Jason T. Rowinski – Shawnee Church of the Nazarene
Sermon Series: ENEMIES of COMMUNITY (1 of 4) “Do-Over”
Hermeneutical Style: P. Scott Wilson’s 4 Pages Note: Images below are images used for the sermon.
Deuteronomy 6:1-12 (NRSV)
6 Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the ordinances—that the Lord your God charged me to teach you to observe in the land that you are about to cross into and occupy, 2 so that you and your children and your children’s children may fear the Lordyour God all the days of your life, and keep all his decrees and his commandments that I am commanding you, so that your days may be long. 3 Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe them diligently, so that it may go well with you, and so that you may multiply greatly in a land flowing with milk and honey, as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, has promised you.
4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. 6 Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. 7 Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. 8 Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, 9 and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
10 When the Lord your God has brought you into the land that he swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—a land with fine, large cities that you did not build, 11 houses filled with all sorts of goods that you did not fill, hewn cisterns that you did not hew, vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant—and when you have eaten your fill, 12 take care that you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
“DO-OVER”
I’m a fan of the “do over” and I know I’m not the only one. People LOVE do-overs. We have many, though we may not always recognize them as such. Where would we be without some handy-dandy do-overs such as:
Snooze buttons (do-over for waking up in the morning)
Mulligans (do-over for golfers, but God knows your true score)
Extra-credit (do-over for students who chose to be students at the end of the term)
Facebook “edit-post” option (do-over for people who post at 2am)
Grandparents (do-over parenting – give them candy, a puppy, and send them home)
I’m a fan of “do-overs” because I believe in grace and second chances.
I’ve needed more than a few second chances myself – from God and from other people. If we’re being honest, we all have moments in life we’d like to “do-over.”
–>That “gut-feeling” to call someone that you didn’t follow through on that altered your life stories
–>Those harsh words that you said to your spouse in anger that are now affecting everything
–>The time you didn’t keep your promise and you lost that job, that friend, that relationship
–>The regrets we have because our children & children’s children don’t love Jesus
Sometimes we just need a do-over.
CONFLICT & TROUBLE in the TEXT
The scripture we read today is a Do-Over. Deuteronomy means “second-law.” It’s not a replacement of the first law, it’s a retelling. It’s a new opportunity to get something right – to re-participate in God’s covenant love. You remember, of course, the time God established his covenant community – a people of His own. We call it the EXODUS. God liberated them from the heavy-hand of Egyptian slavery – bringing them through parted sea, through a desert, feeding them miraculously, and bringing them to Mt.Sinai where Moses received the 10 Commandments.
Only that’s not the whole story. Those Israelites were the stubborn and dissatisfied type. Instead of gratitude they grumbled about the desert conditions. Instead of thankfulness for food, they took issue with the menu. Instead of reverence for the God who saved them, regarded a Golden-Calf as their rescuer. They were the kind of people who, upon winning an all-expenses paid trip to the Great Wall of China would only manage to complain how many stairs they would have to climb or proclaim how Donald Trump could build a better wall on the border with Mexico.
Think about how much God did for them! They were God’s people, rescued from slavery, set apart to be his covenant people and they chose their idols. God gave them plenty of second chances to live into covenant community but their stubbornness and ingratitude lead them to wandering in the desert for 40 years and never seeing the Promised Land.
Moses’ message to this new generation & every subsequent generation is: Take Care! Don’t forget! The stakes are high: a matter of blessing and curse, life and death. What would they do with their do-over? What will we do with ours?
CONFLICT & TROUBLE in the WORLD
Church, as God’s covenant community today, we need to hear these do-over words of Deuteronomy. What we call “Church” is our practice of covenant community. Yet a cursory examination of the Church here in America reveals some problems. The Gallup Research organization identifies 5 important measures of American religion: identity, attendance, membership, importance, and relevance. Viewed together they look like this chart: DECLINE. What’s perhaps more troubling is that continued statistics like this continue to be met with apathy, not passion to change.
Sometimes being a pastor feels like watchman on the Titanic whose job it was to say: ICEBERG right ahead! No one on the supposedly unsinkable luxury liner wanted to hear those words. Think of the lives that could have been saved – thousands – or even one more, because let’s be honest, there was room for two – yet Rose chose herself and left Jack behind.
Covenant community matters. Larry Crabb says, “As our lungs require air, so our souls require what only community provides. We are created by a Triune God, whose being is relationship and are designed to live in relationship. Without it, we die.” Yet daily we experience the results of community failure – fragmented lives, loneliness, & burnout. Communities become insular and self serving, and people aren’t finding (to quote Randy Frazee, author of “Connecting Church”) “the rich, enduring fellowship for we were created by God to experience.”
The Church (in our society) – needs this do over. It turns out that we aren’t that different from our Israelite covenant community ancestors. We have the same short-term memory/wandering eye problems that led the Israelites to long for the customs and gods around them. How do we keep from repeating the mistakes?
GRACE & GOOD NEWS in the TEXT
This new generation of Israelites get a “do-over.” The question of not repeating the mistakes of the past is on Moses’ mind as he gathers the people on a ridge overlooking the promise land. Moses words would cross the Jordan with them; Moses would not; the generation that left Egypt, their parents, would not go into the Promise Land. God’s grace is a second chance for a new generation. GRACE doesn’t erase our past, it extends us an invitation into God’s good future.
Grace doesn't erase our past, it extends us an invitation into God's good future. Click To Tweet
Moses’ words sound like a prayer -the become THE prayer for covenant community. We call it the Shema. “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.” It seems obvious, to us, that there is only one God in the universe. In the ancient world it was foreign concept. Egypt had its pantheon of gods – which fell to YHWH symbolically in the plagues. The people occupying the Promise Land had their own gods too. The same threat of idolatry that undermined their parents loomed over them.
Idolatry is an ever-present threat to covenant community, even today. The only difference is that we don’t name our idols as gods. A simple definition of an idol is anything that takes God’s place of ultimate importance in our lives. How do you spot an idol? Use Jesus’ TREASURE TEST: “Where your treasure is reveals where your heart is.” Our treasure is what gives us ultimate joy, satisfaction, comfort, and security. We best identify our treasure by how we spend our time and money. We do what we love.
GRACE & GOOD NEWS for our WORLD
God graciously extends us a do-over. It begins with a command to love. This sounds strange to us because love and command seem incompatible. Love is a choice, after all. The idea of rules, laws, expectations, even standards are seen as an imposition on a relationship that should be liberating. The command is love is a charge to be in an exclusive relationship, like marriage, to be faithful in keeping our vows. It’s only in keeping our vows that the relationship has meaning & love comes to life. How do we love? With EVERYTHING: heart (WILL – decisions); soul (SELF – our identity); strength (POSSESSIONS – money/time).
This do-over is a command to do something (again & again). This also sounds strange because “grace” implies for many that we don’t have to “do anything.” Dallas Willard reminds us: GRACE is opposed to EARNING, not opposed to EFFORT.” Here are “statutes & ordinances” that we are to “remember” – which is the biblical sense means “doing repeatedly.” We prioritize God by placing the faith at the center of all our talking, thinking and doing. Some Jews viewed this literally – praying with phylacteries & placing mezuzahs on doorposts. Literal or metaphorical, the point is the same. God’s covenant community must exclusively, publicly, and willingly identify as God’s people. FAITH may be personal but it’s NEVER private.
FAITH may be personal but it's NEVER private. Click To Tweet
If Beyonce were speaking to the church today, she’d say: “lf you liked it then you shoulda put a ring on it.” (o-o-o, o-o-o, o-o-o). Do we think of our covenant relationship with God and his people like we think of marriage? We must look at our covenant community together through the lens of wedding vows:
–>To have and to hold (Not just acquaintances, but the intimacy of true friendship)
–>For better for worse (Not just when I like church or it’s going my way, but when it needs help)
–>For richer or poorer (Not just enjoying the benefits, but giving my time and money in support)
–>In sickness and in health (Not just when my life is good, but in confusion, grief, and failure)
–>To love and to cherish (Not just looking for problems, but testifying to good news among us)
–>’Til death do us part (Not just “until I find something better, but staying together, in-it-to-win-it)
That’s covenant community. Is this what we truly desire?
CONCLUSION
Maybe the problem is we’re not sure we need a do-over. God graciously rescued the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, provided for them in the wilderness, and established a covenant relationship with them. They were a “set free” people. And now God graciously gives them a land with all they could ask for and imagine – flowing with milk & honey, with cities they did not build, goods they did not produce, wells they did not dig. They were about to have a “homeland.” Yet, they took the grace of God for granted and this ingratitude lead to apathy, entitlement, and rebellion. All that God gives can be lost!
We don’t take care and we forget, too. All of our lives are graced. We have salvation we did not earn. We are a part of a community we did not create. We sit in a sanctuary that most here did not build. Are we taking this precious gift of covenant community for granted? The opportunity to participate in God’s story as his covenant people weekly; to give back to God and others so that people who don’t know Christ may come to know him; the moments where we kneel with our children and our children’s children at an altar; the times we laugh together when we’re at a Royals game; the times we get our hands dirty together in service; the times we cry on one another’s shoulders. All that God gives can be lost!
Sometimes we just need a do-over. God’s grace offers us that second chance. Grace doesn’t mean pretending that the bad didn’t happen or didn’t matter – or that there aren’t problems or challenges. Grace means that with God’s help, we get another chance to put things right where we messed up or where we missed out. Grace doesn’t erase the past, it extends us an invitation into God’s good future. Embrace the grace the God extends to us today and live into his good future!
GRACE doesn't erase the past, it extends us an invitation into God's good future. Click To Tweet
AMEN.