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“When
the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one
place. Suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush
of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they
were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among
them, and a tongue rested upon each one of them. And they were
filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other
languages as the Spirit gave them ability.” Which suggests
that one should never be surprised by anything when friends of
Jesus come together in any place, at any time, for any reason.
With
that in mind, I segue to Fred Timpner ... fellow member ...
trusted friend ... who once came to me, fifteen minutes before
the service, with what he thought was a great idea. “Let me
make a suggestion,” said Fred. “I’ll go out and sit
among the congregation. Midway through the service, I’ll
pretend to fall asleep. You stop preaching and come out and
rouse me. I’ll leap up ... shout a couple of Hallelujahs ...
and cry that I’ve been raised from the dead. Then you go
back and finish your sermon.
Now
Fred is a pretty innovative guy. But he didn’t come up with
that idea by himself. Fred had been reading his newspaper,
don’t you see. And a few days previous, Fred’s newspaper
had quoted Oral Roberts making the grandiose claim that he had
enjoyed no small amount of success in raising people from the
dead. In fact, Oral was quoted,
saying: “I won’t tell you how many of the dead have
been raised under my ministry. But there was one time I had to
stop my sermon, go into the crowd and raise a dead person, so
that I could go back to the pulpit and finish preaching.”
Oral then added that people paid a whole lot more attention to
his sermon after he resurrected the parishioner, than before.
Everybody
had a field day at Brother Robert’s expense, including the
sometimes off-the-wall cartoonist Richard Guindon, who
depicted people in cemeteries talking to tombstones,
suggesting that the occupants just sit tight until Oral gets
around to them.
Suffice
it to say that, on the particular Sunday morning in question,
Fred didn’t do his thing. And I didn’t do mine. The
service went on predictably (as printed). Which is the way
most of us expect it, and (if the truth be told) the way most
of us like it.
Why
bring it up today? Two reasons. First, because of this from
John Wimber, founder of one of those new mega-churches (the
one called Vineyard Fellowship). Said Wimber:
When
I became a Christian, I visited various churches in search of
what I called “the stuff.” “Where’s the stuff?”
I’d ask, over and over again. But nobody ever seemed to know
what I was talking about, nor did anybody ever produce what I
was looking for. By “the stuff,” I meant those miracles of
healing and tongue-speaking that were part of the Apostolic
Church. I just assumed that if such extraordinary gifts of the
Spirit had manifested themselves in one era of the church’s
life, they would manifest themselves in another.
“Where’s
the stuff?” That’s what he wanted to know. Which question
wouldn’t have created even a ripple in my stream of
consciousness, had not my new Bishop, Linda Lee, asked the
same question just two weeks ago. Speaking before the opening
session of our Detroit Annual Conference, Linda asked:
“Where’s the stuff?” More to the point: “Where’s the
stuff in your churches?” That’s what she wanted to know.
Sighting
texts like the one I just read to you ... where Jesus sent his
disciples out to preach the Kingdom, cure the sick, cleanse
the lepers, cast out demons and raise the dead ... she coupled
that command of Jesus with his reassuring promise that those
who followed in his name (and took up the burden of his work)
would not only do all “the stuff” they had seen Jesus do,
but greater stuff that they had seen him do.
Then
she began to chide us ... not only for not doing it, but for
no longer believing we could do it. Along about this point in
her sermon, Linda was really “getting it on” (as they say
in some corners of Christendom). So she kept going until she
came to this:
I
ask you, when was the last time (in any of your churches) that
even a single blind person regained their sight. When was the
last time (in any of your churches) you blessed and broke two
of anything and fed 5,000 hungry people. Or when was the last
time (in any of your churches) that anybody was raised from
the dead as a result of your preaching.
Now
I’ve got to tell you, that last set of sentences ...
delivered with fiery passion and rising inflection ... brought
the house down. Or, to be more accurate, brought about ten
percent of the house down. The rest of us applauded politely,
even though we were shocked into mind-numbing disbelief. Had
the Bishop actually said that? Did the Bishop really mean
that? Was she talking figuratively? Or literally? To which she
quickly said: “I am talking literally.”
Well,
my first reaction was both defensive and angry. I wanted to
ask ... not out loud of course ... “When
was the last time any of that stuff happened in a church you
served, Bishop?” But I kept that to myself, pondering the
matter a little longer. Which was when I made a rather
interesting discovery.
What
I was really processing was my own sense of ministerial
impotence ... especially when she touched on the issue of
“raising the dead.” That’s because I deal in death every
four or five days and have discovered that there is little I
can do about it, either before or after the fact. I see people
in the process of dying. Then I bury them, once they have
accomplished it.
I see people die slowly.
I see people die
suddenly.
I see people die too
early.
And I see some who
die too late.
I see people die tragically.
I see people die
foolishly.
I see people die of
their own hand.
And I see some who
die at their neighbor’s hand.
I
see people die by degrees, day after dragging day. I also see
death claim some by drama and others by drift. And in the
midst of all that dying, what do I do? Not much that changes
the outcome. I make visits. I read Psalms. I hold hands. I say
prayers. But, as concerns “all that dying,” I am pretty
much powerless to stop it. And I am absolutely no good after
the fact.
Sometimes,
after death comes, I say to those who remain: “Of course it
hurts. But given what she experienced over the last few days
(few weeks, few months, few years),
I don’t think any of us would willingly call her back
if it meant calling her back for
more of the same.” To which everybody nods. But there
have been other times when death has come and snatched someone
that, had there been a
way for me to snatch them back, I would have done so. But it
never seemed like there was. So I never did.
And
I don’t know if I could today ... even if I tried. But what
I think my Bishop was trying to do, was remind people like me
that there is (by God) more power in us than we either know or
claim. And if it be so for us, surely it is so for the
churches we serve.
I
don’t know what miracles are. By definition, if I could
explain one, it wouldn’t be one. Truth be told, I resonate
to John Claypool’s observation, several Saturday mornings
back, when he said: “A miracle may best be described as what
happens when, for God’s own purposes, God chooses to do
suddenly what God normally does slowly.” Meaning that I
don’t know how water becomes wine in the twinkling of an
eye. But I know how water becomes wine (by God’s good
design) over several months of vineyard-planting,
rain-falling, vines-sprouting, grapes fattening, and juice
fermenting. Most times, God works at one pace. But every
one-in-a-blessed while, it seems that God speeds things up.
But
that’s a subject for another day. What I need to remember
this morning ... and what I need to get you to remember this
morning ... is that God is a tireless worker. And for those
who faithfully labor in God’s fields, there are often
tremendous (albeit unpredictable) results. The smarter I get,
the less I understand. But the longer I minister,
the more I marvel.
*****
Let
me lighten things up a bit as I close. Golly sakes, it’s
nearly summer, isn’t it? Did you hear the one about the
three guys and the locked car? The first guy says: “Give me
a coat hanger and I’ll get us in.” The second guy says:
“Not a coat hanger, stupid. Someone will think you’re
stealing the car.” Leading the third guy to say: “Well,
the two of you better do something pretty quick, because
it’s starting to rain and the top’s down.”
Well,
a half-decent preacher could do a ton of stuff with that. All
I want to use it for today is to say that, in the midst of the
debate that swirls around the spectacular, don't overlook the
obvious. For it is in the midst
of that which is obvious that one often finds the best
miracles the church has to offer.
I
don’t know how many blind people have regained their sight
here. But, Sunday after Sunday, I preach
to a trio of ophthalmological surgeons who do things
with eyes that I can’t begin to calculate
or comprehend.
I
don’t know how many times I’ve broken two of anything and
fed five thousand people. But I’ve got fifty thousand of
your dollars that says we keep a lot of soup kitchens afloat
locally, and seventeen hundred of your signatures on Bread for
the World petitions (thank you, Norris Lee) that will lead to
the feeding of millions, globally.
I
don’t know how many people I’ve raised from the dead, but
tomorrow afternoon, I’ll lay down with more than a hundred
of you and give somebody a new lease on life with a pint of my
old, tired blood.
Not
to mention Scott Wilkinson, who leaves for Belize next
Saturday as part of a medical mission team, or the Birmingham
Eleven who will leave tomorrow afternoon for “Prague Nine”
where they’ll get tired, dirty, sweaty and smelly, as a
result of going a few miles, to pound a few nails, make a few
friends, and build a few bridges.
And
time will surely fail me, should I try to envision all that
you will change tomorrow as a result of all the dollars you
have pledged today. Talk about Good Stuff ...
*
* * * *
This
sermon was preached as part of a great Sunday morning
celebration of Pentecost and Ingathering of Pledges for our
“Now’s Our Chance” campaign. Let the record show that
nearly five million dollars have been pledged toward
the construction of a new Christian Life Center (a fact
which is no less miraculous because it is within the economic
capability of the members of this congregation.)
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