Luke 8:1-3

One time when I was a student living in New York City I got invited to a party on West 92^nd Street.  When I walked in, Bob, the guy I knew, was nowhere to be seen.  But the place was jammed with people in every room.  Everyone seemed to know each other, but no one knew me.  From what I was overhearing, many of the people there were actors and actresses and they had a lot in common, and a lot to talk about.  Few of them were probably actively engaged in acting for a living, as they were trying to break into the business by starting at the bottom, so most of them were waiting tables or washing dishes to pay the rent, but from their conversation you would have thought they were all Broadway headliners.  What I had to offer as a student at a theological seminary seemed pretty lame in a high energy party like this.  I tried smiling and making some small talk, but pretty quickly I was by myself standing in a corner of the kitchen, hoping my friend would show up eventually, while the party went strong all around me.  I felt invisible. 

     Have you ever felt invisible?  Actually, many of us are.  Of course, you seem very visible this morning, we can see you quite clearly, what your face looks like, what you’re wearing, even where you live or work or go to school.  But what’s invisible may be your faith!  How would the world know that you are a follower of Jesus Christ?   Is your faith obvious?  What is there in you that reflects the light of Christ in the lives of people around you?  This is a question rightfully asked of all Christians, to remind us that invisible faith doesn’t accomplish much.  It’s especially a question to ask those who have grown up in the life of the church, now heading out into the world on your own.  Will your faith be part of who you are and what you do, or will it be an invisible part of you that no one will see or know about?

     In the worship bulletin this morning you see a series of readings highlighted about Jesus and how he gathered his disciples.  It began with the four fishermen, Peter and Andrew, James and John.  I think Jesus sought them out because they were hard workers, accustomed to long hours, and they worked well as a team.  If he wanted to catch people, what better disciples than those who knew how to catch fish?

     He also found Phillip and Nathanael, not fishermen, but thoughtful, studious types.  Perhaps he knew that he needed people like this who could read and write and help him teach about God? 

     He also found Matthew, and this is one of my favorites.  In this case, Jesus chose as a disciple someone who most people hated, a tax collector, usually corrupt and working for the Roman occupiers.  But Jesus must have been thinking that a tax collector would know lots of people that Jesus needed to find, the marginalized, the forgotten, and the left-out, the ones no one else liked.  Then the others I haven’t named, there were twelve in all, perhaps chosen in that number to reflect the hope and promise of the old twelve tribes of Old Israel  These twelve would represent the New Israel. 

     Twelve disciples.  But Jesus isn’t done yet.  In the 8^th chapter of Luke, Jesus continues to expand the circle of disciples.  Now he’s inviting women to be a part of it, and notice what kind of women, ones who had first-hand experience of his healing power.  It says Mary had been saved from seven demons.  Wow, seven!  Even one would be overwhelming.  None of the men, to my knowledge knew anything about Jesus’ healing first-hand, but these women did.  And look at the others.  These were highly placed women with access to resources and money.  If you ever wondered how Jesus paid the bills, look no further than these three verses.  The men did all of the fumbling and bumbling,  but the women raised the money that kept them all fed!  Unfortunately, in the history of the church, these three verses are ignored or down-played, and the twelve men get all of the credit.  But in practice the women were not willing to stay invisible.  At the end of the story, the twelve disciples have become invisible, but these women are the ones who go to the tomb to see what has happened.  They are no longer invisible in their faith. 

So we need to encourage each other to be less invisible and more visible for the faith journey ahead.  How to do that, how to become more visible?  You could put a tattoo of Jesus on your back,  you could wear a big cross around your neck, you could put a bumper sticker on your car.  But that visible faith is much more than advertising.  It’s living visible faith in how we live, how we make decisions, and who we chose to hang with.  And that last thought may be the most important.  Visible faith has a lot to do with seeking out and hanging with others who are trying to live the visible faith, too.  So wherever you find yourself, in a college dorm, in the school dining hall, on your summer job, in your classes, always be looking for the ones who are trying to live with visible faith, they’ll help you and you’ll help them.  And if you do that, I think the world will take notice of who you are and what you believe.  

Psalm 146 Every so often someone will ask me about the weather. “Did you hear the weather report?” I am quick to respond that I don’t trust weather forecasts. I think I lost my trust the day that I heard a weather report from a radio station in Rochester, when I lived there, describing clouds and heavy rain, but from my own front porch it was clear and sunny. It seemed to me that the meteorologist had not bothered to actually look outside his window. Another time a huge blizzard was predicted, and they sent all of the kids home from school early, but there wasn’t a single flake anywhere in Monroe County for the rest of the day. So I will listen to the weather report, but I don’t trust it. I’ll just look out the window and see for myself. According to the dictionary “trust’ is “firm reliance on the integrity, ability, or character of a person or thing”. So who or what do you trust? Upon whom do you firmly rely in your life? Upon what do you firmly rely in your life? Your spouse, your partner, your parent, your child, your grand-parent, your kind neighbor, your generous friend, your doctor, a nurse, your lawyer, the town supervisor or any other elected official, a pastor, the economy, the stock market, a used car salesman, a celebrity selling hair restoration, an investment advisor suggesting you put your money in a sure thing, or that stranger from Nigeria who keeps trying to give you a large sum of money if you will only supply your bank account number? Who are what do you trust? In fact, there are a lot of people and a lot of things not to trust. One day by the frozen pond all of my friends told me that the ice was thick enough for skating, and I trusted their wisdom, but a few minutes later I was up to my neck in ice cold water. Don’t worry, I survived. I learned early in my driving life that you can’t rely on old cars on long trips, even if the trusted mechanic says everything is OK. Seems like the danger zone for me has been the mountains of Pennsylvania where things go wrong – late at night – on weekends – with snow falling. Lots of people – but not me! - must trust those middle of the night TV ads selling get rich quick schemes – send in your $19.95 and soon you’ll be learning how to earn millions of dollars without even needing to leave your home. I wouldn’t trust that advertisement for a minute. It’s a complete scam, even though the announcer promises to be completely trustworthy. Psalm 146 offers some caution about who to trust in this world. It says do not put your trust in princes, but to trust in God, who is your hope and your help. In the present time we have no princes or princesses around here in Byron, because we live in a democracy, and we get to elect our leaders. But the point of the Psalm is that where you place your trust is incredibly important. Those who trust in princes may be very disappointed. And so Psalm 146 reminds us of how important it is to place our trust in God. But that’s not an easy teaching at all, is it? There are lots and lots of things that call out to us for our trust, besides God. We trust in money, we trust in possessions and property, we trust in accumulation, we trust in economic and political power, we trust in guns, we trust in nuclear weapons, we trust in addictions, we trust in well-connected friends, we trust in stylish clothing, we trust in sex, we trust in things that are hot, we trust in things that are cool, we trust in the latest toys, we trust in automobiles, we trust in gadgets, we trust in computers, we trust in the internet, we trust in media, we trust in just about everything we surround ourselves with, and most of the time we trust mostly in ourselves. I’m sorry to say that trusting in God is not very popular these days. We may say we trust in God, but we hedge our bets, too, and trust lots of other things, many of which are not actually trustworthy. Someone got the idea that if we put a reminder about trusting God on our money it will get us back on track again. As you have probably noticed, on every US coin and bill is inscribed for all to see: “In God We Trust”. I’m not sure that this has worked as expected. Money may be the best example of how we don’t trust in God at all, because the intense, never-ending need we have for money demonstrates how little we actually trust God. Maybe a more accurate inscription to put on our money would be “We Don’t Trust in God”, or “We Trust in Money”. So if this hasn’t been working well, maybe one solution would be to place this slogan in more places. “In God We Trust” - maybe it should be sewn into the label of every article of clothing to remind us that trusting in image, fashion, or the coolest clothes will get us nowhere. I wonder if it should be printed on every gun, bullet, missile and bomb, to remind us that the true power to change the world is in God, not weaponry. Should it be printed on every toy, on the dashboard of every automobile, posted on the front door of your house to remind us that our real wealth is God, not material possessions? Perhaps it should be printed on every bottle of pills to remind us that it is God who heals. Would putting labels on lots more things make a difference? I’m not sure that it would. We don’t trust enough in God. So we need to get some motivation to change. We don’t trust enough in God. I think it’s because we don’t have a clear picture in our minds of what life would be like if we trusted more in God. I think we could imagine what life would be like if we won a million dollars, what life would be like driving a brand new sports car instead of that old clunker that breaks down in the mountains of Pennsylvania, what it would be like if you could shop at the mall for a day for free. So try picturing what your life would be like if you trusted God more. What would our lives be like if we trusting in God more? Peacefulness, less anxiety, happiness, healthier living? What do you think? It’s probably too much to expect that any of us could trust in God 100% of the time. But what would it look like for YOU to trust God 10% or 20% or 30% more than you do now? Reducing our trust in all of those other things might not be easy, but what would be the benefit? More attentiveness to others, more sharing, more generosity, more helping, more love? I wish Psalm 146 would say more in detail about what life would be like if people trusted in God more. But I actually enjoy having to work that out on my own, so that trusting God is not simply a formula to apply, a program to input, or a pill to take, but something that we learn to do by trying, by experimenting, by working it out with one another, to trust God more. I wish Psalm 146 would say more in detail about what life would be like if people trusted in God more. Actually it does say quite a bit about what life will be like as we learn to trust God more: "Happy are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the LORD their God, who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who keeps faith forever; who executes justice for the oppressed; who gives food to the hungry. The LORD sets the prisoners free; the LORD opens the eyes of the blind. The LORD lifts up those who are bowed down; the LORD loves the righteous. Sounds pretty good to me. Let’s try trusting the Lord more today, are you in for 10%, 20% or more?