Called to Speak Up

Danish author Hans Christian Andersen published in 1837 one of his classic children’s tales about two swindlers who posed as weavers, offering the emperor a magnificent new outfit. They cleverly told the monarch they were using a luxurious, fine fabric that was invisible to anyone who was foolish or incompetent.  While they pretended to measure, fit, and dress the emperor, no one in the court—including the king himself—dared to speak up to admit that they couldn’t see any new clothes.

The vain emperor arranged an elaborate procession before his subjects to display his new royal outfit. People along the parade route were shocked but silent; no one wanted to state the obvious. Finally, it was a child—oblivious to the consequences of speaking the truth—who blurted out, “But he isn’t wearing anything at all!”

Jeremiah was still a boy when he was called by God to speak out as a prophet. You can read the account of his calling in Jeremiah 1:4-10. He became one of the most significant prophets in the history of Israel, often delivering difficult messages to royal and religious leaders. Because the prophet was willing to speak up, he became the target of venomous resentment and mistreatment, including a lengthy period of imprisonment.

It can be hard, dangerous, and costly to speak up. But that is part of our calling as followers of Jesus. Our Lord knew that the road ahead for his disciples was perilous. He reassured them and us that the hairs on our heads are numbered and known to God, that we are infinitely more valuable than the sparrows caught up in the care of the Father. Speak up, Jesus challenges us. “What I say to you in the dark, tell in the light; and what you hear whispered, proclaim from the housetops….  Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven” (Matthew 10:27,32 NRSV). According to Acts 18:9, ^“One night the Lord said to Paul in a vision, ‘Do not be afraid, but speak and do not be silent.’”

This weekend millions around the world commemorate the courage of a 16^th century priest who spoke up against the unbiblical and unjust practices of Rome. Martin Luther never intended a whole new branch of Christianity. He wanted to work on reforms from within the Roman Catholic Church. However, 500 years ago his boldness to speak up stirred a Protestant Reformation that reshaped the history of the Church in the western world.

This Sunday at North Lake Presbyterian Church we worship God with deep respect for the prophets and others before us who have pointed out that “The Emperor’s New Clothes” are truly revealing. And let’s consider our own calling to speak up faithfully when the moment demands.

Blessings!

Jeff

The Rev. Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer

Recent letter sent to First Presbyterian Church in Lancaster PA for their 275th anniversary!

Dear Friends in Christ:

Congratulations on your 275^th anniversary as a congregation following and serving our Lord!

As part of your 250^th celebration in 1992, you also invited me back, and I remember what a privilege it was to return to preach and renew wonderful relationships. I wish I could be back again to rejoice with you in person, but the distance and timing prevent our participation. Know that my wife Bobbi and I offer prayers of thanksgiving for you, for your faithful witness and loving mission all through the years.

We were incredibly blessed by our time with FPC. Those were such callow, formative years for us. I arrived directly from Princeton Seminary with much more enthusiasm than wisdom. But you and your predecessors embraced us with grace and patience and affirmation that helped us flourish. You gave us a baby shower and celebrated with us when our first child was born; David is now thirty-three and has made us grandparents twice.  You encouraged us to stay in Lancaster, providing an interest-free down payment for us to purchase our first home. By the way, your assistance plus the sweat equity we put into 118 North Ann Street gave us a foothold into home ownership, now reflected in the lovely home we enjoy today.

Since leaving Lancaster in 1985, we added twins Rachel and Jordan to our family constellation. We lived in Pittsburgh 1985-1993 where I was pastor of Forest Hills Presbyterian Church. From there we moved to Cincinnati and Northminster Presbyterian Church. Two years ago I accepted a call to North Lake Presbyterian Church in central Florida.

This past march our current congregation observed the 25^th anniversary of its charter. North Lake looked back and celebrated a meteoric rise from a new church development to an average Sunday worship attendance of nearly 1400 and a dynamic missional impact in the community. Several charter members were in attendance as well as the founding pastor, so we had all North Lake senior pastors present for the worship and reception on that day. At the time I pointed out that the church where I was ordained, FPC of Lancaster, PA, was exactly 250 years older. That put things in a healthy perspective. We are in this journey of faith for the long haul, and you have exemplified that.

I know you don’t have any charter members attending your celebration. Nor do you have all of your prior pastors, even those of us who are still laboring in the earthly kingdom. But you have been a light shining for the Lord in that city and region since the historic Great Awakening in the colonies. May you continue to fulfill your calling and be part of another spiritual awakening that pleases God and animates the coming generations!

Yours in Christ’s love,

Jeff

The Rev. Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer
FPC, Lancaster – Associate Pastor (1981-1985)

Rescue

Junior high dances are hard enough without a sucker punch!

I was thirteen in the spring of 8^th grade with size thirteen shoes and complexion problems ahead of my peers. It was my first year in a new school district. Awkward, yes! I was one of the taller boys in my grade and an easy target for a high school junior, smaller in stature, drunk, and looking to pick a fight to prove something. I’m still not sure what. As soon as I left the dance and the school building, he was on the sidewalk with a group of his toughs. I had never seen him before, but he singled me out for taunting. I did as I’d been taught by parents, teachers, and coaches: turn and walk away. The next thing I knew he pulled to spin me in his direction while taking a full-strength punch at my face, glasses and all.

In the instant that followed, all I could see was red from the bleeding gash under my eye. The broken frame of my eyeglasses had gouged a chunk of my upper cheek. Initially I was afraid I had lost my right eye. Friends grabbed me and guided me back inside the school, as teachers and chaperones rushed out to ward off any further threats. One of my heroes was my track coach, who made sure I was safe and getting first aid; then he sprinted off after the group of hellions trying to get away. He collared the one with the bloody fist and brought him back to await the arrival of the police.

I survived that night, obviously, and the follow-up experience as a complainant in juvenile court, in spite of some intimidation from a rough element in the high school. It was a growing season in my life. Today the scar is completely gone. I can’t even find it. But I’ll never forget the young coach, a dozen years older than I, who came to my rescue. His reassuring voice, his hand on my shoulder, his resolve to track down my assailant, his support through the weeks that followed … yes, I will always remember the way he responded when I was so vulnerable.

Our God is a master of rescues. The scriptures are full of them. In Acts 7:34 Stephen describes the call of Moses. The Lord said: “I have surely seen the mistreatment of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their groaning, and I have come down to rescue them. Come now, I will send you to Egypt.” God often uses people as the agents of his rescue missions. Moses is one example. Esther in Persia is another. At some point, in some fashion, we are all called to be part of God’s rescue squad.

Let’s consider our calling as we worship our God-to-the-rescue. This week we’ll also share the Lord’s Supper on World Communion Sunday. Remember “God so loved the world” that he sent his Son on a life-saving rescue mission. He is there when we need him most!

Blessings,

Jeff

The Rev. Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer

Called to Survive

In his epic war drama Saving Private Ryan, Steven Spielberg used prologue and epilogue scenes depicting an elderly James Ryan at the National Cemetery in Normandy, France. Most critics loved the film, but panned the beginning and ending, calling it sappy, sentimental, overly patriotic, and pandering to the audience. I disagree, as I often do with the so-called critics. I think by framing the D-Day landing and Ryan rescue with the scene of the elderly survivor returning to Normandy, paying respects to his rescuers, Spielberg shows that the story is about more than the war. It is also about survival, about salvation, about living instead of dying.

Now that you and I have survived Hurricane Irma, we continue to pray for those who are left desolate and aggrieved by the storms, earthquakes, and tumult of this world. This week Maria takes her turn, laying waste in the Caribbean. Some perish, many survive; but life and home has changed forever. Survivors have to pick up the pieces, find a way to put them together, and make sense of the suffering and loss.

SURVIVOR is not a new reality TV series, it’s an old story, as old as Noah and his family. It’s an old story, as old as the people of Israel, defeated and exiled by the Babylonians, but surviving long enough in a strange land to begin a homeward journey. It’s an old story, as old as Paul who boldly declared “For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain” (Philippians 1:21 NRSV), and he survived to share the Good News of Jesus all the way to Rome.

You and I are called to survive. And North Lake is filled with survivors. Not only hurricane survivors, we have veterans who’ve survived combat. We have many who’ve outlived beloved spouses and children. We have countless who’ve survived cancer, heart attacks, stroke, and other assaults on their health, and we have those who’ve survived physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. Yes, we are survivors. That’s more than an instinct. It’s a calling.

Let’s worship the Lord this Sunday as survivors. We’ll be conscious of the gift of our longevity or the extension of life. We’ll express gratitude for living on this side of the storms and calamities. We’ll also consider our purpose, what we do with the days we are given. Certainly Noah, the Israelites, and Paul had to figure that out when they survived longer than they expected or longer than others around them.

As you read this, know that I give thanks you have survived whatever you have faced. God has a reason for that and a purpose for your days. And when your time here is concluded, the Lord lovingly claims you for eternity. In fact, God sent his Son on a saving mission to rescue us all. What a great reason to worship and give thanks!

In His love,

Jeff

Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer
Senior Pastor
North Lake Presbyterian Church
Lady Lake, FL

Living Our Calling

My call to ministry crystallized in three distinct steps over a five year period. When I was nineteen, I answered a call to follow Jesus. With the encouragement and example of persons God placed in my pathway, I made a conscious decision for Jesus as my Lord and Savior. In that saving, momentous step I effectively began a new life in Christ. I became an intentional disciple, an apprentice or novice learning from the Master, starting a lifelong journey in a Jesus direction.

Two years later I heard a call to serve the Lord. This step I described in some detail in worship last February. It occurred during my final season as a college football player. God used the experiences and emotions of that 1976 season to stir up new questions and insights about my future. With unfinished law school applications spread out on my desk, the Lord and I met one night when I walked over to the football stadium, climbed over the fence, headed to the center of the field, and then lay down looking up at the heavens. That starlit conversation with God lasted well over an hour. I was trying to listen as well as speak from my heart. When we finished talking, I knew that the law school applications would be replaced with seminary applications.

The call to serve provided new purpose and direction, but it was still unclear what exact form that service would take. Three years later I sensed a distinct call to pastoral ministry. I had considered other possibilities (e.g. chaplain, missionary, or teacher) through my first couple years at seminary. However, while serving fourteen months as a full-time intern pastor at a church in State College, PA—where I also met and married my lifetime ministry partner Bobbi—God confirmed in my mind and heart that I am called to pastoral ministry. Since then I have been blessed to share the Good News and good life in Christ with congregations in Lancaster, PA, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and now Lady Lake, FL.

My sense of calling continues to develop and focus in new ways more than forty years since God called me to follow and serve. I hope your sense of calling is also fresh and invigorating. Calling is not just for pastors or those who go to seminary! It is for all of God’s people. The Lord beckons all of us to follow and serve in various ways. The ways that we serve Jesus will change through the years. But your calling is not concluded until God’s final call heavenward.

“Living Our Calling” will be our worship theme at North Lake Presbyterian Church in September and October. I am excited about the scripture passages and biblical figures we’ll get to consider, like Noah, David, Esther, and Samuel. We’ll commence on September 3^rd with “Holy Partners in a Heavenly Calling” from Hebrews 3:1. I am happy to share stories of my calling, but I’m more eager to partner in the heavenly calling with you and to hear how the Lord has called you to follow and serve. If you have an experience of “living your calling” that you’d be willing to share, please write it down and get it to me. The Lord may use your calling to bless and encourage others.

Jeff

Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer

All the Families of the Earth Shall Be Blessed

When God called Abraham to leave his home (in present-day Iraq) and move to Canaan, the Lord gave him a promise: “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:3 NRSV). That was a foundational promise, echoing throughout the scriptures and biblical history. God repeated the promise to Abraham after the human father showed his radical obedience and willingness to offer his son on the altar. Of course, God intervened so that Isaac was not sacrificed, and then pronounced “by your offspring shall all the nations of the earth gain blessing for themselves, because you have obeyed my voice” (Genesis 22:18 NRSV).

The promise was issued later to Isaac (Genesis 26:4) and then to Abraham’s grandson Jacob (Genesis 28:14). The blessing of God would flow through the line of Abraham’s descendants. However, the blessing was not confined to his family; their family line was a conveyor of blessing to all the families of the earth.

In an ancient world of tribalism, defined lines of insiders and outsiders, fierce and bloody rivalries, honor codes, and vengeful retribution, the idea that God’s blessing would flow through Abraham’s tribe to all the tribes of the world was stunning. It sliced through the established patterns and expectations that God would favor his people exclusively. That foundational promise anticipates a Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Good News that God’s love is for all the world and for people of every family and tribe.

The promise surfaced again when Peter addressed the Jews at the Jerusalem temple (Acts 3:22-26). He wanted his listeners to understand God’s promise was being fulfilled and they were a part of the fulfillment. And so are we.

Given the outbreaks of tribalism and identity politics in our time, we need this promise as much as ever. Given our natural tendency to think in “us and them” categories, we need a reminder that the blessings of God are intended for all the families of the earth. Given the venomous chants and clashes in Charlottesville, VA, we need to see how God’s blessings are given not only to flow to us—but to flow through us to others, even those very different from ourselves.

Please join me in praying for our nation, for wise and gracious leadership when the chaos of tribalism swells, for deeper and more respectful conversations, for a mutual appreciation of the wounds and anxieties of others, and for a keener awareness that we are “blessed to be a blessing” to all the families of the earth.

In His love,

Jeff

Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer

Times and Time

The spring I graduated from high school the English progressive rock band Pink Floyd released their classic album Dark Side of the Moon. That was one of my favorites. Just last year I gave my “vinyl” to our son Jordan who enjoys listening to records on a turntable and appreciates classic rock. When he was in high school we drove from Cincinnati to Cleveland to visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which has a large section devoted to Pink Floyd. We’ve had fun sharing that interest, or at least he has humored his old man!

The song “Time” on Dark Side of the Moon probes the passage of years and the existential urgency of living in the present, from the perspective of a 29-year-old. The author of the lyrics, Roger Waters, told an interviewer almost a decade later:

“I spent an awful lot of my life — until I was about twenty-eight — waiting for my life to start. I thought that at some point I would turn from a chrysalis into a butterfly, that my real life would begin.”         [Rolling Stone, Sept. 16, 1982]

What an important and regrettable insight: “I spent an awful lot of my life … waiting for my life to start.” Here’s one of the ways he expressed that in the lyrics:

You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun.

I was marinating in such music and lyrics during my freshman year of college when Jesus fired the starting gun for my new life. I was nineteen, and I did not miss it. The Lord helped me understand I was already alive in him. He gave me focus and prompted me to move forward, so I wouldn’t “fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way” – another line from “Time.”

So, how does following Jesus impact our experience of time? That’s the underlying question for the message this Sunday, “Times and Time.” If you read ahead in Acts 3:17-21, you’ll see Peter tells the temple crowd that by turning to God they can expect “times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.” And because of Jesus they can anticipate “the time of universal restoration.” In his own way, Peter is telling them “don’t miss the starting gun!” He wants them to experience all the moments and the eternity that God has prepared for them.

I hope we get to spend time together this Sunday at North Lake. And I look forward to sharing forever with you, refreshed and beloved in His presence.

Blessings,

Jeff

PERFECT HEALTH

Perfect health … what is that?

The last time I was reading Acts 3 devotionally this phrase perfect health jumped out at me.

“And by faith in his name, his name itself has made this man strong, whom you see and know; and the faith that is through Jesus has given him this perfect health in the presence of all of you.”    Acts 3:16 (NRSV)

Maybe it caught my eye because of all the rancorous debate about healthcare in our country. Or maybe I noticed it because as a pastor I’m aware we have hundreds of health-related prayer requests within our congregation. Or maybe I underlined perfect health because my joints and waistline are daily reminders that I’m not in perfect shape myself.

Peter used the phrase perfect health (in Greek it’s holoklería, a compound word that means “whole in every part”) to describe the lame beggar who had been raised to walk and leap about, praising God. In the aftermath Peter was explaining the wondrous healing to the astonished Jews at the temple. The source of the miracle certainly wasn’t our power and piety, he said of John and himself. Such perfect health was only possible in the name of Jesus.

For years we’ve heard about the advantages and the failures of Obamacare. Currently our national legislators are locking horns over the future of healthcare and what many are already referring to as Trumpcare. I’m not going to raise my voice or head in the middle of that fray. Anyway, I’m a proponent of Jesuscare, which sets perfect health as the standard. I want you to sign up for Jesuscare; and I promise, “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.”

You can read more about it in Acts chapter 3, specifically the testimonial in verses 11-16. Jesuscare is named for the “Author of life” who himself was raised from the dead. That’s a pretty good starting point for a health care system!

I hope to see you this Sunday at North Lake. Or you can catch the message next week at our website – northlakepc.org. In the meantime, in the name of Jesus Christ may you experience what it means to be whole in every part!

Blessings,

Jeff

Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer

“Come to the Beautiful Gate”

Maybe you heard about the call that went out over the walkie-talkie: “Can we have some underwear to court 18?”

It was another underwear violation last week at the Wimbledon tennis tournament with an all-white dress code. Tournament supervisors had to intervene at least twice to insist that players change their underwear before proceeding with their tennis matches. No hint of dark or colorful undergarments is permitted on the stately, dignified lawn tennis courts of the All-England Club in Wimbledon, London.

The traditional dress code dates back well over a century.  Historically it was even more stringent, as the photo of the 1908 women’s finals shows. How could they even move in those outfits, competing for a tennis championship? When American Gussie Moran scandalized Wimbledon in 1949, showing up in a new designer tennis outfit with a shorter skirt and lace visible around her thighs, the All-England Club officials accused her of “bringing vulgarity and sin into tennis.”

Once we humans have decided our standard of good and right, we are typically reluctant to tolerate violations or exceptions. When we deem something truly beautiful and noble, we don’t want anything to tarnish or diminish its beauty.

First century Jews had their magnificent temple in Jerusalem, the house of the Lord built by the unscrupulous King Herod. Of course he was welcome at the temple regardless of his villainy. Royalty had its privileges. But anyone lame—basically anyone with a physical disability or obvious blemish—was not allowed to enter the temple. It would have been a violation.

Some persons with apparent defects would get as close as possible, hoping to beg from the worshippers entering for daily prayer. One advantageous location for beggars was on the steps outside the gate called Beautiful. What a notable and sad contrast: the elegant, colossal bronze gate that opened to the holy ground of the Jewish faith … and the steps littered with deformed, helpless, impoverished souls.

That was the scene for Acts 3:1-10 where Peter and John accomplished the healing of a lame beggar. In the name of Jesus Christ and by the hand of Peter, God did something truly beautiful at that gate. This Sunday at North Lake Presbyterian Church I invite you to “Come to the Beautiful Gate” with me. And you don’t need to worry about the dress code!

Blessings,

Jeff

Dr. Jeffrey A. Hosmer