June 24, 2012
Pentecost 4
1st Samuel 17:32-49
Mark 4:35-41
(prayer)
I enjoy a good contest. I like to watch sports from time to time. Here and there I might have a favorite team, but a lot of the time, I just enjoy the uncertainty of the game and enjoy seeing what can happen.
I don’t know if it is just me or if others do this too, but when I’m watching a baseball game, or whatever, where I don’t have a pre-determined favorite, I usually end up rooting for whoever’s behind. In a basketball team where one team is down by a few points in the final minute, I want that losing team to catch up. I love those last minute shots to win at the buzzer.
If there’s a horse race on TV, I’d rather see a jockey push his horse from well back to nose out a victory at the wire.
Even beyond sports, I like political upsets. I cheer for the small business owner fighting the big corporation.
Does anyone remember the scene from the movie, “Fried Green Tomatoes”, where Cathy Bates’ character was pulling up to the super market only to have the parking space (she had been patiently waiting for) taken by a car of young girls who zoom in from the other direction. “Face it lady, we’re younger and faster”, they laughed as they walked away. The next thing you hear is the crunch of metal on metal. Cathy Bates was repeatedly driving into the back of the girl’s car. “Face it girls, I’m older and I have more insurance.”
The tendency to cheer for the underdog had the audience roaring at how that scene turned out.
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Last we in church here, we read about the day that the prophet Samuel went to Bethlehem to visit a man named Jesse.
God had told Samuel that it was time to find a new king to replace Saul, who had become corrupt. Samuel expected to find the new king from among Jesse’s sons.
In spite of his youth and relatively small stature (compared to his older brothers), Samuel knew that David, the shepherd boy with his boyish good looks was the one. That day, David son of Jesse was anointed King of Israel.
Although God is apparently decided and Samuel has performed a coronation ritual, no one was prepared to let King Saul in on the news.
As we heard in our first reading this morning, David has not yet challenged Saul for the throne, but, in fact, continues to loyally serve Saul who is well advance in years at this time. David would bring provisions out to the soldiers and offer soothing harp music for the king. And…at the same time, David regularly commutes back to the hills of Bethlehem to tend his family’s sheep.
Saul had a war on his hands, with the costal people of Philistia. David’s coronation seems to have been ignored. David’s three oldest brothers, in fact, were fighting against the Philistines in Saul’s army. They even got annoyed when they saw David come out to the battlefield thinking he just wanted to curiously gawk at what was going on and should be back protecting what few sheep the family had left.
While David was there, he heard a sound that was all too familiar to Saul and his army: the taunting voice of the champion of the Philistines, a giant of a man whose strength and confidence was almost single-handedly winning the war. The text says he was six cubits and a span in height – that would be plus or minus ten feet (probably an exaggeration) - but it makes the point about how totally demoralized the Israelites were at just the sound of Goliath’s voice as he taunted someone, anyone, to come out and challenge him one-on-one. This taunt had gone on twice a day for forty days. There was no one in Israel foolish enough to face Goliath. No one until David came to the battlefield that day.
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I think it is fair to say that the story of David and Goliath is so well known that it can be hard to hear it with fresh ears. This is more than a story of God siding with the underdog. It is a story about stepping up to what is needed and right in a situation, regardless of how futile that stepping up might appear to be. Before David volunteer to face Goliath, he ask the soldiers “who is this Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God.” For David, this was a battle for the integrity of his faith, more than it was a matter of war.
I get the sense that David was naïvely surprised at the fear that had grown to dominate Saul’s army. Even promises of riches and a life of ease provided by a grateful king could not motivate even one of Saul’s soldiers to face Goliath.
To David, it was as if God was absent from the thoughts of the soldiers.
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You heard the story. David was not a soldier. Even the king’s top-of-the-line armour was not for him. He would rely on his skills as a protective shepherd who had stopped lions and bears from harming his flock. A sling shot and a few river stones was all he had when he faced the Philistine champion. David won the challenge and (apparently) the war with one perfect shot to the Goliath’s forehead.
The bigger they come, the harder they fall.
A week or so at my son Matthew’s football practice. He ended up tackling one of his fastest teammates. Not because Matthew could ever hope to catch him in a footrace, but because Matthew was in perfect position and he used the right tackling technique. In Atom level football, we are always reminding the players that when it comes to tackling the “low man wins”. You’d think that the little guys might even have the advantage. The trick is convincing them that technique compensates for size; but that can be hard to believe when you see this goliath of a ten year old bearing down on you. But when the players begin to believe that size is not the only factor and that they are well equipped and well protected, their courage can grow!
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Goliath had the size-advantage, but David the courage-advantage. David’s courage came from his trust and faith in God.
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Fear dictates so much of our lives in this world. I see shows on TV like bubble-wrapped kids and I listen to the talk shows about how kids used to leave the house at 8 in the morning on a summer day and only pop by the house to eat. Parents and kids had no cell phone to maintain constant contact.
People seemed to be more fearful in the world today. Unsafe playground equipment, nasty guys with nasty plans lurking in dark vans, e coli, bird flu, the swine flu, global terrorism and the fear of the slowing down of the perpetually growing economy.
When we are afraid, we tend to be very cautious with our next step. Fear makes us actually appreciate the misery we know because it is potentially better that what miseries we fear might be ‘out there’.
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‘Let us go across to the other side of the lake.’
A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat; the boat was already being swamped.
But Jesus was in the back, comfortably asleep; and the others woke him up and said to him, ‘Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?’
It is interesting; this is not a situation where the disciples expected Jesus to be able to do anything to save them. After all, they were the skilled sailors, not him. Their death was assured as long as the wind continued to bring water into the boat that far from shore.
What they knew Jesus could give them was compassion. They wanted comfort at this time of peril. Misery wanted company. ‘Care about us Jesus!’ He did more:
Jesus rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm.
This was unexpected. It was nothing short of a miracle. Jesus showed compassion for the peril they faced as well as how that peril was making them feel. He did not just calm their fears, he catapulted away the need to be afraid.
Of course, one of the biggest fear people have (in any era of time) is a fear of the unknown.
Jesus could see that they now displayed a new fear – a fear of what Jesus’ amazing actions might mean. They were still afraid.
Jesus said to them, ‘Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?’
Fear. Faith. Jesus sets these words up here as antonyms: opposites. We often think of different antonyms for these words:
Fear > Calm, Safe.
Faith > Doubt, Uncertainty.
What is it about Fear that makes it an antonym for Faith: even more so than doubt?
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Fear often thrives on a lack of confidence that something good is possible. Fear would have us believe that we have nothing to count on; that we are alone and so should shrink away from everything.
Fear wants to crush our confidence. Fear wants to take away our belief that ‘there is more’ than that which scares us in our midst.
Faith thrives on hope and promise and confidence and a refusal to let fear be the only voice in our head.
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People of faith get afraid - don’t get me wrong. But with even a sliver of confidence that ‘we are not alone, that we live in God’s world’ – the voice of fear has company in our thoughts, and therefore, fear does not need to dominate.
Each situation that challenges us is an opportunity to see what will dominate for us: faith or fear.
Some the fear gets out in front and we avoid the opportunity because it might expose us more than we would like: it will take too much energy or money or time. Or one of fears favorite phrases: it won’t make any difference anyway.
We are given the hope that the gospel is ever moving, ever progressing, ever advancing. Our God invites us to look at what is before us and to venture on paths assured that we are not alone.
When fear attempts to cloud our faith, will we step up to the challenge and hold even stronger to the promises of God?
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In today’s scripture passages, ‘daunting jobs’ needed doing - David and Jesus stepped up. Their courage (in the context of fear) benefited everyone around them.
One of the wonderful metaphoric messages of the story from Mark four is that Jesus’ confidence fed the faith of everyone around him. Even as they struggled to understand what happened, Jesus invited them to set aside the fear that was holding them back from trusting in the power of God.
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I imagine that young David’s act of heroism inspired the people of Israel. Years later when he would ascend to the throne, the confidence he portrayed on the battlefield against the Philistines would have allowed the people of Israel to have confidence in him as ruler.
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The struggle between faith and fear is not always one of life and death. Fear is also quite good at holding us back in more mundane ways. Fear gets us thinking narrowly and selfishly. Fear closes our hearts so that the needs of others must be waved away in favour of looking out only for ourselves.
It is natural – it is easy.
But there is hope.
Jesus is our source of calm and confidence. Jesus’ over-reaching love and compassion is our model for living his Way today.
As personal as it is, faith is ultimately overflowing with group benefits. Fear is about me and only me. Faith is about a relationship with the mystery that is God. Relationships have to be about more than me.
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The power of faith allows this to become real for us.
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Let us pray…
We are grateful, God of Wonder that even in our quietest moment, you are there. In our deepest distress, you are there. You are our source of all calm and protection. Give us the courage to trust that we are not alone. Amen.
#637VU “Jesus Saviour, Pilot Me”
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