Loving Others

Text: James 3:1-12

Focus: Being nice in our speech.

Function: To help us love each other

Form: GOK: God Only Knows

Intro: (Animated) Thumper, what did your daddy tell you?

Thumper: “If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all.”

Being the week of 9/11, this has been a week of sad remembrances. I suppose that I was sort of lucky, spending the day traveling in my car with a precious brother and two precious sisters on our way home from AC.

It was sort of sobering to see all the flags at half mast and to have the conversations about what we were doing and where we were when those 4 planes were crashed into buildings and a field killing so many in an obvious terroristic attack.

Scot Miller made the point to me that the whole world, as we know it, changed on that day.

This morning, my grand daughters got to meet and speak with Jeanie and Nancy Hammond-Chaffey as we took an evening of respite at our Englewood, Ohio home.

It was odd, almost impossible for me to think of it when my grand daughter asked me about that day since, although she is now a teenager who seems more and more grown up every time I see her, to realize that she was not yet born on that day.

She only knows this post 9/11 world. All she really knows, all that she really understands, all that she has ever really heard about is the anger, hatred and calls for revenge as the nation still grieves the attack and the death.

I am patriotic. So, I have to remember that on that day, if we round up the number of deaths, 4,000 people -mostly American Citizens- died during that attack. And then another 8,000 combat Americans have died in our attempts to prosecute reprisals against our enemies.

And I have to remind myself that around 212,000 innocents and 50,000 soldiers, among our (show quotation marks) “enemies” have died.

And there are those who would say, “well, they attacked us and they ought to have known better.”

I understand that. And that is not really the point from this passage.

But it helps me to frame today's passage and great lessons I learned from the morning bible studies at NOAC lead by Robert Bowman together into this sermon.

Every bible study started out with this phrase: “A Certain Man Had Two Sons.”

We looked at the parable, commonly known as “the Prodigal Son.” Professor Bowman led us through the parable from the perspective of the Elder Brother, the perspective of the Younger Brother and the perspective of the Father.

I have preached that parable time and again, but never really considered something he brought to light. I agreed with him when he said it wasn't really about the prodigal, the son who left his family and returned. We most often hear the parable preached from the perspective of the waywardness, rebellion and reconciliation of a sinner who comes back to God.

I was raised in a pastor's family, but at a young age, I rebelled against my faith and my father's teaching, left the Church and was restored as the prodigal is.

Even though the parable follows the story of the lost sheep and the lost coin, and the ensuing celebration over their recovery, it isn't really about the lost son coming home.

Jesus told the parable in answer to the criticism that He was receiving because He was accused of being morally impure because Jesus was, and still is, by the way, the friend of sinners.

The story is about the elder brother's anger at the father for extending mercy to the younger brother.

I have preached that part more than I have preached about God's willingness to take us back if we have ran away from God.

The elder brother clearly resented the Father's mercy.

He was outside throwing a fit. And the father goes out to him to invite him to celebrate the restoration of his younger brother. And the elder brother goes off on his dad.

Jesus was telling those who criticized him for hanging around with imperfect people that God loves to forgive, restore and heal.

And we, we who are God's, whether we served God all our lives, or whether we came back to God after leaving, or whether it is our first encounter with the God who chose to name God's own self as “Love,” need to be happy at God's mercy, not resent the fact that others “got away” with sinning and still get to heaven.

Anyone who says that implies that living an evil life is more fulfilling that living a life of love, mercy and sacrifice.

Both children were pretty selfish and were only thinking of themselves. The younger brother when he squandered his portion of the family wealth on self-destructive living. And the elder brother when he initially refused to forgive.

But Professor Bowman said something I hadn't considered before.

I was thinking I was a pretty good bible scholar up until this point. I was feeling sort of smug when he was saying it isn't about the prodigal, the parable is about the elder brother.

But I always thought it was about the elder brother's refusal to be happy at the father's mercy. I always wanted to name the parable “the ungracious brother.”

But my smugness was dashed, and rightly so, when Professor Bowman said it out to be named: “The unfinished story of the elder brother.”

Because, we do not know if the brother changed his mind, agreed with his father's joy over the restoration of the lost son, or if the elder brother chose not to.

In the OT narrative. Esau, who was cheated, tricked, lied to and outright stolen from chose to forgive the younger brother even though his entire family was thrust out of the line of heritage that eventually made up the nation of Israel.

He was the better man.

But then, Cain murdered his younger brother.

Professor Bowman pointed out that Jesus leaves us with the tension, the unresolved mystery of exactly what the elder brother choose to do.

And, he said, that is where we are at.

Do we choose to forgive, or do we choose to continue to resent.

When I heard that I thought, “can I too, be happy about grace and mercy, or do I resent it?”

At one time in my youth, I was trained to run sound equipment, how to mix sounds to improve the voices of the singers/actors for either a concerts or a theatrical productions.

I was running the sound board for an outdoor Christian festival near Angola, Indiana in 1977.

A man was singing and sharing his story of how after years of self-destructive living, he was restored to God and his own family and the concert was a wonderful celebration of God's grace and forgiveness.

Standing near me were two members of Christian musical family who have regularly been featured on Gaither Homecoming videos and concerts.

The father, and leader of the musical family, in a fit of what seemed to me to be jealousy said: “I don't get it, we have been serving God faithfully for over 50 years, we have never sinned, backslid or fallen away and this guy gets all the credit for getting to do his own thing and people are happy about it?”

He was the elder brother.

And before we judge the elder brother, it is important to remember that his gripes were indeed legitimate. He was faithful. He was hard working. He took care of his father. He never disobeyed. He was hard working, conscientious and sincere. He was a great son. He was the son that father should indeed be proud of.

He did everything right. And the story wasn't finished, if he truly was a righteous man, then when the father asked him to be happy with the father at the joy that his brother survived his indicretions, he may have seen it father's way. Professor Bowman kept pointing out that we are not perfect, and sometimes, when we are angry, we need a reminder to consider things from God's perspective and celebrate with God the fact, power and joy of God's grace.

AMEN?

I love the Hymn, “I love to tell the story of God's love” because it reminds me of the good news of the gospel. Every time someone is restored from a self-destructive life to one of love and sacrifice for the Kingdom of God, I, We, all rejoice.

Amen?

The next day, Professor Bowman told the story from the younger brother's perspective and pointed out that we really don't know why the younger brother left. He may not have felt like he had a real chance, never measured up to his elder brother, it may have even been a mutual decision by the youth and the dad for him to leave. It was a great message as well.

And the next day, he tells the story from the Father's perspective.

A Certain Man Had Two Sons.

And the Father loves them both.

The Father wanted the sons to love each other.

And if the younger brother had legitimate reasons for leaving, and then when he got alone and away from his elder brother, and squandered his inheritance on self-destructive living, that is the best translation from the Greek that the KJV translates “riotous living,” we shouldn't be to hard on the man.

The Father clearly loved both sons and wanted them to love each other.

Their animosity, anger, fighting or whatever, was breaking the Father's heart.

Jesus wanted those who thought they were better than others to consider just how much the Father loves both.

God's love for us does not stop toward us, even if we reject God. God is love.

That is my favorite “self-description” of God for God's own self. LOVE.

Now our text about the tongue.

The text clearly says that what comes out of our mouths is clearly a matter of what is in our heart.

The parable teaches us that even the best of us -whether it was the elder or the younger brother- but the emphasis is that God loves both the best and the worse of us.

9/11 happened. And God loves our enemies. The elder brother wasn't happy about that fact.

But God's heart is an heart of love.

(Prayer to heaven) Pray with me, please. “God, help us love like you love.”