Mission Impossible

Of all of the stories in the bible, the ones in Genesis are my favorites. I love the whole book. I love the way the writers chose to tell us the stories of our beginnings and I love the way the women have such an important role in it all. Today’s story from Genesis is one that we all know fairly well, and while our liturgist did a wonderful job reading it to you from the bible, I’d like to share with you another version:

........One blazing summer afternoon, Abraham was sitting at the entrance to his tent, when the LORD appeared to him. Looking up, Abraham saw three strangers approaching him. He immediately jumped up and hurried to welcome them as honored guests. He said, “Please allow me the honor of sharing the hospitality of my home with you. Come in. Take a bath. Put your feet up for a bit. Let me serve you up a meal so that you can leave refreshed and strengthened. I would count it a favor to have the opportunity to serve you in this way.”
........So they said, “Thank you, we accept.”
........Abraham hurried into the tent and said, “Sarah. Quick! Bake up a batch of cookies while I organize the barbeque.”
........Then he ran out to his grazing herd and butchered a prime calf. He instructed one of his workers to prepare the best cuts for the barbeque. When it was all ready, he served it up for his guests with a yoghurt dip and plenty to drink, and waited on them while they ate.
........During the meal, they said to him, “Where is your wife, Sarah?”
........Abraham replied, “She’s inside; in the tent.”
........Then one of the three said, “Mark my words! I’ll be back this way in about a year’s time, and by then your wife Sarah will have a son.”
........Sarah was in the tent behind them as they talked, and she overheard this. Knowing well that she and Abraham were both elderly, and that she had long since passed menopause, she laughed to herself, saying, “Fat chance! Am I going to have such pleasure at my age; and with my husband past it too?”
........The LORD said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and question whether she can have a child at her age? Is there any good thing that the LORD is incapable of doing? I’ll be back this way in about a year’s time, just as I said, and Sarah will have a son.”
........Sarah was shocked that she had been caught, and blurted out, “I didn’t mean to laugh.”
........“Yes, but you did laugh,” replied the LORD.
........The LORD was good to Sarah and followed through on the promise made to her. Sarah fell pregnant to Abraham and gave birth to a baby son. This happened when they were both old and grey — Abraham was already one hundred years old when the child was born. Sarah gave birth to their son right at the time that God had spoken about. Abraham named his son Isaac, and circumcised him when he was eight days old, because that is what God had told him to do. Sarah said, “Now God has given me something to laugh about! And everyone who hears the news will laugh with me! Once no one would have dared raise the topic of me having a baby with Abraham, but now I have given birth to the old man’s son!” (From Laughingbird.net)

Seriously, can you imagine? Those of you who are retired, can you imagine how you would react if God said, “oh, by the way, you are having a child”. What would you do? What would you say? I imagine, you might react with some disbelief. Perhaps you’d even snort, snarl, or scream. Maybe you’d say “Are you nuts?” or maybe, just maybe, you’d be like Sarah and you’d laugh at the absurdity of it all. Abraham was 100 years old. Sarah was likely in her 90’s. How else COULD she react?

God placed an “Impossible” opportunity at her feet, and her reaction was typical.

She couldn’t believe it, she was scared of the possibility, and she was ready to give God a thousand and one really great reasons why such a thing just WOULD NOT work.

Sarah could not believe what the messenger had said. She couldn’t even begin to imagine that she could have a child. Not only had Sarah been barren for probably 90-some-odd-years, she had been through “the change”, she was old, she was tired, and there was no way God could be serious about someone like her having a baby. Talk about the “impossible dream”… she had no reason to believe she could ever get pregnant, and yet here is a messenger saying she would indeed bear a child. She had accepted hopelessness as normal. She had come to terms with her barrenness. She had no reason to believe that God WASN’T joking.

And ohhhh she was scared. Can you imagine how scared she might have been? To be in her 90’s and to think about being pregnant? Would she live through the pregnancy? Would she live through childbirth? Would she see her child grow up? No worries about being the oldest mother in the kindergarten group…she was quite possibly going to be the oldest mother EVER. She probably worried about keeping up with her baby, worried about the stress of raising a family, and probably worried that Abraham would be able to handle any (or all) of the whole mess! Of course she was scared.

But most of all, she was ready to give God her list of reasons why this whole baby-at-90 thing would just not work. She’d say, “I’m old. I’m wrinkled. I’m withered. My husband is old. He’s wrinkled. He’s withered. I’ve gone through the change. My insides are just as withered up as my outsides. I can’t take care of a baby at this age. I won’t be able to make it. I can’t do this.” She’d come up with more reasons if she had to…silly absurd reasons, perfectly rational reasons, all of the reasons she could possibly invent. She would just know that it’s so much easier to have reasons to NOT believe in the impossible, than to have a little bit of faith.

So she laughed. She laughed at the idea. She laughed at the impossibility of it all. And she laughed right in God’s face. This laughter was not laughter of joy, it was laughter of bitter disbelief. This was one of those *snort* “are you kidding me?” kind of laughs. She could not believe in the possibility of the impossible.

It’s so easy to look at Sarah and go “tsk tsk tsk”…to think that she was unfaithful…to think that she didn’t have enough belief in God to trust that God’s promise would hold true. And yet when we are told to believe that a new day is possible here at Court Street…that our neighborhood and our ministries can be revitalized…we are just like Sarah. We can’t believe it, we are scared of it, and we are more than ready to give a thousand and one really great reasons why it just won’t work!

We can’t believe it. God wants us to do what? God really wants us to go out there…on Court Street…down in the Haskell neighborhood…out there with the homeless and DO SOMETHING? No no, not us. God can’t be calling us to do that. That’s what other organizations are for. That’s what Love inc, The Rescue Mission, and Carpenter’s Place or for. That’s what the food pantry is for. We give our money. We bring our canned goods. God certainly can’t be asking us to do more. We’re old. We’re tired. We’ve been here longer than they have. We can’t believe God would ask us to do more than we’ve been doing for over 150 years.

And ohhhh are we ever scared of it. What if something happens? We can’t go out there. What if it gets dark? What if we get mugged? I mean gosh Becca, your own laptop was stolen right out from under you in this very building. You of all people should be scared to go out there in our neighborhood. You could get killed!

And reasons? Oh do we ever have reasons. We can give you a whole list of reasons why this won’t work. It didn’t work when we tried it 30 years ago. It didn’t work when we tried it 50 years ago. It worked 30 years ago, but now this is a different church…a different neighborhood. It worked 50 years ago, but that was when person x, y, or z was here. Our church is too big. Our people are too old. Our youth group is too small. We don’t have enough money. Person Z wouldn’t want their money used that way. It might not work. Or worse, it MIGHT JUST WORK and we’d be stuck doing it forever. We’ve got great reasons!

So we scoff. We laugh. We snort. We dismiss. And we tell god, “No, God. Not here. That’s just not possible.”

And God’s response to Sarah is God’s response to us. “Is anything to hard for God?” Well, is it? Is anything truly impossible with God?

Be careful how you answer that question.

If you say, “Yes, some things are impossible,” then God ceases to be God. We take the infinite power of the universe and relegate it to hopeless stagnation. We say that we know more about the way things work than God does. We claim that our knowledge of the universe is somehow deeper, better, and more enlightened than the one who created it!

But if you say, “No, nothing is impossible with God,” then it’s time to stop laughing. Stop scoffing. And stop giving excuses. It is time to trust that God will be there. That God will not lead us astray. That God’s purpose for us is bigger and greater than any limitations we can put on ourselves through our own narrow vision. Was it impossible for Sarah to have a son? NO! In her old age she and Abraham conceived and delivered a son…Isaac. Despite all of the seemingly insurmountable hurdles of human bodily limits, the impossible DID become possible. If God can do that? If God can create the whole universe and all that is in it? If God truly knows more than we do? How DARE we say anything other than, NOTHING is impossible with God. We are quick to say God can do everything. That our God can do anything. But are we as quick to believe it? Well, I’ll tell you this. There is only one thing that our God cannot do. Our God CANNOT fail. And if we trust…neither can we.

Do you remember the old TV Series Mission Impossible? Or perhaps you saw the movie a few years back. It always started the same way. Agent Phelps would receive a message, stating “Your mission, should you choose to accept it….” And while the Mission was always difficult, it was never truly impossible.

So, Court Street United Methodist Church. Your mission, should you choose to accept it…

Your Mission is to listen to God.

Your Mission is to believe the Impossible.

Your mission is to go out there and be a part of this neighborhood.

Your mission is to help our neighborhood grow and develop.

Your mission is to feed the hungry.

Your mission is to clothe the naked.

Your mission is to visit the sick.

Your mission is to be God’s Light, God’s Heart, and God’s active force in this neighborhood.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it is to be a Church in the heart of the city with a heart FOR this city.

If you are willing to listen to God, willing to accept this mission impossible, there will be opportunities for you! Your first chance is next Sunday. Take part in our roundtable discussion. GO with us as we pray and walk through the city. Help us pack bagged meals to take to our neighbors. Volunteer at Vacation Bible School. Help us in October when we plant bulbs.

A bright future at CSUMC is NOT mission impossible. It’s mission VERY POSSIBLE as long as we listen to God and trust in God to guide us. After all, is anything impossible with God?