The Breath of Life

Preached by Michael Cheuk
May 11, 2008, Pentecost Sunday, Year A
Psalm 104:24-34; Acts 2:1-21

Today, we are celebrating a very special birthday in the life of our church. Yes, Cecil Yeatts is celebrating his 80th birthday today. Happy Birthday, Cecil! 10 more years and you’ll get to celebrate your 90th like Billy Johnson did yesterday! And yes, today also happens to be my birthday. Happy Birthday, me! But more special than these two birthdays, today is Pentecost Sunday, a day on the Christian calendar in which we celebrate the birthday of the Church. Today, we celebrate our birthday as the community of faith of Jesus. Happy Birthday, all of us!

It’s always been interesting to me that we go all-out celebrating the birthday of Jesus during Christmas and we make a big deal celebrating the resurrection of Jesus at Easter, but when it comes to celebrating our birthday as the Church of Jesus Christ, many Christians, we Baptists included, mostly ignore it. In fact, I’m willing to guess that most evangelical churches today will emphasize Mother’s Day more than Pentecost Sunday.

Now don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with celebrating Mother’s Day and recognizing the role that mothers play in bringing forth, sustaining and nurturing life. After all, everyone in this room came into being through a biological mother. If it weren’t for them, we wouldn’t be here today. Our mothers carried us in their wombs for around nine months, giving us sustenance and life during a time when we couldn’t do that for ourselves. And then for many mothers, they had to go through a painful labor and delivery process. Bill Cosby once quoted Carol Burnett’s description of what labor pain is like: “Take your bottom lip and pull it over your head!” And through all the breathing and the pushing, our mothers gave birth to us. And we can all be extremely thankful for that. Even so, no matter how much our mothers did for us while we were still in the womb, once we were out, we still had to draw our first breath of life in order to stay alive out in the world apart from the protective cocoon of our mother’s womb.

On that first Pentecost Sunday described in Acts chapter 2, Jesus’ disciples went through a similar birthing experience.

Pray for Myanmar

Please pray for Myanmar as that country tries to recover from a devastating cyclone that hit earlier this week. A U.S. Diplomat estimates that the death toll may hit 100,000. Here’s a recent CNN.com article.

Church member Rodney Dunning has a post on his blog that gives more details about this tragedy. He also suggests ways that we can help (especially regarding malaria).

UPDATE: You can also donate through the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship website to help with the humanitarian and rebuilding efforts at Myanmar.

A Prayer for the Church

Preached by Michael Cheuk
May 4, 2008, Seventh Sunday of Easter, Year A
John 17:1-11

Have you ever unknowingly walked in on a person who was praying?  It can be a somewhat awkward situation.  I remember one Sunday morning at University Baptist Church, and I was preparing for the worship service.  I had one quick question for Tom Leland, my senior pastor, and so I walked into his office.  I found him in front of a chair on his knees, hands clasped, head bowed obviously deep in prayer.  I quickly turned around and stepped out of his office and waited until he came out before I asked him the question.  He knew that I had entered his office while he was praying, but he was gracious enough not to mention it.

His response was quite different from mine when we had a group of friends over one night for dinner.  One couple, who was notorious for always being late, was of course, late for the meal.  The food was all set out on the dinner table and our other friends were all ready to sit down when we heard that couple’s car drive up.  So we all quickly found our places around the table, and pretended we were saying the blessing.  And right as they walked into the front entrance near the dining room, I prayed: “And O Lord, please be with the Wilsons, as once again they are late.  Let them know that we waited as long as we could before deciding to partake of this meal.  Inspire them to bring a very nice dessert to make up for their tardiness!”  Our tardy friends were at first very quiet and reverent, until they quickly realized that my prayer was part of a joke.

Well this morning, in our Gospel lesson from the book of John, we are given the opportunity to overhear a prayer that Jesus prayed for his disciples.  This was a prayer that Jesus prayed to his Heavenly Father, but it was also a prayer that was intended to be overheard by his disciples.  And this prayer was no joke. 

A Gentle Witness

Preached by Michael Cheuk
April 27, 2008, Sixth Sunday of Easter, Year A
1 Peter 3:13-22

When I was a college student and active in the Baptist Student Union, now called the Baptist Collegiate Ministries or BCM, one of the things that was impressed upon me was the importance of giving a verbal witness to my faith.  I was encouraged to share Christ with my friends, my roommates, and even my professors.  Now, as I’ve told you before from previous sermons, I grew up a very shy, introverted child.  When given the choice of being alone or being with people, I much preferred being alone reading a book or doing my own thing.  And frankly, talking was not one of my strengths, much less witnessing to strangers about my faith!  And if you had told me then that God was going to call me to be a pastor, being with people all the time and speaking in front of them almost every Sunday, I would have said you were crazy.  But lo and behold, here I am.  Just goes to show you that God has an ironic sense of humor!

So back to my college days.  This witnessing thing was a major source of anxiety for me.  I studiously learned the Four Spiritual Laws and the Romans Road, but I was always afraid that I would get the presentation wrong.  I was scared that someone really smart would be able to poke holes through my logic and arguments.  I was apprehensive that I wouldn’t be able to answer a skeptic’s question like, “If God is so good and so powerful, why would God allow evil in the world?”   And while I shared a couple of times with my classmates, there was no way that I was going to “witness” to my professors.  Are you kidding?  I was just a student and you want me to witness to someone much older, smarter, and someone who has the power to alter my future academic career with a stroke of a pen?  No, thank you.  Furthermore, I had heard enough stories of Christian students being ridiculed by their professors in front of the whole class.

As we continue with our sermon series on the book of 1 Peter, I wonder if those early Christians felt the same way I did in college when it came to sharing their faith. 

Healing Wounds

Preached by Michael Cheuk
April 13, 2008, Fourth Sunday of Easter, Year A
1 Peter 2:18-25

“Christianity is for sissies!” I overheard someone say years ago. He saw Christianity as a religion that encourages followers to be doormats by letting others run all over them. “And what’s this about Christianity that teaches: ‘Blessed are the meek’? Isn’t that just a way to teach people to become sacrificial lambs rather than to fight for their rights and go for the gusto?” “Karl Marx was right,” he asserted, “religion, and Christianity in particular, is an opiate of the people, sedating them into submitting themselves to unjust systems and institutions.” When I first heard him ranting and raving about this, I wasn’t sure how to respond to him. And boy, if he had only read our New Testament lesson this morning about slaves submitting themselves to their masters, both good and bad, he would probably have gone ballistic, since this passage seems to affirm everything that he disliked about Christianity.

But let’s face it, for most of us who live in twenty-first century America and who try to take the Bible seriously, verses like 1 Peter 2:18 that exhort, “Slaves, submit to your masters with all respect,” are problematic. After all, the South fought and lost a war that some say was about slavery, and verses like this have been used by Baptist preachers to justify the institution of slavery. Verses like 1 Peter 2:18 is so problematic, in fact, that the compilers of the Revised Common Lectionary omitted this verse and started the assigned passage with verse 19. But without verse 18, we lose the full context and meaning of this passage, even though it makes my job as preacher harder!

According to biblical scholars, Peter was addressing people who were most probably household slaves.[1]

Made to Last

Preached by Michael Cheuk
April 6, 2008, Third Sunday of Easter, Year A
1 Peter 1:17-23

This morning, we have witnessed a beautiful event-we witnessed Jewel Moore’s baptism, which symbolizes the new spiritual birth that has already taken place in her life as she identifies herself with the death and the resurrection of her Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I tell you, the real sermon has already been preached by Jewel this morning. My comments now are mere footnotes to her beautiful testimony. As I baptized Jewel, I was reminded of the privilege it is to help bring new life into the world. I was reminded of the births of my children, Thea and Wesley. I was also reminded of the cost to bring new life into the world. It takes a lot to give birth to a child, and every mother here can testify to that. It costs a lot to give birth to a child; the average cost of an American birth is around $9000.[1] I remember four months after Thea was born, we finally received a bill from Martha Jefferson Hospital for the delivery. Beth and I joked as to whether there was a money back guarantee, so that if we were dissatisfied with our baby, we could return her for a full refund. Needless to say, we paid the bill. Bringing a new life into the world can cost a lot!

But being born is not necessarily a cake walk either. God knew what He was doing when He made it so that we wouldn’t remember our own births. Because if we did, we might be so traumatized that we would be messed up the rest of our lives!

Good Morning, Jesus!

Preached by Michael Cheuk
March 23, 2008, Easter Sunday
John 20:1-18

“Good Morning!”  Have you ever had someone say that to you while you were still deep in sleep?  I remember as a boy when my mom would have to repeatedly call out my name and shake me from my slumber in order to get me to wake up for school.  It can be a hard thing waking up in the morning, and while some of us get over that as we grow older, I daresay that there are a few of us here who still have trouble getting up early in the morning-right Margaret Stombock?

Now, there are many ways to be awakened from sleep in the morning.  One can use the old standby alarm clock, the one that beeps incessantly until you turn it off.  Or you can use the clock radio-there’s nothing like letting Francis Wood wake you up.  Or you can try the gentle, soothing approach to waking up.  In the last ten years or so, engineers have designed alarm clocks that make gentle nature sounds to slowly draw you to an alert state, clocks that gradually infuse the room with light to help your body adjust to morning, clocks that plug into your I-pod so that you can wake up to a different song every day of the year, etc.  And then, there are masochistic ways to get up.  I remember attending youth camp where counselors scream out, “O what a beautiful morning . . .” or trumpet out “reveille.”  In our family, as some of you may remember, we have … the infamous bunny alarm clock!  Now, if that doesn’t annoy you into getting up, almost nothing will!

But as we all know, there is a difference between being up and being awake.  This past week, Beth and I have been recovering from the flu, and I tell you, there were mornings when it was nearly impossible to get up out of bed, but once out of bed, it didn’t mean we were fully awake either.  And in our Gospel lesson this morning, it seemed that Mary Magdalene was having the same trouble becoming awake on that first Easter morning.  In those pre-twilight hours when it is darkest before the dawn, it was almost as if Mary was groggy and sleepwalking through a fog.

From Cheers to Jeers

March 16, 2008, Sixth Sunday in Lent
Matthew 21:1-11; Matthew 26:14–27:66

For Palm/Passion Sunday, instead of having a sermon, we decided to let the Matthew reading speak for itself. For the first half of the service, we celebrated Palm Sunday and read Matthew 21:1-11 for the “cheers” part of the service. Then we used a script based on Matthew 26:14–27:66 taken from The New Handbook of the Christian Year by Hoyt Hickman, Don Saliers, Laurence Stookey and James White (pp. 135-141). Several members of the congregation read parts out of the script. That reading served as the “jeers” part of the service. An .mp3 of the reading can be found here.

It was a lot of scripture of being read this past Sunday in worship, but sometimes, I think it is important to let scripture speak for itself, especially during Holy Week, when there were so many events leading up to Christ’s crucifixion. And as someone who believes in the perspicuity of Scripture, this Sunday was an opportunity for the Holy Spirit to work through the clear meaning of the written word to impress upon us the depth of love shown to us by the living Word.

Rising Sign of Hope

Preached by Michael Cheuk
March 9, 2008, Fifth Sunday in Lent
John 11:1-45

This episode from the Gospel of John has often been called “The Raising of Lazarus.” And yet, it is interesting that in the forty-five verses it takes to tell this story, only two verses are devoted to the actual raising of Lazarus, and they take place almost at the very end. For forty-two verses, the Fourth Evangelist tells a story about loss, mourning, grief, questioning and yes, even anger in the face of the sickness and death of a loved one. And who among us has not experienced the fear and uncertainty over the sickness of a loved one? Who among us has not experienced the grief, mourning and even anger over the death of a loved one? Who among us has not questioned why a loved one had to die? Who among us has not second guessed all the things that we or others could have done in order to prevent the death? If you have experienced those feelings, then you are not alone, for Martha and Mary also experienced all those feelings when their brother Lazarus fell sick and then died.

When Martha and Mary first learned about their brother’s grave illness, they sent an urgent message to Jesus and his disciples, who were staying a day’s journey away from Bethany at the Jordan River in the wilderness near the Dead Sea. Jesus and his disciples were there because the Jewish authorities from Jerusalem were seeking to kill Jesus. Martha and Mary sent Jesus a simple message: “Lord, the one you love is sick.” Now, Jesus loved Lazarus and Martha and Mary, and so it seemed unusual for Jesus to stay where he was for two more days before heading back up to Judea. We might think that Jesus put off returning to Bethany, so near Jerusalem, because to go back meant risking his own life. But Jesus makes clear that he has other reasons for staying away, and he was certainly not indifferent to Lazarus’ plight.

When Jesus finally reached Bethany, the funeral for Lazarus was well under way. He had already been in the tomb for four days. According to popular Jewish belief, the soul of the deceased hovered near the dead body for three days, only to depart for good on the fourth day. Jesus waited to return to Bethany on the fourth day, when he knew that Lazarus was good and dead. The whole town was out, mourning the loss and trying to comfort the grieving sisters.

Blind Faith and Seeing Unbelief

Preached by Michael Cheuk
March 2, 2008, Fourth Sunday in Lent
John 9:1-41

Once upon a time, there was a man blind from birth. From the moment he was born, his eyes were shut to the world. No light. No shadows. No shapes. Darkness was his constant companion. When he was younger, perhaps he cursed the darkness and denounced his disability. But then again, perhaps he didn’t, because the world of darkness was all he ever knew. He had never seen light. He didn’t have anything else to compare it with. He didn’t know any different.

But yet, he knew he was different. He might be blind, but he could hear. And from what he heard, he knew he was different. He heard the whispers of people behind his back: “Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” He heard the condescending tones of travelers: “Get outta my way, you blind man!” He heard the innocent questions of children: “Mom, what’s wrong with that man’s eyes?” But there was nothing he could do about it. So eventually, he saw himself not as a man who happened to be born blind, but as a blind man. Blindness became the defining part of his identity. And every morning, he would leave his home, make his way to the edge of town with the help of his walking stick, sit down outside the town gates, and shake his little tin cup, hoping to receive a coin here, a piece of bread there, morsels that could help him make it to another day. That was the world he knew. Yes, it was a small and limited world, but he knew his place in it, and that brought a measure of security and comfort.

One Sabbath day, while begging at the town gates, the man heard the usual whisperings, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Same old question, that was nothing unusual. What was unusual was the answer: “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the work of God, the glory of God might be displayed in his life. . . . While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” Now what could that mean? But before he could even think about it, he heard a spitting noise, and then he smelled and felt something like mud being applied to his eyes. And the next thing he heard was a voice that gently said: “Go wash in the Pool of Siloam.” Too shocked to do anything else, the man did what he was told. And as the water from that pool trickled down his face, streams of light began streaking through his eyes. He could see! As he adjusted his eyes to the light, he tried to identify the man who was the light of the world. But his healer was no where to be seen. He had simply disappeared and left a man healed of blindness.

A man healed of blindness. What a blessing, right? Who wouldn’t want that? Who wouldn’t want to be healed of blindness and receive sight? Well, if you had a chance to ask that man, perhaps he would tell you that the day he received his sight was not the day his troubles ended, but the day his troubles began.