Sermon Illustrations For Lent 4 (2017)
Illustration
1 Samuel 16:1-13
I do not eat a lot of watermelon, but I am amazed at how much is on the internet about how to tell if a watermelon is ripe. There are several tips, ranging from noting the white spot at the bottom of the melon to looking at the curling tendril. However, the most reported and accurate tip, according to most sources, is to pick up the watermelon and thump it. If it has a deep, almost musical sound like a drum, it is ripe. Almost all the experts write that you cannot tell by simply looking at it.
I suppose that is no surprise. I’m not at all an expert about watermelons, and I could’ve guessed that. There’s not much of anything that you can measure by just looking at it. In 1 Samuel 16 we find more than watermelons being discussed.
The Lord is sending Samuel to anoint the new king for Israel. After challenging him to not worry about Saul, the Lord sends Samuel to Jesse’s house. One of his sons will be king. When Samuel presents a sacrifice to the Lord, Jesse’s sons begin to come, including Jesse’s firstborn, Eliab. Samuel looks at him and thinks “He’s the one.” The Lord, though, stops him. “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” After the rest of Jesse’s sons pass, only the youngest, David, is left. He is anointed king.
God doesn’t judge people by the outside. He looks much deeper. He sees what’s inside of us and who we are. That’s a good lesson for us too. As we interact with others, let’s not make decisions solely based on what we see. Look deeper. God does, and so should we.
Bill T.
1 Samuel 16:1-13
Six months after the 2011 tsunami in Japan destroyed a nuclear reactor, a remembrance service was held. It was an ecumenical worship service sponsored by the Japan Ecumenical Disaster Response Office. Victor Hsu, the office’s ecumenical consultant, said: “My prayer is that the ecumenical partners will not forget the survivors who continue to face serious challenges.”
Application: Our lectionary reading talks about the importance of peace and remembrance, and how they should influence our actions.
Ron L.
1 Samuel 16:1-13
Statistics indicate that the quality of American life has been in decline. The child poverty levels are worse than in any developed country. We rank only 27th globally in median adult wealth (behind Cyprus and Ireland). And in life satisfaction, America ranks only #12, behind the likes of Israel, Sweden, and Norway. Things were bad in Israel too under King Saul. Unfortunately, the faithful are too often passive in the face of such dire circumstances, just as the great hero of the faith Dietrich Bonhoeffer once observed: “There are many Christians who bend their knees before the cross of Jesus Christ well enough, but who do nothing but resist and struggle against every affliction in their own lives” (A Testament to Freedom, p. 305).
What we need in these circumstances is to do what Samuel did in our lesson and take the advice of the great medieval mystic Meister Eckhart. As he once urged: “Be willing to be a beginner every single moment.” Oprah Winfrey makes a similar observation with special relevance to changing things in America today: “I want every day to be a fresh start on expanding what is possible.” We clearly need our new president and congressmen and women to bring us together to begin this fresh start. It might look something like the “beloved community” Martin Luther King Jr. sought to describe: “But the end is reconciliation; the end is redemption; the end is the creation of the beloved community. It is this type of spirit and this type of love that can transform opposers into friends. It is this type of understanding goodwill that will transform the deep gloom of the old age into the exuberant gladness of the new age. It is this love which will bring about miracles in the hearts of men.”
Mark E.
Ephesians 5:8-14
As I child, I loved the dark. Rather than being afraid, I felt safe and at peace in the darkness. Maybe it was because no one could expect anything of me, or no one could bother me. Maybe it was because in the rural area where I grew up, to sit in the dark was to encounter the wonder of a star-filled sky. That is not the kind of darkness that Paul writes about.
Paul is writing about a darkness that encumbers and separates us from God. Saint Ignatius of Loyola would call that kind of darkness desolation, that which separates us from God. That is not the darkness I love. I want the light Paul writes about, the light of consolation, of connection with God. I want the light that is Christ, that fills me with hope and a different kind of peace; a light that helps me live up to my potential in relationship with God and my neighbor. Walk into that light, my friends. Life will never be the same.
Bonnie B.
Ephesians 5:8-14
You’re probably familar from cartoons, both printed and animated, with the image of a tiny angel and devil, a matched set, standing on opposite shoulders of a person facing a moral choice. The angel encourages the person to do right. The devil tempts the person to do the wrong thing. Since these are cartoons the effect is usually humorous, but at the heart of this meme is the assumption of free will. We have a choice.
Or maybe you had to memorize Robert Frost’s poem about how two roads diverged in a wood, and he chose the path less traveled by.
There are some real choices in the world. God’s people called these choices the Two Ways. In Hebrew, the yetzer ha’tov was the good way and the yetzer ha’ra was the wrong way. The earliest Christians shared this concept. We see it in the Didache, sometimes called the Teachings of the Twelve Apostles. The Dead Sea Scroll community also wrote about the children of light and the children of darkness.
Whatever you call it, you can see how Paul differentiates between the children of light and those of the darkness, going so far as to describe the differences in detail. It is the way to the resurrection. That’s why the children of light will one day hear the hymn or saying quoted by Paul: “Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (5:14).
Frank R.
Ephesians 5:8-14
Last fall we were in “darkness” for a while during the election campaign. Maybe I should say that we were in confusion. We heard so many things on both sides that we were not sure what was light and what was darkness. Our Lord is the only one who can help us see the light.
We should be children of light and help others see the light. You can’t throw a switch and make everything dark! Darkness is there only when the light has not been turned on. Nothing exposes the deeds of darkness other than God’s light. Without God, we fumble around knowing only evil -- even if we have fun in the dark, we are lost if we don’t seek the light. God is our only hope.
Our job when we have God’s light is to expose the darkness of evil so that it will become obvious.
Those who commit rape and robbery and other sinful deeds usually wait until it is dark so that no one will catch them. It is our job to bring them under the light so they can see their sin and open their lives to God’s light.
Lent is a time when we search for the light of Jesus so we can live in a different world than the one we read about in the newspapers and see on television. It is the duty and blessing of our church to give us that light of God!
Bob O.
John 9:1-41
A diving accident in 1967 left Joni Eareckson a quadriplegic in a wheelchair, without the use of her hands. She struggled with life, she struggled with God, and she struggled with her paralysis. She discusses that struggle in telling her story. She talks about a friend, Steve, who came to see her. She told him one day: “I just don’t get it! I trusted God before my accident. I wasn’t a bad person. This possibly couldn’t be a punishment for any sin that I’ve done. At least, I hope not. I don’t get it, Steve. If God is supposed to be all-loving and all-powerful, then how can what has happened to me be a demonstration of his love and power? Because, Steve, if he’s all-powerful, then surely he should have been powerful enough to stop my accident from happening. If he’s all-loving, then how in the world can permanent and lifelong paralysis be a part of his loving plan for my life? I just don’t get it! Unless I find some answers, I don’t see how this all-loving and all-powerful God is worthy of my trust and confidence. Who is in control? Who’s will is this anyway?”
Those are some tough questions coming from an aching, hurting heart. The disciples in John 9 have a similar question. They see a man born blind and want to know why. Was it this man’s sins, or his parents’? What caused him to be born this way? These too are hard questions. The questions reflect the rabbinical teaching of the day, that the sins of the parents could be visited upon the children. or that this man himself might have sinned before his birth. There must be a reason for this calamity, so what is it?
We ask that question too from time to time. What is the answer? Jesus gives one. “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” The reason for this situation was that God might be able to work in him. Joni Eareckson Tada found that answer. She wrote: “God can reach down to what otherwise would seem like a terrible difficulty and wrench out of it positive good for us and glory for himself. There is no inherent goodness in disability, disease, or deformity, but we are promised in the book of Romans, in the 8th chapter and the 28th verse, that all things can fit together into a pattern, a plan for good, our good and his glory.” The blind man saw that too. “I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.” Maybe we can see it too.
Bill T.
John 9:1-41
Christine Sine, who writes for Sojourners magazine, wrote an article in 2011 that reports the internet has created “virtual communities.” She wrote that while church participation is on the decline, “millions are finding community online.” Sine’s concern is that these virtual communities weaken one’s faith, for they lack the quality of being genuine Christian communities.
Application: Our lectionary reading discusses the importance of being a part of a community of faith.
Ron L.
John 9:1-41
We are often blind. A 2015 Pew Research Center poll reveals that nearly 50% of Americans think programs to help the poor make things worse. Also note statistics in my illustration for 1 Samuel 16:1-13 for more examples of American blindness. Jesus heals the blind in our gospel lesson.
Modern Reformed theologian Karl Barth offered a nice reflection on the miracle accounts pertaining to Jesus, comments most relevant to illustrations for this text: “No, the important thing about them [the people in the miracles of Jesus] in these stories is not that they are sinners but that they are sufferers. Jesus does not first look at their past, and then at their present in light of it. But from their present he creates a new future” (Church Dogmatics, Vol. IV/2, p. 223).
We need healing from our blindness, and the fresh start Barth says God promises. When we get that healing it changes us, makes us God’s heirs. And then with our eyes open we are more likely to take up the tasks of God in healing others. Martin Luther made clear how this gift of healing changes our behavior, makes us inheritors of God’s healing ministry. The gift, he claims, is like a child born in his or her parents’ home, with a right to the inheritance by birth, though when the child grows into adulthood it naturally follows that the adult child will see to increase the family inheritance. “[The child of the house] does not, first of all, gain the inheritance by our works; yet we must be co-laborers with the father to increase it” (Complete Sermons, Vol. 2/1, p. 349).
Mark E.
I do not eat a lot of watermelon, but I am amazed at how much is on the internet about how to tell if a watermelon is ripe. There are several tips, ranging from noting the white spot at the bottom of the melon to looking at the curling tendril. However, the most reported and accurate tip, according to most sources, is to pick up the watermelon and thump it. If it has a deep, almost musical sound like a drum, it is ripe. Almost all the experts write that you cannot tell by simply looking at it.
I suppose that is no surprise. I’m not at all an expert about watermelons, and I could’ve guessed that. There’s not much of anything that you can measure by just looking at it. In 1 Samuel 16 we find more than watermelons being discussed.
The Lord is sending Samuel to anoint the new king for Israel. After challenging him to not worry about Saul, the Lord sends Samuel to Jesse’s house. One of his sons will be king. When Samuel presents a sacrifice to the Lord, Jesse’s sons begin to come, including Jesse’s firstborn, Eliab. Samuel looks at him and thinks “He’s the one.” The Lord, though, stops him. “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” After the rest of Jesse’s sons pass, only the youngest, David, is left. He is anointed king.
God doesn’t judge people by the outside. He looks much deeper. He sees what’s inside of us and who we are. That’s a good lesson for us too. As we interact with others, let’s not make decisions solely based on what we see. Look deeper. God does, and so should we.
Bill T.
1 Samuel 16:1-13
Six months after the 2011 tsunami in Japan destroyed a nuclear reactor, a remembrance service was held. It was an ecumenical worship service sponsored by the Japan Ecumenical Disaster Response Office. Victor Hsu, the office’s ecumenical consultant, said: “My prayer is that the ecumenical partners will not forget the survivors who continue to face serious challenges.”
Application: Our lectionary reading talks about the importance of peace and remembrance, and how they should influence our actions.
Ron L.
1 Samuel 16:1-13
Statistics indicate that the quality of American life has been in decline. The child poverty levels are worse than in any developed country. We rank only 27th globally in median adult wealth (behind Cyprus and Ireland). And in life satisfaction, America ranks only #12, behind the likes of Israel, Sweden, and Norway. Things were bad in Israel too under King Saul. Unfortunately, the faithful are too often passive in the face of such dire circumstances, just as the great hero of the faith Dietrich Bonhoeffer once observed: “There are many Christians who bend their knees before the cross of Jesus Christ well enough, but who do nothing but resist and struggle against every affliction in their own lives” (A Testament to Freedom, p. 305).
What we need in these circumstances is to do what Samuel did in our lesson and take the advice of the great medieval mystic Meister Eckhart. As he once urged: “Be willing to be a beginner every single moment.” Oprah Winfrey makes a similar observation with special relevance to changing things in America today: “I want every day to be a fresh start on expanding what is possible.” We clearly need our new president and congressmen and women to bring us together to begin this fresh start. It might look something like the “beloved community” Martin Luther King Jr. sought to describe: “But the end is reconciliation; the end is redemption; the end is the creation of the beloved community. It is this type of spirit and this type of love that can transform opposers into friends. It is this type of understanding goodwill that will transform the deep gloom of the old age into the exuberant gladness of the new age. It is this love which will bring about miracles in the hearts of men.”
Mark E.
Ephesians 5:8-14
As I child, I loved the dark. Rather than being afraid, I felt safe and at peace in the darkness. Maybe it was because no one could expect anything of me, or no one could bother me. Maybe it was because in the rural area where I grew up, to sit in the dark was to encounter the wonder of a star-filled sky. That is not the kind of darkness that Paul writes about.
Paul is writing about a darkness that encumbers and separates us from God. Saint Ignatius of Loyola would call that kind of darkness desolation, that which separates us from God. That is not the darkness I love. I want the light Paul writes about, the light of consolation, of connection with God. I want the light that is Christ, that fills me with hope and a different kind of peace; a light that helps me live up to my potential in relationship with God and my neighbor. Walk into that light, my friends. Life will never be the same.
Bonnie B.
Ephesians 5:8-14
You’re probably familar from cartoons, both printed and animated, with the image of a tiny angel and devil, a matched set, standing on opposite shoulders of a person facing a moral choice. The angel encourages the person to do right. The devil tempts the person to do the wrong thing. Since these are cartoons the effect is usually humorous, but at the heart of this meme is the assumption of free will. We have a choice.
Or maybe you had to memorize Robert Frost’s poem about how two roads diverged in a wood, and he chose the path less traveled by.
There are some real choices in the world. God’s people called these choices the Two Ways. In Hebrew, the yetzer ha’tov was the good way and the yetzer ha’ra was the wrong way. The earliest Christians shared this concept. We see it in the Didache, sometimes called the Teachings of the Twelve Apostles. The Dead Sea Scroll community also wrote about the children of light and the children of darkness.
Whatever you call it, you can see how Paul differentiates between the children of light and those of the darkness, going so far as to describe the differences in detail. It is the way to the resurrection. That’s why the children of light will one day hear the hymn or saying quoted by Paul: “Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (5:14).
Frank R.
Ephesians 5:8-14
Last fall we were in “darkness” for a while during the election campaign. Maybe I should say that we were in confusion. We heard so many things on both sides that we were not sure what was light and what was darkness. Our Lord is the only one who can help us see the light.
We should be children of light and help others see the light. You can’t throw a switch and make everything dark! Darkness is there only when the light has not been turned on. Nothing exposes the deeds of darkness other than God’s light. Without God, we fumble around knowing only evil -- even if we have fun in the dark, we are lost if we don’t seek the light. God is our only hope.
Our job when we have God’s light is to expose the darkness of evil so that it will become obvious.
Those who commit rape and robbery and other sinful deeds usually wait until it is dark so that no one will catch them. It is our job to bring them under the light so they can see their sin and open their lives to God’s light.
Lent is a time when we search for the light of Jesus so we can live in a different world than the one we read about in the newspapers and see on television. It is the duty and blessing of our church to give us that light of God!
Bob O.
John 9:1-41
A diving accident in 1967 left Joni Eareckson a quadriplegic in a wheelchair, without the use of her hands. She struggled with life, she struggled with God, and she struggled with her paralysis. She discusses that struggle in telling her story. She talks about a friend, Steve, who came to see her. She told him one day: “I just don’t get it! I trusted God before my accident. I wasn’t a bad person. This possibly couldn’t be a punishment for any sin that I’ve done. At least, I hope not. I don’t get it, Steve. If God is supposed to be all-loving and all-powerful, then how can what has happened to me be a demonstration of his love and power? Because, Steve, if he’s all-powerful, then surely he should have been powerful enough to stop my accident from happening. If he’s all-loving, then how in the world can permanent and lifelong paralysis be a part of his loving plan for my life? I just don’t get it! Unless I find some answers, I don’t see how this all-loving and all-powerful God is worthy of my trust and confidence. Who is in control? Who’s will is this anyway?”
Those are some tough questions coming from an aching, hurting heart. The disciples in John 9 have a similar question. They see a man born blind and want to know why. Was it this man’s sins, or his parents’? What caused him to be born this way? These too are hard questions. The questions reflect the rabbinical teaching of the day, that the sins of the parents could be visited upon the children. or that this man himself might have sinned before his birth. There must be a reason for this calamity, so what is it?
We ask that question too from time to time. What is the answer? Jesus gives one. “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” The reason for this situation was that God might be able to work in him. Joni Eareckson Tada found that answer. She wrote: “God can reach down to what otherwise would seem like a terrible difficulty and wrench out of it positive good for us and glory for himself. There is no inherent goodness in disability, disease, or deformity, but we are promised in the book of Romans, in the 8th chapter and the 28th verse, that all things can fit together into a pattern, a plan for good, our good and his glory.” The blind man saw that too. “I do not know whether he is a sinner. One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.” Maybe we can see it too.
Bill T.
John 9:1-41
Christine Sine, who writes for Sojourners magazine, wrote an article in 2011 that reports the internet has created “virtual communities.” She wrote that while church participation is on the decline, “millions are finding community online.” Sine’s concern is that these virtual communities weaken one’s faith, for they lack the quality of being genuine Christian communities.
Application: Our lectionary reading discusses the importance of being a part of a community of faith.
Ron L.
John 9:1-41
We are often blind. A 2015 Pew Research Center poll reveals that nearly 50% of Americans think programs to help the poor make things worse. Also note statistics in my illustration for 1 Samuel 16:1-13 for more examples of American blindness. Jesus heals the blind in our gospel lesson.
Modern Reformed theologian Karl Barth offered a nice reflection on the miracle accounts pertaining to Jesus, comments most relevant to illustrations for this text: “No, the important thing about them [the people in the miracles of Jesus] in these stories is not that they are sinners but that they are sufferers. Jesus does not first look at their past, and then at their present in light of it. But from their present he creates a new future” (Church Dogmatics, Vol. IV/2, p. 223).
We need healing from our blindness, and the fresh start Barth says God promises. When we get that healing it changes us, makes us God’s heirs. And then with our eyes open we are more likely to take up the tasks of God in healing others. Martin Luther made clear how this gift of healing changes our behavior, makes us inheritors of God’s healing ministry. The gift, he claims, is like a child born in his or her parents’ home, with a right to the inheritance by birth, though when the child grows into adulthood it naturally follows that the adult child will see to increase the family inheritance. “[The child of the house] does not, first of all, gain the inheritance by our works; yet we must be co-laborers with the father to increase it” (Complete Sermons, Vol. 2/1, p. 349).
Mark E.
