This is the sermon I delivered after a week of violent protests in my home town of Stutterheim, South Africa
O God, sovereign over all, your overflow of life pours into everything and streams in fullness back to you. May I speak in Your Name a message of hope and peace. Amen.
God certainly does have a sense of humour. Just look at our readings today! It was as if He wrote them down exactly for us in Stutterheim and for exactly this time. When you listen to these readings you get an immediate sense of the weight of God’s Word and power; you get an idea of how involved in our lives He really is. It is as if the Job reading is saying, “ Who can count the clouds? I can, people of Stutterheim. I am your God and I can count the clouds of smoke billowing from your town. Why do you fear?”
Yes, God has a sense of humour, because he is God and knows all things that have been, that are and will be. Why else would we get a message like this today?
Job had lost everything. His children had died in a fire. All his worldly possessions had been taken from him. Job had even lost his health, with a disease all over his body causing him pain and despair. Job had lost his peace of mind. Before all of these disasters had come upon him, Job never questioned God, he simply served Him and did His will. God blessed him for it. Why did this have to happen, then? Why did Job have to suffer, if he was a good person?
Why do good people have to suffer today? Why does God allow Satan to do this to us? Reading Job causes us to question God.
What has happened to Stutterheim this week is very similar to what happened to Job. Buildings have burned to the ground, buildings that offered comfort to the people. Our youth seem to have got lost. They have abandoned the way of peace and hope for a road of violence and wreckage. Wealth and the pursuit of money and power has led our entire town and all of our people into destruction and conflict. The health of the people has been threatened with medicines burnt to ashes. And our town’s peace of mind is also gone. There is little joy on the streets and everyone seems ready to run in case the violence begins again. There is a tension in the air that wasn’t there before.
And we are questioning God. Why did this happen? How could He have let people suffer in such a way? Why did He allow so much destruction and so much recklessness? Why did so many good people who just wanted to carry on their normal lives have to be threatened and be made afraid? How could this have happened to Stutterheim?
And how have we responded to what has happened to us? What emotions have been coursing through our brains and what thoughts have taken hold of our hearts? Fear. Anger. Hatred. Unforgiveness. Aimed at whatever side of the conflict this week, should this be how we feel? How should a Christian react in the face of this week’s events?
If we believe St James in his letter to the Hebrews, then perhaps not. James says that Jesus is our High Priest, who has made sacrifice for our sins and prays on our behalf. Jesus is our High Priest who calls us to be more and more like Him everyday. That means that instead of fear we should have faith. Faith in the power of God’s creative power to see us through whatever the world throws at us. Faith in Jesus’ promise never to abandon us. Faith in the Holy Spirit’s ability to guide us to do the right thing, even when the world is pretty bad.
Compassion instead of anger. Instead of being angry for what we or our community has lost, we should consider the suffering of others and the pain they feel. People do not simply get angry for no reason. Nor do they calm down without compassion and understanding. I am not defending anyone, but a little bit of compassion will go a long way to building a lasting peace. Anger will not.
Love instead of hate. What has hate ever achieved? Is there anyone here who can name one good thing that hate has ever achieved? Hate does not rebuild. Hate does not renew. Hate does not strengthen or encourage, hate only ever destroys. That is why Jesus tells us to love. To be good to those who harm us and to pray for those who seek our harm. As Christians we have an urgent need to love unconditionally, now more than ever. The world and indeed our town, is not going to believe in Jesus because Christians hated the people who caused them or society harm. No, this town will only know the presence of Christ through the unconditional love of the Christians in it.
And forgiveness instead of unforgiveness. Wow. How do you forgive someone who threatened your safety? How do you forgive the person who said they would harm your children for going to school? How do you forgive someone when they try to stop you from going to work so that you can feed your family? How do you forgive someone who has made false promises for years and continues to lie to you? Well you can’t. Not on your own. You can only forgive people through Christ who has forgiven you. And forgiveness will set us free from all the fear and the anger and the hate that we might be feeling. Forgiveness is amazing because it is the life that comes from God, not us.
When James and John, the Sons of Thunder as Jesus called them, came to Him and asked Him for power and glory, what did He say to them? He told them that they were going to suffer pain and death. The baptism of Christ is pain. The cup of Christ is death. We will be persecuted and we will suffer on this earth. That is a given. But that’s okay, because the baptism of Christ is also resurrection and the cup of Christ is also eternal life.
The Christian life is filled with pain and disappointment. That’s life. It comes with the programme. But the Christian part means that we live in the hope of a better world. And while we are here we do God’s Will: we serve and we love. Service and love is what matters during these few short years of suffering that we have on this earth. We serve God and people just as we love both God and people. You cannot do one without the other. Loving God counts for absolutely nothing and is totally meaningless without loving people and truly loving people is impossible without loving God. We are called to love and serve God, even though He is mysterious and allows bad things to happen to us. We are also called to love people, even though they are difficult and do the most awful things.
Seeking wealth and power is what got Stutterheim into this mess, Jesus says: give up your money and your power and your position and your worries and just follow Me. Jesus teaches us to serve and so we serve. Jesus calls us to love and so we love. Jesus asks us to forgive and so we forgive.
Amen.
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