Building a House for God

Grace Episcopal Church, Madison NJ
July 19, 2009

The Seventh Sunday after Pentecost
Year B: Proper 11
2 Samuel 7:1-14a
Psalm 89:20-37
Ephesians 2:11-212
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

Building a House for God

Well, it’s been quite a week. Many of you know that we had Vacation Bible School, which was a really great experience for me and I think for the children and other adults who participated. Since in the past I had managed to avoid vacation bible school, I wasn’t really sure what to expect.

I knew this year’s theme was “Paul and the Underground Church” and I had looked at some of the program materials ahead of time. That was about it. I did know that with Mary Lea in charge it was going to be very well done. And, sure enough, Mary Lea and the parent volunteers did a fantastic job planning the week and creating a really spectacular environment in Grace Hall. The colorful tents and mats really fired up our imaginations and helped us to pretend that we were in ancient Rome. The older youth who served as counselors were so good with the children – they were both leaders and also role models.

I mentioned last week that my job at VBS was to play St. Paul. The children’s chapel was transformed into Paul’s house in Rome where he was being held under house arrest by his Roman guard Brutus, well-played by Eric Roper. Each day groups of children would come downstairs to Paul’s cave-like house and learn a little bit about Paul’s life and talk about some key parts of the Christian life.

We talked about how God’s love for us is a gift and how we are changed by God’s love and called to share God’s love with other people.

I like that these conversations about God’s love took place in what was supposed to be Paul’s house. I like that because one of the ways we can describe recognizing God’s love for us and sharing God’s love for us is building a house for God.

Today’s lessons begin with the very literal idea of building a house for God but then we move to a less-literal and much more powerful understanding of what it means to build a house for God. By recognizing God’s love for us and sharing that love we build a house for God – we help the world to see that God lives right here in the world among us.

In our reading from Second Book of Samuel we continue with the story of David. If you were in church last Sunday you may remember how King David led a triumphant parade with 30,000 men of Israel and the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem.

Remember the ark was believed to be the most sacred object in the universe – containing the stone tablets of the Ten Commandments, but also the very presence of God.

Last week I talked about how, in a sense, David was using this most sacred object as a political prop to let everyone know that he was God’s anointed, and, perhaps, warning any opponents that God was on David’s side.

Today we pick up the story in Jerusalem where David the king is living in “a house of cedar” and decides that he should build a house for God. And David means that literally – rather than keeping the ark in a tent David wants to construct a building where God can live.

At first the prophet Nathan encourages David, saying, “Go, do all that you have in mind; for the Lord is with you.”

But God has much bigger ideas of what it means to build a house for God’s Self. David has a very limited idea of God’s house – it would be house not unlike David’s own house.

God tells Nathan that instead of David building a house of cedar for him, God will build a house for David – a house not made of cedar but a royal dynasty.
It’s going to take more than David to build a house for God.

As Christians we know that ultimately God will use the house of David to give the greatest sign of God’s love by becoming a human being in Jesus of Nazareth, born of the House of David.

In our gospel lesson we hear an example of the ever expanding idea of building a house for God, helping the world to see that God lives right here in the world among us.

In his life and ministry, Jesus taught and healed and revealed the gift of God’s love for us. But his work was not just limited to his own teaching and healing. Jesus also sends out his disciples to continue his work – to continue building a house for God, helping the world to see that God lives right here in the world among us.

Earlier in Mark’s gospel the apostles had been commissioned by Jesus to continue his work. Mark tells us that the twelve “went out and proclaimed that all should repent. They cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.”

In other words, the twelve went out and helped to reveal God’s love for us and God’s presence among us. The twelve were helping to build a house for God.

In today’s gospel lesson, Mark picks up with the apostles returning and telling Jesus all that they had done and taught. In my imagination it’s a very warm scene as the twelve excitedly tell Jesus about the people the places they had gone, the people they had met, the work they had done. And in my imagination Jesus looks on them with the pride of a teacher knowing his students had learned their lessons well.

But Mark doesn’t end this scene on a self-satisfied note. Although Jesus wants to retreat with his followers to a deserted place, that doesn’t seem to be possible. People need Jesus. People are hungry for God’s love. Jesus looks at the crowd with compassion “because they were like sheep without a shepherd.” People from all over, from villages, cities and farms, they all need Jesus, they all want his healing, they all need to know the gift of God’s love.

It’s going to take more than the twelve to build a house for God.

St. Paul is one of the people who understood we needed to expand our idea of what it means to build a house for God. Paul – who never met Jesus in his earthly lifetime and in fact had persecuted some of Jesus’ first followers - Paul recognized that Jesus was the gift of God’s love not just for the people of Israel but for the whole world. And Paul dedicated his life to spreading the news about the gift of God’s love. Paul dedicated his life to telling how the gift of God’s love had changed him. Paul dedicated his life to building a house for God, helping the world to see that God lives right here in the world among us.

In many ways the Letter to the Ephesians is a summing up of Paul’s ideas. And Paul very clearly saw his work as traveling among non-Jews, among the gentiles, and helping to build a house for God. Paul, or one of Paul’s disciples, writes in the Letter to the Ephesians to the gentiles who have put their faith in Jesus:

“So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God.”

Paul encouraged people to see that they were part of this great project of building a house for God.

But it’s going to take more than Paul and those early Christians to build a house for God, to help the world to see that God lives right here in the world among us.

You and I are called to this work of building a house for God, helping the world to see that God lives right here in the world among us. Just as in the time of Jesus and Paul people are hungry for God’s love and desperate for God’s healing.

And if we look around we see that the work of building a house for God is underway all around us. When people give up a week in the summer to create a wonderful Vacation Bible School for our children they are helping to build a house for God. When people give up a week in the summer to go on a mission trip to Camden they are helping to build a house for God.

When people give up their time to unload furniture and furnish the apartment of someone who has nothing, they are helping to build a house for God. When people in a time of economic anxiety give money so some of the poorer residents of Madison can afford a pool membership, they are helping to build a house for God.

When people organize the delivery of food to the sick or a family with a loved one in the hospital, they are helping to build a house for God. When people take the time to visit or call someone who is sick or lonely, they are helping to build a house for God.

When people share with someone the importance of our faith or invite others to church, they are helping to build a house for God.

If we look around, there is a great building project underway. People are helping to build a house for God – sharing the great gift of God’s love for the world – helping people to see God’s love and presence right here among us.

But it’s going to take more to build a house for God. It’s going to take all of us.

Amen.