“Blessing Upon Blessing”   (Return to Sermon Page)

February 3, 2008

Matthew 5: 1-12                                             

What’s your week been like?  It’s been a trying week, ups and downs, not easy.

When I was serving at the church at Concord, there was a woman who had a saying no matter what happened in her life:  “Count it all joy!”

Her husband was a policeman in another city.  She could have been afraid every day.  He commuted 2 hours a day and worked late hours, but she had a serenity.  She knew that he purposely lived far from his work to protect his family from any retaliation.  And she knew that at the end of the day, he came home to her.  Count it all joy. 

When her youngest son 12, she discovered she was pregnant again.  Once again she put her own college plans on the shelf.  But ‘Count it all joy!’, she finally had a girl after 4 boys. 

At first I thought she was a Pollyanna and didn’t allow herself to have normal feelings, but over time, I saw that she had a different attitude to life.

She had learned a secret to living:  that God is present in all things. 

You may weep, you may be scared, you may have trouble, but God is with you through it, and God will bring you joy.  She had had so many experiences of just that, that she could anticipate the joy even when she couldn’t see it yet.

Count it all joy.  She was a great woman of faith.

It wasn’t so much that every trouble has it’s silver lining, but that every new thing brings adjustment and new possibilities. 

This is not a statement of how we have to live in order for God to love us,

it’s a statement of how we live because God is in relationship with us.

It is not a statement about passively waiting for and then enjoying God’s blessings.  It is an attitude that becomes self-fulfilling as Christians together live in this way. 

If you are part of a Christian community, then when you are in mourning, there are people who comfort you. 

If you are a Christian community that is rooted and grounded in God’s compassionate grace, then you live out the beatitudes in action.

This is some of that upside down, reversing the order of things teaching from Jesus.  This is not the way the world teaches us. 

From the beginning of our growing up we are taught that success can be measured

There is a standard to be met. 

You must achieve, you must produce, you must prove that you are worthy.    

When I was young my Dad was big.  Never mind that later I discovered he was only 5’9”.  He was BIG.  When he came home he filled the whole house. 

The rhythm and dynamics of the house changed when Dad got home. 

He sees everywhere.      He knows everything!

Dad was often silent…..until report card time……

Dad always knew when we got our report cards. 

How’d he know?  Dad knows everything.

You could only hold out so long before those cards had to be handed over.

          He’d scan down the list of grades:  huh      muh  huh…..

His moving finger would find the one discrepancy.  Only an S--satisfactory in pays attention in class?  Don’t you pay attention in class?

          How’d you get this B?  No matter how many A’s were there……

          Where’d this B     C     D    come from?

          D?!  We all knew what D stood for:  DEATH; to get a D was to die.

          F stood for annihilation:  zip you’re gone, erased, rubbed out, unthinkable

But D was thinkable, horrifyingly, dyingly thinkable.

Some of my friends actually got paid for their good grades. 

We always felt grateful that we’d narrowly escaped a spanking, at least this time.

          Dad got older, I got more sophisticated about what I reported.

I learned to say:  I’m a senior pastor.  My congregation numbers about 450. 

Yes, we have so many at worship; or yes, 2 services.  We’re in a building program.

I’ve heard my brother say:  I’m the senior superintendent of everything.

I work 80 hours a week and travel 75% of the time.  He’s scored high and big.

See Daddy, we’ve both really made it.

          And Jesus said:  blessed are you……         Yea, cause I’ve made it!

Blessed are you who are poor in spirit……           Me?  Poor in spirit?  Me, blessed?

We’ve been taught to work for our blessing, to earn it. 

Success becomes the measure of our being. 

If we get a raise, not only are we doing a good job, we are a good job.

          We generally expect a blessing after the fact, after we’ve worked hard, done good, learned, followed, obeyed.  And blessing eludes us.

Jesus looked out and saw a crowd---a lot of hurt, a lot of seeking, a big demand.  And he called his disciples to him and began to teach them this way:

          Blessed are you in the midst of trial and trouble, of failure and hurt

          In the midst of all the ways the world says you don’t measure up.

          So you who get discouraged---blessed are you.

          And you who just want to weep---blessed are you.

          You who are getting shoved around---blessed are you.

You who are persecuted, insulted, betrayed, discounted, misunderstood

                   blessed are you.

In the midst of life, God is bringing blessing, comfort, hope, freedom, goodness.

Some of you come to the Lord’s table as though you were handing in your report card, asking have I been good enough to receive this? 

Some fail to come having already answered their own question.

                   The Lord blesses first and teaches after.

                             Come this blessing is for you.