Stre------tch

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
October 12, 2008

Stre------tch
1 Chronicles 29:1-9
Matthew 6:25-34

Who isn’t worried?
The news about the economy just gets bleaker and bleaker.
Banking and insurance companies collapsing;
stock markets in a sickening dive,
not even a spiral,
but head first, straight down;
750,000 jobs lost since January,
and more sure to go as businesses pull back;
Companies that were household names vanished,
there one day, gone the next.

Economists, bankers, business executives,
government officials all trying to understand
why things turned so bad so quickly,
all trying to come up with solutions.

There is no doubt that this is the most serious economic downturn
we have witnessed in more than 70 years.
And it isn’t limited to this country;
the problems are global.
The subject now dominates the election at every level,
state, local, and national.

I find myself transfixed by all this.
When I responded to God’s call to ministry
and went to seminary twelve years ago,
I did not turn my back on the business world
that I had been part of for the previous 15 years.
In fact I stayed actively involved throughout Seminary
working as a contributing editor to business journals
at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania,
where I earned my business degree 30 years ago.

The past few weeks I have been staying up
later at night than I should
surfing the Internet
to find out what is happening in Asian economies:
Japan, China, Korea, India.
I check on Europe early every morning.

I can make a small claim to some prescience:
Back in 1995 when I was with the Economist Group
I led a team that produced a major report
on the complex financial instruments
that companies were just starting to use,
and which now seem to be a major cause
of the economic meltdown.
We wrote that while these hybrid financial instruments
had great benefits,
they required companies to exercise diligent oversight,
and they also required effective
and thorough government regulation.
(“Strategic Derivatives”,
The Economist Intelligence Unit, 1995)

I am baffled by the speed of the meltdown;
I am uncertain about the remedies being proposed;
and I am outraged at the appalling greed of business executives
who led these now troubled businesses.
No one is worth $20 million, $30 million or more;
No one is worth $100,000 a day!

But for as baffled as I am,
as uncertain as I am,
and as angry and outraged as I might be,
am I worried?
One look at my pension plan and retirement savings
tells me I should be.

But I am not.

I am not
because my faith is not in the marketplace,
my faith is Jesus Christ.
I am not worried because Jesus teaches me and you
not to worry.

Our Second Lesson appears twice in the gospels:
first in Matthew, and then again in Luke (12:22)
Don’t worry.
“Do not worry about your life,” says Jesus,
“what you eat or what you will drink,
or about your body, what you will wear.
Is not life more than food,
and the body more than clothing?
…Can any of you by worrying
add a single hour
to your span of life?”

Jesus asks the question,
and we all know the answer is, no.
We know it, even if we don’t weave the lesson
into our lives.

Jesus tells us what we are to do:
“strive for the kingdom of God.”
“strive for the kingdom of God,
and God’s righteousness.”
Each of us, that’s what we are supposed to do,
individually and collectively.

Strive for the kingdom,
strive for righteousness in our lives --
We fill our days with that,
and we won’t have time to worry.
We do that,
and other matters will sort themselves out,
sometimes for the good,
sometimes in other ways.
Our call is to trust,
to have faith,
to let go of our worries
and let God watch over us.

Now that’s all well and good for Jesus to say.
He didn’t have a family to feed,
a car payment to make,
or a mortgage on his house.
He wasn’t concerned with shrinking equity in his home;
he wasn’t concerned about an evaporating 401(k);
and he wasn’t concerned about pending job cutbacks.
Yet still Jesus would say calmly to each us,
“trust in the Lord,”
“have faith.”
“strive for the kingdom of God,”
“strive for God’s righteousness and goodness.”

God’s promise to us is so simple;
it is a promise made in two words,
a mere three letters: “I am”.
“I am”.
God’s promise of presence in our lives,
in good times and in bad times,
even in the bleakest times,
when storm clouds hover over us,
when howling winds threaten to knock us off our feet.
God’s presence to give us the strength we need
to face even the most difficult times.
God promises, “I am”
“I will be with you.”
It is promise that Jesus reinforces
with the same two words: I am.
It is the promise the Psalmist recognized
when he said, “even in the Valley of the Shadow of Death,
you are with me.”
God so close the Psalmist whispers “you”:
“you are with me, even here,
even when I can feel death’s hand on my shoulder,
I know you are with me.”

With that promise,
we can leave worry behind,
for the ground that we stand on
is not the shaky ground of a trouble economy,
it is holy ground.
There is good reason the Psalmist
repeatedly called God,
“the rock of our salvation.”

So this is where we are, here and now,
on October 12, 2008, in the midst
of economic turmoil and uncertainty.
Our trust is in the Lord,
our faith is in the Lord.
We lift worry up to God.
We let go and let God.
Our focus is on the Kingdom, on Christ,
on righteousness.

If only these walls around could talk,
the voices of the saints who’ve gone before us
who filled these seats over the past 141 years,
here and the pews in the old church in Old Town.
They’d all say, “Yes, Yes! Strive for the Kingdom!”
“We lived through the Panic of 1873,
and the Panic of 1893,
and the Panic of 1907,
and the Great Depression,
and the recession of 1953,
and every other economic downturn of the past 50 years.
We lived through wars,
we lived through epidemics.
We built this church from the rubble
of the Civil War.
We lived through it all,
as you will,
for we lived our lives in faith,
putting our trust in the Lord.”

So that’s just what we will do:
lift our fears and our worries to God,
give them over to Jesus
and look confidently ahead,
as we strive for the Kingdom and
work for righteousness.

And the first bold act we can do in faith,
is to plan for our ministries and missions for 2009,
plan confidently.
And the starting point for that is for each of us
to make a pledge of support
to the Stewardship Campaign we begin today.

Our Stewardship Ministry Team has put in many, many
hours to develop a campaign to help us understand our needs,
all the different missions and ministries we support.
And just as important, the Stewardship team
has created a campaign designed to build community,
and even encourage us to have some fun in the process.

We are excited about this year’s campaign
because we are excited about the ministry of this church,
excited about what Jesus calls us to do,
and excited about what Jesus may call us to do in the future.

Stewardship is not just about money,
not just about filling out our pledge cards,
as important as that is.
It is about everything we do,
how we live our lives as Christians.
It is about striving for the Kingdom,
God’s Kingdom, as Jesus would have us,
here and now in our every act,
our every word and deed.
Stewardship is living our faith,
trusting God,
even when dark clouds fill the sky over us,

The officers of our church have taken the lead
in this year’s campaign.
You heard Mishelle:
every Elder and Deacon,
every one of them,
has already returned a pledge card.
This is a wonderful way to start:
100% participation from our officers.
My card is in;
I returned it in August.

Now it’s your turn.
Now it is your turn.
Even if next year looks uncertain for you,
return a pledge card;
If you are uncomfortable with the word “pledge”,
then use the term “estimate of offering”:
your best estimate of what you hope
to return to God next year
from what God gives you.

You’ve heard the reasons:
pledging is important because it helps us plan,
helps us develop a budget;
pledging is important because it builds community,
with all of us working together;
But most important,
pledging is your opportunity to put your trust in God,
to act in faith,
to respond to God,
to offer your gratitude to God,
to make that commitment, that act of faith
in your pledge to return to God
a portion of what God has given you.

Your pledge is your opportunity to say to God
“Thank you for what you have given me.
I recognize your blessings
and so with joy and thanksgiving,
with faith and trust,
I willingly, eagerly, return a portion
of what has come from you, O God.”

Filling out a pledge card
is a statement of faith;
In this economy it may require a leap of faith,
a stretch.
But isn’t that was Jesus call us to do:
to stretch as we follow him,
stretch in our lives as disciples?

And that will be easy to do
won’t it, because of God’s promises to us,
the promise of “I am”.

So let’s get this Pony Express on the trail,
off to a galloping start,
and then let’s look forward to a successful conclusion,
to November 16 when we end the campaign,
when we gather as the children of Israel did before David,
“the people rejoicing
because they had given willingly
with a single mind
offering freely to the Lord.”
Each of us,
all of us together,
striving for the Kingdom,
all of us putting our faith and trust
utterly and completely in God.
Praise God from whom all blessings flow!
AMEN