wpc
Westminster Presbyterian Church
Bradenton, Florida
Sermons
Genesis: Stories of Faith-Short Straws and Ladders
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Genesis: Stories of Faith
“Short Straws and Ladders”
Genesis 28:10-19a
The Reverend Chris Adams
July 17, 2011
I want to talk about short straws and ladders this morning, and to help me I have three stories I want to tell...
Story 1. Several years ago, my wife Paula was on a mission trip to Honduras with a whole group of ladies. They were on a medical mission trip with a physician from Camden, SC named Alice. So we called them “Alice’s Angels.” I think there were twelve ladies in their group.
As I remember the story now, most of their work was in the mountain regions near San Pedro Sula. Several times, they traveled to remote mountain villages having to leave behind the vehicles they were traveling in and walk up the hill to the tiny village.
They saw patients, healed sickness and disease, and distributed medicine to the villagers. Many of these folks had not been able to see a doctor in several years, and so you can imagine the kinds of illnesses they saw. It was an incredible rewarding trip for all involved, especially for Paula.
But that is getting a little ahead of the story I want to tell you this morning...
As I said, there were twelve of these ladies and with their guides they easily filled a small bus that they used to get around from place to place. The problem was, again as I remember the story, the bus couldn’t make the trip to lots of the places they went. Not to mention the small truck that followed the bus with all the medical supplies they used.
On one particular day of the trip, the group knew there would be no way the bus and truck could get up to a village they needed to visit. However, it was too far to walk. Fortunately, the village had a couple of four-wheel drive vehicles that could make the mountainous journey. That was the good news.
The bad news was that it still took two vehicles. On the way up to the village there was no problem. But when the time came for the return trip, on to the next village they would serve... the other vehicle never showed up. Friends, that’s not at all unusual in Central America. It’s where I learned my favorite beatitude, “Blessed are the flexible for they will never be bent out of shape.”
No worries, there would just have to be two trips: one for supplies and one for people. But it was a two hour trip to the next village and they couldn’t just leave all the supplies in the village unsupervised for two hours, so a volunteer was needed to go ahead with the supplies and wait with them for the others.
I am not sure they drew straws that day, but if they had, Paula got the short straw. She was selected for the job. She would go ahead to the next village and wait. She was elected.
As Paula tells the story, even for her, this was a bit of a stretch. Central America, new unknown village, doesn’t yet know anybody or even whether or not this village is dangerous, broken Spanish, twenty five crates of medical supplies including drugs, American lady all by herself... you get the picture?
You see, sometimes being elected is a bit of a challenge.
The good news was, and knowing Paula as I do, of course this would happen, within a few minutes she had met no less than the mayor of the small village, who had promptly welcomed her on behalf of the whole village, and assigned a couple of men to wait with her for the others.
They had a wonderful visit to that village that year, and even in subsequent years, we returned there, serving again and again. All because Paula had been elected to be the advance party... God’s fingerprints were all over this mission trip.
You see, sometimes being elected is a bit of a challenge. But that challenge is sometimes what God uses to do His work.
Story 2. Jacob, the cheat and the liar as I call him, was a great blessing to us. He and his family started as the people of God, and we inherit their lineage and their faith even today.
But that is getting a little ahead of the story I want to tell you this morning...
Jacob was traveling in the mountains himself one particular day in the ancient world. He must have been tired after a long days journey because he lay down on the ground and used a rock for a pillow. Not very comfortable.
Well, as he slept, he had a dream of a great ladder reaching up to heaven above. On that ladder, angels were going up and coming down. And God stood next to Jacob and spoke to him... saying in essence, “you are elected!” You have the short straw!
Now that’s not how we usually hear this story, because of course Jacob is given an incredible blessing of the land he rests upon, the promised land, and he is also promised that his name and his offspring will be like the “dust of the earth.” Too numerous to count.
But the whole blessing of Jacob ends with the words, “All the families of the earth will be blessed by you and your offspring.”
You see, Jacob is the advance party. Jacob goes first to the Promised Land, and because he goes, even though he is alone at this point in a dangerous land, God promises to be with him to offer a blessing to others.
You see that’s the point. The blessing is for Jacob, but not just for Jacob. Jacob is the elect, and while the elect in this story certainly ought to be seen as a great blessing, being the elect also comes with great challenges.
Like those angels going up and down the ladder, like Paula and her fellow angels in Honduras going up and down the mountain, being the elect of God has its ups and its downs. That, my friends, is what it means to serve God.
You see, being chosen by God is not just for privilege or for salvation of self. That’s all about us. Being chosen by God, drawing the short straw we might say is also for the blessing of others. The mission of God is about serving others.
In the end Jacob takes that rock under his head and builds it up into a marker, calling that land Bethel, or “house of God” because God’s presence is there. He experienced the very presence of God in being elected for service. That’s what this particular story of faith is all about. God’s fingerprints are here too.
Story 3. A couple of weeks ago, I met a lady in St. Pete. She attended the same banquet I did. In fact, she was being honored at that banquet for special service to her community. She leads an organization that champions water safety for small children. She teaches little kids how to swim.
I remember her saying as she received her reward, “Knowing how to swim in Florida is not a luxury, it’s a necessity!” Indeed... She is a great lady, doing something amazing with her life. She truly is serving the needs of her community, as a blessing to others.
But that is getting a little ahead of the story I want to tell you this morning...
You see, she didn’t just wake up one day and decide to do all this. She was chosen. She was elected. And for her, it definitely came in the form of drawing the short straw.
You see on January 27, 2004 this lady’s two-year old daughter Katelyn drowned after falling into a swimming pool. I cannot imagine how devastating an accident like that can be to a whole family, a whole community, let alone to Katelyn’s mother. As I said, Katelyn got the short straw that day, and so did her mom.
Now I want to be careful in saying that I don’t believe God elected to take that little girl to heaven that day. If that’s how it works for you, that’s okay. I just don’t believe that’s what God does. What I do believe is that she was one of those angels climbing that ladder to heaven that day. That’s what God does.
But what I also believe that day is that Katelyn’s mom was elected that day. She was chosen, and being chosen can be so hard. It can be the challenge of a lifetime. It’s not comfortable and it’s not fun, but it seems something happened to that lady that day.
You see, I believe God was with Katelyn’s mom that day, and promised to be with her from that day on. I am not sure, because we didn’t talk about it, that she knew that or knows that. But what is clear is that God’s fingerprints are all over the place.
Today, Katelyn’s mom is the leader of the “Katelyn Foundation,” a non-profit dedicated to teaching children how to swim. She has committed to raising money and giving scholarships all over the Tampa Bay area to children that need to learn how to swim. As she said, “swimming in Florida is not just a luxury, it’s a necessity.” She is a blessing to others, because she was chosen, even in tragedy.
She told us just a little of that amazing story, and then she told us that she herself has just completed her own training and certification in swimming. The Extreme Home Makeover TV show pool builder had heard her story, and has donated a full-fledged swimming pool in her backyard. Today, that servant of God’s mission to health and wholeness is teaching children how to swim for free.
I mean, it’s one thing to raise money for a cause, it’s one thing to run an organization for water safety, but Katelyn’s mom has taken it to the next level. She herself gets in the water everyday and blesses other children. So that no other child, no other family, no other mom ever has to go through her tragedy again.
You see that’s what it means to be the elect, that you might be a blessing to others, that you might be blessed with the very presence of God in your own life.
So it’s the same question again, isn’t it? What is God up to with you? What is God up to with us? What are we being chosen for?
We are the elect because we are God’s people. We have drawn the short straw. It’s our ladder to climb, and to come down, and to climb again. You see when you are the elect, it happens again and again. That’s the message of the Jacob story of faith. That’s part of our story.
So what is our challenge? Because you know in answering that challenge, the very presence of God is promised. By the way, that challenge comes to every person in every place.
It comes in the mountains of Honduras, and in the retirement communities of West Bradenton. It comes to young and old, healed and sick, tired and rested, and experienced in faith and those with nothing to offer but their lives. The challenge comes to the elect.
The challenge comes in the midst of tragedy, and sometimes with the greatest joy one can imagine. But make no mistake about it, when we journey with God, we will be challenged.
Thanks be to God that the very presence and power of the Holy Spirit, given to us by the work of Jesus Christ, and offered in the relationship we share with Almighty God, is also with us in every moment in being the elect. For this too is a house of God.
This place too is Bethel.
“For surely the Lord is in this place”– and because we are the elect, the chosen, because we have drawn the short-straw, we knew it all the time!
Amen.
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