FEELS LIKE HOME

             Linda Rondstadt would probably be surprised to learn that a communion meditation sold one of her albums, but it did. When Judy, a few weeks ago, used a song from the album Trio, featuring Rondstadt, Dolly Parton, and Emmy Lou Harris, titled “Feels Like Home,” Frances and I decided to get it.  I won’t try to repeat what Judy said but her theme deserves re-emphasis.  The verses of this Randy Newman song make it clear that the reason it feels like home to her is because  there is someone there who loves her. 

            I thought of this as I studied and began memorizing Psalm 84 last week.  The first four verses say: How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts.  My soul is longing and yearning for the courts of the Lord.  My heart and my flesh cry out to the living God.  Even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow a nest for herself in which she sets her young, at your altars, O Lord of hosts, my king and my God.”  Clearly, the Psalmist feels he has found a home, the dwelling place of God, His temple in Jerusalem.  There he feels loved, secure, and safe in the presence of the Lord of hosts, his king and God.

            We too can find our home in the very place where God dwells, but it isn’t in the temple on Mt Zion in Jerusalem.  In the NT, Jesus refers to his own body as the new temple and Paul speaks of God living fully in Him.  Remarkably, the NT also speaks of us, the church, God’s people, as his dwelling place.  Ephesians 2:19 says, “You … are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household.”  It goes on to say that the apostles and prophets are the foundation and Christ is the cornerstone and the whole building is “a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.”

            Today the Psalmist, if he were a Christian, would look at the church and say, “How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts.”  That is what I want to say today.  This church feels like home to me because I sense God’s love through you in it.  It is a love that begins with God in Christ at the table.  Here is his overwhelming, unconditional love that was demonstrated on the cross and remembered by us at the table.  From this table his love flows out throughout his holy temple, his reconciled people, to you and me.  That’s why it is so good to be here.  It feels like home.

            How can we make sure it continues to feel like home?  The song that follows “Feels Like Home”on the album tells me how.  Sung by Emmy Lou Harris it is titled, “When We’re Gone, Long Gone,” and the chorus says:  “And when we’re gone, long gone, the only thing that will have mattered is the love that we shared and the way that we cared, when we’re gone, long gone.”

            It was love that created the church and it is love that will sustain it.  At this table we are reminded of where it all began.  If there has been a failure to love, let us repent, and resolve to love again.

WAR IS ALWAYS WITH US

            The gods of war seem to always be with us.  Last Veteran's Day many of us put out our flags.  It was a day of remembrance, a time to pause and say thank you to those who have given so much.  A spectacular picture was created in London where red ceramic poppies filled the moat surrounding the Tower of London in honor of the over 800,000 British citizens killed in World War I, the war to end all wars.  Of course, it did not end all wars.  I wish it had but history tells us that the gods of war seem to always be with us.

            Like some great drama such warfare with guns and planes, tanks and battleships, take place on the main stage of this world.  Behind the scenes another war is raging.  Paul speaks of it when he urges us in Ephesians 6 to “put on the whole armor of God, that you might be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.  For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against … the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” 

            In a sense, the whole book of Revelation is a commentary on this text in Ephesians.  It depicts in highly symbolic images the spiritual war that the devil is waging against God and his people.  Like any war, it is difficult and costly.  Winning freedom is not easy.  There are always casualties.  But if the book of Revelation says anything, it says that God is going to win.  If one statement could be picked to express this theme of victory it could be this one found in 12:10-11, Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, “Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down.  And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death.”

            They overcame him by the blood of the lamb.  Today we remember and give thanks for the greatest casualty of all, the one that secured victory.   I came across a little poem by one of the lesser known poets of the First World War, Edmund Sillito, that expresses this with a striking image of God.

             The other gods were strong; but thou wast weak.

             They rode, but thou didst stumble, to a throne.

             But to our wounds, only God’s wounds can speak;

              And not a god has wounds, but thou alone.

           

            Yes, as Isaiah said, He was pierced through for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell on him, and by his scourging we are healed.

            For our wounded God of Calvary we give thanks and remember the words of Jesus who said of the bread, “take, eat; this is my body,” and of the cup, “this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins.”  Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through Jesus Christ our Lord.