suffering

Rejoice: God’s Promise or Restoration and Joy

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Rome, Religion, Remove, Rejoice

December 15, 2024*

By Pastor John Partridge

Zephaniah 3:14-20                Luke 3:7-18                Philippians 4:4-7

For much of Israel’s history, including today, things were not perfect. While there were lengthy periods of peace, those periods of peace were often under the rule of foreign empires or less than ideal kings. And, if we’re honest, the same thing can be said about much of the world and about much of history. Although we often speak fondly of American history, we also admit that those periods struggled with slavery, discrimination, and the mistreatment of women, minorities, and anyone who failed to fit the mold that society had declared to be normal, as well as denying opportunity and accessibility for persons with disabilities. Whenever we become wistful for “the good old days,” it is always worth considering for whom those days were good.

But all that is simply to say, that throughout history, we nearly always find ourselves looking forward to something better. No matter how good or how peaceful a time each generation finds itself in, there is almost always something that needs to be improved upon and some segment of that society that has been left out of whatever peace and prosperity everyone admires. But in looking forward to something better, we are reminded of the promises that God made to the nation of Israel, to the world, and to us.

We begin this morning reading one such promise recorded about seven hundred years before the birth of Jesus, by the prophet Zephaniah, a fourth-generation descendant of Israel’s King Hezekiah and likely a member of Israel’s royalty and frequent visitor to the halls of political power and the king’s court. But the message that Zephaniah delivers is not good news. It is, instead, an announcement of God’s judgement against Israel and the destruction that would come at the hands of the Babylonian empire. And yet, included alongside harsh and explicit descriptions of the suffering that Israel would endure, Zephaniah also proclaims God’s promises of mercy and restoration. And we find these as we read from Zephaniah 3:14-20:

14 Sing, Daughter Zion;
    shout aloud, Israel!
Be glad and rejoice with all your heart,
    Daughter Jerusalem!
15 The Lord has taken away your punishment,
    he has turned back your enemy.
The Lord, the King of Israel, is with you;
    never again will you fear any harm.
16 On that day
    they will say to Jerusalem,
“Do not fear, Zion;
    do not let your hands hang limp.
17 The Lord your God is with you,
    the Mighty Warrior who saves.
He will take great delight in you;
    in his love he will no longer rebuke you,
    but will rejoice over you with singing.”

18 “I will remove from you
    all who mourn over the loss of your appointed festivals,
    which is a burden and reproach for you.
19 At that time I will deal
    with all who oppressed you.
I will rescue the lame;
    I will gather the exiles.
I will give them praise and honor
    in every land where they have suffered shame.
20 At that time I will gather you;
    at that time I will bring you home.
I will give you honor and praise
    among all the peoples of the earth
when I restore your fortunes
    before your very eyes,”
says the Lord.

Although Zephaniah proclaims God’s judgement and Israel’s future destruction, he also tells of a time when God will take away their punishment, turn back their enemies, and once again brings peace to his people. Zephaniah says that a day will come when God will deal with all those who oppress the people of Israel, a day when God will rescue the lame, return the exiles from the four corners of the earth, restore their fortunes, and give them praise and honor among the nations of the world.

And God’s people remembered the words of Zephaniah as they waited for the fall of Babylon, and then again during the rule of the Persians, and then the Greeks, and then the Romans, and then a dozen other empires throughout history. But clearly, as Luke describes the ministry of Jesus, it is Rome that the people would have had in mind. And in that time, we hear these words in Luke 3:7-18:

7 John said to the crowds coming out to be baptized by him, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. 9 The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.”

10 “What should we do then?” the crowd asked.

11 John answered, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same.”

12 Even tax collectors came to be baptized. “Teacher,” they asked, “what should we do?”

13 “Don’t collect any more than you are required to,” he told them.

14 Then some soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”

He replied, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”

15 The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Messiah. 16 John answered them all, “I baptize you withwater. But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you withthe Holy Spirit and fire. 17 His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” 18 And with many other words John exhorted the people and proclaimed the good news to them.

Calling the people a brood of vipers is a harsh way of beginning a conversation, but I suspect that although John had been preaching and baptizing for some time, the moment that Luke records for us here is one in which it had become… shall we say… “popular” for people to say that they had seen John. If that is the case, then this is the moment when the politicians, religious leaders, and others who didn’t really care that much about repentance or renewal came to hear John. They hadn’t left their comfortable offices because they were particularly interested in John’s message but had done so because everybody was talking about him, their curiosity was aroused, and because they didn’t want to feel left out of the conversation because they were the only ones who hadn’t seen him.

And so, John sees those who were merely curious mixed in with those who were honestly seeking and he asks then, “Who warned you about the judgement and destruction that is coming?” John tells them that the thing to do is not to wander out into the desert to hear him preach, but to produce the real fruit of real repentance instead of resting on your family history because family history and faithful ancestors is not a plan that’s going to work. John says that God is already moving to cut down the family tree in which you live unless he finds that tree producing fruit.

In answer to several specific questions about what producing fruit looks like, John says that it looks like sharing what you have, not padding your billing, not stealing from others or using your power to extort money from others but to be content with what you are paid honestly. But John goes on to say that the long-awaited messiah is already on the way, and it is he that will bring in God’s harvest and burn up the chaff. And this is important. Everyone there had some idea of who the chaff would have been as God sorted through the people of Israel. They probably assumed that the chaff would be the military that occupied their nation, the politicians that constantly divided the people, and the religious leaders who divided into factions and confused the people about what God taught. But John’s message continued and in it he encouraged the people to repent and change their lives, to follow God, to produce fruit, and proclaimed the good news of God’s rescue.

And while we need to take all of John’s message to heart, today, as we celebrate the third Sunday of Advent, we particularly take note of that last bit about the good news of God’s rescue. It is this good news that the angel spoke of when appearing to shepherds saying, “I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people.”

And Paul expands upon that in his letter to the church in Philippi and gives all of us some advice on how we are to live as the followers of Jesus Christ. In Philippians 4:4-7 Paul says:

4 Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5 Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Rejoice. Doesn’t that fit with the theme of joy that we remember on this third Sunday of Advent? Rejoice! Rejoice that we have heard the good news of Jesus Christ. Rejoice that we have been rescued from sin and death. Rejoice that we have been forgiven. Rejoice that we have an intimate relationship with the creator of the universe. Rejoice that we can lift our thoughts and our voices in prayer. Rejoice that we are not, and will never be, alone. Rejoice that we have been adopted as the sons and daughters of the king of the universe. Rejoice that we are God’s people and the brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ. We have ample reason to rejoice.

But, as God’s people, as a people who are called to rejoice and to live lives that are filled with joy, what does that look like? And to that, Paul says, be gentle. Be so gentle that it will be evident and obvious to everyone around you. Live your life so that the world will know that God is near to you. Do not be anxious, don’t let your life be filled with worry, but always take your concerns to God in prayer, always give thanks to God for what he has given to you, and always feel free to ask God for the things that you need. Be filled with God’s peace and guard your hearts and your minds so that you never allow yourself to turn away from Jesus, or from the path and the calling to which he has called you.

Rejoice. Be filled with joy. And live a life that honors God, produces fruit, and reflects your relationship with Jesus Christ so that through you, and through your actions, the people around you can see Jesus…

…and feel his love.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

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Facing the End of the World

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Facing the End of the World

November 17, 2024*

By Pastor John Partridge

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

What do you do when the bottom drops out of your life? Or when the other shoe drops, or when bad goes to worse, or it’s more sickness than health, poorer instead of richer, and worse instead of better? The people that we meet in today’s scriptures either find themselves in those kinds of circumstances, or they are considering times that sound like the end of the world, or that actually is the end of the world.

We begin this morning with the story of Elkanah and his two wives Hannah and Peninnah. The prophet Samuel tells us that while Peninnah had children, Hannah had none. And every year, Elkanah went to Shiloh to worship and to offer sacrifices to God in the place where Eli, and his sons Hophni and Phinehas, were the priests of the lord. But we are told, in 1 Samuel 1:4-20, that…

4 Whenever the day came for Elkanah to sacrifice, he would give portions of the meat to his wife Peninnah and to all her sons and daughters. 5 But to Hannah he gave a double portion because he loved her, and the Lord had closed her womb. 6 Because the Lord had closed Hannah’s womb, her rival kept provoking her in order to irritate her. 7 This went on year after year. Whenever Hannah went up to the house of the Lord, her rival provoked her till she wept and would not eat. 8 Her husband Elkanah would say to her, “Hannah, why are you weeping? Why don’t you eat? Why are you downhearted? Don’t I mean more to you than ten sons?”

9 Once when they had finished eating and drinking in Shiloh, Hannah stood up. Now Eli the priest was sitting on his chair by the doorpost of the Lord’s house. 10 In her deep anguish Hannah prayed to the Lord, weeping bitterly. 11 And she made a vow, saying, “Lord Almighty, if you will only look on your servant’s misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then I will give him to the Lord for all the days of his life, and no razor will ever be used on his head.”

12 As she kept on praying to the Lord, Eli observed her mouth. 13 Hannah was praying in her heart, and her lips were moving but her voice was not heard. Eli thought she was drunk 14 and said to her, “How long are you going to stay drunk? Put away your wine.”

15 “Not so, my lord,” Hannah replied, “I am a woman who is deeply troubled. I have not been drinking wine or beer; I was pouring out my soul to the Lord. 16 Do not take your servant for a wicked woman; I have been praying here out of my great anguish and grief.”

17 Eli answered, “Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked of him.”

18 She said, “May your servant find favor in your eyes.” Then she went her way and ate something, and her face was no longer downcast.

19 Early the next morning they arose and worshiped before the Lord and then went back to their home at Ramah. Elkanah made love to his wife Hannah, and the Lord remembered her. 20 So in the course of time Hannah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Samuel, saying, “Because I asked the Lord for him.”

In a world where children, and the ability to bear children, was an indication of God’s blessing, Hannah, although she was dearly loved by her husband, was childless. Because of that, her husband’s second wife, Peninnah, tormented Hannah relentlessly. And so, while the modern catchphrase says that we should dance like no one is watching, that is how Hannah prayed before God. She went to the holy place of God at Shiloh, she got physically as close to God as she was able, so close that Eli could hear her weeping from his chair at the doorway, and she poured out her heart to God.

Because of her faith and her passion, before she left, Eli assured her that God had heard her prayer, and when she returned, she brought her son, whom she had named Samuel, because in Hebrew “Samuel” sounds like “heard by God.”

And then, in Mark 13:1-8, we find Jesus throwing a wet blanket over the enthusiasm of his disciples. They are excited to be in the big city of Jerusalem, excited to worship in God’s temple, and thrilled at all the magnificent architecture that surrounds them. And Jesus’ response is to announce that all these incredible, expensive, labor intensive, buildings that had taken decades to build, and some of which were already hundreds of years old, would one day be destroyed and thrown down like a child casting aside broken toys.

13:1 As Jesus was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, “Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!”

2 “Do you see all these great buildings?” replied Jesus. “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down.”

3 As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked him privately, 4 “Tell us, when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are all about to be fulfilled?”

5 Jesus said to them: “Watch out that no one deceives you. 6 Many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and will deceive many. 7 When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 8 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.

Jesus doesn’t rain on the disciples’ parade and spoil their mood of excitement just to be mean, his intent is to tell them something about the future. Jesus tells them that as great as things are, as wonderful as it might have been to be a part of the Roman Empire, and to live during the great Pax Romana, or Roman peace, none of those things were going to last forever. There is an idea from the Enlightenment period that says humanity is on a relentless and unstoppable climb to perfection, and while we still hear that idea resonating in the twenty-first century, Jesus says that things will not always get better. Tomorrow will not always be better than today, and the future will not always be better than the past. Jesus says that even the great buildings of the Roman Empire and of Herod the Great will be cast down, wars will still be fought, and earthquakes, famine, and other natural disasters will still claim victims before God will bring about the end of the world. And in those future days, many will stand before the world and claim to be Jesus, or claim to be sent by Jesus, and many people will be deceived by such charlatans. But the people of God, and the followers of Jesus Christ, must remain faithful to what we have been taught while also being vigilant and careful.

And then, in Hebrews 10:11-14, 19-25, Paul repeats a message that we heard last week, that Jesus has taken away the need to make sacrifices for sin, and then offers the followers of Jesus some advice on how we should behave, and what we should do as we face hard times, struggles, disasters, and the end of world… together. Paul says…

11 Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again, and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. 12 But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, 13 and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool. 14 For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, 25 not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Paul begins by repeating the message we heard last week, that the human priests that worked in the temple of Jerusalem offered sacrifices for sin over and over again, for hundreds, even thousands of years, but Jesus’ sacrifice was offered once and his sacrifice was enough to remove the sins of all humanity for all time. Because of that, Paul says, we were given a new way to enter the presence of God. In the temple, there was a great curtain that separated the world from the holy of holies, the place where the Arc of the Covenant was kept and the place where God rested his feet upon the earth. But that curtain was split from floor to ceiling as Jesus died on the cross, and Paul says that a new and living way, through the body of Christ, was opened for us to enter the house of God. And so, Paul encourages us to hold tightly to what we have been taught and what we have believed, to remain faithful, to encourage one another to do good and to be loving, to continue meeting together as the gathered body of Christ and to encourage and support one another as we struggle through the difficulties of life.

But more than that, Paul says, as we face hardship, disasters, and the end of the world, we should not give up doing these things but should instead commit to doing them even more. When we face the end of the world, when the disasters, suffering, and pain of our lives make it seem like the end of the world, in personal ways as it did for Hannah in her childlessness, or in national ways like the destruction of the temple and all of Jerusalem, we should not walk away from God, but redouble our efforts to draw closer to him as Hannah did. To pour out our hearts to God in prayer, but also to draw closer to one another as the body of Christ, do good deeds for the people around us, to love one another, support one another, and to encourage one another because our suffering will always be greater when we are alone, and becomes less and less when we are together.

Often, you have heard me encourage you to invite others to visit our church but that isn’t so that our church will grow, although that is also likely to happen. The reason that we invite others to our church is because this is a place of hope.

And this is a place of hope because we are a people of hope.

Hope is greater, love is greater, and life is better… when we are together.

Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

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Pentecost and the Politics of Pain

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Pentecost and the Politics of Pain

(Pentecost)

May 19, 2024*

By Pastor John Partridge

John 15:26-16:15                   Acts 2:1-21                 Romans 8:22-27

If you have any empathy at all and have watched the news at any time in the last several years, you just might despair for the state of our planet and its people. The United States is struggling with issues of race more than 150 years after the Civil War. South Africa continues to grapple with their racial issues thirty years after the end of Apartheid.  Russia remains intent upon regaining control of Ukraine and other nations over which it once held sway during the years of the Soviet Union. Israel and Hamas continue to fight one another with far reaching calamity in an enormous city filled with civilians. Genocidal acts continue to be perpetrated against Christians and their churches in Nigeria. China continues to persecute ethnic minorities, Christians, and anyone else that might be perceived as a thread to the communist party. Venezuela’s political conflict has so utterly crashed its economy that people are said to be eating rats, pigeons, and dogs to survive. And, unfortunately, that’s just the beginning. The more we read about what is going on, the more we weep over the state of our planet.

But surely it will get better, right? Or maybe we’re just in a bad place at this present moment and it goes in some kind of cycle. And, while that might seem to be true locally, I don’t know that such a thing has ever been true when we look at the world as a whole unless, of course, we simply go back to a time when there weren’t many people at all, but even then life, and survival, was often simply brutal.

That’s a harsh assessment, but is there any good news?

Of course there is. But before we get to the good news, let’s look at the promise that Jesus made to his disciples after the resurrection but before his ascension into heaven. For that, let’s begin with Jesus’ own words carried to us by the Apostle John in John 15:26-16:15, where Jesus says:

26 “When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father—the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father—he will testify about me. 27 And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning.

16:1 “All this I have told you so that you will not fall away. 2 They will put you out of the synagogue; in fact, the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they are offering a service to God. 3 They will do such things because they have not known the Father or me. 4 I have told you this, so that when their time comes you will remember that I warned you about them. I did not tell you this from the beginning because I was with you, 5 but now I am going to him who sent me. None of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 Rather, you are filled with grief because I have said these things. 7 But very truly I tell you, it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. 8 When he comes, he will prove the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment: 9 about sin, because people do not believe in me; 10 about righteousness, because I am going to the Father, where you can see me no longer; 11 and about judgment, because the prince of this world now stands condemned.

12 “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. 13 But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. 14 He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. 15 All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.”

Jesus foretells of his return to heaven but promises that when he goes, he will send the Spirit of God, the Advocate, to earth in his place. The Advocate, Jesus says, will prove to the world that they were wrong about sin and righteousness, and wrong about judgement. The Spirit will also guide the followers of Jesus toward the truth. That doesn’t mean that Christians will have any sort of monopoly on truth, but that, over time, as we follow him, we will move away from falsehood and closer to the truth.

These are important promises, not only because our world seems to be broken and we need to have some good news, but because both individually and collectively we find that its far too easy to wander into half-truths, falsehood, fake news, propaganda, and delusion and we need help to stay focused and guided toward the truth. But as important as Jesus’ promise was, perhaps even more important is the fulfillment of that promise on the day of Pentecost that we see in Acts 2:1-21, which says:

2:1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tonguesas the Spirit enabled them.

5 Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. 6 When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. 7 Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? 9 Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!” 12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?”

13 Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.”

14 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. 15 These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! 16 No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

17 “‘In the last days, God says,
    I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions,
    your old men will dream dreams.
18 Even on my servants, both men and women,
    I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.
19 I will show wonders in the heavens above and signs on the earth below,
    blood and fire and billows of smoke. 20 The sun will be turned to darkness
    and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
21 And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Jesus returns to his home in heaven and, in fulfillment of his promise, sends the Spirit of God to earth and in a visible and unmistakable way, the Spirit arrives and enters into the disciples and other followers of Jesus Christ that were waiting for its arrival. Jews from all over the known world had gathered in Jerusalem to celebrate a Jewish holy day, and all of them heard the disciples preaching in their own unique languages and dialects.

This begins the fulfillment of the promise that Jesus made, but it is not the complete fulfillment. An undeniable miracle happens in full view of hundreds of unbelievers and the world sees that the power of God lives in the message of Jesus and the disciples. But has this proven the wrong of sin to the entire world? No. And has it guided them to the truth? Not everyone.

And what about the darkness and evil that we see throughout history and in the world in which we now live? It is obvious that pain and suffering and the politics that often perpetuate it haven’t gone away. And so, it’s fair to ask, “What role does the Spirit have in the world?” “What role does the church, and its members have?”, and “What does God expects of us?” We gain insight into these questions from the words of Paul in his letter to the church in Rome found in Romans 8:22-27 where he says:

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

Paul openly admits that all of creation groans as if it were in labor and giving birth because of the pain, suffering, injustice, darkness, and evil that is in the world. In short, the world sucks. But amid that groaning of creation is the inward groaning and anticipation of our adoption, redemption, and a new life in God’s recreated and perfect world that is yet to come. Although we live in a world that is suffering and broken, we have hope in what is yet to come. And as we wait patiently in hope, the Spirit of God helps us in all our weaknesses, all our shortcomings, all our faults, and all the places that we just… aren’t enough. Even when we are so frightened, frustrated, angry, confused, irritated, broken, hurt, suffering, or otherwise unable to find words to pray, the Spirit of God intercedes for us and interprets our groans, and the feelings of our hearts, puts words to them, and carries those prayers to the throne of God.

Despite the constant barrage of unwelcome news and the politics of pain, the good news of Pentecost is that God is with us, that God loves us, cares for us, intercedes for us, and even puts words to our prayers of groaning even when we can’t find words for ourselves. In a world full of suffering and pain, the clear message of scripture is filled with hope because it tells us that…

… we… are not… alone.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Hope for the World

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Hope for the World

April 21, 2024*

By Pastor John Partridge

Luke 24:36b-48                     Acts 3:12-19               1 John 3:1-7

The question that we asked last week was “What comes next?” And we asked what we were supposed to do with what we had learned from the stories that we read during Lent and about the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ at Easter. And although we looked at some examples of what the disciples did, and, I hope, better understood what God commands us to do with the story of the resurrection and the message of the gospel, there is another question that was left unanswered. And the unanswered question is… why.

Why does God call us to share the good news of Jesus Christ? Why are we supposed to share our stories and the stories of scripture? Why are we commanded to inconvenience ourselves by having uncomfortable conversations about eternity with our friends, family, and people everywhere?

And so that’s the question that we’re going to dig into this morning, but, to do that, we are going to start in the same place that we started last week, and with the same story, but this time reading from the gospel of Luke, instead of the gospel of John that we read last week. We begin with what should be a familiar story in Luke 24:36b-48, which says…

36 While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”

37 They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. 38 He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? 39 Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”

40 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. 41 And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate it in their presence.

44 He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”

45 Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. 46 He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47 and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things.

Just like we heard last week, Jesus begins his time with the disciples by saying “Peace be with you” just because, knowing full-well that Jesus was dead, seeing him appear in the middle of the room scared the dickens out of them and everyone thought that he must be a ghost.  But Jesus calms them down, allows them to touch him to understand that he is both alive and solid, and even eats in their presence because, I suppose, logically, dead guys and ghosts don’t eat. But then Jesus gets to the important stuff and reminds them that what they have seen in his death and resurrection is nothing less than the fulfillment of dozens of ancient prophecies that they had all read in the Law of Moses, in the writing of the prophets, and in the Psalms. Jesus connected the dots between what they knew about the scriptures, the promised Messiah, and what they had seen in Jesus so that they understood that he was indeed the Messiah that Israel had been promised.

And then Jesus answers the “so what” question. Jesus says that the next step that must come, the next thing that must happen after the arrival of the Messiah, is that people need to repent and be forgiven of their sins, and the good news must be preached to all the nations of the world. In addition, having said that, Jesus declares that the disciples, and the other followers that were there, are witnesses of what had happened. The clear implication is that Jesus is commanding them to go and preach to the nations of the world because they were the people who had witnessed what had happened.

And so, the disciples begin to do exactly that. They are transformed from being scared men and women who meet in private behind closed doors and start to preach the message of Jesus Christ in public places and even in the Temple itself in full view of the priests, Pharisees, Sadducees, and the soldiers of the Roman Tenth Legion. In Acts 3:12-19, Peter heals a lame man whom everyone had seen begging at the gates of the temple, brings him into the temple courts, and everyone crowded around them asking questions and trying to understand what had happened.

11 While the man held on to Peter and John, all the people were astonished and came running to them in the place called Solomon’s Colonnade. 12 When Peter saw this, he said to them: “Fellow Israelites, why does this surprise you? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk? 13 The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus. You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate, though he had decided to let him go. 14 You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. 15 You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this. 16 By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has completely healed him, as you can all see.

17 “Now, fellow Israelites, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did your leaders. 18 But this is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, saying that his Messiah would suffer. 19 Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, 20 and that he may send the Messiah, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus.

And it is here that Peter says exactly those things that Jesus commanded them to say, that they were witnesses, that Jesus died, that God raised him from the dead, and that by repenting, turning to God, and putting our faith in Jesus, our sins are forgiven, wiped out, and erased as if they never happened so that we can rest and be refreshed in the presence of God.

But that still doesn’t answer the question of why. So far, what we’ve seen isn’t much different than what we saw last week. Jesus sends the disciples out, they go out, they perform miracles, and they preach because they were the people who had witnessed Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection. But how does that connect to us, and why are we called to share what we know if we weren’t the people who witnessed these events firsthand? And we hear the answer in the letter of 1 John 3:1-7, which was written, by the Apostle John, to the churches of in the Roman province of Asia between the years 85 and 95 AD as he says…

3:1 See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears,[a] we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. 3 All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

4 Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. 5 But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. 6 No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.

7 Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous.

John says that even if we weren’t there to see it all unfold firsthand, we have still experienced the loved of God in a lavish and extraordinary way as we have been adopted into God’s family and declared to be the children of God. But John reminds us that not everyone knows the love of God or has experienced the lavish gift of adoption into God’s family. And because others have not heard the Good News, have not been adopted, and have not experienced the lavish love of God, they live without hope.

Let me say that again and let it sink in, all who have this hope in him, purify themselves just as Christ is pure. But the people who haven’t heard the Good News live without hope. We live in a world that is filled with sadness, darkness, hopelessness, and despair. Imagine watching the evening news, reading your newspaper or your morning internet news feed, seeing all of the death, destruction, warfare, violence, bloodshed, greed, suffering, corruption, and outright evil splashed across your screens and into your eyeballs every day without a shred of hope that it will ever get better, without hope that there is a better day coming, without hope that there is a God who cares, without hope that there will ever be justice for the poor and the oppressed, and without hope that there is anything at all beyond the veil of death. That is the reality for all those who have not heard and understood the message of Jesus Christ.

And that’s the answer to the question of why God has called us to share the story of the gospel, of Easter, and the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The answer to why, is simply because each of you, each of us, is the last guardian, the last bastion… of hope.

What kind of human being would watch a child drown when they only had to reach out their hand to save them?

But we live in a world full of people who are drowning in hopelessness.

And we are called to reach out our hands… and share the hope that we have.

Please LIKE and SHARE!

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Click here if you would like to subscribe to Pastor John’s weekly messages.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Photo by firehawk77 on Freeimages.com

Is The Lord Among Us… Or Not?

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Complaints and Test Questions

October 01, 2023*

By Pastor John Partridge

Exodus 17:1-7                        Matthew 21:23-32                             Philippians 2:1-13

Have you ever had a time in your life that you just wondered what God was up to? I’m thinking about a time in your life when things were weird, difficult, or nearly impossible, and you wondered why you were there, why God was allowing those things to happen, or how those things could possibly fit into God’s plan for your life. There is a curse in Deuteronomy 28:23 that calls up an image of the heavens being made of bronze so that prayers just bounce off without reaching God and some of us have had times that felt like that too, that our prayers went nowhere and remained unanswered. And, because we have passed through difficult times, we appreciate the pain and the struggle of others that are facing those trials today. And that’s why, as much as we spoke last week about the whining and complaining of the Israelites in the desert, we completely understand how they might struggle with a lack of faith when facing that kind of hardship. It is during these difficult times that we ask hard questions and that’s exactly what God’s people did in Exodus 17:1-7.

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. 2 So 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?”

3 But 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?”

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

5 The 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. 6 I 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. 7 And he called the place Massah [which means testing] and Meribah [which means quarrelling] because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”

Is the Lord among us… or not?

If we’re honest, that’s a question that we have asked before, personally, as a church, and as a denomination.

Is the Lord among us… or not?

During our personal struggles with divorce, drugs, alcohol, physical or emotional abuse, unemployment, the loss of loved ones, physical illness, mental illness, depression, and a host of other things, we may well have asked ourselves if God had forgotten us. As we have watched our denomination tear itself apart, we may have asked if we had gone so far wrong that God no longer cared, and certainly, as a church that once worshiped hundreds every Sunday, and that had to build an education wing just to make room for all their children, at some point, or at many points along the road to having only fifty in worship some Sundays, we have probably asked… Is the Lord among us… or not?

But you will notice that the story of God’s people did not end when they asked the question. The story didn’t end in the desert, but neither did God miraculously rescue them before they had spent forty years in the desert and learned a few things about faith and trust. Despite their questions, and despite their struggles, God never abandoned his people, and we have confidence that God has not, and will not, abandon us either.

But in Matthew 21:23-32, the chief priest and the elders asked Jesus a different sort of question.

23 Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him. “By what authority are you doing these things?” they asked. “And who gave you this authority?”

24 Jesus replied, “I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. 25 John’s baptism—where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?”

They discussed it among themselves and said, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will ask, ‘Then why didn’t you believe him?’ 26 But if we say, ‘Of human origin’—we are afraid of the people, for they all hold that John was a prophet.”

27 So they answered Jesus, “We don’t know.”

Then he said, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.

28 “What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’

29 “‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went.

30 “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.

31 “Which of the two did what his father wanted?”

“The first,” they answered.

Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. 32 For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.

Do you see the difference in the kind of question that the elders are asking in comparison to the question that God’s people were asking in the story of Exodus? In Exodus they just wanted to know if God had abandoned them, but here, the priests and the elders are asking “who gave you permission” to say the things that you are saying? They aren’t concerned about God being with Jesus as much as they are concerned about power structures, and who gave permission. Worse, having asked the question, the elders are so concerned about how the people would react to their answer, that they refuse to answer Jesus’ question at all. For them, politics, power, and appearances are more important than honesty and integrity. And when Jesus sees that, he tells a parable that reveals the truth. Because the elders of the church love politics and power more than they love God, the tax collectors, prostitutes, and other outcasts who repent are moving up the line and entering the kingdom of God ahead of them because the outcasts understood that a life of obedience to God was more important than money, power, politics, or appearances.

This understanding is the key to the message of Paul that we find in Philippians 2:1-13 when he says…

2:1 Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

6 Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!

9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.

12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.

Paul says that he would be filled with joy if the church would just work together, love together, and look to the interests of others rather than their own.  The key to a healthy church, and to healthy relationships is to have the same mindset as Jesus, to live and to love like Jesus. We work out our salvation by allowing God to work in us and through us.  God works in us as he transforms us into the likeness of Christ, and through us as he works in the world to accomplish his mission and purpose.

Despite our questions, despite our struggles, and despite our complaining, we have confidence that God has not, and will not, abandon us. But we must fight against our culture and the way that we are told that world works, and remember that a life of obedience to God is more important than money, power, politics, or keeping up appearances. Our goal is not to be important, influential, powerful, famous, rich, or to be adored and admired. Our goal is to be obedient so that God can transform us into his image, and work through us for the transformation of the world.

Please LIKE and SHARE!

Click here to subscribe to Pastor John’s blog.

Click here if you would like to subscribe to Pastor John’s weekly messages.

Click here to visit Pastor John’s YouTube channel.

*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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Suck It Up!

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Suck It Up!

September 24, 2023*

By Pastor John Partridge

Exodus 16:1-15                      Matthew 20:1-16                               Philippians 1:21-30

How long does it take you to get a bad attitude?

For example, if you had an absolutely great day today, on par with getting a great promotion at work, getting married, watching one of your children being born, or maybe the ribbon cutting for your own business or the completion of a project in which you invested years of your time, blood, sweat and tears, how long do those good feeling last? After you have one of those “mountain top” experiences, how long can it be before you get grumpy and have a bad attitude again?

I know that sometimes, it doesn’t take much.  Sometimes you can have an absolutely awesome day, come home, step in dog poop in the front yard… when you don’t even own a dog, and before you even get in the door you are on a collision course for a full-on grump.

And that seems to be exactly what we’re looking at in our scripture lesson today from the story of the Exodus. The official lectionary selection skips the first verse, but I put it back in because it tells us just how long much time has passed between the really awesome things that happened to the people of Israel, like the Passover, their rescue from slavery, their journey out of Egypt and into freedom, witnessing the physical manifestation of God in the pillar of cloud and fire, the parting of the Red Sea, and the destruction of the Egyptian army. These were all awesome and amazing things and, if you recall from last week, everybody swore that because of what they had witnessed, they would choose to follow God.

But those things began on the fifteenth day of the first month of their new year and as we read together, I want you to notice that the part of the story that we’re reading today from Exodus 16:1-15, happens on the fifteenth day of the second month. Only one month after Passover, and maybe a week after the crossing of the Red Sea.

16:1 The whole Israelite community set out from Elim and came to the Desert of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had come out of Egypt. 2 In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. 3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”

4 Then the Lord said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions. 5 On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.”

6 So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you will know that it was the Lord who brought you out of Egypt, 7 and in the morning, you will see the glory of the Lord, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we, that you should grumble against us?” 8 Moses also said, “You will know that it was the Lord when he gives you meat to eat in the evening and all the bread you want in the morning, because he has heard your grumbling against him. Who are we? You are not grumbling against us, but against the Lord.”

9 Then Moses told Aaron, “Say to the entire Israelite community, ‘Come before the Lord, for he has heard your grumbling.’”

10 While Aaron was speaking to the whole Israelite community, they looked toward the desert, and there was the glory of the Lord appearing in the cloud.

11 The Lord said to Moses, 12 “I have heard the grumbling of the Israelites. Tell them, ‘At twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning, you will be filled with bread. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God.’”

13 That evening quail came and covered the camp, and in the morning, there was a layer of dew around the camp. 14 When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor. 15 When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was.

Once the pressure was gone and the excitement wore off, just as it does for the rest of us three thousand years later, the realities of ordinary life slapped the children of Israel right in the face. Once they had crossed the Red Sea, they were still in the middle of a desert and much like human beings have always done, even in the best of situations, and even after one of the most incredible mountain top experiences in the history of the world, they started to complain. Our scripture said that the entire community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. (reading with the most whiney voice you can imagine) “It’s too hot. There’s not enough water. We ate better when we were slaves. We would be better off if we were dead. You only brought us out here to die.”

But apparently God was still in a good mood because he heard their whiney complaints and, in the evening, he sent flocks of quail that covered the camp, and in the morning, he sent flakes of dew that dried like bread. No one had ever seen anything like it before and so they asked, “What is it?” which has been transliterated from the Hebrew as… manna. Manna literally means, “What is it?”

God had promised to care for the people of Israel, and he fully intended to keep that promise even if they whined about it.

Whining, grumbling, and complaining seem to be part and parcel of human life and have been since before humans developed language. The Israelites grumbled within a week or two of witnessing one of the most amazing rescues in the history of the world and, in Matthew 20:1-16, Jesus tells a parable in which he predicts his followers will grumble and complain about heaven itself. This is important because this parable is literally about us, about our church, and about how we feel entitled to tell God how to conduct his business.

20:1 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

3 “About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4 He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ 5 So they went.

“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. 6 About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’

7 “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.

“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’

8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’

9 “The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12 ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’

13 “But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? 14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’

16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

The owner of the vineyard goes into the marketplace around six o’clock in the morning to the place where day laborers congregate looking for work and he hires everyone that he can find. He still doesn’t have enough people to get the work done as quickly as it needs to be done, and so he returns every three hours for the rest of the day and, each time, hires everyone that he can find. His only promise to them is that “I will pay you whatever is right.”

At the end of the day, the guys who worked for one hour were given a denarius, which was the common amount for a full-day’s wage. So, of course since these guys got a full day’s pay for one hour of work, the men who had been there longer, and especially the ones who had been there for fourteen hours, simply assumed that they would get more. But they didn’t. And they grumbled, whined, and complained about it. And, if we’re honest, you would certainly hear the same complaints today about fairness, favoritism, and preferential treatment, and all sorts of other accusations.

But the landowner said, “Didn’t you agree to work for one denarius? And didn’t I pay you one denarius? And don’t I have the right to pay my employees generously if choose to do so? So, are you angry because I am generous?” And that message kind of sticks in our craw and rubs our twenty first century, American sensibilities wrong. To us that sounds unfair. But what’s worse, is that at the beginning of the story, Jesus said, “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out…” That makes our discomfort over this apparent unfairness worse, because basically Jesus just told us that the landowner is God and it’s God who is acting in ways that we perceive as being unfair.

There’s more, but hold on to that for a bit until we read two paragraphs from Paul’s letter to the Philippians 1:21-30 where he says:

21 For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. 22 If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! 23 I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; 24 but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. 25 Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith, 26 so that through my being with you again your boasting in Christ Jesus will abound on account of me.

27 Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel 28 without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved—and that by God. 29 For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him, 30 since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had, and now hear that I still have.

By this time in Paul’s life, his health is failing. As he writes this letter, he is most likely on house arrest in Rome, but he has, on quite a few occasions, been imprisoned in far worse places like Caesarea, Ephesus, and a few others. Some of those prison cells were just cold, damp, dark, pits in the ground. Paul’s eyesight was failing, and his health was poor, and he says that he can either live and work, or he can die and be with Christ. But whatever happens to me, you should quit complaining and live lives that are worthy of Jesus Christ. Paul says, you are going through the same struggles that I had, and still have. You are not the first to suffer or struggle. Get over it.

The message of Exodus is that God sees us when we struggle. Yes, God sent food, but no, God did not rescue the people of Israel from the desert for another 40 years.

The message of Jesus’ parable of the workers is that God can, and will, do what he wants regardless of whether we perceive that as being unfair. The convict at the penitentiary who chooses to follow Jesus moments before his death sentence is carried out, may well get the same reward as some of us who have followed him, worked for him, and sacrificed for him for our entire lives.

And the message of Paul is that we aren’t the first people who struggled from time to time. But when we face struggles and suffering, we should do our best to live up to the examples of the people who have gone before us.

In summary, the message of scripture is to get over it, quit complaining, quit grumbling, stop acting as if we’re entitled to more than we are, trust God to be generous, and just get on with doing the work of God’s kingdom, “striving together as one for the faith of the gospel.”

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

To Heaven, Through Hell

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To Heaven, Through Hell

November 13, 2022*

By Pastor John Partridge

Isaiah 65:17-25                      Luke 21:5-19              2 Thessalonians 3:6-13

Anyone with more than a few laps around the sun is well aware that sometimes life is not a bed of roses, or a bowl of cherries, or however you want to say it, life is not always all that great.  Sometimes it flat-out sucks pond water.  Life is filled with pain, sickness, hurt feelings, tragedy, betrayal, abandonment, loss, suffering, and death.  But it isn’t always bad.  As bad as life can be, and the bad stuff can sometimes last far longer than we’d like, we also know that life can also be filled with joy, healing, excitement, victory, hope, encouragement, friendship, and love.

This understanding is the source of two great quotes that help us to keep our pain in perspective.

Dr. Seuss’s Cat in the Hat said, “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”

When we struggle with death and loss, and when whenever good things end, it helps to remember that the reason that we are mourning, is because of the good things that happened.  But when we are faced with pain in our future, or when we are enduring it in our present, we should remember that Winston Churchill famously said…

“If you’re going through hell, keep going.”

And it is those perspectives that I would like you to keep in mind this morning as we consider where we are going, what we will pass through on the way there, and how should live our lives in the present so that we can keep moving toward our final destination.  We begin this morning reading from Isaiah 65:17-25, as God paints a picture of what life will be like in the world that is to come.

17 “See, I will create new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind.
18 But be glad and rejoice forever in what I will create,
for I will create Jerusalem to be a delight and its people a joy.
19 I will rejoice over Jerusalem and take delight in my people;
the sound of weeping and of crying will be heard in it no more.

20 “Never again will there be in it an infant who lives but a few days,
    or an old man who does not live out his years;
the one who dies at a hundred will be thought a mere child;
the one who fails to reach a hundred will be considered accursed.
21 They will build houses and dwell in them; they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
22 No longer will they build houses and others live in them,  or plant and others eat.
For as the days of a tree, so will be the days of my people;
my chosen ones will long enjoy the work of their hands.
23 They will not labor in vain, nor will they bear children doomed to misfortune;
for they will be a people blessed by the Lord, they and their descendants with them.
24 Before they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.
25 The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox,
    and dust will be the serpent’s food.
They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain,” says the Lord.

God will create a new heaven and a new earth that is fundamentally different from the one in which we live, and we will live there for so long, and our healing will be so complete and enduring, that we will hardly remember the pain and the suffering that we once endured.  Life will no longer be a struggle but will be filled with joy instead of weeping.  Old age will be normal and there will never be the sorrow of mourning the loss of a child.  No longer will people and nations be uprooted by famine, warfare, natural disasters, pestilence, unemployment, taxation, or anything else but God’s people will live, work, grow, plant, and endure in one place, in one home, with their families.  Even the animal kingdom will be changed so that we will have no fear of them, they of us, or them for one another.  God’s promise is that there is a better future for all those who love him.

But that isn’t at all the picture that Jesus draws for his disciples.  The future that Jesus describes reminds us that what God showed to Isaiah is the distant “not yet.”  In between our now, and the “not yet” is more of the ugliness that we have seen throughout history, and worse.  As Jesus and his disciples are walking through Jerusalem, the disciples marvel at the beautiful stonework of the temple and its surroundings.  But Jesus uses those stones as a warning of what is to come.  We hear these words in Luke 21:5-19.

5 Some of his disciples were remarking about how the temple was adorned with beautiful stones and with gifts dedicated to God. But Jesus said, 6 “As for what you see here, the time will come when not one stone will be left on another; every one of them will be thrown down.”

7 “Teacher,” they asked, “when will these things happen? And what will be the sign that they are about to take place?”

8 He replied: “Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time is near.’ Do not follow them. 9 When you hear of wars and uprisings, do not be frightened. These things must happen first, but the end will not come right away.”

10 Then he said to them: “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. 11 There will be great earthquakes, famines and pestilences in various places, and fearful events and great signs from heaven.

12 “But before all this, they will seize you and persecute you. They will hand you over to synagogues and put you in prison, and you will be brought before kings and governors, and all on account of my name. 13 And so you will bear testimony to me. 14 But make up your mind not to worry beforehand how you will defend yourselves. 15 For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist or contradict. 16 You will be betrayed even by parents, brothers and sisters, relatives, and friends, and they will put some of you to death. 17 Everyone will hate you because of me. 18 But not a hair of your head will perish. 19 Stand firm, and you will win life.

Jesus says that his followers will be hated by their families, friends, neighbors, and the entire world simply because of their love for him.  But in the end, we will endure because who and what we are in Jesus Christ endures even beyond death.  The only way that we can lose is to give up.  Stand firm.  Keep moving forward.

“If you’re going through hell, keep going.”

But what does that mean for us today?  How does that inform us, or teach us, about how we might survive, one day at a time, through the weirdness that is life in the twenty-first century?  And that is one of the things that Paul addresses in his letter to the church in Thessalonica in 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13

6 In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we command you, brothers and sisters, to keep away from every believer who is idle and disruptive and does not live according to the teachingyou received from us. 7 For you yourselves know how you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with you, 8 nor did we eat anyone’s food without paying for it. On the contrary, we worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you. 9 We did this, not because we do not have the right to such help, but in order to offer ourselves as a model for you to imitate. 10 For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.”

11 We hear that some among you are idle and disruptive. They are not busy; they are busybodies. 12 Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat. 13 And as for you, brothers and sisters, never tire of doing what is good.

Clearly, this isn’t a prescriptive text that tells us everything about how to live as a church in times of disruption and chaos, but Paul says that one of the things that we need to be to be doing, as we have heard in other passages in recent weeks, is to keep busy, and to stay on task.  And one of the ways that we do that is to stay away from people who are bad examples.  The first among these bad examples are people who aren’t doing anything.  But worse than that are the people who aren’t doing anything and are using their free time to disrupt the people who are doing something.  Also, a part of Paul’s description of these disruptors is that they are people who claim to believe, and count themselves among the believers of the church, but do not live as if they believe because they don’t do the things that the scriptures teach.

Paul says that, because he and his ministry team intentionally wanted to be a good example, they did not accept a salary, or gifts, or meals, or anything else while they were in Thessalonica.  They didn’t do so because pastors, missionaries, and work teams aren’t entitled to being paid or even being treated well, but because they wanted to be a model for the people to follow.

It is worth noting at this point, that the phrase Paul uses here, has been borrowed, grossly misinterpreted, and misused by a recent political campaign.  Apparently, there has been someone, during the most recent election, that was claiming that the phrase, “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat” implies that welfare or giving to the poor runs against biblical principles.  But that is, frankly, spiritual malpractice.  Paul’s statement, and this example, in this case, is for internal church use and is ministry specific.  When the church was busy working, and fed its workers afterward, it didn’t make sense to feed people who didn’t do any work.  Paul wasn’t saying that the church shouldn’t feed the poor, that would be contrary to the words of Jesus.  What he was saying was, don’t show up to eat lunch at the Habitat for Humanity work project if you aren’t doing any work.  In that specific case, the food was intended to feed the workers.  And so that sentence should not, and cannot, be misconstrued to try to say that Jesus doesn’t want us to feed the poor.

Let’s summarize.  What we heard today is that we are on our way to someplace better.  God is at work, even now, preparing a place for us to live forever and in that place all the broken things of this world will be fixed.  There will be no more mourning, or crying or pain, parents will no longer have to bury their children, no longer will people and nations be uprooted by famine, warfare, natural disasters, or pestilence, and will all live, work, grow, plant, and endure in one place, in one home, with our families forever.

But between here and there, will be pain, and suffering, and death, and all the other terrible things that we have come to expect from our broken world.  Not only will those things continue but, at times, they’ll be a lot worse.  In the meantime, whether things are better for us or worse, the message is to stay on task, to keep doing the work that God has given us to do.  And while we’re doing that, we should stay away from busybodies who keep other people from doing their work.  Stay away from people who are idle and disruptive because they’re just going to waste your time and keep you from doing the work that God has given you to do.

The message for today is just to stay busy.  God has given us work to do as individuals, and as a church.  We can expect to go through difficult stuff.  We can expect that the horrors of this broken world will not get better and will often get worse.  But through it all, we need to keep moving forward, keep doing the work of Jesus Christ, and keep on calling the world to hear the message of the gospel so that they too can receive healing, rescue, and restoration.

Never tire of doing good.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

Survive, Endure, Be Grateful

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Survive, Endure, Be Grateful

October 09, 2022*

By Pastor John Partridge

Jeremiah 29:1-7                     Luke 17:11-19                        2 Timothy 2:8-15

Many of us, and quite likely most of us, have been through some tough times.  As we noted in the last week or two, suffering is common to the human condition.  Some of us started finding our way through tough times while we were still in childhood, and all of us passed through some stuff before we were far into adulthood. Cassandra Clare, in her book “City of Heavenly Fire” said, “Temper us in fire, and we grow stronger. When we suffer, we survive.”  But sometimes the fire through which we passed was almost overwhelming.  It was about those times that ancient Roman philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca said, “Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.”

But once we were on the far side of our difficulties and struggles, many of us have found that we learned something.  We came away from our trials stronger, and perhaps wiser, than before.  And sometimes we discovered that our suffering left other things behind within us.  Ben Okri wrote that “The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering.”  But in the middle of our suffering, we could not think about what we might learn, or gain, from it. Nick Hornby, in “How to Be Good” wrote, “You don’t ask people with knives in their stomachs what would make them happy; happiness is no longer the point. It’s all about survival; it’s all about whether you pull the knife out and bleed to death or keep it in…”

And as the prophet Jeremiah writes to the survivors of the siege of Jerusalem, a people who witnessed so much bloodshed, suffered from so much loss, were witness to the destruction of everything that they knew, and who were now in captivity in Babylon, he writes to people who feel as if they have a knife in their stomachs.  Many of them are in such agony and turmoil that they are considering whether they should just stop eating until they die.  And to them, Jeremiah shares a word from God. (Jeremiah 29:1-7)

29:1 This is the text of the letter that the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the surviving elders among the exiles and to the priests, the prophets and all the other people Nebuchadnezzar had carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon. 2 (This was after King Jehoiachinand the queen mother, the court officials and the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, the skilled workers and the artisans had gone into exile from Jerusalem.) 3 He entrusted the letter to Elasah son of Shaphan and to Gemariah son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah king of Judah sent to King Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon. It said:

4 This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5“Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. 6 Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. 7 Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”

Jeremiah’s message to the Hebrew people in Babylon was not the news that they wanted to hear, and it was not the news that their false prophets were sharing with them.  God’s message to his people was, ‘You are not going home. Plan on being a Babylon for a lifetime.”  Through Jeremiah, God had told the people that they would be in captivity for 70 years.  But at the time that Jeremiah writes this letter to the surviving elders among the exiles, they are mourning the loss of their temple, their nation, and their way of life, but they are still hoping that God will miraculously rescue them just as the false prophets were proclaiming.  But God’s message to his people is they should make plans for a life in Babylon and even pray for Babylon and her rulers because their prosperity was now tied to the prosperity of their conquerors.  It wasn’t what they wanted, but now, adapting to their new reality was how they would survive.

But even knowing that they would survive, and having hope that one day, even though far in the future, that they would return to Israel, surviving until then meant finding a way to endure whatever captivity held for them in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead of them.  And that kind of endurance is what Paul talks about in his second letter to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:8-15 when he says…

8 Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David. This is my gospel, 9for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained. 10 Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they too may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory.

11 Here is a trustworthy saying:

If we died with him, we will also live with him;
12 if we endure, we will also reign with him.
If we disown him, he will also disown us;
13 if we are faithless, he remains faithful,
    for he cannot disown himself.

14 Keep reminding God’s people of these things. Warn them before God against quarreling about words; it is of no value, and only ruins those who listen. 15 Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth.

Paul tells Timothy that he endures chains and imprisonment so that others might hear the good news of Jesus Christ and the gospel message.  Paul was able to survive and endure because he found purpose in his mission and purpose in his imprisonment.  Even in prison, Paul found a way to minister to the people around him, to offer grace to those who worked in the prison, to preach to the lawyers, judges and anyone who would listen, and to write letters of encouragement to Timothy and to the churches where he had ministered.  Although Paul was chained and imprisoned, he knew that the word of God had the freedom and the power to change lives, and to rescue the people with whom he had contact.

And then we remember Jesus’ healing of the ten men who were suffering and enduring the pain and the isolation of leprosy in Luke 17:11-19 and learn another important lesson about survival and endurance.

11 Now on his way to Jerusalem, Jesus traveled along the border between Samaria and Galilee. 12 As he was going into a village, ten men who had leprosy met him. They stood at a distance 13and called out in a loud voice, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us!”

14 When he saw them, he said, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” And as they went, they were cleansed.

15 One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. 16 He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan.

17 Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? 18 Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?” 19 Then he said to him, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.”

We should notice that these lepers had survived and endured any way that they could.  They were outcasts from their society, and they were feared and chased away everywhere that they went.  But with through the kindness of family members, the charity of strangers, and by caring for one another, and working together, they had found ways to live.  Hearing the stories about Jesus’ miraculous healing power, they found him and cried to him for help and for mercy.  And, without touching them, or breaking any rules regarding lepers or cleanliness, Jesus sends them to the priests for the legally required examination to certify their cleanliness and healing.  They believe, they obey, they are healed as they go, they are declared clean by the priest, and receive the blessing and restoration of God and the freedom for which they had so desperately hoped.

Because they were healed, we know that all ten had found faith in Jesus Christ.  But, caught up in the excitement of their healing, perhaps because they so desperately wanted to go and see their families and tell everyone that they knew the story of their own personal miraculous healing, nine out of ten forgot something important.  Only one, and then only the one that we should least expect, the Samaritan, the foreigner, the enemy, it is only he that returns to Jesus to say thank you.  Even Jesus, filled with grace and mercy asks, “Where are the other nine?”

How often does that describe us?  How often do we pray for healing, or for rescue, or for strength to survive and to endure?  And, when we have received the things for which we had so hopefully and fervently prayed, how often are we so excited to get on with our lives, to get back to normal, to return to the things and the people that we loved, that we forget to return to God…

…and say, “Thank you?”

We pray that we may never face the kinds of trials, pain, sorrow, and suffering that were faced by the people of Israel in Babylon, or those endured by Paul in prison, but until they carry us out of the room feet first, we will certainly face trials through which we will suffer and endure.  I am certain that we will pray and ask God for strength, patience, courage, healing, intervention, mercy, grace, and whatever else that we think that we need to survive and to endure. 

And that’s a good thing.

God wants us to have faith in him.  God wants us to cry out to him.  God wants us to talk to him and to ask him for the things that we need.

But afterwards… after we have survived… after we have endured… let us never forget…gratitude.

All of us have stories about answered prayers.  We have witnessed life giving rescue, healing, and received hope.  We have been given strength to endure, been given children, money, health, jobs, promotions, protection from storms, fires, earthquakes, bullies, bosses, drunk drivers on the highway, and all sorts of other things.  I am confident that if we shared our stories of answered prayer, we would be here for hours.

But when we have received the answers to our prayers, let us never forget…

… to be grateful.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.

Sources of Suffering

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Sources of Suffering

October 02, 2022*

By Pastor John Partridge

Lamentations 1:1-6               Luke 17:5-10             2 Timothy 1:1-14

On January 1, 1970, George V. Higgins, while he was still employed as Assistant US Attorney, but who would eventually be described as the grand master of crime fiction, published his first crime novel “The Friends of Eddie Coyle.”  In that story, gun runner Jackie Brown famously said, “This life’s hard, but it’s harder if you’re stupid.”  That quote has often been misattributed to John Wayne, but there is no record of John Wayne, nor any of his movie characters, ever saying such a thing.  In any case, many of us have found this to be true.  “This life’s hard, but it’s harder if you’re stupid.”  Few, if any of us, have managed to always make good decisions, and while we have learned valuable lessons from them, those bad decisions often made our lives much more difficult and painful than they needed to be.  But, at the same time, sometimes life is hard because we made good decisions.  Changing careers, working as a student pastor, with a student pastor’s salary, going to school full-time, while raising three children was hard, despite being a good choice.  And many of you could describe similar choices and similar struggles.

But despite our experiences, and our past struggles, many people ask the question, “Why is there suffering?” Or “Why am I suffering?”  And while I don’t have the definitive answer that applies to all people for all time, this morning we’re going to read several stories which illustrate several kinds of sadness, sorrow, and suffering and maybe, along the way, we will find some of the answers to our questions about suffering. We begin this morning, in a place where we don’t often go, to the book of Lamentations.  A lamentation is defined as a “passionate expression of grief or sorrow” and so this book of scripture is the place where we find the mournful prayers of the people of Israel who have lost the war with the Babylonian army, been ripped from their homes, watched as their city and their temple were destroyed, enslaved, and dragged into Babylon to make a new life in captivity.  Not surprisingly, tears were shed, and God’s people asked why this had happened to them.  “Why are we here?”  “When will we go home?”  Will we ever go home?”  “Why did God allow this to happen?”  And “Why has God allowed us to suffer?”  We begin in Lamentations 1:1-6, where we hear these words:

1:1 How deserted lies the city,once so full of people!
How like a widow is she, who once was great among the nations!
She who was queen among the provinces has now become a slave.

2 Bitterly she weeps at night,tears are on her cheeks.
Among all her lovers there is no one to comfort her.
All her friends have betrayed her; they have become her enemies.

3 After affliction and harsh labor,Judah has gone into exile.
She dwells among the nations; she finds no resting place.
All who pursue her have overtaken her in the midst of her distress.

4 The roads to Zion mourn,for no one comes to her appointed festivals.
All her gateways are desolate, her priests groan,
her young women grieve, and she is in bitter anguish.

5 Her foes have become her masters;her enemies are at ease.
The Lord has brought her grief because of her many sins.
Her children have gone into exile, captive before the foe.

6 All the splendor has departed from Daughter Zion.
Her princes are like deer that find no pasture;
in weakness they have fled before the pursuer.

Not everyone was taken into captivity because farmers and laborers were needed tend the land, harvest crops, and send taxes and tribute to the nation of Babylon.  It was not in Babylon’s best interests to take everyone, and so, much like the takeover of the communists in China, they took, or killed, the king, the royalty, the leaders of the military, the government, the church, and anyone else who might lead and rally people together in rebellion.  To borrow an expression from our nation’s experience in Vietnam, what Babylon wanted was a pacified Israel that would obey the orders of Babylon’s king and pay their taxes.

The people who were left behind may have been almost as miserable as those who have been taken into captivity.  Every day they remembered.  They remembered what their cities had once been, they remembered how beautiful their temple had been, how busy the roads had been, how peaceful it was to go to the synagogue and hear the words of God read from the Torah scroll.  But now that was all gone.  The roads mourn in their emptiness, the city gates are broken and desolate.  The people are gone.  Their friends and allies abandoned them in their time of need.

But there is recognition of why this had happened to them.  Jeremiah might not have been popular when he came to Jerusalem to proclaim the words, warnings, and condemnation of God, but the people remembered what he, and other prophets had said.  They knew that their grief and their suffering had come about because they loved their sin and had turned their backs on God.  And now life was harder, infinitely more difficult, and filled with weeping, sadness, mourning, suffering, and pain because of the bad choices that they had made.

But we often twist the question and, rather than ask “why are we suffering?” we ask, “why isn’t God blessing us?” and essentially ask why God is shortchanging us for doing good or assume that we aren’t getting what we want, or aren’t getting the expected result of God’s blessing, because we don’t have enough faith.  That’s the question that the disciples are asking Jesus in Luke 17:5-10 when Jesus is telling them about the consequences of sin and the need for his followers to forgive others.

5 The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!”

6 He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.

7 “Suppose one of you has a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, ‘Come along now and sit down to eat’? 8 Won’t he rather say, ‘Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink’? 9 Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? 10 So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’”

Jesus says that you don’t need a lot of faith because even a little bit of faith is a powerful thing.  The problem isn’t that we don’t have enough faith, the problem is that we expect God to bless us every time we do what we’re supposed to do.  We don’t expect our employer, or our boss, to thank us every time that we show up for work in the morning.  Rather than expecting God to pour out blessings on us for every little thing, our expectations should be, at minimum, that we will do the things that God has commanded us to do.

Let me say that again.

Our expectations should be, at minimum, that we will do the things that God has commanded us to do just as our employer expects that we will show up for work on time and do the job that we’ve been hired to do.  Doing the minimum doesn’t give us the right to expect bonuses and an abundance of praise and thanksgiving.  We shouldn’t expect God to bless us because we did half of what was expected. Doing the minimum is the least of what God expects from us.  Jesus said that servants are expected to do what servants do and at the end of the day simply acknowledge that “we have only done our duty.”

I’m sure that’s not the most encouraging thing that I’ve ever preached, nor is it the most encouraging thing that you’ve ever heard in church. 

But it gets worse.

In his second letter to his friend Timothy, the Apostle Paul explains that while God will empower us, and give us the tools, and the strength that we need to do what he has called us to do, even making the right choices, and doing the right thing, in the right way, for the right reasons, may still result in suffering.  In 2 Timothy 1:1-14, we hear Paul say this:

1:1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, in keeping with the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus,

2 To Timothy, my dear son:

Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.

3 I thank God, whom I serve, as my ancestors did, with a clear conscience, as night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers. 4 Recalling your tears, I long to see you, so that I may be filled with joy. 5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also.

6 For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love, and self-discipline. 8 So do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner. Rather, join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God. 9 He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, 10 but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. 11 And of this gospel I was appointed a herald, an apostle, and a teacher. 12 That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet this is no cause for shame, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day.

13 What you heard from me, keep as the pattern of sound teaching, with faith and love in Christ Jesus. 14 Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you—guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.

Paul breaks down the ideas of faith and works for Timothy by saying at he knows Timothy has faith. Because he has faith, he knows that he has received the gift of the Spirit of God.  Because the Spirit of God does not make us timid, but gives us power, love, and self-discipline, then Timothy should not be afraid, ashamed, or embarrassed to tell the people around him about Jesus Christ or about Paul’s     imprisonment.  Instead of being embarrassed, Paul says that Timothy should join with him in suffering for the sake of the gospel message, which is, in Paul’s view, suffering by the power of God.  Paul says that God did not call us because we deserved it, or because we had great qualifications, or because we had any qualifications at all, God called us because we fit into his plan, for his own purposes, and God called us because he chose to pour out his grace into our lives.

In the end, we are like Paul.  We have been called to be the heralds, proclaimers, apostles, town criers, and the announcers of the gospel message and the good news of Jesus Christ.  But suffering has always been and, until the day of judgement, always will be a part of the human experience.  Sometimes life is hard, and we suffer because we’re stupid and we made poor choices.  Sometimes we suffer because we get so selfish and self-focused that we put God in second, or third, place.  And sometimes we suffer for all the right reasons.  We made the right choices, did the right things, the right way, for the right reasons, and suffered anyway.  The odds are good that most of us here have endured through some hard times and in this life, the odds are good that we’re not done.  Suffering is just a part of the human experience.  But, if we’re going to suffer, let it be because we’ve made the right choices, done the right things, the right way, and for the right reasons.  Let it be so, that when we suffer, we suffer for the cause of Jesus Christ and for his kingdom.  Let us busy ourselves answering his call, and doing his work, so that when the day comes, we cannot be accused of only doing half of what we were called to do but can instead proclaim that ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’”

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.

Two Big “Ifs” of Christianity

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Two Big “Ifs” of Christianity

August 07, 2022*

By Pastor John Partridge

Isaiah 1:1, 10-20                    Luke 12:32-40            Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16

If you have ever programmed computers, you know that on the first day of your first programming class, you learn about the IF-THEN statement.  It is just what it sounds like.  The IF-THEN statement asks the computer to check some value and if that value is what you want, then you instruct it to do some other thing.  For example, IF the turnstile rotates one time, THEN add one to the memory location tracking the number of customers.

But outside of computer programming, we deal with if-then situations all the time.  If I want to earn interest on my savings, then I need to take our money out of my mattress and put it in the bank or invest it somewhere.  If we want to have a less difficult visit to the dentist, then we should brush our teeth every morning and do the things that our dentist asks us to do.  If we don’t want to run out of gas in the middle of nowhere, then we need to stop and buy fuel when the needle moves to toward empty.

We understand if-then decision making because we make those sorts of decisions every day.  But sometimes those “ifs” can be big and dangerous.  If we smoke three packs of cigarettes a day, then we run an exceedingly high risk of cancer and other health problems.  If we drive our automobile over one hundred miles per hour, then the odds of dying in the event of an accident are almost 100 percent.

We can find if-then choices throughout our laws and in every contract ever written.  They say, if you do this for us, then we will do that for you.  Or, if you do this to us, then we will do this to you.  And, not surprisingly, this is also the kind of language that God uses to explain our choices to us and, in Isaiah 1:1, 10-20, we find two really big “ifs” in God’s words to Israel, and despite the passage of time and the coming of Jesus, they remain important advice and instruction to which we should listen. 

1:1 The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah, son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.

10 Hear the word of the Lord,
    you rulers of Sodom;
listen to the instruction of our God,
    you people of Gomorrah!
11 “The multitude of your sacrifices—
    what are they to me?” says the Lord.
“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,
    of rams and the fat of fattened animals;
I have no pleasure
    in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
12 When you come to appear before me,
    who has asked this of you,
    this trampling of my courts?
13 Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
    Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—
    I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.
14 Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals
    I hate with all my being.
They have become a burden to me;
    I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands in prayer,
    I hide my eyes from you;
even when you offer many prayers,
    I am not listening.

Your hands are full of blood!

16 Wash and make yourselves clean.
    Take your evil deeds out of my sight;
    stop doing wrong.
17 Learn to do right; seek justice.
    Defend the oppressed.
Take up the cause of the fatherless;
    plead the case of the widow.

18 “Come now, let us settle the matter,”
    says the Lord.
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
    they shall be as white as snow;
though they are red as crimson,
    they shall be like wool.
19 If you are willing and obedient,
    you will eat the good things of the land;
20 but if you resist and rebel,
    you will be devoured by the sword.”
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

By describing Israel’s leaders and people as Sodom and Gomorrah, God accuses them of all sorts of sin and injustice.  And because of their actions, God says that he doesn’t care about their sacrifices, gifts, offerings, religious holidays, festivals, celebrations, meetings, gatherings, or even their prayers. 

What God really wants is for his people to stop doing evil, to defend the oppressed, to speak for the legally voiceless such as widows and orphans who, without a male family member, couldn’t even speak for themselves in court.

After that, God presents the two big “ifs” to his people.  “If you are willing and obedient,” then “you will eat the good things of the land.”  “But, if you resist and rebel,” then “you will be devoured by the sword.”  If you follow God, and do what God commands, then he will give you all sorts of blessings.  But, if you choose to ignore God, and do things your own way, then God will withdraw his protections and his blessings and let you face the world, and all the evil in it… alone.

The temptation for the people of Israel in the time of Isaiah, as well as the time of Jesus, is a temptation that still afflicts us in the twenty-first century, and that is to deceive ourselves into thinking that God isn’t watching, or that the return of Jesus Christ won’t happen any time soon.  Sure, we understand that Jesus is coming back, and we say that we believe that he is coming back, but do we really act like we expect that to happen any time soon?

That is exactly the point that Jesus is making in Luke 12:32-40 and as he makes his point, Jesus offers a warning to the people gathered in front of him that is just as relevant to us today.  Jesus said…

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near, and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

35 “Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, 36 like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks, they can immediately open the door for him. 37 It will be good for those servants whose master finds them watching when he comes. Truly I tell you, he will dress himself to serve, will have them recline at the table and will come and wait on them. 38 It will be good for those servants whose master finds them ready, even if he comes in the middle of the night or toward daybreak. 39 But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. 40 You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”

Jesus cautions us that we cannot act as if we are going to live forever.  When we say that we trust God, we must act as if we trust God, and that includes how we treat our wallets and our giving to the poor.  God’s call isn’t for us to give what is leftover or, only what we feel that we can spare, but to give to the poor as if we trust God to care for us like we say that we do.

That hits kind of close to home, doesn’t it?

Jesus continues by saying that we cannot act as if the master isn’t coming back until tomorrow, or next week, or next year, or sometime after we die.  We must take God at his word and behave as if we expect Jesus to return at any moment.  We must act as we would if we genuinely intended for Jesus to find us busy with the work of his kingdom upon his return.

Paul revisits this same idea in Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16 by reminding his listeners about people who had great faith such as Abel, Enoch, Noah, and Abraham, and using those examples to illustrate how faith might look if applied to our lives if we choose to be obedient.

11:1 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. 2 This is what the ancients were commended for.

3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

8 By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed, and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9 By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11 And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12 And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.

13 All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. 14 People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

God promised Abraham an inheritance that only his descendants would see, and yet he persisted and remained faithful.  And through that, and other examples, Paul reminds us that our promise is for a future that we may never see in this lifetime.  We look forward to something better, we look forward to a better future, but it is a future in a kingdom that is not of this world.  We may never see health, or wealth, or prosperity in this world, we will face trials, temptations, loss, betrayal, and all sorts of struggle in this life but through these examples, Paul reminds us not to give up hope.

Instead, we, like Abraham, must remain faithful as we hope for a future that we might only see in brief glimpses or shadows in this life.  We must act as if we trust God.  We must give to the poor, share with others, and seek justice as if we believed what we say that we believe.  We must keep watch for the return of our master, Jesus, and conduct our affairs as we would if he might return this very afternoon and we wanted him to find us busy caring for his kingdom and his kingdom business.

Because, in the end, we still face those two big “ifs” that we heard in the words of Isaiah.

“If you are willing and obedient,” then “you will eat the good things of the land.”

But, if you choose to ignore God, and do things your own way, then God will withdraw and let you face the world, and all the evil in it… alone.

Where will Jesus find you when he returns?

Choose wisely.

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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.  These messages can also be found online at https://pastorpartridge.com .  All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.