What box is your life in

Sermon given at Grace UMC 11/1/15

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Scripture Reading:

^NRS  1 John 3:13 Do not be astonished, brothers and sisters, that the world hates you. ¹⁴ We know that we have passed from death to life because we love one another. Whoever does not love abides in death. ¹⁵ All who hate a brother or sister are murderers, and you know that murderers do not have eternal life abiding in them. ¹⁶ We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us-- and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. ¹⁷ How does God's love abide in anyone who has the world's goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? ¹⁸ Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. ¹⁹ And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts before him ²⁰ whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. ²¹ Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have boldness before God; ²² and we receive from him whatever we ask, because we obey his commandments and do what pleases him. ²³ And this is his commandment, that we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us. ²⁴ All who obey his commandments abide in him, and he abides in them. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit that he has given us.

Have you ever moved from one place to another and as you began the move you questioned all the stuff that you own? Or maybe you began to try to stuff the possessions of your life on all the boxes that you acquired for just that purpose. I recently made such a move several years ago where I focused on downsizing from the lifestyle I was accustomed too, to a lifestyle that is to be simpler when finally complete. This required me to go through every box, every closet and every place where stuff was kept, placing it in three piles, keep, store and sell. All of this sorting and looking through stuff got me to thinking about life.

What is important in saving, what do we see when we reflect through our stuff and what do we ultimately throw away. It occurred to me that in each box, there is the potential for many things, depending on the size of the box, the stuff inside the box and what the stuff brings to our minds. It raises the question, what box is your life in?

Our scripture this morning tells us that if we do not have Jesus abiding in us, then we are doomed to die. If we allow God’s love to fill up our empty shell, our own empty box, then we find that we are bold to witness to the mercy and love of God. But if we allow our boxes to be filled with the stuff of life that has no love in it, then we are doomed to death. Jesus commanded us to love one another and nothing except loving God first is more important than that. Jesus gave His life for us that we might understand that sacrificial kind of love. We are asked by God to do the same for our friends, neighbors and fellow human beings. What box is your life in?

In life, there are the items that are bigger than boxes, furniture for example that they just do not make a box big enough to hold. As I contemplate the meaning of these bigger items, here we find the things that make our lives, our lives. Our furniture becomes us.

We live on it as we spend our lives eating dinners at the kitchen table, sitting on the chairs and sofas watching TV and sleeping on our beds. Our bedroom furniture becomes so ingrained in us and our lives, that when we change a drawer where we keep our clothes, it completely changes our daily routines. It kind of makes you wonder what our real lives reflect not only in our furniture, but in the lives that we present to other people. If someone were to come into your home, what person would they view in the type and placement of furniture in your home? If someone were to spend time with you, what would they say about the way you communicate or present yourself to them? Are you the Victorian reserved person, the modern open person or the country friendly person? What box is your life in?

We now come to the large boxes where we place the larger items of our lives, like lamps and bedding, towels and linens. In these boxes are the things that support our lives. For some of us, this is where we would find how we wish to accent our world, various shapes and sizes, color combinations that coordinate the room and whether we prefer pillows that are soft or hard. Have you ever considered for a moment how something as simple as curtains can speak worlds about who we are as people. Typically in these larger boxes we will also find our clothing. What do these things say about you? Are you the type of person who stays with conservative colors because your life stays within conservative means? Or do you like the vivid colors of life and we would see that you live life to the fullest, wide open? What box is your life in?

Or maybe your box is the one that holds books. The box is a little thicker to withstand the weight of books in the box. But more importantly, one can determine often who you are by what you read. So what things do you read? Are you the action driven stories, science fiction or romance? Would you rather take time to read a mystery or study an autobiography of someone famous? Or are the books you read the kind that you would be ashamed for us to see? In this box lies the heart of who you are and who you want to be. Many people lose themselves in stories of intrigue or romance, an escape from their real lives. Can we find your life in the books you read? In these boxes are the stories that maybe shaped us when we were young and found a life path for us to follow. Or maybe we find within these books the stories of our ancestors. Or yet maybe we would look in and see the biblical stories laid out in a row in the boxes from your life. I love science fiction because often in these stories we see the battle between good and evil played out in the pages of the book. The bible is also a great source of inspiration, education and fascinating facts. I have a question for you, if God were coming to help you move, would you allow him to see inside your boxes of books? Which box is your life in?

Now we come to the smallest and yet most fascinating of boxes. The smallest boxes moved are often the ones that hold our insides. Up to this point we spent our focus on the external things of our lives, but now we come to the internal things. Here I am clearly talking about the box that contains our memories. They may be in the form of Knick knacks collected along the journey of life or they may be pictures. Or they may be the stuff we collect as we journey through life from our kids or loved ones. Have you ever opened a box only to find something you had forgotten or had assumed was lost, only to have the memories of events flood your mind? Maybe it was shoe from your child’s infant days, a blanket from your baby’s first days, love letters from your spouse of significant person in your life. Or maybe it would be a yearbook as you look back on your life. In these boxes lie the memories of our lives. We could easily argue that in these boxes; lay the artifacts of our lives. In all the other boxes, everything that we found clearly identified who we are in out appearance, how others see us or identify us. Those things define maybe our personality or how we interact with others. But in these boxes, my friends, in these boxes we find our hearts. Is there any among you who cannot say that they have memories locked in a box somewhere. Here we relive our joys, our sorrows, our past loves, our moments of happiness and sadness. We may even find evidence of lost opportunities in these boxes. What box is your life in?

I remember a story of a young man who finds himself in the presence of Jesus in a room with file cards. Each card documents a specific event in his life, good and bad. As they pull out each card, the young man relives the events where he shared happiness, love, anger and fear. When I think of these boxes, this is what I think about. Within these boxes are our special moments that we cherish forever. For me, it was an opportunity to relive childhood dreams, the loss of a mother, and the birth of a child. But it also makes me realize that we often focus on what we have rather than what is important. If we only had one box to pack, what size would it be and what would it contain? Would the box contain our relationships, especially our relationship with God? Which box is your life in?

I continually ask this question of you because as we continue to journey through our lives, we collect things. We begin the process of building a life through our stuff and for most of us, stuff matters. And it is through this stuff that others get to know who we are as well. But it is the special boxes that hold our hearts. Here we get to relive our memories, remind ourselves where we came from and the important people and events in our past. In first Samuel we find how God looks at us. ^NRS 1 Samuel 16:7 But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for the LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart." God doesn’t care about the big boxes in our lives. He could care less about the color coordinated bedroom curtains and bed clothing. What he cares about are the people who live in the bed in the coordinated room.

Have you ever met someone who appeared to have it all together only to find out that either they were as confused as you and I or were simply a phony person who hid it better than most? God knows what is in our hearts and it here that you and I need to live. The books we have are a reflection of who is important in our hearts. The memories we share need to be those that include God and people who love God. Which box is your life in?

Moving allows us to reflect on our lives, on our treasures and on who we are. On that last day when we move to an eternal plane from the physical one we now live in, it will be the boxes of life that will open before God. There we will be judged, as Paul says in Hebrews 9:27 And just as it is appointed for mortals to die once, and after that the judgment, we will be judged. Which box is your life in? The one that will allow you to stand before God with a smile on your face knowing that you will spend eternity with him, or the saddest look known to mankind? Which box is your life in?