pocket presbyterian church

Jeremiah 29:1-7 / Philippians 4:10-13                                                    “Living in the ‘Now’”


   It’s funny how something your child said years ago can stick with you. I still remember one of those from a sunny summer day during our years living in Taiwan. We had just finished some kind of evening meeting… And while we adults stood in a circle and talked, our young children ran and played together. Before long, a group of four or five pre-schoolers (including our daughter Janet) were racing around the cluster of adults in a tight circle—as fast as they could—laughing and trying to catch each other. For awhile, the children were having a great time; but finally, Janet cut a corner a little too tightly, slipped, and fell down hard on the asphalt parking lot—scraping up one knee and both hands. I picked her up and held her tight for a minute, and then we started wiping up her knees and hands. After she had calmed down and stopped crying, she looked up and said, “Daddy, why did God make the ground so HARD!?”

    I’ve thought about that question more than once since that day! Because in this world we live in, life can FEEL like a hard asphalt parking lot. We get our knees scraped… and our hearts broken… we struggle in school, or get laid off from work… and sometimes people we thought were our friends turn out not to be the people we thought they were! As the years go by, we get sick, and have to deal with fear and discouragement… and too often, we have to say goodbye to somebody we love very much. My daughter might have only been four years old, but she was right: Life on planet Earth can feel very harsh and painful and unfair.

   In the days of the prophet Jeremiah— about six centuries before Jesus walked that same land— the nation of Israel was going through one of those lonely, pain-filled times. Jeremiah is speaking the Word of God from the capital city of Jerusalem... but that’s not where most of his countrymen are! Most of the Jewish people are in exile: they’ve been taken captive, uprooted from their homeland, and taken by force to live in a foreign country that they hate and fear. They’re prisoners in an unfamiliar land— forced by the Babylonians to learn their language and culture, and do whatever labor that they’re assigned to do. The Israelites may be God’s chosen people, but at that moment what they feel is lost and alone and abandoned. And they’re wondering: How long will it be before we can go back to the land we know and love? Or will we ever see those familiar fields and hills again? And if God loves us, why is he taking so long to help us?

   You can imagine that in those days, the Jewish people were starving for some good news, and for a reason to hope. And some of their Jewish prophets there in Babylon were telling the people the message they wanted to hear— “Don’t worry”, they said--- “This time of exile won’t last… God is going to set us free any day now!” But those words were not the truth! The real message that God was sending those discouraged Israelites through Jeremiah are these surprising words: “Build houses, and settle down; plant gardens; marry, and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters.”

      How strange God’s instructions must have sounded! Because if you’re going to be moving soon, you don’t want to build a brand new house. And you definitely don’t want to go to all the trouble of planting and tending a garden if you’re not going to be around long enough to enjoy its produce. So the first thing that God says to Israel through Jeremiah is this: unpack your suitcases, and get used to the neighborhood, because you’re not going anywhere anytime soon!

   Can you imagine how disappointing Jeremiah’s words must have been for these Jewish exiles? It’s not the message they wanted to hear! There they are— after being torn away from their homes— trying to survive in a hot, swampy, humid part of the Middle East, infested with mosquitoes and malaria. Who could blame these Jewish captives if they longed for their homes in Israel?

   The Israelites wanted to go back—not just back to Israel, but back to the “good old days”! The days when there was peace in the land… when farmers could plant crops without worrying if an invading army would burn them up or steal their produce. Maybe that makes you think of a time when things were different here in Lee County.

·        Do you remember when Sanford was much smaller, and the pace of life was slower?

·        Do you remember when everybody went to church on Sunday...

·        When families sat down and ate dinner together every night...

·        When teachers led prayers in public schools?

    In churches that have watched their membership grow smaller and smaller over the years, you often hear people thinking back about what their church USED to be like. It can sound something like this:

·        “When I was a little girl, this church was filled every Sunday morning.” Or…

·        “Twenty years ago, we had two dozen children in this church— now we don’t have any.”

·        And “Oh, you should have known the Reverend Jones— he was a saint! You just cannot find a minister like that anymore!”

   Last Sunday, our Homecoming guest preacher did a good job highlighting some of the challenges that this congregation has faced in years past, and how the Pocket Church family persevered. And it’s important to remember your past, appreciate it, and learn from it. But, as she reminded us, you cannot LIVE in that past! If you get stuck longing for what life used to be like, then it becomes impossible to live with energy and purpose right now!

   So God sends Jeremiah to shake the Israelites out of their day-dreams. God tells them, “Settle down right here in Babylon— build houses, plant gardens, have children and grandchildren. You may wish you were somewhere else... but right now, YOU’RE HERE!” In verse seven, God tells his people “Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you... Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.” Can you imagine how hard it was for the Israelites to pray for that pagan community they’d been forced to move into? But that was God’s will for them at that time in their history— with the hope that they would learn patience and endurance and dependence on God during this challenging, discouraging time in their lives.

    Do you ever feel like you’re an “exile?” Someone living in circumstances you’d rather not be in? You wish you had a better job… or a more understanding husband… a brighter, or more athletic child… or a church with more young families?

·        But maybe this is what God wants instead: Not for you to find a better wife, but to learn to appreciate the one you have—in spite of her quirks and shortcomings.

·        Maybe instead of wishing your child was a straight-A student, or someone that’s got a more pleasing personality, your job is to learn to love that child you’ve already got—in spite of the ways he makes you want to pull your hair out sometimes.

·        Maybe the challenge for you at work is not to keep wishing that you had coworkers who were easier to work with, but learning to be patient with them, encourage them, listen to them— and, for YOU to be the kind of coworker they need you to be.

·        Maybe what God wants for us as a church is not only to hope for a good future, but to also make sure that we give God our best right now— using the people and the resources we already have!

One time I saw a bumper sticker on a car that said “Want a better pastor for your church? Then pray for the one you’ve got!” That’s one that Jeremiah could have written himself!

Ų      Want a better wife? Then pray that God will show YOU how to be a better husband!

Ų      And are you dying to get a better job? Just be sure that you also ask God to help you to do your best at the job you still have—until that new job comes along.

Ų      Want a stronger church? Ask God to show you how you can use your time and talents and money and energy to help shape Pocket into the church God wants us to become!

   There will always be things about life that we’re not happy with. Unexpected problems… things that just don’t seem fair… circumstances we wish more than anything we could change. And some of those will change over time—but many will not! But even if they don’t change, God has put us in this community… this job… this family… this church— right now, in the last couple of months of 2010— to make a difference! To show our world what it looks like when God’s people share and sacrifice and forgive and “turn the other cheek”… To be living witnesses of the love of Jesus Christ in a world of lonely, broken, hurting people. And when we do, remember that we don’t go out to face those challenges alone. God make us this promise: “I will never leave you or forsake you… Do not be discouraged, and do not be afraid.” So even if there are things in your life right now that are hard to bear, remember that we can still let the light of Jesus Christ shine through our words, our attitudes, and our actions this week. Because along with the Apostle Paul, “We can do everything through him who gives us strength.”

(Preached Oct. 24, 2010, at Pocket Presbyterian Church, Sanford NC)