Today's Sermon - Where Is God? - 9/1/19

Where is God?

(based on Jeremiah 2:4-13)

          Jeremiah was called by God to be a prophet when he was just a boy.  God came to him and told him that he was known by God when he was still in the womb and that God had a difficult task for him to perform during his lifetime.  God told Jeremiah that he would face a people that had forgotten about their God.  He would face nations and rulers that were set on destroying Israel, and in fact, would do just that.  God told Jeremiah that he would have a difficult life, that he would be required to stand up to the people of Israel and proclaim aloud the bad things they had done and the consequences that would befall them as a punishment.  God told Jeremiah that the people would be stubborn and would not listen and that he would be hated for the message he brought to the people.

          Doesn’t that sound like a wonderful life?

          Doesn’t that sound like a real, exciting prospect for your future?

          Jeremiah may have thought, “Gee, thanks God.  Can’t wait to grow up and do that?”  And yet, Jeremiah was faithful to God’s call in his life and he did just that.  He railed against the people, and the government and the priests of God.  He was bullish in his task and did not shy away from telling the stark truth nearly from the time that he was a young man.

          We’ll come back to the passage that we read this morning in just a moment, but I do want to fast forward to when Jeremiah became an old man.  The consequences Jeremiah prophesied to the people came to pass, they were conquered by Babylon and were exiled from their land.  They found themselves living in foreign territory, broken, afraid, and lost.  And once the people have hit bottom, Jeremiah turns from being an angry prophet wailing against the sins of the people and becomes their counselor, their comforter, and he assures them that eventually everything will work out.  He assures them with soothing words and a lamenting song that God still loves them and will give back to them all that they have lost.  It will take more than 70 years for that to happen, but we can’t just read today’s passage without knowing how it all works out; so I want to read, Jeremiah 29:4-14.

          Now, getting back to today’s passage from Chapter 2, what went wrong for the Israelites?  What did they do or fail to do that brought them so low?

          Chapter 2 says that they “went after useless things”, they “went after things that do not profit”, those who were in charge of the law did not know the spirit of the one who gave them the law, they exchanged their God; the fountain of living water, for a well of muddy water that leaks and does not hold anything.  And twice in this passage it says that they forgot to ask the question, “Where is the Lord?”

          Friends, I’m not Jeremiah.  I’m not a prophet that rails against the faithlessness of the people, or the ways of the lawgivers, or the ministers and priests that have nothing to say, or the nations that stand at the border waiting to destroy us.  But this morning, I am a voice that asks if we have forgotten to wonder and make an awesome discovery of what the Lord has done for us every day.

          I don’t think we’ve forgotten to ask the question, “Where is God?”.  In fact, I think we ask that nearly every moment these days.  But, I do think we’ve forgotten how to see. 

Actually, I think we’ve gotten pretty good at asking, “Where is God?”  But we stop at the question and forget to look around and notice the wonder of God, notice the ways of God at work in our lives, at the world around us.  And because we’ve forgotten how to see, we’ve lost touch with our main purpose in this life; proclaiming the glory of God every day.

          I remember the first mission trip I led with a group of teenagers.  Linda Williams, director of Christian Education and Disciple-making at Presbytery, helped me put a mission trip together to go to Alaska, because it was a desire of one of our youths at my church in Leetsdale to do it.  Every since she was about 5 years old, she’d always wanted to go to Alaska and teach VBS there.  She turned 16 when we were on the trip.   I’d never led a mission trip before.  I’d never led a group of teenagers away for nearly three weeks of work in the isolated communities of Alaska to a new culture, new environment, new everything. 

And while there, every day was a challenge for me.  Every day I worried about the details and the travel plans, and the arrangements for accommodations and food preparation.  I worried every moment about what could go wrong and how to solve the problems that cropped up every day.  But, each night, Linda brought us and brought me, in particular, back to focus on why we were there and what purpose we served going to Alaska when she’d ask us, “So, where did you see God today?”

          I led that first trip to Alaska 17 years ago.  Since then, I have never failed to ask at the end of the day, “Where did you see God today?”  In fact, it has become such a routine practice that I no longer wait until the end of the day to reflect on that question, instead I notice God at work all the time.

          Last night, I had the opportunity of attending the Water Lantern Festival.  It was held at Lake Elizabeth which is next to the National Aviary on the North Shore.  I travel by that park and that lake often and had never noticed it before.  The festival was attended by upwards of about 5,000 people.  The people came from all over Pittsburgh and elsewhere.  We sat on the lawn by the lake with our camp chairs and blankets.  Each person was given a wooden float and an LED candle that would hold a paper lantern.  Each of us were given a colored marker to decorate the paper lanterns while we waited for the dark.  And while we decorated our lanterns, complete strangers would share their markers with others.  A purple one was traded for a red one and then a black one or a green one, until all those around us were satisfied with what we’d drawn or written.

          There was a time for people to come up on the stage if they wanted to and share their “lantern stories” as the organizers called it.  People talked about being there to share love, peace, hope, or to remember a special loved who had just passed away, some were there to mark anniversaries of being sober or drug free.  Bible passages were read, poems were recited.  People of all ages, sizes, ethnic backgrounds, socio-economic statuses, religions, all kinds of people shared their stories.  One young boy about 6 years old, introduced himself into the microphone with a crystal clear voice, “My name is Eli and I just want everyone to remember….that you are amazing!”

          We hear so much negativity in the world.  We hear about shootings and killings.  We hear about war and destruction.  We hear about hatred and evil.

          But last night in that park, as the lanterns were lit and launched on the water, people with hopes and dreams, sadness and joy, stood around the perimeter of the lake and watched the lanterns drift upon the water with the breath of the wind.  It was a glorious, moving sight.  Each lantern representing a person’s spoken or unspoken prayer.  Some lanterns traveled together in a pack, others seemed to have a mind of their own and go in a different direction.  But, as we stood there, families hugging, strangers smiling at one another, I heard the crystal clear voice of God that sounded an awful lot like a 6 year old.  “Just remember, you are amazing!”

          Friends, God is most definitely still at work in the world.  Don’t just stop and ask the question, “Where is God?”  Instead, look around, listen and see!  AMEN.