St.
Paul Lutheran Church Sunday Service
Message:
“The Church Is Larger Than It Looks” 2
Cor. 5:6-8
4th
Sunday After Pentecost
July
6, 2003
Buildings like books can be deceiving.
What is it we say about books? “Don’t
judge a book by its cover!” The
same can be said for some buildings.
Don’t judge the Minden Opera House by the fact that it’s located on
the north side of a small town square, in an aging brick building, flanked by a
donut shop on one side and a flower shop on the other side.
Not much to look at on the outside, but it’s what’s on the inside
that really surprises and impresses people.
The same is true of churches. Some
church buildings look small from the outside, yet once inside you discover room
to seat 350 to 400 people rather comfortably in
a spacious sanctuary. You say to
yourself, “This church is a lot larger than it looks.”
But then, by the grace of God, when it comes to churches, THE church IS
larger than it looks, especially the one, holy Christian church; Christ’s
church on earth. Christ’s church
as people who are all one in Christ is always larger than it looks.
On any given Sunday in a church with 350 members there may be only 150 in
church, yet “in the workplace, in the marketplace, on vacation, in
hospitals, at the lake, in places of amusement or entertainment; in virtually
every part of our society, the church is all round us every day.”
Wherever the church is truly the church of our Lord and Savior
Jesus Christ; wherever
the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus comes in this life, it is larger and more active
than it looks like seed, said, Jesus, hidden, silent, growing, maturing,
sprouting in the dark.
The church is also larger than it looks in another sense too. It is
larger than it looks in terms of the strength & support it brings people.
A paratrooper was once asked how many times he had jumped from an
airplane. He readily admitted that
he had never jumped from a plane.
The
admirer-turned-critic quickly responded,
Well, I don’t see how you can call yourself a paratrooper!
Oh, I’m a paratrooper all right, he said, It
wasn’t that I jumped, but I was pushed out 37 times.
You see – there are
two kinds of courage. One is the macho-tough-guy bravado of a Sylvester Stallone
or a Clint Eastwood or a Harrison Ford. But the other kind of courage is the
silent courage of a para- trooper who gets on the airplane 36 more times after
being too scared to jump on his first mission.
Or I wonder how many people regularly give blood who aren’t all that
fond of needles or they’re a little afraid of passing out. But still they give
& give, quietly, regularly. Or
what about the people that take shot after shot or treatment after treatment for
some chronic disease or terminal illness.
Courage consists not in blindly overlooking danger, but in seeing it,
facing it, and coming through it with confidence and hope.
The courage of Christians may not be flamboyant or dramatic
courage, but it gets the job done. Sometimes we call it “Hanging in there.”
Ernest Hemingway called it “Grace Under Pressure.”
St. Paul calls it “Good Courage.”
In the closing verses of this Sunday’s Epistle from 2 Corinthians 5,
St. Paul uses this phrase twice . . So we are always confident (of good
courage) – for we walk by faith, not by sight.
Yes, we have confidence (good, hopeful courage). .
I like Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of these verses. His take
on what Paul is saying about courage to face life & death issues reads like
this. The Spirit of God whets our appetite by giving us a taste of
what’s ahead. He puts a little of
heaven in our hearts so that we’ll never settle for less.
That’s why we live with such good cheer.
You won’t see us dropping our heads or dragging our feet!
Cramped conditions here don’t get us down.
They only remind us of the spacious living conditions ahead.
It’s what we trust in but don’t see
that keeps us going. Do you suppose a few ruts in the road or rocks in the
path are going to stop us? When the times comes, we’ll be plenty ready to exchange
exile for homecoming.
Life is a journey!
Life has a beginning and an end, and for all those, young & old alike, who
belong to the Kingdom of God by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, the end of
the journey is better than it’s beginning. For
we walk by faith, says Paul. It’s
what we trust in but don’t see that keeps us going.
A boy named Stephen, 5 years old, was invited to stay overnight
at his cousin’s house. It was
Stephen’s first time away from home and it all sounded like an exciting
adventure. But when his mom and dad
took him to his cousin’s house, on the way he started to get homesick. With
tears in the corners of his eyes and his voice shaky, he said, “Mommy, I
don’t feel so good. I’d better
go home with you.”
His mom said, “It’s up to
you, but I know you’d have a good time.”
“But mommy,” Stephen
whimpered, “They said they were going to climb a big hill tomorrow, and
I’ve never been there before!”
It takes courage; good, hopeful, quiet, confident courage to look ahead,
but sometimes like Stephen, we’ve “never been there before!”
Are there places we’re afraid to go; hills to climb; valleys to walk?
Yes. Do our fears increase?
Do our imaginations work overtime? Do we have questions but no answers? Can our
nights get long & rest-less? Are our days filled with things that suddenly
seem empty and sometimes pointless? Yes.
How large is God’s love? How
large is God’s power? How large
is God’s grace? It’s larger
than seed planted in the ground! It’s as large as Christ’s resurrection from
death and the grave. It’s like stepping out of a large city hospital, seeing
& feeling the warmth of the sun, hearing birds sing above the sound of city
traffic, leaving the city behind & heading for the peace & quiet of a
familiar home.
In the church of our Lord Jesus Christ; for those who belong to the Body
of Christ, God’s love, God’s power, God’s grace, God’s gift of eternal
life is like – always, a lot larger than it looks.
So there’s this little song I’ve learned to sing.
I sang it a few Sunday’s ago some 4000 plus LWML Convention goers as
part of one of the opening devotions in the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma
City a few weeks ago. We it sang it several times; sang in loud; sang it soft;
sang it slow; sang it with feeling; sang it again & again.
Lord, listen to Your children
praying.
Lord, send Your Spirit in this place.
Lord, listen to Your children praying.
Send us love, send us power, send us grace.
It’s true, the
church is larger than it looks.
The church is a wonderful strength & support in time of need.
The church is God’s people, walking by faith & not by sight.
In every Christian Baptism, in every celebration of Holy Communion, in
Word and Sacrament, in every prayer we offer, in every kind and caring word we
speak to help strength and support others, we have life, the abundant life,
eternal life. Even when life is
bad, we have it good.
Did you catch that in yesterday’s Portals of Prayer devotion?
“Pastor,” said an active 94 year old woman who suffered a sudden stroke and
had to be moved to a nursing home; “Pastor, we have it good even when we have
it bad.
It’s what we trust in but
don’t yet see that keeps us going.
When our courage and confidence is rooted & grounded in Christ; when
we walk by faith and not by sight; then we truly discover that God’s love in
Christ; God’s power in Christ; God’s grace in Christ; is larger than life;
larger than death, larger than suffering, larger than any pain of loneliness
or feelings of being left behind, larger than our worst fears or our best
efforts.
When loved ones are sick & hurting; when fellow church members feel
weary & helpless; when we long to do something helpful, positive, reassuring
. . . let this be the way to begin . . . the way to new courage &
hope-filled living.
Lord, listen to Your children
praying.
Lord, send Your Spirit to this place.
Lord, listen to Your children praying.
Send us love, send us power, send us grace.