GOD WINS

A sermon by the Rev. Dr. James G. Kirk

Harundale Presbyterian Church

Glen Burnie, Maryland

February 15, 2004

Text: “In fact Christ has been raised.” (1 Corinthians 15:20)

Three weeks ago, Elizabeth and I celebrated her sixtieth birthday with a dinner party in New York. Twenty-three of us gathered for dinner, family, friends and people who’d meant a lot to her through the years. In my opening remarks I mentioned how time after time I hear people mention at funerals how family and friends should make an intentional effort to get together for joyous occasions and not wait until somebody dies. Yet, sadly, it seldom happens and they have to wait until the next funeral until the family’s together again. So, this time was going to be different and everyone agreed; it was a lovely time

In a similar manner Paul’s making such an argument today. So often people let death have the last word, when in reality the resurrection to new life should always be the last word. We said as much a moment ago when in the excerpt from the Brief Statement of Faith we concluded that, “With believers in every time and place, we rejoice that nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

“Nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” That ought to be one of the most liberating, exhilarating, thanking God statements we can make! Imagine, we are bound hip and jowl with our creating God throughout eternity. As Paul reminds us in 2 Corinthians even in the midst of life threatening illness; even in the midst of the ravages of time and the toll it may take on our bodies; even in the midst of the pain, nausea, and fatigue of cancer; even in the midst of our deepest depression and feelings of worthlessness; even in the midst of our impression that nobody really cares or wants to know what we’re going through, Paul writes: “So we do not lost heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure. For we look not at the things that can be seen; we look at the things that cannot be seen. For the things that can be seen are temporary. But the things that cannot be seen are eternal. For we know that if this earthly tent we live in is destroyed we have a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”

(2 Corinthians 4:16-5:1) In other words, “We rejoice that nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We have assurance and we need to affirm that assurance time and again that we are the people of the resurrection. That affirmation sadly finds a very difficult audience in today’s society. Here we are the mightiest, most wealthy, most independent and most democratic nation in the world and yet people are reaching out to fill what they perceive to be voids in their lives. Certainly being armed to the teeth doesn’t seem to bring peace of mind to anyone when we live under the constant threat of terrorist attacks. Certainly with all the wealth in this country there still seems to be many people who live from paycheck to paycheck. Certainly our independence has left many people feeling isolated and very self-centered, searching for anything that will bring them a measure of contentment. Oftentimes they choose individualism rather than celebrating and sharing their individuality. And just as certainly over the years the church has seen its influence wane in the whole democratic process and its impact on society except for those on the radical right who want the country’s morals to be controlled by their way or no way. Or, those on the radical left who seem to assume that good Christian discipline and worship is whatever makes you feel good about yourself.

Paul faced similar fortunes or fantasies in the Corinthian church. He was besieged by those in the Corinthian church who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead. We hear in Acts 17:32 how the Stoic and Epicurean philosophers who listened to Paul’s famous speech on the Aeropagus were unimpressed with Paul’s claims about the “resurrection of the dead.” In order to understand where Paul’s coming from we have to hear him say in a previous verse another creedal formula that we hear every Sunday we baptize someone, namely how: “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scripture, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and now sits at God’s right hand and intercedes on our behalf; so that if we have been buried with Christ in a death like his, we will certainly be raised with him in a resurrection like his.”

Paul always wants us to hear about what God’s done on our behalf and not what we have to do on God’s behalf. In the midst of life threatening illness God embraces us like a loving mother and holds us in that life affirming embrace that God will never leave us. In the midst of the ravages of time and the toll it may take on our bodies Paul reminds us that when this earthly tent we live in is destroyed we have a house not made with hands eternal in the heavens. In the midst of the pain, nausea and fatigue of cancer Paul reminds us again how suffering produces endurance and endurances produces character and character produces hope and hope is the assurance that with God there will be wonderful surprises. In the midst of our deepest depression and feelings of worthlessness we hear Paul affirm, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels or principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. ((Romans 8:38-39)

In mid-January, 2004, the Moderator of the General Assembly, Susan Andrews, worshipped with 300 members of the Iglesia Presbyteriana de Colombia—a joyful, hospitable, evangelical service—with all the music led by youth and young adults. Earlier in the day she had heard stories from many people that had burned her soul: pastors with guns held to their heads by paramilitaries because they had reached out to the poor; pastors who saw an elder shot dead for selling medicine from his drug store to the poor; members who worked with 500 families in a refugee camp for people displaced by the violence—no water, no schools, no employment, no hope; the General Secretary of the church who receives regular death threats. After the worship Susan was invited to a party—a party with great food, passionate dancing and laughter, an energetic expression of intergenerational joy. The Moderator asked: “How could they party in the midst of such poverty, fear, violence and despair?” They responded, “We are the people of the resurrection. As a resurrection church we believe that in a culture of death, life has the final word.” (From a speech delivered to the General Assembly Council, February 12, 2004).

I have in my hand a glass angel. This angel was made in Bethlehem and was given to me this past week when I attended the meeting of the General Assembly in Louisville. The person who gave it to me told me to feel the glass and think about how many other hands had touched it. You see, an unemployed Palestinian woman made this cross. The Rev. Dr. Mitri Raheb, Director of the International Center of Bethlehem and one of our Presbyterian mission partners, has gathered unemployed Palestinian women and taught them how to make these angels. They gather the glass from all the devastation that the war between Israel and Palestine has shattered and are making these angels as a statement that in the midst of the death they encounter every day there is the hope of new life. The broken glass pieces are a sign of the brokenness of the world. They also are a reason for God to become incarnate. God has picked what seemed to be worthless and hopeless and transformed it into a beautiful and whole creation.

When the person gave me this angel, he asked me to think about whom else had touched these pieces of glass. Was it someone picking it up from rubble of a bombed-out building? Was it someone carefully shaping the brokenness of this glass as well as her own life into a symbol of God’s hope in the world? Could it be a testimony that God does win and we can never count out the fact that we are a people of the resurrection?

We don’t just say it Sunday after Sunday at the beginning of our worship service. It’s who we are and what makes us unique. So let us rejoice always in the fact that “nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Thanks be to God,

Amen