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So Now What?; (sermon 1/11/09)
Topic Started: Jan 10 2009, 04:58 PM (186 Views)
Dewey
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HOLY CARP!!!
John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey. He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” - Mark 1:4-11

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How many of you have seen the kid’s movie, “Finding Nemo”? It was a good, cute movie. If you didn’t see it, it was about a clownfish named Marlin, who lived on the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. Marlin has a son named Nemo, who ends up getting caught in a fishing net, and ultimately ends up in a tropical fish tank in a dentist’s office in Sydney. The movie details Marlin’s quest to find his son, and to be reunited with him. Of course, in the end, they are reunited, so it all turns out well. But one of the cutest scenes in the movie is at the very end, after the main plot is wrapped up, and even after the final credits have rolled – if you left the theater too soon, you never saw the scene. In that last scene, you see all the other fish who were in that fish tank in the dentist’s office. All along, they’d been trying to figure out how they could escape, and get out into the Sydney Harbor, just across the street from the dentist’s office. One day, the dentist has to clean the tank, and he had taken the fish out. He put each one in some water in a little plastic bag, tied shut at the top, until he could get the tank cleaned out and refilled. When the dentist is out of the room, the fish figure out how to move their little baggies, and they gradually get them to roll – first out the window, then across the way, and across the busy roadway – and one by one, they make it across, and they roll off the pier and down into the water. They all cheered as the last of them made it safely across and dropped into the harbor. But then the conversation suddenly went quiet, as they all look around at each other floating and bobbing around on the top of the water, all of them still tied up in their plastic bags, until one of them asks, “So now what?”

I think that in some way, that’s where we Christians find ourselves this time of year. We’ve just come through the Advent and Christmas season, when we focused on the coming of Christ into the world, and the great joy of the salvation that we have in Christ. It’s a time when we concentrate on beginnings. That’s actually what today’s Scriptural passages are about, too. Genesis 1 – the beginning of it all. And Mark’s account of the baptism of Jesus, the beginning of his public ministry.

We’ve all heard the story of John the Baptist many times. Of the various gospel accounts, Mark’s is the shortest and most direct, the one that gets most quickly to Jesus’ baptism. Mark tells us that John is out there, in the wilderness, doing his thing and preaching the message of repentance and turning to God. And somehow, without the benefit of television commercials, radio spots, or the internet, all the people in Jerusalem, and surrounding Judea, and beyond into Galilee, got word about this man out along the Jordan River, and the blunt, pull-no-punches message that he was delivering. Oddball, nonconformist religious zealots were a dime a dozen back then, just as they are today. But there was really something about John that was different – something that made people pay attention, and drew them out to hear him. He became a major social phenomenon, someone who had such public support that the established religious leadership had to tread very carefully in dealing with him.

And finally, Jesus comes out to the river, too. We’ve all pictured this scene in our minds. Jesus, coming up out of the water and toward the river bank. And the Scriptures say that at that moment, he saw the sky “torn apart” – maybe the clouds rolling back – and the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove. The voice of God comes from heaven, saying that God is well pleased with Jesus, his Beloved Son.

I said a few weeks ago that I doubted that any of us had had a personal visitation from the angel Gabriel, like Mary did. I’d also bet that none of us has seen anything like Jesus did as he came up out of the water, too. Mark tell s us that immediately after his baptism, the Holy Spirit drove him out into the wilderness, beginning his time of fasting and temptation.

He knew what he was supposed to do next. But for the rest of us, we come through this past season of refocus and rededication, ready to renew ourselves to being Christ’s disciples. But we don’t see any rolling clouds, or hear any thundering voices from the sky. We don’t usually get such clear, unambiguous verification that we’re doing what God wants of us. Like those fish bobbing around in their plastic bags, we’re often left asking, “So now what?”

The “now what” for us, I think, is to keep moving forward. Keep praying, and studying, and asking for God’s guidance as we start out in this new year. This year will definitely bring us challenges – everything from the economy, to things we’re not even aware of yet. It will also see some exciting new developments for us, too. This morning, we’ll be adding a new member to our church family, and hopefully we’ll add others throughout the year. We’re about to begin another chapter in the life of our congregation, as we begin our building addition project.

As we try to discern God’s will for us throughout the year, as individuals and as a congregation, we’ll probably make some mistakes. We’ll probably hit a wall here or there, and we’ll have to back up, adjust course, and keep moving ahead. But that’s all right. I believe that even if we occasionally slip up, and don’t get it quite right as we try to hear God’s will – as we try to allow the Holy Spirit to guide us – I think that just the fact that we’re trying to please God, in and of itself does, in fact, please God.

So the answer to the question “So now what?” for us, is maybe another quote from Finding Nemo – the advice given to us by Dory, the ditzy fish with serious memory problems, who sings, “Just keep swimming, just keep swimming…” And to that I’d add, just keep praying, keep listening, keep our hearts set on following God wherever that will lead us this year. If we just stand still, we’ll lose our renewed sense of focus that we gained this Christmas season. There’s an old adage in the business world, “If you stand still, you’ll die.” It’s just as true in our individual lives of faith and in the life of our congregation. Just keep swimming. If we do that – if we keep focused on more and more closely following Christ, God’s Beloved, in whom he is well pleased, then even if we occasionally stumble, God will be well pleased with us, too.

Thanks be to God.
"By nature, i prefer brevity." - John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, p. 685.

"Never waste your time trying to explain yourself to people who are committed to misunderstanding you." - Anonymous

"Oh sure, every once in a while a turd floated by, but other than that it was just fine." - Joe A., 2011

I'll answer your other comments later, but my primary priority for the rest of the evening is to get drunk." - Klaus, 12/31/14
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Red Rice
HOLY CARP!!!
Thanks for the sermon, Dewey. It reminded me of the quote I'm currently using as my sig. :smile:
Civilisation, I vaguely realized then - and subsequent observation has confirmed the view - could not progress that way. It must have a greater guiding principle to survive. To treat it as a carcase off which each man tears as much as he can for himself, is to stand convicted a brute, fit for nothing better than a jungle existence, which is a death-struggle, leading nowhither. I did not believe that was the human destiny, for Man individually was sane and reasonable, only collectively a fool.

I hope the gunner of that Hun two-seater shot him clean, bullet to heart, and that his plane, on fire, fell like a meteor through the sky he loved. Since he had to end, I hope he ended so. But, oh, the waste! The loss!

- Cecil Lewis
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Aqua Letifer
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ZOOOOOM!
Very good sermon indeed, Dewey. :smile: Sorry I missed it the first time.

Kind of along the same lines: "Remember, my friend, that success is a process, not a destination. There are no peaks in life; only plateaus. Do not remain upon them for very long for we have so much to do." - t3h Bruce
I cite irreconcilable differences.
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Dewey
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HOLY CARP!!!
Thanks. That was actually one of my shorter, and frankly, more generic sermons. I had to keep it shorter than usual because I had to carve out about five to ten minutes later in the service as we were bringing in a new member.

If you listen to the podcast, you'll hear me actually (sort of) singing that "Just keep swimming, just keep swimming..." line. The podcasts "as delivered" actually are fun to listen to; sometimes there's a fair amount of ad libbing, and you can hear when the times when the humor works, and worse, when it doesn't. (oops, just realized, the last two sermons aren't on the website yet)
"By nature, i prefer brevity." - John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, p. 685.

"Never waste your time trying to explain yourself to people who are committed to misunderstanding you." - Anonymous

"Oh sure, every once in a while a turd floated by, but other than that it was just fine." - Joe A., 2011

I'll answer your other comments later, but my primary priority for the rest of the evening is to get drunk." - Klaus, 12/31/14
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Aqua Letifer
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ZOOOOOM!
Dewey
Jan 13 2009, 03:17 PM
Thanks. That was actually one of my shorter, and frankly, more generic sermons. I had to keep it shorter than usual because I had to carve out about five to ten minutes later in the service as we were bringing in a new member.

If you listen to the podcast, you'll hear me actually (sort of) singing that "Just keep swimming, just keep swimming..." line. The podcasts "as delivered" actually are fun to listen to; sometimes there's a fair amount of ad libbing, and you can hear when the times when the humor works, and worse, when it doesn't. (oops, just realized, the last two sermons aren't on the website yet)
Don't think I have the website bookmarked; mind posting it?
I cite irreconcilable differences.
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CTPianotech
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Fulla-Carp
Podcasts?!!?

I require 1XLINXPLzKthnxbai!
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Dewey
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HOLY CARP!!!
Go to the church's website, www.frankfortpres.org . Click the tab titled "Pastor's Page" at the top of the page. Almost all of my sermons are on that page, scrolling down into infinity. But you'll also see a link to a page of mp3's of the sermons, starting sometime last August.

The direct link to that site is http://www.gcast.com/u/frankfortpres/main . It will automatically start to play the most recently uploaded sermon - but I advise not listening to the sermons that way; the audio is a bit garbled. On that same page, you can select the sermon from a list below - just click the little "MP3" button, and you can open it into Windows Media Player on your computer - it sounds a bit better (acoustically, if not theologically) listening to it that way.
"By nature, i prefer brevity." - John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, p. 685.

"Never waste your time trying to explain yourself to people who are committed to misunderstanding you." - Anonymous

"Oh sure, every once in a while a turd floated by, but other than that it was just fine." - Joe A., 2011

I'll answer your other comments later, but my primary priority for the rest of the evening is to get drunk." - Klaus, 12/31/14
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CTPianotech
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Fulla-Carp
great, thanks!

(i noticed i'm very good at not being able to guess what forum-members voices sound like :whome: )

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Dewey
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HOLY CARP!!!
That's why you didn't have that link before - I hate my own voice!
"By nature, i prefer brevity." - John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, p. 685.

"Never waste your time trying to explain yourself to people who are committed to misunderstanding you." - Anonymous

"Oh sure, every once in a while a turd floated by, but other than that it was just fine." - Joe A., 2011

I'll answer your other comments later, but my primary priority for the rest of the evening is to get drunk." - Klaus, 12/31/14
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