"Sent Out"
a condensed version of the sermon delivered by Rev. Kirk Moore on M0ther's Day -- Sunday, May 13, 2007 at Union Congregational Church in Somonauk, Illinois.

PODCAST of "Sent Out."

This Morning's Scripture reading is:
Acts 16:9-15

Do you pay attention to your dreams? I have some strange ones. Sometimes I’m falling off my bicycle or off the side of a mountain I’m climbing. Other times I’m sitting in a peaceful meadow feeling the green-smelling breeze on my face. I know – those aren’t strange. The strange ones usually involve some scary voice or a horrific face that’s either threatening me in some way or challenging me to escape or defeat it. And then there are the dreams where animals turn into people and start talking or flowers start walking around and picking up seeds or everyone can fly except for me.

And when I wake up I usually sigh, thankful that the strangeness was only a dream and then I fall back asleep.

That’s not at all interesting, is it? Sure, you might go home and say, "Did you know our pastor sometimes dreams about scary and horrific faces and about animals talking?" to your friends, but I suspect we all have some strange dreams.

I can’t remember ever having a dream that inspired or guided me to do something, however. I didn’t have a vision about becoming a pastor. No visions or dreams that told me where to work or where to go on vacation or who to marry. I just have dreams. I don’t know what they mean. I guess I just identify them as movies only I get to see. I know other people experience dreams differently. That’s just how they work for me.

I think Paul had a different experience with dreams than I’ve had. He wasn’t the only person in the Bible who gained deeper understanding or experienced God’s guidance in dreams.

Today’s dream is Paul’s vision of the man from Macedonia. After having the dream, which followed an encounter that prevented them from travelling into Asia, Paul and friends were sent out to Europe. They traveled through Troas, Samothrace and Neapolis. (Say all those names 10 times fast you win a prize!) And then they came to Phillipi.

Without going too much deeper into this dream stuff, I think it’s interesting that Paul went to Macedonia. (It’s in southeast Europe) He didn’t want to (he was "prevented from") going to Asia and then had this dream of going to the place where Alexander the Great set out from 300 years earlier. Alexander went out to conquer the lands where now Paul had been. Now Paul was going back in peace to bring the good news of Jesus. Paul was like the anti- Alexander.

When Paul came to Phillipi, (The city developed by Philip, father of Alexander the Great) he and his team met Lydia – who would become the first Christian convert in Europe.

Lydia was from Thyatira. Thyatira was in the province of Lydia. How does that work? It’s possible that this passage really means that they met a "Lydian woman" who had another name. The province of Lydia was long known for its purple-dyers. More likely is that being called "Lydia" is related to the practice of referring to slaves as one from "a location" Lydia may have been a former slave. It’s clear now, however, that she’s in business.

Lydia loved God. Lydia ran a business. Lydia was the head of her household. She offered hospitality to strangers! She heard and believed. I think that after she and her household were baptized – they started telling people about what they’d experienced. Women, men, children – everyone started hearing about Jesus because of this extraordinary woman. When Paul was released from prison, he stayed again with Lydia. Lydia was sent out to the ones who had been sent out. They came to speak the good news. Lydia lived it!

Today’s scripture continues to speak about God’s love and welcome to those who are usually on the margins. It seems that no one told Lydia that running a business and a household was men’s work. It seems that no one told Lydia that men are the ones who get to be the ones who get all the recognition and leadership when it comes to following Jesus.

It seems as though the early Christians were continuing to learn that God’s neighborhood – everywhere – is for everyone.

The example of Lydia -- a worshipper, mother and businesswoman calls on us to do better. She reached out with hospitality to these strangers. I believe she followed Jesus call to love God and one another with the same fervor that she worshipped God before hearing of Jesus. This mother, Lydia, forever changed the world – because as the first Christian convert in Europe, she was the beginning of, through good and bad, Christianity in the United States.

What an excellent person to honor on the mother’s Day. There’s a woman with similarities to Lydia that lived near the end of the 1800’s. Julia Ward Howe wrote the Battle Hymn of the Republic. She was also the first to call for the celebration of Mother’s Day in 1870. Listen to what she wrote:

Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."
From the bosom of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plow and the anvil at the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God -
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

Mother’s day was originally envisioned as a day to call for peace.

Julia Ward Howe’s leadership had a profound effect on the people of her time. It can have a profound effect on us today.

Lydia’s leadership had a profound effect on the people of her time. It can have a profound effect on us today.

What can we do? We can spend today, and each day:

We’re sent out – not as anyone who is better than anyone else—but sent out with Jesus love to provide hospitality and honor to all we meet. Let’s remember that every day – we are sent out.

Close with prayer

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