The 'Puter Ate My Sermon!

Tropical storm Fay rained down upon our rural area all day and night this previous Saturday. I had worked up most of the text for Sunday's sermon and had only the finishing touches to put on it prior to heading to church Sunday morning. The storm knocked out the electricity at our home and much of the surrounding area overnight Saturday. I got up in the dark and tried my best to find clothes that didn't need ironing. With no water (we have a well), no lights or electricity, I headed to the door. My sermon was stuck inside my PC and I couldn't print it out.

When I got to church some had said they saw me drive by earlier. Yep, I headed uptown to get a sausage biscuit as we couldn't cook anything at home that morning. I told those gathered about our dilemma and went on to say that I couldn't print out my sermon due to no electricity. I was assured that the sermon would be just what The Lord wants to be said.

Sure enough, to my amazement, the sermon was just what we needed to hear. The Lord spoke things through the scripture that I had not planned and I was as inspired as the congregation. After church a small group came to me and said that I should let my computer eat my sermon every Sunday! I don't know if I'm going to follow that advice but I'll certainly be more willing to let the Holy Spirit guide the message more than me.

New Youth Minister....Yippie!

We (I) hired a new youth minister as a result of placing an ad on the conference classifieds. He comes from Church of God, but is lead to minister to youth anywhere...from any denomination. I welcome him.

Tonight was his debut service and he got the elders in attendance to be motivated to do more to support the youth. More importantly, he ministered to the youth and let them know that they were a part of a movement of God in the community, county, and state. They were overwhelmed by his message. I was as well.

God puts people in our lives for us to minister to, learn from, and move forward in Christ through. I feel, as a pastor, that I have to minister to our new youth minister. More importantly, I have to take a back seat to his ministry. Together we can accomplish things that neither of us could do alone. Does this make sense?

Empowerment is a big deal. Many pastors lack a sense of desiring to empower someone else to make a move in Christ. I, as a budding pastor, see this as a move that is to be embraced, cultivated, and heralded. If it comes back to bite me in the face...so be it. But for the meanwhile, I'm supporting our new youth minister. He comes from a Church of God background...but aren't we all in a church of God? We'll see where this venture takes us, but for now, I'm supporting our new youth minister! Tonight's message he brought made us all come to tears in following Christ.

Just a rural pastor's perspective. Whaddya city slickers think? ( I used to be a city slicker.)

Sunday 081708 Sermon

Weekly Sermon Posts

What Fruit Do I Bear

Matthew 15

Clean and Unclean

1Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2"Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don't wash their hands before they eat!"

3Jesus replied, "And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4For God said, 'Honor your father and mother'^[a] and 'Anyone who curses his father or mother must be put to death.'^[b] 5But you say that if a man says to his father or mother, 'Whatever help you might otherwise have received from me is a gift devoted to God,' 6he is not to 'honor his father^[c]' with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8" 'These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9They worship me in vain;
their teachings are but rules taught by men.'^[d]"

10Jesus called the crowd to him and said, "Listen and understand. 11What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean.' "

12Then the disciples came to him and asked, "Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?"

13He replied, "Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14Leave them; they are blind guides.^[e] If a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit."

15Peter said, "Explain the parable to us."

16"Are you still so dull?" Jesus asked them. 17"Don't you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man 'unclean.' 19For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20These are what make a man 'unclean'; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him 'unclean.' "

What was Jesus telling his disciples, and the Pharisees? In a nutshell, it isn’t what we eat, or how we eat it that matters, rather, it’s what we say, think, and do that determines whether we are holy in God’s eyes.

In those times, the Pharisees ritualistically did everything. They prayed the way that they had been instructed to pray, they would eat, drink, and do all they did according to doctrines and traditions…and the law. The disciples weren’t cut from the same cloth.

When preparing for a meal the Pharisees would go through a cleaning ritual the was as follows: They’d pull their garment back on their arms to above the elbows, then wipe off any visible dirt on their hands. Next they would take an eggshell sized amount of water and pour it over one hand. Then, making a fist, they would rub the water against the open hand cleaning the one hand first. They would repeat the procedure with the other hand. Next another dose of water was poured over each hand until the water ran off the arm at the elbow. That was the ritual they followed in preparation for a meal.

Jesus tells them they are hypocrites! All this ritual does nothing to purify them, for it isn’t what goes in – or for that matter, how it goes in – that makes one holy, rather it is what comes out from the heart that makes one holy. This ritualistic cleansing the Pharisees did was for the benefit of those who saw them eating. It was to make a grand display as to how righteous and holy they were in the eyes of others. But this is a dangerous thing to do because it is only for appearances sake that they do it.

It wasn’t just the Pharisees who tried to give the appearance of piety. Look at Acts 5, and what happens when someone in the early church does things for appearance sake, rather than for the Lord:

Anannias and Sapphira sell their property but keep some of the proceeds for themselves before presenting the gift to the church. Both are stricken dead because of it.

They wanted to be made to look holy, but they were actually being greedy. Appearances lead others to see us a certain way.

Please let me share with you a story.

Illustration:

After WWI there was a rugged man - a man of the sea - who was taking treatments for a skin disease on his face. His appearance was very disturbing. He traveled great distances to get his treatments and had to stay for a few days whenever he had his treatments. He sought out a place to stay near the hospital, but whenever anyone saw his face they refused him a room.

One night he went to a boarding house near the hospital and asked only to be able to take up a place on the porch for shelter and rest. The woman who ran the place was repaginated when saw him. He said that people look at him and are afraid because of his appearance, but he assured her that he wouldn’t be any trouble. She said that it would be ok. A little later in the evening she went out to the porch and invited him in to join them for dinner but he said that he’d be fine where he was, as he had some food with him. After dinner the woman came out to the porch and visited with the man. He was sweet and very nice to talk with. She told him that she would make up a cot inside and he could sleep there.

The next morning when the woman got up she saw that the man had left and the bed linins were folded up neatly and the cot put up. A little later in the morning a neighbor saw her and said that she noticed the guest leaving early in the morning. She said, “I can’t believe you let him stay at your place. He came to my place and I refused him.”

The next time the man came to the hospital for treatments he went to the boarding house and presented the woman with some fish and the largest oysters she’d ever seen. He said that he caught them earlier in the morning so that they would be as fresh as they could be. This man had to catch a bus at 4am in order to get to the city for treatments later in the day. Imagine what time he had to get up to go catch those fish and oysters.

Over the next year that man would send flowers, fruits and vegetables that he grew himself simply as gifts to the lady and her family who showed him hospitality. It wasn’t anything about what went into this man, his appearance, or what others thought that made him who he was…it was what went out from his heart.

So what things come from our hearts? We get so caught up in things of this world – the flesh - that we don’t realize what’s coming from our hearts. What we feed our spirit with is what will come from us. Do we get enough spiritual food to make our actions bear spiritual fruit?

This book, the Holy Bible, gives us spiritual food.

This time of worship today, gives us spiritual food.

Prayer every day, throughout the day, gives us spiritual food.

Bible study; small group meetings; prayer groups, all give us spiritual food.

And if we take enough in, we become what it is all about. If we’re to have someone who knows us write an essay about who we are, what kind of person we are…if they can’t say first that we’re Godly or loving or have a servant’s heart…we’re not much better than the Pharisees.

It isn’t what people see in us because of a position, title, job, grade or anything else that matters. Our actions reflect what’s in our hearts and if they don’t result in the world seeing Christ in us, then we really, really need to see if the title “Christian” truly applies.

The "Johnny Box"

When I began pastoring my church in June this year I was told about passing the "Johnny Box" after the children's sermon. It looks like a treasure chest with a slot in the top. The children walk through the congregation and people make a donation to the box. It was made by a previous (now deceased) pastor and he encouraged the congregation to deny themselves at least one little pleasure during the week (like a soft drink, dessert, candy, etc.) and donate that money to the box for the pastor to use when a person in need comes for assistance. It's awesome!

Just last week a woman in need contacted the church. I was able to help her with her power bill with funds from the Johnny Box. Add that to the food we were able to glean from our pantry and it made a difference in at least one person's life.

Many pastors don't have a well funded discretionary fund to draw upon. Our very giving church keeps adding to and adding to this fund with only myself and one other person knowing how much money is in it (she converts the coins and dollar bills into more manageable denominations). I've shared this idea with some other pastors and they all say that it's something that would help in their church. I'm truly blessed to have been preceded by someone with such a great idea.

Small, Rural Church Preaching

Being a rural preacher it is somewhat different from being in highly populated urban environments in many ways. Most rural congregations are small. When one visits there to deliver the message, there is a sense of "invitation to join our family" that doesn't present itself in larger environments. It is something that those from an urban background sometimes wrestle with.

More than that, you will meet and shake hands with every person there, making a special connection that doesn't quite come about in a large congregation. The folks in these small churches want to know about you, your family, and why you are there. Contrasting that with larger congregations, in these there lacks that personal interaction (perhaps merely due to the numbers). It is something to be missed and yearned for by the big city preacher.

I like the rural preaching assignments. These days I have my own congregation in a rural area and my focus will be more about them than rural preaching at large. Nonetheless, I cannot forget the small church experiences that brought me to where I am today. Today I'm serving ONE congregation. Lord willing, this small rural congregation may grow to be a large rural congregation. But a rural congregation, it will remain.

Brother Marty