No Longer Strangers, Part 3: God's Powerful Love

Ephesians 3:14-21

I have an app on my phone called Ceaseless. Every morning at 8:00 it pings me and asks me if I would like to pray. Sometimes I say, “later.” And that is okay, because it is always there for me.

It gives me focus for my prayers. Each day this app randomly pulls three people in my contact files and suggests I pray for them. I never know whose name will pop up.

So it happens, sometimes, that it is the name of a person I am angry with. Or it may be the name of someone I am deeply concerned about or anxious for. It could be someone I haven’t thought about in ages, someone I’ve lost touch with and I have no idea what is going on in their lives.

And Ceaseless asks me to pray for them. Sometimes, though, I don’t know how to pray for them.

If it is someone I am angry with, how can I pray for them? Maybe I should be praying for myself, that my heart would be more forgiving and the anger would go away – but how should I pray for them?

If it is someone I have lost touch with, I look at their name and I wonder what in the world is going on with them. Where they are, what their life is like, if they are even still living. I have no idea what they need, and I wonder, how should I pray for them?

But I think sometimes the hardest of all are the ones where I do know what’s going on in their lives. Sometimes I know the challenges they are facing and I am sure I know the many ways they make their challenges even more difficult. And I think to myself, if only they would do more of this or less of that! And a part of me would like to pray, God, make them do more of this and less of that. So when their names pop up on the screen, I wonder, how should I pray for them?

Have you ever thought that you just don’t know how to pray? Annie Lamott said the most common prayer in the world is “please, please, please,” or “help, help, help!” And the second most common is “thank you, thank you, thank you.” But I think it’s a distant second, because we are just more likely to turn to prayer when we feel the need for something.

Perhaps you have had the occasional night of little sleep, when something is weighing heavily on you and as you toss and turn you make your fitful prayers to God. Little cries to a supreme being who, you feel, may or may not be listening. And they might sound like,

“Make it stop!”

“Save him!”

“Make this pain go away!”

“Keep her safe!”

Whatever is keeping you awake, whatever is giving you great anxiety, this is your focus and your sole desire is to fix it. Asking God to fix it. Our cries of desperation, these are the rawest form of the “Please, please, please” prayers.

And then, if God does make it stop, save him, make the pain go away, you might return to God with a deep sigh of “Thank you.”

But if not … If not –

What happens to our prayers when we don’t receive the answers we wanted? What happens to our faith when we are disappointed?

When the addict keeps on using. When the pain does not cease. When the problem doesn’t get fixed. Then we might wonder if prayer is worthwhile – just a tiny drop in the ocean. Or, if we still hold on to hope, we might wonder: If not like this, then, how should we pray?

I remember a man who had prayed ceaselessly for his grandson who was an alcoholic. It seemed like nothing could stop this poor soul on his path toward self-destruction. The grandfather said, “I don’t know how to pray for him anymore. All I do now is say his name and offer it to God.

Scripture gives us a lot of examples to help us with our prayers. The first thing I believe we can learn from them is that all kinds of prayers are good prayers. To pray what is in your heart is not wrong. There have been times I have tried to second-guess my feelings and muster up what might be a proper, respectable prayer. But I am not fooling God. I am only hiding from myself.

Opening our hearts to God is the beginning of prayer.

But here in this portion of the letter to Ephesians, we find an astonishing example of prayer that both strengthens our hope and gives us something to aspire to. This prayer for the church is that they might begin to comprehend God’s powerful love.

“I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Consider this.

He does not pray that the Ephesians will be healthy. He does not pray that they will be wealthy or successful. He does not pray that they will live their best life now, as we might have heard some preachers say. He does not pray that they will triumph over enemies, whether they be people, corporations, nations, or diseases. He simply prays that they will know fully, deeply, completely, the power of God’s love through Christ.

And to know the breadth and length and height and depth of this love is not to take its linear measure. It is not to know its precise dimensions. To know its measure is to know that, for us, it is immeasurable.

His prayer for us, God’s beloved, is to know God’s power is love and that love is immensely powerful – so powerful that it is beyond anything we can ask or imagine.

Beyond anything we can ask or imagine.

It would not be a bad thing for us to think of these words when we pray – for ourselves or for others. When I try to pray for someone I am harboring a grudge against, I might recall that the power of God’s love can accomplish far more than I can ask or even imagine. And when I am trying to pray for someone I want to fix, because I can see several ways they might live their life better than they currently are, I might recall that the power of God’s love can accomplish far more than I can ask or even imagine.

When I am losing hope for someone, I might recall that the power of God’s love can accomplish far more than I can ask or even imagine.

When I don’t know how to pray, I might recall that the power of God’s love can accomplish far more than I can ask or even imagine. And this may strengthen my hope: To know the answers are not in my hands; they are in the power of God’s love. God seeks to put his power within us, rooting and grounding us in love.

Imagine, if you will, how much we could do with the power of God’s love.

This, my brothers and sisters, is the beginning of living the life we have been called to. God has drawn us together under the banner of God’s love.

The letter to the Ephesians will go on to speak more in detail about how we might live in the likeness of Christ. There are parts of this letter that might irritate us, parts that might puzzle us; but, while the details might change over time, the fundamentals remain the same: God’s power is love and God is still seeking to fill us with this love.

Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

No Longer Strangers, Part 2: Aliens Brought Near

Ephesians 2:11-22      

In 1871 two archeologists found a piece of engraved stone from the Jerusalem temple with Greek writing on it. It held a stern warning: “No foreigner is to enter the barriers surrounding the sanctuary. He who is caught will have himself to blame for his death which will follow.”

This was one rule they were, evidently, pretty strict about. No gentiles were permitted to enter the temple. But it was not the only rule. There were degrees of acceptability in the temple worship of the time.

The outermost area of the temple was called the court of the gentiles, and it was a large, open, public area. Anyone could come into the outer court. But within this courtyard there was a barrier, called a soreg, which surrounded a wall defining the perimeter of the outer court of the temple. The outer court was also called the court of the women, because this was as far as Jewish women were allowed to enter. Further within, there was an inner court, the place where the burned sacrifices were made. Jewish men were permitted to enter the inner court, as long as they didn’t have certain conditions that would make them disqualified. And finally, the innermost region, called the Holy of Holies, where only the purest ones could enter.

When you read the Old Testament you notice that there were many types of people who were restricted from participating in temple worship. Foreigners, or those of mixed race; women; eunuchs; anyone with a skin disease; these were all barred from entering. But additionally, Jewish men who were deformed in some way were prevented from entering the inner region. The scriptures speak of the blind and the lame, dwarves, and hunchbacks, all excluded. Anyone judged to have abnormalities or imperfections, excluded. There were many ways a person could be shut out.

We talked a bit last week about insiders and outsiders, and the ways we tend to separate the world into these two categories. The human mind likes order, and if we can’t find it in the world around us, we will create it and impose it. We divide people up into categories, and then judge those categories. So, in the end, there are those who are like us and others. These others might be frightening to us. They might just be perplexing to us. Or they might somehow seem wrong to us.

In the first century, as the church was yet small but growing fast, who should belong was still an open question. But it was becoming increasingly clear that many different, diverse peoples were going to belong. Among those who gathered to worship, there were differences in race and culture, which would not easily be erased yet must be overcome. No longer, in the church, would there be the circumcised and the uncircumcised, but there would be one body in Jesus Christ.

These issues are raised in many of the New Testament epistles, seeming to indicate that this was a common problem at the time. The Spirit of God was crossing over boundaries and drawing diverse groups together in Christ – but those people were, maybe, a little averse to being drawn together. They were too preoccupied with their differences, and the ways those differences made them uncomfortable with one another. And in their own ways, they were prone to judging those who were different.

There were the poor Christians, some of them even slaves, and the wealthy Christians. They had dramatically different lifestyles, obviously. And the wealthy ones were sometimes unable to comprehend the unique challenges of the poor ones.

We have to admit that we are still beset by these kinds of problems. It is hard for us to understand people who are different from us. For those who abide strictly by the law, it is hard to understand the law-breakers. For those who are free of addiction, it can be hard to understand those who suffer under the weight of addiction. For those who have enough, or more than enough, it can be hard to understand those who don’t have enough and, to our minds, do a poor job of managing what little they have.

Put simply, it can be very hard for us to understand those whose path through life has been different from ours. In some cases, we admire them; in others, we disapprove of them. sometimes we are simply appalled by them.

Philip Yancey, in his book called What’s So Amazing About Grace, relays a story a friend once shared with him. A young woman came to his friend in desperate straits. A miserable sinner without a shred of dignity left, she was an addict, homeless, a mother of a two-year-old girl. She had no money and no food. She unloaded on this man a torrent of words, confessing to him all the horrible things she had done, all the horrible things that had been done to her. He listened, then he asked if she had considered going to a church for help. She looked at him with shock, and said, “Why would I do that? I feel terrible enough about myself already. They would just make me feel worse.”

To be truthful, I am afraid if I had been sitting across from the woman Yancey wrote about and listened to all the things she confessed, the thought would have entered my mind, “How could anybody do that?” And it is possible I would have judged her, condemned her, proving to her that yes, the church is there to make you feel bad about yourself, just in case you don’t feel bad enough already.

Any time we start a sentence with the words, “Why would anybody …” it is a chance to stop. Pause. Think about what it is we don’t understand. And then perhaps rephrase the question: “What kinds of circumstances might cause me to do such a thing?”

The reason Yancey told this story is because he couldn’t help but see the contrast between this young woman’s relationship with the church and Jesus’ relationship with sinners. Particularly, the stories about some of the women who came to him, miserable sinners without a shred of dignity. They were accustomed to being scorned by the religious establishment, but they looked at Jesus and saw someone they could turn to. They saw someone who would have compassion for them. Even though, as Paul wrote, he himself was sinless, Jesus put no barriers between himself and all the sinners of the world.

When we think about what the church is for, it is worth noting that it is sometimes called a hospital for sinners. No one, no matter how deep their transgressions, should be turned away from the church in their time of need. No one, no matter how appalling their sins, should ever be turned away from the church because of them. Remembering that we, too, are sinners and have found sanctuary in the church, where Christ heals us of the sickness of our souls. How could we not extend that same grace to others?

The radical thing that Jesus Christ did in his life was to draw the sinners and the outcasts to him. He healed those who had been cast out of society, giving them a chance to become reconciled with society, an opportunity to be restored to wholeness.

The letter to Ephesians speaks to the gentiles, saying you who were once far off, or aliens, have been brought near, by the blood of Jesus Christ. You who were once excluded: the gentiles, the women, the blind and lame and deformed, the sick, the imperfect. Now the walls and barriers have been removed, the gates are open. In Christ, all have been brought together.

For in him we find our peace. There becomes a whole new way to find and articulate our identity – and a whole new way to frame our outlook on the world.

You see, where we once looked at the world as a framework of lines dividing peoples into groups, separating them from others, we found our identity by focusing on the lines and what they represented: differences in acceptability, differences in belongingness. The lines represented the ways we differed, and we defended the boundary lines because they defined who we were against who we were not.

But in Christ everything changes. And we no longer look to the boundary lines, but we look to the center, which is Christ. The holy of holies. He is our center, our purpose, what we are drawn to, where we find our peace. He is our peace.

And so in Christ the circumcised and the uncircumcised came together. The slave and the free, the Jew and the gentile, the north and the south and the east and the west, all came together to find their peace in him. Turning our attention away from the lines that separate us and toward the center which now defines us.

May it be so.

Photo: A copy of the soreg inscription at the Museum of Roman Civilization in Rome. Translation is "No stranger is to enter within the balustrade round the temple and enclosure. Whoever is caught will be responsible to himself for his death, which will ensue."

No Longer Strangers, Part 1: The Family

Ephesians 1:3-14

This week we begin a new series focusing on Christian community. Using the letter to Ephesians to explore this basic question: how to live as a community of faith in the best ways we can.

The church has changed an awful lot over the past 2000 years, but something that has not really changed is the struggle we have to be an authentic Christian community. Ever since the beginning, this has been a hard task for the church, because it is a fight against our tribal instincts. Human beings have always had a tendency to cluster into groups of people who are “like us.” In whatever ways are important to us, whatever values are foremost in our minds, these are the markers we look for in creating community.

And this is precisely what the church of Jesus Christ is working to overcome. The very radical thing that the church does is to cross over tribal and familial boundaries and create new community.

God, through Christ, is making a new family, adopting us as God’s own, kid brothers and sisters to Jesus Christ. Crossing over family lines – blood lines – and grafting us onto the family tree. All of us, and many more. The image of family is a strong one for the church. It is an image we use frequently. The joys and trials of family are things we think about a lot.

Because it’s a topic that most everyone has an interest in, there are many good movies about family. I watched one this past week, called The Family Stone. It came out about 10-15 years ago. It’s Christmas and all the adult children of the Stone family are coming home. And – spoiler alert – there will be tension.

Have you noticed that in most families every member plays a specific role? This is true in the Stone family, where they all have unspoken labels. The eldest son Everett is the successful child. He wants to make his parents proud. Susannah is the nurturing one, who spends most of the film in the background quietly caring for her young daughter. Ben is the free-spirit who marches to the beat of his own drummer, and the first to be blamed if something goes wrong. Thad is deaf and gay, the one they all rally around to support and protect. And Amy is the spoiled baby of the family.

This Christmas Everett is bringing home Meredith, the woman he plans to marry. Things don’t go well. Amy hates her. The rest of the family tries to be polite, but they look at Meredith like she dropped in from the planet Mars. She doesn’t seem to fit in well. The more nervous she gets, the more she puts her foot in her mouth, offending them.

Ben, however, takes an interest in Meredith – maybe he has sympathy because he knows what it’s like being the square peg in the house. Unexpectedly, they seem to be kindred spirits.

Pretty soon, a couple of other oddball characters get added to the mix. There is Brad, who has had an awkward crush on Amy since high school. And Meredith’s sister, Julie, who – unlike Meredith – does fit in quite well. Which creates an even bigger wedge between Meredith and the family. When Julie shows up, it’s like waiting for a car crash to happen.

The film is funny and sweet and sad and familiar, because we all know how challenging family can be. Family involves a lot of relationships that were not entered into by choice. And, in general, we are stuck with them no matter how difficult they are. And we all know they can be really, really difficult.

The thing we see happening with Meredith in the film is an example of how hard it can be to join a family. It’s like everyone has their place, their role, and there isn’t always room for someone new. They were all dismayed by Meredith, in one way or another, because they couldn’t figure out where she fit in. Even more of a problem, they didn’t need Meredith. They felt complete as they were, without her.

Family can be very hard. Just when you might think you’ve got it all sorted out, one little thing shifts, and everything is out of whack. It’s not easy being in relationship with a bunch of people you didn’t necessarily choose to be in relationship with. Which brings us to the church.

The letter to the Ephesians speaks of the church as family, as we are all, each one of us, adopted into the family of God through Jesus Christ. And this letter is deeply concerned about the matter of insiders and outsiders, and how the various members are treated. Because not everyone was treated well. The circle of membership wasn’t always open and inviting.

The message we hear in these words from Ephesians is that God’s divine plan involves gathering up all of God’s children into one family. Christ is the firstborn, our elder brother. The Jews who followed him were gathered in first, but the family did not end there. The gentiles from all the nations were gathered up into the family as well, to make up the body of Christ, the church, with Christ as our head. It is by God’s grace and for God’s purpose that we are gathered together, to be heirs to the promises God made so long ago.

The Jews, Christ’s brothers and sisters, needed to know that the family, the promises of God did not end with them. And the Ephesians and all the other churches of Asia needed to know that the family did not end with them. And we, of course, need to know that it does not end with us. God is still at work, gathering, reconciling, healing the world.

God has made us one family, in Christ, not to set ourselves against the world, but to welcome all the world into the fold. We are family. Not because we chose each other, but because God chose us. We are family. Not because we like each other but because God loves us. We are family. Not because we have so much in common but just because we all, each one of us, bear the mark of adoption.

You and I and all of us are beneficiaries of the love and grace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. It’s a done deal. And because of that, other labels no longer have meaning. As Paul wrote to the Galatians, there is no longer Jew or Greek, male or female, slave or free, for we are all one in Christ Jesus.

It’s like in the Stone family. Like most Christmas movies, everything resolves toward love in the end. Accepting one another, forgiving one another, and loving one another. And in the end they are all, every one of them, members of one big family.

By the end there is no longer uptight-and-awkward-Meredith and goofy-boy-down-the-street-Brad and I’m-only-here-because-my-sister-asked-me-to-come-Julie. There is no longer black-sheep-Ben and gay-Thad and spoiled-baby-Amy. There is one family where all are loved. The members are held together, in spite of their differences, by the love and grace of God.

There is so much more we can say about this matter of being in community with one another. But it begins with God. God chose us and loves us into community. We have been called, forgiven, and anointed as God’s own for God’s purposes.

We are here because God marked us as God’s own, as members of God’s family. And no matter how much things change, that will be the same.

Occupy

2 Samuel 5:1-5,9-10

2 Corinthians 12:2-10         

The beauty of following a story through a series of Sundays is being able to see how characters develop. You think back to just a few weeks ago when we were reading about the boy who ran around with a slingshot in his back pocket, following the sheep around the pasture, running errands for his dad and his big brothers. You think about this little boy who bragged to the soldiers of Israel, I could beat that old giant any day! And they laughed him off. And then he did.

That cute little boy from the hick little town of Bethlehem, ruddy and innocent – look at him now. He’s king over all Israel, ruling from his new stronghold, the city on a hill, the city of David.

All the tribes of Israel came out to see him, they praised him and honored him. They made a covenant with him and anointed him king. He was 30 years old when he began to rule. Not bad.

Not bad for the man, and not bad for the nation. These were the glory days for Israel. David occupied the stronghold, he became greater and greater, and Israel became greater and greater. As their leader, he defeated enemies and increased their territory and wealth. These were the glory days. They were on top of the world. Taking possession of the city on a hill, the stronghold, this was a critical point in their rise.

It wasn’t easy, of course. 

David wanted this city for his capitol because it seemed impregnable. High on a hill with good vantage points all around, there was no way to sneak up on Jerusalem. The Jebusites, who occupied it at the time, felt pretty confident that they were keeping it. In fact, they were so confident they taunted their enemies saying even their blind and lame could defend Jerusalem.

But that turned out to be wrong. David’s army managed to surprise the Jebusites by taking the less-traveled route. They shimmied up a water shaft and – surprise! – popped up inside the fortress. At that point it was essentially a done deal. All they had to do was get in there, and the city belonged to David. Occupation was all they needed.

It got me thinking about the spaces we occupy.

In some way, the space we occupy defines who we are.  To be the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, or 10 Downing Street – we know who you are. To occupy these addresses is to occupy a seat of power. When David arrived in the city of Jerusalem, I guess dubbing it the City of David was just a formality.  To occupy this city was to claim power. And it still is today, as we witness ongoing power struggles over control of this city.

But the matter of occupation and power impacts all of us, even those of us who are not kings, prime ministers, and presidents. The space you occupy means something. The space you occupy says something to the people around you. When you have the biggest house on the block, or when you have the tall-steeple church in the center of town, it says something about your importance.

Israel was flying high on that day when they took the city of Jerusalem, and for many years after. And they probably thought it would last forever, because that’s the way we tend to think. If you’re sitting on top of the world, why wouldn’t it always stay that way?

But, of course, it didn’t.

A few hundred years later they were exiled from the land altogether. Some of the tribes of Israel were beaten so severely and scattered so thoroughly that they were never reunited. They are known as the lost tribes of Israel. Others were sent to a foreign land, Babylon, where they lived as captives.  Later, they were permitted to return to Jerusalem and rebuild, but they were never again the masters of their own land. They were always in the company of one unwelcome occupier or another. By the first century CE, they were living under Roman occupation.

And so it’s interesting to me that Jesus, the descendant of King David, grew up in an occupied land, under the oppressive rule of Empire. And it’s also interesting to me that Jesus claimed no space of his own. He occupied only the space that he happened to be in at any given moment. And what’s more, he asked the same of his disciples. An interesting 180 degree turn from the glory days of King David, isn’t it? Just what, exactly changed?

The theology underpinning the books of Samuel and Kings draws a strong connection between Israel’s obedience to God and their fortunes. The covenant law holds that the foundation of the relationship between God and the people of Israel is their obedience. As long as they are obedient to God, God will be with them, and they will receive the benefits of God’s presence with them. The story says that David became greater and greater, for the Lord was with him. At other points, they tell us that Israel suffered losses because of their failure to obey God’s laws.

This passage from Samuel is affirming this theological point. Yes, David’s army was great; they had strength, ingenuity, courage, and all sorts of good qualities. But they didn’t take the city because they had good qualities. The scripture wants us to know that they took the city because God was with them. They were successful, they prospered, because God was with them. And God was with them because they were obedient to God. That is the message of Samuel.

Honestly, it is a message that probably doesn’t work for all times and places. We know full well that there are people in the world who lack goodness and compassion and humility, yet still occupy high places. They prosper because they are ruthless and greedy. I will not say that their prosperity and success is due to their godliness, or even that God has reasons for wanting them to be successful.

The story of our faith gives us more than kings, though; it also gives us prophets.  Prophets were sent to Israel, again and again, to show them the ways they had strayed and to bring them back to their God. The prophets told them in so many ways that their failures to care for the least among them was a failure that would bring them great pain and suffering. Their failures to care for the well-being of all, instead of allowing a few to prosper at the expense of the many – this would be their great failure. But did they listen?

Jesus grieved for Jerusalem, calling it “the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it,” he said. He said, “Your house is left to you”; they still occupied the city on a hill. But he would not be left with them – for much longer.

How we occupy the space we occupy is the question that matters. This is a matter of spiritual occupancy.

Paul writes to the Corinthians “I once knew a man who was caught up into third heaven.” Whatever that is.

Ancient religions sometimes spoke about the layers of heaven, that there were seven levels of heaven – hence, the term seventh heaven. Apparently, there are some extra-biblical writings that speak of these levels of heaven, although I don’t know much about it, but I have read that some believed that God resides in the third heaven. So, to be co-occupants with God in the third heaven, that would be a big thing.

Scholars agree that Paul is really referring to himself, when he says, “I knew a man who went to the third heaven.” But he probably doesn’t say so because he is preaching to the Corinthians about humility. He is trying to steer them away from the so-called super-apostles who boast about their credentials, back toward himself, Paul, who has said previously that if he boasts at all he boasts only of Christ.

That if he would boast at all, he would boast of his weakness.

He would not boast of having the biggest house, the best address, the most powerful position.  He will not boast of his education or his evangelistic achievements – but only of his weakness and his need. This thorn in the flesh that was given to him, whatever it was, kept him humble, always knowing that but for the grace of God he would be nothing.

The spiritual space we occupy is what matters. This will make the difference in how we use whatever we have been given. Think about what we have: buildings, location, endowment, a long and rich heritage and countless spiritual gifts amongst us.

The question we must ask ourselves is this: How will we choose to occupy it?

What We Give

2 Samuel 1:1,17-27     

2 Corinthians 8:7-15   

Ours is a culture that believes in charity. It’s a value we share, that it is good to give to those who are in need. We believe that it is good to give, but not that we should be compelled to give. It should be something that comes from the heart, so each one should have the right, and should be encouraged, to give freely; to give as much as one has made up one’s mind to give. 

I think we got this idea from the Apostle Paul. 

Paul tells the Corinthians that he wants them to be generous, basically for their own sake, but that he does not want to compel them to be generous. Because that would sort of defeat the purpose. He really wants them to want to do good. And you just can’t force that on someone.

That is essentially what I think Americans believe too. We are a land that celebrates freedom, and that includes freedom in giving. So in our country, we have a lot of charities. 

I am sure you know this from first-hand experience. How many requests for donations have you received this week? There are so many charities we need other organizations that help us figure out which charities to give to. We need Charity Navigators, to tell us who is worthy and who is not. 

You know that once you give, you get on everyone’s list and the requests multiply. I have known some people who try to respond to all the requests that seem worthy with at least a small amount, and others who try to narrow their focus to just a few and ignore the rest. I once knew a man who told me he and his wife were so overwhelmed by this problem they just ignored them all. And then they felt guilty about not giving, so they decided that their penance would be to pay every penny of taxes they might be responsible for, not looking for any deductions or credits that they might be eligible for.

The problem of giving can easily become an overwhelming and thorny problem for us. And we don’t have any outside authority telling us how to do it. It’s just up to each one of us to decide what and how to give. 

Some of us use the tithing rule. We say that the Bible mandates we give ten percent of our earnings to God, so that is how much we pledge to the church. Of course, then we grapple with the question of whether it’s ten percent of gross or net earnings. And there is a question of whether we give the whole ten percent to our congregation, or if we divide it up between the church and other charitable organizations. Then finally there is the question of whether ten percent is meant to be the limit of our giving, or just the starting point.

The question of how and what we give is not a simple one. And to be told, “Just give as you want to give. It’s a personal decision,” is not all that helpful. We need more guidance than that. 

Actually, we have more guidance than that. we can find it in both these passages we heard today.

Let’s look first at the story of David in 2^ndSamuel. This doesn’t sound like a story about giving, but bear with me.

You know that when he was just a boy David was anointed by the prophet Samuel to be the king of Israel. For years afterward, Saul remained the king. During this period, young David came to serve in the king’s palace. He played on his harp to soothe Saul’s troubled spirit. He fought in Saul’s army. He became close friends with Saul’s son Jonathan. He even married Saul’s daughter, Michal. But eventually, Saul turned on David and they became enemies. 

David became a leader of his own army, a revolt against the king. But through all of this there was a great love between David and Saul’s son, Jonathan. Jonathan tried to facilitate a reconciliation between David and Saul when things first fell apart. He made several attempts, but eventually realized that his father was dead set on killing David. So Jonathan, who loved and honored his father, was in the position of having to choose sides. And here is what he did.

He stayed and fought with his father. But he also gave warning to David, protecting him from Saul’s wrath. He pledged his love and loyalty to David, even while fighting beside his father. He didn’t choose one over the other. He chose both.

Jonathan’s loyalty to his father was just what was expected of a son. But the love and loyalty he gave to David went beyond what anyone would expect. It was beyond what was even good for him. He suffered his father’s wrath because of his loyalty to David. His father’s army was weakened, partly, due to his loyalty to David, and eventually Jonathan died, in part, because of his loyalty to David.

And after his death, David sings of his great love for Jonathan, praising Jonathan’s love and loyalty that surpassed all expectations. Perhaps this story about David and Jonathan tells us something about giving.

Do we sometimes have a tendency to expect something back when we give? An expectation that the favor will be returned. Or that we will be lauded and praised for our generosity. Or that those we give to will use our gift precisely the way we want them to. 

At the very least, I want to get a tax deduction.

But Jonathan could not expect to get anything back for what he gave David. Jonathan’s duty was to his father, but his gift to David was the truest form of generosity. He gave without regard for his own gain.

I think the letter of Paul to the Corinthians gives support to this notion, in a slightly different way. 

Paul devotes a lot of ink to this matter of generosity among the Corinthians. However, there is something important that is not specifically denoted but would have been known to them. Paul is urging them to give to the church in Jerusalem.

Why is this significant? Something we know from the writings of the New Testament is that there was a divide in the early church. Paul was going out farther into the world to spread the gospel, but his ministry was evolving along the way in ways that were making it different from the church back in Jerusalem. There were tensions between them, power struggles, and attempts to claim authenticity over the others. You know, kind of like how things have always been.

So in urging the Corinthians to give generously to Jerusalem, Paul was urging them to give to a different church, led by different men, with different understandings and practices of the faith. 

Once again, I suggest to you, it seems to be about giving beyond expectations – and without expectations.

And so we might ask ourselves: Do we sometimes have a tendency to make judgments about who is worthy of our gifts? Only those who think and act like us. Only those who show sufficient gratitude. Only those who will use our gift well. We have certain expectations that sometimes get in the way of generosity.

Giving freely is the idea. And it means giving what you are able to give – not more and not less. 

And so, you might ask, how does that help me figure it out? 

The answer to the question of what to give is really this: it should never stop being a question. It is never something to have solved and set in stone, so you won’t have to think about it again. Because what we give is something we should always be thinking about.