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Century Christian
Church 1301 Tamarack Road, Owensboro, KY 42301, (270) 684-0286, Pastor: Rev. Jim Westmoreland |
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Mercy is Creative His name is Bill. He has wild hair, wears a T-shirt with holes in it,
jeans, and no shoes. This was literally his wardrobe for his entire four years of college.
He is brilliant. Kind of esoteric and very, very bright. He became a Christian while
attending college. Across the street from the campus is a well-dressed, very conservative
church. They want to develop a ministry to the students, but are not sure how to go about
it. One day Bill decides to go there. He walks in with no shoes, jeans, his
T-shirt, and wild hair. The service has already started and so Bill starts down the aisle
looking for a seat. The church is completely packed and he can't find a seat. By now,
people are really looking a bit uncomfortable, but no one says anything. Bill gets closer
and closer and closer to the pulpit, and when he realizes there are no seats, he just
squats down right on the carpet. (Although perfectly acceptable behavior at a college
fellowship, trust me, this had never happened in this church before!) By now the people
are really uptight, and the tension in the air is thick. About this time, the minister realizes that from way at the back of the
church, a deacon is slowly making his way toward Bill. Now, the deacon is in his eighties,
has silver-gray hair, and a three-piece suit. A godly man, very elegant, very dignified,
very courtly. He walks with a cane and, as he starts walking toward this boy, everyone is
saying to themselves that you can't blame him for what he's going to do. How can you
expect a man of his age and of his background to understand some college kid on the floor?
It takes a long time for the man to reach the boy. The church is utterly silent except for
the clicking of the man's cane. All eyes are focused on him. You can't even hear anyone
breathing. The minister can't even preach the sermon until the deacon does what he has to
do. And now they see this elderly man drop his cane on the floor. With great
difficulty, he lowers himself and sits down next to Bill and worships with him so he won't
be alone. Everyone chokes up with emotion. When the minister gains control, he says,
"What I'm about to preach, you will never remember. What you have just seen, you will
never forget. When we have experienced the richness and goodness of God's mercy, we
can do the unexpected. Because His mercy has changed the way we think and judge others,
God can be creative in us to act in a new way, to find a way to show His love to others
when we thought we didn't know how. Wouldn't we like to be the kind of people who were
known as "grace" people, as "mercy" people, not because of what we
said we believed, but because of how we treated all people in the community. Our text in l Peter gives us some guidance into how to become that kind
of person. I want to look first at v.10, "for you were once not a people, but now you
are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy."
My theology and images of God's work have been forever shaped by my studies in preparing a
research paper for an advance biblical studies class dealing with Isaiah 40-66. We had to
pick a topic from 100 or so that were listed as approved topics. Topics like servant,
suffering and messiah were already taken when I chose mine. I saw the topic
"creation" and it drew me to it. In the library, as I took an armload of books on Isaiah to a study
carol, which is just a small desk with a shelf attached to the back of it, I began looking
in the index at the back to see which ones dealt with the subject of creation. Some had
somewhat more to offer than others, but, clearly, this was not a topic like the images of
the Servant, which had tons of things written about it. And then, I found the book,
"The Themes of Creation and Redemption in Deutero-Isaiah," by a German Catholic
OT scholar named Carroll Schtuelmueller. The distillation of this is , What God creates,
He works in history to redeem, and God's redemption is always creative, as He creates a
new nation out of the Exodus, as he speaks through the prophets about a new covenant of
the heart, as He comes in the flesh to live and die for us, as he gives us the new birth,
and as he gives us new beginnings when we fall and fail. And so, we see Peter saying now you have received mercy. Because we have
received mercy, we, who were once not God's people, now "are
the people of God." We continue to see God's creative mercy at work as we
look back at v. 2, "Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that
by it you may grow into salvation." Some have said this verse only applies to new
Christians, but I think it applies to us all. More than once Jesus used the image of
children as an attitude without pride or pretense for us to be like. Here, Peter is using
the image of the natural and strong and sometimes loud hunger of babies to be fed. Like
newborns with their strong and natural desire to be fed, we are to long for spiritual food
so that we may grow in our salvation. Though salvation has a beginning point, it is to
continue growing in us until Jesus takes us home when we will be completed in Christ.
People used to talk about these three aspects as salvation, sanctification and
glorification. Because we have received God's mercy and have been made to be God's
people, we show the desires of His people as we hunger to know the scriptures and to
listen to His Spirit. This hunger leads us to grow in living our salvation. Peter writes
in v. 3 "if, indeed, you have tasted that the Lord is good." The growth that God
desires for us is creative because He is uniquely shaping us to be who He created us to
be. Isn't that something? We can say, "I have tasted the Lord and He is good, and He
is at work in my life, helping me to become who He created me to be." In v. 4 Peter changes his metaphor to building a building. He talks
about Christ as the living stone that the builders rejected. The image of a living stone
goes back to the Old Testament images of the Messiah. Jesus was the Messiah, part of God's
creative-redemptive plan for our sins. But, Jesus was rejected, so Peter writes that Jesus
as a special stone was "rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God's
sight." He continues to move the metaphor from Christ to us. We are to be
"like living stones" being built into a spiritual house. We are to be a holy
priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. It is
only through Jesus that our sacrifices are acceptable. What Peter referred to as becoming a people in v. 10 really means to be
a community. This is what the church is to be. He fills out the picture more in v. 9,
"you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, in order
that you may proclaim the mighty acts of Him who called you out of
darkness into His marvelous light." What are God's mighty acts? There are a list of things that came to mine
when the prophets reminded the people of the mighty acts of God. The first is calling
Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees and making a covenant with him to bless all the nations of
the earth through him. When He saved Noah and his family from the flood, God did His
mighty acts to redeem and to create a new beginning. When Moses led the children of Israel
out of Egypt, God was involved with His mighty acts! But God's greatest act was to sent
His son to come in the flesh and live among us. He performed many miracles and signs and
forgave sins. He was falsely condemned and he gave himself to die on a cross. And, God
raised him from the dead on the third day. These are some of God's mighty acts, but God's most personal mighty acts
are the ones he has done in my life. He forgives my sins. He gives me new life, He gives
me new opportunities to serve him. It is wonderful to be called into "His marvelous
light!" When we look at all that God has done, we can see Him continually
creating life, new beginnings, new opportunities to serve Him. We can see his mercy
actively seeking to forgive us. He deals with us, not by what we deserve, but by his
mercy, he heals us and hears us and calls us as His own people. What God builds is His church, the Body of Christ. We are chosen as
living stones to be a part of what God is building. We are all fitted together around the
chief cornerstone, which is Jesus. God is building, creating His people, the Church. God
fits our talents, abilities, our gifts and ministry into the Church! Now let's go back to the beginning of this sermon. Remember the scene in
the church. Everybody was dressed right and sitting in the right place doing the right
thing. A long-haired student showed up who was not dressed like others. I suppose no one
offered him a seat next to them. We know how to spread out and make the pew look full, but
most of the time, we can move closer together and make room for one or two more. Nobody
made room, so he walked toward the front and sat in the aisle. When the silver-haired saint started hobbling toward him, everyone expected him to give the young man some criticism about how he was dressed or where he was sitting. But when we are drinking the milk that God provides and when we have tasted the sweetness of His mercy, then creative and unexpected things happen! Love takes the place of criticism. Mercy takes the place of rejection. And when God's mercy lives boldly in us is when we preach our best sermons! |
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