A NEW THING

When we were kids, my Uncle Clark use to talk about driving around in his car with his 4/60 air conditioner cooling him off. A 4/ 60 air conditioner was driving your car with the four or two windows rolled down and at sixty miles per hour. I love old cars. I love the look of the models of the late '50's right through to the muscle cars of the late '60's. But I love my van with air conditioning. It is not new, nor is it a classic car. But it has the modern convenience of air conditioning. This is something which is essential for those Eastern Ohio summers.
I remember watching Ben Casey on TV. I remember that when he ran into a difficult medical situation he ordered an exploratory surgery to be performed. I'm glad today we have new things like cardiac catherizations.
I remember Dr. Kildare. I remember when he ran into a medical situation he could not figure out, he would perform an exploratory surgery. I like the old TV shows but I like the new medical break through like CAT Scans and M.R.I.s which eliminated unnecessary surgeries.
We have seen a lot of change in the past 50 years. To move with change we need three things.
We need to be:
Understanding
Accepting
Flexible
We have to be understanding that new things are possible
We have to be accepting
We have to be flexible
These are three things the leadership in Jesus' day were not.
They were not understanding new ways of doing things, accepting change or people and they certainly were not flexible in their thinking or in their behavior.
The religious leadership in Jesus' day did not like change or new things. They liked things the way they were. And Jesus was anything but the old way.
In the beginning of Matthew chapter 9 Jesus heals a paralytic. This did not go over well with the established leadership. They did not like the fact that Jesus understood this man's pain and frustration. They did not like the idea that Jesus was talking and communing with him and offering him forgiveness. And they certainly did not appreciate the fact that Jesus healed him on the spot.
To counter their many objections, Jesus told a parable. The parable was given to the disciples, but meant for the old leadership then, and for us today. Jesus told the parable, "Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins and both are preserved."
Maybe the old leadership was the old wineskins which were dried up, rigid, inflexible and unable to take in the new wine of Jesus' teachings. I think we all have choices - to be like the old leadership which was not flexible to change - or to be like the new wineskins, flexible and ready to grow with the new wine.
When my grandmother, Mary Long Mangione, was a young woman she worked as a secretary in a textile mill in western North Carolina. When she began in the early 1900's she began working on a new machine, a typewriter. The old people in the company and even in the town were not so sure that using this new machine was a good idea. It had never been used before. The company had never done it this way before. They were use to working on large ledgers. Today my grandmother's ancient typewriter is on display in the museum in Valdese, North Carolina. And today it seems that everything is done on computer.
Change and new things are all around us. They are happening at school, in the work place, in our homes, in our church. But we have a choice; to be flexible or rigid. Today, the choice is ours.

Never Give Up

If you ever felt overwhelmed, full of despair, beaten down and ready to give up because of no apparent signs of hope - then Jesus' parable, 'The Persistent Widow', in Luke 18:1-8 speaks to you.
In the parable the widow, who is seeking justice has it denied repeatedly. As a widow, she is a symbol of all who are poor and defenseless. Her only weapon is her tenacious spirit; an attitude of persistence. The judge refuses to hear the widow's case. Then he finally gives in, granting her request and dispenses justice.
In this parable the judge is not compared to GOD. Sometimes this parable gets misunderstood when we compare the judge and his actions to GOD. By comparing the judge to GOD forces us to misunderstand the point and power of the parable and take it to mean that we must constantly 'pound on GOD's door' for our prayers to be heard - rather than being a story that describes persevering in our prayer life and throughout our life.
Here, Jesus contrast the judge to GOD. It's as if Jesus said, "If this callous judge, who doesn't care anything about anybody answers the widow's plea, how much more will GOD hear and answer our prayers?"
The parable is about persevering. It's about never giving up.
Winston Churchill was a stutterer. He suffered from dyslexia and from bouts of depression. It took him 3 years to get through the eighth grade because he had trouble with English. And yet, years later he was invited to address the Oxford University commencement exercises. He arrived wearing his top hat, smoking a thick cigar with his cane in hand. After being introduced, he walked up to the podium as the crowd rose in appreciative applause. Standing at the podium, Churchill laid his hat on top of the podium, removed his cigar, and gazed at his waiting audience. Authority rang in Churchill's voice as he shouted, "Never give up!" Several seconds passed before he rose to his toes and repeated, "Never give up!" Again he shouted, "Never, ever give up!" As the words hung there in the air, there was a deafening silence as Churchill reached for his hat and cigar and began to walk off the stage. Then the crowd erupted into a roar of applause because they knew he was someone who never gave up.
When we are faced with challenges. When we are hurting, when we are facing problems we should listen for Churchill's commencement words and never give up.

Welcoming?

There are 40 parables recorded in the Gospels that Jesus gave. The parable of the Lost Sheep is given in response to the Pharisee and the Scribes comment in Luke 15:2, "This man (Jesus) welcomes sinners and eats with them." Jesus welcomed the outcasts of His day. And He ate with them, which was a way of demonstrating that I accept you. Jesus may have hated the sin, but He loved the sinner. This parable reminds us that GOD cares for us, loves and welcomes us into His Kingdom, just as the shepherd in the story demonstrated those characteristics for his lost sheep.
The Apostle Paul in Ephesians 5:1 reminds us we are to be "Imitators of GOD." Imitators of the Good Shepherd who not only sought out those which are lost, but lovingly welcomed them back, accepting them into the fold. If we are to truly imitate Him, doesn't this mean we are not only to be welcoming, but accepting of others?