Adolph Allen Funeral
November 11, 2002
I met Adolph Allen a scant four weeks ago. The last four weeks of a ninety-three year life. Four weeks out of 4,836. In case some of you are not good with fractions that is 1 thousandths of Adolph Allen’s lifetime. In our first meeting he was very quick to get to the point at hand. After we had exchanged the obligatory introductions Adolph asked the question that many of us gathered here today wonder about. It is a question that has haunted many persons whom I have known in the condition and position of Adolph Allen for the last twenty-two years. Two minutes into our discussion, Adolph Allen asked the question, “Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then at the end of their life ask God to take them to heaven?” How would you answer that question?
When I was a young pastor I tried very hard to explain its fairness in relationship to a loving God. I tried ever so hard to explain that God’s ways are not our ways. As a young pastor, I worked diligently to explain that God’s mind is not our mind and that we cannot fathom the depths of God’s perspective on the question, “Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then in the final fleeting moments turn around and plead for mercy, and get it?” I used to try and do that. However, I found as a young pastor that 93 year old iron workers, while they may not know much about theology, they understand a lot about this world and a lot about life and a lot about what is fair and what is not. I have learned that 93 year old iron workers who are facing their last days on this earth and standing at the doorway of eternity have a earned a PHD in fairness. Those answers that I argued for the better part of twenty-two years don’t stand up under the scrutiny of ninety-three years of experience.
You’ve heard the question. Those of you who knew Adolph can hear it in your ears right now. The strong, resolute yet raspy voice, halting mid-question as he labors to draw another bit of oxygen from the tube, “Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then in the final fleeting moments turn around and plead for mercy, and get it?” Now you will hear the answer that Adolph Allen heard four weeks ago. An answer that I wished I had known and given to 83 year old Lester Marshall in 1982, 82 year old Herman Walden in 1986, 94 year old Otto Elkins in 1989 and 99 year old Rosa Baldwin in 1992. In 93 years one learns to get to the point and ask an honest point blank question. In twenty-two years of ministry I have learned to answer in the same point-blank honest. When asked, “Is it fair for someone to live their whole life one way and then in the final fleeting moments turn around and plead for mercy, and get it?” I answered, “No Adolph, it isn’t fair. But, Adolph luckily for you and me, God is not fair.” We know that from the scripture passage I have chosen for today’s message, Matthew 20: 1-16.
(Read) Matthew 20:1-16
Does anyone in here think that the owner of the vineyard was fair? Paying men who work an hour the same salary as men who work 11 hours! Some of those men worked hard, and some of those men hardly worked! But they all got paid the same. It’s not fair!
If total fairness is something you value highly, this morning sermon is going to shock you.
If Old Testament “Eye for an eye” justice is what you like, you’re not going to like this sermon this morning!
Wait a minute Jeff! How can you say that? God is fair with each and every one of us.
NO, He’s not fair! He’s not fair with me. He’s not fair with you! If Our God was a fair God, we’d all be bound for Hell right now! We all sin…every one of us! We put nice clothes on… We hide our evil thoughts behind innocent smiles… We do our sinning in the dark, hoping no one else will see it…We all sin!
As a pastor, I just wish folks would quit pretending that they’ve got it so together and are so good, and just fall on the mercy of God once and a while…but that’s another sermon!
We seem to have an instinctive notion that life should be fair. Job, in so many words, says that it is all unfair in chapter 30 verses 25-27. “Yet when I hoped for good, evil came; when I looked for light, then came darkness. Good things should happen to good people and bad things should happen to bad people. Renown psychologist Dr. Larry Crabb explains that wrong thinking in his book entitled, “Inside Out” he says, “We are designed for a better world than this. And until a better world comes along we will groan for what we do not have.” Another writer, Phillip Yancey writes, “We still expect a God of love and power to follow certain rules on earth, Why doesn’t he?”
If God is unfair, what are the possible answers? Why doesn’t God follow certain rules?
1.) “There is no God.” That was Job’s wife’s response. “Forget God, if bad things happen to good people he can’t exist.”
2.) God is loving and weak. Rabbi Harold Kushner writes from this perspective. But the complexity and immenseness of all we see around us proves that God is a REAL power and not weak at all. The famous atheist Elie Wiesel, who was thrown to atheism from his experience in a Nazi concentration camp says to Kushner, “Why doesn’t your weak God resign and let someone more competent take his place?”
3.) In the end, it all balances out. Hinduism teaches in it’s doctrine of karma that it may take up to 6.8 million incarnations to realize perfect justice. When that balanced karma is reached everyone receives just the right amount of pleasure and pain. There has to be a better answer than to wait around for 6.8 million incarnations.
4.) There really isn’t a problem here. Many or maybe most Christians are in this category or they at least traverse through this territory at one time or another. This form of thinking says things like, “God is trying to teach you something.” You may learn something, but that is not valid. Dr. Crabb writes, “this type of thinking tries to use faith as a means of not learning contentment regardless of circumstances, but rather to rearrange one’s circumstances to provide more comfort.” The worst of these statements I hear well meaning Christians utter often is “All things work together for good, you’ll see.” Ask Elie Wiezel, sometimes it doesn’t work out for the good. Bad things are bad things
I am not a proponent of all the things of Robert Schuller. But I think he has gotten at least one thing right and that one thing explains for me the answer for unfairness in our world. In his book entitled “Life Is Not Fair, But God is Good” Schuller writes, “Life is made up of everything that happens to us or hits us. And life is the business of living in a sinful world where evil, injustice and wickedness are very much alive! Place the blame where it belongs: on the FACTS of life. Not in the ACTS of God.”
5. Life is not fair, but God is good.
But folks, since I told you that I wanted to be candid, I will be. Every one of you here today ought to be thankful that God is Not Fair! That’s right you ought to be “way happy” that God is not fair. There are at least four things for which we should rejoice that we serve an unfair God.
First, God faithfully seeks to save us. Let me ask you this question, “Who went in search of whom? In the parable of the vineyard and workers in Matthew 20 we are told that God went looking for the laborers. Time and time again he went out and imploring others to join him in his work and mission. Candidly people: You did not find Jesus, he found you. You were lost, he came and got you in your “lostness” and he led you into “foundness.” He did and does all the work and we reap all the benefits. Do you know what the bible is a record of? It is a record of God reaching out to touch mankind, it is not a record of man trying to find God. From Abraham to Jesus, this is true. God came to Abraham, not Abraham to God. Jesus came into the world not the other way around. The people of planet earth did not decide they needed a Savior and called out to God. God knew we needed a Messiah, a perfect sacrifice and in due time, “God sent his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish.
Here’s another question, “Why do You Love God?” 1 John 4:19 says, “We love Him because he first loved us.” In 6.8 million incarnations (sarcasm folks) you would never, I repeat never decide to love God if he had not loved you first.
Second, Our unfair God deals with us individually. A fair God would treat everyone the same. God knows that different people respond to God at different times, in different circumstances, in different ways. I have a whole shelf full of hats at home that says on the tag, “One Size Fits All.” You might be able to get everyone on your head but one size does not fit all. A fair God would treat us all the same. An unfair God deals with each of us individually.
Third, an unfair God redeems all, hear that word…all? An unfair God redeems All who are willing. That is a big deal folks. Jeffrey Dahlmer reportedly gave his life to Jesus a few short weeks before he was murdered in prison. I am a fair person, I don’t like the sound of that. Fairness dictates that Jeffrey Dahlmer should languish in the fires of Hell for eternity. But. An unfair God redeems all who are willing. Instead of focusing on the unfairness of Jeffrey Dahlmer living next door to you in eternity, how about focusing on God’s timing. Remember I said that he accepted Jesus a few weeks before he died. That is incredible timing. And, if God is unfair enough to let Jeffrey Dahlmer in, he might just be unfair enough to let you…or me in too.
Finally, an unfair God always rewards those who serve him. Going back to Matthew chapter twenty again. The master hires some to work in the morning at noon at 3 in the afternoon and at five. Quitting time is 6 P.M. and the Master pays everyone the same wage. The ones who work all day cry, “UNFAIR” but the master says, “The wages are mine to pay, I pay as I choose, I pay as I have agreed with each person.” Man, am I glad I serve an unfair God.
Adolph Allen got the opportunity to serve an unfair God if only for four weeks. I also told him after he had given his life to the Lord that day that what he had just done was like driving at full speed toward the rim of the Grand Canyon and then with a few feet to the edge, slamming on the brakes and then coming to rest, tires over the edge, teetering back and forth, a quarter inch from destruction yet still safe. It would be wonderful everyone knew when to slam on the brakes and come to a stop just before they tipped over into destruction. I once had a T-shirt that read, “Most people who plan to serve the Lord in the eleventh hour die at 10:30. What is immensely unfair is that Adolph Allen never knew the peace, the joy and the sense of direction that Life with God has given me for the twenty-seven years since I gave him my life at the age of nineteen. But four weeks, one thousandth of his time here on earth is something to celebrate about.
Ask the LSU football team after their surprise come from behind win over Kentucky at Kentucky this past weekend. If you didn’t see it. Kentucky scored and with the final kick-off returned to the twenty-five yard line, with two seconds to go, two seconds. The LSU quarterback, Marcus Randall was told by LSU coach, Nick Saban, “Just throw it as far as you can.” The Kentucky coach had already been doused with a cooler of Gatorade, the Kentucky fans were already swarming the field when the ball was arched into the air, it was deflected once, twice, LSU wide receiver Devery Henderson juggled it twice and finally gained full control of the ball as he crossed the goal line. The announcer on TV went nuts, the Kentucky players grasped their heads and fell to their knees, the LSU team swarmed onto the field fell in a in a heap on Devery Henderson and today in Baton Rouge they are still celebrating. Incidentally, 2 seconds of a 3600 second game is one thousandth of the game. It is unfair that Kentucky was ahead for 999 thousandths, and LSU wins it in the last 1 thousandth of the game left. LSU rejoices, Kentucky agonizes. Well today it is Heaven that rejoices and Hell that agonizes, Satan let one slip away. With 1 thousandth of the contest remaining on the clock, the ball is thrown, it is tipped once by a chaplain at SW Indiana Hospice, tipped again by the pastor at American Baptist East, he juggles it once, twice and the ball comes safely to rest in the arms of Jesus. The crowd goes wild. 93 years, it just doesn’t seem fair but today they’re still rejoicing in Heaven. It doesn’t matter what the score board said for 93 years, it only mattered what it said last Saturday and last Saturday it read God one, Satan zero.
