Ephesians 5:8-14
Fourth Sunday in Lent
2 March 2008
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Is anyone feeling as if you’ve maxed out, as if you’ve hit an invisible ceiling in your relationship with God, as if He’s just stopped listening or responding? Maybe that feeling is in the subject area of your family. Maybe that feeling is in the subject area of your employment. Maybe that feeling is in the subject area of your relationships with others. Maybe that feeling is in the subject area of your finances. Maybe that feeling is in the subject area of your health. Maybe that feeling is in the area of our government, our current administration and the war in Iraq. Maybe that feeling is in a totally different subject area, an area that I can’t even in my wildest dreams imagine.
If you have ever felt – or maybe right now are feeling – as if God has stopped listening to or responding to you, I have a real life story to share with you today. This story is the transcript of an actual radio conversation between the USS Abraham Lincoln and Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland in October, 1995. To set the stage for this story, the captain of the USS Abraham Lincoln spotted in the distance a light that he assumed was from an approaching ship. Here’s the transcript of the radio conversation:
Americans: Please divert your course 15 degrees to the North to avoid a collision.
Canadians: Recommend that you divert YOUR course 15 degrees South to avoid a collision.
Americans: This is the captain of a U.S. Navy ship. I say again, divert YOUR course.
Canadians: No. I say it again, divert YOUR course.
Americans: This is the Aircraft Carrier USS Lincoln, the second largest ship in the United States’ Atlantic Fleet. We are accompanied by three destroyers, three cruisers and numerous support vehicles. I demand that you change your course 15 degrees North, that’s one five degrees North, or counter measures will be undertaken to ensure the safety of this ship.
Canadians: This is a lighthouse. Your call.
If you have ever felt – or maybe right now are feeling – as if God has stopped listening to or responding
to you, have you ever stopped to check your position in life, especially your position in relationship to God? Are you allowing God to direct you or are you dictating to God how you want to change Him? Are you allowing Him to set the compass in your life or are you trying to mess with your “magnetic field,” thinking He won’t know or notice?
Listen again to these words St. Paul wrote: “For you were once darkness but now are light in the Lord. Live as children of light ... and find out what pleases the Lord” [Ephesians 5:8, 10].
I have to wonder how many times the blind man and his parents felt as if the Lord wasn’t listening to them [John 9:1-41].
Some of you, I know, have had the unpleasant experience of knowing personally and intimately from the moment of birth that something was wrong with your child. I bet I know your first question: “Why?” I bet I also know your second question, “Why us?” I bet I also know your third question: “What can be done?”
Actually, those questions are probably not just the first three questions asked by parents who have encountered problems with the birth of a child. They’re the standard first three questions asked by all of us when something doesn’t quite go “right” in our lives: “Why?” ; “Why me?” ; “What can be done?”
The parents of the man born blind had, like all parents of all times, had certainly asked those questions. Seemingly ignored by God, they then exhausted every avenue available to them. They had exhausted the limited medical technology available to them. They had tried home remedies. They had pursued experimental, alternative, questionable forms of healing. Finally, they committed themselves to the best and seemingly only course of action available to them. They propped up their son near the city gate wearing a pair of sunglasses and holding a beggar’s cup. “If he has to be blind, at least he can provide for his own support.”
That’s when Jesus came along and answered their every question: “Why?” ; “Why us?” ; “What can be done?” Jesus finally answered them: “This happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life” [John 9:3]. Suddenly, their eyes were opened – and not just the eyes of the blind man. Also the eyes of parents. Also the eyes of other bystanders. They finally saw that they were not the lighthouse. They finally saw that they were not the final authorities. They finally saw that they were the ship at sea, that Jesus was the lighthouse, and that they needed to walk as children of the Light, not setting their own course, but following the course He in His more infinite wisdom set for them.
Listen again to these words St. Paul wrote: “For you were once darkness but now are light in the Lord. Live as children of light ... and find out what pleases the Lord” [Ephesians 5:8, 10].
There is an ancient Persian proverb that goes like this: “An Arab sat in his tent and held up a candle to a fig. In the fig, he saw a worm. He reached for another fig and held it up to the candle. In it was a worm. He reached for a third fig and held it up to the candle. Another worm. He blew out the candle and reached for a fig. We sometimes prefer the darkness.”
Are you asking those questions today? “Why?” ; “Why me?” ; “What can be done?”
If you are, I would encourage you, based upon God’s true, living and inerrant Word, to instead ask this other set of questions: “What is God trying to tell me?” ; “Where is God trying to move me?” and “How is God going to bring glory to Himself through me?”
Asking those questions takes the pressure off of us, the pressure and stress that comes into our lives when we try to change God, when we try to fit Him into our plans instead of allowing Him to fit us into His plans. Suddenly it’s no longer about us. It’s about Him!
Jesus was no stranger to this shift in thinking. According to His Divine nature, Jesus knew that He was headed for Jerusalem. Jesus knew that He was headed for extreme suffering and for a painful death on a Cross. [Matthew 20:17-19]. Yet, according to His human nature, that wasn’t a thought that appealed to Him. You will remember Jesus’ agonizing words in the Garden of Gethsemane: “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death ... My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from Me” [Matthew 26:38, 39]. That was Jesus asking “Why?” ; “Why me?” ; “What can be done?”
You will also remember what else Jesus said: “Yet, not as I will, but as You will” [Matthew 26:39]. That was Jesus asking “What is God trying to tell Me?” ; “Where is God trying to move Me?” and “How is God going to bring glory to Himself through Me?”
We know God’s answer to Jesus’ questions. That suffering and anguish and painful death was not a punishment for Jesus. Instead ,it was the only way to solve the problem of sin, the real problem that to this very day brings all pain and suffering and heartache into our own lives.
As your pastor, I have walked with many of you and with many others during painful times of life. I have added my own questions of “Why?” ; “Why them?” ; “Why me?” and“What can be done?” to your similar questions. Sometimes I have rejoiced when both I and you have switched our questions instead to “What is God trying to tell us?” ; “Where is God trying to move us?” and “How is God going to bring glory to Himself through this?”
Other times, including events going on right now, I have sadly witnessed people dig deeply into those initial questions and refuse to let them go, refuse to move beyond them, refuse to acknowledge that painful events may indeed have nothing to do with them. I have sadly witnessed people set out like the USS Abraham Lincoln, determined to destroy the Lighthouse set there to protect them.
Are you today feeling maxed out? Are you today feeling as if you’ve hit an invisible ceiling in your relationship with God? Are you today feeling as if God’s just stopped listening or responding?
Listen again to these words St. Paul wrote: “For you were once darkness but now are light in the Lord. Live as children of light ... and find out what pleases the Lord” [Ephesians 5:8, 10].
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Pastor Christopher Schaar
Historic First Lutheran Church of Pasadena