• A friend texted a reminder that the Seahawks’ game begins at noon on Sunday, and could we finish worship a bit early this week? Let’s explore that idea.
• I often wonder if people who wear Seahawks jerseys in worship reciprocate by making some bold demonstration of their faith in Christ at the office? I suspect not. I suspect, rather, that they live by the unspoken and unseen assumption that (in Augustine’s language) they are living not in the “City of God” but in the “City of Man.” And it’s the latter of those two that defines both their passions and what they take to be “normal.”
• Interestingly enough, Augustine wrote the City of God when the Roman Empire was in rapid decline. He was mostly untroubled. He saw Rome as emblematic of the perishable kingdom of this world and he knew, inevitably, that kingdom would be displaced by the imperishable Kingdom of God.
• Historian Phillip Schaff, describing Augustine’s view, speaks of “the supernatural city of God, founded upon a rock, coming forth renovated and strengthened from all the storms and revolutions of time, breathing into wasting humanity an imperishable divine life, and entering at last, after the completion of this earthly work, into the sabbath of eternity, where believers shall rest and see, see and love, love and praise, without end” (Schaff v.III, 87).
• And God himself says, “here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come. Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name” (Heb 13:14).
• Each Sunday we declare ourselves citizens of that city which is to come and “offer up a sacrifice of praise to God” which is “the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.” If you want to rush home and acknowledge the name of Richard Sherman as your practical emotional messiah, well, I won’t stop you. But I would urge you to read Schaff’s description again. If it doesn’t stir you, it’s time for some honest questions: what the heck are you really looking for? Where does hope come from? What is that longing inside you that is unfulfilled? And how on earth (I mean this seriously) did a boys game with a ball get to be a multi-billion-dollar industry controlling the passions of millions?
• And another friend would like to add, when the chubby man on the sidelines throws his headset to the ground in disgust, someone needs to tell him to grow up.
– Pastor Eric