In our Epistle text for today, the Apostle Paul encouraged young Pastor Timothy to work hard at his charge as the pastor over the church in Ephesus. He wrote to his young protege “An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard working farmer who should have the first share of the crops.” In other words, “do your work. Do your best. Be honest, play by the rules, and trust the Lord to bless your efforts.”
That same advice could apply to us, here at St Paul Chuckery.
Over this past week, in the Confirmation class that I teach here at the day school, we have been talking about the Kingdoms of God. Lutheran Theology talks about 3 Kingdoms, 2 on earth and one in eternity; the two on earth are the Kingdom of Power and the Kingdom of Grace, and then, God's heavenly kingdom where he will reign supreme for all eternity is the Kingdom of Glory. If you have the time and the opportunity, I would encourage you to take one of them aside and have them define each of those kingdoms for you. See what they come up with.
For our discussion this morning, those first two kingdoms, those Kingdoms where Christ is Lord and King here on earth are important, the Kingdom of Power and the Kingdom of Grace, we also refer to them as the “Right Hand Kingdom” and the “Left Hand Kingdom”. The kingdom of Grace (The Right Hand Kingdom) is the church, where Christ rules with love and forgiveness, where he gives out salvation for free and where the only thing we have to offer is our sin. The second kingdom, the Left Hand Kingdom is the Kingdom of Power. It is where God rules on earth through the earthly authorities, through our parents, but also through presidents and governors and teachers and employers. Here we have obligations and deadlines to fulfill and we also have work to do. According to the Kingdom of Grace, God has done everything for us. According to the Kingdom of Power, there is work that God wants us to do. And when we do our work and when we apply ourselves, we are rewarded.
In the Epistle Text for today, Paul was telling Timothy, as a pastor in the Church to get to work and get the job done. In the Church, in the Right Hand Kingdom, Christ had done everything. But that Church, you and I, we find ourselves living in the Left Hand Kingdom where there is work for us to do, where God blesses our work and our effort. We can't earn a spot in the church, We can't earn a spot in God's heart, that is done for us by Jesus. But by our own work, we can earn a spot in men's hearts, we can play according the man's rules, we can build up this spot in the Left Hand Kingdom and then use it for Christ to build up His Church.
Our Old Testament Lesson brings these two things together for us this morning. The Book of Ruth is an example for us of one who applied herself in the kingdom of the left, and one who was then blessed by the Lord, and because of her work and through her work, the Lord accomplished our salvation.
Ruth was a Moabite girl. A pagan and an unbeliever. She grew up with parents and friends who prayed to false gods and who did not know the true God. She happened into the Scriptures and into the people of God and the community of faith almost what might seem by accident. There was a famine in Israel and the Israelites went where the food was. You might compare her situation to our own. These days the economy is bad, people are out of work so they go where the jobs are. The same thing happened with Ruth's husband. His family moved to Moab in the midst of a down economy in Israel. They got married and all of a sudden Ruth's story coincided with God's salvation story.
It wasn't too long after, that Ruth's father in law died. Her Mother In Law, Naomi, stayed in Moab, however, because her sons where there. Their jobs where there. But soon her sons died also. And Naomi was left with no husband, no sons, and no relatives, a stranger in a strange land. She heard the local economy back home was better, she figured there were better chances for her with her family so she set off to move back home. We could probably read that same story or one a lot like it in the Columbus Dispatch, couldn't we?
So here's Ruth. Her husband is dead, her mother in law is moving away, to only God knows where, but she decided to go. She had nothing in Israel, no-one familiar waiting for her, no friends, no relatives, no house, no employment, not a whole lot to look forward to, but she devoted herself to the care of her mother in law. They both lost everything, she would make sure they didn't loose each other.
Now there was another sister in law in the picture, Orpah. Orpah, like Ruth, had married one of Naomi's sons. Orpah, like Ruth and Naomi had her husband die. When Naomi set about returning home Orpah went with her. But Naomi protested. The girls should stay with their families and with what was familiar. Orpah consented and stayed. She went back to the home of her family. Could you blame her? Isn’t' that what you would have done? I know I would have. But not Ruth. She stayed with Naomi. To put this back into our previous conversation, she saw work to be done in the Kingdom of the Left, to help and to serve her mother in law, she devoted herself to that work, and the Lord blessed her.
What work has the Lord placed before you? Are you like Ruth, one who has been challenged with service to your neighbor, to someone that you certainly are not obliged to serve, you aren't required to help, but still, if you did The Lord might work through your efforts for good.
Consider the work of the LWML. Today is LWML Sunday, for those of you not familiar with our Lutheran Acronyms, that stands for the Lutheran Women's Missionary League. The LWML does Ruth's work, of finding those who have needs and supporting them, and caring for them, and providing for them. They support the seminaries and the training of future pastors, here in the United States but also around the world. They provide clothing for the needy, humanitarian aid for the destitute, the support missionaries in countries all over the world. Between 2009 and 2011 they have plans to distribute $1.8 million to all of these projects, one mite box at a time.
And guess what, through their hard work and their willing service doing projects few people even bother to notice, God works for the good of his Kingdom. The LWML works hard in the Kingdom of the Left to take care of those who have need and through that work God builds up the Kingdom of the Right, the Church on earth. It grows, it is fed, it is encouraged, it continues its fight and its battle with sin death and the devil through little card board boxes filled with pennies and dimes and quarters.
God does the same through you. You, people of St Paul Chuckery, God works through you. As you do your work and dedicate yourself like Ruth did, like the LWML does, as you do your work in the Kingdom of the Left, God blesses that work and He works through those efforts to build up his church. You might not think about it, you might not realize it, but God makes things happen, God continues to write chapters in his salvation story.
That's what he did through Ruth. Like we said, her story was pretty common, one we might read in our own newspapers, tragic? Yes. Special or out of the ordinary? Not terribly. But God worked through her.
If you skip ahead to Matthew chapter 1 we are given a genealogy, a family history of Jesus. Where he came from and who his ancestors were. In that list is mentioned one, Ruth, a girl who grew up a pagan, an unbeliever, but one who He called to faith, one who he called to be his own, one who willingly received the gifts that God gave and then set about using those gifts to serve her mother-in-law when she was needed. And the Lord worked through her efforts and her faithfulness. She became a piece of the story of Salvation that God wrote for you and me. Jesus was born to be our King, the King of the Jews and the King of the heavens and the earth. He earned that crown and that throne when He died and paid for our sin and when His Heavenly Father accepted his sacrifice and raised him from the dead and seated him as King over every king and Lord over every lord. Jesus is Lord of Heaven and Earth, in the Kingdom of Power, but also and especially in the Kingdom of Grace.
And as he was writing that story, as he was making that happen, God used Ruth. And maybe God will use you as well. When all of His Salvation history has been written at the end of time and we are together in Eternity, perhaps your name will be mentioned as one God worked through to call someone else to faith. Maybe a word that you spoke encouraged someone to go to church, to pick up their Bible, to get to know Jesus, maybe that little work you did, that little mite that you donated had a profound and eternal impact on the life of another person. You might never know. Ruth probably didn't, at least not at the time, but here she is in our Scriptures as an ancestor of Jesus.
The Lord worked through her. Through Ruth and because of Ruth, Jesus was born.
Ruth worked. She did her part in the left hand kingdom, and God used it for good in his Right hand Kingdom. God's ultimate purpose is heaven and salvation and eternal glory in the new heaven and the new earth. And He made that happen through Jesus. Jesus is lord and Jesus is king. And Jesus is powerful. He uses that power over this world and he uses that power in you.
May you, like Ruth and like the LWML be a willing servant in the Kingdom of God.
Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment