Graduation Sunday Message: Two Gifts, One Warning, and a Mission

Join Pastor Tom Helmich as he delivers his first message as "Pastor Tom." 

This message was for our graduates in high school, college, and post-graduate studies - and truly, for all believers. On this Memorial Day weekend, Pastor Tom explores Jesus' prayer in John 17, unpacking the gifts of God's Word, Christ's intercession, and our mission in the world. 

Key highlights: 

• Understanding our role as Christians in the world
• The importance of staying rooted in faith
• Finding mentors and community
• Living as witnesses of Christ's love 

Whether you're a graduate, parent, or anyone seeking spiritual guidance, this message offers wisdom and encouragement for your journey. 

Chapters

• 0:00 Memorial Day Weekend Introduction
• 3:32 Reading from John 17: Jesus' Prayer for Disciples
• 10:29 Two Gifts: God's Word and Jesus' Intercession
• 14:00 The Warning: Christians in the World
• 20:08 Mission and Guidance for High School Graduates
• 21:11 Closing Prayer

Transcript

Tom Helmich: 0:03

Good morning neighborhood church, first of all, for the youth are here and everybody else who who signed this, I spent quite a bit of time reading all the comments and the signatures in here, and only a few people that have handwriting that is as bad as mine. But thank you again for everything, all the support, and this will will tie in towards the end of the message. But tonight, today or tonight, last time I got and talked in front of people was Wednesday night, and I thought it was morning. So this morning, first thing I want to acknowledge is that this is Memorial Day weekend, and it's a rainy day, and I think that kind of fits the mood of it a little bit. And I just want everybody to recognize and remember that the reason why we have a three day weekend, three day weekend is not just for us to enjoy backyard barbecues and have more time at home with family, but to recognize and honor all the people have gone before us to pay the ultimate sacrifice for this great nation that allows us to be here and worship in the way that we feel called. So I hope that you keep all them in your prayers and thoughts this weekend and remember it the holiday for what it represents. So but jumping into the message points, we have a reading today, and I picked this reading intended for our high school graduates. It also fits for college graduates. It fits for me and it fits for everybody else out there this morning, whether you're on Facebook or here in the building. And so this reading is going to be from John chapter 17, verses 14 to 23 I have given them your Well, let me introduce this first. This is Jesus talking. If you have a Red Letter Bible, this is all in red. It's not the entire prayer. It's a section of it. But this is Jesus praying to God, the Father, the Creator, on behalf of all of us. He says, Jesus says, I have given them Your Word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world, I am not asking you to take them out of the world, but I ask you to protect them from the evil one they do not belong to the world, just as I do not belong to the world, Sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth. As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sakes, I sanctify Myself so that they may also be sanctified in truth, I ask not only on behalf of these but also on behalf of those who will believe me through their word that's all of us, that they may all be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may Believe that you have sent me the glory that you have given me, I have given them, so that they may be one as we are one in them and you in Me, that they may be completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as You have loved Me. So break some of this stuff down a little bit, because it's kind of a long reading, but it fits what we're talking about with sending our seniors out. So Jesus says, I have given them your word. Well, Jesus is the word in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. So Jesus is the word he's given us, not only the Word of God in Scripture, but in himself that he poured out on the cross. And I noticed also he says that he asks that God not take the disciples out of the world, because there's a lot of stuff that's kind of rough out there sometimes. And Jesus could have said, Father, I pray you take them all out of the world and we just all go to heaven immediately. And that's it. But that's not what happened, and there's a reason for that, and we'll get into that here in a little bit. So of the message, message points. I titled this two gifts, one warning and a mission. Two gifts, one warning and a mission. And this is primarily for high schoolers, but it's true for all of us. So the first two gifts, I think it's the next slide, the yes Jesus has given you the Word of God. Remember that that is a gift the Bible that you have on your phone or in your lap, that is a gift from God for our use, for us to strengthen our faith, to have an idea of what the will of God is for us in our lives, what we're supposed to do, how we're supposed to treat each other, how we're supposed to view ourselves in the world. That is a gift that we should cherish and treat as a precious gift. The other gift is that Jesus has prayed for us. This is Jesus in this reading, and he's praying for his disciples and all of those who come to believe through their word, and that follows through like an apostolic tradition. So. From from the original disciples on down all the way to all of us. That is who Jesus is praying for. Jesus has prayed for you, for you, for me, for you. Jesus has prayed for all of us. And what better prayer can we ever hope to get than from the Word of God incarnate? If Jesus is going to pray for us, what better strength can we possibly have in the world. Prayer is important. He set the example for us, but he has prayed for us, and that is a huge gift. He prayed that God protect us from evil, because there is a lot of evil out there. As a cop for 25 years, I've seen it, but Jesus prayed that the Father in heaven would protect all of us from evil. And he didn't, and he said he didn't pray for us to be taken out of the world, just to be protected from the evil that is in the world. He also prayed that we be one with the Triune God, that that we be one with God, the Father with Jesus, just as Jesus is one with the Father, we're all part of the gathered Body of Christ. We're all part of this church that is not a building. The people in the church are the the people see caught myself, the people are the church. The people in the building are the church. This building can all go away, and we could be sitting in lawn chairs in the middle of a field and is still very much the church, and remember, he prayed these things for each and every one of you. Now we have the one warning. Jesus said that the basically told us, the world will not always be kind to you. Anybody here ever had the world not be kind to them? Yeah, the world is not always a kind place, but being a Christian isn't about having an awesome life in the world. Otherwise, Jesus would have just prayed that the world be kind to everybody. Jesus could have called us out of it right then, but he left us here because we have something to do. The world will not always be kind to us, but we have to remember that we don't belong to the world. Jesus said that twice in his prayer, we do not belong to the world. Remember who we belong to. We belong to God, the Father in heaven. That is where we belong. We are here, away from home on a mission. We have to be careful that we don't give ourselves away to the world and all the temptations and the sin that's in the world and that we hold true to our Creator and to our Savior. And now the mission. There is a mission. This is the closest I can ever think to get with what is the meaning of life. Anybody ever wondered, like, what's the meaning of life? What's the point? Why are we doing this? Like, what's what? Why? Why are we here? Right? If there's no point, then why didn't Jesus just call us home? Then? Well, because we have a mission. Jesus says, I am as you have sent me. I am sending them. We have been sent out into the world that we are in. We all have a purpose out there, and it's not necessarily a vocational purpose, because we can change jobs and still be Christians. You can be a Christian in just about any job, but we have a role to play for the kingdom. That's that we live our life in relationship with God, in relationship with the other people around us, and through that, we show ourselves as a witness to the love of Christ, to remember that, that recognizing that Jesus has loved me despite my sin, and then when we do our best to love the other people around us like Jesus has loved me, we show them the love of Christ that they may never have experienced, may have never heard that is our mission out there, to Go out into the world as Christians and to live as Christians. So I'm wearing this kind of funny piece of clothing, right? It's not cold, it's not a scarf, and it's burlap. I wouldn't want to wrap it around my neck. It was a gift at my ordination. I got a bunch of signatures from folks in the church, a bunch of the kids. I wondered when on a Wednesday night, Joe kept snatching kids out of the warehouse and secreting them kind of over to little neighbors. And now I know why. So this is called a stole and you'll see somebody, maybe even me, wearing the black shirt with the little white collar. I know you've never seen Joe in one I checked the pic. I checked the picture at the seminary. I found Jess picture and Joe's picture, no black shirt with a little white collar. So you know what that shirt symbolizes? It's just like a dedication to the church. You don't have to be an ordained pastor to wear it. I wore it for years before I was ordained, but that's kind of come to mean to people see it as a symbol of somebody like a pastor. Or a priest. This is the symbol of the vocation of Pastor, and it's The stole represents a yoke. Not many people it's not an agricultural area anymore, so not many people know what a yoke is. It's not the orange, yellow part in an egg. It's close. Anybody know what a yoke is? Some of the kids probably do, because we've talked about it in church, right? You know what a yoke is? Yell it out. Yes, absolutely. When you yoke somebody with a burden, like a beast of bird, not a horse or an ox, and it's just either wood or I've seen some that are leather have a like a leather coating, and that goes around their shoulders, and you hook the ropes or the chains to it, and they use it to pull something. It's how they shoulder the burden to pull something. And this is kind of what this, this symbolizes, is the yoke that goes around the neck. Remember Jesus said, My burden is light and my yoke is easy, or My yoke is easy, My burden is light. I may have that backwards, but I'm less Dixie. So it happens it's the light burden and the easy yoke, right? It took y'all a minute, didn't it? It's the first it's the early service. I bet the second service get a little quicker, because they've had time to drink a little more coffee. But it symbolizes that yoke where we shoulder the burden of things. But I'm not the only one that has this. This is just an outward symbol so that you can see it, to know that it's my role to stand up here and do this, even though I've only seen Joe wear his twice. But you don't have to have it to do the work, and it's just to make it visible. Everyone of you has a yoke as a Christian, everyone of you has a yoke around your neck, about around your shoulders, and a burden to bear, but it's a light and easy burden, because all of you are part of the priesthood of all believers. Now this is something that may not get talked about a whole lot. So early on, you know, around the Protestant Reformation, there were the priests, and then there was everybody else, and it created this class system in society and in the church, where the priests were seen as above everybody else. And what, what one things Luther said is that we are all on equal ground. I have people ever heard the joke. I've heard this a few times lately. Hey, now that you have a direct line to God, can you like pray for the rain to hold off? Haven't gotten that number yet. That's not how that works. I have no more authority over God or the Holy Spirit than any one of you. No difference between you and me. The only difference is I'm the one that's been delegated to dedicate my time to doing this while you go out and do you know, dedicate your time to doing other things that are in support of society. You have the same yoke that I do as a Christian, because every Christian is a member of the priesthood of all believers, every one of you has a responsibility to be a witness to the love of Christ in the world. And for high schoolers, this is a new thing for them to kind of understand, because high schoolers, especially, they've lived their lives in their parents households, and when they graduate high school, no matter where they go, whether it's the military or college or straight into the workforce, they are now a little different. Technically, they're an adult. Emotionally, they're still getting there. Life experience wise, they're definitely just getting started, but they're moving into that new role as their own person. But for the high schoolers out there, or graduate fresh graduates, you gotta remember, you are now stepping out into the mission field, no matter what you do, whether you're picking up trash, whether you're cooking in a restaurant, whether you're taking care of kids, building houses, digging ditches, working on computers, no matter what you're doing, you are doing that in the mission field. You're doing that out in the world as a member of the priesthood of believers, as a representative of Christ's Church in society and on Earth. And you don't do it by necessarily standing up and preaching, because, face it, I came here. You all came here to meet Joe and I anybody in here, not a Christian, don't raise your hand. I don't want to dime you out if you're just wondering. You know that was a bad idea. I just thought about this for the moment. We can talk afterwards, if you want, no pressure, right? But who comes to the church, the people we need to witness to, are still out there, and who's going to go out there and meet them? I can only meet so many people, and most of the people I interact with are already Christians. The reality is all of you will do more for the kingdom of God and for Christ's Church on earth than I will, because there's one of me, there's a couple 100 of you, not this morning in the house, but you know, it's raining and it's, you know, it's a holiday weekend, but you know, out there on Zoom and the church as a whole, you all will. Do more to witness to the love of Christ than I will, and you'll do it in your everyday life. You do it in the moments that you show kindness to other people because you're compelled to love your neighbor as Christ, Jesus has loved you. Means when you see people doing something that you don't necessarily approve of, you love them anyway. You don't have to like them. You just have to love them. And the easy way to do that sometimes is just being kind. Somebody who doesn't look like you, sound like you, think like you, believe like you, live like you. No matter how much you disapprove or approve, you just greet them with a smile and be kind. Jesus said that they will know you by my works. If you love me and you love others, they will know you as my disciples. That's how you should you don't have to wear a cross on the outside of your shirt for people to see. You don't have to wear, you know, a stole or something like that. You don't have to be over the top. You just have to go out into the world as a Christian and live your life according to what Jesus has commanded you the best you can, and treat people with kindness and dignity and take care of those that need help and can't take care of themselves. And for the high schoolers, it's rough because a lot of high schoolers, I'm not going to name names, but a lot of them, that's a point, and a point in my life. Anyway, it was a very selfish season in my life, because now, all sudden, you get this freedom, and you can do whatever you want, and shortly thereafter, take this as a warning comes the consequences of doing whatever you want, and the hope is you eventually come back to center a little bit. Staying rooted in a community faith is a big part of that. It keeps you from going too far off onto the margins. It puts you in a community of other believers and of mentors that can help you. Because there's a point as a graduating senior, at least for me, where I was trying to differentiate myself from my home of origin a little bit, and I'm sure it's frustrating for my parents, and I've experienced this where I'm sure they were telling me, like, what I needed to do, and I've told my kids what they need to do, and they're like, hey, whatever, you don't know anything. And then somebody else tells them the same thing, and they think, Oh, that's a great idea. And I'm like, Oh my gosh, but it's real. You need that mentorship that you will get from other Christians in the gathered body in the church, no matter what church it is, here's here's another truth. I'm a big advocate when we do the apostles creed of leaving the word Catholic and not changing it to Christian lowercase c, I don't want to give that over to one specific tradition of the church. We say we believe in one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, because Catholic means worldwide. Not everybody's going to like this. But whether you go to a Baptist church, a Methodist Church, a Presbyterian Church, an Episcopal Church, a Lutheran church, that is part of the one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. We do it different ways. It sounds different, it looks different, but it is all part of Christ's one worldwide church. So for the high school seniors, no matter where you go, be a part of that church, no matter what tradition or style it is, because this is where you come to be empowered to go out into the world to witness to the love of Christ in the world. This is where you come to worship as an act of worship and sacrifice. It's also where you come to be enabled and empowered and and trained to go out there and do the real work. And I can only do a small amount of that in the world, 99% of it's going to be done by all of you. And for the high school seniors, that means you now too, because you are now going out into the world, stay devoted to God's word, studying the scriptures, coming to church, listening to sermons from whoever you want, participating in the sacraments, taking communion and staying rooted here, when you go out, not necessarily here, here, but like, you know, in a church, wherever you are, and when you have moments where you feel like you screwed up, just know that I have. I'm 49 years old. I have screwed up more than you, you'll be okay. There's grace for that. As long as you keep after all your screw ups, you keep coming back, turning back to God. A piece of advice for the high school seniors, find a mentor. Sometimes it's a little easier if you hear the exact same thing, unfortunately, from somebody other than your mom or dad. Find an adult that you look up to, that you trust, that you can have a relationship with and talk with, and that somebody who's going to hold you accountable and say to you, Hey, what the heck are you doing? You. Because the other teenagers you're hanging out with, they also do not yet have a fully formed brain. For the boys, especially you got about seven, eight more years guys, I have a theory high school kids, especially boys, they grow so fast. You've seen boys grow just incredibly fast. My theory is, and I'm not a biologist, is that the human spinal cord is the slowest growing part in the male body, and as their body grows and gets taller and taller and taller, their brains way up here, but the spinal cord is still down around here somewhere. And about 26 oh, hey, the lights come on. And now we're all sudden, we're figuring out what's going on, right? So just know that you won't have all the answers. You don't even have all the questions yet, find somebody that's got the experience to have done that and to give you some honest feedback and to hold you accountable, and that you can go ask the hard questions too, because you're going to need that. And for the adults out there. I heard this piece of advice from somebody years ago. Have a good, close friend that's in the generation before yours and the generation after yours, because you are also learning to be part of the priesthood of believers in the world. It's something we have to continually work on. We never stop learning. We never stop learning. No matter what you're doing, there's still stuff I'm trying to figure out, but together, we support each other as we go out to do this work. So remember guys, especially guys and gals, especially the high schoolers. You don't necessarily have one of these around your neck for people to see, but you have an invisible one that's part of your faith. It's part of who you are and who you believe in, and what your role is in the world. Represent the church in the world, and stay rooted in your faith. Thanks be to God, if you'll pray with me, please, Heavenly Father, I give you thanks that you have sent people out into the world and Lord, I give you thanks that you've come to us to show us how to do this holy work. Lord, I pray that you help all of us, me especially, to stay rooted in the Scripture and to stay devoted to studying the Scripture and to know how we're to go out and to be your hands and your voice in the world around us. Lord, help us to put our own our own prejudices and our and our own desires and our own selfish ambition behind us, so that we can go out and witness to the true Christ, to the Word of God out into the world. Lord, pray you help these, these high school seniors, especially as they're learning to try to adult, that they find a guide and a mentor to help them, and that they go out and to live their lives as a witness to your love, remembering always that as you have sent Christ, Christ has sent you, for Christ has sent them, Lord, I Pray that you help us to always recognize and remember and focus on the love we have and the mission we have out in the world. And we pray these things in your holy and precious name. And all God's people said, Amen. Amen.