Creekside Church Sermon of November 17, 2002 "Putting the Judge Back in Jesus" Matthew 25:31-46	Rev. David Bibbee
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While going about my work this week, I heard a voice. It said, "There's got to be an easier way to make a living than this."

I heard another voice also. It said, "Quit your whining. There are lots of easier ways, but the easiest is rarely the best."

God "picks" people and puts them places to achieve his purposes. Why, isn't always exactly clear.

Ask any pastor and they'll tell you that sometimes preaching gives you fits. Preaching is such a fickle, imprecise exercise. Imagine yourselves as Coke bottles and each Sunday I try to fill you up with a garden hose. Once words leave my mouth, I have no control ever them.

MAYBE…
Maybe the sermon did some good…maybe not.
Maybe it started someone thinking about something they hadn't given a second thought to before.
Maybe it meant the world to someone, than again, maybe not.
Maybe it gave someone a shot of courage to face a person or some personal demon.
Maybe it led someone to Christ, or deepened an existing commitment.
Maybe it did nothing at all. (It goes with the territory.)

Does anyone remember what I preached last Sunday? I have no clue if it was effective or not, but I do know this…Last Sunday I told the truth. Just "how" true at the moment, I didn't realize.

The gist of it was, "Be prepared because life is precious." On one knows the day or hour the Lord will come, and no one knows what events life will bring our way.

LIFE is so fragile, so changeable, and we can't afford to waste precious time wasting precious time. Often times it takes weeks like this one when life hangs by a fingernail to realize exactly "how" precious it is.

During one of the several trips to the hospital this week to be with Dave and Karen, something occurred to me. "Perhaps we are never so conscious of life's preciousness as when we are in the midst of suffering."

God is not a "good-times" God. If God in only present during the "all is well" times of life, we're sunk! We don't have a need of a remote, aloof God who is untouched and unmoved by the pain of the world. We need a God who knows about pain, and this is precisely the one we have in the God of Jesus Christ. A God in the thick of suffering.

Barbara Brown Taylor says, "Anyone who has suffered through even one night of deep hurt knows what it is to beg for relief. Sometimes the prayer is answered and sometimes it is not, but those who have been there will often say that the strange, sweet presence of Christ in their suffering becomes dearer to them than the hope of recovery."

This has been a week of "ample evidence" of the presence of Christ. Let me tell you about some "isolated instances" that happened while Karen's precious life hovered near death.

THE NURSE
As Karen's condition deteriorated she had to be on a ventilator. Before she was sedated, the nurse said that there are angles "all over the unit." She prayed with Karen. Some of the last words Karen heard before going under the sedation were "God will protect you."

THE SAINTS
As Dave tried to absorb "unreal" words such as "Less than 50/50 chance," the saints came marching in. Berkebiles, DePues, Berta, Louise, and Xavier sat with, listened to, prayed for, and sang with Dave.

THE GEESE
One morning as I was going from the hospital parking garage to the hospital there was honking coming from the third floor. Not cars, but geese. They were flying in against a background of gray sky, and brilliant red and gold leaves.

"Therefore, do not be anxious about your life…look at the birds of the air. They do not sow, reap, or gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?"

I was filled with a momentary, but real feeling that everything was going to work out. Everything would be all right, even if it wasn't all right in that moment.

THE DREAM
Kurt Vardaman woke from a dream on Wednesday at 3:00 a.m. His room felt pervaded by reassuring Presence that Karen would be safe. He said he felt the direction to surround and smother our brother Dave with love.

DAVE'S PRAYER FOR INFO
Dave was wanting to understand what was happening to Karen's respiratory system and he prayed for answers. Soon a nurse came with a medical book and tried to explain it to Dave but the medical terms were too much for Dave. Then Walter Harroff came and was able to explain it to Dave in terms he understood. Also, Tim McFadden had researched this subject during medical school and was able to help Dave.

WALTER'S HAND
When Walter visited in the hospital he was able to go back and see Karen briefly. He extended his hand in gesture of blessing, "God be with you." It was as if Walt had become Moses parting the Red Sea and providing a way out when none was present.

NURSE ASSIGNED TO KAREN HAD M.S.
One of the nurses assigned to Karen this week also has M.S. and is a Christian woman. She went about her work as if it were a ministry, which it is. She said, "You belong to no one but God."

SIMONE WEIL
Simone Weil was a young French Jewish mystic who left spiritual writings. In the 1930's she applied for one year leave from teaching to work as an unskilled laborer in an electric plant and as a machine operator for Renault.

She changed her name and rented a room near the factory. She became very ill, working long hours for low pay. She joined the resistance against Hitler in 1940 but was later exiled to England.

She voluntarily limited herself to the rations occupied French people would get with their food cards. She was an educated person of means, but refused to use her privilege. She became sick and malnourished. She entered a hospital and died at the age of 34.

She did it all because of an encounter with Christ. She believed it was possible for a person to take on suffering for the sake of others.

She believed there was no supernatural remedy for suffering. She believed there was a supernatural use for it.

CAN WE CARRY KAREN'S SUFFERING?
A number of you this week said you were so distressed. You couldn't get her off your mind. You said you "felt" for Dave. Maybe you were taking her suffering upon yourself.

The loads on the critical care unit pile up in a hurry…emotional loads. There are red eyes, a "V" in the brow, that lost look. It takes people coming in every day to haul it out. It takes rejoicing in our sufferings.

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