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A sermon preached by Bob Keller on May 25th, 2008, based upon 1 Corinthians 4:1 – 5, entitled “Passing Judgement.”

Earlier, David read to us from Paul’s first letter to the Church in Corinth.

Why was the letter needed?

First, a little background about this fair city.  It was a large and very prosperous city established by the Greeks, and by the time Paul established the Christian Church there, it had been destroyed and rebuilt by the Romans.

Corinth was a seaport and a very important stop on East to West and West to East trade movement.  Its inhabitants were of many cultures and backgrounds, and, due to its location on the trading route, it was also a very prosperous city.  This wealth, as it often does today, left for idle time that was often spent doing things that were at best unseemly and at worst downright decadent!  In fact, Aristophanes coined a Greek verb that, translated, means to “act like a Corinthian,” a synonym for “to act with sexual immorality.”

Plays of the day often portrayed Corinthians as drunkards and reprobates.

Still, Corinth was where Paul took about a year and a half to build a Church.  He started by trying to convert the Jews, but later turned to the Corinthian Gentiles.  The Church was undoubtedly a reflection of the multi-cultural, and somewhat ‘seedy,’ diversity of Corinth.  But what better place to show the redeeming and transforming powers of Christ to the Roman world than by converting Corinth?

So now Paul is in Ephesus, setting up the Church there, and he gets a couple of letters that tell him “There’s Trouble (with a capital ‘T’), in Corinth.

Aside from the societal problems I’ve already mentioned, problems exist in the Church.  Paul’s letter could likely be applied to many churches today.  It’s a pretty interesting read.

The small section of the letter we read today has to do with the way church members are viewing their leaders.  One of the problems was that many church members were identifying themselves as followers of one or another of the leaders rather than as followers of Christ.

In some translations of Paul’s letter, he mentions two common vocations during his time as illustrations.
First, he uses the word “minister.” The Greek word is huperetes. In classical Greek, this word refers to an under-rower. Under-rowers man the oars of a ship below-decks.

Two things must be said about under-rowers. First, they work the oars in the belly of the ship. They do not know where the ship is going. They simply obey the direction of the Captain.

Secondly, under-rowers must work in harmony. If they do not work together, their efforts will be wasted, to say the least.

Christians are assigned the role of under-rowers. They propel the church forward. They are under the authority of our Lord. He gives the orders. But they must listen to the Captain, the Lord, and pull together.

The second word that Paul uses is “steward.” The steward is in charge of the administration of the house or estate. He administers the affairs of his master. He has authority over the master’s servants and makes crucial decisions. Ultimately, he is accountable to his master.

Paul chooses these two words to answer those that were holding him up as the responsible leader as well as those that criticized him for the seeming failure of the Church at Corinth.

This is really a pretty stiff rebuke from Paul for he basically tells them “I can’t even judge myself!  Why should I worry if you judge me?  My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent.  The Lord will be my judge.”

And that was my “AHA!” moment in preparing this message for today.

We spend a lot, probably way too much, of our time in judgment, don’t we?  We judge ourselves and we judge others and we allow others to judge us.

Is any of it valid?  Well, since the Lord will be our ultimate judge, the easy answer is “Yes and No.”

As we go through life, we judge ourselves.  Typically, that judge is the still, small voice called ‘conscience’ – or perhaps the angel on our shoulder that whispers “Nay – Nay” in our ear when we’re about to do something that we shouldn’t be doing.  That is stuff for the moment.  Judging ourselves calls for more and that’s self-evaluation.  We have to ask ourselves – not once a year or once a month, but continually – “How is my life squaring with what God wants from me and for me?”

Then there is “THEM.”  What will “THEY” say?  What will “THEY” think of me?  I confess that I worried a bit about that this morning when I was getting dressed.  I said, “I’m in the pulpit today.  If I wear my usual sneakers, blue jeans, shirt and sport coat, what will “THEY” say?  Should I show a bit of respect for “THEM,” and for this pulpit, and dress a little better than I usually do?

Paul addresses worship situations in this letter as well.  He also tells the church that it is important to keep in mind what others think of them.   Maybe I shouldn’t have read that far ahead, but I did tell you that this letter is a good read.

Should I have been concerned with how I dressed this morning?  I know to some of you it doesn’t matter.  Others may be thinking “Nice of him to put on a tie for today.”  Still others are thinking “I got up on a holiday weekend to come to church and the preacher didn’t even show up!”

The story is told of a man and his grandson traveling down the road, walking and leading a donkey. They met a man who said, “How foolish for you to be walking. One of you should be riding the donkey.” So the man put his grandson on the animal.

The next traveler they met frowned and said, “How dreadful for a strong boy to be riding while an old man walks.” So the boy climbed off the donkey and his grandfather climbed on.

The next person they met said, “I just can’t believe a grown man would ride and make a little boy walk.” So the man pulled the boy up and they rode the donkey together. That is, until they met another man who said, “I never saw anything so cruel in all my life — two human beings riding on one poor defenseless donkey!”

Down the road a ways, they met a couple of men. After they passed, one of the men turned to the other and said, “Did you ever before see two fools carrying a donkey?”

The point is: We can’t please everyone we meet.  But we do need to be considerate of how our actions and our words will affect other people.

And then there is the ultimate judgment that Paul wrote about – the judgment of God.

This Memorial Day weekend I’m reminded of the sacrifices of so many, so very many, men and women that have served our nation and provided the freedom and liberty that I have to stand here before you to proclaim God’s Word.  In so many countries today, this would have to be done in secret, if it could be done at all.

G. K. Chesterton, an English author that was very popular early in the 20th century, wrote that a true soldier is not one that hates that which is before him, but loves that which is behind him.

Many men and women, Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard and Merchant Marine, gave their lives in service to our great nation, to preserve “that which is behind them”, that which they loved.

As we remember them, can we also remember the One who gave us life to begin with?  Can we remember the sacrifice made by God giving his Son to die in our place?  Can we remember that when we face that final judgment that God will ask “Did you believe?  Did you believe that I loved you so much that I gave my Son to die in your place?  Did you love yourself and others as I loved you?

Again, from G. K. Chesterton:  “There is a road from the eye to the heart that does not go through the intellect.”  That road is our faith and traveling that road, through God’s word, is Jesus.

Can we remember our place in God’s kingdom?  Can we remember that when we have feelings of failure that God loves us and will help to pick us up and that maybe we’re being too hard on ourselves?  Can we remember that everything we do and say has an effect of those around us?  Can we remember that God will be our ultimate judge?

A sermon preached on May 18, 2008 based upon Genesis 1:1 – 2:4a; 2Corinthians 13:11 – 13; and Matthew 28:16 – 20, on the occasion of the reaffirmation of wedding vows on 40^th anniversary of Michael and Anna Weiss, entitled, “Made for Relationship”.

When Anna and Michael asked me about the possibility of renewing their vows within the worship service itself, I said, “I’ve never done that before, but sure, why not? Sounds like a wonderful idea.” And I discovered, as is often the case, that when you listen to the Bible stories from new points of view, you hear them in interesting, new ways, which is exactly what happened when I listened this week from the perspective of thinking about wedding vows.

The lectionary for this Sunday included the first chapter of the Genesis, which most of us have heard it before.

Just for the record, so you’ll know where I’m coming from, I don’t take these creation stories literally, in the sense of this is how it all actually, historically happened. And these stories often talk about God in such a way that it’s easy to picture God as the old man with the white beard. I don’t think that’s so either, although it can be fun some times to picture God this way. I do, however, think there is truth in these stories. They invite us to ponder spiritual truth through the vehicle of our imagination.

Genesis 1 takes us back to a time before everything was, and there was nothing but darkness and chaos. You can think of God as being at that moment the ultimate single person. (You could say single “guy”, but you could just as easily say single “gal”, because the story tells us that when God made us in God’s image, God made us male and female, so God is both male and female.)

So the single life wasn’t so bad. Pretty calm. No troubles. Why did God want to go and stir everything up?

Driving to school this past week, my son Bobby with his capacity for deep thoughts began imagining what it would be like if there wasn’t anything at all. It gave him the willies. I think maybe nothingness gave God the willies too.

In one sense, God didn’t have to create anything since God is free to do whatever God chooses. In another sense though, God had to create. Since God is by nature good and creative, God’s creative goodness required the creation of good stuff. God wouldn’t be true to God’s self otherwise.

You could say that single guy/gal God needed an “other” to relate to. So God started off creating. First night and day, then earth and sky, then dry land and ocean, and then fish and birds and all the other animals.

Things were going pretty good. God was on a roll. Sometimes, though, you got to know when the time has come to back away from the table. Some will argue that God had reached that point. Evidently though, there was something about what God had created up until that point that although certainly good, simply wasn’t enough from God’s point of view.

Take ducks for instance. God could have created ducks and kicked up his heels and enjoyed those little fellas, and watch them do all those ducky things ducks do. The thing about ducks, though, is that they don’t really have any of what we could call “freedom.” God designed ducks to quack, to take to water — the whole duck routine — and there really isn’t any way a duck isn’t going to do those duck things. It’s called “instincts”, this programming. Ducks can’t help but do what they’ve been programmed to do.

And frankly, God found these purely-programmed creatures unsatisfying in terms of relationship.

So God moved on to God’s crowning creation: God made us human beings in God’s image and likeness, which is to say that we human beings have some measure of freedom that is like unto the freedom that God has. We have instincts, yes, but we also have this capacity to go beyond our instincts — to choose something other than what our instincts dictate to us.

Evidently once God created us human beings, God’s need to be in relationship was satisfied. It was very good, God declared. So God kicked up God’s heels and rested.

In a way what you have here in Genesis 1 is the first marriage. God gives up the single life in order to be wed to us human beings. There was no wedding — no ceremony.

Apparently God didn’t think that was necessary. God assumed everything was understood. So we just started off cohabitating.

God comes off a little naïve in that first marriage, not unlike us human beings in our human marriages. God doesn’t seem to realize what God has gotten God’s self into.

Now the most tangible, concrete expression of the freedom that distinguishes us from the ducks can be seen in every two year old child. It is that adorable capacity to say, “No.” “No!” “Ain’t gunna do what you want me to do.” “No’s” in relationship can be very, very frustrating, but the thing about the capacity to say “no” is that it makes the “yeses” all the more significant. Magnificent really.

In Genesis 2 we hear about what happened when the honeymoon was over. The human beings start exercising their capacity to say “No.“ The serpent shows up with what sounded like a better offer, and metaphorically speaking, the human beings start sleeping around.

It all goes down hill from there. You can almost hear God saying, “I should have left off after creating the ducks.” The next few chapters of Genesis read like the legal briefs put forth by God’s attorney in divorce court. It records the various ways that human beings were negligent in fulfilling their spousal responsibilities.

Finally God has had enough. “This was all a terrible mistake. What was I thinking? Good riddance to those trampy human beings.” God files for divorce. God’s temper gets pretty nasty, making it rain for 40 straight days.

But afterwards, you get the feeling that God feels bad about what God has done. The single life just won’t hack it for God. Being good, and by nature a lover, God needs to be in relationship, and not just with some instinct-driven duck, but with human being with our confounding capacity to say, “No.”

And so God tries again with the handful of human beings who have survived the flood. If you look up Genesis 9, what you will find there is the first wedding ceremony. This time around though, what was implicit is made explicit. God formally makes a covenant of marriage. God takes vows: “I’m gunna love you forever,” God declares. “I promise to never, ever destroy you.”

This time around God enters the marriage with more wisdom and realism. God now knows how absolutely infuriating we human beings can be. God knows that God will get angry, and be tempted once more to make those rains fall forever.

So God puts a signal in place to safeguard the relationship. When God feels tempted to start throwing things, when God starts getting those rain storms revved up, a rainbow will show up in the sky. Why? So that God will see the rainbow, and remind God’s self that, “Oh yeah, I promised never to do this again.” And God will put down the lightning bolts and go out and take a walk in order to cool down.

Interestingly, at that first wedding ceremony, God doesn’t even bother to require human beings to take vows. God seems to know we won’t keep them, so, let’s not even pretend that we will.

*****

Interestingly, back in the garden story, shortly before the honeymoon ended, God, recognizes that the solitary human being thus far created needs a flesh and blood companion, a helpmate, a partner. “It’s not good for the man to be alone.” The story in Genesis 2 arises from a separate tradition from the one in Genesis 1, and in this story, the animals get created after, not before human beings.

It’s a humorous scene. God creates the animals one by one and asks the human being, “Do you think this thing could be your help mate, your partner?” Lots of these creatures certainly appear capable of being fairly helpful: you know, the dog, for instance, or the cow, or the horse. But none of them have what it takes to be the man’s partner. The companion. The lover.

Finally the woman is made, and as the man’s equal, she is a worthy partner, because she, too, is free. Interestingly, it is the woman’s ability to say “No” which makes her capable of being the man’s partner. Unlike the animals, the woman is not under the man’s dominion. (Those religious traditions that say women are supposed to be submissive to men — what they’re essentially saying is that the man should have married a duck.)

****

So here we are. We weren’t made merely for ourselves, to exist in isolation. We were made for relationship: with God, and with one another. And relationships aren’t easy.

David read for us a lovely little scripture reading from the end of Paul’s two letters to the Corinthian Church, in which Paul encourages his readers to “agree with one another, live in peace… Greet one another with a holy kiss.” It’s easy to miss the fact that Paul is addressing people who have been at each other’s throats, saying “No” to one another a great deal.

In the end, it’s all about learning how to live in peace.

One important form that our lives sometimes get lived out in relationship is through marriages. Human marriages mirror that first marriage between God and human beings. There is the honeymoon period that draws the couple together in the first place, where the spouse is imagined to be the perfect partner, where all that is said between the couple is only “Yes, yes, yes!”

But eventually every honeymoon comes to an end. The “No’s” start showing up. “No! I don’t want to do what you want to do!” “No! I don’t see things the way you do!”

And along with the bombardment of “No’s” comes the clear implication that there is something wrong with us — something hard to live with, which inevitably has some truth to it.

Eventually comes the thought, “I’ve made some terrible mistake. What was I thinking?”

At this point, some marriages end up in divorce. Other couples stay together, but only in a kind of pretense of marriage, without any true love or life present.

Others plow on, finding the grace to pass through the more difficult times, discovering a deep sort of joy, learning essential lessons along the way regarding humility and the need to face one’s own very real flaws — one’s own sin and darkness. They move beyond the fairy tale and forge a much deeper, stronger kind of love than the enchantment that originally drew them together.

This morning we have celebrated one such marriage, that of Anna and Michael Wiess, forty years in. Thank you, Anna and Michael, for providing the rest of us with the example of your love and covenant faithfully kept. And thank you, God, for being here throughout, sustaining this love.

On that mountain in Galilee, Jesus promised, “I am with you always to the end of the age.” This is a promise we can trust.

A sermon preached on May 11, 2008, Pentecost Sunday (and also Mother’s Day), based upon Acts 2:1 – 21, (22 – 47), entitled “Signs and Wonders.”

Insofar as this is Mother’s Day as well as Pentecost, I begin this morning with a story I came across testifying to the reality of the spiritual realm that arises from the deep connection that exists between mothers and their children. A man writes:

“Back when I was five years old, I suffered a near-fatal accident. I lay between life and death for three full days. No one, including the doctors, knew if I would awaken from my comatose state or not. On night three, my weary mother finally left my bedside at the hospital and went home to get some sleep. About three that morning, while wide awake, she heard me calling to her from the hallway outside her bedroom. “I’m okay, mommy! Don’t worry.” The phone rang a few minutes later. It was my dad telling her that I had just awakened and was calling for her.” (found on internet)

There are countless others stories like this one.The next story I want to tell doesn’t involve mothers, but it also points speaks to the power of the Spirit. It’s a well-documented story that comes from the life of a Spanish explorer named Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca. During the first half of the sixteenth century, De Vaca was shipwrecked and stranded on the what would become the coast of Texas. Fearing murder at the hands of hostile natives, he hid, along with two fellow survivors, in a pit they dug, where they spent several cold winter nights sleeping naked. They had lost everything, and yet mysteriously they underwent a remarkable transformation, emerging from that pit with spiritual power to heal. On their way westward, their fame spread ahead of them. The natives would bring their sick, and de Vaca and his friends would heal them, and they were thus able to travel unharmed. Eventually they made their way back to Mexico City, the seat of Spanish civilization in the New World, where there were doctors trained in the European techniques of the day. Here de Vaca evidently lost his power to heal, succumbing to the beliefs of his contemporaries regarding what was, and what wasn’t possible. (Larry Dossey, MD, Healing words, pp. 88-89)The most illuminating words about the nature of the Spirit were said by Jesus in his conversation with Nicodemus, who had been drawn to Jesus by the “signs and wonders“ that were present in his ministry: “The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit. (John 3:8)  Like the wind, the Spirit is invisible, beyond our control, and mysterious. Sometimes you can see its effects, but the thing itself always remains invisible.

A sermon preached on May 4, 2008, based upon 24:44 -53, entitled “Blessing”. 

Years ago on a Sunday morning I was up early finishing off a sermon that involved encouraging people to inwardly, silently blessing people as we go out into the world.  I went to the bagel store to get a coffee and bagel, and, and while I was waiting, I thought to myself, “Jeff, you should try to practice what you preach.”  And so silently I said, “God bless this woman who is preparing my bagel.”  At precisely that moment the woman sneezed, thereby allowing me to say the words out loud.  God, I’m convinced, has a sense of humor.

When God brought forth creation, on the sixth day he made human beings in the likeness and image of God, and we are told that once God had made us, God blessed us.

When God called Abraham and Sarah to leave behind their homeland and to go into an unknown future, an unknown land, we are told that God blessed them, and that in that blessing they would be a blessing to all the world. 

Later we hear about Isaac, Abraham and Sarah’s son,  lying on his death bed, blessing his son Jacob, shortly before Jacob leaves home to set out into the world. 

Twenty years later, on the night before that same Jacob returned home, he wrestled with the angel of the Lord, refusing to let go until the Lord blessed him, which he did.

And in this morning’s Gospel lesson we hear that the very last thing Jesus did before he departed to heaven was to raise his hands and bless his disciples. 

And so I am lead this morning to ponder what it means to “bless” someone. 

To bless someone is to intentionally seek to channel God’s love and grace to that person, that they may enter into the abundant life which God desires to give them.  In order to bless someone, it is necessary for us to be able to bring our whole selves and full attention into the present moment of the blessing.  You cannot bless someone if your heart and mind are divided. 

As such, the practice of blessing someone generally involves some kind of ritual.  Rituals doesn’t have magical powers, but they can aid us as we seek to bring our whole selves fully into the presence of God into order to be that open channel.  Jesus raised his hands as he blessed his disciples not because the blessing couldn’t take bless without him doing so; rather it was a ritual action that helped focus the attention of everyone involved. 

Is a blessing powerful?  Yes.  Is God’s love present apart from the blessing?  Of course.   But the act of blessing helps us tune into that love, to align ourselves with God’s love.

Rituals of blessing are particularly important at key times of transition in life, such as at birth, at marriage, in the midst of dying and death.  Generally speaking, Roman Catholics have a greater appreciation than we do of the role of ritual, as well as a wider array of established rituals to draw upon. 

But nothing says we can’t create our own rituals of blessing.  For instance, when you move into a new home, or start a new job, you could create your own ritual for blessing.  Set aside some unhurried time, perhaps inviting loved ones to join with you.  Be creative:  light candles, put on special music, create an altar to God’s glory, read scriptures, all for the sake of bringing your whole self before God in a desire to receive God’s blessing, and to bless the path before you.

In doing so we strengthen our desire and intention to live in harmony with God’s love, to live in the light rather than darkness, to provide space for God to dwell at the center of our lives. 

You could create a ritual of blessing if you have a child starting her first day of school, or a new year of school.  Or just before you set out on a vacation, to strengthen your openness to God’s love and guidance on that vacation. 

If you find yourself truly desiring to change a bad habit in your life, a ritual of blessing can help enormously to strengthen your resolve and to invite God and loved ones to support you and hold you accountable in your new way of living. 

In the act of blessing, we are often called to let go, to trust God.  When a child leaves home, for instance, the act of blessing that child entrusts her to God, assisting the parent in letting the child go so that she won’t be held back from fully thriving on her new journey.  This is, in essence, what Jesus did for his disciples, blessing them in his departure, that they might be free to move forward on their own rather than dwell in the past.

And there is a tremendous need for rituals of blessing in relation to dying and death.  So often in our society death isn’t faced directly.  It is not uncommon to have a person be dying, and neither the person nor their loved ones talk about the fact of their dying directly, and then all kinds of unfortunate things can happen.   For instance, the person may reach a point where they are ready to die, but the family isn’t ready to let the person go, and so the dying person continues to cling to life, a mere shell of themselves, in order  to accommodate the loved ones.

How many people die in this world without either first blessing the people they have shared this life with, or receiving the blessing of their loved ones?  How many people in this world are handicapped because they never really felt like they received their parents blessing, or, that never really gave their parents their blessing.

What about the opposite of blessing, which would be, of course, a curse. Curses show up frequently in the Old Testament.  There was said to be a curse brought upon the human race by the fall of Adam and Eve.  Sodom and Gomorrah, is cursed by God and brought to rubble. 

Is there power in curses as well?  Yes.  We can just as easily be a channel for  destruction and hate as we can channel God’s creativity and love. 

One of the most striking things about Jesus is that he forsook the practice of curses.  One time, Jesus was passing through a Samaritan village with his disciples, and the people there, acting out of the longstanding hostility between Samaritans and Jews, were inhospitable to Jesus.   In response to their rudeness, the disciples James and John, known as “the sons of thunder,” offered to call down lightning upon the village, like Sodom and Gomorrah of old.   Jesus rebuked them, clearly dismayed that the disciples simply weren’t catching on to his way.

“But I say to you, listen, Love your enemies, do good to those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.” (Luke 6:27)  And Jesus put his money where his mouth was when, dying on the cross, when if ever a person had a right to evoke a curse, Jesus certainly did,  and we read that he steadfastly refused to curse, asking instead forgiveness by God of those who had nailed him to the cross. 

The most challenging thing about following Jesus is his call to forsake cursing, which doesn’t mean using bad words, but rather giving up the practice of channeling revenge and hatred towards who wrong us. 

Blessings and curses appeared in the news two times this past week that caught my attention. 

There is a lovely song we Americans enjoy singing, “God bless America.”   Following the terrorist attacks of 9/11 the song was sung frequently, and the words proclaimed all over America, an understandable reaction to the deep sense of loss we shared as a nation. 

It is appropriate to ask God’s blessing on America.   There is a problem, however, when people seek to withhold that same blessing from other nations, and sometimes “God bless America” is proclaimed in that spirit.  I made a point following 9/11 to leave a message on my answering machine that said, “God bless America, and God bless the whole world,” because I think that is what Jesus would do. 

Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the pastor of Barack Obama, was in the news again this past week defending some of controversial things he had said in the past in his sermons.  For instance, in a sermon shortly after 9/11, Rev. Wright asked  “God bless America?” He answered,  “No, God damn America!”  

Rev. Wright’s point involved his conviction that America is not without sin, which is a valid point, and not one I wish to get into here.  I think however that our instinct to be disturbed by such words coming from the mouth of a Christian pastor were correct, because, Jesus damns no one. 

The other piece of news came from the General Conference of our own United Methodist Church, which was held the past two weeks in Fort Worth Texas.  

Two people are drawn to one another in this life, and decide they want to live with one another for the rest of their lives, striving to love each other — to covenant themselves to one another in fidelity and faithfulness, to devote themselves to the hard work required to sustain a life-giving relationship over the long haul.  Knowing how difficult this can be, given the fact that we human beings tend to be by nature rather self-centered, they come together before the altar of God to look into one another’s eyes and bless one another in the presence of God and of the community that loves and supports them, to make holy vows to one another for which they seek the blessing of God, that God might be the central partner in strengthening them and holding them accountable to keeping this covenant.  We know how important a wedding ceremony can be in providing the ritual in which this blessing can take place. 

Unfortunately, the delegates at our General Conference once again voted to withhold this blessing if the two people who desire to come to the altar of God happen to be gay or lesbian. 

It distresses Jesus, I believe, the position taken by the majority of the delegates of our General Conference, but Jesus would not have me curse these delegates, rather, God bless these delegates.

I think it distressed Jesus when Pastor Wright said “God damn America,” even though I’m sure there are many, many things about America that God is distressed about, but I will not curse Rev. Wright, rather I will say, God bless Rev. Wright.

And I think that it distresses Jesus when certain church communions withhold the blessing of holy communion from those who are not their members, but Jesus would not have me curse such churches; rather, God bless these communions. 

Today I received out of the blue one of the most curious emails I ever received. I’ve pasted it below:

Hi,

I need to get your side of the story on your game against Grace on the mount. I have gotten the email from Grace in regards to the game and what happened. Once I have your email, the league will come to a decision on how to handle the situation.

In Christ,

Eric

Our church used to field a team in the church softball league of which Eric is the league president, and evidently my email address was mixed up with somebody else’s who now fields a team. Nonetheless, the email is intriguing. What exactly did happen at “the game against grace on the mount?” The league we used to play in was supposed to be “coed, non-competitive”, with the clear understanding that it wasn’t to be taken too seriously. Before the game started, league rules required a prayer, in which, generally speaking, we’d give God thanks for the ability to be there, ask God for protection that no one might get hurt, and to help us all to have fun and be good sports. Our team used to joke about our mission in the games was to help other teams feel good about themselves, which we succeeded in routinely, because we rarely won.

Apparently something went wrong in “the game against grace on the mount.” (I looked it up on the internet; “Grace on the mount” is a big, new non-denominational church in Netcong.) Evidently the league, represented by Eric, has been called upon to render a decision in a dispute between the two teams. Eric has heard Grace on the mount’s story; now he needs to hear the story from the opponents.

Since Eric signs his email, “In Christ”, it is clear that he is looking to Jesus for aid in rendering his decision. In this regard, I offer Eric this story recorded in Luke 12:13 – 15:

“Someone in the crowd said to (Jesus), ‘Teacher, tell my brother to divide the family inheritance with me.’ But he said to him, ‘Friend, who set me to be a judge or arbitrator over you.’ And he said to them, ‘Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.’”

I don’t think it would be a stretch to assume that Jesus would also want to say, “one’s life does not consist in the abundance of wins.” He might add (which in various forms he’s saying to all of us), “Get a life.”