22.8.06

Wisdom lies ahead

Sermon for the 11th Sunday after Pentecost
Sunday, 20 August 2006

Today’s readings deal with wisdom. And what is wisdom may I ask? Is it intelligence? Is it knowledge? Is it common sense? Does old age make me wise? Does young age make me wise? Let us look at what some have said about wisdom thru the centuries.

[Quotes on Wisdom from Wikiquote]

There you had a sample of what has been said about wisdom by some dead wise guys. It really doesn’t matter that they’re dead. To their credit, a bit of their wisdom
is still alive for us to take to heart. There is wisdom in sharing wisdom.

There’s a fable by Aesop titled The Sick Lion. It goes like this,

A LION, unable from old age and infirmities to provide
himself with food by force, resolved to do so by artifice.
He returned to his den, and lying down there, pretended
to be sick, taking care that his sickness should be
publicly known. The beasts expressed their sorrow,
and came one by one to his den, where the Lion devoured
them. After many of the beasts had thus disappeared,
the Fox discovered the trick and presenting himself
to the Lion, stood on the outside of the cave,
at a respectful distance, and asked him how he was.
"I am very middling," replied the Lion, "but why do
you stand without? Pray enter within to talk with me.
"No, thank you," said the Fox. "I
notice that
there are many prints of feet entering your cave, but
I
see no trace of any returning."


You know the deal with fables. There is always a moral
to the story. Can anybody take a guess as to what is the
moral of this story? According to Aesop, “he is wise
who is warned by the misfortunes of others.” Well, there’s
a wise guy right there or I should say a wise fox.
But what is wisdom? Since we live in the Information and
Communication Age, we should know what wisdom is,
shouldn’t we? We have everything there is to know
at the tip of our keyboards and the left-button click
of a mouse. In fact, to show you how true this is
I went online and looked up about wisdom on Wikipedia.
This is the definition it gave me,
Wisdom is the ability, developed through
experience, insight and reflection, to discern truth and
exercise good judgment. It is sometimes conceptualized as
an especially well developed form of common sense. Most
psychologists regard wisdom as distinct from the
cognitive abilities measured by standardized
intelligence tests. Wisdom is often considered
to be a trait that can be developed by experience,
but not taught. When applied to practical matters,
the term wisdom is synonymous with prudence. Some see
wisdom as a quality that even a child, otherwise
immature, may possess independent of experience
or
complete knowledge.(Wikipedia)

Now that we know what wisdom is, are we any wiser? Does
a definition about wisdom found online teach us in the
way of wisdom? No, it doesn’t. We now only know the
definition of one little word and compared to words like
information and knowledge and computers and technology,
that little word, wisdom, is becoming a stranger concept
by the hour. Nonetheless, it is true that wisdom is a
little word, but a little word whose application has
an impact on our lives for the better.

The trend of the human race since the beginning of the
Industrial Revolution back in the 18th century has been
an amazingly fast race towards more production, more
information, more knowledge, more technogadgetry that
results in a longer bottom line and at the same time in a
lack of wisdom and common sense that results in stifled
lives. In consequence, we have learned how to live with
and, moreover, depend on more information and more
knowledge and more computers and more technology,
and more media without wisdom. To a degree, we have
come to exchange one for the other, but there is no
real substitute for wisdom. Life according to God
requires wisdom.

Today, the deal is more about production, production,
production; numbers, numbers, numbers; faster, faster,
faster! We end up with a whole lot more stress, stress,
stress and exhaustion, exhaustion, exhaustion, and much
less, much less, much less wisdom. On this equation
something doesn’t add up.

So we are confronted with wisdom in our Bible readings for
today. And mind you, the Bible is full of wisdom. Oh yes,
full of it. The best wisdom literature available is not
found in ancient Greece and its philosophers; it is found
in books like Job, Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. It is the
best wisdom literature because it points us to the
beginning and the end of wisdom. It shows us how to live
the way of wisdom, how to stay in it and how to achieve
its ultimate goal.

The Bible says in the first seven verses of the book of Proverbs,

1 The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel:
2 To know wisdom and instruction, to understand words of insight,
3 to receive instruction in wise dealing, in righteousness, justice, and equity;
4 to give prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the youth--
5 Let the wise hear and increase in learning, and the one who understands
obtain guidance,
6 to understand a proverb and a saying, the words of the wise and their riddles.

7 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction. (ESV)

I wanted to know how this same passage read in a different version of the Bible. So I went to The Message version of the Bible and this is what I found on the first seven verses of the book of Proverbs,

1-6 These are the wise sayings of Solomon, David's son, Israel's king—
Written down so we'll know how to live well and right,to understand what life
means and where it's going;
A manual for living, for learning what's right and just and fair; To teach the inexperienced the ropes and give our young people a grasp on reality.
There's something here also for seasoned men and women,
still a thing or two for the experienced to learn—
Fresh wisdom to probe and penetrate, the rhymes and reasons of wise men and women.
7 Start with God—the first step in learning is bowing down to God;
only fools thumb their noses at such wisdom and learning.

Wisdom has a beginning and that beginning lies in God. It doesn’t matter how old we are. The sooner we start with God in our lives the wiser we will be, for true wisdom belongs with God and comes from him.

In Proverbs 9:1, the wisdom of God is a source of strength for our lives. Applying our hearts to the instruction of the Lord will protect us from swaying to tides of relativism, from moving our lives away from the anchor that is the cross of Christ. Listen to the strong imagery with which Solomon describes wisdom in today’s reading from Proverbs chapter 9,

Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn her seven pillars.

There is the possibility of building a house upon a single or a couple of columns, but when encounter the number seven (7) in the Bible we have a marker for God. Seven pillars means the completeness and perfection of the wisdom of God. The wisdom of God if acquired and applied will give us a sure foundation. God lacks nothing and those who put their trust in him lack nothing either. His wisdom is sufficient and effective to lead us not into temptation as we will pray later on.

Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn her seven pillars.

When Christ spoke to his disciples on the Sermon on the Mount, he concluded the sermon in Matthew chapter 7, verses 24-25, with the story of the two builders. What is being said of those who take hold of the wisdom of God in our reading from Proverbs today is what Christ said of this one builder,

If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock. Rain poured down, the river flooded, a tornado hit—but nothing moved that house. It was fixed to the rock. (The Message)

It sure beats the alternative, doesn’t it? Yet, Proverbs 9 continues its imagery of wisdom,

She[wisdom] has slaughtered her beasts; she has mixed her wine; she has also set her table.

How many of us have been to the Hometown Buffet restaurant? How many of you have gotten a full belly just by taking a good look at the food trays, the salad bar and the dessert bar? How many of you have said,

That sure is one nice salad bar right there? Oh, look at that roast beef, isn’t it pretty? Look at that ice cream! It’s top of the line, it doesn’t melt!

I am absolutely positive that none of us go to the Hometown Buffet to appreciate how nicely laid out the food is, important as that is. Or how beautiful the restaurant is, important as that is. Or how delicious things smell, important as that is. No, my brothers and sisters. The one and only reason we go to the Hometown Buffet is to eat, plain and simple. Charles Spurgeon said once in a sermon that nobody has ever been satisfied by only speaking about food. Speaking about food will make you want to eat it. Hungry yet?

There’s an important reason why wisdom has slaughtered her beasts; why she has mixed her wine; and also set her table. And the reason is so that we might eat from hera. Food is for the body not for contemplation. In the same manner, the wisdom of God is for us to learn how to live a godly life. The wisdom of God is worth our time and effort, our prayers and practice. We are foolish if we come to the table God has set before us and don’t eat from it. If we approach the life God wants us to live and say, “No thanks,” Solomon calls us fools.

So who is wise? What is living according to the wisdom of God?

In his letter to the Ephesians, Saint Paul the Apostle gives us a very practical rundown not on what wisdom is, but on how wisdom is translated into everyday living. He who follows the simple admonition of the apostle is considered wise.

We might think that to live wisely is something difficult to do; that to appropriate ourselves with the wisdom of God we have to live a very regimented life. But there is something about the wisdom of God that can easily be categorized as simple. The wisdom of God excels over any wisdom of man precisely because of its simplicity. It doesn’t lead us to the path of philosophy, a program of rule-keeping or the carpe diemseize the day—kind of excrement that goes by wisdom nowadays.

My brothers and sisters, what God gives us to eat he helps us to digest. Saint Paul told the Ephesians and is telling us today in chapter five of his letter,

Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.

The version we read today says “making the most of time”. In other words, redeeming time or acting upon every opportunity afforded us in the most effective, less time consuming way possible, but not at the expense of a hurried life. Doing things in a timely fashion; not putting things off till later, but doing them as quick as you can is what it means to make the most of every opportunity and will even give us the luxury of some spare time later on. John Wesley said once in a sermon, “If you desire to rise early, sleep early.” There is no way around it.

“Because the days are evil,” says St. Paul.

There is evil creeping into our lives from without, but there is also evil springing from within us. It’s not difficult for us to lead lives that become busy, convoluted and stressful. And it is not strange that what was once a source of joy in our lives has become a source of unhappiness. The days are evil and it is important for us to recognize that leading a busy, convoluted and stressful life whether at home or at work can kill us, physically but more importantly, spiritually. We need to keep ourselves in check, in other words, we need to live wisely because the days of our very new 21st century are out to chew us up if they are able.

Saint Paul continues his advice on verse seventeen of chapter 5,

Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is.

Here, it’s easy to get the “do not be foolish” part of the advise, but what is it to “understand what the will of the Lord is”? How do we know the will of God for us? Well, it’s not as difficult as we might think it is. The combination of reading the Bible and praying is the surest and safest road to get to know what the will of God is for our lives. If we find ourselves doing these two things, we can be sure that we will know what God requires of us and with that comes the wisdom to apply accordingly.

Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.

Has there ever been any wisdom in drunkenness? We recently heard the really sad news of Mel Gibson’s run in with the law because of a DUI. Will they remember him more due to The Passion of the Christ or because of his drunken tirade against an ethnic group? Will people remember him more for his wisdom or his foolishness?

None of us is foolishness-exempt. We are all prone to the way of foolishness, my brothers and sisters, and that makes today’s exhortation to wisdom all the more important. Are we to choose wisdom or foolishness? Let us, for our sake, be filled with the Spirit of God for where there is the Spirit of God there is liberty. And where there is the Spirit of Lord there is wisdom also.

Saint Paul entreats us,

Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Recently, I read a quote from Meister Eckhart, a wise theologian from the middle ages. He said this,

If the only prayer you say in your entire life is 'Thank you,' that would suffice.

There is wisdom in gratitude and humility; in singing to and praising God; and in encouraging one another with spiritual songs. These are not hard things to do, my brothers and sisters. Doing these things is heeding the call of wisdom and he who heeds wisdom, heeds life.

Do you remember the Magi who came to see Jesus? Have you ever stop to think why they where called wise men? Yes, they were learned men indeed; very knowledgeable about the stars, infinity and beyond. But I contend that their previous knowledge or trade isn’t what categorizes them as wise men.

What really makes them wise men is that they set out to find Christ, they stuck to the search and they ultimately found him. All they had was a star to guide them and that star was Christ himself for when they stopped their search they found themselves in the presence of him whom they had set out to worship. It was Christ himself leading these wise guys, no pun intended, to him. Wisdom is light and Christ is the light of the world.

In Proverbs 9, Wisdom keeps telling us,

Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!" To him who lacks sense she says,
"Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed.
Leave your simple ways, and live, and walk in the way of insight."

We return to the image of wisdom as a feast. You see, God is bent on feeding his people, making us healthy for the great race that still lies ahead of us. It is his provision, so it is what we need. He is the producer and we are the consumers as Spurgeon also said.

There is one more way to illustrate what wisdom is and what it can do for us. We know that what food is for the body, Christ is for the soul. Let’s take a look at the forceful and graphic language of our gospel reading. In the words of Christ himself, eating from the tree of wisdom, that is, eating from him, is a matter of life and death for those who follow him.

Only insofar as you eat and drink flesh and blood, the flesh and blood of the Son of Man, do you have life within you. The one who brings a hearty appetite to this eating and drinking has eternal life and will be fit and ready for the Final Day. My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. By eating my flesh and drinking my blood you enter into me and I into you. In the same way that the fully alive Father sent me here and I live because of him, so the one who makes a meal of me lives because of me. This is the Bread from heaven. Your ancestors ate bread and later died. Whoever eats this Bread will live always. (The Message)

We can imagine all about the wonderful table of the Lord. We can talk about it all we want. We can theologize about the mystery of the real presence in the Holy Communion of Christ, but none of it will be of good to us if we leave it at the theory level. Of what use is our Lord to us if when coming to him we leave him untouched?

Only insofar as you eat and drink flesh and blood, the flesh and blood of the
Son of Man, do you have life within you.

If there has ever been a real food and a real drink for the Christian, it is the body and the blood of Christ. Christ is the wisdom and power of God. Partaking of him makes the difference between wisdom and foolishness, between strength and weakness. Eating his body and drinking his blood determines eternity in his company or eternity without him.

It is great to go to the baker’s house and smell the baking bread, but that’s beside the point because the point is that we all come to the Baker’s house to eat the bread. We all have come. What shall we do now with our Lord’s Bread? Wisdom lies ahead. Amen.

1.8.06

¿Sabes?

Para Aixa

¿Sabes?

Cuando muera dejaré

una sonrisa impregnada en tus labios

y mi corazón en tus manos.

Llegaré al cielo incompleto

tu llegada esperando.

Sentiré los latidos de mi pecho vacío

en el más allá de tu llanto

y me convertiré en una constelación

de seis estrellas que fuimos nosostros

en la tierra.

Sabrás donde encontrarme

en el oscuro lienzo de la noche

aunque lleguen las nubes

queriéndome apartar de ti.

Me perderás junto al sol

por un momento, pero

te seré fiel junto a la noche

antes del sueño.

Mi sonrisa en tus labios y

mi corazón en tus manos,

seré completo, amor, a tu llegada.

cspellot 2006

The Value of our Relationship with Christ

Homily for the Eight Sunday after Pentecost, B

Today’s readings abound in many practical lessons for us. We learn about trust in Elijah’s relationship with Elisha and in Christ relationship with his disciples. We learn about faithfulness in Paul’s exhortation to the Ephesians. But there is one thing I consider to be the most important lesson in today’s readings.

Simply put, everything that takes place in today’s readings and everything we can glean from them come by way of the relationships presented. Nothing happens in isolation. Whether it is Elijah and Elisha, Paul and the Ephesians or Christ and his disciples, it is through these relationships that we come to learn more about the meaning of trust, faithfulness, faith, patience and perseverance, but also about unbelief and doubt; about fear and immaturity.

We can answer many things to the question of “What is the purpose of our existence?” Yet, by far the most important answer to this question is “To know God and to worship him with all our strength, all our mind, all our heart and all our spirit.” Our peril as Christians has always been to lose sight of who God is and he is first and foremost relational. He created us to have a relationship with us, both individually and corporately.

You and I together are bound in a corporate relationship with God as members of the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church. We are members to one another and governed by the head who is Jesus Christ. We continue in that relationship when our corporate worship ends. We do not stop being members of Christ body once we leave this building’s doors.

But each one of us also walks his or her own journey with Christ and while our destination is the same, the Lord will decide to take each one of us through a process that is not completely equal to that of my neighbor’s. We will all enter into the kingdom of heaven by the narrow road of the cross of Christ; there is no other way. But as we grow in our relationship with God, he will decide that if I’m a little arrogant, I need to grow humble. If I’m a little impulsive, I need to become more patient. If I have a foul mouth, I need to work on a clean one. These are some of the things that God works in each one of us as his children and they spring out of a relationship with him.

Life will put many distractions ahead of us so that we belittle if not forget who we are in Christ, the sons and daughters of God. The many distractions of this world will keep us from growth, and our own sin, if not brought to Christ, will disable us spiritually.

How are we to remain steadfast and faithful to Christ our Lord in the midst of so many distractions that we ourselves create or that come across our doorway?

The relationship between the prophets Elijah and Elisha exemplifies what it is to remain focused on the hope of our redemption.

Elijah is at the end of his ministry; about to be taken up to heaven. Elisha is the successor appointed by God to continue bringing his word to Israel. Elijah does something quite interesting, and perhaps a bit incomprehensible. On three different times he tells Elisha to stay back because he needs to take care of business somewhere else. First, he told Elisha, "Stay here; for the LORD has sent me as far as Bethel." Then, he told him again, "Elisha, stay here; for the LORD has sent me to Jericho." Lastly, he told Elisha, "Stay here; for the LORD has sent me to the Jordan."

Why so much insistence on separating himself from his pupil at the moment when he was about to be taken up to heaven? Well, these were distractions sent to Elisha so that he might lose sight of the prize coming his way, a double portion of the Spirit of God. Yet, he made sure not to lose sight of his master at the crucial moment when their relationship was about to end. In fact, yielding to his master’s request would have signified the real end of their relationship as master and pupil, but Elisha met his master’s bizarre requests with opposing determination. Three times Elijah had asked him to stay back and three times he responded, "As the LORD lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." I like how The Messenger version puts it, "Not on your life! I'm not letting you out of my sight!" How are we meeting the distractions of life? How do we confront them? What is our response when they try to make us lose sight of our hope in Christ and our relationship with him?

Elisha’s commitment to his master was shown in his replies. Relationships are nothing if there is no faithfulness in them. They’re as good as dead.

“There’s not a chance I will leave you alone, Elijah. Don’t even think about it.” Let me tell you that Elijah was not expecting any other answer from his junior prophet. I want to also tell you that that is the same answer Christ our Lord expects from us his children at crucial times in our lives. “Oh no! There’s not a chance I’m going to leave you alone, Lord. Don’t even think about it.” It shows how we regard our relationship with Christ regardless of any distractions that might and will come our way. Any other reply would have been wanting and would have left us wanting of the Spirit of God.

Elisha pressed on with his master. We should also press on with ours.

Allow me to put it this way. A friendship is different from a courtship and a courtship is way different from a marriage. They have in common that they are all relationships, but they differ greatly in the amount of commitment to that relationship. Each stage in this progression means growth in that relationship and everything else grows with it. A husband as God would have us be grows each day in his faithfulness and commitment to his wife. A husband as God would have us be will not allow himself to be distracted by what might come our way however enticing. So would a wife that knows the value of her relationship to her husband.

This is exactly what Saint Paul tells to his Ephesian brothers and sisters in chapter 4 of his letter when sharing with them what it means to grow in Christ.

“I, Paul, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Relationships take our time and effort. They are hard work and that’s why any relationship worth its salt will require of us a lot of love, humility and patience. These ingredients must be found in any true relationship.

Paul wants us to understand that in Christ we are to grow in our relationship with him and in our relationship with each other as brothers and sisters. Listen to his words,

“But each of us was given grace according to the measure of Christ's gift. […] To equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ. We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people's trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming.”

There are tests sent to us by God to help us grow into the image of his Son Jesus Christ. Then, there are tests sent to us by Satan so that we completely reject God, so that we remain distracted, shying away from developing into mature Christians and growing as the body of Christ. So that we remain, in Saint Paul’s words, as “children, tossed to and fro and blown about every wind of doctrine.” If we remain like little children soon enough we will decide that this is just a waste of time. That it’s just to much. That we cannot do it.

We persevere against the distractions of this world when we do what we have done today. We all could have stayed home, couldn’t have we? Some of us would still be sleeping right now cuddling a pillow or two. But we don’t persevere in Christ by sleeping. We persevere and grow in him by saying no to our own flesh and yes to Christ and his kingdom. In our relationship with Christ we have much to gain. Without a relationship to Christ, we don’t just have much to lose, we are simply lost.

Yet, we have come saying no to ourselves and to so many other distractions that would have kept us back from seeking God’s grace this morning. Today, we have said as Elisha told Elijah,

"Not on your life! I'm not letting you out of my sight!"

Today, we have come for Christ, haven’t we? Here we will find him. Do not, my brothers and sisters, let Christ out of your sight, never ever. It is because our relationship with him matters to us that we approach him in humility to receive his grace from his own hand so that we might grow in him. Amen.

Let us pray.

God, the protector of all who trust in you, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy: Increase and multiply upon us your mercy; that, with you as our ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal, that we lose not the things eternal; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.