March 5, 2008 – Midweek Lenten Worship
Philippians 1:8-11
Grace and peace to you from God the Creator and the Lord Jesus. Amen.
The theme for this evening’s meditation – the theme for this week – is The Clean Heart. The Clean Heart is the heart that is freed from the entanglements of others’ expectations, the heart that perceives what is truly important and is productive in the ways that God wants it to be productive.
The Gospel lesson for this past Sunday was the story of The Man Born Blind. It just as easily could be called The Man With the Clean Heart. He didn’t start out that way, though. He started out by simply minding his own business. He had been blind all his life. He knew all the ins and outs of begging – it’s how he survived. How Jesus came to pick specifically him, we don’t know; all we know is what happened as a result.
Jesus performed a miracle and gave the man sight. He formed a clay paste of his own saliva and some dirt, plastered the paste on the man’s eyes and told him to go and wash it off. When he did, he saw.
It was a Sabbath day when Jesus performed the miracle, and the action Jesus took was considered work, a violation of Sabbath law. So the religious rule-keepers wanted to know about this miracle-worker. They couldn’t find Jesus, but they did find the man who had been blind, and they questioned him, not once but twice.
It’s interesting to note that each time they talked to the man he became increasingly clear about who he was and about who Jesus was. Each conversation, laced with hostility, served to act as a refiner’s fire for the man; he became sharper and more and more willing to stand on his own, separating himself from the authority figures that had defined his life, and aligning himself more with the One who had given him a new lease on real Life. Finally, he gathered up enough chutzpah to meet their offensiveness with some attitude of his own. That was the last straw, of course; they tossed him out – out of the meeting place, out of the rigidly bordered religious structure that had given his life whatever meaning it had had until then.
And that’s when Jesus entered the picture again and talked with him.
“Tough day?” Jesus asked.
“Ah, you wouldn’t believe,” said The Man With the Clean Heart.
“But do you believe?” Jesus asked. “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
“Show me who he is, so that I can believe,” the man said.
“It’s me,” Jesus said, “you’re looking right at him.”
And with that, Scripture says, the man worshiped Jesus.
And that’s it. That’s the last we see of this man. He doesn’t show up again in any of the Gospels, as far as we can tell. But surely he had to say something to somebody. Surely he couldn’t keep to himself the best news that had ever happened to him. Maybe this is indeed the end of his story, but isn’t it true that the end of one person’s story is often the beginning of another’s?
And so, the story of Albert McMakin. Back in 1934 Albert McMakin was a farmer. He loved to go to church. And he loved to bring people to church. So every Sunday night he’d make the rounds in his truck and load up whoever he could talk into coming to church with him. He had his eye especially on this 16-year-old kid who he just knew would love his church if he gave it a chance. But the kid wasn’t interested, not in church, at least. He did have a passion in life – girls – and that particular interest occupied most of his attention. Church? Christianity? Not for him.
But McMakin was determined. He continued to invite the kid, and finally hit on a fool-proof idea to attract him. There was one thing the kid loved almost as much as girls, and that was trucks. So McMakin asked if he’d be willing to drive the truck on Sunday night and make the rounds the pick up the folks going to church. It worked.
For several weeks the kid would deliver the church-goers, sit in the truck until the service was over, then drive everybody home again. But on the third or fourth trip, the kid decided to wander inside and see what all the fuss was about. And when he entered that church for the first time he was grasped by the wonder, the power, the grace of this God who had entered our world to give his life in an act of pure love, the purest love anyone could ever know. That love was for him, personally.
And from that evening on, life would never be the same for a 16-year-old kid named Billy Graham. If you’ve ever heard of Billy Graham, it’s because you’ve never heard of Albert McMakin. He’s the farmer who planted the seed of the Gospel in the one who’s planted the seed of the Gospel in more people that you or I can count.
So never underestimate the impact of your Holy Spirit-inspired and Christ-centered word of encouragement, of hope, of accountability, of courage, of comfort. That word might represent just the barest tip of your story, but the ending of one person’s story if often the beginning of someone else’s.
God doesn’t call us to forecast success before we speak. He calls us simply to speak, and trust the harvest to God. May God grant you rich faith, as you speak from a clean heart. Amen.
