You are One of God's Best Sermons

“Shine like stars in the Universe, as you hold forth the Word of Life”

Philippians 2:15b-16a

It is truly amazing all you can learn about God from the stars!  I first heard this from Dr. Steunkel, the President of the College where Linda and I attended.  He was talking about Isaiah 40:26 – “Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these?  He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls them each by name.  Because of His great power and might strength, not one of them is missing.”  Wow!  There is a lot in those words.  God is the creator of the stars.  He made all of those stars you see in the sky.  They belong to Him, as does all of His creation.   I am told that on a clear dark night you and I can see with our eye only a few thousand of the millions of stars that fill the Universe.  Yet each one of those stars is important to our God and creator.  “He calls them each by name.”  Because of His power they were created and because of His power not one of them is missing.”

You get the message.  If God cares that much about each and every star in the sky, imagine how much He cares about you and me.  After all it was for you and me that He gave His Son. It was for your salvation and mine that Jesus gave His life.  Jesus Himself tells us that the lilies of the field preach this same sermon.  “If that is how God clothes the lilies of the fields, which are here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will He cloth you?”  After all, in the words of Paul, “If God did not spare His own son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also along with Him, freely give us all things?”  That’s quite a sermon the stars preach.

But did you know that God preaches that same sermon through you to those around you.  That’s what Paul is telling us in Philippians.  “Shine like stars in the Universe, as you hold forth the Word of Life”  Like the stars, He created each of us. We are fearfully and wonderfully made.  Of us the Lord says, “I have called you by name, you are Mine.”  “The very hairs on your head,” Jesus tells us, “ are all numbered.”  He gave His Son for you.  At Baptism He made you His own.  God intends for you’re your life and your words to be a living, breathing sermon about God’s care and grace to all who meet you.  “Shine like stars in the Universe!”

But how can you or I be such a sermon.  This world is a very dark place. How can you and I possibly make any real difference.  That’s precisely the point, my friends,.  Those are the moments when God shines brightest through you and me.  Once again God teaches us through the stars.  When it is bright and sunny outside, you can’t see the stars. The sunshine obscures them.  But when its dark… indeed when its completely dark outside, that’s when you see the stars. That’s when they are at their brightest.  In the same way, it is in the midst of the darkest moments in life when God’s light shines most clearly from your life and mine.  I remember one man named Dwain, dying of cancer.   As the darkness of death encroached his faith shone at its brightest, sharing his faith with his son-in-law while in the hospital waiting to die.  His joy, his hope in the face of death – that was the sermon God preached through Dwain.  That’s what He does through you and me.  He makes us His stars shining with faith, hope and love in the darkness of this world.  For those who know you at home, at work, in various parts of your life - no sermon I ever preach from the pulpit can match up to the sermon God  preaches through you, your faith and your life.  You are one of God’s best sermons.