JEREMIAH 8:18-9:1

18 My joy is gone; grief is upon me;
my heart is sick within me.
19 Behold, the cry of the daughter of my people
from the length and breadth of the land:
“Is the Lord not in Zion?
Is her King not in her?”
“Why have they provoked me to anger with their carved images
and with their foreign idols?”
20 “The harvest is past, the summer is ended,
and we are not saved.”
21 For the wound of the daughter of my people is my heart wounded;
I mourn, and dismay has taken hold on me.

22 Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then has the health of the daughter of my people
not been restored?
9:1 Oh that my head were waters,
and my eyes a fountain of tears,
that I might weep day and night
for the slain of the daughter of my people!

Who you are is God’s gift to you.  Who you become is your gift to God. That’s one of my favorite sayings.  It’s a saying that challenges you to answer an important question and the question is simply this: Am you putting your God given gifts to good use?  In other words: Are you living up to your potential? 

It’s sad when someone doesn’t live up to his or her potential.  When that happens you could end up feeling the same way John Ralston felt many year ago.   John Ralston was the coach for the Denver Broncos from 1972 to 1976.  During that time he compiled a record of 34 wins and 33 losses and the team never made it to the playoffs.   So, they fired him.   In an interview John Ralston said he was fired because of “illness and fatigue.  “The fans,” he said. “were sick and tired of me.”

It’s sad when someone doesn’t live up to his or her potential.  Jeremiah knew what that was like.  Jeremiah knew what it was like because the Jewish people weren’t living up to their potential and it made him sad.  You can feel his sorrow in the words that he wrote. 

My joy is gone; grief is upon me; my heart is sick within me.

Oh that my head were waters and my eyes a fountain of tears that I might weep day and night for…my people!

Jeremiah was sad because the Jewish people weren’t living up to their potential. They were supposed to be God’s Chosen People.  That meant that they were supposed to be a light to the Gentiles.  They were supposed to bring God’s love to people near and far.  They were supposed to show people how to make the world a better place by following God’s commandments.   They didn’t do that though.  Instead, they thought that because they were the Chosen People it meant that God loved them more than everyone else.

The Jewish people weren’t living up to their potential and because they weren’t living up to their potential Jeremiah knew that the ax was about to fall.  By the way, the ax did fall a few years later when the Babylonians swooped down from the north.  It happened in 587 B.C. when Nebuchadnezzar burned the city of Jerusalem to the ground and sent thousands and thousands of people into exile.

That’s why Jeremiah’s eyes were full of tears. The Jewish people weren’t living up to their potential and I can’t help but wonder.  Are we, as a nation under God, living up to our potential?   Before you answer that question here’s something to consider.  As far as God’s is concerned a nation’s potential has nothing to do with the number of cruise missiles that it can launch.  A nation’s potential has nothing to do with the number of gold medals that it wins in the Olympics.  A nation’s potential has nothing to do with the size of its gross domestic product.  Many years ago a well dressed woman went to Africa for a safari.  One day her tour group stopped for a brief visit at a leper hospital.  The heat was intense and there were flies buzzing around them.  When the woman saw a nurse kneeling in the dirt to tend the pus-filled sores of a leper she was disgusted.  “I wouldn’t do that for all the money in the world!” she said.  The nurse looked up and replied, “Neither would I.”

A nation lives up to its potential when it takes care of the sick and feeds the hungry and helps those who are oppressed.  A nation lives up to its potential when it puts God’s will first.  That’s why I really like something Stan Van Gundy said last December.  Stan Van Gundy is the basketball coach for the Orlando Magic.  I seem to be on a sport kick this morning but I assure you that it’s just a coincidence.  Anyway, last December Stan Van Gundy made it clear that he wasn’t happy when he learned that his team was scheduled to play a game on Christmas Day.  In an interview he said, “I would rather not play on Christmas…I think we get a little carried away with ourselves in sports thinking we’re so much more important than everything else…I’m a big basketball guy but this is a day to spend time with your family.”

No matter how you look at it this nation under God isn’t living up to its potential and it won’t live up to its potential until enough people in the nation live up to their potential.  That’s why it so important for people in the pews and pastor’s in the pulpit to ask themselves that important question.  Am I living up to my potential.

Before you answer that question here’s something to consider.  As far as God is concerned your potential has nothing to do with the size of your stock portfolio.  Your potential has nothing to do with the kind of car that you drive.  Your potential has nothing to do with the awards that you’ve won.  You live up to your potential when you embrace the words of the prophet Micah…“and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God…”  (6:8)

In his book, “Living Faith,” former President Jimmy Carter tells a story about a moment when he had to decide if he was living up to his potential.  That moment came during his campaign to be reelected governor of Georgia.   During that campaign he was invited to speak to a Christian men’s group.  They asked him to talk about the ways you can share your faith with others.  While he was preparing his speech President Carter sat down and did a little arithmetic.  He added up the times that he had shared his faith with others and asked them to follow Jesus.  The number came to 140; 140 people.  Carter then wrote these words, “The Lord must have been looking over my shoulder because immediately I remember my 1966 political campaign when Rosalynn and I had traveled the state and had shaken hands with 300,000 Georgians, extolling my good points, and asking them to vote for me. I had asked 300,000 to support me but only 140 to affirm Jesus.  The terrible difference in those numbers brought me to my knees.”

Are you living up to your potential?  Are you doing God’s will?  Are you making God’s grace real for others?

As you ponder that question consider if you will something tennis player Martina Navratilova said many years ago.  One day during an interview she was asked how important the game of tennis was to her.  She replied that she wasn’t just involved with the game of tennis.  She was committed to it.  When she was asked what the difference was between being involved and committed she replied, “It’s like ham and eggs.  When it comes to ham and eggs the chicken is involved.  The pig is committed.

Are you living up to your potential?   Who you are is God’s gift to you.  Who you become is your gift to God. 

Many years ago a young Boston University student had to decided if he was living up to his potential  It happened while he was walking down a hallway in the School of Public Communications.  It was his first time in the building and in this particular hallway there was a plaque on the wall.  The plaque consisted of a quote from Horace Mann, a famous educator back in the mid-1800’s.  These were the words on the plaque:  “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.”  That quote captured the BU student’s heart and mind.  He literally couldn’t walk down that hallway without stopping to read that quote over and over again.  He eventually came to understand that God was speaking to him in those words and he had to stop running away from his call.  So, after he graduated he made the decision to go to seminary and that was the first step in a journey that eventually led him to North Reading where he was called to be the pastor of the Union Congregational Church.

It’s sad when you don’t live up to your potential.  On the other hand, I can tell you, that  life is good, really good when you do live up to your potential.   Amen.

Rev. Dr. Richard A. Hughes

September 19, 2010