Text: Matthew 21:23-32
Theme: “7UP: Sloth” (4th in a series)
15th Sunday after Pentecost
September 25, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
23 Jesus entered the temple courts, and, while he was teaching, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him. “By what authority are you doing these things?” they asked. “And who gave you this authority?”
24 Jesus replied, “I will also ask you one question. If you answer me, I will tell you by what authority I am doing these things. 25 John’s baptism—where did it come from? Was it from heaven, or of human origin?”
They discussed it among themselves and said, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will ask, ‘Then why didn’t you believe him?’ 26 But if we say, ‘Of human origin’—we are afraid of the people, for they all hold that John was a prophet.”
27 So they answered Jesus, “We don’t know.”
Then he said, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.
28 “What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’
29 “‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went.
30 “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.
31 “Which of the two did what his father wanted?”
“The first,” they answered.
Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. 32 For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.
Every now and then, upon arriving home, I take note that my boys are there and proceed to yell upstairs: “Wassup?” Then, inevitably, the reply drifts back down the stairs: “Hey, Paulie! Just chillin’.”
I’m so out of date with the lingo of the late teen and twenty-something crowd that even the phrase “just chillin’” could already be out of circulation. I need to start carrying an urban dictionary or some other useful tool to help me. I hope “chillin’ out” is still the go-to phrase because I like it. Let’s analyze it for a moment. It is prompted, most often, by “what’s up?” – which, of course, means, “What’s going on?” or “What are you doing?”, etc. The reply, “Just chillin’”, essentially means we’re not doing a whole lot. The word “chill” at least implies that something is warm or hot, and you can get warm or hot if you’re engaged in, say, some strenuous activity. After awhile, you need to cool down or, indeed, chill.
“Chilling out”, linguistically, may be a hip variation of “hanging out”. But “hanging out”, understood literally, doesn’t sound like much fun. What? Are you out there floating in the breeze or something? And what’s this business about “out”? I can understand “hanging in there” which suggests a sort of stick-to-it-ive-ness, but “hanging out” seems to mean that we’re giving up – if words mean anything. I have a hunch that the “out” part of either “hanging out” or “chillin’ out” means that we’re not engaged in anything at the moment; we’re “off-line”, so to speak.
Anyway, I like the two-word phrase “chillin’ out”. I’ll continue using it until someone whispers in my ear and says: “Honey, you sound like an old man when you say that!” I like “chillin’ out” so much better, for instance, than the phrase “killing time.” What a sad abuse of language that is! It’s like time is a human being, and we’re out there committing murder! Have you ever heard people use that phrase or a variation of it? You ask somebody what they’re doing, and they reply: “Ah, I’m just killin’ a little time.” I suspect it is often heard at airports when flights are delayed. “Well, we got a couple of hours to kill, honey. What do you want to do?” If “killing time” is the only parlance we used, then we’ve have to conclude that time is the greatest martyr that ever lived – or died, for that matter. Now, for you sensitive types out there, I don’t want you to feel bad about using this phrase. It’s in common parlance, and it probably will continue to be. But here is the point, perhaps, where we all need the reminder that words mean things – even words, good and solid words, that are out of circulation.
Take the word sloth, for example. Sloth is one of the sins that is up for consideration this morning in our series, 7Up: A Refreshing Look at the Seven Deadly Sins. Dictionary.com defines sloth as an “habitual disinclination to exertion”, or “indolence”, or “laziness.” Other related terms include “shiftlessness”, “idleness”, or “slackness.”
A reporter once walked up to a person on the street and asked: “What are the two greatest problems facing America today?” The person, with a certain cockiness, replied: “I don’t know and I don’t care.” The reporter thought to himself: “He named them both.” “I don’t know” is ignorance. “I don’t care” is apathy.
Ignorance hangs out with sloth. But apathy is buddy-buddy with sloth. Another scholar has described sloth as a “sense of ennui.” Ennui is a feeling of utter weariness or discontent resulting from a lack of interest or boredom. Even the writer of the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes gets the idea: “All is vanity. What do people gain from all the toil at which they toil under the sun. A generation goes, and a generation comes … .” Pretty clearly, the author is taking a divine potshot at all the workaholics who have the mistaken notion that more work, or frenzied activity, is the antidote to sloth. The more you try to counteract sloth, the worse it can get!
Pinpointing our modern cynicism with laser-like accuracy, the writer of Ecclesiastes goes on: “So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I must leave them to the one who comes after me. And who knows whether he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all the work into which I have poured my effort and skill under the sun. This too is meaningless. So my heart began to despair over all my toilsome labor under the sun.”
So sloth, Biblically understood, is something more than just run-of-the-mill laziness (although it certainly can begin with that). It’s a kind of spiritual torpor and despair – or even depression.
Now, just to change things up a bit, it’s time for a little “Name That Tune”. See if this song sounds familiar. (Play piano.) That’s right; it’s the theme from M*A*S*H, the popular TV series of yesteryear. Set in the context of the Korean War, it gave us characters such as Hawkeye Pierce, Colonel Blake, Radar O’Reilly, and Hot Lips Hoolihan. Everyone remembers the theme song, but far fewer recall the lyrics. A portion of them, written by Johnny Mandel, go like this:
Through early morning fog I see
Visions of the things to be
The pains that are withheld for me
I realize and now I can see
That suicide is painless
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave them if I please.
M*A*S*H was a sit-com, but that song is anything but funny. That song, ladies and gentlemen, is nothing if not an anthem to existential despair. But sloth, from which such despair so often springs forth, does not seem to be deadly. Couch potatoes don’t die at the snap of a finger. But what sloth (or laziness or listlessness or apathy) gradually leads to -- spiritual and existential despair – can, indeed, be deadly. Here is where we best heed the dictum of C.S. Lewis who wrote: “The safest way to hell is a gradual one --the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.”
By the grace of God, I hope the Holy Spirit will use this message today as a signpost for us all. And the best is yet to come.
There in the temple, long ago, stood Jesus Christ. He was in His teaching mode. Earlier, He was interrupted by yet another question brought forth by the religious establishment. Having dispensed with that, He went on to tell everyone within earshot a little story. He started it as follows:
“What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’
29 “‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went.
30 “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.
31 “Which of the two did what his father wanted?”
“The first,” they answered.
Now, I don’t know what the unemployment rate was when Jesus told this story, but the man who had two sons issued a request and provided a job opportunity. Son number one said no. “I’m not going to do what you want, dear Father. And I’m not going to work.” It sounds like he may have the symptoms of sloth, doesn’t it? But, as the story goes, he ends up going to work.
The second son is given the same request and opportunity. Son number two appears to be rip, roarin’, and ready to go. “Here I am. I’m the guy. I’ll get the job done for you – not like that slothful, lazy, listless, indolent brother of mine.”
But, in the end, son number two ultimately nixes the request and shuns the opportunity. “Which of the two did what his father wanted?” asks Jesus. “The first,” they all said of one accord.
Stated simply, the first son changed His mind. That’s what the Gospel of God’s love in Jesus Christ does for us, dear friends. By the power of the Holy Spirit, it enables us to change our minds.
Instead of the way of sloth – which leads to spiritual despair and even worse, there is the alternative. It’s what Jesus, in today’s Gospel reading, calls the “way of righteousness.”
Your presence here this morning indicates that you know a little something about this way, this path. We are on that path today. And we’re not on it because we’ve worked too hard or worked too little. We’re not on that path because we’ve got our theological I’s dotted and T’s crossed. We’re on that path because God’s is gracious; God gives grace; God gives you and me another chance. God doesn’t gradually make you righteous. In Christ crucified and risen from the dead, He declares you righteous.
When we start to understand this, when we realize that we’re a part of this, sloth is drained dry of its resources. Spiritual despair gives way to that new and living hope. Life, not in the sweet bye and by but right here and right now, takes on its liveliness, its adventure. We are blessed to realize that we are a part of something greater than ourselves, something that will last. We become what we are: a people not so much buffeted by sloth but blessed with glorious destiny. Thanks be to God!
Amen.
THE STRAIGHTFORWARD PULPIT
Monday, September 26, 2011
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Remarks/Invocation at the Texas Center for the Judiciary Memorial Breakfast 2011
Your Honors, I ask for a point of personal privilege before we pray today. Thanks are herewith extended to The Honorable Judge David Garcia of Denton County, Texas Criminal Court #3 for his invitation to me to be with you. I’d like to think the invitation was issued on account of our friendship, but he would probably would say it was because he felt a smidge sorry for me since his Texas Longhorns have beaten my Nebraska Cornhuskers ten out of the last eleven times they’ve met on the gridiron. Then again, maybe he wouldn’t say that. So I’m not quite sure why I’m here!
Football loyalties aside, Judge Garcia is a dear friend and quite a competitor on the golf course. I thought of him last Sunday when I preached a sermon on envy, one of the seven deadly sins. There is this strange form of envy that our German friends have a delicious word for. It’s called schadenfreude. It is defined as taking delight in the misfortune of someone else. I have this feeling quite regularly as I watch another one of David’s golf shots go into the woods or a water hazard. Of course, schadenfreude is exactly what he feels toward me after I walk off yet another green having three putted. On that alone, we have lots of sins to confess!
Some of you may know this, but not all of you. David leads a Sunday school class for the developmentally disabled at his church. That notched high marks in my heart as I’m the father of two autistic daughters. He may be – and probably is! – as competitive as anyone could get. But that’s not what matters most to me. Rather, it’s the gift of his unique faith and friendship. So, thank you Judge Garcia.
Let us pray:
Lord God, this is the day that you have made. Enable us to rejoice and be glad in it. Open our lips that our mouths may show forth your praise. Make haste to help us in the daily round of life. Look, with Your eye of blessing, on Your servants, these judges, assembled in this room. Grant to them wisdom and strength sufficient unto the day and to the many and various situations of their common calling. Shower every good and perfect gift upon their spouses and family members. Protect them all.
We pray for all those in positions of authority, for our armed forces, and for our first responders bother here in our beloved Texas and throughout the United States. Thank you for their faith, their commitment, and, with some, for their last full measure of devotion. Give to them a genuine, a humble, and a quiet yet powerful patriotism which revels in that freedom undergirded by a lawful and orderly society.
With gratitude, we remember before you the lives and the examples of the judges no longer with us in this earthly life. Thank You for the lessons they taught and the good precedents they set. Grant us Your grace and the gifts of Your Spirit so that we, with reverent joy, can look forward to that day when You welcome us home with a “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” Bless this food to the usefulness of our bodies and this fellowship to animate our friendships and enliven our vocation. We pray in the Name of the One who came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many – even Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Football loyalties aside, Judge Garcia is a dear friend and quite a competitor on the golf course. I thought of him last Sunday when I preached a sermon on envy, one of the seven deadly sins. There is this strange form of envy that our German friends have a delicious word for. It’s called schadenfreude. It is defined as taking delight in the misfortune of someone else. I have this feeling quite regularly as I watch another one of David’s golf shots go into the woods or a water hazard. Of course, schadenfreude is exactly what he feels toward me after I walk off yet another green having three putted. On that alone, we have lots of sins to confess!
Some of you may know this, but not all of you. David leads a Sunday school class for the developmentally disabled at his church. That notched high marks in my heart as I’m the father of two autistic daughters. He may be – and probably is! – as competitive as anyone could get. But that’s not what matters most to me. Rather, it’s the gift of his unique faith and friendship. So, thank you Judge Garcia.
Let us pray:
Lord God, this is the day that you have made. Enable us to rejoice and be glad in it. Open our lips that our mouths may show forth your praise. Make haste to help us in the daily round of life. Look, with Your eye of blessing, on Your servants, these judges, assembled in this room. Grant to them wisdom and strength sufficient unto the day and to the many and various situations of their common calling. Shower every good and perfect gift upon their spouses and family members. Protect them all.
We pray for all those in positions of authority, for our armed forces, and for our first responders bother here in our beloved Texas and throughout the United States. Thank you for their faith, their commitment, and, with some, for their last full measure of devotion. Give to them a genuine, a humble, and a quiet yet powerful patriotism which revels in that freedom undergirded by a lawful and orderly society.
With gratitude, we remember before you the lives and the examples of the judges no longer with us in this earthly life. Thank You for the lessons they taught and the good precedents they set. Grant us Your grace and the gifts of Your Spirit so that we, with reverent joy, can look forward to that day when You welcome us home with a “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” Bless this food to the usefulness of our bodies and this fellowship to animate our friendships and enliven our vocation. We pray in the Name of the One who came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many – even Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
7UP: Envy
Text: Matthew 20:1-16
Theme: “7UP: Envy” (3rd in a series)
14th Sunday After Pentecost
September 18, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
1 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay them a denarius[a] for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
3 “About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4 He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ 5 So they went.
“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. 6 About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
7 “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.
“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
9 “The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12 ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
13 “But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? 14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
He got his start on the Oprah show, and his personality and technique caught the attention of the Oprah-watching public – and that’s quite a few people. I speak, of course, of the famous Dr. Phil McGraw who earned, in 1979, his Doctor of Philosophy degree in Clinical Psychology right here in Denton at the University of North Texas. All across the fruited plain, people were entertained with his approach to tackling the problems folks faced – interpersonal or otherwise. He was and is, as they say, “Texas-direct.” He “shoots from the hip”. He was and is blunt with people almost to the point of being mean.
Another psychotherapist was once asked why Dr. Phil, with his “in your face” approach, could garner such a big audience. Certainly, the connection with Oprah helped, but, said the psychotherapist, “People are ready to be told the truth about themselves, even when it hurts, because they know that, without getting the truth, they won’t get life.” We might add that even if we don’t like the truth told to us straight, we get a bang out of it when Dr. Phil does it to someone else.
The landowner in the story Jesus told in today’s Gospel comes off sounding a lot like Dr. Phil. Whether they, the workers, worked the entire eight hour shift or only an hour or so, they all agreed to be paid a day’s wages, which seems somewhat bizarre to begin with. It doesn’t seem as though fairness is part of the equation at all. Of course, it never is with grace! When those who worked the longest noticed that those who worked the least got paid the same amount of money, a whole bunch of belly-aching ensued. It’s not fair; it’s not right; it’s not just; it’s plain wrong. The landowner, ala’ Dr. Phil, fires right back: “Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?”
That was a zinger if there ever was one! It had to hurt those who heard it. Envy was pulled right out into the light of day for everyone to see. Here were these day laborers, coming early to the party and forming something along the lines of a union, demanding their fair share. In the process, their envy is exposed. Envy can hide behind even our most noble purposes.
Envy is one of the seven deadly sins. It’s today’s topic in this series I’ve dubbed “7UP: A ‘Refreshing’ Look at The Seven Deadly Sins.” So lets cut to the chase: Dictionary.com defines envy as ”a feeling of discontent or covetousness with regard to another's advantages, success, possessions, etc. “
If that’s the case, envy is all but in the air we breathe. It’s like a spiritual anthrax spore that pummels our existence with time-released poison. To illustrate a generalized form of envy, let me quote Jack Nicholson’s character, Melvin, in the motion picture As Good As It Gets for which he won an academy award: “Some of us have great stories, pretty stories, that take place at the lakes with boats and friends and noodle salad. (For) a lot of people, that’s their story: Good times! Noodle salad! What makes it so hard is not that you had it bad but that you’re that upset that so many others had it good!”
Envy. There is so much more to talk about. Take politics, for example. Last week I heard one pundit pompously say, envious of Obama voters, “Only the supremely rich and the poorest of the poor have any reason to vote Democrat.” There is envy in terms of race and class and creed. There is surely envy in the upper echelons of academia as professors battle for tenure –- if not the best parking spots. Envy lurks around various skill sets. I remember my piano teacher telling me to never become a professional musician. When I asked her why I shouldn’t, she said “It is because musicians are insanely jealous of one another.” She knew that of which she spoke; she played with Sophie Tucker, Eddie Peabody, and the Dorsey brothers. There is certainly envy in athletics. I have a close friend who is a sitting judge here in Denton County. Like me, he loves golf and he’s very competitive. The trouble is, he makes more putts than I do – and I’m very envious of that. Of course, I hit the tee shot better than he does and I get a sinister delight when he’s out in the woods hunting for his ball while I’m right in the middle of the fairway. That sinister delight is what the German language calls schadenfreude – or a pleasure in someone else’s misfortune. It’s a close – and nasty! -- cousin to envy. You’d think ministers, supposedly the paragons and exemplars of virtue and godly living, know how to handle envy. Baloney, I say! I drive east down University Drive after church nearly every Sunday and I have to wait as the police department actually directs traffic out of Denton Bible Church! You think I’m not envious of that?
There is envy in families. Remember the Hatfields and the McCoy’s! Think of those historical, occasional, and, at times, regular outbreaks of sibling rivalry! Envy prowls around in it all. Envy even meanders into relations with your in-laws. One gentleman said, “I’m happiest when I know I’m making ten dollars more a month than my brother-in-law.” Envy. On it goes. One scholar muses: “Perhaps humanity could have gotten by without envy, but then Eve bore a second son…(and) as Cain found out with Abel, it is very difficult to urge people to be social and fraternal, without also urging them to measure themselves, to define their self-worth on the basis of others.”
Still, you’d think that if there were a level playing field of some sort envy would cease to exist. With all things being equal, what would there be to envy if we all had the same amount of money, or dressed the same, or lived in similar houses, or all drove Chevy Volts? It might not eliminate envy, but it might take the edge off. Would you agree?
One of the things I learned as I studied the history of Christian thought on envy is that some of the earliest wrestlings with our topic came from a surprising place: Christian monasteries. Think of those monks in the middle ages, having taken a vow of poverty, who lived in something of a commune. They wore the same habit and ate the same food. Brother Joe had no more or no less of the accessories of life as did Brother John! They worshipped the same God at the same hours of the day; they said the same prayers and sang the same songs. They slept on identical beds with no thought of what their individualistic “sleep number” might be.
As it turns out, however, with all things being equal, it was a hotbed for envy. It was inevitable. In the midst of all that equality, envy became a way to grope for individual distinction. When envy is quietly going around doing its work, pride stands back and nods its head.
There’s more to this fascinating sin of envy. Among other things, it’s lodged in The Decalogue, the Ten Commandments. “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s this, that, or the other thing,” we read in no uncertain terms. Furthermore, we don’t need a legislative jobs bill to be employed by envy. If ever there was an equal-opportunity employer with a “Help Wanted” sign hung on the front door, it is envy. Envy, to go yet further, has no regard for whether you’re male or female. Men envy what men have or are and women appear to do the same. As another scholar suggested, envy “… begins in the showers after the junior high basketball game.”
With all due respect to the “Mean Green” of the University of North Texas, have you ever heard the expression “green with envy”? The phrase may be Shakespearean. In Merchant of Venice, the character Portia speaks of “green-eyed jealousy.” Whatever the case, it suggests that there is a kind of sickness to envy. Some sins make other people ill, but envy upsets the equilibrium of its host. It seems to be its own punishment. When we envy someone else, we diminish ourselves. When we envy, we are, to use a phrase, “shooting ourselves in the foot.” When it is all said and done, envy ends up being a kind of subtle, deep, quiet, perhaps even pervasive sadness. No wonder that St. Thomas Aquinas described envy as a mode of sadness.
In later messages, I’ll talk about the deadly sins of gluttony and lust. Conceivably, one can enjoy gluttony for a time. A few weeks back, we even cheered it on as one diner sought to set the record for the most Hell Burgers consumed in one sitting at Rooster’s Roadhouse Restaurant in Denton. Lust might carry its momentary pleasure. But what satisfaction do you get from envy? Can you think of any?
“Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” asked a queen of Disney movie fame. Envy, despite its quiet, subtle ways, will not rest until you conclude that you are the fairest of them all. Of course, that leads to a life of great disappointment. See what I’m getting at?
Singer/Song-writer Howard Jones, perhaps unknowingly, captures the ultimate disappointment in envy:
You can look at the menu, but you just can't eat
You can feel the cushion, but you can't have a seat
You can dip your foot in the pool, but you can't have a swim
You can feel the punishment, but you can't commit the sin.
You can build a mansion, but you just can't live in it
You're the fastest runner but you're not allowed to win
Some break the rules, and live to count the cost
The insecurity is the thing that won't get lost.
You can see the summit but you can't reach it
Its the last piece of the puzzle but you just can't make it fit
Doctor says you're cured but you still feel the pain
Aspirations in the clouds but your hopes go down the drain.
In 1 Corinthians 13, St. Paul declares that love does not envy. Do you think he would have written that if he didn’t think it was a problem in the church? When he speaks of love that does not envy, he does not speak of a self-seeking love but a self-giving love.
Envy, which is one of the most natural realities in our fallen world, can be exposed, refreshingly forgiven, and actually transformed. “By what?” you ask. By Christ’s love for us, I say.
And this love, which is not about equality or fairness, is all about grace.
This is what you and I, by the power of God’s Holy Spirit, are trying to proclaim and share every Sunday and every day and in all kinds of ways here at First Presbyterian Church: the grace of God that has come to us in Jesus Christ.
My friends, that neighbor that we are to love as we are to love ourselves can also be the neighbor that we envy for whatever reason it might be. But God is also the God of that neighbor, and that neighbor shares so many more things in common with us than the envy which drives us apart.
That grace and love of God is not proclaimed on CNN or ESPN. It takes the church and the church’s people to do that. When that proclamation is at its best – that is, when that message is empowered and blessed by the Spirit of God, we should not be surprised to see at least two things happen: disappointment will decrease and joy will increase. How does that sound?
Amen.
Theme: “7UP: Envy” (3rd in a series)
14th Sunday After Pentecost
September 18, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
1 “For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay them a denarius[a] for the day and sent them into his vineyard.
3 “About nine in the morning he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. 4 He told them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ 5 So they went.
“He went out again about noon and about three in the afternoon and did the same thing. 6 About five in the afternoon he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, ‘Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?’
7 “‘Because no one has hired us,’ they answered.
“He said to them, ‘You also go and work in my vineyard.’
8 “When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.’
9 “The workers who were hired about five in the afternoon came and each received a denarius. 10 So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. 11 When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. 12 ‘These who were hired last worked only one hour,’ they said, ‘and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.’
13 “But he answered one of them, ‘I am not being unfair to you, friend. Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius? 14 Take your pay and go. I want to give the one who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’
16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
He got his start on the Oprah show, and his personality and technique caught the attention of the Oprah-watching public – and that’s quite a few people. I speak, of course, of the famous Dr. Phil McGraw who earned, in 1979, his Doctor of Philosophy degree in Clinical Psychology right here in Denton at the University of North Texas. All across the fruited plain, people were entertained with his approach to tackling the problems folks faced – interpersonal or otherwise. He was and is, as they say, “Texas-direct.” He “shoots from the hip”. He was and is blunt with people almost to the point of being mean.
Another psychotherapist was once asked why Dr. Phil, with his “in your face” approach, could garner such a big audience. Certainly, the connection with Oprah helped, but, said the psychotherapist, “People are ready to be told the truth about themselves, even when it hurts, because they know that, without getting the truth, they won’t get life.” We might add that even if we don’t like the truth told to us straight, we get a bang out of it when Dr. Phil does it to someone else.
The landowner in the story Jesus told in today’s Gospel comes off sounding a lot like Dr. Phil. Whether they, the workers, worked the entire eight hour shift or only an hour or so, they all agreed to be paid a day’s wages, which seems somewhat bizarre to begin with. It doesn’t seem as though fairness is part of the equation at all. Of course, it never is with grace! When those who worked the longest noticed that those who worked the least got paid the same amount of money, a whole bunch of belly-aching ensued. It’s not fair; it’s not right; it’s not just; it’s plain wrong. The landowner, ala’ Dr. Phil, fires right back: “Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?”
That was a zinger if there ever was one! It had to hurt those who heard it. Envy was pulled right out into the light of day for everyone to see. Here were these day laborers, coming early to the party and forming something along the lines of a union, demanding their fair share. In the process, their envy is exposed. Envy can hide behind even our most noble purposes.
Envy is one of the seven deadly sins. It’s today’s topic in this series I’ve dubbed “7UP: A ‘Refreshing’ Look at The Seven Deadly Sins.” So lets cut to the chase: Dictionary.com defines envy as ”a feeling of discontent or covetousness with regard to another's advantages, success, possessions, etc. “
If that’s the case, envy is all but in the air we breathe. It’s like a spiritual anthrax spore that pummels our existence with time-released poison. To illustrate a generalized form of envy, let me quote Jack Nicholson’s character, Melvin, in the motion picture As Good As It Gets for which he won an academy award: “Some of us have great stories, pretty stories, that take place at the lakes with boats and friends and noodle salad. (For) a lot of people, that’s their story: Good times! Noodle salad! What makes it so hard is not that you had it bad but that you’re that upset that so many others had it good!”
Envy. There is so much more to talk about. Take politics, for example. Last week I heard one pundit pompously say, envious of Obama voters, “Only the supremely rich and the poorest of the poor have any reason to vote Democrat.” There is envy in terms of race and class and creed. There is surely envy in the upper echelons of academia as professors battle for tenure –- if not the best parking spots. Envy lurks around various skill sets. I remember my piano teacher telling me to never become a professional musician. When I asked her why I shouldn’t, she said “It is because musicians are insanely jealous of one another.” She knew that of which she spoke; she played with Sophie Tucker, Eddie Peabody, and the Dorsey brothers. There is certainly envy in athletics. I have a close friend who is a sitting judge here in Denton County. Like me, he loves golf and he’s very competitive. The trouble is, he makes more putts than I do – and I’m very envious of that. Of course, I hit the tee shot better than he does and I get a sinister delight when he’s out in the woods hunting for his ball while I’m right in the middle of the fairway. That sinister delight is what the German language calls schadenfreude – or a pleasure in someone else’s misfortune. It’s a close – and nasty! -- cousin to envy. You’d think ministers, supposedly the paragons and exemplars of virtue and godly living, know how to handle envy. Baloney, I say! I drive east down University Drive after church nearly every Sunday and I have to wait as the police department actually directs traffic out of Denton Bible Church! You think I’m not envious of that?
There is envy in families. Remember the Hatfields and the McCoy’s! Think of those historical, occasional, and, at times, regular outbreaks of sibling rivalry! Envy prowls around in it all. Envy even meanders into relations with your in-laws. One gentleman said, “I’m happiest when I know I’m making ten dollars more a month than my brother-in-law.” Envy. On it goes. One scholar muses: “Perhaps humanity could have gotten by without envy, but then Eve bore a second son…(and) as Cain found out with Abel, it is very difficult to urge people to be social and fraternal, without also urging them to measure themselves, to define their self-worth on the basis of others.”
Still, you’d think that if there were a level playing field of some sort envy would cease to exist. With all things being equal, what would there be to envy if we all had the same amount of money, or dressed the same, or lived in similar houses, or all drove Chevy Volts? It might not eliminate envy, but it might take the edge off. Would you agree?
One of the things I learned as I studied the history of Christian thought on envy is that some of the earliest wrestlings with our topic came from a surprising place: Christian monasteries. Think of those monks in the middle ages, having taken a vow of poverty, who lived in something of a commune. They wore the same habit and ate the same food. Brother Joe had no more or no less of the accessories of life as did Brother John! They worshipped the same God at the same hours of the day; they said the same prayers and sang the same songs. They slept on identical beds with no thought of what their individualistic “sleep number” might be.
As it turns out, however, with all things being equal, it was a hotbed for envy. It was inevitable. In the midst of all that equality, envy became a way to grope for individual distinction. When envy is quietly going around doing its work, pride stands back and nods its head.
There’s more to this fascinating sin of envy. Among other things, it’s lodged in The Decalogue, the Ten Commandments. “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s this, that, or the other thing,” we read in no uncertain terms. Furthermore, we don’t need a legislative jobs bill to be employed by envy. If ever there was an equal-opportunity employer with a “Help Wanted” sign hung on the front door, it is envy. Envy, to go yet further, has no regard for whether you’re male or female. Men envy what men have or are and women appear to do the same. As another scholar suggested, envy “… begins in the showers after the junior high basketball game.”
With all due respect to the “Mean Green” of the University of North Texas, have you ever heard the expression “green with envy”? The phrase may be Shakespearean. In Merchant of Venice, the character Portia speaks of “green-eyed jealousy.” Whatever the case, it suggests that there is a kind of sickness to envy. Some sins make other people ill, but envy upsets the equilibrium of its host. It seems to be its own punishment. When we envy someone else, we diminish ourselves. When we envy, we are, to use a phrase, “shooting ourselves in the foot.” When it is all said and done, envy ends up being a kind of subtle, deep, quiet, perhaps even pervasive sadness. No wonder that St. Thomas Aquinas described envy as a mode of sadness.
In later messages, I’ll talk about the deadly sins of gluttony and lust. Conceivably, one can enjoy gluttony for a time. A few weeks back, we even cheered it on as one diner sought to set the record for the most Hell Burgers consumed in one sitting at Rooster’s Roadhouse Restaurant in Denton. Lust might carry its momentary pleasure. But what satisfaction do you get from envy? Can you think of any?
“Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” asked a queen of Disney movie fame. Envy, despite its quiet, subtle ways, will not rest until you conclude that you are the fairest of them all. Of course, that leads to a life of great disappointment. See what I’m getting at?
Singer/Song-writer Howard Jones, perhaps unknowingly, captures the ultimate disappointment in envy:
You can look at the menu, but you just can't eat
You can feel the cushion, but you can't have a seat
You can dip your foot in the pool, but you can't have a swim
You can feel the punishment, but you can't commit the sin.
You can build a mansion, but you just can't live in it
You're the fastest runner but you're not allowed to win
Some break the rules, and live to count the cost
The insecurity is the thing that won't get lost.
You can see the summit but you can't reach it
Its the last piece of the puzzle but you just can't make it fit
Doctor says you're cured but you still feel the pain
Aspirations in the clouds but your hopes go down the drain.
In 1 Corinthians 13, St. Paul declares that love does not envy. Do you think he would have written that if he didn’t think it was a problem in the church? When he speaks of love that does not envy, he does not speak of a self-seeking love but a self-giving love.
Envy, which is one of the most natural realities in our fallen world, can be exposed, refreshingly forgiven, and actually transformed. “By what?” you ask. By Christ’s love for us, I say.
And this love, which is not about equality or fairness, is all about grace.
This is what you and I, by the power of God’s Holy Spirit, are trying to proclaim and share every Sunday and every day and in all kinds of ways here at First Presbyterian Church: the grace of God that has come to us in Jesus Christ.
My friends, that neighbor that we are to love as we are to love ourselves can also be the neighbor that we envy for whatever reason it might be. But God is also the God of that neighbor, and that neighbor shares so many more things in common with us than the envy which drives us apart.
That grace and love of God is not proclaimed on CNN or ESPN. It takes the church and the church’s people to do that. When that proclamation is at its best – that is, when that message is empowered and blessed by the Spirit of God, we should not be surprised to see at least two things happen: disappointment will decrease and joy will increase. How does that sound?
Amen.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
7UP: Pride
Text: Romans 14:1-12
Theme: “7UP: Pride” (2nd in a series)
13th Sunday after Pentecost
September 11, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
1 Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. 2 One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3 The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. 4 Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.
5 One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind. 6 Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. 7 For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. 8 If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. 9 For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
10 You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister[a]? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:
“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,
‘every knee will bow before me;
every tongue will acknowledge God.’”[b]
12 So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God.
Many and various have been the remembrances, testimonies, services of worship, and special events surrounding this day, which is the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on our country. Last week at UNT, former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates – who served under both President Bush and President Obama -- led us through a long and detailed history of terrorism in our time which reached a culmination of sorts on 9/11.
While listening to some of these civic rituals, I was reminded of the days and weeks and months which followed that horrible day. There was such an outpouring of national unity. For a little while, just a little while, we seemed to set down the rhetorical weapons of our caustic political warring and sensed a togetherness as Americans that we hadn’t experienced in quite awhile. Flags seemed to fly higher. They were draped over railings and banisters. Mini-versions of Old Glory were affixed to automobile doors. The national anthem was sung with more vigor, and it was often accompanied by a fly-over of F-16s. Our hearts and our dollars and pints of our blood went out in unprecedented proportion to the victims, the families of the victims and first responders. A patriotic fervor swept the nation. New bumper stickers were omnipresent. One of them, featuring an image of the red, white, and blue, said, quite simply: “The Power of Pride.”
Pride does seem to have a power: the power to look back on the past and confidently assert that we’ve learned its lessons. Pride includes the power of experience, tradition, and ties of family and background and religion. Pride, carefully understood, can be a good thing. Pride can be, as one scholar suggests, a “most attractive virtue. Parents try to instill a sense of ‘self-worth’ in children.” Yes, too much pride is rightly called arrogance, but the beneficial effects of pride – a sense of achievement, a desire for excellence, an aspiration to do the best that one can do and be the best that one can be – seem to outweigh the negative.
It’s difficult to see how pride, rightly understood, could be a deadly sin. But there it sits, nonetheless, on the historical list of the most deadly sins. Some would say that pride has been rehabilitated from being a vice to be avoided to a great virtue to be cultivated – think of National Pride, or Black Pride, or Gay Pride, or Southern Pride. There is pride in the great state of Texas. “I wasn’t born here, but I got here as fast as I could,” say some “foreigners” now living in our Lone Star State. I have to admit that pride is plastered all over my office walls with pictures from Nebraska’s national championships in football. Even more insidiously, there are placques noting my vocational attainments. And Pride dominates our politics. It is featured in our rehabilitation and counseling centers where “self-esteem” is encouraged. The great sin doesn’t seem to be pride at all. William Willimon states:
Somehow Pride and its cousins – arrogance, egotism, vanity, and conceit
- got trumped by self-respect, self-esteem, self-confidence, and self-ascribed dignity. Jesus’ exhortation to “love thy neighbor as thyself” has been shortened to a hard and fast, ruthlessly enforced mandate: love thyself.
After probing deeply into what many theologians and philosophers and thinkers have observed on Pride, I think it accurate to say that pride cut off from a connection to almighty God is a deadly sin. Moreover, a heart that is filled with pride alone is not the route to go. The Lord’s servant Moses prays as follows in the 90th Psalm: “Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” Wisdom, and not pride of the foolish or vain variety, is the route to go.
But how shall we gain wisdom? Is it gained by earning an associate, a bachelors, a masters, or a doctoral degree? Someone once said that “your education is what you have after you’ve forgotten everything you’ve learned in college.” Is wisdom, therefore, only the sum total of your experiences?
What’s this about numbering our days? When we number our days, we mark time – days, weeks, months, and years. It jogs our memories. “Do you remember when?” we sometimes ask in conversation. We discover, very quickly, that our own days on this earth are numbered as well, although we don’t know that number. We have no way of knowing, for sure, whether we will be here for another day, year, or decade.
This knowledge of our limits -- indeed, the wisdom gained by numbering our days – drains the tank from the engine of our pride. The question now becomes this: since our days are numbered, how are they to be lived?
As the blessed apostle Paul points out to the Romans Christians in today’s text, our lives are to be lived toward the Lord – to the Lord and for the Lord. Paul declares: “For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.”
St. Thomas Acquinas said that “Pride is the unavoidable sin.” The more we try to avoid it, the more we face it. But we are not left to our own devices. Our Lord, in Jesus Christ, came to seek us and to save us. As the old hymn says: “Chief of sinners though I be, Jesus shed His blood for me – died that I might live on high, lives that I might never die. As the branch is to the vine, I am His and He is mine.”
As we number our days, as we mark time, as we face our limits, as we remember events tragic or joyful, the words of the Lord through the prophet Jeremiah say it all:
This is what the LORD says:
“Let not the wise boast of their wisdom
or the strong boast of their strength
or the rich boast of their riches,
but let the one who boasts boast about this:
that they have the understanding to know me,
that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness,
justice and righteousness on earth,
for in these I delight,”
declares the LORD.Amen.
Theme: “7UP: Pride” (2nd in a series)
13th Sunday after Pentecost
September 11, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
1 Accept the one whose faith is weak, without quarreling over disputable matters. 2 One person’s faith allows them to eat anything, but another, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. 3 The one who eats everything must not treat with contempt the one who does not, and the one who does not eat everything must not judge the one who does, for God has accepted them. 4 Who are you to judge someone else’s servant? To their own master, servants stand or fall. And they will stand, for the Lord is able to make them stand.
5 One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in their own mind. 6 Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. 7 For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. 8 If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. 9 For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
10 You, then, why do you judge your brother or sister[a]? Or why do you treat them with contempt? For we will all stand before God’s judgment seat. 11 It is written:
“‘As surely as I live,’ says the Lord,
‘every knee will bow before me;
every tongue will acknowledge God.’”[b]
12 So then, each of us will give an account of ourselves to God.
Many and various have been the remembrances, testimonies, services of worship, and special events surrounding this day, which is the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on our country. Last week at UNT, former U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates – who served under both President Bush and President Obama -- led us through a long and detailed history of terrorism in our time which reached a culmination of sorts on 9/11.
While listening to some of these civic rituals, I was reminded of the days and weeks and months which followed that horrible day. There was such an outpouring of national unity. For a little while, just a little while, we seemed to set down the rhetorical weapons of our caustic political warring and sensed a togetherness as Americans that we hadn’t experienced in quite awhile. Flags seemed to fly higher. They were draped over railings and banisters. Mini-versions of Old Glory were affixed to automobile doors. The national anthem was sung with more vigor, and it was often accompanied by a fly-over of F-16s. Our hearts and our dollars and pints of our blood went out in unprecedented proportion to the victims, the families of the victims and first responders. A patriotic fervor swept the nation. New bumper stickers were omnipresent. One of them, featuring an image of the red, white, and blue, said, quite simply: “The Power of Pride.”
Pride does seem to have a power: the power to look back on the past and confidently assert that we’ve learned its lessons. Pride includes the power of experience, tradition, and ties of family and background and religion. Pride, carefully understood, can be a good thing. Pride can be, as one scholar suggests, a “most attractive virtue. Parents try to instill a sense of ‘self-worth’ in children.” Yes, too much pride is rightly called arrogance, but the beneficial effects of pride – a sense of achievement, a desire for excellence, an aspiration to do the best that one can do and be the best that one can be – seem to outweigh the negative.
It’s difficult to see how pride, rightly understood, could be a deadly sin. But there it sits, nonetheless, on the historical list of the most deadly sins. Some would say that pride has been rehabilitated from being a vice to be avoided to a great virtue to be cultivated – think of National Pride, or Black Pride, or Gay Pride, or Southern Pride. There is pride in the great state of Texas. “I wasn’t born here, but I got here as fast as I could,” say some “foreigners” now living in our Lone Star State. I have to admit that pride is plastered all over my office walls with pictures from Nebraska’s national championships in football. Even more insidiously, there are placques noting my vocational attainments. And Pride dominates our politics. It is featured in our rehabilitation and counseling centers where “self-esteem” is encouraged. The great sin doesn’t seem to be pride at all. William Willimon states:
Somehow Pride and its cousins – arrogance, egotism, vanity, and conceit
- got trumped by self-respect, self-esteem, self-confidence, and self-ascribed dignity. Jesus’ exhortation to “love thy neighbor as thyself” has been shortened to a hard and fast, ruthlessly enforced mandate: love thyself.
After probing deeply into what many theologians and philosophers and thinkers have observed on Pride, I think it accurate to say that pride cut off from a connection to almighty God is a deadly sin. Moreover, a heart that is filled with pride alone is not the route to go. The Lord’s servant Moses prays as follows in the 90th Psalm: “Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” Wisdom, and not pride of the foolish or vain variety, is the route to go.
But how shall we gain wisdom? Is it gained by earning an associate, a bachelors, a masters, or a doctoral degree? Someone once said that “your education is what you have after you’ve forgotten everything you’ve learned in college.” Is wisdom, therefore, only the sum total of your experiences?
What’s this about numbering our days? When we number our days, we mark time – days, weeks, months, and years. It jogs our memories. “Do you remember when?” we sometimes ask in conversation. We discover, very quickly, that our own days on this earth are numbered as well, although we don’t know that number. We have no way of knowing, for sure, whether we will be here for another day, year, or decade.
This knowledge of our limits -- indeed, the wisdom gained by numbering our days – drains the tank from the engine of our pride. The question now becomes this: since our days are numbered, how are they to be lived?
As the blessed apostle Paul points out to the Romans Christians in today’s text, our lives are to be lived toward the Lord – to the Lord and for the Lord. Paul declares: “For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.”
St. Thomas Acquinas said that “Pride is the unavoidable sin.” The more we try to avoid it, the more we face it. But we are not left to our own devices. Our Lord, in Jesus Christ, came to seek us and to save us. As the old hymn says: “Chief of sinners though I be, Jesus shed His blood for me – died that I might live on high, lives that I might never die. As the branch is to the vine, I am His and He is mine.”
As we number our days, as we mark time, as we face our limits, as we remember events tragic or joyful, the words of the Lord through the prophet Jeremiah say it all:
This is what the LORD says:
“Let not the wise boast of their wisdom
or the strong boast of their strength
or the rich boast of their riches,
but let the one who boasts boast about this:
that they have the understanding to know me,
that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness,
justice and righteousness on earth,
for in these I delight,”
declares the LORD.Amen.
Sunday, September 4, 2011
7UP
Text: Romans 13:8-14
Theme: “7UP” (1st in a series)
12th Sunday After Pentecost
September 4, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
8 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,”[a] and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”[b] 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
11 And do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. 12 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. 14 Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.
Here’s a quintessential American story just in time for Labor Day weekend. For over eighty two years, Americans have enjoyed a particular kind of liquid refreshment known as 7UP. The effervescent soft drink with the lemon-lime flavor – and a little less sweet tasting than, say, Sprite – was invented by a gentleman by the name of Charles Leiper Grigg. Ten years before 7UP was born, Mr. Grigg invented an orange flavored soft drink called Whistle. But he had a falling out with the company he worked for. Thus, he started his own business and produced another orange-flavored beverage called Howdy. The record shows that Howdy was well-received by the soft drink drinking public. But it was no match for the ever-popular Orange Crush. So Mr. Grigg set about, as an American entrepreneur in the bottling business, to come up with something to challenge Orange Crush. As it goes, many other bottlers were doing something with the lemon-lime flavor, but nothing held a candle to Orange Crush. Grigg saw an opening, and 7UP was born. The beverage was initially called “Bib-label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda.” The “bib” bit was for the paper label that slid down a generic bottle. The “lithiated” was for the traces of lithium, a mood-altering substance found in spring waters, that was included in the concoction.
The name was a bit too long, and it soon morphed to 7UP Lithiated Lemon Soda. Even that was too much verbiage, so, in 1936, the soda was officially and finally re-dubbed as 7UP, and the Howdy Corporation became the 7UP Company.
Why was it called 7UP? Mr. Grigg never explained why. We don’t have an answer to the question. Lacking an answer, theories often fill the void – and there are several of them which I won’t get into now.
The name of the beverage has the number 7 in it. So does the list of sins that have been handed down to us through the centuries. I speak of “The 7 Deadly Sins.” Why there are seven of them, I do not know. Why they are deadly, is another good question. In any case, the seven deadly sins are as follows: pride, envy, sloth, wrath, greed, gluttony, and lust.
During the next few Sundays, I propose to take what I’m going to call a “refreshing” look at these seven deadly sins. We’ll touch on their history and highlight stories from the Bible – and from our current age – that illustrate them.
Note, I did not say that the sins were refreshing. The sins themselves are patently stale and most certainly corrosive – damaging to body, mind, and soul -- if engaged in over any period of time. Even a patently atheist or agnostic psychiatrist or psychologist can tell you that. But my aim will be to bring them up (7UP!), haul them out of the darkness and into the light, expose them, name them, and then, with the resources of the Gospel and Sacraments of Christ, outline and celebrate what God has done – and is still doing – about them! If this happens (and I hope it does!), that will be refreshing for us.
In today’s New Testament reading, the apostle Paul urges the Christians at Rome to “…clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.” What exactly are those “desires of the flesh” that we aren’t to think about gratifying? As we shall see, many of them can be spotted in the seven deadly sins.
Now, let me be the first to say that God loves you, God forgives you, God knows the plans He has for you – plans to prosper you and to give you hope, and all of that. Certainly, we’ve come to praise God, thank God for His benefits to us, enjoy the company of his people. The inconvenient truth, though, is that we can do all this and yet be in total and profound denial about sin. Sin is a word – and a reality – that we either joke about publicly or murmur about under our breath as we point the finger at someone else. Why is it that someone else’s sins – perceived or otherwise – are so plainly obvious to us, while our own are shrouded in mystery?
A pastor once asked a young man, a recovering alcoholic, why he stopped coming to church. He replied: “I’ll tell you. After you have been t o AA, and taken the cure, and had to stare your demons in the face, and had to stand up naked in front of twenty other drunks and tell every bad thing you have done or thought, and had to ask God and them to forgive you for being you, well, church just seems like such a trivial waste of time.” Reflecting on the exchange, the pastor wrote: “Church is about more than sin, but, but by the grace of God, it ought not to be less than this.”
He reflected further:
It is odd that we have made even Jesus into such a quivering mass of affirmation and oozing graciousness, considering how frequently, unguardedly, and gleefully Jesus told us that we were sinners. Anyone who thinks that Jesus was into inclusiveness, self-affirmation, and open-minded, heart-happy acceptance has then got to figure out why we responded to him by nailing him on a cross. He got there not for urging us to ‘consider the lilies’ but for calling us ‘whitewashed tombs’ and even worse. Yet it is perhaps not such a mystery that we have attempted to produce a promiscuously permissive, user-friendly Jesus. After all, we are the folk who, having just lived through history’s most bloody century, kicked off a new one on a September morn by witnessing the killing of scores of innocent civilians, then excusing another Bush war that slaughtered even more innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, all for the very best of democratic, national motives. Let’s simply say that we are not off to a particularly good start at presenting ourselves as good, kind, loving, and enlightened folk who have at last put all that primitive sin behind us. (William H. Willimon, Sinning Like a Christian: A New Look at the Seven Deadly Sins)
Earlier, I mentioned the original name of 7UP: “Bib-label Lithiated Lemon-Lime soda.” “Lithiated” means that there are traces – only traces – of the mood-stabilizing drug, lithium, in it. With that in mind, there are those who would like worship to include traces of spiritual lithium, if you will, to stabilize moods. With the world being what it is, our moods can be off the charts. A little stabilization might be a good thing. Some would say that it’s called for. Church should be “Happy Hour”, no?
Jesus Christ, who dealt with moods both off the charts and stabilized, loved people and spoke the truth to them. No matter the mood, He loved them – which included calling them out on their stuff; He “truthed” them.
Church, at its best, is not for attitude adjustment. It is for finding ourselves on the receiving end of heaven-sent love and truth. It is for clothing ourselves with Christ, so that we do not gratify the desires of the flesh.
And this morning, in our world where the seven deadly sins – and so many more! -- are having a bull run, the Lord sets a table. He has not left us to our own devices. Rather, He enjoys fellowship with us. That, my friends, is refreshing.
Amen.
Theme: “7UP” (1st in a series)
12th Sunday After Pentecost
September 4, 2011
First Presbyterian Church
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
IN THE NAME OF JESUS
8 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,”[a] and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”[b] 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
11 And do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. 12 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. 13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. 14 Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.
Here’s a quintessential American story just in time for Labor Day weekend. For over eighty two years, Americans have enjoyed a particular kind of liquid refreshment known as 7UP. The effervescent soft drink with the lemon-lime flavor – and a little less sweet tasting than, say, Sprite – was invented by a gentleman by the name of Charles Leiper Grigg. Ten years before 7UP was born, Mr. Grigg invented an orange flavored soft drink called Whistle. But he had a falling out with the company he worked for. Thus, he started his own business and produced another orange-flavored beverage called Howdy. The record shows that Howdy was well-received by the soft drink drinking public. But it was no match for the ever-popular Orange Crush. So Mr. Grigg set about, as an American entrepreneur in the bottling business, to come up with something to challenge Orange Crush. As it goes, many other bottlers were doing something with the lemon-lime flavor, but nothing held a candle to Orange Crush. Grigg saw an opening, and 7UP was born. The beverage was initially called “Bib-label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda.” The “bib” bit was for the paper label that slid down a generic bottle. The “lithiated” was for the traces of lithium, a mood-altering substance found in spring waters, that was included in the concoction.
The name was a bit too long, and it soon morphed to 7UP Lithiated Lemon Soda. Even that was too much verbiage, so, in 1936, the soda was officially and finally re-dubbed as 7UP, and the Howdy Corporation became the 7UP Company.
Why was it called 7UP? Mr. Grigg never explained why. We don’t have an answer to the question. Lacking an answer, theories often fill the void – and there are several of them which I won’t get into now.
The name of the beverage has the number 7 in it. So does the list of sins that have been handed down to us through the centuries. I speak of “The 7 Deadly Sins.” Why there are seven of them, I do not know. Why they are deadly, is another good question. In any case, the seven deadly sins are as follows: pride, envy, sloth, wrath, greed, gluttony, and lust.
During the next few Sundays, I propose to take what I’m going to call a “refreshing” look at these seven deadly sins. We’ll touch on their history and highlight stories from the Bible – and from our current age – that illustrate them.
Note, I did not say that the sins were refreshing. The sins themselves are patently stale and most certainly corrosive – damaging to body, mind, and soul -- if engaged in over any period of time. Even a patently atheist or agnostic psychiatrist or psychologist can tell you that. But my aim will be to bring them up (7UP!), haul them out of the darkness and into the light, expose them, name them, and then, with the resources of the Gospel and Sacraments of Christ, outline and celebrate what God has done – and is still doing – about them! If this happens (and I hope it does!), that will be refreshing for us.
In today’s New Testament reading, the apostle Paul urges the Christians at Rome to “…clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.” What exactly are those “desires of the flesh” that we aren’t to think about gratifying? As we shall see, many of them can be spotted in the seven deadly sins.
Now, let me be the first to say that God loves you, God forgives you, God knows the plans He has for you – plans to prosper you and to give you hope, and all of that. Certainly, we’ve come to praise God, thank God for His benefits to us, enjoy the company of his people. The inconvenient truth, though, is that we can do all this and yet be in total and profound denial about sin. Sin is a word – and a reality – that we either joke about publicly or murmur about under our breath as we point the finger at someone else. Why is it that someone else’s sins – perceived or otherwise – are so plainly obvious to us, while our own are shrouded in mystery?
A pastor once asked a young man, a recovering alcoholic, why he stopped coming to church. He replied: “I’ll tell you. After you have been t o AA, and taken the cure, and had to stare your demons in the face, and had to stand up naked in front of twenty other drunks and tell every bad thing you have done or thought, and had to ask God and them to forgive you for being you, well, church just seems like such a trivial waste of time.” Reflecting on the exchange, the pastor wrote: “Church is about more than sin, but, but by the grace of God, it ought not to be less than this.”
He reflected further:
It is odd that we have made even Jesus into such a quivering mass of affirmation and oozing graciousness, considering how frequently, unguardedly, and gleefully Jesus told us that we were sinners. Anyone who thinks that Jesus was into inclusiveness, self-affirmation, and open-minded, heart-happy acceptance has then got to figure out why we responded to him by nailing him on a cross. He got there not for urging us to ‘consider the lilies’ but for calling us ‘whitewashed tombs’ and even worse. Yet it is perhaps not such a mystery that we have attempted to produce a promiscuously permissive, user-friendly Jesus. After all, we are the folk who, having just lived through history’s most bloody century, kicked off a new one on a September morn by witnessing the killing of scores of innocent civilians, then excusing another Bush war that slaughtered even more innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, all for the very best of democratic, national motives. Let’s simply say that we are not off to a particularly good start at presenting ourselves as good, kind, loving, and enlightened folk who have at last put all that primitive sin behind us. (William H. Willimon, Sinning Like a Christian: A New Look at the Seven Deadly Sins)
Earlier, I mentioned the original name of 7UP: “Bib-label Lithiated Lemon-Lime soda.” “Lithiated” means that there are traces – only traces – of the mood-stabilizing drug, lithium, in it. With that in mind, there are those who would like worship to include traces of spiritual lithium, if you will, to stabilize moods. With the world being what it is, our moods can be off the charts. A little stabilization might be a good thing. Some would say that it’s called for. Church should be “Happy Hour”, no?
Jesus Christ, who dealt with moods both off the charts and stabilized, loved people and spoke the truth to them. No matter the mood, He loved them – which included calling them out on their stuff; He “truthed” them.
Church, at its best, is not for attitude adjustment. It is for finding ourselves on the receiving end of heaven-sent love and truth. It is for clothing ourselves with Christ, so that we do not gratify the desires of the flesh.
And this morning, in our world where the seven deadly sins – and so many more! -- are having a bull run, the Lord sets a table. He has not left us to our own devices. Rather, He enjoys fellowship with us. That, my friends, is refreshing.
Amen.
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