Semper Fidelis! Semper Preparatus!

Text:  Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16 & Luke 12:32-40

Theme:  "Semper Fidelis!  Semper Preparatus!"

12th Sunday after Pentecost

August 11, 2013

FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Denton, Texas

Rev. Paul R. Dunklau

 

+In the Name of Jesus+

 

The night is bitter
The stars have lost their glitter
The winds grow colder
And suddenly you're older

Sinatra says that it's all because of "The Gal That Got Away". It may not be a "gal" for you; it may be a "guy".  Perhaps it's something else altogether, but the feeling is the same:  "The night is bitter; the stars have lost their glitter.  The winds grow colder, and suddenly you're older."

 

Twenty six years ago, toward the end of grad school, a favorite professor of mine made a startling statement to me.  He said, "The world will seek to domesticate you to its ways."  "Domesticate", linguistically, comes from "domestic".  "Domestic" comes from the Latin "domesticus".  At the root of "domesticus" is "domus" -- the Latin term for "house" or "home".  The professor was saying that the world will seek to make you quite "at home" with its ways. 

 

Jesus spoke of being in the world but not of the world.  If we leave off the bit about not being "of the world," then we are left, only, with being in the world.  And the world is quite good at "domesticating" us to its ways. You hear it so often in the language that's used:  "Oh, that's the way the cookie crumbles"; "it is what it is"; "who knows what tomorrow will bring"; "you just have to do the best that you can."  "The heat index is what?  120 degrees?  Well, that's just summer in Texas."

 

Then there's this bit of verse that was scotch-taped to the inside kitchen cabinet door of my childhood:

The clock of life is wound but once

And no one has the power

To tell just where the hands will stop

At late or early hour.

 

Roughly forty people died, while I read that short poem, somewhere in the world.  Sooner or later, our number will be called -- and it will likely be just another day for all the rest of the folks still waiting for their number to be called. The world seeks to domesticate us to its ways. 

 

But somewhere, in the hidden recesses of our spirits and souls, in those parts of our minds and hearts that we kind of keep to ourselves, we cannot help but sing with Sinatra:

The night is bitter
The stars have lost their glitter
The winds grow colder
And suddenly you're older

And it's not because of "the gal that got away." It's because we're not sure what will become of us, and, therefore, we're afraid.  Why?  Because we know that there is something in us that yearns, that yearns for more than being domesticated to the ways of the world, that yearns for something better.  Stick with that yearning.  Stay with it for a moment.  It is more important than we can even begin to imagine. 

 

The resource for all of this domestication to the ways of the world -- where we often feel like pawns on someone else's chessboard, -- is what the readings for today give us. 

 

Nowadays, when science seems to be all and end all, the Bible gets cut up and shredded and dissected and discounted as all a bunch of ancient hogwash.  So called "scholars" try to disprove this and discount that all in attempt to cast doubt and polish their Ph.D's.  I take a different tack.  I don't see the Scriptures as some sort of literary laboratory specimen.  I see it as a gift, and the gifts in today's reading are piled up so high it's almost impossible to explain. 

 

Today's reading from the New Testament book of Hebrews talks of the ancient people of God.  You've heard of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Sara.  It is said that they lived by faith.  Certainly, they were in the world.  But they lived by faith and not by the ways of the world.  What is it that kept them from being completely domesticated to the world?  Faith!  And what is faith?  Our text answers:  "Faith is the asssurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." There is more to life than simply trying to smile when you're heart is aching.  There is faith.  "By grace are you saved through faith," the apostle said, "and this is not of works -- lest anyone should boast." 

 

My friends, I don't want a ministry or service that simply makes suggestion on how I can be a kinder, gentler, nicer person.  I need a ministry, a service, that fills me full of faith.  Semper fidelis!  Always faithful.  My times, your times, our times are in God's hands!  In Jesus Christ, those hands have nail marks in them.   You get a hold of that, and you've got the world by the tail!

 

Those people that I mentioned from God's World in the book of Hebrews, they were in the world.  But they yearned for a better country -- a heavenly one.  "And God," it says, is not ashamed to be their God, for He has prepared a city for them."  After church and after Sunday lunch, you'll likely go home this afternoon.  But deeper and better than going home after church is to know that at any time, whether here or there or anywhere, you are on your way home.  Jesus says "I go to prepare a place for you."

 

The message of Jesus, in today's Gospel, dovetails beautifully with the material from Hebrews.  Jesus exclaims: "Have no fear, little flock.  It is the Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom."  Since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, since fear is gone, since we live by faith, we can then be prepared to act on that faith.  We can live with God by faith and our neighbor with love.  Instead of singing the blues with Sinatra, instead of what of one of our great hymns calls "weak resignation to the evils we deplore",, we can get out of ourselves and seek to be of service. "Be dressed ready for service, and keep your lamps burning," says Jesus.  Semper Preparatus!  Always prepared! 

 

So there you have it:  in this world that seeks to domesticate us to its ways, in this world where the night is often bitter and the stars have lost their glitter and where the winds grow colder and suddenly you're older, there are the resources that pull you through.  The world will go on being the world, but we are, by the grace of God,  Semper Fidelis!  Always Faithful!  Semper Preparatus!  Always prepared!

 

Amen.