Grace to you and
peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ. Amen
I splurged this
last week.
As you know, I
work as a cabinet maker and am constantly around machinery and unhealthy
amounts of noise.
I have
significant hearing loss, and it’s not getting better, but rather continues to
get worse.
A compressor, a
dust collection system, and various power tools all add to a deafening din of
noise that, in addition to causing hearing loss also simply makes for an
unpleasant working environment.
It doesn’t have
to be this way. That was my conviction.
Over the years I’ve
tried various methods to protect my hearing.
You can put foam
plugs in your ears.
I have often worn
ear muffs to lessen the sound.
And, in a rather bizarre
move, used ear phones to play music and drowned out the sound, which means just
covering up the objectionable noise with music, which just makes matters even
worse because the music has to be uncomfortably loud to drown out the sound of
the machinery.
But thank God for
new technology that is available to us today.
I decided to
invest in that in the hope it would help.
I purchase a set
of Bose Quiet Comfort 35II noise cancellation head phones.
I have never been
so impressed.
It’s just
amazing.
These work by actually
cancelling out the noise. They don’t
muffle it, or cover it up, they eliminate the noise itself.
Noise, you see,
is actually sound waves that strike your ear drums, causing them to vibrate and
send signals to your brain.
The way the Bose
headphones work is that they have microphones that pick up the noise in the
room, and then speakers which emit the opposite noise on the sound spectrum
which then cancels out the original sound.
It’s hard to
imagine.
But it works.
For every sound,
there is an opposite sound, and by emitting the opposite sound to what’s in the
environment, the headphones simply cancel out the noise around you producing,
not more sound, but quiet.
And then, as an
added bonus, you can listen to music or audio books, take phone calls through
the headphones.
Amazing.
Amazing, but it’s
all possible simply by following the laws of physics.
If an
objectionable noise is counter acted by an equal and opposite noise, the result
is peace and quiet. It’s one of nature’s
balancing acts.
Last week our
lessons focused on the presence of evil in our world and our battle against it.
Paul wrote in
Ephesians:
For our
struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers,
against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness,
against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Cosmic powers of this present darkness.
Spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly
places.
These are powerful statements.
We have struggled over the years to deal with
evil.
How do we respond to the evil in the world?
In 1 Peter, the third chapter, it is
written:
Do not repay evil for evil or abuse for
abuse; but, on the contrary, repay with a blessing. It is for this that you
were called—that you might inherit a blessing.
10 For "Those who desire life
and desire to see good days,
let them keep their tongues from evil
and their lips from speaking deceit;
11 let them turn away from evil and do
good;
let them seek peace and pursue it.
12 For the eyes of the Lord are on the
righteous,
and his ears are open to their prayer.
In Romans Paul
writes:
Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take
thought for what is noble in the sight of all. 18 If it is possible, so far as
it depends on you, live peaceably with all. 19 Beloved, never avenge
yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written,
"Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord." 20 No, "if
your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to
drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads." 21 Do
not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
In our lessons
for today, we hear about Moses encouraging the people to keep the law of the
Lord.
We hear James’
statement that “Every generous act of giving,
with every perfect gift, is from above”
And “Religion that is pure and undefiled before
God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and
to keep oneself unstained by the world.”
And in the Gospel
lesson, Jesus speaks about the right use of the Law, to counter the evil
tendencies of the human heart.
When we hear the
Law of God spoken, it works in us in various ways.
Jesus says:
'You shall love the Lord your God with all
your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. ' 38 This is the
greatest and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: 'You shall love
your neighbor as yourself.
Traditionally,
Lutherans have spoken about the two ways the Law works.
The first is as a
guide and instruction for living. Love
the Lord. Love your neighbor. Do these things and life will go better for
you.
The second is as
a measure by which we are judged. We
have not loved the Lord with all our heart, soul, and mind, and so we
stand condemned in the face of the Law, and dependent upon God’s grace and
mercy that we might be forgiven.
But there is yet
another way that God’s Law governs the world in which we live – and that is as
a response to the evil in the world.
Imagine with me
that evil is like the harsh noise in my woodworking shop.
God’s Law and our
obedience to that Law, functions like my new Bose headphones: It responds to evil with and equal and
opposing force of good, and thereby cancels out the evil.
In short, how do
we respond to the hatred that is far too often evident in our world?
We do so by offering
an equal and opposite response of goodness and love—by loving God with our
entire being and our neighbor as ourselves.
We counter evil
with goodness, and so restore the balance of life.
One of the ways
we do this is by making amends for the wrongs which we have done.
This is one of
the most important things that we learn in Alcoholics Anonymous. We learn to face the wrongs that we have done
to those we love, and then to make amends, to counter the wrong, with a good.
Another way we counter
evil with goodness is to respond to the evil that others have perpetrated in
the world, by doing right.
There is hatred
and prejudice all around us.
We offer love and
mercy.
Every act of
kindness, every act of mercy, every time justice prevails over injustice, good
is served and evil is countered.
I go back to my
experience with the harmful noises that I must deal with.
One response was
to try and muffle the noise with ear protection. This works somewhat, but it a bit like
denial. If we cover our ears, we simply
insolate ourselves from the noise, but it remains.
If I simply don’t
listen to the news, I can muffle all the noise about evil in the world, and I
feel better, but the world remains filled with the evil.
Another way is to
seek to drown out the noise with other sounds.
We do a lot of
this in our world. People respond to
what they perceive as evil by shouting out and seeking to drown out the evil
they oppose. But it just adds more
noise. And all too often what happens is
that one evil is responded to with yet another evil.
What we need, is
not insulating ourselves from evil, or simply trying to drown out evil of one
type, with another type, but to cancel out evil with good, like my headphones
cancel out the noise in my shop.
God’s purpose for our congregation is to
welcome, love and serve all in our local and global community.
We welcome
others, when often they are rejected.
We love, when too
often people experience hate.
We serve, when so
often people are oppressed.
If we do those
things we will have done our part to overcome evil with goodness and to restore
peace to the world.
We cannot do this
alone, but by God’s grace “every generous act of giving, with every perfect
gift, is from above. . .”
It’s easy for me,
at times, to get depressed when I see what is happening in the world around
us. So much evil, how can we ever
overcome it?
But then, at
other times I realize that every act of love and mercy does overcome evil.
The promise for
our lives is simply this: That we can
make a difference.
That’s why God
has gathered us together as his people and called us into his service.
We’re not a large
congregation by any means, but nevertheless, every act of goodness we do
contributes to the redemption of this world.
That’s why God
has so blessed us with gifts we have to do his will.
Amen
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