Worship Service Video
Sermon Podcast
Sermon Text
The poster hung on the wall of my journalism teacher’s classroom. There was a black and white photo of a landscape and at the bottom of the poster was this phrase: “God is a concept.” I was fascinated by this poster. I wondered what it meant.
I chatted with the teacher about this phrase and I asked her, what was the message of the poster? To be honest, I can’t remember exactly what she said. What I do remember is the sense that we had two very different understandings of God. I believe God is a person, an actual being that wanted a relationship with me. My teacher’s understanding, on the other hand, was that God was more of an idea.
Is God a concept? What would it mean if God was a concept? Does a concept change lives? Does a concept change our lives? Can a church gathered around a concept make a difference in the world?
David Watson, a Methodist minister that I know has opined that modern Christians have a hard time believing in the supernatural. It’s hard to believe in miracles; things that can’t be easily explained. We have a hard believing God acts in history. For many people, God is more of a construct, the name we give to our ethical claims or our feelings of social justice. But we don’t think God actually enters into history and changes things.
This is why today’s text is so fascinating to me. We don’t see God as a concept here. The people are amazed when Jesus starts teaching in the synagogue. One version of this text says that Jesus teaches as someone who authorized to preach. That’s a fascinating interpretation. Here was a guy who was the son of a carpenter, who didn’t seem to have the background of the scribes and yet taught as if he was someone authorized to preach. They were seeing God show up in a place they never expected.
And that’s where things went weird.
The service was broken up by a man shrieking like a devil. This is probably because he had a devil in him. The demon tried to name Jesus in order to have authority over Jesus. But Jesus wasn’t having it and commands the demon to leave this man. The people were amazed. This didn’t happen every day. They wanted to know who was this man. He seemed to have a sense of authority that they had never seen.
Here’s the thing: do we believe that God can act in the world? Do we believe that God can make a difference in our lives? When we pray, do we think God listens and do we expect God can heal those who are sick? Is God more than a concept, more than a good feeling, but a person that can turn this world upside down?
If you are part of the community of First Christian, you probably received a letter asking you to pledge for this year’s budget. Stewardship, the act of setting aside some of the gifts we receive to give back to God is an exercise in faith. It’s believing that God can and does act in the world and acts through us. God acts in our own lives and in turn, we allow God to work through us. Our small congregation can make a difference in the world because through Jesus Christ we are authorized to share the good news for the sake of the world.
You and I need to believe that God is so much more than a concept. We must believe that God can show up in places we never expected and do things we never expected. We must believe that the bread and the grape juice are a reminder of God’s love for us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Because if we do, then we can be agents of healing. We can confront evil in the world and through the power of Christ defeat the powers that oppress.
God is not a concept. God is so much more. Let’s go into the world knowing that God will do wonders in our lives. Thanks be to God. Amen.