All Saints: Hope

Hope: All Saints

Jesus is the Resurrection

John 11:32-44

Rev. Tim Callow

Preached Sun. October 31st, 2021

Jesus has come on the scene. He’s answered Mary and Martha’s summons, but he’s four days late. Their brother, Jesus’ dear friend Lazarus, is already dead. He is already buried. His body wrapped in linen and the stone rolled in front of his tomb. His body has begun to stink. It is over. But Mary and Martha are, nevertheless, happy to see their old friend and teacher in a time of grief.

“Lord,” Mary says kneeling before Jesus, “if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” There is sorrow in these words, but also an implicit faith. I’ve seen you heal, Lord. I’ve seen you work wonders. If you were able to get here in time my brother would have been fine. But I understand how things are. How busy you can get. How hard it is to travel. The danger that besets you at all sides. The danger you have put yourself in even showing up today, here in Judaea, where the religious authorities want you dead. 

“Where have you laid him?” Jesus asks. 

“Lord, come and see.” 

Jesus weeps. Perhaps he weeps because he knows what he is going to do and he knows it will anger the religious authorities, and he knows it will lead to his death. Perhaps he weeps at the human condition. The love Mary, Martha, and the others have shown. The death that Lazarus was forced to undergo. The condition he has come to save us from. Maybe he weeps for both reasons. Our tears don’t always have any one reason why they flow. But those around him say, “See how he loved him!” 

They assume Jesus wants to see the tomb so that he can pay his respects. That he might weep and grieve as they all did. But others begin to question him saying, “Could not he who opened the yes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”

It’s true Jesus had delayed. And if he showed up before Lazarus died he would have been healed. But God does not always operate on our time, I’m sure we’ve all experienced that. Sometimes God waits to perform something even greater. Sometimes God says “no” because there is something else in store.

In this case Jesus wants to show the meaning of those words he told Martha as he entered Bethany. “I am the resurrection and the life, He who believes in me, even if he dies, will come to life. And everyone who is alive and believes in me, shall never die at all…”

Jesus arrives at the grave and orders them to take away the stone. “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Martha tells him. But he is undeterred. “Did I not tell you that if yo believed, you would see the glory of God?” Well, no one is going to say no to Jesus. So they roll the stone away and we can imagine the stench that emanates from the cave. The body may have been covered in linen and perfumes and spices, but ancient Jews didn’t embalm bodies the way we do today. Or the way Egyptians did back then. Decomposition came on fast.

But Jesus looked up to the sky and prayed. “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” He then cries into the grave with a loud voice, “Lazarus! Come out!”

And there is a long pause.

Today is Halloween. A day for horror, the macabre, the grotesque. A day that we expose ourselves a little bit to our fear of death. And also a day for fun and candy. But it seems as good a day as any to point out what doesn’t happen here, and what we might expect to happen here. This account has all the makings of a good horror story. A mad scientist may take science too far and bring his bride back from the dead. A necromancer might raise the dead, but they are no longer the same person, no longer what they seem. Or Lazarus might burst out of the grave with a taste for flesh, living on the life of others to sustain his undead half-life. Horror is full of stories that take us to the brink of our fear of death, our fear of the uncanny. It plays on our hopes, our desire for a happy ending. Someone seeks to overcome death, but is tragically overcome by certain trade offs that are necessary. In horror, time and time again, death has the final say.

But Jesus is the resurrection, and he is life, and in his raising Lazarus he proves it. There is no trade off. There is no uncanny half-life of a man who must feed off of the life of the others. The Lazarus who walks out of the tomb at Jesus’ beckoning is the same Lazarus who grew up with Mary and Martha, the same Lazarus who ate with Jesus and sat at his feet. The same Lazarus who met his death. It is this Lazarus who lives. And he lives because Jesus is resurrection, and he is life, and all who believe in him may know that life.

What Jesus accomplishes seems too good to be true. A real overcoming of death. A real life that is eternal. And what Jesus promises seems to good to be true as well: that we might know his victory. That we too may experience the life that is stronger than death. That on the last day we too may be raised. But it is with this hope that we are confronted with this morning. Contrary to all the stories of horror that imbue our culture: there is no trade off. Death does not have the final say. There is life. Life eternal. And this life comes from Christ.

Halloween may be a holiday for the macabre, but its origins are Christian. That is, before it became secularized and taken over by Hollywood and candy companies. Halloween is All Hallow’s Eve, or, the Eve of All Saints. As there is a Christmas Eve, there is also an All Saints Eve. And on this day we are given opportunity to remember those saints who have gone before us. We are also given opportunity to give thanks to God, not only for their lives and all the difference they’ve made for us. We can give thanks to God for the Life. The Life those who have gone before us know in its fullness. The life we too are offered. That peace, that joy, that comfort in the Spirit. And most importantly that hope. That hope that is stronger than death. That hope against hope in the Resurrection and the Life.

Things Fall Apart: Resurrection

Things Fall Apart: Resurrection

If You Want to Know What God Plan to do, Look to the Cross

Job 42:1-6, 10-17

Rev. Tim Callow

Preached Sun. October 24th, 2021

Truth be told the ending of the Book of Job has always troubled me. God never lets Job in to his wager with the Satan. God vindicates Job in the presence of his friends, saying that he spoke rightly while they didn’t. But it’s unclear why Job should be in the right given the accusations he makes against God. God, making up for the loss of his family and household, restores his fortune and gives him double the property he had before. He gives Job new children, including daughters that are more beautiful than any in the land.

It’s a fairy tale ending, but it rings very hollow to me. The poet who wrote Job is very careful, so I have to imagine we are meant to think this is a hollow ending. Imagine yourself in Job’s shoes, you’ve lost everything. Your children all died when the roof fell in on them during a feast. Would being given more children make up for the loss of the first in any way? Who thinks gaining one loved one over another is a “restoration”? God gives Job a lot of gifts, but the pains and griefs of the evils that were inflicted remain with him. These are sufferings that can never go away. Seemingly inflicted on a mere wager.

First of all, I’m not sure we should take the frame story all that literally. For one, it anthropomorphizes God in a way that God’s appearance in the whirlwind does not. By anthropomorphize I mean make God out to be like a human being. God is Spirit, God does not act like we act. God does not have heavenly council with prosecuting attorneys. So the story is in some way a fable, but a fable meant to make a point for us. I imagine it’s there to explain to us that Job truly is innocent. God’s speech in the whirlwind seems pretty clear about our inability to understand such heavenly councils to begin with.

But I think the question of Job’s “restoration” and whether he is truly restored is far more difficult. God certainly blesses Job, and these blessings are meant to make up for the losses incurred. But it’s not a truly happy ending, because what was lost is not restored.

It is here that I want to step beyond Job in discussing the problem of evil, and how God acts. Oftentimes when we are troubled by the problem of evil, how a good God could allow evil things to happen in the world, we focus on God’s creation. How it is that God could have created a world where everything changes. Because change entails loss, it entails suffering. How could God have made a world full of death? And in such a world how can God allow injustice and unnecessary suffering? One thinks of Hurricane Ida, or other such natural disasters that ended in loss of life.  

In the Book of Job the problem of evil is mostly on this horizon, though I think it hints at how a satisfactory answer cannot be found if we limit ourselves to looking at God’s actions in creation. The real answer the Bible provides to the problem of evil is in the New Testament. Job is not the only biblical figure to face great evil with great patience despite being innocent. Jesus, too, is innocent and is tortured. Jesus is innocent and he is put to death.

But Jesus’ denouement is very different than Job’s. On the third day the sinless and innocent Jesus of Nazareth is resurrected. He is given new life on Easter morn. This answer to the problem of evil, is not found in God’s creative power active each and every day, this answer to the problem of evil is found in God’s decisive and liberatory grace, that overcomes the powers of chaos and evil, and that will come to full victory at the end of this evil age.

The answer we find in the New Testament, then, is resurrection. This world is overrun by evils. By powers and principalities, murderous spirits, decadent vices, and great disaster. This truly is an evil age in revolt against God. All is not right with the world. But God is not satisfied to leave us to our fates, to leave us in bondage to sin and to the corruption of the flesh. God sends us his Son that we might share in the power of his resurrection, and that by his grace he might make all things new. That what was once lost, may come back. That Job might be fully restored, not in having received new children, but in seeing his old children again.

What is the answer then? Why do bad things happen to good people? Why won’t God feed the poor in Africa or prevent needless suffering? Frankly, that’s kinda passing the buck isn’t it? I’m sure God might ask us the same question. But more to the point, God intends to wipe out all evil. God intends to bring resurrection. If we want to know what God’s plan is, we need only look at the Cross.

Things Fall Apart: The Answer

Things Fall Apart: The Answer

In the Presence of God Questions Fade Away

Job 38:1-7, 34-41

Rev. Tim Callow

Preached Sun. October 17th, 2021

They told him it couldn’t be done. Job has spent the majority of the book outlining his case against God. How he was an innocent man, how God subjected him to grievous evil unjustly. How God even lets the wicked lead long lives of great success. He spoke of his fear in that encounter, that God would simply overwhelm him and not bring a satisfactory answer. But his friends told him God does not answer mortals. When Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar cannot answer Job, Elihu steps up the plate and seeks to step in as mediator. As God’s advocate he tells Job that he has no standing, does not know how he may have offended the Lord, and furthermore God would not answer him.  

When has God ever appeared at the call of a mortal? Why would God waste his time with a sinner? Is the matter not clear? Isn’t Job clearly full of pride, and full of lies?  And yet, miraculously, shockingly, suddenly, God appears in the storm. “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you will answer me.”

Job’s request has been answered. God has accepted his challenge, and will now stand for trial. Now Job may be vindicated, his righteousness settled.  But God’s speeches are the most difficult and perplexing parts of the book. God does not answer Job directly. Instead, God asks a series of questions. Questions about the creation of the world, the location of the storehouses of snow, the source of the rain, the power that binds the constellations. Questions about the birth of animals and their sustenance. In other words, God asks Job if he can do better. Does Job have the wisdom that created the heavens and the earth? Can Job judge the wicked and bind chaos? If Job is capable God will bow to his wisdom. But of course Job cannot do these things, as we cannot.

What are we to make of this response of God? Is God really answering Job’s accusations? Or is God just boasting? Is God overawing Job just as Job had feared?

I am suggesting there are two things going on here. The first is pretty clear on a surface reading: God is questioning Job’s knowledge of the matter. Job does not know God’s justice, or how God exerts justice. Job only knows human justice which is not exactly God’s justice. God is not bound by our laws and procedures. Job, in other words, has no standing before God. This is important because it means Job’s vindication will not come at God’s expense. 

But I think the second thing that is going on here is more important for us this morning. While God is undermining Job’s case, he is also giving Job an answer. In offering his line of questioning God is describing himself through his actions. Who is God? God is the one who binds the Pleiades and Orion. God is the one who walks along the deep. God is the one who smashes the head of Leviathan. God is the one who makes sure the lions have something to eat. God is the one who gives the wicked their due.  God is the one who holds off the forces of chaos. It is this God that Job has met face to face in the whirlwind.  

What is Job’s answer to his accusation? The answer is the face of God. The God who holds all things in life, who fights evil, who will send his Son for our sake. In the presence of God comes the peace that surpasses all understanding. In the presence of God all our complaints are put in a new context. In the presence of God we are filled with hope.

God describes himself in poetry that we might have sense of the presence that Job knew in the whirlwind. That in his self-description we may have some sense of the one in whom we can trust, the one who we know in Jesus Christ. God does not give an answer because God does not need to be justified in his actions. But when we attend to God we find the answer that is deeper than our own questions.

The answer Job receives may not be entirely satisfying. It is more of a promise than an answer, more of an attempt to undercut his complaint than to provide any reason. But we already knew that God is too big for our comprehension, that human attempts to comprehend God’s workings can only limit him. And so we find ourselves embraced by the mystery, overcome by the presence. And in his presence all such questions fade away.

Things Fall Apart: Patience

Things Fall Apart: Big Enough

We Do Not Justify God, God Justifies Us

Job 23:1-9, 16-17

Rev. Tim Callow

Preached Sun. October 10th, 2021

Our discipleship can be greatly hampered by images of God that are just plain wrong. J.B. Phillips, bible translator and Church of England clergyman wrote a short book in 1953 that is still just as relevant today called Your God is Too Small where he interrogates these false conceptions of God and reveals them for what they are, too small to matter. Not worth the faith we put in them. One example of these small gods is God the Resident Policeman who patrols the world and makes sure all the baddies get their due. God the Parental Hangover, the daddy we never had. Or maybe God is too painted by the daddy we did have and did not like. There’s God the meek and mild who would never judge us. God the Cosmic Bosom who is only there to comfort us in troubling times but not draw us to holiness. And so on and so on I think you get the picture.

All of these images of God are true in their way. God is meek and mild, we know that because Jesus was meek. But that meekness does not preclude judgment. God is our Father, but that doesn’t mean God is like human Fathers. God is sovereign, but God doesn’t police each and every instance. There is free will after all. What makes them too small is they take an aspect of God’s character, and make that all of God’s character. But the biblical picture of God is far more than just being a daddy or being a police officer. And we do ourselves great harm when we don’t pay attention to all that God is.  

The Book of Job opens us up to God’s great mystery, even in the face of evil.  The God of Job is by no means small, he is far beyond our conception or reckoning. Most of the book concerns debates over God’s character, how God works in the world, and whether God can be at fault in the case of Job the good man who has had evil done to him.  

When we left off last week Job has lost his family, household, and farm. He has been covered in sores and ulcers. He now resides on a dung hill in the ashes. His wife told him to give up on his integrity and curse God and die. He has refused, and he did not sin. Since then he was visited by three friends: Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. When they arrived they could hardly recognize him and sat down and wept with him. They sat on the ground for a whole week and wouldn’t say a word because of how great his suffering was. They were great friends until they opened their mouths.

Finally, Job’s patience seems to wane when he opens his mouth and curses the day of his birth.  He demands to know why he has lived to suffer so much, why he could not have died at birth that he might rest with the kings in the grave. He accuses God of hedging him in, and hiding from him the way that leads to life. This outburst greatly disturbs Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. The majority of the book recounts their debate with Job. Job insists that he is innocent, that he has done no wrong, and that God has acted unjustly. He wishes his concerns could be brought to trial, that God would not simply overawe him with terror, and that he would be vindicated.

  His friends, on the other hand, seek to justify God. Job could not possibly be innocent, because this great evil has befallen him. He must, in some way, deserve it. He must have committed some grave sin. Perhaps he has ignored the pleas of the poor, or plundered ill gotten gains. Instead of consoling Job they begin to attack him. In their zeal for defending the Lord, they forget their responsibility as friends to console the aggrieved. They add to Job’s sufferings.

Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar have a God that is too small. Their God is the Cosmic Accountant who makes sure to rightly balance our debts, or our sins, with our credits, or our merits. Since it is so, Job must deserve what he suffers, and God is vindicated. But as we will see, it is not the friends who are vindicated, and God judges that in labeling him a cosmic accountant they have spoke wrongly of him. Unlike his servant Job, who has spoken rightly this whole time.

This temptation to try and justify God by making him small is a temptation that remains with us today. When we confront injustices or great suffering it can make us insecure in our faith, and when we are insecure in our faith we seek to justify God. We try to make sense of the suffering, and how it fits God’s plan. In the case of Job’s three friends that meant blaming the victim. Today it might mean trying to diminish God, making it out like he can’t help combatting evil. Or it might mean saying that God is helpless to combat evil because evil is the necessary opposite of good. Which puts God in a peculiarly tight spot and makes us wonder what heaven must be like. Or it might mean claiming that evil will eventually come out in the wash, that it will all make sense by and by. In these ways we limit God, we try to make sense of God’s actions in our own limited systems of logic. But the consequence is making God too small, and hurting others or ourselves.

Truth be told, God doesn’t need us to justify his actions.  We need God to justify us.  The desire to make sense of God, to explain God, to justify God, misses who God is.  God is big enough to take criticism. God is big enough to hear our laments. God is big enough to even take the blame. Because God is big enough to overcome all evil.  

Here is the great evil of making God small, of seeking to justify God: Grace is not rational. Grace cannot be justified. It is grace that justifies. And the God who is the cosmic accountant has no room for grace. The God who makes evil come out in the wash does not act in grace. Grace exceeds all calculation. Grace cannot be rationalized, has no utility, and most importantly is not fair. But God is big enough to be graceful. So we should be faithful enough to trust in his grace, and not make him out to be small.

Things Fall Apart: Patience

Things Fall Apart: Patience

Patience is Enduring Evil

Job 1:1, 2:1-10

Rev. Tim Callow

Preached Sun. October 3rd, 2021

One day I was in Sault Ste. Marie up in the Upper Peninsula with a friend and we were walking around downtown. As we were crossing through a parking lot I noticed a familiar red car. It was a 1990 Buick LeSabre. Usually I’m not good at recognizing cars by their make and year but I could recognize this one because I used to have it, and with a quick inspection I could tell it was certainly mine. On the right front tire you could see damage from the time my tire exploded on the freeway.

The summer I first got that car I grew very sick. I would bloat, I would get nauseous, and I barely ate. By the time Labor Day rolled around and I had to be to school for my senior year, I couldn’t eat a thing. The morning I had packed up to go, I was abjectly miserable. Rather than taking a trip to the hospital and delaying my semester, I bullheadedly got in the car with a bottle of pepto bismol in my cup holder.

The whole drive down I could feel the vibration in my steering wheel, but I did not think much of it because I was so focused on how sick I was. It wasn’t until I got pass Milwaukee that the wheel blew. Right there, on the free way. In a car full of books and clothing and furniture. All of it covering the spare tire and jack. And I was barely functional as is.

That was the beginning of one of the worst years of my life, as I did not fully recover that whole senior year. I would spent a month in starvation mode. I would grow so weak I couldn’t walk across campus. I would have to defend my senior thesis while sick. When I saw my old car in the parking lot in Sault Ste. Marie these memories came flooding back. And while I was glad the car was still in use, I was glad I wasn’t the one using it.

I don’t think there’s anyone in this life who does not hit a season where everything seems to be falling apart. Perhaps you’re stuck with a grave illness. My illness was not deadly, but it was certainly all encompassing and painful. And when you’re sick like that it colors everything. Perhaps you’ve lost a loved one, or many in a short span of time. Perhaps you are handling family strife, strife at work, or financial difficulties. And no matter how much you try to pick yourself up it seems like there’s something else waiting to throw you back down. And you may wonder, “why?” “Why is this happening to me?” Or maybe even, “why is God doing this?”

The Book of Job is about a man who seeks an answer to the question “why?” And more so, seeks his vindication before God. We will be covering the Book of Job through the month of October. Job is an intensely difficult book, many well-meaning interpreters of scripture run aground on its shoals, so I will do my best to do justice to the book and how it helps us make sense of our own lives. But more than that, I want to make sense of how it points beyond itself to Jesus Christ. It goes without saying that I feel a great burden discussing Job, as the book deals with weighty matters. So I hope by God’s grace what I say might make sense, and would align with what the book says. Today I am going to talk about the patience of Job.

The Book of Job is written as a fable. Its introduction, “There was once a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job“ calls to mind an ancient time before history. It is rather like opening a story by saying “once upon a time...” The book paints Job as one of the wise sages of half forgotten times. Job, we are told, was righteous and upright. He feared the Lord, which meant he was wise, and turned away from all evil. We did not hear this this morning, but we are also told that he gave sacrifices regularly for his children just in case they may have accidentally sinned. Such was his piety and love.

Not only are we told that Job is righteous, but God thinks so as well and tells the Satan as much. The Satan in Job is not what we might imagine, the diabolical fallen angel who corrupts and dominates this age. Satan comes from a Hebrew word meaning Adversary, as in a prosecuting attorney in a court of law. That is who the Satan is here, an angel who is not fallen, who acts as a prosecutor in God’s court. When God brings up Job’s righteousness the Satan suggests that the only reason he’s so righteous is because he has it so good. Job isn’t righteous out of love for God, but for the things God gives him! But if God were to remove the hedge he has placed around him, if God were to take his cattle and his children and his whole household, he would curse God to his face. God takes up the bet, and allows Satan to take everything away from Job but not to touch his flesh. Well, Job loses his children, his animals, his slaves, everything in a succession of disasters that could only come from God. Job mourns, but concedes “The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed is the name of the Lord.”

So the Satan returns to God and God gloats over the patience of Job. But Satan insists that Job is only patient because he himself has not been harmed. But skin for skin! If the Satan could attack his flesh he would surely curse God. So God relents and allows the Satan to give Job painful sores and ulcers. Job scrapes himself with broken pottery to remove the pus. His own wife tells him that he should give up his integrity and just curse God and die.

“You are talking like a foolish woman.” Job replies, “shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?”

The book grows more complicated from here on out, as Job begins to launch his accusations against God. But for now I want to stop and meditate on the awesome patience of Job. Job has lost everything. He has lost his family, his property, his health. He has seemingly lost his wife. All he has left is his integrity, his dignity, his knowledge that he is an upright and righteous man who has done no evil. And it is this integrity that gives him patience.

Patience is a wonderful quality. It’s the quality that allows us to endure evils. Oftentimes we think of patience in the sense of keeping from anger. Or, in other words, not losing our cool. But patience is also about keeping ourselves from despair. Patience is a quality that also requires grit and determination. Patience is the ability to see through the present evil because as Paul tells us we know that it is nothing compared to the glory that is waiting for us. This morning we see Job exhibiting his patience. And, I believe, he exhibits this patience more or less throughout the book.

From where comes Job’s superhuman patience? What keeps him from cursing God? What keeps him in hope that he may be vindicated even though he believes God is against him? It doesn’t come out of nowhere. It’s not some innate quality that Job had that we cannot. Job had patience because he prepared his whole life for this moment. I’m not saying that Job expected that God would take away everything he had, or that Job expected to come down with ulcers that covered his whole body from head to feet. Job had patience in that he was a righteous man, who did what was right by all, who had integrity, and a love for God. His patience was born out of his character.

Patience comes from character. And the most powerful patience comes from a life of holiness and happiness. Sure we can practice patience in times when we are angry, learning to count to ten or stepping away. Those are all good things and I need to do that from time to time. But the patience that Job exhibits is of a different order, it comes from a life of integrity and love. If we want the patience of Job, that will not crumble in any circumstance, we need to lead a whole life of righteousness. And that is a life that we cannot construct on our own, but it is a life that God is willing to offer by his grace. So that in all times and in all circumstances we might say with Job “the Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord!”

Devoted: Confession

Devoted: Confession
We Confess Our Sins So We Know Grace 

James 5:13-20
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. September 26, 2021

In the beginning, before all worlds, God spoke and said, “Let there be light.” In the fullness of time God’s Word, Jesus Christ, became a human being. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and the sure path to salvation. That Word broke down the barrier between God and humanity that we call sin. And that Word gave us words that we might speak. Words such as “Jesus Christ is Lord,” “Our Father, who art in heaven,” “I baptize you in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” “This is my body, this is my blood.” We have been given words of tremendous power and might. 

As James concludes his letter he’s coming back to his theme of speech. What then should we say? I’ve already addressed one right use of the tongue, that is worship. But he also lists petition, prayers of healing, confession, and rebuke as good forms of speech. Prayers of petition and healing will arise some other time. What I want to discuss this morning is confession. After all, we can only talk about rebuke after we have confessed. 

I’ve been to different churches that have done confession in different ways. I’ve said, “merciful Lord, we confess that we have not loved you with our whole heart, we have failed to be an obedient church, we have not done your will, we have broken your law, we have rebelled against your love, we have not loved our neighbors and we have not heard the cry of the needy.” I know that one the best, that’s what we use out of our hymnal. I’ve also said, “We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, which we from time to time most grievously have committed, by thought, word, and deed, against they divine Majesty, provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us. We do earnestly repent, and are heartily sorry for these our misdoings; the remembrance of them is grievous unto us, the burden of them is intolerable.” What are we doing? 

I’ve heard some people tell me that they are troubled by the words of the confession we use because they feel like words are being put into their mouths. They do not feel as if they’ve “failed to be an obedient Church” and the word failure is pretty strong. The confessions we say can feel like self-flagellation more than a cure. I’m sure that as I said the words of the Book of Common Prayer “we acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness” that some of us felt uncomfortable. We don’t want to come to Church feeling judged because we get judged enough in this world. We want to come to Church and know we are forgiven and have a place to belong. That God welcomes all of us to his house regardless of our station in life. So when we say these words about how nasty we can be it seems to fall out of place. 

But we are called to confess our sins. In the first place because we are all sinners. All have sinned and fallen short, Paul tells us. We are all in need of forgiveness, otherwise we wouldn’t be here. So we confess our sins that we may be cleansed, that the burden might be released. God's grace truly is freely offered to all, but we need to remember the story of the pharisee and the publican. How the pharisee’s prayer was all about how much better he was compared to the publican, and how the publican would not even look up to heaven, but only confessed his status as a sinner. It was the publican who received forgiveness, and the pharisee who was left in his sins. Forgiveness is offered to the sinner, the physician goes to the sick. We must ask to receive, but he who seeks, finds. 

That is why we say our confession, but as a matter of churchly convention why do we confess in the manner we confess? At least, as a corporate body. We can always confess directly to God, or to one another as James suggests. But when we come together as a Church we confess in a manner that may seem overblown. It may seem untruthful. So why do it? 

When we speak in worship we speak in a certain register, a certain key. What we say is heightened and perhaps a little hyperbolic, but it’s nevertheless true and right. Think of it this way, if you were to lay down with the one you love and you were to say “honey, you are the most handsome man or the most beautiful woman I know” would that be true? Well, in a manner of speaking no. It may be more accurate to say, “Honey, you are a standard deviation more beautiful than most people I know in town.” But you’d probably suffer for that. It may be accurate in a sense, but it’s not the right thing to say, and it doesn’t express the truth you mean to express anyway. You’re not speaking the language of love, you’re speaking the language of, well, statistics. And that’s not usually what belongs in a relationship. That we speak in different registers doesn’t make us any less authentic, it only makes us more authentic. What’s inauthentic is putting the wrong register in the wrong situation, like a politician trying her hand at stand up comedy on the house floor. 

So, too, when we confess our sins we speak in a different register. We speak in a register of humility and contriteness. Even Paul says, “I am the chief of sinners.” In a certain sense that’s just downright false. He didn’t betray Jesus Christ like Judas, for instance. But in another sense it’s absolutely true, because he comes to God in meekness and humility. So too, it may be more accurate for us to say, “I did a few things wrong, but by and large I did pretty good.” But it’s not the appropriate way to go about a confession. We confess hyperbolically, if I can use that word, that we might know God’s hyperbolic grace. We come in humility, expressing our manifold sins and wickedness, that we might know more strongly and proclaim more boldly God’s overwhelming grace. And we confess not as an individual, but as a corporate body. All our failures, all our mistakes, all our sins. That we would know there is not a single thing God will refuse to forgive. Not a single thing that will make God turn away. 

The message of confession is not that we are a miserable lot of sinners who don’t deserve to live. The message of confession is that God forgives even the most miserable sinner, that no one is outside of grace, that no one is so lost they cannot be reclaimed, so damaged that they cannot be made whole. That God’s forgiveness and grace extends to everyone, everywhere, if they will but knock at the door. 

Devoted: Envy

Devoted: Envy

God is the Giver of All Good Gifts 

James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a
Rev. Tim Callow 

Preached Sun. September 19, 2021

Jesus is on the run. The Pharisees are against him, and they have influence in the towns. The Herodians are against him and they have influence in the cities. He stays hidden, traveling in the wilderness as if he were an exile or refugee. If he is found he may be killed, and his time had not yet come. It’s in this context that Jesus teaches his disciples about his inevitable end. It isn’t surprising that an itinerant preacher with a rag tag group of disciples might anticipate his death. “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him,” but what is surprising is he anticipates resurrection, “and three days after being killed, he will rise again.”

The disciples don’t understand this at all. And, like high schoolers trying to keep up appearances with their teacher, they are afraid to ask questions. Instead they ignore his teaching and start arguing with each other. When they get to a safe house in Capernaum Jesus asks them what they were arguing over. They remained silent, ashamed because they argued over which one of them is the greatest disciple.

Their self-delusion here is really astounding. Jesus is on the run. None of them carry a single weapon. He’s telling them how he must die. And they’re arguing over which one of them is the greatest. “No, I’m the best disciple, no I’m the best disciple.” They should be shivering in terror, but instead they’re boasting.

So Jesus continues his teaching, "Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” And then he takes a child to his knee, "Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” Discipleship is not about honor. It’s not about bragging rights. It’s not about wealth or power. It’s about service. Caring for others. Sharing in love. The disciples are busy boasting when Jesus would call them to loving service. Loving service that may lead to the cross, but ends in resurrection.

In our Psalm this morning the Psalmist outlines two ways. There’s the way of the righteous and the way of the wicked. The righteous is like a tree planted by streams of water. He is firm, well protected, well nourished. All he does shall prosper. But then the way of the wicked is doomed, it cannot stand. Jesus, though he faces the cross, walks in the way of the righteous. The disciples, in their boasting, are in danger of walking in the way of the wicked.

James, this morning, helps clarify further. The righteous among us, the wise, would show gentleness in their lives. Jesus shows us this shame gentleness in how he treats his disciples, wayward as they are. And how he treats us, in going to the cross for our sake. But the way of the wicked is a way of boasting, selfish ambition, falsity, and envy.

What is the root of the difference? But the way of the righteous is grounded in God, his good works, and his good gifts. The way of the wicked is characterized by envy. What is envy?  Full blown envy is more than just wanting what someone else has, or coveting. It’s seeing that someone else has something that you want, something that’s really really good, something that you wish they didn’t have, and grieving over the fact they have it and you don’t. It’s when we get it in our heads that somehow our self-worth is diminished because someone else has something we feel we should have. That’s full blown envy, that’s when it gets deep seated. And when it gets that bad, and turns into a form of grief, it can lead to all sorts of strife. It can lead to quarrels and fights and cursing. It can even lead to murder because we are possessed by our grief, and act in strange ways. As James says, "You want something but you don’t get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight.”

The envious, in other words, think there is only so much to go around. Life is a zero sum game. And if someone else has something they feel they deserve, it grieves them. The disciples ask who is the greatest because someone has to be on top. There must be a greatest disciple. They can’t all be equally faithful, or equally loved by Jesus. They argue, and they boast, and they fight.

But how strange it is that we would envy anything. James tells us in the first chapter of his letter that, “every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” All good things are a gift from God, and God places them where he wills. So why, then, should we grow envious of anything anyone has? What we’re doing is questioning God’s judgment. Moreover, we are grieving over the very gifts of God, the very presence of God in this world when we grieve over the good things people have. 

And this grief comes out of ignorance, ignorance of the good things God has given to us. We forget the blessings we have in our lives, and we forget that the greatest gift of all is not someone’s promotion or family life, but the greatest gift of all is Jesus Christ. The greatest thing we have received is our salvation that was purchased on the cross. When we are reminded of these great gifts, that all great gifts are from God, how can we remain in our envy? 

This is why James tells us, “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you.” God does not flee from sin. Sin flees from God. Jesus Christ did not avoid the sinner, but made them clean. So too, Jesus Christ does not abandon us in our sins, but rather is the sole solution and antidote to our sins! The way past envy of all sorts, whether small or great, is Jesus Christ. He brings the healing, he points the way forward, he gives us all good gifts. 

Devoted: Tongue

Devoted: Tongue

Discipline Your Tongue with Praise

James 3:1-12


Rev. Tim Callow


Preached Sun. September 12th, 2021

When I was in grade school we had an old saying, perhaps you have heard of it. “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me.” It’s one of those incantations that are especially devastating because it has a good rhythm or it rhymes. One could also say in the same moment “I am rubber and you are glue, everything you say bounces off me and sticks back to you.” And, I suppose, that’s how it is. But the idea was that whatever you might say, whatever anyone may say, can’t hurt. The only way you are going to get at me is if you pick up a rock. But then the teacher is more likely to notice.

The truth is “sticks and stones might break my bones but words will never hurt me” is one of those childish ideas that we soon outgrow. Of course words hurt. Words can be far more devastating than any stick or stone. A broken bone is easier to heal than a broken heart or a poisoned mind. The words we say, the words others say, can have tremendous consequences as we are reminded this morning. James tells us, “The tongue is a little member and boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! And the tongue is a fire!”

Shortly before I started my ministry in the UP they had a large forest fire up by a place called Duck Lake. Almost 22,000 acres were burned down, $450,000 worth of damage. I used to preach at a little forest chapel near the mouth of the big two hearted river. In order to get there I passed through miles of burned down forest. It took a long time for the bushes and trees to begin to grow, so all you saw was ash and the skeletons of burned out trees. All that damage was caused, in the first, by a lightning strike and a small fire. The tongue, James reminds us, is a fire. It is small, but it can have big consequences if we use it falsely.

James compares the tongue to a bridle. If you want to control a horse you put the bridle in its mouth and you can direct the horse where to go. If you want to steer a large ship you can set its course with a very small rudder. And so too with our lives, the words we say, the way we choose to describe people and events, all help determine how we will act.

One of the stories from the exodus concerns spies who were sent to the promised land to search it out. The spies came back with two reports. Joshua and Caleb came back saying the land was everything God had promised. It was flowing with milk and honey. It had large fertile fields of produce, and much rich grazing land. There were large cities ready for the taking. They saw the land in terms of the promise of God. But the others came back with a different report. Where Joshua and Caleb saw the fruitfulness of a land ripe for the taking, they emphasized that there were giants in the land. They spoke fearfully about the large defenses of the cities, and how it would be impossible to take. The people of Israel listened to the others, and wailed. They grew fearful, certain that they had been led to the slaughter or to die in the wilderness.

All it took was the power of speech. Joshua and Caleb described the land faithfully. The others described the land in terms of their fears. Both were describing the same land. But one description was right, and the other was wrong. One would lead to life, and the other to death. In the end God chose not to lead that generation into the land he had promised, because they had in effect rejected it. It would be Joshua, not Moses, who would lead their children in to the land.

The words we say matter because description matters. It matters that I call myself stupid in my own self talk. Or it matters that I’m always talking down someone I don’t like behind my back. It matters that I’m always venting, and then always looking for more to vent. Our disciplines of speech can make us upset, and lead us down bad roads. We have to be careful with our speech. A stream doesn’t bring forth both fresh and brackish water, so how can a mouth both curse and praise? We need to be judicious with our words.

The need to be judicious with our words is one reason why worship is so important. Worship has a moral dimension, too. In worship we offer up our speech in praise to God. We show gratitude and thanksgiving. We are reminded of God’s deeds, and of God’s salvation. Our hearts are turned, once again, to Jesus on his cross giving himself up for us. And not just for us, but for that person we keep gossiping about. Not just for us, but for that coworker we can’t help but vent over. Not just for us, but for them, the people who cause all the worlds problems. And especially for ourselves at our most stupid. We turn our speech to God that we might re-learn how to talk about ourselves, our world, and others.

We are reminded of Jesus’ sacrifice, and God’s power. We are reminded of the Spirit among us, and our place in the body of Christ. And when we are so reminded we may learn to speak aright. Aright about ourselves, our God, each other, and our world.

Devoted: Words

Devoted: Words

Don’t Be Satisfied with Words

James 2:1-17


Rev. Tim Callow


Preached Sun. September 5th, 2021

I visited Manhattan once, and very much felt like a fish out of water. I wasn’t used to there being so many people, and I wasn’t used to none of the people acknowledging me. I also quickly realized, coming off the train, that my plaid shirt and blue jeans were not the sort of wear common in Manhattan. But I did spend the day there, wandering about, checking out Soho and Chinatown and Little Italy. By the end of the day my friends and I found our way to Wall Street. I remember the stock exchange being much smaller than I thought it would be.

On Wall Street is an old church, and one of the richest churches in the world. It had been deeded, I think, a fifth of Manhattan before any of it was developed. It doesn’t own a fifth of Manhattan anymore, but it does have many investments in real estate and in stocks. It’s a big deal. I was excited to have a chance to get inside and take a look. But I suppose they didn’t have the volunteers to open up at 8pm on a weeknight. So instead I was treated to the incongruous image of a sign that told me I was welcomed, behind a wrought iron gate with a comically large padlock locking me out.

I’ve never forgotten that image. I always think of it when a Church’s rhetoric doesn’t meet their action. When their acts contradict what they claim to believe.

James, this morning, wants to remind us that our acts and our beliefs are one in the same. We act out what we truly believe, we believe what we do. We cannot separate the two. He uses the example of favoritism. How can we say we truly believe in the gospel if we show favoritism? A rich man arrives with gold rings and fine clothes, and a poor person with dirty clothes arrives at the same time. But if you take notice of the rich man, serving him, and disrespect the poor man, how is that in line with the gospel? Aren’t we showing that we don’t believe Jesus died for both the rich and the poor man? Can we truly say we are following Jesus’ command to love our neighbor as ourselves?

It is easy to fall into the trap of saying but not doing. Especially when the ideal enshrined in the gospel is so high. I knew one person who would tell me the importance of forgiveness, and that they felt God had made forgiveness easy and joyful for them. But then would also tell me about all the people they were, as yet, unwilling to forgive for whatever reason. It’s fine to struggle with forgiveness. In fact, I’m going to be very surprised if it isn’t a struggle to forgive some people. There are people I have difficulty forgiving, I’d much rather be angry. But we show with our acts, not our words, what we truly believe deep down.

It is easy to fall into that trap of saying but not doing. Which is why we need to continually repent, and continually encourage one another to do what we say. We say we believe in the love of God, and the love of neighbor, but we so continually fall short. But we show, further, that we believe in the forgiveness of God and the power of his grace by returning to him and confessing our sins.

This, in the end, is why James is not in contradiction with Paul. When I was in college this text was used to read James against Paul. Paul tells us that faith saves, James says it does not. Paul contrasts faith and works, but Paul says it is faith alone that saves and not works. But I think Paul and James are really one in the same on this point.

“What good is it,” James asks, “if you say you have faith but do not have works?” What good is it if you say one thing but never act on it? Jesus tells a parable about a man who sends his two sons out into the field. One says he won’t go, but goes. The other says he’ll go, but doesn’t. Who follows the father? It’s not the one who says yes, but doesn’t go. It’s the one who says no, but goes anyway. Our deeds, not our words, will say what we truly believe.

Faith is not simply a matter of assent, it’s a matter of action. It’s not just what we say, it’s what we do. I can tell you all about how I trust this boat to be seaworthy. But I won’t show you any faith in the matter until I step on the boat! I can tell you all day long about God’s love and forgiveness and how we are to love and forgive others. But until you see me try to put that in action, you won’t see the faith! Faith, if it is not put to work, is dead. Faith, if it is not practiced, isn’t worth the name.

The world isn’t satisfied with your words, the world has words enough. The world wants to be shown. We can’t be satisfied with words, whether they are our own words or the words of someone else. Don’t settle for words. Instead, seek to show. Put words to action. Display love, display forgiveness, display mercy, display the difference the gospel makes.

Devoted: Distraction

Devoted: Distraction

God Will Have All of Us

James 1:17-27


Rev. Tim Callow


Preached Sun. August 29th, 2021

Modern life gives us ample opportunity for distraction. Drive down the highway and there are all sorts of billboards and signs begging for your attention. TV programs are cut up into chunks so that we can fit the adverts in-between. But even those programs can suck us in, and distract us from life for awhile. If you’re like me, a well done TV show or movie can absorb you into its world, so that you can’t stop thinking about it. Some of you are listening to this sermon online through a radio app. The internet itself is full of distractions. They don’t even need to pop up, you just think of something you want to search and it’s so easy to find.

And I haven’t even begun to talk about those distraction making machines we call smartphones. Devices so adept at making distractions that they don’t even need to vibrate, you sense the phantom vibrations.

Every once in awhile there’s a study purporting to show what our attention span truly is. Microsoft sponsored a study half a decade ago that said our attention span is likely 8 seconds, down from 12 seconds the last time the study was done. Others try to figure out what the optimum length for a speech or sermon would be, before people really begin to lose interest or ability to focus. Some say 20 minutes, others say 9 or 10 minutes. The average TED Talk runs 13 minutes.

But when Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglass famously traveled Illinois debating politics, they talked for three hours. The first candidate got an hour, the second a ninety minute rebuttal, and then the first candidate got another thirty minutes. And these debates were events, held outdoors, with hootin’ and hollerin’ and music and festivities. Methodist camp meetings, in the same era, would meet for weeks at a time with sermons spanning hours. We are certainly capable of greater focus and attention than we have now. Our society is built to distract.

Our capacity for diversion, amusement, and distraction can be a problem. It can be a spiritual problem. Because as James reminds us this morning we are called to a new life by the word of truth. And when we are distracted we falter.

James tells us “In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.” That word of truth is the gospel that was preached to us. God gives us new birth through the preaching of the gospel. When we hear the gospel: that God loves us, sent Jesus Christ his son to die for our sake, and that he lives and reigns forevermore offering forgiveness and calling us all to himself we may find ourselves transformed. When we are confronted by that news, truly confronted, when we know in the words of John Wesley that “he died for me, even me” we may experience that new birth that sets us on a new life.

Jesus talks about that gospel, the word of truth, in a parable. He says there was a sower who went out to sow, and he cast his seed all over his land. Some fell on the path and is snatched away before it can fall into the soil. I think that’s what we’re most afraid of when it comes to sharing the gospel, that the word will get picked off before it can truly be heard. The other seeds fall into shallow soil, and have no roots to survive when the storms come. They are joyful for awhile, but don’t stick to it. But then others fall into the thorny soil. And James is warning us about the thorny soil. The seed hits the ground and grows, but as it grows it is choked out by thorns and weeds. Those thorns and weeds are distractions. Worries. desire of wealth, glory. These things can snuff out a faith before it grows into full leaf. But the word that hits good soil, in a good environment, gives much fruit.

We are those who have heard the word. That word sinks into our hearts. It proves us to be called to a new life, and a new purpose. To be the people of God in a world that is estranged from God, that needs to know God. To be part of God’s work in this world to make his love known. To be beacons of his grace.

But it is not enough to simply hear the word. The gospel is not God’s afterlife insurance. You hear the pitch, say the prayer to buy it, and keep it in your back pocket just in case. But “be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”

We can’t simply hear, and be distracted. The Gospel is not insurance. It’s not some interesting ideas. It’s not a theory. It’s not a philosophy. It’s not a fact. It is news. It is proclamation. It is glad tidings. It is a calling, it’s our calling, to lead a life of love, joy, peace, and thanksgiving. It is a calling to live in the aftermath of our Lord’s resurrection, joyously awaiting his return.

If the gospel is a calling, a summons, a proclamation, it invites a response. We can’t simply be hearers who might be distracted. We must be doers. That’s why James says, “For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like.” How silly it is to look into a mirror and forget what you are like! We must never forget who we are in Christ, we can’t let ourselves be distracted from our calling and purpose. But we must be singlemindedly focused on Christ and Christ alone. Knowing ourselves to have been born again, a new person.

Being a disciple encompasses our whole life. The distractions of this world would tell us otherwise. When we allow ourselves to be distracted we separate our lives into different departments, we may find ourselves imagining different world. But we can’t allow ourselves to forget who we are in Christ, we can’t be distracted from that. God will have all of us, not just some of us. Jesus didn’t die to have you for a Sunday morning. He died for you, all of you, that you might have life. That you might know his life. That you might be his, and he yours. And that we might show the world his peace.

Faithfulness: Dwell

Faithfulness: Dwell

God’s Faithfulness Exceeds our Grasp

1 Kings 8:1,6,10-11, 22-30, 41-43
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. August 22nd, 2021

When I was younger, about middle school age, I started having a problem with praying “thy will be done.” I don’t know how many of us might have had the same problem. For me, I had anxiety issues that were not insignificant. I had developed rituals each morning to keep my mind focused and to endure the inevitable anxiety attack. I taught myself to exert a certain amount of willpower and control over my surroundings in order to manage these attacks, and endure them when they arrived. So I had this overwhelming sense that my wellbeing depended on being in control of my life.

How can I stay in control and at the same time pray “thy will be done?” 

I never doubted God’s goodness, or God’s faithfulness. But I did imagine God as a divine drill sergeant at times who, in trying to bring me to where I need to be, is willing to drag me through trials. And in my need to control my life and my mind I wasn’t quite sure I could say “thy will be done.”

It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, but not because God wishes to shatter us. It is a fearful thing because God wishes to shatter our illusions, and sometimes we hold our illusions dear. My illusion was the illusion I had any control at all. As if I were withholding from God the exercise of his will. Like God sits in the heavenly throne going “I want to do this, but I’m waiting for Tim to say the magic words.” God’s will is done with or without our prayers, and thanks be to God! The question is whether we are on board or we try to row against the current.

Over time I came to realize that God is not the divine drill sergeant, and God does not delight in trial. But the only way to find our way through the trials that come is hope in the faithfulness of God. 

God’s faithfulness is both extravagant, and exceeds our grasp. God makes extravagant promises. He promises Israel a King. He promises peace, and prosperity. He promises David that his throne would endure for all generations. He promises Solomon wisdom. And promises to make the Temple a place for his name. But so often we fail. The people ask for a King, rejecting the Lord as King. Saul in his paranoia and pride gives up on God. David commits adultery and murder. Solomon, the great builder of the Temple and one of the wisest men who ever lived would be tempted toward the worship of false Gods. God made promises to all these people, extravagant promises, and yet they turned away in their own ways and frustrated the fulfillment of those promises.

As the old hymn goes, “prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love” What is so wonderful about God’s faithfulness is not, first, that God makes extravagant promises. But that God is faithful to those promises even when we are unfaithful. Even when we err and even when we sin God still works to fulfill the promises he has made. And, oftentimes, he comes to fulfill those promises in still more extravagant ways.

In our Old Testament reading this morning Solomon is dedicating the Temple to the Lord. He marvels at God’s extravagant faithfulness up until that point. “O LORD, God of Israel, there is no God like you in heaven above or on earth beneath, keeping covenant and steadfast love for your servants who walk before you with all their heart, the covenant that you kept for your servant my father David as you declared to him; you promised with your mouth and have this day fulfilled with your hand.” But then he prays something that may have made your ears tingle when you first heard it. He says, “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!”

Solomon marvels at God’s extravagant faithfulness in setting aside the Temple as the place for the dwelling of his name. That at this Temple all may come in prayer. All may receive forgiveness. All may receive blessing. And God’s presence may be assured. The Temple was a wonderful grace for the people of Israel, and indeed the whole world. But people came to take the Temple almost for granted. Or, perhaps a better way of putting it, they thought the Temple meant that they had God in some way under control. Offer up the right amount of bullocks and calves and your sins could be forgiven. God’s mercy was seen as utterly dependable. As if God did not truly desire that they love justice, mercy, and walk with their God. So God’s glory would leave the Temple, and it would be destroyed. The Ark lost for all time.

But that’s not why your ears likely tingled. He prays “But will God indeed dwell on the earth?” God had promised David an eternal throne. He promised that there would always be someone to reign in his house. And God fulfilled that promise despite the sins of the house of David, despite the sins of Israel. God fulfilled that promise by, indeed, dwelling on the earth. What the universe could not contain was contained in a manger. And God dwelt not in a Temple but in a person, as a person. Jesus Christ. 

God remained extravagantly faithful to the promises he made to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and Solomon. He remained extravagantly faithful even in the midst of our unfaithfulness. And his faithfulness always exceeded our grasp, was always more than we could have asked or imagine. For indeed, God was not satisfied to simply give us a Temple, but God would make us a Temple by pouring his Holy Spirit into our hearts. God was not satisfied to dwell in a house, but he dwells among us. And he draws us all nearer to himself, as we await the fulfillment of all his promises. Probably in a way we still could not fathom.

Faithfulness: Wisdom

Faithfulness: Wisdom

Wisdom Requires Humility

1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. August 15th, 2021

God was faithful to David to his dying day. Though there were rebellions, though there were famines, though there was war at Israel’s borders, God kept the nation safe and prosperous. David died, not an exile, but a King. And Solomon, his son, came to rule. Solomon, the son of Bathsheba. And these last two sermons will concern his rule, and God’s faithfulness to Solomon. 

Solomon is known for two things throughout history. One is that Solomon was very very prosperous. The other is that Solomon was very very wise. And today we hear how it is Solomon came to be both very prosperous and very wise. 

“But where can wisdom be found? Where does understanding dwell?” Job asks. Finding understanding is no easy thing. We all seek understanding, and wisdom. And in a world full of so much information, true understanding can be hard to find. I got this phone I keep in my pocket. And if I wish I can go to the right app and scroll down and find all sorts of information. Some of it is actually true. It is easy to overload our mind with information, with trivialities, and with falsities. If you want to check the weather in Spain or the Tigers’ record that sort of information is easy to come by. But there is no app for understanding and wisdom. Wisdom is much harder to come by.

Understanding, or wisdom, is the ability to know what is right and what is wrong and to act on it in the right way. There’s a qualitative difference between any old information, and wisdom. Wisdom puts everything we see and hear into context, and directs our steps. This is why the Bible says wisdom is precious, with wisdom and understanding comes so much more.

Understanding is not the sort of thing that can be picked up by reading. In one of Plato’s dialogues Socrates jokes that he wishes understanding were like a piece of yarn that you put in a cup full of water, so that it might fill up another cup. That way he could gain understanding just by sitting next to a wise person. Of course, it’s not that way either. Just because someone has a good teacher doesn’t mean they gain understanding. Even Jesus taught Judas. Where is understanding to be found?

Solomon, like I said, was renowned for his understanding and wisdom. Early in his reign Solomon went to Gibeon to sacrifice to the Lord. That night God appeared to him in a dream and said “ask what I should give you.” 

What a message to get from God, right? “Ask, and you will receive. Whatever you want, I will make it happen.” No strings attached. No limitations. Whatever desires are deep in your heart, I will fulfill.

We don’t know how long Solomon waited, long in thought. But when he made up his mind he said, "Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?” He didn’t ask for anything superficial: a long life or prosperity. He didn’t ask for revenge on his enemies. He didn’t ask for glory. He proved himself to be wise before such wisdom was even granted. He asked, simply, that he would be given understanding. That he would be able to discern between good and evil. That he could govern the people of Israel well.

This pleased God, and God gave him that great wisdom. But, God said, “I give you also what you have not asked, both riches and honor all your life; no other king shall compare with you. If you will walk in my ways, keeping my statutes and my commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your life.” Because Solomon was not selfish, and asked for the right thing, God gave him everything else to go along with that wisdom. It is nothing for God to give away such trifling things as honor, wealth, and length of days. Solomon asked for the truly precious thing and got everything else along with it.

True wisdom, true understanding, is not anything that you can go out and grasp. It’s not mastery over life, or over self. It’s not, in the end, our accomplishment. Some of the most foolish people, the least wise, are those who fancy themselves as being wise. Who think they are wizened and know. But if we want to be truly wise, if we want true understanding, that can only come from God. Solomon shows his wisdom, such as it was, in that he asked for it. He didn’t presume. He knew what he did not know, and he asked the one who has all understanding. 

True wisdom is a gift. It is a gift we can hone, and cultivate, and improve upon. But it is ultimately a gift. “The fear of the Lord,” we are told, “is the beginning of wisdom.” Not because we are afraid of thunderbolts from the sky, but because we are humble and recognize the wisdom of God. We need to be humble to be made wise. We need to recognize we are empty to be made full. 

God was faithful to Solomon in giving him what he asked. Jesus says to us as well “knock, and the door will be opened, seek and you will find.” God still remains faithful. And God still asks us “ask what I should give you.” If we want wisdom, it will be given. If we want understanding, it will be given. But it takes a humble and contrite heart. It takes a self emptying, of a sort. It takes listening. It comes on our knees, and through the reading of the word of God. 

Faithfulness: Absalom

Faithfulness: Absalom

God is Present

2 Samuel 18:5-9, 15, 31-33


Rev. Tim Callow
Preached

Sun. August 8th, 2021

The Kingship of David can be divided between his success before his adultery and murder, and the struggles after his adultery and murder. Before he committed those heinous deeds the Lord was with him, and he was blessed with victory, wealth, and peace. But following that act we see a very different David. A David who is powerless to control his own family. Who watches, helplessly, as the Kingdom is taken from him by his own son. And is only restored to the Kingship by the grace of God. It is an involved story, but one that I’ll try to tell. in it all we see that while David is forgiven, yet he must live in the consequence of sin. And through it all, God’s faithfulness shows through.

David’s troubles begin with his son Amnon. Amnon grew love sick for his half-sister Tamar. He confessed his love to one of his cousins, who counseled him with an evil scheme. He told him to pretend to be sick, ask for Tamar to prepare food for him in his presence, and when they are alone to take her. So he does this horrible, heinous thing, and Tamar can’t live with the shame. It’s horrible. It’s his father’s sin magnified.

Tamar’s full brother Absalom cannot forgive Amnon for his evil deed. And while David was furious, Amnon was his eldest. So he showed favoritism and didn’t punish him. Absalom chose to take matters into his own hands. So he held a feast with all his brothers, including Amnon. And when Amnon was drunk, he struck, and killed Amnon. After that he fled.

Absalom is really the star of this story, so I ought to properly introduce him. Absalom was a proud man, and very charismatic. But he was also, as you can tell, very vengeful and spiteful. He grew his hair out long, and shaved it once a year because it grew too heavy on his head. The Bible says he has handsome and without blemish. After a few years Joab, David’s chief general, connived to have Absalom return to Jerusalem. When Absalom returned, David refused to see him. This, as you can imagine, bothered Absalom.

Absalom himself then connived to take the Kingdom. He’d sit at the gate with horses and chariots and stop people on their way to see the King. He’d ask them what business they had, and when they told him about their lawsuits and complaints he said the King did not have time for them, and didn’t have any deputies to hear. Then, he’d loudly and openly lament this, and suggest someone else would do a better job. Someone like Absalom.

After awhile Absalom became a very popular figure. Popular enough to form an insurrection of his own. He went to Hebron, the old capitol, and proclaimed himself King, with a priest named Ahithophel as his advisor. There was enough support that David was forced to flee Jerusalem, once again an exile like in his youth. It was then, as Nathan had prophesied, that Absalom took David’s concubines.

Truly David lived with the consequences of sin in this moment. His son Amnon had taken after David with his own sin. Because David was still shackled by sin, he didn’t do what was necessary to punish Amnon. Instead, he excused it. This set off Absalom who had a warrior’s heart like his father’s. And, over time, that same spiritedness led Absalom to take the Kingship from David much as David took Uriah’s life. While David was forgiven his sin, because he had asked forgiveness in perfect contrition, that did not mean he would not need to live with its consequences. That sin dwelt in David’s house, and nearly led to David’s ruin. Imagine if he hadn’t known God’s forgiveness, how far things would have gone.

But God remained faithful to his promise to David, in spite of David’s sin. He would see David through the consequences. As it happened David was able to plant a man by the name of Hushai in Absalom’s inner circle. When time came to summon the war council Absalom asked for advice. Ahithophel first advised that Absalom send him twelve thousand men to take down David before he could muster his forces. This, we are told, was good council. But it didn’t feed into Absalom’s pride and lust for glory. Hushai advised that he wait, form a large force, and strike down David wherever he may be. This plan put Absalom in command. So Absalom chose it. That, we are told, was the beginning of the end.

Which brings us to our passage this morning. The battle has begun, they will fight in the forests of Ephraim. David commands his generals to not kill Absalom if they see him, but instead bring him alive. David waits in the gates of the city to hear the outcome of the battle. He has grown too old to fight his own battles. Absalom’s long hair is his undoing, his pride gets him entangled in the trees of the forest. And as he hangs there Joab chooses to deliberately disobey David’s order and take matters into his own hands. He murders the helpless Absalom.

When word gets back to David we hear one of the most emotional verses of the entire Bible. "O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!” He may have won the Kingdom, but at such a high cost. He lost his son, and will never have a chance to reconcile.

God’s promise remains with David. Through it all, despite his sin and despite its consequences, David remains King. But remember what I said before about how God’s promise works. There can be a more immediate fulfillment, and something that we only come to see at a later time. Here God provides a little foreshadowing in the midst of David’s grief, though it is only something we could see on this side of the Resurrection. Doesn’t Absalom remind you of someone? A King. A victim. Hanging on a tree. Stabbed in the side. Even in such heartache and pain, God makes his plans known. Our redemption.

Faithfulness: Repentance

Faithfulness: Repentance

God is Always Willing to Forgive

2 Samuel 11:26-12:13a
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. August 1st, 2021

God is not fair. We see this time and time again in scripture. The Bible has a word for God’s unfairness: grace. Today I want to look at one of the times God was not fair, and investigate why that is the case. I want to compare the sins of David and Saul.

You may recall I had mentioned before that Saul had sinned and the spirit of the Lord was taken from him. He had shown a pattern of pride and impetuousness. But the sin that tore the kingdom from him was an act he committed after a battle with the Amalekites. God had devoted everything in the battle to “the ban.” Meaning, the Israelites were to take no prisoners and were to take no spoils. But following the battle with the Amalekites Saul had taken their King and many others prisoner, and had captured their choice livestock and goods. In doing so he directly disobeyed a command of God. 

God alerted Samuel to Saul’s misdeed and commanded Samuel to confront him. When Samuel did Saul explained that they had only captured the livestock and goods of the Amalekites that they would sacrifice to, in his words, “the Lord your God.” Not, “the Lord my God” or “the Lord our God” but “your God” Samuel’s God. Samuel told Saul that day that the Spirit of the Lord would leave him, and he was no longer to be King over Israel.

Today we heard about Nathan confronting David for his own sins, murder and adultery. He does so in the delicate form of a parable. He says there were two men in a certain city. One man was poor and the other rich. The rich man had many flocks and herds, but the poor man had nothing but a single ewe lamb. We can imagine the parable is already pulling at the heartstrings of the shepherd David. The poor man cared for the ewe like it was his own daughter, and dearly loved it. He even fed it his own meager food. But one day a traveller came to visit the rich man, who was loathe to slaughter one of his own calfs for the man. So instead he stole the poor man’s lamb and slaughtered it.

David was infuriated with the rich man in the parable. He said, “That man deserves to die! He should restore the lamb fourfold because he did this thing with no pity!”

Nathan’s response was simple: “You are the man!” Do not think this thing you did could escape God’s notice. You took the wife of Uriah, and you had him murdered. You are no better than this rich man, who had much, who takes from the poor man, who has little. And David was deeply grieved. He said, “I have sinned against the Lord.”

Now here is what is so unfair. Saul’s sin was that he didn’t kill when he was called to kill. David’s sin is that he committed adultery and murdered. Surely David’s sin, when you weigh them, is far worse than Saul’s. But Saul has the kingdom taken from him. David does not. God’s promise remains with David, and his house. It seems more than a little unfair.

But the justice of God is not simply to weigh offenses, it is also to pardon the contrite. Why is God so unfair in these two cases? It is simply that David humbles himself. “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me… Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me.” Whereas Saul sees no need for forgiveness, he is convinced he knew better, that he did what was right. Moreover, David knows he sinned before his God, Saul speaks of “your God.”

God is not fair because God is forgiving, and ever ready to forgive. David escapes the punishment of Saul not because his offense is any less, but because he responds in contrition and seeks forgiveness. God is always more willing to forgive than we are to ask. He is not like us, where we may forgive begrudgingly, or we may count the number of times we’ve had to forgive. But he delights in forgiveness, because he delights in us. 

There is no sin that’s too great for God’s forgiveness, we can never be too late, and God places no limits on his forgiveness. We can know the priority God puts on forgiveness in that while he was on the cross Jesus said “father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” And we know the priority God puts on a relationship with us, that he gave us his son, and he died for the sins of the world.

David is the man after God’s own heart not because he could never sin, but because he knew God’s heart. And even in his failure, he still sought forgiveness.

But that is, of course, not the end of the story. David may know the forgiveness of God, but he still needs to deal with the aftermath of his sin. God is ever willing to forgive, but forgiveness does not mean we do not have to make amends or live with the consequences of sin. David, and by extension the nation of Israel, will have to live in the aftermath of David’s sin. “I will raise up trouble against you from within your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this very sun.” Trouble will come to David’s house, and it’ll threaten to take the whole nation down.

Faithfulness: Bathsheba

Faithfulness: Bathsheba

The Mystery of Sin

2 Samuel 11:1-15
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. July 25th, 2021

We began this series through the life of David with the people asking for a king, like the other nations. Samuel warned Israel what a king would be like. He would take. He would take their lands, the fruit of their toil, their daughters, their sons. Israel decides this is a small price to pay for having a king to fight their battles for them. So Samuel anoints Saul king, who very quickly falls into sin. Samuel anoints David to succeed him. Thus far David has been an exemplary king. He has been faithful, courageous, loyal. He has shown himself to be the man after God’s own heart.

But even David can fall. 

Today we hear about David’s famous sin, a sin that will have consequences for the history of Israel. Israel wanted a king to fight their battles, but it is the war season and David remains at home. Late one afternoon David goes on his roof to cool off. It is there that he looks through a window and sees the beautiful Bathsheba bathing. He is smitten. And he is king. So he orders that she be brought to him. And he lay with her. The Bible leaves it at that.

David the king takes the wife of Uriah the Hittite. After a time Bathsheba sends word to David that she is pregnant. So David calls for Uriah the Hittite to be sent from the front. It appears David tries to appease Uriah with gifts and feasts. Perhaps his hope is that if he wins over Uriah’s favor, Uriah can forgive him for taking his wife. But Uriah is a righteous man who refuses to eat feasts or receive presents or sleep with his wife when the men of Israel fight in tents. Ironic, isn’t it? Just last week we heard how David was concerned that he lived in a house while the Ark of God dwelt in a tent. Now David is more than satisfied living in a house and feasting while his soldiers dwell in tents along with the Ark of God. Time has changed David.

Since David can’t appease Uriah, he decides he will have to get rid of Uriah. So he bids Uriah leave to the front, and sends with him a message to Joab the head of Israel’s army. The message is Uriah’s own death warrant. On top of his adultery, David has Uriah murdered in the heat of battle. His stratagem, sending forces out into the hardest fighting and having them draw back so Uriah is killed, threatens the lives of other soldiers. It also potentially threatens the success of the battle! But David does not care. He must take Uriah’s life, he must save his own skin.

Why does David do this? David, after all, has been richly blessed by God. He has known victory in battle, wealth, the joy of the Lord. More than that, he is the man after God’s own heart. David’s relationship with God is close. If David can fall, none of us are immune. He had every reason not to do what he did, but he did it anyway. Such is the mystery of sin.

Sin is a mystery because it is rebellion against God. When we sin, we choose to put ourselves and our own desires above God. It is a disease of the will, that choses the evil rather than the good. Or, in the words of the psalm this morning, when we sin we are like fools who say in our hearts “there is no God.” The psalm is not taking pot shots at atheists. There weren’t really many atheists back then, if there was a single one. Rather, the psalmist tells us something about the mystery of sin. That with sin there is a sort of practical atheism, whatever we might believe. When we sin we act as if we were to say “there is no God.” “God does not matter.” “God does not care.” We take matters upon ourselves. And we further separate ourselves from God.

David’s sin is disastrous. I’ll talk more about the consequences of that sin next week. But it also frays his own relationship with God, and also frays his relationships among his family and nation. That’s what all sin does. When we seek to place ourselves above God, and above God’s will, we fray the whole fabric of relationship. We set ourselves against God, and we set ourselves against friend, family, and neighbor. This is why sin always leads to a suffering, of a sort. Because sin always brings its own consequences.

But God will not leave us to our sins, again, as we will hear next week. God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. It is for this reason that Jesus came to us. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. I am only speaking of the human condition. But Jesus would forgive us, raise us up, join us back into relationship with his Spirit, and lead us in the way to life.

Faithfulness: House

Faithfulness: House

God’s Faithfulness Exceeds his Promise

2 Samuel 7:1-14a
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. July 18th, 2021

God always remains faithful to his promises. God might not remain faithful quite in the ways that we expect. But God is always exceeding our expectations. Today’s reading is about God’s promise to David, and we have known how God remained faithful to his promise.

King David has settled in his house because God has given him rest from his enemies. It is then that David notices that he lives in a house of cedar, while God dwells in a tent. Or so David thinks. But he thinks this arrangement is all wrong. God should have a glorious house for his name. Certainly a much finer house than David’s. So he calls the prophet Nathan into his presence and tells him his plans. Nathan says, "Go, do all that you have in mind; for the LORD is with you.”

But Nathan, it seems, spoke too hastily. That night God appears to Nathan and says, “Go and tell my servant David: Thus says the LORD: Are you the one to build me a house to live in?” God reminds Nathan that the Ark has been in a tent since the days of Moses and he has never once asked that a Temple be built to his name. God, it seems, is perfectly fine to dwell in a tent, to not have his own house. After all, God did not dwell in the Tabernacle anymore than he dwelt in the Temple when it was built. God is in all places. If a Temple were to be built, it would not be because God needs it. No Temple could contain God.

And so God reminds Nathan, and by extension David, all that it is he has done. How he chose David from the pastures, gave him victory over his enemies, and has always remained with them. “Will you build me a house?” We might imagine God asking. “No, but I will build you a house.” That is, not a house a cedar but a dynasty. “When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come forth from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me.”

God promises David that his son will get to build the Temple, and his son will have an eternal kingship. Imagine the joy David must have felt. The blessing of knowing his son would have success, that his kingdom would have success, that the Temple he had set his heart on would be built. And in a literal sense God keeps this promise. David’s son Solomon does succeed him, though not without bloodshed. He is a wise and prosperous King. He does build the Temple. But as soon as Solomon dies the Kingdom is rent asunder. The ten northern tribes go their own way. The throne of David is left to Judah. Is this an eternal kingdom? Perhaps God’s promise was not kept.

Maybe we have felt this way. We read all sorts of promises in the Bible that God makes for us. The lion and the lamb will lie down together, those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength, all things work for the good of those who love God. We can read these promises and wonder, “Really? When? How?” 

Solomon’s son Rehoboam may have wondered about the promise of God. God promised his grandfather an eternal kingdom, but now it feels like it’s on its last legs. Certainly Zedekiah, Judah’s last king, must have wondered the same, as he was being sent into exile. 

The Bible is full of all sorts of promises and prophecies that mean something in the immediate context, but point to a winder and more fuller fulfillment. This is one of them. David certainly understood the more literal meaning of the prophecy he was given. His son Solomon would rule and build the temple and the kingdom would last a long time. But there is a fuller meaning to this prophecy that David may have understood but could only be known when it had come to its fulfillment. The deeper promise God had made to David and to his house. And that is the promise of Christ.

When God says “I will raise up your offspring after you” he doesn’t just mean Solomon, he means Jesus who is born of the House of David. When he says “I will establish his Kingdom” he is talking about Jesus life, death, and resurrection. Remember Jesus is proclaimed King on his cross, and vindicated in his resurrection. And the Kingdom of Jesus is not an earthly kingship. It’s not like David’s rule or Solomon’s rule. It is something far greater than David could have imagined. It is a rule over life and death. It is a rule over the forces of wickedness and over Satan. It is an eternal rule that cannot be defeated or overcome or falter or split. And he lives and reigns now and forevermore, and decrees that we might have forgiveness and life.

That is the fuller promise God made. And it is a promise not many understood. But it is a promise that we have seen fulfilled. An eternal kingdom for the House of David. How amazing. How breathtaking. But such is the faithfulness of God.

Faithfulness: Dance

Faithfulness: Dance

Worship is a Joyous Response

2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. July 11th, 2021

By this point King David has assumed the throne of Israel. By the power of the Lord he has been able to quell Israel’s enemies. Israel has even grown to such power that neighboring kings render them tribute. God has blessed David, and by extension all of Israel, exceedingly. How is David to respond to God’s faithfulness? To God’s abundant gifts? To God’s lavish grace?

So too we have known the grace of God. Paul tells us God has “blessed us in Christ withe very spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world.” And, “He destined us in love to be his sons through Jesus Christ, according the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace which he lavished upon us.” 

God has indeed lavished us generously with his grace. Perhaps more than generously, perhaps extravagantly and even recklessly. What has God gifted us? But God has gifted us the forgiveness of our sins in Christ. All the mistakes we’ve made, all the wrongs we have committed, all our faults, God would wipe clean and cast aside as far as the east is from the west. God will not count any of it against us, out of his sheer grace. And what else? But not content simply to forgive us our sins, God would adopt as as his own children. He would make us all sisters and brothers, he would make us heirs of a heavenly inheritance. That is to say, he would make us inheritors of an eternal life. We would know his peace, his love, his joy, forevermore. 

But let’s not stop there, what more would God gift us? But God would gift us an eternal life that is not only to be known in the world to come, but an eternal life that can be known here and now. We do not need to wait until we die to know heaven, but we can experience heaven here and now. We can know that peace here and now, we can experience his love here and now, we can dance in joy here and now. God desires for us to grow in intimate relationship with him, God desires for us to share what we have found with others. God wants to work through us to share his love and sanctify this world. 

All this God gives us in his Son Jesus Christ. All this and more. We would also receive every blessing in the heavenly realms: gifts of leadership, of stewardship, of languages, of healings, of listening, of serving, of pastoring, of hospitality, of fellowship, and on and on. He would gift us this wondrous journey, this adventure, of being part of this tsunami of grace and would sweep the world.

We certainly know the grace of God. David knew peace in his borders and the presence of God in his ark, we know peace in our hearts and the presence of God in worship. How does David respond to the grace he knew? 

He dances with all his might before the Lord.

How could he not? He has known the faithfulness of God in the grace he bestows. When we receive a gift we can’t help but give thanks and gratitude. When we receive the grace of God we can’t help but worship. How does David worship? But he dances. Foolishly. Simply. Naively. He embarrasses his wife Michal, who despises him for it. He is so full of joy, he cannot help but dance like no one is watching, while everyone is watching. He has no sense of propriety. He very simply offers up his joy and worship in an almost primal way.

When we gather in worship we are like a host of Davids. As David responds to God’s generous faithfulness and abundant grace, we too respond to God’s work in worship. Worship of God is always a response to what God has already done. It is a joyous response, a noble response, a dignified response, but it can also be a simple and foolish response. 

We all respond to the wondrous works of almighty God in the way that our heart sings. How did David’s heart sing before the Lord? It sung in ecstatic dance. How do our hearts sing before the Lord? In offering up our prayer and praise? In beautiful music? In the rapt hearing of scripture? In meditation? In silence? In shouts?

Michal despises David because she is embarrassed by how David’s heart responds to the acts of the Lord. She despises him because she is embarrassed by his joy. We may not all be David. But let us not be Michal. It is good for us to rejoice before God in the ways that our heart speaks. To respond to his wondrous acts in the ways our hearts lead us. For indeed, we have received every generous grace, we have received abundant blessings beyond all measure. What can we do but pray? What can we do but sing? What can we do but dance?

Faithfulness: Baptism

Faithfulness: Baptism

We Are Anointed Ones

2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. July 4th, 2021

Perhaps you felt some deja vu hearing our reading from the Old Testament this morning. It was not that long ago when we heard about David’s anointing by the prophet Samuel. How he had clandestinely come to Bethlehem to search out the one God had chosen to replace Saul. He looked at all of David’s brothers, thinking they were prime candidates, but while humans may look on the outward appearance God looks on the heart. It was the young boy David he had chosen, and it was the young boy David Samuel anointed.

Now that young boy has grown into a mighty warrior. He has fought philistines, he has fought Amalekites. He has learned how to live off the land, he has learned how to survive in exile. And now, after a civil war, he has been anointed once again. When he was anointed King as a child he was receiving God’s Spirit. In that anointing God chose him. This anointing is different. Now the people of Israel are choosing him. The former anointing was private, this one is out in the open in front of the gathered people of Israel. 

The people acknowledge this themselves when they say, "For some time, while Saul was king over us, it was you who led out Israel and brought it in. The LORD said to you: It is you who shall be shepherd of my people Israel, you who shall be ruler over Israel.” The people of Israel are coming to acknowledge what was already evident, this man and no other is the Lord’s anointed. And they confirm his anointing with their own.

The greek word for anointed one is Christ. David is the Lord’s Christ. He acts as a foreshadowing of Jesus. He like Jesus flees a jealous King, wanders the wilderness, hides in a foreign land. He like Jesus forgives his enemies. Though he is an imperfect foreshadowing, as we will see. He is certainly not Christlike in all his ways. He seriously falls, and puts his dynasty in jeopardy.

But we too are little Christs. As Jesus is anointed so we too are anointed. Jesus’ anointing was at the River Jordan, when the Spirit descended on him like a dove. We are given that same anointing. That anointing is called baptism. Baptism has two parts, much like David’s two anointings. Baptism, like any sacrament, is an outward and spiritual sign of an inward and spiritual grace. And so there is the outer part, and the inner part.

This morning David’s anointing at Hebron shows us the outer part of Baptism. Baptism is a proclamation of our faith, and a public affirmation of our faith. Through the use of water, we proclaim God’s cleansing power. After all, God saved through water at the Red Sea, and we commonly bathe in water, at least I hope. And also through the invocation of God Father, Son, and Holy Spirit we proclaim our faith in the God who saves. Baptism is a public pledge of allegiance to our one Lord. That is also why we say the creed, the condensed story of our faith.

Since baptism is a public affirmation, we do not practice private baptisms, unless it is an emergency. Baptism is an act of worship, it is a way we proclaim to the world who our Lord is. David, here, is baptized, or anointed, in public. He publicly acknowledges himself as shepherd of God’s people, the people of God publicly acknowledge him to be the Lord’s chosen.

That is the outward sign. The water, the words, the public affirmation. But there is also an inward grace. That is revealed in what David receives in private. The gift of God’s Spirit. The same gift given to us in our baptisms. But our baptism is superior to David’s anointing. In our baptism we are enjoined to Christ, we are adopted as Children of God, we are given a great inheritance: eternal life. We are made part of God’s mighty acts of salvation. We are joined to God’s working in this world in a way David could have only dreamed.

That is also why in our baptism we make certain vows. We renounce the spiritual forces of wickedness; we accept the freedom and power that God gives us to resist evil, injustice, and oppression; and we confess Jesus Christ as our savior and put our whole trust in his grace. This is the life we are called to by baptism, and we are given the grace that we might live it out.

What a tremendous gift that we have been given that we may be so anointed. It is because baptism is a gift of God’s grace that we offer it to all. And such an abundant gift is only needed once. The inward grace, the outward sign, the gift of God. The steadfast reminder of God’s faithfulness toward his people.

Faithfulness: Lament

Faithfulness: Lament

The Love of Enemies and the Love of Friends

2 Samuel 1:1, 17-27
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. June 27th, 2021

David became a very successful soldier in King Saul’s service. So successful the women would sing, “Saul killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands.” This made Saul jealous, and paranoid. If they say Saul killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands, he thought to himself, how much longer before they give David the Kingdom? So he turned against David from that point on. He’d throw his spear at David when an evil spirit overtook him. At times he would set his heart to arrest and execute David. At one point David fled to Ramah, where the prophet Samuel had retired. 

Jonathan, Saul’s son, found David there. Jonathan and David were close. We are told at least twice that Jonathan loved David as his own self. Jesus tells us one of the greatest commandments is to “love your neighbor as yourself.” Jonathan’s love for David, and David’s love for Jonathan was that great. They would give themselves up for each other, because they saw each other as an extension of their own self.

David tried to explain to Jonathan what King Saul had planned for him, but Jonathan couldn’t believe it. His father always roped him in when it came to his plans. If Saul wanted David dead now, he would have run it by Jonathan. So David proposes a plan, to make sure Saul’s heart is set against him. He tells Jonathan he will not attend the feast at the New Moon. Instead, he will wait at Ramah. But if Saul asks where he is, he tells Jonathan, let Saul know he has gone home to Bethlehem to sacrifice with his family.

A day goes by and Saul notices David has not been attending the feast. He asks Jonathan where David is, knowing they are close friends. Jonathan tells his father the story David had concocted, that he had gone to Bethlehem to sacrifice with his family. This enrages Saul, who is certain David is set against him, will destroy the dynasty, will overthrow his Kingdom.

Jonathan leaves in a huff, having been embarrassed by his father and now afraid for his friend. He sends David a signal that lets him know it is time for him to run. But before David leaves, they embrace, and cry. 

David and Jonathan do not meet again. David will wander in exile and join the Philistines for a time. Saul and Jonathan will fall in battle at Mount Gilboa, having lost to the philistines. Our Scripture this morning is David’s lament for Jonathan. And his lament for King Saul.

What is perhaps most perplexing about this lament is its focus on King Saul. It’s understandable why he would lament the death of Jonathan. “Greatly beloved were you to me; your love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.” They did love each other as if loving their own selves, they are a model of friendship. But why does David sing, "O daughters of Israel, weep over Saul”? Should he not, at this moment, be rejoicing. The one who wanted him dead has been slain. He is free. He can return from his exile among the Philistines. He will become King. 

But instead he laments.

There is another story that might help us make sense of this lament.

Once while Saul was pursuing David he went into a cave in order to relieve himself. As luck would have it, that was the very cave David was hiding in. His soldiers told him God must have placed Saul into his hands, so he could kill him and become king. But instead of slaying Saul, David cuts off a corner of his robe. 

Even that much is too far for David. “The LORD forbid!” He said, “That I should do something like that to my master, the LLORD’s anointed, or lift my hand against him, because he’s the LORD’s anointed!” So David did something that most people would think is foolish. He got out of the cave and yelled after Saul, “My master the King!” And he approached Saul explaining what he had done, apologizing. In that moment Saul had a change of heart, knowing that David had proved himself righteous. “David, my son, is that your voice?” He said as he broke down in tears. This would not be the only time Saul would hunt down David, while David spared his life.

David never sought to kill his enemy. He was never going to ascend to the kingship through the shedding of blood. But at every moment he withheld his sword, and showed obeisance to the King who he regarded as the Lord’s anointed, even as the anointing had left him. David loved Jonathan with the highest love, but David also loved Saul his enemy. As he sought to do what was right for Jonathan, he’d also seek to do what was right for Saul. And it was not right to kill him.

Why does David lament the death of Saul? Because Saul was the King of Israel, his master. Because he loved Saul, though Saul didn’t love him. That is why he laments.

David in his wanderings gives us one image of what it means to love our enemies, as well as to love our friends. In this way he foreshadows Jesus. Jesus loved his friends, going so far as to lay his life down for them. And he loved his enemies, forgiving them always. So too with David. He loved his enemies, he loved his friends. And we too are called to do the same. David helps model this for us.

Faithfulness: Goliath

Faithfulness: Goliath

David Has Faith

1 Samuel 17:1a, 4-11, 19-23, 32-49
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. June 20th, 2021

The people demanded a King who would fight their battles for them. God gave them Saul. In today’s readings we see what Saul has become. While his early battles were wildly successful, Saul now hides himself in the center of his camp while Goliath, the champion of Gath, hurls insults and blasphemies at Israel’s armies. Goliath offers a deal. Why should we fight and spill all this blood? Send out your champion to fight me. If I win, you will be our servants. If your champion wins, we will be your servants. But Goliath seriously doubts anyone can beat him.

And who can blame him? Goliath is six cubits and a span tall, which is nine feet six inches. That makes him over two feet taller than Wilt Chamberlain or André the Giant. On his head was a helmet of bronze, coated in mail. The mail coat weighed five thousand shekels, or 91 pounds. The shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s beam, and the spear’s head weighed six hundred shekels or 15 pounds. This man was a monster. No one in Israel’s camp could compare to his size or strength. Who would so foolishly risk their lives?

David happened to be in the field that day delivering food to his brothers. When he heard the philistine’s boasts and the prize Saul was offering to fight him, he marched into the King’s tent and offered his services. “Let no one's heart fail because of him; your servant will go and fight with this Philistine.”

Imagine how incredulous Saul must have been. Of all the ranks of Israel, the only one willing to go and fight Goliath is this child? "You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him,” Saul said, “for you are just a boy, and he has been a warrior from his youth.”

But David reminded the King he was not inexperienced in combat. For David was a shepherd, which meant he fought lions and bears. And he won. And David was convinced this philistine would be no different. Goliath would be no different because it was not David alone who fought the lions and the bears, but the Lord who was with him. And the Lord will be with him when he fights this philistine who blasphemes the Lord and insults the army of God.

Who knows why, but Saul was convinced. Maybe Saul was desperate, maybe Saul thought a little bit of crazy is what was needed to do the job. Either way, he relented. He summoned his armor and had it put on David, but Saul’s armor was far too big for him. David insisted that he use only the weapons of a shepherd: his sling and five stones he found in the creek.

Last week we talked about how God does not look on what is outward but instead he looks on what is inward. Saul looks on what is outward. He sees a monster of a man who could crush his bones. The fear of the Lord has left Saul. He does not put his trust in God to fight his battles. He is left to cower in fear and despair. 

But David does not care about the outward appearance. This is what makes David a man after God’s own heart. What did God see when he chose David from the sons of Jesse to be King over Israel? He saw his faith and zeal that is on display as he steps forward to fight Goliath. This is what human eyes cannot see, what makes the boy David far stronger than the giant Goliath. It is his faith in the living God that wins for him the victory. 

When David stands before Goliath, wearing no armor and armed only with a sling and a few rocks, Goliath is insulted. “Am I a dog, that you come to me with sticks?" He asks. “Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and to the wild animals of the field.”

But David is unmoved, “You come to me with sword and spear and javelin; but I come to you in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. This very day the LORD will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head; and I will give the dead bodies of the Philistine army this very day to the birds of the air and to the wild animals of the earth, so that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, and that all this assembly may know that the LORD does not save by sword and spear; for the battle is the Lord's and he will give you into our hand.” 

That’s some trash talk. David has no fear.

Goliath approached David to fight, and before he could wield his spear David takes out his sling and strikes Goliath with his rock. The rock hits him with such force that it sank into his forehead, and the giant was struck dead.

In all the troubles and adversities we face, there is no greater support than faith. How is David able to stand up to the giant? But because he has faith in the living God, and by that faith he knows how to act. He knows he does not fight the battle alone. None of us, are left in the arena alone. But the Lord fights his battle alongside him. By faith he knows he will be delivered. And by faith he looses his sling.

Saul lacks faith, which is why he stays huddled alone. Goliath lacks faith, which is why he is so boastful and arrogant. Only David has faith, and by that faith God wins for him the victory. David is not foolish, he is not brash, he simply knows who God is, and knows that God is with him.

What David knows is that God is faithful. And that is why God makes him King.

God remains faithful. God is faithful enough to send us his Son that we might have life. God is faithful enough to provide for us this Church in which to grow and serve. God is faithful enough to pour out on us his Spirit that gives us life. God is faithful enough that in all the trials of this life he will not leave us or abandon us. That when when we may feel that we have had enough and cannot go on any more, God does not abandon us in that time. God is faithful enough to have won for us the victory, the victory that matters, over sin and death. 

Let us be like David, confident that the victory is won before we enter the arena. Confident that God is with us. Confidence that comes from our faithfulness in God’s faithfulness.