Let me begin by thanking you again for encouraging me to attend the American Baptist Churches Biennial meeting last week in Our meetings were held at the I still remember the time, long ago, when we visited a church for the first time—I don’t remember where it was—I’m pretty sure it was also our last time there—but I do remember that the sermon was a very, very dull report on the meeting the pastor had attended the week before. So although I am going to report some of our experiences last week in this sermon, I will try not to put you to sleep. I’m not going to talk about the business sessions, because if I did, I would surely put you to sleep. The resolutions presented were not at all controversial, so there was almost no discussion from the floor. If you need something to help you get to sleep, let me know and I will be happy to make copies of the resolutions for you. The real value of this Biennial was in the worship and in the communication of mission outreaches in the ABC. The theme for the Biennial was “Arise and Shine,” taken from Isaiah 60:1-2, which is also my title and my text for this sermon. Throughout the conference, speakers used this text, and I want to share with you some of their insights as well as my own thoughts on the text. First, let me read it. Isaiah 60:1-2. 1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
One of my favorite speakers of the week, Rev. Lauran Bethell, shared the way those words, “Arise and shine,” brought her back to the days when her mother would try to wake her up in the morning. Her mother would come cheerfully in to wake her, often singing something like “Rise and Shine,” and Lauran would pretend not to hear her, hoping for a little more sleep. Her mom would come a second time, and Lauran would hunker down under the covers, hoping her mom would forget about her. She said sometimes when it came to the third time trying to wake her, her mom would spray her with a spray bottle filled with water. That apparently did the trick.
When we hear the words of the prophet Isaiah, calling us to Arise and shine, we might feel a little bit like Lauran, hunkering down under the covers. We’ve become accustomed to our sleepy, quiet ways of doing things, and the last thing we want is to arise and shine. We would rather hit the snooze button and pull the covers over our heads.
But again and again last week, we were reminded that the time to arise and shine is now.
Another speaker that I really enjoyed was Dr. Tony Campolo. We had to arise and shine early Saturday morning in order to get ready, have breakfast, and walk from our hotel to the convention center, where he spoke at 8:30 am. I have heard him speak before, though, so I did not want to miss it.
He told us the story of Albert Einstein, when Einstein was a professor at
Campolo reminded us that we as a church need to know where we are going. He reminded us of our revival origins. He said, “You don’t have to be Baptist to get to heaven! ---But why take a chance?”
Campolo told us there are two things people are looking for when they come to church. They want to experience God, and they want to develop relationships with other people. He reminded us that we need to speak the words of salvation to the world. We are Christ’s witnesses in this world. He observed that often Christians will say, “You don’t have to say it; they will see your life and they will want Christ.” And Campolo said to us, “Who do you think you are?”
Do we really think we are so great that people will notice our lives and want to know our God? Of course we hope that our lives reflect the grace and goodness of God, but we must not ever think of ourselves as better than others. God has given us a message of salvation and of justice and of mercy. He has given us the ministry of reconciliation. And we must arise and shine and speak the words of truth in this world.
But most of us will hear this and want hit that snooze button and hunker down under the covers. We’re not ready to arise and shine—at least not quite yet.
One of our speakers reminded us that we are not the message, but we are to reflect God, just as the moon reflects the sun. In case you’ve forgotten your science of the moon, the moon, though it often shines brightly, is not a source of light. The moon simply reflects the light of the sun. We don’t need to find the wherewithal within us to save the world; we simply need to reflect the light that comes from God.
The passage read earlier in the service from 2 Corinthians 3 speaks to this. Paul tells the Christians at
4Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. 5Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.”
God does use our lives to proclaim his goodness, but we need to be careful not to think we are better than we really are, and certainly not to think we are better than others.
Paul goes on, in verse 12:
12Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 13We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. 14But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. 16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
When Moses met with God, his face became so radiant from being in God’s presence that he had to put a veil over his face so the people would not be afraid. Paul also alludes here to the temple veil, which separated even the priests from the holy of holies, where God’s presence was. When Jesus died on the cross, the veil was torn in two from top to bottom, signifying that because of Jesus, we now can be in God’s presence.
We now have unveiled faces so that we can reflect the Lord’s glory, for the purpose of reflecting God’s goodness and grace and mercy in our world. We are the reflection of God in the world.
What does it mean for us here at Queen Anne Baptist to Arise and Shine? Let’s look again at those two verses from Isaiah 60.
1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
It’s not difficult to understand that there is a darkness covering the earth. Once again last week there were terrorist bombings that remind us that inexplicable hatred and evil still reigns in this world. In addition, we know that poverty and inequality still exist in many parts of the world.
Two of our speakers at the Biennial told us about the horrors of human trafficking and slavery that still exists in many parts of the world today. Women and children who are desperately, desperately poor are sold into prostitution and literally enslaved for the rest of their lives. It is a terrible ugly reality in our world that we would really rather not even know about. We want to hunker down and pull the covers over our heads and maybe it will go away.
But God, through the prophet Isaiah, calls us to see the darkness and to see as well the glory of the Lord rising upon us. Arise, shine, for your light has come. Not because of who you are or what you can do, but because of who the Lord is and what the Lord can do, if only we will allow him.
How can we be reflections of God’s light? Well, the first thing we will have to do is to arise. We will have to stop hitting the snooze button and hunkering under the covers. God says to us, Arise! We just can’t do much for God with our heads buried under the covers, can we?
And as soon as we arise, we must shine. But what a relief it is that we don’t have to shine all by ourselves. We simply are called to be a reflection of God’s light, which is brighter than any light we can even imagine.
We are called to face the darkness and reflect God’s light into those places where deep darkness covers the earth.
Before I went to
Second, several of you said you would be willing to be part of a group to look at outreach to our community here on Queen Anne. This month, our special offering is for the purpose of providing some funds that will enable us to do some outreach projects. To me, this is the most exciting thing happening here at our church. Because quite frankly, unless we are reaching out to our community, we really have very little reason to exist. The purpose of the church is certainly not to give its members a comfortable place to sit on Sunday mornings until they die.
If you forgot to turn in your form or if you want to be part of this group that will work on outreach, it’s not too late. Because I was gone for a week, I will start working on contacting you to discuss your commitments next week. If you’re in a big hurry, feel free to give me a call—you don’t have to wait for me to contact you.
As a congregation, we need to look for ways God wants us to reflect his glory in our community. It might help us to admit right here and now that we would really rather not arise and we certainly don’t want to shine. We really would be much more comfortable hunkering down under the covers. But God is calling us to Arise!—to get up and do something! So Arise! And don’t just arise, but Shine!—let your life and your words and your actions reflect the glorious light of our Lord and God.
I still remember the time, long ago, when we visited a church for the first time—I don’t remember where it was—I’m pretty sure it was also our last time there—but I do remember that the sermon was a very, very dull report on the meeting the pastor had attended the week before. So although I am going to report some of our experiences last week in this sermon, I will try not to put you to sleep. I’m not going to talk about the business sessions, because if I did, I would surely put you to sleep. The resolutions presented were not at all controversial, so there was almost no discussion from the floor. If you need something to help you get to sleep, let me know and I will be happy to make copies of the resolutions for you. The real value of this Biennial was in the worship and in the communication of mission outreaches in the ABC. The theme for the Biennial was “Arise and Shine,” taken from Isaiah 60:1-2, which is also my title and my text for this sermon. Throughout the conference, speakers used this text, and I want to share with you some of their insights as well as my own thoughts on the text. First, let me read it. Isaiah 60:1-2. 1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
One of my favorite speakers of the week, Rev. Lauran Bethell, shared the way those words, “Arise and shine,” brought her back to the days when her mother would try to wake her up in the morning. Her mother would come cheerfully in to wake her, often singing something like “Rise and Shine,” and Lauran would pretend not to hear her, hoping for a little more sleep. Her mom would come a second time, and Lauran would hunker down under the covers, hoping her mom would forget about her. She said sometimes when it came to the third time trying to wake her, her mom would spray her with a spray bottle filled with water. That apparently did the trick.
When we hear the words of the prophet Isaiah, calling us to Arise and shine, we might feel a little bit like Lauran, hunkering down under the covers. We’ve become accustomed to our sleepy, quiet ways of doing things, and the last thing we want is to arise and shine. We would rather hit the snooze button and pull the covers over our heads.
But again and again last week, we were reminded that the time to arise and shine is now.
Another speaker that I really enjoyed was Dr. Tony Campolo. We had to arise and shine early Saturday morning in order to get ready, have breakfast, and walk from our hotel to the convention center, where he spoke at 8:30 am. I have heard him speak before, though, so I did not want to miss it.
He told us the story of Albert Einstein, when Einstein was a professor at
Campolo reminded us that we as a church need to know where we are going. He reminded us of our revival origins. He said, “You don’t have to be Baptist to get to heaven! ---But why take a chance?”
Campolo told us there are two things people are looking for when they come to church. They want to experience God, and they want to develop relationships with other people. He reminded us that we need to speak the words of salvation to the world. We are Christ’s witnesses in this world. He observed that often Christians will say, “You don’t have to say it; they will see your life and they will want Christ.” And Campolo said to us, “Who do you think you are?”
Do we really think we are so great that people will notice our lives and want to know our God? Of course we hope that our lives reflect the grace and goodness of God, but we must not ever think of ourselves as better than others. God has given us a message of salvation and of justice and of mercy. He has given us the ministry of reconciliation. And we must arise and shine and speak the words of truth in this world.
But most of us will hear this and want hit that snooze button and hunker down under the covers. We’re not ready to arise and shine—at least not quite yet.
One of our speakers reminded us that we are not the message, but we are to reflect God, just as the moon reflects the sun. In case you’ve forgotten your science of the moon, the moon, though it often shines brightly, is not a source of light. The moon simply reflects the light of the sun. We don’t need to find the wherewithal within us to save the world; we simply need to reflect the light that comes from God.
The passage read earlier in the service from 2 Corinthians 3 speaks to this. Paul tells the Christians at
4Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. 5Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.”
God does use our lives to proclaim his goodness, but we need to be careful not to think we are better than we really are, and certainly not to think we are better than others.
Paul goes on, in verse 12:
12Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 13We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. 14But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. 16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
When Moses met with God, his face became so radiant from being in God’s presence that he had to put a veil over his face so the people would not be afraid. Paul also alludes here to the temple veil, which separated even the priests from the holy of holies, where God’s presence was. When Jesus died on the cross, the veil was torn in two from top to bottom, signifying that because of Jesus, we now can be in God’s presence.
We now have unveiled faces so that we can reflect the Lord’s glory, for the purpose of reflecting God’s goodness and grace and mercy in our world. We are the reflection of God in the world.
What does it mean for us here at Queen Anne Baptist to Arise and Shine? Let’s look again at those two verses from Isaiah 60.
1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
It’s not difficult to understand that there is a darkness covering the earth. Once again last week there were terrorist bombings that remind us that inexplicable hatred and evil still reigns in this world. In addition, we know that poverty and inequality still exist in many parts of the world.
Two of our speakers at the Biennial told us about the horrors of human trafficking and slavery that still exists in many parts of the world today. Women and children who are desperately, desperately poor are sold into prostitution and literally enslaved for the rest of their lives. It is a terrible ugly reality in our world that we would really rather not even know about. We want to hunker down and pull the covers over our heads and maybe it will go away.
But God, through the prophet Isaiah, calls us to see the darkness and to see as well the glory of the Lord rising upon us. Arise, shine, for your light has come. Not because of who you are or what you can do, but because of who the Lord is and what the Lord can do, if only we will allow him.
How can we be reflections of God’s light? Well, the first thing we will have to do is to arise. We will have to stop hitting the snooze button and hunkering under the covers. God says to us, Arise! We just can’t do much for God with our heads buried under the covers, can we?
And as soon as we arise, we must shine. But what a relief it is that we don’t have to shine all by ourselves. We simply are called to be a reflection of God’s light, which is brighter than any light we can even imagine.
We are called to face the darkness and reflect God’s light into those places where deep darkness covers the earth.
Before I went to
Second, several of you said you would be willing to be part of a group to look at outreach to our community here on Queen Anne. This month, our special offering is for the purpose of providing some funds that will enable us to do some outreach projects. To me, this is the most exciting thing happening here at our church. Because quite frankly, unless we are reaching out to our community, we really have very little reason to exist. The purpose of the church is certainly not to give its members a comfortable place to sit on Sunday mornings until they die.
If you forgot to turn in your form or if you want to be part of this group that will work on outreach, it’s not too late. Because I was gone for a week, I will start working on contacting you to discuss your commitments next week. If you’re in a big hurry, feel free to give me a call—you don’t have to wait for me to contact you.
As a congregation, we need to look for ways God wants us to reflect his glory in our community. It might help us to admit right here and now that we would really rather not arise and we certainly don’t want to shine. We really would be much more comfortable hunkering down under the covers. But God is calling us to Arise!—to get up and do something! So Arise! And don’t just arise, but Shine!—let your life and your words and your actions reflect the glorious light of our Lord and God.
The real value of this Biennial was in the worship and in the communication of mission outreaches in the ABC. The theme for the Biennial was “Arise and Shine,” taken from Isaiah 60:1-2, which is also my title and my text for this sermon. Throughout the conference, speakers used this text, and I want to share with you some of their insights as well as my own thoughts on the text. First, let me read it. Isaiah 60:1-2. 1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
One of my favorite speakers of the week, Rev. Lauran Bethell, shared the way those words, “Arise and shine,” brought her back to the days when her mother would try to wake her up in the morning. Her mother would come cheerfully in to wake her, often singing something like “Rise and Shine,” and Lauran would pretend not to hear her, hoping for a little more sleep. Her mom would come a second time, and Lauran would hunker down under the covers, hoping her mom would forget about her. She said sometimes when it came to the third time trying to wake her, her mom would spray her with a spray bottle filled with water. That apparently did the trick.
When we hear the words of the prophet Isaiah, calling us to Arise and shine, we might feel a little bit like Lauran, hunkering down under the covers. We’ve become accustomed to our sleepy, quiet ways of doing things, and the last thing we want is to arise and shine. We would rather hit the snooze button and pull the covers over our heads.
But again and again last week, we were reminded that the time to arise and shine is now.
Another speaker that I really enjoyed was Dr. Tony Campolo. We had to arise and shine early Saturday morning in order to get ready, have breakfast, and walk from our hotel to the convention center, where he spoke at 8:30 am. I have heard him speak before, though, so I did not want to miss it.
He told us the story of Albert Einstein, when Einstein was a professor at
Campolo reminded us that we as a church need to know where we are going. He reminded us of our revival origins. He said, “You don’t have to be Baptist to get to heaven! ---But why take a chance?”
Campolo told us there are two things people are looking for when they come to church. They want to experience God, and they want to develop relationships with other people. He reminded us that we need to speak the words of salvation to the world. We are Christ’s witnesses in this world. He observed that often Christians will say, “You don’t have to say it; they will see your life and they will want Christ.” And Campolo said to us, “Who do you think you are?”
Do we really think we are so great that people will notice our lives and want to know our God? Of course we hope that our lives reflect the grace and goodness of God, but we must not ever think of ourselves as better than others. God has given us a message of salvation and of justice and of mercy. He has given us the ministry of reconciliation. And we must arise and shine and speak the words of truth in this world.
But most of us will hear this and want hit that snooze button and hunker down under the covers. We’re not ready to arise and shine—at least not quite yet.
One of our speakers reminded us that we are not the message, but we are to reflect God, just as the moon reflects the sun. In case you’ve forgotten your science of the moon, the moon, though it often shines brightly, is not a source of light. The moon simply reflects the light of the sun. We don’t need to find the wherewithal within us to save the world; we simply need to reflect the light that comes from God.
The passage read earlier in the service from 2 Corinthians 3 speaks to this. Paul tells the Christians at
4Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. 5Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.”
God does use our lives to proclaim his goodness, but we need to be careful not to think we are better than we really are, and certainly not to think we are better than others.
Paul goes on, in verse 12:
12Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 13We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. 14But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. 16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
When Moses met with God, his face became so radiant from being in God’s presence that he had to put a veil over his face so the people would not be afraid. Paul also alludes here to the temple veil, which separated even the priests from the holy of holies, where God’s presence was. When Jesus died on the cross, the veil was torn in two from top to bottom, signifying that because of Jesus, we now can be in God’s presence.
We now have unveiled faces so that we can reflect the Lord’s glory, for the purpose of reflecting God’s goodness and grace and mercy in our world. We are the reflection of God in the world.
What does it mean for us here at Queen Anne Baptist to Arise and Shine? Let’s look again at those two verses from Isaiah 60.
1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
It’s not difficult to understand that there is a darkness covering the earth. Once again last week there were terrorist bombings that remind us that inexplicable hatred and evil still reigns in this world. In addition, we know that poverty and inequality still exist in many parts of the world.
Two of our speakers at the Biennial told us about the horrors of human trafficking and slavery that still exists in many parts of the world today. Women and children who are desperately, desperately poor are sold into prostitution and literally enslaved for the rest of their lives. It is a terrible ugly reality in our world that we would really rather not even know about. We want to hunker down and pull the covers over our heads and maybe it will go away.
But God, through the prophet Isaiah, calls us to see the darkness and to see as well the glory of the Lord rising upon us. Arise, shine, for your light has come. Not because of who you are or what you can do, but because of who the Lord is and what the Lord can do, if only we will allow him.
How can we be reflections of God’s light? Well, the first thing we will have to do is to arise. We will have to stop hitting the snooze button and hunkering under the covers. God says to us, Arise! We just can’t do much for God with our heads buried under the covers, can we?
And as soon as we arise, we must shine. But what a relief it is that we don’t have to shine all by ourselves. We simply are called to be a reflection of God’s light, which is brighter than any light we can even imagine.
We are called to face the darkness and reflect God’s light into those places where deep darkness covers the earth.
Before I went to
Second, several of you said you would be willing to be part of a group to look at outreach to our community here on Queen Anne. This month, our special offering is for the purpose of providing some funds that will enable us to do some outreach projects. To me, this is the most exciting thing happening here at our church. Because quite frankly, unless we are reaching out to our community, we really have very little reason to exist. The purpose of the church is certainly not to give its members a comfortable place to sit on Sunday mornings until they die.
If you forgot to turn in your form or if you want to be part of this group that will work on outreach, it’s not too late. Because I was gone for a week, I will start working on contacting you to discuss your commitments next week. If you’re in a big hurry, feel free to give me a call—you don’t have to wait for me to contact you.
As a congregation, we need to look for ways God wants us to reflect his glory in our community. It might help us to admit right here and now that we would really rather not arise and we certainly don’t want to shine. We really would be much more comfortable hunkering down under the covers. But God is calling us to Arise!—to get up and do something! So Arise! And don’t just arise, but Shine!—let your life and your words and your actions reflect the glorious light of our Lord and God.
1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
One of my favorite speakers of the week, Rev. Lauran Bethell, shared the way those words, “Arise and shine,” brought her back to the days when her mother would try to wake her up in the morning. Her mother would come cheerfully in to wake her, often singing something like “Rise and Shine,” and Lauran would pretend not to hear her, hoping for a little more sleep. Her mom would come a second time, and Lauran would hunker down under the covers, hoping her mom would forget about her. She said sometimes when it came to the third time trying to wake her, her mom would spray her with a spray bottle filled with water. That apparently did the trick.
When we hear the words of the prophet Isaiah, calling us to Arise and shine, we might feel a little bit like Lauran, hunkering down under the covers. We’ve become accustomed to our sleepy, quiet ways of doing things, and the last thing we want is to arise and shine. We would rather hit the snooze button and pull the covers over our heads.
But again and again last week, we were reminded that the time to arise and shine is now.
Another speaker that I really enjoyed was Dr. Tony Campolo. We had to arise and shine early Saturday morning in order to get ready, have breakfast, and walk from our hotel to the convention center, where he spoke at 8:30 am. I have heard him speak before, though, so I did not want to miss it.
He told us the story of Albert Einstein, when Einstein was a professor at
Campolo reminded us that we as a church need to know where we are going. He reminded us of our revival origins. He said, “You don’t have to be Baptist to get to heaven! ---But why take a chance?”
Campolo told us there are two things people are looking for when they come to church. They want to experience God, and they want to develop relationships with other people. He reminded us that we need to speak the words of salvation to the world. We are Christ’s witnesses in this world. He observed that often Christians will say, “You don’t have to say it; they will see your life and they will want Christ.” And Campolo said to us, “Who do you think you are?”
Do we really think we are so great that people will notice our lives and want to know our God? Of course we hope that our lives reflect the grace and goodness of God, but we must not ever think of ourselves as better than others. God has given us a message of salvation and of justice and of mercy. He has given us the ministry of reconciliation. And we must arise and shine and speak the words of truth in this world.
But most of us will hear this and want hit that snooze button and hunker down under the covers. We’re not ready to arise and shine—at least not quite yet.
One of our speakers reminded us that we are not the message, but we are to reflect God, just as the moon reflects the sun. In case you’ve forgotten your science of the moon, the moon, though it often shines brightly, is not a source of light. The moon simply reflects the light of the sun. We don’t need to find the wherewithal within us to save the world; we simply need to reflect the light that comes from God.
The passage read earlier in the service from 2 Corinthians 3 speaks to this. Paul tells the Christians at
4Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. 5Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God.”
God does use our lives to proclaim his goodness, but we need to be careful not to think we are better than we really are, and certainly not to think we are better than others.
Paul goes on, in verse 12:
12Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 13We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. 14But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. 16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
When Moses met with God, his face became so radiant from being in God’s presence that he had to put a veil over his face so the people would not be afraid. Paul also alludes here to the temple veil, which separated even the priests from the holy of holies, where God’s presence was. When Jesus died on the cross, the veil was torn in two from top to bottom, signifying that because of Jesus, we now can be in God’s presence.
We now have unveiled faces so that we can reflect the Lord’s glory, for the purpose of reflecting God’s goodness and grace and mercy in our world. We are the reflection of God in the world.
What does it mean for us here at Queen Anne Baptist to Arise and Shine? Let’s look again at those two verses from Isaiah 60.
1 "Arise, shine, for your light has come,
and the glory of the LORD rises upon you.
2 See, darkness covers the earth
and thick darkness is over the peoples,
but the LORD rises upon you
and his glory appears over you.
It’s not difficult to understand that there is a darkness covering the earth. Once again last week there were terrorist bombings that remind us that inexplicable hatred and evil still reigns in this world. In addition, we know that poverty and inequality still exist in many parts of the world.
Two of our speakers at the Biennial told us about the horrors of human trafficking and slavery that still exists in many parts of the world today. Women and children who are desperately, desperately poor are sold into prostitution and literally enslaved for the rest of their lives. It is a terrible ugly reality in our world that we would really rather not even know about. We want to hunker down and pull the covers over our heads and maybe it will go away.
But God, through the prophet Isaiah, calls us to see the darkness and to see as well the glory of the Lord rising upon us. Arise, shine, for your light has come. Not because of who you are or what you can do, but because of who the Lord is and what the Lord can do, if only we will allow him.
How can we be reflections of God’s light? Well, the first thing we will have to do is to arise. We will have to stop hitting the snooze button and hunkering under the covers. God says to us, Arise! We just can’t do much for God with our heads buried under the covers, can we?
And as soon as we arise, we must shine. But what a relief it is that we don’t have to shine all by ourselves. We simply are called to be a reflection of God’s light, which is brighter than any light we can even imagine.
We are called to face the darkness and reflect God’s light into those places where deep darkness covers the earth.
Before I went to
Second, several of you said you would be willing to be part of a group to look at outreach to our community here on Queen Anne. This month, our special offering is for the purpose of providing some funds that will enable us to do some outreach projects. To me, this is the most exciting thing happening here at our church. Because quite frankly, unless we are reaching out to our community, we really have very little reason to exist. The purpose of the church is certainly not to give its members a comfortable place to sit on Sunday mornings until they die.
If you forgot to turn in your form or if you want to be part of this group that will work on outreach, it’s not too late. Because I was gone for a week, I will start working on contacting you to discuss your commitments next week. If you’re in a big hurry, feel free to give me a call—you don’t have to wait for me to contact you.
As a congregation, we need to look for ways God wants us to reflect his glory in our community. It might help us to admit right here and now that we would really rather not arise and we certainly don’t want to shine. We really would be much more comfortable hunkering down under the covers. But God is calling us to Arise!—to get up and do something! So Arise! And don’t just arise, but Shine!—let your life and your words and your actions reflect the glorious light of our Lord and God.
top