CELC The Third Sunday in Lent

The Third Sunday in Lent – March 14, 2004

Isaiah 55:1-9

You remember Dave, don’t you? He is my friend on his third career. You remember that his third career is as a comedian. Dave is the one who told me about my photographic memory that is missing film.

Dave also has a story telling side and recently he told about the three B’s. It seems the buzzard, the bat, and the bumblebee are all interesting metaphors for people of faith. Let Dave tell his story about your faith and these three B’s.

Did you know that if you put a buzzard in a pen six or eight feet square and leave the pen entirely open at the top, the bird, in spite of its ability to fly will not be able to leave the pen? It will be a prisoner there.

You see it takes a buzzard about ten to twelve feet of running before it will take off and fly. Each time a buzzard takes off it runs. Place the bird in a confined space and it will not even try to fly. A pen with no top can become a small jail for a buzzard.

Now, Dave couldn’t be talking about you, could he?

Next, Dave says, there is the bat. As nimble a creature as the bat is, it cannot take off from a level place. Place a bat on a level floor and it will shuffle around helplessly and no doubt painfully, until it finds a slight incline from which it can throw itself into the air. Then, it is immediately off in a flash.

Could Dave be suggesting you are like a bat?

Finally, Dave tells that the ever humble bumblebee when dropped into a tumbler will be there until it dies. The bumblebee never sees the open top of the tumbler, it only tries again and again to find a way out through the sides or bottom. It will continue to try and find a way out that does not exist until it destroys itself.

Is Dave right that you may be a bumblebee when it comes to faith in God?

In all three examples from nature, you are being told that you only need to look up and you could be free. Whether it is a pen or a level floor or a tumbler, they need not imprison you.

Yet, don’t you find yourself doing that very thing when life presents to you the reality of your dead-end ways? It is easy to get into the “I can do it myself” mode and reject God’s loving mercy.

A grandfather tells about his young grandson who had to serve himself dinner when he was not really able to move the food from a dish to his plate. Even though plenty of folks sat by him and could help, he was going to do it himself.

You know that scene, don’t you? It is what makes the words of Isaiah so true, the words Isaiah speaks for God:

Seek the Lord while he may be found,

call upon him while he is near;

let the wicked forsake their way,

and the unrighteous their thoughts;

let them return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on them,

and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

Those closing words are especially important to you this Lent. “Let them return to the Lord…” is Isaiah’s way of saying “repent.” You will recall that this particular season of the church year you devote yourselves to repentance, along with prayer, fasting and acts of love. The repenting means to “turn around” your lives and look to God.

It is somewhat like being penned in and looking up to see our salvation is from God. Or it is like living on a level floor and not being able to take off until you seek the grace of God. Or it is like living in circumstances that you can’t see until God gives you the vision of faith. Repentance is taking responsibility for your self-imposed circumstances and seeking God’s intervention in your life.

The good news is that God has intervened. Isaiah says it this way: “I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David.” This sure, steadfast love is the same love that hangs on the cross for your sin. It is in the cross that God takes buzzards, bats and bumblebees and releases them from their prisons. It is in the cross that God releases you from the prisons of your sin that you form so well.

That is grace. The steadfast love of God continues to come to you each day. It specifically comes to you today in the means of bread and wine, the body and blood of Jesus, our Lord. Here is the priceless bread of heaven given for you. Here is the priceless blood of Christ, shed for you. Come, eat and know the everlasting forgiveness of all your sin.

Interview the “man-or-woman-on-the-street” and they may tell you that they are one of these three B’s. One fellow says he is a buzzard because it takes him a long time to get going each morning. One woman says she is a bumblebee because she is certain she is not an “old bat,” at least not yet. So, which “B” are you?

When you decide, never forget that whatever the circumstance is, God steadfastly pardons your sin and sets you free from whatever it is the binds you. So, look up and see your salvation, it is there on the cross. Amen.

Pastor Robert F. Holley