The psalmist lifts a painful voice to heaven:

“How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever?” – Psalm 13:1

A typical biblical lament by one who feels forgotten by God.

If I were the psalmist, I would add a companion cry:

“How long, Lord, will the preacher go on without saying anything worth listening to?”

I’m a fan of good preaching, preaching that digs up some gem of the Gospel from the soil of human experience and applies it in a way that inspires people to rise up and live their faith. You don’t hear much of this preaching these days. Run through the TV channels on a Sunday and what you hear mostly is the self-help, self-empowerment, how you can be less anxious, more successful, and theologically correct gospel which really isn’t the Gospel at all.

Twenty, thirty minutes of your life wasted listening to babbling bullshit posing as eternal truth.

Complete with Bible quotes.

How long, Lord?

But I heard some great preaching last week at the Annual Conference of the International Council of Community Churches. Sermons that carefully mined the tunnels of life as it is happening in America today. Sermons that brought the Gospel into places like Ferguson, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Baltimore, Charleston, Chattanooga as well as your own city, neighborhood, family and personhood.

Violence. Racism. Gay marriage. Economic disparity. Discrimination. Transgendered persons. Church shootings. Police shootings. Radical fundamentalism. Riots. Immigration. Unemployment. Terrorism. Crime. Hopelessness…

One preacher started out by turning around Dickens’ famous words in his epic A Tale of Two Cities. He said:

It was the worst of times, it was the best of times…

The preacher went on to explain that in so many ways people today feel discouraged and down. So many things are going on that create fear, worry and uncertainty. The times feel frightening. To many, it is indeed the worst of times.

What should we do in times like these? What CAN we do?

Then the preacher said this:

It was the best of times!

And he told the famous story about Denver Broncos quarterback John Elway who led his team from certain defeat to victory in the 1987 AFC Championship game against the Cleveland Browns. With time running out and down by a score of 20-13, Denver got the ball on its own 2-yard line. NINETY-EIGHT YARDS TO GO!

It was the worst of times!

But when Elway got into the huddle he looked into the discouraged eyes of his Bronco teammates and said, “WHAT AN OPPORTUNITY!

Opportunity?

Yes, the worst of times always give people the opportunity to stand up and make history – to be counted – to show what they’re made of – to demonstrate their values – to live their faith!

And so Elway led the Broncos on an almost-miraculous 98-yard drive that tied the game as time ran out. Then Denver went on to win with a field goal in overtime.

The best of times (if you were not a Cleveland Browns fan..:))

The Bible is loaded with stories about people facing the worst times of their lives and choosing in those moments to use them as an opportunity to live out their faith and demonstrate the grace of God..

Moses and the Hebrews smack up against the Red Sea during their escape from bondage in Egypt. The boy David standing up against the giant Goliath. The hemorrhagic women daring to touch the hem of Jesus’ robe for healing against all convention.

And, of course, Jesus dying on the cross.

“Father, forgive them.”

“Into Thy hands I commit my spirit.”

These were some of those “worst of times” into which these remarkable people lived their faith, trusting God for what would happen next.

For us today – facing what many people say are pretty bad times – the opportunity before us is to BE GOD’S PEOPLE. We do not have to succumb to the difficulties all around us by abandoning our faith, or reducing it to self-help religion, or cowering in the face of fear and despair.

We have an opportunity to rise up and BE WHO WE ARE AND WHOSE WE ARE!

We can take hold of the central core of our faith.

We can preach it, advocate for it, and live it.

And it is not a very complicated thing, this faith of ours.

Jesus summarized it by saying, “Love God and love your neighbor.”

The prophet Micah explained what this loving God and neighbor thing looks like in real life:

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. – Micah 6:8

Today’s “worst of times” are crying out for people to preach the Gospel by working for justice, loving mercy (kindness and compassion), and practicing humility with God and others.

And we need churches to be teaching us how to do these things in practical ways.

If your preacher is not speaking about justice, mercy and humility in these times, or how the Gospel can be brought into our world as it really is, you might want to lovingly ask her or him…

…”How long?”