The Image of the Invisible God, the Firstborn of All Creation

Scripture Lessons: Jeremiah 23: 1-6 and Colossians 1: 11-20 Sermon Title: The Image of the Invisible God, the Firstborn of All Creation Preached on November 24, 2019 This coming Thursday is Thanksgiving, which makes me think about a lot of things. Especially, Thanksgiving makes me think of something that starts with the letter “t.” That’s right. Traffic. There’s a lot of traffic on Thanksgiving, but there’s always traffic here, in Marietta, GA. People have places to go, and they need to get there quickly, plus they’re usually running late. Not long ago I saw a man brushing his teeth while sitting in traffic. That’s strange, isn’t it? But people do strange things while they’re sitting in traffic. Some people listen to books, others text message, which isn’t safe. Some get uncharacteristically angry. In the heat of traffic, even kind people will honk their horn or employ the use of their middle finger. People have places to go, and they need to get there quickly, plus they’re usually running late. They’re thinking about what they have to get to, not necessarily about how low the covered bridge is that they’re going under. On the front page of the paper last Friday, once again, was coverage of contraptions being installed to prevent people driving under the historic Concord Covered Bridge with their too tall cars or trucks. So often our focus is solely on getting some place fast rather than slowing down to pay attention to the signs telling us to turn around or slow down. Worse last Friday was coverage of a teenage driver who drove too fast and lost control of his car, running head-on into a school bus. Luckily no one was hurt too badly but let us heed this warning: When the clock is ticking and the boss is waiting it seems like getting there on time is a matter of life and death. Should we be too hasty and lives may truly hang in the balance between life and death. When we see the lights of the sheriff or the police officer our priorities shift. Or pulled over on the side of the road so that the hearse can pass, all at once the meeting we were rushing to isn’t so important. Practice is back to just kids playing ball in a field. You realize all at once that you might lose your appointment with the hairdresser or doctor, but for you there will be another day. The hearse is the sign that not everyone will have that. At the sight of it in Marietta, GA everything still stops, and we show our respect to the wife, the mother, the husband, the son, who is looking straight into the reality that the world as they knew it has just ended. Stopping for a funeral procession can be a moment where no matter how important we think the meeting or the errands or the appointment is, when we stop we see clearly again. The priorities shift. And whatever we were rushing to gets back into its proper place in the grand scheme of things, because we’ll have the chance to be on time again tomorrow. For someone there will not be a tomorrow, at least not on this side of mortality. That kind of realization comes when you stop for a funeral procession. Coming to church can, in a sense, do the same kind of thing. What we’re doing now can shift our own priorities if we’re willing. Each week we have six days of being busy. Six days of thinking about ourselves and what we must do and what we need and who all needs us, and then Sunday comes, the clock strikes 11:00 and we stop. We stop to look up from whatever it was that seemed so important to focus on the giver and redeemer of life. Six days of focus on the world and this one hour to focus on the one who created it and the one who will take us from this world into the next. It’s in a moment like this that we are invited to see clearly. The priorities shift back to where they should be: God right here at the top and everything else below, only here’s the problem, while just about everyone in Marietta still stops for funeral processions, not everyone stops at 11:00. Not everyone stops to see the world clearly through the lens of hope that our Lord provides, so they go on looking through the lens of fear and anxiety. Not everyone stops so that their priorities settle back into the order they should, so they go on chasing after momentary contentment. They go on defining themselves by physical beauty or wealth or popularity. They go on dedicating themselves completely to their jobs. They go on rushing through life and wondering why they feel so empty. They go on thinking that the whole world rests on their shoulders, forgetting about the One who holds the whole world in His hands. Every once in a while, we all have to stop to think on such things. If we don’t, we’re like those who race from one thing to the next, busying ourselves with what seems important while neglecting what is essential. We’ll race through life, exhausted, yet failing in our true vocation. The first question in the Shorter Catechism in our book of Confessions is this: What is the chief end of man? The answer: Man’s chief end is to glorify god, and to enjoy him forever. I ask you, is that what you’ve been doing with your time? There’s wisdom on this subject in the book of Proverbs. Proverbs 16: 25: “Sometimes there is a way that seems to be right, but in the end, it is the way to death.” Not everyone stops to think about such things. Few stop to question the rat race because everyone else is doing it. Still, it is good and right to step off the hamster wheel to consider whether or not we’re getting anywhere. It’s good to stop and think, and today we are called to stop and think and consider who is at the top and who is down below. Who is truly King and does he wear his rightful crown in our lives? We all must stop to think about what’s driving us. There’s a moment on the show Mama’s Family when a young man proclaimed: “I get to know God just fine from the comfort of my bed on Sunday morning. I don’t need the church to get through life.” Mama responded: “Well, you don’t need a parachute to jump out of an airplane either.” Today is an important day, and I’m glad that you’re here so that together we can stop, let our priorities shift back into the order that they should always have, and to remember that we have been thinking so much about our president and his fate that we may have forgotten that we already have a King. Today is Christ the King Sunday. It’s a day to stop and think about where we’re going, which is important for we have been walking around like we are the masters of our own lives and kings of our own castles for so long that we may have forgotten that we are his subjects. We have been rushing so quickly through it all that we might think that the future of this world is all up to us, only wait a minute. He is God and we are not, and no matter how important the appointment, ultimately our fate rests in him. Because today is Christ the King Sunday this hour in the great scheme of things has significance, for here comes from Scripture the reminder that among all the failed shepherds who have promised us the world while leading us nowhere, the Creator God raised up for us a righteous branch, the firstborn of all creation, and in him all things in heaven and on earth were created and in him all things hold together. Today is the day for us to pull over to the side of this busy life full of anxiety and false hope to recognize that we have a savior, and in him we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. On the other hand, the world doesn’t stop. Some just keep on driving, and they are like those who drive by the funeral procession unable to recognize that something important is happening. He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, but while some bow before him, others just keep on driving. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, but while some marvel at him, there are others who don’t have time to stop. And he has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, but some of us just keep on driving as though nothing new has happened. Yet to be rescued is worth stopping the car, for to be rescued by him means something, it declares something about who you are and who I am. According to the author of Colossians, the Lord “has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son.” What this would have meant in ancient times is that he has captured us, invaded our territory and taken us to a different place. To be transferred into a different kingdom is something like what happened to the nation of Israel when Babylon invaded and took so many of the people to live in exile, but here it is Christ who has invaded the world, concurred it, and has taken us as his captives into a new kingdom – the Kingdom of Heaven – and here we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Here we are not subject to the powers of sin and death. Here all things visible: thrones, dominions, rulers, or powers are subject to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, though far too often we bow before them. Sometimes we look to them for legitimacy. Sometimes we rest our trust in their mortal hands, or worse, in our own, which means doing work that is not our to do. There was a quote from a humorist named Robert Benchley in the Marietta Daily Journal last week: Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn’t the work he or she is supposed to be doing. What work is ours, but the work of praise? What work is His? Everything else. Rest then in the security of his powerful love. Rest in the hands of the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For going through life trying to control, manipulate, and do your will on this earth is no way to spend the short time that we have. My friend Jim Goodlet quoted another pastor to me this last week. One of the great pastors, the prince of preachers he was called, Charles Spurgeon, who once said that “good character is the best tombstone, only carve your name on the hearts of those you love, not on a tombstone.” Today let us remember the one who has carved his name on all our hearts. All praise and glory and honor are His, the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. Amen.