October 4, 2020
Hope Lutheran Church
Sermon Series: “Faithful, Hopeful, Loving”
Psalm 91; Philippians 3:4b-14
Hopeful Generosity
Friends, may grace and peace be yours in abundance in the knowledge of God and Christ Jesus our Lord.
“Give us today our daily bread.” This petition of the Lord’s Prayer is laden with hope. We lift up our prayer to God already knowing that God gives daily bread to all people, even without our prayers. But praying for our daily bread helps us perceive and internalize God’s steady faithfulness. When we do receive our daily bread, we do so with thanks.
Our daily bread. War always seems to bring many orphans with it. World War II was no exception. Repeated bombing raids left thousands of children orphaned and displaced. They experienced traumas no child should endure. By the time they made their way to refugee camps, many of these children had suffered so deeply they couldn’t sleep at night.
Even though they now were sheltered and fed, the traumas had left a mark on them. It was hard for them to let go at night and fall into sleep. They feared that the next morning they’d be homeless again and without any food. Nothing seemed to reassure them that they were safe. Their deep trauma and fears would not allow them to sleep.
Finally, someone tried another tack. When they were tucked into bed, each orphan child was given a piece of bread. And holding that bread in their hands, at last they could sleep in peace. The bread assured them that tomorrow they would eat again. *
That bread was their hope. Tomorrow they would have a home. Tomorrow they would not go hungry. Tomorrow, someone would take care of them. The bread was hope.
Our fall stewardship emphasis is “Faithful, Hopeful, Loving.” Today we focus on the hope component, Hopeful Generosity.
Hope grounds us in promise. That promise opens up the future. Hope is future-oriented. It gives us a tomorrow budding with potential. And because we’re secure about tomorrow, we can live freely and abundantly today.
This morning we hear the words from Psalm 91. The psalmist addresses what it’s like to live in the shelter of the Most High. God will be there for us through all things. The psalmist can rest securely knowing that God is his refuge and fortress. He details all of the possible sources of threat: terror by night, arrows by day. Twice he mentions pestilence. That’s something we’re very familiar with these days with COVID-19! There are the enemies we can see and the very real dangers we cannot see.
In all of these situations, the psalmist takes comfort that God is his protector. He describes the image of a mother eagle spreading her powerful wings over her young. “He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge.”
With eagle cams today, we can capture the protective attention eagles give to their young. In our northern climate, they lay their eggs while there’s still deep snow. The eagles protect their eggs and their young by covering them with their bodies.
The Psalmist didn’t have eagle cams, but he was aware of the tremendous length eagles went to in caring for their young. That’s the image he uses to describe God’s sheltering love.
Hope isn’t mere wishful thinking. Hope is grounded in something very real and very secure. Because we believe in the assurance of this very certain presence, we can look forward in confidence.
What is our anchorage? There are many things we can rely on. Our first instinct is to look within our own resources. We admire the self-made individual. The rags to riches person, the person who has nothing but digs down deep and finds a strength from within, that’s the person we look up to! Self-reliance, personal strength, that’s what we admire!
In our reading today from Philippians, St. Paul tells a very similar story about himself. Paul had it made in spades! Religiously, he was a Hebrew among Hebrews. He lived a blameless life. He’d risen in the ranks of Pharisees. If anyone had scaled the peak of righteousness, it was Paul!
At one time, Paul had derived a great deal of confidence in all these things. It caused him to look down his nose at others. He’d become so zealous in his thinking and his personal rightness that he’d actually become something of a holy terrorist. He sought out and persecuted the new Christians. Paul was the religious police.
But you know his story. The one who sought out the Christians became pursued by Christ. The risen Lord Jesus came to Paul – not in rage and hatred, but in love and grace. Paul came to see a power beyond himself, a source of strength and love grounded in the divine.
In this experience, Paul came to a shocking new conclusion. All his self-reliance had been fruitless. He tells the Philippians, “I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”
This was Paul’s anchorage. It was grounded in a source outside of himself. He anchored himself in Christ.
Hope is about anchorage. I remember a sermon illustration my father once gave. When he was going through college, my dad worked at a garage during the summers. He’d have to go out for runs with the tow truck once in a while. He said that a tow truck is only capable of pulling its own weight. If something should weigh more than the truck, then it’s beyond the truck’s capacity of influence to pull it out.
However, if you apply a ground brace, suddenly that truck has way more power. Anchored to the ground, the winch on the truck can pull far more than the truck’s own weight. The scope of its strength has increased tremendously.
That’s what Paul and the psalmist both came to realize about their strength in God. Left to our own devices, our power is limited to our own finite strength. But when our anchorage is fixed in God, now we suddenly have a power far beyond our limits.
Within our own power there are many things we’re capable of. We might be able to get by for a time by our own mind and strength. BUT, there are too many times to count when we find ourselves up against obstacles way bigger than we are! These things sap our strength. They make us weak in the knees. They wake us up in the middle of the night as we fret over their magnitude:
• Quarrels with a spouse
• Conflict at work
• Concern over a child who is bullied at school
• Helplessness in the face of addiction
• Worry over mounting expenses
• Loneliness
• A disturbing medical diagnosis
• Global warming
Where, oh, where is the piece of bread that will help us sleep through the night? These problems we face are bigger than we are. What we need is anchorage in something greater than ourselves, a source of power greater than the scope of troubles!
“You who live in the shelter of the Most High,
who abide in the shadow of the Almighty,
will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress;
my God, in whom I trust.”
As we agonize and strive against these mighty foes, these forces greater than we are: very quietly, a feeling may come over us. In spite of the troubles gripping us, a quiet spirit of calm makes its presence known. It’s like there’s an invisible pair of hands underneath us. And we feel their support. Something greater than we are upholds us through the trials. And we know that we are upheld by the mighty hands of God. And no matter what happens, no matter how the series of life’s events will unroll, we know that through all things, God is with us. And if God is with us, then all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.
This is the hope that does not disappoint us. In that hope – because of that hope – we’re able to sleep through the night. And when we wake in the morning, we’re able to face the new day not with fear, not with dread, but with the confidence that God will make a way. That hope allows us to live in the abundance of God’s promise. No longer do we have to grasp and cling to yesterday’s crust of dried bread. For the fresh manna from heaven will come again today. There will be bread in plenty, God’s manna stretching across the plain, for all to share in. Friends, our hopeful generosity comes from on high. Live in that hope.
*From the book Sleeping with Bread: Holding what Gives You Life, by Dennis Linn, et al.
