The City of God, a sermon based on Genesis 2: 4b-9 and Revelation 21: 1-6, preached on May 18, 2025

Our Bible begins in the garden, but it ends in a city. According to the book of Revelation, when we come to our end, we will be welcomed into a holy city, the new Jerusalem, the City of God. In that place, death will be no more. Mourning and crying and pain will be no more. Jesus tells us that in that city, there is a mansion with many rooms. There will be a room for me and a room for you, and when we get there, we won’t have to worry anymore about cancer or poverty, death or taxes, crime or inflation. We won’t spend time worrying about when the next shoe is going to drop, for God will be with us, making all things right and all things new. This is the promise of Scripture, that some bright morning, when this life is over, I’ll fly away, to that home on God’s celestial shore, where joys will never end. We anticipate that day, not with fear, but with faith. We live as those expecting the world to be put together perfectly. We are not the kind of people who fear that the world will go to hell in a handbasket, for we know that the day is coming when sin will be no more. In that city, our God will heal what’s broken. We will be so filled with the love of God that there will be no more room in our hearts for selfishness or greed. We will be made new, as our God puts right all that’s gone wrong. My friends, Scripture promises, the book of Revelation promises, that this fallen world will be made new, yet Christians have never been satisfied just waiting for that to happen. For 2,000 years, Christians in every nation under heaven, while taking heart in the promise of what is to come, have worked to make this world cloaked in shadow just a little brighter. We are called to be healers of the breach. We are called to be a balm for a wounded world, to be salt and light. We were created to be a blessing to the nations. While we wait for justice to come rolling down, we also work for justice. While we wait expectantly for redemption to come, we’ve also built schools, hospitals, and orphanages. Some even went so far as to leave their homes behind in the hope of creating a more perfect union built on the love of God and the love of neighbor. In 1630, Rev. John Winthrop preached a sermon in a boat among fellow settlers just before they reached the Massachusetts Bay Colony. In that sermon, he called their new colony to be “as a city upon a hill. A light to the nations,” and I’m not going to say that those colonists achieved their goal of bringing heaven to earth, but they didn’t sit around waiting for this world to get better all on its own. They got to work. They stepped out in faith. They tried to start a new country that was built differently than their old one. They attempted to create a new nation defined by decency and order, mercy and justice. They longed for a nation where the politicians were honorable, where hard work was rewarded with a fair wage, and no one went into debt after buying a week’s worth of groceries. My friends, in so many ways, we are living in a blessed city. We live in a place that often seems to me to be pretty close to Mayberry, or to the bar in Cheers. Marietta can feel like a place where everybody knows your name. For example, last week, I walked into a restaurant on the Square for lunch, and at a booth in the back was a table. Nearly every woman seated there to celebrate a birthday, I knew by name. One was a former teacher at the elementary school I attended. Others were members of this church. After greeting them, I joined the pastors of First Baptist Church and Zion Baptist Church and the director of Mayes Ward Funeral home for lunch to discuss the future of our parking lots. The waitress came and introduced herself. Rev. Brandon Owen of First Baptist Church invited her to his church because that’s what Baptists do, but notice that we all had lunch together because that’s what pastors in this town do. I give thanks to God for such a close-knit community. I’m so thankful that we live in a town where the pastors of the churches don’t compete with one another, but work together for the common good, and yet, there are newlywed members of this church who are trying to buy a house in which to raise their family, and they can’t afford much closer than Acworth. Our city’s elementary schools offer food pantries because so many of their students live in homes where the cupboards are bare. Too many of them have no address, for they live out of their cars. Too many of them have parents who work but can’t make ends meet. We live in a society of wealth and poverty. Some have savings accounts and others are drowning in debt. On the one hand, I think of Marietta, Georgia as a city on a hill, a bright light in a world of shadow; however, we are not yet the community that God calls us to be. My friends, the call of God is not to wait until we make it to those Pearly Gates to live in a city of justice and peace, but to walk towards such a reality today. Now, maybe you’re thinking: What can I do about the brokenness and injustice of our world? I think that way sometimes. Last week, I had breakfast with a representative of the Presbyterian Foundation. The Presbyterian Foundation is this big, well-funded organization responsible for managing the endowment entrusted to the Presbyterian Church. Because they have so much money, I asked the representative if she thought the Presbyterian Foundation would get our denomination moving in the right direction again, and she looked at me and asked, “Why are you waiting for us, when the light of Jesus Christ is shining in you?” Why are you waiting for something to come along to make a change in this world when the light shines so brightly in you? My friends, don’t wait for someone else to do what you are more than capable of doing. The light shines in you, so reach out your hands in love to your neighbor. Walk into the jail. Visit the sick. Use the gifts you’ve been given to the glory of the Lord. When you do, you make our community a little more like the City of God. Amen.

The Lord is My Shepherd, a sermon based on Psalm 23 and Revelation 7: 9-17, preached on May 11, 2025

Mother’s Day is today, and I’m celebrating because our daughters have received the great gift of a wonderful mother. My wife, Sara, is a particularly wonderful mother. Among other things like feeding them, paying attention to their grades, and taking them to the doctor, when our girls need her to hold them, she holds them, and when they need her to let them go, she lets go. Think about that skill with me for just a moment. When we hold onto our children too closely, we call it coddling. When we push them out of the nest too early, we may break them. When we dropped Lily off at Kindergarten, she was ready, and Sara was excited. Sara could see how excited Lily was to go to school, so she celebrated with her little girl. She cheered her on in taking that step of independence into her Kindergarten classroom, while I, soon after dropping Lily off, cried in the car. Likewise, as Lily passed her driver’s test and drove off into the world on her own, Lily was happy. Sara was happy with Lily, while once again, I cried, only this time it wasn’t the car, because now my car is Lily’s car. I cried in the house instead of crying in the car, and I cried because I felt like I was losing our little girl, while Sara was proud and excited, for motherhood is, at its best, the mastery of two movements which are at odds with each other. A mother holds her baby close to her chest and then encourages her to fly. Today, on Mother’s Day, I’m focused on flying and those who have nudged us out of the nest. This movement begins as soon as the umbilical cord is cut. From the moment that cord is cut, babies are learning to move out into the world. They roll over, learn to crawl, stand up, and start to walk. From walking, they run, and the best mothers cheer for them. The best mothers nudge their chicks out into the big scary world, which becomes a little less scary the more we trust the community to watch out for them. How wonderful that there would be a baptism today, for in baptism, mothers are reminded that they are not their children’s lone caregiver. In the Presbyterian church, the baptism is a public event. It takes place during the worship service so that the parents can hear the congregation promise to help them raise their child. In every Presbyterian baptism, the congregation is asked two questions: “Do we, the people of this congregation, receive this child into the life of the church?” and “Will we promise, through prayer and example, to support and encourage her to be faithful in Christian discipleship?” We Presbyterians can’t have private baptisms because the parents must hear the congregation say: “We do,” and “We will.” Parents need to know that their baptized child has this incredible advantage of community. Not only is there mom, but there is also a congregation, so faith, for us, is not the promise of an easy life without trial. Faith, for us, is instead the promise that amid all the trial and tribulation, we are not alone. There is a community, both human and divine, for our fellowship includes the Good Shepherd, who promises, not to watch from a distance from the clouds up in Heaven, but to walk with us, leading us beside the still waters from green pasture to green pasture. The Presbyterian church continues in this celebration of relationships with the wedding liturgy. I’ve had the honor of officiating many weddings, maybe 200 weddings. The most memorable include one with a medieval theme held at a botanical garden that started one hour late because the mother of the groom was making all the dresses but hadn’t finished in time, so the groomsmen were killing time, just wandering around the botanical garden with swords on their belts. They scared a few people with those swords, although the most terrified of all was the father of the bride. I thought he was going to have a heart attack. He didn’t. Still, I’ll never forget that wedding. Another wedding I’ll always remember is the wedding of my wife’s sister. Sara’s sister Ami married a Methodist minister, so my wife, Sara, and her sister Ami both married protestant ministers, which is ironic because they were raised Roman Catholic. The Rev. Lyn Pace, my brother in-law, is a chaplain at Duke University. The two of us arm wrestle over who will pray at Thanksgiving. My daughters, Lily and Cece, will have the option of their uncle or their father to officiate at their weddings. I’m thankful for the honor of officiating their Uncle Lyn’s wedding, both the first and the second time he married Sara’s sister Ami. Upon their engagement, Lyn and Ami set their wedding date and put the invitations in the mail. Then Lyn’s father got sick. When his father’s death seemed eminent, Lyn and Ami asked me to officiate a small wedding service, just family, so that, should Lyn’s father die before the publicized wedding date, he wouldn’t miss the chance to see his son marry the love of his life. The small, family wedding was beautiful. A picture of Lyn’s father giving his blessing to his son on that day is etched in my memory, but the invitations had gone out. The original date had not been canceled. On the day their guests showed up, I asked them, “If they’re already married, what are we doing here?” “We are here because they need your love and support,” I said. Then I asked the congregation: “Do all of you promise to uphold this couple in their marriage and strengthen them in their life together?” This is an important question that is asked at every Presbyterian wedding, for like the congregation at the baptism, the guests at the wedding are not there just for the open bar at the reception, but are a group of people who create a community of love to support and encourage newlyweds as they step out into the world together, making our big scary world just a little less scary. In addition to the people is a Shepherd who promises, not to watch from a distance from the clouds up in Heaven, but to walk with us, leading us beside the still waters from green pasture and even through the valley of the shadow of death. Do not fear for He is with you. Think with me this morning about what it means that our Bible would again and again use this image of a shepherd to describe who Jesus is, for what does a shepherd do? If we are His flock, and if the Lord is my Shepherd, then what does a shepherd do but help me move from where I was or am to where I will be? On this Mother’s Day, think with me about the ones who held our hands while we learned to walk, but in helping us to walk, enabled us to move from one stage to another. Those stages continue on far past childhood and adolescence. The young look forward to turning 16 so they can drive. Then 21. Then, we stop looking forward to the next birthdays, yet the stages continue. We move from one pasture to the next one until we reach the final destination. Be not afraid, for you are not on this journey alone. The road is not easy, but He will not let your foot slip. Think with me about that gentle Shepherd who leads us to lie down in the green pastures, beside the still waters, and through the darkest valley because we were not created to settle in and make our permanent residence until we stand before the throne of God. My friends, we are pilgrims in a foreign land. We are on a journey to our final destination. We travel through this mortal life. Do not be afraid. Do not get stuck where you are, for our journey through life requires we move from our mother’s arms out into the world. Yes, we may get hurt along the way, and yes, we may not all make it from adolescence to adulthood. From early adulthood to middle age. From middle age to retirement. From retirement to that age when we are not testing to receive our driver’s license but testing to determine when we must relinquish it. We are on a journey from one pasture to the next. It’s not easy to keep moving, so I implore you: Trust the Shepherd who guides us to our final destination. Do not neglect your relationship with Him. Learn to hear His voice. Learn to trust Him. Learn to follow. For until we stand before the throne, we cannot settle in. We are on a journey of maturing, a journey of rising, a journey of falling, a journey of learning and understanding, rejoicing and weeping, winning and losing that will be far too terrifying to embark upon if we do not trust the One who leads us. Follow Him until you stand before the throne of our Creator and hear that loud voice saying, “Salvation belongs to our God.” Trust Him, until He wipes every tear from your eyes. Last week, I was back on the Presbyterian College campus because now I’ve been graduated long enough to be considered wise and experienced, wise and experienced enough to instruct recent graduates in how to be a Presbyterian minister. It was a gift to be there, for that was the place I first fell in love with a young woman, who was raised Roman Catholic who has now become my wife and the mother of my children. While I was there, I saw two of my professors, who now live at the Presbyterian Village Retirement Community. They did not resist retirement. They did not fight it but embraced the journey because they trust the Shepherd and know where He is leading them. The Lord is my Shepherd. And I will trust Him, too. Amen.