Who Are You?

November 21, 2021 PastorPartridge Sermon Alliance, bright, Broadway, Christ, church, David, faith, followers, future, Jesus, John, judgement, King, Methodist, Ohio, Partridge, Pilate, promise, promises, rescue, Revelation, salvation, Samuel, shades, Street, United, vision

Who Are You?

(Christ the King Sunday)

November 21, 2021*

By Pastor John Partridge

2 Samuel 23:1-7 John 18:33-37 Revelation 1:4-8

You’ve probably heard the song, but in 1986, singer-songwriter Pat MacDonald wrote a song for the band Timbuk3 as an expression of his pessimism about what he saw as impending nuclear destruction. But the song gained notoriety and popularity because most listeners ignored the grim tone of the lyrics and focused instead only on the chorus which says, “The future’s so bright, I gotta wear shades.” And so, rather than being seen as a commentary on nuclear proliferation, MacDonald’s song has been widely adopted as a hymn or a theme song for students at their graduation from high school or college.

And for their part, graduation is a moment when many of us are filled with optimism and hope for the future. We know that nothing in life is certain, but what we have accomplished so far will, we hope, set the table for future success. But of course, sometimes life doesn’t turn out the way that we expect, there are no guarantees in life…

…except in those rare cases when there are.

In 2 Samuel 23:1-7, near the end of his life, God gives King David an oracle, a vision, of the future. And in that vision, David sees a bright future for his family, his descendants, and for his nation.

^23:1 Now these are the last words of David:

The oracle of David, son of Jesse,
the oracle of the man whom God exalted,
the anointed of the God of Jacob,
the favorite of the Strong One of Israel:

²The spirit of the Lord speaks through me,
    his word is upon my tongue.
³The God of Israel has spoken,
    the Rock of Israel has said to me:
One who rules over people justly,
    ruling in the fear of God,
⁴is like the light of morning,
    like the sun rising on a cloudless morning,
    gleaming from the rain on the grassy land.

⁵Is not my house like this with God?
    For he has made with me an everlasting covenant,
    ordered in all things and secure.
Will he not cause to prosper
    all my help and my desire?
⁶But the godless are all like thorns that are thrown away;
    for they cannot be picked up with the hand;
⁷to touch them one uses an iron bar
    or the shaft of a spear.
    And they are entirely consumed in fire on the spot.

Even though he is at the end of his life, David knows that the future is bright for his family and for his nation. As long as they remain faithful, and rule over the people justly, and in the fear of God, David’s descendants will lead the nation of Israel forever. This isn’t just the boundless optimism of a graduating senior but is the revelation and eternal promise of God. But, although David heard God’s promise, and although he saw a bright future for his descendants and for Israel, he almost certainly did not envision or imagine how God was going to bring about such a future. Rather than pass the mantle of leadership and kingship from generation to generation, and hope that each generation would remain faithful to God and maintain their connection to the God that made it all possible, God had an entirely different solution in mind as we see as we read the story of Jesus in John 18:33-37.

³³Then Pilate entered the headquarters again, summoned Jesus, and asked him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” ³⁴Jesus answered, “Do you ask this on your own, or did others tell you about me?” ³⁵Pilate replied, “I am not a Jew, am I? Your own nation and the chief priests have handed you over to me. What have you done?” ³⁶Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not from this world. If my kingdom were from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” ³⁷Pilate asked him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.”

Despite the confusion of the disciples, Pharisees, Sadducees, Pilate, and almost everyone else, Jesus never had any calling or intention of being and earthly king. Although he was the descendant of King David, and even though Jesus would claim the fulfillment of God’s promise to David and rule over Israel forever, Jesus wasn’t going to physically sit on a throne in Israel (in this creation). The kingship that God had in mind was spiritual, not physical, and the borders and boundaries of that kingdom extend far beyond the borders of one tiny country in the Near East. The kingdom of God is a kingdom of truth, and his followers listen and obey the words and the instructions of Jesus in places and in times far beyond the imagination of Pilate, or anyone else of that era.

But the time will come when all of us move on from this life into the next, when this world ends and another begins, when the present Israel and the present Jerusalem pass away and the followers of Jesus move into a new creation and a new Jerusalem. Then, Jesus will sit on his throne and rule over all the earth. And that is the vision that John saw and recorded for us in Revelation 1:4b-8, where he says:

⁴John, to the seven churches that are in Asia:

Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, ⁵and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

To him who loves us and freedus from our sins by his blood, ⁶and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

⁷Look! He is coming with the clouds;
every eye will see him,
even those who pierced him;
and on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail.

So, it is to be. Amen.

⁸“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.

John begins by bringing what can be read as both a blessing and a prayer extending grace to the seven churches of Asia Minor from God, from the seven spirits, and from Jesus. I thought the reference to the seven spirits might be a reference to the seven churches, to whom John’s letter was written but, with a little research, found that the “seven spirits” can probably be understood, from the way in which similar language was used by Isaiah and other Old Testament writers, to mean the Spirit of God, the third person of the Trinity, so the entire greeting can be thought of as being a prayer to God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. John then reminds us that the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross was a twofold action that both rescued us from sin and called us to something bigger. John’s reference to “a kingdom and priests” reminds us that we are not just saved from our sins, but also saved for “a destiny as his agents and worshipers”[1][emphasis mine].

But then, after the greeting, and a reminder that we are God’s agents in the world, John shares his vision of the future in which he saw Jesus descending to earth from the clouds, and a waiting world below standing in fear as they realize that the rescuer and redeemer that they rejected is indeed the creator of the world, and the God of the universe. And, as if to add emphasis, Jesus then pronounces that he is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, and in doing so reminds us that God is eternal (and we are not).

Before he died, God gave David a vision of the future that assured him that God would keep his promise to place one of David’s descendants on the throne of Israel for all time. And, with the coming of Jesus, his death, and resurrection, God kept that promise in a way that David almost certainly never expected. Like David, we too look to the future and wonder what that future holds for us. We might not want to sing, like Pat MacDonald and Timbuk3, that our future is so bright that we gotta wear shades, but from John’s vision, we know that we do have a future… an eternal future, with God, because of our relationship with Jesus Christ. Without Jesus, the day of his return will be a day of fear, embarrassment, terror, and regret. But because we have faith in Jesus, we eagerly look forward to that day with optimism and hope because although we might not need shades…

…that future looks pretty bright.

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[1] Craig S. Keener, The New Application Commentary: Revelation, Zondervan, Grand Rapids, MI, 2000

*You have been reading a message presented at Christ United Methodist Church on the date noted at the top of the first page. Rev. John Partridge is the pastor at Christ UMC in Alliance, Ohio. Duplication of this message is a part of our Media ministry, if you have received a blessing in this way, we would love to hear from you. Letters and donations in support of the Media ministry or any of our other projects may be sent to Christ United Methodist Church, 470 East Broadway Street, Alliance, Ohio 44601. These messages are available to any interested persons regardless of membership. You may subscribe to these messages, in print or electronic formats, by writing to the address noted, or by contacting us at secretary@CUMCAlliance.org. If you have questions, you can ask them in our discussion forum on Facebook (search for Pastor John Online). These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.wordpress.com/. All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.

Facing Anxiety, Hopelessness, and Disaster

November 14, 2021November 15, 2021 PastorPartridge Podcast, Sermon Alliance, anxiety, Broadway, Christ, church, community, depression, despair, disaster, endure, faith, followers, Hannah, hope, hopelessness, Jesus, John, life, love, Methodist, Ohio, Partridge, prayer, provoke, rescue, salvation, Samuel, Street, torment, United

Facing Anxiety, Hopelessness, and Disaster

November 14, 2021*

By Pastor John Partridge

1 Samuel 1:4-20 Mark 13:1-8 Hebrews 10:11-14, 19-25

What do you do when life just isn’t going the way that you had hoped, you are filled with anxiety, faced with hopelessness, and God doesn’t seem to be answering your prayers? If you’ve been in the church or been a follower of Jesus for any length of time, you know that being a Christian is not some magical ticket to a pain-free life. We are not immune from tragedy, suffering, worry, or depression. If we were to go around the congregation this morning, and survey each of you we could probably list many most difficult emotional traumas that human beings can typically face.

But we’re still here.

We endured.

But what is it about us that allowed us to endure? What do we have that can help others to find their way through difficult struggles and paralyzing emotional turmoil? If we’re honest, many of us haven’t thought about it too hard in those terms. There’s a fair chance that we deliberately avoid thinking about some of our life’s experiences because revisiting them, even as a form of self-analysis, is just too emotionally difficult. But without baring your souls to one another in church this morning, I invite you to immerse yourselves in the struggles and anxiety of the prophet Samuel’s mother, Hannah. And, as we think about Hannah’s struggles, maybe we can discover something within ourselves as well. We begin in 1 Samuel 1:4-20 where we hear these words:

⁴On the day when Elkanah sacrificed, he would give portions to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters; ⁵but to Hannah he gave a double portion, because he loved her, though the Lord had closed her womb. ⁶Her rival used to provoke her severely, to irritate her, because the Lord had closed her womb. ⁷So it went on year by year; as often as she went up to the house of the Lord, she used to provoke her. Therefore, Hannah wept and would not eat. ⁸Her husband Elkanah said to her, “Hannah, why do you weep? Why do you not eat? Why is your heart sad? Am I not more to you than ten sons?”

⁹After they had eaten and drunk at Shiloh, Hannah rose and presented herself before the Lord. Now Eli the priest was sitting on the seat beside the doorpost of the temple of the Lord. ¹⁰She was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord and wept bitterly. ¹¹She made this vow: “O Lord of hosts, if only you will look on the misery of your servant, and remember me, and not forget your servant, but will give to your servant a male child, then I will set him before you as a naziriteuntil the day of his death. He shall drink neither wine nor intoxicants, and no razor shall touch his head.”

¹²As she continued praying before the Lord, Eli observed her mouth. ¹³Hannah was praying silently; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard; therefore, Eli thought she was drunk. ¹⁴So Eli said to her, “How long will you make a drunken spectacle of yourself? Put away your wine.” ¹⁵But Hannah answered, “No, my lord, I am a woman deeply troubled; I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord. ¹⁶Do not regard your servant as a worthless woman, for I have been speaking out of my great anxiety and vexation all this time.” ¹⁷Then Eli answered, “Go in peace; the God of Israel grant the petition you have made to him.” ¹⁸And she said, “Let your servant find favor in your sight.” Then the woman went to her quarters, ate, and drank with her husband, and her countenance was sad no longer.

¹⁹They rose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord; then they went back to their house at Ramah. Elkanah knew his wife Hannah, and the Lord remembered her. ²⁰In due time Hannah conceived and bore a son. She named him Samuel, for she said, “I have asked him of the Lord.”

Hannah lived in a place where much of a woman’s value was seen as her ability to produce children… and she had none. Worse, her husband had two wives, and although Elkanah loved her greatly, the other wife, Peninnah, was not kind and went out of her way to taunt, torment, ridicule, and otherwise provoke Hannah because she had no children. And the annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem for this important sacrifice was a moment that Hannah dreaded every year because she had to watch Elkanah pass out portions of the sacrifice to Peninnah and to all her many sons and daughters, and then, even though he gave her a double portion, there was just… Hannah… alone.

Hannah was emotionally gutted. After the feast she was deeply depressed. She advanced as far into the temple courts as women were allowed, wept bitterly, threw herself into prayer and began bargaining with God, swearing that if God would grant her a son, she would dedicate him to a life of service to God. But in her misery, she ran out of words, and while she was praying silently Eli the priest thought that she was drunk. Hannah answers him that she is not drunk, but deeply troubled, Eli answers with a blessing, encourages her to go in peace, and prays that God would answer her prayer. Some time later, presumably before the same feast the following year, Hannah has a son and names him Samuel, which means “I asked God for him.”

Ordinarily, this is the point that we would thank God for answered prayer, and for the miracle that Hannah had received. But today I want to consider what it was like for Hannah. Let’s think about her anxiety, hopelessness, depression, and despair. Let’s think about how long she endured that situation. If she was the first wife, then she would have been married for at least a year or two before Elkanah married Peninnah. And then Peninnah bore at least two sons and two daughters, and possibly more. Assuming that she didn’t have more than one child per year, then Hannah had been feeling the looks of others in her community, had been hearing the whispered comments, had endured those comments and mistreatment, as well as the looks of pity in her community, had been tormented by Peninnah, and had grown increasingly desperate for at least five or six years and possibly ten, or even twenty years.

And all that time, God was silent.

Clearly, God is not a genie in a bottle and prayer is not just a way for us to rub the lamp and ask God to grant us wishes and the desires of our hearts. Clearly, life doesn’t always go our way. And hundreds of years later, Jesus makes that same point as he walks through the city of Jerusalem with his disciples as we read in Mark 13:1-8:

As he came out of the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher, what large stones and what large buildings!” ²Then Jesus asked him, “Do you see these great buildings? Not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down.”

³When he was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, ⁴“Tell us, when will this be, and what will be the sign that all these things are about to be accomplished?” ⁵Then Jesus began to say to them, “Beware that no one leads you astray. ⁶Many will come in my name and say, ‘I am he!’ and they will lead many astray. ⁷When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come. ⁸For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be earthquakes in various places; there will be famines. This is but the beginning of the birth pangs.

The disciples point to the incredible buildings that they saw, and they were indeed marvelous to look at and incredible feats of engineering. In the temple, there is one stone in particular that is 44.5 feet long, 11 feet high, is estimated to be between six and eight feet deep, with a weight somewhere between 250 and 300 tons, is considered to be one of the largest building blocks in the world and would require one of our largest modern construction cranes to move. The disciples assumed that such beautiful and awe-inspiring construction and engineering would have some permanence, but Jesus tells them that these things would all be destroyed, that imposters would come who would claim to be Jesus, and who would lead many people away from God. Jesus continues by telling them that life wasn’t ever going to be easy and that the world would continue to see violence, wars, earthquakes, famine, and other man-made and natural disasters. Worse still, Jesus says that all these things would just be the beginning of the end of this world and the birth of the next. Jesus wants us all to understand that these struggles, pain, and suffering will be a part of our world, and a part of our lives until his return.

Ultimately, life is hard, and it isn’t going to get any easier.

At this point, I can almost hear some of you thinking that today’s message is not at all encouraging, and it wouldn’t be if we ended it here. But thankfully, this is not the end of our lesson. When the angels sang at the birth of Jesus, they said that they carried “good news of great joy for all the people.” And as we continue to read the story of scripture, despite our suffering and pain, we discover reasons for hope. In Hebrews 10:11-14, 19-25, Paul explains why when he says:

¹¹And every priest stands day after day at his service, offering again and again the same sacrifices that can never take away sins. ¹²But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, “he sat down at the right hand of God,” ¹³and since then has been waiting “until his enemies would be made a footstool for his feet.” ¹⁴For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.

¹⁹Therefore, my friends, since we have confidence to enter the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus, ²⁰by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain (that is, through his flesh), ²¹and since we have a great priest over the house of God, ²²let us approach with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. ²³Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who has promised is faithful. ²⁴And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, ²⁵not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Paul reminds us that although the day of judgement has not yet come, the world has begun to change. Worship in the temple required that the priests offer sacrifices for sin over, and over, and over again, but the sacrifice of Jesus Christ was offered once, was completed forever, and Jesus now sits at the right hand of God and waits for the end of the world when the enemies of God will be ground underfoot. With one single offering, Jesus perfected and sanctified, for all time, every person who chooses to follow him and put their faith in him. And, because of that offering, made by Jesus on the cross, Paul says that we have “confidence to enter the sanctuary.”

That’s helpful, but not entirely clear so I want to unpack that a little.

Remember in the story of Samuel, Hannah went as far as she could toward the temple but was forced to stop at the edge of the court of the women. The temple had clearly designated and enforced areas of worship. The men could pass through the court of the women and draw closer to the sanctuary, but only priests could enter the sanctuary, and only the high priest could enter the holy place. But Paul says that because of the sacrifice of Jesus, we have the “confidence to enter into the sanctuary” and come before God… as priests with Jesus as our high priest. Paul encourages us to approach God with a true heart, an assurance of faith, and a clear conscience and we are to hold tightly to hope because the one who has given us his promise is faithful. Rather than provoke one another to despair, depression, and anger as Peninnah did to Hannah, we are called to provoke one another to love and good deeds, to remember to regularly meet together, and to encourage one another more and more, particularly as we see the signs that the day of judgement and redemption is drawing closer.

Our world is a mess. It is full of violence, war, disaster, envy, greed, and suffering. Our lives are often filled with desperation, depression, anxiety, trauma, and darkness and, despite his love and compassion, God has never promised that we would be rescued from those things in this lifetime.

But…

But… we have hope. We have hope because we know that this world and this lifetime are not all that there is. We have hope because we know that the sacrifice of Jesus Christ has been given so that we are, even now, rescued, forgiven, purified, and sanctified in the eyes of God so that we can enter the sanctuary with confidence. We can, as priests, carry our burdens and worries before God, share them with him, and leave them there. We can provoke one another to love, and good deeds and we can meet together, and encourage one another as we face the trials and difficulties of life. The message of scripture is not that the followers of Jesus Christ will be exempt from trouble or that we will escape the pain and suffering that is common to all of humanity.

The message of scripture is that there is hope and that…

…we are not alone.

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The Cost of (Not) Living

November 7, 2021November 8, 2021 PastorPartridge Sermon Alliance, Broadway, Christ, church, death, faith, followers, fountain, Fountain of Youth, hope, Isaiah, Jesus, John, life, Methodist, Ohio, Partridge, Ponce de Leon, rescue, Revelation, salvation, saved, Street, United, youth

The Cost of (Not) Living

November 07, 2021*

(All Saints Day)

By Pastor John Partridge

(Note -Video of this service can be found here: https://youtu.be/z_RqQcgOK1c)

Isaiah 25:6-9 John 11:32-44 Revelation 21:1-6

How many of you would like to be younger? Or to retain all your knowledge and memories but return your body to the condition it was in when you were twenty years old?

That is the idea behind the mythical stories of the Fountain of Youth. Here in North America the story that is most familiar is the myth of Ponce de Leon and a “lost” fountain of youth somewhere in Florida, but stories about sacred or otherwise restorative bodies of water circulated long before the birth of Juan Ponce de León in 1474. There were stories about Alexander the Great discovering a healing “river of paradise” four centuries before the birth of Jesus, as well as similar legends in places like the Canary Islands, Japan, Polynesia, and England. During the Middle Ages, there were stories about a mythical king, Prester John, whose kingdom contained both a fountain of youth and a river of gold.

The myth of the Fountain of Youth is a Taino Indian legend about a spring that was said to exist on the island of Bimini in the Bahamas, as well as a river, in what became known as Florida that would restore youth to those who bathed in their waters. But nowhere is recorded history, or in any of the writing between Ponce de Leon and Europe, is he ever associated with any of those myths. at least, not until decades after his death.

But what if such a place was real? Can you imagine the lives that would have been lost trying to find it? Or the wars that would have been fought to control it? Or, in our modern era, at what cost would its corporate owners be willing to sell its miracles?

One of the inescapable rules of life, is that one way or another, death will find us all.

But maybe not. At least, maybe death isn’t what we think it is. Maybe death isn’t a permanent condition. Maybe our death is less of an end, and more of a transition from one sort of life to another. That sounds more hopeful than thinking that everything ends after sixty, seventy, eighty, or ninety years, or so. And it is that sort of hope, and that sort of promise, that we hear, repeatedly, in scripture. We begin this morning by reading from Isaiah 25:6-9, where we hear of a day in which God’s people will be reunited with one another and reunited with life itself. Isaiah says:

⁶On this mountain the Lord Almighty will prepare
    a feast of rich food for all peoples,
a banquet of aged wine—
    the best of meats and the finest of wines.
⁷On this mountain he will destroy
    the shroud that enfolds all peoples,
the sheet that covers all nations;
⁸    he will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears
    from all faces;
he will remove his people’s disgrace
    from all the earth.
The Lord has spoken.

⁹In that day they will say,

“Surely this is our God;
we trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the Lord, we trusted in him;
let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.”

Isaiah says that there will be a gigantic, and most fabulous feast, attended by people from the entire planet, on the day that God destroys death, the covering that darkens the door of every home and snuffs out the light of every life. On that day, every tear shed for the loss of a loved one will be wiped away and the embarrassment and disgrace of lost battles and sinful living will be erased.

And, more than saying that it will happen “one day” or “someday” in some distant future, in John 11:32-44, we see Jesus open the door to give us a glimpse of what that day might look like as he arrives, deliberately later than he could have, at the home of his friends, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.

³²When Mary reached the place where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

³³When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. ³⁴“Where have you laid him?” he asked.

“Come and see, Lord,” they replied.

³⁵Jesus wept.

³⁶Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”

³⁷But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

³⁸Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb. It was a cave with a stone laid across the entrance. ³⁹“Take away the stone,” he said.

“But, Lord,” said Martha, the sister of the dead man, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been there four days.”

⁴⁰Then Jesus said, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”

⁴¹So they took away the stone. Then Jesus looked up and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. ⁴²I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”

⁴³When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” ⁴⁴The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.

Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”

Earlier in the story, Jesus was told about Lazarus’ illness but chose to remain where he was for several more days. And now he arrives four days after Lazarus’ death and burial. Some of the people who were there recognized how close Jesus and Lazarus had been but wonder aloud if Jesus could have healed him if he had only arrived earlier. But that seems to be exactly the point that Jesus was trying to make. Everyone knew that Jesus could heal the sick. But healing the sick and raising the dead are two entirely different propositions. Had Jesus arrived earlier, no one would have been surprised if he had healed his friend. They knew that he could. He had done it before. And, if we’re honest about history, there had been other people, prophets as well as secular healers, who had healed the sick and performed miracles. But now Lazarus was dead. Really and truly dead. And not just dead, but dead and buried. Even if someone tried to argue that Lazarus didn’t really die before his funeral, he had been sealed inside of a tomb for three or four days without food or water. So, if he was so sick that everyone thought that he was dead, then had a funeral, then was buried, and was inside of sealed stone chamber for more than seventy-two hours… he was most assuredly dead.

But Jesus arrives and asks the mourners and onlookers to roll the stone away from the entrance to the tomb and he reminds Martha that he had once told her that if she believed, she would see the glory of God. Everyone had read, or at least heard the words of, Isaiah. They knew the promises of God. They had heard that one day, someday, God would defeat death. But on this day Jesus wants them to see death overturned. But Jesus does not act alone. This is an audience participation event, and as the people trust Jesus, obey him, and move the stone away, Jesus calls out to Lazarus…

…and the dead man walks out of the grave.

This is more than healing the sick. This is conquering death. This is a foreshadowing, a preview, an illustration, and an example of what is to come. Death is overcome and overturned, and the dead are returned to life and walk among the living.

Others, before Jesus had healed the sick. But dead is dead. Death is permanent. No one can raise the dead.

Only God can defeat death.

But there stands Lazarus all the same.

And finally, after Jesus’ death and resurrection, John sees the final fulfillment of Isaiah’s promise in a vision and records Jesus’ last words on the subject in Revelation 21:1-6 where we hear these words:

^21:1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. ²I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. ³And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ⁴‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

⁵He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

⁶He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life.

John begins by saying that, in his vision of the future, both heaven and earth had been remade into a new form and even things that seemed to be permanent, immovable, and unchangeable like the oceans themselves had passed away and were no more. And in this new, renewed, and changed world, John sees a new holy city, a new Jerusalem, a city no longer in ruins. John had heard of Jerusalem’s destruction. Much of the city had been leveled and the Temple pulled down, thrown into the valley below by the Roman Army. General Titus had even been said to plow the earth where the Temple once stood with a team of oxen. John’s present was full of destruction, violence, and sadness but that was not the future that he saw. The future in John’s vision saw a new Jerusalem that was more beautiful and glorious than any of the temples that had ever been built, and God himself would reside in the temple and live among his people. No longer would there be destruction, violence, sadness, mourning, weeping, pain, and death.

The work that Jesus had begun with Lazarus and at Easter would be completed. Death will be defeated forever and always. Jesus declares that these words are trustworthy and true because he is the beginning and the end. He is the creator of the universe. He is the righteous judge and is entrusted by God to rule over all of humanity. And Jesus says that he will provide all who are thirsty with water from the spring of life.

We all know that there is a cost of living, but there is also a cost of not living. For hundreds of years, on several continents, legends of a fountain of youth, or healing rivers persisted because life is hard and often far too short. All of us would like to have bodies that were as fit was we were in our twenties. But such legends were never more than myths and wishful thinking, though they were perhaps influenced by the writings of scripture. The water of life is real, but we will never find it in Florida, or the Bahamas, or anywhere else on this present creation. We will find it by placing our full faith and trust in Jesus Christ, the creator of the universe, the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the redeemer and rescuer of humanity.

In him there is no longer destruction, violence, sadness, mourning, weeping, pain, and death.

It is in him that we find… hope.

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Almost Saved

October 31, 2021October 31, 2021 PastorPartridge Sermon Alliance, almost, Broadway, Christ, church, faith, finish, finish line, followers, football, forgive, forgiveness, goal, Jahmar Brown, Jesus, John, Methodist, Ohio, Partridge, rescue, Ruth, sacrifice, salvation, saved, Street, track, United

Almost Saved

October 31, 2021*

By Pastor John Partridge

Ruth 1:1-18 Mark 12:28-34 Hebrews 9:11-14

I know some of you don’t watch football, but this past week there was a play that is worth talking about because it tells us a story that makes sense of a spiritual theme that we read in today’s scripture passages. During a game between Troy and South Carolina, Jahmar Brown recovered a fumble, ran fifty yards toward the end zone and, one yard before he crossed the goal line, stated celebrating and threw the ball into the air. The referees ruled that it was not a touchdown because he did not have possession of the ball when he crossed into the end zone.

He had the ball. There was no one nearby that could stop him, success was certain, but he became overconfident and started his celebration before he actually crossed the goal line. When our children ran track, we saw the something similar happen more than once. A winning runner would start easing off just before they crossed the finish line and, at the last moment, the second-place runner passed them and won the race. These stories remind us that it isn’t a touchdown until you cross the goal line, and you haven’t actually won the race until you cross the finish line. The difference between winning and losing often depends upon whether you commit the effort to finish what you started.

A spiritual lesson with the same theme can be found in scripture. We begin this morning with the story of Ruth. Ruth was a daughter-in-law of Naomi and, and both women were widowed while they were living in Moab. Naomi, her husband, and her sons, were citizens of Bethlehem, but moved to Moab during a time of famine. We join the story in Ruth 1:1-18.

^1:1 In the days when the judges ruled, there was a famine in the land. So, a man from Bethlehem in Judah, together with his wife and two sons, went to live for a while in the country of Moab. ²The man’s name was Elimelek, his wife’s name was Naomi, and the names of his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were Ephrathites from Bethlehem, Judah. And they went to Moab and lived there.

³Now Elimelek, Naomi’s husband, died, and she was left with her two sons. ⁴They married Moabite women, one named Orpah and the other Ruth. After they had lived there about ten years, ⁵both Mahlon and Kilion also died, and Naomi was left without her two sons and her husband.

⁶When Naomi heard in Moab that the Lord had come to the aid of his people by providing food for them, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to return home from there. ⁷With her two daughters-in-law she left the place where she had been living and set out on the road that would take them back to the land of Judah.

⁸Then Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “Go back, each of you, to your mother’s home. May the Lord show you kindness, as you have shown kindness to your dead husbands and to me. ⁹May the Lord grant that each of you will find rest in the home of another husband.”

Then she kissed them goodbye, and they wept aloud ¹⁰and said to her, “We will go back with you to your people.”

¹¹But Naomi said, “Return home, my daughters. Why would you come with me? Am I going to have any more sons, who could become your husbands? ¹²Return home, my daughters; I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was still hope for me—even if I had a husband tonight and then gave birth to sons— ¹³would you wait until they grew up? Would you remain unmarried for them? No, my daughters. It is more bitter for me than for you, because the Lord’s hand has turned against me!”

¹⁴At this they wept aloud again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye, but Ruth clung to her.

¹⁵“Look,” said Naomi, “your sister-in-law is going back to her people and her gods. Go back with her.”

¹⁶But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. ¹⁷Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” ¹⁸When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.

Naomi and her family move to Moab, her sons both marry local girls, and then both Naomi’s husband and sons all die leaving her a widow with two dependent children widow children. Since the famine in Israel is over, and since she has no job, no family, and no support system in Moab, she decides to return to Israel where she at least has some family from whom she can ask for help. But as they begin their journey, Naomi recognizes that, as much as she could use the help, her return to Israel won’t do any favors for her daughters-in-law. In Israel, they will have the same problem that she has in Moab. They will be far from home, separated from everything they know, and have no family or support system upon which they can depend. And so, out of compassion, Naomi sacrifices her own needs and tells her daughters to return to their families where they have a better chance to be cared for, or to find new husbands and families for themselves.

Orpah resists and initially rejects Naomi’s offer, but ultimately agrees and returns to her family, but Ruth does the same thing that Naomi had modeled for her. Instead of returning to her family and doing what was best for herself, Ruth sacrifices her own needs for the good of Naomi because of her loyalty and love for her mother-in-law. And the sacrifice that we see in the story of Naomi and Ruth is a foreshadowing of an even greater sacrifice that Jesus would make in order to offer a path of rescue, reconciliation, and restoration to the entire world. But knowing about the sacrifice of Jesus isn’t enough, just as knowing about God, memorizing, and even following, the commandments isn’t. And that’s what Jesus is talking about with one of the teachers of the Law in Mark 12:28-34 where we hear this:

²⁸One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

²⁹“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. ³⁰Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’³¹The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’There is no commandment greater than these.”

³²“Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. ³³To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”

³⁴When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.

Jesus says that it’s good that this teacher of the law understands the law and the commandments. It is good that he follows the law and the commandments. Understanding and following the law and commandments is almost enough because Jesus says that in doing so the teacher is “not far from the kingdom of God.” Because he knows, understands, and follows the law and the commandments, the man is almost saved. But something is still missing. Jesus has hinted at it, but in Hebrews 9:11-14, Paul explains it more clearly.

¹¹But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. ¹²He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtainingeternal redemption. ¹³The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. ¹⁴How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!

There are several things here that we, as well as the original recipients and readers of Hebrews, already know. We know that Jesus is our high priest who intercedes between God and humanity. We know that Jesus was the perfect sacrifice for sin and willingly offered himself as our sacrifice so that we could be redeemed in the eyes of God forever. We know that because Jesus sacrificed himself for us, we are forgiven of all our sin, can stand before God, and can live with a clear conscience.

But after Paul repeats these things that we already know, he concludes by saying why God did these things. He says that God did these things “so that we may serve the living God.” The reason that God has offered us salvation and rescue is so that we can offer him a life of service. We were purified for service. We were saved for service. The reason for Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and the reason for our rescue, is so that we can serve God.

This is the same thing that we saw modeled for us in the story of Naomi and Ruth, and the same thing that Jesus was hinting at in Mark. While it is good to believe in God, to know the law, the commandments, and the rest of the scriptures, and while it is good to follow the instructions of God, that isn’t enough. The thing that Naomi knew, that Ruth learned, and that Jesus was teaching, is that after we begin to follow the instructions of God, we must also be so filled with compassion and love that we begin to model the sacrificial nature of God, to sacrifice ourselves, to sacrifice our wants, our needs, and our desires, for the good of others and for the good of God’s kingdom.

Knowing, believing, and even following are all good things, and they are almost enough. Doing those things will bring us to place that is, as Jesus described as “not far from the kingdom of God.”

But Jahmar Brown started celebrating and dropped the ball before he cross the goal line. The whole point of football is carrying the football across the goal line. And Paul says that the whole point of God’s redemptive work through Jesus Christ is so that we will live lives of service and sacrifice to God.

Let’s not miss the point and quit before we cross the goal line.

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Freedom

April 3, 2021 PastorPartridge Sermon Alliance, Broadway, Christ, church, crucifixion, death, disciples, Easter, failure, favoritism, fear, forgive, forgiveness, freedom, fresh start, fullfill, Gospel, grace, guilt, Jesus, John, July 4, Mary, mercy, Methodist, mistakes, nepotism, Ohio, Partridge, past, Paul, Peter, priorities, prophecy, racism, rescue, resurrection, revolution, Salome, salvation, sin, Street, suffering, United, United States, witness, witnesses

Freedom

April 04, 2021*

(Easter)

By Pastor John Partridge

Mark 16:1-8 Acts 10:34-43 I Corinthians 15:1-11

We are three months early.

Three months from today, July 4^th, is our nation’s birthday and a grand celebration of freedom and independence.

An in that sense, our celebration today, on April 4^th, is three months early. But our celebration today is the celebration of a freedom that is far grander, and far more amazing, that our independence from King George and the nation of England.

The freedom that we celebrate today has been the subject of our sermons for the last seven and a half weeks and even then, we’ve barely scratched the surface of why our remembrance of this day is the cause of so much joy, gladness, and celebration. But make no mistake, like the celebration of July 4^th for the citizens of the United States of America, the Easter celebration for the citizens of the Kingdom of God and of Jesus Christ, is a celebration of freedom. I’m going to briefly recap the last seven weeks and remind you of a few of the freedoms that we are celebrating in a little while, but first I want to read words of Mark 16:1-8 and add to our remembrance of the story of Easter that our youth began this morning in our sunrise service.

^16:1 When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. ²Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb ³and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”

⁴But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away. ⁵As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.

⁶“Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. ⁷But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’”

⁸Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

As the two Marys and Salome walked to the tomb, they were worried about what Jesus body would smell like, they were worried that the stone was too large for the tree of them to move, worried that there might not be anyone to help them move it, and worried that the Roman soldiers, or whomever was guarding it, would refuse to help them, or even refuse to allow them to re-wrap Jesus’ body with the spices, incense, and aromatic tree sap that they had brought with them. But upon their arrival, the two-thousand-pound stone had already been moved and they worried about why it had been moved. But when they entered the tomb to look inside, instead of finding Jesus, they found a messenger from God whose first words were, “Don’t be afraid.” But after he had given them their instructions and sent them on their way, they were still trembling, confused, and afraid.

But that initial reaction changed as they met Jesus face-to-face and realized that Jesus was alive. As time passed, they began to understand the things that Jesus had taught them, including the things about death, burial, and resurrection that had always been confusing. They began to understand that everything that they had seen, had happened exactly as Jesus had said that it would happen, and exactly as the ancient prophets had described hundreds of years earlier. And, by the time that Peter stays in the home of a Roman Centurion named Cornelius in Caesarea, he has processed the lessons that he learned from Jesus in an even deeper way (Acts 10:34-43).

³⁴Then Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism ³⁵but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right. ³⁶You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all. ³⁷You know what has happened throughout the province of Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John preached— ³⁸how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.

³⁹“We are witnesses of everything he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They killed him by hanging him on a cross, ⁴⁰but God raised him from the dead on the third day and caused him to be seen. ⁴¹He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already chosen—by us who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. ⁴²He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead. ⁴³All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

Peter realized that Jesus’ fulfillment of the prophecies of the Old Testament had begun something entirely new and changed the way that God’s people would engage the world around them and change the way their entire relationship with God. The new covenant, this new contract with God, was a contract without favoritism, without nepotism, without racism, and without judgement except for the judgement of the one person who understood us best, and who was perfect, just, and infinitely wise.

And just a few decades later, Paul, having learned from the disciples, as well as through his own experience, and having had even more time to process what he had learned, seen, and heard, writes to the church in Corinth to help them to understand what the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus meant to them, and still means to each one of us (I Corinthians 15:1-11).

^15:1 Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. ²By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

³For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. ⁶After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, ⁸and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

⁹For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. ¹⁰But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. ¹¹Whether then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.

Paul reminds us that it was by this gospel, this story of life, death, and resurrection, through which we were saved… if we hold firmly to what we have learned. Paul knows what his life was like before he met Jesus. Paul knows that he is utterly undeserving of God’s rescue, let alone the honor of being counted among the disciples of Jesus Christ. Paul remembers that he had been so anti-Jesus that he had become known as the hunter of Christ followers who had them arrested, tortured, and worse. And because of who he was, and the life that he had once lived, Paul understands the depth of God’s mercy and grace.

Through the story of Easter, through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, Paul had found freedom. And that freedom has flowed down through history to us. It is a freedom that is far grander than anything that we celebrate on July fourth. It is more than our freedom from King George and the nation of England. It is more than the freedoms enumerated in the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights.

The message of the gospel is a message of many freedoms.

Mary, Mary, and Salome learned that it is a message of freedom from fear.

Peter learned that it was a message of freedom from favoritism, nepotism, and racism.

Paul learned that it is a message of mercy, grace, and freedom from our past.

And as we’ve learned over the last seven and a half weeks, it is a message of freedom from corruption, rescue from the flood, freedom from the Law of Moses, freedom from the demands of other gods, a message of keeping God at the center of our lives, freedom from the misplaced priorities and wisdom of the world, freedom from our failures, freedom from our guilt, freedom from suffering, freedom from sin, and even freedom from death.

And that is why we repeat the story every year, and why Easter should be filled with joy.

The message of Easter was a story about freedom long before the events of the Revolutionary War and long before July fourth had any meaning to the citizens of North America.

We celebrate Easter because today is the day when God gave us the immeasurable gift of freedom.

Happy Easter everyone.

You can find the video of this worship service here: https://youtu.be/JpemgjB6bIY

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Death by Distraction

January 29, 2021January 30, 2021 PastorPartridge Sermon Corona virus, coronavirus, covid-19, death, distract, distraction, exorcism, focus, followers of Jesus, Good News, idols, Jesus, Jesus Christ, life and death, masks, meat, mission, rescue, rights, salvation, spirit

Death by Distraction

January 31, 2021*

By Pastor John Partridge

Deuteronomy 18:15-20 Mark 1:21-28 1 Corinthians 8:1-13

On several long car trips, I have seen signs along the highway that remind drivers to put their phones down and to avoid distracted driving. Not long ago, that wasn’t something that we even thought about. We didn’t have phones in the car, or computer screens for navigation, or many of the other things with which today’s driver can be distracted. We had a handful of radio buttons and maybe a box full of cassette tapes and the highway signs only reminded us to fasten our seat belts. But while our children, radios, and fast-food lunches always had the potential to draw our attention away from the highway, today’s abundance of electronic devices distract us in similar abundance and our distraction at seventy miles an hour in heavy traffic can become deadly in the blink of an eye. Our life, and the lives of those around us, depends upon us keeping our focus on the important things and not being distracted by the army of ephemera that nags at the edges of our consciousness.

But scripture tells us that our spiritual lives are much like that, and worse.

In Deuteronomy 18:15-20, Moses warns the people of Israel that they must listen to God and not be distracted.

¹⁵The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him. ¹⁶For this is what you asked of the Lord your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly when you said, “Let us not hear the voice of the Lord our God nor see this great fire anymore, or we will die.”

¹⁷The Lord said to me: “What they say is good. ¹⁸I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their fellow Israelites, and I will put my words in his mouth. He will tell them everything I command him. ¹⁹I myself will call to account anyone who does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name. ²⁰But a prophet who presumes to speak in my name anything I have not commanded, or a prophet who speaks in the name of other gods, is to be put to death.”

Moses warns the people that while it is critically important to listen to God’s prophets and to obey God’s commands and instructions, they must be careful not to be distracted by people who only pretend to speak for God. He says that there will inevitably be people who speak fake and false prophecy for their own benefit, or who attempt to speak for other gods to distract God’s people and shift their focus from where it should be. Just as it is when we are driving, God’s people are at risk any time that our attention turns away from the main thing.

In Mark 1:21-28, an evil spirit comes into the synagogue and is afraid of Jesus.

²¹They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, Jesus went into the synagogue and began to teach. ²²The people were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law. ²³Just then a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an impure spirit cried out, ²⁴“What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”

²⁵“Be quiet!” said Jesus sternly. “Come out of him!” ²⁶The impure spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.

²⁷The people were all so amazed that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching—and with authority! He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him.” ²⁸News about him spread quickly over the whole region of Galilee.

The impure spirit knows who Jesus is and is afraid of his power, but it also is trying to begin a discussion with him that is a distraction from Jesus’ main message. But Jesus knows the importance of keeping his focus on the main thing and does not allow the impure spirit to distract the people in the synagogue from the message that he is teaching. The spirit tries to steer the discussion in the synagogue to one about Jesus’ intensions toward the spirit world, but while Jesus’ presence and his message will ripple into their world, what happens to demons and impure spirits is not the focus of Jesus’ ministry. The message of Jesus isn’t about the destruction of evil spirits, but about the rescue of the lost and the salvation of the living.

But what application does that have for us today?

Of course keeping the main thing, the main thing means sharing Jesus’ message about rescuing the lost and the salvation of the living. That is, after all, the mission of the church and the mission of every follower of Jesus Christ. But keeping the main thing, the main thing can mean more than that as we see in Paul’s letter to the church in Corinth. In that place, there were people who had converted from Judaism, people who had been Christians for some time, and people who had only recently converted to Christianity from idol worship.

In Corinth, most of the meat that was available had been sacrificed to some idol at the pagan temples and then sold later in the meat market. Similarly, the traditional place to hold many weddings, celebrations, and other gatherings was at those same pagan temples. So, among the people of the church, there was a dispute. If Christians stayed away from the idols and pagan temples, they would miss the weddings of their friends, and be excluded from many celebrations and business opportunities. If they refused to eat meat that had been sacrificed to idols, they might rarely eat meat at all. And so, in the middle of this dispute, Paul writes these words to the church (1 Corinthians 8:1-13):

^8:1 Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that “We all possess knowledge.” But knowledge puffs up while love builds up. ²Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know. ³But whoever loves God is known by God.

Paul recognizes that the more mature believers understand that the idols aren’t real. They know that our God is the only god that there is and that gods made of stone and metal had no real power. Whether they attended an event at the pagan temple or ate meat that had been sacrificed there made no difference. But many of the newer converts, who had grown up in that system, still believed that setting foot in a pagan temple, or even eating the meat that had been sacrificed there, gave power to those gods, and gave them power over you.

And what Paul says, is that “We possess all knowledge.” Yes, we know that these are false god. Yes, we know that attending your nephew’s wedding at the pagan temple makes no difference. We know that eating meat, or not eating meat, makes no difference. But, if we read the rest of this passage, Paul encourages them not to do these things anyway. Why? Because even though idols and false gods have no power, and even though believers in Jesus Christ had every right to attend social gathering and eat meat that had been sacrificed to idols, exercising that right caused harm to fellow believers whose faith was not yet as mature as theirs. Attending those gatherings, and eating that meat, caused less mature believers to doubt their faith and possibly leave the church. Paul says that more important thing is not what knowledge we have, or what rights we have, but that we do not cause harm to our brothers and sisters in Christ. For Paul, it wasn’t an issue of knowledge or of rights, but of keeping the main thing, the main thing.

Even two millennia later, this idea flows into everything that we do. One of the foundational principles of the Methodist movement is “Do no harm” and it is often a check for us to keep the main thing, the main thing and to keep our focus where it belongs. Even though we have every right to hold in-person worship, we must consider what harm we might cause to fellow believers by exercising that right. Even though we may personally feel that we have every right not to wear a mask in public, do we cause harm to the people in the community, and to fellow believers, and to their faith, if we choose to exercise that right. Paul’s message to the church in Corinth, and to us, is just because we have the right to do something, doesn’t mean that we should exercise that right, or that exercising that right is a good thing.

The more important principle is to do no harm.

When we drive our automobiles down the highway, we understand that the full focus of our attention is required for the task at hand, and that our distraction can lead to our death, or to the death of others.

Moses warned that God’s people needed to test the people who claimed to be prophets and only listen to those that proved to be real because being distracted from God’s message could lead to death.

When Jesus preached in the synagogue, he did not allow the impure spirit to change the subject and distract him from the focus of his message. The main thing, had to remain the main thing and the most important message wasn’t about the future of the spirits, but about rescuing the lost and calling God’s people to repentance and obedience. Paul knew that throughout our daily lives we run the risk of distraction and death.

We must constantly struggle to keep the main thing the main thing. To keep our focus on the mission of the church, to rescue the lost, and to preach a message of salvation and the Good News of Jesus Christ. And in the process of doing that, we may occasionally need to set aside our rights, to surrender to God some of the things that we feel like we have earned for ourselves because the main thing isn’t about exercising our rights, or about doing things just because we can do them.

The main thing is to do no harm to fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, and to the community around us.

Because despite living in a country where we hold our rights to be incredibly important, sometimes our rights are a distraction from our main purpose, focus, and mission.

And distraction is death.

Let us keep our focus on rescuing the lost and sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ.

And let us continue our struggle to keep the main thing, the main thing.

You can find the video of this worship service here: https://youtu.be/QV5D2PTS5Cw

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Enemies No More

March 15, 2020 PastorPartridge Sermon Corona virus, enemies, followers of Jesus, God, Jesus, Jesus Christ, Messiah, rescue, salvation

Enemies No More

March 15, 2020*

By Pastor John Partridge

Exodus 17:1-7 John 4:5-26 Romans 5:1-11

Last year, as a part of his activities in ROTC, our son Jonah participated in a competition involving a variety of firearms. In and of itself, such a competition, for a bunch of young people who are preparing for a career as officers in the United States Army sounds pretty ordinary. But what made it interesting, at least to me, is that it was possible, if you scored well enough, to earn an award that could be worn on your uniform. What makes that remarkable, is that the competition is not an American competition and the award is not an American award. Both the competition, and the award, are a part of the German army. There are very few, if any, other similar awards, given out by other countries, that can be worn on the uniform of the United States Army and it is that rarity that highlights just how close the United States and Germany have become as allies in the last 60 years. Imagine how odd that would seem to a time traveler that arrived here from the height of World War Two. Or imagine their confusion at seeing the United States Navy and the Navy of Japan holding joint war games together. Or imagine trying to explain to a visitor from the height of the Cold War, how we cooperate with Russia and other members of the former Soviet Union in building and operating the International Space Station.

The world has changed.

Many of those nations with whom we were once at war, are now some of our closest allies.

And that idea is a big part of what we see as we read our scriptures for today. We begin in Exodus 17:1-7, where we hear these words:

^17:1 The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the Lord commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. ²So they quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.”

Moses replied, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you put the Lord to the test?”

³But the people were thirsty for water there, and they grumbled against Moses. They said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?”

⁴Then Moses cried out to the Lord, “What am I to do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.”

⁵The Lord answered Moses, “Go out in front of the people. Take with you some of the elders of Israel and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. ⁶I will stand there before you by the rock at Horeb. Strike the rock, and water will come out of it for the people to drink.” So, Moses did this in the sight of the elders of Israel. ⁷And he called the place Massah [Massah means testing] and Meribah [Meribah means quarreling] because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”

For four hundred years, the people of Israel lived as slaves in Egypt and prayed that God would rescue them. Finally, God sends Moses, they gain their freedom, and they set out across the desert. They got what they wanted. They have their freedom. They have escaped the grasp of the Egyptians. And still, they complain. They got what they wanted, but it still wasn’t good enough. God rescued them, but they didn’t trust God. They grumbled against Moses and talked about going back because they weren’t sure what God intended. The people had followed God and Moses, but only half-heartedly. They couldn’t bring themselves to trust God when things got difficult. And their doubt caused them to test God by asking, “Is the Lord among us or not?” And God tells Moses to go out in front of all the people and he provided a very visible and obvious sign so that everyone will know that God is still here, God is with you, and God still cares about you.

More than a thousand years later, Jesus arrives with an entirely different way of demonstrating that God is with us. And with his coming, we receive the comfort of knowing that God cares about us and our entire understanding of what it means to be an enemy is changed. (John 4:5-42)

⁵So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ⁶Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

⁷When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” ⁸(His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

⁹The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

¹⁰Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.”

¹¹“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? ¹²Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

¹³Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, ¹⁴but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

¹⁵The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

¹⁶He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

¹⁷“I have no husband,” she replied.

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. ¹⁸The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

¹⁹“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. ²⁰Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

²¹“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. ²²You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. ²³Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. ²⁴God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

²⁵The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

²⁶Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

At first, this doesn’t sound nearly as revolutionary as it really was. Jesus, a Jew, is passing through Samaria because Samaria was in the middle of Israel and the fastest way from the north of Israel to the South of Israel was to go through Samaria. But it was still a big deal. For years, the Jews and Samaritans were at war with one another. They hated one another, and the only reason that they weren’t fighting was because the Romans made certain that they didn’t. Jewish Rabbis taught that the Samaritans were unclean. Good Jews generally tried not to have any interaction with Samaritans at all. Some carried food with them as they journeyed through Samaria so that they didn’t have to talk to Samaritans or buy food from them. So bitter was their hatred for one another was that devout priests and rabbis would add several days to their journey, and go several times farther, so that they could travel around Samaria rather than through it. On top of that, good Jewish men often tried to limit their contact with women, and if you take all these things together you begin to see why the Samaritan woman was so surprised when Jesus takes the time to speak with her and have a conversation. You can almost hear the surprise in her voice. “You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?”

And before their conversation is over, the woman understands that Jesus is the messiah for which both the Israelites and the Samaritans had been waiting, hoping, and praying for generations. And then, based on her testimony, the entire village comes out to meet Jesus. In an instant, generations of hatred were erased, and enemies are joined as friends and coworkers for God’s kingdom.

But, as I often ask, what does that have to do with us?

And, as is often the case, the Apostle Paul can help us to understand. In Romans 5:1-11, we hear this:

^5:1 Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, ²through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. ³Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; ⁴perseverance, character; and character, hope. ⁵And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.

⁶You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. ⁷Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. ⁸But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

⁹Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! ¹⁰For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! ¹¹Not only is this so, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Paul explains that it wasn’t just the Samaritans and the Jews that came together because of Jesus, the same is true for all of us. We have been justified through faith and we have peace with God through Jesus Christ. Not only were human beings constantly at war with one another, we were also enemies of God. But because of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we have all been welcomed back into God’s family. And, because human beings are still just as stubborn as they were in the time of Moses, God offers us a sign, a demonstration, of his love for us just as he did when he caused water to start flowing out of a rock for Moses. Of course, in this case, the demonstration of God’s love for us is the sacrifice of his own son. While we were powerless, Christ died for his enemies… us, so that we could be reconciled, and welcomed back into the family of God.

Abraham Lincoln had it right when he asked, “Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?” And that is exactly what Jesus did. Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection ended our separation from God. We are no longer the enemies of God once we believe in Jesus. Just as the coming of the messiah brought the Jews and the Samaritans together, it also offers us hope that the warfare between other groups of humans can also be ended. Because we are joined with Jesus, we no longer separated from one another. Whether we are white, black, Hispanic, Indian, Asian, North American, South American, European, African, rich, poor, male, female, Jewish, Christian, rural, urban, suburban, college education, uneducated, or any other division that you can think of, once we put our faith in Jesus Christ, we are adopted by God as brothers and sisters and joined together in a common purpose for the Kingdom of God.

We are enemies no more.

We are no longer the enemies of God, nor enemies of one another.

And that is the reason that Paul says that “we boast in the hope of the glory of God.”

Every day we hear messages of hatred. “I hate Republicans,” or “I hate Democrats,” or corporations, or rich people, or poor people, or sick people, or the Russians, or the Chinese, or evangelicals, or progressives, or Hollywood, or… whatever. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

The Prince of Peace has come to end the fighting and to end the hatred.

We have heard the Good News.

God is still here. God is with you. God still cares about you.

We know the truth.

We have hope.

Neither the Corona virus, nor anything else, can take away our hope, our joy, and our peace.

And it’s up to us to share our hope so that everyone else can have hope too.

Have a great week everybody.

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*You have been reading a message presented at Christ United Methodist Church on the date noted at the top of the first page. Rev. John Partridge is the pastor at Christ UMC in Alliance, Ohio. Duplication of this message is a part of our Media ministry, if you have received a blessing in this way, we would love to hear from you. Letters and donations in support of the Media ministry or any of our other projects may be sent to Christ United Methodist Church, 470 East Broadway Street, Alliance, Ohio 44601. These messages are available to any interested persons regardless of membership. You may subscribe to these messages, in print or electronic formats, by writing to the address noted, or by contacting us at secretary@CUMCAlliance.org. If you have questions, you can ask them in our discussion forum on Facebook (search for Pastor John Online). These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.wordpress.com/. All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.

The Scandal of Christmas

December 24, 2018 PastorPartridge Blogs accessibility, Christmas, church, David, faith, Israel, Jesus, justice, prostitution, salvation

Note: This was originally a Facebook post back in 2014 and I’ve repeated it there occasionally, but I thought that it was also worth sharing here.

We’ve made Christmas pretty with twinkly lights, shiny decorations and well dressed characters in the nativity but we forget that Christmas was and is a story of scandal.

A baby born to poor, unmarried parents who were themselves descended from prostitutes, foreigners, adulterers, murders, and the absolute WORST king that Israel had ever had, a man who was describes as more evil than Israel’s enemy the Ammonites.

His birth was announced to shepherds, people at the very bottom of the social order. The rich, the important, and the popular were excluded.

Everything about the story is aimed at reminding us that God uses the weak, the small, the outcasts, the unpopular and the people that others call failures to do his greatest work.

The coming of the the Messiah was not the triumph of the establishment, but an invitation to everyone who has ever felt like they weren’t good enough, or rich enough, or just simply not “enough.”

The scandal of Christmas is that God came to earth to invite us all, regardless of wealth, race, popularity, nationality, or even goodness. He came to redeem and transform us, at his expense, so that we could *all* be invited into his house.

Never forget the scandal of Christmas because it was that very scandal that invited us in to become sons and daughters of God.

Merry Christmas everyone.

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“Patience and the Promise Keeper”

December 10, 2017December 10, 2017 PastorPartridge Sermon church, faith, future, patience, prophecy, salvation

“Patience and the Promise Keeper”

December 10, 2017

By John Partridge*

Isaiah 40:1-5 2 Peter 3:8-15 Mark 1:1-8

Have you ever received mail from a friend or relative that got lost by the post office somewhere along the way and arrived long after it had been sent? Have you ever read stories about people who had been separated by World War Two and decades later received love letters or gifts that had been found in an attic by their grandchildren? These sorts of things take us on journeys out of time, or displaced in time, in some way. I also think about some of the older families in the east coast. A friend of mine once told me a story about a friend of his who had been dating a girl in the DuPont family. The DuPonts are the family that founded, and still own a majority share, of the international chemical conglomerate, but their family goes back to founding of our nation. The story that I heard was that, while visiting his girlfriend, this young man was invited to help decorate the DuPont family Christmas tree, and while doing so was reminded to handle the decorations with care, because some of them had been handed down from generation to generation and dated back to the 1700’s. As I heard it, the young man was nearly paralyzed with the fear that he might break something that was clearly irreplaceable.

With that in mind, now imagine that while you were unpacking such a box you found a letter from your four or five times great grand parents in which they promised an inheritance that would not only change your life, but would change the course of our nation, and lead to a world in which the leader of the United States would rule over the entire world. That idea would be pretty hard to get your head around. A thousand questions would swirl through your mind. How could they have known? How would they ever be able to accomplish such a thing? But let’s make it even harder. Imagine that you were doing some historical research and found a letter with that same kind of bold promise, but the letter in question was so old that the English in it had to be translated before you could understand it. Imagine that such a letter was written eight hundred years ago in the year 1217, a year in which the Crusades were being fought, Genghis Khan was conquering Persia, the Magna Carta had only just been written, and the Shogun still ruled over Japan.

We would think that such a promise was impossible to make or to keep and, after 800 years, had certainly been forgotten. But that is exactly the sort of thing that we are talking about as we read the prophecies and the promises of God sent to the people of Israel through the prophet Isaiah. Of course, there’s a big difference between the promises of a human being and the promises of God, but eight hundred years before the birth of Jesus, Isaiah wrote these words to the people of Israel in Isaiah 40:1-5:

^40:1 Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
²Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
double for all her sins.

³A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
the way for the Lord;
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.
⁴Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
⁵And the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

And, far from being lost in some library somewhere, the people of Israel kept the words of Isaiah close to their hearts, taught them to their children, passed them down from generation to generation, and read them in their synagogues. But, much like today, some people in positions of authority, and people who thought that they were “sophisticated” began to think that the words of Isaiah were no longer important or relevant while others took God at his word and had the faith to believe that, despite the long wait, God would keep his promises. That’s why there were people like Mary and Joseph whose faith allowed them to believe that God was at work in their world and in them. That’s why scholars from the east (perhaps in Babylon) noticed the birth of the messiah before Israel’s own scholars. And that’s why the beginning of the book of Mark sounds so familiar to anyone who had ever heard the words of Isaiah. (Mark 1:1-8)

^1:1 The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God, ²as it is written in Isaiah the prophet:

“I will send my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way”—
³“a voice of one calling in the wilderness,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord,
make straight paths for him.’”

⁴And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. ⁵The whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem went out to him. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. ⁶John wore clothing made of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. ⁷And this was his message: “After me comes the one more powerful than I, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. ⁸I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

After 800 years of waiting, God was moving in Israel. After generations of wondering when it would happen, God’s messenger had arrived to proclaim the arrival of the messiah, savior, and rescuer of Israel.

God was keeping his promise.

But that 800 year wait seems like a long time. In fact, 800 year doesn’t “seem” like a long time, 800 years “is” an extraordinarily long time. And as we notice that, we cannot help but notice that it’s been almost 2000 years since Jesus rose from the dead and promised to return. So much is different. So much has changed. Are we wrong? Has God forgotten? Is God slow to keep his promises? Or is it something else?

These are not uncommon questions. In fact, these are not new questions. In a letter to the entire church and to believers everywhere, Jesus’ disciple and close friend Peter addresses some of these very questions.

(2 Peter 3:8-15)

⁸But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. ⁹The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

¹⁰But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.

¹¹Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives ¹²as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. ¹³But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.

¹⁴So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him. ¹⁵Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him.

Peter reminds us that the God who spoke galaxies and stars and the entire universe into existence is not a creature that is a slave to time in the way that we are. God sees time but experiences it, or at least thinks about it, in an entirely different way. Perhaps simply being an immortal, eternal being makes him less constrained by, or less concerned with, the passage of time than human are. But in any case, Peter explains that God is not slow in the way that we understand slowness. God has made promises to his people, and God intends to keep those promises. But since God is not only eternal and immortal, but also omniscient, or all-knowing, God has the ability to keep his promises in a way that benefits the most people. God does not desire for anyone to die in their sin, but desires instead that everyone might repent and be saved. Rather than rush to fulfill his promises, God chooses to be patient in order that more people might have the opportunity to be saved.

But Peter also reminds us that a day of destruction, the end of the world, and judgement is coming. We therefore look forward to a new creation, a new heaven, and a new earth where the righteous will live forever. But as we look forward, we are called to do all that we can, in Peter’s words, to “make every effort” to live righteous lives, to be as perfect as possible, so that we might “be found spotless, blameless, and at peace” with God.

And so, on this second Sunday of Advent, as we light the candle of Love, we remember that God is not slow to keep his promises, but instead is being patient with us. God is taking his time to give us another chance to get it right. God is being patient so that we might make another effort to be righteous, to be as perfect as we can be, to be more like Jesus than ever before, and to tell even more people about the Good News of Jesus so that everyone might repent and be saved.

It was 800 years from the time prophecies of Isaiah to their fulfillment in time of Jesus, and it’s been almost 2000 years since Jesus promised that he would return.

God is not slow.

God is giving us another chance to get it right.

Let’s not waste it.

_________
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^* You have been reading a message presented at Trinity United Methodist Church on the date noted on the first page. Rev. John Partridge is the pastor at Trinity of Perry Heights in Massillon, Ohio. Duplication of this message is a part of our Media ministry, if you have received a blessing in this way, we would love to hear from you. Letters and donations in support of the Media ministry may be sent to Trinity United Methodist Church, 3757 Lincoln Way E., Massillon, Ohio 44646. These messages are available to anyone regardless of membership. You may subscribe to these messages by writing to the address noted, or by contacting us at subscribe@trinityperryheights.org. To subscribe to the electronic version sign up at http://eepurl.com/vAlYn. These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.wordpress.com/. All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.

Life is More than Living

March 12, 2017 PastorPartridge Sermon death, faith, Jesus Christ, life, rescue, salvation, trust

“Life is More Than Living”

March 12, 2017

By John Partridge*

Genesis 12:1-4a John 3:1-17 Romans 4:1-5, 13-17

Are there people in your life that you trust?

We probably all have someone that we trust. And, depending on how long we’ve known them, and the history that we have between us, our trust varies.

So I guess the question is, “How much do you trust?”

As an illustration, I want to remind you about Charles Blondin, also known as “The Great Blondin,” or just “Blondin,” whom I have used as a sermon illustration before. Blondin was a tightrope walker and daredevil in the 19^th century. In June and July of 1855 he strung a tightrope across Niagara Falls near where the Rainbow Bridge now stands. The crossing was 1100 feet long on a rope 3.25” in diameter, and 160 feet above the water. During those two months, Blondin made as many as 17 crossings between the United States and Canada, but his own personal drive was such that after the first time, just crossing wasn’t enough. On each trip he did something to make that crossing more spectacular than the last. He once crossed blindfolded, once with his legs in a sack, then on stilts, and once with both his hands and his feet in manacles. He stopped in the middle to do tricks; he did backflips, lowered a rope to the Maid of the Mist on the river below, hoisted a bottled beverage from the boat, drank it, and then continued on. He once carried a stove with him on his back, stopped in the middle, cooked, and then ate an omelet. Once he carried a chair, stopped in the middle, balanced the chair on one leg, and stood on it. He crossed once on a bicycle, once crossed backward, and returned pushing a wheelbarrow. Afterward, he reportedly asked the crowd if they thought he could do it again, and they all shouted “Yes.” He then asked if they thought he could do it again with a man in the wheelbarrow, and again they shouted “Yes.” But when he asked if any of them would volunteer to sit in the wheelbarrow, not one of them volunteered. The crowd believed that he could do it, you might even say that they even trusted that he could do it, but there are limits to our trust. On the other hand, at least once, if not twice, Blondin made the crossing with a man on his back. Once he crossed with his manager, Harry Colcord, and possibly once more with his assistant.

And so again, we return to the question of how much do we trust. Do you trust your boss, or your employees, or coworkers, or anyone, enough to put your life in their hands?

It’s that kind of trust that we need to think about this morning as we begin in Genesis 12:1-4a with the story of Abram.

^12:1 The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

²“I will make you into a great nation,
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
³I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.”

⁴So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran.

At the age of seventy-five, Abram makes a new beginning, leaves behind everything that he knew, and sets out for a country that he’s never been to, and in fact toward a destination that he didn’t even know when the trip started.

God said “Go,” and Abram went.

God did not lay out a map, pass out lots of charts and graphs, and give a PowerPoint presentation to show Abram where he was going, what was going to happen when he got there, and what his standard of living would look like.

God said “Go,” and Abram went.

And to be totally fair, so did Sarai.

Because he trusted God, and because he went where, and when, God told him to go, Abram was honored and revered as the patriarch and founder of the nation of Israel for generation after generation. But what was it that made Abram and Sarai honorable? Should they be respected because of their actions or because of their faith and trust in God? And that is exactly the question that Paul answers for us in Romans 4:1-5, 13-17.

^4:1 What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter? ²If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God. ³What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”

⁴Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. ⁵However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness.

¹³It was not through the law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith. ¹⁴For if those who depend on the law are heirs, faith means nothing and the promise is worthless, ¹⁵because the law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression.

¹⁶Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham’s offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who have the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all. ¹⁷As it is written: “I have made you a father of many nations.” He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed—the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.

Paul reminds us that Abraham was described in Genesis 15 as being “credited with righteousness” because of his faith and belief in God. For Paul, wages are paid to someone who works and wages are therefore owed to the worker as an obligation of the employer. But on the other hand, for someone who simply trusts God for their justification, it is their faith that results in God crediting them with righteousness. In Paul’s equation, work equals pay, but trust equals faith.

Paul continues by pointing out that since the laws of Moses had not yet been written, it was not the law that saved Abraham either. For Paul, even though he was a Pharisee and a devout Jew, it was not the rules that brought about salvation. Instead, it is our faith, and the grace of God, that brings about our salvation.

All that means that Abram and Sarai weren’t saved because they answered God’s call to “Go,” they went because they had faith and trust in God and believed that God would be faithful in return. It is their faith that makes them admirable.

After all that, I guess the next question is this: Just how important is faith in God and in his son Jesus?

In John 3:1-17, we remember this meeting between Jesus and a Pharisee named Nicodemus:

^3:1 Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. ²He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

³Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

⁴“How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

⁵Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. ⁶Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. ⁷You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

⁹“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

¹⁰“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? ¹¹Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. ¹²I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? ¹³No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. ¹⁴Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, [Note: “lifted up” means “exalted,” but also hints at the coming crucifixion] ¹⁵that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

¹⁶For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. ¹⁷For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

First, it is important to note that although we often hear stories about how the Pharisees made attempts to trick or trap Jesus, and how Jesus often criticized the Pharisees in return, Nicodemus was a Pharisee. Not only that, he was a member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council, and we know that he came to Jesus as a representative of others because he begins his talk with Jesus with a statement in the plural saying, ““Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God.” This tells us that at least some of the Pharisees and the members of the Sanhedrin knew that Jesus was a teacher that had been sent by God and they agreed that the signs and miracles that Jesus had performed were certain evidence of this. But Jesus replies that simply knowing, academically, that Jesus had been sent by God was not enough. In order to be credited with God’s righteousness, you must not only be born physically, but also be born of the Spirit of God. In order to go to heaven, you must have faith and trust in God and in his son Jesus Christ.

What Jesus is saying, is that simply being born is not enough. Depending on your Jewish heritage and the covenant of God with Israel was not enough. Following the Law of Moses, the Commandments, and the rules of the Pharisees, was not enough. Living a “good” life and being a “good” person is not enough. Simply being alive is not enough.

There is more to life than living.

Real life is more than living.

Of all the people that gathered to watch the Great Blondin cross the chasm at Niagara Falls, only two had real faith in his ability. It wasn’t enough to believe that Blondin was capable of crossing the chasm at Niagara Falls. Simply believing that he could do it didn’t demonstrate faith or trust. The two that had real faith were willing to get into the wheelbarrow or climb up on his back.

Likewise, it isn’t enough to simply believe that Jesus has been sent by God. It isn’t enough to know, academically, that Jesus has been sent by God. It isn’t enough to believe, academically, that Jesus is the Son of God, and the savior and rescuer of all humanity.

We have to be willing to trust him enough to get in the wheelbarrow. We have to be willing to trust Jesus with our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

There is more to life than living.

Real life, which is eternal life, is lived by trusting Jesus with everything that we are, everything that we have, and everything that we hope for the future. We have to put our faith and trust in him and be willing to answer his call to “Go” wherever he sends us.

And so we return to the question that we started with.

How much do you trust?

Do you trust Jesus enough; do you have faith enough, to get in the wheelbarrow?

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^* You have been reading a message presented at Trinity United Methodist Church on the date noted on the first page. Rev. John Partridge is the pastor at Trinity of Perry Heights in Massillon, Ohio. Duplication of this message is a part of our Media ministry, if you have received a blessing in this way, we would love to hear from you. Letters and donations in support of the Media ministry may be sent to Trinity United Methodist Church, 3757 Lincoln Way E., Massillon, Ohio 44646. These messages are available to anyone regardless of membership. You may subscribe to these messages by writing to the address noted, or by contacting us at subscribe@trinityperryheights.org. To subscribe to the electronic version sign up at http://eepurl.com/vAlYn. These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.wordpress.com/. All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.