7/21/13 Sermon by Rev. David Haberer, Pastor: SERMON NOTES: DO YOU HAVE TIME FOR GOD? Luke 10: 38-42 Time matters. We live by the clock. Growing up my parents, without really saying anything, taught me that being early was on time, on time was late, and late was unacceptable. My father believed that it was better to be early than right on time. His brother, my uncle, and him always fought about time. My uncle thought my father was always late. We were of good German stock, and time mattered in my family. A sociologist I heard some time ago argued, and I think with he had a good point, that people from northern European backgrounds tend to be more time conscious. He reasoned that it goes back to when most cultures were agrarian. In the colder northern countries where you had a limited growing season, time was money. You had a limited amount of time to plant your crops in the spring because of the shorter growing season. The crops needed to mature by the end of summer so that they could be harvested before the first frost. If you failed in the spring to get the seed in the ground, your crops would fail, and by mid winter you would be out of food. This was not a problem in warmer climates. With a longer growing season if you didn’t plant today, you could do it tomorrow or next week; it really didn’t matter and so your view of time and deadlines was different. In my last church I had two good lessons on how time is viewed differently by different cultural groups. The first was at an Advent service we were having with a local African-American church. We had planned to do joint services and agreed that they would begin at 6pm on Sunday evenings. The first service was at the other church, and as was the plan, the guest church would supply the preacher. Being the guest preacher, I wanted to be a little early to make sure I understood what was expected of me and how they ran their service. So when I, and a number of the members of my church, showed up about 20 minutes early, we found the doors of the church locked and no one around. We stood outside the church and waited. At 6pm when the service was supposed to start, the crowd outside the locked church had grown with more members from my congregation and none from the hosting church. Did we have the wrong time? I was sure it was to begin at 6pm. At about 6:30 someone from the church showed up to unlock the door unapologetically because there was no sense that the fact that they were late was a problem. The host pastor came 15 minutes later, and we got started after 7pm. Time was not what was important. What mattered was that eventually everyone would arrive, and we would have our service. The second experience with time was even worse. I was performing a wedding for a friend who was at the time a member of my church. He was marrying an African woman. The wedding was planned for 2pm, and I the “responsible” time obsessed pastor was at the church around noon to get everything ready. The groom and the ushers arrived a few minutes before the time of the wedding and all of his friends and family were in their seats ready for the service. At 2pm there was no sign of the bride or her family and friends. Brides are always late right? So we waited. 3pm no bride or anyone from her side had yet arrived. 4pm still no one. At around 5pm they all arrive together. No apologies offered because there was no sense of offense given. Weddings start when the bride arrives, and she arrives when she is ready. Everyone knows that at least where she came from, and so in her mind what’s the problem. People view time differently. Today’s text is about time and values. In America, time is money. Time has value that can be gained and lost. You can use time wisely, or you will lose it. Time matters. If you viewed time on a graph line, Americans would be all the way on one side of the chart, and Africans would be all the way on the opposite side of the scale. We view time as valuable, where they would view the event as valuable. Think of how you run your life. Most of us live by our schedules. Each hour is accounted for throughout the day. We have deadlines to meet and tasks to be accomplished. Many people make To Do lists and check off each item as it is finished. Before you take on something else, even a lunch date with a friend, you both need to check your calendars to see if you are available. Even pleasurable events are often booked weeks in advance. We are obsessed with time. Time is important because that is how we can be assured we will accomplish the tasks we have planned. I get it, and it is how I live my life. I am an American, and the value placed on time is how I carry myself in this world. But it is not without problems. Jesus is visiting Martha and Mary. Martha is quite responsible. Martha is a good host, and I respect her for that. Nothing like going to a well-organized party. Thanksgiving at our home is such a party. The planning begins months in advance when the menu is decided. The day of the party the best china and silver are brought out, and the table is set with love and care. Everyone works to make it a special event. My sister-in-law does not share my concern for a nice party. Go to her house on Christmas Eve, and you will be standing in a buffet line with a paper plate to get your food. Martha would not have enjoyed my sister-in-law’s parties. Jesus was coming over, and Martha was going to make this party special. So she went to work. She was going all out because Jesus was coming over. I respect Martha’s efforts. The problem with being obsessed with something is that it moves from being a good thing to being a god that demands our worship. There is nothing wrong with what Martha wanted to accomplish except at some point in the day good planning and time management became more important than the fact that Jesus was coming over. Though I appreciate a well-organized party, I need to remember that the party is first and foremost about the people. The food and decorations are there to enhance the event; they are not the event. Martha lost sight of her priorities, and when that happens, it is never good. As Martha was in the kitchen preparing everything in her intention was to do her best for Jesus, but something happened. Along the way there was a values switch. It was no longer about Jesus but about Martha. She was on a time schedule to meet her set goals. Being with Jesus and serving him took a back seat to cooking a great meal and setting a beautiful table. Time and task were no longer servants to the event but became gods to be worshiped that demanded all of her allegiance. So when Mary decided to spend time with Jesus because that was the reason for the party, Martha’s gods would have no place for that. Martha became angry and confused. As she steamed in the kitchen, she lost all sense of what was truly important. She storms out of the kitchen and runs to Jesus to complain. She goes to the guest of honor to tell him that Mary was wrong to spend time with him and that she should be in the kitchen helping out. The party for Martha was more important than the quest of honor. Martha was blind to the fact that she was serving the wrong god. How often we are like Martha. We long to do the right thing, we even see it as being responsible before God, when in fact we are pushing God to the side in pursuit of other gods. Often as Christians we justify our busy schedules with the belief that we are being good stewards. We work long hours with the excuse that we need to take care of the needs of our families. We push ourselves to reach goals that are important to us. We seek fame and recognition. We pursue wealth and status. We want to make and so we work hard. We tightly manage our schedules always justifying what we do as being responsible individuals. When others don’t share our values, we look down on them. We are Martha. For those who have tight schedules, who make To Do lists to help guarantee you will meet your goals and objectives, after all we are to be good stewards of the gifts and talents God has given us, how many of you schedule time with God each day? You will schedule lunch dates with friends weeks in advance, but somehow God is not worthy of your time. You spend money on things that bring you happiness and even thank God for the ability to get the things you want, but you fail to contribute to the work of God an a weekly basis. Jesus, you say and even believe, is the guest at your party and yet, you neglect being in his presence as you pursue other things in his name. Jesus commended Mary for spending time with him. Martha lost sight of what is really important. It is so easy to get led astray by the gods of this world while thinking we are serving Jesus. I am not advocating neglecting the things in your life that need to be taken care of. Martha was not initially wrong in trying to prepare for Jesus’ coming. What I want to challenge you with is the need to not only prepare for Jesus but to actually sit down and spend time with him. In our time obsessed culture, that means scheduling Jesus in. The lie of the Devil is that to do so would cheapen one’s relationship with Jesus. The fact of the matter is that for us in this place, what we value is always in our schedule. You might by chance run into a friend and decide to have lunch one afternoon, but the truth of the matter is that if you don’t schedule in advance, you are unlikely to have lunch together, and the relationship is not really that important to you. Martha was doing well until Jesus arrived. At that point everything changed. When you consider the priorities in your life, remember that Jesus has arrived. All the good things you are doing are important, but it is most important that you spend time with Jesus. His presence changes everything.
Posted on: Mon, 22 Jul 2013 18:02:44 +0000
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