Sermon prepared for Messiah Lutheran Church, Auburn
WA
by Pastor Gregory S. Kaurin
8:30 traditional & 10:30 AM Holden Prayer
services, 9/5/04
Text: Deuteronomy 30:15-20
Sermon:
There’ll Be No Whining
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I mentioned this story in last week’s sermon, but I
knew that I wanted to talk about it more.
Over a week ago, Pauline and I were in the car on our way to dinner with
two of our friends—I’m sorry to admit it—but I was complaining a bit, about
attitudes and politics in church, and other stuff. Then, my friend, who is a religion professor at PLU stopped me.
“Greg,” he said, “this is Lutheranism isn’t is? Lutherans don’t whine do they?”
I had to laugh out loud. He caught me. In that
statement, “Lutherans don’t whine,” he hit all kinds of levels. In some way, he was responding
sympathetically against the whining and grumbling that I was talking about, but
at the very same time, there I was in the car grumbling and complaining.
And on a deeper, Biblical and theological level, how
incredibly right on he is. We are
Christians. We have been given and have
access to all the promises, forgiveness, and eternal assurances of God,
embodied, proved and given to us through the death and resurrection of Jesus
Christ.
And we Lutherans, some would say we don’t talk enough
about our responsibilities, obedience and God’s judgment against sin, and that
we over-emphasize God’s forgiveness, grace and acceptance, that we make
Christianity too easy. Well, even if
that were true, then we would definitely have no right to unconstructive,
fearful or self-indulgent whining.
We are baptized, forgiven, saved Christians, embraced
by God, clothed in the righteousness of Christ and destined for the courts of
heaven. St. Paul assured us in the
Bible that there is nothing and no power in all creation that can separate us
from the love of God through Jesus Christ.
From that perspective, we’ve got nothing to complain about.
Besides that, we’ve got too much to do to waste time
whining. There are too many people to
comfort, too many people with whom to share the grace and forgiveness of
God. There’s to be no whining… in
Christianity.
Early last week, I was studying what other
theologians and preachers have said about this powerful passage from
Deuteronomy, our first lesson. This
speech from Moses occurred near the end of the Israelites’ 40-year Exodus from
their Egyptian slavery to the Promised Land.
The Bible tells us that Moses was 120 years old by this time. This was one of his very last, final
statements before his death.
The major point of this last discourse of Moses was
that because God chose them, saved them, led them, Moses begged the people to
remain faithful, to trust God enough not to be tempted, don’t fall in the trap
of worshipping any other gods or idols.
Moses summarized everything in his last few sermons by telling them to,
above everything else, trust God. “Love
God heart mind and strength.” Trust God
with you life, your future and your destiny.
This was the choice: to trust God is to choose life,
the source and destiny of life. To turn
from or distrust God at his word is returning to fear, darkness and death. Moses says, “Choose life.” In other words, chose to live in the new
life that God has now given you.
Stop acting like victims. That is what really caught my attention as I was studying for
today’s sermon. One of the commentators
I read said that Moses was telling the Israelites that it was time to stop
feeling and acting like victims. While
they suffered in Egypt, the Israelites cried out, God answered and saved
them. But almost immediately and
constantly they began grumbling and whining at every turn in the Exodus.
They grumbled and feared and whined that they were
better off in Egypt. “Why did you bring
us out here, just to let us die in the desert?” It wasn’t wrong of them to cry in hunger or thirst. What was wrong was that, every time they hit
a snag or some struggle, they called everything into question: God’s
love for them, God’s ability and desire to be with them, to protect and guide
them, his promises.
What Moses was saying, what Jesus would repeat, and
one of the central messages of the Bible and Christianity, and the whole point
of the Reformation and Lutheranism, is that it is time to stop feeling and
acting like victims. There’s to be no
whining in Christianity.
But now, we need to be clear, not all tears,
frustration or criticism can be called whining. It’s when we allow these things to actually call into question
everything else. It is perfectly normal
and reasonable to cry and grieve when someone we love dies. Even Jesus did that outside of the tomb of
Lazarus.
It’s only when we allow our hardships, struggles or
grief to call into question our relationship with God, or the assurance of
salvation and the great reunion in heaven.
You can cry over losing someone you love for awhile, and at the very
same time you can trust God that you will see him or her again.
When I say that Christians shouldn’t whine, I also
don’t mean that we should be passive whimps.
As I have often said, we can and should allow ourselves to cry when it’s
sad, laugh when it’s funny, yell or argue when it’s frightening or maddening,
but we can let these moments come and go as they do. They do not have dominion over us. We should expect and work for justice, but we don’t need
revenge. We can deal with things and
then let them go because they are not ultimate.
We often think of meekness and humility as
weakness. The true definitions of
meekness and humility is knowing when to be angry and when to remain calm,
knowing what is worth fighting for and what is not, knowing when to speak and
when to be quiet.
Rather than reacting and fussing over everything,
meekness and humility is a call to save our voices, indignation and criticism
for the things that truly matter. I was
reading this book, Reclaiming the “L” Word, by Kelly Fryer and ran
across story:
It sounds simple to say, “Jesus Is Lord.” But, I know that for me, it isn’t always easy to actually mean
it. Most of the time, I want to be the
boss of my own life. And I don’t think
I’m alone…
A few years ago I met a woman who told me about a big mess her
congregation had gotten into. It seems
the church council had voted to move the grand piano, which sat in the front of
the worship space, FIVE INCHES so that they could make room for some new
handicap-accessible seating. I’m not
sure why the church council was voting on something like this, but there you
go. Anyway, the council members agreed
on a date and time for meeting at church to move the piano. I’m not sure why they were going to do this
themselves, either, but apparently word got out that this was happening.
The appointed time arrived. The
church council members gathered in the sanctuary, dressed, I suppose, in
appropriate clothing for piano moving and, maybe, feeling a little bit
scared—like lightening was going to strike or something if they dared move
ANYTHING in such a holy place. But
before they even had time to think about it, the director of music burst
through the doors of the sanctuary and barreled up the aisle. She said not a word but, rather,
communicated her position clearly by hoisting up her generous frame and
throwing herself ACROSS THE TOP OF THE PIANO.
Presumably she was dressed for piano straddling. At any rate, she flat out,
don’t-even-try-to-mess-with-me REFUSED to come down off the piano until the
church council agreed not to touch it.
Who—or what—was lord in that place, do you think? It is easy to get confused, putting
tradition or culture or “my” ideas or whatever, at the center even of our life
together as Christians. But I wonder
how many of our problems—at church, as well as in our own personal lives—would
be solved if we simply remembered that JESUS is Lord, no thing and no one
else.[1]
This was an extreme case, but too often, we allow
ourselves to get distracted from the central elements of our faith. There are things in our faith we need to be
stubborn about, in our preaching, teaching, and worship. This book lists five things in her church
that they hold central:
1.
Jesus Is Lord
2.
Everyone Is Welcome
3.
Love Changes People
4.
Everybody Has Something
to Offer
5.
The World Needs What We
Have[2]
These are the things, the statements of faith like
these, which should be in all our preaching, teaching, and worship, and actions
of a congregation. Other societal and
religious arguments and debates may come and go, but these beliefs should never
be watered down. Jesus is Lord. Everyone is welcome. Love changes people. Everybody has something to offer. The world needs what we have.
And for the rest of life: We can see and be a part of
this world, but at the very same time, we have an overriding sense of calm and
joy because we see beyond this immediate world.
Like everyone else, we are affected in this world by
disease, death, terrorism in Russia and our own country, hurricanes in Florida,
politics, abuse, rape, discrimination.
All of this will slap us in the face; we feel it and we are called to
respond to it. But we are not finally
victims of it. God will be with us, and
will see us through it. And God will
always get the last word.
Nothing, nothing in all creation, compares to the
promises we have in Christ. We are not
victims. We have been claimed by God in
our baptisms and given his victory.
There will be no whining in heaven.
So, let God’s will be done now on earth as it is in heaven.
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