Sunday, August 7, 2022

Ninth Sunday after Pentecost
Genesis 15:1-6
Psalm 33:12-22
Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16
Luke 12:22-34 (35-40)

Our soul has waited for Yahweh. He is our help and our shield. For our heart rejoices in him, because we have trusted in his holy name. Let your loving kindness be on us, Yahweh, since we have hoped in you.

The psalmist writes, “Blessed is the nation whose God is Yahweh...” The numbers from surveys throughout the U.S. in the past few years have been disappointing. They show that fewer people have faith in God than ever before. I still believe that Americans believe that there is something bigger than them. Even so, I’m not so sure that we really trust in God as we should. We trust in so many things. We trust in our talents. We trust in our politicians. We trust in our strength. We trust in our financial institutions. We trust in our ideas. We even trust in our generosity. Sadly, I’m not so sure that many churches even trust in God. Too many Christians these days trust in their pastor, their programs, and even in their material possessions. Just like those in the secular world, they trust in their ideas rather than in God.

We are reminded that a king is not saved by an army or a man by great strength. Man is saved by God’s grace, and God has no favorites. He sees all mankind; He watches all people of the earth. The psalmist describes Him as the one, “who fashions all of their hearts and considers all of their works.”

We are called to be patient and to trust in God. He is our help and our shield. We struggle with this because we have seen that there are wonderful people who helped and shielded others. We don’t give God credit for the work they do. We are thankful for the military and first responders. We are thankful for the Food Banks and other organizations that aid the poor. There are so many in the world who are doing good works locally, nationally, and internationally to make a better life for others. But we forget that all those who are blessed to help are blessed by God.

There are things that happen in the world that require action. A hungry person will not eat if someone does not help them find some bread, but we have to be careful that we do not allow our actions or generosity to become our god, that we do not trust in ourselves or let others trust in us. Blessed is the nation, and the man, whose God is Yahweh. Happy are they who trust in His holy name. We might be able to give of ourselves in very real ways, acting on the opportunities in front of us to serve our neighbors, but we have to trust that God is behind it all, that His grace is what saves people even in tangible ways in this world.

This seems like an impossible expectation. As a matter of fact, too many people think we are foolish to trust in God, especially when we trust in Him to care for us in ways that seem to take too much time. “Where is your God now?” they ask when our prayers seem unanswered. Unfortunately, we can easily suffer the same doubts when God does not work according to our expectations.

There was a movie released in 2001 called “The Rat Race” was about a Las Vegas magnate who set a star filled cast on a wild chase after a bag of money to provide a new way for his customers to gamble. The film was filled with cliché experiences as the characters became involved in all the craziness.

In one scene a couple of women were driving down the road and somehow they lost the highway. They came across a roadside stand with a woman who was selling squirrels. They did not want a squirrel, they just wanted directions to the highway. They repeatedly refused and asked the lady for directions. The lady described a shortcut and they trusted that following her very detailed instructions would get them to the highway. As they came across each turn exactly where and how it was expected, they became more and more confident in the lady’s instructions. They were excitedly expectant as they turned the last corner but then realized they had made a huge mistake. That last turn led to a very steep hill and as they were careening down it they passed a bunch of signs that said, “You,” “should,” “have,” “bought,” “a,” “squirrel.” Then their car fell over the cliff into a large pile of other vehicles whose owners made the same mistake.

The squirrel lady initially seemed odd to the women, but their trust grew at every turn when her instructions were perfect. Sometimes the world, and the people in the world, make it easy for us to believe that they are right and true. A lie becomes believable if you tell it enough times, giving us reason to trust in something other than God’s Word. Unfortunately, we see too much of this in the world today, and it makes us wonder why the God of truth has not done something to make the world right. As we lose our patience, we turn our faith to the people whom we think have proven themselves to be true. We believe in the promises that sound believable.

What happens when a promise is too long in coming? We live in a world of instant gratification. People don’t write letters because it is faster to send an email. We have overnight delivery for packages we buy online; in some cases, we can even get things delivered within hours. We don’t have to go into a grocery store anymore: we simply shop online, and they will have it waiting at a pick-up spot.

We don’t like to wait. We pick the shortest line at the grocery store. We follow recommendations at the theme parks to visit the busiest rides early to avoid the crowds. We pay extra for expedited shipping. I read a post on Facebook that suggested that if someone doesn’t return a text within minutes, then they must not want to communicate. We can have just about anything we want instantly, gratifying our deepest wants and our basic needs quickly.

Patience is difficult for us all. Imagine what it must have been like for Abraham. When Abraham first arrived in Shechem after being sent away from his home and family in Genesis 12, God promised that his offspring would inherit that land. Abraham was already an old man, and Sarah was not much younger. She was sixty-five, well beyond childbearing years, but God promised offspring. It could have been accomplished by adoption, but God promised a child from his own flesh. In Genesis 15, Abraham questioned the promise.

“Behold, you have given no children to me: and, behold, one born in my house is my heir,” said Abraham. God is not bothered by our doubts and questions. When we are uncertain about what He intends for our lives, we won’t be called unfaithful if we ask Him to explain. As a matter of fact, despite the ridiculousness of the promise as it is given in today’s lesson, Abraham still “believed in Yahweh, who credited it to him for righteousness.” Faith in God means trusting Him, even when it seems like the promise can never be fulfilled. Isaac was born when Abraham was 100 years old; decades passed between the promise and fulfillment.

Unfortunately, between the promise and the fulfillment Abraham and Sarah took God’s plan into their own hands. Sarah gave him her maidservant Hagar and a child was born. Sarah gave him her maidservant Hagar and a child was born. This lack of trust has caused problems throughout the world for millennia, even to today.

We don’t need to take God’s plan into our own hands, but we like to see results. The clock is constantly ticking in our world. God might not be limited by time or space, but we are. So, like Abraham and Sarah, we do whatever we think is best to make God’s will happen. Now, of course, there are those who blame Sarah, especially since we are told that Abraham’s faith is extraordinary. But the reality is that Abraham allowed himself to be swayed. He believed, but he also doubted.

We want the tangible evidence that God is really doing what He said He would do. But faith is not really faith if it is about things that we can experience with our senses and our flesh. Faith, as the writer of Hebrews tells us, is the assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen. Faith is believing in something we can’t touch, see, hear, taste or smell. It is believing in something that is beyond this world. Faith is believing in the better, heavenly country which was promised to our forefathers. They believed when it was not even within their reach. The people of Israel would not see the Promised Land given to Abraham for hundreds of years. Yet, they believed in the a distant promise, one that was given to their descendants. It was given to us.

The writer of Hebrews reminds us of the people who came before, the faithful from every generation who believed in God’s promises even though they would not receive it during their lifetime. We have been given that which they desired; we dwell with the One to whom they committed their lives. We have received the promise. Is it something we can grasp? No, eternal life is not something we can touch, see, hear, taste or smell. However, we can be assured that it is true by faith. We are convicted by God’s Spirit and His grace of that which is real though unseen. We believe not because we have done anything to deserve that which is to come, but because God is faithful. We have Abraham as an example of faith, but even more so we have Jesus Christ who is our life and our hope and our peace. Everything else is like the squirrel lady, unreliable, unpredictable and perishable.

If we are honest with ourselves and honest with God, we would all admit that there are parts of the Bible that are easy for us to ignore because it seems like Jesus is speaking only to the needs and understanding of the crowds in His day, not to ours. After all, His examples and stories do not reach into our modern daily lives. We don’t understand their way of life. We have a much different point of view, different problems, and many different expectations. Our economic world is different. Our political world is different. Our social world is different. How can Jesus expect us to fulfill the expectations He gave to the people two thousand years ago and thousands of miles away?

The writer of Hebrews tells us, “Now faith is assurance of things hoped for, proof of things not seen.” It’s all about faith. This is an easy statement to make, but it is much harder to live. After all, what is faith? How do we define something so intangible, so incomprehensible? The scriptures are filled with faith stories, and we all have our own stories to tell, but can we really define what it is? And what happens when our actions are faithless? What happens when we question God about how or when He will accomplish His promises? Does this mean we don’t have faith?

We won’t necessarily see the promises of God fulfilled as we want or expect. Think about the people in Jesus’ day who were expecting a military or political king. They didn’t get what they expected, they got something better, and yet most of them did not see the truth. There are many today who are still waiting for the Messiah to come to make Israel great again. They want God to make things happen in their time and in their way. The point of faith is to believe that God will do what He promises in His time and way.

That’s the hard part. We have a difficult time waiting and recognizing how God is fulfilling His promises even now in our lives. We really are impatient, but I don’t think that’s a quality that is missing just from those of us who live in this age of instant gratification. Abraham waited longer, but even so he didn’t wait long enough. He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness, and yet we learn he didn’t trust God enough to wait. The people in Jesus’ day trusted that God would send His Messiah, but they didn’t trust Him enough to believe that He was doing it differently than they expected. Despite all their failures, God was still faithful. Despite all our questions and doubts, God will be faithful.

The Old Testament and Epistle lessons today remind us that Abraham had faith. He trusted God and followed Him out of the world He knew into a world he did not know. He left his home and his people to become a nomad, to journey to a strange and foreign land because a God he didn’t know called him. There is nothing reasonable about Abraham’s story, at least from our point of view. How do we react to those who say, “God told me to do this?” Usually we laugh or ridicule them, or we reject the notion that God might speak to an individual in such a specific way. This modern world scorns those who act on faith, especially when it doesn’t fit into their expectations.

I wish God would talk to me with such clarity. I have asked Him repeatedly what He wants me to do for as long as I can remember. I’ve sought His will on career, family, future. Sometimes I think I know what’s He’s saying, but most of the time I just muddle through. I’m not very patient, you see, and so when things don’t fall into place as soon as I think they should, I begin to second guess myself. So, even now as I wander through each day with the faith I have, I wonder if I’m headed in the right direction. God does not always seem as clear to me as He seems to have been to Abraham. Could I leave my home and family like Abraham to follow God? I’d like to say “Yes, I have that much faith,” but I’m not quite that confident.

But that’s the point of our scriptures today. It isn’t about how much faith we have; it is about trusting in God even when we feel like we are faithless. It is comforting to see this story of Abraham from Genesis 15, because even though Abraham is lifted up for his faith in this text, we also see the reality of Abraham’s faithlessness. He trusted God even while He doubted God. Abraham questions how and when God will provide him offspring because he doesn’t see how any gift or blessing really makes sense if he has no heir to which it can be passed.

I suppose the thing we have to ask ourselves in the midst of our questions is what to do while we wait. We don’t have to wait if we are instantly gratified, but that’s not the way it works with faith. Sometimes God’s promises take time. Take the promise of eternal life, for instance. We know we have eternal life now, but it is a future promise that we won’t see fulfilled until we pass from this life into the next. We are certainly not running off to take that into our own hands, although I have been finding myself crying out “Come, Lord Jesus,” often these days.

Jesus doesn’t make living in that faith easy. He tells us in today’s Gospel lesson, “Sell that which you have, and give gifts to the needy. Make for yourselves purses which don’t grow old, a treasure in the heavens that doesn’t fail, where no thief approaches, neither moth destroys.” Perhaps we have not been given the command to leave our family and our homeland to go to an unknown place, but God wants us to trust in Him even to the point of sacrificing everything for His sake, and it is that faith that is credited to us as righteousness.

Jesus has set His expectations of us so high that it doesn’t seem possible to achieve them. Trusting in a God we can’t touch, see, hear, taste or smell, who makes promises that are completely out of our reach is hard. Jesus tells us to trust that God is in control through our bad times as well as our good times. We fail to believe. We fail miserably. We fail daily. We fail desperately. So, we often look at this expectation of trust as something that isn’t meant for us. Yes, we know eternal life is ours, but we don’t know why God isn’t making things right in our world today. So, we ignore some of the texts that don’t seem relevant because we just don’t think Jesus expects the same from us. The bar is too high, and it was set for a people from a different world.

How can I sell everything and give it away when I’m not sure I can even fill the tank of my car to get to work this week? We need every penny just to feed our family. The economic realities of today’s world do not allow us to gather a heavenly treasure without risking our survival now. We trust God, but only so much. Perhaps spiritually, but it is much harder to trust Him when it comes to the tangible world in which we live. So, we make excuses. And we take things into our own hands.

Jesus did not teach us His expectations so that we could find loopholes. He gave them to us so that we might strive to be like Him: Christ-like. He knows we will fail. He knows we will make mistakes daily. He knows that we will never be perfect. But that is alright. There is no reward for faith. He won for us the fulfillment of the promises for which we now wait.

Jesus isn’t looking for the best or most righteous people. Unfortunately, too many thinks that’s the goal of the religious life. They think that if they are faithful enough, the God (or god) they trust will grant the blessings they seek. They think that if they are righteous enough, then they will get what they deserve. Christianity shows us something different. From Jesus we learn that we will never be good enough. We will never be strong enough. We will never be righteous enough. We will fail. That’s why Jesus came. He came to overcome our failure, to stand before God in our stead.

That doesn’t mean we can slack off, however. Jesus still calls us to live according to His expectations, but when we fail, He is there to forgive. He is there to encourage. He is there to continue building us up in faith and hope and peace so that one day - that glorious day - we’ll be face to face with our God for eternity. The words are meant for us, just as much as they were meant for those who heard them from Jesus’ own mouth. They are meant to challenge us, but even more so they are meant to show us how big and wide and wonderful is God’s grace. His love is greater than our mistakes. Faith is not about our faithfulness, maturity, or morality. Faith is about trusting in God’s grace, looking forward to that heavenly country, which is ours because God has promised, not because we’ve done anything to deserve it. We fail miserably. We fail daily. We fail desperately. We justify our failure with an understanding that we live in this different world, as if Jesus’ words are not for us too. We think Jesus can’t expect so much from us. We decide that if the bar is that high, then Jesus meant for us to walk under it.

We can look to Abraham as an example in holding out hope even when there appears to be none. Abraham had been promised a child for decades, but the time came when it seemed he was too old to even think there was no chance for it to happen. The LORD told Abraham to not fear and reaffirmed the promise. Abraham believed and it was credited to him as righteousness. He believed God’s Word and it gave him hope about tomorrow.

There may be promises that we long to see fulfilled, promises about our lives and future that God has spoken into our hearts. We believe that God can and will provide for us in these ways but let us always remember as we wait that God will fulfill all His promises in His time and way. Blessed are those who trust in God because they know what truly matters. We have faith in something we will not see in this world, an eternal Kingdom where we will dwell in God’s presence forever. We have this hope by faith, and this is what is credited to us as righteousness. God remains true even when we question and doubt. He watches from heaven above and knows all, into the very depths of their souls.

God has called us into His Kingdom and given us all we need. He has promised us more than we can possibly imagine, and we are counted as righteous because we believe. We are children of Abraham that are as numerous as the stars in the sky; we are not children not by our own power or work, but because God is faithful. We need not worry or take matters into our own hands because in His time and in His way, He will make everything come together perfectly.

We will not see the fulfillment of all God’s promises in our lifetime; Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham and Sarah all believed even though the promises were years and generations from being fulfilled. And even though they were not always faithful, God was. He is faithful to us, too. So, let us walk in that faith, and live in the hope that rejoices at the promises even before they are fulfilled. In faith we will dwell with God now and forever and inherit the Kingdom that is eternal.