“Serve the Lord with--- Kindness!"

 A sermon based upon Colossians 3: 12-15; Luke 7: 1-10

By Rev. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin

Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership

The Fifth Sunday of Easter, April 28th, 2013

“Serve the Lord with kindness; this shall be our theme, As we walk together In his Love supreme…..” 

That’s not exactly how the third verse of B.B. McKinney’s 1930 hymn goes, but it could and if we know what’s good for us, it will.   We must serve the Lord gladness and also with KINDNESS.  It is that kindness we give to one another that will bring us the gladness and joy of life.   

Actually, there is another hymn that directly expresses the high value the gospel of Jesus places upon the grace and virtue of kindness.  It goes: “In Loving Kindness Jesus came, my soul in mercy to reclaim, And from the depths of sin and shame, Thro’ grace he lifted me.  

             From Sinking Sand he lifted me.  With tender hand he lifted me,

             From shades of night to plains of light, O praise his name, he lifted me!

Just as Jesus’ came to save ‘in loving kindness, our loving Kindness toward each other keeps the mercy of grace going and keeps the light of love on.  But as Tom Long has written, Christian kindness is “a simple, but it’s also a not so simple.”

KINDNESS: SIMPLE, BUT NOT ALWAYS EASY

The story goes that two neighbors met after not having seen each other for a while.  One asked “And how are things with you?” 

       “Oh,” said the other, “I’m managing all right, although I lost my husband several months back.” 

      “What happened,” asked the friend? 

       “Well,” explained the widow, “I was making dinner and asked him to go to the garden and get some corn.  After he’d been gone a long time, I went out to check on him.  There he laid, dead – a heart attack.”

       “How awful!  What did you do?” 

     “Oh,” said the widow, “I had a can of corn in the pantry, so I just used that.”

Kindness is seldom an automatic, easy matter in a culture like ours.  We are in such a hurry to get to the next thing, to express what we feel, or complete our own agendas at almost any expense, that simple kindness can be overlooked. But in our text from Colossians, Paul says that our behavior as Christians is not to mirror the culture, but to counter it as we follow and become like Christ.  Paul writes, "As God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience."

Notice that Paul suggests that Christian kindness simply flows out of who we are, as “God’s chosen ones, as God’s holy ones, and as those who are loved by him.   Kindness is not something we decide out of the blue or want to do for a change, but kindness should come naturally with the growing awareness and knowledge of our relationship and standing in Christ.   In kindness, God has chosen us, so we choose to be kind.  God calls us to be holy, so we choose saints who care in divine kindness.   We are loved, so it is natural for us to love and be kind to others.    But as our awareness of God has decreased, so has our ability to be kind.  Kindness has gone missing, because God is missing in many lives.  Some still know how to be polite, but do we still know what it means to be kind?  In a recent U.S. News & World Report poll, 89% of Americans think that rudeness, incivility, and a lack of kindness has become a serious problem in our culture; and that it has gotten much worse in the last 10 years.  As church attendance declines, so does the kindness quotient. 

This is a sermon about kindness, simple kindness, and it’s also about kindness that is harder and harder to find in people.  But in this sermon I want you to see the opportunities that we have, all of us, to put our faith into practice in the most practical way, as Paul says in Colossians, to treat other people, and to treat each other here at church with gentleness, meekness, tenderness, mercy, and kindness.  Sometimes we do; sometimes we don't.  Sometimes it’s simple, sometimes it’s hard.  Kindness is simple, but not so easy. 

When I say it’s not always easy, you know already what I’m talking about.  I'm talking about the woman who runs the cash register at the grocery store. She's had a hard day. Her face is lined with weariness. Her hair is soaked with perspiration. She's beginning to be irritated at the customers, and you're next in line. What are you going to say to her?  How are you going to treat her?  What will you do to make her day better and make her at least wonder whether or  God might be looking down on her?  Might you be that kind?  It’s simple, but sometimes it’s not so easy.  

Several years ago, there was a woman who made my life miserable.   There was a misunderstanding between us and she would not let it go.  She became so angry with me that and she had so much influence in the church, that she made it impossible for me to continue my ministry there.  We took a call to another church, though we were still living in the same community.  A couple of years after that painful chapter of our lives, Teresa met that woman in the grocery store.   When she saw Teresa she froze in fear.   I guess she had told so many lies on us, either or conscious was bother her, or she was afraid Teresa would come over and slug her one.   Teresa did walk up to her.  The woman stepped back.   Then Teresa put her arms around that ‘troubled’ woman and hugged her, telling her, as the woman broke down in tears, “It’s O.K.  It’s O.K.”   Kindness.  It’s simple, but it’s not always easy.

Maybe you heard about the widow, who lived in the country.  In spite of that, she was a very godly lady, but she had a neighbor who was an unbeliever.  He hated the idea of God. He hated the church and he particularly did not like this woman, because of her godliness. He was always being rude to her and very mean to her.   This woman tried repeatedly to reach this man and to build a friendship with this man and to witness to him, but he would have none of it. He despised her. He despised her God and he especially despised her chickens.  You see, this lady had chickens. In fact, it was part of the way that she earned a living, by taking the eggs and selling them.

One day her chickens got out of her yard, into this neighbor's yard and it just infuriated this man. He picked up one of those chickens, wrung its neck and threw it back over the fence. He wasn't even watching where he threw the chicken and she happened to be in the yard and that dead chicken landed at her feet.   When the man saw where the chicken landed, he just turned and stormed into the house.

That evening, the widow knocked on his door and there she was holding a fresh plate of fried chicken.  She gave it to him and said, "I hope you enjoy your dinner." It broke that man's heart and he wound up giving his life to Jesus Christ.   Heaven came down and filled his soul just like that fried chicken filled his stomach.   And it all happened because of a plate of fried chicken.  Now you know why preachers like chicken.   It’s simple, but when you pay for the chicken, or, better yet, if you are the chicken, it’s not easy.

KINDNESS:  SOMETIMES EASY, BUT NOT ALWAYS SO SIMPLE

But as hard as kindness can be, I want you to know that you are never more like God than when you are kind, especially when you are kind to people who don’t deserve it, but need it even more desperately than you do.  

There are people around us every day who need kindness.  Kindness is a needed commodity and a necessary preaching topic.   As a preaching professor says: “kindness is not a controversial preaching topic”  “Sometimes preachers have to preach courageous sermons on very controversial topics.  There are preachers who’ve gotten in big trouble preaching very prophetic sermons on political issues, money issues, or about a host of other controversial issues.   But who’s ever heard about a preacher getting in trouble for preaching on kindness.  As the popular Glenn Campbell song use to say, “Try a little Kindness”!   Everybody knows we need as much kindness as we can get in this world.  Even the Boy Scouts say we need to be brave, thrifty, clean, reverent, and kind.   Well, I'm not looking for trouble, mind you.   But I would like to also suggest that, if we really understood the nature of God’s kindness toward us, and the kind of kindness we should show toward one another, there are plenty of reasons that kindness can get complicated, very complicated.   Kindness can be easy, but not always just that simple.

A case in point is this story from Luke’s gospel.   It tells about a time when kindness was more than a little complicated for Jesus.  In Luke 7: 1-10, we read how a Roman centurion in Capernaum sent some Jewish elders to Jesus, requesting that Jesus come and heal his slave.  Now, you have to read between the lines to see all this, but remember first of all that the Romans were occupiers.  They had invaded Jewish land and taken control.  They were not always ‘nice’ overlords.   This situation could also be tricky.  This man who was sick was a Jewish slave and the centurion wants him healed so he can keep him as his slave.   But the Jewish elders do say that this centurion is kind to his slaves and to all the Jews.  They say, he’s even ‘built’ our synagogue for us.”  Having rulers over you isn’t a good thing, but it helps when they are kind.  So hearing how unique this centurion is, Jesus goes to pay a visit. 

But as they make their approach to the centurion’s house, he comes out to meet Jesus.  What happens next amazes Jesus:   The centurion says:  “Lord,”don’t trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof…but only speak the word and let my servant be healed.  I’m a man of authority, with soldiers under me; and give them all orders”.   It appears that the centurion wants Jesus to help heal his slave, but he doesn’t want Jesus to get to close.  It’s not that he’s embarrassed to be seen with Jesus, but “He’s just not worthy”.  So, he asks that he and Jesus not be seen together at his home, but makes a special request that Jesus just ‘speak the word’ and let the servant be healed.

Jesus did not have to go to this fellow.   This centurion needs something from Jesus, and he can’t give Jesus anything in return.   He can’t let himself and Jesus be seen together.  It’s a big, big risk, both for this centurion to call upon Jesus to come; and it’s an even bigger risk for Jesus to come near his home.  But Jesus did come, at least up to his door step.  Jesus went as far as he is allowed to go, and Jesus might have gone further, but he wasn’t allowed to come in.  Would you heal his servant?  Would call this great faith?  Or would you say this guy wants something for nothing?   How kind would you be?  

Jesus decides to honor the centurion’s request and heal the servant from a distance.  Not only that, but also from a very long distance, across cultures, religions, and all kinds of complicated differences,  Jesus admires the first steps of faith from this centurion who is, at least for now, still his enemy.  Jesus even dared to give the centurion a very big compliment, “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith”.   Would you go that far in kindness?   Paying a compliment to your enemy who is an outright sinner, making personal trip to visit your enemy who needs your help, but does not dare to get close to you, nor will ever be able to pay you back?   Then, of all things, granting your enemies request that will help him maintain his dominating rule over you, now that’s kind---almost too kind.   It’s the kind of kindness that will make Jesus very popular with outsiders, sinners, prostitutes, tax collectors and publicans, but it will also make Jesus much hated by insiders.   Even today, for many well established people, Jesus is just too kind.  They can’t believe this form of kindess will work in the real world.  Being kind to the certain kinds of people can get you in trouble.  Have you ever been that kind?

In almost every religious tradition, in order to become a priest or a minister you have to be tested on your theology. You have to be examined to make sure, at least from that point of view of that tradition, that you're theologically sound. I know one tradition that puts candidates for the ministry in front of veteran ministers and lay leaders, and they can ask as many theological questions as they want, until they're satisfied that the candidate is theologically sound. There's one old minister in this group who has asked the same question for 35 years to every single ministerial candidate. He says to the candidate, "Will you look out the window?"

The candidate does.

"Tell me when you see a person out the window."

"I see one."

"Do you know that person?"

"No, sir, I don't."

"Good. Would you describe that person theologically?" He's been asking that question for 35 years and he says that he has found that the answers tend to fall in one of two categories. Either they say "That person is a sinner in need of the saving power of God in Jesus Christ," or they say, "Whether that person knows it or not, that person is a child of God, embraced by the love of God, surrounded by the grace of God."

The old minister commented, "I suppose both of those answers, technically speaking, are correct, but it has been my experience that the ministers who give the second answer make the better ministers because they see people not just as they are, but as they will be in the future of God."   

Kindness is can be easy, but it’s never just that simple.  It’s not simple because kindness believes, sees, hopes, imagines, and dreams things that can be, but are not yet there.  And kindness can dream very big, because ‘kindness is the refusal to see people only in the present tense, but to see them in light of what God is doing to recreate and to redeem their lives.” (From Tom Long, see note below).

Finally, let me tell you another story about a man went to catch an airplane at the airport and found that the flight was delayed, so he sat down in the waiting area of the airport. Right across from the waiting area there was one of the little airport restaurants. It was in the middle of the afternoon, and the restaurant was largely unoccupied. There was only one person there, a homeless man, shabbily dressed, his head down on the Formica table top, resting. It wasn't long before a man who appeared to be the manager of the restaurant made a beeline for the table and my friend thought to himself, "Uh-oh, he's going to throw him out." But instead, as the manager walked past the homeless man's table, he put down a hot dog, just a hot dog. On the way back, he put next to the hot dog, a cup of coffee. A hot dog and a cup of coffee. From one point of view it was kindness, simple kindness. But from the point of view of the faith, the manager was in effect saying, "In a few minutes I'm probably going to have to be the manager of this restaurant, and you're going to have to be a homeless person, and I'm going to have to ask you to leave. But for a moment, just a moment, let us be who we will be in God's future. I’m going to try a little kindness: Welcome to the feast, Brother. Welcome to the feast."  (From Tom Long’s sermon on Kindness found at:  http://www.csec.org/index.php/archives/23-member-archives/346-thomas-long-program-4018).

Kindness is simple, but it’s not always easy.   And Kindness can be easy, but it’s not always so simple.   Kindness can be hard, and it can get very complicated.   How complicated does kindness get?   It’s about as complicated as Henry James was, when he once said to his young nephew, "There are only three things important in human life: be kind, be kind, be kind."  There is nothing more simple, more difficult, more complicated, or more rewarding than to ‘try a little kindness’ you see out on the road of life.  And if you are really daring, try a lot.  We all need it.    Amen.