Planting Seeds
Psalm 78:1-8[1]
Most of us have been in the place where we’ve poured our
hearts out in prayer to God and for all we can tell the only response we got
was silence. It’s one of the reasons people tell you why they don’t think
religion is worthwhile for them. I believe you know me well enough by now to
understand that I’ve been in that place myself. I’ve told you about my two
divorces. What I may not have told you is that I prayed for years—for years—for
my marriages to be healed and whole and stable. I prayed for my family to stay
together, both times. I would say that the greatest disappointments of my life
have been going through two divorces despite doing everything humanly possible,
and despite pouring out my heart in prayer to God for years to keep them
intact.
I understand why people who go through deeply discouraging
experiences like that back away from church. When I went through my first
divorce, I was so heartbroken that I wasn’t sure I even wanted to be in
ministry any longer. I kept going to church, because I needed the support I
found there. But I wasn’t entirely sure whether God had failed to live up to
his end of the bargain. My faith was shaken for several years. To some extent,
I had to rely on the faith of my friends in order to get through that time in
my life. It was their faith that helped me to reclaim my faith. And it was
their faith that helped me find my way back to ministry. After several years of
trying other things, it was my incredibly unimpressive performance as a Realtor
that convinced me that, despite my shortcomings, I belonged in ministry!
Last week we talked about some of the reasons why we
participate in this church. I want to continue that theme this week. Our Psalm
reading for today calls attention to one of the reasons we highlighted last
week: we come to church because we’ve made a decision to raise our children in
a community of faith. But precisely how to do that isn’t as “straightforward”
as it used to be. As I alluded to last week, we’re trying to plant seeds of
faith in children and young people who are inundated with all kinds of messages.
We’re definitely trying to carry out the work of teaching the next generation
in what the business world would call a “competition-rich” environment. As you
may know, there are a lot of opinions out there as to how to “reach” this
generation.
The Psalmist answers the question in a very traditional
way: if you want the next generation to thrive, make sure to keep telling the
story of what God has done. And the Psalmist said to do it in a way that’s
compelling so that “each generation should set its hope anew on God” (Ps 78:7, NLT).
Unfortunately, if we were to read the rest of the Psalm, we would hear from
Israel’s history that telling the story of what God has done doesn’t
necessarily guarantee that every generation will actually “set its hope anew on
God.” That’s one of the challenges of trying to reach younger generations: we
can tell the story, and we can do it well, and it doesn’t guarantee that they’ll
respond. It’s the risk that goes along with faith: the outcomes aren’t
guaranteed.
In fact, as the Psalmist recounts, time after time, those
who actually witnessed firsthand God’s “great wonders” turned away from faith.
The Psalmist says that they “forgot” what God had done (Ps. 78:11). In the face
of a long history of unbelief, writing generations later the Psalmist continues
the tradition of telling the story of God’s saving wonders so that future
generations would trust in God. In fact, he envisions the effect of telling the
story not only on the children of his day. He believed that each generation has
the responsibility to recount God’s wonders “so the next generation might know
them—even the children not yet born—and they in turn will teach their own
children” (Ps 78:6, NLT). Faithfully telling the story of what God has
done will impact a generation not yet born. And beyond that, continuing to tell
the story will lead future generations to pass it on to their children.
But I think we also have to “read between the lines” a bit
with this Psalm. Because it’s not only important to keep telling the story of
what God has done to ensure that future generations will have a faith to pass
on to their children. Part of the problem recounted in the Psalm was that in
every generation there were adults who were raised with the stories of Gods’
“great wonders” who then “forgot” what God had done! It’s not only children who
need to be told the story of what God has done to plant seeds of faith in them.
All of us, whatever age we may be, need to hear the story again and again to
nurture the seeds of faith within us! Wherever we are in the development of our
faith, whether a seed, or a sprout, or a sapling, or a mature tree, our faith
continually needs nourishment from the story of what God has done for us!
Some of you know that I’ve participated in Al-Anon for
years. People get confused about that. I’m not an alcoholic. In fact, I rarely
drink alcoholic beverages. Those of us who participate in Al-Anon are there
because our lives have been affected by someone with a problem with alcohol. I
recently had a discussion with a newcomer to our meeting, who thought that as a
pastor I should have the “right” prayer to help her “save” her alcoholic son. In
the process of trying to help her understand that’s not the way it works, she
asked me why I as a pastor still find it important to participate in a group
like Al-Anon. I tried to tell her that we all share our experience, strength,
and hope, and in doing so we encourage one another to make healthy choices with
our lives. And that’s just as important for someone who has been there for
decades as it is for someone who is brand-new.
I think that’s the gist of what I want to say on this
Stewardship Commitment Sunday. There’s a notion out there that “we’ll go to
church long enough to get our children through confirmation.” But my question
is where that leaves their children, and their children’s children. We
support the work of this church with our service, our faithfulness, our telling
of the story, as well as our contributions to ensure that we’re doing
everything we possibly can to plant seeds of faith in our children. But we also
continue do so in the hope that future generations will “set their hope on
God.” More than that, the truth is that none of us ever “outgrows” the need to
nourish our faith. That’s especially true when we face hard times. The
disappointments and discouragements we may encounter along the way can bring us
to the point where we need the faith of our friends in this church family to
help us make it through and recover our own faith on the other side. We support
the work of this church because it takes all of us working together to keep
planting seeds of faith, and nurturing those seeds that may have become
distressed by the heat of loss or the drought of discouragement, in everyone
whose lives we touch
[1] ©
Alan Brehm. A sermon delivered by Rev. Alan Brehm, PhD on 11/12/2023 for
Hickman Presbyterian Church, Hickman, NE.
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