"Accentuate The Positive"
Sermon Transcript for July 11, 2004
Scripture Reading: I Chronicles 29
By Rev. John Elliott
Praise God! We could use a little mixture of yours with Methodist stuff; and we do which is nice. Let us pray, “Hello, are we going to pray together? Are you here? What are you saying? What do you want from us? Lord we have come here to meet you, to submit ourselves to you and we pray that we will be able to do that and that you will be able to touch us. It would be nice if we felt it. But rather we feel it or not, that you touch us, each one of us, this day in your house. In Christ’s name, Amen.”
When I was a young boy during WWII there was a catchy song called, “Accentuate the Positive”. Some of you remember that song. I won’t try to sing it, but the words went like this: “You’ve got to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, latch on to the affirmative, and don’t mess with Mr. In Between.” I never did find out who that was—Mr. In Between. But I like the song; and I remember it. I want to make the point that accentuating the positive and the Kingdom of God are very similar. The Kingdom of God and accentuating the positive are made of the same victorious stuff. Our Bishop, Woody White, told us this little exultation, which I want to practice with you. “God is good.” “All the time.” We can do it better than that. “God is good.” “All the time.” “All the time.” “God is good.” Is that positive or not? Is that true? Yes, it is true; that’s why we say it happily.
God is good all the time is a primary aspect of the Kingdom of God. And it is the other side of the coin with accentuate the positive. God is the most powerful and the most good force in the universe, is that not true? Likewise, Jesus Christ is the most positive person and force who ever lived. Jesus could see things in His disciples nobody else could see—positive things. It wasn’t that He was a better psychologist than others with some secret ability to see what others missed seeing; instead, what Jesus saw in the average disciple was visible to Him because He could see the Kingdom of God breaking into the world around Him. And that changed everything. If God is an awesomely positive force, than the way God governs will have the same incredible positivity. Why should we be surprised about such a God? If you know these things and if you live by them, then to use Jesus’ words, “You are not far from the Kingdom of God”.
The first point I want to make is the Kingdom of God is a completely positive reality. It is absolutely clear in the New Testament that the Kingdom of God was Jesus’ principle topic for preaching and teaching. Some of the greatest Christian leaders across the century would go further. They would say the Kingdom was not just Jesus’ main subject, but it was His only subject. What they meant was that everything Jesus ever said and did was tailored around God, the King, and the King’s kingdom, which was breaking in which Jesus could see, and the enormous difference this makes in a person’s life. That’s the reason the word “Gospel” is used to describe just how positive is the news from God. The expression Jesus used, “Kingdom of God”, was actually ancient. He might have been thinking of King David’s words in I Chronicles 29. If we could have those on the screen, I’d like you to repeat them with me. They are wonderful. “Praise be to you, O Lord God of our father Israel, from everlasting to everlasting. Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor for everything in heaven and earth is yours. Yours, O Lord, is the kingdom. You are exalted as head over all.”
The people of that time could understand God as king. The terms were familiar to them. They understood that the king of the universe would have a kingdom. We Christians today don’t much like kings so we must translate what Jesus was saying into modern terms which is what I am attempting in this sermon. People then could understand the words, but Jesus’ followers could not see the kingdom Jesus saw and we are just about like those followers. For the most part we can’t see God’s Kingdom either or we would talk about it more often even though it has been preached for nearly two thousand years. The fact is that people back in Jesus’ time weren’t tuned to God’s Kingdom. They were tuned to many other things especially hating the Romans. They were tuned to making a living when it was very hard. They were tuned to blaming others for their problems. And today most of us are tuned to other things than the Kingdom. We are tuned to worrying about terrorists. We are tuned to complaining about high gasoline prices. We are tuned to spending money and enjoying ourselves. The words of David have been largely forgotten—that everything belongs to God—the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the majesty, and the splendor. “For everything in heaven and earth is yours, yours, O Lord, is the Kingdom.”
How many of you read this book several months ago? If you did you are familiar with what I am going to say. On the first page of Chapter 1, the first line of the book says, “It’s not about you.” And that is profound and can help us to see the Kingdom of God today. The Kingdom is not about me. In Rick Warren’s book, the author did not go on to say quickly, “It’s not about you, it’s about God”. But that’s exactly what he meant. And the same thing is true of the Kingdom. It’s not about us. It’s about God. There is a reason why the Kingdom of God is not more real to us today because historically we have claimed for hundreds of years we have talked about how “we” build the Kingdom and about how “we” are bringing in the Kingdom. But it’s not about us. The Kingdom is about God!
I want us to look at some scripture passages to see just how dominant the Kingdom theme was in Jesus’ teaching. Matthew’s gospel shows us, perhaps, the best. Now the first three chapters are not about Jesus’ ministry. The first three chapters of Matthew tell about the genealogy and the visit of the Wise Men when Mary and Joseph fled to Egypt to avoid being killed by King Herod. Then there’s a portion about John, the Baptist, baptizing Jesus. And Chapter 4 begins with Jesus being tempted in the wilderness. And then His ministry begins and we hear about the Kingdom of God immediately. I’m going to be reading the King James, the RSV translation first because you are familiar with the words of it. But these really speak to us. But then I’d like us, together, to read The Message version of each of these verses. So the first is the King James, the Revised Standard says, “Then from that time Jesus began to preach saying, ‘Repent! For the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand.” Read with me, “Change your life, God’s Kingdom is here!” We didn’t get that, did we? Yes, we did. Six versus later, 4:23 of Matthew, “And he went about all of Galilee teaching in the synagogues and preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom and healing every disease and every infirmity among the people.” Would you read with me? “He went all over Galilee. He used Jewish synagogues for meeting places and taught people the truth of God. God’s Kingdom was His theme. But beginning right now they were under God’s government—a good government.” Thank you, I didn’t have that on my text.
Chapter 5 begins with the Sermon on the Mount and the Sermon on the Mount is almost exclusively about the Kingdom of God. Verse 3 of Chapter 5, you’re familiar with these words “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” Now read with me, “You are blessed when you are at the end of your rope. With less of you there are more of God and His rule.” Verse 5, “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth.” Verse 5, “You are blessed when you are content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.” Verse 8, “Blessed are the pure in heart, they shall see God.” Let’s read, “You are blessed when you get your inside world, your mind and heart, hooked up. Then you can see God in the outside world.” And verse 9, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” “You are blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That’s when you discover who you really are and your place in God’s family.” Verse 10, “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” ”You are blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper into God’s Kingdom.” Verse 11 and 12, “Blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad for your reward is great in heaven for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you.” “Not only that, count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit you. You can be …” Not quite a perfect connection here, but we’ll live with it.
I have a second point. The Kingdom is not easy to see. Unfortunately, no matter how positive the Gospel of the Kingdom of God may be and no matter that Jesus was constantly teaching and preaching the Kingdom, most of the people who heard Him did not understand Him. We need to admit that the Kingdom isn’t easy to see even for most Christians. In this sanctuary we often hear the idea that everything comes from God and everything belongs to God. That may be true. But we find it very hard to see and live by. We can be totally committed to Christ but we also live in the real world in which I say, “This is my wristwatch. I bought it. I wear it. I look at it all of the time. It’s my wristwatch. It’s my car. Even my clothes. I live in my house. My children are mine. This is my town. This is my church. This is my country.” We end up holding two contradictory positions. It all comes from God and it all belongs to God but it also belongs to me. This struggle goes on in my life every day. In the midst of this tension, the best help we have …(lost part of transcript due to tape change). If we would do that, promises Jesus, God will see that all our necessities are met. I have both versions here. The RSV Version is very familiar. Please read with me, “Therefore, do not be anxious saying, ‘What shall we eat or what shall we drink or what shall we wear, for the Gentiles seek all these things and your Heavenly Father knows you need them all.” And then it goes on, “But seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness and all these things shall be yours as well.” I like the new Message version and we’ll try that to. “What I am trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way He works fuss over these things. But you know both God and how He works. Steep your life in God reality, God initiative, God provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your every day concerns will be met.”
The final point is, the Kingdom manifests the King. Now there’s another way of approaching the King’s Kingdom. I can’t remember how many times I have committed my life to Jesus Christ, but many times. When Reverend Mike or Reverend Dan calls for a total commitment, as they often do, why do I feel a powerful urge to respond? Why don’t I say to myself, “Hey, take it easy. You gave yourself to Christ long ago. You can pass on this one. Reverend Mike isn’t aiming at me. I’m already committed.” Why don’t I think that? Why don’t you think that? Because just as St. Paul admitted he hadn’t yet arrived at his goal, so neither have we arrived at our goal. God is perfect. But we live everyday in an imperfect world and we are imperfect. The Kingdom of God overlaps the real world we all live in. God created this real world and in some mysterious way governs it right now. God created us real people for the real world. And we own our possessions. The tension between God’s ownership and our ownership is created because we become legalistic. Again we fall into the trap of thinking, “This is about us.” It isn’t about us; it’s about God--a God whose nature is to be good all of the time. Whose nature accentuates the positive. Instead of being legalistic, God rearranges our inner most being to focus on love. God is love. Love is the essential work by which God governs the Kingdom. The very best gift we can receive is the gift of love with which God creates us and the Kingdom of God. When this love from God motivates us we can confess that everything we own comes from God. But it is not a legal matter; it’s a love matter. God’s love can enable us to become loving by slowing making love our nature just as it is God’s nature. We don’t have to be loving, but God wants us to be loving in every situation including Iraq, Afghanistan. God doesn’t grit divine teeth in order to love us. And God is never basically discouraged or pessimistic. Was Jesus pessimistic and defeated? That’s why I like the picture so well. I picture Him as being that way much of the time. God is willing.
Read with me one more verse from John 15, Verse 11, “These things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full.” The Kingdom of God is about joyful loving. That’s what God does; that’s what Christians should do. Even loving is not primarily about us. It’s about God. God is good. “All the time.” All the time. “God is good.” And who is this God who is so good all of the time? Daddy, our daddy—not our father. The good God is daddy to us. I rest my case.
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