Domes - Our Monthly Newsletter
Dunbar UCC
February 14, 2010
Micah 6:6-8
Matthew 21:28-32
The Weight
I. When we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we say, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” What does that mean? How do we know what God’s will is?
In June 2003 President George Bush said God told him to invade Iraq as part of a divine mission to bring peace to the Middle East.
Our enemy, Osama bin Laden, said that God told him to wage a holy war against the United States. Were they both doing God’s will?
II. Is God’s will for us to attack, kill, and torture others? The reason many Americans didn’t feel bad when we tortured our enemies is because they thought it was God’s will, part of winning a war on terror. People said, “Sometimes, to defeat terror, you have to use terror.”
That’s crazy logic, isn’t it. To make less of something, you have to make more of it. People who talk like that live in Mental Hospitals -- but I guess they also lead nations.
III. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
What is God’s will? How do we know? If in doubt -- or if a world leader say’s it’s God’s will to torture and kill -- or if a television minister says God’s punishing the people of Haiti with an earthquake -- check it out. Don’t take another person’s word for it -- LOOK YOURSELF. Read what the prophet Micah says about God’s will. He says God wills us to do justice, show kindness and mercy, and be humble. And each of these needs to be together. Executing someone might be justice, but there’s no mercy or humility in it, so it’s probably not God’s will.
IV. This agrees with what Jesus said about God’s will. “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” He said. "If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even 'sinners' love those who love them. ... But love your enemies, do good to them. .... Then ... you will be children of the Most High, because God is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. “
This is the weight Jesus asks us to carry. It’s heavy, but of all the burdens we could carry in this life, it’s the lightest.