Creekside Church Sermon of November 16, 1997 "Prodded, Pestered, Provoked" Hebrews 10:19-25	Rev. David Bibbee
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It was the summer of 1941 at a remote, beautiful lake somewhere in California. Walt and Grace pulled up to the dream cottage anticipating a quiet honeymoon. They didn't need a "Do Not Disturb" sign to ward off people, but they had a big problem with a woodpecker. The honeymooners hadn't even finished unpacking their bags before the rat-tat-tat-tat-tatting began. Walter hollered at the bird, but in no time it was back. He tried to take the feathered hammer out with a rock, but soon it returned and commenced to tapping. Then Walt was loading a rifle for the final solution, but his softhearted bride intervened. "Let him go, honey. Let's just befriend him."

For the next ten days they shared the cabin with the bird, feeding, studying, and laughing at him. They even composed a character study depicting the woodpecker as "noisy, raucous, obnoxious, and rudely persevering." Grace created a wacky laugh to mock the bird, and Walter made a series of sketches portraying all of the bird's moods. Walter and Grace Lantz took an irritating encounter and channeled it into a cartoon series, which for years brought laughter to scores of people. You know him as Woody Woodpecker.

It's a classic story of how an irritation was turned into a catalyst for something creative. Today I want to talk with you about a posture we can assume with each other in the church whereby we stir up our settledness and nudge and poke and prod and pester one another to deeper, dedicated discipleship. We will talk about the product of creative, caring intrusion. The letter, or I should say the sermon to the Hebrews will guide our thoughts. With deep theology, carefully-crafted argument, and pastoral concern, the author spells out why Jesus is the supreme high priest whose sacrifice is totally sufficient to make matters right between us and God. By his offering, we have confidence in our worship, our witness, and eternal, intimate relationship with God.

Our passage begins, "Therefore..." Whenever you hear this word, you pay attention. It spells out the ramifications of a prior understanding. "I'm the boss, you are the employee, therefore..." "You promise, your love for better or worse, richer or poorer, therefore..." If our confidence is in Jesus, if his way is authoritative for our lives, therefore in confidence we can challenge each other. When we care for each other and the ministry entrusted to us, we therefore will do the necessary work of calling each other to be more and to do more.

So look at verse 24. The translation in your pew Bible is a bit too weak. It says we are to, "be concerned and help one another show love and do good." Other translations read, "Let's stir up one another...let's use some agitation to get things moving." But the word that is closest to the Greek translation is "provoke." Let us provoke one another to love and good deeds. Let's prod and pester each other till we get being a Christian straight. We are here to get stirred up to be provoked and do something about Jesus to whom we have offered our lives.

But isn't this provoking business a little too strong? When I think of provoking, I think of what we did to our ninth grade industrial arts teacher, Mr. Beers. It was a great accomplishment to pull his trigger and watch him explode. We know people who in the name of good intentions provoke us, but not in the best way. Someone spotted this faux pax in a church bulletin: "The outreach committee has invited twenty-five visitors to make calls on people who are not afflicted with any church." There are times when unconsciously we can become a source of affliction to one another in the church.

We can think of instances in the Bible when the word provoke doesn't have positive connotations. The Old Testament says God was provoked, fed-up, his patience worn thin by the rebellion of Israel. On the missionary trail, Barnabus and Paul had a falling out. It says they were provoked with each other. Parents are admonished not to provoke their children to anger.

But the provoking mentioned in Hebrews is of a different sort. It is not the charge of the BULLY BRIGADE. It is a positive provocation; the sort that is done, but with encouragement and the desire for another's betterment at heart.

Go back over the files of your life and pull out the time when you were positively provoked by someone who really cared for you. Ask yourself what your life would have been without their challenge.

There was a student who was interested in everything about college except academics. After the first term, he was barely above passing, and so for the next two semesters he worked relatively hard to bring his g.p.a. into the average category. Knowing what he needed to get by, he was content to coast. It was hard for him to be serious about much of anything, except for the weekend party scene. His professors weren't losing any sleep because of his grades, and besides, he was giving serious consideration to dropping out of school at the end of the year. He might have done it, too, except for one professor who called this guy into his office and was on him like stink on a skunk.

He told him he had passed his course, but said that wasn't good enough because he could do better. "How long are you just going to get by? How long are you going to stay lazy? How long are you going to pretend you're an intellectual cripple?" Then he paused and told this kid, "I like you. I see good things ahead for you. God has a future for you in ministry. So get outta here and get to work!" The professor provoked this student to excel. His last two years bore no resemblance to the first two. Had Tim Rieman not cared enough to prod, pester, and provoke David Bibbee, there's no telling the life I would have settled for. Consider the people who cared enough to caringly confront you. Be grateful that someone cared enough to pull you aside, declare to you what you are capable of, and held you to a higher standard.

"Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. Let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds." The preacher of this sermon chose strong language because the Hebrew Christians were wavering. Some were folding under persecution. Some were returning to Judaism. Some were bored. The preacher understood that if the church was to survive, it would need to reclaim its confidence in Christ and the authority of his love. A provoking encouragement was necessary to hold the church together and keep it on track.

This truth was rediscovered years ago by the Jewish psychiatrist Victor Frankl who barely escaped death in the Nazi concentration camps. We hear a lot these days about the need to reduce stress in our lives, but Frankl observed that stresslessness creates its own problems and that we are most happy and fulfilled when we face a challenge. He noted that after a project is completed, after everything to be done is done, when the degree is earned, when an obstacle is overcome and there is nothing on the horizon to take its place, we face the question, "Now what?" or register the complaint heard more than any other..."I'm bored." We deplore boredom so much that we'll create problems and projects to avoid it.

A British doctor said to his minister, "The most deadly of human diseases is one we can't touch with a scalpel or save people from with drugs." "You mean cancer?" "No. We'll get that devil yet. I mean boredom. There is more wretchedness, more torment, or what you preachers call sin due to boredom than anything else. People will do anything to escape it. They'll drink, sell their bodies and souls, fling themselves into crazy causes, torture themselves and others to escape the misery of being bored. Anyone who discovers a cure for that will put an end to more human tragedy than all of us doctors put together."

Well, there is a prescription for boredom, and it is Jesus Christ. You wouldn't think that would need to be said in church, but it needs to be especially said in church. Maybe one of the persistent problems facing the church today is glassy-eyed boredom. If there's nothing to aim for on the horizon except showing up on Sunday, taking a turn on a committee, and repeating what's been done before without asking why or wondering whether it's still fills a need, the soul won't be fed and the church will suffer.

There is a reason churches opt to remain the same. It's easier. It's easier to let things slide. It's easier to let someone go along the way they are. It's less complicated than spending the time and effort necessary to make things better. It's easier for the minister to preach messages that aren't hard to swallow. But just as a muscle needs resistance to grow strong, and people need a goal to aim for to find purpose, every church must have a foundation and a mission.

The holding pattern is never an option...not if you want to grow; not is you want to live. The missions most worthy of our lives and our loves are often those we are prodded, pestered, and provoked into. And the surest sign of confidence in Christ and the clearest evidence of care for each other is the willingness to provoke one another to love and good deeds of righteousness.

When you study the root of the word provoke, you learn that it also means "To cut". New life and growth requires change. Embracing change requires letting go. To positively provoke sometimes calls for the courage to cut.

I remember a graphic story of a lumberjack in Europe. Years ago, long wooden chutes were built in the forest to slide the huge logs down the slopes into the valley and into the river. Since the insides had been worn smooth by all the sliding logs, the lumberjacks would use them to go tobogganing down the hill instead of walking. While sliding down, a lumberjack got his foot caught in the chute and couldn't free it. Just then he heard the warning shout from above that a log was on its way down. He saw it coming and made a last, desperate attempt to free the foot. There was only one option left. With a sharp blow from the axe he freed himself. He would be handicapped for the rest of his life, but he was alive.

The courage to cut, the courage to change is never easy. To be the church of Jesus Christ means we are under his authority and in that authority we pray for each other, and we positively prod and provoke each other to let go of that which keeps us from growing and living as intended, and to do things differently when new occasions call for new duties.

God give us the courage and confidence and care to hold fast to Christ whose promise is faithful, and let us provoke one another to love and good deeds.

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