CMLC 2023-11-12 Sermon

Now, this is a season where it is much cooler and a lot of people like to think of this

as, you know, if somebody is single, they might want to go out and try to find a relationship.

They call it cuffing season.

They're like, I want to be in a relationship for the winter months or whatever it might

be.

Well, you know, personally, I would hope it would go longer than that.

But I wanted to make sure that for all of those, especially you online who are joining

us that you may need some help with this area.

And of course, I am an expert in the area of dating and relationships, as you can tell.

So I'm going to give you a few good opening lines that can be used in case you need this.

I see you in the back with the purple.

I know just in case you need this as well.

Okay, good.

So here are eight of the better ones that I liked.

We may not be socks, but I know we'd make a great pair.

Let's commit the perfect crime together.

I'll steal your heart and you steal mine.

I know, I know.

How did the telephone propose to his girlfriend?

He gave her a ring.

Yes.

Have you been to the doctor lately because I think you're missing some vitamin me.

Ah, okay.

We got four more.

We got four more.

Okay, did you hear about the notebook that married a pencil?

She finally found Mr. Wright.

I was told never to date a tennis player because love means nothing to them.

Are you a bank loan because you have my interest?

And finally, are you Australian because you meet all of my koala vacations?

Yes, this explains a lot, doesn't it?

Yes, I know, I know.

The thing is, is that oftentimes we find a lot of the passages in Scripture that talk

about romantic love or intimacy and we kind of like brush over them quite a bit.

But I find it interesting because that's more of a thing that we have started to do in our

society today is that we oftentimes don't know how to deal with conversations about

intimacy and relationships because either it's plastered everywhere around whether we

like it or not or we're afraid almost to talk about it and we feel like it's something

to avoid.

The thing that I always loved about Paul?

Paul doesn't really avoid too much.

He's pretty clear about things.

The thing with this is that Paul is speaking to people in the city of Thessalonica.

Thessalonica is this Greek port city.

And with that, not only do you have a lot of the Greek influence, but it's also at a

time during the Roman Empire.

Now what we see is that there were some different cultural norms that were happening during

this time period.

Now remember, a lot of letters that had been written were oftentimes written to the Jewish

community that had come to know Christ.

But in Thessalonica, this is one of the examples where Paul does need to talk to those who

are Roman citizens who have more of a Hellenistic background, a Greek type of background, not

just culture, but also in their society.

Now the thing is that back then there were a lot of things that were different in regard

to what people expected or accepted in regard to male, female, or other relationships.

With that is there might be examples where there were temples in the area where oftentimes

it was expected that things like prostitution were a normal part of the way they would practice

in the temple.

There were also times whenever certain officials would have not just a wife, but also two others

that might be a part of either not only the official's life, but also even having additional

families outside of his primary family.

There might also even be times where the idea of having relations with somebody was actually

seen in many ways as not just a part of marriage, but rather is just getting to that as soon

as possible.

The idea of eroticism was moved to a level where people weren't even sure how to see

a Christian life beyond what they had been used to before that.

The thing is that we know quite often how we see in a world that has many things that

are acceptable, that it is very difficult to communicate the idea that what we do with

our lives, our physical, our mental, our spiritual lives, are meant to be glorifying to God.

Last week, I believe it was last week, we were discussing how in Christian realms of

different ideas of dating in the life, it is that it oftentimes went so far as to even

be afraid of whether or not to kiss someone before their wedding night.

And yet oftentimes then what we'll actually see in Christian circles is that it's sort

of like this idea that if I've gone past a certain point, then now everything else doesn't

matter in God's eyes.

This is a thing that is difficult not just for the people during Paul's time.

You see it says in Scripture that there's nothing new under the sun.

This is still a place that we find ourselves today.

Is there oftentimes parts of our lives that we see this is something for God.

And then the rest of it, well that's for me.

Or you know God's idea of what should happen, that's just a little too narrow.

So I'm just going to do what makes sense to me and we're going to go from there.

The thing that we end up seeing in Paul's letters is that we end up having an idea of

what we're meant to do not just because we have the letter of the law, but rather asking

what is actually good in God's eyes, but also what is good with one another.

When I was teaching over at Chinkelpin, there was a student, we were finishing up, I was

coaching volleyball one semester.

I was originally supposed to coach middle school volleyball because middle schoolers,

you're just wanting them to get the ball over the net.

I was like I can handle that part, that sounds great.

And then at the last minute, and I mean like the week before school started, the varsity

coach for high school quit and said I'm not helping anybody with anything.

And they said, well Jason, you're literally the only one who's even played volleyball.

And I'm like, I never played in school.

So I don't know what's going on.

So that was the worst season that they had in volleyball at the school.

We won three out of six games, I think maybe.

It was pretty bad.

But with that though, it was an opportunity though to get to know some of the students.

And as we were finishing up one of our games, one of the things that I appreciated about

the school where I was teaching was that they really emphasized being able to have conversations

with students about life and being able to be there for them.

And out of nowhere, one of the students says, hey Jason, you're a pastor, right?

And it was like, well, yeah, that's what they told me at seminary.

And it was one of those things where she says, what is this whole thing about like not having

sex before marriage?

Is that really that big of a deal?

And I'm like, what in the world?

How in the world?

It was like in the evening.

It was like dinner time.

And I'm just like, who in the world randomly asks some adult that question?

And I'm like, oh my word, how am I going to handle this?

Now we could go to things like, you know, like there's Sunday school answers, you know.

Well, you know, the Bible says do not commit adultery, which kind of sort of fits it.

But not exactly.

Not when you're talking to a high schooler who's never been married.

But at the same time, you're still trying to communicate to this high schooler that

even though she may be looking at her life as just do whatever seems like fun at the

moment is that there's more to it than that.

And so instead talking about how God created Adam and Eve and that the two of them were

together and that from the beginning of humanity and our culture and everything is that there

was meant to be a one to one relationship that doesn't just end.

And that later on, whatever Paul is speaking, he's talking about how our relationships are

meant to be about respect.

And in talking about this stuff and being able to explain more than just saying it's

a commandment, don't do it, is you actually have a student saying, oh, that actually kind

of makes sense.

I have no idea what she did with going forward.

But at least that one moment in time, something finally sank in.

But that's also the thing that Paul is trying to get across is that he's trying to communicate

to people who didn't grow up in a Jewish community where they had the 10 commandments and they

just accepted that this is what our society does.

How do you communicate to a world that didn't grow up in the same background about what

it is that God would want for you?

Now Paul goes into here and saying that, you know, do not go out and have these other relationships

because you're supposed to respect your brother in Christ.

Now I do want to pause because in many ways this is this idea that people married young

and therefore what it was is that you don't want your brother now to have lost their spouse.

It's a very narrow view of this.

Paul was in a culture at the time that very much was focusing on male headship and the

idea of respecting your fellow man.

But realizing that in today's world the same thing is true male and female is that much

of this is about respect for that person.

See whenever we see ourselves as being less than the temple of God, whenever we just see

ourselves as well just do whatever we wish at some moment in time, we stop not only respecting

ourselves but also other people.

If two people are intimate and then they realize wait we have nothing else that's in common

and then they split, now you've just communicated to a person that they were only good for one

thing and then what happens to them in their next relationship?

What happens to us in our relationship?

What even more than that is to ask what is it that we even do in our interactions all

around us?

If all that we can do is think about how we're satisfying one part of ourselves then what

does that mean for the billions of other people in the world that we're never going to have

that with?

Does that mean that now they have no use in our lives and we have no use in theirs?

And I hope that's not the case because that would make for a very lonely world.

When we see Paul's letter and it speaks in here in so many different ways about what

it is to not just disregarding man but also are you disregarding the Holy Spirit from

God is that we are facing a world of YOLO.

We're facing a world that says you only live once so get as much out of it as you possibly

can.

I find it fascinating that Paul puts this part right before discussing the resurrection

of the dead.

See the thing is that we're often time spending so long measuring our life in decades here.

He's asking these questions of well I only have a few years of this part of my life and

then I only have a few years of that part of my life and how can I get the most out of

all this and we live such hectic reckless lives.

We squeeze so much into every single moment.

Not even just in these relationships that can often times be so fleeting but what we

do with our families, what we do with our jobs is that we are trying so hard to squeeze

everything out of it that after a while is that we pause and say when was the last time

that we actually did something meaningful where somebody either in our family or our

friendships or our careers or our lives were actually blessed to know Christ today.

Well I had too much to get done and yet does this life finish when we enter the grave?

See it's different for us in some ways because we're post 2000 years of knowing that Jesus

hasn't come back yet.

So for us we can take this idea that Jesus will come back again and we can still kind

of hold it as this idea but for the people back then they were understanding Jesus is

about to come back and then it's a year later and two years later and three years later

and people have passed away.

Does that mean that they miss Jesus?

Does that mean that they were just trying to get as much out of this life as possible

and oh no, well that's the end.

If only you could have just lasted a little bit longer and waited for Jesus to get back.

The thing is is that everything in our life no matter how long it lasts is still not the

end when we are here on this earth.

It still goes on for an eternity.

We will be raised up in Christ on that last day and that's not meant to be this whole

discursus on what's going to happen with the rapture or anything like that.

People get way too caught up in the weeds on those things.

But to point out that that's not the end for those who have passed.

But it's also not the end point for you either.

Are you living this life just trying to make sure that there is enough for today to make

sure that you had a memory or a photo or something that you can discuss at the water cooler?

Or is today another building block on something that's meant to go to eternity?

I think we lose sight of that.

I was told at one point when I first came to Christ Memorial Lutheran that we are a

church of managers.

We oftentimes have a habit of trying to figure out how we are going to tell everybody else

what needs to get done or who we are supposed to hire to get it done.

Sometimes we lose track of the fact that we are the ones who are supposed to get it done.

When was the last time that you had an afternoon or an evening of mentoring a child, of cleaning

up somebody's yard, of sitting down with someone you haven't seen at church in forever and

just finding out what's going on in their life?

When was the last time that you, yourself, were a part of that?

See a lot of times we lose sight of the fact that when we say we have only one life to

live, well we have only one life to live before the resurrection, how much are we using this

life in preparation for the life of the world to come?

And that's what we see in our Gospel lesson for today.

See, our Gospel speaks about the ten young women that are there waiting for the bridegroom.

And the thing is that with this they are unmarried women.

They have so much to look forward to as far as what their life, what it is that they have

coming forward for them.

But being young some of them didn't quite realize that they needed to be prepared for

the future, falling asleep at that moment.

Because at that exact moment I'm tired, I don't feel like doing anything else, well

did you get enough oil?

Well, I'm sure the bridegroom will come back, I'm sure it'll all work itself out.

But the thing is we do the same.

Did I manage to make sure that I had enough vacation time?

Did I manage to make sure that I had an extra room built onto the house?

Did I manage to make sure that I was able to upgrade the Lexus, whatever it might be?

I don't know what y'all drive, I have a Toyota, I used to have trucks, I don't think I'm ever

going to have a Lexus, I'm a pastor.

But with it though is we're spending so much time making sure we've squeezed enough right

now.

But if Jesus comes back today, what does he see?

Because that's the difficulty with the young women and their lamps.

Their lamps went out and it's night time in a place that doesn't have street lights, in

a place that doesn't have the local glow of the McDonald's down the street in the golden

arches.

If it's dark it's dark.

And if you're inside and the light is behind you and you look out into the darkness and

somebody doesn't have a light on, you have no idea who it is, are you going to let them

in?

At that moment is let us in, I don't know you.

If Jesus comes back and looks at us does he see us living out the lives that he gave us

on the cross?

If he sees us does he recognize us?

Are we spending so much time consumed with things that aren't going to matter?

Or are we actually letting that light shine for the things that do?

And that's the thing for me to tell you all the day.

We could go back to just trying to get to glory days of the church and everything else

that we think we want to be.

Or we can just pause and say am I letting my light shine today?

Not because I think that somehow that's going to make God love me, but because that's what

Jesus has already given to us.

In closing I had some of the youth over the weekend.

I gave them little votive candles.

Put a little light, you know, like each one we turned it on.

And I sent them all over this gym and turned off the lights.

I said okay I need you all to come and find each other.

And I had one of our confirmation students, I whispered go blow out their candles.

Because I knew that he would have a great time doing that.

And I also knew that he's a little bit sneaky.

He'd be good at it.

That got so frustrating for everybody else because they weren't expecting that.

I think we do the same.

I think we sometimes get so caught up in living a good life that we miss out on the fact that

there are other people who look just as good as us with their candle, but they're blowing

out ours.

And so what did they have to do?

They had to go back to other people who still had their light glowing.

And get it relit again.

So I don't know where you're at today.

I don't know what's been happening in your spirit.

I don't know what's been happening with what's going inside of you and why it is that it

feels like that light keeps being blown out.

But what I do know is that we're in this together.

And that if you're struggling with that, let us help you to relight that.

Not by our own power, but by the Word of God who is still glowing by his spirit within

us.

So that together we can get out into the world and we can make it a little bit brighter for

the world to come.

Thanks be to God.