Pasadena Presbyterian Church Sermon Text
April 4, 2004

"No Reserve, No Retreat, No Regrets"

Preached by The Rev. Dr. Barbara Anderson

Scripture:  Luke 19: 29-40; Matthew 25: 14-30

Two thousand years ago, Jesus of Nazareth rode into Jerusalem on a donkey as crowds threw their cloaks on the road to make a carpet before him.  On his left and right, his growing crowds of disciples waved palm branches and cried out joyfully, "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heaven!"  When Pharisees tried to stop the crowd's praise, Jesus boldly proclaimed that even the stones would shout for joy today if the people were silent. 

What a day of joy and triumph it was:  God's promises coming true.  The Savior of the World had arrived.  God's king had come to rule.  The weak would be strong.  The mighty overthrown.  And all the years of unjust Roman rule would be overturned.  Praise be to God, for Jesus is King!

Last week, I had a wonderful experience preaching in my home congregation in Ohio as part of its 200th anniversary celebration.  The accolades I received as a daughter of the church who's "done good" still linger with a delightful aftertaste in my heart.  How much more extraordinary it must have been for Jesus, poor son of Nazareth, to come into the holy, royal city of Jerusalem proclaimed as messiah and king.  Surely it's hard to do better than that.

On this Palm Sunday, I want to set Jesus' entry into Jerusalem in the context of what came just before, remind us of what comes after, and challenge us to take risks in our own life that model and spread the life-changing love of Jesus Christ. 

In the Gospel of Luke, just before his entry into Jerusalem, Jesus tells a parable about a nobleman who gave money to each of three servants and told them to do business with this money until the nobleman returned.  Two of the three invested the money.  The third buried his portion in the ground.  When the master returned, he praised the first two and rewarded them generously.  The one who had taken no risk, but out of fear had buried the money and returned it with neither loss nor gain, was punished.  Even what he had was taken away.  Risking all for the kingdom was rewarded.  Fear that held back from risk and made excuses instead, was judged and judged harshly. 

In the Gospel of Matthew, a similar parable we know as the Parable of the Talents is told by Jesus after he is already in Jerusalem.  It is no coincidence that these parables of risk-taking for a greater good are wedded to Jesus' final week among us.  After all, that's what his whole life was: a grand, life and death risk on God's part to show us how much we are loved.

We already know how to risk; we do it in many parts of our life.  Twenty-five thousand people risk shooting the rapids of the Colorado River each summer.  We ski down steep slopes on pieces of composite material.  We invest our pensions in the stock market.  We start businesses, we take a new job, we choose a college.  We open our heart to a friend, we fall in love, we start a family, we move out on our own. Life is full of risks.  Risk is a reality.

Yet how many people identify the call of the Lord Jesus Christ with a willingness to take risks for the sake of Christ's church and kingdom of God?  We come to church to be inspired and challenged, but usually we want that to happen in the context of security, safety and comfort.  Most churches are, to use business language, "risk averse."  Instead, our faith confronts us with stories such as The Parable of the Talents, which does not have so much to do with what one does with talents, as with what one risks for the sake of the Lord and His work.

All of us have been given by God a quantity of the "stuff of life."  That stuff is our time, talent, and resources.  God has given us the same 24 hours per day.  God has given every believer a talent, a capacity.  God has entrusted us with resources.  This parable is about our willingness to risk time, talent and resources for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ and His church.  That's why Luke follows it directly with Jesus' riding into Jerusalem to risk his life for us.

Mark Smutny and I have never before challenged this church to take the kind of risk the boards are challenging us to take as a congregation this year.  But we believe, and the leadership of this church believes, the time is right to hear God's call, to respond to this challenge, and to risk sacrificing beyond any level we have done before for the ministry of Jesus Christ through this church. 

The present challenge before our church calls for a decision of risk.  We will, in the days ahead, be called upon to risk time, talent, and resources.  We will shortly decide to risk our very substance for the sake of the challenge before our church.  We will pledge a portion of our future income for the great advance before us.  Jesus Christ calls upon us to take risks for the sake of His kingdom and church: the risk of participating in what God is doing rather than merely observing.

The well-known story of the three servants who were given talents is etched into our memories since early childhood.  The Greek coin that we translate "talent" was the largest denomination commonly minted - a large sum of money.  In reality, the five-talent servant and the two-talent servant become window dressing to set off in clearer relief the response of the one-talent servant.  Although he had less to lose than the others, he still did nothing.  He had one talent of the stuff of life and did nothing with it.  He was the typical observer, bench warmer, or nonparticipant.  He was incarcerated in inertia, imprisoned in his own special paralysis.  He could not even risk the minimum.

The final scene in this three-act drama is a scene of judgment in which the risk-takers are rewarded and the riskless servant is nailed to his irresponsibility.  "After a long time the lord of those servants came and settled accounts with them." (Matthew 25:19)  Jesus teaches that one aspect of God's judgment will be a judgment of our willingness to takes risks for the sake of the church and the kingdom.

The one-talent, riskless servant sounds thoroughly modern.  He blames his environment and his own emotions for his unwillingness to take a risk: "I was afraid, and went and hid your talent in the ground." (v. 25)  He blames his own fears and his lord (v. 24).  He excuses himself with much of the same kind of determinism that swirls around us and comes out of our own mouths far too often.  We blame environment, family, education, politics, economics and genetics for irresponsibility in life, and lack of responsiveness to God.  We need to set aside such blame and accept responsibility for our actions. 

What is most important to God is not whether we have one or two or five talents.  What matters is whether we are willing to risk what we've been given for God's work in this world.  All those who are willing to take risks belong to the same order of heroes in the eyes of God.  The loving master gives the same words of commendation to the two-talent servant who gained two more as he did to the five-talent servant who gained five more: "Well done, good and faithful servant.  Enter into the joy of your lord." (v. 21,23)  He did not denigrate the two-talent servant whose resources for risk were less than the five-talent servant.  Indeed, both had risked to the limit of their capacity.  We can presume that even if the one-talent servant risked the talent and lost it, the lord would have known that he had it in his heart to assume the risk for the sake of his master.

It is said that contemporaries of Jesus told similar parable with a radically different outcome.  In their parable, the master of the house divided up his goods between two servants and took a long journey.  One of them risked it and lost it; the other played it safe and did nothing with it.  When the master returned, he visited the risk-taking servant with punishment, but the riskless servant was promoted to be the head of his house.

No wonder it was said that no one had ever spoken stories like those of Jesus.  He made their villains heroes and their heroes villains.  To be prudent but useless to the Kingdom was as far down as one could go on Jesus' scale of values.

God hands us the "stuff of life."  That stuff is the mix of our influence, contacts, network, abilities, money, time, and energy that make up life in short, our time, talent, and resources.  God expects us to risk that for the sake of the church and kingdom.  We have the same options as the servant: risk it or lose it.  The challenge for our church in the weeks before us will call each of us to take risks for the sake of reaching others with God's message.  Each one of us will assess the stuff of life that God has handed us and will decide to risk some of it for God's work or do nothing with it: the risk of doing something for God rather than doing nothing.

Refusal to risk what God gives us warps our perspective on God.  When confronted with his riskless existence, the one-talent servant revealed his twisted perspective on his lord: "Lord, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you have not sown, and gathering where you have not scattered seed." (Matthew 25:24)  His lord was anything but a hard man.  His lord joyfully and generously rewarded servants who took risks for the sake of the kingdom.

Edgar Allen Poe tells the story of poor family who finally got a prized telescope.  They set it in their window and took turns looking through it.  They all became terrified because when they looked through the telescope, they saw an enormous, horrible black monster with long legs and huge wings. Eventually they realized that what they were seeing was only a praying mantis on the wall of the apartment across the courtyard. 

Having the wrong perspective warps our view of reality.  Living a riskless life warps our perspective on God and the church, because risk is what following Jesus is all about.  Jesus didn't sneak into Jerusalem down a side street.  He didn't speak in quiet tones in a private home.  He jumped into the middle of the action, and put everything he had out there for God.  Then he even gave his life for us.  What amazing love this is, that would risk all and give all for us! 

In the challenge before our church, we will all have a point of view, a perspective.  Truthfully, those who are unwilling to experiment, risk, and explore this invitation to greater spiritual depth that Mark and I spoke about earlier will miss an opportunity to be part of the action into which God is calling us.  Those who become risk-taking participants will experience the life of the church all around them, the growing energy and spirit that comes from being part of a shared cause, and the spiritual change that comes from risking the stuff of life for the sake of reaching our community with the love of Jesus Christ.

The challenge before us calls upon this congregation to take risks.  Many will be called upon to risk the use of time as we move forward.  Surely these days will call us to risk our talents in the current sense of the word.  Whether we make phone calls, label mailings, speak to our friends, or exercise the gift of prayer, each one of us can risk the time and talents God has given us.

And certainly these days call for the risk of resources.  The major decision of the days ahead will be a decision about risking the resources of life for the sake of God's kingdom: the risk of doing something for God rather than doing nothing.

God does not expect us to go beyond our capacity for risk.  Some have a five-talent capacity, some a two-talent capacity, and others a one-talent capacity.  If God has given us pebbles, God does not expect us to build a pyramid, but God does expect us to build.  If God has given us burlap thread, God does not expect us to weave golden garments, but God expects us to weave something.  In light of the challenge before our church, God does not expect every member to risk the same thing.  God does not expect equal gifts, but expects equal sacrifice.  We do not have equal potential to give, but we do have an opportunity to cross the line of risk in our lives.

Søren Kierkegaard was a famous 19th-century philosopher and theologian in Denmark.  He was a radical critic of the Danish church and one of the founders of Christian existentialism.  He believed that God had intended the church to be like an actor on the stage.  The church would be the actor, the preacher the prompter, and God the observer of the church's actions.

Kierkegaard observed that, in the modern church, these roles had been changed.  The preacher became the actor, the congregation the passive observer, and God the prompter in case the show slowed down.  Such an arrangement left the congregation as only a passive observer of the show, rather than a risk-taking participant.  For the sake of our church and its future, these days ahead must be when the church risks time, talent, and resources.  We dare not be mere spectators.  We must be eager, risk-taking achievers.

Let no one think that we cast ourselves into the abyss of blind fate when we risk something for the sake of God's kingdom.  The outcome has been tilted by the nail-scarred hand of One who took the ultimate risk for the sake of God's work and overcame death, hell, and the grave!  When we risk something for God, we have the assurance of the Great Risk-Taker who went before us in the realm of risk.

Today's sermon title comes from a note written by a young, wealthy graduate of Yale University, in 1909 on his deathbed in Cairo.  He had stunned his millionaire family and classmates by dedicating his life to spreading the Gospel in the mission field.  None of them could understand why he would set aside the comforts of affluence for the rigors of the mission in China.  Yet John Borden believed there was nothing more important than sharing the love of Jesus Christ. He died of meningitis in Egypt on his way to China, but on his deathbed he still found joy in the risk he had taken.  "No reserve, no retreat, no regrets," he wrote on a notepad beside his bed. Although he didn't reach his destination in China, Borden's willingness to risk everything for Christ had an impact far beyond the boundaries of his own life.

We all have the stuff of life:  time, talent, and resources.  In the aftermath of our church's immediate challenge, we will all have years ahead to reflect on whether we took the risk.  In a few short weeks, we will, one-by-one, take that risk, or not. We will take our time, talent, and resources and act as God's risk-takers, or we will not.  Those who take that risk can live with the satisfaction for a lifetime that they had no reserve, no retreat, no regrets. 

"Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord," we shout today.  Blessed is the Christ who held nothing in reserve, retreated not even from the cross, and with no regret poured out his life of love for us.  God grant that we may follow in his steps: no reserve, no retreat, no regrets, risking all until that day we hear our Lord speaking to us, "Well done, good and faithful servant.  Enter into the joy I have prepared for you."  Amen.

  (c) Copyright 2004 by Barbara A. Anderson.  All rights reserved.  Permission granted for non-profit use with attribution.