An Example at Any Age

Transcription

1 Promises, Promises Ruth 1:1-18 An Example at Any Age I Timothy 4:7b-12 By Rev. Jeffrey ByV. O Grady June 26, 2016 Rev. Jeffrey V. O Grady Pastor January 14, 2007 San Marino Community Church 1750 Virginia Road San Marino, CA (626) San Marino Community Fax: (626) Church Virginia smcc@smccpby.com Road San Marino, CA (626) Fax: (626) smcc@smccpby.com All rights reserved. These sermon manuscripts are intended for personal use only and may not be republished or used in any way without the permission of the author.

2 June 26, 2016 To the extent possible, effort has been made An to Example preserve the at quality Any Age of the spoken word in this Rev. written Jeffrey adaptation. V. O Grady, Pastor Our summer series Stories began last week with Abraham and Sarah, two older adults who began a faith journey at advanced age. Well beyond the years for childbearing, they learned the lesson of faith that... if you re not dead, you re not done. So I thought this week it might be useful to hear the story of a young person of faith, Timothy. There are so many great minor characters in the biblical story and Timothy is one of them. This week in my reading I came across an article about a new book, The Golden Rule, by Bob Bowman. At the heart of the book is the story of Michael Phelps, the most accomplished Olympic Athlete ever. He is likely to qualify for the Olympics in Rio in 2016 but has already won more gold medals than any athlete in any sport. He has established individual world records 29 times. Bob Bowman is Michael Phelps coach, and has been since Michael was eleven years old. Usually top athletes change coaches as often as they buy new shoes but not in this case. Bob Bowman has led this accomplished athlete through mind-numbing routines designed to produce superior results complete with twice-a-day practices and grueling dry land workouts. Bob Bowman, successfully coaching a top athlete to the pinnacle of Olympic success, identifies in his book the golden rules for success both in the pool and in life. According to the review, many of his steps or rules are pretty conventional, like dream big, think positive, and stay motivated. He goes further with the rule that... adversity will make you stronger. To illustrate the point, he once secretly cracked Mr. Phelps goggles so he had to compete, unable to see clearly as water filled his goggles. Another rule, Live the vision every day. 1 Michael Phelps practiced every day, seven days a week, missing just five practices in the first ten years. This kind of grueling schedule can lead to burnout and it happened to Michael after the 2008 Olympics when he was arrested for driving under the influence. He checked himself into a treatment center. Coach Bob has had to work with him through many challenges through the years. 1 Bowman, Bob, The Golden Rule, St. Martin s Press (May 17, 2016) 2

3 Paul s letters to Timothy sounds a bit like a coach s instructions to a young person, complete with rules to follow in order to succeed. Train yourself in godliness, for, while physical training is of some value, godliness is valuable in every way, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come. As a young man who enjoyed athletics, this verse made sense to me and helped me to see the value of a disciplined approach to my faith. I began memorizing verses of scripture, and praying daily just as I practiced for sports. Garbage in - garbage out became a familiar mantra so I decided to exercise greater control over what I thought about and how I spent my time. I determined that each day the first words from my mouth would be those of thanksgiving to the Lord for the gift of life and for the many blessings daily never take it for granted. Too often we forget that simple changes can lead to enormous differences in results. One of the coaches I ve come to appreciate is Darryl Sutter, coach of the LA Kings. He comes from a hockey family in Alberta, and is one of seven brothers, several of whom have also played in the NHL, like Darryl. But what strikes me about him is how the coach of a team in Los Angeles can get away with such an unpolished, unvarnished media presence. His responses to questions are so minimal, he is so obviously irritated that he has to respond at all, that I find myself hanging on his every word. Listening to what he has to say is like a sideshow during the hockey game. During one intermission interview at the Stanley Cup Finals in 2014, Sutter was asked something about the outcome of the game, to which he responded something like, That s confusing outcomes with outputs. We don t focus on outcomes, we focus on outputs. As if to say, the outcomes you can t control. Lots of factors beyond one s control affect outcomes, but you can control how hard you work, and that will likely impact the outcome. Sometimes the outcome is a direct result of what you put into it. I liked his simple redirect of the question. And I ve come to enjoy his unglamorous/inarticulate, but occasionally substantive responses. 3

4 The Apostle Paul instructs Timothy about how to focus on output rather than results. We know very little about Timothy. He was the product of a Christian home, where his mother, Eunice and his grandmother, Lois, instructed him in faith, laying a foundation for his beliefs. This week there has been a great deal of reflection in the national news about sexual assaults on college campuses. An entire newpaper section on education featured an article about the reality of campus assaults and how young women can better protect themselves when they go to college. I wanted to ask, Where is the article about how young men should conduct themselves when they go off to college? We need some training in godliness, it seems to me! The Apostle Paul is intent on coaching Timothy on how to live, especially as a leader in the Church. Let no one despise your youth, but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. Every young person can be an example of how to live better, more faithfully, more generously, more deliberately. Don t think for one moment it doesn t really matter how you live. It matters in every way. Even if no one else knows, you know! A crooked arrow cannot shoot straight. Dedicate yourself to live better and more faithfully, it matters for this life and the next. Thank God for the Eunices and Loises of the world who train their sons and grandsons in how to conduct themselves. We fathers and grandfathers need to talk with our sons and grandsons about how to treat women, and model it ourselves. Just a little aside, in the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. women began to be ordained in 1958, but women in ministry go back to Eunice and Lois and countless others in the first century and ever since. Faith provides an essential critique of culture. Those who have gone before us accomplished so much with so little, and we are in danger of accomplishing so little with so much. We in America are the wealthiest people to have ever lived. If we prayed more often, perhaps we would discern how to do more with our wealth than entertain ourselves endlessly. What if our church became a school of godliness, where young people 4

5 learn about morality? Wouldn t it be a remarkable contribution if we provided the next generation with a reason to live and a way to live in our consumer culture that focused on character and not consumption? Michael Phelps has made sacrifices to become an Olympic athlete. Sacrifices are required in life and especially in the life of faith. The Hillhaven Hospice in Tucson, Arizona is a 33-bed facility. The chaplain there told the Executive Director of the Ecumenical Center for Religion and Health of a particularly difficult weekend when eight of their thirty patients died. The staff is very close to one another so the Executive Director asked about the effect so many deaths has on the staff. The chaplain told him this story: On Saturday, one of their patients who had been there a couple of months had a visit from her teenage son. The staff said it must have been a great visit because there were laughs and lively conversation coming from the room. At noon the boy said, I m going to have lunch with some friends. I ll be back later mom! After he left, the patient called her favorite nurse and said, I think this may be it. I may be dying. The nurse checked her vital signs and replied honestly, It s possible that you are. The patient asked her nurse friend, Will you hold me? I think if you hold me I can do this well. The nurse crawled into the bed and cradled that emaciated body in her arms, and held her into eternity. It was not easy on the nurse. She took four days off to go to the mountains to process and decide whether she wanted to come back to work again. The chaplain said, She ll be back. You learn in a place like this that caring hurts, but when you care you offer something special and become something special yourself. Paul might have said something like that to Timothy. You will learn in the Church that when you care you offer something special, and become something special yourself. Timothy, a minor character, became something special and so can each one of us. 5

6 Now is our time to make a mark, to lodge a critique, to live as an example to others. Doesn t matter how old or how young you are, you can be an example of how to live better and more faithfully. We must engage in this moral effort, we must run the race, we, too, must keep the faith. Without faith no great thing is ever attempted. Without faith no great battles are ever won. But with faith, we can build a community dedicated to character and willing to carry others into eternity. Become something special! Live this faith daily and be an example of what it means to be fully alive! Train yourself in godliness. This is what brings glory to God and joy to you! Amen. 6