I preached a sermon a couple weeks ago and for some reason it keeps coming back to me. Once in a while a sermon will do that to me. I keep being reminded about the message – or what the scripture is saying. I hope that happens for others. I mean, I hope when you hear God's word it comes back to you in a meaningful way and changes you. I would not expect that to happen every time you hear a sermon. Every sermon just isn't for everyone.
Back to this recent sermon. We were studying Daniel 3 about Daniel's friends who were sentenced to be burned to death because they would not bow down to an idol. The friends respond to the king by saying – we believe that God will save us, but even if He doesn't we will not bow down.
Their words were a great reminder to us that we don't worship the outcomes in our lives, we worship God. We worship God whatever the outcome. Too often we praise God for a good parking spot or a sunny day. No doubt, God gives good parking spots and sunny days. But we come dangerously close to worshipping the outcomes in our lives, or worshipping God because of the good outcomes in our lives. It was abundantly clear that Daniel's friends would worship God regardless of the outcomes in their lives.
I think the reason the sermon keeps coming back is in part because of my disdain for superstition disguised as Christianity. The dictionary defines superstition like this: an irrational, but usually deep-seated belief in the magical effects of a specific action or ritual, especially in the likelihood that good or bad luck will result from performing it.
Sometimes we have been guilty of demeaning our faith by shrinking it to a mere superstition. The reason it makes me so mad is that we have this rock solid, logically consistent, intellectually reliable faith. The Christian faith is so sound and real. To use a metaphor, it really is a rock you can stand on. When we turn it into a superstition that gets us good parking spots, sunny days, and helps the Lakers win championships, it makes me angry. Our faith is so much more than a superstition. It is a real relationship with a real God. Don't get me wrong, God cares about your rainy days, and where you park at Wal Mart. But His intention is not to shower you with candy from heaven. His intention is to grow you into a person who is more loving, kind, patient, good, gentle, compassionate, understanding, and faithful. His intention is to make you more like Him. [Oh, and He died on a cross, not exactly a sunny day.] There is no reason for us to worship some talisman or follow a superstitious religion. We serve a real God. And we can live real life with Him.
Eugene Peterson said it well. Faith is not a leap out of the everyday but a plunge into its depths. Plunge into the real God who is every bit as much with you on the good as well as the bad days.
A friend of mine summarized it well. " . . . I have hope for good things, but faith that if things don't turn out the way I see as good, God still is in charge and will use it for His good."
Yep, that's what it is.
