October 3, 2010
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
I confess that by and large, most of my sermons are characterized by their conviction of scarcity. Too many of my sermons point out what more you still need to do. They remind us of what we still need or what are our shortcomings. I admit that I may have conveyed this “scarcity thinking” in our church. You come to church with a positive attitude and you leave with a sermon title like: “Nine Reasons Why You are Not Really a Christian Even Though You Thought You Were When You Came to Church This Morning.” I apologize to you if I come across like this.
Are you sitting there thinking, “What? That’s ridiculous for the pastor to apologize. Of course we don’t have enough of what we need in this church. We don’t have enough pledges to do what we would like to do. We don’t have enough pastors to shepherd our different worshiping congregations. We don’t have enough volunteers for all the board and committee positions to fill. Everywhere we turn we find lack and scarcity.”
You say, “Aren’t we going to be told later this afternoon that we need to step up to have enough pledges to make the 2011 Proposed Budget?” That is very true.
But this morning, I want to tell you that we have all we need right now. We are not scarce or lacking of anything! God has already given us enough people to do the work that God commands, enough good ideas, and enough financial and spiritual resources to do the job. We’ve got enough time, enough energy, and enough money. Nothing that God demands is impossible for us in our present state of ministry.
When I was in seminary, one of my professors advised us that we are going to learn all the shortcomings and sins of our people. It will be too easy to be overwhelmed by all that and become defeated by a pessimistic assessment of them. He told us to remember that with all of the people’s shortcomings and problems, they are still God’s people, the ones that God has sent to be the church in your time and place. They are the best that God has got.
My professor’s words seemed wise to me today. For all of your shortcomings, you are the best that God has got in this place and time. You are all that God needs to do what God wants to do in the world. And I am grateful to be a part of you.
Increase Our Faith
Consider today’s scripture. Jesus has called a small group to follow him as his disciples. And throughout the story, they have shown that they are less than perfect disciples. They have misunderstood him and disobeyed him.
Any yet, Jesus tells them that they are to be full of forgiveness, to forgive those who wronged them time and time again. Is there anything more difficult to do than to forgive, not once, but dozens of times?
What on earth, from what Jesus has seen of these disciples in action, gives Jesus the impression that they will be able to obey him in his demand for them to be forgivers? Why set himself up for yet another disappointment with his disciples?
Maybe that’s why the disciples then beg, “Jesus, increase our faith!” They said, “If you are going to ask great things of us, Jesus, then you will surely have to increase our faith.”
Jesus’ reply to his disciples surprises us. It surprised the disciples too. He said you don’t need much faith to be faithful as one of my disciples. If you have just a small amount of faith, as small an amount of faith as a tiny mustard seed, then that’s enough.
In other words, they have all that they need to obey him and to be his disciples. They’ve got more than enough.
“Increase our faith,” say the disciples.
“You already have enough faith to do what I command,” says Jesus.
Sometimes I think that we use humility, complaining about all the virtues we lack because to believe that we have all that we need would require us to step up and make good on our faith. How often have we heard someone say, “Ask so and so because he is a much better speaker than I am?” Or, “Why don’t you ask someone who’s younger and has more energy than I have?” Or, “I can’t do that. There are others who can do a much better job than I can.” This list can go on and on.
Forgiveness is probably one of the most difficult commandments Jesus asked us to do. “Forgive seventy times seven!” commands Jesus. And we reply, “Look, Jesus, I’m no saint. I try to do what little good I can, but I’m not all that religious.”
And Jesus replies, “I have given you all that you need to follow me. Now get on with it.”
You Are the Best
You might not believe this but I truly believe that you are the best that God has got! You are faithful enough that God needs to do what God wants to do in this world. Maybe like the disciples when Jesus asked them to forgive others that we also want him to increase our faith because forgiveness is a very hard thing to do.
But Jesus told his disciples 2000 years ago and he is telling the disciples in this church in the year 2010 that your faith like a mustard seed is faithful enough to forgive each other and others in the world.
Your faith is enough to say to a mulberry tree with roots that are set deep and wide in the ground to be replanted out in the sea. Regardless of how bizarre and amazing is that, Jesus says that your faith is enough.
When Pastor Lauren resigned to care for her growing family and become a full-time mother, some of you said, “What are we going to do now that Pastor Lauren has left our church? Things are surely going to fall apart.”
But things didn’t fall apart. We missed Pastor Lauren, but Lauren’s departure forced us to look for other leaders whom God has given us. Some of the young mothers and fathers have stepped up and reorganized and cleaned-up the Nursery. Some of them took charge of planning Family Camp this past September. Some of them are serving on the search committee reviewing the applicants to call a new Pastor of Family Ministries to come to our church.
How many other gifts has God given this congregation that we have yet to discover?
Last Sunday, we were totally impressed and pleased with the beautiful and usable facilities that the YMCA has to offer us to expand our ministries in Chinatown. For the past 3 years, we questioned whether our faith was enough to partner with the Y and to trust our church in God’s hands. When it’s time to start a new worship service in the Y or to move one of our three services in the sanctuary to the Y, we have enough faith, enough leaders, enough gifts and talents, enough resources to make good on our promise to carry out God’s mission in the world through FCBC!
This afternoon at our Membership Meeting, you will be introduced to a Proposed Budget that will invite you to have enough faith to continue to perform God’s work in Chinatown and beyond like we have done for the past 130 years.
How many other gifts has God given this congregation that we have yet to discover?
Doing Our Duty
In the rest of the passage we read this morning, Jesus tells of a story about a master and his slave. After the slave has worked out in the field, the master expects the slave to prepare dinner and in the end, the master didn’t have to even thank the slave for all that he has done. Now for us, we find this story a bit repugnant and harsh because we don’t have or believe in owning slaves and when we do have servants, nannies, or gardeners working for us, we are often very appreciative and gracious to them to the point that we thank them. Some of us even clean our houses before the maid comes. But Jesus’ point in this story is that the slave was simply doing his job.
The application for us is that inasmuch as the master has given his slave everything to do his job well, God has given us gifts like faith to be faithful. Like the slave, our duty is to be faithful even when it’s very little.
The ultimate worth of the slave, the significance of who he is and what he has done, is in the hands of the master. This is his duty.
Duty has an old-fashioned sound about it. Most of us today believe that we ought to do what we do, not from a sense of duty, but from heartfelt desire, from a passionate, earnest determination to contribute. Who does anything out of a sense of duty these days? Maybe even the Boy Scouts don’t do good things out of duty anymore but rather for more achievement badges.
And yet, when you think about it, some of the best things we do for God, we do out of a sense of duty. We do them because the Master expects it and we are servants of the Master. Most of us forgive, not because we have a deep, strong desire to forgive but because it is demanded of us by a forgiving Savior to forgive.
If you have been keeping up with the news about the state’s capital punishment laws, people forgive even those who have committed the most horrible of crimes, the taking of another life. But people whose loss are unspeakable do forgive out of their deep sense of duty to follow the way Jesus taught us to forgive.
Most of us contribute money to the work of the church, an attempt to do our part when someone is in need, and reach out to others in distress, not because it particularly pleases us to do so but rather because we are followers of Christ and we believe that it is expected of us. In other words, we do these good things out of a sense of duty.
We have a duty to be faithful even when we think our faith is very little. And God will tell you that your faith is sufficient enough.
We don’t have to find God because in Jesus, God has already found us. We don’t have to please God because in baptism God has already declared that God is pleased with us. We don’t have to fix the world because God is already fixing it. Our duty is simply to have faith in God.
Remember that this is God’s world and we are invited with more than enough faith to do the impossible like pulling out a mulberry tree and replanting it out in the middle of the sea. Christ calls us to accept our role, to do our part, to do a duty like the slave performed his responsibilities for his master and let God do his part.
You have enough faith. You are not lacking or scarce of faith and gifts. The disciples asked Jesus to increase their faith. This means that the disciples already have some faith. It’s typical for humans like us to want more than what we have already.
But Jesus tells us today that the faith that you have regardless of how little it is, is enough to carry out forgiveness, to be a full and active member and participant of this wonderful church, and to do your duty for God.
Let us pray.
Lord, we give you thanks that you have created us in such a way that you give us the gifts we need in order to do the work you command us to do. You tell us to forgive when we have been wronged. And we immediately think how inadequate we are to such a task. And yet, you promise us that you will not leave us alone. We don’t have to do any forgiving by ourselves. You will teach us to forgive, even as you have forgiven us. You will give us what we need in order to be faithful to you. Amen.