CALVARY
BAPTIST CHURCH
Rev. Fred Weimert March 30, 2008
“A Living Hope”
When I first
learned that my older sister had breast cancer
It wasn’t really from her…
It was from my younger
sister Niki.
Niki was the
first to tell me that our older sister’s
biopsy
had come back positive for cancer…
Niki then
swore me to secrecy,
because
our sister didn’t want anybody to know
that
she had cancer.
As
Niki put it…
“She told me that she had had a full life…
and
she was ready to go.
And
I told her baloney…
I’ve
seen all but 10 years of your life…
and
it hasn’t been that full.”
Maybe Niki
was a little too blunt…
but
when my sister finally told me about the cancer
I
told her it would be good for her
to
find some people to talk to,
beyond
the medical community…
people
who have been through it.
She
hasn’t really done that too much,
and
so I have had to relay to her
suggestions
from friends I know
who
have been through
breast cancer…
This
is hardly the best way
to get through this,
but it is the way my sister
seems to want to proceed.
Yesterday in
a conversation with her
she
mentioned
that
she had told a person in radiology
that
she was experiencing pain
under her arm…
And
the woman had made for her
a little foam pillow to put under her arm…
Then
she said:
“It made me feel much better
I
wonder why no one in the hospital
had
told me that earlier.”
Then
she added:
You
know before the surgery
you
had mentioned a friend
suggesting
that.”
I
said yes.
then
I added:
“That’s why I said you should talk to people
outside
the medical community.”
I
have told her about people in this congregation
supporting
each other through
a
variety of medical procedures…
It
is nice to have someone who
who
has gotten through the procedure alive
to
tell you…
to
show you, by presence…
It
can be done.
I don’t know that my
sister really gets it…
Some pioneer
spirit or something…
My
mother would probably have called it
stubborn…
pigheaded…
cussedness…
something
appears to be making her want to think
she is going to be the first person
to get through this without help…
from
anyone…
all on her own…
Sadly
that is a pretty lonely and painful pursuit.
In our conversation
yesterday
I
tried to tell my sister about the article on the front page,
of yesterday’s Sun,
under the title Hospitals’ “Hope
Coaches”
It is a story about a
woman,
a
cancer survivor,
who
is now working for the
American
Cancer Society
as
a Patient Navigator
at
In the article the woman
Anne
McNerney is quoted:
“Once you’re diagnosed, you’re free-falling for a while,
You’re
like a deer in headlights.
You
have a million questions…
They
just want someone to listen.
Ninety-eight
percent of the time we connect.
They
don’t know what to expect
and
I have already been there.”
I
guess my sister falls in that other 2%...
Too
bad because I think it is a great idea.
I don’t think it is
really that novel an idea.
In many ways this idea
is the center piece of
our Christian faith…
The
incarnation…
God
in Christ Jesus
taking
on human flesh…
Living
in our world,
with
it’s joy and suffering,
and
telling us that ‘hey, you can make it.’…
or
at least, “I can help you make it.”
“You don’t have to
do
it all on your own.”
But there is a little
difference in what Ms. McNerney is doing
at
and what God
is doing in Christ,
Because,
you see,
there
is a day coming
When
Ms. McNerney is going to die,
and
so are all of the patients
she is talking to…
and
so will all of us…
You
see we are all terminal,
and that is the great thing about Jesus.
Because of
the resurrection
Jesus
is able to say to us…
“The
world uses the word terminal,
which
might be appropriate,
except
for the fact that the world
looks at terminal
as the end of the line.
Whereas
the resurrection indicates
death
is more like a terminal
with
the possibility of
continued travel…
a connecting flight…
another train…
something more.”
This is what the reading from the
letters is about…
It is a reading I
frequently use as the opening verses
for funeral
services…
it
is probably one of my favorite readings about
our
hope…
our living hope.
I
Peter 1: 3-7
Blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!
By his
great mercy
he has given us a new birth
into a living hope
through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ from the dead,
and
into an inheritance
that is imperishable,
undefiled,
and unfading,
kept in heaven for you,
who are being protected by the power of
God
through faith
for a salvation ready to be revealed in
the last time.
In this you rejoice,
even if now
for a little while
you have had to suffer various trials,
so that the genuineness of your faith—
being more precious than gold
that, though perishable,
is tested by fire—
may be found to result in praise
and glory
and honor
when Jesus Christ is revealed.
HERE ENDS THE
Last week I gave
you some of Anglican Bishop N.T. Wright’s ideas
about life in the world to come…
I like many of his
thoughts,
but none of
us knows for certain what is to come…
Except
that we trust that Jesus will be there…
and
we will stand with him…
“By his great mercy”
In the third chapter of
Titus verses 3-7
almost the
same theology is stated,
but
there is a difference.
in
that it further describes the nature of our being
before
our ‘new birth’.
in Titus
3:3ff it begins with a description of our former self:
For
we ourselves were once foolish,
disobedient,
led astray,
slaves to various passions and
pleasures,
passing
our days in malice and envy,
despicable,
hating
one another.
We
weren’t so good
before
the ‘new birth’.
then Titus
describes that birth
But
when the goodness and loving kindness of God
our Savior
appeared,
he saved us,
not because of any works of
righteousness
that we had done,
but
according to his mercy,
through the water of rebirth
and renewal by the Holy Spirit.
This Spirit he poured out on us richly
through Jesus Christ our Savior,
so that, having been justified by his
grace,
we might become heirs
according
to the hope of eternal life.
The rebirth in both
Peter and Titus is by grace
and as Peter
intimates…
but
Titus says outright the ‘new birth’
is
through water:
but
according to his mercy,
through the water of rebirth
“New
birth” comes for us
through
the waters of baptism…
It
may not happen
exactly at the moment
of
our baptism.
Not
so that we are conscious of it…
but
still it is God’s grace present…
through
water.
I
have told you before
Many
people believe that I Peter
was
a letter read at services of baptism.
As I read this letter again
in this year
when because of the full moon so near the equinox…
Passover
occurs almost a month
after
our Easter.
As I read this letter again and
thought of Passover…
I was struck anew with
how many symbols in Peter
also fit the
story of Passover.
the
‘new birth’
in
Peter and Titus new birth
came through water
In
Passover it comes through water…
with crossing the sea… and the
In Peter you have this sense of our inheritance
In
Passover the inheritance is there
with the giving of the law…
by the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob…
and that inheritance embodied
in the land of promise…
In Peter we are protected by the
power of God…
In
Passover Israel is protected
by
the lamb’s blood on the door…
by the sea closing…
by the cloud and fiery pillar…
and In Peter we suffer various trials
and
in Passover Israel remembers that
the wilderness was full of trials.
In a way we like
I don’t think we have to supersede
them…
we both wander with a
sense of grace and promise…
and with a
hope for something more…
No matter what we experience in life
may we never lose this living
hope we understand in Jesus,
or the joy
of
sharing the living hope we have
the
living hope we can be with Jesus in us…
sharing…
person to person…
Just
like Ms. McNerny does in her work.
May
we share the hope we have
with
others who are afraid
they
have no reason to hope…
no
reason to believe
that
life can be made new.
The
death and resurrection of Jesus
is
the stronghold
where
we prisoners of hope
find
refuge.
So
may we live in hope.
Amen.