April 22,
2007
Sunday
Morning Worship
“Presumptuous Sins”
Luke
14:7-11
Parables slip up on us.
They flip our values. They turn
our world upside down and surprise us.
The parables of Jesus are always relevant and always personal. They speak eloquently to us, in the here and
now.
P.G. Wodehouse, the British humorist, has one of his
characters refer to a parable of Jesus’ as looking like a “straightforward yarn
when you begin to read it,” but then you find that it has “something up its
sleeve that pops out at you and [knocks you] flat.”
With this in mind, I want to share an experience from my own
life that relates to one of Jesus’ lesser-told and emphasized parables, the one
just read as our Scripture this morning.
I once served as an enlisted man in the U. S. Navy. I was attached to an air squadron at the Naval
Air Station, North Island, in San Diego, California (my home town), and never really
acquired the status of a sea-faring sailor.
For the most part, I did clerical work in a section dealing with Air
Intelligence and Special Weapons. Although
my job was not particularly glamorous, upon occasion I was allowed to observe
and even participate in highly classified meetings.
One day, I was invited to attend a special film showing and
lecture at the base auditorium, one that dealt with recent Soviet naval
operations. Since the event was
classified and very few enlisted men would be present, I felt quite honored to
be invited. I arrived fifteen minutes
early only to discover that the entire theater was filled to capacity. Except that, right down in the center front, there
were two empty seats.
Now, I’ve always had a high level of self-esteem and self-confidence,
and I saw no reason why I shouldn’t take one of the empty chairs. So I did . . . much to my regret and
humiliation. Soon, very soon, a junior grade officer politely asked me to remove
myself from the seat. It seemed that I
was sitting in one of the seats reserved for the base’s Commanding and
Executive Officers!
Jesus tells this parable about a man who is invited to a
feast and claims the seat of highest honor. It’s interesting that Luke is the only gospel
writer that includes this parable as part of Jesus’ teachings. Now, unlike my situation, this man appears to
deserve the place of honor; clearly, he’s the outstanding man there. However, unexpectedly another guest arrives
who clearly deserves the highest place, and so the first man is escorted from
his seat, much to his deep chagrin.
I can easily and readily imagine how the blood pounded in
his veins and the food upset his stomach and his friends whispering, “You sure
got put in your place tonight. You
thought you were so good with your fancy clothes and all. Well, now you know how the rest of us feel. Maybe you’ll think twice before you pull that
stunt again!”
Now, what we’re talking about here is called presumption. The dictionary defines it as “taking upon one’s
self more than is warranted; forward or overconfident opinion or conduct;
arrogance, pride, taking something for granted.”
This is the kind of problem a person may have and be totally
unaware of. It may be quite obvious to others
but completely hidden from its owner. What
others see as stubbornness, he sees as conviction. What others see as cruelty, he sees as
rightful vengeance. What others see as
selfish gain, he sees as the reward of God.
What others know to be a sham and hypocrisy, he looks on as the faithful
observance of his religious duty.
This is why the psalmist asks in great distress, “Who can understand
his errors?” Then knowing but one answer,
he prays, “Cleanse thou me from secret faults. Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous
sins; let them not have dominion over me!”
(Psalm 19:12-13)
What we’re talking about here are “presumptuous sins.” How is it that we sin by “taking something for
granted,” by assuming “more than is warranted”? What are these subtle, hidden flaws that
escape our notice but appear so repugnant to others and to God? That’s what I want to share with you this
morning.
So,
first, let’s beware of presuming that our sins are forgiven easily. “Thank
you, God, for my nice home and my new car and all my friends. Bless me in all I undertake, and, God, if I’ve
committed any sins, just forgive them, would you?”
Bernard of Clairvaux, one of the medieval saints of the
Church, once said,
I do a great wrong in [God’s] sight, when
I beseech him that he will hear my prayer, which as I give utterance to it I do
not hear myself. I entreat him that he
will think of me, but I regard neither myself nor him. Nay, what is worse, turning over corrupt and evil
thoughts in mine heart; I thrust a dreadful offensiveness into his presence.
A “dreadful offensiveness,” he says. Moreover, by this, he means the shallow,
flippant, presumption that takes sins or shortcomings lightly.
Where do we learn that this isn’t so, that God takes it
seriously if we do not? We learn it from
the bite of a Roman whip, from a crown of thorns, from a jeering mob, and from
a cross that was raised on a hill as the sky turned black.
There was once a man who loved to go to revival meetings and
talk about how he had seen the “light” and changed his ways. He always began by publicly acknowledging the
wicked life he had lived for years. It
seems there was nothing on Paul’s list or any other list of evil deeds this man
hadn’t done. He had been a liar, a
cheat, a thief, a drunk, a womanizer, a drug dealer and more. And, always, when he had finished reciting his
long list of transgressions, the man would smile and say, “But I thank God
through all those wicked years, I never lost my religion.”
You see, this man didn’t realize, as Bernard of Clairvaux
reminds us, that if you seek to be a Christian, the evil habits and the wicked
ways must go. Perhaps not over night,
though that’s possible I suppose, but assuredly and ultimately it must come
down to this: those things that are blocking God in your life must be put aside.
Yes, I know, that a word of forgiveness was spoken there on
the cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” And in that word, there’s grace and hope for
all of us. However, it’s a presumptuous sin
to claim that forgiveness without reflecting on what it cost and what is the
responsibility of one who accepts it.
Second,
let’s beware of presuming that we know the burdens our friends carry. We
don’t. But it’s easy to assume that our
prayers aren’t needed unless they're asked for, that there’s no trouble unless
it’s mentioned, that people are really as happy as they seem in our presence,
and that if they need our help they’ll surely ask for it.
On the other hand, sometimes we become too proud; we don’t
like to ask for help. We also have a
tendency to look at our problems with one end of the telescope and look at
others with the other end, the one that makes everything look small and far
away.
“Bear one another’s burdens,” God’s Word says. How can we do that unless we develop sensitivity
to the little signals people give that they’re hurting? How can we do what my friend did for me in an
uncertain time of my life? He looked
deep into my eyes and asked, “Jim, can I do anything at all to help you?” How can we do it unless we develop a way of
turning the telescope around so that we aren’t so preoccupied with the size of
our own needs and can really know the burden that others have to bear? If this seems hard to do, then I would make
this suggestion: Try sitting for an hour in a police station on any Saturday
night, or in a treatment center for retarded children, or in the Intensive Care
waiting room of any hospital.
Third,
let’s beware of presuming that people know we love them. In
Fiddler on the Roof, Tevye keeps
asking his wife, “Do you love me?” Moreover,
Golde keeps brushing that question aside by talking of how she’s lived with him
the past twenty-five years and washed his clothes, cooked his meals, raised his
children, and milked the cow. But he’s
been watching his daughters courting and marrying and has seen the feelings of
love run strong. All of a sudden, he
needs reassurance; he needs to know that it’s still the same with them; he
needs to hear the words said.
Husband and wife live together, year after year. Surely, they love one another; but has it been
said? Father and son, mother and
daughter, brother and sister—they’re all related to one another. Surely, they love one another; but has it been
said? Christian friends live in the same
community and serve in the same church. Surely,
they love one another; but has it been said? Of course, I also mean more than just “saying”
it.
There’s the story of the young man who snuggled up to his
girl friend and said, “Darling, I love you, I need you, I adore you, I can’t
live without you.” The girl pushed him
away gently, saying, “Please John, don’t say such things. I don’t want to get serious.” To which John replied, “Who’s serious?” How accustomed we grow to the “games people
play” with words—saying one thing and meaning another!
A neighbor across the backyard fence, the person we sit close
to in worship—we presume they know that we love and appreciate them, but have
we ever bothered to let them hear it?
More important, have we ever taken the time to demonstrate the joy, the
superabundant kind of sensitive love that means we really care for another
person? If not, then that, too, is a
presumptuous sin.
Fourth,
let’s beware of presuming that people know how we feel about Christ, even
though we never tell them.
Now I’m not talking about carrying a
sign around or grabbing people by the collar or plastering our cars with bumper
stickers, but I am talking about the word that shares with a friend the faith
we have in Christ.
“But,” I can hear some of you ask, “isn’t it enough to
believe in God and attend church regularly? Doesn’t the life I live testify for itself? Shouldn’t my friends be left alone to make up
their own minds? Won’t there be a better
time than now?” These are some of the thoughts that run through
our minds, but they’re not God’s thoughts.
Dick Van Dyke, years ago, published a book about children in
which the following story appears.
It’s about a Sunday school teacher who
was telling the story of the Good Samaritan to her class of second-graders. The teacher really put herself into the story,
making it very vivid and very real. When
it was over, she asked the children, “What would you do it you were walking
along the road and saw a man who had been beaten by robbers lying in the ditch
with cuts and bruises allover him and blood pouring out of his wounds?” One little girl broke the awed silence saying,
“I’d probably throw up.”
Well, that’s an honest answer. In just about every human situation our first
reaction is, “What’s happening to me? How
will I be affected if I do this or do that?” And then Christ’s spirit comes into our lives
and to our utter amazement the first thing that occurs to us is, “What’s happening
to this one who’s been beaten?”
The gospel invitation is to come and see the miracles of
Christ, then go and tell others. “Gospel” means “good news.” What do you do when you find a bargain at the
store? You pass it on. You don’t presume that your friends will find
out for themselves. Something good has
happened to you, and you want to tell others about it.
Finally,
let’s beware of presuming that we have time for everything. The
grains of sand flow swiftly through the hourglass. Some of us may have more of it than others,
but all of us are running out of time.
A man once bought a used suit of clothes at the Salvation
Army Thrift store. In one of the pockets,
he found a fifteen-year-old ticket for a shoe repair job. The cobbler shop was still doing business at
the old neighborhood location. So, on a
whim, the man decided to try to reclaim the shoes. When he presented the ticket, the proprietor
looked at it for a moment and then disappeared into the back room. A few moments later he reappeared, saying very
calmly, “They’ll be ready next Tuesday.”
Well, that sounds like many of us who have been working in
this workshop we call “the church.” Some
of us have been on the job for much more than fifteen years and the shoes still
aren’t ready. How much time do we need to
take God seriously and to repair our broken relationships? Time has been given to us here in this life,
to discover, to respond, to open up, to become free, to live, to love, and to
hope—and it’s ticking away for all of us. The days are passing.
“Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and
spend a year there and trade and get gain,” we say. But God’s Word says, “You do not know about
tomorrow. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little
time and then vanishes. Instead, you
ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we shall live and we shall do this or that.’ As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.”
Don’t presume the future. Listen to what the scriptures say, “Behold,
now is the acceptable time; now is the day of salvation.” Who would presume to say “some other time”
when God says now?
Let us pray:
O God, we are
thankful you do not give us all we ask but only what we need. May we become your children without becoming
childish. May our faith continually be
informed by our minds as well as our feelings.
May our obedience to your way not become a dependency of mindless
discipleship but a commitment that remains alert and discerning. May we be wise as foxes and innocent as
lambs, so that we can live in this world and remain effective without losing
our dream of love and faithfulness. O
Lord, hear the prayer of our lips and the prayers of our hearts. In the name of Christ our Lord. Amen.