"Sometimes You Just Can't Sit There!"
Matthew 28:16-20
May 18, 2008
St. Paul UMC of Little Rock
Rev. John Fleming
For years and years we have called our scripture lesson for this morning The Great Commission. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and the Book of Acts all refer to it. Christians in the early church lived by these words. Missionaries in the twentieth century both lived and died by these words. The question today is simply this, "Will we try and live these words out or will we ignore them?" That is what I would like for us consider today as we think about Matthew's version of Jesus' parting words to his disciples.
We might put the words of our lesson into this paraphrase. Go into all your worlds and make disciples on purpose. These words ought to be the mission statement of every church. Most churches have a mission statement. They spend hours and hours working on it, trying to make sure all things are covered. Saint Paul has a mission statement, but this mission statement is the best. You cannot go wrong with the Bible. And these words of Jesus ought to be the marching order for all Christians.
So let's take a closer look at our lesson. These are the last words in Matthew's gospel. Up until this point in Matthew's story of Jesus, the savior had not appeared to any of his disciples. He had appeared to Mary Magdalene and another woman named Mary. As those two were leaving the tomb on their way to find the disciples, Jesus appeared to them and said, "Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me."
Their reunion took place on a mountain in Galilee. By the way, in Matthew's gospel, all great teachings took place on a mountain. Matthew writes, "When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted." Isn't that a great line? That is the church of Matthew's day. It is the church of any day. Thomas Long writes, "We worship, but sometimes we shift edgily in our seats and force back the taste of doubt." I can tell you that it is easier to believe on some days and harder on others.
To that congregation of disciples, Jesus said four things. First, he said to go. Just this past week, I heard a story that I think may be my favorite now. It is the about Larry Walters, a thirty year old truck driver who always wanted to fly. Right out of high school he joined the Air Force in hopes of becoming a pilot. Unfortunately his eyesight disqualified him. When he was discharged in 1982, he spent most of his time sitting in a lawn chair in his back yard watching jets scream by.
The rest of the story was recorded in the news and is now on the internet. One afternoon Larry decided to go to his local Army and Navy surplus store where he promptly purchased forty-five weather balloons and several tanks of helium. Fully inflated, these balloons measured four feet across. Back home Larry inflated the balloons, strapped them to a sturdy lawn chair which was anchored by his truck.
He was ready for flight. He tied a six pack of Miller Light to one of the legs of the chair and a sack full of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to the other. He sat down in the chair, pushed away from his truck, while holding a bb gun in his lap. The gun was for popping the balloons when he wanted to come down. Larry thought he would top off at two hundred feet. When he pushed away from his truck, he tells that it was like being shot out of a canon. He topped off not a two hundred feet, but at eleven thousand feet. He was airborne for some fourteen hours.
During that time he was both cold and frightened. Then he got in real trouble. He was drifting. Soon he was in the airspace that was the main approach for the Los Angeles International Airport. A United Airline pilot reported his presence to the control tower. Can you imagine that conversation? He must have said, "You're not going to believe this, but there is a guy up here sitting in a lawn chair with balloons tied to it. He's got a gun in his lap." Radar confirmed his presence and the fact that he was no danger.
His problem got bigger. Soon he was drifting towards the ocean. Finally there was a daring rescue. A helicopter hovered above him and pulled him up to safety. When it was all over, just before he was taken to jail, a reporter asked him why he did what he did. Listen to what he said, "Sometimes a man just can't sit around!"
That's good. First, you have to get up and go. The church is not just something for us, something to fill our wants and our needs. The church is here to spread the news that God loves the world.
So where are we to go? According to my little paraphrase, we go into our worlds. When the book of Acts speaks of the Great Commission, it says disciples are to go to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. The founder of what we now call the United Methodist Church, Reverend John Wesley said this, "I look upon the world as my parish."
My guess is that you are probably not heading off to Judea or Samaria. But maybe you will take Jesus into your world. I will I will have to tell you that it is easy for me to talk about Jesus in my world. In fact, it is expected. If I don't people wonder why I didn't.
That's my world. What about your world? Some of us head off to the school world as teachers where you are not supposed to speak of Jesus but you can be Christ like. Some of us head off to the business world that can be cut throat at times. Some of head off into a world of service, working as social workers and in hospitals. For some of us, our world is taking care of our children; that is an important job. Can you take Jesus into your world?
Bishop Will Willimon remembers asking a group of leaders in the church he pastored if any of them had talked about their faith with someone else in the past year. One person raised her hand. Many years ago, William Buckley, a great author and talk show host said that if you are invited to a dinner part and bring up religion once, it is all right. But if you bring it up two times, most likely you won't be invited back to that house.
We are scared of talking with others about our faith. It could happen like this. Maybe you have a friend who is going through a really bad time. She has gotten back dismal grades from her first semester of law school. The relationship she has been in just ended. Her depression seems to be very deep. You urged her to get professional help, but you also said, "I guess we've never talked about religion. I want you to know that I believe Jesus is more than an idea. He is a presence. He loves you very much and because he has helped me through some crises in my life, I believe he can help you through this one. Would you like to pray with me?" She did. She said that the prayer helped and that she had helped. Isn't that amazing?
You went out there on a limb. You had never talked with anyone about your religious faith before. It was scary. You took Jesus into your world.
First, go into your worlds. Here is the second thing. Make disciples. I've been wondering about that for the better part of this week. How do you make a disciple? What are the ingredients? Do you get a big bowl and mix in a cup of commitment, a teaspoon of faith (Jesus said you only need a little of that), a smidgen of hope, a half a cup of obedience, a pound of love, a half-cup of gentleness and self-control? Do you mix all those things together, put them in a casserole dish, and bake them at three hundred and fifty degrees for thirty minutes? Is that how you make a disciple?
No, not really though I like the idea. Making a disciple is harder than that. Just ask Jesus about that and he will tell you about the twelve he tried to lead. Making a disciple takes longer than thirty minutes, too. Thirty minutes is not long enough. Often it takes a lifetime.
In the United Methodist Church we hope for a life long relationship with God. We teach and believe that it all begins with baptism. We baptized three children in our late worship service last week. I wish we were baptizing someone today! We will next Sunday. When we baptize babies or children, we make promises. Parents promise to raise their children in the church and the church promises to teach and pray for our children. But it takes more than simply bringing them here. It takes more than just teaching them once, perhaps twice a week about Jesus and to pray for them. We must teach these little disciples at home. Even if we do not know the stories ourselves, we must teach our children basic Bible stories. We need to tell them about Noah and Moses. We need to tell them about Joseph and his brothers and the one about the little man who climbed in a tree to see Jesus. We need to tell them about Jesus. But more than that, we must teach our children to love and to trust Jesus with everything that happens in their lives.
This faith of ours may not have come when we were kids. Some of us have come to follow Jesus in our adult years. Are there are hundreds like us just beyond the walls of this church in Kingwood and in Cammack Village. Will we invite them in?
Before we finish our sermon, let me say a couple of more things, mostly about discipleship. I want you to know that disciples are followers. Disciples are the ones who have experienced the living Lord and have pledged their deepest devotion to Him. Disciples aren't people who have reached their destination. They are people who are discovering their direction, often one step at a time.
In our Jesus in the Gospels course last week we learned that the point of being a disciple is to be a disciple. There's no room for advancement. There is only the hope of advancing others. Disciples are also those who commit themselves to a lifetime of learning. It's amazing. When I was a teenager I knew it all. No one could tell me anything. Now I realize how little I knew back then. One of the great benefits of teaching a Bible study is that I learn so many things.
Friends, we are to go into our worlds. We are to make disciples intentionally and we are to remember Jesus' promise to be with us always. Let me close with a saying attributed, again, to John Wesley. May God helps us do all the good we can, by all the means we can, in all the places we can, to all the people we can, for as long as we can. Let us pray.
(Special thanks to the writings of Will Willimon for a couple of illustrations in this sermon. Thanks also to a pastor friend in Tennessee who led me to the opening story of our sermon).