Scripture:
Proverbs 3:5-7 (The Message)
Trust God from the bottom of your heart;
don’t try to figure out everything on your own.
Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;
God’s the one who will keep you on track.
Don’t assume that you know it all.
Run to God! Run from evil!
Jeremiah 29:11 (New Revised Standard Version)
11For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.
Sermon: “Trust God”
I took figure skating lessons when I was a teenager. To be honest, I wasn’t very good at it. I was pretty timid—I didn’t like skating fast, so I never got up enough speed to do the turns correctly. My instructor was always saying to me, “You need to lean into the turns,” but I was pretty sure that if I leaned into the turns, I would fall flat on my face and be sprawled across the ice, with onlookers chuckling at how clumsy I was. So, I would say to my instructor, “I can’t lean into the turns, I’ll fall!” To that she would respond with confidence, “Trust your skates! They’ll hold you up!” But here’s the thing. I was 99% sure my instructor was wrong about my skates. I think she was assuming that I had the same kind of skates as the other girls at the rink: nice, new, thick leather boots with sharp blades on the bottom. My skates, however, were hand-me-downs from one of my mother’s friends who had worn them when she was a teenager 20 years earlier. The boots on my skates were old and flimsy and at least one size too big, but no one could see that, as my 1970’s bell-bottom jeans pretty much covered up everything except the blades.
One day, I finally got fed up with my instructor yelling at me, “Lean into the turn—trust your skates!” So I did. And the result was pretty much what I had feared. I fell right over and sprawled out on the ice. My instructor rushed over, an anguished look on her face. “Are you okay?!” she asked. I was fine—not hurt, just embarrassed. But then she looked at my skates for the first time and said something like, “Oh my goodness! I had no idea your skates were this bad!”
Our first Scripture reading for today, from Proverbs, starts out, “Trust God from the bottom of your heart…” And it’s wonderful advice. But I wonder how many of us, when we hear this kind of advice about trusting God, feel like I did when my skating instructor told me to, “Lean into the turns…Trust your skates! They’ll hold you up!” How many of us worry that if we take the risk and really trust God for the big things in our lives that we’ll end up like I did as a teenager—falling flat on our face, sprawled across the ice, onlookers chuckling at us (or worse)? Isn’t it sometimes tempting to do what I did initially and play it safe--timidly skate along, never getting up enough speed to do much of anything? That way, we don’t have to risk failure or other people’s laughter or criticism.
But here’s the thing. God isn’t like my flimsy old skates. God wants us to trust him—her—for things big and small. And God will be there for us. How different might our lives be—as individuals and as a church-- if more often than not we fully trusted God and leaned into the turns? How different might our lives be if we truly believed what it says in the book of Jeremiah, “For surely I know the plans that I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm—to give you a future with hope.” If we truly believed—from the bottom of our hearts—that God is invested in our welfare and wants us to thrive, might we behave any differently?
Speaking for myself, if I put more trust in God, I know I would be less anxious in times of transition. For instance, I wouldn’t have nights when I wake up at 3 am after dreaming that I showed up to preach at a church where I was applying for a new job only to discover, when I walked into the pulpit, that the Bible was glued shut and I had left my sermon notes home. (Seriously, I have had that exact dream! Trying to pry the Bible open while search committee members were rolling their eyes.)
So, the question is, when waves of anxiety start to lap against our hearts, how do we, practically, put our trust in God? There are many answers to that question, thanks be to God, but one answer I propose to us today is to commit to memory the verse from Jeremiah, that is printed our bulletin: Jeremiah 29:11. Would you read it with me?
11For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.
Members and friends of Franklin Federated Church, we have walked together in faith for the past 2 years and 3 months. We have laughed together; we have cried together; we have prayed together. We have faced joys and challenges. And God has led us and taught us and helped us to grow in faith. And now our paths are diverging—yours and mine. I am grateful for the time I’ve spent with you, and I will be taking what I learned from you here in Franklin, taking your love and prayers, your welcoming spirit, into a new interim position as yet unknown, probably starting in December or January.
And you too will be moving forward into the future, starting a new chapter on October 2nd, with a new, settled pastor, Rev. Doreen Oughton, who is a talented and gifted minister, a person of deep faith and warmth, with a passion for living out the love and justice of Jesus. God has called her to be your spiritual leader, and she has entered into covenant with you. She will soon join you here in ministry, and I encourage you as individuals and as a church to treat her with the same welcome that you have so lovingly shown to me. Pray for her daily. Be open to her ideas and gifts for ministry—whether her gifts are similar or different from mine or any of your previous pastors.
Because following Jesus isn’t about the personality or charisma of pastors or lay-leaders. Following Jesus is about allowing the Holy Spirit to shape us as individuals and as a community, doing our best together to embody the Purpose to which God has called us. My prayer for you, Franklin Federated Church, is that you and your new pastor continue to be a community of abundant welcome to all, growing together in Christ and serving with love—and that by so doing you make a difference in this world for Jesus’ sake.
Let us trust that God is—and will continue to be-- with us all, as we align ourselves with God’s good purpose, and let us walk into the future with hope, shining the light of God’s love wherever we go. Amen.