The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made. All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and all your faithful shall bless you. They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom, and tell of your power, to make known to all people your mighty deeds, and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout all generations. The Lord is faithful in all his words, and gracious in all his deeds. The Lord upholds all who are falling, and raises up all who are bowed down.
The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand, satisfying the desire of every living thing. The Lord is just in all his ways, and kind in all his doings. The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.
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Sometimes, you
hear about random acts of kindness that amaze. Perhaps you have
benefited from them. Perhaps you have been the actor. We often see
these recounted on television—Extreme Home Makeover
is one big example of this—a family struggling to get by is
discovered and kindness is poured out upon them, all of it freely.
I once benefited from such an act of kindness. When I was an intern during seminary, Rachel and I were engaged and she was spending six weeks studying in London. Someone asked if I was going to be able to visit her while she was there, and I mentioned that I wouldn't be able to due to the rather exorbitant plane fare.
It
just so happened that a frequent business traveler overheard this
conversation, unawares to me. The next day I received a phone call
from this man, who said he had a Delta representative on the other
line and would like to know if I would be interested in a plane
ticket to London—given freely. I was amazed, completely in awe of
this man's generosity. I still wonder at the sheer kindness that led
to his giving of that gift.
From
this story, we can conclude some things about this man, right? You
don't know anything about him other than this, but you can guess that
he's a generous and loving man, willing to use what he has to bless
others. We can make assumptions about his character based on this
one act. I can tell you that he is one of the nicest & most
humble people you could ever wish to meet.
Friends,
I want to spend the next four
sermons unfolding my vision for New Hope Presbyterian for 2013. I
want to talk about where we are, and I want to talk about where I
believe God is leading us. All of this is rooted in God's kindness.
What
is God's kindness? I think it's something that most of us take for
granted. So we're going to stop for a moment here and consider it.
How is God kind?
Let's
start with today. God made it. The world would not continue to spin
through the heavens for one moment if God stopped sustaining. It is
God who spoke the world into being, and it is God who sustains
creation by his hand. The sun rose today because God sustains life.
Not
only did God cause the sun to rise, but he gave you the gift of life,
too! He gave us one more day, one more chance to live and breathe
and enjoy God's good creation. He sustains us, too! Life is a gift
from God, a precious gift that we should treasure each and every day.
God
gave us the gift of today, and chances are we awoke in a bed with a
roof over it—what a blessing! What a gift to have a place to
sleep, clothes to wear. I bet you had food for breakfast—if not,
we have refreshments after the service. Food to eat, water to drink,
all gifts of God!
Then,
when you decided it was time, you drove here in a car—another gift.
When you were here, you were surrounded by a community of people who
care about you. Perhaps you know some better than others, and some
of you may not know anyone here at all, but if you give us a chance,
you'll find we care about you and love you. All of this is a gift!
Friends,
these are all examples of the kindness of God—God pours out his
love upon us, day after day, but rarely do we actually stop and pay
attention to the manifold ways that God showers his love upon us. It
doesn't stop with our day-to-day life—In Jesus Christ, God has
given us the greatest gift of all! God has given us hope beyond the
grave, victory over death and sin, joy in the face of despair! God
has given this as a gift, the Scriptures say, forgiveness before we
could even ask for it! What a gift!
Now,
with all of these examples of kindness before us, we can conclude a
few things about God, right? If we're willing to conclude things
about my friend Tom based on one example of generosity, we can
certainly conclude things about God based on example after example of
God's kindness and generosity. He has given us everything we have,
from the life that beats within our chests to the intelligence in our
heads to the hope we have over sin and death. All of it is a gift
from God, which must mean that God is more generous and loving than
we could ever imagine, right? Such kindness poured out upon his
children must mean that we worship a kind and loving God, a God
willing to bless us beyond imagination, to give us undeserved riches
simply because we are his children!
Friends,
God is filled with kindness, and when we stop to list the kindness of
God, it overwhelms us, which is how it should be. We should be
overwhelmed with God, in awe of God's awesome power and grace, in
love with God for the ways he has showered love upon us. Friends,
God is good.
And
his goodness is given with purpose. God does everything with a
purpose—a singular, solitary mission focus—to bring all people to
worship him, so that all of creation glorifies him. God pours his
kindness out upon us, knowing that if we dwell in the reality of his
kindness we will be overwhelmed and spend our days praising him—all
of our lives will be filled with overflowing grace and praise, and
God's kindness will lead us to share the good news of God's love with
others. We can't help but share this Good News when we're paying
attention to it.
We're
going to get more into this next week, but for now I simply want us
to dwell in the reality of God's kindness, of God's love and mercy.
Once you were no people, the Scriptures said, but God will call you
mine. In Christ, God claims us from the realm of sin and death and
gives us hope and life. In Christ, we are made new, filled with life
and love and grace and peace. In Christ, we are renewed, restored,
redeemed.
All
of this is an undeserved gift, freely given to us. Let that sink in
for a moment—God's kindness is a reality in your life not because
you deserve it, but because of who God is.
Now,
I do want to take a moment and address two common objections to this.
There are obviously people in the world who believe that God is not
kind. There are reasons as to why they think so, and I believe there
are reasonable arguments as to why God can still be kind. If you see
a man yelling at his child, that doesn't sound kind, but when you
realize that he is yelling in order to keep his child from running
into the street, you understand.
The
first objection to God's kindness has to do with the Old Testament.
In it, God smites some people. Let's put that out there. There are
some people who just disappear, never to be heard from again. The
earth opens up and swallows them whole. We can argue that they
deserve it, but the fact that God smites them still makes us struggle
with how to understand that in the context of God's kindness.
Smiting doesn't seem kind, does it?
Well,
in the case of that one individual, smiting might not be kind. But
let me set this example before you--
I
adopted my cats from the animal control office in Summerville,
Georgia. It's a 3-day kill shelter, meaning that if a pet is there
on Monday, it's not there on Thursday. After picking up the cats, I
put them in a box and drove them home for an hour. That box probably
wasn't very pleasant on the ride home—the cage in the shelter was a
lot nicer than the box. I could explain to them that where I was
taking them was a lot nicer, but they couldn't understand me. All I
could do was hope that they would trust me.
Now,
the cats may well have wanted me to turn around take them back to the
shelter. They'd have good reason to doubt my intentions, right? But
I could also be understood—they needed to trust me on the journey,
because the destination was worth their obedience. Throwing
themselves out of the car would only lead to more pain and suffering
for them.
In
the same way, God needs people to trust him. Not long after the
Israelite people were freed from Egypt, they were begging God to
allow them to go back to Egypt. They thought life was better there
than in the miserable desert, and they couldn't understand the
journey. Also, they started to break the rules God had made for
society, rules meant to ensure that all of life was ordered around
him. The people were disobedient.
But
God needed them to trust him. God needed them to trust that the
destination was worth the journey, that temporary hardship was worth
eternal glory. When God gave them the rules about life, he was very
clear about the consequences, because it was very important for them
to follow the rules and keep God first.
So
when people broke rules, God allowed them to suffer the consequences
of their decisions. Not to be mean and spiteful, but rather because
the people needed the discipline to understand how important it was
to keep God first. God longed for their eternal peace and safety, a
gift he wanted to give them, but in order for them to preserve this
gift, they needed to follow the rules. So God's kindness is still
evident in that God is still shepherding the body of believers toward
the destination, while allowing the rule-breakers to suffer the
consequences of their actions as a reminder to the people of the
importance of following the rules.
Secondly,
people look at evil in the world today and wonder, if God is kind,
where is God today. I don't
have an easy answer to this one—but I'll tell you what I believe.
That is this—evil is present in the world because of human sin, sin
that stretches back to Adam & Eve. We've chosen to be selfish,
and the consequences of that choice echoes throughout the halls of
history. From the biggest wars we've fought to the grudges we've
held against individuals, from the scourge of cancer to every little
cold, from death and violence to tears and weeping, these are all a
result of the brokenness of the human heart.
I
believe that God, out of his infinite kindness, is working to redeem
our pain and brokenness and sin and violence. I believe that God, in
Jesus Christ, has suffered the hurt and wound of every sling, pain
and tear. I believe that God will not allow us to suffer pain beyond
what he experienced on the cross. God has taken all of human sin and
pain upon himself in Christ, and in his death he offers a path to
redemption, a path to life. I don't know why God hasn't come back
and put an end to the reality of evil in the world, but I know that
God offers each and every one of us hope beyond the grave. There is
healing and redemption that we cannot see. God promises to abide
with us in the midst of our darkness, in the midst of our pain and
our grief and our hurt and our anger, and he promises to redeem it,
to bring it to a good end in him, when God himself will wipe away
every tear, destroy pain and death, and leave us with only life, and
life abundant.
Friends,
I believe that we worship a kind and wondrous God. I believe that
God gives us life, and in the face of every question we have, Jesus
Christ can give us hope. I believe that God pours out blessings upon
us, and while there is still pain in our lives, we can look beyond
and behind the pain and see how the promises of God are bigger than
what evil can throw at us.
When
we stop and list all the ways God pours his kindness upon us, it
should overwhelm us. He has been loving us since before we were
born, and his love will never cease. Friends, let us stop and
contemplate the goodness and love of God, the God who created you and
the God who redeemed you and the God who promises you eternal hope,
life and joy in him. Let us contemplate that and may it overwhelm
us, so that we go forth as a people in awe of how much we are loved,
and may God's love overflow into every corner of our lives, that we
cannot stop praising the name of God!!
Let
us pray
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