Today, you might have noticed that we’re singing more songs than we usually do. Partly, this is because the Worship team met and talked about how we can really get into worship, how we can really worship through the songs we sing.
But before all of that, let’s ask ourselves; what is worship? In Hebrew, the word is Sha-ckha, which means more simply “to bow down.” Imagine for a moment how Muslims worship, bowing down on the floor towards Mecca. This is what the Hebrew word for worship means, and in the Old Testament we often find the Israelites bringing their offerings as they enter the sanctuary in worship, according to the law. At the time, only the Levites were able to enter the tabernacle, the most sacred of places, and there were certain rituals that they had to do in order to properly worship God according to the law. It was a complicated system but, after Jesus comes to us, how does this kind of worship change? Well, let’s ask what the Bible says. The Apostle Paul says, in Romans 12:1 “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, on the basis of God’s mercy, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable act of worship.” When we worship, we are bringing ourselves before God as an offering. But why? Why is it that we need to offer ourselves? It’s simple: we were created to worship God. Before Adam and Eve committed that first sin, they were able to see the Spirit of God always among them, without hiding themselves. But once sin entered into the world, none of us are able to be free of it: no one is entirely righteous, so we have lost the ability to see our God face-to face. But God has a special plan for us, and as John 3:16 says, God offered Jesus as a sacrifice, God’s only son Jesus, who died on the cross for our sins, so that we can connect with God again. Without Jesus, none of us are enough; none of us are worthy enough to approach the most Holy God. But our God didn’t give up on us, and instead brought God’s only son as a sacrifice, purchased our salvation with the blood of God’s only son. When we look, honestly, at our weakness, at our sinful nature, do you really think we can be truly righteous without Jesus? As Paul says in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “‘My grace is sufficient for you, for power[a] is made perfect in weakness.’ So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” We can bring our weaknesses, our brokenness before God as our offering. What you have to share may seem like nothing to you, but that’s not how God sees it. I want to challenge you to have the faith of the boy who brought 5 fish and 2 loaves of bread before Jesus, as an offering to feed thousands! Some of you probably already know how broken and weak I am. I am not a perfect mother, or a perfect wife if I am being honest. But I still come before the Lord to offer my brokenness, like a broken jar of clay. God gathers together those broken parts of me and fixes them, filling them with gold like Japanese potters do with the “kintsugi” technique. Those broken parts are made golden, perfect as the potter puts me back together again. And when we bow down before God, it is the highest way we know to show love and respect to our potter, our creator. And at the same time, it shows how we surrender too. When soldiers surrender in battle, they throw up their hands to show that they have surrendered. When we throw up our hands in worship, we are giving up our human strength, surrendering and allowing God to go to work on us. Personally, in my own experience, that can be a hopeless, desperate feeling. Other than God, there is nothing else in the world that can help when you are as broken as that. But when we surrender to the Lord, we can feel God’s hand reaching down to pick us up, to hold us close and carry us away from the broken places where we are now, and to bring us to the place where God wants us to be. As the church, as children of this loving God, let us try to humbly come before the lord, in surrender, as the united body of Christ? As Jesus said in Matthew 18:20, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” So, whenever we gather to worship our God, to encounter the Holy Spirit, or to witness the Risen Christ Jesus, we find ourselves in the real presence of God together. No matter who we are, no matter how broken we might be, no matter how desperate the situation is we must, and we can, turn back to God, and bow down in surrender. Our loving God, and our Lord Jesus Christ, always invite us to come face-to-face in intimacy, in love, and in care. And for that, we surrender ourselves in worship. Let’s sing together “Broken vessel” and accept God’s loving invitation.
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This past Monday was the 77th anniversary of the surrender of Japanese imperial forces to the US and its allies that brought an end to WWII. I’ve entitled my message “Peace Through Reconciliation,” and so the timing of this message is very appropriate for this season of remembering that terrible conflict of so many years ago. That, of course, was before I was born — but not by much — and well before most of the rest of you were born. I just turned 75 on Aug. 5, but if you correct the exact time of my birth to Japanese time, it was just as they were holding the very first memorial of the atomic bomb at Hiroshima on the morning of Aug. 6 that I took my first breath of air.
Everyone, of course, wants “peace” — including even the likes of Vladimer Putin. In cases like his, of course, it is a “peace” on his own terms that suppresses all dissent or anything else that would get in his way. So, what is “peace” really, and how can it be achieved? Interestingly, there are two words for peace in Japanese that are just the same two characters in reverse order — heiwa and wahei. Heiwa is a positive peace, while wahei is what we could call a negative peace — that is, a lack of war. It’s similar to the difference between “peace making” (which is a positive peace) and “peace keeping” in the sense of using military power to keep warring parties apart. Obviously, what I want to emphasize this morning is the positive peace that in the end only the “Prince of Peace,” Jesus Christ, can bring. In order to do that, I want to tell you about a project I’ve been involved in for some ten years now, this historical novel called “Wounded Tiger.” Here is how the book is described on the front cover: “Wounded Tiger, A True Story, The pilot who led the Pearl Harbor Attack whose life was changed by an American prisoner and by a girl he never met.” The man portrayed on the cover is Mitsuo Fuchida, who was Japan’s top pilot and was chosen to both help plan the attack, train the pilots for this secret mission and then to direct the attack in the lead plane. My role in this project was first to help the author, Martin Bennett, to get the details of the story correct as well as find new information to fill out the storyline, and then to head up a team to translate and publish the book in Japanese, which we accomplished 3 years ago. I might add that KUC’s own Yoshikazu Kawakami helped with that and provided valuable feedback to finetune the translation. Incidentally, he is the only one of the team who knew Fuchida personally, as Fuchida’s testimony was an integral part of Yoshi himself coming to Christ. So, what I’d like to do this morning is to give you an outline of the story and how it illustrates in such a powerful way how reconciliation through Christ is the key to achieving true peace. As a novelized version of the actual history, the author did, of course, have to create details such as conversations between the characters that aren’t recorded anywhere in order to make the storyline flow better. But the actual events themselves are what really happened. The novel is composed of three strands, which at first are seemingly unrelated stories of the main characters, but they all come together in an amazing way in the end. The first strand, of course, is that of Fuchida himself and represents about half of the book. The second strand is of the “American prisoner,” Jake DeShazzer, who was the bombardier on one of the planes of the “Doolittle Raid,” which was America’s response to Pearl Harbor attack. The bombers were launched from an aircraft carrier and were to drop their payloads on military targets mostly in the Tokyo area and continue flying to the free part of China to land. Jake’s plane, however, didn’t have quite enough fuel to reach that part of China, and so he and 7 others were captured by the Japanese and either killed or remained in prison for the duration of the war. The third strand, then, is of a missionary family by the name of Covell, whose daughter Peggy was instrumental in the incredible change that took place in Fuchida’s life. Incidentally, the Covells were one of the missionary families that had a cabin here at Nojiri in the early years of NLA. They spent their summers from the early 1920’s to 1938 in cabin 105, not far from where I’m sitting here at cabin 102. And after the war, the DeShazzers also had a cabin here for a few years. I might also mention another interesting connection I have with this story, and that is that one of the residents at the Penney Retirement Center in Florida where we’ve lived since retirement (when we aren’t here at Nojiri, of course), is the daughter of a missionary family that worked closely with the Covells. Rosemary was only 7 when her family was forced to leave Japan shortly before the war started, but the Covell and Farnum families were sent by the same mission agency and spend a lot of time together. And so Rosemary was particularly moved by this story, as she felt such a close personal connection. You don’t, of course, need to have such a close personal connection to the actual events to be profoundly moved by this true story, and so let’s take a look at what happened in Fuchida’s life to so completely change him from being a warrior dedicated to the war effort to becoming a powerful ambassador for peace. From a young age, Mitsuo Fuchida was particularly fond of the navy, and due to his perseverance, he was able to enter the naval academy, where he quickly advanced in rank. He was such a talented leader and pilot, that he became Japan’s premier pilot and war hero. He is the one that sent the famous “tora, tora, tora” message that signaled success in the Pearl Harbor attack, and he was invited to meet with the emperor to give a firsthand report. The map he drew is one of the more than 250 pictures that are in the book. The reaction in the US to this brazen attack was naturally one of universal anger that sought revenge. That was Jake DeShazzer’s response, and he followed through by becoming one of the participants in America’s initial response. Two of the planes, including Jake’s plane, were not able to make it to safe territory, and so they had to bail out just before their planes crashed in Japanese-controlled territory. The cruel experiences Jake had as a prisoner simply increased his hatred for the Japanese, but a few months before the war’s end, the emperor himself intervened and demanded better treatment so that the remaining 4 Doolittle Raiders would not die. Part of that included receiving reading material, and since the guards somehow found an English Bible, Jake was given that copy to read. He had only superficial knowledge of the Bible from Sunday School as a kid, but as he read, God worked in his heart to change his hatred of his guards and the Japanese in general. In fact, it so transformed him that he decided to go to college to learn Japanese and come back to Japan as a missionary. He arrived back in 1948 on a vastly different mission than the one he initially came to Japan on, as he dedicated the rest of his life to the salvation of his former enemies. Coming back to Fuchida himself during the war, as a result of his continued success in battle following Pearl Harbor, he became an even more central figure in Japan’s war effort. He survived many narrow escapes, and in fact by war’s end, he was the only one of the 70 officers that participated in the Pearl Harbor raid that survived the war. One of those narrow escapes was with the atomic bomb blast in Hiroshima. Up until the afternoon of August 5, the day before the bombing, he had been involved with the planning for the final defense of the Japanese mainland from the seemingly inevitable American invasion. He was, however, suddenly called up to the Yamato Base in Nara for an important meeting, and so he flew his plane up late that afternoon. Everybody he had been working with died the next morning in the atomic blast. He was then immediately sent back to lead the investigation into what happened, and so he flew down a team that afternoon. There was still significant radiation, and so for 3 days, they walked thru the rubble documenting the destruction. Then, of course, the Nagasaki blast occurred, and Fuchida was sent down there to do the same thing. Because they had all been exposed to considerable radiation, the members of the delegation began to develop radiation sickness within a few days, and it was so bad that several of them succumbed to it. But miraculously, Fuchida himself suffered no ill-effects. This is how his reaction to this is described in the book: In the last few years Fuchida knew he could have or should have died on many occasions. At times he even felt guilty for still being alive. He should have been in Hiroshima on the day of the blast. Even though everyone else in his search party was affected, he suffered none of the ill effects any of his fellow officers experienced. Nothing. For the first time he sensed that somehow his life was being preserved, preserved by something beyond himself. His experience at Hiroshima was sobering indeed, and one incident in particular stands out. Quoting from the book: An old woman in a filthy kimono pulling a cart with rusted bicycle rims approached. She stopped and glared at the officers, incredulous that they had the gall to take a sightseeing tour among the wasted ruins and human suffering. “That’s right,” she said boldly, nodding her head. She gazed around at the ruined land, then back at the officers, who were now curious. “That’s right. Take a good look around you. And there are many more cities just like this one.” All the while staring at them, she lowered the cart handles and walked closer to Fuchida. “This is where you have led us.” She sarcastically held her arms wide. “This is your great - Yamato - empire!” “How dare you disrespect an officer!” one of the men said as he stepped forward. She turned to the man and spoke with authority, “What can you possibly take from me that I haven't already lost?” She looked again into Fuchida’s eyes as she stepped even closer and spoke with quiet fury. “You lied to us about everything. You betrayed us. My husband is dead. My sons are dead. My daughters are dead.” Without looking back, she stiffly swung her arm toward her cart full of charred belongings. “This is all I have left!” He saw that they weren’t just the words of a hopeless old woman. They were the words of an enraged nation, furious for having been led into a war that had devastated their country, a land they loved, a nation that had been ground into the dirt in humiliating defeat. She was the voice that was never heard by the military commanders when they passionately argued for war, and she was the voice of the millions who would never speak again. She stepped still closer to Fuchida, her voice beginning softly, “I never wanted this filthy war. Everything is lost. Gone! Destroyed!” With her sooty hands she seized Fuchida’s lapels, to the amazement of the other officers. “Now where will you lead us?! Where do we go now?” Her words exhausted, her composure broke, and she began to weep and tremble, slowly sliding down to Fuchida’s feet, her hands streaking his uniform with soot as she wept. As the speechless officers stared, the woman moaned on the ground before Fuchida, his eyes fixed on the smoke-shrouded horizon. He had no words. One other brief passage illustrates how this warrior was rapidly changing into an ambassador for peace. Right after the emperor’s radio message declaring that Japan was accepting the terms of surrender, Fuchida was at the forefront of the effort to transition to the American occupation. Again, quoting from the book: It had been an exhausting and harrowing two weeks for him since the Emperor’s speech. He’d hastily written a short pamphlet entitled “We Believe This,” explaining to those tempted to continue the fight that they’d done their best and had nothing to be ashamed of, but that now surrender was the will of the Emperor. It was printed and distributed by the thousands. To help smooth the transition, even members of the Imperial Family were sent out to encourage compliance. After the surrender and things had settled down, Fuchida withdrew from public life for 3 or 4 years, spending much time in meditation trying to figure things out. As he was contemplating the meaning of his life and how he should live in the future, he happened to be walking by the “Hachiko” statue of the faithful dog outside of Shibuya Station when he was handed a copy of the pamphlet Jake DeShazzer had put together. It was entitled, “I Was a Prisoner of Japan,” and it told of how Jake had first come to Japan for revenge, but how he had found God in that terrible dungeon he was held in through reading the Bible and how that had so transformed him. He had now come back to Japan in love to seek reconciliation and help the Japanese people. Incidentally, the missionary who handed Fuchida that pamphlet and later got him a Bible also had a cabin here at Nojiri, and so our connections with this history are deep indeed. It was through reading the Bible that things finally began coming together in Fuchida’s mind, and after quite a spiritual struggle, this “Wounded Tiger” came to Christ for the healing of his soul. He said that the words that had the most impact on him were those of Jesus on the Cross, when he said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” That is what he too needed, for he really didn’t know what he was doing when he led the Pearl Harbor attack. After Fuchida made his commitment to Christ, he met Jake DeShazzer, and then from the mid 1950’s until his death in 1976, he served as an evangelist – a few times together with Jake DeShazzer, and he spent much time in the United States itself, where he sought forgiveness and reconciliation. Both of these former warriors, who had harbored a deep hatred for each other’s countries, had found the key to finding true peace. It was through the love of Christ that true forgiveness and reconciliation became possible. That, of course, is what the world needs right now. Imagine what could be possible if the Russians and Ukrainians could find the grace to do that! Yet even through the folly and strife of human beings, God continues to work in the lives of all his creatures calling them to reconciliation through Jesus Christ, who the Bible also refers to as the “Prince of Peace.” The road to peace begins with mutual forgiveness and reconciliation. May each of us find that in our own lives today. Before closing in prayer, I want to take this opportunity to briefly share with you where this project stands now. As I mentioned, the “Wounded Tiger” project began over 15 years ago when the author learned of the story and began doing extensive research. He was offered big bucks by Hollywood studios to make it into a movie, but since he would have no say in what they cut out or modified, he declined, because he felt strongly that the spiritual aspects of the story must be preserved. It has taken many years to develop the funding, but we now have enough for a major marketing campaign for the book in both the US and Japan, which is beginning later this year and into next year. So please do be in prayer for the success of this campaign and that the really big funding and expertise necessary to make this into a really great movie will materialize soon. It really looks promising, and we believe God is going to do a mighty work thru this true story of his grace and mercy. So, let’s close with a prayer: Creator God of the universe. We give you all praise and glory for the mighty work you do in the lives of so many unlikely people. There were probably not many who seemed more unlikely to become a follower of Jesus and ambassador for peace than Mitsuo Fuchida during that terrible conflict of so many years ago. Yet you had a great plan for his life that you worked out in such a dramatic fashion. And while the way you work in our lives might not be so dramatic, we give you thanks that you work in our lives in spite of our stubbornness and folly. Help each of us to realize our potential as we depend on you. We lift up this “Wounded Tiger” project in prayer, asking that you open up a path for this story to become widely known. We pray that more people will catch a vision of the vision this story would have on the “silver screen” to bring people to you and your throne of grace. For it’s in the name of the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ, that we pray. Amen. Sermon title: “Peacemakers” / Scriptures: Matthew 5:9; John 14:27 / Preacher: Rev. Claudia Genung8/14/2022 Seventy-seven years ago on August 6, at 8:15 a.m., the American warplane Enola Gay dropped a uranium bomb into the middle of the city of Hiroshima. A little over 72 hours later, on August 9, a plutonium bomb was dropped into Nagasaki. In Hiroshima, roughly 70,000 Japanese citizens were killed in a flash on that day. Approximately another 70,000 would die in the following two to four months from burns, other injuries, radiation sickness and related illnesses. In Nagasaki, the numbers were roughly between 40,000 and 50,000.
Those two atomic bombs eventually would claim the lives of roughly a quarter of a million people. Generations of Japanese people bear the physical, mental, psychological and cultural scars of those bombings from 1945. Koko Kondo, a friend of mine who is an internationally recognized peace advocate, who has spoken all around the world and also spoken to us at KUC for WOW and various schools, including Canadian Academy, is a hibakusha (A-bomb victim). She was only 6 months old when the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Here is an article about her. “Koko Kondo was only eight months old when her city was destroyed by the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, but the bombing had profound implications over the course of her life. She and her mother survived the blast when their home collapsed on top of them. One of her first memories of the aftermath, she said, was that as a child she was comforted by a group of teenage girls."I could not see their faces. Their lips were seared to their chins. Their eyes would not close because of the burns," she said. Her father, Kiyoshi Tanimoto, a Methodist minister, was featured in John Hersey’s seminal work Hiroshima, and ran an effort called Hiroshima Maidens to allow Japanese girls altered by the bombing to have corrective plastic surgery. Reverend Tanimoto went to the U.S. to promote peace and collect money for the wounded in Hiroshima after the bombing. He never stopped fighting for peace until his death in 1987. His work led him to be interviewed on the This is Your Life show in 1955, where he was joined by his family, including Koko, and interviewed alongside Robert Lewis, the co-pilot of the Engola Gay plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.” As a child, Koko described hating the people who had destroyed her city, but upon witnessing the deep remorse and regret from Lewis first-hand, she realised that “that hating people was not the way; it’s war itself that’s evil.” Koko hopes that we will continue to pray for peace in the world, from person to person, so that peace may be found in the hearts of each and every one of us. 77 years ago Japan’s Emperor Hirohito broadcast his message of surrender at noon on August 15th. That is the day Japan surrendered to the US. WW11 ended in 1945 but since 1945 there have been countless wars. The Korean war, the Vietnam war, the war in Lebanon, the Gulf War (Kuwait and Iraq), Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan, and most recently, the war between Russia and Ukraine. How can we be peacemakers? One way to start is we can pray. Prayer is always good and needed. Prayer can bring unity. But some of us might be called by God to do more. There are little and big steps leading to peace. Prayer often leads us to action. Action takes many forms. Eleanor Roosevelt, the wife of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt who was the 32th US president from 1933 to 1945 once said these words, “It isn’t enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn’t enough to believe in it. One must work at it.” Rev. Toyohiko Kagawa, a well know evangelist and pacifist. He became a Christian in his youth and was sent by Presbyterian missionaries to seminary. It was during the Russo-Japanese War/Period (February 8, 1904 – September 5, 1905) and the students back then had military training as part of their school curriculum but Toyohiko Kagawa refused to take part in it as he was a pacifist so the other students took turns beating him up. He really took Jesus’ words to heart about “blessed are the peacemakers.” Kagawa also believed that “nations should not go to war…” (Isaiah 2:4) He also said; “It is not enough to have ideals. We must translate them into action.” There are many ways to take action to bring about peace. We can vote for politicians who support peace and support policies promoting peace. We can support Article 9 in the Japan Peace Constitution. We can work for reconciliation. We can build bridges with people from other countries. One example I’d like to share is that my husband each year helps with an art exhibit in Osaka showing art by children from South Korea, North Korea and Koreans in Japan. This is another way to bring peace. There are so many ways to be peacemakers. “Blessed are the peacemakers.” What is a peacemaker and what did Jesus did mean? Peacemaker it is someone who is actively seeking to reconcile people to God and to one another. Koko Kondo is an avid peacemaker who speaks worldwide about peace. As Roy Mislang has shared in his talks with us in Sunday School and I have also shared in previous sermons, the word “peace” is the Hebrew word shalom. When I was in Israel, I heard shalom and also heard the word “salaam” when I was in Palestine which is the Arabic way to say “shalom.” In Israel, it is often used as a greeting word or a departing word in much the same way we would say “hello” or “goodbye,” it is has a much wider meaning than hello or good by because it also encompasses wholeness, health, prosperity, serenity, well-being, freedom from trouble, perfect welfare, harmony and blessedness of God. “Blessedness of God” is my favorite part of the meaning of shalom. The blessing in Numbers 6:24-26 said by Aaron, the High Priest, brings out this idea of blessedness when the word “shalom” is used: “The Lord bless you and protect you; the Lord make His face shine on you, and be gracious to you; the Lord look with favor on you and give you peace” (Num. 6:24-25). Shalom also includes justice and righteousness. Where justice prevails and righteousness rules, there you will also have peace. But without those two virtues, lasting peace is not possible. This is shalom, peace in Japanese. The kanji expression of “heiwa” consists of the following two characters: 平: The first part of this kanji means under one roof. We are all under the same roof and for us Christian, all under heaven. 和: The second part of the kanji often used to for harmony. Part of that kanji means “grain” and “mouth.” Peace is not just the absence of war or conflict but the realization of social justice where everyone has enough to eat. (Although food can also be used as a weapon by countries as to who receives food and who does not. Some people have said Russia has caused a global food crisis.) The word “peacemakers” means “the founder or promoter of peace. ”To be a peacemaker is not passive but requires action. Jesus did not say “Blessed are the peace-wishers or the peace-dreamers or peace lovers.” It requires initiative to make peace. God is the author of peace. God wants us to live in peace. Jesus is the supreme Peacemaker. Jesus is moving in our midst bringing peace and calling us to bring peace to others and our world. Jesus came to establish peace; his message explained peace; his death purchased peace; his resurrected presence enables peace, and we in turn give our lives to Jesus. Therefore, we can live in unity and peace in this world. Jesus is the “Prince of Peace” (Isa. 9:6). The angels announced his birth by singing, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and peace on earth to people whom God favors!” (Luke 2:14). Jesus’ word of absolution to sinners was, “Go in peace!” Just before he was crucified, Jesus’ last will and testament was our second reading for today, “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Your heart must not be troubled or afraid.” (John 14:27). When the Lord returned after the resurrection, his first word to the disciples was “Shalom.” "Peace to you!" (Luke 24:36). Jesus brought the peace of God. Jesus is the ultimate peacemaker who brings peace to our hearts. He paid the price for our sins by shedding his blood on a cross for us so we could experience peace. Paul, the Apostle, wrote through Christ God was pleased “. . . to reconcile everything to Himself by making peace through the blood of His cross” (Col. 1:20). Paul informed us that Jesus “. . . might create in Himself one new man from the two, resulting in peace” (Eph. 2:15). Christ is our supreme example in bringing peace in our hearts, our relationships, our church, our nation, and our world. That task, however, will not be easy. There are organizations that are working for peace. Toshi and I were part of the Nuclear Issues and Peace Committee at the National Christian Council in Japan (NCCJ) when we lived in Tokyo. (Toshi was the General Secretary of the National Christian Council in Japan (日本キリスト教協議会) and I was the editor of the NCCJ newsletter in addition to pastoring West Tokyo Union Church.) We were also part of the support for Article 9 which is the “No war” clause in the Japanese Constitution. One thing I remember doing whole we lived in Tokyo was our annual “Caroling for Peace” with other Catholic and Protestant churches and even one Buddhist priest would join us each year. After a peace worship in a church and one year we did it in Tokyo Union Church, we would go out into the streets to sing Christmas carols. Music is also another way to bring peace to the hearts of people and unites us. In Paul’s letter to the Romans, he told them, “If possible, on your part, live at peace with everyone” (Rom. 12:18). If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” That is a pretty clear. But Paul adds that all important phrase, “If it is possible.” Sometimes it Is not. But the last part says, “as far as it depends on you.” I believe we have a God-given, scripturally-directed responsibility to pursue peace. As the hymn “Let There be Peace on Earth” says, “let peace begin with me.” The apostle Paul declared, “God has called you to peace” (1 Cor. 7:15). Sometimes we must or will “agree to disagree” as peacemakers. It is not always easy and things may not always go smoothly. But we can still be peacemakers with our words and actions and by spreading forgiveness, understanding, and reconciliation. St. Francis of Assisi is known as a peacemaker because of the prayer he may or may not have written. Nonetheless, it is attributed to him. In the year 1181, he was born in Assisi in Italy. He was the son of an Italian cloth merchant and took part in a war as a knight. But he had a dream or vison. On his return home, his life changed and he gave up all his wealth, lived a life of poverty. and dedicated himself to God and living in peace. Peace comes then when we learn what the Holy Spirit within us is trying to teach us to be peacemakers. Each of us can be peacemakers. In small or large ways. Each of us can find ways to change the world a little at a time. Perhaps you feel the Holy Spirit tugging on your heart this morning, urging you to be more of a peacemaker. If so, I invite you to repeat silently after me, line by line, the first part of a great prayer of St. Francis. “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; Where there is hatred, let me sow love; Where there is injury, pardon; Where there is doubt, faith; Where there is despair, hope; Where there is darkness, light; Where there is sadness, joy. May the peace of Christ abide in our hearts and throughout the whole wide earth. Let us now listen to our sung response: “Kirisuto no Heiwa” (the peace of Christ). _____________________________________________________________________________ Resources for this sermon (besides the Bible): Koko Kondo’s story: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koko_Kondo; https://rise.icanw.org/koko_kondo; “Hibakusha: Late reverend's daughter aspires to spread message of peace in and outside Japan” https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20220106/p2a/00m/0na/014000chttps://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-08-06/atomic-bomb-survivors-75-years-after-hiroshima-nuclear-attack/12501636 Countries that have been at war: https://www.infoplease.com/history/us/major-military-operations-since-world-war-ii The Eleanor Roosevelt Encyclopedia edited by Hoffman Beasley, Cowan Shulman, Henry R. Beasley Definition of shalom: https://www.preceptaustin.org/shalom_-_definition Kagawa Memorial Museum, Sannomiya, Kobe. https://core100.net 賀川記念館 Study of the word “peacemaker” https://www.studylight.org/language-studies/greek-thoughts.html?article=17 The National Christian Council in Japan (KUC is an associate member church alog with the other union churches.) 日本キリスト教協議会. https://ncc-j.org/ More on St, Francis, go to https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki For his prayer, go https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prayer_of_Saint_Francis God will judge between the nations and render decisions for many countries. They will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; one nation will not raise the sword against another, and never again will they train for war. - Isaiah 2:4 (The Inclusive Bible) Well, summer is here, and one of the things that is true about summer is that people are thirsty. People want a good, cold drink. Lots of good cold drinks. So today I want to look at a story about Jesus and a woman at a well and the topic of thirst.
The truth is Jesus is amazing! For 2000 years we’ve been amazed by Him. The Bible says His words were amazing. His miracles were amazing. His life was amazing. His followers became amazing. Acts 4:13 says, “They were amazed when they saw the boldness of Peter and John.” They were ordinary people but Peter and John were amazing because they were recognized as men who had been with Jesus. Today’s message is about what can happen when you and I meet Jesus and how God’s amazing love and presence can change our ordinary lives life into something that’s amazing. Christians all agree that Jesus was amazing, but often we see ourselves not at all amazing. Jesus was sinless and perfect, but we are full of sin and mistakes. God loves you and wants an intimate relationship with you. If your mistakes or your past are keeping you from being intimate with God, then this is a great message for you. Let’s look at Adam and Eve. They lived in a perfect environment with no sin. And God said, “You can have everything but the fruit of that one tree.” But they couldn’t resist the temptation, and sin and death entered the world, resulting in separation from a perfect and holy God. Because of their mistake, their sin, they got kicked out of their perfect Garden of Eden, and people scattered across the Earth. And things just got worse and worse. Sin and mistakes are a part of our life. But there is hope for us. What I want to do is teach today from an event in the life of Jesus where Jesus goes face to face with a woman who had a mistake filled past. It’s called “The Woman at the Well”. It’s in John 4 and I think there are some things in this event that relate to our lives about how we can have amazing lives when we allow Jesus to be a part of it. John 4:3 says, “So He left Judea to return to Galilee and He had to go through Samaria on the way.” Now, no Jewish person would go through Samaria. As a matter of fact, Jews would avoid Samaria. You can see from the map that even though going through Samaria was the most direct route, Jews would go way out of their way. They would actually cross the Jordan River and go the long way. Why? Because Samaritan were Jews who had interbred with Assyrians. To Jews, Samaritan were unclean, almost like dogs. So they avoided Samaria. But John says Jesus had to go there. Why? Because there was a spiritual need waiting in the heart and life of a woman and her village. This brings us to our first point on your outline. 1. Jesus wants to meet you where you are. It doesn’t matter where you are or how bad your past is. It doesn’t matter what you’re going through. Jesus can meet you there. This woman, who had a horrible past and a great need, met Jesus at a well. Not in a place of worship. You can meet Jesus anywhere. You can meet Him while driving or riding a train or buying a drink at a vending machine. You can be at school or work or on the top of a mountain and Jesus will meet you there. Jesus came into this woman’s life on a normal day while she was doing a normal task. Jesus said to her in verse 7, “Please give me a drink.” The Bible tells us it was the noon hour, the hottest time of the day. Jesus is sitting by a well after a long walk. It’s the middle of the day, and he didn’t have an electric hand fan or a thermos filled with cold water and there were no vending machines nearby selling Pocari Sweat, so he was hot and tired and thirsty. And a woman comes alone to the well. There was no ido bata kaigi for her. The other women would all go in the morning when it was cooler. But this woman was there by herself at the noon hour, which tells us that she was a social outcast, who was despised and bullied by the other women. But she was loved and accepted by Jesus. It says in verse 9 “The woman was surprised for Jews refuse to have anything to do with Samaritans. She said to Jesus, ‘You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. Why are You asking me for a drink?’” She was surprised that Jesus didn’t reject her for her ethnic identity or social status or gender. In verse 10, He says “If you only knew the gift God has for you and who I am you would ask Me and I would give you living water.” She’s surprised and confused and still thinking about water. The amazing thing about this is that Jesus shows that God wants to meet us where we are now. And He has something for you. Jesus will meet you even if your past is awful, full of mistakes and sin, or you’re rich or poor, or lonely, or spiritually thirsty. He wants to meet you right where you are. This woman didn’t expect to meet Jesus that day and yet He filled her with the quality of life that she could only dream of. And He gave her something she couldn’t get on her own. What does Jesus want to give us? Number two on your outline - 2. Jesus wants to meet your physical and spiritual needs. In Verse 13-14, Jesus said, “People soon become thirsty again after drinking this water but the water I give them takes away thirst all together. It becomes a perpetual spring within them giving them eternal life.” Jesus first addressed this woman in terms of her physical thirst—for the water in the well—but then changed the subject to her spiritual thirst. It’s August in Japan. We are all aware of our physical thirst and how to satisfy that thirst. We might have to make some difficult choices to make. Pocari Sweat or Aquarius? Or what kind of tea? Or maybe we want a soda? Or we could get a Frappuccino at Starbucks? It’s hard to decide but we can easily satisfy our physical thirst. But are we aware of our spiritual thirst? This is what Jesus want to satisfy. God calls us to acknowledge this thirst, and to relieve it by drawing from the well of prayer. Our spiritual thirst might be our personal worries, or emotional pain. The woman at the well learned from Jesus that a material thing such as water cannot give us lasting peace; at best, it can give us only temporary satisfaction. By contrast, faith in Jesus Christ and imitation of his example can be the source of lasting refreshment for us and for those whose lives we touch. Jesus wants to do two things: 1. Jesus wants to meet you where you are, and then 2. Jesus wants to meet your physical and spiritual needs. Then there are two things that Jesus wants us to do. 3. Jesus wants you to move past your mistakes. When you move past your mistakes, Jesus can begin to meet your spiritual needs. Look what He says in verse 16 “‘Go and get your husband.’ She says, ‘I don’t have a husband.’ Jesus says, ‘You’re right you don’t have a husband for you’ve had five husbands and you aren’t even married to the man you’re living with now.’” Jesus knew all this about the woman because He was God. And God knows all our secrets and pain and sees us for who we really are, and still, he loves us unconditionally and completely. The woman doesn’t like the direction that the conversation is headed, so in verse 19-20 she says, “‘Sir,’ the woman said, ‘You must be a prophet.’” “So tell me why is that Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship while we Samaritans claim the place of worship is over on that mount.” Any time a conversation feels too intense and you’re embarrassed and getting a little uncomfortable, I encourage you to push through those feelings because that’s God knocking on the door of your heart, saying, “I want to talk to you. I want to teach you. I want to work through this.” We all have things that we’re ashamed of. But what’s amazing about Jesus is even though he acknowledges the sin in her past, he accepts her and invites her to know him as her Lord and Savior. He brings up the five husbands in her past, but then He talks about the future she can have. He never focuses on the past. We’re the only ones who focus on the past. Jesus moves right on to the future and talks about what it’s like to worship God. Here the holy one, God’s Son – perfect – is standing in the midst of sin, crossing all barriers – race, gender, religious – to show this woman love. He didn’t dwell on her past. We’re the ones who do that. We give ourselves labels – “I’m an addict … liar ….” We always label ourselves based on our past. God doesn’t do that. He focuses on our future. If you’re a Christian, then all your sins – past, present, and future – have been forgiven. Move on from your past. Start fresh. Leave your old life behind. Forgiveness is an amazing gift when you really understand it. The reason that we can be forgiven is because Jesus is the Savior. He’s the Messiah that we need. Jesus wants you to move past your mistakes. And there’s one other thing he wants us to do. 4. Jesus wants you to know that He’s the Messiah. The woman had some knowledge of the Messiah because says in v.25, “I know the Messiah will come the one who is called Christ and when He comes He will explain everything to us.” She knew about the prophesy. In v.26, “Jesus told her, ‘I am the Messiah.’” What should we do with those four words? I am the Messiah. He didn’t say, “I am a good teacher.” He didn’t say, “I’m a nice, moral guy.” He said, “I am the Messiah.” There’s a great quote from C. S. Lewis from Mere Christianity. He said, “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things that Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic, on the same level as the man who said he was a poached egg. Or else he would be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was and is the Son of God or else a madman or something worse.” Who is Jesus? Is he a liar? Is he a lunatic who fooled people for 2000 years? Or is he who He said He was – Lord. And if He was God, what does that mean for you? Like the woman at the well, when you believe in Jesus, your life will be changed in an instant. You will know hope and peace and experience some amazing changes. I firmly believe that no one can ever have an amazing life until their life is filled with God’s amazing love. Ever since I became a Christian when I was a student at the University of California, Berkeley, which is a very strange place to become a Christian, God has done amazing things in my life, physically and spiritually. You don’t really know amazing until you meet the God who created amazing and has the power to change you. 1. Jesus wants to meet you where you are, and then 2. Jesus wants to meet your physical and spiritual needs. And then 3. Jesus wants you to move past your mistakes. 4. Jesus wants you to know that He’s the Messiah. And if He already has this kind of a relationship with you, He wants you to live life to its fullest. An amazing life happens when it’s centered around God’s amazing love! And that’s true whether you’re hearing it for the first time today or the thousandth time. It’s always good as we talk about this kind of thing to evaluate where you are in your life. Where are you in your relationship with the amazing Jesus? Let me give you an action step from this story: Leave the well and tell. The Bible says that when she met Jesus, she left her jug right there and she ran back and told the village. Then they came to find Christ. What I find is a lot of people, once they’ve become Christians, all they have is their Christian friends. They get in their little Christian clubs and go to their little Christian Bible studies and do their little Christian talk “Yeah, Jesus! We love You,” and that type of thing. I think all that is wonderful, but if you’re really a follower of Jesus Christ, you can’t contain yourself about the good news. You get out there with people who are really thirsty. That makes most of us nervous. “What will I do? What do I have to say?” Well, what did Jesus do with the woman at the well? He was friendly. He asked questions. He answered questions. He showed genuine concern for her. He faithfully explained the scriptures. And He let this woman know that there is good news for thirsty people. If you’re a follower of Jesus your job is not to convert other people. It’s not even a pastor’s job to convert people. Our job is to leave the well and tell what God is doing in our life and share our story. That’s our job. And you know what the result was? People’s lives were changed. Being a Christian really is an amazing thing. It’s like being pardoned from prison. You’re freed and you’re forgiven and you’re filled with God’s Spirit. The woman at the well was surprised and amazed by Jesus. And the amazing Jesus wants to meet you where you are, too, and change your ordinary life into an amazing one. Jesus AND OUR MISTAKES The Woman at the Well - John 4 Jesus wants to do 2 things: 1. Jesus wants to . 2. Jesus wants to . Jesus wants you to do two things: 3. Jesus wants you to . 4. Jesus wants you to . |
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