Good Shepherd Lutheran Church(elca)
Following Christ, Growing in Faith, Sharing God's Love
Sermon
October 25 and 26, 2008
Commitment Weekend: “Who do you say that I am?”
This is commitment weekend.
This is the conclusion of our fall stewardship emphasis
and the day when you have the opportunity to
complete an estimate of giving card for 2009.
We often have guest preachers for this weekend.
Maybe because it’s hard to talk about money.
So we invite someone else to do it.
I’ve been on sabbatical the last two months
and haven’t preached here for a while,
so I guess I’m close enough to a guest preacher this year.
The question we’re asking today
is the title of the sermon.
Would you read that with me, please.
“Who do you say that I am?”
Who do you say that I am?
That question comes from the story of Jesus,
who asks his disciples:
“Who do people say that I am?”
And they said:
“Some say John the Baptist,
but others Elijah,
and still others Jeremiah
or one of the prophets.”
He said to them,
“But who do you say that I am?”
And Peter answered,
“You are the Messiah,
the Son of the living God.”
Peter, with his words
and with his life,
proclaimed that Jesus
was the chosen one,
the anointed one,
the Messiah,
God’s son.
Peter said the words.
And then Peter followed.
Followed with all his life.
Until he was killed,
because of his faith.
So now, today,
we ask:
What is our mission statement?
Following Christ,
Growing in Faith,
Sharing God’s Love
We begin by following Christ.
If people listen to your words,
what do they hear you saying about who Jesus is?
If people look at your life,
what do they see about
who you believe Jesus is?
Here are some thoughts.
God is a God who provides.
My two-month sabbatical was relaxing in a lot of ways.
I had time for rest
and family
and prayer
and golf
and reading
and time away.
But not particularly relaxing
when I’d check out how the stock market was doing
or read the financial news every day in the paper.
Like most of you,
my savings are worth a lot less now
than they were a couple months ago.
So, as Christians,
what do we do with that?
And I know there are some of you
who have been hit a lot harder by this
than I have.
In the midst of tough times,
how do we trust in God to provide?
In his letter to the Philippians,
the Apostle Paul says:
“Don’t worry about anything?”
How does that work for you?
There are days when I do pretty well with that.
And there are days when I worry.
Sometimes God speaks to us
and gives us comfort
through the little things.
During sabbatical,
I spent a little over a week in Minnesota,
visiting my brother and his family,
and exploring various worship services.
The day I drove back home
was one of those days
when the stock market was going down and down.
I think it went down about 800 points
before regaining about half the losses near the close.
And I was in the car,
listening to the radio as I drove.
So every hour I heard that the market was down some more.
I stopped at a Subway somewhere in Iowa
and got my usual sandwich:
--chicken on honey oat
--with lettuce, tomatoes, black olives, banana peppers
--and chipotle southwest sauce.
Then I drove on down the road a ways
before stopping to eat.
I stopped at a rest area along the highway.
Sat down at a picnic table.
And ate my sandwich.
I sat looking away from the highway.
And as I was eating,
I noticed an apple tree—
--just loaded with apples.
And I’m not exactly sure why,
but somehow that gave me hope and peace.
Realizing that God provides.
That God gives us resources.
That we have so much—
--even rest areas,
that I appreciate a lot more after our trip to Kenya.
And food to eat.
In abundance—even.
A tree loaded with apples.
It doesn’t mean everything will be the way we want.
It doesn’t mean the stock market will always go up.
It doesn’t mean that we’ll always have all the money we want.
Or all the stuff we want.
But it is a reminder,
that God is with us.
That God provides for us.
That God loves us.
Always, always loves us.
And as we follow Christ,
that also means that we love
and share
and give.
Because God is a God who provides
and is also a God who gives.
I suppose those are kind of the same,
but they also seem a little different to me.
As I think about a God who gives,
I think about a God who has everything,
and yet would come to earth,
to live as a human being,
and die on the cross for you and for me.
From Paul’s letter to the Philippians again,
Chapter 2:
“Let the same mind be in you
that was in Christ Jesus,
who, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death—
--even death on the cross.”
That’s a God who gives.
we give, too.
We give of our time.
We give of our abilities.
We give of our money.
Realizing that they are all first gifts to us.
Another thing I did on sabbatical
was use some gift cards.
We occasionally get gift cards
as presents
or through some special deal.
Sometimes we use them right away.
More often, we stick them in a brown manila envelope
we have set aside for gift cards—
--and then get to them later.
Sometimes much later.
I had one gift card from Bass Pro Shops.
I was hanging on to it,
waiting for just the right time,
hoping to use it to get some fishing lures or something.
But I didn’t get there very often.
And when we did drive by a Bass Pro Shops,
I forgot the gift card.
So now, it was sabbatical.
We were heading to visit my Mom in Blue Springs, Missouri.
They have a Bass Pro Shops close by.
I was excited to finally use my card.
And then I read something on the card about it expiring
after a couple years.
And I knew I’d had it a while,
I couldn’t remember how long.
So I called,
and I found out that
it indeed had expired.
I had saved it so long,
that it wasn’t worth a thing.
Well, right away I got out the rest of the gift cards
to see if any of them might be near expiration.
And I found one to Golf Discount
that, if I figured right, was just about to run out.
I checked on the website—
--it said it was still good.
And I raced down to Golf Discount as fast as I could.
Got a putter that was on sale,
and a couple golf balls and a glove.
And the gift card covered almost all of it.
It was a relief.
And it felt like grace.
Like a true gift.
I was happier than I would have been,
if I didn’t think I was about to lose it.
Sometimes we hang out to what we’ve been given.
Sometimes we try to hold it tight.
Save it up.
Try not to lose what we have,
by holding on.
But God shows us a different way.
God is a God of giving.
God empties himself—
--even dying on a cross.
And following Christ,
we give of ourselves—
--our time
--our abilities
--our money.
We don’t need to hang on tightly to what we have.
We are set free by God’s grace and love
to share what we have.
Not just tuck it away somewhere.
But use it in God’s service.
God is a God who gives.
And we follow.
Finally,
God is a God we can trust.
Money can be an idol for us.
We can falsely put our trust in our possessions,
or in the economy,
or in our stuff.
But instead we are reminded to trust God.
Who provides.
Who gives.
Who is trustworthy.
Even as a congregation,
we can put our trust in money.
In tough times,
as a congregation,
we can worry about our budget and finances.
And we count our dollars,
and worry if there aren’t as many as we hoped and planned for.
But God can be trusted.
Even if Good Shepherd had no money,
God would still love us.
God would not desert us.
Things would be different—
--no building
--no pastors or staff.
But finally,
our faith is not dependant on that.
We put our trust in God,
and follow where Christ leads.
And one of the ways we do that
is that today we’ll be asking for an estimate of giving
from our members for a couple reasons.
First,
because of your need to give.
In tough financial times like this,
it’s easy to get caught up in the fear and the worry.
To give financially
is an expression of trust.
We encourage % giving.
So, if your income goes down,
at the same percentage, your giving will go down.
If your income goes up,
your giving will go up.
It’s part of following Christ,
to give back some of what God has given you.
And second,
we ask for an estimate of giving,
so that the leaders of the congregation can plan.
To figure out what existing and new ministries
we can fund in the coming year.
It’s a very helpful tool for planning.
Once again,
what is our mission statement?
Who we say God is?
We follow by sharing what we have been given.
We follow by giving.
As we trust God,
we are set free to follow
As God has given so freely to us,
we also give.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen
