Saturday, July 21, 2012

Sermon (July 22) "The Life of David: Trading Places"


     Like many of you, I sometimes struggle with what to buy for people when it’s their birthday or for Christmas. There’s a feeling of accomplishment when you think of that perfect gift to give to somebody. 
     But isn’t it disheartening when you forget to buy someone a Christmas gift?  Or if somebody buys you a gift and they give it to you like a couple of days before Christmas and then you’re left with a dilemma.  “Would it be tacky if I buy this person a gift?  Obviously, they’re going to know that any gift I give to them is only because they bought me a gift.”    And we wonder what we’re going to do in that situation.
     Gift giving isn’t always easy.
     Someone in my family used to always get me something religious for my birthday and at Christmas.  And there’s certainly nothing wrong with religious things.
     And yet, how many praying hands book ends does a pastor need?  Or how many bible verse wall plaques are one too many?  I think I have every Chuck Swindoll and Max Lucado book that’s ever been published.
     And then we have the problem of buying for someone who seems to have everything.  These are the people who tell you, “Oh, you don’t need to get me anything.”  They think they’re being modest and polite, but it really just makes it that much more difficult for you as the gift buyer.  It would be so much easier if that person would just say something like, “You know, I could use another set of praying hands.”
     What do you get for someone who seems to have everything?
     And what can you and I possibly give to God?  Have you ever thought of that?  What appropriate gift can we give since God is the creator of everything there is?
     About 1,000 years before the birth of Jesus Christ, King David had a tremendous desire to give God a gift.  He was living during a period of Israel’s history where things have really settled down and the nation of Israel was at peace with her enemies.
     David was aware of God’s goodness and love.  And he wanted to express his gratitude to God for all of these blessings.  And one day, he thought to himself, “What would be a nice gift for God?  What does God need?”
    As he looked around at his beautiful house of cedar, the thought came to him that the Lord should have a nice house like this.  And so David consulted the prophet Nathan that he wanted to build the Lord a Temple.
     Nathan likes the thought of this, and tells King David, “That’s a wonderful idea.  I suggest you begin working on getting that gift idea right away.”  But there ends up being one important snag in this whole new home for God idea.  The Lord tells David and Nathan, “Thanks, but no thanks.”
     Why would the Lord turn down such a nice gift?  If you know the rest of the story, it ended up being David’s son, Solomon who built the Lord a Temple.  But why didn’t the Lord want it to be David?
     Our scripture reading from II Samuel tells us why.  It was because the Lord still had another very important gift to give to David.  Instead of a house for the Lord, the Lord wanted to give David a house, not a house of cedar which he already had, but a house or a kingdom that would last forever.  How’s that for trading places?  The gift giver, David, becomes the gift receiver! 
     And this gift of an everlasting kingdom was not only to bless David and his family, but was also a gift for the whole world, because it would be through Jesus Christ, a descendent of David that God’s kingdom would be established forever, a kingdom of God’s love, grace, and righteousness.
     David’s desire to build the Lord a Temple was well meaning and from the heart.  But it didn’t come close to the gift that the Lord wanted to give David.  It can be a struggle to think of what gifts we might give to God, the God of all creation.
     Many of us put an offering in every Sunday morning.  Does God want our financial gifts?
     Or maybe we attend worship and serve in a ministry through our church.  Wouldn’t these be considered our gifts to God?  Does God want us to offer our time and our physical presence as gifts?
     Well yes, but…
     I heard a Christian once say, “You know, my wife and I follow the biblical principle of tithing our income and giving it to the church.  Since we both make decent incomes, that check to the church each week is a pretty big chunk of money.  Ten percent of our income is bigger than our car payments and we have nice cars.”
     And then he went on to say, “But when I stop to think of who God is and how Jesus Christ has changed my life, it makes my check to the church look so puny  in comparison.” 
     I think this person is on to something.  Our gifts to God and the church are meant to be expressions of our gratitude for all that God has done.  Our gifts to God and the church are never meant to earn God’s favor or to pay back what God has done for us.  We can never do that.
     When we put our offering in the plate, I often feel like the man who, in a hurry to go to the church picnic, quickly grabbed a bologna sandwich and ran out the door.  Each family was asked to bring their own food to eat.  The man with the bologna sandwich sat next near a family who had this incredible spread of fried chicken, potato salad, and apple pie.
     And here, this man sat with this meager bologna sandwich all by himself.  The family, noticing this man sitting by himself said, “Hey would it be ok if you share your sandwich with us and we’ll share our food with you?”  This man came with a bologna sandwich, and received so much more.
     On a beautiful fall day, just about the time when the leaves were finally beginning to turn colors, I went for a run on the bike path.  It was a memorable autumn day with  blue skies and sun rays shining through the leaves of the trees.
     It was just one of those moments that I’m sure you have experienced as well, where you just say to yourself, “God is so unmistakingly present in this moment.”  And as I was running, I couldn’t help but to think of how God is so gracious to us.
     What gift could I give to God in that moment as I was taking in God’s beautiful creation?  I smiled as I thought about the absurdity of trying to write a personal check to the church as I was running, even though it’s what I felt like doing in that moment to show my appreciation to God.
     I even thought about the impossibility of signing up to serve in a ministry area as I ran on the bike path, but I usually don’t carry a church commitment form with me when I work-out.  After I was done humoring myself, a more serious thought came to me.
    There was really only one thing that I could realistically do as I ran through that splendid display of God’s beauty.  I whispered some psalms of praise to this wonderful God who blesses us again and again and overwhelms us with his grace even when all that we have is the sweat on our brow and our running clothes.
    Bob Buford, the author of a best-selling book, Half Time, tells the story of receiving a phone call from his brother, Jeff on the evening of January 1987.  His brother called him to let him know that Bob’s son, Ross, along with two of Ross’s friends had attempted to swim the Rio Grande River.
     “I think we have serious trouble,” Jeff told him in a voice that meant it.  “Ross is missing in the Rio Grande.”  He told him that the Texas Rangers were coordinating the search for Ross. 
     And so Bob flew down to the Rio Grande Valley to join in the search, arriving by daybreak the next morning.  Bob, a very wealthy man hired airplanes, helicopters, boats, trackers with dogs, anything money could buy.
     By three o’clock in the afternoon, Bob looked into the eyes of one of the trackers and knew that he would never see Ross again in his life.  He remembers walking along limestone bluff perhaps two hundred feet above the muddy and treacherous river, as frightened as he has ever felt.
     He thought to himself, “Here’s something you can’t dream your way out of.  Here’s something you can’t think your way out of, buy your way out of, or work your way out of. This is,” he thought, “something you can only trust your way out of.”
     And then he prayed, “Dear God, somehow, give me the ability to accept and absorb whatever grace people might bring to me at this terrible time.  Amen.”
     As the search for Ross continued, God’s grace surrounded Bob.  The search team ended up finding his son four months later about ten miles down-river.
     As horrifying and sad as this experience was, Bob also experienced the gift of God’s grace and in ways that he had never experienced before.  Close and silent embraces from friends, letter and phone calls of concern and empathy, and gifts of meals prepared and brought to his home were much-needed signs of God’s love.
      In that moment when Bob was at a loss for what to do, God’s gift of grace is what got him through that very tragic time in his life.  Even with all of his wealth and fortune, that was nothing in comparison to the gift that God provided Bob and his family in their darkest hour.
     God offers us gifts that money can’t buy; gifts of forgiveness, grace, guidance, comfort, love, beauty, and salvation.  Like David, we offer to build God a house.  We bring our offerings and the best that we have, even if it’s only a bologna sandwich. 
     We bring it all to God.  And he gives us so much more.  David teaches us that you just can’t out-give God.

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