Transcript

I have enjoyed the day with you very much it's been a pleasant day and part of the pleasure has been looking forward to worship with you in the evening I like evening worship an opportunity to gather up the remains of the day and give it back to God who gave it to us not long ago and pray for another one tomorrow you've been gracious to me the final work of grace in anybody's life is to make the person gracious and you've been that the text that Kim read a moment ago is a paragraph a brief paragraph from a letter written by a minister a long time ago Paul a missionary apostle he wrote the letter to a church where he had never been very unusual for him to the church in Rome Italy he was at a transition point in his life he was leaving the east because he said I have nowhere else to preach over here I don't like to preach where others have been I don't build on somebody else's foundation and so from Elyricum that is Dalmatia Yugoslavia to Jerusalem I have preached and now I want to come west I want the church in Rome to help me go to Spain and so he writes the letter it is probably in the mid -fifties he is in the city of Corinth he's a guest in the home of a man named Gaius he's spending the winter there the church at Corinth having resolved many of its problems gave him some peace and time to write a letter of the profundity of Romans he had the luxury of a secretary a man named Tertius who probably took it down by dictation as Paul spoke it he also had the luxury of a messenger from a nearby town called Sincri there was a woman a deacon named Phoebe who after the spring thaw was going to Rome and she would take the letter so it was a good time for him and so he wrote because he wanted them to support his mission to Spain he felt it necessary to be in many ways beyond anything else he had ever done autobiographical this is who I am this is what I do this is what I say he wanted their support their blessing their prayers but in this portion of the letter there comes out about autobiographical note that is filled with pain now it's not exceptional for a minister to know pain there's physical pain I know ministers who get upset stomach every Sunday morning just facing the pulpit never get over it take some Maylocks in order to preach something else like that there is physical pain preaching with a dull headache and a low-grade fever preaching with distress all around and climbing into the pulpit ministers no pain physical pain some no pain in the families I know ministers that are very effective they'd climb out of domestic wreckage in order to minister and of course there's pain inflicted by corrugations many times they don't even know how what they do or fail to do how it hurts a lack of encouragement or lack of support a lack of understanding I think you need to spend more time with the young people all right what do you want me to do well take them on a wiener roast all right you announce it 57 times by six dozen wieners a quarter two of mustard and ketchup rent a bus and have it out on the designated Saturday morning beside the church in the parking lot and one kid shows up it's kind of discouraging ministers good ministers no pain but not not the kind of pain that Paul is talking about here it is pain that puts him on the defensive it is the pain peculiar to misunderstanding they misunderstand what he is about and he wants to clear it up and so he takes the stand in his own defense the testimony I am about to give is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God Christ is my witness the Holy Spirit is my witness my conscience is my witness I am telling you the truth I am not lying this is the truth his face is red the veins are sticking out on his forehead on his neck I am before God telling you the truth I know how it seems I know what you mean when you charge me with that but it is not true I have heard from many people the charge that I don't love the Jews anymore when I became a Christian I turned my back on my own people I hear it all the time some of the places where I go I preach with people walking around the church with placards saying gentile lover go home and you say I have harmed my tradition I have raised questions about my tradition I have spit upon my father's gabardine I have sent my mother to an early grave since I became a Christian it is not true I know it looks that way but the reason it looks that way is this I love my own people so much that I decided the only way I could get them to embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ was to stir them to jealousy to take what rightfully belongs to the Jews and give it to the Gentiles and so I have accelerated my activity night and day and night and day on the run all the time working among the Gentiles hopeful that with the Gentiles embracing it my own people will say hey that's our stuff that's our tradition that's our covenant that's our Messiah that's our scripture that's ours that's ours and they will turn and receive it and in the end God will be all in all Jews and Gentiles together in the kingdom of God that is my goal and so what looks like neglect of the Jew has been intended to stir the Jew to embrace the gospel that's what I intend not to hurt not to turn the back not to disregard God knows he said God knows he said I have deep profound sorrow in my heart for my people the word there he used for sorrow appears in the scripture in important places when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane my soul is indeed sorrowful same word this is the word used to describe a woman in the process of giving birth to a baby Lou pay painful sorrow I have Lou pay for my people I have he said unceasing anguish a different word the word that's used for the rich man who is in torment and he sends sin Lazarus over here I am in anguish in these flames or tune a Paul says I have deep painful sorrow I have ceaseless anguish I wake up with it in the morning I go to bed with it at night it never leaves me my ache for my people in fact he said I could almost wish myself to be accursed I could almost wish myself to be lost I could almost wish myself to be damned if it would save my people a strange thing to say old textbooks in psychology years and years ago I took it before psychology was actually invented but the textbook we used had a chapter on instinct and a subheading under that was maternal instinct and it described with pictures an experiment with a mother rat her babies her newborn babies were over at this end of a box she was placed at this end of the box and between was an electric grill that could be charged with increasing voltage and she was placed here her baby is there and a slight charge of electricity and she went across that burning grill to her babies they took her away increased the voltage she went across took her away increased the voltage she went across and finally short of killing her she just about gave her life for her babies I think of that image when Paul says I could almost wish myself to be damned if it would save my people. Years ago when I was teaching in Oklahoma I was teaching a course of New Testament in Greek language students weren't allowed to bring an English Bible this was the third year and so the numbers had dwindled down to a precious few still in there studying their Greek we were reading that semester the spring term we were reading Paul's letter to the Romans it was rather disconcerting spring of the year it was in Oklahoma and this was going on at the week they have nice weather out there in Oklahoma and I remember it's a one o'clock class we all hated one o'clock classes there were about six that were left still taking Greek reading third year they all come in creeping like snail full of pain in their faces that's what you want as a professor it's one of the few pleasures as you expect the students to be in misery and just drag themselves in and plop down and hope they will not be called on except for this one student who came in bouncing in he already had on his tennis outfit a little alligator and his shorts and his shirt had alligator and he had initials in the same color on his socks and he had a can of tennis balls in his racket that he stuck under the chair as he sat down with his Greek New Testament I didn't like that he is supposed to be in complete misery and he bounces in here like this so I knew immediately on whom I would call when we got to this part that was read a moment ago Romans 9 because it is difficult the verbs are very rare so I called on I said would you read and so he read in the Greek and then I said when you translate and so he translated into English flawless really aggravating so I thought I've got to get him one way or another so I began to pick out parts of it and I said the verb there that you translated I could almost wish what what is that verb he said that's a imperfect of the verb euchomai my which means I wish or desire but it's a very unusual imperfect he said ēuchomēn first-person singular I but what's unusual about it is it occurs so rarely because it is what's called by some people an inchoate imperfect that means to say it is not fully formed yet some people call it a tendential imperfect which means there is a tendency to do something on I said shut up that's all we know who wants a recitation like that from a guy dressed for the tennis court he he handled the passage flawlessly when the class was over I wanted to speak to him and I did I said sometimes there are in reading passages of scripture a kind of moment even in a class I recall such a moment at Vanderbilt when my teacher Leander Keck had us reading the first chapter of Philippians I thank my god for all my recollection of you and for your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now and we were reading that at a time when several of the black members of our class had been put in jail for public demonstration and Professor Keck said we should not be sitting here in an air -conditioned classroom while Jim and others are in jail I think we should dismiss and do what we ought to be doing and so we stopped the class it was a very important moment and I said to this student Mr. Tennis here I said sometimes there are just really really great moments that happen even in the class when you read that of Paul I have ceaseless anguish I have painful sorrow I could almost wish myself loss condemned accursed if it would save my people did anything happen to you when you read that and he said no except I think Paul was mistaken I said what do you mean mistaken he said Paul was too close to the people in the churches he should have kept his distance if you get close to people then their problems become your problems and that's very upsetting tennis anybody I almost envied his freedom but I didn't when our son graduated from high school our daughter graduated from the university same year same spring almost the same week I decided to give them gifts last of the big spenders I had a Yiddish poem that I liked and so I went to the scripts it the calligrapher at the university and said can you get some of that old parchment like paper and do this in the beautiful writing you know she said yes I said how much will it be she said well $10 each I don't know well I'm spring for that you know so she did it and I went by the dime store and I bought the little frames kind of a painful experience I had to take Marilyn Monroe's picture out to put that in there but I fitted them in the frames and I wrapped them up neatly put them on the bed with their other gifts they both surmised I could read their minds it's a small package it's got money that's going to be the biggie that's going to be the biggest so they opened all the other things you know toasters and stuff towels then they opened mine and they looked at it and read it and they said what is it and I said it's a poem but what are we to do with it I said well read it and I said John read it then John the younger read it I said do you get it he said I don't I don't get it I don't get it I said Laura you graduated from university but you explain it to your brother she said I don't get it they still don't get it each of them have it hanging on in the wall in their homes and I asked them I said why don't you get it they said oh you don't get it but they want to you know honor their old dad it's a Yiddish poem Der Iker it means the main thing you'll get it you'll get it if your outlook on things has changed this is not the main thing if you feel like laughing at old dreams this is not the main thing if you recall errors of which you are now ashamed this is not the main thing even if you know that what you're doing now you will regret some other time this is not the main thing but be aware lightheartedly to conclude from this that there is no such thing as the main thing this is the main thing I can tell you got it and if you get that you will also have the rare privilege of experiencing the groan of God and at times saying I could almost I could almost wish myself lost for the sake of the people. Amen