We
are people with eyes on the front of our heads. I know that sounds like a
strange and obvious statement, but it is something that needs to be said in
light of how we actually move through this world. None of us actually know what
is ahead, we cannot say with any kind of certainty what tomorrow will hold. I
have this sermon here written out before me, but there are things, which could
prevent me from finishing it, and although it is my intention for you to hear
it, you may never. We have intentions, we have plans we act like we know what
our tomorrows hold. We have calendars, which mark the days and the years, they tell
us the days for as far into the future as our hearts desire.
My calendar tells me that I will go to the
library tomorrow to begin work on next week’s sermon. It tells me that I have
plans to hear Carla Sunberg speak on Wednesday and have a meeting directly
following that. It says there is an event at Cidra’s school on Thursday evening.
It tells me which days I plan to be in the office this week and reminds me of
the list of things I need to get done as the weeks progresses. It reminds me at
what time I need to pick Stella up from school each day and at what time I
should expect Cidra to come home. It tells me that we pray on Saturday morning and then I have Stella’s 10th
birthday party that afternoon.
Whether
you write it all out on a calendar or keep it in your head, most of us if
asked, “What are you doing on Wednesday at 10am,” would speak with some amount
of certainty. “I am at work.” “I am in class (I am at school).” “I will be at
the doctors.” I will be, I am, we talk as if we know, as if it is a foregone
conclusion. But, although I will tell you that I will be at ENC on Wednesday
morning. There are any number of things, traumatic and mundane that would keep
me from going to hear Carla speak that morning. I DO NOT KNOW what will be. I can not know what will be. I will never
know what will be. And neither will you.
We
with our eyes looking forward, act like we move through time looking at the
path before us, just as we walk down the street, seeing what is ahead and
adjusting our path accordingly. But, we with eyes on the front of our head, who
walk on this earth looking at the path before us do not actually ever see what
is before us. We go forward through our lives walking backward, seeing only the
moment in which we currently reside and all those that have already past. We
are always, continually, blinded to the moment that is to come. When it comes
to life, when it comes to how we actually move through the universe, we move
blindly, only seeing what has come
and never what is to come. We move
blindly forward, looking backwards, seeing what has past, but never able to
turn, to grasp what it is which may come.
Paul, being human just like the rest of us,
is in the same boat. He stands on the eternal edge of the unknowable future
only able to see what has come and not what is to be. The appeal he was hoping
to make when he wrote his first letter to Timothy has come to be, and he lost.
His hope of release and his hope of coming to see Timothy once again have been
dashed to pieces, as our plans for the future so often are. Paul is once again
under house arrest, but unlike before the shadow of the future which looms over
him seems to be bleak. Losing his appeal means that execution is the event
toward which he is moving.
Paul
looks back and he sees the Church he has built. He sees the conversion of Eunice,
Timothy’s grandmother, and then of Lois, his mother and then finally that of
Timothy. He can remember the joy he knew as each one came to know Christ as
Paul himself knows Christ. He can see the seeds of faith which began at
Timothy’s conversion and can see how they have grown and blossomed. Paul wishes he could see it and him once again
with his own eyes, but the Roman decree which he holds says it will not be.
Paul can remember the laying hands on Timothy at his ordination. He remembers
how the spirit, a most precious gift in filled Timothy with power, love and
self-discipline.
Paul’s
heart is breaking. He cannot turn and see forward, he cannot know what is to
be, but he like the rest of us can see the shadows of what will be and rests in
the hope of what is to come in Christ Jesus and in Christ Jesus alone. He cannot
see, his death or what lies beyond. He does not know what will become of
Timothy, what will become of the Church in the years to come but he knows , “in
whom [he] has believed, and is persuaded, that God is able, to keep that which
[Paul has] committed.”
Paul,
like the rest of us cannot see what will be. But always before his eyes is what
has come. He sees the faith of those who have committed themselves to God. He
sees how that faith has grown and blossomed, how one has become, how two has
become more and how more has become many. He sees the power of the Spirit at
work in each one, he sees the love given by Christ as it flows through his
people and his Church, he sees the self-discipline of Christ’s followers which
has led to the planting and growing of Churches from Jerusalem to Rome, in
Asia, and Macedonia, in Greece and in the world beyond.
Paul
remembers, Paul can see what has been. He can see, every time he prays for
Timothy which is often, he is reminded of the tears on Timothy’s face when they
last parted. Paul left Timothy there, tears on his face, and perhaps fear
seeding in his heart. The weight of Paul’s ministry is being put on Timothy,
Paul has all but passed on the mantle. And even as Paul rejoices in Timothy’s
faith, he remembers Timothy’s face and sees his tears, sees his grief, his
fear, his pain, his sorrow. He sees in Timothy’s face, all the questions that
only the future can answer.
What
will tomorrow hold? The world around seems so full of chaos. The leaders are
not leaders we can trust. The system is broken. The courts are unreliable.
There seems to be no justice found there or anywhere. The people of God are
divided. Some seem to be following and listening to voices which preach, which
teach a gospel foreign to the one we know in Jesus Christ. The moment in which
we reside is so fraught with turmoil, confusion, uncertainty. What will
tomorrow bring? How will our world change in the next month? The next year? No
matter how much we strain our heads to look, to turn, to see, we cannot, way
forward which is ever at our backs. All that tomorrows holds will not be
revealed until tomorrow becomes today and we may not know what changes are
being made until today is yesterday and we can look back and see what has
happened more clearly.
Paul
has a word for us today, it is the same word he gave to Timothy, who stood in
the same place we do today. Our world is just as chaotic, uncertain, full of
turmoil and confusion as his was then. We
do not know what is to come, and will not know what is to come, until what is
to come becomes what has been done.
But Paul says, it is O.K. don’t fear, don’t fret. See what I see, it is the
same as what you can see. You can see the faith of those who have come before
you. You can see where you have been and how God has brought you through. The same
Spirit which is within me is the same gift of God which resides in you. The
same power in which has brought us here is the same power which God will
continue to grant us into the future. The love of God which has been our life’s
blood in the past will continue to be the love that comforts, and surrounds us
as we move forward. The self-discipline given to us through the Spirit which
has grown our faith, and been the strength on which we have relied thus far
will continue to be that for us.
Do
not be ashamed. Your faith is your
faith, remember your testimony, remember your story, remember where you have
been and how God has brought you through. The God of your faith in the past,
the God of the faith of all those around you, (your mother, your grandmother)
is the faith that will lead you on. Let the past, and all that you have known,
in your life, in the life of your parents of the faith, the faith seen in
scripture, the faith of those in our community here today. Look to it, hear
their testimony and do not be afraid, do not be ashamed. Although we all may
know the tears, the uncertainty, the sorrow, the pain, the chaos, of being
people who move forward through life, walking blindly backwards, know that what
we have seen, what we have known CAN lead us faithfully into the future.
We
are weeks from The Head of the Charles, the great international regatta held
here on the Charles each Fall. The river will be filled with rowers. In fact
almost any day between early Spring through late Fall they can been seen on the
river practicing. I love seeing the rowers. I think the sight of them is
beautiful. The way they move so quickly, so seamlessly through the water,
gliding up and down the river with such ease. I also love the sight of them
because they are a visual picture for me of what it is to move through this
life, with Christ.
The
row boats, they move forward up or down the river, while the rowers are facing
backwards. All of the rowers, each and every one of them are backwards. They
guide their boats, up or down the river, but never see what is before them.
They go forward, always only seeing where they have been . BUT they do not do
it alone. There is some in the boat with them, the coxswain. The coxswain,
stands before them, and sees the way forward and guides the rowers along the
path they must take. Let me tell you, we may be like rowers moving blindly
forward, always, only seeing what is behind, but we are not alone in the boat. We have one in the boat with us who can
see the way forward, who will guide and direct us through life’s unseen future.
We have one who can be trusted, who can be relied upon. Who will tells us the
way to go, who will see the obstacles which we cannot and will adjust our path
accordingly. If we are the rowers and the boat is the Church, there is one who
is within the Church, given to the Church, the gift which has been given to
each of us, to all of us, who will guide and direct us. It is the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is here with us, although we can only know what we have seen,
the Spirit can see that which we cannot see and if we rely on the power, the
love and the self-discipline instilled within each of us, within God’s church
we will not be lead astray. The one with eyes to see forward, who can see, what
we cannot see, will guide and direct us into the future, on this we can rely.
We
can join with Paul and say, “I know the one in whom I have put my trust, I am
sure that he is able to guard, until that day, what I have entrusted to him.”
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