Over the last week, I've invested a considerable amount of time in airports. We are just off vacation, an annual trip that our family always takes post holiday. I guess you could call it a holiday from the holiday. After our Christmas Eve marathon of nine services, I confess that the fatigue of the experience left me shaky. I needed a holiday to rid myself of the vertigo and stand on level ground.

 

Our travel schedule wasn't the best and then, weather created an even worse schedule. We waited for ten hours in the Tampa airport to return home. Then, I turned around on Saturday to fly back to Florida to preach an installation service last Sunday for our former associate pastor Mark Condrey. I can tell you that he and his family are happy. Mark is flourishing in his new congregation.

 

The flight back to Florida was easy. It was getting home that was once again the challenge. I spent 5 hours in the airport Sunday, only to get to Atlanta where a tornado had disrupted everyone's schedule. I missed my flight and spent most of Monday trying to get on flights back to Indy. In a period of four days, I waited around in airports close to 30 hours.

 

Perhaps it was because I was in need of an illustration, or maybe it was the gift of the Holy Spirit-I suppose we should allow for the possibly of both---I made an observation. The observation is this. An airport terminal is rather like a congregation. There are people coming and going all of the time. Some are joyful, excited to unite with family. Others are wary; heavy at heart for their trip is filled with sadness. Someone is ill, someone has died, or a family member needs help. There is excitement and there is fatigue and of course, everyone has baggage. It is because of their journey that they are together.

 

It is because of our journey that we are together. Some are coming and going. Churches of our size are more fluid than one imagines. We are always welcoming new families, some for only a visit while others for a long stay. Others are going, a sad reality. Some are leaving because they are moving out of the community; others, because they aren't satisfied. There is coming and going.

 

There is joy here. Glad hearted people who come before the Lord to worship should always bring joy. We know there is sadness. Life cannot be lived without sadness and pain. We are all mature enough to know that without the church, the loneliness of such times is unbearable. When life throws us, we have the shoulders of others on which to weep, the strength of the community to bear our weight and the firm ground of the church to stand on.

 

We are not the first to discover this ground to stand on. Imagine this scene. You live in Jerusalem in 615 B.C. Josiah has been king of Judah for most of the last three decades, a reign which began when he was eight years old. It is a period of relative political stability and faithfulness for the chronicler informs us that Josiah "did what was right in the sight of the Lord and walked in the way of his ancestor David; he did not turn aside to the right or to the left."(2 Chronicles 34: 14). Just a few years earlier, something remarkable happened. Josiah decided to fix up the Temple and while the high priest Hilkiah was cleaning up the place, he discovered a scroll. Like finding a Dutch Masters piece in someone's attic or a previously unknown sonata by Mozart, the scroll created quite a stir. The reason for the excitement was the first sentence of this dusty old scroll which read, "These are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel beyond the Jordan." (Deut.1:1a) It was the Book of Deuteronomy. Josiah immediately read it publicly and the Deuteronomic reform was underway.

 

This reform has been underway for a period of seven years and is quite successful. There is a renewed spirituality in Jerusalem and it is exerting influence in the former territories of the kingdom of Israel. The reform is calling everyone to leave behind their pagan ways and return to the Law of Moses. Spiritual renewals come with mixed blessings. For all of the good they bring, there is always someone who takes reformation to the extreme. Living as you do in Jerusalem of 615, some well-meaning but misinformed leaders have accused you of abandoning the faith before God. They say that you are not fit to participate in leading God's people. As was the custom of the day, you go to the temple to offer to God your prayer for help. You seek acquittal from the ultimate judge. Your prayer is Psalm 26. 1

 

1 "Vindicate me, O LORD, for I have walked in my integrity, and I have trusted in the LORD without wavering.

2 Prove me, O LORD, and try me; test my heart and mind.

3 For your steadfast love is before my eyes, and I walk in faithfulness to you."

 

We don't know who the pray-er of this prayer is. It can't be David's prayer. The scribes pulling together the Psalm into a cohesive unit gave credit to David. It originates later than the time of David's reign. Some scholars think it was a prayer that a priest prayed prior to ascending the temple altar. They get this from the ritualistic requirement to wash hands and feet or face. They think this is found in verse six: "I wash my hands in innocence, and go around your altar, O Lord." (Psalm 26: 6) If this is case, the Psalm is one that I should study as your pastor. But most think that it is simply a prayer of someone wrongfully accused.

 

Either way, you have to admire the honesty, the confidence of stringent examination. It reveals a vital relationship between the worshiper and God. This person is used to falling on his knees praying and welcomes God's review of his work. Notice that the emphasis on the first person I, me, my, balances with the intimacy of "your." Notice the verbs: vindicate, examine, try, test, redeem, free, be gracious. This is someone who stands on firm ground with God.

 

For the sake of this sermon, I think it makes sense to make this prayer both. It is a prayer for both me as your pastor and for you as members in the congregation. This means that each of us has to ask the question, "If this Psalm is my prayer, how does it hold up? Can I stand before the altar, hands washed clean, asking God to test my mind and heart. Have I trusted the Lord without wavering, walked only in faithfulness?" To put it in more modern vernacular, "Do I walk my talk?"

 

I suppose at this point I'm grateful that sermons are monologues. While I think I'd probably get a positive vote from most of you, I know this. I don't always find myself on level ground. Among the more or less harrowing consequences of being called to minister is the occasional sense that you are an imposter. You have to stand before the community and preach about faithfulness, describe it and present it so that everyone knows what "the Lord requires." You preach the Gospel with passion and declare with vigor the importance in following Jesus. But you do so while knowing that you aren't being entirely honest.

 

This may sound strange to those of you who hold ministers in high regard. But in a way, it is hardest for us. We are tempted to try to impress. There are always people to please. There are so many powerful reasons why we should make believe that we are what we appear to be, or pretend to be what we think other people expect us to be. It's tough to walk in our integrity and I will admit that far too often I find myself on shaky ground.

 

Please don't get me wrong. Like the Psalmist, "I love the house in which God (you) dwell, and the place where God's (your) glory abides. (Psalm 26:8) But when I face the intense examination of this prayer, I find myself on slippery footing. I wish that I could say that after thirty years of ministry, I have rid myself of shaky ground moments, but I cannot. Being honest enough to admit this is a start in walking in integrity.

Before you judge me too harshly, I remind you that this Psalm is also about you. It is about the congregation as well as a priest. It is both my prayer and yours. Let me read once more the verses about the people, verses 4 and 5:

 

"I do not sit with the worthless, nor do I consort with hypocrites;

I hate the company of evildoers, and will not sit with the wicked."

 

Add to it verse 9:

"Do not sweep me away with sinners, nor my life with the bloodthirsty,"

If this part of the prayer is about you, how does it hold up?

 

Let me answer for you. There is nothing worthless about you hypocrites. I say this with great affection for long ago, I realized that I minister to a bunch of hypocrites. We are, of course and the sooner we accept it, the better off we will be. When I was in college, I attended the University Church next to the TCU campus. One of its premier ministries at the time was to the college population and one of its subset ministries was a drama team. This was years before it was popular for congregations to include drama in worship. The drama team had a clever but helpful name-the Hypocrites. Before each performance, they would explain that the meaning of Hypocrite is to "put on an act."

 

All of us, at one level or another are putting on an act. You are acting faithful when you have doubts. You are acting Christian with unchristian thoughts. You are acting generous when you are stingy. You are acting brave when you are afraid. You are acting like a saint when you are really a sinner. The priest praying this Psalm knows that we sit with bloodthirsty sinners. I hope and pray that you are bloodthirsty. You thirst for the blood of the Lamb that at least for a moment redeems you from your sin.

When Dietrich Bonhoeffer could almost hear the stomping of the Gestapo boots coming to take him away and execute him, he wondered on paper what kind of people the church was going to need most when the last bomb had exploded and the last person had been killed. He said this: "What the church will need, what our century will need, are not people of genius, not brilliant tacticians or strategists, but simple, straightforward, honest men and women."

 

Of all of the descriptions that could be placed on you, this one seems to fit--simple, straightforward, honest men and women." Putting on an act is what simple, honest, straightforward men and women of the church do. They put on an act in hopes that some day, it will be authentically who they are. When our lives are held up to this Psalm, we find out we are both imposters, a flawed priest and a flawed congregation, hypocrites, praying that God is gracious and that one day, we will walk in integrity and stand on level ground. This is exactly what the Psalmist does. "But as for me, I walk in my integrity; redeem me, and be gracious to me."

 

Integrity isn't talking; it's walking. Integrity is living truthfully in every aspect of your life. But as Yogi says about a baseball game, the story of our integrity isn't over until it's over. Integrity isn't a possession that we have once and for all. Integrity is a calling. That journey we are on together, the one where some are coming, others going, and where all of us carry baggage. It's the journey to integrity.

 

Let me bring this to a close with a little parable from the Native American community. I shared it with you before. It talks of this struggle with sin and evildoing over and against walking in faithfulness and integrity. The parable comes from the lips of an elder in the tribe, passed down from generation to generation. The elder sits down with the children and says, "Grandfather told the people about a battle that goes on inside us all. He said, 'My children, the battle is between two wolves. The first wolf is named Evil. He brings anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, despair, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego. The other wolf is named Good. He brings joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.'"

All listened. All waited, but Grandfather said no more. Then one child asked, "Grandfather, which wolf wins?" Grandfather said, "The one you feed."2

That is the challenge. You have choices to make, as a congregation, as individuals, in this emerging relationship of pastor and people. The future you build depends on the actions you choose, the way you build on level ground. This is in fact, the way the Psalm ends, the great affirmation of the prayer. "My foot stands on level ground; in the great congregation I will bless the Lord." The choice they have made is clear. Which will you choose?

 

It is my prayer that you will choose to walk in integrity and regularly pray this Psalm, that God might test your heart and mind and vindicate you. If you do, you'll find yourself standing on level ground.

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