Life giving acts

I have not been able to post or even read anyone’s posts for the past week. It has been crazy busy at our house, so for now, I will just post the message from this morning and try to do some read and gather my thoughts to do some real posts tomorrow if at all possible. Below is our message for today.

The scriptures were taken from: Revelation 7:9-17, John 10:22-30 and Acts 9:36-43.

If you remember to last week, I told you that there wouldn’t really be a message just a group of stories about the theme which was: God’s plans and at the end there were some comments that you were supposed to ponder when you left here. Today we also have stories though fewer than last week. And, this time instead of pondering, I think the assignment will be more on the line of brainstorming, or at least thinking up some actions to go along with our theme of: life-giving acts.

But life-giving acts aren’t our only focus today. There is also this idea of Jesus as the good Shepherd, and so we have used it in our music and in our liturgy. It comes from both the gospel lesson and the passage in Revelation. And, the Psalm of the day is the 23^rd Psalm, and so we used it in our call to worship.

The gospel lesson tells us that Jesus said “my sheep know my voice.” He says this in the temple in Jerusalem in the Portico of Solomon as he is answering the Jewish leaders, who are trying to trick him into blasphemy by saying he is the Messiah. And, when he lets them know that they are not one of his sheep, they are so angry that they want to stone him. What they missed in his answer about who he is, was the answer about how those who become his followers, his sheep, to them he gives eternal life. They weren’t willing to follow. They wanted to be in charge, they wanted to be the leaders, to show everyone how to follow the laws and do what they said. They weren’t willing to be the followers, to humble themselves to obey the call of the Shepherd. They weren’t willing to be a part of those life-giving acts.

So, before we look at the other scripture lessons, let’s start with a little story about the board meeting we had this past Wednesday. Normally those things can be a bit dry. We start with a reading of the past minuets, and this time there were two of them, then we go through the budget and we hear reports of what we have been doing and finally we talk a bit about what is coming up.

Let me tell you there was nothing dry about Wednesday night, and the not dry part started with the cake that Susan brought. We were laughing from before the meeting started almost straight through to the end, and it wasn’t just a smile here or a polite little laugh there. These were full on holding ourselves laughing. It was the sort of laughing that is actually good for you. I am not kidding. That sort of laughing is healthy because it pushes old carbon dioxide out of the lungs and allows you to breathe better. Come to think of it that might be the sort of church activity we should be sponsoring, or at least holding more often, a laughing session, a life-giving activity.

Anyway, this brings me to the next day, my next day, Thursday. By the end of that night

I was beginning to wonder if perhaps I had been struck for sins committed on Wednesday night at that board meeting. Was all that laughing a “fa-sind-mich” thing? Was I being struck or punished for laughing about those things.

Here was my Thursday. Our track team hosted a four part track and field meet in Linton. For those of you who have helped at a meet either on the field or in the press box, you have an idea how stressful they can get. Well to shorten this story up let me just say the computer scoring program broke down before we started, and so we had to hand score the varsity meets as well as the junior high meets. This was enough to send me over the edge because I mostly want to double check all the sheets that come in before they get announced and ribbon-ed and scored. Now I didn’t really have the time.

Next the sheets from the running events began coming to the press box without the overall places being noted, which is something our clerk normally does. This wouldn’t have been such a problem, except the girls handing out the awards were inexperienced and when they saw the numbers on each heat sheet, they started giving awards that way (six heats of the 100 meant 6 blue ribbons, 6 red ribbons, and on and on for the 100,) etc…As I think about it now, it is about the same as only giving one ribbon to a team when they placed in a relay, which has happened in the past.

Anyway, it didn’t take long for me to be just a little stressed out. I finally realized that I needed to leave the area to clear out my mind to figure out a solution to our problem. Besides that, I needed to go to James’ classroom to get two more paper charts so we could do the varsity hand scoring. Fortunately I had made extra copies.

Well during that long walk up the hill into the school, I finally realized that I couldn’t fix this alone. I needed help and from a couple of different areas. Yes I could do my part, and yes I needed to step up and be the leader and the one who explained the rules and such to the others about how to determine who was first and second and so on, but I couldn’t do every sheet myself, nor could I do all of the scoring alone. This became a group effort and after I told the others how we needed to do it and asked them for help, we got through everything very well, and even laughed a few times. Fortunately those working in the press box were able to adjust to the need to pitch in and help a little faster than those sending the sheets from the finish line. I think it took until the 800 meter run before we started to see the stickers coming in the order of fastest to slowest per heat.

By the end of the night, the thing that gave me a real lift was the way our mile relay teams performed. Mostly though, I felt sort of upset about the way, I initially handled the stress. I wanted so badly to be able to fix the computer problem on my own, but there was no way I could, there was nothing I could do, no configuration I could come up with to make that path reconnect to open that program, and the worst of it was that I knew all the work I had done entering events and rosters that day in preparation for the meet would have to be redone before I could type in the final results on Friday.

So, on Friday morning when I sat down to reread the scripture lessons for this week the final verse of the passage in Revelation hit me. It is the verse about “wipe away every tear from their eye.” I realized that God is there with us in all things through all things, and that we don’t have to go it alone. When we are hurting or frustrated or even at our whit’s end, God is there to comfort us, to calm us, but it doesn’t happen when we try to go out on our own. Just like those Jewish elders who were too important, too pious and lawful to follow Jesus, we won’t get to be part of the sheep if we refuse to listen to the voice of the shepherd.

This passage in Revelation is not about how great the ones robed in white are because they have made it through the great ordeal, although that is a pretty amazing feat. It is about how God took care of them. It is about how Jesus the good Shepherd guided them through, and they followed, and they made it. It is about how God drew them in and sheltered them and in the end even wipes the tears from their eyes. This passage is about how we have that same good shepherd to guide us through the tough times. The way God guides us is not just to go to God, but to be willing to accept help in times of trouble. As independent and bossy as we might want to be, we can’t always do it all on our own. We need to remember God is there for us.

This brings me to the passage from the book of Acts. This is another of the stories about the early church that I wish was longer. I want lots more information about Tabitha, or Dorcas as she is also known. It would be interesting to know more about this woman from Joppa. She sounds like an absolutely wonderful woman who any community, any church, any family would love to claim as their own. From what little we are told, we can believe that she was caring and compassionate. She must have had some financial means as she was able to do much for others in the form of charity. And the women who mourn her show some of the sewing work that she did. But that is all we really get in the way of knowing much about her. By the time this story begins, Tabitha is dead. The women, described as widows, who are with her have already washed her body and prepared it for burial. They are all in mourning, but not quite ready to give up on their friend and so they call for Peter to help them.

They are crying about Tabitha’s death, but still not ready to call it over. And Peter comes and goes to Tabitha and prays to God and she is returned to life. God gives her back to her friends, back to the young church, back to her family, back to this world. And as he does it, the tears are wiped away. Peter becomes the instrument; the women who called for him become the instruments through which life is given back to Tabitha.

This story lets us know how God works through his believers to help those in need. Peter and the disciples were the beginning of the early church. The women around Tabitha were part of the church. They worked not just to spread the news of Jesus’ death and resurrection, but to help each other, to do for each other. I have a pin on my Pintrest site that I am hoping to paint on an old board this summer and hang it in my room. It says: “God is not calling us to go to church; God is calling us to be the church, the hope of the world.”

In other words, the questions for the week, the brainstorming thoughts are: What are the life-giving acts that I can do this week where I happen to be. I need to ask myself, how can I show the love and compassion and life-giving acts of Christ this week? I need to ask that even when the computer breaks down, and maybe especially when the computer breaks down. I was hit with the reality that I am pretty much a work in progress, and there is lots of room for improvement. What life-giving acts are we willing to do for each other and for those around us this week? I bet if we take the time to look to our Shepherd, we will hear some directions. Amen

Mother’s Day sermon.

The following message was given on Sunday, May 11 at St. Paul’s UCC in Eureka. Scripture used were John 10:1-10, I Peter 2:19-25, and Acts 2:42-47

Mother’s Day

Many of you may already know that, I grew up on a farm in the area. It is about 11 miles north and west of here as the crow flies. My father operated it as, according to the Haak definition of a farm, as an “Old MacDonald” farm, meaning he had and did a little of everything. He was mainly a small grain farmer, but also put up hay and silage and raised animals. Here is where the Old MacDonald term comes in. We had every sort of farm animals on our farm except goats and, well I guess as some sheep ranchers might have, there were no lamas either.

My parents raised cattle, pigs, sheep, chickens and a few ducks and geese every so often. We even had some horses, but they were not used for anything useful. We just had them. My mother loved this time of year. It was when the new crop was born, and though my father much preferred dealing with a sow and her litter, building one type of crate after another to keep the piglets safe, my mother and I loved walking through the pastures in the yard and checking out the new baby calves and lambs.

It seems there was nothing more exciting for us in the growing up years than when we got to have a bottle lamb. Those were few and far between because my parents believed that animal mothers do a better job than human children, but oh how fun it was to try to hold that bottle and not let that lamb head bump your side while you figured out what was the least sloppy way to get that milk into the lamb. They were cute and cuddly, but demanding and smelly and at the same time, and they were my favorite animal on the farm because I knew we raised them for the wool and not for slaughter. At least I believed that to be true.

My parents weren’t always sheep owners. I think the last of the sheep happened the year that my father left a small hay stack in their area one day too long. They kept eating around it and around it, and one afternoon when we returned home from a trip to town, the stack had collapsed and the flock appeared much smaller than normal. My parents dug frantically to save what they could of the sheep buried under the pile, but many either suffocated or had their necks broken, and sadly among the dead was my little black-faced pet, Lamby.

See sheep are not the smartest animal on a farm. They are easily led one way or another. They play follow the leader automatically and intensely. On the positive side of this is the fact that if the sheep get out of the pen all you have to do is find a leader and get that one going in the right direction, and the rest pretty much follow along. Pigs don’t do that. We always joked that my brother got his running ability because it was his job to chase the pigs back into their pens when he was a youngster, and I mean from about age five on.

Sheep though, go astray as easily as they are led back to their shelter. And the other part that my parents struggled with is the idea that when a sheep is sick and lays down, it is nearly impossible to get them well and back on their feet again. Of course my stories are over 40 years old, so I am sure veterinary medicine has advanced considerably since then, but I do believe sheep are still good followers, which might explain why the metaphor in scripture is always sheep.

Jesus is the Shepherd, and we are the sheep. We could chalk this symbol up to the fact that sheep were the animals most raised in Biblical times, or it might just be that we are most like sheep. I don’t have that answer today. Perhaps when I start looking into classes, I will find something to give me those sorts of answers. I have to wonder, is sheep the metaphor because we are led as easily as a flock of sheep? I have no answer now, but tuck that thought away for a bit.

John tells us that Jesus said he was the Good Shepherd, and we are his flock. We are the sheep of his charge, and he cares for us the way a shepherd takes care of his sheep. He looks for us when we are lost and he digs us out from under whatever falls on us as quickly as he finds us. We are his to watch over and nurture and protect.

It occurred to me as I was thinking about Jesus as the Shepherd and us as the sheep that a good shepherd takes care of his flock much like a good mother looks after her children. A mother is more than the person who gives birth to you. I would prefer to say that a mother is the one who gives you your life. And mothers have been doing that from the beginning of creation. A good mother also provides for a child not just in terms of food and clothing and shelter, but in terms of nurturing with love and affection and comfort, and perhaps most importantly by giving them the skills to grow up and learn to stand on their own.

I know in many ways that was the most important thing I learned from my mother was how to be myself. She did that by example far more than by telling me anything. In fact my sisters and I loved how our mother would tell us to be good wives by keeping a well-organized home, doing such things as cleaning and cooking and laundry, while she took jobs outside of the house in such jobs as: clerking and accounting at livestock barns, managing roofing and insulating crews and later owning her own business. We learned by watching not by listening.

At this point I took a bit of a side track and don’t remember it exactly, but I described how the livestock barns were not set up to be a straight walk or fancy stairs from the audience area to the area where the workers such as the auctioneer and the clerk and the person weighing the cattle sit to conduct the sale. No, they have to climb over the rails, walk through the ring full of animal droppings then finally get to their desks. My mother did this each week even the Friday before giving birth to my youngest sister on Saturday morning. We really learned by example, not by listening.

A good mother also teaches her family the Christian values that they need to get themselves through the darkest hours. And here is what I mean by saying that Jesus as a Shepherd is like a good mother. Today’s scripture lectionary also includes Psalm 23, and that is why we read it as the Call to Worship. All the things that this Psalm says about how the Lord leads us, relate to how a mother cares for a child by giving him or her comfort and protection in tough times.

Today people all over our country are celebrating Mother’s Day. I found some historical information on this holiday, and I would like to share it with you. I found this article on (national geographic.com). It was written by Brian Handwerk and Updated May 8, 2014. I don’t understand how to do links, so if you want to read the whole thing search the site with Mother’s Day and the author and you get right to it. This is what a little of the beginning says:

The holiday has more somber roots: It was founded for mourning women to remember fallen soldiers and work for peace. And when the holiday went commercial, its greatest champion, Anna Jarvis, gave everything to fight it, dying penniless and broken in a sanitarium.

It all started in the 1850s, when West Virginia women’s organizer Ann Reeves Jarvis—Anna’s mother—held Mother’s Day work clubs to improve sanitary conditions and try to lower infant mortality by fighting disease and curbing milk contamination, according to historian Katharine Antolini of West Virginia Wesleyan College. The groups also tended wounded soldiers from both sides during the U.S. Civil War from 1861 to 1865.

In the postwar years Jarvis and other women organized Mother’s Friendship Day picnics and other events as pacifist strategies to unite former foes. Julia Ward Howe, for one—best known as the composer of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”—issued a widely read “Mother’s Day Proclamation” in 1870, calling for women to take an active political role in promoting peace.

Around the same time, Jarvis had initiated a Mother’s Friendship Day for Union and Confederate loyalists across her state. But it was her daughter Anna who was most responsible for what we call Mother’s Day—and who would spend most of her later life fighting what it had become. [Meaning the commercialization of the day.] She wanted it to be “Mother’s Day,” Not “Mothers’ Day”

Anna Jarvis never had children of her own, but the 1905 death of her own mother inspired her to organize the first Mother’s Day observances in 1908.  The article goes on to say that U.S. President Woodrow Wilson officially set aside the second Sunday in May in 1914 for the holiday.

“For Jarvis it was a day where you’d go home to spend time with your mother and thank her for all that she did,” West Virginia Wesleyan’s Antolini, who wrote “Memorializing Motherhood: Anna Jarvis and the Defense of Her Mother’s Day” as her Ph.D. dissertation, said in an interview.

“It wasn’t to celebrate all mothers. It was to celebrate the best mother you’ve ever known—your mother—as a son or a daughter.” That’s why Jarvis stressed the singular “Mother’s Day,” rather than the plural “Mothers’ Day,” Antolini explained.

Here I want to thank the author Brian H for a great and interesting article and hopefully he understands I am not trying to steal, just promote his writing.

Wow! Isn’t it interesting how some events can be basically side-swiped and turned into a completely different thing than what you plan it to be? I knew before I checked into it that Mother’s Day wasn’t a church holiday, though we observe it on a Sunday. But I never knew it was started so many years before it was officially declared a holiday, or that it was part of a movement to help our country come back together after the long and hard struggle of the Civil War. I did know, though, that it was about honoring your own mother, not mothers in general. And I hope that is what we are able to do today whether they are with us in the pews or if they have gone on ahead to be with their own mother.

Perhaps it is hard for some of us to think of Jesus the Shepherd in terms of a mother figure. Those of us with some old-fashioned or traditional values only want to think of God as the Father, yet everywhere we look in the scriptures we see the compassion and the nurturing and the caring that our culture attributes to a mother’s love. Maybe it isn’t so much what we hear as what we see in the example put before us. Now as we close today, I would like to share a little story I found recently in a book I received from one of my daughters several years ago. Though it is not Exactly what I might say to my own three daughters, it is a pretty close fit.

At this point I read a great excerpt from Chicken Soup for the Mother’s Soul. It was written as if a mother was talking to her three children and kept saying she loved each one best. It was a great humorous piece to take away the somber, but it was also quite true to realize that as a mother you do love each one best and each one just as dearly as you love all of them. I guess that is how God loves us. For me it was nice to have the opening to talk about God as our mother and not just our father. God is everything to us at all times. I guess that is what omnipotence is all about. Hope you enjoyed even though it is so very long.