A Sermon by Pastor Tom Lacey . . .
are you serious?
Philippians 3:7-14, Preached at Congregational Church of Boca Raton, February 28, 2010
Have you ever heard of a serious joke? Let me give you an example: How many electricians does it take to change a light bulb? One.
Being serious today runs risks. We actually don't really understand it very well. One physician's assistant was overheard in a hospital saying to another, "I can't remember exactly what she died of, but I do recall it wasn't anything serious." If you’re a parent of a teenager today there is a question you have heard any number of times when your point of view differs from your child on any number of minor yet still very important issues in their life: “Are you serious?”
Our society today doesn’t like serious, not in general. We like entertainment. Serious is for professors, and professors are, well, too serious, which for many misses the whole point of life: Have fun and live by your guts. Serious is policies, Christians, books, hard-studying students—they just ain’t fun. Serious is a drag. Now of course levity, humor, has its place: like at the beginning of a sermon, for sure. But life isn’t just a balloon full of helium. The serious stuff is really important.
In verses 10-11, Paul wrote: "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection of the dead." Here he places Easter before Good Friday, or to be more precise, he speaks of Easter then Good Friday then Easter again. For Paul, the resurrection--that most joyous moment--interpreted the cross, planting the cross centrally in his faith and in his life and ministry. Let me put it this way: Easter doesn't erase Good Friday; Easter is God's vindication of Good Friday as what defines God's way in and for the world: obedience, suffering, death. We think we are supposed to go from Good Friday to Easter and leave behind Good Friday. We can forget that seriously bad moment in Christ's life and get on with the good stuff. But Paul said that's not how it is. Easter shows that what Jesus went through was God's will for him. God's approval of Christ's "lifestyle," if you will, is shown in rewarding him with resurrection. But it is precisely that "lifestyle" that gets God's OK. Christianity is serious stuff.
In an interview on the Today Show, Bryant Gumbel asked Maya
Angelou what was on her Wish List. With all that she has accomplished in her
life, could there be any more objectives, any more conditions unfulfilled?
"Oh, my Lord, yes," she exclaimed. "I want to become a better writer. I'm very
serious about it. It's what I am. It's how I describe myself to myself, and [I
want to be] a better human being. I'm trying to be a Christian, which is no
small matter. I mean it. I'm always amazed when (people) walk up to me and say,
'I'm a Christian,' I always think, 'Already? You've already got it?' My
goodness."
In verses 13-14, Paul is the runner, when he writes, "But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." Faith for him involved running, wrestling, striving, and fighting, none of which would end until the day of Christ. I'm sure many retirees here, and those of us who are shooting for that golden years of life, have a particular perspective on retirement. For most people, we make it sound as though we expect to be through with the serious issues of life once we reach 65, other than health issues, that is. At this point, we can sort of coast, rest on our laurels.
It's true, maybe our life as a productive member of the work
force is more or less finished, but life as a Christian isn't. It's not right to
think of life in the Spirit as a one-time thing, once you've got it, you get to
keep it. But a true spiritual life requires work; there is no retirement age in
Christianity. The famous Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard observed: "In a
written examination where the students are allotted four hours, it is neither
here nor there if an individual student happens to finish before the time is up,
or uses the entire time. Here, the task is one thing, the time another. But when
the time itself is the task, it becomes a fault to finish before the time is up.
Suppose a man were given the task of entertaining himself for an entire day, and
he finishes as early as noon: Then his speed would not be meritorious. So it is
when life constitutes the task. To be finished with life before life has
finished with one is not to have finished the task." Don't trifle with talent.
Don't waste time. Do good with all your strength. We don't clock out on God's
time sheet until we clock out.
Paul portrays himself in the strained posture of a runner; like an
Olympic athlete in training and especially in competition his lungs burn with
exertion, perspiration rolls, the temples pound, the heart pumps, and his
muscles ache. For Paul all this effort was not to get to God, or to prove his
merit before the Lord; it was just that the smiling, easy presentation of the
gospel as the way to be healthy, wealthy, and wise is at the end insulting to
those who seek to find their life before God and in Christ a more serious and
honest affair than that.
Hal Brady of
Now this may sound a little whacky, and while it's true that God wants spiritual fruit, not religious nuts, there really should be something simple yet serious about our Christian faith. Actually, this person has it right: simple and serious. Too many people want their faith life simple but not serious. easy without sacrifices. Most of the familiar, comforting statistics that describe public religion remain remarkably stable from poll to poll. Somewhere around 86 percent of Americans say they believe in God and another 8 percent or so in a "higher power" of some kind. Sixty percent say faith is "very important" in daily life and another 15 percent say it's "fairly important." In the typical poll, around 80 percent identify themselves as some brand of Christian and claim membership in a congregation. Somewhere between 41 and 46 percent of Americans say they attended church or synagogue in the previous week. Can religious faith answer all of today's problems? Six in 10 say "yes." Throughout the past two decades, nearly two in three affirmed that "God really exists and I have no doubt about it." That's the simple part.
But there is another side of this religion equation. Four in 10 American children go to bed without a father in the home. One-third of teens have been physically abused in the home. One-fourth of all Americans say that drinking is a problem in their home and almost half of all first marriages end in divorce. Surveys reveal an unprecedented desire for religious and spiritual growth among people in all walks of life and in every region of the nation and there is an intense searching for spiritual moorings, a hunger for God. Our faith teaches us that this is right and great but actions speak louder than words and wishes. Paul tells us that God rewarded Christ after the work was done. We don't get the high life until we've the right life--notice I didn't say because we've lived the right life. The point is faith means something, or it should. What it means is things get done, beliefs are put into practice, the bible is studied, praises are sung, spiritual growth is obtained, churches are grown, committees are joined, families are blessed, teenagers are reasonable, people are saved, the poor are helped, the world is bettered, heaven is crowded.
Christians ought to be serious. Take seriously the value of this church to you and yours. Take seriously the value of your time, talent and treasure to God and good. Take seriously what you have yet to do, to become, as a disciple of Christ Jesus your Lord and Savior. Take seriously the goal to reach heaven's gates and have them opened for you. Take seriously what goes wrong in our world, and take seriously the struggle to make things better. Being serious is good.
I want to end with a perhaps surprising piece; surprising because of who wrote it. I will tell you who when I am done. "Now, as the years have passed, sometimes at breakneck speed, sometimes taking eons (usually the former), I find myself on the brink (dare I say it?) of middle age. I've realized that the quest for 'Who am I?' is a lifelong endeavor and is accompanied by a cute, little side preponderance - 'What have I become?' This last little item brings with it the responsibility to take inventory, and is (in my case at least) usually followed by, 'What am I going to do about it?'... Clearly, we are people who want more. This is not intrinsically a negative, given the primordial instinct to achieve, to improve, to realize a need for personal betterment.... These days, however, that instinct for achieving has mutated our value system, twisting our strive-for-more consciousness to the excess, regardless of any cost. We go for more, not because it's good for us or because it expands our experience or minds, but because it's what we think we 'need' to be satisfied. More condos, more vehicles, more entertainment, more developments, more spending, more things, more waste.
So, who are we? I guess we're accumulators of more and more of the same. 'What have we become?'...If we still can find a place to sit and ponder, maybe we can all give some serious thought to our values and responsibilities as visitors on this precious planet. Together we'd surely find that there is more to life than having more.... 'What are we going to do about it?'...Daily solutions, attention to planning and zoning policies, re-evaluation of our needs and goals, and conservation of our natural glory. To this list I only add that we should pray." Who wrote this? Actor Don Johnson of Miami Vice fame. Seriously surprised, right?
Are you serious? I hope so.
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