A Sermon by Pastor Tom Lacey . . .

BE TRUE TO YOURSELF

1 Corinthians 4:1-5, Preached at Congregational Church of Boca Raton, May 25, 2008

A vampire bat came flapping in from the night; face all covered in fresh blood and parked himself on the roof of the cave to get some sleep. Pretty soon all the other bats smelled the blood & began hassling him about where he got it. He told them to let him get some sleep, but they persisted until he finally gave in. "OK, follow me," he said and flew out of the cave with hundreds of excited bats behind him. Down through a valley they went, across a river & into a huge forest. Finally he slowed down & all the other bats excitedly milled round him, tongues hanging out for blood. "Do you see that large oak tree over there?" he asked. "YES, YES, YES!!!" the bats all screamed in frenzy. "Good for you!" said the bat, "Because I didn't!" Hey, at least he has the self-assurance to admit when he messes up.

Our text is about living boldly. Now I’m not talking mountain climbing or sky diving bold, which are great. I’m talking about the boldness of self-assurance, when you can say with Paul, “it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court.” Now that’s freedom, isn’t it? He even says he doesn’t judge himself. He boldly goes … wherever God sends him. Paul is free, but not without conscience. His judge is not fellow flawed, agenda-filled people, nor his self-doubting self. In other words, he won’t let anyone weaken his resolve to live for God and good and he refuses to lower himself to standards that have nothing to do with God’s will for him. God alone has the authority to judge his activities. As Christ’s servant he is free from debilitating self-doubt and lives boldly for a higher goal, which reminds me of little, five year old Bert, who though he suffers from neuroblastoma, a type of cancer, knows who he is. His favorite thing is to draw. One day he was asked, “Are you going to be an artist when you grow up?” And his response was indignant: “I am an artist.” Be confident in what God has to say about you, not what others have said, for good or for bad. Don’t judge yourself as not being important, and don’t judge yourself as more valuable than others. Instead, find your confidence in Christ. As scripture says, “When my soul fainted within me, I remembered the Lord.” Jonah 2:4 And it also says, “If I honor myself, my honor means nothing.” John 8:54 

What we want to see this morning is that inevitably we find ourselves in critical moments when it’s time to say what we believe is true and do with our own time, money, and talent what we believe ought to be done.

It seems to me that these moments of truth come more often than we recognize. We like to think that it’s just teenagers who have to deal with peer pressure, and so we say to them, “What if everyone was jumping off a pier, would you do it also?” But this isn’t just for teenagers, this is for everyone. Not the pier part, but the knowing your mind and values, and when it is time to make sure you are heard. We all have to be true to ourselves, more often than we probably accept, even or especially when it costs something to do so.  

Anthony Campolo recalls a deeply moving incident that happened in a Christian junior high camp where he served. One of the campers, a boy with spastic paralysis, was the object of heartless ridicule. When he would ask a question, the boys would deliberately answer in a halting, mimicking way. One night his cabin group chose him to lead the devotions before the entire camp. It was one more effort to have some "fun" at his expense. Unashamedly the spastic boy stood up, and in his strained, slurred manner—each word coming with enormous effort—he said simply, "Jesus loves me—and I love Jesus!" That was all. Conviction fell upon those middle schoolers. Many began to cry. Years afterward, Campolo still meets men in the ministry who came to Christ because of that testimony. Our Daily Bread

The fact is we aren’t given a golden invitation that tells us when to stand true. We also don’t have a sign that goes on in front of us to tell us to applaud. You have to believe in yourself, no matter the circumstances, favorable or unfavorable, being true to yourself means being free to be yourself. Be true to yourself. Stand up for your values. Consider not what you might lose by saying what needs to be said, but what you will lose if you don’t. When your conscience is being pricked that’s God opening a new door for you to walk through. This is one way we can follow God’s will, even if we didn’t plan on it being this way.

Georgene Johnson lived in Cleveland, Ohio. She was 42 years old. She was trying to have a good attitude about being 42 years old, so she started running and exercising to keep in shape. She said, “I’m not going to look like I am 42, or at least I am going to look like a good 42.” She did well in her running. She was running farther every day. She thought she would try a little competition and entered a 10K race. That’s about six miles. Nervous about her first race, she got up early, arrived at the start of the race. To her surprise there were a lot of people milling around, stretching, getting ready. All of a sudden a voice on the microphone said, “Move to the starting line.” This is it. A gun sounded and they were off, like a huge wave, hundreds of runners, sweeping her up. She was in the race. After about four miles it occurred to her that they ought to be turning around and heading back to the finish line. She wondered why they didn’t turn around. She stopped and asked an official, “How come the course isn’t turning around?” He said, “Ma’am, you are running the Cleveland Marathon. Twenty-six miles.” Her event, the 10K, was to start a half-hour after the start of the marathon. Most people would have stopped right there and said, “That’s it, I’m going home.” But she kept right on going, telling herself, “This is not the race I trained for. This is not the race I entered. But for better or worse, this is the race that I am in.” She finished the race. Now imagine what that did to her sense of who she can be. When in an extremely tense and critical moment in a basketball game, Michael Jordan would remind himself of a past great shot he made in order to steel up his courage to rise to the occasion again. Take the leap of faith and be courageous in order to be yourself.  

By and large, we don’t get to pick our lives. There is accident of birth, of place, of race and color, of time and wealth. Our own type and quantity of intelligence is given at least partly to us by genetics. We might suffer more than others who live similar lives or be the fortunate ones who seem to move so easily through life’s struggles. One choice we make at a young age may influence the next twenty years or more of our lives. Perhaps this is not the race you trained for, but for better or worse it’s the race you’re in. Look at Paul, the servant of Christ. He was at the top of his game in Jerusalem. He was a young, ambitious, politically connected up and coming star operating just on the outside of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish Council. He was trusted with the job of finding and rooting out this new heretical sect called the Way, followers of Jesus. If he did this job well, he would find himself elected to the Council in short order, and then if he played his cards right become a powerful leader on Council in due time. But that’s where it all ended for Saul of Tarsus. He left Jerusalem, headed out on the road to Damascus, and by the time night had fallen, he had been struck blind by a vision of the Lord. When Saul left three days later, his sight returned to him by a Christian’s laying on of hands and baptized in the faith, he no longer traveled to Damascus but into the desert. There he would study Christ’s life, receive his commission, and become Paul, God’s ambassador to the Gentiles. That was now the race he was in, God’s race. We ought to live for what God calls us to live for. We mustn’t be afraid to speak our truth. Be bold and courageous, never doubting that the Lord opens doors, and when doors won’t open, throws up windows, and when windows can’t be found, breaks down walls, and when walls won’t budge, tears open roofs. We may need to go from being Saul to Paul but what a journey that would be.  

How important is it to live according to God’s Spirit? It means everything. Even the Ten Commandments should be seen in this light. Thomas G. Long, writing in The Christian Century (March 7, 2006), argues that understanding the Ten Commandments properly sets people free. The Decalogue begins not with the rules, like ten orders you must obey, but it begins with a proclamation of freedom: ‘I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.’ Exodus 20:2 Having liberated them from slavery, the Lord God does not wish to return them to any form of slavery. And even though we will probably always refer to the declarations that follow as the ‘Ten Commandments,’ we can also think of them as descriptions of the life that prevails in the zone of God’s freedom. ‘Because the Lord is your God,’ the Decalogue affirms, ‘you are free not to need any other gods. You are free to rest on the seventh day; free from the tyranny of lifeless idols; free from murder, stealing and covetousness as ways to establish yourself in the land.’”

Long then concludes that “the commandments are not weights, but wings that enable our hearts to catch the wind of God’s Spirit and to soar.” But we can only soar if we have the courage to fly, and we can only fly if we are brave enough to spread our wings, and we will only spread our wings if we believe we have wings. Believe in your wings. Stand up for yourself. Speak graciously. Act honestly. Keep your integrity. What is it to gain the whole world just to lose your soul? Rabbi Zusya years ago said, "In the world to come I will not be asked, 'Why were you not Moses?' I will be asked, 'Why were you not Zusya?'" The Lord can only enrich you and bring joy to your soul when you live the life God calls you to live.

A school superintendent and his family lived through a time of great tension between the School Board and the teachers' union. They even received threats that their home would be burned. Their son David had the highest SAT scores in the school, a triple A rating on the tuba, was extremely active in school functions, had an almost 97% average, yet was blackballed from the National Honor Society because of the feud between the administration and the teachers. His parents were heartbroken, but after some brief moments of anger and resentment, David announced: "I don't need them to tell me who I am." That’s absolutely true. We only need God. Seek God’s approval. Find the gracious judgments of the Lord to be the true test of who you are. Stand tall and let God’s Spirit give you the courage to be the true you.

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