All Means All

August 14, 2011

by John Partridge

Scripture: Genesis 45:1-15

Matthew 15:10-28

Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32

Do you all get as many sales flyers in the mail as we do? I dont really read the ones that come from stores where we dont shop and I dont mind reading the ones from stores that we like. The ones that bother me though are the ones that are full of exceptions. JCPenney is usually good for this. The headline on the ad says, 40% off storewide! but below that, in little tiny print, it says, excluding leather jackets, housewares, things made from fabric, glass and metal and just about everything else. There have been times when I read these ads that I have had a hard time figuring out which things might actually be on sale. The government does this too. Congress passes tax breaks for everybody but most of us dont qualify. A few years ago they passed some kind of tax rebate where every family was supposed to get $600, but our family apparently didnt qualify. The Declaration of Independence declares that all me are created equal and yet it was signed by men who owned slaves and who obviously felt that some men are more equal than others. Religions do it, they say things like, God loves you but he will love you more if you pray three times a day and go on a pilgrimage. Churches are just as guilty. We hear things like, God loves you, but he will love you more if you put more money in the offering plate or We welcome all people unless you drink, smoke, are gay or lesbian, youre poor, dont dress a certain way, or your skin color isnt the same as ours. Everybody wants to make exceptions. The thing that we learn from scripture is that this is clearly not the way that God operates. In Genesis 45:1-15 we rejoin the story of Joseph and his brothers 13 years later. Joseph, through faith and obedience to God has interpreted the dreams of Pharaoh to mean that God will send seven year of bounty and seven years of famine upon the land, and he has been appointed as ruler of Egypt, second only to Pharaoh himself. When his brothers come to Egypt in search of food they fall at Josephs feet without realizing that he is their brother Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants, and he cried out, Have everyone leave my presence! So there was no one with Joseph when he made himself known to his brothers. 2 And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaohs household heard about it. Joseph said to his brothers, I am Joseph! Is my father still living? But his brothers were not able to answer him, because they were terrified at his presence. Then Joseph said to his brothers, Come close to me. When they had done so, he said, I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt! 5 And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. 6 For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will be no plowing and reaping. 7 But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So then, it was not you who sent me here, but God. He made me father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household and ruler of all Egypt. 9 Now hurry back to my father and say to him, This is what your son Joseph says: God has made me lord of all Egypt. Come down to me; dont delay. 10 You shall live in the region of Goshen and be near meyou, your children and grandchildren, your flocks and herds, and all you have. 11 I will provide for you there, because five years of famine are still to come. Otherwise you and your household and all who belong to you will become destitute.
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You can see for yourselves, and so can my brother Benjamin, that it is really I who am speaking to you. 13 Tell my father about all the honor accorded me in Egypt and about everything you have seen. And bring my father down here quickly. Then he threw his arms around his brother Benjamin and wept, and Benjamin embraced him, weeping. 15And he kissed all his brothers and wept over them. Afterward his brothers talked with him. These are the very same men who threw Joseph into a cistern and who sold him into slavery. If Joseph ever needed a reason to hate anyone and to desire to get even, these men had given him more reasons than he needed. At this moment, Joseph is one of the most powerful men in the world and he controls the food supply for all of Egypt. As his brothers come begging for food, he can have them killed. He could have them sold into slavery. All that he has to do to crush them is to deny them food and do nothing but he doesnt. Joseph worships the God of Israel, the God who forgives and the God who loves. Instead of hating his brothers for what they have done to him, Joseph instead chooses to see how God used his suffering to save the world as well as his entire family. Instead of crying that he has been the victim of his brothers evil, Joseph chooses to see Gods plan for his life. Instead of choosing to hate, Joseph chooses forgiveness. Because Joseph worships the God who loves and forgives, he understands that love and forgiveness cannot have exceptions. All means all. In Matthew 15, the Pharisees and other church leaders criticize Jesus because his disciples do not wash their hands before they eat. (Matthew 15:10-28) These church leaders are angry because Jesus and his friends are not following the traditions of the church
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Jesus called the crowd to him and said, Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someones mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them. Then the disciples came to him and asked, Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this? He replied, Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14 Leave them; they are blind guides. If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.
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Peter said, Explain the parable to us.

Are you still so dull? Jesus asked them. 17 Dont you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a persons mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughtsmurder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them. Jesus says that it isnt what we eat or how clean our hands are or how well we comply with the traditions of our church that makes us faithful or unfaithful. It is not these things that make us clean or unclean, honorable or despicable but it is the condition of our heart that matters. The Pharisees were not better than others because they could remember and because they obeyed all of the rules of the church. The church leaders werent better than other people because they were the tradition police and shook their fingers in the face of people who didnt do things the way they had always been done. Jesus says that all people are defiled when their hearts are corrupted. All means all. Continuing on with our scripture from Matthew 2

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Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 22 A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly. Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.
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He answered, I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel. The woman came and knelt before him. Lord, help me! she said. He replied, It is not right to take the childrens bread and toss it to the dogs. Yes it is, Lord, she said. Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters table.

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Then Jesus said to her, Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted. And her daughter was healed at that moment. Jesus mission on earth was to rescue the lost sheep of Israel, all of the Israelites that had strayed from the teachings of God. It really isnt until after his death and resurrection that Jesus commands his followers to carry the Good News to the Gentiles. This woman comes to Jesus begging for him to heal her daughter but neither the woman nor her daughter are Jews. Jesus tells her that it isnt right to take the childrens bread and toss it to the dogs saying that he should not waste his miracles on foreigners, but this woman understands the real power of Jesus Christ. This woman demonstrates her faith in Jesus by her confidence in what he is capable of doing. While many people would have supposed that Jesus could do a few miracles each day, this woman believes that even the miracles of Jesus are just the crumbs, just tiny fragments, of what he is capable of doing. In this story, with the demon possessed man in Gadara and with the Samaritan woman at the well we see that even though Jesus was on a mission to save the lost sheep of Israel, he still took the time to reach out to all of those who were lost, both Jew and Gentile, and ultimately commanded his followers to draw no distinctions at all. All means all. In Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32 the apostle Paul refutes the thinking that because the church has been called and commanded to reach out to the non-Jews of the world (the Gentiles), that God has now rejected the Jews and the Christians have become Gods chosen people.
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I ask then: Did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew. 29 for Gods gifts and his call are irrevocable. 30 Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, 31 so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of Gods mercy to you. 32 For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.

Paul says that all people, both Jews and Gentiles, have been disobedient to God and because of our disobedience, we are in need of Gods mercy and forgiveness that we find through his son, Jesus Christ. Well after I had started writing this message, I heard an announcement by Pastor Bill Hybels. Bill Hybels is the founding pastor of Willow Creek church, a mega-church in the Chicago area. This week, Willow 3

Creek held their Global Leadership Summit which is a leadership conference held at Willow Creek and in 450 churches nationwide via one of our amazing high-tech broadcasting technologies. The day before the Summit was to start, Pastor Hybels announced that one of the big name speakers, Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks had cancelled because of pressure that was being applied to his company by homosexual activists. In a speech that was full of grace, among other things, Hybels said this Now, this whole thing is sad to me on a number of different levels. First, if the organizers of this petition had simply taken the time to call us, we would have explained to them (as we have to many others) that not only is Willow not anti-gay, Willow not anti-anybody. Our church was founded on the idea that people matter to God. All people. All people of all backgrounds, all colors, ethnicities, and sexual orientation. The mat at every door on this campus has always read Welcome. And for over 35 years we have flung the doors of this campus open to the widest array of humanity I have ever witnessed in the global church. And thousands--tens of thousands--have come to learn the teachings of Jesus. So to suggest that we check sexual orientation or any other kind of issue at our doors is simply not true. Just ask the hundreds of people with same-sex attraction who attend our church every week. Now what is true is that we challenge homosexuals and heterosexuals to live out the sexual ethics taught in the Scriptures--which encourages full sexual expression between a man and a woman in the context of marriage and prescribes sexual abstinence and purity for everybody else. First, I apologize that the issue of homosexuality came up two weeks in a row; I know it is something that we sometimes have a hard time wrestling with but I thought that Pastor Hybels expressed this idea so well that I wanted to include it this morning. Bill Hybels gets it. When Jesus tells us that we are defiled by the corruption in our hearts or when Paul says that all people have been disobedient to God All means all. When Jesus commands his followers, in Mark 16:15 to Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. All means all. All human beings have sinned. Romans 3:23 says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. We have all been disobedient to God and we are all in need of Gods forgiveness and mercy that is available through faith in Jesus Christ his son. All means all. Whether they are Jew or Gentile doesnt matter. The color of their skin doesnt matter. Whether they live in Barnesville, Ohio or Oslo, Norway, or Africa, Asia, Australia or the Arctic Circle doesnt matter. Whether they are gay or straight, rich or poor, educated or uneducated, able-bodied or handicapped, young or old, or any other difference that we would like to use to draw distinctions between people None of those things matter. We cannot choose to ignore people because of where they live or any other sort of manmade distinction. Love and forgiveness cannot have exceptions. We have been commanded to carry the good news to all people and All means all.

You have been reading a message presented at Barnesville First United Methodist Church on the date noted at the top of the first page. Rev. John Partridge is the pastor of Barnesville First. Duplication of this message is a part of our Media ministry, if you have received a blessing in this way, we would love to hear from you. Letters and donations in support of the Media ministry or any of our other projects may be sent to Barnesville First UMC at 123 W. Church St., Barnesville, OH 43713. These messages are available to any interested persons regardless of membership. You may subscribe to these messages, in print or electronic formats, by writing to the address noted, or by contacting us at subscribe@barnesvillefirst.com. If you have questions, you can ask them in our discussion forum on Facebook (search for Pastor John Online). These messages can also be found online at http://www.scribd.com/Pastor John Partridge. All Scripture references are from the New International Version unless otherwise noted.