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The Price Is Right
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The Price Is Right I need three contestants to Come on Down. Welcome to the Price Is Right brought to you today from Tenaha First United Methodist Church. Before you is a lovely Hershey’s Bar with Almonds. The contestant who comes closest to guessing the retail price of this Hershey’s bar without going over the actual price wins the item and a chance to win another lovely prize. (After the winning contestant is determined, invite him or her forward for the next game.) Before you now are three objects: a can of tuna, a DVD player, and a Bible. Stack these objects so that the least valuable item is on the bottom and the most valuable item is on top. You may begin. (The contestant should put the can of tuna on the bottom and the Bible on top.) Well done! (Give contestant the box of Crunch-N-Munch.) But why did you put the Bible on top of the stack and not the DVD player? This Bible only retails for $10 while the DVD player costs $60. Of course, God’s Word is the most important thing we have in this world isn’t it? It’s more valuable than anything we can buy. (The contestant may be seated.) Although our contestant correctly identified the Bible as the most valuable item here, don’t we often forget how precious spiritual blessings are? As a result we often treat God’s Word, our worship service, even Holy Communion as if they were something cheap, like a plastic toy that comes from a cereal box. That’s the attitude Jacob’s older brother Esau demonstrates in our scripture reading this morning. We will remember that Jacob and Esau are twin brothers. Even though they are twins, the boys weren’t identical in appearance or in character. Esau was covered in hair (in fact the name Esau means “hairy”) while Jacob had smooth skin. Esau loved the great outdoors and the thrill of hunting wild animals while Jacob stayed close to home caring for his father’s flock and puttering around the kitchen with Mom. Although Jacob was younger and the quieter of the two boys, God promised that he would be the dominant one, and the one to receive the birthright usually reserved for the eldest son. Receiving the birthright not only meant inheriting a larger portion of Dad’s estate, it meant benefiting from the promise God had given to Grandpa Abraham that the savior would come through his family line. The birthright is something each boy should have valued and sought – not so much for the property one stood to inherit but for the honor of being a direct ancestor of the Messiah. What happens in our scripture reading shows that only one boy truly valued this blessing. One day, Esau came home from a hunting trip and boy was he hungry. As he came closer to the tents his family called home, he smelled something delicious cooking. He picked up his pace to the outdoor kitchen where he found Jacob stirring a pot of lentil stew. Esau said to his brother: “Quick, let me have some of that red stew!” That English translation doesn’t quite capture Esau’s desperate impatience. Esau literally barked: “Let me gulp some of that red stuff. That red stuff there!” Esau didn’t care what Jacob had cooked up, he just needed something to fill his stomach, and now! Jacob answered his brother’s demand with a demand of his own: “First sell me your birthright”. While Jacob’s stew may have smelt good, his attitude stunk. While Jacob was guilty of thinking God needed his help to fulfill his promises, he at least knew what was worth securing. His older brother Esau didn’t have a clue in the matter. When Jacob demanded the birthright in exchange for a bowl of stew Esau responded: “Look, I am about to die. What good is the birthright to me?” And so after swearing to give Jacob the birthright Esau ate and drank and left with a full belly and hardly a thought of what he had just given up. The writer of this text sadly comments that in so doing Esau despised the birthright. Esau didn’t think the birthright to be worth more than a couple of quarters you and I might throw away at the carnival. Esau thought this way because he lived for the immediate and not the ultimate. Do we live for the immediate rather than the ultimate? For example do you come to worship with everything but worship on your mind? Do you ever come to worship and never hear what is said during that time because your mind is so full of the things of the week before and the week ahead? Do you ever come to worship and you think, “I hope the preacher doesn’t take long today the Big Game starts at 12:00. Do you ever miss the blessing God has for you because you stayed at home from church and maybe you said something like “I have worked hard all week, ‘I am too tired to go to church? Think I’ll stay home or go fishing or play golf”, you fill in the blank. Do you ever get here for Holy Communion and think,” I sure hope the preachers sermon is short, I really want to go eat and if we don’t beat the Baptist we will be there the rest of the day.” Or do you stay home on Communion Sunday because church is always so long on that day? Have you
ever spent $70.00 on a new golf club or fishing reel or a new purse
or a hair styling, but when the offering plate comes around you look
for something smaller than a $20.00 to put in plate? Do we try to
relieve our boredom by inhaling all that our modern culture can
throw at us and so we have become more familiar with the babies of
Britney Spears than Bethlehem’s Babe who alone cures boredom by
giving meaning to life? The price of immediate gratification
seems cheap but the actual cost is very expensive. |
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