Is the Lord Among Us or Not?

Posted on March 1, 2008 by jmort

Texts: Exodus 17:1-7; Romans 5:1-11; John 4:5-42

Sermon for Sunday, February 24, 2008, Michigan Ave. Baptist Church, Saginaw, MI by Joseph I. Mortensen

Poor Moses. Exasperated in his role as leader, he cried out to the Lord. “What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.” It was not enough that the Lord had brought plagues on Egypt and sent the Israelites on their way out of slavery. It was not enough that the Lord had given them a cloud by day and fire by night as signs of his presence and signposts on their escape route. It was not enough that the Lord had parted the waters through the Red Sea to safety in Sinai or made bitter water sweet or sent them quails to eat and fed them with manna from heaven. You would think that after all that they could believe that the Lord indeed was among them.

But no. The first hint of difficulty, a lack of water to quench their thirst, sends them crying to Moses. “Why did you bring us out here to kill us, our children and livestock? … Is the Lord among us or not?” And Moses, even as he carried out the instructions to provide water for them, wondered, “Why me, Lord? Why did you chose me to lead this quarrelsome crowd?”

Why didn’t they get it? How could they not get it? Why didn’t multiple, prior experiences of the Lord’s mercy and provision equip them to face a little hardship on their long journey to their true home? How could they ask, “Is the Lord among us or not?”

We shouldn’t have to ask. Have you and I not, most of us anyway, done the same? Regardless of past clear evidence of God’s presence, guidance, and blessing in our lives, we, when faced with a new bump in the road or a delay in the journey, want to know, “Is the Lord among us or not?” We wonder why we set out on this journey of faith in the first place. Maybe it was better before we threw in our lot with God. Maybe turning back makes more sense. “Is the Lord among us or not?” It’s possible, of course, that we were sold a bill of goods. Someone, however well-intentioned, convinced us that just believing in Jesus fixes everything, not merely all our past sins, but all our present pains, and any future problems. Since we still sin, still hurt, and still fret, is the fault in us? Or did we get taken in? “Is the Lord among us or not?” Is there a Lord at all?

As recently as Friday night I faced this question with a very young couple. Their little child had ingested lamp oil and was rushed to the emergency room. As on-call as chaplain for the night I was summoned to come “stat”. As the child lay on a gurney surrounded by a very busy team of doctors and nurses, the most important question of the moment was — for them and for me — “Is the Lord among us or not?” The child was stabilized and sent on to Ann Arbor by helicopter. But, of course, the question lingers.

And there’s scarcely a one of us, all our past positive experiences notwithstanding, who does not ask now and then, “Is the Lord among us or not?” And will he be?

Jump with me now from Moses to Paul, from Exodus to Romans, to God’s people living this side of Jesus’ coming. The 5th chapter of Romans deals with the question and may help us with an answer to this pesky, persistent question. Please note, in verse 3, Paul has the audacity to say, “We rejoice in our sufferings.”

What is it with this man Paul? How many people do you know who rejoice in suffering? Oh, I know, there are some people who enjoy poor health. I had a cousin like that. It worked quite well for her. But I don’t rejoice when I suffer. Not many folks do.

Maybe we’re missing something. “To rejoice in our sufferings” doesn’t mean sufferings make us rejoice or that they’re something to get all giddy about. It means that in the midst of them, really in spite of them, we may hold on to something, we may cling to hope. How can it be?

Paul directs us to the very bedrock of our faith, God’s actions — past, present, and future — and our response to them.

For the first, a past and completed action, look to verse 1. “We have been justified by faith” it says. Here’s another way to put it, “we have been declared in the right on the basis of faith.” Says who? Who has declared it? An opinion poll? A popularity contest? My own assessment after looking in the mirror? No, none other than God himself has said so because of what his Son Jesus did on our behalf. Is or was God among us? When you accept God’s decision about you — notice how I said that — we make so much of our decision about God — he declares you in the right, solely on the basis of your trust in his good and merciful judgment. If God be for us, who can be against us? Did the Lord come among us or not?

A completed action, in this instance being declared in the right, brings a present realization — we have, not may have or will have but have, peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him the door is open to the place called grace. No longer strangers there, we have the keys, a password, an ID card, we belong with full privileges all paid for. Notice how he puts it, “Through Jesus Christ we have access to this grace in which we stand.” This is not sometime, but now and always. Asleep or awake, at home or away, conscious or not, we are ever in the sphere of God’s continuing love.

Wm. Sloane Coffin, a well-known preacher who died not long ago, put it this way:
The bedrock of my faith — mind you, I didn’t get to it easily — is that we are loved by God. He loves us as we are, but too much to leave us that way. We are loved by God, and that’s what gives us value. We don’t achieve value. It’s not because we have value that we’re loved by God, but because we’re loved by God that we have value. Our value as human beings is not an achievement, it’s a gift. We don’t have to prove ourselves. All that is taken care of. What we have to do is express ourselves, return God’s love with our own. What a world of difference there is between proving yourself and expressing yourself.

That’s the truth of it and the basis for living in hope with the assurance of a future with God. The atmosphere of grace in which we live and move and have our being gives us space for hope. As it says, “We boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God.” And this hope doesn’t fail us, it enables us to deal with afflictions and rather than shrivel and die in the midst of them.

But there’s more — God’s love calls forth our love. Verse 5 can be understood in two ways, and both are true. “The love OF God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who is given to us.” No doubt of that. God’s love has been poured into us. But the phrase also means “love FOR God is poured into our hearts.” We love because first loved by him.

God has shown his love for all to see in that the Messiah died for the ungodly — that’s us — not for the worthy, the righteous, the good — a deed few would dare undertake.

God’s love is further demonstrated by Jesus’ resurrection. Iif his death saves us, how much more, asks Paul, will we be saved by his life? Bishop Desmond Tutu fought against racial division in South Africa for what must have seemed like forever before things began to change. Somehow he maintained hope in spite of unimaginable opposing forces. He discovered that Jesus himself is the reason we can be hopeful. He wrote:
Nothing could have been deader than Jesus on the cross on the first Good Friday. And the hopes of his disciples appeared to die with his crucifixion… And then Easter happened. Jesus rose from the dead. The incredible, the unexpected happened. Life triumphed over death, light over darkness, good over evil. That is what Easter means — hope prevails over despair. Jesus reigns as Lord of Lords and King of Kings. Oppression and injustice and suffering can’t be the end of the human story.

“Is God with us or not?” Declared in the right, by God. Granted peace with God, through Christ. Ushered into the great hall of grace, not as a tourist but as one who belongs. Able to rejoice in hope. Having hearts full of love from God and for God. Dwelling in God by the Spirit. Secured by the work of Jesus. Saved by his death. Saved by his life. Reconciled. “Is God with us or not?”

There is not a single “I” or “my” or “me” in this whole passage. It’s always “we” and “us” and “ours” — and that’s important. Not alone but together, we are a new people.

When you wonder — go to these 11 verses in Romans 5. Soak yourself in them. Let them sink in. (My various Bibles all have marks and underlining in this passage.) They contain the basic vocabulary of our faith: justification, faith, peace, grace, hope, glory, love, saved, life, reconciliation. Note the “much mores” here. Take in as much as you can. Give back in thanks to God and love for one another. When you do, you begin to get an answer to the question, “Is God among us or not?”

A final word. It’s not just about us and never was. I refer now to the Gospel reading from John, Jesus’ encounter with the woman of Samaria at the well. Jesus violated two great taboos when he stopped to ask for a drink. “Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.” They regarded Samaritans as dogs, sub-human. Jesus crossed the tribal boundary. He also crossed another line, that of gender. In that society, like much of the Middle East today, men did not speak in public to women not related to them. It was a great offense to do so. But he did it in the service of God’s grace, God’s intention.

It’s never just with us or for us. God intends to be among all and one day all in all. And we are meant to be signs of his gift.

“Is God among us or not?” Church is empowered to press on, even or especially in tough times, when we speak in our native language of faith, love, and hope in Romans 5:1-11. Hear once more the first part of Romans 5:

Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand; and we boast in our hope of sharing the glory of God. And not only that, but we also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
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