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Backseat Conversations on the Way to Heaven: #4 Hand Me All Your Trash!
Backseat Conversations on the Way to Heaven:
#4 Hand Me all Your Trash
Philippians 3:4b-14
† IHS †
May you always be quick to remember the grace, the mercy, love and peace of God our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, as we journey to seeing them face to face!
A Pleasant Journey!
We have been looking at the largest Pastor Parker Parable. That the Journey Home to Heaven is like one of those long journeys of our youth, when we were crowded into the backseat of the family car.
We’ve overheard some of those conversations, remembering when we were urged “to get along back there,” and “That’s Not fair!’. And last week Deacon Michael urged us to consider what happens on those journeys, as we grow up, and eventually get to ride in the front seat.
Today, as we look at Paul describing His life in Christ, I want you to think back to those trips in the car. To remember pulling into the gas stations, where men would pump your gas, clean your windows, check your oil.
When that happened on our trips, as we stopped and Ray Child’s Esso, there was something my dad would always say to us……
No, not, “who has to go to the bathroom” No one would ever want kids or ladies to go into the restroom at that place….
What dad said was….
“Hand Me All your trash!”
It was time to clean the car, getting rid of all the trash, all the candy-wrappers, all the napkins, all the masterpieces colored in crayon, all the broken cheap toys,
Stopping for gas was the time to get the car taken care of, and for us, that meant emptying the backseat of all our trash.
The question is, when our Heavenly Father asks us to hand to Him all our trash…. Will we?
in order to answer that, we have to understand two things…what the trash is, and why it is a benefit to get all that crap out of our lives….
What’s in the Backseat!
It is amazing what we thought were treasures as children. Remember the little 2 piece balsa wood gliders? Or those growing up after me, the happy meal toys that would break before you ever made it home? The baseball cards and the gum that came in the packages. The Pez dispensers with the heads broken off them…
They would end up on the floor, forgotten, smashed, even cried over.
Until Dad asked for them, because they were trash.
Then they were worth more than all the gold in Fort Knox. And we would make a fuss and a fit when our dad’s wanted to throw them out. We counted them as our treasures, irreplaceable things that just cluttered up the backseat.
In today’s epistle, Paul reveals that he saw things that he once thought were invaluable as the trash he needed to stop carrying around. Things that he would understand were trash, which needed to be tossed to the side.
Looking at the list, they don’t really seem all that trashy.
Wait, I need to clarify something. The translators got to the back seat before we did. It wasn’t trash that Paul considered this stuff. Anybody remember the old cloth diapers and what they would be filled with, when they were in the dirty diaper bag? Anybody remember what that bag was like, kept in the back seat on a hot day like we’ve been having? Yeah – that is what Paul called these things he had been so attached to in life
The translators use nicer words, refuse, trash, the old KJV had it more accurate when it said dung.
If I told you the stuff God would take away from you in life, most of you would come up with the idea of sin, or with the old Catechism answer, God removed “sin, satan and death” from our lives.
I am not sure we understand that Paul is talking about sin, when he mentioned that used to count on being born into the right family, into the right race. That he had all the boxes checked off that would see the community think he was a perfect kid. He went to the right schools, go incredible grades. Paul thought, without boasting, that he was living the perfect life. That he did what he was supposed to, even religiously did it.
Sounds like good stuff to me.
Then again, so did the now in 8 pieces balsa wood glider!
The reason these things were trash, or the filling of a diaper, wasn’t because they had no value. It is that they have absolutely no value if you trust in them. They are worthless to trust in, and too often, we do. When we say we can’t do without them, or that these things make us who we are, we have turned them into an idol.
Luther said it this way,
What does it mean to have a god? or, what is God? Answer: A god means that from which we are to expect all good and to which we are to take refuge in all distress, The Large Catechism of Martin Luther.
All Paul was doing in counting these things as trash, was confessing that they had become idols, things in his life he trusted in, especially that he was good enough. He swore he was going to get to heaven because he was a good person, because he had all the boxes checked off, and he trusted in his own work.
Which is why, when Paul heard the gospel from Stephen, it was hard. All that he believed in, all that he trusted in,
We do the same thing. We find our value in all sorts of things. It might be in our bank account, or our financial status. We find our meaning in our job, the awards and diplomas and certificates we receive. We find what defines becoming our roles as parents, or grandparents, even our citizenship. These are the equivalents to what Paul found to be trash, because we allow them to define us, rather than God defining us.
That’s the key, we aren’t who we think we are,…..
We are who God knows we are.
Nothing in our Way!
Getting rid of the trash in our lives is about learning to see each other, and indeed ourselves, as God sees us.
As those who died with Jesus in baptism, and have been raised from the dead with Him. This is what Paul talks about, when he says,
For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ 9 and become one with him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith.
He goes on to say,
10 I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, 11 so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead!
Paul is crying out for a level of intimacy with God that leaves everything in the dust. To be so united with Christ that we become indistinguishable from Him. He lives in us, He shines through us, we are one with Him, as He promised we would be! Paul says this again, when he says,
“But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me.”
Compared to knowing Jesus, well, the other stuff belongs in the used diaper bag. Our relationship with Jesus defines everything we are, and what we can be. It has eternal value, there is nothing that will make life better now, and nothing else, no one else gives us a future and hope that is eternal.
He is the one in whom we find hope, it is in Him we find life, it is in Him we find the peace that passes all understanding, as He guards and protects our Hearts and Minds….
So when you come up, and feast with Him, let go of everything else, and realize that He holds on to you… so hold on to Him.
Amen?
Faith can’t fit in a meme box or 140 character tweet…
Devotional Thought of the Day:
24 The father at once cried out, “I do have faith, but not enough. Help me have more!” Mark 9:24 (TEV)
8 No, the LORD has told us what is good. What he requires of us is this: to do what is just, to show constant love, and to live in humble fellowship with our God. Micah 6:8 (TEV)
FAITH IS SOMETHING we need to ask for. God forbid that we should fail to be importunate with God and with his saints. One of the most refined forms of arrogance consists in claiming that prayer of petition is inferior to other forms of prayer . Only when we become beggars do we realize that we are creatures. When we don’t honor the faith of humble folk, who can teach us how to ask for what we need, then we think that what saves us is pure faith; but that is empty faith, a faith devoid of all religion and all piety. In such a state, we are unable to interpret religious experience. Our intellects go astray with their feeble lights, and we resort to explaining the truth of faith with slogans borrowed from cultural ideologies . (1)
This quote from a pope is one we desperately need to hear, especially those of us who spend any amount of time on Facebook or any other social media.
For far too often we reduce our faith on social media to a snappy quote, a “gotcha” meme, or even try to debate theology or the existence of God in 140 character bursts. What this does is what Pope Francis talks about above – a faith without experiencing God. A Creed, a statement of “faith” that is not communicated, but forced in a way that eliminates conversation, that eliminates discussion. Such burst messages don’t give the full picture, they miss the context, and therein is the problem.
One of my professors once said that good preaching and good theology contains not only the “what”, but the “so what”. How the message impacts the hearer, or in the case of tweets, the reader. How do those words, seen digitally on the screen communicate the need we have to relate to God, to live in fellowship with Him? How can we help people realize that God is dependable, and that they can depend on Him? Even that sentence doesn’t include the incarnation, the death and resurrection of Christ. It doesn’t shake us from our idol of self-sufficiency, our illusion that we can control our world, our environment. For that is where humility begins, knowing that we can’t possibly be God, and in humility finding out that is okay.
Because God,, loves us enough to give up everything for us.
Neither the Pope or I am claiming you need more words to be holier, or more intellectual, but that deep faith is born in deep need. Holiness originating in us, in our brokenness, healing of our lives comes as we realize how shattered they are. It is at those points, when we cry out to God, that we can hear His voice.
And that is what faith, what the “Christian religion” is about – walking humbly with God, in a conversation, assured that He will guide us, comfort us, heal us. Because He has proven, in Christ, the extent to which He will go, and has gone, to do this very thing.
May we today walk humbly, knowing we are His children, and He is our Heavenly father. …
Pope Francis; Jorge M Bergoglio (2013-11-18). Open Mind, Faithful Heart (p. 28). The Crossroad Publishing Company. Kindle Edition.
Overcoming “Whenyoudon’twantto-itis”
Devotional/Discussion thought of the day:
I think I heard it 15 times yesterday…..
First from my five year old – who didn’t wnt to get out of bed….
Then as the day progressed, it seemed everyone was tired, and would rather have spent the morning, if not the day, just relaxing, napping, ignoring the world around them, and just having some “personal time.”
Me too!
I can look from the outside and see that the causes, trying to get back into the swing of things after our kids have been on vacation break, having finally begun to “let down” after the holidays, (rest? really? when?) I can also see the impact of our attitudes on our work – it becomes a little harder to be motivated, we work a little slower, we don’t do as complete a job. In truth, we would rather be resting, playing, just not… back in the swing of things…
Eventually we will get back to speed, eventually our attitudes should improve, but the longer we tolerate our rest…the more we lose out on, the less we see God working thourgh us, the more we become content with our half-heartedness. Is there a way to pass this phase quicker, to desire not to go back to bed- but to greet the day and move on?
I know o only one way – to anticipate who we will spend the day with, to realize that we are going to get to see God at work today, as He works on us, working in us, wortking through us. That we work on Holy Ground, not because of a burning bush, or an ark of the covenant, but because we work with God, He never leaves us on our own. He is there, bringing His mercy and peace and love. Knowing that drowns our lack of desire- and replaces it with anticipation. Realizing that we died in Christ to sin, leaves us rejocing that there is no condemnation for e are in Jesus, we can find ourselves with confidence drawn into His presence., we can rejoice knowing all things will work for good, and so we find our work changing, from being toil to being time with Him….
It’s the only way I can struggle with the wanting to go back to bed…. for I know God has some things in mind today….that will drive me into His presence, remind me that not only can I depend on Him – He desires me to…..
May we all cry for mercy, even as we look forward to walking in His presence, with anticipation. AMEN
