the gifts of God’s grace and what it means to be justified

in that grace, experiencing the gifts that accompany our new birth in

Christ. The gift of being forgiven. The gift of becoming a vessel of

forgiveness. The gift of embracing people of every particular diverse

and difference that you can imagine, that is what it means to justify. Is

to not prove ourselves worthy, but allow God to count us as worthy by

the Love of Christ. And therefore, when Paul shares these words, it is

not just some idea that we walk with out of the building today, it is the

commission that defines us. If anyone is in Christ they experience a

new creation. Everything old is left behind and all this comes from

God. God settled the relationship between us and Him in the gift of

His Son and now He calls us to settle our relationships with each other.

God has given us the task of telling everyone what God is doing and

we’re Christ’s representative. God uses us to help others set aside

their difference and experience, not just learn about, not just talk

about, not just open a book and hand it to you so you can read about it,

not just dragging you to this place on a Sunday morning, so that you

can experience God’s reconciling love. In the Name of Christ, Broth-

ers and Sisters, be restored in His grace. Do you experience new life

in Christ?

Yet, there is one more question. And this is perhaps the one that has

occupied the minds of human beings for as long as you could call us a

human being: Do you know yourself? You see, we all have different

ideas about God and we all have different ways of worshiping and

providing rituals and songs and meanings, but do you know yourself?

Do you know yourself as a sinner? Do you know yourself as a human

being who is limited and impatient and ungraceful? Wesley’s re-

sponse: “I do, but as I say the words, I know I am just kidding my-

self.”

Swing and a miss. Three strikes. Well, he didn’t know what to say.

He hoped Christ died for him. I think I am lying when I tell you I

know who I am. You see, this is sanctifying Grace, the experience of

the gifts of rebirth in faith, hope and love, ongoing, from this moment

forward. You see, we all have prevenient grace in our lives from the

moment of our birth and we all have come to that moment of justifica-

tion and the process of being made right with God. That is what has

brought you here today. You know Christ; you have experienced

Christ as a Savior. You know what it means to have him walk with

you, but this is the one that takes us forward into the future. It is not

what was; it is what is and what will be; to experience the gifts of re-

birth in faith and hope and in love. “Do everything readily and cheer-

fully. Don’t argue. Resolve conflict. Shine the light of Divine Grace

in the darkness of a hurting world. Notice all these verbs are present

and future tense as we go out the door. Show everyone the goodness

of a Living God. Help them experience the Good News. You are a

living witness. “I hope he died for me.” Come on! You’re a living

witness. Believe it! Proof that the work we share changes lives and

hearts in the name of the Messiah, “ Paul writes to his friends in Phi-

lippi:

Do you experience God working in and through you? The reason

these questions matter, do you know yourself as a Child of the Living

God? Do you trust in the sacrifice of Christ for us to bring us new

birth? Do you experience the sanctifying Grace of God bringing us to

perfection?

The reason these questions mattered to Wesley is exactly the same rea-

son they matter to us this morning, because when the storms of life

come, it doesn’t matter who you are with, how much they are praying,

how faithfully they are reading the scripture, how at peace they seem

to be, is the peace what you experience? May we experience the gift

of His peace, not somebody else’s version of it? That is fine for them,

but you and I, we are one on one with God and God has promised to fit

His Grace into your life in a way that you will experience. That is

God’s promise, not mine.