The Window

First Lesson: Samuel 8: 4-11, (12-15), 16-20, (11:14-15)
Responsive Reading: Psalm 130
Second Lesson: 2 Corinthians 4: 13 - 5:1
​Gospel Lesson: Mark 3: 20-35

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Grace and Peace from Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
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Once upon a time, there were two men who I’ll call Larry and John who were both ill and roommates in a hospital in Minneapolis[1].  Larry was allowed to sit up in his bed for one hour each afternoon to get fluid drained from his lungs.  Larry’s bed was next to the room’s only window.  John was required to spend his days lying still on his back.

Larry and John soon became good friends.  They would speak for hours on end about families, jobs, time in service, hobbies, and vacations.  Every afternoon, Larry would describe to John in great detail all that he saw out the window.

The highlight of John’s days was hearing Larry’s descriptions of the outside. 

Larry told John about a lovely park outside[2].  John heard about a lake where ducks and swans floated on the water, and children played with their model boats.  On a nearby path, lovers would walk by holding hands.  Flowers of every color of the rainbow sat in this park with huge trees completing the landscape.  The Minneapolis Skyline could be seen in the distance.  Even Target Field as both Larry and John were huge Twins fans.  John’s eyes would close, and a huge smile would break out on his face as Larry described these scenes. 

One afternoon, Larry even described a parade complete with floats and bands passing by the window.  John was thrilled as he pictured the most fun days of his years growing up when the parade came during his small town’s festival.  

Eventually, though John began to think, He wondered “Why should Larry have all this pleasure, while I never gets to see anything.”

John came to believe that Larry’s window wasn’t fair.  John began to resent Larry more and more with each passing day slowly.  John’s anger caused him to lose sleep at night[3]. 

One night though, John heard Larry start to cough.  It was a violent, unsettling cough[4].  Larry was choking on the fluid in his lungs.  John watched as Larry attempted to reach out to hit his call button, yet never quite hit it.  John never reached for his button.  Five minutes later, Larry’s coughing stopped.  The room was now silent.

The next morning, Larry’s lifeless body is removed from John’s room[5].  Later the next afternoon, John requested to be moved next to Larry’s window.  The nurse agrees to do so.  John gets excited at all the sights that he will now see.  As soon as John’s bed is moved, he props himself up on an elbow for his first look out the magic window.  John anticipates a joy soon coming like he hadn’t encountered in weeks.  As his head starts to turn slowly, he sees that what Larry’s window faced was a blank wall.

Today’s lesson contains some potentially difficult words for us to hear as Christian people.  These words are as difficult as John hearing descriptions day after day of an outside world that he couldn’t see. 

“So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal[6].”  These are words that the Apostle Paul drives further home in the next chapter when he declares: “For we walk by faith, not by sight[7].”

To understand Paul’s words, you need to know that one of the great conflicts within the Corinthian Church which Paul had previously visited was over the meaning of Resurrection. Believers were growing impatient at Christ not returning quick enough.  They thought Resurrection to be perhaps a hoax no different than the stories that Larry was telling his roommate John about the magical window.

Woody Allen, some years ago, declared: “If only God would give me one solid clue like depositing fifty thousand in my bank account[8].”

Woody Allen’s request though is as old as time itself.  When Moses stood on Mount Sinai he asked God to “Show me your glory[9]?” or “Give me just one good look[10].  Moses had a point if God would do this it would probably straighten out the disobedient Golden-Calf worshipping Israelites. 

In a world where I can look up details from a Vikings game from 1989 on my phone within seconds, not getting direct answers to the biggest questions in the universe can certainly frustrate[11].

Here’s the thing though perhaps the reason that we can’t see God’s face is that God doesn’t exist as we exist.  God doesn’t exist merely in material and visible ways.  Faith calls us to trust in invisible realities even when we’d like fifty-thousand dollars placed directly into our bank account. 

Martin Niemoller was born in Germany in 1892[12].  In World War I, he was a U-Boat officer in the German Navy.  Upon the completion of the War, Niemoller returned to school to become a Lutheran Pastor.  Niemoeller was a vocal opponent of the Weimar Republic set up in Germany in World War I’s wake[13].  Niemoeller was at first open-minded to Hitler’s opposition to the Weimar Republic.  He quickly came to see the Nazi Party’s agenda incompatible with his Christian faith.  Niemoller became a founder of a German resistance movement eventually becoming involved in the founding of the Confessing Church with Dietrich Bonhoeffer[14]. In 1937, Martin Niemoller was arrested.  He would spend the next seven years of his life in prison seemingly facing imminent execution. Niemoller could smell burning human flesh from his prison cell[15].  Years later, Niemoller was asked how he could survive all those days in prison while maintaining not only his sanity but also his faith.  

Niemoller replied that we do not know how much we can survive until our tests ultimately come.  “If God dwells in your life, you can stand far more than you think[16].”

All Niemoller could do spending day after day in a prison cell was cling to hope that what he could not see was ultimately more powerful than anything he had seen.  The following belief is what it means to walk by “faith” and not by “sight.”

Author W.P. Kinsella writes the novel Shoeless Joe which was eventually made into a very popular movie called Field of Dreams.

Shoeless Joe tells the story of a struggling Iowa corn farmer named Ray Kinsella.  Kinsella loved two things in the world his family; wife Annie and daughter Karin plus the game of Baseball.  One day while out in the fields, Ray hears a voice almost as if from on high declare “If you build it, he will come[17].”

Ray and Annie discuss the voice which provides no clarity as to what Ray is exactly supposed to build nor who will come.  Ray builds a baseball field in the middle of his corn crop.  For a struggling farmer, this would seem to be an act of foolishness.  Building a baseball field was the boldest act of faith a corn farmer can imagine, especially with a mortgage due.

Following through on any act of faith was not going to be easy as we don’t always control our own future.  Ray can merely be guided by promise that his faith will be given a eventual meaning. 

Pretty soon though faith gives way to sight as appearing on Ray’s field is Baseball’s legendary Shoeless Joe Jackson.  The rest of the book has Ray hearing more voices “ease his pain” “go to the distance.” Leading Ray on a pair of cross-country journeys to bring redemption and healing to those who didn’t think it was possible. 

When Ray Kinsella first heard a voice, he saw merely a cornfield, yet he would soon come to see there was something beyond the cornfield that would eventually gather people from far and wide to have their lives changed.    

The Apostle Paul would write to the Corinthian Church earlier in his ministry[18]: “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known[19].”

Ray Kinsella’s cornfield would reunite him with his Baseball playing father[20].  A strange voice would turn into a manifest reality before his very eyes. 

We can probably relate to Ray Kinsella or John dreaming about Larry’s window.  We wonder why doesn’t the Holy Spirit speak more clearly to us[21]? Why can’t God make his intentions clear? Why don’t we get $50,000 placed in our bank account?  Why can’t we see God’s face?

Here’s why we do walk by faith and not by sight? God knows more than we can ever fathom.  God knows more about sin, grace, heaven, hell, death, and resurrection.  We see the Cross as God’s ending when in reality it is merely the beginning.  We see the temporary on this day, but we cannot see the eternal.  The good news is our God can see both the temporary and the eternal. 

Larry could see many wonderful things out his hospital room window; John merely saw an empty wall.  As people of faith like Larry, we are called not to cling to the temporary windows we see on this day, but rather the great eternal hope given to all God’s people.  Amen


[1] The following is a reimagining of a story told by AuthorUnknown posted on Stories for Preaching retrieved on May, 29, 2018. 
[2] Author Unknown. “The Window.” Stories for Preaching. Web. May.29.2018. 
[3] Author Unknown. “The Window.” Stories for Preaching.
[4] Author Unknown. “The Window.” Stories for Preaching.
[5] Author Unknown. “The Window.” Stories for Preaching.
[6] 2 Corinthians 4:18. 
[7] 2 Corinthians 5:7
[8] Bowen, Gilbert. “Life by the Invisible.” Sermon Writer. 2005. Web. May.29.2018. 
[9] Exodus 33:18. 
[10] Bowen, Gilbert. “Life by the Invisible.” Sermon Writer.
[11] Bowen, Gilbert. “Life by the Invisible.” Sermon Writer.
[12] “Martin Niemoeller.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation. 7. May.2018. Web. May.29.2018. 
[13] Martin Niemoeller.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia.
[14] Martin Niemoeller.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia.
[15] Bowen, Gilbert. “Secularism: The Subtle Enemy.” Sermon Writer. 2006. Web. May.29.2018. 
[16] Bowen, Gilbert. “Secularism: The Subtle Enemy.” Sermon Writer.
[17] Huston, Jeffrey. “Why ‘Field of Dreams’ Is the Best Christian Parable in Movie History.” On Faith. Web. May.29.2018. 
[18] King, David. A. “Field of Dreams’ shines in the light of faith.” Georgia Bulletin. 19.May.2017. Web. May.29.2018. 
[19]1st Corinthians 13:12. 
[20] Wahl, Keith. “Field of Dreams - The Journey of Faith.” Complete Game Ministries. 30.Nov.2017. Web. May.29.2018. 
[21] Huston, Jeffrey. “Why ‘Field of Dreams’ Is the Best Christian Parable in Movie History.” On Faith.