08.07.2022 - Be Prepared

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. 35 “Be dressed for action and have your lamps lit; 36 be like those who are waiting for their master to return from the wedding banquet, so that they may open the door for him as soon as he comes and knocks. 37 Blessed are those slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes; truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them. 38 If he comes during the middle of the night, or near dawn, and finds them so, blessed are those slaves. 39 “But know this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. 40 You also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour.”

Looking Ahead

Begin with the ending in mind.

Colonel Mike Mullane saw Sputnik launch when he was twelve years old. That day, he and hundreds of other children decided that they wanted to be astronauts when they grew up. Mike was one of the first team of astronauts from NASA and had three space missions on the Discovery and Atlantis before retiring from NASA and the Air Force in 1990. He accomplished his goal of becoming an astronaut in a time when the field was still new.

The requirements to become an astronaut were and are tremendous. If you think about it like a military branch for rocket scientists with a boot camp that lasts 2 years and you probably will not be far off. In 2020, over 12,000 people applied to be astronauts. Ten were selected.

Many of the goals we set are self-oriented. They focus on what we want to gain or experience. As we learned last week from the previous passage in Luke 12, those kinds of goals don’t add up in eternity. But we can dream dreams and set mighty goals with God as well. Paul the apostle is a great example of this. His mission was to take Jesus to the Gentiles. At that point in time, there were few examples of non-Jews becoming disciples. It would have been very similar to Colonel Mike Mullane seeing Sputnik and wanting to become an astronaut. But, with God’s help and a lot of preparation, Paul achieved that goal and more.

You cannot give what you do not have, so you won’t be alert and ready if you are not prepared.

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Two Perspectives

This teaching of Jesus is about more than staying awake. And it is about more than the final appearance of Christ. Consider this teaching from two different perspectives:

First, we can think of it as an example of God’s mighty act of salvation in Exodus. On the eve of the final plague, the Hebrew people were told be prepare themselves for the moment of their salvation and departure from Egypt. They knew it would not come at a convenient hour. It would happen the moment God finally got through to Pharaoh. This was a moment the people prepared for their own salvation, but not as individuals... as an entire community of faith. It did not mark the end of their time following God, it marked the beginning.

Second, we can think of it in the many post-Easter examples of Jesus showing up unexpectedly to visit the disciples. Whether it was interrupting dinner parties, meeting people walking on the road, or standing on the beach, waiting for Peter to get out of the boat, Jesus appeared many times to encourage his disciples to take their next steps in God’s mission. Jesus also meets us right where we need Him when we are about His work.

There is a connection between these recent passages about the teaching of Jesus. A lawyer wants to be justified by focusing on avoiding sin. Martha keeps herself too busy with work that she misses out on the presence of Jesus in her own home. A man in the crowd is too focused on getting temporary rewards that he misses out on the teaching of eternal blessings Jesus offers him. And today, we have the warning that our Lord Jesus comes and checks in on us before our time to depart this world.

Like the rich young ruler, Jesus teaches again that we should rid ourselves of the earthly things that hold us back from heaven and allow God to be our treasure, the focus of our hearts and our lives. But letting go and surrendering to God is just the beginning. Jesus then tells us to prepare for the master’s return. We are to put on our work clothes and remember who it is that we serve. These are the lessons for disciples who live in the time between hearing Jesus say, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” and the words “Well done, good and faithful servant.” These are lessons to teach disciples to know what they are doing and to do those things faithfully. These disciples are prepared for Jesus to come to check in on them at any time. In fact, they are expecting Him.

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More than Staying Awake

In the midst of these lessons, there is a beatitude, or claim about who God blesses, which tells us, “Blessed are the slaves whom the master finds alert when he comes, truly I tell you, he will fasten his belt and have them sit down to eat, and he will come and serve them.” Beatitudes have 2 parts - The who and the how.

Who is blessed? Slaves, or servants. If you are unwilling to put yourself beneath others and serve them, this is a blessing you will miss out on.

How are they blessed? The master comes and serves them when He finds them alert and prepared to serve, waiting for His instructions.

As opposed to the story about the rich farmer, here Jesus gives a positive example of what disciples look like. But there are three different responses servants can have to serving Christ. Busy, Unwilling, and Prepared.

Busy servants have the appearance of working, but they don’t know if it is what God wants them to do.

Unwilling servants, like Jonah, the Old Testament prophet, know God’s will, but they refuse to do it.

Prepared and Alert are the servants that focus on Doing God’s will, God’s way, and waiting on God’s timing.

Which kind of servant are you? Busy, Unwilling, or Prepared?

It is difficult being a servant who is always ready to serve Jesus. If we are not prepared, we will not be alert and ready. Instead, we will be scrambling and missing opportunities or making messes out of the opportunities we take. Again, look at the passage. Jesus is not asking for a kind of perfection. He is asking for willingness, preparation, and the act of letting Him lead rather than trying to do things our own way.

Oh, but as long as there is music, bible reading, and some kind of lesson, God will fix it all together and make it work out. Well, yes, perhaps, but wouldn’t it be better to ask God what he wants and work together on that? Worship team, this one is for us. We want to follow God’s leading and be prepared with our gifts in worship so that Sunday morning, we can be alert and ready for Jesus to show up. And what does He say He will do if we are prepared and alert for Him? He will put on work clothes and come serve us. That’s a whole different kind of worship service.

And for those who work in the kitchen - yes, food is food, and we can all just make our favorite thing and have a potluck. But what happens when we make a meal listening to God’s instruction and do so in such a way that we are not so busy that we miss Jesus showing up? Jesus showed up at a wedding feast once, and lives were changed. The ones whose lives changed the most that day were the servants preparing and serving the wine because they did exactly what Jesus told them to do.

That goes for teachers teaching lessons, greeters welcoming people in well, those that guide and direct people to the things and places they need, our leaders who guide and direct our teams, those who clean the church, and those who have a ministry of prayer. Every kind of servant has the opportunity to be visited by and, if they are prepared and alert, served by Christ. Church, please hear this. Jesus is not asking us to be perfect in our service. He is asking us to be prepared so that we can be alert to Him.

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Focus

How do we prepare ourselves so that we can be faithful and alert to Jesus?

We have to focus. If you are like me and have trouble focusing at times, know that we don’t have an excuse. Quite the opposite. We are particularly blessed because we don’t discriminate against distractions. We will go after anything shiny. How is that a blessing? Chances are, the very same tools we use to help us focus enough to get through normal life are the same tools that we can use to help us focus on God.

If you do not have internal focus issues, know that you do have external ones that try to pull you from God every day. The devil’s goal is to get everyone back to “doing what is right in their own eyes” or whatever makes sense to them. He will try to derail you into just being busy in Jesus’ name. He will try to convince you that there is a smarter, not harder, way than to follow Jesus’ instructions. He will pull out every trick in the book until they are left trying to convince you that someone else can do it. The forces of darkness don’t care about how you live your life, good or bad, or the million possible ways you could spend your days... except one. They cannot tolerate the servant prepared and alert to work alongside Jesus because, as Jesus told Peter, “with God, all things are possible.”

So, how do we become prepared like that? How do we focus?

We find the one thing God wants us to see, hear, know, and do today. Give us this day, our daily bread. Not yesterday’s bread. Not tomorrow’s bread. We start with the one thing Jesus alluded to when he told Martha that her sister Mary had discovered the one thing that would not be taken with her, while Martha was distracted by the many things. We ask God to help us focus on the one thing. Some of you already know what that one thing is. Start there.

Some of you may find your one thing to be your own salvation, and it may make sense to you that this would be the most important thing for you to focus on every day. If that is you, I would love to have a conversation with you, and you can talk to one of our Sunday School teachers or other pastors as well. If God keeps leading you back to your salvation, there is probably a good reason for it, and there may be something God wants you to go through with him so that you are free to serve with His guidance and power.

The big win for each of us is hearing Jesus say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.” What do you need to focus on today to reach that end?

Communion – The Great Thanksgiving II

Christ our Lord invites to his table all who love him,

who earnestly repent of their sin

and seek to live in peace with one another.

Therefore, let us confess our sin before God and one another.

Merciful God,

we confess that we have not loved you with our whole heart.

We have failed to be an obedient church.

We have not done your will,

we have broken your law,

we have rebelled against your love,

we have not loved our neighbors,

and we have not heard the cry of the needy.

Forgive us, we pray.

Free us for joyful obedience,

through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Hear the good news:

Christ died for us while we were yet sinners;

that proves God's love toward us.

In the name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven!

Glory to God. Amen.

The Lord be with you

And also with you.

Lift up your hearts.

We lift them up to the Lord.

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.

It is right to give our thanks and praise.

It is right, and a good and joyful thing,

Always and everywhere to give thanks to you, Father Almighty, creator of heaven and earth.

And so,

With your people on earth

And all the company of heaven

We praise your name and join their unending hymn:

Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might, Heaven and earth are full of your glory.

Hosanna in the highest.

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Hosanna in the highest.

Holy are you, and blessed is your Son Jesus Christ. By the baptism of his suffering, death, and resurrection

you gave birth to your church,

delivered us from slavery to sin and death, And made with us a new covenant

by water and the Spirit.

On the night to which he gave himself up for us

he took bread, gave thanks to you, broke the bread,

gave it to his disciples, and said;

“Take, eat; this is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”

When the supper was over, he took the cup,

gave thanks to you, gave it to his disciples, and said:

“Drink from this, all of you

this is my blood of the new covenant, poured out for you and for many

for the forgiveness of sins. Do this as often as you drink it,

in remembrance of me.”

And so,

In remembrance of these your mighty acts in Jesus Christ, we offer ourselves in praise and thanksgiving,

as a holy and living sacrifice,

in union with Christ’s offering for us, as we proclaim the mystery of faith.

Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again.

Pour out your Holy Spirit on us gathered here,

and on these gifts of bread and wine.

Make them be for us the body and blood of Christ, that we may be for the world the body of Christ,

redeemed by his blood.”

By your Spirit make us one with Christ, one with each other,

and one in ministry to all the world,

until Christ comes in final victory,

and we feast at his heavenly banquet.

Through your Son Jesus Christ,

with the Holy Spirit in your holy church,

all honor and glory is your, almighty Father,

now and for ever.

Amen

The body of Christ, given for you. Amen.

The blood of Christ, given for you. Amen.

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