Gifts from God

15th Sunday of Pentecost Year B James 1:17-27 Every Good Gift September 2, 2018 Children’s Sermon…… Let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God's righteousness. (v. 19-20) Object: Sunday comic pages Good morning, boys and girls. How many of you like the Sunday comics in the newspaper? (Show the comic pages and let them answer.) What are your favorite comics? (Let them answer.) Some of my favorites are Garfield, Beetle Bailey and Hagar the Horrible. One thing that I always notice about the comics is that there is usually someone who is always getting picked on. Do you notice that Garfield always picks on Odie and Jon, his owner. Sarge always picks on Beetle Bailey. There are people always shooting arrows at Hagar the Horrible. The funny thing is that these characters who get picked on never appear to really get angry. (Have an example of this ready and read it to the children. Then express your opinion that the character has a chance to be angry, but never shows it.) That's what I like about this comic strip. It reminds me of this morning's lesson. In the lesson we are told to be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to anger. Anger does not make us good. God wants us to be good. If I didn't know better, I'd say that (name the comic character who didn't become angry) is doing what God wants. He is not becoming angry, even though he may have a good reason to be. Here's what I want you to remember this week. We all have reasons to become angry at something every day. Sometimes we can't help but become angry. It's okay to be angry. God wants us to think before we become angry. Listen to others who may make us angry. Think before you say something in return that may make an argument worse. Try very hard not to become angry with someone. Anger doesn't make us good. The next time that someone is making you angry remember our lesson this moining. Think of (name the comic character). Try not to become angry. Try to love the other person. That's what God wants of us. CSS Publishing Co., James 1:17-27 Common English Bible (CEB) 17 Every good gift, every perfect gift, comes from above. These gifts come down from the Father, the creator of the heavenly lights, in whose character there is no change at all. 18 He chose to give us birth by his true word, and here is the result: we are like the first crop from the harvest of everything he created. Welcoming and doing the word 19 Know this, my dear brothers and sisters: everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to grow angry. 20 This is because an angry person doesn’t produce God’s righteousness. 21 Therefore, with humility, set aside all moral filth and the growth of wickedness, and welcome the word planted deep inside you—the very word that is able to save you. 22 You must be doers of the word and not only hearers who mislead themselves.23 Those who hear but don’t do the word are like those who look at their faces in a mirror. 24 They look at themselves, walk away, and immediately forget what they were like. 25 But there are those who study the perfect law, the law of freedom, and continue to do it. They don’t listen and then forget, but they put it into practice in their lives. They will be blessed in whatever they do. 26 If those who claim devotion to God don’t control what they say, they mislead themselves. Their devotion is worthless. 27 True devotion, the kind that is pure and faultless before God the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their difficulties and to keep the world from contaminating us. Common English Bible (CEB) Copyright © 2011 by Common English Bible The Hebrew faith has a long tradition of wisdom literature – practical advice on how to live from day to day. As a matter of fact there is a whole section of the old testament which is considered wisdom text – Job, proverbs, song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes are all considered to be practical advice. In the new testament – the Christian book of wisdom or practical advice on how to be a Christian. The book of James is an interesting book. There are those like Martin Luther who hate this book. There is no mention of Jesus or Christ in this book. It almost did not even make it into the bible. No one is for sure of who James is- the popular belief is that he is the brother of Jesus, who became an important bishop in the early church. James does speak of the church – but he is not specific about which church. This book is considered a universal letter- not addressed to a specific congregation for a specific reason. I think that James offers a powerful message for all of us to take into consideration. I don’t think that you even need to be a Christian in order to take the advice of James – but it sure does help. The book of James begins with the words – Count it all Joy – what ever happens in life to be positive and to find the joy in it. There are two ways of dealing with life – we can be positive or we can be negative – but we should be positive – because God is positive. Today I want to focus on 4 messages in James chapter 1 Our scripture for today starts out with the words every good gift comes from God. In a village in Africa, a teacher taught her students the meaning of Christmas. Of giving gifts in honor of the new born king. The children were not Christian, but they understood anyway. One little boy was so taken with the idea, that he gave his teacher a gift the next stay. A beautiful stone, she noticed that this kind of stone could only be found in a village by the sea – that was some distance from where they lived. She thanked the little boy and asked where he go the stone – he told her that village. She said that is a little far, you didn’t need to go through that much trouble to give me a gift, you could have gotten me something simpler. No replied the little boy – the trip was a part of the gift to show you that I care. Often when we get a gift, we are not aware of what the person needed to do to achieve the gift. We don’t know the labor and love that went into acquiring it for us. Think about the gifts that God has given us – the earth, our food, our well being, our lives, our families and the countless other blessing we have in life – what did it take for God to create those gifts? What about the gifts that Christ has given us – salvation, understanding, new life, - how much did he have to sacrifice to come to earth and to die on a cross? Labor Day is our chance to think about our gifts, and the hands that gave them to us. We get to rest, but we also think of theneeds of others. Many who work in order to survive and to help their families – and yet who work tirelessly to give us the gifts of comfort and life, many of which we don’t even think of. The second message of this passage is To be quick to listen and slow to anger. We have to learn to control our emotions and reactions to life. The ear, the tongue, and the temper — all three elements of our personal and physical anatomy, yet all three ruled with special distinction when they become integrated within the anatomy of our faith. The ear, the tongue, the temper — even these for the Christian are subject to the rule of Christ in our lives. Amen. We have to control each of those things. I love going to the Brookfield zoo. It was a great experience to see not just the animals – but the relationship that we have with them as people. How we learn to live together. The primate building – starts out like a maze, and you had to choose which way to get in. Making the point that primates are the only animals in the world who are able to make a choice about anything. All other animals don’t really think about what they are doing they just automatically do it. They rely on their instincts to live and survive. Some choices we take for granted – and some we ponder over for months. But are lives are always full of choices. Our faith reminds us that we even have a choice about how we deal with life. When cant control the events of our life – but no matter what we can always choose joy – and the joyful path. We can choose to heal and move on from hurts, or we can stay stuck and constantly remember what someone said or did. Life for humans is full of choices. The third lesson of this chapter – faith without works is dead. That is one reason that Martin Luther hated this book. For him – grace is the crux of our faith. We are saved by God’s grace alone. We don’t and can’t do anything to earn our favor with God. Actually James does not negate that, but he says that if we are saved by grace, then we live in grace by saying thank you with our actions. The book of James, the new testament book of wisdom also is based on the premise of choice. We can choose what is wise or we can choose what is foolish. The consequensces are different for each choice. James also wants us to know that one is alive and one is dead. Its is sort of like two plants – one alive and one dead. The dead one looks beautiful and takes no work but a little dusting. The living one must be waters and sunned and taken care of. Which type of faith do you have – living are artificial? Faith without works is dead. The final lesson of James chapter 1 – faith without works is like looking in the mirror and forgetting what you see. We should see God in all that we do. Why do we come to church every Sunday? Why did we come this Sunday? But here’s the reason we Christians gather for worship week after week: We worship to wake up. We worship to come alive and take notice of the presence and power of God in the world, in our lives, in everything we see and do and touch and feel. The Latin “re-ligare” from which we get our word “religion” has the root “lig” — which scholars have traced back partly to meaning “pay attention.” Any religious service, any religious act, should make us sit up, shake our heads, and focus in on the divine. When our lives adhere to a set schedule of work, when everyday routines can be acted out without even thinking about them, we lose consciousness to the wonders that surround us. The wonder of God’s creation. The wonder of love. The wonder of family. The wonder of breathing in and out. The wonder of life. What labor of love goes into what you do for others. More importantly what labor of love has gone into what others have done for you? Look at the gifts in your live – who gave them? How did you get them? What is your response to those who gave them to you? This labor day – may we remember the practical things about life. Being a Christian is not about what we think in our hear – it is about what we do in our life. We come in here, so that we can be better persons out there. We can be bitter about the things that life gives us – or we can recognize the gifts we receive from God. It is our choice. Be practical in your faith, even in times that you may not say Jesus – live Jesus in your life. Amen. Other illustrations…… The “Gratitude Salute” – James 1:17-27 by Leonard Sweet Why are you here? Why did you come to church this morning? What made you voluntarily choose to spend the last summer Sunday -- before the too busy, too crowded Labor Day weekend -- inside a church? Why aren’t you lolling on some beach? (Okay, okay--maybe you will be later this afternoon!) Maybe you are here out of habit. Maybe going to church is “what you do” on Sunday morning. Maybe you are here because your parents dragged you into the car, kicking and screaming, and you would rather be anywhere else. Maybe you are here because you are lonely. Maybe you are here because you feel something is wrong or missing in your life. Maybe you are here hoping that something in here will make you different in here (point to heart). None of these are bad reasons to be at church on a sunny September Sunday (nope, not even being brought by your parents). G. K. Chesterton, one of the most important writers of the last century, put it like this: “The world shall perish not for lack of wonders but for lack of wonder.” This week’s epistle text is from the Letter of James, the letter Martin Luther famously pooh-poohed as “an epistle of straw.” Luther’s words gave a lot of us a “free pass” on James. James was seen as “weak sauce” — not worthy of much attention. But skipping James lets us slip by to our peril of slipping up and missing some of the most real life, faith-in-action admonishments in the New Testament. Could that be the real reason it is so tempting to keep James on the back burner? James won’t let us get away with some things we like getting away with? Judge Lienhouts, who established one of the most successful probation programs in the United States, told of a time he had listened to a young man pour out his tale of woe for an hour and a half, without his saying a word. At the end of this time, the young man said, "Thank you. You have been the greatest help of anyone I've ever known. No one else has ever taken the time to listen to me." The late Dr. Charles Jefferson once said, "So prone is anger to mix itself with base and unlovely elements, so frequently does it stir up the mud at the bottom of the soul, that it is not easy to free our minds from the feeling that anger has something sinful in it; or, if not actually sinful, an unlovely flaw in conduct, a deformity in character from which we may wisely pray to be delivered."

God Loves Faitfulness

November 15, 2015 1 Samuel 1:4-20 Year B 25th Sunday of Pentecost "Mom, why am I called Samuel?" The boy asked the question one day during the evening meal. Nervously she toyed with her dinner napkin. She hadn't dared tell anyone for fear that they would think her foolish. After all, she lives in the modern world, not the world populated by Old Testament characters. All of her friends knew that for years she had tried everything possible in order to be able to have children. First there were the specialists who insisted on taking all sorts of tests, making all sorts of observations, and trying to figure out what the biological impediment was. Then there were the endless sessions with counselors trying to find out whether or not there were emotional blocks. Other counselors had indicated that perhaps her concerns about her husband were interfering with conception. The list of tests and the observations seemed to go on without end. Almost unconsciously she kept going to church. Every week she would be in her regular place. Every week she sang the hymns, prayed the prayers and joined in the celebrations of the church. She also prayed silently that God would be able to work a miracle. Yes, she had a certain amount of trust in the miracles of science and medicine. She would hardly have been willing to discount the insights of psychologists. But if anyone had bothered to ask her what she really trusted she would have had to say that she really trusts in the power of God. Among some of her friends this was a little too much. "Surely you don't think that prayer itself will make much difference, do you?" they would ask. "Surely you don't intend on trusting something you can't see or measure?" said others. In fact, she had overheard one acquaintance suggest that perhaps she was getting a little too involved in the church. Nevertheless, she kept her doctor appointments and remained active in the church. At length she and her husband received the great, long-anticipated news. Her pregnancy test revealed that she would indeed have a baby. The name, what should the child's name be? Should they name the child after a favorite aunt? an uncle? perhaps a friend. No, the now-expectant mother knew what the child's name would be. It would have to come from the Bible, maybe the Old Testament. If it's a boy, then Samuel would be his name. Years later, when the boy had gotten old enough to wonder, he asked one day, "Mom, why is my name Samuel?" her answer came softly, "Son, everyone else may say that you are the result of modern science and medicine. But your father and I are convinced that you are a gift from God. So we called you Samuel which means 'I have asked of the Lord,' You are an answer to prayer." The name Samuel means heard by God. This story we are going to focus on today is the third story in a series about women, who were thought of as worthless in society – whose faith was heard and rewarded by God. At their absolute lowest point in life God stepped in and made a difference. If God can do that for them, then God can make a difference in our lives also. Today I want to ask you what is your Samuel? And who is your Hannah. And yes I said what is your Samuel, not who is your Samuel. The world has not changed as much as we think it has, and the role of women has not changed much either. We still compare ourselves to one another, we still place value on one another. In this story Elkanah was a very rich farmer with two wives. This is a significant fact, because even though it was legal, it was not common for a jew at that time to have two wives. It was expensive, but as demonstrated in this story it fostered competition. Getting married and having a boy child to take care of you was everything. And when one wife was doing better than the other, it created a very unhappy household for everyone. That is probably why marriage evolved into one woman and one man. But even today, women don’t have to be married in order to fight over a man. Women would rather fight one another, than leave the man who is coming between them. As demonstrated in our story – women still pray for a boy child that will take care of them. Even today some of those prayers are answered, and some of those prayers are not. Today, women are present in every arena of life, not just the family. So the prayers of women may be a little different. There are other things to define us, besides our children. That is why I ask what is our Samuel, not who is your Samuel. What is your lifelong dream? What is the things that defines you. And makes a difference to you. Christian music star Kathy Troccoli shares how her ministry has filled an important place in her life: Being single at 42, I'm realizing I may never have a child. But God has repeatedly brought me stories from women who have chosen life over an abortion as a result of hearing a song I wrote. At a concert in Dallas, I had just finished singing when a 21-year-old woman's voice came over the loudspeaker. She talked about when she was pregnant with her second child and was being encouraged to abort the baby. During that time, she had come to one of my concerts. I'd sung, "A Baby Prayer": "But if I should die before I wake, I pray her soul you'll keep. 'Forgive her, Lord; she doesn't know that you gave life to me.'" The Holy Spirit used that song to clinch her decision. She kept her baby. God has shown me that more children have been born through that song than I could ever bear. Kathy Troccoli and Dee Brestin, Falling in Love with Jesus (Word, 2001) I just spoke with a university professor who said that in the Catholic church, a woman is not considered relavant unless she is a mother. And once again, in her 40’s she never married, thus never had children. In the meantime she pursued her education. And yet she works at a Methodist college, because she is not considered a real woman in the Catholic world. Hannah returned her Samuel back to God. She prayed and prayed for a son. Not just a baby, but a son. She made a promise that he would be in the service of God all of his life. When she has her son, she keeps him for three years and then returns him back to God. Samuel goes on to become one of the most important men in Isrealite history. He is the man who ushers them into a new way of living, he gives them a king, first King Saul, and then king david. In those days it was believed that either God heard your prayers, or God did not. The opposite of answering, was thought to be neglect. All those years that Hannah prayed for a son, was God neglecting her prayer, or was God preparing for what she was asking? Someone said that prayer is knocking at a locked door for years with your knuckles bloody, waiting for an answer. Samuel does not mean I prayed – it means God heard. What is your Samuel? What is it that you have prayed for and still waiting for answer? What is it that you have at stake, that you just need to know that God hears in order to a make all the difference in the world? More importantly, what are you doing to prepare yourself to receive it? And how will you say thank you to God? Your answer from God is not just about you. I want you to hear me this morning. Your answer is not just about you. It will affect your family, it will affect your life, it will affect the world that you live in. What is your Samuel. Two parents who went to church faitfully had two sons. But, as is often the case with kids, one of their sons (along about the fourth grade) protested that he didn't like Sunday school….didn't see what was so great about Sunday school….and didn't see why he had to go to Sunday school. Sunday school was boring. And in a world where there are enough kid-friendly electronic bells and whistles to make life exciting, why settle for boring? Fortunately, not all kids feel that way. Some do. But not all. Maybe you have heard the complaint. Or maybe, light years ago, you made the complaint. So, what to do? Some parents, of course, capitulate to the kid. "All right, stay home. We'll all stay home. We can't have this fighting, Sunday after Sunday. It isn't worth the hassle. When you're old enough, you'll choose for yourself, anyway." Which is true. The kid will….when older….choose for himself. The choice generally being: "None of the above." Other parents call us with a set of implicit demands. "Make it more interesting," they say. "Less boring," they say. "Recruit people who will capture my kid's interest," they say. "Go knocking on doors in my neighborhood and recruit seven or eight of my kid's best friends (so that my kid will see faces he knows when he comes to Sunday school)," they say. And we accept many of those challenges, given that a subtle justification often underlies them. While others beat the kid….bribe the kid….or hit the ecclesiastical trail, going from church to church with the kid, effectively surrendering all control to the kid, mumbling quietly: "Wherever he's happy, we're happy." Which may be a reason to make one change, but when you're staring at your fourth or fifth change, it may be time to inquire as to whether your home is a dictatorship….and if so, just who the dictator is. But back to my friends and the complaint of their son: "Why should I go when I don't want to go….don't need to go….and don't have many friends who go?" To which they said (after listening attentively to his concerns): "Son, you've seen baptisms in church, haven't you? Well, when you were really little….so little that we had to carry you in our arms….we had you baptized. And, on the day of your baptism, we made a promise to God that we would bring you to church (at least until you're a whole lot bigger than you are right now). You wouldn't want us to break that promise to God, would you?" Which he thought about. Then thought about some more. Before saying: "No, I guess not." Which is pretty much the last thing he's said about it since. I suppose you could say: "He's one smart kid." Or you could say: "He's one lucky kid." All I know is what I heard his parents say: "Hey, he's not our kid." Asking for Help The early church asked for the Spirit. They acknowledged His power and His way. Sensitive souls have always turned to the Spirit for help. The Spirit does not add qualities of life we do not possess. Those qualities are not something poured into us from the outside. They are inside humans and respond to the Spirit, developing every potential to its fullest. John Milton asked the Spirit to aid him as he began his epic poem, Paradise Lost. But it would have been of little help had he not possessed the genius of a poet. John Wesley declared that the success of his work was due to the Spirit, but we must remember that Wesley was a born leader. The Spirit used him. There was something in Wesley that responded to the Spirit. "God honors radical, risk-taking faith. When arks are built, lives are saved. When soldiers march, Jerichos tumble. When staffs are raised, seas still open. When a lunch is shared, thousands are fed. And when a garment is touched -- whether by the hand of an anemic woman in Galilee or by the prayers of a beggar in Bangladesh -- Jesus stops. He stops and responds." (Lucado, 69) What is your Samuel? Rest Assured that we worship a God who hears. The related question for each of us is who is our Hannah? Hannah is one of my favorite persons in the bible. I love her faith, I love her devotion, I appreciate her gift to God. There is a Hannah in our lives who prayed for us, but there is a Hannah in our lives who we need to love and understand and support in her prayer. Sometimes in the church today we fail to minister to those who have great odds stacked against them because we fail to look beyond our prejudices and rituals and see their real need. Bishop Noah Moore, Jr., often told of a woman who came to the altar during one of the worship services when he pastored the Tindley Temple United Methodist Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He said that the woman's clothes were torn. Her hair was not combed and her eyes were red and bloodshot. Assuming her to be drunk with alcohol, he said to her: "Daughter, you know better than to come to church drunk like this." She said, "Pastor, please let me pray. You don't understand. I had to fight my husband in order to get out of the house to come to church and I will have to fight to get What is your Samuel? Who is your Hannah? Let us pray….. …..additional illustrations….. 108 Daily Routine Of Bishop The late Bishop John H. Vincent had the custom of repeating to himself each morning the following simple but far-reaching solution, which may serve as a model for us: “I will this day try to live a simple, sincere, and serene life; repelling promptly every thought of discontent, impurity, and self-seeking; cultivating cheerfulness, magnanimity, charity, and the habit of holy silence; exercising economy in expenditure, carefulness in conversation, diligence in appointed service, fidelity to every trust, and a childlike faith in God.” —Christian Observer back in. But I had to come here this morning to get the strength to make it another week."