How many of you remember MAD magazine and Alfred E. Neuman? He was the iconic face on the cover of MAD magazine who’s famous quote was, “Who me, worry?” There is no great story behind the fact that Alfred E. Neuman was known for that phrase, the producers of MAD magazine just wanted Alfred E. Neuman to come across as laid back and easy going and so that phrase just seemed to fit. But Jesus would tell us that “Who me, worry?” should be our motto as well - Jesus would say that as his followers we have no business worrying about anything.
Easier said than done I realize and we wonder how it is even possible to live a life worry free. What with the Virus and social unrest. However Jesus seems to think it is possible - as many times as he says to us “Don’t worry” it seems like it is pretty important to him. The great philosopher Van Wilder once said, “Worrying is like a rocking chair. It gives you something to do, but it doesn’t get you anywhere!” You know this - worrying doesn’t change anything. Worry doesn’t make things happen. In reality, worry doesn’t do anything except cause the worrier to lose sleep and raise their blood pressure and often waste time and energy.
Worry can do nothing but yet (Pause) we are great worriers. Could Jesus really mean that we shouldn’t worry about anything? Yes that is exactly what he means. Why? because Worry is symptomatic of a different problem in our lives as followers of Jesus - worry is symptomatic of a lack of faith; a lack of trust in the God who is constantly trying to get us to understand how very much he loves us and how very much he wants to take care of us.
what happens is this - we have these expectations of how we want our lives to be. We have these expectations of what we want to happen. And when something happens in our life and it is not what we want; or not how we would have had it happen - then we assume that God doesn’t love us or that God doesn’t care.
That is what happened to Elijah in our Old Testament reading. Elijah is a prophet from God. His job is to try and keep the leadership of Israel in line with God and this is proving to be quite a challenge with King Ahab and Queen Jezebel. Elijah holds a contest to show Ahab and Jezebel that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the one true God; through Elijah’s prayer God reigns down fire from heaven! Yet when Jezebel threatens Elijah’s life for killing the priests of the pagan god Baal, Elijah becomes afraid and runs away. He is worried that he is not going to come out of this alive. He runs as far as he can and when night falls he stops and goes to sleep under a broom tree. As he sleeps, an angel woke him and said, “Get up and eat.” Elijah looked and there beside him was some baked bread and a jar of water. So he ate and went back to sleep. Later, the angel woke him once again and said, “Get up and eat some more so that you can continue on your journey.” So Elijah got up and ate and drank and the food gave him enough strength that he was able to continue on his way - refreshed and strengthen and more able to cope with what he was so worried about. God comes to him and assures Elijah of his presence and his care and Elijah is able to go back to his work as a prophet. Notice God didn’t criticize Elijah for his worry - God just shows Elijah what God can do. God provides what Elijah needs and Elijah realizes that he doesn’t need to worry. Elijah has some time to remember all the times before that God has come through for him; Elijah remembers that regardless of what situation he is in, God has provided. And that is important for us. The next time you begin to fret and wring your hands and pace the floor, stop for a minute and look back and think about those times that God has come through for you; those times when things have resolved; when life has continued on through whatever was going on…
Like the first time Elijah went to King Ahab and confronted Ahab about his sin; confronted Ahab about trying to worship God and worship Baal. Elijah told Ahab that he couldn’t do both - he had to choose. Worship God or worship Baal and until Ahab made up his mind there would be no rain - and there wasn’t. Elijah had to live through this drought just like everyone else in the land of Canaan. But Elijah never had to worry about his being able to survive the drought because God continually cared for him. Scripture tells us one day God said to Elijah - ‘Go to the village of Zarephath and I will lead you to a widow who will care for you.’ So Elijah had faith, trusted God and obeyed him and traveled to the village of Zarephath. There he found the widow and asked her “Would you please bring me a little water to drink?” As she was going to get it he called after her, “How about bringing me some bread too?” This time she came back to him and said, “There is a drought. I do not have a single piece of bread in my house. I have one handful of flour left and a touch of oil. I was getting ready to gather some sticks to cook this last meal for me and my son, and then we will die because we have no more food.” Elijah said to her “Don’t worry. Use what bread and oil you have left and bring me some bread - and then what is left you use for you and your son. If you are obedient to God in doing this, then God says there will always be flour and oil in your containers until the time God sends rain and the crops grow again.’ (Which we remember is 3 years!) So the widow did as Elijah asked and for the remainder of the drought there was always oil and flour in her house.
“Don’t worry.” Elijah said, “Just Trust and Obey and you will have what you need.”
Would we have enough faith to use the last little bit of oil and flour to feed a stranger? Or would be be worried that if we use it, then it will be gone and we will die…..
The worry that is essential - according to Jesus - is a lack of faith; a lack of trust in God. And since our primary mission as followers of Jesus is to show the glory of God - to show the goodness of God - to teach others that they can put worry aside and trust in the God almighty - worry for us is problematic. It is essentially denying the power of God and denying our call to witness to others that God is trustworthy.
Frank Powell is a Christian writer who recently wrote about worry. He pondered why we as followers of Christ, as members of Christ’s church, still worry so much. He asked people he knew; he asked learned theologians - and what he heard was this “Our greatest concern is that we don’t want to need God. We’re Americans. We’re independent. As Americans we will do anything to maintain the illusion of control and responsibility, so no wonder worry plagues us. Worry is the by-product of bearing a weight only God can bear. The more independence you desire, the more worry you will experience.”
God did not make us to be independent - God made us to be dependent. Remember Jesus’ words, “Unless you become like little children, you won’t experience the Kingdom of God.” Think about your childhood. For most of us our childhoods were worry free. We didn’t worry about having a roof over our head or being hungry or having clothes. We were free from all that because we knew that our parents would take care of that. Now I know that there are some of you and some children today who do have to be concerned about those things - but don’t get distracted in the exceptions - the point Jesus is trying to make that we as his followers need not worry - God will provide.
Maybe that provision is comfort during a tragedy; maybe that provision is peace when things don’t go the way we want; maybe that provision is friends who sit with us when we are confused or depressed or despondent like Elijah in the wilderness. Maybe that provision is the hand of an angel when our world falls apart. Maybe that provision is guidance when our world changes.
Has our world changed anymore than it has right now? I was talking to someone who said, “Its not that I went that many places before this, but it is that now if I decide to go somewhere, I can’t.” Maybe the worst part of this COVID is the lack of choices. There is so much we can’t do and we worry about that. We worry about what affect going out may have on ourselves - but also what affect our going out might have on someone else. We worry about what risk we are willing to take? We worry about not doing thinks and we worry about doing things. And we worry about ‘how long this will last……”
“Do not worry” does not mean that all will be well in our lives - cause we know better than that. COVID, cancer, heart problems and other illnesses has taught us that. “Do not worry” means that regardless of what life throws at us God will provide what we need when we need it. Whether it be physical needs or emotional needs or spiritual needs - God knows and God will be there.
“Do not worry” is all about faith and trust and acceptance. And if you think about it, is that not what we pray for each time we pray the Lord’s prayer - “Give us this day our daily bread” - cause every time we say that, essentially what we are saying is “God I won’t worry because I know that each day you will provide what I need.” And if God provides everything we need, then what do we have to worry about.
And I will repeat - worry is not having faith that God will provide what we need; worry is wanting things to turn out the way we want them to turn out; worry is thinking we can manipulate the world around us so that things go our way.
Elijah didn’t think God would protect him - and he did. The widow of Zarephath thought God had forgotten about her, and he hadn’t. I could tell more stories and I will from the Bible which show us that God knows exactly what we are going through, that God knows exactly what our issues are and while we might not think he provides things quickly enough or provides what we want him to provide - he will provide what we need. Isn’t that what we pray for “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done.”? Either we are sincere in our prayer or we aren’t.
Things are going to happen in your life. That you can be assured of. We can either bog our lives down in worry - we can wring our hands and say “Woe is me” like Elijah did before God came and gave him food. Or we can live a life of peace and as situations happen that we don’t like or don’t understand we can be like Alfred E. Neuman and say, “Who me, worry?”

Amen!

The Love of a Father - The Story of Jairus

Today is Father's Day. This is a day set aside to honor fathers. We all have one. Some are still with us and some have left us physically but will always be with us in our hearts. I have always struggled when it comes to Father’s day sermons. Mother’s Day is easy as Scripture is littered with good Mothers and so Ideally a father’s day sermon should be about some father God has lifted up as an example from scripture ….. but that becomes a real challenge when you look at the Father’s in the Bible. Its hard to find a man who really stands out as a good father…..
I could give you all kinds of stories from scripture about bad fathers… and maybe they could serve the purpose of saying something like - don’t be a father like this… Remember Jacob who had 12 sons but really only paid attention to one - his favorite son Joseph and Jacob didn’t seem to mind letting his other sons know that he only cared for Joseph which turned Joseph in to a little brat….So the lesson here perhaps is don’t show favoritism to one child. David had a husband killed to cover up for his indiscretion. And there are lots more of those kinds of stories.
However we look at God who is the ultimate good Father who is presented to us in the story of the Prodigal Son where the son runs off and squanders everything the father has given him and his Father stands at the door waiting and watching for the run away son and takes him back and lashes wonderful things on him when he returns - here God teaches us the unconditional love and care of a good Father.
But it really is unrealistic to hold God up as the marker when determining what a good father is like. More realistically
in the book of Luke we do have an example of a normal guy, someone we can relate to, who is an example for us of a good father. Here really is someone we can look to and say - “Here is what God wants a good father to be”. So let’s look at the story of Jairus.
Like so many of the stories of Jesus, they are told in the context of a crowd of people. We get the impression that everywhere Jesus went, large crowds of people formed around him; the people wanted to be in the presence of this special man - there was just something about Jesus that attracted people to him and word spread all around the area about the things he said and the things he did. How he taught with authority and how he healed the sick and how he spent time with people no one else was willing to spend time with. And it was no secret how much he was despised by the religious leaders.
Sometimes when we tell these stories of Jesus we have to take a moment to remember what society was like in ancient Jerusalem because it is so different than our experience and it is important in understanding a lot about Jesus and the context for much of his teachings. The case in point here is that the religious leaders, in Jesus day, had great power. As a Jew, your daily life was dictated by the rules and regulations governed by the religious leaders. And the religious leaders had the power to hold you accountable for how well you followed the rules and regulations. The religious leaders had their own army; their own judicial system; their own jail. And it was not an equitable system. There was no “I’m going to get a lawyer and defend myself”. The religious leaders had complete control. If they said you broke a religious law then you suffered the consequences and that was that. The other important point to remember is that salvation was not through the love and grace of Jesus Christ - salvation was through your appearance at the temple and your offering of the correct sacrifice. Without your presence at the temple, you lost your relationship with God. So if the religious leaders would ban you from the temple for some infraction, then they were in essence taking away your salvation.
Understanding this life as a Jew under complete control of the religious leaders helps us better appreciate the story of Jairus.
First, Jairus was the ruler of a synagogue. The Jewish synagogue was more like a community center than what we would think of as a church. There were Bible studies there; they would have held the Jewish school for the sons; the local jews would gather there for lots of different activities.

There was some worship there but real worship could only be done in the Temple in Jerusalem. Jairus, as the
ruler of the synagogue, would be the one who oversaw the activities; who took care of the physical property and pretty much just was a caretaker. He was not a priest or a rabbi who held different functions. In our denomination he would be like the Clerk of the Session and not the preacher. As a ruler of the synagogue he would have been answerable to the religious authorities and expected to be a ‘good Jew’ who followed the rules and lived life as he was ordered by the Jewish leaders. He would have had a lot to lose had he made the religious leaders angry.
Another thing to keep in mind - the religious leaders had declared that anyone associated with Jesus could be banned from the Temple. Being association with Jesus could be considered a crime punishable by the religious leaders. One would have to think long and hard before rushing to Jesus to ask for help.
But there was a crisis at Jairus’ home. His 12 year old daughter had fallen ill - and she was very ill. She was sick enough her father was worried about her survival and he was a good father who was willing to do whatever was necessary to help his daughter. He must have had heard that Jesus was in town and he would have known that Jesus was going to be surrounded by crowds - because Jesus was always surrounded by crowds. He also knew that if the religious leaders heard that a man of his position had gone to Jesus; had publicly talked to Jesus; had brought Jesus back to his home - his livelihood and the salvation of himself and his family could be in jeopardy. But we can see by the way this story is written that Jairus was willing to risk everything to help his daughter get well and he knew that his only hope was in the hands of Jesus.
So Jairus leaves his home and goes to seek Jesus out, obviously not caring who sees him. Right now the most important thing to Jairus was getting help for his daughter. He finds Jesus and falls down at Jesus feet, humbling himself before this man he was suppose to be avoiding. How hard is it to ‘humble’ yourself? Jairus was a man of stature in the community; someone who would have been very sure of himself and a man who would expect others to humble themselves before him….. and yet he was willing to do that because he was sure Jesus was the answer to his dilemma.
Think what it must have been like at that moment for Jairus - he had to put aside a lot of baggage to seek Jesus out in a crowd and to kneel down before Jesus and to beg Jesus for help. Who among us likes to make ourselves so vulnerable we are willing to beg for help?
Jesus says ‘yes’ he is willing to help and starts working his way through the crowd towards Jairus’ house when he is stopped by a women who wanted Jesus’ healing. What do you think it was like for Jairus when he had Jesus on the hook to come help; he knew his daughter needed immediately help; and then this woman in the crowd stops Jesus and Jesus stops to help her. I can picture Jairus being like me. I would be hopping up and down saying, “Come on Jesus! Come on! My daughter needs you now! This woman has been sick 12 years, she can wait a few more minutes…..”
But also see what Jairus then witnessed - Jesus healed the woman right in from of him. Jairus got to see this miracle and it had to have had an impact. But then Jairus’ heart must have sank when someone from his house comes running to him and says, “You don’t have to hurry anymore. Your daughter has died.”
The amount of emotion in Jairus had to have been enormous. Here he had risked everything to come to Jesus; he had humbled himself; had allowed himself to beg; had his hopes up because Jesus was actually coming with him; and then to have the bottom fall out because Jesus had stopped to help this other woman….. Can you imagine how he felt? Grief over the loss of his little girl; anger over the interruption by the woman; and regret that he hadn't come to Jesus sooner.
Jesus heard the report about the little girl and Jesus looked at Jairus, the grieving father, and said - “Don’t worry. She will be healed. Have faith in me.” And then Jesus continues on to Jairus’s home where he indeed heals the girl and she is restored to life because of what this loving father was willing to do.
Jairus did the greatest thing a father can do; he came to Jesus. Jairus was a good father because he showed us a father's love for his child. He was even a better father because of his faith in Jesus Christ.
Jairus showed us the secret of being a good father and the secret is simple - it is faith. Being willing to put your faith in someone other than yourself. To realize that being a good father is not taking care of everything yourself, but realizing that you can’t always take care of everything yourself; realizing that you need help and that help only comes from one place..... faith in Jesus Christ. Amen!