“Being in the Wrong Place at the Right Time”

I Peter 3:8-12

June 1, 2003

St. Paul United Methodist Church

Rev. John Fleming

Have you heard the story about the young man who went out and bought a luxurious German sports car? He bought a Porshe and decided that he wanted to celebrate his purchase in some way. He thought that the best way to do that would be to ask a minister to bless his new car. So the man went in search of church because he did not have a church home. In fact, it had been a long time since he had even been inside of a church. His family had been members of several churches. They had been Baptist and they had been Presbyterian. There was a time when they had also been Methodist. His family had bounced around churches as they moved to different towns. As a result of that, the young man was not quite sure what he was, Methodist Baptist or Presbyterian. And so he stopped at the first church that he came to and got out of his car. He parked his car on the parking lot. He wanted to make sure that there would not be any dings in the door of his car, so he parked far away from any of the other cars on the lot. He walked across the parking lot and into the church’s office. He spoke to the church’s secretary and said that he would like to speak with the pastor. By the way, I am leery of people who come to my office and want to speak to the pastor. It means that they don’t know me. This minister was available and so the two talked for a few minutes. Then the young man turned to the pastor and said, “Sir, I have come today to ask you if you would bless my Porshe.” The minister said, “I would love to bless your Porshe. I love to bless things. But I will have to be honest with you and say that I do not know what a Porshe is. Can you tell me what a Porshe is?” A sort of scowl appeared on the man’s face. He could not help but to think to himself. I cannot let this minister bless my Porshe. He cannot appreciate it. He does not even know what it is. So he politely excused himself, went out to his car, got into it, and went in search of another minister and another church.

Just a few miles down the road, he saw another church and pulled into their parking lot. He parked far away and walked across the parking lot to the church’s office and asked if he could speak with the minister. The minister was there and they began talking. After a few minutes of chit-chat, the man turned to the purpose of his visit. He asked, “Pastor, I have come today to ask you if you would be willing to bless my Porshe.” The minister said, “Oh, I love to bless things. I do this sort of thing all of the time. But I’m not really sure what a Porshe is. If you will tell me, I would be happy to bless it. The young man said, “Sir, I do appreciate your willingness, but I need to find a pastor who knows what a Porshe is.” So he walked out of the pastor’s office, across the parking lot, got into his car, and drove off, in hopes of finding a pastor who could bless his new car.

A few miles down the road, he saw another church and he pulled into the parking lot of a United Methodist Church. Now, let me give you this disclaimer. In my years of telling stories, I have discovered that it is always a good idea to tell stories on your own church instead of others.

The man parked his car, went to the church office, asked if he could speak to the church’s pastor. The pastor was there and was available. He had some time in his schedule. After a few minutes of small talk, the young man turned to the pastor. He said, “Sir, I have come here today to ask you if you wold be willing to bless my Porshe.” The pastor’s eyes lit up. He asked, “You have a Porshe?” The man said, “Yes, I have just bought it and I would like for you to bless it. The minister said, “Tell me about your car.” He said, well, it is Arrest Me Red. Church, you do know what that color is, don’t you? When a police officer sees a car that is painted Arrest Me Red, he decides that it is a car that at some time will deserve a ticket. The young man continued, “My car has leather seats, a cd player, a sun roof, and an eight cylinder engine in it.” The minister said, “Ah, I’ve always wanted to own one of those cars. I have always wanted to drive one of those cars. Can I drive your car?” The young man was not so sure about that, but he was excited to find a minister who knew what a Porshe was. He was even thinking of visiting this church come Sunday mornin. He thought, “Surely he will bless his car.” He asked again, “Pastor, will you bless my Porshe?” The pastor said, “Sure, I’d be happy to. But I have got to ask you one thing before I do. What is a blessing?”

Like I said, it is always a better idea to tell stories like this one on your own church than on other churches. I know that the United Methodist Church knows about the blessing of things. I would, however, say that we do not do a lot of blessing of things in worship services. Though the blessings of offerings does come to my mind. A couple of Octobers ago, I took my two dogs, Macie and Winnie, to a blessing of the animals service at McArthur Park. I do not think that their blessing has done much good in their lives. But I do hope that we know what a blessing is. A blessing is a prayer for prosperity and success for things like cars and people and animals. Maybe we could say that a blessing is a prayer for things to go well, or for joy and peace. I think that I know what a blessing is. The first official blessing that I did happened down in Harmony Grove, near Camden. I got a phone call one day from Linda Gayle Wagnon. Linda was a member of my church and had recently moved her beauty shop business from a rented space to a building on her property. She asked me tentatively if I would come by and bless her beauty shop. So on my way home that afternoon, I pulled into her driveway. With the smell of permanents in the air and women in curlers and under hair dryers and men waiting for hair cuts, I blessed Linda’s beauty shop. By the way, a side benefit to blessing a beauty shop is free haircuts. For three more years, Linda gave me free haircuts. Linda’s shop is not the only thing that I have blessed. I have stood at the front of an aisle and watched as a nervous groom and a beautiful bride joined hands to prepare for their vows. In those moments, I have blessed their marriages. I like to do that. Then three are those blessings that take place on hot May evenings. In rows of chairs with their caps and gowns on, a minister blesses high school and college seniors for the great accomplishments that they have completed. There, they hear a prayer, but it is really a blessing for the rest of their lives.

A minister friend of mine told me that one of the things that he blesses from time to time is the opening day of his town’s Little League season. I told him about Linda’s beauty shop and he told me about the baseball season. He said this to me, “I always wanted to throw out the first pitch, but they won’t let me. That’s our mayor’s job. All I can do is pray that things will go well.” Blessings, prayers for prosperity, for success, for joy, for things to go well. That is what a blessing is.

In our scripture lesson for this morning, if you will read it carefully, you will see that Peter mentions the word blessing, but he uses it in a very different way than the way that we have already used it this morning. In his words to the church, Peter writes that they are to be a blessing to other people. It is your calling to bless other people says Peter and unless we bless others, we ourselves, cannot receive a blessing. These words ought to sound familiar to you. “Do not repay evil for evil or abuse for abuse. On the contrary, repay with a blessing” I can only imagine how hard that must have been. You see, these people were in great and severe danger. They were being persecuted for their faith. They knew evil and they knew abuse. To encourage them, Peter writes to them and he says, “This is how you make it in the world that we find ourselves in. This is a survival guide for your lives.” He writes and tells the men of the church how they should behave. He writes and tells the women of the church how they should behave. He writes words to slaves and servants and lets them know how they are to behave. Then he writes words that are for the church, instructions on how the church should operate in these persecuted times. As I said, these words ought to sound familiar to you. In Jesus’ first sermon, the one that he preached on the mountain, he said, “Do not repay evil for evil, but on the contrary, love your enemies. Be good to those who hate you. Bless and do not curse those who do evil to you.”

Now I know what you must be thinking. This is a little like last week’s lesson from Jesus about friendship and loving others. It is, you are right about that. Blessing others is no easier than loving others. Someone in the back is thinking, “Preacher, do you know who I have to deal with on a daily basis?” Maybe I don’t, but do you know who I have to deal with on a daily basis? Throughout the New Testament, if you will go home and read it, you will see time and time again where it says that it is our Christian calling to bless others. And just in case you think that those words are old fashioned and not contemporary enough for us today, let me remind you that words have the ability to hurt as well as they do to heal. For instance, if you tell someone over and over again that they are not worth much, that they are a failure, then they won’t let you down.

They will be that way. Do you know what you have done when you have said those kinds of words, you have cursed them. But, on the other hand, if you tell someone that they are one of God’s children, and that they are dearly loved. If you tell them that God loves them so very much that even if they fall short a few times, it is all right, because they have so much potential and that all of us make mistakes, then do you know what you have done when you have said those words? You have blessed them.

A little boy came home from pre-school one day with a giant star pinned on his shirt. The star was made out of cardboard and construction paper. His dad saw it and asked, “Son, where did you get that star? Did you make it at school today?” He said, “No, dad, I earned this star.” The father asked, “You earned it? What did you do to earn your star?” His son answered, “Today I was the best rester!” Do you know what that little boy’s teacher did for him, she blessed him. I think Peter would have nodded his head if he had heard about that. I think that he would have said, “That is the kind of thing that I am talking about!”

I ran across a story this week that may be one of my new favorites. It is one that the great preacher and speaker Tony Compollo tells about the time that he went to a funeral for one of his friends. His mom had always told him that he needed to go to funerals, that it was the right thing to do when friends of his and friends of her’s died. So he went to the funeral home and he walked into the chapel on the day of his friends’ funeral. He went to the front of the chapel and found a seat. Curiously he was the only one in the room. He waited and waited. No one came in. Finally he decided that he would look in the casket, to make sure that he was in the right place. It ends up that he was in the wrong place. The one in the casket was not his friend. In fact, he had never laid eyes on this gentleman. He was about to leave when a woman dressed in black walked in and said, “You knew my husband, didn’t you?” Tony did not know what to say, but he did not tell the truth. Instead he said, “Yes, I did. He was a fine man. Everyone liked him.” She asked, “Will you sit with me?” It ended up that they were the only two who came for the man’s funeral.

The minister walked in and preached a sermon to the two of them, talking about this man. When the service was over, Tony rode in the limousine with this woman, to the cemetery. After the words had been said, there at the cemetery, he placed a rose on the casket as it was lowered towards the ground. The two of them got back into the limousine and began the trip back to the funeral home. In that car, Tony made his confession. He said, “I’ve got to be honest with you. I was at the wrong place today. I didn’t know your husband. I have never seen him before today.” He explained that he was in the wrong place. The woman, this widow, said, ““You will never, ever, ever, ever, know what you did for me today. I will never forget it.” Tony, you see, was in the wrong place at the right time. It turns out that he was a blessing to this widow.

Bless, do not curse, for to this you were called. That is the ninth verse. In the eighth verse, Peter suggests that the ways that we can do that, the ways we can be blessings. He lists these things: unity of spirit, sympathy of love of everyone, a tender heart, and a humble mind.

We could take any of those, church, and use them to bless others. But this morning what is on my mind more than the other’s is a tender heart. We have all heard of people, maybe even described others, as those who are tender hearted. What does that mean, really? When you talk about someone being tender hearted, sometimes that is a bad thing. I believe that being tender hearted means to have compassion. It is the capacity to feel what other people are feeling, to put yourselves in another’s shoes, to so get inside them that you can feel and know what they are going through.

Can I thank you, church for blessing me this year. In eight days, we would have been together a year. I look back at this year and see what you have done for my family. I have noticed how you have welcomed us. Our youth group was at the parsonage just after Susie, Annie Grace, and I left for her November ear surgery. When we left, the yard was full of leaves, when we returned, no leaves were in the yard. Can I thank you church for blessing others, most often with your presence, but sometimes with your casseroles. I have seen you in emergency rooms and sitting at bedsides. I have seen you hug and celebrate with joy. But you are doing what you’re supposed to be doing aren’t you? Listen again to Peter’s words, “For this we are called.” Let us pray.

(Special thanks goes out to Mark Trotter for the opening story. Thanks goes out to Linda Gayle Wagnon and her confidence in me for blessing her beauty shop. I trust that the shop is still doing well. Thanks goes out to brides and grooms who have trusted me to bless their marriages and high schools that have blessed me to participate in their ceremonies. Most importantly, I thank God for blessing me with a wonderful staff and a great church. Join me as we bless each other and the world).