Old South Sermons:

Reflection on Congregational Care & Support Sunday
 
by Quinn G. Caldwell, Associate Minister

Job 2: 11-13, Philippians 2:1-11

September 21, 2008

Listen to this sermon

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Will you pray for me?  Lord, may the words of my lips and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight, our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.

So, you know the story of Job, right?  Godfearing, righteous man living a prosperous life, with kids and wife and livestock and his health and all.  And then suddenly, bam!  Away it all goes.  Before he knows it, Job is left with nothing: kids, livestock, servants, property, crops all gone.  Before he knows it, he’s sitting on the garbage pile at the edge of town with nothing left to do but scratch at the sores all over his body.

You know this story.  It’s not unfamiliar to you.  You know this story not just because you’ve heard it in church or maybe read it at home before, but you know the story of Job because it’s true.  Because you know that guy.  Right?  The guy, the good guy going along just fine, everything more or less well and then bam!  The phone rings, or the test results come back, or the brakes give out, or the kid gets sick….  You know the story of Job because you know that guy…maybe you know it because you’ve been that guy.

A part of the story that you might not know, because far too many don’t, is this: Job has friends: Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar .  Now, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar are not friends that always get it right.  If you know this story, you may also know the term “Job’s comforters”: the kinds of friends who come to you in adversity and, trying to help, say a lot of stuff that only makes it worse.  Through a lot of the book, that is what they do.

But.  Before they open their mouths and start getting it very wrong, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar actually do something right.  It’s a small thing in its way, and it’s easy to overlook, and it is the very stuff that grace is made of.  Job’s friends come to him there on the ash heap, and before they start talking and saying the wrong things, they sit down next to him, and they put ashes on their heads as he has put ashes on his, and they stay there with him without saying a word for seven days and seven nights.

Seven days and seven nights, just sitting there net to him sharing in his pain.  You see, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar know just how alienating calamity is, how it can make its victims feel like they’re sitting alone on the far side of a chasm with everybody else, all the happy, un-calamitied people on the other side.  So they do what good friends do: they do not stand on the near side of the chasm, waving at their friend, and they do not try to coax him back across.  They go over to him.  Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar cross the chasm, leave their own comfort behind, and sit next to him on the ash heap.  They do not say anything, they do not try to explain what happened, or try to fix what cannot be mended, or try to get him to snap out of it or go back to normal life.  They come to him in his agony, they join him in it insofar as they can, and they just sit with Job.  They do not leave him alone.

It is exactly that that we seek to do through the work of the Congregational Care & Support Committee and the Care Crews.  The work of these groups is the work of Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, the work of crossing the chasm.  The meals, the calls, the cards, the rides, all are our way of sitting for seven days and seven nights or as long as it takes with those who need it.  Most of what ails the world—most of what ails us—we cannot solve with our casseroles and cards.  What we can do is make sure that the suffering—and the rejoicing—know that they are not alone.

On the back of the white insert in your bulletin, you will see notice of one of the newest ministries of Congregational Care & Support.  Our own Erik Gustafson is recording, with the help of Sam Ou, Bob Lake, and Elizabeth Tustian (or should I say Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar), music for every season of one’s life.  Several of the pieces, including the one he will play for today’s prayer response, are Erik’s own compositions.  The Committee will distribute these CDs to those in need or joy (or both), a gift of beauty and a reminder that none of us in this church is alone, and it will be, I promise you, exquisite.

Today’s Call to Worship and opening hymn is adapted from one of the most beautiful pieces of Scripture ever: Philippians 2:4-11.  It goes like this:

Let each of you look not to your own interests,

but to the interests of others.

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

who, though he was in the form of God

did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,

but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave,

being born in human likeness.

And being found in human form,

he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death

— even death on a cross.

Therefore God also highly exalted him

and gave him the name that is above every name,

so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend,

in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the Father.

It’s the story of another chasm, the one between God and humans, and how God looked across that chasm and decided to not leave us alone, but to cross to us, to be with us, to sit with us, to enter into our estate.  Of how God was born in human likeness, though it would kill him, so that God could come close to us, not leave us sitting on the ash heap and scratching ourselves alone.

It tells the story of how for his doing that, Jesus became exalted, holy, so that even at his name every knee bends to God’s glory.  It tells that story, and it invites us into it as well.  It invites us to join in the work Jesus began when he crossed the chasm to be with us.  It invites us to be as Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, not simply because it’s a good idea and not simply because we’re nice people.  We are invited into the work of crossing the chasm, the work of the Congregational Care & Support Committee and the Care Crews, because it is the same work God did, it is God’s life, and to do it is Godlike.

When the phone rings in the middle of the night, or the test results come back positive, or the kid gets sicker than any kid should.  And likewise when the lovebirds finally tie the knot, when the new job comes through, when the baby is born or baptized.  When life changes for good or ill, we are called to be like Eliphaz, Bildad, Zophar, and God.  And if we are, if we let that power of God shine in us there on the ash heap with our friend, God promises us exaltation as well.  Not just for the Eliphazes, Bildads, and Zophars, but for the Jobs too.  Exaltation.  Newness,  Glory.  A life so full that all who see it will want to bend their knees in praise of all that God can do.

And, just in case you don’t believe me about Eliphaz and Bildad and Zophar and Jesus and exaltation and us.  Just in case you don’t believe Ken and Chris about it.  Just in case you don’t believe it after seeing Erik’s CD and hearing his music, watch this.

If you are a member of the Congregational Care & Support Committee, please stand up and stay standing.

If your new baby received a Jesus Loves Me T-shirt when he or she was born, stand up if you can and stay standing.  If your baby got a baptism picture book when she or he was baptized, stand up.

If you have ever received a card from the Care Crew, will you please stand up?  Now if you’ve ever sent a card.  How about those of you who have received meals?  And you who’ve made meals?  If you’ve given a ride or received a ride to church or an appointment, stand up.  If you’ve received an Easter lily, or delivered one, if you’ve received a visit, or made one.

Now sisters and brothers, look around, turn to someone next to you and say God is great  (God is great).  Eliphaz, Bildad, Zophar, Job, Jesus, you, and the glory of God.  I don’t know what Jesus’ exaltation, the exaltation of the next world, looks like.  But exaltation in this world, looks like this.  Well done, thank you, praise God, amen.

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