Sermon:
May 20, 2001
Morning Services

Scripture:
Ecclesiastes 3:1-12

“To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven.” If only we knew, with absolute certainty, when it was. The time, I mean.

In the late 1950s a man developed the digital watch. He flew to Switzerland and met with the leaders of the Swiss watch industry, offering them his new invention. They turned him down. They said they already had the perfect watch. Not to be deterred, he sold his idea to Seiko. In the late 1940s there were over 80,000 artisans making watches in Switzerland. Now there are less than 18,000. In the late 1940s, 80% of all watches purchased in the world were Swiss watches. Now 80% of all watches purchased in the world are digital watches. What did the Swiss discover? They discovered that just because you can keep time doesn’t  mean you can read it.

Timing is everything, they say. But not everyone reads  it correctly or is  prepared to swing with it, once they do. Just the other day, I was talking with a young man who has diamonds in his eyes….or, at least, a diamond in his plan. He is  almost ready to buy one, the better that he might give it to the young lady who has captured his heart. But this guy is one methodical fellow. He’s been mulling this over for a long time, pro-ing and con-ing it every which way from Sunday. Not only does he want to be sure, he wants to do it just right. He wants the time to be perfect. Meanwhile, it’s going by….time, that is. And while diamonds are forever, she may not be. So I told him about the fellow who couldn’t make up his mind about his beloved. So he went away for a number of months to clear his head. But not wanting her ardor to cool, he wrote her a love letter every single day. In the end, her ardor didn’t cool. But it did undergo a transformation. She married the mailman.

“Do everything exactly at the time.” That was one of John Wesley’s rules for his ministers. John was big on time. He wanted us to be, too. So his  rule is still on the books. When John’s rules are read to would-be ordinands, his  rule on time is read  along with the rest of them. Then,  we are asked if we will keep John’s rules. All of John’s rules. To which we must give our ascent….out loud….up front….on stage….in full view of everybody.

“Do everything exactly at the time.” When I was a student, I made a lot of money giving summer tours at the Ford Rouge plant. The most popular tour featured the vehicle assembly line. For people who had never seen automotive assembly, it was fascinating to watch the feeder lines meet the main line….supplying just the right part…. to just the right car….at just the right time. From scouting around on my own, I knew that each feeder line could be traced to huge stockpiles of parts (inventories that could  stretch for miles and last for days.)

Today, those supply bins are all but empty. Parts now arrive from various suppliers, only as needed and called for. Stockpiled inventories are a thing of the past. The new way of doing things is called “just in time assembly.” Computers make it possible. Cost-cutting makes it necessary. And it works….at least it works when people are alert and systems are responsive.

A couple of weeks ago, while touring Edinburgh Castle, we were shown a massive cannon. In its time, it was really something. It had the capacity to alter  the entire course of the war. Except it was never used in a war. One day it was deemed necessary. But it was so cumbersome to transport that, when they finally moved it into  place, the war was over.

I have known people like that. Heck, I’ve been people like that. I am talking people who have all the answers, but never give  them….all the convictions, but never express them….not to mention all the  dollars, but never spend  them. Because the timing’s never  quite right. Or so they say. 

Twenty years ago, in a sermon entitled “Twas A Less- Than -Perfect Day For The Game” I told of a family in New England who kept a beautifully- maintained musket mounted over the fireplace. Always proud of showing it off, they claimed it had been in their family since before the Revolution. But when pressed to describe any shots it had fired, the owners had to confess that it had never been loaded, adding: “It seems that our ancestors could never muster much enthusiasm for Mr. Washington’s rebellion.”

One pictures the musket’s original owner….purchasing the gun….polishing the gun….cradling the gun in his lap….dreaming of the day someone would come to the door in full-dress uniform and present him with a summons, inviting him to join the noble cause of the Patriot Army. Except that no such summons ever came. Or it came in a different guise. One night, there was a frantic knock on the door by a few out-of-breath and shabbily-dressed neighbors. Upon crossing the threshold, they shouted: “Ben, there’s been a heck of a scrap over Concord way. Grab your gun and let’s go.”

But since it wasn’t like he’d  imagined it....and it wasn’t like he’d  planned it....he never grabbed it....and he never fired it. And there it hangs to this day.

“To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven.”

Here at First Church, we have decided that this is the time to build (and raise money for) a Christian Life Center. Is this a good time? Many of us believe so. Is this God’s time? I have come to believe so. Is this your time? I can only hope so.

Let’s acknowledge that no time is perfect. Especially for raising money. Do you know that in the thirty-six years I’ve been at this work, no one has ever come to me and said: “Bill, this is a perfect time to raise money.” No one has ever said that. Because when most of you look at your financial situation, it never is. I figure that whenever a church goes out for money, there are probably not more than seventeen people who say: “You couldn’t have come at a better time.” But I have also discovered that when we look at things from God’s perspective....when we ask what God would have us do.... or when we go one step further and ask what God might be trying to do through us....the picture changes. When people read this marvelous passage in Ecclesiastes, they always quit too soon. They quit before verse 11, where the writer suggests that the suitability of any given time....whether it be for planting or plucking, birthing or building....is determined by God. The proper translation for verse 11 reads: “He has made everything suitable for its time.”

It is an awesome thing for a church to think that God might be using it to do something outside of its normal comfort zone. But I think that is exactly what God is doing here. This is not only our window of opportunity. This may also be God’s window of opportunity.

I have been saying in a number of venues that this is not what I planned to be doing at this stage of my life....at this stage of my career....at this stage of my ministry. This is when people my age tend to put it on “cruise control.” But with each passing day, I feel like this is exactly where I am supposed to be, and that this is   exactly what I am supposed to be doing. I don’t know whether God led me to this place, or simply tapped me,  once I got here. I am very slow to make claims about what I (at any given moment) think  that God is doing. I am fully cognizant of  the maxim that my thoughts are not God’s thoughts, neither are my ways necessarily God’s ways. But things keep happening, don’t you see, that suggest that this is bigger than me....bigger than you....bigger than us. Sometimes you seize the moment. But four or five times in your life, I think the moment seizes you.

Two stories in closing. Both happened in the last couple of days. One is about need. The other is about blessing.

Need first. One of you came to see me and said: “We are probably well past the need to justify the building at this stage of the campaign. But you might want to think about the following.” Which was when she told me that several of our finest high school kids (honor-rolling, scholarship-earning, God-fearing, sweet-singing girls and boys) occasionally get themselves thrown out of our local high school gym. Why? Because they break in, set up the volleyball nets and play a game. Which is not to be encouraged. I mean, I wish they wouldn’t. But I also wish there wouldn’t be any need to.

Blessing second. Just yesterday, a couple asked if they could drop by the house. They wanted to tell me (in person) about the gift that they planned to give. Which, when I heard it, took my breath away. As it already had theirs. They said: “We’ve never done anything like this before. This is virgin territory for us. But the opportunity to work on this project and offer this kind of support has changed our lives.” Then they went on to tell me how. Which brought to mind Clarice Percox’s famous line when, at age ninety-three, she came out of the woodwork and gave us the elevator. Said Clarice: “If I’d known how much fun this was going to be, I’d have done it years ago.”

Dan Hubert once said: “You can’t outgive God.” As I recall, he was standing right over there at the lectern. And when Dan said it, he was a lot  closer to twenty-three than he was to ninety-three. Some of us learn early. Some of us learn late. All in God’s good time.