Rev. Dustin ParkerWhat a gift life can be!
Concordia Lutheran Church
Advent 3, December 11, 2010
What a Gift Life Can Be!
James 5:7-11
IN JESUS NAME
May we realize the gift this life is, as we live in the presence of the God who steadies us and strengthens us, allowing and causing us to mature, in His time as we grow, in Christ Jesus!
What a Gift Life is!
Vacation – Holiday – Holy Day!
The holy days are rushing toward us, as least what the world recognizes as our holiest days. Personally, I think they don’t get what a holy day is, and this results in them thinking that are holy days are Christmas Eve, and Christmas, Easter, and maybe Pentecost and even more rare, All Saints and Reformation.
The rush can be unsettling – do you realize that in two Sundays, this specific holy day will be past, and we will be cleaning up the torn wrapping paper, maybe wondering when we should take down the tree, and the Holy Day will transition to simply Vacation, or as they say in Australia – the holiday break. Over there the words holiday and vacation are simultaneous, as unconscious recognition of the rest that we get. I think there is an unconscious recognition of the commonality of vacation and holy day. They are both about respite, about the opportunity to relax from the stress of life, about the chance to rest…and find recovery.
This world moves to fast at this time of year, and as we move, we don’t find the down time, the opportunity to relax from the trauma, and from the traumatic. A little such joy is seen the odd moment after saying grace, when we look around our table and realize how much we are a family, a family that is blessed by God. It is same the feeling I had Wednesday night, seeing so many of you encouraging Mark and the people of Our Savior, as Mark proclaimed to all Christ’s peace, as Don led us in liturgy. The family of God listing up and serving each other.
But a few hours later, the world thrust its bizarre and perverse sense of reality back, to invade even our fleeting, temporary sense of peace.
We need that vacation, we need that holiday, we need that Holy Day to last more than a day, than a moment. We need to understand the words from James epistle, where he talks of the prophets and their staying power, when James says “what a gift life is, to those who stay the course!”
Our challenge then, is to have the patience, to let God steady us, and strengthen us, that we can endure, and rejoice to see what our lives have truly been.
The Struggle of waiting..on Christ
I have learned this, as a father; parents need to develop the very patience that they encourage their children to develop. We want them to be patient, to wait with both expectation, but also peacefully; we want them to develop the ability to delay gratification, and we want them to do that before noon…yesterday!
In ministry, we have the same kind of challenge. We all know the basic answers o our faith. Did Christ die for us? Did His death break down the separation of us from God the Father, by nailing our sins to the cross? Yes! Is the Holy Spirit given to us, as a gift during our baptism? Yes. Is He coming again, to judge the quick and the dead, and to live with us forever? YES!
Yet we don’t wait patiently, we lose our focus on the return of Christ. The challenges of the world swamp us, the traumatic incidents pile up and weigh us down. Rather than wait 6-9 months for something to spring up within the fertile soil of our souls, we get frustrated when “they” just don’t get it. We get upset when results are anything but immediate. James writes about this, when he talks of complaining or judging and being critical of each other. Don’t we realize, James says, that we could be judged as well? That Christ is just on the other side of the door – patiently waiting for the time the Father has determined for His return?
Would we live differently, if the door behind Chris suddenly opened and Jesus were to appear? Would we look at the challenges in our individual lives, and the challenges in the lives around us differently, if we knew Christ was coming this Thursday, or the Friday night after that?
Would we grasp onto that which was given in our baptism, would we hear the words of our absolution with more relief? Would we sing with more joy as we anticipated His coming?
Such questions sting a little, because they cut our pride back quickly, and perhaps they reveal to each of us, that our motivation isn’t always focused by God’s love and presence. We struggle because, well sin as a while is based in our desire to be in control, to be the captains of our own ships, the master’s of our own lives.
To this James says, “wait patiently for our Master’s arrival…”
James then writes something that slams this lesson home – He brings up the Old Testament prophets, the men whose lives would be considered challenging by the standards of any modern hero. He holds them out to us as mentors, their lives living examples, not of just their faith, but of God’s faithfulness. They had faith, because they saw the vision of Christ’s coming and redeeming the people. A vision that was only partially fulfilled in the first Advent. According to Hebrews – they still wait patiently for us…
Time for some blunt honesty. There are days I feel like Job, and there others where I wonder if I was called to pastor 50 or so Jobs and have another 20 or so that I am acquainted with closely. I see how much people have lost, the trials that you endure, As I wrote, I started writing the names, the challenges from health to finances, to losing loved ones, to not knowing the future. I might as well just read the church’s phone directory for what family has not had its challenges? Funny thing – if I brought up family A, they would point to family B as having it worse, Family B would point to family x, who would point to family L, who would point back to family A
Then I look around and see the challenges faced by you all, and I am lifted by watching you listen to God’s grace and love, and peace and joy confirmed. I watch you as you pass Christ’s peace to each other, and there is a holiness about those moments, as you greet each other, not just out of habit, but in love.
We have more to go, times where of rejoicing with each other, times where we break down and sob together. Times where we know God is working here, and times where we individually might wonder if He left on vacation.
Strengthened by the Holy Spirit, the Comforter’s presence, we survive, our trust in God grows,
Established – we are put in place together, as we see the baptisms, as we celebrate the gifts given at this altar to us,
Our lives are blessed, they are truly a gift, even if we cannot grasp this until we someday look back. But we see it in the little moments, we see it as we wait together, knowing Christ’s death for us is not in vain, it has down what it was meant to do.
Save us. Give us life, and that life abundant and eternal. You see, James wrote this incredible truth, for us, and for those like us. “you know how God brought it all together for him at the end. That's because God cares, cares right down to the last detail.”
What a gift life is… to know every day is a holy day
We often hear, “I need a vacation”, and sometimes we even say “I need a vacation from my vacation”. It is interesting, if we use the Australian for – I need a holiday! Or the English from where holiday comes, I NEED A HOLY DAY.
That is the cry of Advent. We need a Holy Day – a day set apart and rest – and recover and re-focus our lives and our priorities on that which we know – that our Master, Jesus Christ, will return for His people.
Christ-mas will be such a day as we hear that Immanuel – God with us. Christmas Eve will be such a day, as we hear that we can rest and be merry, and that nothing should cause dismay.
So to is today, as we come to this alter, and know there Christ purchased us, and calls us to rest and share in a meal, His body and Blood given and shed that we would know peace. For this time, this place is a Holy place.
And as we pass the baptismal font, on our way back to our lives, and to the world, know this my friends. Out there – it is a holy day as well. Tomorrow will be such a holy day, for we walk together with a God who is with US, who has marked us as His own, who has marked every moment of our lives as holy.
May we live every moment – rejoicing in that rest and peace, that the world cannot know. The peace of God that passes all understanding, and guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
AMEN?
 
Advent 3, December 11, 2010
What a Gift Life Can Be!
James 5:7-11
IN JESUS NAME
May we realize the gift this life is, as we live in the presence of the God who steadies us and strengthens us, allowing and causing us to mature, in His time as we grow, in Christ Jesus!
What a Gift Life is!
Vacation – Holiday – Holy Day!
The holy days are rushing toward us, as least what the world recognizes as our holiest days. Personally, I think they don’t get what a holy day is, and this results in them thinking that are holy days are Christmas Eve, and Christmas, Easter, and maybe Pentecost and even more rare, All Saints and Reformation.
The rush can be unsettling – do you realize that in two Sundays, this specific holy day will be past, and we will be cleaning up the torn wrapping paper, maybe wondering when we should take down the tree, and the Holy Day will transition to simply Vacation, or as they say in Australia – the holiday break. Over there the words holiday and vacation are simultaneous, as unconscious recognition of the rest that we get. I think there is an unconscious recognition of the commonality of vacation and holy day. They are both about respite, about the opportunity to relax from the stress of life, about the chance to rest…and find recovery.
This world moves to fast at this time of year, and as we move, we don’t find the down time, the opportunity to relax from the trauma, and from the traumatic. A little such joy is seen the odd moment after saying grace, when we look around our table and realize how much we are a family, a family that is blessed by God. It is same the feeling I had Wednesday night, seeing so many of you encouraging Mark and the people of Our Savior, as Mark proclaimed to all Christ’s peace, as Don led us in liturgy. The family of God listing up and serving each other.
But a few hours later, the world thrust its bizarre and perverse sense of reality back, to invade even our fleeting, temporary sense of peace.
We need that vacation, we need that holiday, we need that Holy Day to last more than a day, than a moment. We need to understand the words from James epistle, where he talks of the prophets and their staying power, when James says “what a gift life is, to those who stay the course!”
Our challenge then, is to have the patience, to let God steady us, and strengthen us, that we can endure, and rejoice to see what our lives have truly been.
The Struggle of waiting..on Christ
I have learned this, as a father; parents need to develop the very patience that they encourage their children to develop. We want them to be patient, to wait with both expectation, but also peacefully; we want them to develop the ability to delay gratification, and we want them to do that before noon…yesterday!
In ministry, we have the same kind of challenge. We all know the basic answers o our faith. Did Christ die for us? Did His death break down the separation of us from God the Father, by nailing our sins to the cross? Yes! Is the Holy Spirit given to us, as a gift during our baptism? Yes. Is He coming again, to judge the quick and the dead, and to live with us forever? YES!
Yet we don’t wait patiently, we lose our focus on the return of Christ. The challenges of the world swamp us, the traumatic incidents pile up and weigh us down. Rather than wait 6-9 months for something to spring up within the fertile soil of our souls, we get frustrated when “they” just don’t get it. We get upset when results are anything but immediate. James writes about this, when he talks of complaining or judging and being critical of each other. Don’t we realize, James says, that we could be judged as well? That Christ is just on the other side of the door – patiently waiting for the time the Father has determined for His return?
Would we live differently, if the door behind Chris suddenly opened and Jesus were to appear? Would we look at the challenges in our individual lives, and the challenges in the lives around us differently, if we knew Christ was coming this Thursday, or the Friday night after that?
Would we grasp onto that which was given in our baptism, would we hear the words of our absolution with more relief? Would we sing with more joy as we anticipated His coming?
Such questions sting a little, because they cut our pride back quickly, and perhaps they reveal to each of us, that our motivation isn’t always focused by God’s love and presence. We struggle because, well sin as a while is based in our desire to be in control, to be the captains of our own ships, the master’s of our own lives.
To this James says, “wait patiently for our Master’s arrival…”
James then writes something that slams this lesson home – He brings up the Old Testament prophets, the men whose lives would be considered challenging by the standards of any modern hero. He holds them out to us as mentors, their lives living examples, not of just their faith, but of God’s faithfulness. They had faith, because they saw the vision of Christ’s coming and redeeming the people. A vision that was only partially fulfilled in the first Advent. According to Hebrews – they still wait patiently for us…
Time for some blunt honesty. There are days I feel like Job, and there others where I wonder if I was called to pastor 50 or so Jobs and have another 20 or so that I am acquainted with closely. I see how much people have lost, the trials that you endure, As I wrote, I started writing the names, the challenges from health to finances, to losing loved ones, to not knowing the future. I might as well just read the church’s phone directory for what family has not had its challenges? Funny thing – if I brought up family A, they would point to family B as having it worse, Family B would point to family x, who would point to family L, who would point back to family A
Then I look around and see the challenges faced by you all, and I am lifted by watching you listen to God’s grace and love, and peace and joy confirmed. I watch you as you pass Christ’s peace to each other, and there is a holiness about those moments, as you greet each other, not just out of habit, but in love.
We have more to go, times where of rejoicing with each other, times where we break down and sob together. Times where we know God is working here, and times where we individually might wonder if He left on vacation.
Strengthened by the Holy Spirit, the Comforter’s presence, we survive, our trust in God grows,
Established – we are put in place together, as we see the baptisms, as we celebrate the gifts given at this altar to us,
Our lives are blessed, they are truly a gift, even if we cannot grasp this until we someday look back. But we see it in the little moments, we see it as we wait together, knowing Christ’s death for us is not in vain, it has down what it was meant to do.
Save us. Give us life, and that life abundant and eternal. You see, James wrote this incredible truth, for us, and for those like us. “you know how God brought it all together for him at the end. That's because God cares, cares right down to the last detail.”
What a gift life is… to know every day is a holy day
We often hear, “I need a vacation”, and sometimes we even say “I need a vacation from my vacation”. It is interesting, if we use the Australian for – I need a holiday! Or the English from where holiday comes, I NEED A HOLY DAY.
That is the cry of Advent. We need a Holy Day – a day set apart and rest – and recover and re-focus our lives and our priorities on that which we know – that our Master, Jesus Christ, will return for His people.
Christ-mas will be such a day as we hear that Immanuel – God with us. Christmas Eve will be such a day, as we hear that we can rest and be merry, and that nothing should cause dismay.
So to is today, as we come to this alter, and know there Christ purchased us, and calls us to rest and share in a meal, His body and Blood given and shed that we would know peace. For this time, this place is a Holy place.
And as we pass the baptismal font, on our way back to our lives, and to the world, know this my friends. Out there – it is a holy day as well. Tomorrow will be such a holy day, for we walk together with a God who is with US, who has marked us as His own, who has marked every moment of our lives as holy.
May we live every moment – rejoicing in that rest and peace, that the world cannot know. The peace of God that passes all understanding, and guards our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
AMEN?
 
