Sermon - 2014-05-26

If you love me, you would keep my commandments.  Jesus words to his disciples are words for us to know and understand today.  For they are part of our history and part of what makes us Christians even today.  For in many regards, they still define who we are and what is so very important to us.  

Several thousand years ago, God gave to Moses the stone tablets. Upon those tablets, God wrote the Ten Commandments.  These commandments would be given to the Hebrew people after leaving the land of Egypt.  The purpose of the commandments was a gift of love, to show and remind people that God is a part of their life. Yet, there is a need for others and need for community to care and help one another.

Commandments 1-3 deal with your relationship with God

Commandments 4-10 deal with your relationship with others.  

Having these good relationships in your life is so very important.  It reminds you not worry about the little things but focus on the bigger picture.    

Yet so often, people share these commandments as things that people HAVE to follow.  These are things that God is calling you to do, to be, and make sure others are doing too.  However, today we hear the truth, that a disciple of Jesus Christ should WANT to do the commandments because they love Christ.  Instead of anger, instead of yelling,  and instead of shame, we should encourage everyone in their faith, helping them in their journey by using these commandments as an example.  

So, if we find someone not living out the Ten Commandments, how should we encourage them?  Yes, I realize that I am preaching to the choir.  For you are here and understand some of these very things, about which I am talking.  You came today knowing that church is important in your life.  It is why you are here every Sunday, just like you gather together to eat food.  Yet, you may be wondering, what can you do for others who are not here, but you would like them to be.  

Paul gives us an example of what we should do.  First, enter into their lives.  Understanding the false gods that are a part of their lives. What is distracting them. What is leading them into false relationships.  You should pray for them.  When the time is right, share with them, welcome them into the community, and a relationship of which they are hoping to be a part.  

Now all of this may seem very distant.  It may seem like something that does not apply to our community, our lives, and our modern times in which we live.  However, in our own community we have things that can easily be false gods.   For people can make false gods out of: hospital (the place where people go to have help with their physical bodies).  People make false gods out of college (the place where we go to find out answers, or have hope for the future), and even the sport fields (the place where they build community).  Now please do not get me wrong, these are not bad places.  They can be very good for a community as a whole.   But, they should  be understood that their place in the community does not replace God.  

The church is the place where we gather together as a people of God.  The church is where we remind one another that God should be the very most important thing in your life.  That we are in need of God and our relationship with others in our life.  There are times in which we will mess things up, and there will be hard feelings, but we still are able to gather together in the presence God.  To receive forgiveness and know that we can continue a right relationships with one another.

May you be reminded of your relationship with God and one another.

May you grow in faith and trust in God.

And may you go forth to share all of it with those whom you encounter. Amen.