Text: Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17
Theme: “Reformation on Pennsylvania Dr.”
Reformation Sunday
October 26, 2014
FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
Denton, Texas
Rev. Paul R. Dunklau
+In
the Name of Jesus+
Lord, you have been our dwelling place
throughout all generations.
2
Before the mountains were born
or you brought forth the whole world,
from everlasting to everlasting you are
God.
3
You turn people back to dust,
saying, “Return to dust, you mortals.”
4
A thousand years in your sight
are like a day that has just gone by,
or like a watch in the night.
5
Yet you sweep people away in the sleep
of death—
they are like the new grass of the
morning:
6
In the morning it springs up new,
but by evening it is dry and withered.
Relent, Lord! How long will it be?
Have compassion on your servants.
14
Satisfy us in the morning with your
unfailing love,
that we may sing for joy and be glad all
our days.
15
Make us glad for as many days as you
have afflicted us,
for as many years as we have seen
trouble.
16
May your deeds be shown to your
servants,
your splendor to their children.
17
May the favor[a]
of the Lord our God rest on us;
establish the work of our hands for us—
yes, establish the work of our hands.
Today, on this Reformation Sunday, the Lord’s Table is adorned
with its red parament and so is this pulpit.
Red is the traditional color of the Holy Spirit, the third person of the
Holy Trinity. It also symbolizes the
church. In the background are placards
that represent the confessional statements that are in the Presbyterian Book of Confessions. These statements demonstrate that the church,
inspired by the Spirit, has confessed the faith it has been given. For all of this, we can be joyful and sing
with that great reformer, Martin Luther:
Ein Feste Burg ist Unser Gott. (“A
Mighty Fortress is Our God”). Even
better, we can listen to King David in the 90th Psalm: “Lord, You have been our dwelling place
throughout all generations.”
Reformation means change.
One popular phrase about the Presbyterian Church I learned when studying
for ordination was as follows:
“Reformed, and always reforming.”
It seeks to convey that the church has changed, and it will keep
changing.
Change makes a good number of us uncomfortable. If
anything needs to be done in the life of the church, it’s nothing more than a
little tweaking here and a little fine-tuning there that won’t hurt that much
if at all; this, in turn, will lead to what some church observers call
“explosive” or “dynamic” growth. But
wholesale change – reform on a large scale -- is a big “No, No”. Those resistant to change – to modern
reformation -- are often content with the status quo. But meanwhile, outside the church’s doors,
the status quo is marching right on by.
Inside the church’s doors, folks start to wonder what happened – as they
see older members pass on to their great reward and younger generations stay
away.
What happened? The
church hunkered down. President Kennedy
was assassinated; the Vietnam War gripped our attention in the 1960s. In the 1970s, we sat shocked at the emergence
of the “Jesus Generation”. We kind of
liked that, but shuddered at the rock and roll, free love, and drug use that
came with it. Some, in the 1980s, jumped
full-bore on the Reagan bandwagon, and the thought gained traction that
latching on to political coattails might be the way to go. That was the case among Presbyterian
conservatives. The more liberal or
progressive believers latched on to the agenda of the World Council of Churches
and the National Council of Churches and steered the church toward what they
called “social justice” Conservatives called that socialism; liberals called
that “what Jesus taught”. (These lines
of argumentation are still current to this day.) Then came the 1990s and the technological
revolution. It marched right on by while
the church was trying to get its thinking clear on the previous decades. The advent of the microchip marched right on
by the advent of our Lord. Information
was knowledge, and knowledge is power. We
can unite the world with invisible beams and satellites, but we also can unite
terrorist cells. Now, mid-way through
the second decade of the new millennium, we have the children of the
baby-boomers – represented today by all these empty pews. It should surprise no one that they believe
that life is all about looking out for themselves. Yet, they desperately crave community – and
that little cellphone is nothing short of the cultural sacrament that binds
them together.
And what about our Protestant/Reformed/Presbyterian
tradition? We’re still figuring out how
to text and tweet. Again, we hunkered
down. We turned in on ourselves. We became a club and, therefore, very
particular about who we let in and kept out.
Spiritually, church became our dwelling place. Somehow, through the
decades, we forgot what King David said:
The “Lord is our dwelling place.”
One road that leads in and out of the neighborhood where I
live is Pennsylvania Drive. I turn left
on Pennsylvania Drive, and I come to Teasley Lane. There at the stop sign, I look left and I see
the Southmont Baptist Church. I look to
the right, and there before me is St. Mark Catholic Church. If you want to get technical about it, those
two congregations are separate today because of the Reformation of the 16th
century. Historically, that’s an
undeniable fact. More often than not, I
think of this when I come to the intersection.
I think of this breach that theologians have debated for hundreds of
years – as the world marches right on by!
Of late, however, I learned about a faster route out of my
neighborhood. I’m still on Pennsylvania
Drive for a bit, but I avoid clashing with those churches, so to speak.
I was at LA Fitness recently and was talking with a new
friend there. He asked me: “What exactly IS a Presbyterian?” Just as I was about to share something of an
answer, another guy in the locker piped up:
“A Presbyterian is just a Baptist that knows how to read.” Fascinating.
Speaking of that gym, two and half years ago, I really hadn’t
planned on going. I felt reasonably well,
and in fairly good shape. But then came
an annual physical: cholesterol was at
306; blood pressure was over 150. I
checked in at 219 lbs. The doctor
said: “You can afford to lose twenty
pounds” – as he handed me prescriptions for the blood pressure and
cholesterol. He talked about going to
the gym and being proactive about my health.
You know, sometimes I hear people say “I’m too old to
change.” Jerry Jeff Walker even wrote a
song by that title. Then there’s
this: “Leopards can’t change their
spots.” I don’t buy it. Today, my cholesterol is 169. My blood pressure is 120. I’m off those meds. I’m 175 lbs.
My bodyfat is twelve percent. I’m
in better shape than I was when I was in 8th grade playing football
and dreaming of playing for Nebraska.
All it took was an ounce of willingness – to change.
Christ has died.
Christ has risen. Christ will
come again. The changes that He brought
to the world, the changes the reformers brought to the world, were not in
vain. They will never be in vain as long
as they point to the Lord alone who is our dwelling place and who has given so
much and done so much, in Christ, for us all.
When these truths are renewed in us, we can find that ounce
of willingness to make change. We can be
reformed, and always reforming.
Amen.
