"WHEN A 'QUICK-FIX' ISN'T AN OPTION"

We all know that in life..."stuff' happens. No one's immune to the annoying little problems that crop up from time to time. Just this past Wednesday evening, Lorraine and I had been out doing some errands and we had stopped at a 7-11 to fill up my car's gas tank. We got the gas, Lorraine got back in to start the car and...nothing. Well, actually there was something: the sound of that frail spark and sputter that immediately sets your brain on fire: THE CAR WON'T START! We had been driving that car all day. We had just made several stops. Now, for no reason, we'd been suddenly plunged into auto owners purgatory: all stressed out and no way to go!

So...we released the brake and coasted the car away from the gas pumps and over to the pay phone where I put that suddenly priceless AAA card to use. While we waited, we put the hood up and stood there looking at the engine. No idea what it all means, of course, but it just makes you feel better to stare at it, doesn't it?!

About 20 minutes later, up came a young fellow in a compact car, carrying a hand-held "booster unit." He took one look at the corrosion on the battery terminals and said, "Yep That's probably it." He hooked up his handy-dandy little gizmo, had Lorraine turn the key and, viola! We sighed a duet of relief.

This guy then proceeded to suggest that it might just be corrosion build-up around the terminals keeping a good connection from happening. Then he clued us in to a little "home remedy" we could use that might take care of the problem completely. He said, "Pour Coca-cola over the terminals and scrub them off with an old toothbrush. Coke will eat right through battery acid buildup and corrosion!" Makes me kind of glad Lorraine and I drink Pepsi products!

So we picked up a can of Coke on the way home, I went upstairs and got an old toothbrush, came back down and Yikes! He was right! That green corrosive build-up came right off! Got in...the car started right up! We waited about a half an hour and tried starting it again! No problem! It's so great to find a "quick fix" to life's little problems.

I was chuckling about how I had fixed the car with Coke and a toothbrush all evening and the next morning...right up until I got in to start the car. Nothing. Not even a spark and sputter...just a quick "sp..." - and that was it.

Bottom line...we purchased a new battery this week. And, as a side note, I also had to have my car's air conditioning recharged and filled...two weeks after Lorraine and I had had the brakes replaced on both cars! O.K., so sometimes the fix is not so quick and easy after all.

In fact, sometimes the problems and trials we face in life cannot be fixed. There are some things we will face that no mechanic can make all better. Not the body mechanics we call doctors. Not the emotional mechanics we call therapists. Not the spiritual mechanics we call ministers. What can we do when a "quick-fix" isn't an option?

That's when it's time to step aside and let the Master Mechanic - Creator of the Universe and Personal Source of Power for the Powerless - step in and take control.

No one among us...no one in the world...is immune from the serious problems, the personal tragedies and the chronic challenges that life can bring. We live in a broken world that has been made treacherous in many ways by the presence of evil and by human frailty. The consequences of those two things can effect any of us, at any time.

St. Paul, the great evangelist and writer of our Scripture reading this morning, understood this reality of life: some things are beyond the option of a quick-fix or even an eventual repair. But we are never beyond hope because of the power of God.

This reading we heard starts out pretty strangely. Earlier this week, I showed Lorraine the text I had selected for this morning's message and, as she started to read the first few verses, she made this face - like you make when something smells really bad - and said, "Where do you get this stuff?" I just shrugged and said, "The Bible!"

Like a lot of biblical passages, this section from 2 Corinthians doesn't make much sense taken out of context: all this stuff about "a man caught up in the third heaven - in the body, out of the body, who knows?" Yeah, exactly! Who knows and, really, who cares! Paul's getting just a little too esoteric for most folks at that point. What he's basically talking about is that, like a lot of people in the church at that time who were bragging about their ecstatic visions, he, too, had had spiritual revelations of things that were very, you know, "cosmic" and unexplainable. If people were gonna be bragging about how "spiritually enlightened" they were, he could do that, too. So what! He's saying that it would be better, if he's going to brag about anything, to brag not about what it is that makes him so strong but about how much God has helped him in his weakness. That's what really matters! That is what is truly significant!

In verses 7-10, Paul talks about how he has been given, in his life, some "thorn in the flesh" that makes him weak and keeps him humble. Now over the centuries, there has been lots of speculation about what this "thorn" really was. Some have said it was spiritual doubts and temptations; some say it was the persecution and opposition he faced as he preached and traveled. Some have speculated about sexual temptations, while many hypothesize about possible physical ailments ranging from migraine headaches or serious eye problems, to epilepsy or malaria. No one really knows what it was, but we do know that whatever it was plagued him off and on throughout his life and, although it never stopped him completely from doing his work, he was often laid up and greatly hindered by it. The word that we have translated as "thorn" can also mean "stake," like a sharp stake driven and twisted in the body. This was not a"quick-fix" condition in Paul's life. Despite his many prayers for relief, whatever this problem was, it remained a chronic source of pain and weakness for him.

All the more meaningful, then, to hear the words God spoke to Paul: "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Paul responded, then, "Most gladly, therefore, I would rather boast about my weakness, that the power of Christ may dwell in me. So I am content...for the sake of Christ; when I am powerless, it is then that I am strong."

A life of faith in God is often filled with irony. God's power is made perfect in our weakness. That makes no sense in terms of the goals and expectations of our culture and the world. It is a truth that cannot be explained by logic but which can be verified through the lives of people who are living that truth every day.

I suppose I have a distinct advantage in that I know a lot more about the people in this church than many of you do. But let me tell you: this room, right now, is filled with people whose lives and whose faith testify to the ironic reality that where weakness exists, God is most surely present.

There are plenty of "thorns in the flesh" among us here today. People who have lost body parts or been permanently disabled in accidents. People who have lost body parts to disease and who have been disabled by life-threatening illness. People who suffer from the socially misunderstood but devastating effects of chronic depression or fibromyalgia. People who have seen their relational lives ripped apart by divorce and estrangement from their children...purely because they want to be themselves. People who have experienced, firsthand, violence and abuse because ofwho they are or, when they were children, simply because they exist. People trapped in the "Catch 22" of jobs that are too stressful to keep but which they are too old or too dependant upon financially to quit. These are the lives that justify the translation of that word in the Scripture as a "sharp stake driven and twisted..." not only into the body but into the heart and mind, as well. There is much weakness in this room.

But, ironically, there is also much strength here...made manifest by God in the lives of these same people. Some of the strongest, funniest, most loving people in this church are the ones in the wheelchairs and with the missing body parts. Some of the most spiritually bold and tenacious among us are the ones with chronic conditions who never know what their bodies or minds will allow them or prevent them from doing on any given day. Some of the most devoted, committed and gentle people here are ones who have lost their families over the issue of identity. Some of the most creative, responsible, and dependable people here are the ones dealing with those difficult "traps" of everyday living. These are the lives that also prove God's grace is sufficient in all things...and that God's strength comes through the most when we are weak.

A lot of us only want to hear about how God can "fix" things...that prayer can change things...that enough faith will make everything O.K. and that in Christ we can overcome anything. But we need to understand what all that really means. Sometimes God's way of "fixing" things is not ours. Sometimes prayer is meant to change us, not the circumstances. Enough faith can make us emotionally O.K. in spite ofthe chaos around us. In Christ, we can rise above the challenges we face and gain a wider spiritual perspective that allows us to live, at peace, through whatever life may bring.

This is not a message intended to give you 3 easy steps to fix your life. There are thorns that can invade our lives when a "quick fix" is not an option. This is a message intended to remind us all that we have 3 choices about how we respond to the "thorns" in our iives.

We can curse them...blame God...give up hope...and "exist" as bitter and joyless shells. That's an option too many in the world have accepted. Please...don't be among them.

We can try to remove the thorns on our own. We can pretend we don't feel as badly as we do and fool pretty much no one. We can vow to just "get over it" and move on, while we continue to sink in emotional quicksand. We can light candles and rub rocks and wish upon stars. We can try to get rich quick by starting "I can do this myself.com."

Or...we can face the reality of our weaknesses and needs and ask the Lord, if removing them is not an option, then to give us the strength and the courage and the faith to get through it and to carry on the very best way we can, each and every day...knowing that we are dependant on the grace of God. As our choir sang this morning, from Psalm 121: "I lift up my eyes to the hills - where does my help come from?

My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth." Amen.

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