Special Note
The weekend of February 8-10, our church will engage in a week of reflection and study called, “First Things.”  Dr. Jim Baucom, pastor of the Rivermont Avenue Baptist Church in Lynchburg, VA, will be our guest facilitator.  Rivermont is a church very similar to Cliff Temple.  For years it was a declining congregation in a transitional inner-city neighborhood.  Under Jim’s leadership, the church has reclaimed its identity and embraced a new dream for its future.

The purpose of “First Things” will be to create a process by which our church defines the non-negotiable core values upon which we can all agree as essential to our church’s life and out of which we will do our ministry.  These “values” will be intended to help us redefine our mission and give unified focus and purpose to all that we do.

This sermon is the second in a series intended to provide the necessary focus in preparation for February 8-10.  Much of what is said in these sermons will assume what is only being communicated orally in our worship services at Cliff Temple.  The purpose of this special note was to provide a better context for understanding the sermon.

Thank you.

Before Jesus did one thing for which we remember him in his public ministry, before he performed one recorded miracle or preached one recorded sermon, he heard these words from his father, “‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’”  Listen closely.  Before Jesus did one thing that identified him as Lord and Savior he had his father’s blessing; he heard his dad say to him, “I’m proud of you.”  Jesus’ life and ministry were what they were because he was living out of the power of his father’s blessing instead of trying to earn it. 

There is perhaps no more influential factor in any of our lives than the blessing, or lack of it, from those who brought us into this world.  We either sense that we have their blessing and are living out of the inner strength and security it brings or we spend the rest of our lives trying to earn it.  On the human level, if there is a more significant factor that shapes the trajectory of our lives I do not know what it is.  More than a high I.Q. or lack of it.  More than wealth or lack of it.  More even than natural physical ability or lack of it, the presence or lack of the blessing of those who brought us into this world as someone in whom they find pleasure either empowers us or forever restrains us.  Jesus had his father’s blessing from the beginning and it empowered him to save the world. 

Dave Thomas died this past week at sixty-nine.  He founded the Wendy’s restaurant chain back in the 60’s.  He was not only very successful and wealthy, he was also a very generous philanthropist.  He was also a workaholic.  He worked so hard that, not only did he play little or no role in raising his own children, his daughter said that he didn’t even know where her high school was while she was in school.  Yet, this same man gave generously of himself furthering philanthropic causes that benefited children.  How come this strange mix?  Maybe there’s a clue in Thomas’ own confession.  He said that, for most of his life, there were three things he never wanted anyone to know about him.  That he was born out of wedlock, that he was adopted and that he had quit school before getting a high school diploma (A&E, Biography). 

He eventually came to realize that being born out of wedlock should never be a source of personal shame.  None of us are responsible for how we came into this world.  He was also finally able to affirm how wonderful it was to be adopted, to be chosen by a family that loved and blessed him.  Testifying before a Congressional committee on adoption he once said, “‘I know firsthand how important it is for every child to have a home and loving family.  Without a family, I would not be where I am today (Mark Williams, “Wendy's Founder Dave Thomas Dies,” The Associated Press, January 8, 2002).’”

Again, Jesus had his father’s blessing from the beginning and it empowered him to save the world.  “‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’”  My guess, Jesus took more than one quick mental trip back to those Jordan River waters to revisit the place where he got his father’s blessing.  Our family’s blessing is kind of like an emotional and spiritual address that keeps moving with us so that it’s never a long journey home no matter how far away we move.  The contrary is also true.  If we never had that sense of blessing, that keeps moving with us, too, no matter far up or down the ladder of success we may climb.  It’s never more than a rung or two away.  People who left home without the power of being blessed are always something like emotional orphans, looking for someone, anyone, to adopt them.  Something like a stray dog I saw this week.  Battle-scarred from more than one fight for survival.  Scrawny from malnourishment.  Willing to take whatever handout anyone offers just to make it to tomorrow.  I could have been handing her poison.  She was so hungry, she didn’t care.  Kind of like that man that stands on the corner of Jefferson and Beckley, down here, in front of Dave Thomas’ Wendy’s.

Parents who belittle their children, who don’t respect them, who abuse them in any way send their children out into the world unblessed.  This includes parents who don’t love their children enough to spend time with them.  Parents make a terrible mistake when they work so hard to give their children things that they deprive them of the one thing they want most.  Children don’t want what we can give them as much as they want us.  They don’t often know how to tell us that; it doesn’t make it any less true.  On the other hand, parents who bless their children will more likely send them out empowered to live significant, meaningful and generous lives. 

One man went home to see his father just before the father’s death.  He told his dad, “You have always been there whenever any of us children needed you.  And, across the years, you have given us the best single gift that any parent could give – you took delight in us.  In all sorts of ways you let us know that you were glad we were here, that we had value in your eyes, that our presence was a joy and not a burden to you (John Claypool, Stages, Word, 1980, p. 23).”  Blessing our children is not a scientific process whereby we add two parts this and one part that.  It’s an art.  An art that only our hearts know how to practice in the subtle but powerful language that is spoken, parent to child, when that child knows that their presence is a joy and not a burden to us.  That is true of our human parents.  It’s also true of our heavenly parentage.

Over the past several weeks I’ve spent so much time focusing on the blessing of God in sending Jesus to us.  For that matter, I guess you could say that has been the theme of my preaching since you’ve known me, the grace of God in Jesus.  There are two reasons for that.  For one, from my experience, more people who call themselves believers than not live with a secret anxiety about whether or not God truly loves them.  They’ve heard all the scriptures about his love with their ears, but not with their hearts.  They can’t believe that God could ever love them that much even though the scripture says, “God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us (Romans 5:8).”  They live forever handicapped by an inner sense that God takes no pleasure in their presence never quite able to accept that God “chose us in (Christ) before the creation of the world . . ..  In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will (Ephesians 1:4-5).”  God is on the prowl for spiritual orphans who need a safe place to call home and a blessing they never got. 

Essential to redefining our values and mission as we more toward February 8-10 is knowing that, before we start, we have our heavenly Father’s blessing.  Churches whose sense of identity grows out of the blessing of God function in more healthy ways than churches that are still trying to earn God’s blessing.  Churches without that sense of blessing are like emotional and spiritual orphans, always looking for a place to call home.  They’re always following the latest trend in church growth or worship under the guise of honoring God but in reality starving for anything that will make them look good in comparison to other churches.  Churches who live out of the power of God’s blessing become the home for people seeking God’s blessing.  That is the second reason I have focused so much attention on the grace of God in Jesus, so that we might accept God’s blessing in order to live out of it instead of working to earn it.

Every time we walk into this sanctuary we face an enormous challenge.  A visual challenge.  This sanctuary was built in 1938 for a church that, in some ways, no longer exists.  It will hold 1,600 people, I’m told.  On a good Sunday, we’ll have maybe 500 people in worship.  It’s easier to see how many people aren’t here than to see how many people are here.  It’s easy to get lost in comparing the church that is today to a church that doesn’t even exist anymore and come away feeling defeated.  But, only if we measure our significance numerically in comparison to other churches or to the church that once was even here. 

If we let God’s blessing be the standard of measurement, that he takes delight in us and in our presence in his world, defeat is transformed into victory.  We’ve won before we even try.  We are the blessed people of God.  Blessed by our creator who is daily recreating us and is more interested in who we are becoming than who we have been.  We are forgiven, filled with hope, transformed by the living presence of Jesus in us and blessed with his presence every single time two or more of us gather in his name.  We have the power of God’s blessing in us.  And, because we do, we have the power to bless this broken, hurting world full of spiritual orphans.

The apostle Peter preached a sermon in which he referred to Jesus this way.  “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him (Acts 10:38).”  Living out of the power of the blessing he already had, he did good for others as he went along and also empowered them to live spiritually significant lives. 

This is the way the prophet Isaiah expressed the effect the people of God would have on this world when they lived out of the blessing of God.  “‘I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, to open eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.’” 

One of our members was telling me about going through the drive-through at Wendy’s late one evening with her children.  When they pulled out onto Beckley they found themselves at the stoplight right by that man who always stands there with a sign in his hand.  You know, the guy who mumbles to himself, scraggly beard, dirt-black hands.  Like you, I’ve struggled with what to do in those situations.  It is true that some of those folks are con artists.  It was Christmas though and he looked hungry.  Besides, she knew, we’ve all been con artists at one time or another, milking someone else for what we should have earned.  So, she rolled down her window and gave him her burger.  There was plenty of food at home for her.  She was more than blessed.  So, she shared her blessing.

It’s not going to always be easy to know how, when and where and who.  But, we have been empowered by God’s blessing to do more than just come to church and listen to one more sermon on how much God loves us.  As Larry James of Dallas Central Ministries, says, it’s time we cashed in our blessing and put it to work blessing others.  We have been empowered by God’s blessing so that, like Jesus, we might go about doing good in this world and empowering the people of this community to live spiritually significant lives.  It isn’t just a question of whether we should give a cup of cold water or share a word about Jesus.  We are to give cups of cold water in Jesus’ name.  Either without the other is not the justice Jesus seeks.  It’s not either or, it’s both.  And, if we are looking for a place to start, how about the hungry person within our reach, just outside our window? 

Justice isn’t defined strictly in terms of making certain that soccer dads who murder other soccer dads in a fit of rage do time.  Justice, in the truly biblical sense, is proactively seeking ways in which to free people from social, physical and spiritual dungeons in which they’ve been doing time all their lives and to which they were sentenced for the simple crime of being born.

I used to tell the story about some people eating in a restaurant being horrified by what they saw through an open window, a homeless man rummaging through garbage cans in the alley for something to eat.  It was a nice restaurant, sophisticated clientele.  Everyone was horrified.  Finally, a man got up and walked to the window, pulled the curtains to, and said, “There, that’s better.”  I told that story as though it was someone else’s. 

I’ve finally realized that story is mine.  I was the one rummaging through the garbage, looking for something, anything, on which to survive emotionally and spiritually.  Jesus came to the window, saw my ugly scene and threw open heaven’s windows, even its doors, and invited me to feast at his Table.  Then, hecame with me into the alleyway and helped me find a new street called Hope.  I have now come far enough to redefine “better.”  Better is not closing out the ugly scene but opening the curtains so I can see it better and then opening the door and inviting the hungry man to my table to share my food, then going back into the alley with him so that I can help him find his way back to a street that will lead to new hope.  I have the power to do that.  We have the power to bless like that.  Will we cash it in?