“LONG-TERM INSURANCE”
Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany
January 31, 2016
Bethel Evangelical Lutheran Church
Glenshaw, Pennsylvania
TEXT:
Do not cast me off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my
strength is spent.
Psalm 71:9 (ESV)
At my last congregation there was a dear lady--one of our oldest
members--who would almost always say to me, whenever she greeted me
after the service or at meetings: “Pastor, whatever you do, don’t
ever get old.” In reply, I would just smile and say: “Well, the only
alternative to that is to die young, and nobody seems to be too
excited about that option.” Since then that “advice”--“Don’t ever get
old”--has been repeated to me many times by a number of elderly
people, but I’ve tempered my reply a bit through the years. Now I
typically respond by saying: “I don’t know anybody who’s getting
young.” It is truly amazing how fast the years go by and especially
how those years seem to go by even faster the older we get. It is
difficult for me, at times, to process the fact that my parents would
both be turning 104 years old this year or that when I was my son’s
age, I had already been a pastor for three years.
The appointed psalm for this day is the prayer of an elderly child of
God who is struggling with old age and everything that comes with it.
The author is not identified in Scripture but, because this psalm is
so closely related to the one that precedes it (which was written by
David) and because it uses so many words and expressions and even
entire verses from several other psalms of David, many Biblical
scholars have speculated that it was written by David in his old age,
when he was beset with the mockery of various enemies who saw the
king’s weakness and frailty as indications that the God in whom he had
trusted for so many years had now abandoned him, making him vulnerable
to their attacks. As we examine the psalmist’s prayer before us (and
as we continue to age by the minute), we will reflect this morning on
two petitions in particular that appear in this verse.
First, the psalmist prays to the Lord: “Do not cast me off in the
time of old age.” Our current “culture of death,” as it is often
called, is pretty good at casting off the elderly, pre-born infants,
and anyone else whose life is deemed to be less than what the powers
that be think it ought to be. There was a time when the very idea of
deliberately terminating a human life was repulsive in our society,
but those days are long gone. What the psalmist is experiencing in
this verse is what many people experience today: the feeling of
loneliness that sets in when a person is given the impression that he
or she doesn’t matter anymore--that no one cares. And when a person
gets that impression that no one cares anymore, he or she begins to
wonder whether or not God cares. The enemies that the psalmist faced
were those who wanted to see his demise and rejoiced in his physical
and mental decline. The enemies that people face today are the
ailments and the overall declining health that make a person feel
utterly worthless.
But unlike so many people in our modern culture, our God never casts
anyone off. From the greatest to the least in human estimation, God
knows and values each and every human being. We read in another
psalm: “Where shall I go from Your Spirit? Or where shall I flee
from Your presence? If I ascend to heaven, You are there! If I make
my bed in Sheol, You are there! If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand
shall lead me and Your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely
the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,’ even
the darkness is not dark to You; the night is as bright as the day,
for darkness is as light with You” (Psalm 139:7-12). So much does the
Creator value each and every one of us that He became One of us,
permanently uniting Himself with our human nature, so that He might
redeem us from the curse of sin and reclaim us as His own. No matter
what we may think about ourselves or others, God values each and every
one of us enough to literally take our place and bear our burdens,
even to the point of suffering and dying for us.
The psalmist also prays: “Forsake me not when my strength is gone.”
The world places a lot of value on strength and it despises the weak.
Strength is idolized in our culture, while weakness is disparaged.
This is true not only of physical strength, but of political and
financial strength as well. I find it to be very interesting and
ironic, for example, that, in a country where we are constantly
hearing complaints about the rich getting money out of the poor, the
poor, on a regular basis, willingly give their money to the rich at
sporting events and at the movie box office--and they even fight over
who gets the opportunity to do it! Strength is seen as power--as the
ideal. Nobody aspires to be weak or poor or powerless. Why do sports
heroes and other celebrities retire? It is because as they age, they
lose their strength and, consequently, their ability to satisfy their
fans and thereby be an asset to the people who pay them. In a very
real sense, they are “forsak[en] . . . when [their] strength is gone.”
The Lord has an altogether different perspective when it comes to
strength and weakness. His greatest strength is manifested in what
the world sees as utter weakness. The God and Creator of heaven and
earth and everything in them becomes a helpless little Baby who is
born in poverty so extreme that His cradle is a feeding troth for
cattle. The King prophesied by the ancients marches into His holy
city not on a muscular white stallion surrounded by legions of armed
troops but riding on a humble jackass surrounded by His disorganized
and often inept little band of disciples. The One who came to conquer
sin and death did it not by demonstrating His divine power and glory
with a spectacular display of miracles, but by submitting to the
insults and torture of His enemies and by suffering and bleeding and
dying on a cross--the most humiliating method of execution ever
devised by man. This is what strength is to God and it is also what
strength is those who follow Him, as the apostle writes: “I will
boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of
Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content
with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities.
For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:8-10).
There are many uncertainties in life and these uncertainties become
more frequent and more difficult as time goes on. Aging and the loss
of strength can put us in an uncomfortable situation as we begin to
worry over what the future holds and whether or not we are of any
value to anyone anymore. But the comfort of the Gospel is that we are
and always will be valuable in the sight of God. He values us even to
the point of identifying with us and taking all of our burdens upon
Himself. He will never cast us off or forsake us. He has invested
His entire Being in us, redeeming us from sin and death in Christ and
making us His own by the power of His Holy Spirit. Because of what He
has done for us in the past we can rest assured that He will always be
there for us in the future as well, so that we can say with Ralph
Waldo Emerson: “All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for
all I have not seen.”
Amen.
May the God who caused light to shine out of darkness cause you to
increase and abound in love toward one another and toward all people,
as His love abounds for us; and may the glory of His Son be manifested
to you and in you, that you may be witnesses to all nations now and
until the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is
faithful, and He will do it. Amen.