Mitford Sermon #3: OVERHEARD FROM THE ATTIC
First preached: June 29, 1997
I don’t have any particular memories about the 1997 Grand Forks flood to share in this post. I am preaching this Sunday at Open Heart United Methodist Church so between preparing for that and some family busyness I haven’t had time to give this post a lot of thought.
These particular post-flood sermons are intertwined with scenes and thoughts from the Mitford book series by Jan Karon. These books are full of little surprises and the story reflected in this sermon is one of the big early surprises in the series. It sets a theme for the rest of the books - that God is in the business of transforming lives. This sermon has a very evangelistic theme. I know you will enjoy it.
(If you click on the image of the book cover below you will be taken to one of the places from which you can purchase these Mitford Books. And I am sure you can find them in your public library as well. They are an enjoyable, inspiration, humorous read.
Scripture Readings:
2 Corinthians 5:11-21 (NRSVue)
Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we try to persuade people, but we ourselves are well known to God, and I hope that we are also well known to your consciences. We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you an opportunity to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast in outward appearance and not in the heart. For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ urges us on, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died. And he died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for the one who for their sake died and was raised.
From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we no longer know him in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have come into being!, All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ: be reconciled to God. For our sake God made the one who knew no sin to be sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
John 3:16-21 (NRSVue)
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him. Those who believe in him are not condemned, but those who do not believe are condemned already because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.”
Often in these past few months I have wanted to gather us all up for a trip to Mitford, North Carolina. Although fictional, in title at least, it would be a nice place to go. The pace of life is a little bit slower with no sort of flood recovery to deal with. This small town does a good job in taking care of its own. Of course, Mitford is not problem free. Father Tim, the 60 year old Episcopalian rector, has his enemies. In fact, Barnabas, the great big scripture heeding mutt that unexpectedly comes into his life and he grows to love is kidnaped right in front of his eyes. Sin and abuse lie both within and outside of the town. The surrounding hills are full of poverty and neglect - alcoholism and drug marketing - hate and distrust.
Yet, great things happen in Mitford. Time and time again the people rally around those in need. Romance springs up in the lives of the young and the old, some who have never felt love before. Faith is expressed simply and profoundly, saturated with prayer. People are changed, some of them in intense and unexpected ways.
Mitford would be a good place for us to be for awhile - a nice place to vacation. Our souls would be done some real good.
Mitford has mysteries as well. Many strange events puzzled Father Tim in the months that surrounded Christmas. While inspecting the church flower beds he noticed ashes, like fireplace ashes, scattered in the flower bed. One noon he found his lunch bag missing from the church refrigerator, along with the communion wine. At a lay readers meeting Esther Bolick’s famous orange marmalade cake was stolen out of the same refrigerator. Days later Father Tim decided to clean out the closet in the parish hall. It served as a columbarium housing six urns containing the cremated remains of deceased church members. As he dusted them he noticed the remains of Parrish Guthrie rattled differently - almost like pebbles. His curiosity got the best of him. He took it out to the kitchen and unscrewed the top. On to a tea towel he gently shook the contents. Instead of ashes and bits of bone, out came brightly cut gems. Having no idea what to do about it and worried how it might goof up an already hectic holiday season, he put it back to deal with it after Christmas. The same day Father Tim went into the sanctuary to pray. An agitated man knelt in the dark. He shouted, “If you’re up there, prove it! Show me! If you’re God, you can prove it.” It was a prayer of anger, despair and odd hope. Father Tim knelt beside him. “You may be asking the wrong question. I believe the question you may want to ask is not, ‘Are you up there?’ but, ‘Are you down here?’”
A conversation ensued. It ended with the two praying as the shoe salesman asked Jesus into his life — “Thank you, God, for loving me, and for sending your Son to die for my sins. I sincerely repent of my sins, and receive Christ as my personal savior. Now, as your child, I turn my entire life over to you. Amen.”
After the prayer the man was suddenly embarrassed. He shook Father Tim’s hand and took off.
Strange events continued. After Christmas it was time to deal with the urn full of jewels. Father Tim called the local policeman. But now the urn was empty. Later he discovered his Bible missing. One day he walked into the sanctuary and smelled chicken soup coming from the attic. Access to the attic came from a fold down ladder right above and behind the pulpit area. Father Tim pulled down the stairs. He found nothing except the wrapper of an Almond Joy candy bar, still smelling like fresh chocolate.
All of these mysterious happenings connected one Sunday morning during the worship service. “As he offered the prayer before the sermon, he heard a harsh, grating noise somewhere behind him in the sanctuary. When the prayer ended, he saw the entire congregation sitting with open mouths and astonished faces, gazing toward the ceiling.”
“.... the attic stairs had been let down and ... someone in bare feet was descending .... the man reached the floor and stood beside the altar .... tall and thin, with a reddish beard and shoulder-length hair .... Yet, the single most remarkable thing about the incident, the rector would later say, wasn’t the circumstances of the man’s sudden appearance, but the unmistakable radiance of his face.”
To make a beautiful, long scene shorter, the man told a story of his struggle with sin and God. Shortly before Thanksgiving he had come into possession of some stolen jewels. As he ran off to get away God got a hold of him. He ended up in Mitford not knowing what to do. Going into the Episcopalian Church, he noticed saw the stairs into the attic and decided to live there until God told him what to do. He hid the jewels in one of the urns in the closet. He roamed the building when the church was empty to use the bathroom and find food.
He overheard the conversation between Father Tim and the shoe salesman. As he tells it, “That was a real two-for-one deal, Father, because I prayed that prayer with you. You threw out the line for one, and God reeled in two.” He confessed to stealing Father Tim’s Bible and continued, “As I read during the next few weeks, I began to find the most amazing peace. Even more amazing was the intimacy I was finding with God — one-on-one, moment by moment.... I come to you this morning, urging you to discover that intimacy, if you have not.
“I also come to you to thank you for your hospitality, and to say to whoever made that orange cake — that was the finest cake I ever ate in my life.”
With that George Gaynor asked that someone be called to take him into custody and with that starts another story.
This is not the last time Father Tim leads someone to Christ - for some the process is slow, for others it is as dramatic as this. Father Tim considers it an important and natural part of his ministry - bringing people to come to know Jesus.
Believe it or not I was in a setting during the last year with other Christian folk, many of them pastors no less, where it was discussed whether or not talking with people about accepting Jesus Christ into their lives is an appropriate dimension of our ministry. One pastor said and another agreed that their denominations did not believe in that sort of thing. I couldn’t believe it. Didn’t they realize they would not even be in business today if it hadn’t been for the evangelistic sharing of their foremothers and forefathers? Didn’t they realize they won’t be in business tomorrow if they don’t rediscover it? Didn’t they realize that the foundation of our New Testament is the life-changing power of the gospel of Jesus Christ?
It is a Biblical theme that cannot be ignored unless one chooses to ignore the authority of the Bible and the experience of life. In the New Testament the word “salvation” or derivations of the word “saved” are found 161 times, only one of the words used to describe the process of accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. One can’t read the Bible without being brought face to face over and over again with the invitation to be saved - to be converted - to be born again - to be changed inside out and outside in - to come to the truth. One can’t read the Bible without being brought face to face over and over again with the command to share that good news with others.
And it is good news. We have found ourselves to be in places where have desperately felt the need to change - where we have felt the need to be saved from ourselves; saved from the mess we have put ourselves in; saved from sickness, despair, loneliness; saved from the consequences of our sins. Like the shoe salesmen we cry for God to show Himself to us. As we have come to Jesus we have experienced the goodness of being forgiven, of being healed, of being set free from the guilt and power of our sins.
As we have experienced it ourselves we must never forget that we are surrounded by people who are looking for God, who are desperately seeking salvation from the messes of their lives. Father Tim was wise enough to know what to do. He shared Jesus. This is our calling as well.
George Gaynor came to Christ as he overheard the conversation between Father Tim and the shoe salesman. That’s another good image to keep in mind. As the people on the outside over see and over hear our life and conversation are they led towards Jesus or away from Jesus?
As we read from 2 Corinthians 5:17 -- “So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.”
Jesus brings change and he invites us not only to enjoy it for ourselves but to pass on the opportunity. If we fail to offer Jesus to the world we are withholding from them the greatest gift ever made available. Do we not love our friends, our family, our world enough to want them to have the best?
Thanks to Jo Hurley’s hospitality I spent a good majority of this week by myself at Maple Lake. With my bike, my guitar, my Bible, my Mitford books I relaxed and was renewed. I especially enjoyed spending a lot of time in the water. It hasn’t been until the last couple of years that I have enjoyed swimming. I have often wondered why now all of a sudden. I came up with some reasons this week. One reason is I now have a little more fat surrounding my skinny bones so I don’t get cold quite so easily. Probably closer to the truth, now I can see when I swim. I have been wearing glasses, very thick glasses, for the past 35 years. It looked just a little too “nerdy” to wear glasses in the pool or at the lake so whenever I went swimming I was virtually blind. About 15 years ago I began wearing contact lenses but never felt comfortable with the risk of wearing them in the water. Within the last two years I discovered disposable contacts. Not only are they cheap but they are so comfortable I can wear them even swimming.
This is a primary reason why I enjoy swimming so much more. Water can be frightening enough but when one can’t see, at least for me, it was extremely uncomfortable. Now that I can see I am no longer afraid of the water. I enjoy it.
Could that same principle be true of life? We are filled with discomfort and fears and uneasiness when we cannot see clearly. The eyes of our heart are closed. We are surrounded by dark. But when Jesus comes into our life and our eyes are opened to His light and love we lose the fear of living. Maybe that is what John Newton had in mind when he wrote “Amazing Grace.”
“Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
This is a message we need to experience. It is a message the world needs to hear.