A Sermon Preached By

The Rev. Dr. Peter W. Shidemantle

The Day of Penticost, Confirmation Sunday, May 11, 2008

PEBBLE HILL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

5299 Jamesville Rd., DeWitt, NY  13214

Phone:  315-446-0960     FAX:  446-0672

phillchu@twcny.rr.com     http://pebblehill.presbychurch.org

            Colin, Emily, Maddie, Nick, Sydney - in a little while you’ll be asked to make a public profession of your faith in Jesus Christ, and along with that, make some pretty heavy promises.  You’ll be asked if you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, if you trust in him, if you intend to be his disciple and show his love, and finally, if you will be a faithful member of this congregation, giving of yourself to the life and ministry of this people of God.  Your answer to that last question is, “I will, with God’s help.”

            “I will.”  I’ll do it.  I commit myself to it.  It’s a promise.  It’s like when you agree to help a friend, or do something your parents have “asked” you to do.  It’s like when you are part of a team or a club or a musical group.  If you agree to be part of it, that means you need to participate, to do your part.  It doesn’t mean that you’ll always do it great.  Some days you aren’t feeling well, so you aren’t playing your best.  Or, you’ve got too many things going on, and it’s tough to do your best for any one of them.  So sometimes you have to struggle with priorities, with what is most important.  This is all part of life as we grow and mature.  You remember how when you were little kids and all you had to do was play?  Everything else was pretty much done for you, provided for you.  Along about 7^th and 8^th grade, and on in to high school, you start to take on more responsibilities.  More and more things are up to you.  You start to learn what you are good at and what isn’t so easy for you.  You find that you have more choices to make than you had to make before.  And sometimes it isn’t easy, because there are all these influences around you in addition to your parents, and some of the influences are not good for you, but they will seem tempting to you. 

            So this is a choice you are making today, a choice for God, to be a follower of Jesus Christ, to be a part of his church.  Before this it was your parents who chose for you, one way or the other.  Now you are making that choice for yourselves.  And like any other promise or commitment or decision, you won’t be able to do it perfectly.  As we talked about in confirmation class, there is no such thing as a perfect Christian.  It does take a decision on our part to follow Jesus.  It doesn’t just naturally happen.  And that’s the most important thing here this morning.  Your confirmation reminds all of us of that.  To follow Jesus requires a decision.  It’s not just about being a nice person, treating people kindly, or not doing bad things.  You don’t need to be a Christian for that.  And it’s not about thinking and believing the right things, or knowing everything there is to know about the Bible or about theology.  It’s not about being certain of everything that the faith says about itself.  All of these things are important, and as we grow in our faith we want to learn more and explore more and understand more.  But Jesus didn’t come so that people might think differently; he came so that people might live differently. 

            “Love one another as I have loved you,” he said - and he demonstrated with his life what that means.  This doesn’t mean that we are supposed to have “warm fuzzies” in our heart for everybody we meet.  That isn’t possible.  Some people just bug us, or rub us the wrong way.  Some people just aren’t very lovable.  Sometimes we aren’t very lovable.  But the way Jesus lived, and the way he shows us to live - is to see every person we meet as someone who is loved fully and completely by God, even when they turn away from God.  He showed this most fully himself on the cross, when in his agony he prayed for God to forgive those who put him there.  God did this for you, and for me.  It is such an amazing love!  That love changes things.  When it gets inside us, it changes how we look at others, changes how we look at the world.  It changes how we live.

            So, this is what you are saying “I will” to.  But there is a second part to that answer, which is just as important for us as Christians - “with God’s help.”  None of us can do this by ourselves.  We need help.  Once, there was a man who brought his son to Jesus to be healed from a terrible illness.  The father was desperate.  He said to Jesus, “if you can do anything, have pity on us and help us.”  Jesus said to him, “all things are possible for one who believes.”  And the father cried to him, “I believe; help my unbelief.” 

            All things are not possible for us.  Jesus wasn’t saying that if you only believe hard enough or strong enough, everything will happen in the way you want it to.  If that were true, none of us would have a strong enough faith.  The test of faith is not in how hard we believe but in how much we trust God.  We do our part when we say, “I will.”  I will do my best to follow Jesus, to love others as he loved us, to see the world, this beautiful creation of God, and everyone in it, as so loved by God that he gave his very life for it.  God knows we need help to be the kind of people God wants us to be.  God knows our sinfulness and our fears.  God knows we are not perfect.

            Today is Pentecost.  It’s the day when we celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit to the church, to the world.  Before Jesus was crucified, he said to his disciples “I will not leave you alone.  I will send a helper, one who will help you to live the kind of lives I need to advance God’s kingdom on earth.”  He even said that they would do even greater things than he had done!  In the story about that day in the book of Acts, when the Holy Spirit came, it settled on every one of the believers - and they were filled with joy.  From that point on they discovered the amazing things that God would do in them and through them because God’s spirit was with them.  The church was born, and it grew, and God’s love was made known far and wide. The church has never been a perfect place, or a perfect people.  Some terrible things have been done in the name of religion, and Christians have done their share of them.  Whenever Christians think they can do it all themselves, when they have it all figured out, when they think they don’t have anything to learn from others - that means trouble - because their faith is more in themselves than in God their help. 

            But the church is also a wonderful place when it recognizes first its need of God, and our need of one another.  We’re not afraid to say, “Lord, forgive me for I have sinned.”  We’re at our best when we say, “Lord, we can’t do it by ourselves.  We need your help.  I believe, help my unbelief.”  This walk of faith is not an easy one.  So why should we make that walk?  Why not just try to be a good person, be nice to people and help them out when we can?  Why spend a Sunday morning with a bunch of people praying and singing and listening to the preacher go on and on, and talking together about what it means to say yes to God and to follow Jesus - when you could be at home sleeping or doing something that would probably be more fun?

            Why bother with trying to live a life that puts others first, a life of service, a life that is framed by prayer and led by love.  Why should we risk being hurt and rejected by others when we could just go along and not cause any waves?

            Well, there are a lot of reasons why - but I guess the one I’d like to leave with you on this day of your confirmation is that it’s too lonely to live without God.  When everything is up to you, when it all depends on you, when you have no one to fall back on except yourself, when other people disappoint you and even hurt you, when the world seems so crazy and its problems seem so massive and beyond help - and, believe me, we all feel that way sometimes - there is that reminder that we’re not alone, that the God who created the world in love, the God who loved us so much that he came into this world to teach us and live with us and suffer and die for us, is the God who remains with us always, is always there beside us to help us, and that even in death he doesn’t leave us.  This is a God worth living for. 

            It’s a big step, to say “yes” to all of this - but we don’t do it alone.  We are brothers and sisters in faith.  We walk the way of Jesus together.  And every day we are beginners, because we don’t know what any new day will bring.  But God is with us, and as we trust God, and look to God for help, we come to know that there is no greater joy.  We thank God for you, for who you are as beloved children of God - for exactly who you are right now, and for the people you will become.  You have already been a blessing to us.  The gifts you bring and share with us will change forever who we are.

            God bless you on your confirmation.   

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