Being a Witness

Sermon delivered at Chestnut St Presbyterian Church - Wilmington, NC

June 1, 2014

I wonder how many people here would be willing to witness for Christ. If I put out a sign-up sheet for people to make a commitment to spend 2 hours a month being a witness for Christ, going out and visiting people to witness to them about the faith we share would you sign up? Would you actually show up at the first meeting for orientation and training? How many would show up the first day we were scheduled to go out visiting? My guess is that only a very few members would actually sign up, and not everyone who signed up would show up. Presbyterians aren't really big on witnessing. The annoying Jehovah's witnesses and the evangelical protestants who are big on witnessing, especially those who ask if you are sure where you would go if you died tonight, these people have given the word and the idea of witnessing a bad name. It doesn't seem like the Presbyterian thing to do. 

 

The problem with the typical Presbyterian attitude is that Jesus clearly commands his followers to be his witnesses. You heard it in the Gospel lesson, Jesus met with the 11 and their companions and said to them “repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. ⁴⁸You are witnesses of these things.” In the book of Acts before Jesus was taken up into heaven he said to his disciples “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

When we joined the church we affirmed that we want to be disciples of Christ, so why are we unwilling to be witnesses?

I want to suggest that we may have a misunderstanding about what it actually means to be a witness. The image we have of witnessing for Christ is that we should go out and tell strangers what the scriptures say about Jesus, how he died for our sins and was raised on the third day, and if they believe in him they can be saved and go to heaven. This was pretty much what I once believed and I spent a year working part time for our Presbytery as a staff consultant in evangelism, working part time training people to do this kind of evangelism. I learned and taught others how to do this kind of evangelism. We trained people to use a marked up New Testament to explain God's plan of salvation and to urge the people we visited to pray the prayer of faith and be assured that they would go to heaven if they died today. People in our congregation did go and had many memorable adventures, but in truth the most successful and fulfilling visits never used the scripts that we had taught them and involved loving and authentic conversations.

I would not do this today, I think at this point in my life I had a total misunderstanding of what it means to be a witness.

The setting for the word witness comes from the courtroom. I would guess that there are at least a few people who are here this morning who have actually been called to be a witness in court but most of us have not had this experience, but we have some idea of what it is like from books or movies or television. There may even be a lawyer or two here who spent years in school learning about such things. When you are called as be a witness to testify in a criminal case or have been called to give testimony in a civil case, either in a court trial or by deposition the rules about being a witness are pretty much the same, the witness must promise or swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. A witness cannot testify to something he or she did not personally see or hear. A witness may have heard many stories and versions of what happened, but with a very few exceptions a witness cannot give testimony about what someone else has told him or her, only what the witness personally saw and experienced. 

 

So how can we be a witness to something that we have not personally seen. We cannot be a witness to Jesus being raised from the dead because we weren't there. We may have read about the empty tomb, but we didn't personally see or experience this.

We may have read about Jesus meeting with his disciples by the lakeside, when they ate fish with the resurrected Christ but we were not there, so we cannot witness to that meeting. What we can witness to is what happened in our life, about the times when we have met with Jesus. I can't tell you what exactly happened in that sea side meeting, but I can tell you about a Sunday morning when we were vacationing with friends at Seabrook, how we fought the mosquitoes to get to the beach and there just after the sun had risen we shared the fish that was left over from dinner, and finished the last of a nearly empty bottle of wine and remembered Jesus and each of experienced the certainty that the risen Jesus was with us in that place – in the fish and the in the wine and in fulfillment of his promise that where two or three are gathered in my name there will I be in the midst of them. I am a witness to that. 

 

I don't personally know what all happened on the Emmaus road and at the inn at the end of their walk; but I know that a few months ago we went to a gourmet dinner and were assigned to have dinner with the people who will be our neighbors when our house is completed. We had already drunk wine with the appetizers, and there was wine and bread on the table as well as beef ribs, and potatoes and vegetables and as every one sat down the hostess said let us pray and everyone joined hands and with simple words the food was blessed and my eyes were opened and I knew that more than neighbors had gathered at table but Jesus was there also. There have been those times – I admit not every time I have partaken of the Lord's supper, but there have been times when my eyes were opened and my heart burned within me and I knew without a doubt that the Lord was in that place, that Jesus was more than a character in a book, but he was alive and in our midst. It might be that some of you will have the same experience and can bear witness to others that you have experienced the a burning within your heart, that your eyes were opened to see that the risen Christ is a very present reality in the midst of our lives. 

 

I cannot be a witness to what happened on that third day morning when the women went to the cemetery and according to various reports found an empty tomb. One of the gospels says they saw an angel who told them that Jesus was raised and they were scared to death and were afraid to tell anyone what they had seen. Another said that the women saw the stone rolled away and an angel told them to go and tell the men that Jesus had risen from the dead. John tells the touching story about Mary who did not believe that he had risen, she thought someone had stolen his body away from the tomb until the man she thought to be the gardener called her by name, saying Mary, and her eyes were opened and she recognized that this was her dearest friend and teacher who was crucified, hung until he was dead and buried in a borrowed tomb, and here he was alive and talking to her. So we have four different stories about what happened that third day morning all sort-of the same, yet each one is different, and we cannot question the witnesses since they have died about 2000 years ago. We cannot be a witness to what happened on the first Easter morning because we were not there, we did not experience it for our selves.

I have never seen Jesus' empty tomb but I am a witness that at one very low point in my life I was buried in a grave of discouragement and depression. I can say for my self that I been buked and I've been scorned, I've been talked about sure as your born. I've had lies told about me and my family, lies so outrageous that people believed them because they couldn't imagine someone deliberately making them up. I've had friends who were silent when they could have spoken up for me. I've had days when I went to the office and sat down at my desk and just sat there almost catatonic with no energy to do anything. I didn't want to call anyone, I didn't want to answer the phone, I didn't want to go and visit anyone because I didn't know if I'd be welcomed or be sent away. I was down mentally, I was down spiritually, and eventually I was down physically to the point that I ended up in the emergency room with the flu and an asthma attack so severe I thought I was going to die.

Thee was almost no one except Kathleen who seemed to care about me, the presbytery committee that was supposed to help mediate the situation came to believe the lies that were being told. In the midst of all the discouragement there was one spot of hope and that was one member, Elaine Williamson, who recognized the depth of my depression and Elaine told me that she was making me a promise. She was going to pray for me twice every day, and she kept her promise. She would call me nearly every day and say I prayed for you today – or another time she would say I prayed for you this morning and I am getting ready to pray again – I just wanted you to know. Elaine's prayers and her faithfulness touched the depths of my soul. When last year one of the members of the MLK choir got up and sang somebody prayed for me, had me on their mind I broke down in tears because I am a witness to the truth of her song. I don't know if it is true or not that payer changes things, but I am a witness that prayer changes people who are prayed for, and I am a witness that prayer changes the people who pray. 

 

I am a witness to the power of resurrection because the Lord lifted me out of the muck and out of the miry clay and set my feet on solid rock. The Lord made a way when there seemed no way. The Lord opened a door of opportunity and led me to a Church whose commitments to inclusiveness matched my commitments to inclusiveness, whose passion for justice and meeting the needs of the poor and oppressed matched my own. The Lord lifted me up out of my depression and enabled me to walk through the door of opportunity, to interview and to persist and to secure a call to this position. I am a witness that the Lord is good and his mercies endure forever. I am witness to the power of resurrection and new life because it happened to me.

That is my testimony and my witness. What about you. Has there been a time in your life when your eyes have been opened and you experienced the presence and power of the living God. Some are called to be preachers and teachers, but we are all called to be witnesses to those we meet about what the Lord has done in our lives. Have you personally experienced the power of God in your life? Have you experienced the power of prayer. Have you ever been discouraged and down and found that the Lord has lifted you up. That is what you have to witness about. Have you ever been sick and experienced the healing power of God and the healing power of prayer. If you have experienced it in your own life than you can give testimony to what your eyes have seen, what your ears have heard, what your heart and soul have experienced.

Jesus said you shall be my witnesses in Judea, that is where you are now, but also in Samaria, in the land of your enemies, and even to the ends of the earth. Luke says that he said you shall receive power when that the Hold Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be my witnesses. Next Sunday is Pentecost when we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit. Can you witness to the power that comes from the Holy Spirit?

Scriptures for this sermon
Luke 24:44-53
⁴⁴Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you — that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.” ⁴⁵Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, ⁴⁶and he said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, ⁴⁷and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. ⁴⁸You are witnesses of these things. ⁴⁹And see, I am sending upon you what my Father promised; so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”
⁵⁰Then he led them out as far as Bethany, and, lifting up his hands, he blessed them. ⁵¹While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. ⁵²And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; ⁵³and they were continually in the temple blessing God.


Acts 1:1-11
¹In the first book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning ²until the day when he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. ³After his suffering he presented himself alive to them by many convincing proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. ⁴While staying with them, he ordered them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait there for the promise of the Father. “This,” he said, “is what you have heard from me; ⁵for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”
⁶So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” ⁷He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. ⁸But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” ⁹When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. ¹⁰While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. ¹¹They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

Here I Am; Send Me

Sermon delivered at Lake Waccamaw Presbyterian Church

June 22, 2014

(Scripture follows the sermon)

Our text this morning is a strange passage, Isaiah has this vision of seeing God in the temple high and lifted up – seated on a heavenly throne and the hem of his robes filled the temple and some kind of strange creatures were flying around him. Isaiah called the creatures Seraphs and said that they each had six wings two covered their eyes so they did not look directly at the purity of God, they flew with two wings and this translation it says that the last two covered their feet. Now in the Bible feet are often used as a euphemism for a person's private parts. When Ruth went to Boaz to seduce him as he slept on the threshing floor the book of Ruth says she uncovered his feet – well this was a discrete way of saying that she uncovered more than his feet. So these strange creatures were flying around covering their privates with one set of wings, covering their eyes with another set and using the third pair to fly with and all the time singing to one another, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.

Now lets be honest – what kind of reaction do you think you would get if you told your neighbor that you saw something like this? Most folks would want to know what you had been drinking, what kind of medication are you taking, what kind of drugs have you been smoking or shooting. Go and tell your doctor you saw something like that and the doctor would probably send you for a blood draw to see what is going on, what is off balance in your body, and for good measure he would probably give you a referral to a psychiatrist of psychologist.

We live in a society that no longer believes in dreams or visions. I am not saying that people do not have dreams and visions, in 45 years of ministry I have had many people confide in me and tell me about their dreams and visions, and even more often had people tell me about hearing voices that they were certain came from God. What I am saying is that the prevalent social attitude in our secular culture regards any spiritual experiences with skepticism at best, or at worst as signs of mental illness.

I am sure that the majority of his contemporaries who heard about Isaiah's vision did not think it either strange or sick. In their society people believed in dreams and visions. What Isaiah is describing is a vision, an inner spiritual event. If I had been with Isaiah when he saw these strange things I probably would have seen nothing out of the ordinary except that Isaiah might seemed to be asleep, or in some sort of a trance. God was getting something over to Isaiah, he was calling Isaiah to accept his vocation to be a prophet – to speak God's word to the people and to the king, to call the nation to repentance and to show them that the consequences of their rebellion against God would be the the destruction of the nation.

Our culture has changed, but God has not changed. When Peter preached on the day of Pentecost he quoted the prophet Joel who said that God will pour out his spirit on all flesh and young people shall have dreams and old people will have visions. God did not stop communicating with people after the New Testament was written, God continues to reveal God's self in a variety of ways, and one way is through dreams and visions. People today continue to have dreams and visions, and some of them come from God. The problem is that in our society most people don't pay attention to their dreams and those that do read books that supposedly tell them what their dreams mean without considering that God may be speaking to them through their dreams. And visions – well we don't talk about them because we are concerned about what people might think about us.

But Isaiah paid attention to his vision and He wasn't ashamed to write about what he saw. In the vision God was calling him to do the work of a prophet. But something was standing in the way of his responding to God's call. It seems very common for those who God calls to find all sorts of reasons not to respond to their call. Moses said who is going to pay attention to me. I am a murderer and I am hesitant of speech. I am no kind of leader of people – I'm better at leading sheep than people. Jeremiah told the Lord that he was too young to be a prophet.

Isaiah's problem was the problem of guilt. Standing in the presence of God, the almighty, the Holy the perfect one he was sure he was going to be stuck dead because no one could look at the face of God and live. He said “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

So God dealt with Isaiah's problem and sent one of the seraphs to touch Isaiah's lips with a red hot coal from the fire on the altar and the seraph said “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” Then the Lord spoke and said “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

There are many of us who are like Isaiah. We know that God has a job for us, God has work for us to do, but we are hesitant to answer God's call because we feel we are not up to the task, we feel unworthy, we feel sinful. I will never forget one man in my first Church, Archie Cross. Archie was an old man, must have been well into his 70's is not over 80. Archie started out coming to Church occasionally, then gradually he became one of the regulars. Now Archie knew everyone in the Church, his wife was one of the regular Church ushers, but when he came he always sat in the back pew. He wanted to stay as far away from the preacher and the choir as he could be and still be there. But he came every Sunday. He had never been a member of anyone's Church. Archie had never even been Baptized. Of course once he became a regular attender people begin to ask him when he was going to join the Church. I visited with him more than once and ask him why he didn't come down the aisle and join the Church. We opened the doors of the Church and had an altar call every Sunday, invited people to come forward and join the congregation. But Archie clung on to his back seat Sunday after Sunday. He told me, Terry I have been a very bad man. Well I didn't know what all he might have done, he was probably once a gambler, probably had been a womanizer. Might even have committed violence when he was younger, but Archie wasn't that way anymore. Annabell Riley told me that one of the times she was in the hospital Archie came to visit with her and before he left she said that Archie said the most moving prayer with her. But Archie said I have been a very bad man, and sat in his back pew. I knew there were dozens of people praying for Archie every time I gave an altar call, but Archie held on tight to that back seat in the Church. We kidded about wiring up that back seat so he got a shock when I opened the Church doors and would rise up and think it was the Holy Ghost pushing him down that aisle. But one Sunday the Holy Spirit did touch him somewhere in the depth of his being and he did walk down that aisle, he met with the session, told us he decided he better not wait too late, and the next Sunday I took him down into the Baptizing pool and he was baptized under the water.

Well so much about Isaiah and so much about Archie; the really important part of today's message is about you. Yes you in the front seat and those of you in the back seats and those in the middle. What is God calling you to do? What is the work that God is calling you to do? Is God calling you to teach Sunday school, is God calling you to sing in the choir. Is God calling you to visit the sick and shut in members of this congregation? Is God calling you to feed the hungry and help provide housing for the homeless? Is God calling you to be reconciled with that person who you have had a falling out with? Is there some member of your family you are not speaking to? Is God calling you to be reconciled with that person who has offended you, or with the one you have offended?

I am convinced that God is calling each one of us to do something. Perhaps you know what God wants you to do, but you are resisting saying yes to God's call. Is it guilt or a feeling of unworthiness that is keeping you from responding? Or do you not know what God's call to you is. Perhaps you need to pay attention to your dreams. Maybe that thing that you have been dreaming about is exactly what God wants you to be doing. Perhaps you need to pay attention to see a vision of what you could be doing for Jesus and for this Church. God speaks in dreams and visions, but God also speaks in a still small voice, a voice we need to listen carefully to hear and understand.

If you know what it is that God is calling you to do, let this be the day when you say yes to God. If you truly do not know what your calling is then let this be the day you begin to listen carefully and deeply to hear the voice of God. Let this be the day when you say I am yours Lord, I will follow you where ever you lead me. I'll do what you want me to do, I'll go where you want me to go. Our Hymn is Jesus calls us o'er the tumult of our lives' wild restless sea, day by day his sweet voice soundest, saying Christian, follow me.

Scripture text for the sermon

Isaiah 6:1-8

New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

6 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. 2 Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. 3 And one called to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.”

4 The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. 5 And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

6 Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. 7 The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” 8 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

BAGELS

Ingredients

for the dough

2 Tablespoons active dry yeast

1 ½ Cups lukewarm water

1 Tablespoon honey

4 Cups bread flour (You may need a little more or less to make a dough that is stiff and elastic)

2 teaspoons salt

1 egg yoke *

for the boiling

2 ½ quarts water in a large pot

1 Tablespoon honey

for the topping

1 egg white mixed with one Tablespoon of water

couple of Tablespoons of either (or all) sesame seeds, poppy seeds, coarse salt, minced onions, or caraway seeds (optional)

To make the dough

Combine the first three ingredients and let set for 5 or 10 minutes until yeast works

Add the salt and egg yoke

Mix and knead in the flour to make a dough that is stiff and elastic

(I use a stand mixer with a dough hook. Anyone who is a serious bread maker should have one. I recommend Kitchen Aid. I burned up a couple of other brands before Kathleen bought me the Kitchen Aid. My first lasted 20 to 25 years.)

Turn the dough out on a lightly floured surface a, knead it a few times by hand adding flour if necessary so it is not sticky. Shape into a ball, put it in an oiled bowl, turn once so the surface is coated lightly with oil. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 1 ½ hours.

(If you have a warming oven it probably has a proofing setting. I don't now so I turn the oven on the the lowest setting for only 3 minutes and turn off.)

To shape and boil the bagels (Time these steps carefully)

Combine the water and honey and bring to a gentle boil

Punch down the dough and knead a little on a lightly floured surface. Divide the dough into 8 balls. Cover these with plastic wrap and let them rise five minutes.

Turn the oven to 425 and preheat. One shelf in the middle of the oven and the other in the top third.

After the five minute rise flatten the balls a little, stick your thumbs through the middle and stretch to make a hole larger than you want the bagel to have. The hole will shrink as the bagels rise and bake.

Let the bagels rise for 12 minutes. You want them to look puffy but not so much so that they fall again when you put them in the water.

Using a wide spatula or skimmer gently drop the bagels into the simmering water. You will probably need to turn the fire up to keep the water boiling gently. After 30 seconds turn them over and boil the other side for 30 seconds. Let them dry on a smooth dishtowel for a few minutes and transfer them to two baking sheets sprinkled lightly with cornmeal. (or use a parchment paper covered baking sheet.)

Brush them with the egg white glaze and sprinkle them with the toppings of your choice.

Bake them 25 or 30 minutes until dark brown and crispy.

Notes

* In any recipe that calls for an egg white glaze I add the yoke to the bead dough.

This recipe is based on one in GREAT BREADS by Martha Rose Shulman but this is the way I make them.

If you are a fan of whole wheat you can use up to 2 ½ cups of whole wheat flour in place of an equal amount of white.

I usually make a half a recipe because there are only two of us in the house.