The best discoveries are the discoveries made by accident. The things you did not set out to find, but found anyway. The five dollar bill tucked in between the pages of the book you picked up to read. The charming little boutique around the corner from where you really intended to go. The best discoveries are those that instead of your finding them, they find you. You just stumble on something, and it gives you joy.
The scientists have coined a phrase for this. They speak of quantum leaps. Quantum leaps. If you are into physics, you know that this has something to do with energized molecules and emitting energy. Let’s not bog down in that. But the scientists use the phrase “quantum leap” to remind us that sometimes we make very fast progress. Sometimes we don’t just discover some little something; sometimes we discover something very big, something very important. Sometimes we make a huge advance. That’s a quantum leap. And it may happen by accident. Sometimes scientists will stumble, they will make a mistake; but it gives them a quantum leap, a major advance.
I’m told that Alexander Fleming, for example, made a mistake in his laboratory. Some of the wrong material got into his little culture dish. But out of that mistake Fleming discovered the curative powers of penicillin. That’s stumbling into a quantum leap.
I read not long ago about the development of radar. Here in Washington, along the Anacostia River, some Navy scientists were trying to send radio signals over to Virginia, but found that their signals were bouncing back instead of getting across the river. Somebody just happened to look out of the window and saw a ship in the way; they figured out that big, dense things like ships send back radio signals. And that led them to think about how they could use radio signals to find big, dense things on purpose. Radar: stumbling into a quantum leap.
Maybe you’ve had this happen to you. I have, quite literally. My wife tells me that I have this habit, when I walk, of not watching where my feet are going. She says I have my head in the clouds (and I admit that’s true whenever she is reciting the honey-do list); I admit that I have my eyes so firmly fixed on where I’m going and what I intend to do next, that I don’t watch where my feet go down.
So one Wednesday afternoon I was coming home, with one hand carrying my brief case, and the other hand carrying a potted plant (that’s what it’s like to be married to a member of the Building and Grounds Committee) .. one hand carrying the brief case, the other hand lifting a potted plant, my mind rehearsing what I was going to do in Bible study that night .. and, because I was not watching where my 9 1/2 D’s were going, I stumbled and fell, and great was the fall thereof. Papers flew out of the briefcase; potting soil dribbled from the flowers; Bible verses streamed out of my mouth (you know, something like, “Jesus wept”). It was a disaster. I had really stumbled. But, as I leaned over the edge of the porch to pick up my papers and recover my dignity, what to my wondering eyes should appear but some moldy old mail, mail that clearly had been down on the ground behind a bush for a number of days. It must have dropped from the postman’s hands as he was trying to put it in the mailbox. And when I looked at that mail, what did I find but a tax refund check! Moldy and wet but negotiable just the same! I had stumbled, yes. But I had stumbled into something wonderful. I had stumbled into a quantum leap, a big step forward for my bank account.
The best discoveries are those made by accident. The things you did not set out to find, but found anyway. The blessings you got not because you went looking for them, and certainly not because you deserve them, but just because they happen. The best discoveries are those that instead of your finding them, they find you. You just stumble on them. And, in fact, it is the stumbling itself that brings you to the good thing. It is the mistake itself, if you acknowledge it and deal with it, that offers you the leap.
Let me say it in a spiritual way: when we sin, when we mess up, if we admit it and repent of it, then God has an opportunity to bless us. Our stumbling can become a quantum leap. But if we are afraid to make mistakes; or, when we make them, if we are too proud to admit them; we will never get anywhere, we will never leap, we will never experience the joy God wants to give us. You have to stumble .. and acknowledge it, repent from it .. before you will do a quantum leap.
The prophet Isaiah looked at the condition of the Kingdom of Judah, and he was most disappointed. Preaching in the middle of the eighth century before Christ, he saw nothing but stumbling in the life of Judah. There was a moral crisis, brought about by too much wealth. The people were rich, and could afford to indulge themselves in just about anything they wanted. Isaiah saw stumbling in that. There was a political crisis, for the Assyrian army, which had just finished off the neighboring Kingdom of Israel, now had an appetite for Judah as well. The nation plunged into a military and political crisis. A very serious stumble. And, as always, there was the spiritual stumbling. There was idolatry, faithlessness, turning against justice, a don’t-care attitude toward the poor. Isaiah preached about these things, but to no avail. The people stumbled on. The prophet told them that a day of judgment was coming. You do not long stumble over God’s law without getting hurt. The day of the Lord was on its way.
But as Isaiah preached on, he also spoke of good news. God never pronounces judgment without at one and the same time announcing good news. The good news was that after judgment, there would be forgiveness. After sorrow, joy. After stumbling, a great leap forward. A quantum leap.
The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom ... Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are of a fearful heart, "Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you." Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer.
“Make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God’ ... then the lame shall leap like a deer.”
Look with me at how, when we stumble, but repent, God brings us to leap like a deer. Let me tell you a little of my own story.
I
It has been only a few years since I would do everything I could to avoid visiting sick or dying people. I was afraid of it. I don’t know whether it was that I could not confront my own mortality; or whether it was the fear of failure, thinking I would say the wrong thing; or what it was. I do know one thing: it was a stumbling. It was sin. I remember when I was serving as a deacon in another church that one night somebody called and told me that a man in my cluster was critically ill at Washington Adventist Hospital. Would I please visit? Well, I did everything I could to avoid visiting that man. I drove slowly. I took the long way to the hospital. I fantasized that there wouldn’t be any parking place when I got there, but the Lord saw to it there were plenty, for once. And when I dragged myself up to the desk and gave the name, and the computer couldn’t find it, I almost ran out of the place giddy with relief .. until the lady at the desk called out, “Oh, here it is, I found it.” Caught! I thought the visit was pretty bad, too, except that afterward my friend spoke with such conviction about what that visit had meant. And I vowed never again to let my shyness stand in the way of a blessing! God had used by stumbling steps anyway! And now, when I go to visit sick and hurting people, I come home elated and floating on air, because God has took my stumbling and turned it into a quantum leap. Though we stumble and sin, when we repent and dismiss our fears, God gives us a quantum leap forward.
One Sunday morning, I stood here and tried to be funny. It turned out to be a disaster. I was trying to show how we wanted you to tear up strips of cloth so that we could roll them into bandages for the White Cross project. The aim was to show you how to tear bandages; but I put a special spin on that. I said, “If you need a little motivation, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to take that piece of sheet, and I’m going to think ‘Deacon” ... rip! “Sunday School teacher” ... rip! “Trustee” .... rip! Everybody laughed and we all went home. End of story? Not at all. That afternoon one of you called and said, “Pastor, we had hoped you loved your deacons and teachers and trustees and other leaders. We didn’t know you had that kind of negative feeling.”
Oh, great God! What a horrible stumble! I could have lost everything from that insensitive joke! But out of it, God gave us a quantum leap forward. Relationships have been altogether different since then. Love has grown here since then. Do you see? Though we stumble and sin, when we repent and dismiss our fears, God gives us a quantum leap forward.
And I tell you, what He has done for me, He’ll do for you. What He’s done for others, He’ll do for you. “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. ... then the lame shall leap like a deer.” Stumbling into a quantum leap.
II
You see, we as a church have some things to repent of. We as a body of God’s people have stumbled at certain points. But where there is repentance, and where we are willing to dismiss our fears, there God wants to help us leap like a deer. God wants us to experience a quantum leap; God wants us to have great progress forward.
A number of years ago, before I got here, I am told that some were feeling confused and erratic. They didn’t have a real understanding of the scope and power of the Christian faith. Many people had only snatches and snippets. The church repented of its inactivity, and organized a new class, with a new approach to Sunday School. It became a quantum leap forward. Out of the Currie Intergenerational class, where it was expected that you would voice your doubts, argue your point, and just dare to be different .. out of that new approach came deacons and teachers, ministers and other leaders. The church stumbled into a quantum leap forward. And we’ve done much the same thing twice more in our Christian Basics classes. It may be stumbling, but it is stumbling into a quantum leap.
Only a couple of years ago, some of us were feeling a certain powerlessness in our lives. We knew the Scriptures, we were doing all the correct things, we were loyal church people. But something was missing. We didn’t quite know what it was. Somebody heard about a discipleship study called “Experiencing God.” We felt as though this might be right for us. And we tried to get it organized. Committees toyed with it, but nothing much happened. One day somebody went off to a leadership seminar, and one of the choices there was a workshop on “Experiencing God”. When just those few heard how the “Experiencing God” program had changed the workshop leader’s life, they came back ready to do whatever it would take to make that happen here. And it has been a spiritual revolution! We did not set out to plan a spiritual revolution; we stumbled on it. But when we repented of our inertia and let it happen, something like 100 of us have discovered that the lame can leap like a deer. “Experiencing God” has changed and will continue to change this church. We have stumbled into a quantum leap.
Not long ago, we awoke to the fact that our ministries for this community were far too few. Good as they were, they were not enough. And so we began to repent. We moved to create some new things: SHARE and after-school ministries and Exercise Classes and an enhanced youth ministry and a wider children’s ministry. We had stumbled seriously by ignoring those outside the loop. But we have begun to hear God’s voice, and we are changing all that. The children are coming; the youth group is growing; ministry is happening; opportunities for evangelism and outreach are showing up. We may not yet be leaping, but we are poised on the brink. Do not be afraid of what God will do out of our stumbling and our repentance. It will be wonderful. It will be a quantum leap!
About a year ago I stood up and advised you not to employ a new full-time staff minister. A year ago I told you we could not afford to do it. I argued forcefully that it was the wrong thing to do. But you voted against that position. Frankly, I thought I might be gone within the year, because I foresaw disaster. Oh, but God, but God. God is able to call us to repentance and to make us leap like a deer. This church’s fellowship, its spiritual appetites, its finances have blossomed in these past twelve months! What can I say but that God is good, He cares for His church, and despite the stumbles and the blunders of the undershepherd, the sheep have followed the good shepherd, and we are going to experience a quantum leap! We may have stumbled, but we are stumbling into a quantum leap forward!
I am not going to preach the usual stewardship sermons this year. I am not going to ask for money, I am not going to plead for loyalty or call for sacrifice. I am just going to proclaim the goodness of God. I’m just going to point to His blessings on this church, and let your heart take it from there. I am just going to repent of my own timidity and experience the quantum leap that God will give us. “Make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God’ ... then the lame shall leap like a deer.”
III
For, you see, today I remember that there was one who stumbled into a garden to pray. Great drops of blood came from his brow as He asked the father to keep His steps secure, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” Today I remember that there was one who stumbled into a garden to pray that you and I would be one, united in heart and mind, as He and the Father were one. And since that is exactly what I see happening, I know that we have stumbled into a quantum leap.
Today I remember that there was one who stumbled and staggered into the judgment hall, there to be accused and reviled, with shame and spitting. But before Pilate and the powers assembled, He proclaimed that the truth would set us free. And since I have found that in repenting of falsehood and turning to His truth, we stumble into a quantum leap, I will set my heart on His Kingdom and His Kingdom alone. I will let my stumbling steps become a quantum leap.
Today I remember that there was one who stumbled over the stone streets of the city, His back burdened by a cross, His heart burdened by your sin and mine. Today I remember that there was one they hung upon that cross, and “mine eye at times can see the very dying form of one who suffered there for me. So from my smitten heart with tears two wonders I confess: the wonders of His glorious love, and my unworthiness.”
We have stumbled. We have sinned. But if we repent and if we dismiss our fears, we may yet leap as a deer.
“My sin, not in part but the whole was nailed to the cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul” We have stumbled into a quantum leap.
My wife is right when she says my feet stumble because I do not watch where I am going. But I am haunted by the memory of my mother, who always walked with her head down, her eyes downcast, careful, cautious, perfect, no mistakes allowed. Nothing to repent of. And so no joy. No victory. No leaps. I think I’ll keep my eyes lifted up, lifted up to the Cross. I’ll take my chances on stumbling into a quantum leap.
