Persisting In The Struggle
Children's sermon
Illustration
Preaching
Sermon
Worship
Object:
The key themes in this week’s lectionary epistle and gospel texts are the value and necessity of patience and persistence. In the Luke passage, Jesus illustrates God’s responsiveness to prayer with a parable about a dogged widow whose unrelenting pursuit of justice eventually wears down a haughty judge. Meanwhile, Paul counsels Timothy (and us) to “proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or unfavorable; convince, rebuke, and encourage, with the utmost patience in teaching.” In this installment of The Immediate Word, team member Chris Keating explores how patience and perseverance are vital qualities of living out our faith. And Chris points out that -- in the wake of video surfacing of Donald Trump making vulgar comments about aggressively imposing himself on women -- we are reminded of another group for whom patience and persistence are certainly necessary: victims of sexual harassment and/or abuse. Like the widow, all too often they find themselves trying to obtain justice from a legal system that seems indifferent to their plight -- and as a result they must persist in making their claims... frequently trying to overcome a sense of entitlement on the part of abusers who feel they can do whatever they please because of their celebrity and power. Yet, as Chris notes, Jesus’ parable reminds us that hope endures -- and that our persistence will be rewarded, not only by earthly authorities who are eventually worn down, but more importantly by our heavenly Father. Moreover, Chris points to the call we have as Christians to align ourselves with God’s persistence in seeking justice.
Team member Beth Herrinton-Hodge shares some additional thoughts on the Jeremiah lection where it is that we actually have the word of the Lord inscribed. According to the prophet, the Lord says that “the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel... I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.” But as Beth notes, this implies something different than the core belief of those who advocate for public display of the Ten Commandments in our civic institutions. Despite repeated court decisions that these monuments violate constitutional separation of church and state, supporters argue that society benefits from prominent public display of the commandments. Yet the clear implication of Jeremiah’s words is that God’s laws are written in the hearts of believers... and Beth asks us to consider: If they are truly written in our hearts, do they really need to be written on our walls as well? And what about the disconnect we often see between our actions and what we say is in our hearts (a charge that both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have had to confront this past week)?
Persisting in the Struggle
by Chris Keating
Luke 18:1-8
Even by Jesus’ standards, the contrast between the judge and the widow could not be more stark.
Robed in fine silk, the judge sits on his dais, surrounded by minions and courtesans bound to do his bidding. He reigns with power, fearing neither human beings nor God. Before him a steady stream of petitioners makes their way, ready to present their case and argue for justice. Among them stands a short and unadorned widow. “She’s back!” whistles a clerk. The judge combs back his golden hair as the woman resumes her pleading, her shrill voice rising above the din.
She’s a headache for the judge -- and he is ready for her to disappear. But the truth is she’s not going anywhere. She persists in her quest for vindication. And her appearance in this week’s lectionary could be a timely reminder of how God persists in seeking justice for those who have been wronged, including long-silenced victims of sexual abuse, rape, and crude sexual objectification.
As the shockwaves of Donald Trump’s lewd conversations reverberate around the nation, the widow of Luke 18:1-8 is a reminder of God’s persistence in seeking justice. Video recorded in 2005 showed the then-newly married Trump bragging about his sexual exploits with women. Celebrities can “do anything” to women, Trump claimed, apparently including sexual assault.
In a campaign marked by a constant game of shock limbo, the tape represented a new low, and resulted in political havoc as Republicans tried to recover from the “October surprise.”
Trump’s escapades were recounted endlessly on cable news, yet missing from the recordings are the stories of victims. The widow’s persistent pleading gives voice to their silent cries. Her insistence is a reminder of the stubbornness of hope, and the call to never lose heart in seeking justice -- even in the face of a judge who fears neither humans nor God.
In the News
Forget talk about Syria, the economy, jobs, or trade. All talk this past weekend was focused on “the tape.”
Late Friday, the Washington Post released an off-camera recording in 2005 of Trump chatting with Access Hollywood host Billy Bush as they were taping material from Trump’s cameo appearance on a soap opera. Their conversation won’t play terribly well in most pulpits, but one snippet is particularly illuminating. Popping a breath mint prior to meeting a beautiful woman, Trump bragged to Bush about his sexual prowess: “When you’re a star, they [women] let you do it. You can do anything.”
It was the voice of entitlement, yet Trump persisted in efforts to brush it off.
Following Sunday evening’s presidential debate in St. Louis, Trump’s team was eager to move beyond the recording. Campaign manager Kellyanne Conway argued that the media should stop calling her candidate’s lewd confessions sexual assault. “That’s a very unfortunate phrase,” Conway told reporters, “and people really should stop using it.” Her reasoning? “He did not say the words ‘sexual assault.’ ”
Indeed, during the debate Trump tried blocking debate co-moderator Anderson Cooper’s questioning about the incident. “You described kissing women without their consent, grabbing their genitals. That is sexual assault,” Cooper said. “You bragged that you have sexually assaulted women. Do you understand that?”
“No,” replied Trump, “I didn’t say that at all. I don’t think you understand what was said. This was locker-room talk. I’m not proud of it.” He then added that he would knock the hell out of ISIS.
It’s interesting logic. Trump evaded Cooper’s question, then switched topics. Part of his response calls to mind the sort of dodging tactics President Bill Clinton used in describing his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. “It depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is,” Clinton famously said in 1998. Clinton’s remarks were a thinly veiled defense, but there may still remain at least a slight difference. While Clinton was defending his impeachment, Trump was bragging about an attempted conquest.
Trump’s braggadocio is not a partisan issue. Indeed, the weight of sexual scandal falls upon Democrats (see Weiner, Anthony) as well Republicans. There are other points to be debated as far as the election goes. Theologically, the issue to be explored can be framed this way: who is speaking for the victims?
Not many.
As several Republican elected officials defected from supporting Trump, some members of his team scrambled to mount a defense. Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani appeared on Meet the Press and ABC’s This Week, trying to brush aside concerns over Trump’s salacious mannerisms. Eventually, he was forced to concede that the behavior Trump described constituted assault, even if it was just talk.
Others were less certain. After the debate, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama) told a reporter that calling Trump’s behavior assault would be “a stretch.” Sessions said that he was unclear about whether or not Trump’s graphic description of grabbing a woman’s genitals constitutes assault. “I don’t characterize that as sexual assault,” Sessions said. “I think that’s a stretch.” Asked if grabbing a person in the manner Trump described would be illegal, Session replied: “I don’t know. It’s not clear that he -- how that would occur.”
Over the weekend, Republicans began distancing themselves from their ticket’s leader. Vice-presidential candidate Mike Pence bowed out of representing Trump at a campaign event Saturday, though he later reaffirmed his candidacy. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan squashed any attempt at party unity on Monday, however, when he announced he would no longer actively support Trump.
Among those responding to the 2005 tape were evangelicals, including Beth Moore, a best-selling author of Bible studies and popular speaker. Moore, a victim of sexual violence, demanded that evangelicals break ranks from the Trump movement. “Try to absorb how acceptable the disesteem and objectifying of women has been when some Christian leaders don’t think it’s that big a deal,” Moore said.
In many ways, the misogynistic remarks are part of an unbroken chain of inflammatory comments from the candidate. He has mocked a reporter’s disability, and body-shamed women. He’s made racist remarks, and demanded that Muslims be prevented from entering the United States. His companies have been repeatedly sued for sexual harassment. He demanded that women working at one of his country clubs be fired if they weren’t pretty “enough.”
Trump has made apologies for the remarks in the video, which he dismissed as “locker room banter.” His friend Giuliani tried to brush off the episode as the stuff of guy talk.
Maybe. But the standard for political discourse should rise above the level of middle-school boys’ locker rooms. Spraying the air with Axe body spray doesn’t remove the stink. Adolescent macho talk probably happens elsewhere, yet its ubiquitous nature makes it no less noxious. It might even point to a bigger and more persistent problem: how do we lower the background noise so that the persistent pleas for justice can get a fair hearing?
In the Scriptures
Patience is never easy. Some years ago, our family was caught in a parking lot mess following the simultaneous ending in adjoining venues of a major league baseball game and a rock concert. Cars moved at a snail’s pace for no apparent reason. Impatience inside our minivan was rising to the level of insurrection. A member of my family poked her head out of the window and asked, firmly but politely, “What’s going on?”
The man directing traffic lifted up his hand and said, “Patience is a virtue.”
It’s become a tagline in our family. The truth of the matter, as described by Jesus, is that patience is more like a struggle. In Luke 18, Jesus continues his travels to Jerusalem with a parable designed to inculcate patience and persistence among the disciples. But patience is never easy, nor does it come quickly.
As Jesus tells the story, there is a rather unsavory judge more inclined to act on what benefits him than what is right and just. The judge is confronted by the incessant pleadings of a widow. While the image of a nagging widow might prompt a smile, the truth of the matter is that eventually the judge becomes unnerved by her pleas. Verse 5 proves to be an illustration of Luke’s famous use of reversals. The judge gives in to the woman out of fear that she may bruise him.
The nameless woman becomes a powerful voice in the gospel. Though she would have had no right to present her case, the woman does not give in. Trump might agree: “She doesn’t quit.”
Unlike politicians, the judge gives in. He relents not out of faithfulness nor from despair, but simply because the widow’s persistence threatens his position. He is concerned that this scrappy widow might lick him mano a mano. The point Luke seems to be making is that the power of God will ultimately triumph over the powers and principalities of this age. God’s justice will prevail; do not lose heart.
Theologically, the text urges that disciples remain in relationship with God through prayer. Yet the reality is that each of us has known a victim like the widow who has died without vindication. We trust that God will provide for our lives, yet we see hurricanes blow through impoverished nations. We hear stories of women subjected to groping. We watch as bullies trample on those without power.
It is easy to lose heart, which is perhaps why Jesus ends this pericope by wondering if the Son of Man will find faith on earth upon his return. Those tempted to lose heart need only recall the widow’s nagging persistence, and her determination to let her voice be heard even when the outcome was uncertain.
In the Sermon
This year’s election poses a dilemma for many preachers, especially for those whose politics might not match up evenly with their congregants. It’s perhaps made even worse by the campaign’s “R” rating. Trash talk has migrated into lewd conversations, and even the New York Times was forced to print the F-word on its front page. Deciding whether or not to address Trump’s indelicate discretions may be a preacher’s first consideration.
Amazingly, many conservative Christians have answered that question by remaining loyal to Donald Trump. If racist remarks didn’t cause them to disavow him, then appearing in a soft-core Playboy video was unlikely to dissuade them. His remarks are either ignored or sequestered from consideration.
It’s the sort of behavior the judge of the parable would have understood, and perhaps that is a way into the sermon which would keep it from being a partisan diatribe. This does not need to be a get-out-the-vote moment for a particular candidate, but instead can be a way of reminding our congregations of God’s persistent search for justice.
The judge -- fearing neither humans nor God -- operates in a universe where justice is selective, and witnesses can be produced to support any conclusion he wishes to make. His rulings benefit not the pursuit of justice but his own sense of entitlement. The voice of the victim has no place within his courtroom.
The sermon could use this moment to allow long-silenced voices a chance to be heard. Or, to adopt the parable’s metaphor, it could remind those who plead their case day-in and day-out to not lose heart.
Many victims of sexual assault will resonate with that experience. Look around, and you will find plenty of stories that sound remarkably like the persistent widow. Actress Amber Tamblyn reacted to Trump’s 2005 banter by recalling her own story of being sexually abused. Tamblyn’s Instagram account featured a photo of Trump kissing a former Miss Universe. In a caption, Tamblyn recalled how a former boyfriend had assaulted her in the same manner described by Trump. (Her story is reported in explicit detail here.)
Her story was prompted by author Kelly Oxford’s call to victims of assault. Within hours of posting a request to Twitter, the Canadian author’s inbox was overflowing. Hours later, she said, “the stories did not stop, they did not get less upsetting.”
The parable of the widow is more than a story of an old Jewish woman hounding a judge. It is the story of how her truth demanded to be heard -- and a reminder of the how Christians are called to persist in prayerfully and persistently seeking justice. We need to let the widow’s voice be heard.
Trump may have apologized, but whether or not he understands that his self-described banter (or worse) has caused real harm is less certain. Meanwhile, victims of sexual abuse continue to mill around, persistent in demanding justice.
SECOND THOUGHTS
Written on the Heart
by Beth Herrinton-Hodge
Jeremiah 31:27-34
On August 1, 2001, Chief Justice Roy Moore unveiled a monument displaying the Ten Commandments and some historical quotes in the Alabama Supreme Court building. In November of 2002, federal judge Myron Thompson issued a ruling that Moore’s Ten Commandments monument was unconstitutional and violated the separation of church and state. After a federal appellate court upheld Thompson’s ruling, Thompson ordered that the monument be removed from the public spaces of the judicial building by August 20, 2003 -- and said the state could be fined up to $5,000 a day if it was not removed. When Moore defied the federal court order -- and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case -- Moore’s fellow justices had the monument pulled from display... and Moore was subsequently removed from his position.
Nevertheless, in November of 2012 Alabama voters once again elected Moore as the state’s chief justice. And last month, Moore was once again suspended from the bench -- this time for telling the state’s probate judges to defy federal orders regarding gay marriage.
Despite these suspensions, Moore has become something of a cult hero in many quarters because numerous people share his sentiment regarding the Ten Commandments: that they are founding principles for our nation’s precepts of law and order, and therefore they should be displayed in public for all to see as a reminder of our guiding rules and laws.
The recurring issue about the public placement of the Ten Commandments seems to fly in the face of Jeremiah’s message this week: “The day is surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant... I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts” (vv. 31, 33). If God’s law is written on the heart, why does it need to be displayed in public -- in our courtrooms, on the walls of the clerk of courts office, in the public square?
Jeremiah’s text continues: “No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord.’ For they shall know me from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord” (v. 34).
This new covenant which God promised to God’s people during their exile in Babylon, a time of dire circumstance, is the covenant claimed by Christians as the new covenant wrought by Christ: the covenant of forgiveness, salvation, inclusion, hope, justice, mercy, and peace. This covenant affirms that God is sovereign; that God is in charge; and that God wills what is best for God’s people and God’s creation. Whatever mess the world has gotten itself into, God remains our God and we are forever God’s people. This is written upon our hearts, a sealed promise from God.
During the vice-presidential debate on October 2, both candidates were asked to discuss in detail a time when they struggled to balance their personal faith and a public policy position. Governor Mike Pence responded: “My Christian faith is at the very heart of who I am.... And I have tried to live that out -- however imperfectly every day of my life since.”
Following the revelation of Donald Trump’s 2005 audiotaped conversation with Access Hollywood’s Billy Bush, Pence issued a statement, saying in part: “I do not condone his remarks and cannot defend them.... We pray for his family and look forward to the opportunity he has to show what is in his heart when he goes before the nation tomorrow night.”
What is in our hearts? Deep inside, do we know Christ? Is God’s law written within us? Do we build and plant, survive and thrive, because of God’s unshakable covenant with us? Does God’s law inform the decisions we make, the actions we take, the way we treat one another?
Following events from this weekend -- both the Trump tape and the release of another slew of leaked e-mails from Hillary Clinton (including transcripts of closed-door speeches to large Wall Street companies), I read a post on a friend’s Facebook page from The Political Insider that read: “No matter who is president... Jesus is King. Do you agree?” The obvious and short answer, for Christians, is “Yes.”
My friend is a conservative Christian, a faithful woman who loves freely and cares deeply for God’s children. That she has also admitted her intention to vote for Trump is not lost on me. She, like many in Christian circles, points her ultimate allegiance away from Trump and toward Jesus Christ, toward God as the ultimate One in charge. With Jesus as King and God in charge, what does it matter who becomes president of the United States?
The implied message that accompanies this post is that it doesn’t matter what our presidential candidates do or say. It’s not what’s written on their hearts that is central to their candidacy or their success. Jesus is King. God is in charge.
But these truths don’t call us to look past what is written on a person’s heart to see what his or her allegiance is. God writes God’s laws upon the heart. God is our God. We are God’s people. But do our lives reflect God’s laws? Do our lives reflect our allegiance to Jesus as King? Do we live God’s mercy and justice?
For Jeremiah’s audience, their collective “defective heart” of God’s people was the cause of their exile to Babylon (John M. Bracke, in The Discipleship Study Bible, p. 1081). Jeremiah, among all the prophets, spoke God’s message to God’s people, pointing out how they had turned their hearts and lives away from God. Most people didn’t want to hear these messages. The solution God provided for the people’s “defective heart” was a promise to transform their hearts as God restored their nation. By writing God’s law on the heart, God’s people would obey and seek to follow God.
A “defective heart” belies a heart that does not hold God’s law. Or if it holds God’s law, it doesn’t live God’s law. “But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person” (Matthew 15:18). What do the words and actions of our leaders (or potential leaders) say to us about what’s in their hearts?
Of Donald Trump, many are saying: “He said those things years ago,” or “It’s locker room talk, nothing more.” Of Hillary Clinton’s speeches, many say: “She says one thing to the people and something else to Wall Street.” Take a closer look. What do their words and actions indicate about what’s in their hearts? Is there any remote resemblance to God’s law shown in what these candidates have said or have done in their lives prior to this election season? Or during this election season?
Last Friday, there was a very interesting piece by a woman writer in the Washington Post, delving into the attitude underlying the Trump video: “the world where Donald Trump lives: a world where men are people, and women are women. Not quite people. Something different.”
Surely, not all locker room conversations are as vile as the Trump audiotape. Yet the thoughts that fill our heads, or the conversations we have in private, could tend to display the truth of our hearts. Sometimes our actions can mimic a faithful heart, even when we’re not especially generous or forgiving or fair. Yet God’s intention for writing the law on our hearts is to ground our faith, our words, our actions in God. The outward law merely serves to remind us of the relationship with God that resides within us.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Ron Love:
Jeremiah 31:27-34
The Chicago Cubs are once again contending to appear in baseball’s World Series -- but with the team experiencing a 108-year drought since their last championship, many fans wonder if the Cubs’ quest will succeed. That’s because of the “Curse of the Billy Goat,” which dates back to the Cubs’ appearance in the 1945 World Series. It seems that Billy “Billy Goat” Sianis, the owner of Chicago’s Billy Goat Tavern, bought two tickets for Game 4 of the Series -- one for himself, and one for his goat Murphy. But when Sianis and Murphy arrived at the game, Cubs owner P.K. Wrigley would not allow Murphy into the ball park -- saying that Murphy “stinks.” When the Cubs went on to lose that game and the series, legend had it that the rejection of Murphy brought a curse on the team -- and that the Cubs, known as the “loveable losers,” will not win the pennant until the curse of Murphy is lifted.
Application: The people to whom Jeremiah spoke must realize that they must give up their old way of thinking for the new.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34
In a Non Sequitur comic, a group of executives are sitting around a conference table. One man is standing at a chart with a pointer, and the chart shows the company’s profit line is plunging downwards. The boss, sitting stoically at the head of the table, says: “As you know, my motto is ‘The Buck Stops Here.’ The blame, however, is what I pay you people for.” (Note: If your sanctuary has a projection screen, you may want to display this comic.)
Application: It would seem that everyone to whom Jeremiah was speaking was trying to blame someone else.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
A recently published biography looks at the career of Richard Posner, a Reagan-appointed judge who presides over the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago. Posner has written 50 books, 500 articles, and 3,000 majority opinions for the court. Yet Posner has never been considered for appointment to the Supreme Court because of his eccentric views. He is the first judge to base all of his decisions on economic theory -- with every ruling viewed as a way to optimize profit. Posner sees the value of dollars as a substitute for the value of life. He does not look to the constitution, but to social consequences. This is why he has proposed the selling of babies, and posited that rape could be acceptable if measured by the pleasure of the rapists over the victims.
Application: One must be careful in the law one puts on one’s heart and meditates upon.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
The Washington Post wanted to know how one can vote for president when both candidates are disliked. In an extensive study, they discovered that “rejection” is how voters decided. Voters do not choose the best of the two candidates, but instead reject who they think is the worse of the two. The Post concluded that this is really good, since rejection takes more thought and a person voting by rejection is less likely to be influenced by negative campaign advertising and other emotional pitches.
Application: We are to be careful about what laws we are to keep in our hearts.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
Kentucky governor Matt Bevin is encouraging ministers to preach politics from the pulpit. He says that the federal law prohibiting this is a “paper tiger,” noting that “There is no reason to fear it, there is no reason to be silent.” He says we are to have “boldness” in the pulpit and be “unapologetic.” Though seldom enforced by the IRS, what the governor is proposing is still very much against the law. As the chief legislator of the state, he ought to know better.
Application: We should be aware of what laws we keep upon our hearts and are willing to observe.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
Alabama Supreme Court chief justice Roy Moore has been suspended for the second time in his career. This time the suspension is permanent -- since by the time he is eligible to run for election again, by law he will be too old. The first suspension was for his failure to remove a monument with the Ten Commandments from the supreme court building; his second suspension was for his directive that the state’s judges should not perform or rule in favor of same-sex marriages, even though the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of this. Moore wrote that it is the “duty to disregard illegal orders.”
Application: We cannot disregard the rules of God.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
Kathy Gannon, a reporter for the Associated Press, wanted to know what motivated individuals who engaged in an “honor killing.” What was their motivation? An honor killing is when a Muslim man kills a wife or sister in his family because an act of hers was considered dishonorable. Gannon interviewed Mubeen Rajhu, who murdered his sister Tasneem, to learn the answer. Tasneem eloped, marrying a Christian man who converted to Islam. But the conversion meant little to her family, as her husband was still considered an infidel. Tasneem returned home, trying to reconcile with her family. During this time Rajhu was being taunted in his factory and community for allowing his sister to bring dishonor to the family. Rajhu, who was always short-tempered, found the taunts unbearable. So he bought a pistol, and on the seventh day of Tasneem’s stay at the family home, as she sat on the cracked concrete floor in the kitchen talking to her mother, Rajhu walked over and shot her in the head. He told everyone who asked, “I could not let it go. It was all I could think about. I had to kill her. There was no choice.”
Application: We need to careful of what laws we put upon our hearts.
*****
Genesis 32:22-31
Colombia president Juan Manuel Santos has been awarded the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize, emerging as the winner from 400 individuals and organizations. He was recognized for trying to bring peace to the 52-year-old civil war in Colombia between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Though his peace proposal was defeated in a nationwide referendum with a vote of 50.2 percent against it, the Nobel committee still recognized Santos’ amazing accomplishments. In accepting the award, Santos said: “I invite everyone to join our strength, our minds, and our hearts in this great national endeavor so that we can win the most important prize of all: peace in Colombia.”
Application: There are many ways in which we wrestle with the angel to receive a blessing.
*****
Psalm 121
Christianity Today reports that China has implemented 26 new rules to control the church. The rules, taken in their entirety, remove any freedom of worship and assembly the church once experienced. Everything that a church does must be approved by the State Administration of Religious Affairs (SARA). The list includes many things that cannot be done without SARA approval, such as: printing religious material; studying theology; accepting donations; providing a venue for religious service; and meeting as a religious organization in one’s home.
Application: We are looking to the hills, seeking our help in a time of trouble.
*****
2 Timothy 3:14--4:5
Pope Francis’ recent visit to the country of Georgia was met by many protests. The protestors, who are members of the Orthodox Church, view Francis as a heretic. More than this, they feel that Francis, who is from the West, is trying to corrupt the values of those who live in the east with western style of living. The leader of the Georgia Orthodox Church, Patriarch Ilia II, issued a statement condemning anyone who disrupted the pope’s visit.
Application: We should express our beliefs with dignity.
***************
From team member Mary Austin:
2 Timothy 3:14--4:5
Love Rounds
In Second Timothy, we are urged to “proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or unfavorable.” At Loma Linda Hospital in California, the staff has a tradition called “love rounds.” Usual hospital rounds involve physicians from different disciplines gathering to talk about a particularly thorny case, with the resident doctors in training learning from the experience of other doctors. In love rounds, as former medical resident Turya Nair explains, “the medical team chooses a patient who they are caring for in the hospital -- usually a particularly sick or sad patient, or one who has been in the hospital for a long time -- and ask the patient’s permission to bring the team with Dr. Alexander [Wil Alexander, Ph.D., who is not a physician but a 94-year-old minister and professor of religion who brings an important non-medical perspective] to the bedside and learn more about the patient as a person. When the team comes to the bedside with Dr. Alexander, we watch him pull up a chair in front of the patient’s bed, greet all the patient’s family members, make a few jokes, and then begin asking the patient questions that perhaps no one else has been asking during the rest of the hospital stay. These include questions such as ‘How do you feel about being in the hospital?’ ‘Tell me the story of your sickness,’ ‘Tell me about the last time you really felt well,’ ‘What are you famous for?’ ‘What do your friends and family love about you?’ ‘Do you blame God for your sickness?’ or ‘Do you think God is punishing you for something?’ ”
As Nair says, “These questions have the magical ability of restoring the patient from simply a list of lab numbers, x-rays, and a sick body in a bed to a human being -- not only in the eyes of the medical team, but oftentimes more importantly in the eyes of the patient themselves. And we are all reminded that the relationship we enter between doctor and patient is a sacred one that involves the patient’s spiritual beliefs about their health and sickness as well.”
The questions proclaim a different message -- they proclaim the humanity and worth of the person at the center of the group. They proclaim a different kind of truth about the patient.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
Learning to Be Like the Widow
If we think we could never be like the widow in Jesus’ story, that we would never have her courage or perseverance, we’re wrong about ourselves. Persistence can be developed and strengthened. Writer Heidi Grant Halvorson says: “Grit is a willingness to commit to long-term goals, and to persist in the face of difficulty. Studies show that gritty people obtain more education in their lifetime, and earn higher college GPAs. Grit predicts which cadets will stick out their first grueling year at West Point. In fact, grit even predicts which round contestants will make it to at the Scripps National Spelling Bee.”
We can grow to be more and more like the widow. “The good news is, if you aren’t particularly gritty now, there is something you can do about it. People who lack grit more often than not believe that they just don’t have the innate abilities successful people have. If that describes your own thinking... well, there’s no way to put this nicely: you are wrong. As I mentioned earlier, effort, planning, persistence, and good strategies are what it really takes to succeed. Embracing this knowledge will not only help you see yourself and your goals more accurately, but also do wonders for your grit.”
When we’re developing our tenacity, we should “Focus on what you will do, not what you won’t do. Do you want to successfully lose weight, quit smoking, or put a lid on your bad temper? Then plan how you will replace bad habits with good ones, rather than focusing only on the bad habits themselves. Research on thought suppression (e.g., ‘Don’t think about white bears!’) has shown that trying to avoid a thought makes it even more active in your mind. The same holds true when it comes to behavior -- by trying not to engage in a bad habit, our habits get strengthened rather than broken.” Like the widow, we can ramp up our persistence.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
Did the Widow Have a Tidy House?
If we’re seeking the kind of persistence that the widow has, it pays to clean up. Researchers say that a messy environment undermines our ability to be persistent. Depleted mental resources make it hard to persist, and a messy environment draws away our energy. Researchers think that’s because a “mess poses a threat.” It threatens our sense of control, and thus depletes our mental energy. If we need to call up our ability to persevere, having a calm, serene environment around us will aid in that.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
Can We Be Too Persistent?
In the story Jesus tells about the widow who wears down the uncaring judge, he lauds persistence. That kind of perseverance in prayer draws us closer to God, even in adversity. But we can also be too persistent for our own good. Business writer Muriel Maignan Wilkins says: “Stubbornness is the ugly side of perseverance. Those who exhibit this attribute cling to the notion that they’re passionate, decisive, full of conviction, and able to stand their ground -- all of which are admirable leadership characteristics. Being stubborn isn’t always a bad thing. But if you’re standing your ground for the wrong reasons (e.g. you can’t stand to be wrong, you only want to do things your way), are you really doing the right thing?”
Wilkins suggests some corrective viewpoints that will keep us focused on the right things, including listening and being open to other possibilities. She adds: “At the root of all stubbornness is the fear of letting go of your own ideas, convictions, decisions, and at times identity. But as renowned author James Baldwin eloquently stated, ‘Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it.... Yet it is only when a man is able, without bitterness or self-pity, to surrender a dream he has long cherished or a privilege he has long possessed that he is set free... for higher dreams, for greater privileges.’ Sometimes, letting go of an overly staunch position can result in greater value than you originally expected.”
Sometimes we need to be like the widow in our focus, and other times blind persistence may keep us from what we really want.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
The Uncaring Judge Gives us a Gift
Aptly named author Paul Tough says running into uncaring people like the judge in Jesus’ story, or encountering adversity, can end up being a gift in the long run because of the way our character develops in response. Success, Tough says, is about how children (and adults) build character.
Tough worked with teenagers in Chicago, watching them overcome tremendous challenges. One young woman he worked with had been sexually abused by a relative, was getting into fights in school, and was on the verge of dropping out. But then she entered an intensive mentoring program that changed her life. “She made it through high school, overcame a lot of obstacles, and now is getting a cosmetology degree,” Tough says. “For some people, that wouldn’t be a huge success. But for her, she overcame obstacles that won’t only set her on a path for material success, but also psychological success.” With persistence, she managed to make a change in the course of her life.
Tough says that persistence can take a person farther in life than good test scores: “I think there’s lots of evidence out there now that says that these other strengths, these character strengths, these non-cognitive skills, are at least as important in a child’s success and quite possibly more important.”
Being like the widow is better for life success than a fantastic SAT or ACT score.
WORSHIP RESOURCES
by George Reed
Call to Worship
Leader: Oh, how we love your law, O God!
People: It is our meditation all day long.
Leader: How sweet are your words to our taste.
People: They are sweeter than honey to our mouths!
Leader: Through your precepts we get understanding.
People: Through your teachings we avoid every false way.
OR
Leader: God calls us to come into the Divine Presence.
People: We need God’s presence in our hectic lives.
Leader: God is here to strengthen us for our mission.
People: Our strength is almost gone, and we are grateful.
Leader: God calls us to persevere with patience.
People: With God’s help, we will do so.
Hymns and Sacred Songs
“O God, Our Help in Ages Past”
found in:
UMH: 117
H82: 680
AAHH: 170
NNBH: 46
NCH: 25
CH: 67
LBW: 320
ELA: 632
W&P: 84
AMEC: 61
STLT: 281
“All My Hope Is Firmly Grounded”
found in:
UMH: 132
H82: 665
NCH: 408
CH: 88
ELA: 757
“Great Is Thy Faithfulness”
found in:
UMH: 140
AAHH: 158
NNBH: 45
NCH: 423
CH: 86
ELA: 733
W&P: 72
AMEC: 84
Renew: 249
“Standing on the Promises”
found in:
UMH: 374
AAHH: 373
NNBH: 257
CH: 552
AMEC: 424
“O Master, Let Me Walk with Thee”
found in:
UMH: 430
H82: 659, 660
PH: 357
NNBH: 445
NCH: 503
CH: 602
LBW: 492
ELA: 818
W&P: 589
AMEC: 299
“My Faith Looks Up to Thee”
found in:
UMH: 452
H82: 691
PH: 383
AAHH: 456
NNBH: 273
CH: 576
LBW: 479
ELA: 759
W&P: 419
AMEC: 415
“You Satisfy the Hungry Heart”
found in:
UMH: 629
PH: 521
CH: 429
ELA: 484
AMEC: 705
“Seek Ye First”
found in:
UMH: 405
CCB: 76
“Our God Reigns”
found in:
CCB: 33
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982 (The Episcopal Church)
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African-American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELA: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day / Collect
O God who with patience and persistence had led your people: Grant us the grace to grow in those traits so that we can be true disciples of Jesus; through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, for the patience and persistence with which you have led us. Throughout the ages, you have been our steadfast guide. Open our hearts to your Spirit, so that we reflect yourself more clearly as we follow Jesus as his true disciples. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
Leader: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins, and especially our lack of patience and persistence.
People: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. We have failed to be your obedient people. We have become discouraged when things have not changed quickly enough for us. We have given up too easily when things have become difficult. Strengthen us, and send us out once more to be your presence in this world. Amen.
Leader: God loves us and our world. Receive God’s grace and forgiveness, and go to do the work that God has for us.
Prayers of the People (and the Lord’s Prayer)
All glory, honor, and blessings are yours, O God, for you are the steadfast architect of all creation.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. We have failed to be your obedient people. We have become discouraged when things have not changed quickly enough for us. We have given up too easily when things have become difficult. Strengthen us, and send us out once more to be your presence in this world.
We give you thanks for your patience with us when we are so slow to develop as your children. We thank you for those you have given us who have helped shape us as disciples of Jesus and stayed beside us in our journey.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for one another in our need and for all your creation. We know of your steadfast love for all your people, and we pray that we may help to share your presence with them.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray together, saying:
Our Father . . . Amen.
(or if the Lord’s Prayer is not used at this point in the service)
All this we ask in the Name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Tell the children about Thomas Edison and how hard it was for him to create the electric light bulb. He had so many failures, but he kept at it. He didn’t see them as failures but as learning experiences. He learned what wouldn’t work as a filament in a light bulb. Finally it all paid off -- and we are glad that he was patient and persistent.
CHILDREN’S SERMON
Persistence
by Dean Feldmeyer
Luke 18:1-8
You will need: a picture of Helen Keller and one of Annie Sullivan, or a picture of both of them together. (These images can easily be located using an internet search engine like Google or Bing.) One picture for each child would be even better.
When the children have gathered around, say:
This is Helen Keller. (Show her picture.) When Helen was born she was a normal baby, but when she was just 18 months old she caught a disease that damaged her eyes and ears, and she became deaf and blind. She could not see and she could not hear.
For years she was unable to communicate with anyone. She didn’t know what was going on around her, and she became sad and angry and began to throw violent temper tantrums. She was very difficult to live with. Finally her parents decided that Helen needed special help, and they hired a lady named Annie Sullivan to be her teacher. (Show her picture.)
Annie and Helen moved into a cottage together, and Annie began teaching Helen to use a special language of symbols pressed into the palm of her hand to understand what someone was saying. For months she tried and tried to help Helen understand, but it looked like it wasn’t going to work. Helen just wasn’t getting it.
Then one day Helen felt the water coming out of a pump and Annie spelled the word “water” in Helen’s hand -- and Helen understood. Helen was eager to learn more words, and before the day was over Helen had learned 30 new words. In just about a year, Helen learned to talk and hear with this special sign language. But she was not able to talk with her mouth. So Annie said she would help her learn to do that.
Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller worked together for 25 years before Helen felt comfortable enough with the way she talked to make a speech in public. The audience at her first speech was amazed. Not only was this deaf and blind girl able to speak clearly, she was smart and funny and interesting too. Soon people all over the country were inviting Helen Keller to speak. She made speeches at churches, clubs, and events all over the United States.
By the time Helen Keller was 80 years old, she was one of the most famous people in America. She had written several books, started some organizations to help deaf and blind people, and she was admired and loved by thousands of people.
And this was all because her friend and teacher Annie Sullivan never gave up on her... and because Helen Keller never gave up on herself.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, October 16, 2016, issue.
Copyright 2016 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
Team member Beth Herrinton-Hodge shares some additional thoughts on the Jeremiah lection where it is that we actually have the word of the Lord inscribed. According to the prophet, the Lord says that “the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel... I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.” But as Beth notes, this implies something different than the core belief of those who advocate for public display of the Ten Commandments in our civic institutions. Despite repeated court decisions that these monuments violate constitutional separation of church and state, supporters argue that society benefits from prominent public display of the commandments. Yet the clear implication of Jeremiah’s words is that God’s laws are written in the hearts of believers... and Beth asks us to consider: If they are truly written in our hearts, do they really need to be written on our walls as well? And what about the disconnect we often see between our actions and what we say is in our hearts (a charge that both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton have had to confront this past week)?
Persisting in the Struggle
by Chris Keating
Luke 18:1-8
Even by Jesus’ standards, the contrast between the judge and the widow could not be more stark.
Robed in fine silk, the judge sits on his dais, surrounded by minions and courtesans bound to do his bidding. He reigns with power, fearing neither human beings nor God. Before him a steady stream of petitioners makes their way, ready to present their case and argue for justice. Among them stands a short and unadorned widow. “She’s back!” whistles a clerk. The judge combs back his golden hair as the woman resumes her pleading, her shrill voice rising above the din.
She’s a headache for the judge -- and he is ready for her to disappear. But the truth is she’s not going anywhere. She persists in her quest for vindication. And her appearance in this week’s lectionary could be a timely reminder of how God persists in seeking justice for those who have been wronged, including long-silenced victims of sexual abuse, rape, and crude sexual objectification.
As the shockwaves of Donald Trump’s lewd conversations reverberate around the nation, the widow of Luke 18:1-8 is a reminder of God’s persistence in seeking justice. Video recorded in 2005 showed the then-newly married Trump bragging about his sexual exploits with women. Celebrities can “do anything” to women, Trump claimed, apparently including sexual assault.
In a campaign marked by a constant game of shock limbo, the tape represented a new low, and resulted in political havoc as Republicans tried to recover from the “October surprise.”
Trump’s escapades were recounted endlessly on cable news, yet missing from the recordings are the stories of victims. The widow’s persistent pleading gives voice to their silent cries. Her insistence is a reminder of the stubbornness of hope, and the call to never lose heart in seeking justice -- even in the face of a judge who fears neither humans nor God.
In the News
Forget talk about Syria, the economy, jobs, or trade. All talk this past weekend was focused on “the tape.”
Late Friday, the Washington Post released an off-camera recording in 2005 of Trump chatting with Access Hollywood host Billy Bush as they were taping material from Trump’s cameo appearance on a soap opera. Their conversation won’t play terribly well in most pulpits, but one snippet is particularly illuminating. Popping a breath mint prior to meeting a beautiful woman, Trump bragged to Bush about his sexual prowess: “When you’re a star, they [women] let you do it. You can do anything.”
It was the voice of entitlement, yet Trump persisted in efforts to brush it off.
Following Sunday evening’s presidential debate in St. Louis, Trump’s team was eager to move beyond the recording. Campaign manager Kellyanne Conway argued that the media should stop calling her candidate’s lewd confessions sexual assault. “That’s a very unfortunate phrase,” Conway told reporters, “and people really should stop using it.” Her reasoning? “He did not say the words ‘sexual assault.’ ”
Indeed, during the debate Trump tried blocking debate co-moderator Anderson Cooper’s questioning about the incident. “You described kissing women without their consent, grabbing their genitals. That is sexual assault,” Cooper said. “You bragged that you have sexually assaulted women. Do you understand that?”
“No,” replied Trump, “I didn’t say that at all. I don’t think you understand what was said. This was locker-room talk. I’m not proud of it.” He then added that he would knock the hell out of ISIS.
It’s interesting logic. Trump evaded Cooper’s question, then switched topics. Part of his response calls to mind the sort of dodging tactics President Bill Clinton used in describing his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. “It depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is,” Clinton famously said in 1998. Clinton’s remarks were a thinly veiled defense, but there may still remain at least a slight difference. While Clinton was defending his impeachment, Trump was bragging about an attempted conquest.
Trump’s braggadocio is not a partisan issue. Indeed, the weight of sexual scandal falls upon Democrats (see Weiner, Anthony) as well Republicans. There are other points to be debated as far as the election goes. Theologically, the issue to be explored can be framed this way: who is speaking for the victims?
Not many.
As several Republican elected officials defected from supporting Trump, some members of his team scrambled to mount a defense. Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani appeared on Meet the Press and ABC’s This Week, trying to brush aside concerns over Trump’s salacious mannerisms. Eventually, he was forced to concede that the behavior Trump described constituted assault, even if it was just talk.
Others were less certain. After the debate, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama) told a reporter that calling Trump’s behavior assault would be “a stretch.” Sessions said that he was unclear about whether or not Trump’s graphic description of grabbing a woman’s genitals constitutes assault. “I don’t characterize that as sexual assault,” Sessions said. “I think that’s a stretch.” Asked if grabbing a person in the manner Trump described would be illegal, Session replied: “I don’t know. It’s not clear that he -- how that would occur.”
Over the weekend, Republicans began distancing themselves from their ticket’s leader. Vice-presidential candidate Mike Pence bowed out of representing Trump at a campaign event Saturday, though he later reaffirmed his candidacy. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan squashed any attempt at party unity on Monday, however, when he announced he would no longer actively support Trump.
Among those responding to the 2005 tape were evangelicals, including Beth Moore, a best-selling author of Bible studies and popular speaker. Moore, a victim of sexual violence, demanded that evangelicals break ranks from the Trump movement. “Try to absorb how acceptable the disesteem and objectifying of women has been when some Christian leaders don’t think it’s that big a deal,” Moore said.
In many ways, the misogynistic remarks are part of an unbroken chain of inflammatory comments from the candidate. He has mocked a reporter’s disability, and body-shamed women. He’s made racist remarks, and demanded that Muslims be prevented from entering the United States. His companies have been repeatedly sued for sexual harassment. He demanded that women working at one of his country clubs be fired if they weren’t pretty “enough.”
Trump has made apologies for the remarks in the video, which he dismissed as “locker room banter.” His friend Giuliani tried to brush off the episode as the stuff of guy talk.
Maybe. But the standard for political discourse should rise above the level of middle-school boys’ locker rooms. Spraying the air with Axe body spray doesn’t remove the stink. Adolescent macho talk probably happens elsewhere, yet its ubiquitous nature makes it no less noxious. It might even point to a bigger and more persistent problem: how do we lower the background noise so that the persistent pleas for justice can get a fair hearing?
In the Scriptures
Patience is never easy. Some years ago, our family was caught in a parking lot mess following the simultaneous ending in adjoining venues of a major league baseball game and a rock concert. Cars moved at a snail’s pace for no apparent reason. Impatience inside our minivan was rising to the level of insurrection. A member of my family poked her head out of the window and asked, firmly but politely, “What’s going on?”
The man directing traffic lifted up his hand and said, “Patience is a virtue.”
It’s become a tagline in our family. The truth of the matter, as described by Jesus, is that patience is more like a struggle. In Luke 18, Jesus continues his travels to Jerusalem with a parable designed to inculcate patience and persistence among the disciples. But patience is never easy, nor does it come quickly.
As Jesus tells the story, there is a rather unsavory judge more inclined to act on what benefits him than what is right and just. The judge is confronted by the incessant pleadings of a widow. While the image of a nagging widow might prompt a smile, the truth of the matter is that eventually the judge becomes unnerved by her pleas. Verse 5 proves to be an illustration of Luke’s famous use of reversals. The judge gives in to the woman out of fear that she may bruise him.
The nameless woman becomes a powerful voice in the gospel. Though she would have had no right to present her case, the woman does not give in. Trump might agree: “She doesn’t quit.”
Unlike politicians, the judge gives in. He relents not out of faithfulness nor from despair, but simply because the widow’s persistence threatens his position. He is concerned that this scrappy widow might lick him mano a mano. The point Luke seems to be making is that the power of God will ultimately triumph over the powers and principalities of this age. God’s justice will prevail; do not lose heart.
Theologically, the text urges that disciples remain in relationship with God through prayer. Yet the reality is that each of us has known a victim like the widow who has died without vindication. We trust that God will provide for our lives, yet we see hurricanes blow through impoverished nations. We hear stories of women subjected to groping. We watch as bullies trample on those without power.
It is easy to lose heart, which is perhaps why Jesus ends this pericope by wondering if the Son of Man will find faith on earth upon his return. Those tempted to lose heart need only recall the widow’s nagging persistence, and her determination to let her voice be heard even when the outcome was uncertain.
In the Sermon
This year’s election poses a dilemma for many preachers, especially for those whose politics might not match up evenly with their congregants. It’s perhaps made even worse by the campaign’s “R” rating. Trash talk has migrated into lewd conversations, and even the New York Times was forced to print the F-word on its front page. Deciding whether or not to address Trump’s indelicate discretions may be a preacher’s first consideration.
Amazingly, many conservative Christians have answered that question by remaining loyal to Donald Trump. If racist remarks didn’t cause them to disavow him, then appearing in a soft-core Playboy video was unlikely to dissuade them. His remarks are either ignored or sequestered from consideration.
It’s the sort of behavior the judge of the parable would have understood, and perhaps that is a way into the sermon which would keep it from being a partisan diatribe. This does not need to be a get-out-the-vote moment for a particular candidate, but instead can be a way of reminding our congregations of God’s persistent search for justice.
The judge -- fearing neither humans nor God -- operates in a universe where justice is selective, and witnesses can be produced to support any conclusion he wishes to make. His rulings benefit not the pursuit of justice but his own sense of entitlement. The voice of the victim has no place within his courtroom.
The sermon could use this moment to allow long-silenced voices a chance to be heard. Or, to adopt the parable’s metaphor, it could remind those who plead their case day-in and day-out to not lose heart.
Many victims of sexual assault will resonate with that experience. Look around, and you will find plenty of stories that sound remarkably like the persistent widow. Actress Amber Tamblyn reacted to Trump’s 2005 banter by recalling her own story of being sexually abused. Tamblyn’s Instagram account featured a photo of Trump kissing a former Miss Universe. In a caption, Tamblyn recalled how a former boyfriend had assaulted her in the same manner described by Trump. (Her story is reported in explicit detail here.)
Her story was prompted by author Kelly Oxford’s call to victims of assault. Within hours of posting a request to Twitter, the Canadian author’s inbox was overflowing. Hours later, she said, “the stories did not stop, they did not get less upsetting.”
The parable of the widow is more than a story of an old Jewish woman hounding a judge. It is the story of how her truth demanded to be heard -- and a reminder of the how Christians are called to persist in prayerfully and persistently seeking justice. We need to let the widow’s voice be heard.
Trump may have apologized, but whether or not he understands that his self-described banter (or worse) has caused real harm is less certain. Meanwhile, victims of sexual abuse continue to mill around, persistent in demanding justice.
SECOND THOUGHTS
Written on the Heart
by Beth Herrinton-Hodge
Jeremiah 31:27-34
On August 1, 2001, Chief Justice Roy Moore unveiled a monument displaying the Ten Commandments and some historical quotes in the Alabama Supreme Court building. In November of 2002, federal judge Myron Thompson issued a ruling that Moore’s Ten Commandments monument was unconstitutional and violated the separation of church and state. After a federal appellate court upheld Thompson’s ruling, Thompson ordered that the monument be removed from the public spaces of the judicial building by August 20, 2003 -- and said the state could be fined up to $5,000 a day if it was not removed. When Moore defied the federal court order -- and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case -- Moore’s fellow justices had the monument pulled from display... and Moore was subsequently removed from his position.
Nevertheless, in November of 2012 Alabama voters once again elected Moore as the state’s chief justice. And last month, Moore was once again suspended from the bench -- this time for telling the state’s probate judges to defy federal orders regarding gay marriage.
Despite these suspensions, Moore has become something of a cult hero in many quarters because numerous people share his sentiment regarding the Ten Commandments: that they are founding principles for our nation’s precepts of law and order, and therefore they should be displayed in public for all to see as a reminder of our guiding rules and laws.
The recurring issue about the public placement of the Ten Commandments seems to fly in the face of Jeremiah’s message this week: “The day is surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant... I will put my law within them and I will write it on their hearts” (vv. 31, 33). If God’s law is written on the heart, why does it need to be displayed in public -- in our courtrooms, on the walls of the clerk of courts office, in the public square?
Jeremiah’s text continues: “No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord.’ For they shall know me from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord” (v. 34).
This new covenant which God promised to God’s people during their exile in Babylon, a time of dire circumstance, is the covenant claimed by Christians as the new covenant wrought by Christ: the covenant of forgiveness, salvation, inclusion, hope, justice, mercy, and peace. This covenant affirms that God is sovereign; that God is in charge; and that God wills what is best for God’s people and God’s creation. Whatever mess the world has gotten itself into, God remains our God and we are forever God’s people. This is written upon our hearts, a sealed promise from God.
During the vice-presidential debate on October 2, both candidates were asked to discuss in detail a time when they struggled to balance their personal faith and a public policy position. Governor Mike Pence responded: “My Christian faith is at the very heart of who I am.... And I have tried to live that out -- however imperfectly every day of my life since.”
Following the revelation of Donald Trump’s 2005 audiotaped conversation with Access Hollywood’s Billy Bush, Pence issued a statement, saying in part: “I do not condone his remarks and cannot defend them.... We pray for his family and look forward to the opportunity he has to show what is in his heart when he goes before the nation tomorrow night.”
What is in our hearts? Deep inside, do we know Christ? Is God’s law written within us? Do we build and plant, survive and thrive, because of God’s unshakable covenant with us? Does God’s law inform the decisions we make, the actions we take, the way we treat one another?
Following events from this weekend -- both the Trump tape and the release of another slew of leaked e-mails from Hillary Clinton (including transcripts of closed-door speeches to large Wall Street companies), I read a post on a friend’s Facebook page from The Political Insider that read: “No matter who is president... Jesus is King. Do you agree?” The obvious and short answer, for Christians, is “Yes.”
My friend is a conservative Christian, a faithful woman who loves freely and cares deeply for God’s children. That she has also admitted her intention to vote for Trump is not lost on me. She, like many in Christian circles, points her ultimate allegiance away from Trump and toward Jesus Christ, toward God as the ultimate One in charge. With Jesus as King and God in charge, what does it matter who becomes president of the United States?
The implied message that accompanies this post is that it doesn’t matter what our presidential candidates do or say. It’s not what’s written on their hearts that is central to their candidacy or their success. Jesus is King. God is in charge.
But these truths don’t call us to look past what is written on a person’s heart to see what his or her allegiance is. God writes God’s laws upon the heart. God is our God. We are God’s people. But do our lives reflect God’s laws? Do our lives reflect our allegiance to Jesus as King? Do we live God’s mercy and justice?
For Jeremiah’s audience, their collective “defective heart” of God’s people was the cause of their exile to Babylon (John M. Bracke, in The Discipleship Study Bible, p. 1081). Jeremiah, among all the prophets, spoke God’s message to God’s people, pointing out how they had turned their hearts and lives away from God. Most people didn’t want to hear these messages. The solution God provided for the people’s “defective heart” was a promise to transform their hearts as God restored their nation. By writing God’s law on the heart, God’s people would obey and seek to follow God.
A “defective heart” belies a heart that does not hold God’s law. Or if it holds God’s law, it doesn’t live God’s law. “But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person” (Matthew 15:18). What do the words and actions of our leaders (or potential leaders) say to us about what’s in their hearts?
Of Donald Trump, many are saying: “He said those things years ago,” or “It’s locker room talk, nothing more.” Of Hillary Clinton’s speeches, many say: “She says one thing to the people and something else to Wall Street.” Take a closer look. What do their words and actions indicate about what’s in their hearts? Is there any remote resemblance to God’s law shown in what these candidates have said or have done in their lives prior to this election season? Or during this election season?
Last Friday, there was a very interesting piece by a woman writer in the Washington Post, delving into the attitude underlying the Trump video: “the world where Donald Trump lives: a world where men are people, and women are women. Not quite people. Something different.”
Surely, not all locker room conversations are as vile as the Trump audiotape. Yet the thoughts that fill our heads, or the conversations we have in private, could tend to display the truth of our hearts. Sometimes our actions can mimic a faithful heart, even when we’re not especially generous or forgiving or fair. Yet God’s intention for writing the law on our hearts is to ground our faith, our words, our actions in God. The outward law merely serves to remind us of the relationship with God that resides within us.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Ron Love:
Jeremiah 31:27-34
The Chicago Cubs are once again contending to appear in baseball’s World Series -- but with the team experiencing a 108-year drought since their last championship, many fans wonder if the Cubs’ quest will succeed. That’s because of the “Curse of the Billy Goat,” which dates back to the Cubs’ appearance in the 1945 World Series. It seems that Billy “Billy Goat” Sianis, the owner of Chicago’s Billy Goat Tavern, bought two tickets for Game 4 of the Series -- one for himself, and one for his goat Murphy. But when Sianis and Murphy arrived at the game, Cubs owner P.K. Wrigley would not allow Murphy into the ball park -- saying that Murphy “stinks.” When the Cubs went on to lose that game and the series, legend had it that the rejection of Murphy brought a curse on the team -- and that the Cubs, known as the “loveable losers,” will not win the pennant until the curse of Murphy is lifted.
Application: The people to whom Jeremiah spoke must realize that they must give up their old way of thinking for the new.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34
In a Non Sequitur comic, a group of executives are sitting around a conference table. One man is standing at a chart with a pointer, and the chart shows the company’s profit line is plunging downwards. The boss, sitting stoically at the head of the table, says: “As you know, my motto is ‘The Buck Stops Here.’ The blame, however, is what I pay you people for.” (Note: If your sanctuary has a projection screen, you may want to display this comic.)
Application: It would seem that everyone to whom Jeremiah was speaking was trying to blame someone else.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
A recently published biography looks at the career of Richard Posner, a Reagan-appointed judge who presides over the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago. Posner has written 50 books, 500 articles, and 3,000 majority opinions for the court. Yet Posner has never been considered for appointment to the Supreme Court because of his eccentric views. He is the first judge to base all of his decisions on economic theory -- with every ruling viewed as a way to optimize profit. Posner sees the value of dollars as a substitute for the value of life. He does not look to the constitution, but to social consequences. This is why he has proposed the selling of babies, and posited that rape could be acceptable if measured by the pleasure of the rapists over the victims.
Application: One must be careful in the law one puts on one’s heart and meditates upon.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
The Washington Post wanted to know how one can vote for president when both candidates are disliked. In an extensive study, they discovered that “rejection” is how voters decided. Voters do not choose the best of the two candidates, but instead reject who they think is the worse of the two. The Post concluded that this is really good, since rejection takes more thought and a person voting by rejection is less likely to be influenced by negative campaign advertising and other emotional pitches.
Application: We are to be careful about what laws we are to keep in our hearts.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
Kentucky governor Matt Bevin is encouraging ministers to preach politics from the pulpit. He says that the federal law prohibiting this is a “paper tiger,” noting that “There is no reason to fear it, there is no reason to be silent.” He says we are to have “boldness” in the pulpit and be “unapologetic.” Though seldom enforced by the IRS, what the governor is proposing is still very much against the law. As the chief legislator of the state, he ought to know better.
Application: We should be aware of what laws we keep upon our hearts and are willing to observe.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
Alabama Supreme Court chief justice Roy Moore has been suspended for the second time in his career. This time the suspension is permanent -- since by the time he is eligible to run for election again, by law he will be too old. The first suspension was for his failure to remove a monument with the Ten Commandments from the supreme court building; his second suspension was for his directive that the state’s judges should not perform or rule in favor of same-sex marriages, even though the United States Supreme Court ruled in favor of this. Moore wrote that it is the “duty to disregard illegal orders.”
Application: We cannot disregard the rules of God.
*****
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104
Kathy Gannon, a reporter for the Associated Press, wanted to know what motivated individuals who engaged in an “honor killing.” What was their motivation? An honor killing is when a Muslim man kills a wife or sister in his family because an act of hers was considered dishonorable. Gannon interviewed Mubeen Rajhu, who murdered his sister Tasneem, to learn the answer. Tasneem eloped, marrying a Christian man who converted to Islam. But the conversion meant little to her family, as her husband was still considered an infidel. Tasneem returned home, trying to reconcile with her family. During this time Rajhu was being taunted in his factory and community for allowing his sister to bring dishonor to the family. Rajhu, who was always short-tempered, found the taunts unbearable. So he bought a pistol, and on the seventh day of Tasneem’s stay at the family home, as she sat on the cracked concrete floor in the kitchen talking to her mother, Rajhu walked over and shot her in the head. He told everyone who asked, “I could not let it go. It was all I could think about. I had to kill her. There was no choice.”
Application: We need to careful of what laws we put upon our hearts.
*****
Genesis 32:22-31
Colombia president Juan Manuel Santos has been awarded the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize, emerging as the winner from 400 individuals and organizations. He was recognized for trying to bring peace to the 52-year-old civil war in Colombia between the government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Though his peace proposal was defeated in a nationwide referendum with a vote of 50.2 percent against it, the Nobel committee still recognized Santos’ amazing accomplishments. In accepting the award, Santos said: “I invite everyone to join our strength, our minds, and our hearts in this great national endeavor so that we can win the most important prize of all: peace in Colombia.”
Application: There are many ways in which we wrestle with the angel to receive a blessing.
*****
Psalm 121
Christianity Today reports that China has implemented 26 new rules to control the church. The rules, taken in their entirety, remove any freedom of worship and assembly the church once experienced. Everything that a church does must be approved by the State Administration of Religious Affairs (SARA). The list includes many things that cannot be done without SARA approval, such as: printing religious material; studying theology; accepting donations; providing a venue for religious service; and meeting as a religious organization in one’s home.
Application: We are looking to the hills, seeking our help in a time of trouble.
*****
2 Timothy 3:14--4:5
Pope Francis’ recent visit to the country of Georgia was met by many protests. The protestors, who are members of the Orthodox Church, view Francis as a heretic. More than this, they feel that Francis, who is from the West, is trying to corrupt the values of those who live in the east with western style of living. The leader of the Georgia Orthodox Church, Patriarch Ilia II, issued a statement condemning anyone who disrupted the pope’s visit.
Application: We should express our beliefs with dignity.
***************
From team member Mary Austin:
2 Timothy 3:14--4:5
Love Rounds
In Second Timothy, we are urged to “proclaim the message; be persistent whether the time is favorable or unfavorable.” At Loma Linda Hospital in California, the staff has a tradition called “love rounds.” Usual hospital rounds involve physicians from different disciplines gathering to talk about a particularly thorny case, with the resident doctors in training learning from the experience of other doctors. In love rounds, as former medical resident Turya Nair explains, “the medical team chooses a patient who they are caring for in the hospital -- usually a particularly sick or sad patient, or one who has been in the hospital for a long time -- and ask the patient’s permission to bring the team with Dr. Alexander [Wil Alexander, Ph.D., who is not a physician but a 94-year-old minister and professor of religion who brings an important non-medical perspective] to the bedside and learn more about the patient as a person. When the team comes to the bedside with Dr. Alexander, we watch him pull up a chair in front of the patient’s bed, greet all the patient’s family members, make a few jokes, and then begin asking the patient questions that perhaps no one else has been asking during the rest of the hospital stay. These include questions such as ‘How do you feel about being in the hospital?’ ‘Tell me the story of your sickness,’ ‘Tell me about the last time you really felt well,’ ‘What are you famous for?’ ‘What do your friends and family love about you?’ ‘Do you blame God for your sickness?’ or ‘Do you think God is punishing you for something?’ ”
As Nair says, “These questions have the magical ability of restoring the patient from simply a list of lab numbers, x-rays, and a sick body in a bed to a human being -- not only in the eyes of the medical team, but oftentimes more importantly in the eyes of the patient themselves. And we are all reminded that the relationship we enter between doctor and patient is a sacred one that involves the patient’s spiritual beliefs about their health and sickness as well.”
The questions proclaim a different message -- they proclaim the humanity and worth of the person at the center of the group. They proclaim a different kind of truth about the patient.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
Learning to Be Like the Widow
If we think we could never be like the widow in Jesus’ story, that we would never have her courage or perseverance, we’re wrong about ourselves. Persistence can be developed and strengthened. Writer Heidi Grant Halvorson says: “Grit is a willingness to commit to long-term goals, and to persist in the face of difficulty. Studies show that gritty people obtain more education in their lifetime, and earn higher college GPAs. Grit predicts which cadets will stick out their first grueling year at West Point. In fact, grit even predicts which round contestants will make it to at the Scripps National Spelling Bee.”
We can grow to be more and more like the widow. “The good news is, if you aren’t particularly gritty now, there is something you can do about it. People who lack grit more often than not believe that they just don’t have the innate abilities successful people have. If that describes your own thinking... well, there’s no way to put this nicely: you are wrong. As I mentioned earlier, effort, planning, persistence, and good strategies are what it really takes to succeed. Embracing this knowledge will not only help you see yourself and your goals more accurately, but also do wonders for your grit.”
When we’re developing our tenacity, we should “Focus on what you will do, not what you won’t do. Do you want to successfully lose weight, quit smoking, or put a lid on your bad temper? Then plan how you will replace bad habits with good ones, rather than focusing only on the bad habits themselves. Research on thought suppression (e.g., ‘Don’t think about white bears!’) has shown that trying to avoid a thought makes it even more active in your mind. The same holds true when it comes to behavior -- by trying not to engage in a bad habit, our habits get strengthened rather than broken.” Like the widow, we can ramp up our persistence.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
Did the Widow Have a Tidy House?
If we’re seeking the kind of persistence that the widow has, it pays to clean up. Researchers say that a messy environment undermines our ability to be persistent. Depleted mental resources make it hard to persist, and a messy environment draws away our energy. Researchers think that’s because a “mess poses a threat.” It threatens our sense of control, and thus depletes our mental energy. If we need to call up our ability to persevere, having a calm, serene environment around us will aid in that.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
Can We Be Too Persistent?
In the story Jesus tells about the widow who wears down the uncaring judge, he lauds persistence. That kind of perseverance in prayer draws us closer to God, even in adversity. But we can also be too persistent for our own good. Business writer Muriel Maignan Wilkins says: “Stubbornness is the ugly side of perseverance. Those who exhibit this attribute cling to the notion that they’re passionate, decisive, full of conviction, and able to stand their ground -- all of which are admirable leadership characteristics. Being stubborn isn’t always a bad thing. But if you’re standing your ground for the wrong reasons (e.g. you can’t stand to be wrong, you only want to do things your way), are you really doing the right thing?”
Wilkins suggests some corrective viewpoints that will keep us focused on the right things, including listening and being open to other possibilities. She adds: “At the root of all stubbornness is the fear of letting go of your own ideas, convictions, decisions, and at times identity. But as renowned author James Baldwin eloquently stated, ‘Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it.... Yet it is only when a man is able, without bitterness or self-pity, to surrender a dream he has long cherished or a privilege he has long possessed that he is set free... for higher dreams, for greater privileges.’ Sometimes, letting go of an overly staunch position can result in greater value than you originally expected.”
Sometimes we need to be like the widow in our focus, and other times blind persistence may keep us from what we really want.
*****
Luke 18:1-8
The Uncaring Judge Gives us a Gift
Aptly named author Paul Tough says running into uncaring people like the judge in Jesus’ story, or encountering adversity, can end up being a gift in the long run because of the way our character develops in response. Success, Tough says, is about how children (and adults) build character.
Tough worked with teenagers in Chicago, watching them overcome tremendous challenges. One young woman he worked with had been sexually abused by a relative, was getting into fights in school, and was on the verge of dropping out. But then she entered an intensive mentoring program that changed her life. “She made it through high school, overcame a lot of obstacles, and now is getting a cosmetology degree,” Tough says. “For some people, that wouldn’t be a huge success. But for her, she overcame obstacles that won’t only set her on a path for material success, but also psychological success.” With persistence, she managed to make a change in the course of her life.
Tough says that persistence can take a person farther in life than good test scores: “I think there’s lots of evidence out there now that says that these other strengths, these character strengths, these non-cognitive skills, are at least as important in a child’s success and quite possibly more important.”
Being like the widow is better for life success than a fantastic SAT or ACT score.
WORSHIP RESOURCES
by George Reed
Call to Worship
Leader: Oh, how we love your law, O God!
People: It is our meditation all day long.
Leader: How sweet are your words to our taste.
People: They are sweeter than honey to our mouths!
Leader: Through your precepts we get understanding.
People: Through your teachings we avoid every false way.
OR
Leader: God calls us to come into the Divine Presence.
People: We need God’s presence in our hectic lives.
Leader: God is here to strengthen us for our mission.
People: Our strength is almost gone, and we are grateful.
Leader: God calls us to persevere with patience.
People: With God’s help, we will do so.
Hymns and Sacred Songs
“O God, Our Help in Ages Past”
found in:
UMH: 117
H82: 680
AAHH: 170
NNBH: 46
NCH: 25
CH: 67
LBW: 320
ELA: 632
W&P: 84
AMEC: 61
STLT: 281
“All My Hope Is Firmly Grounded”
found in:
UMH: 132
H82: 665
NCH: 408
CH: 88
ELA: 757
“Great Is Thy Faithfulness”
found in:
UMH: 140
AAHH: 158
NNBH: 45
NCH: 423
CH: 86
ELA: 733
W&P: 72
AMEC: 84
Renew: 249
“Standing on the Promises”
found in:
UMH: 374
AAHH: 373
NNBH: 257
CH: 552
AMEC: 424
“O Master, Let Me Walk with Thee”
found in:
UMH: 430
H82: 659, 660
PH: 357
NNBH: 445
NCH: 503
CH: 602
LBW: 492
ELA: 818
W&P: 589
AMEC: 299
“My Faith Looks Up to Thee”
found in:
UMH: 452
H82: 691
PH: 383
AAHH: 456
NNBH: 273
CH: 576
LBW: 479
ELA: 759
W&P: 419
AMEC: 415
“You Satisfy the Hungry Heart”
found in:
UMH: 629
PH: 521
CH: 429
ELA: 484
AMEC: 705
“Seek Ye First”
found in:
UMH: 405
CCB: 76
“Our God Reigns”
found in:
CCB: 33
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982 (The Episcopal Church)
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African-American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELA: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day / Collect
O God who with patience and persistence had led your people: Grant us the grace to grow in those traits so that we can be true disciples of Jesus; through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We praise you, O God, for the patience and persistence with which you have led us. Throughout the ages, you have been our steadfast guide. Open our hearts to your Spirit, so that we reflect yourself more clearly as we follow Jesus as his true disciples. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
Leader: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins, and especially our lack of patience and persistence.
People: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. We have failed to be your obedient people. We have become discouraged when things have not changed quickly enough for us. We have given up too easily when things have become difficult. Strengthen us, and send us out once more to be your presence in this world. Amen.
Leader: God loves us and our world. Receive God’s grace and forgiveness, and go to do the work that God has for us.
Prayers of the People (and the Lord’s Prayer)
All glory, honor, and blessings are yours, O God, for you are the steadfast architect of all creation.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. We have failed to be your obedient people. We have become discouraged when things have not changed quickly enough for us. We have given up too easily when things have become difficult. Strengthen us, and send us out once more to be your presence in this world.
We give you thanks for your patience with us when we are so slow to develop as your children. We thank you for those you have given us who have helped shape us as disciples of Jesus and stayed beside us in our journey.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for one another in our need and for all your creation. We know of your steadfast love for all your people, and we pray that we may help to share your presence with them.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray together, saying:
Our Father . . . Amen.
(or if the Lord’s Prayer is not used at this point in the service)
All this we ask in the Name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Tell the children about Thomas Edison and how hard it was for him to create the electric light bulb. He had so many failures, but he kept at it. He didn’t see them as failures but as learning experiences. He learned what wouldn’t work as a filament in a light bulb. Finally it all paid off -- and we are glad that he was patient and persistent.
CHILDREN’S SERMON
Persistence
by Dean Feldmeyer
Luke 18:1-8
You will need: a picture of Helen Keller and one of Annie Sullivan, or a picture of both of them together. (These images can easily be located using an internet search engine like Google or Bing.) One picture for each child would be even better.
When the children have gathered around, say:
This is Helen Keller. (Show her picture.) When Helen was born she was a normal baby, but when she was just 18 months old she caught a disease that damaged her eyes and ears, and she became deaf and blind. She could not see and she could not hear.
For years she was unable to communicate with anyone. She didn’t know what was going on around her, and she became sad and angry and began to throw violent temper tantrums. She was very difficult to live with. Finally her parents decided that Helen needed special help, and they hired a lady named Annie Sullivan to be her teacher. (Show her picture.)
Annie and Helen moved into a cottage together, and Annie began teaching Helen to use a special language of symbols pressed into the palm of her hand to understand what someone was saying. For months she tried and tried to help Helen understand, but it looked like it wasn’t going to work. Helen just wasn’t getting it.
Then one day Helen felt the water coming out of a pump and Annie spelled the word “water” in Helen’s hand -- and Helen understood. Helen was eager to learn more words, and before the day was over Helen had learned 30 new words. In just about a year, Helen learned to talk and hear with this special sign language. But she was not able to talk with her mouth. So Annie said she would help her learn to do that.
Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller worked together for 25 years before Helen felt comfortable enough with the way she talked to make a speech in public. The audience at her first speech was amazed. Not only was this deaf and blind girl able to speak clearly, she was smart and funny and interesting too. Soon people all over the country were inviting Helen Keller to speak. She made speeches at churches, clubs, and events all over the United States.
By the time Helen Keller was 80 years old, she was one of the most famous people in America. She had written several books, started some organizations to help deaf and blind people, and she was admired and loved by thousands of people.
And this was all because her friend and teacher Annie Sullivan never gave up on her... and because Helen Keller never gave up on herself.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, October 16, 2016, issue.
Copyright 2016 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
