February 25, 2007 Sermon

Undivided
Psalm 86:11-17

Following the graduation of his daughter Ashley, Steve Turner no longer attends high school choir concerts. I miss him. He often caught me giving what he called my “Look of Death” to people in the audience who made too much noise. I would send a laser somebody’s way, then see him silently laughing at me.

Last week we attended a performance of Verdi’s Requiem at the University of Michigan. Such beautiful music! But with the same talent that leads me always to choose the slowest checkout line at WalMart, I found seats behind a boy about five years too young to attend a long performance of classical music. When his wiggling began his mother started whispering to him. Whispering, of course, cuts straight through all other sound. Then an older woman to the left of us began the excruciating process of unwrapping a cough drop one crackly fold of paper at a time. Finally, an elderly man in the front rows stood and started staggering up the aisle. The auditorium clearly had been built before handicapped access laws came into effect. The walkway was steep. He wobbled from side to side. Once, he steadied himself by plopping his hand down on a startled man’s shoulder. It took him a Very Long Time to pass us. Ten minutes later he reappeared, gingerly making his way down the cliff-face to his seat. I gave him the Death Stare even though he had his back to us. How dare he disrupt my enjoyment of the Requiem?

Then it hit me. We were listening to a requiem, a Roman Catholic service for the dead. By all appearances this man had neared the time where he might need a requiem. Who was I to be distracted by his struggles? I had become impatient with a man who no doubt was mortified (so to speak) by his need to walk the aisle during the performance. I had no real grievance. I had suffered no actual wrong. Yet I had let my heart become infected with anger. In Psalm 86 we encounter a man who knows real affliction, yet does not allow it to taint his attitude toward God. He knows what we need to know: paying attention to God pays off.

We know exactly who wrote Psalm 86: David. We might say King David, of Old Testament fame, but scholars do not know for certain whether he had become king by the time he wrote this psalm. David endured a series of horrific events that stretched across his lifetime. Before and during his reign he knew betrayal at the hands of his most intimate friends. He knew the grief of a dying child. He knew the terror of approaching enemies. He knew all this and more, and we can read the incredible story of his life in the book of I Samuel.

Knowing David’s story helps us appreciate just how powerful his faith in God really was. As C. S. Lewis observed, it is only through the presence of black that we can see the full brightness of white; only by the presence of valleys can we be awed by the height of mountains. David knew real affliction. Yet somehow he did not permit his pain to weaken his relationship with Almighty God. “I give thanks to you, O Lord my God,” David wrote, “with my whole heart I will glorify your name forever.” I let an elderly man distract me from enjoying a piece of music meant to praise God. I might have used it to become an act of praise of my own, but I grew angry instead. I know this malfunction is not mine alone. If such a trivial thing can ruin our attitude of worship, what might real suffering do?

David prayed, “Teach me your way, O Lord, that I may walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart to revere your name.” What if we sincerely made this prayer our own? We have entered Lent, the season of preparation for our commemoration of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Christians have traditionally used Lent as a time of sacrifice as a means of creating deeper worship of Christ. Lent goes far deeper than the perfunctory giving up of red meat for six weeks that my mother’s Roman Catholic relatives grumbled about. Lent, properly understood, can become a spiritual discipline perfectly suited for our modern, consumerist, supercharged lives. Lent can become a time of down before the up of Easter, a time of owning the pain our sin causes before a time of rejoicing in the peace Christ made ours as he walked out of his tomb.

What if during Lent we prayed—daily and honestly—for an undivided heart with which to revere the Lord God as known to us in Christ Jesus?

Let us all commit ourselves to praying daily for an undivided heart. We need not use fancy words in these prayers. In fact, simple humility would fit the need perfectly. Pray each day in the plain words of David: “O Lord, give me an undivided heart to revere your name.”

hat would it mean to have an undivided heart? It would mean keeping the first and second commandments: that we would worship no other gods but the Lord God Almighty, who came to earth in human form and died on the cross. It would mean that as Good Friday approaches this coming April 6th, we would experience a sense of dread and even of real pain that Jesus died unjustly. It would mean feeling great joy on Easter morning, joy such as we may not have felt since we first believed in Jesus as Lord and Savior, when the message of Easter was still fresh in our as-yet undivided hearts.

In a few moments we will hear a testimony from Elder Matt Hanna. I will let him speak for himself, but I do want to set the table for his speech. The elders have called on the church to observe Lent. Specifically, the elders have asked that every friend of Northern Lakes Community Church use Lent as a time of sacrifice and prayer. They call upon each one of us to keep a daily discipline of prayer with the cross of Christ—and His empty grave—in mind. In addition, the elders ask that each of us sacrifice something until Easter. If possible, set aside the money you would have spent on that thing, and then place it in the offering on Easter morning (or the next Sunday you attend worship). The church will place that money in our new building fund. Matt will speak about what our church has meant for his family, and what he hopes we can do when we expand. But he will speak from his heart for Christ, and that matters far more than the balance in the new building fund.

The point, remember, is to have an undivided heart, a heart that worships Jesus Christ without getting distracted by the aches and pains of life. We spend terrific amounts of time and money chasing after things we hope—foolishly—will give us the very joy and peace that Jesus Christ offers us free of charge. Paying attention to God pays off.

Our daughter Laura sang in that Verdi requiem that I referenced in the opening to this sermon. Eva Lymenstull, a former Interlochen student who has performed for us in this church, played cello in it. The Verdi requiem is a sweeping, technically challenging, dramatic, and all-around big piece of music. It demands much from those who perform it. It was a pleasure to watch the two hundred or so young adults on that stage pour themselves into the performance. They brought tremendous energy and skill to bear on their work. Above all, they brought concentration—attention—to their work.

May God watch us, as we watched those musicians, and see us bring a similar attention to our purpose in life. May God derive the same pleasure we received from that performance. May each one of us pray for an undivided heart. May each one of us receive. Pay attention to God in Christ. Use Lent to sacrifice in order to focus on Christ’s death. Use Easter to celebrate his resurrection.

Paying attention to God pays off. Try it this Lent. Pray for an undivided heart.