Takoma Park Baptist Church, Washington, DC January 12, 1986
It was the Mad Hatter, wasn't it, who in one version of “Alice in Wonderland” spent his energies darting around the scene, here and there, hither and thither, screaming at the top of his voice, "I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date." The fact that no one ever identified exactly what that date was or when it was was of no importance; the important thing, the significant thing was that the dear brother knew he was late, late, late, late for some very important if unknown date.
Being on time and knowing what you're on time for is a real art. I don't know how many meetings I've hurried off to, anxious and bothered because I suspected I was going to be late, only to arrive and find out I'm the first one there and that the others are not sure when they are coming or what they are going to do when they get there. And I feel very much like our friend the Mad Hatter, "I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date," if only I knew what it was and why it was so all-important. Being on time but at the same time knowing what you are doing and why it's important to be there is a real art.
And I’ve discovered, too, that we all have different kinds of clocks inside us. We all have our own definitions of what it is to be on time. And it depends on lots of things, including the occasion. If you are as Anglo-Saxon as I am then you think that if something starts at 9 o’clock, then you should be there at 8 forty-five and if you are there at 8 fifty-nine you are late. Now that's fine when it comes to Sunday morning worship since when we are late you know who has to give up a piece of his sermon. But when you are going to a party at somebody's house and you show up at 8 forty-five you are likely to catch her in her curlers and him trying to light the barbecue fire. Late is sometimes on time and early is sometimes late and on and on. As I say, being on time, getting your timing right, and knowing when to be there, that's a real art.
Now it strikes me that it is never more an art when it has to do with selecting a time to offer a witness for Christ. There is a sense of timing that goes with the work of being an evangelist. And the problem is that a good many of us are like the Mad Hatter, running about the scene, screeching at the top of our voices, “I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date.” We know we need to be about the task of witnessing, we have bought the idea in theory that somebody out there needs us, needs to hear what we have to say, and we know we haven't done much with It, so, when It comes to witnessing, "I’m late, I'm late,” but at the same time we have never learned how to get the timing right, we have delayed and delayed and delayed, we have hemmed and hawed so long that we've lost our way, we've forgotten how to read the signs of the times. And we're late, we're late, for a very important date. Except, what was it exactly? And how do I know when and how to offer my witness? Is it urgent at all? Is there a right time to do this? Do I need to be at it, soon, now, maybe, and how?
For some answers I commend to you this morning the prophecy of that prophet of the days of Israel in exile. We call him sometimes Second Isaiah or Deutero Isaiah – never mind the Biblical scholarship behind all that. Suffice it to say that this prophet, more than any other in the Old Testament writings, carries in his heart a sense of urgency about the task of God's people as witnesses. It is this prophet, this Second Isaiah, who calls God's people to be a light to the nations; it is this prophet who sees that God's people and God's anointed one, God's messiah, must become the suffering servants who in their own willing self-sacrifices do something for the world which the world cannot do for itself. It is this prophet who cries out to God's people, in effect, you are late, you are late, for a very important date, for a very important task. Now let's work on your timing!
I
First, the prophet would say to us, would ask us, when you look at what you have to offer, doesn't that create in you a sense of urgency, doesn't that make you eager to share the good news? The prophet is obsessed with the graciousness of our God, and he holds out before all these promises:
"Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat: Come, buy wine and milk without mo money and without price."
When you consider that what our God offers all humanity is exactly what we need, doesn't that create in you an eagerness to share it?
I have a friend who says that he has observed, mainly by following his wife around all over the landscape, that the principal form of recreation appreciated by all women everywhere is shopping. We fellows may pig out on football for six hours this afternoon, but if my friend's theory be correct, the ladies would rather be doing their own blocking and tackling in the bargain basement somewhere. Now you can attack that assumption if you like, but I suspect that most of us, whether men or women, do get pleasure out of shopping if we get a great bargain. If I can buy gasoline 2 cents a gallon cheaper across town than here in Takoma Park, then never mind that I drove 18 extra miles to get it; the point is I got a bargain. And the bigger point is that I have to tell you about it. I have to brag about it. I have to display my prowess at cost-cutting and then I'll say to you, you ought to get over there too. You ought to be buying from that merchant, you ought to take advantage of what I found, because it's good, it's a great deal, you can get what you need at a great price. I'm eager to share my wonderful discovery with others.
Well, listen to the bargain basement prices the prophet is finding and sharing, “Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come buy and eat! Come buy wine and milk without money and without price." If you had found a bargain like that, would you not be eager to share it with others. If you had discovered that you could get exactly what you needed, and that it came as a gift, wouldn't you like others to know?
Well, that is exactly what you have received. That is precisely what our God has done for us. He has slaked our thirst, he has fed our hungers, he has poured out upon us the gifts of his grace, and grace they are, without measure and without price. Then where is our eagerness? Where is our desire to share?
Can it be that we have lost sight of the wonder of his gift? Can it be that we have forgotten just how much we have needed all that his grace can supply? We have forgotten what this is really all about, and so here we are, Mad Hatters everyone, eager, after a fashion but unsure where we're headed with our eagerness. I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date. But when you consider what is being offered, that is so important, so substantial, this feeding of the heart's hungers, that we ought to be eager, most eager, to share it.
II
But there is a converse to this truth, there is another side, the back side, if you like. The prophet implores us to remember that when you look at how men and women waste themselves and their resources, then surely there must arise in you a sense of urgency to save them from all that. When you consider that the alternative to a life lived in God's will and in relationship to our God in Christ is a life wasting itself, winding itself down into the abyss, then how can there be anything but urgency? How can there be anything but a desire to share the Gospel and to share it now?
Hear the prophet of the exile again:
“Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy? Hearken diligently to me and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in fatness. Incline your ear, and come to me, hear, that your soul may live."
Why indeed does anyone spend his resources for that which does not finally satisfy? You and I would say that's idolatry, that's idolatry at its heart, a misplaced loyalty that puts all the emphasis on the wrong things, and they deceive, they snare, they trap us, and we are not finally satisfied. Now, do not tell me that you do not know of people whose lives are described to a T by our friend Isaiah? Do not tell me that you know of no one whose energies are being dissipated in all the wrong things. Do not argue that you cannot think of a single soul whose life is being spent, poured out like water, and there is nothing to show for the time and the energy and the money and the emotion expended. Do not tell me you know of no one who is investing in idolatry, because I know better. I am confident that every one of us has encountered the young person whose life is an endless series of street corner hangouts. I am confident that we know that mother who dotes on her kids, spoils them, gives them literally everything, hoping that she can gain some reason for being that way.
I am clear that every one of us knows exactly what it is to spend our money for that which is not bread and to labor for that which does not satisfy? Then where is our urgency? Where is the burning passion to say to someone, “Stop! Stop, right there, don't you see?” If we believe at all that in Christ Jesus there is an alternative to the world's ways, then what keeps us from pouring our energies into sharing the way and the truth and the life? What indeed, except that our own priorities have gotten mislaid, misplaced, and we are Mad Hatters, dashing about, doing church, and shouting to the four walls that screen out the world of need, "I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date; I just forget who and where and when and why, that’s all. I'm late.”
III
Now when I think about all this that I've raised, when I remember that there is something so wonderful and so fulfilling about the Gospel that I ought to be eager just to share the good news; and when I remember that the alternatives to life in Christ are so destructive and so unsatisfying that simple human compassion ought to drive me to a sense of urgency, when I recall both of those things, then I must know that there is another element in my failure to share the faith. There must be something else which holds me back. What would it be? What is it, exactly, that keeps us from being consistent, dynamic, forthright bearers of good news?
Lots of things, perhaps, but none so powerful as the notion what we are going to be embarrassed. Nothing holds us back and stifles our courage; so much as the idea that someone will reject us or call us derisive names, or maybe it is that we fear to fail. Maybe at the heart of it we bustle about with our sense of being late, late, for something or other but we're not able to focus on what it is, because we are afraid to fail. Have you ever thought of it that way? We are just plain scared that when it, comes down to the wire, someone will laugh in our faces, and that we cannot take. And so the only way to keep from failing is never to venture forth; now we keep on planning to venture out, but we never really do it. We keep on training and planning and attending the pep rallies, but we never get in the game.
Suppose this afternoon the Patriots decide that they are mighty afraid that these rugged Dolphins are going to do them in, so they get ready for the game in a strange way. They attend the strategy sessions, they memorize the playbook, they whoop it up at the pep rallies, they put on their uniforms – but at kickoff time they are scurrying around the locker room, looking mighty busy and terribly dedicated, but they never get out on the gridiron and play the game. Because, you discover, they are afraid to lose. You don’t win but you don’t lose either, or do you? Ever hear of forfeiting the game?
I hear the Apostle Paul reminding us that what we think of as failure doesn’t matter so very much in the long run. I hear Paul in his admonitions to the church at Corinth reminding us that if we seem to fail in a cause that is of God, it may well be that we have not failed at all. Hear him: We show that we are God's servants by patiently enduring troubles, hardships, and difficulties; we have been beaten, jailed, and mobbed; we are both honored and disgraced; we are insulted and yet we are praised; we are treated as liars, yet we speak the truth, we are treated as though we were dead, but we live on. Punished, we are not killed, saddened, we are always glad; poor, we make many rich; having nothing, yet possessing everything.
Oh, my friends, how can I say this so that we will all hear it and be changed by it? If God in Christ did not fear to go to the cross for us, how can we be stopped by our fear of any impediment? If the Apostle did not fear this catalog of beatings and imprisonments and insults and slanders so that he could carry the Gospel across land and sea, how dare we fear the rejection of a next-door neighbor? If godly men and women in years past could risk their fortunes, their reputations, their energies to put on this corner a house of worship where the Gospel might be heard, who are we to fill it with nothing more than our foolish cries, "I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date"? Late we are indeed, late in getting the message of salvation to someone who needs it.
Are we too late? I pray God we are not. For I hear again the voice of God's prophet, "Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.” I pray God we are not too late, for I hear Paul's sense of timing, his exquisite sense of urgency, “This is the hour to receive God's favor, today is the day to be saved.” And today, I submit, is the day to share it.
