May 23, 2010 - What's In Your Box?

John 14: 15-20 ‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments. ¹⁶And I will ask Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. ¹⁷This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you.

18 ‘I will not leave you orphaned; I am coming to you. ¹⁹In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me; because I live, you also will live. ²⁰On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. 

Acts 2: 1-8  When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. ²And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting.³Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. ⁴All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

5 Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. ⁶And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each.⁷Amazed and astonished, they asked, ‘Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? ⁸And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language?

Today concludes the worship series on being more faith-full and fear-less. So I want to address a fear that is rarely talked about, yet it is mentioned throughout the Holy Bible, from Genesis to Revelation; it is the fear of God.  Pentecost is a great reason to experience the fear of God because of the dramatic way in which Jesus’ followers received the Holy Spirit.  They were all in one room praying and worshipping, when all of a sudden with a rush of wind and tongues like fiery flames, God burst open the box they may have put Him in! This was not the first time God did this of course, yet it was among the most dramatic.

Lucado writes, “Boxes bring wonderful order to our world. They keep cereal from spilling and books from tumbling. When it comes to containing stuff, boxes are masterful.”

Yet when it comes to containing Christianity, boxes fall short. And certainly people try to put Christians in a box. And also, Christians may be keeping their perception of God in a box. For example, the Pentecost story of the Holy Spirit arriving in fiery fashion – blowing in like a might wind, alighting on Jesus’ followers and inspiring them to speak in different languages is an action-filled non-fiction movie. Yet if the story is viewed as just another chapter and verse in the dusty bible on the shelf, then it has been put in a box – unusable oddly enough by the very people who claim that organized religion is irrelevant and out of date. Huh. Who has God in a box?

Even the people in Jesus time tried putting him in a box. His “Palestinian contemporaries designed an assortment of boxes. Be he never fit one. They called him a revolutionary; then he paid his taxes. They labeled him as a country carpenter, but he confounded scholars… He defied easy definitions. He was a Jew who attracted Gentiles. A holy man who hung out with streetwalkers and turncoats. In a male-dominated society, he recruited females. In an anti-Roman culture, he opted not to denounce Rome. He talked like a king yet lived like a pilgrim. People tried to designate, (categorize, and enclose him in a box). They couldn’t. (yet people) still try.” (Lucado)

All to often, God is kept in a box until such a time that we’re in desperate need. Then, like a Genie, we ask God to answer our wishes. While all along, the resource of God is available 24/7 through the Holy Spirit.

Last century, during the Great Depression, a woman struggling through the difficulties of that time went to the front desk of an insurance company in Minneapolis. She opened the lid of a shoebox that she held in her arm, and pulled out a worn and yellowed piece of paper, an insurance policy issued many years before.

She said that she had to stop making payments on the policy because she had run out of money. At first the desk clerk was a bit rude. After all, he got calls like this nearly every day, and he didn't want to be bothered with another one.

But then he took a look at the paper. It was a life insurance policy in a man's name - worth $300,000 -- right in the middle of the depression.

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "This is a pretty valuable policy, ma'am," he said finally. "Does your husband know you want to cancel it?" "My husband! Ha. I’ve been going through boxes of stuff and I found this the other day. You see my husband died three years ago."

There she was, at the end of her rope.  And in her box she held a piece of paper that could turn her life around. Fear keeps us clutching at paper, tightfisted and anxious. But faith in God releases to us the priceless power of the Holy Spirit within us.  Recall Paul's words to young Timothy: "For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline."

I’m certain there are many ways to help prevent putting our concept of God in a box. I want to explore just one; The fear of God.

I confess that as a child, there was a part of Sunday’s worship service that scared me. Maybe it put the “fear of God” in me, all I know is that I was scared of the traditional doxology that was sung after the offering. “Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost”.

Ghost?! Every week we sang it. Children and ghosts don’t go well together!

Now I’ll confess that as an adult, what I fear more than ghosts is being out of control.

Yet that’s exactly what the Holy Spirit wants to do in us, is fulfill God’s purpose in us beyond our control, beyond our ability to put God in a box inside a nice orderly category so we can utilize him only in times of need, yet not be troubled by the Lord at other times when we feel in control of life.  An apt warning on the label of the God Box is: the Spirit of God tends to comfort the troubled and trouble the comfortable!

From Genesis to Revelation, the bible emphasizes having the “fear of God” more than 121 times!  AND yet, The words "Fear not" appear 365 times in scripture, one for every day of the year. That's probably how often we need to hear our Lord warn us about the mesmerizing power of fear and doubt. As Jesus said, "Don't be afraid. Only believe!"

So what’s the difference between having “fear of God” while also trying to “fear not, God is with you”?

Well, we know that fear is an emotion. Yet it is not just a negative or frightful emotion.

To have fear of God means to have feelings of reverence, awe, and respect for the Lord.

To have fear of something else may have an unpleasant emotion caused by a sense of risk or danger.

And we know that fear may be healthy or harmful. Healthy fear keeps us from putting ourselves in dangerous situations – like a hand in the fiery flames.  Healthy fear is proclaimed in Proverbs “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge;” (1:7)

On a very human level, the fear of the Lord involves a deep recognition that God is God and we are not. We need God to exist, and God does not need us to exist.

A harmful fear involves a sense of terror or dread. And God’s Word instructs “fear not… do not be afraid… take courage.”

On the other hand, an unfaithful person has good reason to be panic-stricken at thoughts of God. Still, this kind of fear of God does not often lead to a faithful relationship with the Lord.

In the faith journey of life, people may be quick to recall the biblical comfort of “do not be afraid”, and people may be slow to recall the biblical command “fear the Lord”.

Max Lucado clarifies the relationship between the fears, “as awe of Jesus expands, fears of life diminish. A big God translates into big courage. A small view of God generates no courage. A limited fearless view of God has no power over cancer cells, corruption, stock-market crashes, or global calamity… A box-sized version of God simply does not work to” alleviate our fears.

Nature helps us understand reverence and awe of God as it illustrates the fear of God: for example, Standing on the edge of the north rim of the Grand Canyon, being in the presence of a 1,200 pound bull elk when bugles, walking on the path in Glenwood canyon when the spring run-off in the Colorado river thunders it’s way past in a torment of crashing waves! You get the idea.  So, if the majesty of nature commands respect, how much more does the Creator of all creation deserve our holy fear in reverence and awe?

One person posted a quote on face-book this week: “Instead of telling God how big our mountains are, tell those mountains how big your God is!”

I believe that when we faithfully fear God in reverence, awe, and humble respect, then we fear less the things that try to terrorize us and we can faithfully live out-of-the-box.

One more box for our spiritual consideration this week: I’ve heard parents of children say that when they’re driving through town, their child would see the church building and pronounce, “look, that’s where God lives!”

While that’s age appropriate theology for a child, it’s not so age appropriate for an adult.  If people only access the power of God at church in worship; if they only avail themselves to the Holy Spirit during bible studies at church, then perhaps they are keeping God in a box that is only opened on Sunday morning or on the corner of 5^th & White ave.  The Holy Spirit calls followers of Jesus to express the love of God through their spiritual disciplines at home and their faithful actions to others in the community during the week – just as the disciples did in response to receiving the Holy Spirit of God.

Come Holy Spirit come! Inspire us with the fear of God so we may be faithful and fearless followers of Jesus Christ. Amen.