Sermon for February 8, 2009 on Mark 1:29-39

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How many of you have ever been in a car that has a GPS unit? For those of you who don’t know what they are or have never used one, the GPS unit or Global Positioning System is a little box that sits in your car and tells you which way to go. All you have to do is plug in your starting point and ending point and the GPS will get you there

(Or so they say.)

The first time I ever encountered a GPS was when I was up in North Carolina for my sister’s wedding. Heather and I were riding with my neice, Karen. She was so excited because she just installed the new GPS in her car. She turned it on as we were traveling from the rehearsal back to the hotel. I was enthralled! The voice from the GPS said, “Turn right onto such and such a street,” and Karen did, and off we were. About half way through the trip the GPS said, “Turn left in 200 feet.” Karen went straight. The GPS now said, “Recalibrating… Turn left in 300 feet.” Karen went straight! Now this was starting to drive me crazy. I know that my neice is a strong willed woman but why wasn’t she at least listening to this little box in her car?

Finally, after the fifth recalibration I said, “Karen, do you know where you’re going?”

“Oh yes,” she siad, “I know a much easier route.” Sometimes, we’re like that with God, aren’t we? We like to keep God in our little box on our dashboards so that God can tell us where to go and what to do. But even when that happens we don’t always listen, because we think we know an easier way.

I can only wonder how many times God has had to recalibrate my life because I refused to listen, and took another road. I’m sure that it’s more often than not.

Life seems so much more simple when we keep god boxed in, when we try and keep control, when we set our own course, regardless of God’s presence. But it’s not!

The disciples tried to do the same thing. Jesus called them from their comfortable lives of fishing on the Sea of Galilee. He called them out into ministry, and how many times did their lives have to be recalibrated?

Today’s Gospel lesson is one of those times. Jesus comes to the home of Simon and Andrew and immediately they tell him of the fever that had affected Simon’s mother-in-law. Jesus heals her, then heals a bunch of people from the town, and by the next morning they said, “Everyone is searching for you.”

Now it would be so easy to just pitch his tent in Copernum and finish out Jesus ministry there. After all, everyone loved and welcomed Jesus there. But what does Jesus say to the disciples? He says, “Recalibrate. Let us go on to the next towns, that I might preach there also; for that is why I came out.”

Then, there was the time that Jesus told the disciples that He had to go up to Jerusalem to suffer and die on a cross so that the world might be saved. You want to talk about a recalibration! You want to talk about god stepping out of the box we try and put Him in, well, that was the ultimate.

The story is told of the ancient library of Alexandria. Only one book survived a great inferno. It was quite an ordinary book, dull and uninteresting–or so it seemed. It was sold to a man for just a few pennies, but he soon discovered that it probably was the most valuable book in the world. For on the inside of the back cover a few sentences had been written revealing the secret of a certain touchstone that could change anything it touched into gold. The inscription said that this “pebble of great price” could be found somewhere along the shore of the Black Sea among the countless other similar pebbles. There was one difference, however. All the pebbles were cold to the touch, except the touchstone, which was warm to the touch.

Rejoicing in his good fortune, the man sold all his possessions, borrowed all the money he could and set out for the shores of the Black Sea. On his arrival, he set up a tent and began his needle-in-a-haystack search for the touchstone.

As he moved along the shore, he picked up one pebble at a time, and if it was cold to the touch he tossed it into the sea. Hour after hour, day after day, and year after year he carried on his painstaking search–picked up a pebble, felt cold, threw it into the sea. Picked up another and on and on. All the pebbles were cold to the touch until one day he picked up a pebble and it was warm to the touch–and through sheer force of habit he threw it into the sea.

What’s the effectiveness of our GPS system that’s installed in each one of us? Remember when I said that GPS stood for Global Positioning System? Well, for the rest of the sermon it stands for God’s Positioning System. How effective are we in listening to God’s Positioning system? When we come to worship do we see it as a rote excercise–devoid of meaning?

Or, do we feel the warmth of Christ’s presence and have the ability to shed our selfishness in order to serve in His name!

We’ve been called out of our comfort zones today. Out of our small fishing villages of our minds and told that we need to take the message of God’s love shown in Jesus Christ beyond the doors of the sanctuary.

Now is the time.

Today, we begin our Capital Campaign. The hope and dream of this campaign is to follow God’s Positioning System beyond these walls so that we may touch the lives of God’s children everywhere.

We don’t seek to build buildings of brick and mortar just to have a fancier place to worship. We envision a campaign that will open up our ministry to reach more people with the Gospel, because to this very day, everyone is still looking for Jesus. Just as the people gathered in front of Simon’s house that morning 2,000 years ago, so too they gather today. At the line waiting for food at the Cafe of Life, searching for clothes at the Christitan Brothers in order to stay warm, waiting for rent help at Bonita Assistance, hoping to get a job in this dismal economy. People are still looking for Jesus whether they realize it or not.

Now is the time for us to step out boldly and follow God’s voice.

Let’s shake up the world a little bit. Instead of God having to recalibrate all the time because we keep screwing up, why don’t we start to recalibrate our lives to God’s direction. If God calls us to do something or to reach out to someone, let’s do it!

Now is the time.

Let’s grab onto God’s hand and through prayer and contemplation follow where God leads us.

And always remember, as we take God’s hand, God will raise us to our feet. It is for this purpose that we, like Simon’s mother-in-law, might love, serve, honor, and obey God forever.

God cannot be kept in a box, and neither can we as a church.

Now is the time… Reach out with the love of Christ i nwhatever way God calls you to, and share Christ that all might live victoriously!

Amen.