Title: Christians aren’t idiots
Text: Daniel 2:12-19
MP: The intercession of Daniel’s friends brought about God’s intervention.
SO: I want to encourage the church to live in community with each other and visit each other.
Intro:
One of the worst things about the English language is that too often we don’t really know how to use our own words. Data, for instance is plural. There is no such thing as one data point. Or, take the word corporate. When I say that, I suspect you’re thinking Enron or IBM or some other company. Well, originally it just used to mean any task undertaken together. You know, lot’s of people corporately coming together for a single purpose. It used to be that the *opposite* of corporate was an idiot [pause] – literally a solitary, singular guy who didn’t go in for the benefits of being part of the group. It used to be that an idiot was just somebody who stuck to himself – in an idiosyncratic way. You see, there are still hints of it.
But I’ll tell you the word that’s been messed up the most. And that’s the word ‘church.’ You probably know that a church is a group of people – it’s the corporate gathering of the body of Christ. But let’s face it: when you and think of church, we’re probably thinking of a building. The truth is it’s so easy to think of the church as a building because it’s easier for church to be a place than a way of life. It’s safer when it’s a building we go to once a week, more so than an attitude which defines our lives.
Well, that may be what we think, but it’s too limited. I fear that we may be in danger of losing our corporate notion of church. I think that Long Branch is better than most at understanding church as a people, but we can always do better. We do a pretty good job of visiting each other, caring for each other, praying with each other.
But even we have friends and neighbors and colleagues that need us. Too many isolated people are imprisoned voluntarily in the cells of their own homes, when what simply need most is the companionship and friendship of a God-breathed individual more interested in serving God than himself. Left to my own devices, there is no reason to look out for these people, other than the fact that God loves them.
We know that sick people gain strength from being visited. We know that even the most introverted of us need that human touch, that human contact. A TV is no replacement for a friend. We know that people live longer in community. But the world has no use for such people. Only a loving God who desires that all of his creation be cared for would or should ever bother taking the effort to make sure these people are in the community too. It is good for them, and it is good for us, even if it makes us go the extra mile to give them that call or to stop by.
Those of us who have been there for others know there is great reward, but it isn’t a reward that is easy to quantify. The reward of being visited is different from that of visiting. But you should experience both. If you’re lonely, the best cure is to get out and cheer up others. For two people to be alone is just wrong.
I grew up in a church where it was too easy to get lost. At the church I grew up in, you could fade into the crowd, you could stop coming, and no one would notice. No one would call and just ask, ‘How are you doing?’ Well, that’s a key part of church – we check up on each other, we lift each other up in the Lord, and we can always improve at that.
But I’d like to tell you that is more than just a church growth strategy. Oh, make no mistake – if a church wants to grow, there is nothing that can replace individual members individually bringing their friends and maintaining that one-on-one contact; but I’ll tell you this: It gets right to the heart of the Biblical message. It was the Biblical way of doing church long before church even existed as something we did.
Our God is a corporate God, not in the sense of being bureaucratic, but in the sense of togetherness that he desires for his people. We worship him in a community. It is a community centered on Jesus to be sure, but it is not, as we suppose, just a ‘Jesus and me’ thing. In our reading this morning, I’d like to point out something that, frankly seemed like a minor detail to me in our story of Daniel 2, but it’s a detail that shows up time and time again. As we read the text this morning, would you notice how centered on relationship this story is?
Think about the relationship that Daniel has with Arioch. Think about the relationship Daniel has with his friends. See how it is that these relationships ultimately bring Daniel in closer relationship to God. And that’s what we’re after, right? If we want to know how to talk to God, I want to suggest this morning that we need to understand this notion of corporate.
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Well, okay, Arioch’s job was perhaps to bring Daniel a bit closer to God than Daniel was expecting, but did you see how Daniel was able to talk with him so freely? Clearly Daniel and Arioch had a pre-existing relationship so string that Daniel could get Arioch to risk his job, and even his neck, in delaying the king’s order. That doesn’t happen by accident. I am sure that they spent time together. There is nothing to suggest that Arioch could have cared a lick about Daniel’s god. But he cared about Daniel. And through that relationship, he could learn to appreciate his god. I know it’s a cliché, but it’s true: We are often the only Bible our friends will ever read. Are you in circulation? Does anyone read the scriptures through you?
Did you notice the only real idiot so far is the one who is acting by himself? I mean, why is the king so furious that he wants to kill off his entire government? Why? Because he is acting impetuously, and alone. This is not a corporate act, unless perhaps if you were at a big accounting firm or HP. Corporate acts are slow and deliberate precisely because they benefit from tempered counsel. Corporate acts can be slow for a lot of reasons, but that’s at least one good one.
But, perhaps more importantly, did you notice the fellowship of the believers? Hannaniah, Mishael, Azariah. They all came together to pray. It just so happened that the word came to Daniel. That’s a group in total humility to God and to each other. I doubt they cared which one of them actually heard from God directly. They were simply living out the commandments of God in community. They didn’t go to Temple together – Temple was over 800 miles away, and it was in ruins. They didn’t go to synagogue together – that concept hadn’t been invented yet!
They simply came together out of a common love for an uncommon God who had supernaturally reached out to them and chosen them for his kingdom. I am sure sometimes they wondered about their ‘chosen people’ status, and I suspect at these key times of trial, they might have wondered why God couldn’t have chosen someone else. But they knew if they were going to be faithful to their God, they needed each other.
Today, we’d call that an accountability group. It’s a twenty-first century name for a timeless idea. A group of people come together for the sake of the gospel. They come together in humility and common love for God and one another. They extend that love to the world around them. They lift each other up. When one of them is hurting, they extend God’s love. When one of them is missing, they’re there. And one of them is rejoice, they’re each lifted up.
As I said earlier, one of the nice things about Long Branch is that we are small enough to act like an accountability group when we so choose. We can and should get involved in each other’s business. That’s okay. I know the culture teaches us that we just shouldn’t get involved, but guess what:
Things only happen when people get involved. People get fed when other people get involved. People heal when doctors get involved. People change when others get involved. Whether it be through prayer or visitation or just being a pain in the butt about getting them to church so they can have the companionship they need, getting involved is a necessary thing.
We are called to be a community of Christ that realizes as great as our individuality is, our corporate presence in the worship of our King is even greater than ourselves.
As Christians, we are called to overcome the world. We overcome it precisely by being greater in love, compassion, and friendship. Nowhere does the Bible ever say, ‘They will know we are Christians by our … doctrine, or our theology – even our potlucks.’ No, the world recognizes how we love one another. How we visit one another, how we care for each other. In Sunday School, we have been thinking about a question Phillip Yancey asked: What would it be like if we as a church competed not on doctrine but tried to out-grace one another?
If we would desire to out-grace, outdo in love, then we must know how to talk directly to God. And, if we would talk to God, I would suggest we would first learn this: that we speak with God in community. We are called to be his both individually and collectively. This is the pattern I see for worship. This is the pattern for seeing God collectively respond to those who love him and ask him specifically for certain things.
This principle of corporate worship we see with Daniel and Mishael and Hanniah and Azariah is something I see all across the bible. For every great hero of the Bible, there is a companion. Like Gideon, it would not do for us to think we had accomplished the Lord’s work in our own, solitary strength. Adam had Eve, Moses had Miriam and Aaron and Joshua, Joshua had Caleb, David had Jonathan, Esther had Mordecai, Paul had Barnabas; even Jesus had Peter. When the Lord declared that it is not good for man to be alone, I think he meant more than just males and more than just marriage.
Even the Lord himself admitted that he created us because he desires to be in fellowship with us. Imagine – if God himself could desire the company of those who love him, how much less should we?
Daniel had Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Frankly, I missed it in Daniel 1: Daniel was already in close communion with these fellows. In Daniel 3, you know the story of the fiery furnace. These three are never mentioned accept in community with one another. Daniel is chock full of stories of integrity and courage – standing up when everyone else bows to the culture. How did they did do it? They did it together. How would you have liked to have been a part of that small group?
I’m sure they had their squabbles and disagreements. I wouldn’t be surprised Shadrach thought that Abednego was always late for prayer group, and I wouldn’t be surprised is Meshach thought that Shadrach needed to shower more often. I’m sure that each of them was an individual who was great in his own right – after all, you don’t get to be princes of the land by being a wallflower. But it is testament to their sense of corporate love for God that we don’t know anything about each of these guys except as part of group. They go together like Larry, Curly, and Moe, only a lot more influential.
These men understood something. They were all great, but they were all equal before God. You cannot acknowledge God’s complete, scale-altering greatness, and not see that any comparison to your fellow man is petty foolishness.
We are all beings created for fellowship with God and others. We all need each other. Why else would God have given us backs we can’t scratch on our own? When I say that we are created to live in community, that’s not something I have thought up on my own. For centuries it was simply assumed. It is only in a hyper-individualistic culture such as our own that it even needs to be said. But it is precisely here that it must be said.
No man is an island in God’s eyes. We live in God’s community.
I want to end by reading a meditation that the world loves. Ernest Hemmingway wrote a novel that took its title from this piece; Simon Garfunkel made a song out of it, but we need to hear the full to understand what the preacher said. And yes, it was a preacher who wrote this.
John Donne was an up and coming young MP in 1601. He was middle class but moving up. And he had good friends too. Good friends like the writers Christopher Brooke and Ben Johnson, who helped him by secretly providing cover for him to marry the love of his life. Sadly, that woman was also the niece of the captain of the Tower. And he did not approve. He effectively killed his career with that move. But, by all accounts he and his wife loved each other. They had twelve children together before she died in childbirth.
Donne was even able to mend relationships with the king – King James I. By 1615, he was able to ask the King to intercede for him, and James in fact responded, though perhaps not as Donne had anticipated. King James demanded that Donne enter the church, and there he reluctantly went. In only a few short years, through the support of his friend the king, he became Dean of St. Paul’s – one of the most important churches in England. There, he had time to write his saintly sonnets and moving meditations, like this one I read to you now:
PERCHANCE he for whom this bell tolls may be so ill, as that he knows not it tolls for him; and perchance I may think myself so much better than I am, as that they who are about me, and see my state, may have caused it to toll for me, and I know not that.
The church is Catholic, universal, so are all her actions; all that she does belongs to all.
When she baptizes a child, that action concerns me; for that child is thereby connected to that body which is my head too, and ingrafted into that body whereof I am a member.
And when she buries a man, that action concerns me: all mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God’s hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another.
As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come, so this bell calls us all; but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness.
The bell doth toll for him that thinks it doth; and though it intermit again, yet from that minute that this occasion wrought upon him, he is united to God.
Who casts not up his eye to the sun when it rises? but who takes off his eye from a comet when that breaks out? Who bends not his ear to any bell which upon any occasion rings? but who can remove it from that bell which is passing a piece of himself out of this world? No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend’s or of thine own were: any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
From "Devotions upon Emergent Occasions" (1623), XVII: Nunc Lento Sonitu Dicunt, Morieris - "Now, this bell tolling softly for another, says to me: Thou must die."
Note – next week Joel 2.12-14 goes well with the dream… (Although, point #3 of ‘How to talk to God is – Rejoice!)
NOTE: There really is an element of ‘choose your friends wisely’…
…
Last week, we began looking at the story of Daniel, when God told him the King’s dream. I hope you took the few minutes last week to read it through, to see God’s providence.
I hope as well that it gave you a sense of déjà vu – you know the idea that you’ve seen that before. If you remember that God did the same thing for Joseph, when he was in prison in Egypt, you get extra points. If you remember that like Joseph, Daniel also became a foreigner who was second in the land, you see the parallels. But far more important than mere poetic analogy or literary trivia, what you should see is this. Anything is possible when the person of God chooses to get involved. When he deigns to speak as a man, face to face, things change.
It is in that vein, in that hope that we have been reading through Daniel 2 last week and next, as well as this. We are well aware of God’s power. We all know that when he chooses to get involved, he can do anything. The question is: how is it that we can talk to him?
Last week, we learned that sadly there is no magical incantation that will get God to do our bidding. That is the province of soothsayers and astrologers and magicians. But our God is not magic. He is not something we can control. You see, only forces can be controlled. And, what differentiates our God from everything else is that he is not a force, he’s a person.
If you think a person can be controlled, can I simply invite you to watch Rachel’s class for an hour? We are all individuals with hopes and dreams and aspirations. We are individuals who can love.
Beautiful, isn’t it? That famous line – For Whom the Bell Tolls, of course, became the title for an Ernest Hemmingway novel. It’s ironic, for Ernest Hemmingway was such a rugged individualist. Saddened and wearied by a long, solitary life, he ended up dying at his own hand in his 70s. Now that is the end of the man who would be his own captain, the master of his fate.
Simon and Garfunkel vs John Donne?
Long Branch Baptist Church
Halfway, Virginia; est. 1786
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Enter to Worship
Prelude David Witt
Meditation Psalm 104:1-7
Invocation
*Opening Hymn #428
“In the Garden”
Welcome & Announcements
Morning Prayer [See Insert]
*Hymn #481
“Just a Closer Walk with Thee”
*Responsive Lesson [See Right]
*Hymn #236
The Church’s One Foundation”
Offertory Mr. Witt
*Doxology
Praise God from whom all blessings flow / Praise Him all creatures here below
Praise him above, ye heavenly host / Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.
*Scripture
Sermon
“Christians aren’t Idiots”
Invitation Hymn #405
“We are Called to be God’s People”
*Benediction
*Congregational Response
May the grace of Christ of Savior / And the Father’s boundless love
With the Holy Spirit’s favor / Rest upon us from above. Amen.
* Congregation, please stand.
Depart To Serve
RESPONSIVE LESSON
Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner.”
Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil.
For if they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to one who is alone and falls and does not have another to help. Again, if two lie together, they keep warm; but how can one keep warm alone? And though one might prevail against another, two will withstand one.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ.
For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many, that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another.
If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.
Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.
Those who withhold kindness from a friend forsake the fear of the Almighty.
O Lord, you know; remember me and visit me.
In your forbearance do not take me away; know that on your account I suffer insult.
I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me,
I was in prison and you visited me.’
Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured.
Gen 2:18;Ecc 4:9-12;1 Cor 12:12-14,25-26;Job 6:14;
Matt 18:19-20;Jer 15:15;Mt 25:36; Heb 13:1-3;
MORNING PRAYER
Almighty and everlasting God, who art always more ready to hear than we to pray, and to give more than either desire or deserve: Pour upon us the abundance of thy mercy, forgiving us those things whereof our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things which we are not worthy to ask, but through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord; who lives and reigns with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
PRAY FOR FORGIVENESS OF YOUR SIN
Everlasting God: Pour on us the abundance of thy mercy.
Rain down on us, reign over us, be our Lord Protector with healing in your wings we ask. We ask for Warren, first that he would taste your sustaining power. Keep him strong. Lord, bring healing to Susan, keep her strong and watch over her and her family. Father, we pray for Martha too, that her body and her family would have peace. Lord, we ask for the Waddells healing, for Cindy and Lee strength, for Kathy and Mark and Lori your healing hand, and for these as well:
PRAY FOR YOUR NEIGHBORS
Everlasting God: Pour on us the abundance of thy mercy.
Lord, we praise you for this church. We praise you that longer than we’ve been here, you have been here, bringing us friends with whom we can praise you. You have never left us, nor forsaken us, but rather given us a guide and a friend, and made us whole. You have created us in a community that we love, ask your blessings upon it and its leaders, and we pray that you would sustain and grow them both. We pray that we could be a part of that. We pray as Simeon that we would see with our own eyes that miracle you will bring about.
PRAY FOR YOUR COUNTRY AND CHURCH
Everlasting God: Pour on us the abundance of thy mercy.
Pour your spirit on us too, we pray. Lord, we praise you and pray to you in the words your Son taught us. Our Father …
ANNOUNCEMENTS
COAT DRIVE CONTINUES THROUGH OCTOBER 27TH
DAYLIGHT SAVINGS TIME ENDS NEXT WEEK. BE SURE TO SET YOUR CLOCKS BACK ONE HOUR. BE SURE TO SET YOUR ALARM FOR TWO AM, SO YOU CAN DO IT AT THE RIGHT TIME.
SUNDAY SCHOOL CONTINUES WITH WHAT’S SO AMAZING ABOUT GRACE? 9:00AM IN THE SUNDAY SCHOOL ROOM. BILL MATLACK IS ‘FACILITATING.’
SCRIPTURE READING
12 Because of this the king flew into a violent rage and commanded that all the wise men of Babylon be destroyed. 13 The decree was issued, and the wise men were about to be executed; and they looked for Daniel and his companions, to execute them. 14 Then Daniel responded with prudence and discretion to Arioch, the king’s chief executioner, who had gone out to execute the wise men of Babylon; 15 he asked Arioch, the royal official, “Why is the decree of the king so urgent?” Arioch then explained the matter to Daniel. 16 So Daniel went in and requested that the king give him time and he would tell the king the interpretation.
17 Then Daniel went to his home and informed his companions, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, 18 and told them to seek mercy from the God of heaven concerning this mystery, so that Daniel and his companions with the rest of the wise men of Babylon might not perish. 19 Then the mystery was revealed to Daniel in a vision of the night, and Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
Daniel 2:12-19
