Jeffrey T. Howard
Sermon Lamentations 1:1-6, 3:19-26
Eagle Rock Presbyterian Church
Churches throughout the world today are gathering together for World Communion Sunday. Already churches in
Lord Jesus, we approach your throne of grace united by you across ethic, language and cultural barriers. We are grateful for the unity you provide for us. Bless our relationships across the barriers that usually divide us. And be with us as we come together around your table today. Amen.
587BC was a bad year for
The Babylonian army returned to
How could this happen? God had promised David that his descendents would sit on his throne in
In the midst of all this Jeremiah was having a really bad day. Listen again to his words, “The thought of my affliction and my homelessness is wormwood and gall!” His mind was racing though all that he had been through. He was focused on his own problems which were many and he was fighting despair. Then he said, “My soul continually thinks of it and is bowed down within me.” Jeremiah tale is relentless. His life had turned upside down.
I remember one evening when a good friend of mine called because his life had turned upside down. He had been preparing to ask his long time girlfriend to marry him, but instead she came over to break up. She had found someone new. My friend was devastated and heartbroken. His life was upside down. He desperately needed a friend to talk to. We talked for hours.
I remember another time when a woman at my church, a close friend, called. Her mother had collapsed in the bathroom that morning and was rushed to the hospital. She had just heard the bad news; her mother had a brain tumor and just a few weeks to live. She needed a friend to come to the hospital to be with her because her life had turned upside down. She needed someone to sit with her in waiting room silently as the hours passed.
Have you ever experienced your life being upside down? Most of us have at one time or another. But even if it has never happened to you or your family it happens every day in places like
At times like these we have to wonder what happens to our prayers. Do prayers actually reach God? Last year a fisherman found 300 letters to God floating in the ocean. These letters had been written by church members and mailed to the pastor to be placed on the communion table and prayed over, not unlike the prayer cards in your bulletin today. Some of the letters went back to 1973. It has been suggested that someone was cleaning the pastor’s former home and decided to give the letters a final tribute by sending them off to sea.[1] Some of the letters were prayers in the form of “Hey God, let me win the lottery”. But most were from people like you and me whose lives had turned upside down.
Are our prayers simply cast on the waters like this? This is the biggest fear of Christians, that our prayers never find their way to God. But listen to Jeremiah’s great reversal, “but this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” In the middle of Jeremiah’s life turning upside down he began singing “Great is Thy Faithfulness”. He did this because his mind was turned from his own upside down life to the faithfulness and love of God who hears every prayer.
Jeremiah knew that there was no reason to send letters to the pastor because God already knows the prayers that are written on our hearts. God’s love was not dependant on things getting better and better. God’s love did not depend on our hard work or our success. Jeremiah knew that the Hebrews would never be cutoff from God’s love because God’s love only depends on God’s faithfulness which never ends.
We can’t earn this love. There is nothing we ever do to deserve it. Jeremiah tells it just shows up every day. Who of us by our hard work made the sun rise this morning? How much did you pay for the air in your lungs? Who of us deserves the love we receive from the person closest to us? None of us do. Jeremiah tells us that we receive God’s love by God’s mercy, a free gift of God’s grace.
For many of us we are so busy each day we never notice what God has freely given. Here in Eagle Rock we live with warm temperatures, a blue sky, and flowers blooming year round. Do any of us ever stop to thank God for all that He has done each and every day? We are so busy trying to make our own lives that we don’t even realize the wonderful life that God has given us.
So when our lives turn upside down what should we do? Jeremiah says to wait patiently. Just wait in silence waiting for God to act. It is only while waiting in silence that our souls go looking for God. Waiting is after all the only thing you can do when your life turns upside down. But in the silence God reminds you of your hopes and dreams and the blessings you have received throughout your life.
The Hebrews in exile were richly blessed by God. After a Sabbath rest of 70 years they were permitted to return and rebuild their city and God’s temple. The one blessing God withheld from them was having their own king. But they were filled with the hope of the faithfulness of God. So they longed for the day when God would fulfill his promise and restore David’s kingdom. They waited and hoped for 400 years for a descendant of David to return as the messiah. God is faithful. Around 4BC a descendant of David was born, not as the king of an earthly kingdom, but as the king of the heavenly
We experience God faithfulness every time we gather around this table. God never cuts us off. Rather we are invited to come to taste and see the mercies that never end. Great is God’s faithfulness.
Thomas Obediah Chisholm was born in a log cabin in 1866. He experienced a conversion in his 30’s which led him to become a Methodist pastor. But shortly after becoming a pastor his health began fail. This forced him to leave the pastorate and led to a difficult life of poor health. His life was turned upside down. At age 75 looking back over his long life he saw not the numerous health problems that had plagued him, but the blessings that he had received from God each day. To celebrate his blessed life Chisholm wrote a poem. Here it what he said:
Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father;
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.
Refrain
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!
Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.
Refrain
Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!
Refrain
Father in heaven we thank you for your great faithfulness which you renew in us each day. Amen.
Nicene Creed, pg 15 – Ecumenical version
"We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
"We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary
and became truly human.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son,
who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified,
who has spoken through the prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen."
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