4th Sunday after Pentecost
July 2, 2017
1st Sunday at Lisbon UMC
Genesis 22:1-14
One of the more creative children’s movies to come out of
Disney Pixar in the past few years was the film Inside Out from 2015. The story is about an eleven year old girl
named Riley whose family moves from Minnesota to San Francisco. Has anyone seen
it? What’s unique about this movie is that the story isn’t told in a normal
first person or third person account; it’s told from the point of view of
Riley’s emotions, Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust, and Sadness. The movie is about
how her emotions handle her family’s
move cross-country. Joy tries to keep things under control yet Disgust is repulsed
by the idea of California broccoli pizza and Sadness misses her old life and
friends back in Minnesota.
It’s really a cool way to talk about feelings with
children, as well as to recognize some of those same feelings within us.
This morning’s Old Testament passage is familiar to many of
us, and yet we rarely focus on the child in it or his feelings. We know about
God testing Abraham, asking him to give back to God his only son whom he dearly
loves. We know Abraham is faithful and is ready to sacrifice his son simply
because God asks. I actually preached my first sermon ever back in seminary on
this text, and I focused on how sometimes God asks us to do things that don’t
make sense, or at least don’t make sense until after we obey and do them and
then we understand. This morning, though, I wanted to focus more on emotions
and I was going to look at Abraham’s, when I realized that, actually, we can
probably speculate a little more accurately about Isaac’s. You see, we know
Abraham’s actions. God calls; Abraham answers. God asks him to do something;
Abraham sets about to do it. But this morning let’s look at Isaac.
Isaac is an only child, born to parents who were
significantly older. He was a surprise, late-in-life baby, for whom his parents
had waited a very, very long time. If he were born today, he’d be super
spoiled. Regardless, it gives you an idea of just how much his parents love him
and cherish him. So, early one morning his dad wakes him up, has him get ready
for a trip to last a few days to offer a special sacrifice to God, and off they
go with some supplies and two servants. On the third day, he and his dad leave
behind the supplies with the servants and walk on by themselves. His dad cuts
some wood and gives it to him to carry. His dad gets his knife ready and the
flint for the fire. Isaac notices this and that they have everything for a
burnt offering except the lamb. He asks his dad and his dad answers that God
will provide. Okay, they walk on. Then his dad builds an altar, puts the wood
on top of it, ties him up and puts him on
top of the wood! The emotion, Fear, has got to be working overtime here! Maybe
even Anger, too. In the Inside Out
movie, Anger is depicted as this little squat red guy whose hair becomes flames
of fire when he gets mad. Isaac may be used to burnt offerings and animal
sacrifices, but most likely he didn’t want to be the sacrifice himself. He’s
got to be getting a little worried, a little anxious, maybe even a little mad
at his dad. He may not show his fear and anger; we don’t know. The focus is on
Abraham’s following through on what God told him to do, it’s not on how that
follow-through affects others.
Yet following through always affects others, and it often
does cause some anxiety. When I was 25 I told my mom that I felt very strongly
that God was calling me to leave my teaching position at the elementary school
ten minutes from her house and to go serve in Latin America. My mom was very
supportive, and not very surprised I don’t think, but there was certainly some
worry and concern. Moving here has had some worry and concern, for y’all as
well as for my family. Are we going to like it here? Are y’all going to like
us? I know a previous pastor was not a good fit, so, naturally, there’s concern
to wonder if I will be. The District Superintendent called me in January to say
he had a new appointment for me and my jaw about hit the floor. And then the
wheels start spinning. Will it be close enough for the kids to stay in the same
school? No. Will it be a more central location for my husband to travel to his
customers? Yes. I need to tell y’all up front, we’ve never lived in a rural
community before. It will be okay; I’m not worried about it overall. I just
know from experience of moving to somewhere unlike anywhere you’ve ever lived
that at some point culture shock will hit. It will probably be over something
minor, like Californian broccoli pizza was the tipping point for Riley. At some
point I expect to hit a point of too different, too much change, and oh my
golly, God, why did you call me here? There will be some disgust and anxiety
for me when that hits, and I simply ask you to allow me some grace and some
patience. One of the points I hit in Nicaragua was during the dry season, which
is also the hot season, and air conditioning is not common. I asked God why I
couldn’t have been sent somewhere with air conditioning. Well, here I am! God
answers prayer.
Moving and transitions tend to intensify emotions. That’s
why the movie Inside Out was about
feelings connected with a young girl’s first time moving. You get happy over
little things, like figuring out which electrical outlet connects to the light
switch. You end up speechless or laughing manically when you discover a
squirrel hiding in your basement. High times of stress in our lives, such as
moving, magnify our emotions, where we’re not even sure which one is the best
one to feel or to let show. It adds to the anxiety, as does the bittersweetness
of change. You’re sad to see the previous pastor go and at the same time happy
to meet me. There are times in life when we feel happy and sad at the same
time, when we smile even while we feel worried. In Inside Out, Sadness and Joy have to figure out how to work together
to help Riley, because they’re both feelings that you need.
I’m guessing some of y’all have a little anxiety over
this change, also. You always kinda wonder. What will the new pastor be like?
Will she preach as long as the last pastor? Is she going to change everything?
Is she going to love us? Accept us. Like us. Work well with us. Seek to
understand us. I should also let you know that I am probably going to ask some
dumb questions. When I met Mr. P. at the Transition Workshop and he said he has
just finished planting 500 acres of corn, besides being amazed by that number,
my only other thought was to wonder if that’s corn for people to eat or corn to
feed the cattle and livestock. I don’t know a lot about farming, but I do want
to learn. On the last day of Annual Conference this year they had a special
service to recognize every pastor moving and every church receiving a new
pastor. Mr. H. sat next to me to represent y’all. At one point the Bishop
commented that appointments are not fixed until the Bishop sets them at the end
of Annual Conference and Mr. H. leaned over and asked me what that meant. I
said it means it’s not 100% official yet, I can still leave. I don’t know Mr.
H. well enough yet to know if he’s got a dramatic flair, but he gave me quite
the look of horror and panic and anxiety. I told him, don’t worry. I’m not
going anywhere. And I’m not. We’re here. We expect to be here for at least three
years, hopefully longer. We expect both our kids to go to school next door.
In Matthew 6, in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount,
Jesus tells his disciples and the crowds, “Do not worry about your life, what
you’ll eat or what you’ll drink, or about your body, what you’ll wear.”[1]
Worrying cannot add a single hour to your life. Nothing is gained by it. “Do
not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has
enough trouble of its own.”[2]
Instead, “give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t
get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal
with whatever hard things come up when
the time comes.”[3]
Give your entire attention to what God is
doing right now.
Once Abraham let Isaac go, imagine the relief both
Abraham and Isaac felt. And not just relief, but gratitude. Joy, at its best,
is thankfulness. Whenever you hear about anything that claims to have the
secret to happiness or the key to being happier, you know what it always is?
Gratitude. Being thankful. As Christians, we’re not just thankful in general,
but we thank God, in particular. We give thanks to God. We thank God for
bringing us through hard times. We thank God when we get to enjoy good times.
We thank God when we get a fresh start, a new opportunity, when we enter into
the next season of our lives. Imagine how Abraham’s and Isaac’s relationship
must have changed after this experience. It would have begun a new season in
the life of their family when they walked back down the mountain to Sarah.
Part of me really wanted to use the first sermon I
preached at my last appointment for this morning, but that was a different time
and a different place and would not have been the faithful thing to do.
However, the illustration I used is still appropriate. It was about a play that
came out in 1960 at the Globe Theatre in London called “A Man for All Seasons.”
The play was quickly turned into a movie by the same title that won the Oscar
for Best Picture in 1966. It’s the story of Sir Thomas More, also known as
Saint Thomas More in the Catholic Church. To put it briefly, Thomas More was
executed by King Henry VIII of England because he believed that his obedience
to Christ came before his duty as a royal subject. For this act of putting God
ahead of King, he became known as a deeply principled man, a “man for all
seasons.” What my previous appointment needed to hear was that the core of the
church, the identity of the church does not change. Yet the church does go
through different seasons. It’s much the same as the life of an individual. The
core of who each of us is does not change even as we get married or get
divorced or have children or move or change jobs or go to school or anything
else. Who we are doesn’t change with each season, nor does who the church is.
Yet seasons change. Methodist pastors come and go. The leadership of the church
changes but the roots of the church do not.
We are now at the beginning of a new season, a season of
our life together. I’m excited to be here. Several of you have told me that
you’re excited that I’m here. Fear is lurking a little in the corner but Joy is
the main emotion. She’s the one standing at the control panel. I will tell you
one more thing, which my previous District Superintendent shared with me. Just
as you had an interim pastor last year, the Baltimore Metropolitan District had
an interim DS. He had been a DS before, years ago. He’d been through many
appointment-making seasons. But he said this one was different, because this
year the Bishop broke down each step of the process into smaller steps than
he’d ever seen, and she insisted that the cabinet pray before beginning each
step. The cabinet prayed to begin their time together. Then before proceeding
with a church, she had someone pray over what they were about to hear. Then
they read the profile for Lisbon Church. Then they prayed again, for Lisbon and
for discernment as to who to appoint there. Then cabinet members offered up
names. Then they prayed again. Then they came to a discernment of who God
wanted them to appoint as pastor. Both my previous DS and our DS here, both of them told me they believe that
you and I are the perfect fit for each other. They firmly believe that God
wants you and me to walk together during this next season of Lisbon’s life. You
need to hear that affirmation. Both of them used the word perfect. Not that our
time together is always going to be roses and blue skies, not that we’re not
going to have ups and downs or zero conflicts; that’s not realistic. That’s not
life. But they trust God has put us together for such a time as this. And so, for
a new start together, give thanks. For the prayerful discernment of our bishop
and her cabinet, give thanks. You see the end of this story with Isaac is that
he was a firsthand witness to his dad’s faithfulness. He knew God came first
for his dad, just as God came first for Sir Thomas More. It cost More his life;
it almost cost Abraham his son. Yet then that son got to live to tell the
story. Just as we live to tell the story of Jesus and his love, his love that
brought you and me together today to share the next season of our life
together. Thanks be to God.
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