The View from the Pulpit – 7/12/10
July 12, 2010 by Gary Carter
Filed under View From The Pulpit
Dear Church Family
Finally, some rain fell last night for the whole town of Kennett. I heard reports yesterday of real gulley washers on Thursday and Friday last week at Three Rivers Regional Medical Center and Masterson School. But we got nothing here at 300 College or at 205 Charles. One of our members reported that only half their patio table got wet during one particular cloud burst. I don’t think they were referring to a top vs. bottom but they weren’t specific.
I’ve experience the same conundrum during conversations after worship. One will be excited by the vitality of such a spirit filled time and another can’t wait to talk about last night’s ball game. Why didn’t God’s presence make the same impression on each? The time I’ve spent helping to build radiators and churches helps me see the many unknown variables at work in the world. I’m beginning to think that the only unchanging human experience is that things are always changing.
So once again we sang our songs, said our prayers, and listened for God’s eternal Word to speak to a moment in time. A trio of Ladies (Jan McDaniel, Jennifer Bell, & Scottie Landess accompanied by Dianne Carter) sang the joy of hearing familiar names “When the Roll is Called up Yonder.”
We worshiped the Holy One who continues to create humanity, forming us in spite of wind and rain and our own wanderings into His people, His children, His servants. We celebrate God’s stick-to-i-tive-ness. It touches us all and is the only other thing, I can say with any confidence, that never changes.
Come join us next week as we look out God’s window and see some summer fruit.
In Christ’s Love…..Gary
What’s Happening This Week
Mon. 6:00pm – Trustees Meeting in the Fellowship Classroom
7:00pm – Church Council Meeting in the Parlor
Tues. 6:00pm – “Whispers of Hope” meets in Nursery II
6:30pm – “Led by Thread” meets in the Parlor
7:00pm – “Hour of Prayer” meets in the Sanctuary
Wed. 9:30am – “Ladies Prayer & Share Bible Study” meets in the Parlor
7:30pm – “The Shack” Bible Study meets at Greenway’s home
All week long Nineteen of our members attend “Sanctuary Kamp” at Blue Mountain
Prayers
Following is the list of people for whom we prayed yesterday during “UpWords” and “The Celebration”. Please watch your E-mail or visit us at 1stumckennett.net for updates and requests as they arrive.
- Marsha and Keith Morrison who lost their adult son, Ron Morrison, in a fire on Sunday Morning.
- Ester Childress (our member). Montrell told me Sunday Morning that Ester’s sister, Sara Mackefield, had died.
- · Nancy Brown - got some negative news on cancer.
- Ralph Williams – David William’s Dad – Had a liver Transplant over the weekend. David reports that there was a 5-8 day window when this surgery put more pressure on the heart and they are still in that period so still not out of the woods.
- Lou Arthur fell and damaged her shoulder.
- Robin Jones
- Howard Fletcher
- Church Campers, Counselors, Directors, & Staff
The Tribute Candle burned in memory of Garrett Short on the 18th anniversary of his birth.
A Church Camp Experience for Adults
Evenglow is a camp experience at Blue Mountain campground for persons over 50, August 24-27. A brochure with additional details and registration form is available in the church office or upon request.
This year’s participants will be doing a book study on a short book, Three Simple Rules by Bishop Rueben Job. In Three Simple Rules, Bishop Job offers an interpretation of John Wesley’s General Rules for today’s readers. This simple but challenging look at three commands, “do no harm, do good, stay in love with God,” calls us to mutual respect, unity, and a deeper relationship with God.
Debbie Deneke of Gordonville Zion is this year’s camp director. For additional information, please contact Debbie Deneke by emailing her zionumc@showme.net or calling 573-243-8025.
“Outside God’s Window – A Plumb Line”
Psalm 82
Amos 7:7-17
You may not believe it now, but when I was younger I was quite a basketball player. One of my high school coaches noted four things about my hoops prowess; pretty good defense, good hustle, unselfish with the ball, couldn’t hit a bull in the butt with a bucket. I guess I never found my shot.
Anyway, we were pretty good even though Hardin didn’t offer organized basketball until the now unheard of age of 12 or 13 when we entered 7th grade. That first season began with a fourteen game winning streak. We were pretty good. Our fifteenth game was played against the big county seat town, a school ten times bigger than Hardin-Central. I’d like to report that we stretched our streak to fifteen, but I can’t. We got clobbered, which really didn’t surprise any of us. I guess we kind of expected to lose to a school that had more kids on their team than we had in our class. But our loss did surprise one person; our coach.
I had to think hard to remember his name this week. It was Mr. Camp who was also employed as the Superintendent of Schools. That fact reveals a lot about how old I am. Can you imagine Mr. Noble coaching 7th grade boy’s basketball? It was truly a different time. And it became pretty obvious that he thought he had a different team when he informed us after the game that we were going to have a special practice the next day (Saturday) at 8:00am.
I guess he thought more of us than we thought of ourselves. That’s the only basketball practice I can ever remember when no one ever touched an actual basketball. We ran for 60 minutes, wind sprints, line drills, laps, it didn’t matter we ran and didn’t take a break for the whole hour. I don’t even remember him talking to us. Mostly he spoke with short blasts from the silver whistle that hung around his neck.
To make things worse, he gave me a ride home afterwards. We had moved into town by then so I was use to walking. I don’t remember him or any other teacher ever offering a ride to any of us any other time. I’d like to think that maybe he was feeling a little guilty for having worked us so hard, but I doubt it. It was grace.
I do remember saying something that only a dumb 7th grader would say. I don’t remember the exact words but it had something to do with supposing that the tough practice meant he really cared about us because if he didn’t he wouldn’t have bothered. He just kind of chuckled at that and the conversation died.
But I thought about that long-ago Saturday morning this week as I looked out the window with Amos and saw God standing there next to a wall with plumb line in hand. I joined Amos in wondering what God was doing out there. Why did He even bother?
Most likely Amos was also wondering what he was doing in here. He was standing with Amaziah who was the chief priest of the temple in Bethel. Bethel translates “God House” and it was located in Israel, but not the Israel you’re probably thinking about. It was some time during the 700’s B.C.
The Promised Land God gave to His Chosen People had been divided by war. Israel was the northern part of the land ruled by descendents of Saul. Amos was from the southern part called Judah ruled by descendents of David. The Promised Land divided after Solomon’s death. To make it simple, the ten northern tribes chose to follow Saul’s sons while the two southern tribes chose David’s sons as their king. In their arguments over who would lead they lost track of the idea that God was their ultimate King (which is what God told them would happen when they insisted on a human king in the first place) and that they needed to live according to God’s plan.
LORD took Amos from following the flock and caring for sycamore trees and sent him to Bethel, God’s holy city in Israel (the north). This southern boy’s task was to tell them it was time to change their ways. Most of what upset God had to do with the way the rich treated the poor and the life that made “self and stuff” into a god to be served. The Psalmist mentions that kind of upside down world when the song tells of the day God called a meeting with gods to say; 2“How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? (Selah) 3Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. 4Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.” (Psalm 82)
God continues speaking through the Psalmist, revealing what it means for us to be the Chosen People; “ 6I say, “You are gods, children of the Most High, all of you; 7nevertheless, you shall die like mortals, and fall like any prince.”
God gave Amos the same message and needless to say the priest of the king’s temple wasn’t too happy with it. Particularly that part where Amos told them that their wives would become prostitutes and their children would be killed by the sword and “your land shall be parceled out by line; you yourself shall die in an unclean land, and Israel shall surely go into exile away from its land.” (Amos 7:17)
At least that’s what God showed Amos as he stood by a wall with a plumb-line in hand. God’s presence was revealed and along with it a promise that God would not abandon them or overlook them and would hold them along side God’s creative vision to see how they compared to God’s blue-print for “human”. God promises, “I will never again pass them by.” The Jewish Publication Society translates God’s resolve in Amos 7:8 as “I will pardon them no more.”
It has been a long time since some of us have seen a plumb-line. I made one this morning to show the children; using my grandfather’s old Shakespeare fishing reel with a rather large fastener (a “nut” that screws onto the threaded end of a bolt that showed up on the parsonage driveway a couple months ago after the DDD was delivered) tied to the end of the fishing line. If you hold the line up with the weight swinging close to the ground it will show perfect vertical. That’s very important if you want to build a wall that will last. I also used a ruler (used to draw a straight line and show a unit of measurement) and the United Methodist Book of Discipline (tells us how we think we ought to organize ourselves in order to be able to be the church God wants us to be).
There are times when God’s presence can be a real pain. Israel would discover that in 722 B.C. when the Assyrians conquered their kingdom and spread their people all over the Assyrian Empire. Their scattering was so complete that we can’t be sure now if they ever returned to the land God gave them.
The southern kingdom of Judah followed their cousins from the north into exile in 583 B.C. The Babylonians were their conquerors but the reason for their fall was genetic. The Psalmist’s words eventually described them and their leaders were taken into exile in Babylon. They were given a second chance a generation later. By then Persia was the world power who were followed by the Greeks and then finally the Romans who were in charge when God decided to send another plumb-line; God-With-Us, Jesus Christ, to show us The Way to live as humans.
Jesus once told a parable that we could have read this morning. Some of you know about the “Good Samaritan” as the answer to a young man’s question about eternal life. Jesus reminds him to love God and to love neighbor as he loves himself. The man asks “who is my neighbor?” Jesus holds the Samaritan, a Priest, and a Levite up and simply asked who did the neighborly thing for a man traveling the wilderness road who was mugged. (read Luke 10:25-37) By the way…a long time before Jesus, Samaria was a part of the northern kingdom of Israel.
What do you see when you look out the window? Do you see people best described by the Psalmist? Or do you see Jesus or the Samaritan held up as an example of neighbor?
What do you see when you look in a mirror? Be honest now because God has promised to be honest with you. God’s presence can be a real pain. But there is Good News….Christ died for you while you were still a sinner. That proves God’s love for you! In the Name of Jesus Christ you are forgiven! Glory be to God!! Now go and be human.
Next Week
Scripture:
Psalm 52
Amos 8:1-12
Sermon:
“Outside God’s Window: Summer Fruit”
