“Sing to the Lord a New Song”

Isn’t that what we are about today, a new Song?

The old songs just won’t do any longer. There is something stirring that calls for celebration!

Since April 12^th we have been singing  This is the feast of Victory for our God”…. Alleluia! Sing with all the people of God and join in the hymn of all creation: for the lamb that was slain had begun his reign – Alleluia – alleluia!

Like the psalmist of old, we sing…

“Shout with joy to the Lord all you Lands, you have made known your Victory, You have revealed your righteousness in the sight of the Nations.”

Well,

I can say one thing about whoever wrote this he was not a Lutheran.

I haven’t heard too many shouts during worship, either of joy or anguish…

To be honest there hasn’t been much to shout about lately!

No place to call home! Unless you want to call the VFW, with it’s prohibition of “members only at the bar” home.

Now the Grange…

after the VFW with is bar and tap in plain view..   But the “members only” sign also in play view, this is an improvement.

So today we sing to the Lord a new song, because He has done marvelous things.

So, against some pretty big odds, we will turn the spade, but to tell the truth, and that is after all what preachers are called to do… the 98^th Psalm, is not about us and our little celebration today.

It is of course about something much bigger, but in another way it is also about us, as the other lesson today makes clear.

Let us sing to the Lord a new song for he has done marvelous things… make a joyful noise the Lord break forth in joyous song and sing praises.

The word Joyful and Joyous and praises echoes throughout. 

Israel praised God with makeshift instruments made as best they could with what was available…

And their sole purpose was to produce sound that would rise to the skies and be heard by God. Ps. 98 speak of the lyre or harp, it was the lyre that Orpheus played in mythical story of ancient Greece called the Odyssey. In the saga, sailors where seduced by the songs of the sirens and ship wrecked on the perilous rocks nearby.

Odysseus managed to sail past the danger by stuffing wax in the ears of the rowers and strapping himself to the mast of the ship.

 Orpheus simply pulled out his harp and played a song even more beautiful that of the sirens and the sailors listened to his song and where safe.

Praise is our best counter to evil in the world.

If we are “lost in wonder, love and praise,”

There is not much chance we will stumble into doubt, despair or cynicism.

Praise is the antidote for much that troubles our world today!

If we make a joyful noise to the Lord (cf. Ps. 100.1) we will experience a quite soul and even as storms rage we will find peace.

Praise God for he has done marvelous things. . He has made known his victory.

Like a master weaver God has spun the universe into existence, painted the flowers of the field and meadows, carving the glaciers and the Grand Canyon…. Just to mention a few.

And with the astronauts repairing the Hubble… we can add not only our little planet, but also the far-flung galaxies of the Milky Way and beyond.

In this Psalm, not once or twice but three times, we hear the writer proclaim God as the victor over all.

The Heb. Word trans. Victory is Y e s h u a

This is where things get interesting.

Jeshua is the name that the angle Gabriel told Mary that she should give the as the name of her first born in Bethlehem.  We know it as Jesus..

Now listen again to the Gospel I have said these things to you that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete (11).

And in I John 5.4 For whatever is born of God conquers (NIKE) the world and this is the Nike that conquers the world, our faith.  Who is it that conquers (Nike) the world?

But the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.

Kind like a catechetical lesson given by Jesus to his disciples – Question/Answer.

In these vss. from the  NT John puts the Psalm in to perspective.

Those early pilgrims who travelld in little groups  up to Jerusalem to worship must have had considerable hutzpah to walk for days over dusty roads in small groups or caravans just to get to Jerusalem and squeeze through the bronze doors with the others to shout “The Lord is King!”

Compared to the Parthenon and many of the other ancient architecture of Greece and Rome, they must have known that their temple was a pipsqueak –

Their God who was named Yahweh must have seemed like a weakling on the playground of he the more impressive Deities like Marduk or Ea of the Babylonians or Osiris and Amun – Ra, the Sun God of Pyramids.

As has been said “how odd of God to pick he Jews” the least of the great nations of the near Eastern world.

What is this foolishness of Israel? Or was it more?

Was it a profound faith? (there is that word again).  A faith that could stand boldly in the face of being the laughingstock of the other nations and still affirm “Our Lord is King and your is not!”

In the Gospel for today Jesus calls his followers friends. One of the problems of picking the hymns for a Sunday before you write the sermon is that sometimes you discover things that make a difference and the hymns picked ahead of time no loner fit.

Such was the case today. A closer reading of the Gospel I discovered that John does not say that Jesus is our friend but the other way around… He calls his followers friends.. He hymn What a friend we have in Jesus got it wrong..

I changed it to be more in line with the overall theme of the sermon.

Besides, there is little room in Scripture for sentimentality that passes for piety.

 Listen again to the text “ you are my friends… I do not call you servants any longer.. but I have called you friends”.

YOU DID NOT Choose me – but I chose you!

Here comes the clincher… The disciples are chosen to do what? 

I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last.

And just incase you haven’t caught on – the commandment that the Gospel hammers home is that good fruit and loving one another go together.

The halls of power and influence are not in the faith community, not in the Churches, Synagogues or Mosques – They are housed in the buildings Government, Wall Street, Universities and the hospitals connected with them.

Like the pipsqueak Israelites who came down the wilderness to road to Worship in Jerusalem. Christians today are in a minority. So as we go and turn a few solves of dirt this morning let us be reminded that the new song we sing is first of all about Jesus who calls his disciples friends. Let us remember that the building we will build is a visible mark of that New Song in a world that really doesn’t much care or even want us to succeed – because to shout “Alleluia” is not cool in a world that measures success by standard other than the cross – which the Apostle reminded us: Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe… I Cor. 1.21ff.

There is more of course, but for now and for today,

let this be our  Alleluia! 

Let us go forth as fools with Him who calls us his friends.

 Amen.