In the Strength of His Power, a sermon based on Ephesians 6: 10-20, preached on August 25, 2024

“Put on the whole armor of God.” That’s stronger than how I end each worship service. When we get to the end of each worship service, I always say the same thing: As God’s own, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, and patience. Clothe yourselves is different from arm yourselves, but sometimes the world outside requires armor. People are fighting all kinds of battles every day. The great preacher Dr. Frank Harrington, who served the Lord at Peachtree Presbyterian Church, used to talk about how he was all the time fighting the battle of the bulge. He wasn’t talking about what happened on the Western Front during the winter of 1945. He was talking about how hard it was some mornings to button the top button on his white shirt. He was talking about the battle of temptation to avoid the potato chips and to go for the carrot sticks instead. He was talking about the belt he put on and the feeling he got when he ran out of holes. Just last week, I received a joke from Fran Hammond put out by “The Laughing Christian.” It said: I got on my bathroom scale this morning, and let me tell you, the full armor of God is heavy! Halleluia! In the days of the Ephesians and the Apostle Paul, the battle was different, but it was also the same. Each day, those Ephesian Christians walked out into a world in which their faith was tested and their identity was questioned. Likewise, we will all walk out of this worship service, going into a world where our patience will be tested, and it will happen the minute we try to turn out of our parking lot. We live in the world where sin and death, evil and hatred, envy and vanity still have power, and if we are to resist, some days it takes more than just clothing yourself with love. Some days, what you need is the belt of truth. Speaking of the battle of the bulge, whenever I put on a belt, I’m noticing the hole I used the last time I put that belt on. I wear the same belt often enough that I can tell which hole is my standard. Then there’s the hole one notch up that I use for the week after Thanksgiving. My friends, we are not living in exile in Babylon or under the power of the Roman Empire, thanks be to God, but we are living in a society so overrun with standards of unattainable beauty that girls are turning to anorexia and bulimia at younger and younger ages. If a little girl looks at her reflection in the mirror and says anything other than, “I am a beautiful child of God,” then she needs to add a belt of truth to her outfit. As you think about the armor of God this morning, think about what it takes to extinguish the arrows that come at us. Do you have your shield? Do you have your helmet? Have you put on your belt of truth so that you know who you are while living in a society that tells you you’re only as good as you look? This is what Christians have been doing for generations. We have maintained our conviction despite the world around us. Let me tell you about the Huguenots. Do you know anything about the Huguenots? About 500 years ago, John Calvin, the theologian, became so popular that Christians throughout Europe were reading what he had to say. He lived in Geneva, Switzerland, and there, those who followed his interpretation of Christianity were called Calvinists. In Scotland, they were called Presbyterians. And in France, they were called Huguenots. Many of those French Huguenots immigrated here and became some of the first Europeans to settle in Charleston, South Carolina. One of the oldest churches in that city of Charleston is the old Huguenot church, established in 1687, but not all of them left France. Other Huguenots stayed, and during World War II, when the Nazis invaded and took over the country, a small village of Huguenots wrestled with what they should do. How would they live their faith under Nazi occupation? How would they go on living without compromising their convictions? How would they survive without losing their souls? With the armor of God in mind, their pastor stood in the pulpit of that town occupied by the Nazis and said, “The responsibility of Christians is to resist the violence that will be brought to bear on their consciences through the weapons of the Spirit.” In other words, put on the breastplate of righteousness, for they may have invaded our borders, they may be occupying our nation, their hatred and cruelty may surround us, but we can still defend the state of our hearts. That’s part of what a breastplate does. It guards your internal organs. It protects your heart, and those Huguenots, they couldn’t push back the Nazi tanks with their hunting rifles, yet with pure and loving hearts, they provided sanctuary to Jews all during the war, and by the time the war ended, the total number of Jews they had saved was over 5,000. “The responsibility of Christians is to resist the violence that will be brought to bear on their consciences through the weapons of the Spirit.” “Put on the whole armor of God.” Wear that belt of truth. Put on the breastplate of righteousness. And lace up the sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. That’s such an interesting phrase: lace up your sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. I think it means that if your boots get too used to marching off to war, if your fingertips get too used to arguing on the internet, if your brain gets too good at criticizing, you won’t be ready for the dawn of peace. You might come home from the battlefield, the cease fire may be called, but if you’re too used to fighting a battle, you won’t be ready for peace. On the other hand, those Huguenots knew that the Nazi occupation wouldn’t last forever. They didn’t surrender nor give in, but they resisted. They were so rooted in the faith that they were like a tree whose trunk twisted by the wind, whose branches were battered, but remained standing once the hurricane passed. That’s the main thing about this armor of God. It’s not about winning the battle. It’s about standing firm until the battle is won, and Who is it who will win this battle for us? Who is it who’s always fighting on our side? For several years now, every day, I’ve been reading a morning devotional. I went through “Jesus Calling” a couple times. Do you know that one? I just moved from “Jesus Calling” to “Jesus Listens,” and last week in “Jesus Listens,” I read this line, that amid all the headlines we read each day, something most important is always left out by the journalists. We read the headlines of the conflict in the Middle East. We read about the desperation of the Palestinian people. We read about the plight of women in Afghanistan. We read about the upcoming presidential election. And we think we know who the major players are in all those conflicts, but unless we remember that in the midst of all of that, God is working His purpose out, we’ll never really know what’s going on out in the world. My friends, we don’t need to worry about the outcome of the battle, for the war is already won. We just can’t lose our souls in the midst of it. Don’t sacrifice your friendships. Don’t spend your time spreading the division. Put on that belt of truth, and the breastplate of righteousness, and the helmet of salvation, and lace up those sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. Don’t take up your sword to fight the battle that He’s already winning. Notice with me that the sword in the whole armor of God isn’t a lethal weapon for us to wield. It’s the word of God. The sword is the word of God, but in the Bible, do you remember how Peter used his sword? Jesus was being arrested to be taken to His trial, where He’d be condemned and crucified. Peter thought Jesus needed him to defend Him, so he took out his sword and he cut off the ear of an enslaved man named Malchus. I think about that, and I remember how impulsive we all can be. We want to stand up and defend ourselves and our religion and our convictions, forgetting that Jesus doesn’t need us to fight for Him. He’s already won the victory. My friends, we are in the middle of a spiritual conflict that will not be solved with a political solution. Our struggle is not against blood and flesh, but against the cosmic powers of this present darkness. That’s what the Bible says. So, we need to be, not Christians who are ready to lash out at our brothers and sisters, but mature Christians who are always wearing the armor of God. A great preacher named Oswald Chambers once said, “Spiritual maturity is going from being thin-skinned and hard-hearted to thick-skinned and soft-hearted.” Have you ever been around someone who was thin-skinned and hard-hearted? Of course you have. They’ve taken over the internet. However, the spiritually mature wear the armor of God to maintain a tender heart, open and compassionate. Wear that armor and be quick to listen, slow to judge. Don’t break under criticism but remember who you are. Be spiritually mature. May the state of your heart remain steady in spite of the chaos around you. Stand firm, knowing that the storm will pass, and that Christ will have the victory. Be strong in the strength of His power. Amen.

All God's Creatures Have a Place in the Choir, a sermon based on Ephesians 5: 15-20, preached on August 18, 2024

I once had the honor of preaching at a tiny Presbyterian church in South Georgia. I was a seminary student, preaching as a sub for their pastor, and that Sunday, the choir loft was empty, and there were 15 or 20 sitting in the pews. When we got to the choir anthem, those 15 or 20 sitting in the pews stood up, walked to the choir loft, and sang the anthem. All God’s creatures have a place in the choir. That’s what I titled this sermon, “All God’s Creatures Have a Place in the Choir,” but Dr. Jeffrey Meeks hasn’t had the chance to sign off on that title. I’m not sure that he would endorse the message that all God’s creatures have a place in the choir, for the truth is that not all God’s creatures can sing. While we can all make a joyful noise to the Lord, it’s not necessarily a pleasant noise, so while many a cross-stitched sampler has declared that all God’s creatures have a place in the choir, most people know better than to think that they can just walk into a choral group and sing. However, if you walked into a kindergarten classroom, they wouldn’t. I once heard a story about a teacher who walked into a classroom full of kindergarteners. She asked, “Who in here is an artist?” Those kids had just painted pictures that were hanging on the walls, and so every kid in there raised his or her hand. They had all donned smocks and had handled a paintbrush, so every one of them considered him or herself an artist. Then the teacher asked, “Who in here is a musician?” One kid raised his hand and said, “I can play the triangle.” Another, “I can play the maracas.” On they went. The classroom was full of musicians. Then she asked, “Who in here can sing?” Again, every hand shot up. Why? Because no one told them that they couldn’t, and they were all young enough to still be trying everything they could possibly try. That changes by the time we get to high school. By the time we get to high school, most of us specialize in one thing or another. I specialized in baseball. I gave up Boy Scouts and playing the trombone so that I could sit the bench for the Marietta Blue Devils. Last Sunday, I ran into the older brother of a team member I had played with. We talked about how his little brother could throw a fastball right by you. Our conversation was as though that Bruce Springsteen song “Glory Days” had come to life. Do you know that song? It goes: I had a friend who was a big baseball player, back in high school. He could throw that speedball by you; make you look like a fool. Saw him the other night at this roadside bar. I was walking in; he was walking out. We went back inside, sat down, had a few drinks. But all he kept talking about, was Glory days. Well, they’ll pass you by, glory days. In the wink of a young girl’s eye, glory days. Glory days. That song is so good, maybe because it’s so true. Most of us who played sports in high school have taken up watching sports rather than playing sports, apart from pickleball, which everyone is playing these days. Think with me about the difference. Watching is not as life-giving as doing. Now, consider this verse from our second Scripture lesson: Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery. You’ve likely heard this verse before, but don’t just interpret the obvious lesson of this verse. Visualize with me the old football player, sitting in front of a TV or in the stands, beer in hand, watching players on a field do the thing he used to do. Keep that image on the one hand and consider with me the second half of that sentence: Do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves. Did you hear what the author of our second Scripture lesson did there? On the one hand is the old baseball player from the song who thinks all his best days are behind him, so he has a few drinks and reminisces on the bar stool, yet the alternative is to sing. Not listening to music but singing it. Not remembering the good old days but looking forward to tomorrow. My friends, most of us can’t play the sports we played in high school or college anymore, so we stop playing and start watching. That won’t work in here because Christianity is not a spectator sport. You don’t have to sing in the choir. You don’t have to preach the sermon or play the organ. These things are not for everybody, yet when you’re in here, you must sing. You must praise. You must lift up your voice because of all the seats in this room, not one of them is for the audience. Everyone in here is a participant in praising God, and when our hour of worship is over, the service begins. I’ve been reading this book that I’ve told you about. It’s a book titled, The Anxious Generation, and in it, the author, Jonathan Haidt, calls for all kinds of changes. He’s all for these changes that Marietta City Schools is already implementing, like those locked bags that kids put their cell phones in so they’re not distracted by them in class. Assistant Principal Anthony Booker, he told me this morning that it’s hard to implement, but it’s worth it because his students are talking to each other again. In addition to those locking bags for cell phones, Jonathan Haidt encourages no social media before the age of 16 and no smart phones before high school, but the big thing this guy encourages is to restore independence, free play, and responsibility to childhood. He says that our playgrounds are too safe to be any fun, and that we parents are so nervous about our kids getting hurt, that we haven’t given them chores or let them walk to school or ride the bus, and so our kids grow up without feeling the joy that comes from independence and having a purpose. According to Haidt, we all have two big human needs: community and purpose. We all need to be around people, which makes us feel loved, and we need to have the chance to do something that we love and that serves a higher purpose. That makes us feel like our lives have meaning. In other words, while washed-up old football players are sitting back drinking beer and watching the game, our kids are sitting back and looking at their phones, and the result is the same. We lack purpose. We lack community. We’re watching more than we are living, and Christianity is not a spectator sport. You don’t have to sing in the choir, but we all have a place here. We all have a part to sing and a gift to bring. Of all the seats in this room, not one of them is for the audience. Everyone in here is a participant in praising God, and when our hour of worship is over, the service begins, and when we serve, we are filled with the Spirit. Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about. You might know that groups of musicians from our church have been going around to retirement communities to sing. The group that went out the week before last went to Atherton Retirement Community one afternoon and sang songs like “Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini.” That one’s not in our hymnal. To talk to some of these singers and to ask them why they’re doing it, I talked with Lynne Sloop abut it one afternoon, and she said that she loves doing this. It brings her joy. If you could see Amy Sherwood singing. She and Lynn were the first two to go out to sing as a part of this program, and they sang “Moon River” during lunch at Atherton on the birthday of our church’s oldest member, Betty Kuhnen. The Cobb County Sheriff’s department heard that they were doing it, and they brought flowers and made Betty an honorary sheriff’s deputy for the day. It was an amazing experience to witness, and it never would have happened if Amy and Lynne had grown used to listening to music rather than singing it. We listen to music too much, when we were created to sing. We watch people do the things that we are meant to do. We wait around, frustrated with the world, and we wish someone would come along to do something about it, when we were created for just such a time as this. My friends, let us sing to remind ourselves that our Glory Days are not behind us, but before us. Let us lift our voices to praise the One who has promised that ahead of us are brighter days, brighter than all the days we have known before. Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine! O, what a foretaste of glory divine! Not an aftertaste, but a foretaste. Sing the wondrous love of Jesus. Sing his mercy and his grace. In the mansion bright and blessed, he’ll prepare for us a place. When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be, If you want to be ready to rejoice when we make it there, you had better stop mumbling through the words now. Together, let us sing will full hearts, giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

Strength for the Journey, a sermon based on 1 Kings 19: 4-8 and Ephesians 4: 25 - 5: 2, preached on August 11, 2024

Many years ago, in a small European village, the priest decided it was time to teach the town gossip a lesson. I don’t know what it was that finally pushed him over the edge. Whatever it was, he had had enough, and so he asked the town gossip to come to the church, where he led her up the stairs to the steeple There, he cut a slit in a feather pillow, handed it to her, and asked her to empty it out. She did. She shook the feathers out from the pillowcase. Some didn’t go far. They just hit the roof and glided down along the shingles to the gutter, but others were caught by the wind, and they went far and wide, over the tops of houses and through the streets of the town. Pointing to the empty pillowcase, the priest then said, “Put them back. Pick up all those feathers and put them back into the pillowcase.” “That’s impossible,” the town gossip said. “It can’t be done.” The priest agreed. “You’re right,” he said, “And your words are the same. Once you’ve whispered a rumor to your friend or your neighbor, you have no control over where those words go next. You can’t get them back, and your words have swept through the streets of this town like those feathers, damaging reputations for years.” After that, the town gossip changed her ways, but this morning I ask you: Why did she gossip in the first place? My friends, nearly 2,000 years ago, the words of our second Scripture lesson were written. Since then, have we gotten any better at using our words to “build each other up?” That’s what the Apostle Paul urges us to do this morning: Put away falsehood. Speak the truth in love. Be angry, but do not sin. Let no evil talk come out of your mouths. Be imitators of God. That’s the word we’ve read this morning. Yet, judging the state of our nation by the headlines or my social media feed, some days it appears as though we have only gotten worse about using our words since the Apostle first penned these words to the Ephesians. A member of our church sent me a joke yesterday that the legion of evil spirits Jesus sent to inhabit that herd of pigs in the Gospel of Matthew must have jumped out of those pigs and landed on Twitter. I read the headlines, and I scroll through my social media feeds, and I wonder, why do we talk this way to each other? Why do adults today violate the standards of speech enforced in our preschool? If we won’t allow the children of this church to call each other names, then why are we doing it? Why do we spread rumors? Why do we put each other down? In traffic, why are we so quick to honk the horn so aggressively? I think it was my mother-in-law who forwarded an email to me about why it’s good to be patient while driving. I wonder what it was about my driving that inspired her to send me this email. The email was about how, when we’re on the road, we don’t know where the person in front of us is going. It may be that the driver in front of us is driving so slowly because he’s on the way home from a funeral and is wiping tears from his eyes. Likewise, we don’t know why the couple is moving so slowly down the grocery store aisles. While we’re trying to get in and out of Kroger as quickly as possible, it may be that the couple slowing us down is taking their time because they just heard the news that she only has weeks to live, and so they’re trying to savor every moment. My friends, we don’t know what kind of day our neighbors are having. We don’t know what kind of day the bus driver or the garbage man is having. We don’t know if our mail carrier has been bitten by a dog or if the waitress just heard she was rejected from another graduate program. We don’t know what kind of battles the people around us are fighting, so be kind, the email said, and that’s lesson of our second Scripture lesson. Build each other up. We can’t mirror the standard of speech out in the world. We’re not supposed to imitate the world. We’re called to be imitators of God. Likely you’ve heard all this already, so think with me this morning about why it’s so hard to do these things. Why is it so tempting to say, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, come sit by me.” Why is gossip fun to hear? Why do we lash out at strangers? Why are we rude? Why are we attracted to politicians who slander their opponents? Sometimes, we are our worst selves just because we’re hungry. I love our first Scripture lesson. It’s the story of Elijah, who needed a snack. He had been running and running. He was so tired, he fell asleep under a broom tree just after saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life.” Have you ever felt that way? Sure, you have, and notice how God responds. God responds the way my mother did when I came home grumpy after a day at school and an afternoon of baseball practice. “How was your day?” she’d ask. “Fine,” I’d say. “Tell me about it. What happened?” “Nothing,” I’d respond. Then she’d say, “Why don’t you get yourself a snack, and then we’ll talk.” Likewise, the angel of God said to Elijah, “Get up and eat, or the journey will be too much for you.” There’s so much wisdom in just that statement, so my friends, if you ever catch yourself saying things to your neighbor that we would not tolerate in our preschool, have a snack. If you ever catch yourself losing your mind over an email you just read, and you hear yourself typing a response more loudly than usual because your fingertips are slamming down on the keyboard, take your lunch break. One of the greatest technological advances that I can think of in recent years is this feature on our email program at the church. After hitting “send,” you can “undo send” for a few minutes just in case you think better of it, and so to the question of “Why don’t we use our words to build each other up?” part of it is because we’re hungry or tired. We’re not so different than infants who cry when we get tired or hungry or wet. When I make the mistake of riding my bike on a rainy day, I walk into the house in a bad mood because I’m wet. Our physical state affects our emotional state. That’s not my opinion, that’s science, and it’s Scripture, so before you speak, have a snack, stop, and think it over. Take your time in using your words, for once your words are out of your mouth, they are like feathers taken up by the wind. That’s just how it is. If you’re really needing to criticize somebody, if you’re really wanting to knock someone off his pedestal, look at your feet and consider the ground you’re standing on. My friends, we can’t build each other up if we’re not standing on solid ground ourselves. If we’re trying to leave someone out of the circle, it’s likely because we don’t feel like we belong. Life is this competition, it seems sometimes. When I was a kid, I thought that it would get better once I was grown. It’s not. Parents are as nervous at the parent meeting as the kids are on the first day of school because adults are not as different from children as we like to think. We adults get hungry and grumpy and throw temper tantrums. We feel insecure and worry if we’ll be included. Christians, we can’t help others feel good about themselves if we don’t feel good about who we are. That’s why I remind you on Sundays at the very end of the service: Remember who you are. If you notice yourself losing your temper or spreading gossip, take a nap, have a snack, and remember who you are. We are on a journey to the Kingdom of God, and we need strength for that journey. Stand on the truth, and then you’ll have the strength to put away falsehood. Rejoice in the promises of God, and then you’ll be able to build up your neighbor. Remember who you are, and then remind your neighbor who she is. My friends, we won’t be able to be true imitators of God until we experience His love for ourselves. Last week, I remembered this moment in the Metro State Women’s Prison. I was a chaplain intern there one summer years ago. It was a hard summer because my eyes were opened to realities I hadn’t ever considered before. There was one woman who asked to meet with me because she was afraid God was going to send her to Hell. “What got you thinking about that?” I asked her. She told me about this dream she had, this memory that was coming back. There was a campfire, and around the campfire, she remembered doing things that she regretted and men who took advantage of her, and so she asked me if I believed God would send her back into that fire. I told her that I believed she had already been to hell, and that Jesus came to save her, not send her back to the place she’d already been because I believe that Christ has saved us from condemnation, and as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us, let us be kind to one another. I see such kindness in our preschool. This little preschool student invited me to his birthday party last week. His birthday is in February, his mom told me, but I’m looking forward to it. Just that invitation reminded me of the joy that we are promised in Christ Jesus our Lord. Remember that promise. Remember His love. And love one another. Amen.