BUILT TO LAST - June 1, 2008
Matthew 7:21-29; Psalm 49; Genesis chapters 7-9
The first thing that impresses me about this scripture is the water -- the floods. Even as I prepared the song for the children, which is a song I sang as a child, it brought an ache to my heart in the wake of the cyclone in Myanmar, and the flooding of the tsunami just a few years ago. This scripture even touches the earthquake in China, and brings us right into the midst of the tragedy of the school buildings collapsing.
A flood coming up is a serious disaster. A house or any building collapsing or being washed away is serious business. We have seen that it is a life or death situation. We have seen that it is important to plan and build wisely.
I was in California in 1994 and lived in Santa Clarita, very close to Northridge, which was the epicenter of an earthquake. There was damage to my condo building, and to the church, but they did not fall down. The Northridge United Methodist Church was largely undamaged and did not fall down.
However, a few blocks away, there was a three-story apartment building that collapsed, and people who lived in that building, especially people who lived on the first floor, died. Why did that one apartment building collapse? The contractor or builder was supposed to use 3" nails for all the construction, but instead used 2" nails.
The best way to build is to code -- to not only know it, but to act on it. To listen to those who have set the building codes. To be honest. To build with integrity.
In the church, we need a house built to code, a house built on the teachings of Jesus, to withstand the wind and the waves of the floods of life that threaten to wash over us, or wash us away. In Psalm 46 we read:
The Beloved is our refuge and our strength,
a loving Presence in times of trouble.
Therefore we will not fear though the earth should change,
though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea;
Though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble with its tumult.
There is a river whose streams make glad the Holy City,
the holy habitation of the Most High.
The Beloved is in the midst of it,
it shall not be moved;
Our loving Creator is an ever-present help. . . .
"Be still and know that I am Love.
I am exalted among the nations,
I am exalted in the earth!"
The One who knows all hearts is with us;
The Beloved is our refuge and our strength.
("Psalms For Praying" by Nan C. Merrill)
J. B. Phillips was a scholar in the Anglican church and wrote a book titled Your God is Too Small, which has become a classic work. His main point is that many of the ideas we have of God are simply too limiting, and that if we worship the god of those concepts, we miss glimpsing the true God.
In that book, Phillips describes a man who faces a lot of problems in his daily work and strains in his other duties. But this man is also happily married and thus looks forward to returning home each day. And because his home is a place of love and joy, he is able to cope, even with some zest, with those difficulties outside. If his marriage were to go sour, however, he might find the other problems of life altogether too much to deal with. The happy home, being a refuge (Phillips calls it the man's "center of operations"), gives him a place not to hide, but to regroup and then sally forth again.
In saying that God is our refuge, the psalmist is not seeking to escape, but he recognizes that God is our rock of secure footing, of joy, and of strength from which to deal with the problems of life. God is a refuge who protects us not by hiding us, but by adequately equipping us to face that which cannot be avoided, whether it be cancer, meaninglessness, terrorism, emotional illness or wounds, death of a loved one, financial loss, foreclosure or anything else.
Lilo Vaikuuta, one of the Lay Leaders from Honolulu 1st UMC, shared this story yesterday at the United Methodist Men's breakfast.
He said that in Tonga, when the rains come, you seek shelter in the eve of a thatched roof house. If there is a neighbor or friend with you at your home, you tell them to "move in." That is, come close, share the shelter of the roof of the house. If we stay where we are, we are going nowhere. If we stay where we are, we are only getting set. We are to "move in."
We do not grow in our faith if we stay where we are. If we stay where we are, we only get wet. We are to "move in," to the shelter of Jesus, who is our rock.
Then, we will have a house that is "Built to Last."
Amen
Pastor Fran
