WHAT IS
YOUR SOURCE OF STRENGTH?
Nehemiah 8: 1-10; Luke 4: 14-21
Whether it is from the lips John
Calvin in Geneva, Huldrych Zwingli in Zurich, Martin Luther in Wittenberg,
John Knox in Edinburgh, John Witherspoon in Princeton, or Peter Marshall in Washington D.C.,
the word of God has been central to worship, and to preaching. The bridegroom
of the church—Jesus Christ—has been proclaimed as the Head of the Church. Each
of the mentioned ministers also believed that the marks of the true church are:
where the Word of God is rightly preached and understood; where the sacraments
of Baptism and Holy Communion are rightly administered and received, and where
vice is repressed virtue is nourished. People throughout the ages have found
strength in worshipping God in a congregation of the True Church.
Counterfeit congregations, it might be said, focus on solely pleasing
parishioners or preacher’s egos. Congregations of the True Church
seek to please and serve God, to lift up Jesus Christ as the Lord and Savior of
the world, and to have the Word and Sacrament illuminated by the power and
presence of the Holy Spirit. In a time when powerful church figures taught that
the righteous were saved by the church through the administration of the
sacraments, and by doing good works, thoughtful people like the ones I just
named read the Apostle Paul’s treatise to the Romans and came to a different
conclusion. Chapter 1, verse 17 says: “The righteous shall live by faith.” Did
Paul’s fervent soul develop that concept from meeting Jesus on the road to Damascus? No; the words
were surely known to Paul as the young Jewish man Saul who studied in the school of Gamaliel. The prophet Habakkuk said the words
first: “The righteous shall live by faith.” Paul ended up molding the doctrine
of what was called the Protestant Reformation when he wrote these words to the
Ephesians: “For by grace you are
saved through faith; and this is not
your own doing, it is the gift of God, not because of works, lest anyone try to
boast.” [2:8-9] John Newton knew the source of a Christian’s strength as he
penned the words “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but
now I see!” His words take us straight to Scripture and the Prodigal Son story
of Luke 15, when the father’s son thought of himself as a wretch, he ran back
into town and ended up falling into the arms of his breathless and joyful
father; one is also reminded of blind Bartimaeus in Mark 10:46 when the blind
beggar called Jesus a title of understanding—Son of David—and Jesus stopped and
pronounced that his faith had made
him well. It is faith that carries, heals, and grounds us. That concept takes
us straight to the throne of God, through the cross of Calvary, and reminds us
that it is God’s desire that we be saved,
it is the gift of the Son that makes the
salvation path clear; it is to God to whom we should cleave, and to God to whom
we will return. The Sovereignty of
God is at the center of Christian worship in Reformed congregations. And the
Word of God is written in the Bible, preached from the pulpit, made visible in
the Sacraments, and lives in Christ to undergird our Christian lives. What
persons were faithful forerunners before Christ?
God chose a man named Moses, and gave
him the companionship of his brother and sister, Aaron and Miriam. Our roots
are in covenant faithfulness. God made a covenant, the first one, with the
people God chose; God was always faithful in that covenant, but the people’s faithlessness, not unlike our own,
was epidemic. Broken covenants were renewed using process that even the Lord
Jesus knew: Remorse, Repentance,
Restitution, and Restoration. The four “Rs.” The most costly part was restitution. Some
tried to show their remorse and pay their restitution by wandering in the
wilderness, giving up food by fasting, and acknowledging their uncleanness by
heaping dust and ashes on themselves while wearing burlap like sacks for
self-punishment. Later, groups built a temple to the Lord, and altars to God in
wilderness areas, sacrificing birds for what they deemed minor sins, goats, for
medium sins, and lambs for major sins. The most costly offering was an
unblemished lamb, one of the later titles applied to Christ on the Cross. Now
you see why. Some Jews, especially Pharisaic Jews, believed that they were
saved by knowing Torah instead of by temple sacrifice. So they studied and
memorized Torah. In our first lesson for today, Nehemiah is an officer in the
court of Artaxerxes the First who received permission to come help in the
rebuilding of Jerusalem.
But it was Ezra who encouraged the spiritual
revival of the nation with the reading of the book of the Law. Long before
there was a famous Watergate in Washington
D.C., there was a Water Gate as
part of the first Temple.
Ezra went out there, facing a discouraged group of people whose town was still
in ruins from being sacked, and he read them the old, old story of Torah. When
he opened the book of Scripture, all the people stood, was done as our
scripture entered the sanctuary today. Ezra blessed the Lord, as our worship
today blesses and pleases God. The people responded with “Amen, amen!” and bowed
their heads in humbleness, not unlike what we have done today. Ezra preached,
helping people understand the words of the book, as I and other preachers
through the ages have sought to do. Their
source of strength was in knowing the Law. What is your source of strength? I have watched people whose source of strength
was solely their mother or father or best friend, and they simply crumbled when
they died. Having your main source of strength as anyone mortal rather than in
God’s Word and God’s Son is just sinking sand. Without a relationship with God before a time of tragedy; without the assurance of a life beyond this life
because you know Jesus as Lord, people melt into human puddles. When I do
funerals for people of faith, there is certainly sadness, but the old old story
of Jesus and his love, the belief that when the “Roll is Called Up Yonder”
they’ll be there, and the knowledge that the Holy Spirit—the Comforter—is with
them and will not leave them all alone, invites them to lean on the everlasting
arms of God. That is their source of
strength. On whom can others depend?
Even Jesus was a man of the Book.
Returning to his home town and synagogue, he did what he had done every week of
his life: he went to Sabbath service on the Sabbath Day. Being chosen as
liturgist of the day, he was presented with the scroll of the prophet Isaiah.
The selection could hardly be by chance but by the providence of God. As Jesus
read the words, he owned the words.
They were Isaiah’s words, but he made them his own:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, I’m anointed to bring good news to
the poor, to release those who are bound, to free those who are enslaved, and
to say, ‘today will be a new day;’ because we are in the year of the Lord.” The
people were astonished. Even Jesus found power in the Book.
Before the earthquake, Haiti was a nation
in horrendous poverty and with outlandish corruption, yet the people survived
on the edge of night for years. Records for its inhabitants show 96% to be
Christian. Because of rampant ignorance, many families hardly knew what to
believe and who to follow, but they called out to God for guidance and their hope
was largely anchored in God. Some say they were corrupted by other influences,
but then again, even our own nation is not pure, our own lives are not pure;
the people of Israel
were not pure; and even the early Christians to whom Paul wrote were not pure. “All
have sinned” he wrote in Romans, “and fallen short of the glory of God.” [3:23]. As tornadoes hit Port Orange
last summer, and four hurricanes hit Florida in 2004, do you believe they came
because we are sinners, or do you believe they were just part of nature? What
do you do when storms, emotional or physical, come your way? Many in Haiti cried out
to God; they have thanked America
and other rescuers; those who were looking for loved ones cried out in hope; and
those with dead or dying loved ones, of course, were devastated as we would be.
Rescuers still pray for miracles, as do those who are rescued. But God is there,
where food, water, help, shelter, and comfort are offered. As it has happened
in history and in Scripture, we will see, sometimes with agonizing slowness, that
“God is working for good with those who love him, who are called according to
his purpose.” From Jesus’ horrible death on a cross, God brought redemption;
from Abraham’s Godly trust as he raised a knife to his son, God blessed him for
his faith and provided a scapegoat. And from the 2004 storms that broke our
roofs and the roofs of others, we have new codes and repairs that are even
stronger than before. God will do the same today, and tomorrow, with those who
are called according to his purpose. We are Christians, because we, like Jesus
himself, find our strength in God. Let us never waver from that firm foundation.
Jeffrey A. Sumner January 24, 2010