[Propertalk] Fwd: Sermon for this Sunday and illustration

[Joe Parrish]

This week's Illustration:


Heaven
                             
  An ancient Asian tale gives two images that contrast the difference between heaven and hell. The image of hell is this: There is a large banquet hall. The room is prepared with all the finest that money can buy. The table and chairs are made of oak from the Black Forest of Germany. The linen is handmade by European craftsmen. The plates and saucers are bone china and the glassware is Waterford crystal. The meal itself has been prepared by the world's best chefs. The guests are present and are dressed in their finest attire. The only odd thing about this scene is the silverware utensils, which made of sterling silver, are very long, heavy and cumbersome. When the guests sit down and begin to eat, some people are not able to lift any of the utensils. Those that are able to lift the fork, knife or spoon cannot maneuver it so as to get anything to eat. Soon banqueters begin to bump into each other in their attempt to eat. Frustration and even anger is the result. In the end no one gets anything to eat.
                                                         
  The image of heaven is a bit different. The same banquet hall is adorned in the same way; the Black Forest oak, linen, bone china, Waterford crystal and fine food are all present. Even the large and cumbersome silverware is present. There is a different group of guests who are dressed very smartly. Somehow these banqueters have learned an important lesson. They realize that the utensils will not allow them to feed themselves. Thus, as they sit down to eat, those that are able to lift the utensils pick up food and maneuver it so as to feed a neighbor. When necessary two people lift a fork and feed a third person, who, in turn, with aid feeds those who fed him. In the end all eat well; each person is satisfied, because they have learned to feed each other.


Proclaim Sermon for this Week

Becoming Who You Forgot You Were
March 18, 2012


Ephesians 2: 1-10 (RCL)
Ephesians 2: 4-10 (LFM)
Lent 4


Summary
Being created by God in Christ Jesus gives us the power and freedom to do the work of God here on this earth now. How we respond to this determines what we leave behind. We are created for good works.


Excerpt
  In August 2011, a group of archaeological students on a learning dig off the Central Coast of British Columbia, Canada, unearthed the remains of a 10,000-year-old village. They found fishing tools made from deer bones and antlers. That find seems to connect with legends of a village that was a winter gathering place where ancient peoples repaired tools, shared harvests and joined in song and dance. There are legends, but the full story has been lost to time. Those people existed within what seemed to be a certain society but it is now gone: "From dust you came and to dust you shall return."
  We will never fully know what life was like for earlier cultures. We might find coins, tools, signs of advancement and achievement, but most likely, we won't find the diary of a family trying to survive in a world without grocery stores, Starbucks and indoor plumbing. We can't quite know those earlier persons, and yet, they were likely similar to us in trying to understand their place in the world, trying to put into context how one moment life can feel like a wide-open landscape and then the next, like a narrowing path with an end close in sight.
  But now fast-forward 1,500 years. What will future civilizations unearth about us? When we are no longer remembered by our descendants and Facebook albums have faded into technological history like cassette tapes, what will remain about who we were? There is much about our society that contributes to the sciences, arts and humanity, but then, well, there's a lot of strange stuff in our culture like reality TV that makes people famous but contributes nothing.
  This can be a bewildering world. If we find it difficult to make sense of what is going on in our world, just imagine what tomorrow's archaeologists will say about who we are, what we are about and what mattered the most to us.
  Cultures come and go, but there are things we suspect are common to every culture. If we shared a meal with someone from that long-ago village in Canada and someone from a first-century house church in Ephesus, we would likely find that we all want to know why we are here on this earth and what is the purpose for our being. We would also want to know that our lives mean something, that when the layers of dust have covered us over, we will have left behind something that mattered.


A radical statement
  Our scripture reading is addressed to a small community of believers in Ephesus. In it, Paul writes of a new way to...(approximately 1,738 words remaining.)


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