Lectionary 24; September 16, 2007; Bethel Lutheran, Rochester.
1 Timothy 1:12-17.

Dear Friends in Christ, Grace to you and Peace, from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ. AMEN.

Almost three years ago I received an identical story from two people at Bethel. You may have seen it. It is called “Daddy’s Empty Chair”. Perhaps it is even more meaningful to me because it involves a daughter and a father, and one of the people who sent me the story was my daughter. The story goes like this:

A man’s daughter had asked the local pastor to come and pray with her father. When the pastor arrived, he found the man lying in bed with his head propped up on two pillows. An empty chair sat beside his bed. The pastor assumed that the old fellow had been informed of his visit. “I guess you were expecting me,” he said. “No,” said the father, “who are you?” The pastor told him his name and then remarked, “I saw the empty chair and I figured you knew I was going to show up.” “Oh, yeah, the chair,” said the bedridden man.

“Would you mind closing the door?” Puzzled, the pastor shut the door. “I have never told anyone this, not even my daughter,” said the man. “But all of my life I have never known how to pray. At church I used to hear the pastor talk about prayer, but it went right over my head. I abandoned any attempt at prayer until one day four years ago my best friend said to me, `Johnny, prayer is just a simple matter of having a conversation with Jesus. Here is what I suggest. Sit down in a chair; place an empty chair in front of you, and in faith see Jesus on the chair. It's not spooky because he promised, “I will be with you always”. Then just speak to him in the same way you're doing with me right now.’

"So, I tried it and I've liked it so much that I do it a couple of hours every day. I'm careful though. If my daughter saw me talking to an empty chair, she'd either have a nervous breakdown or send me off to the funny farm."

The pastor was deeply moved by the story and encouraged the old man to continue on the journey. Then he prayed with him, anointed him with oil, and returned to the church.

Two nights later the daughter called to tell the pastor that her daddy had died that afternoon. “Did he die in peace?" he asked. “Yes,” the daughter replied, “when I left the house about two o'clock, he called me over to his bedside, told me he loved me and kissed me on the cheek. When I got back from the store an hour later, I found him dead. But there was something strange about his death. Apparently, just before Daddy died, he leaned over and rested his head on the chair beside the bed. What do you make of that?"

The pastor wiped a tear from his eye and said, "I wish we could all go like that."

I wish we could all go like that. I wish we could all live like that! The man felt some need, some duty to pray. He had heard about it all his life. And it was a visit from a friend, a word from a friend that unlocked the grace of Christ for him. An empty chair was a visible presence of the fact that Christ was right in the room with him. An empty chair provided the lap of Christ in his death.

For a long time a man named Saul had no appreciation for the presence of Christ in his life. That is an understatement! He did all that he could to eliminate those who professed the presence of Christ—he calls himself a blasphemer, a persecutor, a man of violence. Yet the grace of Christ overwhelmed his human unworthiness. It was Christ who judged Saul-become-Paul faithful. Christ strengthened him. And then Christ assigned him his duties.

Last week at Bethel we heard the call to duty. Today we hear the source of strength for that duty—the grace of Christ. While we might be moved to humanitarian acts without faith in Christ, it is clear that faith in Christ moves us to be of service to others. A good place to start is Matthew 25 in which we find some of our duties. We are to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit those in prison, welcome the stranger, care for the sick. Those are not some optional exercises. They are commands.

Three weeks ago a Catholic priest left his parish in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, after 19 years—a particularly long time for a priest to be assigned to one place. But the parish of St. Thomas served well under his leadership. Rev. David Beaudry says that he just got on the chariot and let God drive. In a farewell letter to the parish, Beaudry wrote, "What the people of St. Thomas are renown for is love: not programs, but sharing our hearts with the world humbly and quietly. We are becoming the Christ we proclaim, the Holy Spirit breathing through our hearts of love."

There is the grace of Christ. It is the Holy Spirit breathing love into our hearts. It is a love that we then share with others. It is great to have fine programs, and we are so blessed in this congregation. But, to paraphrase the love chapter out of First Corinthians, we could have all the programs in the world, but if we have not love, we are nothing.

In a former church I served, every fall the men would get together one Saturday and do an immense amount of work around the church building and the adjoining church cemetery. We weren’t the most careful of crews, but we got things done, and we didn’t get too many complaints about how we butchered the bushes or the flower beds.

Every year I would try to work alongside different men and have conversations with them. Ordinarily I would ask something like, “Why do you show up to do something like this?” Some of the answers expressed pride in the grounds like, “This is my church. We need to do what we can to keep it looking good.” Some tried to be humorous: “Do you know my wife?” Quite a few would say without humor, “Well, somebody has to do it.” I will always remember the answer of one man. He said, “I was baptized, confirmed, and married in this church. I have seen my kids and my grandkids in the Christmas programs here. I don’t know any other church. Look across the cemetery—the trees, the beautiful countryside. Look at the wonderful church building God has given to us. We are really blessed. How could I not show up and thank Jesus for all he has done?”

All the men came. Some were just doing their duty. At least one was doing his duty in the grace of Christ. It is the smile of that man I will remember. While he was holding a rake in his hand, I could almost see Jesus standing next to him with another rake.

This Christian duty is not for the faint of heart. It is for the full of heart—a heart full of grace in Christ. AMEN.