Sermons 2009
Pentecost 7B (Proper 11B), 19 July 2009, Mark 6:30-34, 53-56













Home | Proper 17B, 30 August 2009, Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23 | Proper 16B, 23 August 2009, John 6:56-69 | Pentecost 10 (Proper 14B) 9 August 2009, John 6:35, 41-51 | Pentecost 8B (Proper 12B), John 6:1-21, 26 July 2009 | Pentecost 7B (Proper 11B), 19 July 2009, Mark 6:30-34, 53-56 | Pentecost 6B (Proper 10B), 12 July 2009, Mark 6:14-29 | Pentecost 5B (Proper 9B) 5 July 2009, Mark 6:1-13 | Pentecost 4B (Proper 8B), 28 June 2009 | Pentecost 3B (Proper 7B), 21 June 2009 | Pentecost 2B (Proper 6B), 14 June 2009 | About Pentecost, Pentecost B, 31 May 2009, | On the Trinity, Trinity B, 7 June 2009 | Jesus and Prayer, Easter 7B, 24 May 2009, John 17:6-19 | How can we love? Easter 6B, 17May 2009, John 15:9-17 | 2 Sermons: Vineyard and a Baptism, Easter 5B, 10 May 2009, John 15:1-8 | Who's in? Who's out? Easter 4B, 3 May 2009, John 10:11-18 | Sacramental Meals, Easter 3B, 16 April 2009, Luke 24:36b-48 | Resurrection, continued, Doubts, and a Baptism, Easter 2 B, 19 April 2009, John 20:19-31 | He is not here, Easter B, 12 April 2009, Mark 16:1-8 | The Seven Sayings from the Cross, Palm Sunday B 2009 | We wish to see Jesus, Lent 5B, 29 March 1009, John 12:22-33 | For God so loved the world, Lent 4B, 22 March 2009, John 3:14-21 | Out with the money changers! Lent 3B, 15 March 2009, John 2: 13-22 | On taking up the Cross, Lent 2B, 8 March 2009, Mark 8:31-38 | News or the real Good News?, Lent 1B, 1 March 2008, Mark 1: 9-15 | Listen to Him! Epiphany Last B Transfiguration, 22 February 2009, Mark 9:2-9 | What do you mean, demons? Epiphany 4B, 1 February 2009, Mark 1:21-28 | Immediately and discipleship, Epiphany 3B 2009, 25 January 2009, Mark 1:14-20 | Right in front of your eyes, Epiphany 2B, 18 January 2009, John 1:43-51 | In the beginning, water and the Spirit, Epiphany 1B, 11 January 2009, Genesis 1:1-5; Mark 1:4-11 | In God we trust, Christmas 2B, 4 January 2009, Jeremiah 31:7-14; Matthew 2:1-12




















Proper 11B 2009                                  Mark  6:30-34, 53-56

’Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free,

'tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

and when we find ourselves in the place just right,

’twill be in the valley of love and delight.

                                   

When true simplicity is gained

to bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed,

to turn, turn, turn, will be our delight

till by turning, turning we come round right.

                                   

      The apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught.  Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and rest a while.  So they went away in the boat to a solitary place.  For Sabbath time.

 

In 1960, expert testimony concerning time management was presented to a Senate subcommittee.  The experts said that, because of advances in technology, within twenty years or so, people would be radically cutting back on how many hours a week they worked, or how many weeks a year they worked, or else they would have to start retiring sooner.  The great challenge, according to the experts of 1960, was what people would do with all their free time.

 

            How many of us sometimes wonder, whether we are retired or whether we are still “working” – how many of us have thought that the technology of which the experts spoke 40 years ago actually has us enslaved?    How many of us have one or more of the following:  touch tone telephone, answering machine, pager, cell phone, fax machine, or computer?  Sometimes it seems as if we can’t escape the E-world and its demands, demands which I have to admit are sometimes simply temptations to which all too readily succumb. 

 

In an ancient collection of stories called Aesop’s fables, Aesop was a freed Greek slave of the 6th Century BC who provided pointed comment on the follies of his world:  One day in ancient Athens a man saw Aesop playing children’s games with two little boys.  This stuffy fellow asked why he wasted his time in such frivolity.

Aesop picked up a bow, loosened its string, and said to his heckler. “Now tell us the lesson of the unstrung bow.”

The man looked at it for several minutes but had no idea what point Aesop was trying to make.

Aesop finally explained:  “If you keep a bow always bent, it will weaken and break eventually; but if you let it go slack, it will be fit for use when you want it.”

 

There is a story about Martin Luther and his friend and fellow theologian Philip Melancthon during the height of the early days of the Protestant Reformation, at a time when pressures of reform and reorganization were not only great but also because their very freedom and even their lives were threatened.  Philip, an intellectual sort, said to Martin Luther one day , “Today you and I will discuss the governance of the universe.”

To which Martin Luther responded, “Today you and I will go fishing and leave the governance of the Universe to God.”

 

Luther understood exactly what Jesus meant when he told his disciples, who had had no leisure even to eat, to come away with him to a solitary place by themselves.  The disciples had just returned from their first missionary trip and they were tired.  Jesus himself was probably tired; the Gospels record several instances when Jesus sought to withdraw from the madding crowd for a little solitude, for a little Sabbath time.  Sabbath time, a time of rest and leisure. 

 

Sabbath time and Re-Creation.  There’s a story about one man who challenged another to an all day wood chopping contest.  The challenger worked very hard, stopping only for a brief lunch break.  But he other man had a leisurely lunch and took several breaks during the day.  At the end of the day and the end of the wood chopping contest, the challenger was surprised that the other man had chopped a lot more wood than he had.

“I don’t get it,” said the challenger.  “Every time I looked, you were taking a rest, but you chopped more wood than I did.”

“Yes, but what you didn’t notice,” replied the winner, “was that whenever I sat down to rest, I was sharpening my ax.”

         Think of all that competes for our spare time and energy: telephone solicitations, television advertisers, junk mail, e-mail, door-to-door drives; sorting invitations to exhibits, lectures, travel opportunities, dinners, meetings, books, plays, movies, concerts; letters to read and to write, newspapers.  Where does it end?

One way or another, we all feel the demands of life.  We have deadlines to meet, quotas to fulfill, places to go. Things to do.  We expect to be busy.  And we are.

But we need Sabbath time to play and to pray. Time to worship. Time to unburden the soul and know the best rest of all, a heart and spirit at rest in God.  

 

’Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free,

                        ’tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

                                    and when we find ourselves in the place just right,

                                    ’twill be in the valley of love and delight.

                                   

                                    When true simplicity is gained

                                    to bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed,

                                    to turn, turn, turn, will be our delight

                                    till by turning, turning we come round right.

            AMEN

Drawn from InterNet Sources.  The gift to be simple is Hymn 554 in The Hymnal 1982.