Homeless or adopted home

Wai­ting for pro­mi­ses – bot­tom­less or with ground under our feet? How do we make ends meet?

A warm wel­co­me to all of you who are back after the holi­days! Back in your fami­li­ar home! This is whe­re I would like to start my ser­mon: What is home for you? Is it whe­re you live at the moment? Or is it your par­ents» house? The other ques­ti­on is: What is home for you? Is it also your home? Or your home­town, whe­re you are natu­ra­li­sed? May­be you have a home of choice? Or do you have the same con­vic­tion as Paul who wro­te to Phil­ip­pi? «[…]our home is hea­ven, whe­re Jesus Christ the Lord lives. And we wait eager­ly for him, for the return of our Saviour». (Phil­ip­pians 3:20 NLB).

We are waiting… 

We are wai­ting… ok! But lon­gin­gly? I don’t know! Some­ti­mes I have the impres­si­on – also of mys­elf – that we are still too stron­gly groun­ded! We don’t glue our­sel­ves to the streets, but we glue our­sel­ves to other things. What have you glued yours­elf to? «The Lord is good to tho­se who wait for him and seek him». (Lamen­ta­ti­ons 3:25 NLB). Wai­ting alo­ne can be gruel­ling, it takes pati­ence, per­se­ver­ance and a firm faith. Wai­ting tog­e­ther is easier for us. If we help each other in this and expe­ri­ence good, relia­ble and fri­end­ly rela­ti­onships here, it is a gre­at help to us! Always in the know­ledge: The wai­ting of the god­ly leads to joy… (Phil­ip­pians 3:20 NLB).

The grea­test help in wai­ting is Jesus hims­elf. How does he do it? He has taken us into his heart! In his fare­well dis­cour­se, he told his disci­ples that he would soon be going back to the Father in hea­ven, and this is what he said: «In that day you will know that I am in my Father and you are in me and I am in you». (John 14:20 LUT). «You in me» – Jesus has taken his fol­lo­wers into his heart! Just as you have taken him into your life and into your heart, he has taken you into his heart. Jesus has a big heart, in his heart he has room for all of us. «You in me and me in you…!»

You have to let this fact pass on your ton­gue for a while and enjoy it! But bewa­re! You can with­draw yours­elf from the heart of Jesus. In the Gos­pel of John, Jesus talks about this in the vine para­ble. You all know this: «I am the vine, you are the bran­ches… He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit… He who does not abide in me is cast away and withers, and is burned».

How do we stay in the heart of Jesus? If we thank him again and again for taking us into his heart. When we say to him «I love you», «I like you» or simi­lar. We remain in Jesus» heart if we also value this clo­sen­ess, lis­ten to Jesus and also talk to him. In other words, read the Bible and pray. Open the Bible! God speaks to us most cle­ar­ly through his Word! He can also spark into your mind, or speak to you through other peo­p­le. Here in the ser­vice or in the small groups. Com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on is ever­y­thing, also in our rela­ti­onship with Jesus. Last Tues­day we met again in the small group and last night we had a sum­mer par­ty tog­e­ther. If we stay con­nec­ted with each other like this and wait tog­e­ther for our future in hea­ven, we can alre­a­dy beco­me a bit at home the­re and deve­lop home­li­ke feelings!

Abraham’s story

Abra­ham has a remar­kab­le sto­ry about wai­ting! God said to him «go» – and he went, even though he did not know whe­re God wan­ted to send him. God sent Abram out into the world with the words: «Go from your father’s coun­try and from your kind­red and from your father’s house to a land that I will show you». (Gene­sis 12:1 LUT).

Abram was alre­a­dy mar­ried when he moved with the who­le clan of his par­ents from Ur in Chal­dea over 1000 km to Haran in the north. And now, with a full 75 years under his belt, he is sup­po­sed to pack his bags again and set off! Inde­ed! He does it! So Abram went out, as the Lord had said to him (Gene­sis 12:4 LUT). He takes his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot (the son of his decea­sed brot­her), his ser­vants and maids – and off he goes! I would love to go on holi­day like that, it would be exci­ting and adven­tur­ous! But a move into the unknown would be much more challenging!

God leads Abram and Sarai into the land of the Kaana­ni­tes. After about 600 km they stop at She­chem. The­re God appears to Abram and says: «To your des­cen­dants I will give this land». And Abram built the­re an altar unto the LORD, which appeared unto him». (Gene­sis 12:7 LUT).

The Canaa­ni­tes had no idea of Abram’s God, but ser­ved other gods. Abram does not want to go along with this and builds an altar to his God, the Almigh­ty. Abram was a true nomad: From She­chem they go on to Bethel, whe­re Abram builds the next altar to wor­ship God. After some time, a gre­at fami­ne forces them to break down the tents and move to Egypt. The­re their flocks have grown so lar­ge that Abram and Lot have to part with all their goods after their return. Lot moves to the watery regi­on of Sodom. Abram stays in Bethel and later moves to the regi­on of Hebron. God con­firms his pro­mi­se to Abram the­re: «Look around you on all sides. All this land that you see I will give to you and your des­cen­dants for a pos­ses­si­on fore­ver. And I will give you so many des­cen­dants that they can­not be coun­ted – like the dust on the ground». (Gene­sis 13:14b-16 NLB).

If I had been Abram, I would pro­ba­b­ly have thought: «Why should I look at this land, it’s not mine yet! Now I’m almost 100 years old and I don’t have any des­cen­dants yet, except Ishma­el from the maid Hager, which is rather a faux pas for me!» God makes a coven­ant with Abram in Hebron, his next place of resi­dence, and gives him and his wife new names: Abram is now cal­led Abra­ham and Sarai Sarah. In addi­ti­on, God pro­mi­ses Abra­ham that he will soon have a son with Sarah! This is a laug­hing stock for Abra­ham! «Then Abra­ham fell on his face, and laug­hed, and said in his heart, Shall a child be born to me at the age of an hundred years, and shall Sarah, nine­ty years old, bear» (Gene­sis 17:17 LUT).

Should anything be impossible for God?

Some time later they are visi­ted by three mes­sen­gers from God, who also per­so­nal­ly announ­ce to Sara that she will have a son in a year. Sara can’t help laug­hing eit­her. «What, now at our age we are still sup­po­sed to cul­ti­va­te love, while my hus­band is also very old!» She must have been thin­king, «They could have come a litt­le ear­lier!!! The three men have a short ans­wer rea­dy for the two of them: Should any­thing be impos­si­ble for God? 

Have you ever thought: Dear God, why did­n’t you inter­ve­ne ear­lier? Don’t we some­ti­mes have trou­ble wai­ting for God to act? Did­n’t God say? This was like an inspi­ra­ti­on from God for me, why does­n’t he react? Whe­re is it stuck?

Abra­ham repea­ted­ly recei­ved a clear pro­mi­se: Des­cen­dants as many as stars in the sky; des­cen­dants as many as grains of sand on the shore of the oce­an! And now he is old, soon to be 100 years old and the first des­cen­dant of Sarah and he is still miss­ing! But oh mira­cle! The pro­mi­se is inde­ed ful­fil­led! Isaac is here! But what about the taking of the land? Abra­ham could see the future land for God’s peo­p­le, but he remain­ed a stran­ger here. He always had Canaa­ni­tes around him who wor­ship­ped their gods. He lived the­re, but he was some­thing of a home­l­ess man. It was not a real home.

This is what hap­pen­ed to his des­cen­dants Isaac and Jacob. In Hebr. 11 we read: «All the­se peo­p­le belie­ved until they died wit­hout having recei­ved what God had pro­mi­sed them. But they saw what was pro­mi­sed to them from afar and loo­ked for­ward to it, for they had reco­g­nis­ed and testi­fied that they were only guests and stran­gers here on earth. And they con­fes­sed that they were sear­ching for a land that they could call home. (Hebrews 11:13–14 NLB). Here we noti­ce how some­thing con­nects us to the­se foref­a­thers in faith! We are also pro­mi­sed a land! Our goal is the king­dom of God in glo­ry. Don’t we as Chris­ti­ans in our sur­roun­dings often feel very much like they did back then? Stran­gers, whe­re you live! At the work­place, in the school class, in the lec­tu­re hall… We are con­fron­ted with many idols and gods! We encoun­ter many ungod­ly things in this cra­zy world. We are human beings like ever­yo­ne else, with fee­lings, with cha­rac­ter, with inte­rests, with likes and dis­li­kes… but the spe­cial thing is Christ in us, our new creature!

Abra­ham held on to his faith through it all. Paul calls us to do the same in 2 Timo­thy. «Lead your life in the faith and love of Christ Jesus. Careful­ly guard what has been ent­rus­ted to you; the Holy Spi­rit who lives in us helps you to do this» (2 Timo­thy 1:13b-14 NLB). The Holy Spi­rit helps us to be strong in faith. Ano­ther help is pray­ing for each other. We were able to expe­ri­ence this per­so­nal­ly in an impres­si­ve way. When we took up our last posi­ti­on in Viva-Chi­le Zug short­ly befo­re the turn of the cen­tu­ry, we soon won a dear woman as a pray­er war­ri­or for our who­le fami­ly. For 25 years now she has been pray­ing for us, Ros­ma­rie and me, for our two child­ren, their spou­ses and for all our grand­child­ren. She will be 94 next Wed­nes­day, but still knows all our names! This woman has been a gre­at help to us! Do you pray regu­lar­ly for peo­p­le dear to you? Then keep at it, becau­se you are such a gre­at bles­sing to the­se peo­p­le, visi­bly or invi­si­bly. Be the­re for each other. Be strong tog­e­ther! To be on the way tog­e­ther with Jesus. Belie­ving tog­e­ther. Hoping tog­e­ther. Wai­ting together.

Jesus gets my clo­sing word: «I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from evil. They are not of the world, as I am not of the world. Sanc­ti­fy them in the truth; your word is truth. As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I sent them into the world. I sanc­ti­fy mys­elf for them, that they also may be sanc­ti­fied in the truth». (John 17:15–19 LUT).

Amen

Possible questions for the small group 

1. Whe­re do you feel at home? What does it take for you to feel at home?
2. Is the­re an area that you would call home?
3. Why is it important that we do not lose sight of our future home with Jesus?
4. What does it mean to you to have a firm place in the heart of Jesus?
5. Do you think it is wrong of God to make his pro­mi­ses known so ear­ly that tho­se con­cer­ned can­not even expe­ri­ence it?
6. What was God thin­king of when he pro­mi­sed Abra­ham des­cen­dants as many as the sand of the sea or as many as the stars in the firmament?
7. When, how and whe­re have you felt a cer­tain stran­gen­ess as a Chris­ti­an among tho­se who think differently?
8. Do you have loved ones for whom you pray blind­ly (wit­hout always kno­wing if it will happen)?