Easter Sermon - Treasures in Heaven

Treasures in Heaven

(based on Matthew 6:19-21, 28:1-10)

Shortly after American English poet A.E. Housman died, a collection of his poems was published under the title More Poems.  The first poem in that collection is titled, “Easter Hymn.”  At the time of his death, Housman was not a confessing Christian but rather a seeker.  Listen to his words as he contends with the risen Christ:

If in that Syrian garden, ages slain,

You sleep, and know not you are dead in vain,

Nor even in dreams behold how dark and bright

Ascends in smoke and fire by day and night

The hate you died to quench and could but fan,

Sleep well and see no morning, son of man.

But if, the grave rent and the stone rolled by,

At the right hand of majesty on high

You sit, and sitting so remember yet

Your tears, your agony and bloody sweat,

Your cross and passion and the life you gave,

Bow hither out of heaven and see and save.

(A. E. Housman, More Poems, 1936)

Housman was saying to Christ, “If you can’t hear this and have no idea what has happened since you died, rest on.  But if you rose to the right hand of God, remembering your cross and passion, look down from heaven and save.”  That’s the thing about this Easter business that we celebrate each year.  It gets your attention, even the attention of those who do not believe but must somehow contend with the story of a risen Jesus Christ.

To live beyond death has been a constant longing of humanity for as long as people have watched others grow old and die, for as long as we have seen others die too soon from sickness or tragedy.  The longing is there not just at funerals either.  It is there when we pass through the shadow of near death and wonder, even out loud, about how much time we have left to live.

Rev. Nadasdy tells the story of an imaginative five-year-old boy riding by a cemetery in the car with his dad.  He spotted a freshly dug grave with a mound of dirt over it.  Amazed he shouted, “Dad!  Look at that!  One got away!”  To which his father responded, “Well, no, little one, that one you think just got away is just freshly put down.”  As the boy grows and experiences more of the world, he will learn what we all have learned, that dogs and goldfish, even groups and institutions, plants and trees, grandmas and grandpas, friends and schoolmates – that everything has an expiration date; they all die, some sooner, some later.

Together this week, as if it were happening all over again, we all watched Jesus die a horrific death by crucifixion.  His death was made sure by a dagger to the side and a large stone to keep his body secure from scavengers.  He was dead alright.  His expiration date had come on that Friday, on the hill of Golgatha.  Yesterday it was the day of in-between, the day where we think of him entombed, a body with no companion on a Sabbath’s rest.  It was cold and dark in the sepulcher.  Sadness and shock overwhelmed his followers, even though he had told them three times and more that he would die and rise.  They hid away and waited for Sunday to tend to his broken, lifeless body.

Then, as the writers of the New Testament tell it, He rose to life after dying, never to die again.  He rose to live forever and, in so doing, paved the way for us to do the same.  Unlike Housman we do not have to say, “If you died to see no morning, then, Jesus, rest in peace.”  We do not even say “If you rose, Jesus, then look down and save.”  For us, it is not a questionable moment.  We state it as a fact, “Christ is risen!”  And because he lives, we will live also.

More than anything, Easter for us Christians means life beyond our graves.  We believe “in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.”  That is the center of our praise this resurrection day.  Christ has paved the way for us to live forever in His presence.

Easter means something else, too.  This Jesus who came to life is the same Jesus who said in his Sermon on the Mount that we are to lay up treasures in heaven which cannot be destroyed.  This is the same Jesus who taught that our hearts need to be with heaven’s treasures, not with the treasures of this life.

In other words, in the death-shattering light of Easter, we should be able to see clearly today what matters most in our lives.  If our lifespan now extends beyond our expiration date, then our perspective changes markedly, doesn’t it?  Now what we treasure most is not our jobs or our homes or our retirement plans or our bank accounts.  It is not the riches we endeavor to store up in treasure chests.  A recession or depression can wipe those out in a moment.  What we treasure most is not even our strong and healthy bodies.  Have you noticed that even as hard as you might work out and eat the right thing, your body is still deteriorating as it moves toward your own expiration date?  Unfortunately, there is no changing that.  

How much of our lives are spent on things that will not last?  In 2018 a report of the self-storage industry reported that Americans now pay $38 billion a year to have someone else store their earthly “treasures.”  There are 50,000 self-storage facilities in the United States and brand spanking new one just went up on Route 51 where the old Tambilini’s used to be (now I sound like a real Pittsburgher).  We do seem still to treasure what will not last.

So, what does matter most?  

I have up on the screen a picture of gold and precious stones – the accumulation of Midas.  But that’s not what matters.  I’ll tell you what matters.  These…..

Open up the container of pictures.  And start sharing them….

These are what matter.  People…the people and relationships you have in your life.  The friends and family that you’ve gathered around you.  The places you’ve been, the experiences you’ve had.  Those relationships that you’ve built. These are the things that matter.  They will be what you take with you into the eternal. 

And the one relationship that matters the most of all of them, is the one that we have with Jesus Christ.  He loved us enough to lay down his life for us.  He is our treasure in heaven.  We serve others in Christ’s name.  We invest in his purposes, his causes.  And most importantly, we need to invest in all the people that he gave his life for.

In honoring that purpose, we give ourselves to what lasts forever.

Thanks be to God.  AMEN.

Palm Sunday Sermon 2019 - Ask, Seek, Knock

Ask, Seek, Knock

(based on Matthew 7:7-11, 21:1-9)

Rev Dean Nadasdy tells this story:

“As a boy I prayed for a motorized Flying Tiger model airplane.  This is before remote control the plane was on the other end of a wire.  For several years I prayed for that plane and did not receive it.  Fast forward 20 years, and I am a young pastor.  I mention in a sermon that sometimes we pray, asking our heavenly Father for something, and the answer is simply, “No.”

“We trust that our Father knows best, and we move on,” I said.  The next Sunday at the close of worship, our organist went into “Off We Go into the Wild Blue Yonder,” and our staff walked up the aisle with a much more sophisticated version of a Flying Tiger model airplane.  We went out that afternoon and flew it.  It was amazing.

Fast forward another 15 years, and I am speaking at a conference in Florida.  I share that story.  The next day a local man who heard the story comes forward and says he would like me to have something.  It was a patch, one of several he had, from the Flying Tiger Squadron of World War II fame.  He had flown with the Flying Tigers.”  

Two weeks ago, I attended a retreat for the Executive Committee of Pittsburgh Presbytery up at Camp Crestfield and the worship leader spoke about the wonders of Disney World.  How many of you have been there?  The world of Disney that gives children and adults alike a sense of wonder, excitement and even magic.  At every turn there is something more to discover and to delight in, from the moment you check in to a Disney resort to the days in each park.  What more could Disney give to those who come seeking refuge from the encounters of our everyday world?

Oh, but there is more!  Every night Disney sets off fireworks for the simple delight of the guests who have come to spend the day there – at a cost of $80,000 dollars each night.

Our scripture passage this morning says, “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:11)

In other words, if Disney – who exists as a business to make money off of those who buy its products – can give its guests a light show at the end of the day at a considerable cost, just for the purpose of providing another level of delight, how much more will God give us?

Jesus teaches in the Sermon on the Mount that our prayers to God are not cold requests to a distant deity, who must be coaxed and appeased. Our prayers are voiced in a deep, trusting relationship like that of a parent and child.  We call God, “Father.”  Just as we expect good parents to do what is best for their kids, we expect God to do what is best for us.

Prayer is very much a matter of asking and receiving, but it is also more.  It is seeking over time and finding.  We can be knocking at the door with the same request not for a day, but for years.  Along the way, prayer is the means by which we discover the Will of God for our lives, that Will which is always good, pleasing and perfect.  It’s what we expect from a good parent; to have our best interest at heart and for a good child to wait patiently for the parent to either provide us with what we need or over time to help us understand why our requests aren’t granted.  To perhaps help us understand that those requests might need to shift to something more practical, helpful or more useful.

Emily Dickinson wrote hundreds of poems – only a handful of which were published during her lifetime, and yet she is known to us as one of the greatest poets/writers of all time.  She struggled with the efficacy of prayer in her poetry.  She wondered, in verse, if God was listening when she prayed.  She wrote:

Prayer is the little implement

Through which men reach   

Where presence is denied them.  

They fling their speech

By means of it in God’s ear;         

If then He hear,  

This sums the apparatus     

Comprised in prayer.

(Emily Dickinson. Complete Poems, 1924.)

There is an iffy-ness to Emily’s prayers, a wondering if God listens.  In another poem she shares the disappointment that comes from a long-term prayer apparently unanswered.

There comes an hour when begging stops,

When the long interceding lips

Perceive their prayer is vain.

“Thou shalt not” is a kinder sword

Than from a disappointing God

“Disciple, call again.”

(Emily Dickinson, Complete Poems, 1924.)

Who has not wondered at times, as we pray, if God is really listening.  Who has not fatigued in knocking at the same door with the same request only to find silence on the other side?  

However, Christ’s teaching on prayer carries no such doubts.  He is utterly confident that our heavenly Father hears our prayers and answers us.  Even in the midst of his greatest struggles, he knew that God heard him and that God, his Father, was listening.

This assurance is especially important for what we might call aspirational prayer.  This kind of prayer expresses a deep desire before God that may take time before it becomes real in our lives.  People in recovery understand aspirational prayer.  So do those who face long-term illness or burdensome grief.  In aspirational prayer we pray again and again and again; perhaps wearing God down to answer our prayer and so we keep on asking.  We keep on seeking.  We knock again and again.  Afterall, this is our heavenly Father, also.  In the very act of asking again and again, in the very process of taking our aspiration to him, we are confident we are heard and will be answered – even if, in the end, that answer must be “no”.

Palm Sunday brings with it such a confidence in aspirational prayer.  As Jesus rides into Jerusalem on his way to the cross, he is the Father’s answer to his children’s prayers over centuries for a Messiah and Savior. Some saw it exactly as it was.  Others were caught up in a revolt against Rome and wanted a revolutionary leader.  Many, no doubt, were just at the beginning of a process of aspirational prayer which would have them finally see Jesus as the promised anointed one.  Those who were Jews, though, knew the prophecies of Isaiah and Zechariah.  They knew the cherished legacy of prayers for the coming of the Messiah and could not help but wonder.

For us who follow the one on the donkey we know where he is heading. We see the Passion before him.  Once again, we will walk the Way of Sorrows with him.  We will listen to him pray deep and hard prayers in the Garden.  We will hear his prayerful shouts from the cross.  He aspired not to greatness but to service, not to power but to sacrifice.  He came to fulfill the aspirational shout, “Hosanna!’ by laying down his life to save us all.

This Son of God has taught us to pray just as he prayed, as a child seeking an answer from our heavenly Father.  Today, as on the first Palm Sunday, all of our aspirations find their “yes” in Jesus of Nazareth.  So, we continue to ask, to seek and to knock, aspiring in prayer to know him and to follow where he leads.  Amen.

Today’s Sermon - 5th Sunday in Lent - Build on Rock

Build on Rock

(based on Matthew 7:24-27)

During this season of Lent, I’ve been using Christ’s quintessential sermon he gave us about living in today’s world - the Sermon on the Mount.  Today, Jesus gives us a story of two builders, not two dreamers who talk about someday building their dream home.  Jesus gives us a story about two builders, not two philosophers, who go on and on about the value of a place we can call home.  Jesus gives us a story about two builders, not architects who can draw a nice home on paper.  In giving us a story about builders, Jesus is talking about doing, about acting.  It’s important that we recognize this.  Both people in Jesus’ parallel stories here build.  They make something; in this case, houses.  Jesus is not talking about theology or creeds or doctrine here, but instead, he’s talking about practice, living out your beliefs.

Another thing the two builders in Jesus’ story have in common—besides being practical people of action—is that their homes are both tested by the forces of nature.  The quality of both buildings will be measured by their ability to withstand the assaults of storms, high winds and water.  These two builders are building in a real world where a storm can take a house down in a matter of seconds.  And this isn’t something that we have to have much imagination about.  We’ve seen and witnessed it.  Storms come and wipe out homes.

But what’s the difference between the builders?  The first is “wise,” and the second is “foolish,” Jesus says.  That’s how Jesus contrasts the two builders.  What makes the first builder wise?  He builds his house on rock, while the foolish builder builds his house on sand.  That’s the difference—rock and sand.  Rock is hard and solid; sand is soft and shifting.  Foolish builders expect their house to stand on shifting sand.  The wisdom of both builders is measured by their building’s durability in a storm.  One lasts, the other fails. 

The Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy is going to fall.  Scientists travel to the town of Pisa every year to measure the building’s slow descent.  They report that the 179 foot tower, which was built in 1173, moves about one-twentieth of an inch every year, and is now over 17 feet out of plumb.  Recent renovations may have saved the nearly 850 year old tower and prevent it from collapsing.  Quite significantly, the word “pisa” is the Greek word for marshy land, which gives some clue as to why the tower began to lean even before it was completed.  Also, another issue is the fact that the builders only provided a ten foot deep foundation.  The reason the Leaning Tower of Pisa is Leaning is because it is built on a faulty foundation. 

We need to be careful how we interpret Jesus’ story of the two builders.  This is not a story comparing those who follow Jesus and those who do not.  As Jesus spells out the meaning of his story, he makes it clear that both builders represent people who “hear these words of mine.”  It’s not a matter of one hearing Jesus teach and the other missing it.  Both listen to Christ’s teaching.  Today we might say that both builders, the wise and the foolish, represent people who read the words in their Bibles.  Both listen to sermons, and both may participate in Bible study.  They know what Jesus has taught.  Even more, they may understand his teaching.  

So, what’s the difference between these two listeners to Jesus’ teaching?  The wise one listens to Jesus teach, understands his teaching, and puts it into practice.  As Jesus says it, this one “hears these words of mine and does them.”  The foolish one, in contrast, hears Jesus teach, grasps his teaching, but never does what Jesus says.  In other words, this listener to Jesus’s teaching “hears these words of mine and does not do them.”

So, the story of the two builders is really a story about what Jesus expects from those who listen to him teach and preach.  He wants more than showing up to hear him.  He wants more than praise for his valuable insights.  He wants more than an impressive theological library or a list of truths and values to which we subscribe.  He wants a life based on his teachings.  He wants us to do what he has told us to do.  He wants us to do it even when it’s difficult, particularly because the storms will rage.  It’s not a matter of if the storms.  No, the storms are coming and they’ll come for everyone.  But, the question in the end not be about the storm, or even about the house, the question will be about the builder.  Was the builder wise or foolish.  Did the builder listen and do, or did the builder listen and decide to do their own thing?

Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount is not so much an ideology or a philosophy as it is a blueprint for how to build a Christ-like life.  His practical teachings show us how to navigate our relationships in Christ-like ways.  The sermon is meant to show itself in how we live day-in and day-out, when life is easy, but also when life is hard.  It’s not just about what we believe, but how we actually live those beliefs out day after day.  It’s not enough to simply hear them, know them, even repeat them to others.  It’s important to live them out.

In the ancient Greek world, there was an ascending staircase of maturity.  It went from knowledge to understanding to wisdom.  Knowledge was learning certain truths.  Understanding was grasping those truths so that you could actually articulate them.  Wisdom, though, was putting those truths into practice, doing them.  Jesus is saying here that wisdom is putting his teachings into practice. 

So imagine you get really sick, I mean, sick to where your life is at stake.  Your physician prescribes a treatment that includes a protocol of specific meds, surgery and diet.  You respect your doctor.  He or she is a respected authority on treating your illness.  You may ask for a second opinion, but wisdom would dictate that you follow his or her prescription.  You’ll take those pills, have that surgery and follow that diet, just as he or she says.  It would be foolish to ignore your doctor and likely just as foolish to follow your own opinion.

It’s like that with Jesus’ teachings.  They are meant to be done.  He wants to see us praying and forgiving, loving our enemies and helping the poor.  He wants us to make peace and show mercy.  He expects us to be the salt the earth and brighten dark places.

The only thing different between Christ’s teaching then and now is that we listen to the words of Jesus in the shadow of his cross.  That cross of love and sacrifice has become for us a motivation to build our lives on what Jesus has taught.  We practice what he teaches not out of fear of judgment or strict obedience, but out of love and gratitude.  As we watch him weather the storm of his Passion, we see him practicing what he taught—humility, reconciliation, forgiveness, prayer.  He withstood his storm with amazing grace and strength, and he did that for us.

His love constrains us to be not just good listeners to his words but dynamic listeners who build on rock, putting his words to work and trusting in God’s almighty grace.  Amen.