August 20, 2006
“How Important is Having A Place?”*
(Hebrews 11:8-16)
Dr. Dan Ivins, preaching

It’s hard to explain what being without a place of your own is to a woman. It’s different with men. At least with me. Libby likes having her own nest. I’d just as soon be out on a limb. You get to see more that way! Course it can break on you too! Some people who have their own place might think its not such a big deal. But if you don’t, it is.

The Bible starts out with a story about a place; a garden, humanity’s 1^st home. But before you know it, the place is taken away. And ever since, having our own place has become a universal desire – imprinted on our very souls since creation morning. But that desire, like every other human emotion, has been corrupted by sin. And that drives some of us to idolize our places. The Book of Hebrews talks about how faith relates to our places (Heb. 11:8). How is it that we have to leave home, in order to find home? That takes some doing. And some never get it done no matter where they roam.

The Bible knows how important it is for us to have a place. Without a place, we’re rootless. Or are we? Adam lost his garden. Noah had an ark, a place of refuge from the storm. Moses' place was all over the place, but mostly down in Egypt. But they still had God. Moses led the people out of slavery, through a desolate place, on the way to another place -- the ever-beckoning promised land. When David made Israel a place to be reckoned with, his greatest ambition was to build a place for God, so that God would stay put.

Because our human need for a place is so strong, we think God needs a place too! But God is never a prisoner of any one place. There is no holy land, because God’s values every place. The world’s biggest problems comes from those who think “God likes our place” better than “their place.” When Jesus needed a place to be born, he showed up in Bethlehem. He grew up in a place, Nazareth. He ministered in a place, Samaria, where a woman at Jacob's well raised the power of places with him: “Our people worshiped on this mountain and you say Jerusalem’s the place to worship.” She tried that old trick of localizing God to her place.

But Jesus came to universalize God to everybody's place. So he said worshiping God can’t be tied to any one place. Worship is not a matter of geography. Rather it’s a matter of the heart. It’s not about where but how: “to be done in spirit and not denying reality.” Jesus believed there’s something we’re gonna need more than a place. And that is faith. “Living water,” as opposed to well water.

The first curse on humanity was to take away somebody's place. Cain's punishment was: “No longer will this be your place.” And he spent the rest of his days “wandering east of Eden, in the land of Nod.” “Mamma, why don't you sell this house and move into something smaller; one with no steps, now that the family’s moved away?” “Because this is my place.” But you’re very sick and unable to take care of yourself anymore. “This is my home!” You have to drag some folks off their places!

It’s as radical as the soul vacating the confines of the body! We feel naked without a place! How can we live without a place? Our place is our life. Without a place, we’re nothing. A place! A place! Everybody wants a place. Then God says, “I’ll lead you to a place that will be your home.” So Abraham and Sarah left their place and journeyed all their days.

The Bible recognizes how important a place can be. And yet, the same Bible insists that the image of a life of faith is that of an old couple, wandering over the land, living in tents, on somebody else’s place! What do you do with that? Those with mortgages look the other way! “I'm gonna give you a place!” But they never get it. On the move all their days. Animals grazing on somebody else's grass. Constantly pulling up stakes. Venturing forth. But never receiving the promise. That’s the biblical image of what it means to trust God.

Why is it that one of our deepest human hungers is to have a place? And yet the Bible insists that the picture of faith is not settling down in one place. But moving...moving...moving? We all know that life is constant motion. We just keep trying to nail it down. Or if not, to at least slow it down. Time moves faster than we’d like. Our bodies tell us nobody has an abiding place here. The seasons come and go. Summer’s on its last leg in New England already? That's the way life is. It moves on. But I want a place! And God says, “OK, I'll give you a place.” But the picture of faith at its best is being on pilgrimage. Not having a place.

Maybe one reason God prefers our being placeless is because once we own a place, we think we don’t need God. After the Jews arrived in Israel, they dug wells. They’d drunk from moving streams in the wilderness, where Moses struck the rock for water. But now that they had their place, they don't need God anymore. So cisterns.

Last year they had to call out the military to remove the Israeli settlers off “their place!” They had to physically haul them off! Even when it’s somebody else’s place! People are serious about their places. So, they end up worshiping their place instead of God.

Pilgrims always visit the Western Wall in Jerusalem, the only part that's left of Solomon's temple. So the orthodox pray at that place like no other place. Placing tiny scraps of paper in the crevices. Bobbing their heads, backing away from it. Of course, they have to keep the men separated from the women. They don’t wanta contaminate the place! We watched them repeat their prayers on the plane, facing the east. But the wall, that’s the place to pray. When they were off in exile, they quit praying. “Now what's the matter? “We aren't in our place. Jerusalem is our place.” They made the same mistake as the Samaritan woman. “How can we sing the songs of Zion in a strange land” like Babylon? That's how pathetic we are when we get too tied to a piece of real estate. Once you own your place, you get attached to it. And the next thing you know, you get to build a fence around it so you can guard it.

The reason I left the SBC, was we lost the battle over who belongs in the place and who doesn’t. They narrowed the tent to where I could no longer in good faith be identified with it. Now the irony is, the same thing is happening in ABC. I guess it’s always happening. Because the religious gatekeepers are constantly sniffing out ways to exclude somebody. Believe like us or get out. These are the folks who think they own the place. It’s their job to keep the “undesirables” out of our region. You see, once it becomes “my” place, then I get to decide who is an insider and who is an outsider. Uh-oh!

I attended the ABC Biennial when it was held in Richmond. And when I returned to the place I’d been called, there was a crisis that occurred while I was away. I called it “the mad hatter controversy!” A young man showed up in worship wearing an expensive Stetson hat. He meant no disrespect. To him, it was class. Today’s young don’t think the way the elders do. Anyway, the ushers told him to remove it in a nasty way and he wouldn’t. So they invited him to leave.

As it turns out, he was the visiting preacher’s kid! He’d quit on church as a youth and was just beginning to renew his interest. So can you imagine standing up to preach as the ushers escorted his son out the door because he was wearing a hat in church? You see, the place had become more important than a person. That’s when I decided I didn’t wanta be pastor at that place anymore. So I left after only a short time there. It was the first and only congregation I’ve been in that needed an individual scapegoat to blame for their own corporate shortcomings. Jesus ran into it when some folks believed the Sabbath took precedence over human suffering. They asked him to leave too! When you “own the place,” you can do that. Then you can put up a wall.

Abraham and Sarah began like we all do, searching for a piece of property so they could say, “This is mine.” But in their pursuit of a place, something important happened: Abraham became “the friend of God.” Being God’s friend is much more important in life than having a place.
So Abraham began to look for “a city whose builder and maker is God!” Father Abraham started out saying, “I want this land God's been promising to me!” But he ended up saying, “I want God more than a place.” That's a long journey folks.

The Bible prefers that we remain unattached to any place. It’s the attachment that does us in. Maybe that’s what Jesus meant when he said, “Blessed are the poor?” I never understood how it was blessed to be poor. But after moving across country and getting rid of most of our stuff, I can understand how it is blessed to be free from all attachments; the need “to have and to hold.” It’s taught me how little you really need to get by.

Jesus had lots of friends. But he didn’t have a condo. Every time you encounter him in a house in the gospels, it’s somebody else’s house! He had no permanent address “Foxes did. They had holes. The birds of the air had their nests. But the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” So it had impact when he said, “If you would save your life you must lose it.” Blessed are the disconnected; unattached from things that most people think are necessary. Blessed are those who want God more than a place. “Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.”

Wouldn't it have been a disappointment, after all those years of wandering, looking for a place, if God said, “All right Abraham. You've finally arrived. Here’s your place!” But that wasn't what God said. What he said was, “Let go of your place. Leave it behind. Learn to depend on me, because there's something more important than where you are.” And Israel hasn’t heard that yet! But Father Abraham did. And the Book of Hebrews says he was great, precisely because he obeyed God, when God said: “Move!” He launched out of his place, into the unknown, with confidence in nothing but God’s word as his security. Breaking every natural bond; disregarding every prudent consideration that might’ve held him back. God is never “ashamed of such people to call him their God.” And the writer of Hebrews says: “You wanta know what faith is? Now that's what I call, faith!”

*Kudos to Craddock is due here

Prayer: God of all races and peoples; Lord of every land and nation, whose providence is confined by walls, neither of time nor space, we are grateful that you created this world to be a home for all your people. Enlarge our vision of the world in which we live and grant that in this worship we’ll be able to see the whole earth as our home and its people as our brothers and sisters.

Grow our faith, because of our never-ending movement in response to the ever-calling God. Thank you for this church that nourishes our faith and stretches it, for the tough times we all experience.

We pray for those who have no place to lay their heads. For those whose place is a hospital or a care facility. And those who don’t know they’re even in a place. We remember all who grieve the losses of those they love. Hold each in the palm of your hand.

Show us in this worship that venturing into the unknown is safer with you, than staying with the known without you. May this hour remind us that our goal is Jesus Christ. And you have given us the means to get there.

Help us to encourage one another as we make our way forward to a place called “promise,” where hopes are realized, because you’re our Escort along the way. Teach us it’s what we become on the way, not whether we have arrived that matters. Grant traveling mercies to each of us as we encounter our own faith-adventures, to stay on track.

And remind us of the eternal, unchanging love of Jesus Christ, in whose name we have gathered, and in whose character we have prayed...Amen.