Preacher, Chris Ayers

God’s Intentions For You

 

Isaiah 25:6-8

 

What are your intentions?------- Are they good---- or are they bad, even evil?

 

Having a rambunctious, testosteronized teenager in our residence, having a teenager in our humble abode who now is almost as tall and as strong as me, (he would say he already is stronger), no longer having a little boy with whom to contend but having a mass of muscle before me, I find myself frequently wondering, being suspicious of his intentions.  His words indicate he intends no harm, but there’s the little problem of history, his history of hurting his daddy, physically taunting me and I feel like a person swatting at a fly that flew away ten seconds before I finished my swat.

 

What are your intentions?

 

I’ve asked that of my son and also of my God, your God, everybody’s God.  Do you, Almighty of the universe, intend good things for me or is this going to be another one of those horrible, bad, no good days or weeks or months or years or decades?  Are you my friend or my foe?  Are you going to help me or are you going to beat me up?

 

How about you?  Do you think God is out to get you, out to rough you up in a Will Ayers sort of way?  Or, do you think God’s intentions are good when it comes to you and your life?  Is God cheering you on, pulling for you, going the extra mile for you?

 

I want to believe God is like Ms. Clarke whose photo from my high school senior year book I’ve reproduced in our bulletin.

 

During the first quarter of my 11^th grade the Ayers family moved from the northern part of Winston-Salem to the southwestern part of town.  Actually, to be precise, we moved to Clemmons.  We moved, get this, from a neighborhood called Wedgewood to a neighborhood called Kenbridge Manor.  In moving to Kenbridge Manor we moved thirty minutes my high school and I was faced with a difficult decision, Should I drive the long drive every day for the remainder of my 11^th grade year and drive across town my entire senior year to remain a student at North Forsyth and stay with my friends or----or should I transfer to West Forsyth High School which was all of a quarter of a mile from my new home?  It was a choice between friends and sleep.

 

If you think I decided in favor of my friends raise your hand.

 

If you think I chose sleep over friends raise your hand.

 

I, being the typical teenager, opted for more sleep, more z’s, more shuteye and decided to go to West Forsyth. 

 

I remember the first day at my new school.  I was sitting in the guidance counselor’s office getting my schedule worked out when in popped a short, fiftyish Cuban-looking lady named Juanita Clarke.  She said hello.  I said hello.  She said, “What’s your name?”  I said, “Chris Ayers”.  She said to the guidance counselor, “I want Chris in my class.”  And so it was done.

 

I later found out Ms. Clarke was a tough teacher, but at that point it didn’t matter.  She had taken an interest in me.  She had cared for me.  She had indicated she wanted me to get the best English instruction available at the school, which meant being taught by her, being taught Greek mythology and James Fenimore Cooper and Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, among other things,by her, hers truly.

 

Have you ever had anyone take a special interest in you?-----------Have you ever sensed that another human being truly cared about your well-being and was willing to insure it?---------------Have you ever been taken to a feast by another person, whether it be a literary feast or a self-discovery/therapy feast or heck, just a regular food feast?  Have you ever had someone give you the best?  Not second rate, not just good enough or adequate or sufficient, but the best?   Do you have people around you who intend the very best for you?

 

This morning I invite you, I invite you with all the feelings you have about yourself, I invite you with your past experiences which may include a sense of being short-changed or neglected or overlooked or picked on, I invite you and your heart and your emotions and your fears to Isaiah 25:6-8.

 

Listen.

 

“On this mountain.”----------Picture a mountain, Mt. Mitchell, Mt. Ranier, Mt. McKinley, Mt. Everest, Pilot Mountain, King’s Mountain, or bring to the surface a memory of some mountain spot you have been at in the past that ushers forth in you a warm feeling, a sense of peace and calm and tranquility and serenity and well-being.  See the trees.-----Smell the fresh air.----Feel the wind.-----Hear the running brook.-----Gaze at the two squirrels frolicking, playing cat and mouse.  Watch the eagle soar majestically above.

 

“On this mountain---on this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples-----and that all includes you, you are not left out this time----the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of fat things.

 

Two weeks ago my next door neighbor, Ann Westlake, had company in.  It was her brother from Memphis, her brother named Johnny who loves chocolate.   So Ann has us over for supper to eat with Johnny and his wife and Ann served up for dessert a thing---a thing she calls Jumbo Christmas Chocolate Fudge Pecan Pie.  That’s a mouthful of a title and believe me it was a mouthful of chocolate.  In all of my life, throughout all of my days, I’ve never eaten more chocolate per bite than I did that evening.  You talk about rich.  You talk about a feast of fat things.

 

That’s what God intends, has in store, for you and me.  A feast of fat things.  And get this, a feast of wine on the lees.  Since yall are liberal Baptists I won’t pause to explain that one. 

 

A feast of fat things.  A feast of wine on the lees.  And the Isaiah passage indicates there will be a removal of a veil.  Perhaps a veil that is covering all the things our heart has questioned and desired to know.  A veil that represents all that has puzzled us, our sufferings, our misfortunes, our diseases.  That veil is going to be lifted on that mountain.  And that’s not all.  On this mountain, at this feast, God will wipe away tears from all faces.  Tears from grief.  Tears from rejection.  Tears from loss.  Tears from emptiness.  All of our tears----gone---forever.

 

Do you remember your mother or father wiping away your tears?  Maybe you had a boo-boo on your knee or hand or arm or perhaps your feelings got hurt.  And tears flowed down your little cheeks and you were picked up and rocked and the tears were wiped away.  Well, imagine the fingers of God wiping away each and every tear on your face.  That’s the feast.  That’s the feast to which we are invited.

 

I have not yet seen the movie, Sea Biscuit, but someone has told me it is a great movie and that the best line in the movie is this:  "Now you are not alone, someone cares for you". 

 

That in a nutshell is Isaiah 25.  Someone cares for you.  Someone intends good things for you.  Someone wants only the best for you.  And that someone is God. 

 

Having trouble believing this?  Having difficulty with the idea that God would throw such a nice party for you because of all the less than good things you have said or done? 

 

Yeah, I see your point, but I think it’s off base. 

 

I am reminded of a "Dennis the Menace" cartoon. As you know, Dennis is indeed a menace, a nuisance, a pain in the neck, a troublemaker to his next-door neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Wilson, and yet Mrs. Wilson continues to be kind and gracious.  One particular cartoon shows Dennis and his little friend Joey leaving Mrs. Wilson's house, their hands full of cookies.  Joey says, "I wonder what we did to deserve this."  Dennis answers and his answer is on target: "Look, Joey, Mrs. Wilson gives us cookies not because we're nice, but because she's nice."

 

The feast.  It’s not because we are nice.  It’s because God is nice.

 

I know the predominate view is of God the great accountant in the sky, God the you better be darn good or you’ll pay one day God, God with a finger on the zap button, or God with his hand on the lever that opens the trap door to hell.  And I’m aware there is biblical support for such a God.  But there’s also another God depicted in Scripture and this God, like Mrs. Wilson, hands out cookies even if we have been Dennis the menace or Chris the menace or --------------well, I’m not going to mention any other names because------because I’d have to mention all our names.   We are all menaces and yet, and yet we will leave this sanctuary this morning with our hands full of cookies.

 

Today I invite you to a table prepared for you by God.  Today I invite you to a feast.  Come, come and eat the bread and drink from the cup.  Come with two or three other Wedgewoodians and serve each other.  Commit yourself to helping each of us see the good things God intends for our lives.  Who knows, through you someone---someone in this fellowship may turn their life around, change their attitude, do something great for God, because you helped them see God’s good intentions for their life.

 

So come to the table with your friends.  Eat the bread.  Drink from the cup.  And before you leave, feel free to stuff your pockets with cookies.

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