"Playing Second Fiddle"
Readings: John 1:29-42, 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10
Introduction
• What’s wrong with second place?
• First place is worth fighting for, isn’t it? Don’t we want our kids to be all they can be? To be the best, achieve the most, get the highest marks, get into the best schools, live in the best neighborhoods?
• What’s wrong with that after all?
• Now I remember watching my cousin run a cross country race.
• My family are Afrikaans, have you ever seen how excited Afrikaans parents get about their children’s sport
• When it comes to the finish line you see all shades of red and even purple in their faces
• Now none of that can compare to a story that I read when preparing for the sermon.
A man named Thomas Junta was a 44-year-old truck driver, who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in Massachusetts for killing his son’s hockey coach, Michael Costin by smashing his face on he ice of the hockey rink during a disagreement. The event was seen by many boys on the team, because the dispute was during a practice, not even an actual game. Charles McGrath, writing about the incident says, "In my experience both as a coach and as a spectator, hockey parents are even worse that Little League parents who seem meek by comparison." This author tells of a fight he witnessed rink-side as two hockey moms literally pummeled each other in a dispute about a game. (NY Times Mag. 1/20/02)
• So there! First place is worth fighting for, isn’t it?
• This incident is bizarre, and deaths involving irate parents at sporting events are rare. But parental anger isn’t.
• Parents want their kids to win.
• Got to be first. Got to be rich.
• I’m afraid our culture is way off course.
• This culture wants to grab hold of us and get us into this endless cycle of acquiring.
• Now Jesus came to make people rich. Isn’t that a wonderful thought?
• The Bible even says that. "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich (Gk. PLOUSIOS), yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty, you might become rich (2 Cor. 8:9)"
• But let me not be one of those prosperity preachers and clarify a little here.
• The Greek word means is "fullness." The root is "to flow." It can mean fullness of goods, but in this case here it means spiritual fullness. It means a flowing in of incredible spiritual riches
• It is more important to have a cup running over with the Spirit of the Lord than a coffee running over with gold.
• The person with the most things - the person with the most first place ribbons, the person who is first chair first, is not necessary life’s most successful person.
1. John the second fiddle
• I guess the greatest second fiddle of all time is John the Baptist.
• I’m going to tell you something about John that some might not know. John the Baptist had disciples. He had people who followed him just like the disciples we know so well followed Jesus.
• They were devoted to their master, John, but they faced a crisis. When Jesus came along, John, "Here’s the guy I was telling you about. Leave me and follow him."
• People don’t like change. Try changing something in the church and watch what happens. I heard about a minister who planted a church and was approached by another minister who said, "I envy you, no traditions, no prejudices to overcome, no people saying, "We never did it that way before." He laughed and said, "I’ve got news for you. It takes about one hour to make a tradition. If in the school building we’re renting I ask the people to change the way we set up chairs last week they fly into a tizzy. It’s human nature.
• Imagine you’ve left your home to follow this peculiar man John the Baptist. All your friends and family at first teased you. Then as they realized you were serious about this they made fun of you. When they saw you packing your bag they got frantic and begged you not to go. "Look at him! He doesn’t even dress right. He doesn’t wear a robe, he wears a shabby camel hair coat, he needs work on his teeth, when was the last time he shaved? So you’ve given up every shred of respectability to devote yourself to this guy, who one day points at a young man and says, "You know what I’ve been telling you all these years, how God was sending someone else whose shoes I am not worthy to shine? See that guy? That’s him. Follow him.
• Well, they didn’t bargain for this. They didn’t know this Jesus from a hole in the ground. And how could he be better than John anyway? But Jesus stands there that day watching. The men shuffle over to him, looking at their sandals. "What do you seek?" asks Jesus. ""Um," they reply, "we were just wondering where you live?"
• They left John and followed Jesus.
• John could well have ignored his calling to point to Jesus and had a great ministry. It’s great when people follow you and it could have gone to his head.
• But it didn’t, the moment Jesus arrived on the scene John pointed him out and took a back seat.
• We don’t even read about John’s death in John’s gospel, he just disappears.
2. Learning to point
• And that’s what we learn from John.
• We learn from John how to point.
• When someone goes hunting for grouse or pheasants, the best thing he can take with him is a dog. A dog trained to point. Pointers can smell and hear the game and they point towards it and the hunter knows where the bird is and can make the kill.
• We Christians are the pointer dogs of the world!
• Our job is to point the hunters to the prey - Jesus Christ. The hunters of course are the seekers of truth. The hunters are those on a quest for justice or peace. The hunters are sometimes broken sinners whose lives are being flushed down the toilet. The hunters are sometimes broken-hearted people. They all need God. John pointed people to them. So are we to.
• Arturo Toscanini, the great conductor of orchestras once said, "It isn’t so hard to find a virtuoso pianist or violinist i.e. second fiddle.
• There are always people who are seeking that place of honour. If you want great music, you have to find people who want to excel playing second violin. The other places make the orchestra."
• Second fiddle. The world needs great second fiddles.
• I wonder what would have happened if someone had told Thomas Junta that he would be giving his son something better if he had taught him the value of playing on the team, or doing his best, or learning to play his position the best he could. No one can say for sure, but Michael Costin might be alive today. I don’t know for sure. But I do know this, that there is something more important then being the best hockey player, or the best violinist, or the best business person or the best student or whatever.
• It is more important that God is alive in you.
• We are the people who put God first in our lives. We are struggling with letting go control of ourselves to give control to God. It is a hard thing to do, but If you think it is easy, you’re not trying.
• CS Lewis says it best. He doesn’t water it down. He tells it like it is - "fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement; he is a rebel who must lay down his arms."
3. Ways in which we can point
• How then do we point, its all very well that I tell you this but what do we do to point to Jesus.
• Remember that we should always play second fiddle to Jesus.
• That means that we should allow Jesus to guide the way we handle things and not ourselves.
• Jesus says that if we should follow him that we should deny ourselves.
• It means that when some one who we don’t like so much or that we know is incredibly different from us that we should still reach out to them…even if it makes us uncomfortable – deny yourself.
• It could not have been easy for the Thessalonians in the time when Paul started the church there.
• In the words of young people today, it was just not “cool” to be a Christian, the “cool” religion was that of Paganism…it was very possible to be ostracised.
• But we read in 1 Thessalonians 1 about Paul praised the Thessalonians for the fact that others had become Christian by the mere fact that they lead by example.
• They were able to deny the difficulty of being Christian and still point other to Jesus by their lifestyles.
• This is the hard part though, it is so much easier and more comfortable to be alright with our personal spirituality and not to worry that others also need Christ.
• As the Thessalonians imitated Paul’s behaviour so we should imitate John’s behaviour.
• Who is it that you know need Jesus and need you to set aside your dislike for them to point them to Jesus.
• I don’t know, that is for you to figure out.
Conclusion
• You and I stand in second place. We’ll never get higher. Because Jesus is in first place. Our job is to point to him. To be witnesses. (Acts 1:8)
• It’s okay to play second fiddle, when first chair first is Jesus Christ.
