Date: November 19, 2023 

Scripture: Deuteronomy 8:7-18

Sermon Title: “Remember Your God”

Preacher: Rev. Dr. Bob Jon

You can also listen on Podcast from iTunes and Spotify. Search for “Podcasting from Rev. Bob Jon.”

Catherine Jones is a woman from Kerrville, Texas. She shares a story about her four-year-old son, who says the blessing at mealtimes. She thought his prayers tended to be short and repetitive. He says, “Thank you, God, for this gracious food. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.” One evening, her son thanked the Lord for the birds, the trees, and mentioning all his friends’ names. He asked God to watch over his family and help them to be good. Catherine was excited that her son was praying from his heart. However, after the Amen, he took a spoon, tasted the stew, and dropped the spoon into the bowl. “I should have said a longer prayer. My food is still too hot!”^[1]

Thanksgiving Day is around the corner. I went to Market Basket yesterday to get the two turkeys that I signed up for Thanksgiving baskets. The store was much busier than the ordinary time because people were shopping for Thanksgiving dinner. As someone who immigrated from Korea, Thanksgiving Day still feels foreign to me. Sometimes, I want to skip the hard part, not cooking extensively. So, I asked my two boys, “Hey, Daniel and Joshua. What would you like for the Thanksgiving Dinner? Do you want us to cook some turkey or chicken? We will definitively make some baked mac n cheese.” I was hoping to hear “chicken!” But they both said, “We want a turkey!” 

I know that it is a time to eat a lot. Take a nap. And eat a lot. And take another nap. For some of us, it is a wonderful time to welcome back our children from college and hear how they are enjoying their studies and friendships. For some of us, Black Friday may sound more enticing, as many people stand in line to get the most desired items at a discounted price. For most of us, although it is getting freezing cold outside, we have a house to stay warm. We will be joined by our family or friends at the dinner place while the fireplace and abundant meal warm our bodies. We can call it a “blessing” that we get to enjoy all these. But God tells us to remember and give thanks to God first. 

When the Israelites were preparing to enter the Promised Land, God gave all the commandments as a sign of God’s covenant with them. You stay faithful to me. And I will stay faithful to you. And in our reading from today, God warns God’s people not to forget God, especially in a time of prosperity. “When you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them, and all that you have is multiplied, then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Do not say to yourself, “My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth. But remember the Lord your God, for it is God who gives you power to get wealth” (v.12-14).

I remember coming to the U.S. in early January 2004. I arrived at Boston Logan Airport with two luggage. That was all I had. I was put into a dormitory to share a room with a guy from New Jersey who was homesick. I cannot remember how many nights I slept less than 2 or 3 hours because I just could not catch up with the reading assignments for each class. As I look back, I feel like I have accomplished a lot. I am an ordained pastor in the UMC. I have my education. I am pastoring at a wonderful congregation at Aldersgate while teaching a class at Yale. As I could be impressed with what I have achieved, God is laughing, “So, you think you have accomplished these because you are smart?” 

But that is exactly our culture. We credit all our privileges to ourselves because many of us have worked hard at it. I am sure that many of you worked very hard to get the job you have today. You worked very hard to earn the promotion. You worked very hard days and nights to get the pension after your retirement. You worked very hard to put your children through education so they can go out and get the jobs they want. You worked very hard to maintain good health, lose weight, watch what you eat, and make sure that you get the rest and go on a vacation. In our consumerist culture, we earn what we work for. Our work, intelligence, and personality have gotten us what we enjoy today. 

However, our relationship with God is based on gratitude that all the things we enjoy today come as a gift from God, who blesses us abundantly so we can bless God and our neighbors abundantly. This is why we sing when we collect the offering to be brought to God, “Praise God, from who all blessings flow; Praise Him, all creatures here below, Praise Him above, ye heavenly host; Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.” God is God who gave us good health so we can enjoy our work, our family, and our retirement. God is God who led you to meet your spouse sitting next to you and make a family. God is God who gave you wisdom and faith in times of challenges and difficulties. Do not forget God. 

In his book The Gratitude Path, Bishop Kent Millard shares a story about his father, who wrestled with addiction. As a kid, he always moved from place to place because his father drank, missed work for a week, and got fired. His drinking problem was also destroying his marriage and his family. Eventually, they moved to South Dakota. There was only one bar in their town, a municipal bar owned by the city. The bartender was the only employee, and he happened to be the sheriff. So, he would sell alcohol to people until they got drunk and arrest them for public intoxication. He would put them in the jail attached to the bar. They had to pay a fine to get out of jail which was a great fundraising for the town. 

One day, Bishop Millard’s father got drunk and arrested. His mother came and paid the bail money. He would promise not to do it again, but this would happen repeatedly. One night, the bartender/sheriff decided not to put him in jail but to take him to an AA meeting. As the first rule of the meeting, he was encouraged to admit that he had no power to control his drinking problem. “Believe there is a power that can save us from this addiction.” Millard’s father could not believe it at first. But later, he fell to his knees and cried out, “God, if you are real, save me because I cannot save myself.” And something happened to him. He became sober, never to drink again. He told his family that he wanted to go to church the following Sunday. When Millard asked him, “Why?” he said, “Because we need to thank God.”

Remembering God with gratitude helps us realize that we do not own anything in a true sense, as David sings in Psalm 24, “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it.” I went to Rolling Ridge Retreat Center in Andover a couple of weeks ago. The director is Rev. Larry Jay. In the middle of dinner, he rang the bell and said these words. “Before the Earth beneath our feet was called Rolling Ridge, before there was the Commonwealth of MA, generations of Pennacook people, an Algonquians-speaking tribe of the Wanamaker Confederacy, belonged to this land and considered it their home. Today, we give thanks for their care and stewardship of this land.” Before we call this place our home, we remember this was someone’s home and will be another person’s home. 

Remembering God is also ethical in that God we worship is God who remembers the poor and disinherited. In Deuteronomy 24, God also gives another commandment. “When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it; it shall be left for the alien, the orphan, and the widow, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all your undertakings.” While many people are busy shopping for Thanksgiving, I give thanks to God for Aldersgate that we remember those who struggle financially and offer them food this day. We honor God by remembering those who are forgotten. We are blessed by God, who calls us to be a blessing to others. 

Remember your God. Giving thanks to God is not contingent on our circumstances. Instead, we always give thanks to God as Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5:16. “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, and give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” There was a pastor named Martin Rinkart in Germany in the 17^th century. He was pastor to a Lutheran congregation in the walled city of Eilenburg, Germany, during the Thirty Years War. Eilenburg was a city of refuge for political and military fugitives, which meant it became severely overcrowded and experienced deadly pestilence, poverty, and famine. Armies came and overran it three times. 

Although Pastor Rinkart did not have enough for his own family, he opened his home to provide food and shelter to countless people in need. In 1637, the people of Eilenburg experienced a severe plague and as the only surviving pastor in the city, Rinkart conducted as many as fifty funerals a day for those who died during the plague. Even Pastor Rinkart’s wife died of the plague, and he conducted her funeral. And he wrote a song for his children to sing at the dinner table in gratitude. 

“Now thank we all our God,

with heart and hands and voices.

Who wonderful things has done,

in whom this world rejoices:

Who from our mother’s arms

Has blessed us on our way

With countless gifts of love;

And still is ours today.

Tired and worn, Rinkart died in 1649, one year after the war ended. But it is said that there is no other song that is sung in Lutheran churches more often than what Pastor Rinkart has left behind. And his gratitude for God was unconditional, as the love of God for us through Christ is unconditional. 

Dearly beloved, this week is a season of blessing and abundance. As many of us would be busy hosting our friends, cooking dinner, and shopping, we stop and remember God, who is the source of our life and blessing. Some of us might be going through some personal challenges, our health, our family situation, our job. Some of us might be disturbed by what is happening in our world today, especially the conflict in Israel and Palestine, Russia and Ukraine. But through all these, we still give thanks to God finding reasons to be grateful because at the end of the day, God is the One who owns and rules, not the political leaders or military powers. And God is the One who shows God’s unconditional love for us. 

Amen.

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^[1] Catherine Jones, Kerrville, Texas, Christian Reader, “Kids of the Kingdom”