Here is my sermon from the weekend if you would like to review it and see what we talked about this weeks so that you can be in the know for next week. thanks
I don’t know about you all, but I have been losing a lot of sleep because of the Olympics this past week. Everything that is worth watching seems like it comes on at 1 or 2 AM and there is nothing like seeing badminton live on the world stage is there? Or If I am too tired I will wake up at like 4 and search the medal count just to see what has changed since the last time I tuned into NBC.
Each time I watch the Olympics I think about what an average day in the life of one of the athletes would look like. When my wife and I sat down to watch the women’s synchronized diving I couldn’t help but think about the radical differences between Marybeth Dunnichay’s experience of high school and my own. The announcers said that she was excited to learn how to drive, and to finally be going to school at a local high school instead of being home schooled like many word class divers are. Being in the Olympics at age 15 wouldn’t have even registered on my radar. When I was that age my summers were spent watching movies, skating and consuming my weight in pizza and pasta in between soccer practices.
Just because I haven’t won Gold in Beijing or Athens doesn’t mean that I less of a person than the athletes who are competing at the top of their class. But seeing these athletes does sometimes make me wonder. Am I doing what I was made to do? Am I on the right path? Why are things so hard sometimes? Through the next couple of weeks we are going to be exploring what our job is as people of faith. The answer that we have come to is that we are to go for the Gold in all that we are called to do. Like the athletes at the Olympics we are all called to be great in one way or another.
Many of us want to know if and how our plans and the dreams that we have fit in with God’s plan. We are seeking to be faithful people and we choose a career path, a major in college (perhaps more than once at the sorrow of mom and dad) and make choices and hope that they translate into something that will be seen as positive in the eyes of God.
Today I would like to turn the bulk of our time together to the narrative of Joseph and his enormous dreams. There is no one that can say that Joe was shortchanging himself by setting his goals too low. As Joseph’s story begins we come to see very quickly that he is the one who his father cares for most deeply. The scripture even tells us that Jacob loves Joseph because he was born to him in his old age. This is an act that in itself would have turned the sons of Israel on their heads because the birth order was truly a force to be reckoned with. With this it would also seem that Joseph would have been the one to continue the business of his father. He was the one that was keeping the other brothers accountable for their work, though they would have most likely seen it as tattling rather than quality assurance.
For the loyalty and faithfulness of his work Joseph was given a reward of an amazingly beautiful coat. I don’t think there could have been a more volatile mix of personalities than the one brewing within Jacob’s household. On one hand you have a faithful son who is doing his father’s work and is rightly rewarded for a job well done. And on the other hand you have the brothers who turn their anger and hate on their little brother rather than recognizing their own sin and brokenness. With the new coat in the picture, the brother’s jealousy and greed boils over because they are seeing first hand something that will never be theirs.
The interesting thing for me at this point in the life of Joe is that he doesn’t rollover or fold under the pressure of the other siblings. He carries on with his duties and keeps plugging on as the person that he is called to be. From the get go we can read into the story that he was determined to do the right thing at any cost. Perhaps that is why I have become so fascinated with his story. He does the right thing even though it is tough. That statement alone would be a powerful sermon for today I would think.
Yet the story goes on and Joseph tells his family of the dreams that he is having and that way in which God’s hand is at work. I am betting it is with excitement that he retells the dreams for the first time as he begins to piece together the meaning of what he had experienced in his sleep. Yet his brothers reject him. Even his father when he hears of the dream rebukes his son. Jacob’s reaction to his son is to bring him back down to Earth with the lofty and outrageous visions that he has.
Should the dreamers in our lives be brought down to earth? We often tell children that they can be and do anything with their lives, but apparently there is some point in our lives that we cross when intervention happens and the sobriety of reality creeps into our thinking and our dreams begin to fizzle or worse we begin to minimize the lofty goals of others.
As I watch the games in China this week I can’t help but think that the Olympians have dreams like Joseph. None of them seeing their athletic careers culminating with a first place ribbon at their local YMCA. Though that may have been a stop they didn’t pack up their gym bag and walk away feeling the pride of going out while still on top. No, they pushed through with clear goal in mind and kept striving for the top.
Where has the flame of your dream flickered or been endangered of going out? Where do you feel you have heard the words of Jacob to the point that you begin to believe them? Where have you begun to give up on your dreams?
Many times our dreams vanish in the mundane. Life becomes more of a mission than an exciting journey. We have to get to the finish line, or the report filled out or the sermon written. All of the “have-to’s” in life begin to eclipse the rays of hope that keep our dreams alive.
Losing sight of our dreams we become like frozen rivers. The life that is inside of us runs and flows with energy, but the life is not seen because of the ice that has covered the surface and gotten in the way. Our life then begins not to reflect our own vocation and call, but rather becomes a cold shell with nowhere to go.
There is an old Quaker saying “Let your life speak” in which author Parker Palmer entitled a book . With the pages Palmer shares insight into listening to our true vocation. He writes:
“Vocation doesn’t come from willfulness. It comes from listening. I must listen to my life and try to understand what it is truly about…or my life will never represent anything true in the world, no matter how earnest my intentions.”
As I turn that statement over and over in my mind I think about the way that Joseph listens faithfully to what God has in store for him. I think about that ways that God is at work even when it would seem like God is distant in Joseph’s life. I think about the way that I dream about my life and the way that I let it shine through. At times I wonder if the “Have to’s” are eclipsing my dreams, other times I know that they are. But, there is a lot that we can learn from this youngest son of Jacob.
We see that God is at work no matter where Joseph finds himself. While just a boy, thrown into a pit, sold as a slave, accused of adultery, put into prison, made ruler of Egypt…God was there through the hardship and times of plenty. All the while Joseph never lost hope or discounted his gifts. He was willing to be used by God, and though it wasn’t always pretty he did great things.
God is working in the same way in our lives too. We are gifted and we are blessed. We have been given dreams. In the past year at our monthly church council meetings we have been sharing dreams that we have for our church and our ministries. Some wonderful dreams have been shared and exciting talk has happened around just the sharing of the ideas. Some of the dreams have come to bear fruit, while others are some distance off. In all of the sharing and the passion I can see God working. As our young people begin to go off to college they carry with them big dreams. As they pack cars full of microwaves, books, pop tarts, ramen noodles, and pictures of family and friends they also hold their exciting opportunities close to their hearts.
As we continue to watch the athletes in Beijing let us be reminded of the way that big dreams don’t have to just stay dreams. We are able to live them out to accomplish what our life have is store for us. With big dreams we set ourselves on the path to find personal gold in all the we do.
In the long run you can bet that a dream given by God is a dream that will come true. My prayer is that you all take the time to let your life speak to you. We search for insight from many places, and all too often the one place we don’t seek is from within. May you be willing to be used by God in a way that your true life will shine through. May you dream ridiculous dreams are wholly impossible without God’s help. Find comfort in knowing that all things are possible through Christ who gives us the strength to seek out those dreams. May you never stop dreaming and my God run wild in your life. In Christ’s name, I bid you peace.
