Title: Living in the Promise of God: Part IV – Failure and Fulfillment
Text: 2 Samuel 11:1-15; Ephesians 3:14-21; John 6:1-21
Grace, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been talking about what it means to really live in the promise of God. To live knowing that God has made a covenant with us, lived out through Jesus Christ, that we are always His and are never alone. I’ve talked about how our lives are those of celebration and sacrifice, as we struggle continually to live faithfully in a world to whom ‘Christ’ is at best an anachronism, and at worst an epithet, about living in a way that shows that salvation is free, but discipleship costs. I’ve told you about the promise of Christ, that we really are never alone; that our salvation really does exist through Christ’s sacrifice.
I’ve told you a lot. In fact, I don’t think there’s a lot more on that I can cover in the time that I have left. But I think there’s enough to cover ‘failure and fulfillment.’
First off, let’s talk about failure. I don’t think there’s a single human being that doesn’t know the stink of failure that doesn’t wash off. But I also know that we continuously play a game with each other.
That’s not that bad. Let me tell you about me. Maybe you’ve heard it before. At certain church gatherings in other traditions when ‘testimonies’ are shared, a general formula works like this: 1 cigarette two months ago in a bar = chain smoking; three beers once a month whether they’re needed or not = borderline alcoholic. It gets pretty ludicrous.
Once I was sitting at a meeting when this was going on and I found myself thinking: jeepers, am I really worth this? What have a I done that’s so bad?
But that’s the point, isn’t it? Don’t we usually either, a) want to downplay our own, or b) play them up for sympathy? And we can spend a lot of time talking about ‘what makes a failure’, can’t we. Been off the wagon? Been on the ‘other’ wagon with the police? Struggle at home with anger, money, or passion – for your spouse, or for someone elses?
The president of the LTS tells of the time he was a missionary in Madagascar. The preacher who always preached about giving money to the church always had his finger in the pot, and the one who preached most about adultery was the one who was most predacious with women.
Certainly, given the number of politicians in the United States who have their failures cast about the world, we might be tempted to sit down and say, ‘well, I’m not as bad as that.”
But that doesn’t really make your heart feel any better, does it? Even when we can honestly say “I didn’t mean to,” that doesn’t actually fix our hearts, does it?
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The story of David and Bathseba is probably one of the most notorious that appears in our lectionary; I quite literally cringe whenever I see it coming up. It’s hard to listen to, as well, and some cynical part of me giggles like a schoolboy when the lector pronounces at the end of the lesson, the word of the Lord.
And the congregation responds, thanks be...to God??
How can we give thanks to God for this story? What does it actually teach us on the surface, aside from how to bollocks up your life?
But you know, I’m not convinced that David is the villain we like to make him out to be. I don’t think he intended to have an affair with Bathseba – and I don’t think that he intended the consequences.
How much of a bungler could he be? First, he recalls Uriah hoping that he will go and sleep with his wife, but his general is so faithful that he refuses to leave his mean in worse conditions. Then David gets Uriah drunk, hoping that he will go home and let nature take its course. But Uriah passes out on his way out the door. Then finally, in desperation, David sends Uriah back to the battlefield ironically carrying a letter that tells his commander to sent him to the forefront of the fighting. Faithful to the end, Uriah goes and dies.
Any of this David could have stopped, had he listened to himself, or repented of his crime. But he didn’t, and his adultery was compounded with his lying, compounded with his murder of Uriah. And yes, you’ll read in weeks to come that David does receive a terrible punishment.
But thanks be to God?
The disciples and Jesus sit down and look at the crowd that stretches out before them.
“you want us to feed them how?” they ask Jesus.
After the crowd is fed with another miracle, the disciples witness as the crowd agitates to make Jesus the king. Jesus refuses, and runs away. The crowd turns back to the disciples: “jeepers, what’s his problem?”
Matthew records that Jesus sent them on ahead, but in John’s gospel they get in the boat on their own. Maybe in their anger the disciples decide to leave Jesus behind, on their way to Capernaum. After all, he just turned down the greatest honour the people could bestow, turned down what could have been their lucky break, their ticket to the sweet life, a life of ease and success, not of dingy backwoods tents and bars, no sick and dirty people.
So they leave Jesus behind. In the middle of the night, they’re terrified that Jesus is walking towards them, across the water. The big strong men tremble.
Praise to Christ, that called people like this to follow him?
YES!
That is what being thankful is all about. It is one thing to sit in the middle of your success, surrounded by glory and all that glitters and write or speak movingly about ‘the power of God.” It is something else to be able to crumble to the ground in the midst of your own ruin and let your faith speak through cracked lips that thirst for the presence of Christ.
I can’t talk to you of my own monumental failures, because quite simply I don’t have any. I’ve not fallen far, or fallen hard. I started below the poverty line, and I’ve not yet really risen above it. I’ve been faithful to the only woman I’ve ever loved.
But I can talk to you of moving repeatedly and not being able to afford it. I can talk to you empty cupboards and bank accounts and the crippling and impotent anger that seizes a man when he cannot provide enough for his family. I can talk to you of being arrogant and presumptuous and being rightfully called to account for it.
I can also talk to you of repentance, forgiveness, and grace.
And I can still stand up here and promise you that God’s grace is enough. I can tell you that God’s promise to you will never been forgotten, because God fulfills his promises.
I can stand here, and join you in saying, thanks be to God, for the hearing and receiving of God’s good and amazing Word in this community of believers.
Thanks be to God for His amazing grace.
Thanks be to God, the fount of every blessing, whose presence attends to us in the morning and comforts us in the evening.
Thanks be to God, whose servants are blessed in community, in the joyful hearts of those who rejoice in their salvation.
Now to Him, who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever.
Amen.
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