Making G.R.A.C.E a Reality

Pastor Burcham's Sermon

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

This morning, what I'd like to start out to do is I'd like each of you to pick a number. Just pick a number. You don't need to write it down or anything like that but, just so you're not cheating, go ahead and whisper it to the person next to you. So think of a number. Everyone have a number? Okay. Did anyone pick a number over a million? Did you? Great. Anyone else pick a number over a million? Why not? Why not? Hold that thought for just one moment.

In 1998, two guys named Larry Page and Sergey Brin incorporated the Google search engine. They were still graduate students at Stanford University . In 2002, there was an article in Fortune magazine's small business edition and, in 2002, they reported on an average day, there were 150 million searches a day on Google. They are able to access over 2 billion pages of information in 74 different languages. Now can you explain to me how two graduate students at Stanford could come together in 1998 and come up with a search engine for the Internet that would become so dominant, so huge that really any other search engine on the Internet doesn't even compare to that? How can you comprehend 2 billion pages of information? And I don't know about you but when I type in something and Google it, bang, it's there. It has searched all 2 billion pages and it's instantaneously there. How is it these two guys could be so wildly successful? How is it this company could grow to the giant it is today?

Well, see, I don't have the technical savvy to explain to you how the search engine works nor do I have the business knowledge to know how they positioned themselves so they could be so successful, but I do know this. It all started with their vision. If you would ask these two gentleman to pick a number, any number, they wouldn't pick a number like 14, 99, or 200, or 500. When they decided to name their company, they decided to call it a mathematical term, Google. Google stands for a 1 with 100 zero's behind it. You see, it all started with a vision of what their company could be. Now there's no way these two guys, Larry and Sergey, could have ever imagined what Google would turn into. In their wildest imagination, they couldn't come up with this that would happen to their search engine. But they had the vision, and they pursued that vision.

Back in the early 1960's, there was a group of people who got together on the west side of Des Moines and they had a vision. They had a vision for a congregation, a congregation here in Urbandale , Iowa . They didn't know what was going to happen to that congregation, certainly didn't know what God was going to do with that congregation, but they had a vision that there was a congregation and there was a need in Urbandale for the gospel message of Jesus Christ to get out to the community. If you talk to some of the founding members, they had no idea back then what Gloria Dei would come to be, no idea about the size of Gloria Dei, no idea of the breadth of the ministry our congregation now enjoys, no idea of how much of an impact we could have on the community and an impact we could have on people's lives. But it began with a vision, a vision of what God was calling them to do.

For the past five weeks, we have been focusing in on our Vision Statement. Our vision statement was most appropriately built upon the acronym of GRACE. It didn't start out that way. It wasn't designed that way, but God put it together that way. And it has a double meaning. What better foundation than grace itself, God's undeserved love, how it is we are saved by grace through faith, but then to have each of the components of that, to have five statements, have a fivefold vision statement of what we believe God is calling us to become. God is calling us to be a growing congregation, that is, here is going to be a place of tremendous spiritual growth. People, when they come through our doors, will experience God in a way that their faith and commitment and their trust in God grows and matures. This is a place where relationships are developed, relationships between one another as God designed us and relationships that will stay together and last a lifetime. This congregation will be a beacon to our community. We're not just in our community, but we're a part of our community. We're not just a large church on the west side of Des Moines , but we're a part of the west side of Des Moines . We're a good neighbor, and we're involved with the people around us. We're a congregation who is courageous, courageous in reaching out with the saving news of Jesus Christ, believing down to our soul it is only through the name of Jesus Christ people will join us in heaven. And so courageously, each one of us has a passion to reach out to our friends, our neighbors, our coworkers to impact our community, our state, our nation, even around the world to spread the good news of Jesus that we will be an equipping center. God's Word, the only source of truth in this world, is going to be the foundation for our lives and that Word will be applied to our lives in real and relevant ways. Then, in all humbleness, God can use us and we can equip the church at large so their ministry also can flourish and grow. It's a vision of grace.

I don't know about you but, over the last five weeks, as we refocus in on those five statements, as I spent time thinking, “How can I communicate those five statement to you?” it's done something for me. First of all, it has given crystal clear direction to our congregation. It has served as motivation for me. I'm motivated to want to make that vision a reality. It has served as an inspiration as I see God at work already in our congregation in what God is calling us to do in the future. It inspires me so every part of me wants to see that vision become a reality. And what I've been praying is each one of you feel the same way, that you feel as a congregation we have direction, that you feel motivated, that you feel inspired, that you feel you want to make that vision a reality. You see it coming together and you want to be a part of it and we want to walk side by side together marching forward in God's kingdom to make GRACE a reality on the western side of Des Moines .

This much I know and this is what I want to share with you this morning: God has given us everything we need to make the vision a reality. I guarantee you God has given us everything we need to make that vision a reality. Because God doesn't call you to something unless He equips you to accomplish it. God doesn't ask you to do something, tell you to do something, unless He enables you to be able to do it. And that's just what God has done. God has given us more than what we need to accomplish this vision.

Jesus Himself teaches us this important concept in the parable of the landowner. We have a landowner who comes to his servants because he's going to go on a trip, not that unusual at this time. But this is a parable, so it's a story Jesus tells for a meaning. That means it represents something. It says again it will be like a man going on a journey who calls his servants and entrusts his property to them. The landowner, the owner here who is going on a journey, is God Himself. And He entrusts His property, He entrusts what He values, what He owns, He gives to His servants. The servants bring nothing into this relationship. You understand that? There is nothing the servant can contribute in this transaction. They simply work for the master. The master has all the supplies. The master has all of the blessings, all of the property, but He takes that property and He entrusts it to them. In other words, He trusts they're going to do what is right with what belongs to Him, that they're going to manage it well.

To the first one, He gives five talents, then two talents, then one talent. Reading through that, in English, you think, “Okay. What's a talent? What's He really talking about here?” So maybe you come up with a number in your mind. Did He give 500, 200, and 100? 5,000, 2,000, and 1,000? What God gives us is of incredible value. A talent equals 6,000 denarii. An average person working an average day's work would earn 1 denarii. So 1 denarii is one day's worth of work. 6,000 denarii equals 1 talent. To the first man, he gave 5 talents, then 2 talents, then 1 talent. Convert that over into our economy, our dollars and cents, roughly, to the first man he gave a little over $2 million. To the second man, he gave a little over $3/4 million and, to the third man, a little less than $1/2 million. What I'm saying here is the landowner entrusts something of incredible value to the servants. He gave them all they needed and more to work with. If He wanted them to use His property and to invest His property and to continue to earn from His property, to have a return from that, He gave them what they needed. If the adage is true that it takes money to make money, He certainly took care of all three servants, even the third one. If you get $500 or $5,000, you're limited to what you can do with that if you want a return on that. But when you're given $1/2 million, there's a lot you can do with $1/2 million. You can buy property. You could start a business. You could invest it in the stock market. You could put it in bonds. All those kinds of things and maybe a combination thereof. He gave them, even the third servant, everything they needed and more to accomplish what He was asking them to do.

And that's the point of the parable. The point of the parable is not the money. The point of the parable is He entrusts to them something of great value, and He gives them more than what they need to accomplish their mission. God has given us everything we need, more than we need to accomplish our vision of GRACE. First and foremost, the greatest gift God has given us, the greatest resource He's bestowed upon us, the thing that is almost incomprehensible in value that He's entrusted to us is His grace. It's God's undeserved love for the world. He has given each one of us and bestowed each one of us His grace. We'd be lost without it. What would we do without God's grace? Grace by definition is God's love for us, but it's a love that's undeserved. It's not a love that somehow you can work your way up to and make yourself good enough so God loves you. It's not a love that somehow, once God loves you, well, you can kind of repay God back and, all of a sudden, become worthy in His sight. That's not it at all. Grace is a one-sided kind of love. It's not earned. It's not deserved. It's something God gives us. When you think about our situation and where we are, we are not the people God created us to be. If you look back at Genesis 1 and 2, we are not the creatures God designed and created because He created perfect people and He created a perfect world. And His perfect, sinless people were to live in that world and maybe one day come and join Him in heaven, which is reserved, by the way, for perfect people. Well, I don't know about you, but I'm not perfect. In fact, there's not one of us who's perfect. In fact, if we look down deep inside of our self, we know to the core of our being, we have fallen far short of what God expects of us. We lie, we cheat, we steal, we gossip. The list goes on and on of the things we have done. We fall far short of what God expects of us. And God says, “If you're not perfect, then there's a punishment for that.” Like all things, if you don't do what's expected, then there's a consequence. There's a punishment for that. But then God does something which is incredible and it's called His grace, His love. Because even though we don't live the way God wants us to live, even though we fall short and, at times, we know what God wants us to do but we do the opposite anyway, God still loves you. In fact, He loves you to such a degree that God sent His Son to live among us. So Jesus came and, although He was God, He became a complete and full human being, just like us, with one exception. He's the perfect human being God originally designed. Jesus was sinless. He followed the Father's will completely, totally. And then God does something which just blows your mind. He does the substitution thing. He substitutes Jesus for us. He watches as His Son is nailed to a cross and He takes all of our sin and all we deserve from that sin and He lays it on Jesus. And He takes Jesus' righteousness and perfection and He lays it on us. So as Jesus hangs between heaven and hell, all of the sins of the world are put upon Him. The death you deserved and I deserved, He died. The hell you deserve and I deserve, He goes through. And the heaven, which is rightfully His, is waiting for us. That's grace. You can't put a price tag on that. You can't assign a value to that. We're lost without it. But that's what God's love is. It's what we need more than anything else. It's what the world needs more than anything else, even if they don't know it.

We have a world of people who are hurting even if they don't know it. We have a world of people who are hurting that deal with guilt, shame, and regret. Because somewhere they know they're not living like they should. They need to hear about God's love and God's grace. God has given us His grace so we can accomplish the vision of grace.

God has given us each other. Would you think for a moment of the resources God has given us of the people of this congregation? Just for a moment, contemplate the people you know in this congregation. What skills, gifts, and talents do they bring to the table? I'm amazed at the wide array of skills and gifts and talents God has brought together in this place we call Gloria Dei. We have everything here. We have doctors and lawyers and nurses and teachers. We have construction workers and landscape artists. We have waiters and waitresses. We have everything. Everything is here. All the skills, all the gifts, all the talents that are necessary for us to fulfill that vision of grace, God has assembled in the people of this congregation. It's almost amazing to think of the talents that are here. And then think about the spiritual gifts, the spiritual gifts God has laid upon each one of you. Some of you have the gift of leadership. Others have the gift of compassion. Some of you have the gift of empathy. Some of you have the gift of hospitality. The list goes on and on of all the spiritual gifts, and they're all here. They're all assembled in this congregation. God has given us all of the people resources we would ever need to fulfill the vision of grace. God has given us all the financial resources we would need to fulfill the vision of grace.

We live in the wealthiest nation in the world. And if we could just be real with one another for a moment, we live in a pretty nice part of town. If you look at other parts of the city, other parts of the country, if we're honest with each other, we're pretty affluent. Look at the cars we drove in this morning. Look at the home we left behind, the clothes we're wearing right now. God has richly blessed us. God has just been generous in pouring out the physical material blessings on this congregation and upon us. And I count myself in that. It's unbelievable how God has blessed us. So I firmly believe God has given us all the financial resources we would need to fulfill the vision of grace, because God doesn't call you to something unless He gives you, unless He equips you, enables you to accomplish it.

And if God indeed has called us to a vision of grace, He's given us everything we need to accomplish that vision. But there's one more thing. God also gives us the responsibility. God gives us the responsibility to use what He has given us to work in His kingdom. What happens when the landowner comes back? He calls for an accounting of His servants, does He not? The servants come in one by one and they are to give an accounting, “What have you done with the blessings I entrusted to you?” He expects they've used them and He expects a return for the work they've done. So the first servant comes in. He says, “Well, you gave me $2 million. Here, $4 million.” The other one comes in and says, “You gave me $3/4 million. Here we go, we have $1½ million your money has earned.” Now notice there's no distinction between those two servants. This is important. He doesn't say to the second servant, “Well, you know, the first guy came in with $4 mil. How come you didn't do the same?” That's not the point. The point is what you're given. God says to use that to the maximum. And He says the exact same thing to both servants. “Well done, good and faithful servant.” Well done. You accepted your responsibility. You accepted the gifts I gave to you and you put them to use. But what about the third servant? The third servant comes in and He says, “Well, here you go. Exactly what you gave me, I'm giving it right back to you. There we are. We're all square.” Can you imagine what this man did? He took $1/2 million, put it in a box, dug a hole in his back yard and buried it and he waited. He waited until He returned. He dug it up, counted it out to the last penny. “Yep, $1/2 mil.” And put it right down in front of Him. What does the landowner say? He says, “You wicked, lazy servant.” Those are harsh words, Folks. Wicked, lazy servant. Can you imagine how irresponsible it would be to take $1/2 million and bury it in the back yard? How irresponsible? How incomprehensible is that? If he didn't have the gift of business, if he didn't know what to invest, the very least he could have done was taken it down to the bank and put it on deposit. At the very least, let's say he gets 2% interest, 3% interest on that money. Do you know what 3% is on $1/2 million? But instead, totally irresponsible, does absolutely nothing, buries it in a hole and gives it back to Him. There we are.

God expects us to accept the responsibility He has given us all these gifts and all these blessings. He expects we're going to use those blessings to fulfill His vision. And we're not scoring points with God here. Let's make sure we're clear on that. This isn't a way in which God is going to smile more favorably on us. Ephesians 2:8-10 is what we base everything on. We're saved by grace, through faith. It's not from yourselves. It's not by work so no one can boast. But it follows up by this. For we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good things, which God has prepared in advance for us to do. In other words, God has given us these gifts. We've received His grace. We understand His love and now we want to respond back. God says, “Now that you understand what my kingdom is all about, I want you to work in my kingdom, to use all the resources you have to advance my kingdom so more people come to a relationship with Christ, more people understand about His undeserved love.” What it comes down to is, and let me be candid with this, we cannot be the third servant. We cannot allow our ministry, our congregation to be the third servant. In other words, we can't kick back and say, “You know, it's looking pretty good. Look where everything has led to us. We have a beautiful sanctuary. We have wonderful facilities. We have a pretty good preacher.” Alright, well, maybe not. “We have a wonderful children's ministry. We have a wonderful youth ministry that's going on. Small groups are growing. Things are looking good. Let's kick back and let's just see what happens. Let's watch and see what happens.” That's like taking $1/2 million and burying it in the back yard. When you think of the resources, when you think of the gifts and the blessings this congregation has and the potential of what this congregation could do, that's simply irresponsible. We cannot be the third servant. Instead, we have to take all God has given to us and, to the best of our ability, we put it to use in His name. And do you know what God says happens then? God says He blesses you even more.

Did you notice what happened to the two servants? His master replied to them after they came back with their return. He says, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You've been faithful with a few things. I'll put you in charge of many things.” You've been faithful with a few things so even more blessings are going to be showered upon you. Look at the history of Gloria Dei. As Gloria Dei has been faithful with God's blessings, as Gloria Dei has stepped out in faith and advanced the ministry, God just pours down more blessings. And God just opens up more doors. And He just keeps pouring them down. And I believe in the future, as we go towards that vision of grace and as we try to accomplish that vision, as we use all the things God has made available to us, God is going to bless us even more. God is going to give us even more responsibility so we can use and manage all of His gifts to the advancement of His kingdom. It's the vision of grace. You see, God doesn't think in numbers of 14 or 98 or 200. God thinks in terms of Google. He thinks in terms of 1 with 100 zeros behind it. And if God is calling us to the vision of grace, and I believe He is, then that vision should be one that gives us laser-precision direction. It should serve as a motivation for us, an inspiration for us. And by God's grace, we will accomplish the vision of grace. Amen.

Copyright 2006 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church