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Elma United Methodist Church |
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An All Volunteer Service |
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Elma United Methodist Church |
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An All Volunteer Service Dan Shelly Elma United Methodist Church June 11, 2006 (Isaiah 6:1-8, Romans 8:12-17)
As a United Methodist Pastor when you’ve been informed that the Bishop would like you to serve in a different capacity in the coming year, there’s a pretty unique thing that happens to you in the month of June. Just as you’re looking forward to Annual Conference, you also begin to look ahead and realize that there are only so many more Sunday’s that you will be here in your present location. And you begin to ask yourself the question, “Is there anything that I really wanted to cover in my sermons, but I haven’t got around to it yet?” Because there’s really not a whole lot of getting around to it left you know! So I’m really glad that this week’s lectionary verses give me an opportunity to touch on one of those subjects. In this case it has to do with what happens when we go to heaven.
The desire to go to heaven is so universal that it’s been used in a lot of different ways. A while back there was a village in Ireland that was having a bit of a problem. It seemed that most of the men folk were spending too much time at the pub, and not enough time doing chores around home. So finally the women went to the parish priest and asked him to help. So Father Flannery went down to the pub, walked up to the first man at the bar and said, “Michael Finnigan, do you want to go to heaven?” “Yes, Father I do.” Replied Michael. “Well then, put down that pint and go stand over there by the wall.” Turning to the next man he asked “William O’Reilly, do you want to go to heaven?” “Yes, Father I do.” Replied O’Reilly. “Well then go join Michael Finnigan over there by the wall.” Then he turned to Sean Sullivan and said, “Sean Sullivan, do you want to go to heaven?” Sean looked up at him, looked at the men standing over by the wall and said, “No Father, I don’t want to go to heaven.”
Father Flannery was amazed. He said, “Sean surely you want to go to heaven. Surely when you die you want to see you dear mother and your saintly grand-mother, and you want to walk with them on those heavenly streets of gold!” Sean looked at him with surprise and said, “Oh yes Father, when I die I want to go to heaven. I just thought you were lining up a bunch of us to go right now!”
We all may want to go to heaven, but I’ve heard a pretty wide range of ideas concerning just what heaven’s going to be like. A while back, I was in a worship service and I heard the preacher stand up and say “When you get to heaven, there’s going to be a final judgment. God is going to open his Great Book and we are going to have to account for everything we did, every word and every deed. So you better watch out!” Well, I did cover that idea pretty well last year at Christmas when we talked about the difference between Santa Claus and Jesus. Santa is all about works, Santa keeps a list and Santa says “You Gotta’ be Good!” Jesus is all about Grace, Jesus’ actions tore up that list once and for all, and Jesus says, “Rejoice, for all your sins are both forgiven and forgotten.”
And today’s reading from Romans went on to flesh out that scene just a bit more for us. It said:
When we cry, ‘Abba!* Father!’ it is that very Spirit bearing witness* with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.
Last week we celebrated the coming of the Holy Spirit, and that Spirit is the Spirit of adoption. Now we are joint heirs with Christ. There’s no place to even think about fear when we’re talking about heaven, because God is Love, and perfect love casts out fear. Jesus stands beside us as our older brother and he sticks up for us to the Father. He says, sure he may have messed up and she might have constantly been slipping, but they’re part of the family and loved just as much as the rest of the kids. And besides Dad, I’ve already taken the rap for all of that stuff. That’s why in the Bible when it talks about God having a Book, it’s not called the book of accusations, or God’s great balance sheet, it’s called the Book of Life. And by the atonement of Jesus, your name is written in it. So going to heaven isn’t a fearful time of wondering whether you’ve done enough to earn your way in, God’s not makin’ a list and checkin’ it twice. Instead it’s a joyful time when God welcomes you home back to the family reunion.
But what about once we get to heaven? What about those images we hear of the golden, shining new Heaven and new Earth from the Book of Revelation? The final verse of the song Amazing Grace reads:
When we’ve been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun. We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise, then when we’ve first begun.
Are we really going to spend all of eternity sitting and gazing upon the glory of God? I don’t know about you, but after a while that sounds like it might get just a bit boring don’t ya think? So while we can’t know for certain what heaven will really be like, I think that this kind of description in the Bible is placed there much more to contrast for us just how different God’s ways are from our ways.
It’s like the guy who read all about God and then he sat down and prayed. “Oh God, I know your ways are different from our ways. I know that to you, a million years is but a second. And I know that to you, a million dollars is but a penny. So God, I understand that this isn’t asking very much, but could you give me a penny?” And God replied, “Sure, just wait a second…”
God’s ways are not our ways, but we can know some things about God and from that we can imagine some things about heaven. First, it’s pretty clear that God doesn’t waste anything. Scientific studies of the physical laws of the Universe that for us. They find that there’s an amazing relationship between energy and matter and how they are converted back and forth between one another, there’s no net gain in this conversion, but there’s also no loss. God doesn’t waste anything.
And secondly, God is a God of love and a God of redemption. In order to redeem this broken world, God sent his only Son to live among us, to teach us of God’s love and God’s longing to redeem all of creation. Jesus the Christ came to live among us, to be present with us, and to allow us through Him, to become the adopted heirs of God. Then the Father God sent the Holy Spirit to inspire us, in fact that’s the very origin of that word – inspiration – God’s Spirit living within us. The Holy Spirit came to inspire us, to teach us, and to help us to grow into the fullness of our new status. As Paul put it “The Spirit came to help us to grow into the fullness of the stature of Christ.” And as we learn and grow, God uses us here on Earth, as members of the Body of Christ to help redeem the Earth and all of creation.
Well, since we know that God doesn’t waste anything, when we finally do go beyond this life and beyond this immediate lifetime, don’t you imagine that God will still have further things for us to do? When we begin to look even the tiniest bit beyond the bounds of this Earth we become aware that God’s Universe is an amazingly vast and spectacular place. Isn’t it conceivable that within this vast and spectacular Universe, God in God’s Wisdom has prepared further things for us to do, further ways for us to use these gifts that we have been given as we’ve learned and grown here on Earth? Perhaps that was what Jesus himself was speaking about when he said, “In my Father’s house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? ...so that where I am, there you may be also.” (John 14:2-3) Along with Jesus, God has a place and a purpose prepared for each of us and God doesn’t waste anything. So I believe that when we finally get to heaven, there’ll be plenty of opportunities for all of us to participate in both the redemption and the ongoing creation of God’s Universe.
And that’s the image I saw as I read our Scripture from Isaiah today. In his vision, a Seraph, a majestic messenger of God, touched Isaiah’s lips with a live coal from the altar and declared “Your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” After that, Isaiah heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And he responded, ‘Here am I; send me!’ Traditionally, we as a Christian community are really good at the first part of this. We’re really good at telling the Good News about God’s redemption, about how through the actions of Jesus our guilt is departed and our sins are blotted out. But we tend to want to skip over the second half, the part where the Lord says “Now that you have been redeemed, there’s work to be done, whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” That’s the time when we seem to develop a bit of a hearing problem.
It’s like the guy who’d been married for quite a few years, and he was becoming concerned about his wife’s hearing. So he asked the family doctor what he could do about it and the doctor told him there was a simple test he could use to check this out. “Stand about 40 feet away and in a normal conversational tone, ask her a question. If she doesn’t respond, move to 30 feet, then 20, then 10. And once you see how close you have to get, call me and let me know. Based on this, we’ll figure out what to do.”
That evening he noticed his wife in the kitchen, about 40 feet away, so in a normal tone he asked her, “Honey, what’s for dinner tonight?” No reply.
So he move to about 30 feet away and asked again, “Honey, what’s for dinner tonight?” Still no reply.
So he move to about 20 feet away and asked again, “Honey, what’s for dinner tonight?” Still nothing.
So he move to about 10 feet away and asked again, “Honey, what’s for dinner tonight?” His wife still didn’t say a thing.
So finally he walked right up to her, put his arms around her and said “Honey, what’s for dinner tonight?”
His wife looked up at him and said. “Good Grief Vern! For the 5th time, we’re having Chicken for dinner!”
Just because we can’t or won’t listen, doesn’t mean that God isn’t still asking ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ And I believe that we will hear those same words in Heaven. You see, God is a God of Love. And God doesn’t force us or draft us into service. Instead God’s work is an All Volunteer Service! God heals us, God grows us up into the image of Christ, and God shows us the work that needs to be done. Then it’s up to us to respond to this invitation, to say “Yes” to God and step out into the work that’s laid before us. God does that for us here on Earth and I believe that God will continue to do that for us in Heaven.
The tasks may change, the scope of our understanding may be vastly different, but as adopted members of God’s family, we will be invited to participate in the ongoing acts of love and creation that comprise God’s ever expanding Universe. And how can we prepare ourselves for this grand adventure? Today the Lord is still saying ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’ Take the time today to listen for God’s voice and then take that radical next step. Say “Yes” to God calling and through faith step out into God’s service, step out into a world that is in need of redemption and new creation.
Today we can begin a lifetime adventure, a journey with God. We can begin to learn and grow in ways that lead us well beyond this lifetime and into wondrous acts of love and new creation throughout the Universe. Today we can say “Yes,” and become a vital part of God’s All Volunteer Service. |