A popluar hymn declares:
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I’m come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
Have you ever wondered what an Ebenezer might be? In this sermon preached on Sunday, October 25th, Dr. Green explains the origins of that term, and what it means for us.
Will Rogers once said, “I never met a man I didn’t like.” I have never met anyone from whom I could not learn something. Everyone has a story, and I enjoy hearing them. Especially when the story speaks—explicitly or implicitly, of the faithfulness of God.
I
While I was in seminary, I met Jeb Stuart McGruder of Watergate fame. He was the first of Nixon’s White House Staff to give in to pressure from the Justice Department. We were in a class that was studying the Gospel of John. One day the professor, Dr. Donald Juel, noted the antagonism of the 4th Gospel toward a people it calls “the Jews.” He told us that we could not understand John’s anger at the Jews, because unlike him we had never been a part of a small little group hounded and persecuted by a larger majority in the society it shared with them. Jeb McGruder spoke up and said, “Speak for yourself, Dr. Juel.” Once I asked Jeb how he became interested in the ministry. He said it was all by grace. Jeb went on to become a prominent Presbyterian Pastor.
While the associate pastor of the Little Church on the Lane in Charlotte, N.C., I met a man named Charles T_____. He lived in the YMCA, and the senior pastor assigned me to visit him. I knocked on his door, already dismayed by the smell of dirty sweat socks that wafted up from the gym below. I went in expecting to be out of there in 15 minutes. I stayed two hours. Mr. T____ was a retired army officer. In the course of my visit I saw his framed decorations—a Soldier’s Medal and a Silver Star. The Soldier’s Medal is given for heroic service in time of peace. I asked him what he got his for. He said, “Well, I received the Soldier’s Medal for being the first man to jump with a nylon parachute.” He went on to tell how they asked for three volunteers to test new parachutes that would be used to replace the old silk parachutes and promised a Soldier’s Medal and a weekend pass. He got to the airfield and they had three chutes, red, white and blue. He chose white—which turned out to be pure nylon. The man with red chute, which was pure rayon, jumped to his death. The man with the blue chute, a blend of rayon and nylon, broke both his legs. T_____ floated gently to the earth, and started his weekend pass. He may have been lying, but he had a Soldier’s Medal and that was not lie. I then asked him about the Silver Star. He said he won it while serving with General McAuliff at the battle of the Bulge.” He asked me if I knew McAuliff’s response to the German demand for surrender. I said, “Sure, he said ‘Nuts!” T_____responded, “Well, that is what the papers said, and McAuliff said that—he did not use profanity, but, when he made that answer, I told him that the Germans would just think he was offering them something to eat. I asked if I could interpret freely. He said ‘Yes.’ I suggested we just tell them to go straight to the place where it never freezes!” Charles T_____ survived the Battle of the Bulge as a Top Sgt., and Korea as a Captain. A Moravian by birth, and a Christian by choice, on that day at the YMCA, he gave God credit for being with him every step of the way.
In 1 Samuel, we read how the Philistines had defeated Israel, and taken the Ark of the Covenant into captivity. Hophni and Phinehas, the sons of Eli who had judged Israel for forty years, were both killed. When Eli heard of it, he fell over dead. The wife of Phinehas gave birth to a son and named him, “Ichabod,” meaning “the Glory of the Lord has departed.” Yet the Ark did not bring the Philistines the good luck they hoped for. One day they set it up at Ashdod next to Dagon, their God. The next morning the priest came in to discover that the idol of Dagon had fallen against the threshold and smashed to pieces. They learned what the Hebrews already knew, “the LORD our God is a jealous God.” After that the people experienced a plague of rats and tumors. Finally, one of their holy men decided it would be good to send the Ark of the Covenant back to Israel. They tried to make amends to change their luck. They filled the Ark of the Covenant with 5 golden replicas of the mice and the 5 golden replicas of the tumors, put it on a cart pulled by two milk cows, and pointed the cattle toward Israel. There were some adventures along the way. It was after the Ark was back that the people of Israel repented and put away the Baals and Ashtaroth that Samuel performed a sacrifice. Then he took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Jeshanah, and called the name of the stone “Ebenezer,” for he said, “Hitherto the Lord has helped me.”
Virtually every Christian I have ever known can echo that responses, “Hitherto the Lord has helped me.”
One of the great hymns of the faith echoes these words:
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I’m come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
I once heard Robert Schuler describe this life as a series of peaks and valleys. He said that when we are on the peaks, it is our right and our duty to stop, look around, enjoy the view, and praise God for getting us there. He said that when we are in the valleys, it is our right and duty to pray that God will get us through the valley, and back up on a peak. He said that we must look through the valleys, and fix our eyes upon a peak. He said that this is the only decent way to live. He called it “the peak to peak principle.”
If you are on a peak, then thank God for it. You are standing on the rock. Name it “Ebenezer” and confess, “Hitherto the Lord has helped me.” And if you are in a valley? Well, look to the next peak, and ask God to help you through the valley.
II
This is exactly what Jeremiah did. In Jeremiah 31, we read how the people of Israel were taken off as captives to Babylon. Jeremiah despaired of Israel’s suffering, and the book of Lamentations is a record of it. Jeremiah did not give up hope. He looked forward to a day when God would gather his people from the farthest parts of the earth, including the blind who could not see the way for themselves and lame who could not walk it without help, and the woman who had already started her labor. He said a great company of them would, with the help of God, return to Jerusalem and to the Promised Land. Jeremiah said that God would lead them back by brooks of water along a straight path in which they would not stumble. He said that God would do this because God was like a father to Israel, and the people were his first born. He promised the people in captivity that they would return to their homes with tears of joy.
Now suppose that we are having a difficult time. We must consider what Jeremiah already knows.
First, we must consider that God loves us as children. Jesus taught his disciples to pray, “Our Father, who art in heaven.” He told them that God knows what we need even before we ask. He told his disciples that even though two sparrows were sold for a penny, God was aware of the fall of each. He said, “Listen, if God so cares for sparrows, how much more does God care for you.” In Romans 8, St. Paul said:
When we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16 it is the Spirit himself bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.
Second, we must have the faith to believe that beyond the valley there is another peak. The New Testament teaches that God delivers us in two ways. Sometimes God delivers us from our trials. In 2nd Corinthians 4, St. Paul describes a time when he was so utterly, unbearably crushed that he despaired of life itself. He felt he had received the sentence of death. He said, “This was to make us rely on God who raises the dead.” Sometimes God delivers us from our trials, but more often God delivers us through our trials. In 2nd Corinthians 11, the same apostle writes:
24 Five times I have received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. 25 Three times I have been beaten with rods; once I was stoned. Three times I have been shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been adrift at sea; 26 on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brethren; 27 in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. 28 And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure upon me of my anxiety for all the churches. 29 Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?
The encouraging thing about this formidable list of trials is that Paul lived to write of them! One valley is not the end. There are other peaks to come.
It is when God delivers us through our trials that we set up the Ebenezer stone and confess with conviction, “Hitherto God has helped me.”
Third, we must have faith that the way is straight, and as easy as God can make it. Sometimes we make it hard for God to make it easy. Most of the obstacles in our path are of our own making. Let me say that again. Most of the obstacles in our path are of our own making. When we have gone astray, and followed the wrong path, and then repent, before we can get back on the path that God would have chosen for us in the first place, we often have to retrace our steps over the obstacles in the path of disobedience that we have chosen for ourselves. Remember, “Forgiveness is primarily a restoration of our relationship with God, not a remission of penalty.” Remember, we can escape the hardships we bring upon ourselves, but only if we face them, and negotiate them.
Fourth, we must have the faith that though the journey may be long, God will refresh us along the way. Jeremiah says that God will lead us by “brooks of water.” The Author of the Twenty-Third Psalm declares, “(God) will lead us by still waters.” In John chapter 4, Jesus told the woman at the well that those who believe in him would have a spring of living water in them, welling up to eternal life. The author of the Revelation invites us to expect the refreshment. In Revelation 22, he writes, “And the Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come.’ And let him who hears say, ‘Come,’ and let him who is thirsty, come, and take of the water of life without price. “ The refreshment is waiting for us, but often we must “come” and claim it. When we remain in disobedience, it is far from us. When we return to God then we find refreshment.
If we are in the valley, we must our eyes on the hills. We must look for the next peak, and look for God to get us there. Above all, we must not give up and we must not despair. I used to have in my study two black & white prints that were given to me by Bishop Spaugh. In the first, Daniel is in the lions den. He is looking at the lions and they are licking their chops. He is about to be supper. In the second Daniel, is looking out of the window of his dungeon cell. He is looking up, up to the sunlight, up to the mountaintop, up to God. The lions have forgotten about him, they are licking their paws and cleaning their coats. When in the valley, keep your eyes focused on the peaks. When in the lions den, don’t look at the lions, look to the God who closes the mouths of lions.
Just the week I visited with one of my heroes. I will just call him Bubba. He was in the hospital dying of cancer, but he was glad to see me. I reminded him that he was a 7th grader at South Park when I was in the 6th grade. I reminded him of several incidents from his youth.
One day an 8th grader said that he could whip anyone in the 7th grade. “Bubba stepped forward and said, “I don’t think you can.” Bubba was right. He whipped that bully fair and square. On another occasion, his cousin used profanity in front of a girl. Bubba told him that was not right, and he watched as his cousin “voluntarily” washed out his mouth with soap.
Don’t get the impression that Bubba was a bully, far from it. He was always taking up for the little guy, and enforcing justice, and I was grateful for him. On several occasions he looked after me, even though I was a P.K., a preacher’s kid. His wife was present as we relived those stories and said, “He has not changed. He has looked after the little guy all life, always standing up to bullies.”
When I had told the stories, I told Bubba I wanted to pray for him. Just before I prayed, I said, “You are still a believer.” He said, “Yes!”, and his faith was as obvious as his courage The next time I went to see him, he was not conscious, but as long as he was, he was unafraid, undiminished, still battling.
Here I raise my Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I’m come;
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
I don’t know where you are in life, on a peak or in a valley. Remember the peak-to- peak principle. Remember that God is still able to deliver us from our difficulties and through them. Remember that the same power that took Jesus Christ out of the grave is available to us today, not Just in the moment of death, but in the midst of life. We live (and die) in a future that is coming from him. Which of us cannot say, “Hitherto the Lord has helped me?” Which of us would want to face a world in which Help from the Lord was unavailable?
Finis