The Big Rock

When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” And they cast lots to divide his clothing. And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!” The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying, “If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!” There was also an inscription over him, “This is the King of the Jews.”

One of the criminals who were hanged there kept deriding him and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed have been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” He replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”

That’s what that children’s message illustration of a few minutes ago was all about. We came to the conclusion that if we don’t put the big rocks in the bucket first, and we filled the bucket with water, or sand or even gravelly little rocks first, we won’t have room for the big rocks.

If we don't put the big rocks in first, we'll never get them in at all. Or, to put it another way, "The Main Thing is to Make the Main Thing the Main Thing."

What are the main things or the "Big Rocks," or the priorities of our lives? What are the big rocks in your life? A project that YOU want to accomplish? Spending time with your loved ones? Returning to your education? Straightening out your finances? Your devotion to a particular cause? Teaching or mentoring others? This illustration of the Rocks, the gravel, the sand and the water, Reminds us to put these big rocks in first or we'll never get them in at all.

The New Yorker[1] magazine once told the story of Kirk Bains, a driven executive who came to see in the course of his fight with cancer that perhaps he had not done too well at setting priorities, focusing on the main thing, getting the big rocks in first.

He had lived for "the deal." And he had been so successful because he was able to know when to get in quick, ahead of everyone else, and when to get out. "There's a difference between what I do and what you do," he told his interviewer. "I couldn't care less about the product ... It can be oil or platinum or software or widgets. It's all a shell game played for big money, and once I win enough, I wave goodbye."

That approach spilled over into his personal life one day. "Are you affiliated with a church?" the doctor asked. "Episcopalian," he said. "I celebrate Christmas ... the music ... giving gifts. That's fun. But the religion - I can't put much stock in it."

Bains went on to say more. "Let me put it in my own terms. I'm not a long-term investor. I like quick returns. I don't believe in working for dividends paid only in heaven."

Kirk Bains signed on to be made a guinea pig in a high-risk experimental treatment. For a few months the treatment seemed to work, but then the cancer came back, and the end drew near. And as it did, Bains came to question his life.

He had always read newspapers, he said, but for him they meant nothing but information for deals. "I never really cared about the world's events or its people," he says. "I had no interest in creating something - not a product or a partnership with a person. And now I have no [spiritual] equity. No dividends coming in. Nothing to show in my portfolio." And he comes to see, "I was a self-absorbed, uncaring [jerk]."

So much in life is about deciding about the big rocks and the little rocks. As we do so, we must decide as well about the biggest rock of all, the rock that needs to go in first, Jesus Christ, the Rock of Ages.

If the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing, then what is the "main thing"?

-The "main thing" is that Jesus Christ died on the cross for our sins.

-The "main thing" is that God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, beating death down forever.

-The "main thing" is that the human struggle entails suffering. Period. Struggle for justice? You'll suffer. Struggle for peace? You'll suffer. Struggle for truth? You'll suffer.

-But the "main thing" is also that you'll not suffer alone. God suffers along with you.

-The "main thing" is that if God be for us, who can be against us?

-The "main thing" is that we are never alone, for there is no place in the universe we can go, there is no sin that we can commit, that will put us out of reach of the grace of Christ's sacrifice, the gift of God's love.

- The main thing is that even as we are never alone with Christ, we then can never really be alone as long as there are other Christians in the world as well. Called by these truths, these main things, we are one in the church, in the body of Christ and made one global people, one global community of believers, brothers and sisters.

These are the really "big rocks." All the rest is filler.

Is the Big Rock of our lives the Rock of Ages?

Jesus Christ - insulted, mocked, sneered at, beaten, ridiculed, falsely accused, betrayed and abandoned and finally, murdered - is the Big Rock and the First Rock.

On Thanksgiving Sunday, we are bound to think of one more big rock. In Plymouth, Mass, pretty close to the home and origin of the very first Thanksgiving, there are two UCC churches, two congregational churches: The Church of the Pilgrimage and the Second Church of Plymouth, UCC.

However, there are also Plymouth Congregational Churches in Belmont, MA; Seattle, WA; Minneapolis, MN; Lincoln, NE; Racine, WI; Des Moines, Iowa; Grand Rapids, Michigan; Syracuse NY; Oshkosh, WI; and San Diego, CA.

Each of these churches is named after another big rock, the Plymouth Rock, or at least the pilgrim experience that has made Plymouth rock famous.

You see the pilgrims were just folks who were trying to get the big rocks into their bucket first. They were just folks who were trying to get their priorities straight.

In the first years of the 17th century, small numbers of English Puritans broke away from the Church of England because they felt that it had not completed the work of the Reformation. They committed themselves to a life based on the Bible. Most of these Separatists were farmers, poorly educated and without social or political standing. And they found that if they wanted to live according to their newly reprioritized way of life, they would need to leave their ancestral homelands and find a new place to live out their new way. So they came to the New World, they came to Plymouth and the legend of the Plymouth rock. They came to this new world to begin a new world set in these new priorities and legend says that as they did, they first stepped upon this big rock. Now if you go to Plymouth, Massachusetts, you can see this rock, surrounded by tourists set in a special spot on the seashore. You can see this testament to folks who wanted to prioritize their lives, based on the main thing, the big rock, the rock of ages, Jesus Christ and our Creator above.

Jesus himself had opportunities on numerous occasions to choose what he wanted to do with his life, what he wanted to be, he too chose the big rock.

In Chapter 23 of the Gospel of Luke from which we have read this morning, we hear the voice of the soldiers who tortured him and “also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine,” They say to him, “If you are the King, save yourself!”

He could have saved himself. Jesus could have chosen to “save himself” as the soldiers had taunted him to do, but he had come to save others. His mission, his purpose to become flesh and walk among humans was to create and reestablish the relationship between the creator and the created. He was here not to save himself but to save those whom he loved. And that was his big rock, that was his big decision, his priority, main thing.

George Buttrick one of the most respected of 20th-century preachers tells in one of his favorite stories, of coming one day upon a farmer who had just rescued a lost sheep. When Buttrick asked how the sheep got lost, the farmer replied, "They just nibble themselves lost." They go, he explained, from one tuft of grass to another, until at last they've lost their way.

That's what happens in life, isn't it? Unless we make judgments, discernments and decisions about what are the big rocks, the pebbles, the sand and the water, we nibble away at life until it's gone and we have no idea where it went.

Jesus made decisions that cost him his life but that helped him accomplish the mission for which he came to us all became incarnate and walked this earth.

Each Pilgrims who came set foot on Plymouth rock, who sat with the natives and celebrated a thanksgiving feast, had made a decision to come to the new world for new opportunities and a new life of faith.

What big decisions have we made? What big rocks have we laid as the foundation for our lives?

Thanksgiving is a time for another important priority and a time to be with those whom most folks claim are our most treasured priorities, our largest rocks, our families and friends, I pray that we can take a clearer look, and again find the rest of our most treasured priorities and place them first into the bucket, give them the most foundational spot, the most privileged and valued spot and make of our lives what we truly want to make them and live them how God has intended us to live them. Amen.