Sermon by Dr. George Bryant Wirth
Stewardship Sunday
October 12, 2008
CHRIST AT THE CENTER: THE FAMILY OF
FAITH
FIRST FRUITS: RESPONDING TO GOD’S
GRACE
Scripture: John
15:1-15
INTRODUCTION
“It was the best of times, it was the
worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was
the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of
light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter
of despair...”
So wrote Charles Dickens at
the beginning of his classic novel “A Tale of Two Cities” (1859), and almost
150 years later, those words seem to frame the picture of what is happening in
our city and across this nation today.
The worst of times, the
foolishness, the incredulity, the darkness and the despair are all words we
could use, and many people have used, to describe the financial crisis and
epidemic fear that we are facing here in
But as citizens of this great
nation, and as Christians who trust in God to see us through, we can look
forward to the best of times, because He has promised to give us the wisdom we
need, and the belief, the light and the hope that will lead us toward a better
future.
That is not “pie in the sky”
my friends – that is the story of The Family of Faith from the beginning to the
end of the Bible. And all these
centuries later, our faith is still centered in Jesus Christ as Lord and
Savior, who says to us today the same words that He spoke to those first
century followers a long time ago: Be not
afraid!
I
Now, those are the words that
need to be heard as we launch our Annual Giving Campaign, focused on the theme:
“First Fruits: Responding to God’s Grace,” and the text that the Neikirks, the
Greenes and their campaign committee have chosen to show us the way comes from
the Gospel of John, Chapter 15.
Remember the background: in
John 13, Jesus was sitting at the Last Supper in the Upper Room of Jerusalem
when He told His disciples and inner circle of friends that He would be leaving
them. According to John 14, when our
Lord saw the fear on their faces, He looked them in the eye and said Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let
them be afraid…The Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will
teach you everything and remind you of all that I have said to you… (John
14:1, 25-26)
But those disciples were like
little children when told by their parents “We’ll be out for the evening, the
sitter is staying here with you, and before too long, we will be back
home.” Then come the questions: “Why are you leaving, where are you going,
how long will you be away, can we come too?”
Just so, recognizing their
anxiety, Jesus told those disciples what He wanted them to do – and that brings
us to John 15 and the words that were meant not only for them, but also for all
of us here today:
Abide in Me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by
itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in Me and I in them (will)
bear much fruit, because apart from me, you can do nothing… I (have) appointed
you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give
you whatever you ask Him in My Name. (John 15:4-5, 16-17)
I take those words to mean
that if we trust our lives to Jesus Christ and are centered and rooted in Him,
like branches connected to the vine, then He has promised to bless us and to
help us produce “fruit” of many kinds to share with others, especially those
who are struggling just to survive.
II
So I’d like for us to reflect
today on how we, in adapting those words from Charles Dickens, can “trust the
Lord in the best of times” and “trust the Lord in the worst of times.”
The Best of Times
Warren Buffett, who is one of
the wealthiest and also one of the most generous human beings on this planet,
was interviewed years ago by Forbes Magazine.
They wanted to know how he got started, and this is what Warren Buffett
said: “The first investors just believed in me.
The ones who had faith stayed on – you couldn’t get my Aunt Katie to
sell if you came at her with a crowbar” (Forbes Magazine, October 9, 2000, page
408). Warren Buffett, and many others,
have been blessed and have become a blessing to people in the best of times.
In 2003, our denominational
magazine “Presbyterians Today” stated the following statistics: “Presbyterians
gave more than $2 billion to their congregations last year, or an average of
around $936 per member. A simple
average, however, masks the wide range of amounts given, from nothing by some
members, to tens and hundreds of thousands given by others. Clearly income has some effect on giving: you
cannot give what you do not have. But
relative to income, the range of giving is still wide, from zero to well over
the 10% tithe. Why do some people give
so generously, while others cannot be bothered?” (From “Go Figure,” Presbyterians Today, 2003,
page 13).
The answer, I believe, is
found in an attitude of gratitude.
Either we trust that everything we have received has been given to us by
a good and gracious God, or we think that all of our assets have been created
and generated by our own ingenuity, hard work and some degree of luck.
And there are those, living
in the best of times, who actually expect that the resources of parents and
grandparents who have gone before them will automatically be passed down to the
next generation. In a column by Ann Landers,
I read about a businessman who made a lot of money in his lifetime, and when he
died, his children, who had high expectations, were surprised. The attorney read the will out loud to the
eager relatives: “I, John Jones, being of sound mind, spent it all while I was
alive. And to my sons and daughters who
expected to be remembered in my will, let me simply say ‘Hi kids.’”
You see, in the best of
times, when the money is flowing and our bank accounts and stock portfolios are
growing, we can make the mistake of thinking that we made it happen by
ourselves, that it all belongs to us, and that the estimated $15 trillion
(which is now a lot less) from what Tom Brokaw called “The Greatest Generation”
will be effortlessly passed on to the baby boomers and their children.
Now the flaw with that way of
thinking is this: according to the Bible and to our Christian faith, all that
we are and everything we have received is a gift from God. And while He wants us to enjoy what we have
been given, the Lord does not want us to keep it all to ourselves. To
those whom much is given, said Jesus, of
them will much be required. And
God’s desire is for us to share our resources with people who are struggling
and suffering in poverty and down on their luck.
So in the best of times, we
as Christians are all called to be stewards of what has been entrusted to
us. And God expects us, with an attitude
of gratitude, to give generously of what we have received to those who are in
need.
III
The Worst of Times
But what about the worst of
times? As everyone here knows, over the
past few weeks the stock market has tumbled, some banks and corporations have
crumbled, government leaders here in
In conversations with members
of this church and others across the city, I have heard some folks say, “Well,
we are finally learning a lesson about the way at least half of the human family
is living on this earth today.” The
sociologist Robert Heilbroner helps us put all of the statistics into
perspective:
“Take the furniture out of
your house, except for a few old blankets, a kitchen table and one chair. Dismantle the bathroom, shut off the water
and remove all the electrical wiring. In
fact, take the house itself away and move your family into a tool shed. Discard all of your clothing except for your
oldest suit or dress, one shirt, and one blouse. Empty the cupboards except for a small bag of
flour, some sugar and salt, and a few moldy potatoes, a handful of onions and a
dish of fried beans. Move the nearest
health clinic or hospital ten miles away and put a midwife in charge of
childbirth instead of a doctor. Then,
throw out all of your bank books, stock certificates, pension plans and
insurance policies and leave your family with $5.00 in cash and finally, lop
off 25 to 30 years of life expectancy for every member of your household.”
That is what it is like for
more than half of the world’s population today – three billion people who live
on less than $2 per day according to Jim Wallis of Sojourners (From “God’s
Politics,” 2005, page 198) in Washington, D.C.
And it may be that those statistics will help us remember that even
though we, you and I, have been hit hard by this financial disaster, our
situation is still better than so many others who need our help and are looking
for hope in the worst of times.
But there is another story I
want to share with you before we close which comes even closer to home and I
believe can help to show us the way God wants us to go.
This past week at a breakfast
meeting of clergy and laypeople who gathered in our church, Dr. Benson Karanja,
who comes from Kenya and now serves as president of Beulah Heights University
here in Atlanta, reminded our group of what happened in April of 1970,
dramatically depicted in the 1998 movie “Apollo 13.”
Just one year after landing
on the moon in July of 1969, our NASA Space Program sent three astronauts back
up there in Apollo 13. Jim Lovell, Jack
Sweigart and Fred Haise were trained and prepared for the journey, but near to
the destination, there was an accident, an explosion, that aborted the mission
and threatened the lives of those men.
The message from Apollo 13
back to earth was this: “
In the midst of the panic,
one man in the
CONCLUSION
So I want you to picture
Jesus once more, sitting there in the Upper Room with His disciples, saying to
them, and to all of us today in the same way:
Let not your hearts be troubled,
neither let them be afraid…those who abide in Me and I in them (will) bear much
fruit, because apart from Me, you can do nothing…I (have) appointed you to go
and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever
you ask Him in My name.
Just as that was true back
then, so it is today as we begin our Annual Giving Campaign. And not only is it true for this church – it
is also true for our nation and for the entire world. If we trust the Lord, really trust Him,
in the best of times and in the worst of times, and do not fall into fear, this
will be our finest hour!
In the name of the Father and
the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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