WEBVTT 1 00:00:01.600 --> 00:00:04.000 In the name of Jesus. Amen. 2 00:00:06.200 --> 00:00:07.000 Yesterday, 3 00:00:08.200 --> 00:00:16.700 I left Chapel deeply nourished and satisfied with the riches of the 4 00:00:16.700 --> 00:00:17.400 Word of God. 5 00:00:18.800 --> 00:00:23.400 Maybe you had that same experience or maybe you've experienced that on 6 00:00:23.400 --> 00:00:24.400 different days. 7 00:00:24.400 --> 00:00:32.100 It was a great sermon that dug into the meat of a text and challenged 8 00:00:32.100 --> 00:00:37.200 me to see God at work in ways that I usually miss. 9 00:00:38.700 --> 00:00:46.500 Beautiful music and of course I was fed with the body and blood of our 10 00:00:46.500 --> 00:00:51.300 Lord Jesus and honestly ever since the pandemic hit 11 00:00:51.300 --> 00:00:54.800 I've been hungry for that more than ever. 12 00:00:54.800 --> 00:00:57.100 It was wonderful. 13 00:00:58.200 --> 00:01:00.200 I needed it all of it. 14 00:01:01.900 --> 00:01:03.700 And then I went to a faculty meeting. 15 00:01:06.900 --> 00:01:09.500 Now please don't 16 00:01:10.500 --> 00:01:16.900 misunderstand there is nothing wrong with faculty meetings usually and 17 00:01:16.900 --> 00:01:22.500 and I don't want to suggest that that yesterday's was in anyway bad or 18 00:01:22.500 --> 00:01:23.100 painful. 19 00:01:23.100 --> 00:01:28.000 We had necessary work to do and we did it. 20 00:01:29.000 --> 00:01:35.100 Some of the agenda was as usual routine and perfunctory in a couple of 21 00:01:35.100 --> 00:01:40.300 items generated thoughtful discussion and will have to be considered 22 00:01:40.300 --> 00:01:42.400 further, in other words 23 00:01:43.400 --> 00:01:44.300 normal. 24 00:01:45.700 --> 00:01:49.600 I don't hate faculty meetings and yesterday's was fine. 25 00:01:51.100 --> 00:01:52.300 I have to admit 26 00:01:53.300 --> 00:01:54.700 in my heart of hearts 27 00:01:56.300 --> 00:01:58.400 I don't love faculty meetings either. 28 00:01:59.900 --> 00:02:04.400 They don't satisfy the deepest needs of my soul. 29 00:02:06.000 --> 00:02:12.300 So it was honestly a bit of a letdown for me to walk from Chapel 30 00:02:13.400 --> 00:02:14.400 into that meeting. 31 00:02:15.600 --> 00:02:17.300 It felt like stepping 32 00:02:18.400 --> 00:02:20.300 from the sublime to the ridiculous. 33 00:02:22.700 --> 00:02:23.400 It struck me 34 00:02:23.400 --> 00:02:24.900 how often 35 00:02:25.900 --> 00:02:33.400 moments of heightened significance and and deep meaning are juxtaposed 36 00:02:33.400 --> 00:02:40.200 with the common everyday nuts and bolts grind of life. 37 00:02:40.200 --> 00:02:41.600 One minute 38 00:02:41.600 --> 00:02:43.700 you're listening to Bach. 39 00:02:45.800 --> 00:02:51.300 And the next minute of commercial trots out some annoying ad jingle 40 00:02:51.300 --> 00:02:54.800 that turns into an earworm and you can't unhear it. 41 00:02:55.700 --> 00:02:59.600 Or you come across something in your in your study or your reading 42 00:02:59.600 --> 00:03:05.500 or your devotions that penetrates your mind and your heart like a beam 43 00:03:05.500 --> 00:03:12.700 of light a profound idea beautifully and elegantly expressed. 44 00:03:14.000 --> 00:03:17.200 And when you get home the sink's plugged up. 45 00:03:18.400 --> 00:03:23.200 And there's laundry to fold and the car is making a funny noise. 46 00:03:25.000 --> 00:03:27.100 One day you have Professor Schmidt. 47 00:03:28.500 --> 00:03:30.500 preaching and the next day 48 00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:32.900 you don't. 49 00:03:35.900 --> 00:03:42.900 Yesterday, I walked out of Chapel extraordinary nourished and 50 00:03:42.900 --> 00:03:48.700 strengthened and forgiving and went to an ordinary meeting. 51 00:03:48.700 --> 00:03:54.600 We move so quickly from the intensely important to the annoyingly 52 00:03:54.600 --> 00:04:01.300 commonplace from the magnificent to the mundane from the transcendent 53 00:04:01.300 --> 00:04:02.500 to the trivial, 54 00:04:03.400 --> 00:04:04.400 from the sublime 55 00:04:06.000 --> 00:04:07.100 to the ridiculous. 56 00:04:09.500 --> 00:04:15.000 Today's text from Matthew 17 is like that in the first couple of 57 00:04:15.000 --> 00:04:16.399 verses as you heard. 58 00:04:16.399 --> 00:04:18.100 Jesus tells his disciples 59 00:04:18.100 --> 00:04:21.800 what is about to happen to him. 60 00:04:22.900 --> 00:04:30.000 He is trying to get them ready for the mind-boggling climax and 61 00:04:30.000 --> 00:04:36.400 culmination of his entire Ministry and Mission his suffering and death 62 00:04:36.400 --> 00:04:37.800 and Resurrection. 63 00:04:41.700 --> 00:04:43.000 And in the next breath 64 00:04:44.600 --> 00:04:50.000 Peter is calling an emergency budget meeting because of some two-bit 65 00:04:50.000 --> 00:04:54.400 paltry tax, which they maybe should or shouldn't pay. 66 00:04:56.800 --> 00:04:57.600 One moment 67 00:04:57.600 --> 00:05:03.400 Jesus is pulling back the curtain on the the terrible, beautiful 68 00:05:04.500 --> 00:05:11.100 profundity of God's salvation of the world and the next minute the 69 00:05:11.100 --> 00:05:17.100 disciples attention is grabbed by something about as transcendent as 70 00:05:17.100 --> 00:05:18.000 a water pill. 71 00:05:20.400 --> 00:05:27.700 I'm sure the temple tax was important or at least urgent at the time. 72 00:05:28.800 --> 00:05:36.500 The words of Jesus in response to that question that Peter didn't even 73 00:05:36.500 --> 00:05:37.200 get a chance to ask. 74 00:05:38.600 --> 00:05:42.000 These words of Jesus are important words 75 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:47.100 we need to hear. We need to take to heart what Jesus teaches about the 76 00:05:47.100 --> 00:05:53.300 freedom that is ours as children of the king of the universe. And the 77 00:05:53.300 --> 00:05:58.300 gracious condescension by which even the son of God himself 78 00:05:59.700 --> 00:06:07.300 humbly submits to puny human regulations. By themselves the question 79 00:06:07.300 --> 00:06:12.200 about the temple tax and Jesus teaching about freedom and submission 80 00:06:12.200 --> 00:06:17.800 are important and helpful, but these helpful and useful teachings 81 00:06:17.800 --> 00:06:21.200 aren't the beating heart of the Gospel. 82 00:06:23.000 --> 00:06:27.300 Why didn't the disciples say back up back up? 83 00:06:27.300 --> 00:06:32.000 Let's hear more about this death and resurrection business. 84 00:06:32.000 --> 00:06:34.600 That sounds really really important. 85 00:06:34.600 --> 00:06:39.100 We can scrape up four drachma later right now. 86 00:06:39.100 --> 00:06:45.100 We need to listen and try to get our heads around what Jesus just said 87 00:06:45.100 --> 00:06:49.400 about dying and being raised to life again. 88 00:06:52.400 --> 00:06:54.300 But the disciples didn't say that. 89 00:06:56.000 --> 00:07:02.000 Jesus didn't lecture Peter for moving on so quickly from literally the 90 00:07:02.000 --> 00:07:06.000 most important thing in the whole world. 91 00:07:08.300 --> 00:07:11.300 To a nothing burger problem of pocket change. 92 00:07:11.300 --> 00:07:19.200 In fact this same Jesus was just said he is about to suffer and die as 93 00:07:19.200 --> 00:07:24.800 the Savior and be raised as Lord this same Jesus listens and knows 94 00:07:24.800 --> 00:07:32.800 and cares about even the smallest details of the normal humdrum life 95 00:07:32.800 --> 00:07:35.100 the disciples are living. 96 00:07:36.400 --> 00:07:43.200 The king of the universe pays attention to Peter's two-bit tax puzzle. 97 00:07:44.300 --> 00:07:50.800 He teaches in fact, he is himself the profoundest most ultimate truth. 98 00:07:50.800 --> 00:07:55.300 He gives himself as a sacrificial lamb 99 00:07:56.200 --> 00:07:59.700 for the sins of the whole world yours and mine included. 100 00:08:00.800 --> 00:08:05.700 He is risen and reigns as Savior and Lord for all eternity. 101 00:08:08.500 --> 00:08:16.600 And he cares about your day-to-day slog through bills and test and 102 00:08:16.600 --> 00:08:19.800 grocery lists and meetings and laundry. 103 00:08:21.800 --> 00:08:25.500 It is not just that it is a short step. 104 00:08:27.100 --> 00:08:27.900 from the sublime 105 00:08:29.300 --> 00:08:30.500 to the ridiculous. 106 00:08:33.000 --> 00:08:40.000 But rather that to quote Thomas Paine the sublime and the ridiculous 107 00:08:40.000 --> 00:08:40.600 are often 108 00:08:40.600 --> 00:08:45.200 so nearly related that it is difficult to class them separately. 109 00:08:46.800 --> 00:08:48.800 Or to put it another way. 110 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:53.600 We don't just step from the sublime to the ridiculous. 111 00:08:53.600 --> 00:08:57.700 We walk with the sublime 112 00:08:58.900 --> 00:09:00.000 to the ridiculous. 113 00:09:02.300 --> 00:09:04.600 Jesus does not require 114 00:09:05.700 --> 00:09:12.600 that we spend all day everyday in raptured in the contemplation of 115 00:09:12.600 --> 00:09:13.700 divine reality. 116 00:09:16.000 --> 00:09:21.200 But he accompanies us through the distractions of normal existence 117 00:09:21.200 --> 00:09:24.900 that fills so much of our days. 118 00:09:26.300 --> 00:09:32.500 My yesterday would not have been more holy if I had stayed in Chapel 119 00:09:32.500 --> 00:09:35.300 and skipped the faculty meeting. 120 00:09:36.500 --> 00:09:41.000 The Jesus who fed and nourished me in Chapel 121 00:09:41.900 --> 00:09:43.600 went with me to the meeting. 122 00:09:44.900 --> 00:09:50.200 The sublime accompanies you through all the ridiculousness. 123 00:09:51.600 --> 00:09:54.000 Is that not wonderful? 124 00:09:56.700 --> 00:10:01.600 I think we all experience from time to time the disappointing 125 00:10:01.600 --> 00:10:09.700 downshift from glimpsing the glory and sheer beauty of God's salvation 126 00:10:09.700 --> 00:10:17.700 in Christ to the insipid preoccupation with the ordinary that crowds 127 00:10:17.700 --> 00:10:18.600 in on us. 128 00:10:20.400 --> 00:10:25.600 But the antidote to that disappointment is not to extend Chapel time 129 00:10:25.600 --> 00:10:27.300 to swallow up the whole day. 130 00:10:28.900 --> 00:10:30.000 Sorry Doctor Burreson. 131 00:10:31.400 --> 00:10:32.200 That's not the answer. 132 00:10:33.500 --> 00:10:41.100 It is not to retreat from worldly tedium into a purely spiritual 133 00:10:41.100 --> 00:10:47.000 contemplatively life where we can tune out the commonplace chaff the tedious 134 00:10:47.000 --> 00:10:50.100 routine and the humdrum ambiguity. 135 00:10:51.200 --> 00:10:55.600 What you might call the Benedict option. No the answer 136 00:10:57.100 --> 00:11:03.800 to this disconcerting downshift in the words of John Piper is to stop 137 00:11:03.800 --> 00:11:06.000 being unamazed 138 00:11:06.900 --> 00:11:11.000 with the strange glory of ordinary things. 139 00:11:13.000 --> 00:11:16.400 The nuts and bolts grind of life goes on 140 00:11:17.500 --> 00:11:22.300 and none of us is exempt from insistent trifles. 141 00:11:23.400 --> 00:11:27.200 Much of life is simply ordinary. 142 00:11:28.300 --> 00:11:34.000 And we are necessarily occupied with the regular agenda of routine 143 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:34.400 duties. 144 00:11:35.700 --> 00:11:37.200 Yet the presence of Jesus the 145 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:40.300 one who suffered 146 00:11:41.300 --> 00:11:44.500 and died and was raised for you 147 00:11:45.800 --> 00:11:49.800 cast of strange and unexpected glory 148 00:11:51.300 --> 00:11:53.000 on ordinary things. 149 00:11:54.500 --> 00:11:58.000 In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.