Isaiah 25:8-9

Called to be Creative

Sermon prepared for Messiah Lutheran Church

By Gregory S. Kaurin

Text: 2 Corinthians 9:10-15

Called to be Creative

You are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. So, do you have to earn your salvation? No. Do you have to earn God's love? No. Do you get that message? Do you believe it... at least most of the time? That's the milk of our faith. Are you ready to take some solid food this morning?

Theologically speaking, let’s move from salvation into sanctification. Or, another word for it is stewardship. Stewardship is what we do in response to and with everything God has given us.

Faith is the key. We say we are saved by grace through faith. There is a saving faith that Christ puts in us through our baptism; it’s there even before we ever understand it. That saving faith leads to trust, trusting God, praying, listening, reading his word, responding to him, and doing our best to live as he wants

In Paul’s letter, he was talking specifically about taking up a collection to help feed other Christians during a terrible drought. He wrote, “You glorify [you honor and worship] God by your obedience [here it means “your dedication”] to the confession of the gospel [the gospel: the salvation message] of Christ, and [also] by the generosity of your sharing with them [those other Christians] and with all others, ¹⁴while they long for you and pray for you [and here’s a key thought for today] because of the surpassing grace of God that he has given you.

Both here and many other places, Paul recognizes two very important things about God’s grace. First is obvious: it saves us. Second, it frees us; it gives us the power, the ability to love God and neighbor. They will pray in thanksgiving for you because they will see through your actions, the surpassing grace that God has given you. “Let your light so shine before others, so that when they see your good works, they may glorify God in heaven.” That is talking about stewardship.

[SLIDE 2]

In the fifteenth chapter of his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul wrote about how Christ appeared to all the other apostles and finally to him, a one-time persecutor of the faith, “But by the grace of God, I am what I am [he means a forgiven and saved sinner], and his grace toward me has not been in vain.” What do you think he meant by that? Both that it was powerful and effective enough to save even a man like him, but also that Paul did something with it. He didn’t have that saving encounter on the road and in Damascus, and just say, “Cool. Thanks Jesus!” to walk home. It set him on a path.

“On the contrary,” Paul said, “I worked harder than any of them, [the other disciples]—though it was not I [that accomplished any of it], but the grace of God that is with me.” Grace 1) saves us, and it 2) gives us freedom, power, and ability to love God and neighbor.

There may be times that we are just the Creator’s Creatures, passively sponging up all his grace. But when we’re full, we are called to move from being his Creatures to Stewards of his creation. We are called to take part in God’s ongoing acts of creation. In us, forgiven sinners, God restores that light in our eyes, and sets us on paths. He changes our priorities, activates our generosity genes. The more willing we are, the more he puts in our path.

I recently read this, "We rejoice and live out what God has declared us to be and empowered us to do through the cross, while at the same time we are sinners who fight sin and its consequences each day" (from "Faith Raising, Not Fund Raising" in Turning Donors into Disciples by Waldo Werning).

We are called to be creative. That’s why stewardship has to be more than money, especially at times like this. It is about letting God reset our priorities. And there is no better time than when we are tested…to set priorities. What does that look like?

1. Offerings – making sure that expressing your faith is a top priority, in time, energy, money, everything God has given. And if you’re low on one, use the others. We are called to be more like the Creator, to take part; to be creative.

2. Meeting your needs, and your family’s. God is not asking (Paul makes this very clear) God does not ask for more than you and your family can afford, but he is asking for what you can afford, in a way that supports, teaches and encourages everyone around you.

3. Savings and security.

4. And yes, recreation—time for re-creation—hobbies, vacations, self-improvement, all these things are investing in and keeping yourself and your relationships healthy and whole.

Last Tuesday in our staff devotions, I mentioned to them that I’m reading this book, The Five Love Languages of Children by Chapman and Campbell. Chapman put out a similar book describing these “five love languages” for adults and couples. I’m not sure if it all works quite as they put it, but it’s giving me a lot of food for thought. They suggest that each person, man, woman, child, has a preferred way that they like to give and receive love. We need all five they say, but without that preferred love language, we never feel satisfied, or filled by love.

The Five Languages of Love as they describe them are 1) Touch: for children, hugs, tickles, wrestling with boys, mussing up the hair. The worst thing you can do to this person is to use touch in a harmful way. 2) Quality time: spending time with, talking with, doing things with a friend or loved one. 3) Words of affirmation: giving sincere compliments, praise, noticing and saying positive things about what they did or how they look. 4) Gifts: not just stuff, but special gifts with careful thought behind it. People who prefer this love language treasure the gift they got from you, or from grandma. They put it in a special place and remember everything about it. 5) Acts of Service. Some people, and this might be mine, some people just really feel loved when you do something for them that you didn’t have to do. One of my little chores at home is dishwashing. Every once in awhile, I get started and find that Pauline has filled the dishwasher half-full, and that really means a lot to me, the rest seems like a breeze after that. When I see this kind of stuff happening at church, I can almost hear the angel choirs, on earth as in heaven.

I mention all this for a couple reasons. First is to think about it this way. What “Love Languages” has God used to love us, to love you? Touch? Sure, at least through other people, or a delightful breeze, sunshine. Quality time? Words of Affirmation? (“You are my child,” he says, “in whom I delight.”) Gifts? Has God given you any gifts? How about acts of service? Has Christ ever done anything for you?

That’s great. He’s done all this for us. But there comes a time in our life and prayers when we move from being his passive creatures, to stewards of his creation. We come together as a local congregation to hear God’s Word of Love, and then to find ways to be God’s Word of Love.

Which of Love Languages can we use to express our love to God. What will he find meaningful? Does God like touch, or at least when we show that kind of love to others? Does God like quality time spent with him? Words of affirmation? Gifts? Acts of service?

There comes a time when we put aside working and praying just for what we want, and we turn to God and say, “Thank you, God, for all your love and grace, for all you’ve done. Thank you. So now God, what can I do… for you?”