A new pastor moved into town, and was calling on parishioners.
He rang the doorbell of one home … heard someone inside, but no answer at the door.
So he left a card, and wrote on the back, Revelation 3:20.
The next Sunday, an usher handed him the very same card with Genesis 3:10 added to it.
Here’s what they say:
Revelation 3:20 - Behold! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone answers, I will come in.
Genesis 3:10 says - I heard your voice, but I was afraid, because I was naked.
We can find just about anything in the Bible.
Some folks love to look for doom and danger.
Some folks dwell on the wrath of God and punishment for sinners.
Some folks look for secrets to wealth and happiness.
Others search the Bible looking for Noah’s ark … or the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah … or the chalice of the Last Supper.
Others look for hope.
What we find depends on what we’re looking for.
Some years ago, I misplaced my glasses in my office … I looked and looked – nowhere to be found.
I called my secretary, “Can you help me?” She glanced around the office and immediately spotted them. They were out in the open and obvious.
I couldn’t find them, because I expected them to be somewhere else.
We find in the Bible what we want to find.
I look for assurance!
The message of assurance on every page.
We belong to God.
God doesn’t forsake His own.
The promises hold true forever!
God at work in all things for good.
We’re all going to make it.
Who doesn’t need a little assurance now and then?
At a retreat center near Tulsa, Oklahoma – a lovely wooded area high on a bluff overlooking the city … I was out for a stroll through the woods – a warm, sunny afternoon in the early fall – everything still, and while strolling along the path, there ahead of me, a small lizard, sunning herself … I stopped … she looked at me; I looked at her … we both stood there for a few moments, sizing each other up.
I didn’t move
She didn’t move.
Who was going to move first?
This path was hers.
She got there before I did.
I was the intruder.
But I moved.
And I was a whole lot larger.
In a heartbeat, she was gone … skittering off into the leaves… hiding … afraid.
How many times I’ve been that little lizard.
Shadows frighten me.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death …
Two cousins of mine lost their spouses this week … the turn of the page, the tick of the clock … the inevitable procession …
My heart trembles …
Clouds fill my mind.
I want to run.
But where shall I run?
Busy myself in work?
Read a little more?
Sleep longer?
Play harder?
Cook dinner and go to the movies?
Where do you run when you feel like running?
We all have our little strategies when shadows cross our path.
I suspect we’re all pretty much the same.
We’re flesh and blood.
Tears and laughter.
We know in our bones how mortal we are.
We see the page turn.
We hear the clock tick.
We do our best to make the most of it.
We love and hope others love us.
We work hard, and we want the world to be a little better because of us.
We forgive and are forgiven.
We dream of far away places … adventures we’ll never have …
We’ve got a book full of missed opportunities.
And a story full of grace.
We’ve made it this far …
I think we’re all pretty much the same.
So where do we go?
When shadows loom?
Is there some anchor to hold the ship in the storm?
A refuge in the wilderness?
A place of safety when all hell breaks loose?
Let’s take a look at our text for the day – Romans Chapter 11 … [read text] …
The question lurking in the background: Has something gone wrong with God’s plan of salvation?
If Jesus is a Jew, from the Jews and by the Jews, why have so few of His people signed on?
Has something gone wrong?
Paul wrestles with this question.
He’s a Jew.
It pains him deeply.
But an answer emerges in Paul’s heart and mind.
God is at work.
In all things.
For good.
Has God rejected His people? Paul asks!
Not at all.
“I’m one of them,” says Paul.
Nothing has gone wrong.
The promises of God hold true.
No matter what!
God’s people are still God’s people.
The apple of God’s eye [Deuteronomy 32:10].
So why have they turned from Jesus?
There’s a mystery here, says Paul.
Their turn has been instrumental in your turn.
For a time being, they’ve gone another way.
So you can find your way.
Paul doesn’t explain, and neither should we.
We step back and celebrate.
We give thanks and we rejoice.
It’s all going to work out.
Because the promise holds true; God’s Word is good to the very end.
But it’s a hard business putting it all together.
Hard for us.
Hard for God.
Nothing easy about love and grace.
Nothing easy about forgiveness.
We all know the sorrow of forgiveness that didn’t come our way when we needed it.
Our heart was aching for a second chance, an encouraging word, and there were only scowls and scorn, wagging fingers and wagging tongues - judgment and chastisement. We didn’t need one more slap in the face – but we got it anyway …
And we all know how easily we can withold forgiveness from others … even as we hope others will forgive us, we become miserly in our forgiveness of others.
A kindly word could heal a wound quickly, but no, our resentment, our sense of hurt, our smoldering discontent, our self-righteousness, our desire to get even and set things straight deepen the wound and increase the hurt.
Why do we do that?
Why the scowl rather than the smile?
Why hang on to our anger?
Why can’t we let things go?
Leave things alone … leave them up to God.
Nothing easy about love and grace.
Nothing easy about forgiveness.
For us, or for God!
It’s tough to cross out sin.
The first sacrifice - in the Garden.
The journey was going to be a tough one.
Fig leaves wouldn’t do.
Something more durable was needed.
So God becomes a tailor.
Leather clothing … animal skins … the first sacrifice … life given in exchange for life.
Every time Israel spilled the blood of a goat or a lamb, Israel remembered how costly forgiveness is.
Life given in exchange for life … all of the blood poured out … yet something more was needed.
Something so good, so pure – to do it once for all – to finish the work.
There would have to be another sacrifice …
On a hilled called Calvary.
A cross.
A crown of thorns.
Shouts and jeers.
Thieves on either side.
Soldiers doing their job.
A spear thrust to the side.
Women weeping.
Men fleeing for their lives.
The proud and the mighty ever so proud and ever so mighty.
It’s a hard business for God.
It’s tough to cross out sin.
But God works.
There are miracles of grace.
Light shines in the darkness.
Hope dawns upon the weary soul.
Faith is born anew.
Courage to face the day.
Strength to continue.
There is both severity and kindness in all of this, says Paul.
God darkens the darkness.
God puts stumbling blocks in our way.
God makes our hatred all the more hatred.
Our despair all the more dark.
Our anger all the more angry.
Our bitterness all the more bitter.
When we walk away from God,
God magnifies the misery.
When we feast on lesser things,
God makes us hungrier.
When we drink at other fountains,
God makes our thirst unbearable.
God takes a hardened heart and makes it harder.
Until we weary of ourselves.
Until we find ourselves utterly disgusting.
Until we begin to ask the right questions.
Is that what I’ve become?
Is this who I really am?
Like the Prodigal Son in the far away land … eating pig slop and dressed in rags … he comes to his senses - Why am I here when I could be in my father’s house?
Why am I so hungry when I could be feasting at his table?
Why am I dressed in rags when I could be clothed in the best?
God hammers us.
Bending us toward life.
Toward love.
Toward grace.
To that moment when we rise from the pig slop and begin the journey back home!
A strange and fearsome grace at work.
Paul reminds his Gentile readers … you’re in, but you’re in by the grace of God … others were here before you got here, and if, for some reason, they’re somewhere else right now, don’t get snotty, don’t get snooty!
If only Christians had read Paul carefully, the sad, tragic, history of anti-Semitism would never have emerged …
If the Church had read the Bible well, there would never have been a holocaust and the death of six million Jews …
I recall my own childhood and the derisive remarks made about Jews.
The story is real … not imagined … the church abused and killed Jews for 1500 years, and what came to pass in Nazi Germany must be laid at the feet of the church.
Gentiles did get snooty and snotty about it all.
Gentiles forgot that it was all by grace!
When it’s all by grace, no one call pull rank.
There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to the promise. [Galatians 3:28-29].
So don’t get snotty, says Paul.
Don’t get snooty!
If you’re in now, Mr. Gentile, Mrs. Gentile, you can just as easily be out.
God grafted you in … you’re but a branch.
You’re not the root.
Jews are the root.
To the Jew belongs the first rank.
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
You’re here by grace!
So be humble in your faith.
Grateful in your praise.
Generous in your love toward others.
Patient and forgiving.
Open-handed and open-hearted.
He has told you, O mortal, what is good;
and what does the LORD require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God? [Micah 6:8].
I have to remind myself of these things now and then.
When shadows loom on my pathway and my heart trembles.
Who am I?
I’m a child of God.
Saved by grace.
Life and love are my destiny.
Jesus died for me.
To cover me with God’s love.
Open the doors of salvation.
Heal the wound.
Forgive the sin.
Bridge the chasm.
Bring me to God.
I’m often frightened by many things.
Yet Christ is present.
Death will close my eyelids.
Yet the hand of Christ will open them anew.
The promise holds.
God doesn’t fail.
We will all make it.
Whatever shadows you’re facing today,
Whatever challenge and heartache have come your way,
You will make it.
Because God made you.
Jesus died for you.
You were there in the mind of God.
When Jesus cries out, It is finished! it was finished for you.
For you, for you, for you.
You’re gifted and you’re able.
You have a good mind and a good heart.
You can forgive.
You can overcome.
You will find a way through, over, under or around.
You are a person of love and grace.
You have the strength of the Holy Spirit within you.
The work God began in you will be finished, and it will be finished well.
The promise holds.
We belong to a faithful Savior.
And Jesus is His name.
Amen and Amen!
