Psalm 21 Prayer Answered: Thanksgiving and Praise
Psalm 19 Glorifying God: A Testament and A Prayer
Psalm 18 Praise My God for Deliverance and Victory
This week, Lord willing and if He tarries in returning, we will be saying goodbye to 2020, some might say good riddance, and hello to 2021. With that in mind, I pursued this particular text knowing this is the time of year when folks naturally look back and reflect on the past and looking to the future make plans. And potentially this can be a frightening proposition. Some have been close to the death, are amazed that God would spare us to continue living on this earth. Others have had changes in health, changes in work life, been furloughed or shutdown, and even changes in how students attended school in person or virtually. Looking back on this year, we’ve faced a lot of change. Whether that meant not being able to eat at your favorite restaurants for a while, not going to baseball games or enjoying the Little league WS, wearing face masks everywhere, or enduring the scorn of sneezing in public (once upon a time someone called out “God bless you!”, now it’s like ewwww, stay away you germ infested parasite!) Things changed, and not always for the best. No shame for inciting violence or rioting, no shame for walking in a pride parades nude or with vulgur hats, no shame in claiming your woman when you know you are a man, no shame to redefine marriage, redefine gender, redefine whatever else. No shame for any of that, but SHAME on you for believing in the Bible. Shame on you if you don’t shut down your church. Shame on you if you don’t do everything the elites of society demand. Is it any wonder then that when we look back on how crazy this year has been, that anxiety is ridden across society at large when we consider the future? And would we not then suspect that this anxiety is present among the church? Yes, pastor, but the Bible says not to be anxious. Indeed, Jesus said “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” (Matt. 6:34) So there you have it, sermon over right? Jesus said so, now obey it. But the obvious question that follows is how. How? How am I, are you suppose to not be anxious? Is there a switch we can flip on or off? Well that’s the aim of this morning’s sermon, God teach us how not to be anxious.
From the 1984 blockbuster movie Ghostbusters and pop song, I took the line “I ain’t afraid of no ghost” and titled my sermon: “I ain’t afraid of no virus!” This is one of those times in our present circumstances, when I decided to take a slight detour from our study in Leviticus and chose to address an issue that most of us in this country are thinking about. If you haven’t had your head in the sand, then you have seen the wall to wall TV coverage of the corona virus, COVID-19. Many of us in this room have already directly or indirectly been affected. The mayor of Williamsport has banned group gatherings of 250 or more. The governor has closed schools for 2 weeks. Flights, cruises, travel, and conferences are all being canceled. Major sporting events are being cancelled as well. And for crying out loud, all the toilet paper and hand sanitizer has vanished off the shelves! Not to make light of the situation, we’re in a crisis. A pandemic. And there is a lot of fear, a lot of worry, a lot of concern, on the part of our public officials, in the news media, and for all the citizens. Even my 11 year-old daughter is concerned that the mailman is going to spread corona virus to every house he delivers the mail to. I had a conversation with my father, a pastor in Houston, who remarked at how people are hanging on to every warning and heeding every instruction that the government health officials, the CDC, etc. have issued, but when we tell them Jesus is coming, that this is not only a life or death issue, but an eternal one, those warnings go largely ignored. People are on edge, some on the verge of panic. So how is the Christian supposed to think in times like these? How are we to behave? What kind of example should we set for others to take note of? Scripture has much to teach when it comes to facing illness and disease. There are many passages where we can find sound teaching. This morning I chose Psalm 91.