"Take, Eat"

 

John 14:8-17

 

     Meredith Viera began the Today Show on Tuesday morning with the words "Americans have a new idol to worship."  It made it sound like we were still back there at Mt. Sinai fashioning another golden calf while we wait for Moses to come down the mountain with the Ten Commandments.  I don't know anything about Jordin Sparks but I do think we have gone down hill in our idol worship.  I mean when Jaclyn Smith was on Charlie's Angels she was an idol worth worshipping.  It is a sad commentary on our society when the number one television show is called American Idol.  There should be a message in there for us somewhere, that somehow our values are messed up. 

 

     One of the preachers we heard last week was Calvin Miller.  He mentioned one Sunday he was preaching when a person near the back of the church had a heart attack.  He said the rescue workers  took out three rows of corpses before they found the person having the heart attack.   It is a sad commentary on my preaching when that could be true here at Waverly Road.  It is a sad commentary on the state of preaching in our country when people find some truth in that statement. 

 

      If there is any Sunday that story should not be true it is on Pentecost.  On that day the people gathered together, still not over the shock of Jesus death, wondering, what do we do now that our leader has left us.  And on that day a mighty wind blew through worship and people who never spoke before got up and began speaking in tongues and for a change everyone understood what was being said.  It was such a wild scene that people who were on the outside looking in thought that they were drunk.  I wonder when the last time was when a mainline denomination church was so full of the spirit that people thought the members might be drunk.  But Peter let them know that they were not drunk, it was God pouring out his Spirit on all flesh. 

 

      It was the Spirit that Jesus was talking about in John 14 when he was preparing his disciples for his departure.  The one he called the Counselor.  Not only will this Spirit dwell in you, this Spirit will change you.  Your sons and daughters will prophesy, the young men will see visions and the old men will dream dreams.  This Spirit will even fill the menservants and the maidservants.  It is a great day that the Lord will bring about, when not just a certain segment of society will hear the word of the Lord. 

 

       Will Campbell spoke Thursday night at the conference.  He talked about a friend of his who picked up trash in the parking lot of a big steeple church.  While he was picking up the trash he came upon a small piece of brownie.  As he picked it up it looked like he was going to eat it.  At that moment a homeless person was walking by and saw him.  He said, "Don't eat that."  "Here, eat this." And he handed him a small McDonald's bag with a hamburger and a small drink in it.  That was probably his breakfast and lunch.  AWill said that was Communion.  Take eat, I offer you all that I have so that you may live.

 

       That homeless person would make a better idol than Jordin Sparks or Jaclyn Smith.  May the wind of God blow us in a new direction, one in which the values of the kingdom of God become our values.  The mainline churches need to stop trying to save themselves and share the good news that the spirit of God is alive and is blowing us in new direction, a direction in which all people will hear the word of the Lord, a direction that recognizes that a homeless person sharing his lunch with someone is closer to the kingdom of God than an idol created by our society.  

 

     This God we worship is something.  When we need a counselor, a word of comfort, that is what God sends our way.  When we need a kick in the pants, when we need to be moved in a new direction, when we are not getting the word out, God's Spirit blows through us and leads us to new people, to share our lives with them. 

 

     Don't eat that old piece of brownie.  Here, eat this and live.