Sermon Series

The (Not So) Heroes of the Old Testament

Right now the movie industry is exploding with movies about super-heroes. It is a multi-billion-dollar industry, filled with exciting characters endowed with special powers who inevitably save the day at the last minute through fantastic feats of strength and courage. Many of these movies are delightful distractions, but I think they also play upon our secret hope for a “savior” to rescue this world from its current state of disarray.

But God does not use super-heroes. In fact, for most of the Bible, God uses not-so-heroic people to move forward the plan of salvation.

Last Lent, we talked about ordinary saints; people just like us – of limited capabilities, without world-changing gifts, who nevertheless make a profound difference through their love, compassion, witness, and simple kindness.

However, there is another Biblical character, as well as another side of ourselves; the ordinary saint is us at our best, helping others out of concern; but the Bible also shows that people of great, even profound, weakness, sin, and fear still have a crucial and primary role to play in the plan of salvation. These are people that God uses in spite of, or perhaps even because of, their faults. People like Jonah – who wanted no part in God’s plan to save those Ninevites because he wanted to keep God’s forgiveness for his own people – or Samson – a petulant bully who used his strength for his own entertainment.

Through these stories, we will discover it is not so much their faith in God, but rather God’s faith in them, that moves the plan of salvation forward.