Good for the Soul

The Rev. Dr. Skip Ferguson

Manassas Presbyterian Church

Manassas, Virginia

April 24, 2016

Good for the Soul

Isaiah 1:16-18

Wash yourselves;

make yourselves clean;

remove the evil of your doings

from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,

learn to do good;
seek justice,

rescue the oppressed,
defend the orphan,

 plead for the widow.

Come now, let us argue it out,

says the Lord:
though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be like snow;
though they are red like crimson,

they shall become like wool.

*****************************************

You cannot say you were never warned.

How many times have you heard:

There will be a quiz.

And today is the day!

It is that time of year

when students of every age

are focused on exams:

older students on final exams,

younger students on SOLs.

So it seems to me that a quiz this morning

would be very appropriate,

not only as a test of our knowledge,

but also as a way for us to grow

in empathy and compassion

for those filled with the anxiety

that can strike even the best-prepared.

You have nothing to worry about here, though.

We are Protestants, after all,

which means grace abounds.

So our quiz this morning will be simple,

just one question.

And since we are people of the Book,

it is a Bible question.

Here it is:

In what book of the Bible

will we find the phrase,

“Confession is good for the soul”?

Now, I can hear the complaints already:

many saying that those who are participating

in our “Year of the Bible” class

have an unfair advantage.

Well, everyone was invited to participate,

and it isn’t too late join the group!

                                   

But, to allay your concerns,

I’ll remind you that even though our

Year of the Bible participants

are a third of the way through the Bible,

which is very impressive,

that still means that they have

not read two-thirds.

So their advantage may not be as great

as you think it is.  

Let’s think about this together:

“Confession is good for the soul.”

Sounds sort of like a proverb, doesn’t it?

So, is that where it is—

in the Book of Proverbs?

It could be part of a Psalm, though.

There are a number of Psalms

that have a powerful

confessional element to them:

Psalm 25, Psalm 32, Psalm 51

among others.

We use those and other psalms regularly

as prayers of confession in our worship services.

Then again,

it could be something that Moses said

to the children of Israel in Deuteronomy,

his final words to the Israelites

after their 40 years in the wilderness,

before Joshua led them across the Jordan

into the promised land.

It could have been Moses’ reminder

of their need to stay humble,

grounded,

eyes, minds and hearts

focused on the Lord God.

We should not overlook Jesus, of course.

There’s something about the phrase

that makes it sound like it

might have been part of

his Sermon on the Mount,

as we find it in the gospel of Matthew,

or perhaps in Luke’s version of the sermon,

the one we call the Sermon on the Plain.  

Some might be thinking

that it has a bit of a Pauline ring to it,

the kind of thing that Paul might have written

to the Corinthians or the Galatians,

followers of Jesus who exasperated Paul

with their waywardness.

Wherever the phrase is to be found,

it was a phrase I heard at a very young age –

a phrase I learned from my mother

who used it regularly,

especially when she suspected me of something.

I learned very quickly

that the moment the words were

out of her mouth

it was a trap;

that she already knew

whatever it was that I had done,

and that she was looking to me

to own up to my misbehavior,

for me to confess rather than hide behind

some concocted story,

or some absurd, obvious lie.

Truth be told,

I’m not sure I learned as a youngster

that confession was good for the soul.

What I did learn was that

confession at least mitigated

the inevitable punishment.

I learned that if I acknowledged

what I had done,

or what I had failed to do;

what I’d said,

or what I had failed to say,

my mother usually went easier on me.

There was still a price to pay,

punishment meted out,

but generally less if I confessed.

What my mother wanted, of course,

was not to punish me;

that wasn’t the point.

What she wanted me to do was learn,

learn from my misdeed,

my bad act,

my fib,

whatever it was I’d done—

my mother wanted me to learn

that it was wrong;

she wanted me to learn

so I wouldn’t do it again.

And isn’t that what every

loving and wise parent wants?

They want their child to learn.

How many times throughout history

do you suppose a parent has said to child,

after punishment has been dispensed,

“I hope you learned your lesson.”

That’s what God wants, as well

which is why God calls us to confess,

why God calls us to acknowledge readily

when we’ve substituted our own will,

our own way,

when we’ve said something

we know we should not have said,

done something we should not have done,

failed to speak or act.

God doesn’t want to stand over us

telling us we are bad, unworthy,

a disgrace;

God loves us

and God wants us to learn.

Punishment is not God’s goal;

learning is,

growing is,

transformation is.

Our stumbling block seems to be

taking that first step—

confessing,

acknowledging,

taking responsibility for our actions,

our words.

We read in the first letter of John:

“If we say that we have no sin,

we deceive ourselves,

and the truth is not in us.

(1 John 1:8ff)

but we deceive ourselves all the time.

rationalizing our acts and actions:

they’re not that bad;

we haven’t murdered or stolen;

and compared to others,

we look pretty good.

But we don’t fool God,

any more than I was ever able

to fool my mother.

Why is it that we have such a difficult time

acknowledging our own waywardness,

our own faults,

but find it so easy to point out

the faults of others,

how others are bad, weak, sinful?

                                   

How quick we are to judge.

And how indifferent we are,

how unresponsive we are

to the many times

Jesus teaches us not to judge others:

“Do not judge,

so that you may not be judged.

For with the judgment you make

you will be judged. …

Why do you see the speck

in your neighbor’s eye,

but not notice the log in your own eye?”

(Matthew 7:1-3)

Jesus conveys the point another way

with this parable from Luke:

“Two men went up to the temple to pray,

one a Pharisee and

the other a tax collector.

The Pharisee, standing by himself,

was praying thus,

‘God, I thank you that I am

not like other people:

thieves, rogues, adulterers,

or even like this tax collector.

I fast twice a week;

I give a tenth of all my income.’

But the tax collector, standing far off,

would not even look up to heaven,

but was beating his breast and saying,

‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’

I tell you,

this man went down to his home justified

rather than the other;

for all who exalt themselves

will be humbled,

but all who humble themselves

will be exalted.”

(Luke 18:9)

Listen to God’s words to us from our lesson

as “The Message” paraphrases them:

“Go home and wash up.
Clean up your act.
Sweep your lives clean of your evildoings
so I don’t have to look at them any longer.
Say no to wrong.
Learn to do good.
Work for justice.

Help the down-and-out.
Stand up for the homeless.

Go to bat for the defenseless.”

Could God be any clearer

as to what God wants from us?

How easy it should be, then

for us to acknowledge

when we’ve not done what God wants,

when we have not lived

as God calls us to live.

In his letter to the Romans, Paul wrote

“I do not understand my own actions.

For I do not do what I want,

but I do the very thing I hate.”

(Romans 7:15)

Paul’s words are a reminder to all of us

that we all stray,

we all do wrong,

we all make bad choices

we all say the wrong thing,

we all judge, condemn,

act without compassion or kindness or

generosity of heart.

God’s promise is sure,

grounded in love,

that when we do confess

we will be put back in a

right relationship with God.

We heard that at the end of our lesson:

“If your sins are blood-red,

they’ll be snow-white.

If they’re red like crimson,

they’ll be like wool.”

(from The Message)

Or, as we hear it in the first letter of John

“If we confess our sins,

[God] who is faithful and just

will forgive us our sins

and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Confession is good for the soul.

because it strengthens

our relationship with God,

teaches us humbleness, modesty,

makes us more attentive to God’s word,

God’s will,

God’s way.

Confession leads us back to God.

We have nothing to fear

and everything to gain from confession.

Now, I need to make a confession.

In asking you which book of the Bible

we’d find the phrase

“confession is good for the soul”,

I asked you a trick question.

You won’t find the phrase in the Bible!

“Confession is good for the soul”

is an old aphorism, a saying

that is thought to have come from Scotland

in the 18^th century.

It may not be biblical,

but the thought behind it

is grounded in God’s word,

and our Lord’s teachings.

So make it one of your proverbs,

to guide you each day,

confession, good for mind, heart,

body and soul,

all, to help you grow closer to God.

AMEN  

Have You Not Heard?

The Rev. Dr. Skip Ferguson

Manassas Presbyterian Church

Manassas, Virginia

April 17, 2016

Have You Not Heard?

Isaiah 40:21-31

Have you not known?

Have you not heard?

Has it not been told you from the beginning?

Have you not understood

from the foundations of the earth?

It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,

and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers;

who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,

and spreads them like a tent to live in;

who brings princes to naught,

and makes the rulers of the earth as nothing.

Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown,

scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,
when he blows upon them,

and they wither,

and the tempest carries them off like stubble.

To whom then will you compare me,

or who is my equal? says the Holy One.

Lift up your eyes on high and see:

Who created these?
He who brings out their host and numbers them,

calling them all by name;
because he is great in strength,

mighty in power,

not one is missing.

Why do you say, O Jacob,

and speak, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,

and my right is disregarded by my God”?

Have you not known?

Have you not heard?

The Lord is the everlasting God,

the Creator of the ends of the earth.

He does not faint or grow weary;

his understanding is unsearchable.

He gives power to the faint,

and strengthens the powerless.

Even youths will faint and be weary,

and the young will fall exhausted;

but those who wait for the Lord

shall renew their strength,

they shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they shall run and not be weary,

they shall walk and not faint.

*************************************

Who doesn’t love the “good old days”?

Who doesn’t love to wax nostalgic,

to look to the past?

So let’s do that this morning –

let’s go back in time,

far back;

let’s go back 200 years,

back to the year 1816.

You would be quite uncomfortable,

sitting on hard wooden benches,

rather than the upholstered chairs

we have now.

And your discomfort would only get worse

as I begin to preach my sermon,

a sermon that would go on and on,

for two, maybe even three hours,

a sermon that would focus on how bad you are,

on how sinful,

on just how far down the road to hell

you all have traveled.

My sermon would not be designed to teach,

or encourage,

or proclaim;

it would be a sermon designed to instill fear,

fear more than anything else,

fear to awaken you

to how sinful a life you are living.

Hellfire and brimstone have gone out of fashion

from most pulpits these days.

Preaching fear is certainly

not an effective way

to share the good news of

the gospel of Jesus Christ.

More to the point,

it is bad theology.

A few years back,

a prominent evangelical preacher

told his congregation

he no longer believed

in the concept of hell

as he and his church had learned it;

as he had preached it;

as he had taught it.

In that pastor’s church,

hell was very real,

a place of eternal fire and torment

for nonbelievers;

and nonbelievers were thought to be anyone

who didn’t think exactly the way they thought

within the walls of that church.

What caused him to change his thinking

was an art show his church had organized,

an art show in which

contributors had been asked

to produce works of art featuring

men and women who had earned reputations

as peacemakers in history.

Among the works

was portrait of Mahatma Gandhi –

no surprise there: he was a man whose life

had been devoted to peace,

to peace-making,

to reconciliation of races and peoples.

Shortly after the exhibit opened,

the pastor noted that

someone had taped a piece of paper

on the corner of the frame

with Gandhi’s picture,

a piece of paper with words that said,

“Reality check: he’s in hell”,

presumably because Gandhi was not a Christian.

When the pastor saw the note,

he was stunned,

and questions flooded his mind:

Really, Mahatma Gandhi is in hell?

Do we know that for a fact?

Has someone checked?

Has someone confirmed this?

Why? Why would Gandhi be in hell?

Why, if we believe in a God of love,

a God of grace,

a God of mercy,

why would such a God want

to subject Mahatma Gandhi,

a man who devoted his life to peace,

to an eternity of hellfire and torment?

To the pastor, this made no sense.

To the pastor, who, up to that point,

had never questioned

the concept of hell he had learned,

the concept he had preached,

found himself asking,

“Does God really punish people

…with infinite, eternal torment?

Does God really punish people

…with infinite, eternal torment

for things they did in their

few finite years of life?”

The pastor went back to the gospels

and realized that every time

Jesus made a reference to hell,

Jesus was not talking about

a place deep underground.

That concept had come from Roman

and Greek literature.

No, Jesus was talking about

the garbage dump outside of Jerusalem;

he was using the garbage dump,

with its ever-present flames

and overpowering stench,

to illustrate the points he was making,

as part of his teaching.

The pastor began to wonder how

his long-held beliefs

fit with the words from

the first letter of John in scripture

which teaches us that God is love,

and those who abide in love, abide in God,

and God abides in them.

The pastor eventually told his congregation

that his thinking about hell had changed,

changed radically from

what they all believed within his church.

Many of his congregation reacted angrily.

The pastor had challenged a foundational belief

that he himself had taught.

Many parishioners left the church;

and before long the pastor himself

stepped down from the pulpit,

and left the church,

the church which he had helped establish.

The pastor’s belief in God,

in Jesus,

his faith –

none of that had changed;

just his thinking about the concept of hell.

But his re-examination of his long-held beliefs,

even the very act of questioning,

had shaken the congregation

to its very foundation.  

(Rob Bell, from his book “Love Wins”)

Two weeks ago,

we talked about how vital it is to our faith

to question, to ponder,

to inquire,  

to look afresh even at deeply-held gospel truths,

I quoted the author David Kinnaman, who asked,

“Is the Christian community capable of

…welcoming hard questions …

Or will the church continue to be seen as a place

where doubts don’t belong

because certainty is the same as faith?”

It is this resistance to looking afresh,

this resistance to looking within,

this resistance to questioning

that has caused so many young people

to turn away from church.

These young people aren’t leaving

one church for another,

as so many did a generation ago,

seeking a livelier experience,

seeking anything other than

their parents’ church.

No, these young people are leaving church, period,

finding churches too stultifying,

closed-minded,

judgmental,

self-righteous.

We are beginning to plan for celebrations

to mark our 150^th anniversary next year.

We should rejoice in our rich history.

But we should also use our

anniversary celebrations

as an opportunity for us

to think deeply, faithfully about our future,

about what kind of church we currently are,

and about what kind of church we want to be,

what kind of church we believe God is calling us to be

in God’s future – 5, 10, 25 years from now.

I think the two texts

that are part of our service today

should guide us,

should help shape our thinking for the future,

shape who we are as children of God

as disciples of Christ,

and as a body of Christ.

The underlying message of

both the text in Isaiah

and Psalm 23 that Bel Canto

will sing in a few minutes

is so simple:

God is with us;

God is with us because God loves us.

God is with us,

in good times and in bad.

God is with us,

and God will see us through,

even if find ourselves in the darkest valley,

even the valley of death.

Jesus never tells us that life will be easy,

nor do our texts.

Jesus never tells us

that our lives will be overflow

with material abundance and riches,

nor do our texts.

But what Jesus does assure us of,

what our texts assure us of,

is that no matter what life brings us,

no matter what life throws at us,

God will be with us.

Health concerns,

financial worries,

relationships collapsing,

job stress,

concern for loved ones –

God is with us,

lifting us up,

giving us strength;

helping to see us through.

Is there a more stressful time in life

than the teenage years

as we transition from child to adult,

as we struggle to learn who we are

who God created us to be?

Even in those tumultuous years,

God is there, with us,

renewing our strength,

lifting us up.

Even in those often terribly lonely years,

we are never alone.

                 

Rabbi Harold Kushner,

who wrote the now classic book,

“When Bad Things Happen to Good People”

wrote in another of his books that,

“Religion should not be

the carping voice of condemnation,

telling us that the normal is sinful

and the well-intentioned mistake

is an unforgivable transgression....

Religion should be a voice that says,

I will guide you through this minefield of

difficult choices,

sharing with you the insights and experiences

of the greatest souls of the past,

and I will offer you comfort and forgiveness

when you are troubled by

the painful choices you made.”

and you will make painful choices…

That’s what I think our text

and Psalm 23 teach us.

That’s what the Risen Christ teaches us.

And that should be the message we convey,

the cornerstone of our ministry,

our mission

as we follow Christ into God’s future.

Here in this pile of bricks,

situated halfway between Costco and Walmart,

anyone, everyone

should be able to find God’s presence.

Here, even the prodigal son should find welcome,

forgiveness,

acceptance.

If we had the space,

it seems to me that new sign

we hope to install later this year should say:

“Have you not known?

Have you not heard?                          

The Lord is the everlasting God,

the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He doesn’t come and go;

He is always here,

to give power to the faint,
and strength to the powerless.
Those who wait for the Lord

will renew their strength,

they will soar like eagles,

they will run and never tire,

they shall walk and never faint.

For God will be with them.

God is here…

for you.”

AMEN

Knowing Faith

The Rev. Dr. Skip Ferguson

Manassas Presbyterian Church

Manassas, Virginia

April 3, 2016

Knowing Faith

John 20:19-29

When it was evening on that day,

the first day of the week,

and the doors of the house where the disciples had met

were locked for fear of the Jews,

Jesus came and stood among them and said,

“Peace be with you.”

After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side.

Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.

Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.

As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

When he had said this, he breathed on them

and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

If you forgive the sins of any,

they are forgiven them;

if you retain the sins of any,

they are retained.”

But Thomas (who was called the Twin),

one of the twelve,

was not with them when Jesus came.

So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.”

But he said to them,

“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands,

and put my finger in the mark of the nails

and my hand in his side,

I will not believe.”

A week later his disciples were again in the house,

and Thomas was with them.

Although the doors were shut,

Jesus came and stood among them and said,

“Peace be with you.”

Then he said to Thomas,

“Put your finger here and see my hands.

Reach out your hand and put it in my side.

Do not doubt but believe.”

Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!”

Jesus said to him,

“Have you believed because you have seen me?

Blessed are those who have not seen

and yet have come to believe.”

***********************************************

I have always thought

history has treated Thomas unfairly.

For two thousands years

he has been known as “Doubting Thomas,”

the man with weak faith.

“Don’t be a doubting Thomas”

is a well-worn phrase

we are quick to apply to anyone

who hesitates,

who questions,

who doesn’t seem fully committed

to faith and belief.

Read the story carefully, though,

and we see that Thomas asked for nothing more

than the same opportunity

the other disciples had had:

they got to see Jesus;

they got to see the scars –

the text is clear on that:

“When it was evening on that day,

the first day of the week,

and the doors of the house

where the disciples had met

were locked for fear of the Jews,

Jesus came and stood among them and said,

“Peace be with you.”

After he said this,

he showed them his hands and his side.

Then the disciples rejoiced

when they saw the Lord.”

[Jesus]  showed them his hands and his side.

and …Then …the disciples rejoiced

when they saw the Lord.”

                 

The disciples didn’t rejoice

when Jesus first appeared in that room,

or even after he spoke to them

in that voice that was so familiar,

“Peace be with you.”

No, they only rejoiced

after they saw the scars.

Only then were they certain

that this was Jesus risen indeed,

Jesus unbound from the tomb.

the living Jesus.

Do you recall our text from last week,

Luke’s recounting of the empty tomb

on that first Easter Sunday?

Listen again to a part of the text:

“and returning from the tomb,

they told all this to the eleven

and to all the rest.

Now it was Mary Magdalene, Joanna,

Mary the mother of James,

and the other women with them

who told this to the apostles.

But these words seemed to them an idle tale,

and they did not believe them.”

(Luke 24:9-11)

The apostles heard what the women said,

what they had found and seen:

an empty tomb,

the linen wrappings,

two men in “dazzling clothes”

who suddenly appeared

and said to them,

“Why do you look for the living

among the dead?

He is not here, but has risen.

Remember how he told you…

that the Son of Man must be

handed over to sinners,

and be crucified,

and on the third day rise again.”

The apostles considered the women’s story

an “idle tale.”

Yes, there was probably more than

a little sexism at work there;

but still, they didn’t believe.    

All, except, it seems, Peter.

At least he got up and went to have a look.

The women’s words were enough

to pique his curiosity.

He was intrigued.

He wanted to see for himself.  

Peter may have doubted the women’s words,

but what set him apart from the others

was that he didn’t dismiss them,

the way the other disciples did,

dismissing the women’s words

as “an idle tale”.

That’s where I think Thomas gets into trouble –

he isn’t “doubting” Thomas

as much as he is “dismissive” Thomas,

dismissing what the disciples told him,

what they shared with him,

what they’d seen,

all of them;

what they’d experienced,

all of them.

Thomas dismissed their words:

“I won’t believe unless I see it,

see Jesus myself.”

There is a difference between dismissing

and doubting.

There is nothing wrong with doubting;

sometimes we are asked to believe

what logic tells us is impossible,

such as a man rising from the dead;

death defeated;

eternal life granted us.

Sometimes we are asked to take on faith

the incomprehensible:

how our Risen Lord,

our Living Lord

feeds us with the Bread of Life

and quenches our thirst with the

Cup of Salvation.

                                                     

Doubting can actually help us to grow in faith,

grow in belief.

When we doubt, we tend to ask questions.

and a questioning faith is a vibrant faith,

not a weak faith.

                 

As a writer in the Christian Century magazine put it,

“an unquestioning faith is no faith at all,

because it shows a lack of engagement

with the divine.”

(Shawnthea Monroe)

A questioning faith is one that is not dismissive,

it is engaged, engaged with God,

engaged with Christ,

engaged with the Spirit.

A questioning faith asks the tough questions,

without fear,

without hesitation,

without apology:

Why is there so much evil in this world?

Why is there suffering?

Why do children die of hunger and thirst?

Why do the rich get richer,

and the corrupt prosper,

while the good so often struggle?

Even as we ask our questions,

we know from the story of Job

we may not get answers that satisfy us;

we may not get any answers at all.

As we walk in faith

we should keep the words of the poet

Emily Dickinson close at hand:

“I shall know why,

when time is over,

And I have ceased to wonder why;”

Still, we should ask,

we should question,

we should learn,

we should grow in knowledge,

knowledgeable faith,

knowing faith.

Not all-knowing faith –

no, we should always be careful.        

The history of the Christian church is one

of too much certainty,

too much arrogance.

A lifetime of faith and study

constantly reminds me

of how much I don’t know.

But when we question,

we can look afresh at

what we call “gospel truths”

and perhaps see things in a new way

come to a new understanding:

slavery is wrong,

even if Scripture seems to approve;

inequality is wrong,

even is Scripture seems to approve;

inclusion, acceptance –

that’s what Christ models,

what Christ teaches us,

even if the Church historically has modeled

exclusion, preference, closed doors.  

In his book, “You Lost Me”,

David Kinnaman asks,

“Is the Christian community capable of

holding doubt and faithfulness in tension,

welcoming hard questions

even as we press together toward answers?

Or will the church continue to be seen as a place

where doubts don’t belong

because certainty is the same as faith?”

It is okay to be a doubting Thomas,

or a doubting Mabel --

not dismissive, or closed-minded,

but questioning, probing,

hungry to know, know more,

know God,

know Christ,

know more about what it means

to walk in faith,

what it means to say, “I believe.”

A bit of doubt keeps us humble;

a bit of doubt keeps us fresh;

and yes, a bit of doubt

keeps us faithful.

AMEN