Sermon - Three O'clock AM

Three O’clock AM

Introduction

What is the significance of 3:00 o’clock AM? Dorothy Terris writes, “It’s three o’clock in the morning, We’ve danced all night thru. . . I could just keep right on dancing forever dear with you.”

How about you? Where were you, what were you doing at 3:00 o’clock this morning? Were you waltzing to the music of 3:00 o’clock?

Were you in deep slumber? Or, were you an insomniac who tossed and turned desperately trying to get a sound, restful sleep?

Or, is anyone perhaps a dreamer like Senator Roco who confessed at 3:00 o’clock on a morning some time before he died, “When I was 20, I wanted to change the world; at 30, I wanted to change my country; I realized at 60 I wanted only to change myself.”

3:00 O’clock Among Disciples

In our text, at 3:00 o’clock in the morning the disciples were in trouble: out in the sea, waves high, winds strong, rain pouring.

The night was dark. No stars. The boat, rocking dangerously. They were navigating fearfully alone.

But why, in the first place, were the disciples in this danger? They were out in the sea because, “Jesus made the disciples get back in to the boat and cross to the other side of the lake.”

The disciples got into trouble because they were obeying Jesus. It is the obedient church that suffers the storms life. It is often the obedient, faithful Christians who get into troubled seas navigating their authentic faith. It is often the obedient, faithful Christians who get into treacherous highways verbalizing issues of social justice and assisting the deprived struggle against poverty and want.
In obedience and faithfulness to Christ, we at UCCP Davao City are dreaming to build a new church that proclaims our audacious faith. Thus, we face the practical problems of design, fund-raising and, finally, construction! No less than total obedience is needed!

Our 3:00 O’clock AM

Today, 3:00 o’clock AM may be a time for tossing and turning among some, or a time for up-to-no-good evildoers in the dark.

3:00 o’clock AM may be time when the bruised and battered, the down and defeated, the grieving and the guilty face themselves alone. The letter not written, the flower not sent and the stone not lifted to make safe and secure a brother’s way are haunting ghosts.

For others, at 3:00 o’clock AM seductive temptations are strong and moral guards are down. As Kris Kristofferson sings, “I don’t care what’s right or wrong, I don’t try to understand, let the devil take tomorrow, lord, tonight I need a friend.”

I learned this week a new meaning of the word arroyo. It was originally used in southwestern US of A and referred to waterway, or deep ravine dried up because of long drought. Some Christians and churches may be in a state of arroyo, meaning, spiritually dried up like a waterway or deep ravine for long droughts of spiritual feeding and neglect of the discipline of prayer.

At 3:00 AM Jesus Appears

Comfortingly, our text continues, “About three o’clock in the morning Jesus came to them walking on the water.” How could Jesus walk on water? And how could Peter walk on water? And why would Peter begin to sink on seeing the waves?

These are the impossible questions. They are asking about the impossible. In short, they are the wrong questions.

Jesus comes at impossible times. When life is darkest, Jesus comes. When people are most worried, Jesus comes.

When storms of life are strongest and our shelter, weakest, Jesus comes. When typhoons are wildest and raindrops are heaviest, Jesus comes. When our need is greatest and our resources scarcest, Jesus comes. When too dark to see, or too turbulent to hope, Jesus comes reassuringly, “It’s all right, I am here. Don’t be afraid.”

A Moment of Trust

A young girl went out for dinner with a lonely soldier after Manila was recaptured from the Japanese about the end of the Second World War. After an evening of friendship, dancing and pure joy that transcended their gender differences, young girl and lonely soldier parted feeling very satisfied.

Alone in her room, at 3:00 o’clock AM, the girl wrote in her diary, “An hour of beauty and trust and friendliness in a world of disillusionment and ugliness and pain – surely it is worth keeping and remembering. . . Yours, faithfully.”

So, what’s the significance of 3:00 o’clock AM? In worship, God summons us to observe an hour of the beauty of trust in Jesus as a friend, and to receive an eternity of hope, love and life.

More importantly, in an arroyo world starved not only of physical food but of the word of God and dehydrated not only of water, but of truth, peace, love and justice, God offers the gift of rococo, meaning, the elegant refinement and charm of divine forgiveness and renewal of life, totally, tenderly and lovingly offered by Christ when he said, “This is my body broken for you . . . This is my blood shed for the forgiveness of your sins.”

Beloved in Christ, let us respond, “God, we are yours faithfully. Here I am send me.”