Second Acts Are Real

Transcript

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[0:00] introduction. Our reading for the sermon is Genesis 18, 1 through 10a. We're going to read the first half of verse 10. And this is the story of Abraham and three visitors who come to him in the noonday heat, which is an unusual time to get a visit. And they give him a promise at the end. And so I want you to listen for that, but I want to give just a brief background on the life of Abraham, because it's going to come in important a little bit later. One thing that we remember is where we first meet Abraham, we meet him through his father Terah. T-E-R-A-H is how it's spelled. They're living in a town called Ur of the Chaldees. This is all the way on the opposite side of the Fertile Crescent from where Canaan is, where Abraham finally settles. And back then, Abraham's name was Abram. God hasn't changed his name quite yet. And his wife's name wasn't Sarah, it was Sarai. They lived there with his father and Abram's two brothers, Haran and Nahor. And God, it seems, even told Terah that to take his whole family, including his son Abram, and travel the whole distance of the Fertile Crescent. And you would definitely go that way because you wouldn't cut across the desert in between. That was impassable. And so they would follow the rivers

[1:18] and they would follow the curve of civilization hundreds of miles. And Terah set out, to go to Canaan with his whole family. But the problem was, even before he left, one of his sons, Haran, died. He died before his father. And his other son, Nahor, ended up marrying one of Haran's daughters. So he married his own niece, which back then maybe wasn't so unheard of. And he stayed behind. And so this caravan that set out started off, should have been with a father and his three sons. It ended up just being the father and his son, Abram. And so he was able to get out of the caravan. And his great-grandson Lot. So only really three families left. It should have been five. So they got halfway there to Haran, which is also the name of the town, which is also the name of Abram's brother. It's more of a coincidence. And there they stopped. They only went halfway. And Terah stayed there until he died. And Abram couldn't go any further because he had to stay with his father. So they were stuck halfway. Why did Terah stop? It seems like he didn't want to follow through and go all the way to Canaan as he intended. But once that once Terah died, Abram set out with his wife Sarai and his nephew Lot, and he completed the journey to Canaan.

[2:39] And from there, many other adventures kind of before even this story took place. But there's one word that lingers over all of this in Genesis chapter 11 and the beginning part of Genesis 12, where they tell the story of this family migrating is that it says that Sarai was barren. She had no children. And this is sort of the backdrop of the whole story of Abram and Sarai, Abraham and Sarah, is that they had no children. And their movement from way back had been a long journey that was met with some tragedy, met with people in the family not coming along, getting stuck halfway there. And then when Abram... When Abram actually made it to Canaan, he didn't necessarily stay there the whole time. He went to Egypt for a while there. He told some lies. And so there's a lot of things where Abram got off track even before this moment. Now we're at the place where Abram has been promised by God, you're going to have more descendants than there are stars in the sky.

[3:47] And Abram said, this is impossible because, you know, I'm pretty old and my wife is pretty old. They were in their 90s, right? But nonetheless, it says in Genesis 15, 6, and this is one to memorize, Abram believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. So only later in life was Abram actually finally getting to the place where he was in a righteous relationship with God. And then we get to this story where the promise is about to come about. So let's go to our reading. It's Genesis 18, 1 through 10a. It begins like this. The Lord, and there you notice the Lord, it says is capital L, small caps, O-R-D. That's whenever you see that in the scriptures, the word behind that is Yahweh. That's that the I am of God. The Lord appeared to Abram by the oaks of Mamre. As he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day, he looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them. And bowed down to the ground. He said, My Lord, if I find favor with you, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought and wash your feet and rest yourself under the tree. Let me bring a little bread that you may refresh yourselves. And after that, you may pass on since you have come to your servant.

[5:16] So they said, do as you have said. And Abraham hastened into the tent to Sarah and said, Make ready quickly three measures. Of choice, flour, knead it, and make cakes. Abraham ran to the herd and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant who hastened to prepare it. Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared and set it before them. And he stood by them under the tree while they ate. They said to him, where is your wife Sarah? And he said, there in the tent. Then one said, I will surely return to you. And your wife Sarah will have a son. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this word. And we ask that you would add your blessing to it. In Jesus' name, amen.

[6:09] Well, what a story, right? This is, I would call it the second chapter. I love what Pastor Noethelfer said earlier. There's these moments in time where there's the past and the present and the future. And at each one of those, there's a new moment. And we've had, if you want to mark the history of the church by what building it was in, it was from 1962 to 1977. If you want to go by which pastor was the pastor, you could go by those years. Or you could go by any one of you who have been here in the church, the time you came to the time you left. Or you could go by decades, 10, 20, 30. So now we're starting our seventh decade of ministry as a church. Praise God. So there are sort of chapters in the life of the church. Just like there's our chapters. And there's a lot of chapters in the life of Abraham and Sarah. And several chapters have come before. Like I said, many of them with some confusion or some brokenness or some stuckness. And on top of it all, the specter of infertility, which was a challenge for them. He was going to make Lot his nephew, his heir. He had kind of already decided that he wasn't going to have any children. He had given up on God's promises and actually started a family with Sarah's servant, Hagar.

[7:22] So he had kind of tried to even go. He was following his own way in all this. And yet God keeps coming back to him with faithfulness saying, no, the next chapter is me being faithful to you. You and Sarah will have a child by faith. And they did. So there's that next chapter that starts. And it starts really right here. Verse 10 where one said, I will surely return to you in due season and your wife Sarah shall have a son. And that next chapter, the second chapter of Abraham's life is a chapter of faithfulness, even to the point and I was reading this story to my son Asher last night and this Jesus storybook Bible about how he takes Isaac up the mountain and in faithful obedience is willing to sacrifice even this one son that he had waited all his life for. And he was certain he could not replace him. And yet he was willing and faithful. And God instead, provided a different sacrifice.

[8:26] So Abram's life changes from this point on. This child comes into his life and faithfulness, not that he hadn't been faithful before, but there were some mistakes. Now faithfulness is moving forward in Abraham's life.

[8:40] I want to say one quick thing. Did you notice that the Lord came to visit Abraham? But when the Lord appeared, who was it? Three men. Three men. Is that a bit confusing? A little odd? Interesting. It's interesting, isn't it? It doesn't, it's not an angel. Well, maybe it is an angel, but it's not just one person. When God shows up, he shows up as three embodied people. Now make of that what you will, but we preached on the Trinity just about a month ago. I thought it was quite fascinating. You know, it's very interesting, but there's this incarnational moment when God comes to earth. It's not just in Jesus, but he takes sort of a fleshly, fleshly form and he comes out and he talks to Abraham in person. And you know, these people, they're not just sort of floating sort of holograms because what do they do?

[9:34] They, he watches them eat a meal. You can't, a spirit can't do that. I don't think it would just kind of pass right through them, wouldn't it? So here God is in the flesh. Isn't it interesting that when God comes in the flesh, a child is born and promised, and new life and righteousness and hope and second chances all come about. Isn't that something that that happens here? You know, the Bible, it has these echoes in the past that point way forward to the future. You could look at this one and see very much that this is prefiguring the story of Christmas. Can't you? You could see it. It's all here. The three wise men come to announce, you know, to, to pay their respects. It's very interesting. And more happens after that. And then after the story that we're not going to go into now, but after this sort of next chapter begins, Abraham starts right away by haggling after this. He haggles with these three men who represent God. He's haggling over the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah. And Abraham is asking God for mercy for the people who live in those towns. And God haggles back. Oh, for 50? Yes. Well, for 50, I will spare. Well, what about for 40? Abraham says, well, okay, for 40. And God and Abraham manages to negotiate with God all the way down to a much smaller number

[11:01] that those towns would be saved if God were to find that many righteous people in them. Abraham is already beginning to act like a merciful person. Ultimately, we know that it doesn't work out for Sodom and Gomorrah. But I think the important thing here is that Abraham is pleading. He's pleading for his world in front of the throne of God, saying, can there be mercy for this world? And that's the right spirit I think that he's in.

[11:31] Well, I'm going to just skip ahead a little bit, but we have Abraham prepares this food for these men. They eat. And that's hospitality. I won't say much more about that, but there's this hospitality that's inherent, where you create a space, where, instead of God, just, you know, just sort of coming and passing through. And there's a little, there's a lot going on in this text. I encourage you to look at it at home. But you may notice at the very beginning, Abraham almost tricks these people, these messengers from God. The other question in this, and we can't really go into it too much, is when does Abraham know that he's in the presence of God? Right? Because the narrator says the Lord, Yahweh, came to visit. But Abraham doesn't know that. He sees three people coming at midday, which is not a normal time to go traveling. You would stay inside or stay in the shade.

[12:29] But at some point, Abraham knows something. Because eventually, of course, he definitely knows, because they start arguing or negotiating about the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah. But at first, Abraham says to these three men, he says, oh, you're passing on through. Well, let me just get you a little bit of water. You know, let me just get you enough and a little bit of bread, and that'll be enough. And you can go. Then you can be on your way. And can you imagine if he had followed through on that? He would have never heard this blessing that was to come. There's this sense that when you create hospitality, though, you create space for the blessing to come in. But even though Abraham said that, that's not what he did. Did you notice that? He said, I'm going to bring you some water and some bread. That's it. Then you'll be on your way. But behind the scenes, he runs around like a madman, creating this giant feast. He sends for the best cattle. He gets his wife to make cakes, which are more like, they're also bread, but they're kind of flatter, and they're made in a different way. And then he goes and gets milk and curds, and he brings all this back. There's a lot more protein in this meal. This is more of a meal that you would have with a relative or somebody that you're transacting business with,

[13:39] or something where you would sort of solemnize a covenant that you make with another clan or another family in your village. And so what turned out to be just the simple hospitality of the family, it's not a big deal. This is great for for for for for for for for for for for for for and stay in this house and pronounce the blessing on us. The title of our sermon is that F. Scott Fitzgerald is mistaken. Famously he said there are no second acts in American life. He was talking about the fact that when he was 23 years old he wrote a smash novel. It was really popular but then later in life he wasn't sure if people could accept that he was going to write other novels that were different and of a different genre. Now it turned out that he was wrong even about himself. He himself had a second act. He wrote The Great Gatsby and some other books after that that were just as popular. But there are second acts. There are second acts for church. There's second acts in American life. Do you know who Madonna is? If you don't you're lucky but if you know who Madonna is she's had five acts now but each one is all I think a little less exciting. She's on her fifth act now easily. So there are fifth five acts in some books.

[15:20] So if you remember if you remember if you remember if you remember if you remember It's still true. God is blessing us, and the next blessings to come are beyond our wildest imaginations. If you want to say we're in our seventh act because we're in our seventh decade, or you want to say in our second act because it's time for a second act, it doesn't matter. There are extra acts. There are new chapters in Abraham's life where you move from this brokenness to this righteousness, to this faithfulness, to this belief that God can and will and actually does do this thing. And remember, overall, all of it, overall of Abraham and Sarah's story was the inability to have a child of their own, to have offspring that would live on beyond them, which was so important in the Middle East back then, but it's still important now. And anyone who knows anyone who's had trouble with infertility will understand this. What a difficult and painful thing it can be.

[16:53] But God comes through and says, in the next act, you will have offspring. And I think he says that to churches too. The future, even though you may be small now, the future holds a time when your offspring will be quite numerous. And we anticipate and praise God for that day. You know, the church as it is now, it's actually a little bit smaller than when the church was chartered. There were 50 churches. There were 58 adults when the church was chartered, when they closed the charter of the church. 58 people had signed. That means there were more than 58 people, though, because many of them had children with them, right?

[17:29] We don't even have 50. We have just about 58 people if you add up all the children too. So we're close. We're just slightly smaller than the church was 60 years ago. And hey, I'll be honest with you. You know, the church was even bigger than this for a while and it saw a decline. There were years when 20 or 30 people were taken off the membership rolls. If you go in the museum, you can look at the record of all the people who've come to the church. And there are many that they have the column where they list when they left the church and why. And it says the deacons contacted them and they decided to leave. Or they haven't even responded to the letters from the church saying, do you still want to be a member of the church? So they've been dropped by inactivity. Or they've moved away, which is understandable. Some of you have moved away. We miss you. We should come back.

[18:16] And Miriam, you are welcome. Back here. But I pray that there's no opportunity for that to happen. But you would be most welcome back here, you know, if you want to come back. She mentioned earlier on. You're always welcome back, everybody.

[18:34] But this church saw a great height of numbers and it has seen decline. It has had moments of great beauty and had sent missionaries all abroad the world. There have been moments of dysfunction in this church where people left the church because they felt it wasn't an emotionally or spiritually safe place. This is true. This is challenging.

[18:55] We're now in a stage where we're counting the fruit, not necessarily as people, numbers, but we're saying, are we being faithful? This is our obedience. Are we being faithful? Are we giving our best work that God asks us to do? And are we being led by the Spirit? And are we being a healthy, healthy, and safe place. And we've made progress in those areas. I think the growth, I think the numbers will come with that as a foundation. It has to start there, okay? And so the church, the church is still here. The church is still blessing this community. The church is still growing young people. One of the, I mean, if you want to hear now, as you're a visitor, you want to hear what's happening in the church. We have a vibrant youth ministry. We have seven youths, going to our version of CHIP tomorrow morning. That's exciting. We have a vibrant children's ministry, Sunday school ministry. Pastor Victoria, whom you met earlier is, is, you know, I think if she were to count between her and me as the best thing that have ever happened to the church in the last 12 years, and I'm not saying I would be it, but it was definitely Victoria. I mean, come on, Karen, give me an amen. Isn't Victoria coming the best thing that's happened

[20:13] to the church in the last? She's a gift. Praise God. And we went through a process when we hired her of faith because we didn't even have enough money to pay her. We said we have enough money in reserves and we're going to, we're going to pay her for about a year. And then we're going to be out of money. And then we have to decide what to do. Either she has to leave or something. And, and things came together. We managed to rent some of the space in the church to a preschool and that gave enough income for Victoria's salary. So God has been faithful to us. We just said, we, we want to hire this person. She's going to do an extra job. We're going to do excellent work for our children. We're going to walk in faith in the sense that we don't know if we can even keep her, but we're going to try. And it worked out. And I'll tell you, we have seen children come to the church because they're friends of other children here in the church. One of them got confirmed a month ago on June 5th. They didn't grow up in church, but they've been coming to church. During, you know, they bicycle here to church in the mornings. Praise God. And so God is good. We see, we see small, but incremental growth and conversion and the gospel going out.

[21:28] And then I'm going to say it again. We have so many people in the church who grew up in the church who are active missionaries right now. Praise God for that. So I've shortened up. That's about all I'm going to say. But one last thing is Jesus started with 12, didn't he? He started with 12 people. So I'm not worried about numbers in the least. Are you? If Jesus can do the whole world with 12 people, we can manage with 58. It's not a problem. And Jesus looks at, I think Jesus would look at the church we have now and say, I can work with this. If you're faithful, if you do your best work for us, if you're led by the Spirit, if you live in a healthy spiritual environment, then I'm going to send you out to the nations. And if you don't know Silicon Valley, I want you to know this. We don't have to go to the nations. The nations have come here. They are our neighbors. You should look at my apartment complex. They are from everywhere. And just in 12 apartments, there's people from all around the world. And so they're all around us here. The nations are here. God is ready to send us out of the huddle and go out into this world. And so I'm glad that you're here for our 60th anniversary. I want you to enjoy and get to know you.

[22:45] And I want you to connect with each other. Again, reconnect with each other. But I want to thank God now for his faithfulness. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this word. Thank you for second acts, third acts. Thank you for the faithfulness of Abraham. Thank you for your faithfulness to the people who had not been able to have offspring, that they could have offspring. We pray for spiritual offspring for this church. We pray for our second act. We pray for what comes ahead. And Lord, we thank you and honor you for this experience today.