Ephesians 1:3-14
Todd Buegler
July 11-13, 2009
Lord of Life
Grace and peace to you from God our Creator, and from Jesus, the Son of God, who show us the way! Amen.
I have a theory: My theory is this: There are two kinds of people in the world. There are “Red Highway” people, and there are “Blue highway people.”
If you look on a map, the highways that are printed in red are the interstate freeways and the major highways that run across our country, from major city to major city. Red highway people are those who are generally interested in hopping on these expressways and getting to their destination as quickly as possible. Their goal is simply to get somewhere, be it on vacation…to work…to visit someone…their goal in any kind of travel or trip is simply the destination.
The blue highways on a map are those smaller highways, often just 2 lanes, that spread across our nation like a spider web, linking smaller towns. Blue highway people, those who prefer these roads, are more interested in the journey. They like to look around. They revel in the trip…and they see the journey as being at least as important as the arrival.
Now let me be clear. There’s nothing wrong with either one. It’s just about being a bit of a different personality type. Ok…a little poll…how many of you think that you’re probably a red highway person? How many of you have a higher quality personality and are blue highway people? I’m kidding…
You see, I am mostly a blue highway person, kind of in the tradition of Clark Griswald, of the movie “Vacation.” You know the type: “Look honey! The world’s biggest ball of twine! Should we stop?” When our family goes to the north shore, even though we might spend some time on the interstate, it’s a blue highway trip. We stop in Duluth for lunch…we wander around canal park. We then drift up highway 61. We might stop here or there at an interesting looking shop…or to grab ice cream. We might wander around split rock lighthouse…we’ll stop and climb around on the rocks on the Lake Superior shore. We’re not in a hurry. The point isn’t necessarily the destination, though we like that too…but it’s being together on the journey.
Our epistle lesson today is clearly a blue highway lesson. Please join me in taking a look at the scripture text from Ephesians 1. In your pew Bibles, it can be found on page _____.
In the time when the Apostle Paul lived, the main form of communication was the writing of letters. Greek letters, like this one from Paul to the Christians living in Ephesus, always began with a greeting, found here in verses 1 & 2. That was usually followed by a brief thanksgiving, or a brief wish for the health and well-being of the recipients. This was usually just a couple of verses.
In Paul's letter to the Ephesians, this brief declaration…well, it’s not so brief. If this were given as a grace before supper, you would guarantee that everyone’s dinner was cold long before you got to eat. It is a meandering, wandering blue highway kind of blessing. It travels through all the dramatic, scenic theological points of interest that are on the way to praising God for enabling early Christians to be God's own people.
In verses 3-9, Paul’s lengthy thanksgiving tells the Christian story and gives thanks for what God has done. What is God’s intent in doing these things? In verse 10 Paul writes that God has done these things to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ. In verse 11, Paul writes of our role in the plan. He writes that for these things to happen, we should live in accordance with God’s will, to put our hope first in Christ, and to praise God’s glory
In short, Paul is saying “God does have a plan for life here on earth…for unity, for peace and for life abundant. This plan…it is glorious...it is amazing…and you are it.” We, with the help of the Holy Spirit, are God’s plan for the bringing of God’s Kingdom to earth.
So then…what does God’s Kingdom look like?
The town of Witts Spring, Arkansas has a population of 100. The 1997 graduating class of Witts Springs High School has 41 students. Witts Spring High School isn’t exactly an athletic powerhouse. But they do field teams, and they manage to produce athletes that take team play to a new level.
“In a basketball game with rival Leslie High School, The Witts Springs Panthers trailed by over 30 points with just two minutes to go. The fans began to chant, ‘Put in Scotty. Scot‑TEE! Scot‑TEE! Scot‑TEE!’ Coach Nash, obliged and inserted senior guard Scotty Harmon. Harmon has cerebral palsy.
In the newspaper account of the game from the Arkansas Gazette, columnist Larry Pillow writes that “Scotty Harmon received a pass, alone and unguarded on the perimeter, and flung the ball toward the hoop. He missed. His teammates scrambled for the rebound and instead of taking another shot, passed back to Scotty and gave him a second chance. He missed again, which started another fight for the ball.
Coach Nash said “‘The kids know when Scotty’s in there, their game is over. They’re doing it for him now; the atmosphere changes. If they’re worn out, they’ll break their necks to get that rebound. Our kids will go above everybody to get the ball to Scotty.’
“On his fourth try, Harmon sunk a three pointer. Fans on both sides of the gym erupted in cheers. A few moments later, the buzzer sounded. The scoreboard said Leslie 89, Witts Springs 58”
This game was over long before the buzzer. Every person in the gym knew this to be true. But the fans, Coach Nash, and the members of the team had decided that even though the end was pre-determined, they were going to pay attention to how they got to that end. They could have folded up. They could have gotten sulkey. They could have gotten chippy. They didn’t. They treated those last few moments of the game as a gift. And they chose to give that gift to Scotty. This is a blue highway decision. And this is what the Kingdom of God looks like.
In our Christian faith, we know the outcome. The end result was determined over 2000 years ago through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. On Easter morning, the buzzer sounded and the angels erupted in cheers and ‘Alleluias”. Death was defeated and we were given new life. Game over. The victory is ours.
What then we do with our lives then is a gift…pure gift. And we get to choose how we will use this gift. But it is so easily forget…it is so easy for us to lose track of God’s will for us.
Many of you are aware that our youngest son, Samuel, who is 6, was hospitalized a few weeks ago. To be honest, it was pretty scary. He developed a strep group-A infection that settled into his wrist joint. There was concern about the infection going into his bone, or into his blood stream. But 5 days, 18 doctors, 2 hospitals, 1 surgery, 1 procedure and a whole lot of antibiotics later, Sam was on the road to recovery. We cannot, by the way, even find words to express our gratitude to all of you for your prayers and support. We’re now halfway through the 6-weeks of ‘at home’ IV antibiotics for Sam, and he’s doing much better.
I learned a lot in the past month. I learned about antibiotics…bacteria… hospitals…insurance…surgery…anesthesia…
But I also learned a lot about my life and my faith. I learned what it was like to be totally dependent on people who I didn’t even know. I learned what amazing people doctors, nurses and others in the health care field can be. I learned about trust. I learned that I, like many of us, sometimes find myself cruising the red highway and that I miss things…I would take them for granted. I learned again about the preciousness of life, and the preciousness of the life and faith journey that we are all on.
I learned that sometimes I need to stop. To breathe deeply. To think. To pray. God has clearly been working in our family in the last month, through the medical professionals, through family, through all of you. I was reminded that I can see the different ways God works, if I just look.
I learned that I am dependent on God’s Holy Spirit. The same Spirit that Paul writes about In verse 14. Here, he writes that the Holy Spirit is God’s pledge guaranteeing our inheritance. In New Testament Greek, the word used there for “pledge” is arrabon, which means deposit or down payment. Paul is saying that God’s Holy Spirit is the first installment of God's kingdom that we're invited to experience every day of our lives. It is just a taste of what is to come.
God cares so much about our day-to-day, nine-to-five, overtime/overdrawn, understaffed/overworked existence that God found a way to redecorate and revitalize our realities with the presence of the Holy Spirit. There's no work we do, no task we accomplish, no agenda we plow through, that can't be transformed by God's kingdom which is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is able to make your everyday life into a life that expresses the wonder and glory of of God's love and grace.
But even though God’s gift of the Holy Spirit is always given…even though it’s always present, how we respond to that is still our choice. Just as we have to intentionally choose to turn off onto a blue highway instead of staying on the red expressway, we must train ourselves to live our lives in the now…to be people who pay attention to the Holy Spirit’s work on the journey.
How do we do this?
Do you remember what they teach children about crossing streets on bikes? 4 things that I think can help us on our spiritual travels: Stop. Look. Listen and then Go.
Stop. We need to stop the frantic rush and fury of our lives and be still to know the presence of God.
Look. If we want to experience God's presence in the unexpected places of our lives, we have to train our eyes to look, to see the evidence of God's presence in our lives and in the world around us.
Listen. Listen for the voice of God. Spend time in the Scriptures. Listen to the words of Jesus. Give attention to the witness of the way the Spirit of Christ is at work in other people's lives. Having done those three, we can:
Go. Go into life with a new awareness and a new confidence that the God who is with us will fulfill his good purpose in our lives.
Stopping, looking and listening before going allows us to pay attention to the journey. It is a way of taking our fast-paced, red-highway lives and of transforming them into blue highway journeys that tend to what the Holy Spirit is up to.
Occasionally, life is going to be a rush…sometimes it just has to be that way. But please don’t mistake that for a lifestyle. Life isn’t supposed to be a footrace to the end…it is a journey that pays attention to the Kingdom of God, and the work of the Holy Spirit, here and now.
Take the exit ramp. Pull onto the blue highway. Stop, look, listen and then go.
Live and experience the journey that is our faith. God’s Holy Spirit is a gift…an amazing gift…and it is for you.
Amen.
