Big Questions of Faith: Sermon Series (3 of 3) : 09-29-24

The Holy Gospel according to John. Glory to you, O Lord.

If you love me, you will keep my commandments, and I will ask the Father,

and he will give you another advocate to be with you forever.

This is the spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him.

You know him because he abides with you, and he will be in you.

I will not leave you Orphaned, I am coming to you. In a little while,

the world will no longer see me, but you will see me.

Because I live, you also will live.

I have said these things to you while I am still with you, but the Advocate,

the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything

and remind you of all that I have said to you.

Peace I leave with you. My peace I am coming to you.

I do not give to you as the world gives.

Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.

This is the gospel of the Lord. Praise to you, Lord Christ.

Today we are on our last Sunday of the Big Questions sermon series.

If you missed one, you can visit our podcast or YouTube channel.

One saturday when the kids were young my husband dan took them on a walk to

the local walgreens to pick up a few items at one point in their conversation

jacob who was five years old,

looked at his sister who was only three and he said to her leah you are going

to be a teacher when you grow up?",

Well, not one to be told what to do, certainly not by her brothers.

Leah's response was, Nuh-uh, it's not my destiny.

Leah, now almost 26, is in her second year as a high school Spanish teacher,

in the suburbs of St. Louis.

She has a Master of Education, a minor in Linguistics, and is also certified to teach ESL.

As it turns out, being a teacher was her destiny.

For some people, their purpose in life and God's will for them is like this.

It's easy and obvious, given who they are and their talents and what they love doing.

Maybe this has also been true for you.

But what if it's not so clear? Or what about how our purpose changes over different stages of our life?

How do we know God's will then?

Or what if you have many interests and talents and do not know which way to

go or you want to try multiple things? James.

Our oldest son, Daniel, just turned 30, and he's already in his second career

in finance after starting out as an arborist.

So also is Jacob, who is now preparing to start his own roofing company.

Has God changed their purpose or will for their lives, or is it just part of

the journey of self-discovery and God goes along.

Just how do we know God's will for our life?

Dan and I have often wondered how Jacob knew Leah's purpose when he was only

five and she was only three.

Out of the mouths of babes and infants, God has established a stronghold as Psalm 8 reminds us.

I think Jacob's five-year-old insight and intuition gives us four guidelines.

I know that's hard to believe from a five-year-old and a two-sentence conversation,

but I think it gives us four guidelines for knowing God's will.

And much more can be said about this topic, but we're going to focus on these four things today.

And those four things are faith, focus, fruit, and fellowship.

The first guidepost in understanding God's will for you is faith.

Jacob and Leah had a relationship, a close one.

As siblings, they spent a lot of time together. They played together. They were buddies.

And at this age, Jacob would sometimes have a sleepover in Leah's bedroom,

and he would get in a sleeping bag on the floor right next to her bed.

It's easy for us to forget that discerning God's will for our lives starts with

our faith rooted in a relationship with God,

a close one sure we

would all like a sky writer to spell it out

for us like the Wizard of Oz for Dorothy except instead of surrender Dorothy

we would like God to say Joe be an engineer and build safer roads or Pam you're

an artist bring joy and challenge to people or Greg retire now and write a book.

I know it'd be fun, wouldn't it? But skywriting is a distant God.

It's more of a concept of God, not a God who is invested in the nitty-gritty of our life.

But a God of relationship is just that, invested in the nitty-gritty with you,

with a sleeping bag by your bed at night.

Where he neither slumbers nor sleeps, keeps, but instead watches over you,

as Psalm 121 promises us.

Jesus is evidence of this God of relationship who wants a faithful,

loving relationship with us as a God who does come to journey with us and desires

this close intimacy in our lives.

Even after Jesus departed the the physical world, he promised our close relationship

with him and the creator would continue through the presence of the Holy Spirit, the advocate.

In the reading I just read, Jesus promises the advocate, the Holy Spirit,

whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you

of all that I have said to you.

This is not a far-off skywriting God, But rather, Jesus declares,

you know the Holy Spirit because he abides with you and he will be in you.

There is no God closer than the one who watches over you at your side and at

the same time dwells within you, within your heart, within your soul,

giving you Jesus' peace so your hearts will not be troubled or afraid.

Nurturing this relationship and the faith that results is the first step in

discerning God's will for you so that when the Holy Spirit nudges you in a direction,

you recognize that it's a nudge and where it is coming from.

Worship here, of course, is part of this relationship, and so also is time alone with God.

Even five minutes a day of quiet listening, if you have to do it in the bathroom, go for it, right?

God is everywhere. Okay, that was an aside, but seriously, we can all find,

or in the shower five minutes a day.

It may take time to deepen faith this way, so I encourage you not to give up.

And that was a lesson I learned.

Maybe some of you have heard this story before, but in 2014,

I started a program called the Spiritual Exercises of St.

Ignatius of Loyola. And my first assignment from my spiritual director was to

spend time every single morning in meditation and prayer, and I had one thing

to do, and that was this, to behold God,

beholding me and smiling.

Beholding God, beholding me, and smiling.

I close my eyes and I did this every single morning.

If growing your relationship with God is where you need to expand and knowing

God's will for your life, then I encourage you to try this spiritual practice.

Imagine God or Jesus however you want.

Beholding God, beholding me, and smiling.

Smiling well 30 days went

by nothing five weeks

nothing six weeks nothing happened I

was tempted to give up but I

said I would do it and I like to be

a woman of my word so I pressed

on seven weeks went by I

kept showing up every morning beholding God

beholding me and smiling on day

56 eight weeks yes

I was counting I was doing

my message my meditation resigned to the idea that

it's the practice that matters not the result also true but then in the middle

of my meditation I got the strong sensation of movement that went from my head

down into my heart and chest.

And I had this overwhelming experience of love like I have never felt before.

And I was so surprised by this.

My eyes popped open and I looked up and I said, you really do love me, don't you?

True story.

We can all strengthen our relationship with God and experience this all-embracing,

pure love deepening our faith and trust.

And since this experience 10 years ago, I have been able to hear more clearly

the voice of the Holy Spirit,

the directions of the Holy Spirit, the presence of the Holy Spirit,

and those nudges from the Holy Spirit.

In Jeremiah, God says, when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you.

When you search for me, you will find me if you seek me with all your heart.

The second way that Jacob's five-year-old insight and intuition guides us is focus.

His young mind and heart were uncluttered in a way that ours rarely is.

Jacob didn't know about teachers' salaries, about buying your own supplies.

Other people's expectations, school vouchers, public versus private, and so on.

There was no pro-con list going on in his head.

Jacob was not clouded by the world, so he could see clearly and with a pure heart.

And he was exactly right.

This is why Jesus encourages us to enter the kingdom like a little child,

with singleness of heart, with honest needs and dependence,

with the courage to strip everything else away way and to focus on what is real

and true around and inside of us.

To get there, we may need to do a pro-con list to name all of those worldly

things that are cramming up our channel to God, if you will.

Things like doubts and expectations and all of the shoulds that we live with,

our hopes and our what-ifs and all of those fears and get it on paper and get it all out.

And then we can say, okay, God, I've got all of these hopes and concerns and

help me set them aside because I trust that you know them all.

And give me the focus of a quiet mind and heart to listen to you.

Then, what do you see and what do you hear?

Or, what sensations do you feel in your body?

Imagine yourself in each possible future and pay attention to how your body feels.

The body never lies. and we forget that the Holy Spirit uses our physical sensations to nudge us.

Goosebumps on the arm, right? Gut feeling, a fluttering in the chest.

How many of you have experienced those? Yes, that is guidance from the Holy Spirit.

I did this exercise with my brother recently, And when he imagined one option

for his future, and I had him close his eyes and pay attention to his body, he experienced relief.

And suddenly, the decision that he was struggling with and the Spirit's nudge

became very clear, and the struggle ended.

Theologian Frederick Buechner describes our vocational calling as the place

where our deep gladness meets the world's deep hurt.

And having focus is a place where this can become clear. So I invite you to

consider stepping into focus as you discern God's will or how to make a decision.

The third insight that we gain from this short childhood conversation is in

the fruit that we bear by what we are doing.

This is highlighted in our reading from Colossians. May you lead lives worthy

of the Lord, fully pleasing to him as you bear fruit in every good work.

Very early on, Jacob found Leah to be a teacher,

somehow in the way they talked or played or in the way she could find lost items

in the house, especially ones that Jacob hid.

Jacob experienced in Leah the fruit of learning.

Discerning God's will at any stage of our life involves paying attention to

the fruit that we bear, which we know from reading Galatians 5.

And so a point of reflection, by your activities, whatever you're doing,

are you showing and sharing more love, joy,

peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness,

and self-control, the fruits of the Spirit?

Does your activity engender in you a more loving heart, a more hopeful disposition,

an attitude of gratitude and service, and with a special bonus,

a desire to read scripture and to know God more intimately?

Maybe you discover that what you're doing is God's will, but you're not in the

right place, or you need a different group of people around you to bring out

those fruits of the Spirit more fully.

I invite you to consider reflecting on the fruit your life produces,

and if it is not godly and life-giving fruit, it may be the Spirit's nudge that

it's time to make a transition.

Fellowship is the fourth insight gained from this childhood conversation between Jacob and Leah.

Jacob had this conversation not when they were alone or playing off outside,

but when they were with others.

They were with the family so that other people could chime in and share what they see.

Knowing God's will for our life is this combination of our inner guidance and

the affirmation of the Christian fellowship around us,

made up of people who know us and love us and affirm the gifts that we have

and who share how they see God working in our life.

For example, one cannot become a pastor or a deacon in this church without this

long process that combines both of these things,

and individuals call from God in addition to the affirmation of one's home congregation,

internship congregation.

A synod committee, and seminary professors.

So it's both and. And this is how Leah got over her nah, I'm not doing that,

to finding out that teaching was her purpose in life because teachers in the

Sunday school at church, the Christian education director,

where she helped out people that she babysat, her own teachers,

even in elementary school, all could see the teaching gifts in her.

And they encouraged her to develop these gifts and to see this as God's call on her life.

So what a great gift is this Christian community unity, to help us hear and

follow God's will for one another as we pray and deepen our relationship with God,

as we focus and distill the truth from the noise of the world,

as we experience the fruits of the Spirit in each other and encourage one another.

So we can pursue faith, focus, and fruit all in the fellowship of this Christian community.

Perhaps God is inviting you into deeper fellowship.

Maybe a life group or a team ministry as a way to build relationships that help

you discern and hear and understand God's will at this time.

Certainly our purpose and God's will can change at different stages of our lives.

I visit a lot of elderly people and have done so throughout my ministry.

And especially now with our homebound members, I tell them that their most important

ministry right now is to pray, to pray for the church, to pray for their families.

It's also to love, right? They are the best practiced at loving people through

all the changes of their life, and to share wisdom.

Some of us use our work to support family and experience our purpose in hobbies

or in activities outside of work.

That's okay too, but God can use us everywhere.

Some people have more than one vocation or multiple ways to serve.

The point is that God can use us in all of these situations to bear fruit. root.

Yes, so this intimate, close God is on the journey with us because Jesus has

promised he is with us to the end of the age and the advocate,

the Holy Spirit, abides with us and lives in us.

Do you think about that? The Holy Spirit is inside of you.

That's the whole point of meditation and contemplation so that we can hear that

Spirit's voice that dwells within us.

And so the Holy Spirit's constant presence then frees us from worry about,

oh, am I getting the right answer? Am I doing the wrong thing?

You're freed from worrying about that because Jesus is in all of our experiences.

And Jesus is using all of that through faith,

through focus, through the the fruit that we bear and through our fellowship

so that we can all live in God's will and purpose wherever we are and whatever

we do. Let the church say amen.

Leave this place with joy, knowing God deeply loves you and blesses you to be a blessing.

Go and make a difference, bringing the grace and peace of Christ wherever you

go as you love, serve, and welcome all. Thanks be to God and we will.