Where Do We Find God’s Calm in Life’s Storm?
Mark 4:35-41

Mark chose his words very carefully when he wrote his gospel. We don’t exactly know his process, but we know that Mark didn’t take dictation, nor watch Jesus and write a biography. Mark probably never met Jesus. We think Mark heard many stories about Jesus from Peter, a fisherman who may not have been able to write. Then he looked at the fiddling Nero’s persecution and chose just the right words to give hope.

Here’s what Mark saw in Rome. Nero had Christians dressed in wild animal skins and torn to pieces by dogs, or they were set on a stand to be lit as human torches for his gardens. Nero instigated the public to call believers, according to Roman historian Tacitus, “notoriously depraved, Christians.” So Mark likened their waves of persecution to the lake’s storm. In what words could the persecuted find God’s calm in their storm?

In what words do we find God’s calm in our storms? There are personal storms related to money today. The perfect storm of the average American debt (George Will sets it at 141% of debt to earnings), plus the housing crisis is sending us into recession.

Or for some there may be a church crisis: with a search for a new Minister of Music will all the current choirs continue? Will a contemporary service be forced upon us? Yes and no. Yes, current choirs will continue; no, a contemporary service will not be rushed into once a new person is hired, but there will be a process to discern God’s will regarding how best to begin a contemporary service. Waves of change.

Or for others there may be national crisis: is it better to elect John McCain to maintain troop strength in Iraq, or is it better to elect Hillobama to draw down our troops?

Like the early Roman Christians we’re all in that boat, but Jesus is snoring:
What words best describe our storm to God and what words does Jesus use back?

Let’s take that in parts: what words best describe our storm to God? This implies a golden nugget of truth. Our usual response to life’s storms is to complain to others. The Bible everywhere condemns complaining to others. Partially because the process of moaning to friends gets our minds more deeply stuck in the post-storm mud. Instead the Spirit lifts up the idea of complaining to God. The most common types of Psalms, fully 1/3, or about 50, are laments. For there is something about whining to God that helps us see Jesus with us. LORD, do you care?! Jesus woke up. For us, we wake up to God

Mark is telling his lion-bait friends and us today to speak our fears to Jesus, and then what happens? Jesus stands up and speaks words of faith: Silence! Be still! And the winds and the waves obey. All through Scripture God teaches us that words have power: the whole world was created by words, Let there be… and there was… In the same way, after complaining to God, there’s great power to speak words of faith: Peace..!

The fire had destroyed millions of dollars worth of Marv’s factory in 1984. It was one of the worst days of his life. So he gathered his management team in the basement of a local Zeeland, MI restaurant with a grief counselor. The counselor helped them process their feelings, in essence, their complaints to God. But finally Marv had had enough of the crying over spilled milk. He stood up, took control, and said, Enough already. Now Smith I want you to call the insurance. Jones, you call our competitors to ask for factory space. Billings, you get a crew to… We’re gonna make it! And they did. So in your storm: speak your fears to God and your faith in God, and you’ll find peace, Amen.

Reverend Todd Buurstra
Pastor of Worship and Witness

Where Do We Find God’s Calm in Life’s Storm of Global Warming?
Gen 7:1-5; 8:20-22; 9:8-15

Did the flood cover the whole earth or just a part of it? so asked a fellow pastor whom I knew immediately was checking my orthodoxy. If I failed the test he might not cooperate with me in a ministry important to one of our members. So I hedged: the whole then-known earth, I said. Honestly? I don’t think it matters whether you believe the flood actually happened or not. That answer would have sunk my ark.

Here’s what I mean. (more…)

 

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Where Do We Find God’s Calm in Life’s Storms?
Racial Complaints

Numbers 11:4-6, 10-18, 31, 32

Where do we find God’s calm in the swirling storms of complaints? Moses had had it! He was as hot and bothered as the rest of the Hebrew people trudging from the Si-nai oasis through that desert. He didn’t need to hear them grouse for quail! Why did you take us out of Egypt? We may have been slaves there, but at least we had fish! Yeah, I’m all dried up out here under the hot, desert sun! Blah, blah. Waa waa Moan, moan.

Now, it was Moses’ turn to complain to the LORD: Why do I have to carry this people? What am I, their mother?! Where am I supposed to get meat?! If you’re going to treat me like this, you might as well kill me, `cause it’s killin’ me anyway! Blah, wah…

Now we could relate this story to any number of complaints today: from kids to parents, from employee to boss, from congregation to consistory, but verse 4 helps us to apply it… Rabble is the motley crew, couldn’t resist, that went along for the freedom ride from Egypt to the Promised Land. From Egypt, Midian, Edom… they instigated the meat complaints. So how does God calm the storm of racial complaints?

Obama’s pastor, and my seminary professor, Jeremiah Wright’s sermon soundbytes about America KKK… Not God bless America, but G d America!… have un-leashed a storm of racial complaints. Can we find God’s calm in the storm’s center?

Before I try, let me share my limited qualifications to speak about race as a privileged, white male, and I mean limited. I lived as a minority, albeit a privileged minority, for 2.6 years in Japan. I strive for equality in a bi-racial marriage within my culture. I strive for equality in a bi-racial staff in my culture. Lastly, Jeremiah Wright was an all-time favorite professor who taught me more about racial inequality than anyone.

There’s a racial storm so how does God calm it? God calmed Moses’ storm of complaints in two ways: by allowing Moses to let off his steam of complaints to God, which we already saw, and, once his blood pressure lowered, to give Moses the idea to involve other leaders by delegating authority. With the load lifted Moses calmed.

How will God calm the storm of our racial complaints? In the same ways. First, God allows us to let off the steam of our racial complaints: how could Pastor Wright say Gd America?! If Obama is a racial healer why didn’t he choose another church?! Etc. And then I think that God would have us involve others. I want to suggest a specific way that you might do that. Ask a minority person, preferable an African American, what they think of Pastor Wright’s comments. Don’t you comment; just listen to learn.

Here’s what I learned listening to Jeremiah Wright 23 years ago. Today’s racism isn’t as blatant as white water fountains and colored water fountains; its more subtle about pulpit talk. We judge Jeremiah’s sound byte sermon by white preaching standards. Jeremiah taught us that black preaching starts low, builds slow, waxes warm, and sits down in the storm. In other words black preaching builds to a rhetorical and emotional storm—G d America! That lends itself to exaggeration. Just like Jesus who said if your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Preaching should be judged within its culture.

What is the result of bringing God our complaints and involving others by listening to them? It may not be that quail migrate on past, but it may be that when whites pause to judge blacks by our standards the black pulpit will need less divisive rhetoric so that our racial complaints may be calmed. That’s what I hear, what do you?

Reverend Todd Buurstra
Pastor of Worship and Witness

 

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We’re conducting a little experiment. We’ve published the audio file from Pastor Mark Swart’s sermon on Sunday, March 30th.

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If yes, which of the following would you prefer if possible (all are free)?

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Please click this link to answer our poll. Thank you.

Jesus? Yes! The Church? No! Acts 10:34-43; Matt.
28:1-6

There you were stopped last night at a Manhattan red light on the way back from a show. Peering through the cab’s window you were taking in the architecture. Look! There’s St. Patrick’s Cathedral! one of you exclaimed. Isn’t it majestic? But wait, what’s going on down front? I don’t know. You heard an angry chant and saw signs wa-ving as the faithful climbed the steps for the Holy Saturday Vigil. Can you read a sign? I can just make one out: Jesus? Yes! The Church No! Whoa! NS What do you think they’re mad about: clergy scandals? DaVinci Code stuff? I don’t know but that’s what I don’t like about organized religion. Yeah, I mean Jesus’ words like forgive your debtors, and his actions to heal, and even the power of his resurrection is wonderful. It’s the church that screws it up with the Crusades, the 100 Year War, or the 10-year war be-tween my Protestant mother and her Catholic son-in-law. Do you believe that last Easter dinner my mother actually asked Andy: So, do crucifix- wearing Catholics believe in the resurrection? Jesus could have appeared and we wouldn’t have noticed for the argument.

Is your story at all like that? (more…)

Cross Orientation
Matthew 21:6-17

If you were Jesus’ campaign manager what advice would you give? After all, things were going really well! You had expertly choreographed his entrance into Jerusalem surrounded by the pilgrim crowds of Passover. News of his healings and prophetic words had spread like wildfire so that people were spreading their cloaks like a red carpet, tearing palms off the trees, waving them feverishly at him while yelling Hosanna in the highest! His poll numbers were in the Obamasphere. I mean the yahoo and msn homepages and the Jerusalem Times all carried a version of the headline: COULD THIS MAN BE THE KING OF THE JEWS?! The historical memory of the event in Matthew 21:10 records the whole city was in an uproar.

How would you have advised Jesus to ride this wave? (more…)

Fasting’s Reward
Matt. 6:16-18; Is. 58:3-9; Zechariah 7:5,6

Your generation couldn’t hack a depression and a world war! So said obaachan to her daughter a couple of decades ago. Indeed obaachan was born into wealth to the extent that her house had servant’s quarters, but she was born in the middle of the Great Depression. After money became so tight that it threatened her father’s business, our WW II bombs began falling upon Tokyo. Obaachan tells of walking home from school in junior high dodging the flames of the wooden city on fire. By that time her family and entire country were so poor that only the rich could eat Japanese flag lunches: rice with a red plum in the middle. Her family could no longer afford the plum so they became malnourished to the point that her two brothers died of TB leaving her as the only child. I agree with her. I don’t think that my generation, or those younger than me, having lived our whole life with quarter pounders on demand, could hack her youth.
In our day of hi-indulgence and low-sacrifice, why fast?

First off, because God blesses the faster. Having said that, God does not bless every faster. In Jesus’ day fasting was “cool” because, unlike today, people valued godly sacrifice. So some religious leaders treated fasting as the anti-Oscar red carpet. They appeared before the crowd on market day with their hair mussed up, their clothes dirty, and their faces painted pale while probably moaning: I’m hungry, but I’m fasting for God. Thinking of the people’s rolling eyes, Jesus replies: That’s their reward.
Jesus teaches that God blesses the sacrifice of the faster who looks for a reward, not from people, but from the Almighty. But what is that reward? I find three rewards:

1. Fasting is good for most people’s health, unless you’re already sick. I notice that I feel purified after fasting. Constant feasting is unhealthy. Our stomachs need a break
2. Fasting is good for your self-discipline. What obaachan is saying is that since my generation and younger has rarely had to face hardship, we’re undisciplined. So we must choose to master our appetites, lest they master us. America is being mastered.
3. Fasting makes you appreciate the feast. I look forward to the meal that breaks my monthly fast. It’s one of my favorite meals of the month! When’s supper?! I ask.

Secondly God blesses others through the faster. Read the prophet’s words with me… Isaiah 58:5-7… God intends the sacrifice of fasting to bless us, and others.
The hunger that we choose can remind us of the hunger that others are forced into. My hunger pangs remind me of the almost 1 billion who live on less than $1 a day. A few times in my 30-year history with fasting I was inspired to write a letter to my congress people regarding hunger issues. Currently the US has made little pro-gress on our Millennium Development Goals set in 2000. Show Congress you care.

Thirdly, God is blessed by our sacrifice of fasting. Another prophet Zechariah preaches to the exiles holding regular fasts to remember Israel…
Often we are with God like a college kid with his parents. The parent complains: He just comes home when he needs money or his laundry done! God wants to be more than a bell-hop, but a loved parent. Fasting reminds me of my hunger for God.

So this Lent the pastoral staff is asking the healthy adults among us to commit to a 24 hour fast from food, not liquids, during Lent, preferably on Good Friday. Will you become acquainted with the blessings of this sacrifice for God this Lent? Amen.

Giving Up Something for Lent?
Matthew 4:1-11

Mom, what are you giving up for Lent? came the question at our Ash Wednesday supper table. Suzy is giving up chocolate said one. Yeah, Jim is going to give up being mean to his sister said the other. That’ll be impossible! came the reaction. Lent.

Historically we Protestants have not given up anything for Lent in order to sacrifice year-round for Jesus. Yet this Lent the pastoral staff is asking the healthy adults among us to give up food for one day, possibly Good Friday. Until then Mark, David and I will be teaching on the ancient spiritual discipline of fasting on Sundays and Wed-nesdays. Richard Foster’s chapter on fasting in Celebration of Discipline will assist us.
(more…)

Relational Kinks      Matthew 6:7-15

 We have all done it.  It often happens when we are in a hurry.  There we were watering the garden or washing the car, pressed for time and when we pressed the hose– nothing.  Ugh!  What’s wrong?!  Then it soon dawned upon us that there was a kink in the hose.  Tracing it back to the source we unkinked it, and the water flowed.
 I am suggesting to you this morning that the three primary relationships of life get kinked up also, even though God designs the water of life to flow freely in and through them.  I notice these relational kinks in my life.  In my relationship with myself the kink becomes to think it’s all about me, about my work, about my problem, and I become dry.  In my relationship with others I may get too bent out of shape that someone else might think differently or feel differently from me, so that my love runs dry.  In my relationship to God I may get so focused on Bless me, Help me that I forget to let the love flow back to its source.  So how does God use prayer to help our relational flow?
 
 Jesus is unkinking God’s flow of love to ourselves when he teaches us to pray:
Give us this day our daily bread… And forgive us our debts… lead us not into temptation.
These are all prayers for God’s love to flow into personal empty wells.  But once in a while I come across a person, like my younger brother, who proudly states, I don’t pray for myself.  I pray for others.  But Jesus wants us to pray for ourselves, too.  For prayer is a free therapy session where we learn to trust his provision of daily bread, have our guilt (debts) washed away, and feel protected (lead us not).  Dr. Alexis Carrel won the Nobel Prize in Medicine, and later wrote a 1936 book extolling the therapeutic value of prayer. 
 Prayer has always been a way of letting God save me $200/hour for therapy.  When Yancey describes his weekly “anger walk” I remember my own up in the Sussex County woods behind the parsonage of my first church.  That church was a surly bunch then.  And being the rookie that I was I often got in the middle of a metaphorical punch intended for someone else.  That made me angry.  And so I remember many woods walks working out my anger at the left jabber du jour with God. Those walks saved my ministry
 The way that prayer is unkinking the water of life to me today is more in line with Dr. Anthony Bloom.  As a physician his pace is described in this way…  My kids tell me at the supper table, You JUST asked me that!  So where was my mind?  Prayer helped Bloom receive the present of the present.  He slowed down… and became more productive.  Yancey concludes… When I…move faster and faster…
 
 Jesus is unkinking God’s flow of love through us to others when we are to pray:
Give us our daily bread…And forgive us our debts as we… lead us not into…
How can we pray give us our daily bread here and then go home, brush half of our baloney sandwich into the garbage not caring about those for whom that would be more than they’d eat all day?  How can we pray forgive us our debts right here and then not answer the caller I.D. when we see it’s the brother with whom we’re fueding?  How can we pray lead us not into temptation here but then yawn at the internet story of the increase of sexual trafficking of Thailands pre-teens?  Our hose is kinked.  So as the demon-possessed always need to be brought to Jesus so prayer brings others to Jesus.
 Bonhoeffer wrote: Christ stands between us, and we can only get into touch with our neighbors through him.  It reminds me of that classic story of the Constitutional Convention in 1787 where our forefathers gathered in the city of brotherly love to write our constitution.  But brotherly love did not prevail for the first 4 weeks during which they had not written a single word.  Wrangling special interests played tug of war to a stalemate.  So Benjamin Franklin stood to make this famous motion: That henceforth prayers, imploring the assistance of Heaven and its blessing on our deliberations, be held in this assembly every morning.  The Almighty was sought and the words were found to the blessing of this union.  To this day that practice continues.

 Jesus is unkinking God’s love flow through us back to the Source when we pray:
Hallowed be Your name, Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is…
My great challenge in prayer is to end my therapy session, get beyond the flow of compassion to others, in order to complete the circle of love to God.  Yancey reminds us that 16th century English country pastor George Herbert called us secretaries of praise.  You and I have no higher purpose on earth than to get lost in wonder, love and praise.
 Yancey tells the story of the great German preacher, Helmut Thielicke who suffered terribly for opposing Hitler.  One day he walked to his Stuttgart church only to find it reduced to rubble and his home destroyed.  But that wasn’t the greatest pain.  His heart broke when he saw his own nearly starving children licking pictures of food in recipe books.  Yet each Sunday amidst the rubble he preached hope in God because he lived in praise.  Surrounded by crushed stones Thielicke declared: The one fixed pole in all the bewildering confusion is the faithfulness…of God!  Whoa!  Praise has power.

 This week, upon which relationship do you need to focus prayer to unkink God’s flow of love: to yourself, to others, or to God?  Concentrate on one and let it flow.  Amen
 

Given God’s Prayer Promises,   Mark 11:20-25

Think of a BIG prayer that you’ve been praying. For: healing, depression, money Got it? Then hear Jesus say… This sweeping prayer promise moves mountains!

Yet, even though Jesus promises such sweeping power to prayer, why do certain prayers go unanswered? Moses prayed to enter the Promised Land—God refused. David prayed for an infant son to live—God let him die. Paul prayed that his “thorn in the flesh” (maybe his eyesight?) be removed—God kept his vision at 20-2000, whatever. Even Jesus prayed that his cup of suffering pass from him—God sent him to the cross.

Today the Spirit will help you examine why a prayer of yours may not be answered.

The first reason Yancey helps us see in the Bible is sin. Jesus is referring to this in verse 25… Someone here is praying for Uncle Harry to get along with the family, but you’re forgetting that prayer probably isn’t going to change Harry, until it changes you to forgive him for the scene he made at Christmas dinner. Another example of sin getting in the way of prayer’s answer, writes Yancey, is when prison chaplains share that some convicts only pray when they hear the police siren. God help me get away! Of course, Yancey points out, that prayer makes God an accomplice to the crime. Then there’s the sin of religious extremism. Faith Assembly church in IN teaches that God heals by faith alone, without the help of modern medicine. So medical researchers have studied the results: the infant mortality rate is three times higher than normal, and the mortality rate associated with childbirth is 100 times greater! Faith and medicine is best!

The second reason that God may not be answering your prayer Yancey calls contradictory prayers. That’s partly what this fig tree curse is about. Jesus was hungry, but it wasn’t fig season. So, no matter Jesus’ desire, God wasn’t about to magi-cally produce figs in February even for his own son! This is why I don’t pray for weather or sports. If I pray for sun on my picnic but the farmer prays for rain, why should God answer me? If I pray for the Giants and my MI family prays for U of M graduate Tom Brady’s Patriots, what’s up with that? (That’s also why I don’t bet because then I’d be tempted to pray a contradictory sports prayer.) On a slightly more serious level Yancey quotes the ironic British WWII poem-prayer… Please read it with me…

The last reason that God may not be answering your prayer, and maybe the most common reason, is that God may have a higher purpose for you. What was the higher purpose of Jesus cursing the fig tree? It was to symbolize Israel’s unfruitfulness in carrying out her mission. So God would prune Israel (e.g., destroy the temple) and graft in we Gentiles to accomplish the mission. (cf. Romans 11). Yancey gives two great examples: 1) Augustine’s mother prays that her son will not sail to wicked Rome. However Augustine tricks her and goes anyway. Later he was converted to Christ there and became the greatest church father of the 5^{th century. 2) The missionaries prayed for China as they were kicked out in 1950. It looked like the church might die. However, under communist oppression God multiplied the underground church many times over!So what are you praying for that is not being answered? Find a quiet time today to think about whether it is because of sin, a contradiction, or God has a higher purpose. Turn from the sin, back away from the contradiction, and/or accept the higher purpose.}