December 17, 2000

Pastor David G. Mullen

Luke 3:7-18

Today we focus on the third ministry priority of our congregation, Daily Life as Discipleship. This priority almost sounds like John the Baptist: "Challenging God’s people to recognize God’s gifts, motivating them to responsibly manage their lives for the sake of Christ’s work in the world." And what might that mean?

I think we could call it, "living the Spirit of Christmas all year round." The Spirit of Christmas: Each holiday season all over America people give gifts to help the needy. Sometimes people are amazing in their generosity. Money flows in to help feed, shelter and bring a bit of joy to the poor and homeless. For example, in response to the Marine Corp Toys for Tots appeal, employees and their employer, Pelco, down in Clovis, California, have donated 140,000 toys. It’s quite a sight–a mountain of toys! Company President David McDonald says, "It’s unbelievable. It’s like taking a whole Toys R Us and dumping it upside down in one pile."

A few weeks ago it was announced here that there was a Christmas tree in the narthex with the names of 50 kids who needed gifts for Christmas. In five minutes after the service, all fifty names were gone. Next Sunday, another 20 names were placed on the tree and in a couple of minutes, those were gone, too. It’s the Spirit of Christmas!

But think for a moment: What if we were that in touch with the needs of others all year round? What if we showed such Gospel inspired generosity every week? That surely would be a big part of the meaning of responsibly managing our lives for the sake of Christ’s work in the world. Thus, Ministry in Daily Life means, among other things, living the Spirit of Christmas year round, and everywhere.

Too often we forget how much the world needs us to be like Christmas all year round! Remember Scrooge, the infamous character in Dickens’, A Christmas Carol? "Scrooge" has become a term for the very opposite of what Christmas is about: Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner!

Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The reason Dickens wrote that story was in hopes of changing the cynical scrooge-like attitudes he saw in his day and age, at the flowering of the Industrial Revolution.

Perhaps it’s not stretching things too far to say that John the Baptist, out in the wilderness, challenging the people to change their lives, was like Charles Dickens, telling a story in the hope of changing the world. Clearly the evangelist Luke placed John the Baptist in the ranks of those who knew, lived, and preached the Good News that a better world is not only possible, but just around the corner. Get on the Gospel bandwagon!

John proclaimed that God’s Messiah was about to enter human history, and therefore, suddenly, there was renewed hope for everyone, even for those most hated in John’s day: the tax-collectors and the soldiers. The tax-collectors, remember, were Jews who cheated their own people by over-collecting. And the soldiers out there in the wilderness listening to John were probably not Roman soldiers, but local Jewish mercenaries who extorted money, property, food and drink from their own people. In other words, the tax collectors and mercenaries were Scrooges. Their fellow citizens despised them as nothing but pond scum. John was truly good news for them, like a Spirit of Christmas, because he actually noticed them, talked with them, and urged them, not to give up their occupations, but simply to do them God’s way: be fair, merciful, and happy with what you have. Thus even the despised ones counted in the coming Messiah’s world! Connected with that hope, they found the courage to change.

But John wasn’t preaching just to the bad guys. His message went to those who considered themselves God’s faithful people. Picture him standing on a huge boulder along the rocky shoreline of the Jordan River. He is telling good guys not to rely on the religion they inherited from ancestor Abraham. He points the rocks all around him and shouts, "God can turn these stones into children of Abraham." John is looking for God’s people to live with faith, justice, mercy, not just to act religious and look successful.

"God can turn these stones into children of Abraham." I’ll bet that Charles Dickens did not just randomly choose the name Ebenezer, but, well schooled in allusions to Scripture, picked the name as a sign of what his story would reveal: the transforming power of the good news glimpsed in the lives of others, a power great enough to change hearts of stone into Christmas-like hearts of faith, mercy, and joyous giving, just like happened in his famous story. For the name, "Ebenezer," comes from 1 Samuel, chapter 7: After the Lord turned back a fierce threat of the hostile Philistines, in gratitude and relief, the prophet Samuel set up a large stone, and called it, "Ebenezer", which meant, in ancient Hebrew, "The Lord has helped us."

The large stone, a sign that The Lord has helped us. In 1965 there was a severe and devastating drought in the city of Santa Rosa, Guatemala. People leaving. Businesses going bankrupt. Crops perishing. Animals dying. Special efforts were made to bring water in, but it was scarce everywhere. Catholics held special Masses. Evangelicals had prayer meetings. Still, there was no rain and no water. Then it happened. In a small Pentecostal meeting, where some believers from the Principe de Pas church had assembled for their regular worship service, the Spirit of the Lord moved in a mighty way. There was a message in tongues, followed a few moments later by an interpretation. It ran like this: "Dig a well in the pastor's backyard. There you will find water."

There was fierce opposition and mockery from other churches as the Pentecostal deacons, elders and pastor began to dig. The crabby, Scrooge-like critics thought these people were fanatics and/or were hallucinating -- especially when they saw that the pastor's backyard was on a hill. A well should never be dug on a hill, as the water runs low. But the pastor, deacons and elders all continued to dig. Because of the drought, the land was hard, so the digging progressed slowly. On the fourth day, they encountered a big boulder. It was so large they thought they had hit solid rock. But they kept digging around the boulder until finally, after more two days, they were able to remove it. When they did, water gushed out, pouring down the hillside. With joy, everyone began to drink and drink. It was a remarkable sign for the whole town. The number of conversions to Christ was staggering; the entire town was influenced by it. [-Wesley D. Taylor, Tigard, Oregon.]

"Ministry in Daily Life" means we gladly keep on digging and trusting God--the God who can turn these stones into children of Abraham. We never know but that we may be exactly the ones God placed in someone’s life to show them what the Good News of Christ can look like. Thus Scrooges may glimpse hope, find Christ the rock, and begin to live the miracle of the ancient name: Ebenezer, "The Lord has helped us." Helped us find and live the Spirit of Christmas, here and everywhere, all year round. Amen.