Trinity Episcopal Church

October 2008

What is truth? What can we count on?

The drunk husband snuck up the stairs quietly. He looked in the bathroom mirror and bandaged the bumps and bruises he'd received in a fight earlier that night. He then proceeded to climb into bed, smiling at the thought that he'd pulled one over on his wife.

When morning came, he opened his eyes and there stood his wife. "You were drunk last night weren't you!"

"No, honey."

"Well, if you weren't, then who put all the band-aids on the bathroom mirror?"

There are two hundred and fifty-six names given in the Bible for the Lord Jesus Christ, and I suppose this was because He was infinitely beyond all that any one name or language could express. And this is the truth I want to talk about this morning. Jesus is Lord.

Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is about every name…Jesus Christ…so that at that name every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth, and every tongue confess that he is Lord.

To say Jesus is Lord had a political as well as a religious meaning in the days of St Paul, who wrote the epistle (letter) to the Philippians. The key to understanding it is realizing that “lord” was one of the titles of the Roman emperor: The great Caesar Augustus, the most powerful, richest man in the world, who brought peace to the mighty Empire of Rome, was called “lord.”

The people would shout it out in the parades: ‘Lord Caesar Augustus: savior of the people.

To say Jesus was Lord was to say Caesar was not lord, which was not popular with the Roman senate, who, perhaps unlike our senate actually got things done in a timely manner, and they‘d crucify you or throw you to the lions.

To confirm the lordship of Christ was to deny the lordship of Caesar, and that took guts and commitment---to call Jesus Lord was to put your life on the line; to trust that God, not Caesar, was in charge of your destiny.

I watched the debates the other night. All the talk about “foreign dictators” and “nuclear arms and waste and debt and the economic crisis,” and of course the “billions and billions and billions” …it was like some Twilight Zone version of Carl Sagan’s the cosmos, only they were talking about dollars not stars; our economy, not space.

Then there was the bail out idea. I suggest a trickle up solution. Take the $700 billion and give it to the tax payers, Americans 18 and older, and let them spend it and growth will automatically trickle up to these big companies. I figure each of you would receive approximately $350 million (700 billion divided by 200 million people).

If you got $350 million, would you promise to spend it? You’d pay off your mortgage - housing crisis solved. You’d repay college loans - what a great boost to new grads. You’d put away money for college - it'll be there. You’d put some in a bank - create money to loan to entrepreneurs. You’d buy a new car - create jobs. Not to mention the 30% income tax that would go back to Uncle Sam. Problem solved. And if it doesn’t work, what do I care, I’ve got a couple hundred million bucks.

I’m not a statistician and obviously not an economist. But I don’t understand why our gov. is always throwing money instead of trying to fix the crisis. It’s like the only tool they have is a hammer and every problem is a nail. I’m a simple preacher, who knows little about finances.

I wondered why doesn’t God fix the economy? Why doesn’t God intervene and help us in our financial mess? Because even God doesn’t understand it. It’s too complicated even for God! Ok, maybe the economy is just too complicated for me.

After about an hour of watching the debates, I said to Kristi, “I’m going up stairs to wash up and brush my teeth and jump off the balcony.” And she casually said, “OK.” But later that evening I thought about how we’re not so much in an economic crisis as we are in a fear crisis.

And I wondered, what are we afraid of? We’ll still have our eyes to see the beauty of this world. What do we really need? We won’t go hungry in the streets. We’ll still have our families and faith and freedom. Didn’t Jesus say, “Don’t worry about tomorrow, what we shall eat or wear…but seek first the Kingdom of God…and all these things will be added to you.”

There was a missionary who worked in the villages of very poor people, and he literally had to pray daily for his food, not to give thanks for it but to actually get some. Each day that he had food was a miracle. When he returned to the states, he said the thing he missed the most, was seeing God’s daily care and provision in small but miraculous ways.

Punching buttons on the microwave and then shouting “It’s a miracle” when it beeps isn’t quite the same.

And mostly, we’ll still have Jesus and his promises. You see, what really is causing a lot of people to worry is Caesar (ie, the government, the financial empire of the US).

But to claim the lordship of Christ is to deny the lordship of Caesar, to deny the fear and trembling the media coverage wants to inflict upon us; to claim the Lordship of Christ is to trust that God is in charge of your destiny, not Wall Street, and that takes guts and commitment---to call Jesus Lord is to put your faith on the line.

I think all the problems this country is having is a sign of change: and what is the good that will come from it? Perhaps Americans will once again really be thankful for their daily bread, and for the simple blessings of friends and family and the kindness that one person bestows upon another in difficult times. Perhaps people will become more responsible and accountable for the space they occupy on this planet.

Christians, let’s go on living and resting and growing and worshiping and working in this country, but there will be one difference---we will view everything against the background of eternity and the Lordship of Jesus, and we will no longer live as if this world (Caesar) is all that matters.

In the entrance of a building is a gigantic statue of Atlas, somewhere in NYC, who with all his muscles is straining, holding the world upon his shoulders. There he is, the most powerfully built man in the world, and he can barely stand up under this burden. 'Now that's one way to live.'

I remember in a church, behind the high altar, a little shrine of the boy Jesus, perhaps eight or nine years old, and with seemingly no effort he is holding the world in one hand. That’s another way to live. We have a choice. We can try to carry the world on our shoulders, or we can give our world to Jesus as our Lord.

Trinity Episcopal Church

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October 2008