Rev. Dr. M. Taylor Bach

Ephesians 2:1-10 Matthew 20:20-28

Back in 1953, reporters and city dignitaries in the city of Chicago were waiting at a train station for a visitor - a very famous visitor. He was the Nobel Prize winner from 1952. When the train pulled into the station, they all gathered to interview him, shake his hand and greet him. Many wanted to have their pictures taken with him. He was a very tall man who exited the train, 6 foot 4 inches with a strong build and a handlebar mustache. As they began to snap pictures and move towards him, he said, “Excuse me a minute. I've got something to do.” He worked his way through the crowd, came to an elderly black lady who was struggling with her luggage, picked up both bags and helped her get on a bus. Then he came back, greeted everyone and apologized for leaving them standing there. One of the reporters commented, “I've just seen a sermon walking.” That man was Dr. Albert Schweitzer, the famous missionary to Africa who opened Africa to Christendom. Like Schweitzer, we all need to be a sermon walking. We don't need to be famous. We don't need to be a Nobel Prize winner but we all need to be a sermon walking. The scriptures read this morning are scriptures about service and that is how we become a sermon walking, by extending service to others.

The letter that was read this morning from Paul to the Ephesians has a very curious line in it. In fact, it was the last line that Ann Bushle read. It says, “For we are God's workmanship created in Jesus Christ to do good works which God prepared in advance for us to do.” So apparently, God has a plan for each of us. And He prepared within us a particular gift or talent that we are to do which makes us good servants in Christ. It is a fascinating thought. Do you know what you are to be doing as a servant in Christ? Have you discovered your gift and your plan? Apparently, according to this scripture, there is something unique about you that you were created to do. Dr. Schweitzer was obviously created to be a physician and to be a missionary. Others will have different talents and different abilities. I am reminded of a woman that I met, an acquaintance of mine. I was kind of in awe of her at the time. She had written twenty eight books and was pretty well-known in the Transactional Analysis community. So I met her at one of the TA conferences. She was an older woman. When I was in my forties, she was in her sixties. He name is Muriel James. I had the opportunity to sit down at lunch with her one day and talk to her about the books that she had written. As she talked about her books, she said, “You know, I get up every morning at 4:00 a.m. to write because all of my family is still asleep and they don't bother me.” I thought, “That is something I'll never do! I guess I won't be writing any books soon.” Then she went on to describe her process. She wrote two books that I could hardly put down. One was Born to Win and the other was Born to Love. Both of them gave descriptions of a person who might be called a really good Christian. So I probed her background a little more. She said, “I don't share this with the psychological community but you know what? I am a United Church of Christ minister.” What? That is the same denomination as me! She said, “I discovered that I was never any good in the pulpit and I wasn't good as a pastor but I could write. So I have been writing.” She was a person who discovered her gift, what God had prepared her for and she went ahead and did it even though she was trained for something else. In her self examination, she discovered that writing was really what she was good at and God had prepared her to write and that is what she was doing. This is the kind of process that all of us need to do. We need to go inside of ourselves and explore  what is it that I like to do? What is it that I know that I am really good at doing? What is it that I experience joy doing and can I do that for others? Can I make that my service for other people? Because that is probably what I am destined to do in the service of God. God has said that when we do things for the least of these his brethren, whatever it may be, if it is only giving a person a cup of water, or maybe it is giving a piece of advice or maybe it is praying for a person...but whenever we do something for another person as a Christian, we are also doing it for Jesus Christ Himself. Wow! That is motivation enough to get busy and do something of service.

Through the writings of Paul, we discover that we can't get into heaven by our good works. We get into heaven through our belief and repentance. But good works probably get us a better place in heaven. Jesus said, “I'm going to prepare a place for you.” What kind of place will he prepare for us if we are in the Book of the Lamb with a whole lot of good works behind our name? What if there are a lot of things that we have done to make life better for other people? The author Rev. Rick Warren has said, “Good works are contagious. The more good works we do, the more likely we are to inspire other people to do good works.” Just imagine, if you inspire somebody else to do good works, isn't that going to raise your place in heaven? Maybe so. Maybe there is a lower level of heaven where people just squeak in and there is a higher level where you have been rewarded for all the things you have done in your life. Wouldn't that be what we should strive for? Wouldn't that be what we would want? I think so. Sometimes I think all of us at some time or another doubt our capabilities. I've done that. I've doubted my capabilities and wondered what in the world can I do? Then I've looked at scripture and I came up with this list of Biblical characters that all served God. Maybe you can identify with someone here. Abraham was old. He really didn't begin his service for God until he was 90. Moses-s-s-s-s stuttered. He had a speech impediment. He was so bad in speaking that he had to ask his brother Aaron to speak for him. Yet he led the Israelites out of Egypt into the Promised Land. David was immoral and committed adultery and murder. Yet because of his repentance, he found great favor from God. He has written most of the Psalms that are found in our Bible. Elijah was suicidal and yet he was considered one of the greatest prophets that ever lived. Naomi was a widow but she followed the Lord. John the Baptist was a kook! He was an eccentric. He wore scratchy clothes and was probably part of the Essene community who went out and lived in the wild. Peter was a hot-head and impetuous. Remember Martha? She was probably what we would identify today as OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder). She had to have everything clean and didn't make time to listen to Jesus when He talked because she was too busy making sure everything was just right in her home. She was mad at Mary because Mary wasn't contributing. Mary was just listening to Jesus and not cleaning the house. Then Jesus said, “Mary is doing the better thing.” How about the Samaritan woman? The Samaritan woman had five marriages that failed and yet God used her for the conversion of a whole city. We don't know what the “thorn in the flesh” of Paul was. Maybe it was a chronic illness. Maybe it was a psychological problem. But something really bothered Paul and he thought it held him back. Yet he was probably the greatest missionary that ever lived.

So God isn't looking for perfect vessels. In fact, one of the epistles says, “He looks for cracked pots”. God is the potter and we are the clay. We don't have to be a perfectly formed pot. We can have cracks but it is through those cracks that our light shines. We can use our weaknesses as our strengths. We can use our messes as our message. As we work on discovering our abilities and talents and the problems and things we have been in, we discover that we can help one another and encourage one another and be there for one another and use our talents and abilities for one another. It is not a stretch. With a little effort, you can be a sermon walking too. That might be better than anything spoken from a pulpit.