Psalm 119:63

 NOTE
I was asked to preach a sermon on May 17, 2026, based on one of the six “Covenant Affirmations” used in the Evangelical Covenant Church. The context was the Sunday morning chapel service at Covenant Living of Florida. In this retirement community, I served as a chaplain before I retired in 2022, and Cheryl and I became residents.

PRAYER
Your word, O Lord, is a flashlight that guides us along dark and cracked walkways. Speak to us again so that our steps leaving here this morning are firmer and steadier than when we entered. We expect that your Holy Spirit will make us stronger and better equipped to face the world in which you have graciously placed us. Amen.

SERMON
My text this morning is short, Psalm 119:63. We already read my paraphrase of it at the beginning of the service. “I’m a friend and companion of all who respect and honor you, of those committed to living your way.”

I’ve been asked to talk about one of six affirmations, or I prefer to say emphases, that characterize the Evangelical Covenant Church — the church body behind Covenant Living — also the church in which I was born and raised.

I say emphases because not one of these six affirmations that form the basis of these sermons is unique to the Evangelical Covenant Church. What is distinctive is how we emphasize and prioritize them.

For those who don’t know me well. Before I retired, and Cheryl and I moved into C114, I was a Covenant Living chaplain on the best Covenant Living campus, a Covenant pastor, a Covenant missionary, and a college and seminary professor. 

For many years, I also taught classes in the Covenant orientation program — that is, I did orientation training for ministers coming from other denominations into the Covenant. So I'm a bit more familiar with these concepts than many, and that's dangerous. I'm going to do my best not to turn this into a seminary lecture.

I mean, it is helpful to talk about these things if we’re going to better understand what makes Covenant Living tick — which is the point. But, again, my goal is that this wouldn’t be so much a lecture on Covenant thinking as it would be a sermon to encourage your faith, while introducing one of the things that characterizes our particular expression of the Christian faith. And this is where Psalm 119:63 comes in.

I chose this passage because it was the basis of an important sermon preached by a young Swedish immigrant pastor, F.M. Johnson, during the founding meeting of the Evangelical Covenant Church on February 20, 1885.

I was not there. But when I was ordained at the Covenant's annual meeting in 1985, there was a lot of hoopla about what had occurred 100 years earlier. And that 19th-century sermon on Psalm 119:63 became a part of the Covenant's DNA, specifically, the affirmation that I've been assigned to talk about.

You remember that two weeks ago, Chaplain Corrie explained AFFIRMATION #1 — the centrality of the Word of God — the Bible, and an historical question that early Covenant people asked — “Where is it written?”

Today, that might better be rendered, “How would you make a biblical case for what you’re saying?” It's not an invitation to prooftext everything but an invitation to look at the broad biblical picture as a foundation for what you believe and how you live.

Then last Sunday, Dr Cindy Hoover, an ordained physician who served as a Covenant missionary in Mexico, talked about AFFIRMATION #2, the necessity of new birth. By the way, if you don’t yet know Cindy personally, she is kinda famous in Covenant circles because of her unique ministry, and she lives in our building #2.

That brings us to my assignment, to talk about how Covenant churches emphasize that the church is a fellowship of believers. And I reference Pastor Johnson’s 1885 sermon because it captured the "Mission Friend" spirit of the Swedish immigrants who founded the Covenant church. (By the way, that’s what they called themselves, “Mission Friends.”)

His sermon was so well received because it spelled out three main pillars in this emphasis on the church as a fellowship of believers — an emphasis that characterized the Mission Friends renewal movement, which God was using to rock Scandinavia and the newly arrived Swedish immigrant communities in the US and Canada.

The first thing to see in Psalm 119:63 is that it anticipates relational unity. I’m a friend and companion…

How do you know if someone is a part of the church? Well, they are friends of God, companions who hang out with him.

The Swedish immigrants who started the Covenant had lived in the old country under a sometimes harsh state-sponsored Lutheran church that regulated who was in and who was out, based on some tightly woven system of theology. 

You might have a vibrant faith and deep commitment to following Jesus, but if you didn't toe the line on doctrinal minutia or organizational uniformity, you were out. Or sometimes even in — that is IN jail. 

These mission friends knew firsthand how entangling church and state leads to the spiritual decline of the church. Yes, there are benefits to getting in bed with the government — preferential positioning for your religious views and agendas, influence, and a wealthy patron to build and maintain beautiful cathedrals. But at what cost?

The government, at the request of a spiritless church hierarchy, was involved in trying to squelch the wave of Pietistic renewal that was flowing throughout Scandinavia in the 19th century.  So when these renewed believers landed in America, they started to form new Lutheran bodies, joyfully without government oversight — churches that would be less rigid, more faith-filled. 

But it didn’t take long in this new environment to realize that not all genuine believers were Lutherans. Again, remember their context.

So in 1885, two of these Swedish immigrant church bodies, the Ansgar Lutheran Synod and the Mission Lutheran Synod, effectively dissolved themselves in order to reorganize as a more inclusive body — the Covenant Church.

Here’s the thing — they still saw the theological world through a Lutheran lens, but they didn't think the Lutheran symbols (Augsburg Confession, Book of Concord), as wonderful and helpful as they are, are a solid basis for Christian fellowship. Fellowship needs to be more relational than formula-driven.

They saw the church as a unity of ALL who are friends and companions of God through Christ. 

And over the years, it became clear that the Covenant saw itself as big enough to include believers with Baptist ideas, Presbyterian and Methodist, Anglican, Campbelite, Pentecostals, Charismatics, Independent, Lutheran, Bible Church and Plymouth Brethren, Quakers, Mennonites — perhaps a few renegade Orthodox and Catholic believers — AND maybe even, eventually Norwegians, Danes, Fins, and other non-Swedes. (Sorry, my attempt at Nordic humor.)

Concurrently, in the old country, a Swedish version of the Covenant Church took shape, breaking free from state oversight, and actually became the second largest church body in Sweden. Their inclusive evangelical approach eventually led to a merger with the United Methodists and the Swedish Baptist Union in 2011 to form Equmeniakyrkan, which in English means the Uniting Church. The mission friends’ approach to being a broad believers church has at times been contagious.

I’m a friend and companion of all who respect and honor you.

In the US, the Covenant people never saw themselves becoming a major player in the religious landscape, but they'd be a big tent welcoming God's faithful friends — even if it meant learning to live and work with believers who didn't always read the Bible in the same way or baptize people in the same way. 

Our relationship in Christ causes us to define ourselves by our friendship with Christ rather than our differences.

And that's one of the reasons that people from so many backgrounds can worship together in chapel here at Covenant Living of Florida. You don't have to give up your Lutheran theology, or your Baptist understanding, or your Reformed Presbyterian emphases, or your Methodist, Charismatic, Disciples of Christ backgrounds to be welcomed and included.

Or maybe you, like many, grew up as a church mutt — a little of this, a little of that. Actually, to find a home in the Covenant Church, you don’t even have to have a faith background. It is enough to have a current relationship with Christ as your saving friend. That's all that is necessary for inclusion in a congregation.

But it also means that we expect everyone to treat others as brothers and sisters in Christ. We don’t just tolerate — but we aim to support each other, even when we don't see eye to eye on theological minutia or some forms of Christian practice.

Secondly, our Psalm 119:63 passage anticipates a Believer’s church where people take God seriously.

The psalmist says, “I’m a friend and companion of all who respect and honor you…” The “you” being addressed here is God himself.

When the early Mission Friends were in Sweden, they had to put up with life in a state-run church that didn't care so much about any real expressions of faith. If you had been properly baptized and showed up to take communion at the assigned times, it didn't matter how you actually lived. You could be a nasty, foul-mouthed, lying, cheat, and still be in good standing — perhaps even an esteemed member of the clergy.

Fellowship, back then, wasn't based on new life in Christ but on your willingness to support the institution and its rules. 

However, as the Mission Friends studied scripture, they began to understand that the church is less an institution and more a fellowship of believers — people who have a relationship with Christ. 

Not that church and institution are antithetical — to the contrary, there is a place for institutions. (Without institutional structure, ministries like Covenant Living couldn't exist with integrity.) But again, it’s a matter of primary emphasis. Church life is built around vibrant, faithful relationships among believers rather than institutional rules and objectives — even though institutions are important.

In some ways, this idea is actually more Lutheran than the established Lutheranism that the Mission Friends had pushed against.

In Martin Luther’s 1526 publication The German Mass and Order of Service, he advocated for churches of “earnest believers” meeting in homes to pray, read scripture, baptize, receive holy communion, and engage in "other Christian works."

One of the reasons I like churches gathering around tables, such as we do here in the Village Center, is that it emphasizes this communal aspect of the church. 

What we have here in the Village Center isn't my doing, but at times we did some similar Sunday morning settings at the Covenant Church I pastored in Phoenix. Believers gathered around tables is very relational, biblical, and also very aligned with the vision of Martin Luther.

Then, the third way that our Psalm 119 passage anticipates a Believer’s church is by emphasizing a changed life — a life changed by Christ as we believe in him.

I’m a friend and companion of all who respect and honor you, of those committed to living your way.

That is, we are kindred spirits with all who are committed to living God-honoring lives in his way. 

Some of the older translations render our verse, “I am a companion of all them that fear thee, and of them that keep thy precepts.”

​In this context, "fear" did not mean terror, but a profound awe and reverence for God that led to a changed life. The church includes all committed to an active and personal living faith ("keeping thy precepts").

This was the faithful genius of Pastor Johnson's 1885 sermon. Instead of focusing on what divided different church factions at the time, Johnson focused on the common bond of new life in Christ. To be a "companion" meant walking together on a spiritual journey. Life together.

When 19th-century Swedish Mission Friends met each other on the street, instead of saying, “Hey, what's up?” or “How's it going?” — they greeted each other with the question lever du? 

Anyone want to take a stab at translating that from Swedish?

It means “Are you living?” Short hand for, how goes your life in Christ? Is your faith alive, active, and growing?

Back then, being a "Christian" was often seen as a matter of birthright or legal status — because everyone was born into the state-sponsored Lutheran Church of Sweden. 

The Mission Friends believed that faith should be a living, personal experience rather than just a formal doctrinal or social requirement. They were more interested in the life of the believer than someone's ability to recite a confession of faith — although, when I was in junior high school, I still had to memorize a bunch of catechism and the Apostles Creed during our Covenant confirmation studies. They didn't let me argue that those kinds of things were totally irrelevant — as a junior higher who thought he knew more than he did,  might be inclined to do.

Yes, creeds and confessions are important, but they are useless apart from a living personal relationship with Christ. So that became the first priority and the basis of fellowship in the church. And if that’s in place, then you have the relational context or framework where you can work out the doctrinal stuff over time.

As I said earlier, it's a matter of emphasis and priority.

So, I want to ask you this morning, 

Lever du? Are you living? How goes your life with Christ?

These sermons on the Covenant Affirmations are not just an introduction to the church that birthed and continues to oversee Covenant Living, but an invitation to embrace what we consider to be of primary importance — to focus on turning to and together living out the new life in Christ that was inaugurated on that first Easter morning, after he had trampled sin, death, and divisiveness.

You know that we live in divisive times. But our calling is to become a counter-divisive voice — a collective witness to the transcending and unifying companionship we have in Christ. So we declare with the psalmist, “I’m a friend and companion of all who respect and honor you, of those committed to living your way.”

And that, believe it or not, is the good news.

Matthew 5:21-24, 43-48; Colossians 4:2-6

"How to Love the Idiots of the World!"
17 August 2025
Covenant Living of Florida Chapel Service

Over the past few weeks, we've been considering Jesus’ command to love our neighbors—even though they might be unlovable, or incarcerated, or foreigners, or enemies, or just different. This morning, I want us to consider how we can love another group of challenging people. 

Originally, I had a sermon title — “How to Love the Idiots of the World.” But there was some concern about using that title on channel 90 and in the chapel publicity — understandably so. 

Idiot is not a kind or respectable term. My parents never allowed me to use the word idiot, and they never did.  My father never called people who voted wrong “idiots.” And my mother never yelled “idiot” at the guy who cut her off in traffic.

However, I hear the term 'idiot' used quite frequently today, as there seems to be less interest in sounding kind or respectable when reacting to self-centered, reckless, and unthinking people who raise our blood pressure by honking as soon as the traffic light changes color. 

At one time in history, “idiot” referred to someone with low cognitive capacity.

Random House Publishing has a series of 120 Idiot's Guide books.

• An idiot’s guide to playing the guitar
• An idiot’s guide to plant-based nutrition
• An idiot's guide to bitcoin
• etc, etc

However, today the word idiot is used more broadly and commonly to describe people who really, really annoy us. 

I hear it applied to people who have different views about history, economics, politics, vaccines, science, education, or sexuality. I hear it used of people who park in someone else's reserved parking spot. Sometimes I hear it used to lambast food service workers. And I've heard the term directed at the one or two people who drive their scooters recklessly through the hallway.

Now, I'm not going to argue over whether these people are actually idiots — or jerks — or morons — or whatever they're called. The terminology itself isn’t really the issue.  The question of what to call them becomes moot when Jesus implores us to love our neighbors irrespective of their social standing or even their behavior. 

Jesus seemed to hang out with a lot of people who would have been labeled “village idiots” in his time—tax collectors such as his disciple Matthew, and Zacchaeus, the wee little man who Jesus invited himself to stay with him. Zach worked the tax racket, too. Then there was the questionable Samaritan woman he met at Jacob's Well. One of his disciples was a zealot — quite possibly a radicalized political subversive. 

The list could go on and on. There were many irresponsible, reckless, and unwise individuals in his circle. And Jesus modeled love toward these people that others labeled as idiots, sinners, or fools. 

I want to suggest that his kind of love is an aspect of the gospel imperative. When we accept Jesus into our lives, we are receiving, along with him, his priorities and values, including the love of neighbors—even if they are different, poor, unlovable, incarcerated, foreigners, criminals, enemies, or idiots. Yes, even the idiots.

If we're truly following Jesus, we'll be loving even the annoying and irresponsible people around us. This is my key idea this morning, and you’re welcome to jot this down in the sermon guide on page three of the bulletin. If we're truly following Jesus, we'll be loving even the annoying and irresponsible people around us.

Of course, this is by its very nature easier said than done. So I want to share 10 ideas to jump-start the love.

1. Allow the love of God to seize your own life as the first priority. 

The only way that we can ever love difficult people is if we first encounter his love for us. 1 John 4:19 summarizes it well, “We love because God first loved us.”

One of my favorite contemporary preachers, Fr Ben deHart, of St John's Episcopal Church in Brooklyn, says, 

“To love God and neighbor, we don’t just need better intentions or stronger will power. We need the Spirit to transform our hearts… Before we can love God, we have to fall in love with him. And that kind of love cannot be forced. It must be given. I used to think I could generate love by mastering the right beliefs or willing it hard enough. Maybe it worked at first—but it never had legs. It left me striving, but unmoved.”

“Then” he goes on, “through no effort of my own—love seized me instead. It happened at an Episcopal church plant in western Pennsylvania. I was a college student, heartbroken after a relationship I had believed would last. Everything felt like ash. One Sunday, I wandered back into church. And somehow—through the sermon, the liturgy, the table—I encountered something deeper than knowledge or willpower. I encountered Christ by the power of the Spirit. I was, in Thomas Chalmers’ words, ‘seized by the power of a new affection.’”

Allow the love of God to take over your life. Allow your life to be seized by the power of a new affection. And BTW, you’re never too old for a new love.

2. Look to the enabling power of God. 

I want to suggest that it's impossible to love difficult people apart from the enabling power of his indwelling Holy Spirit. 

In Galatians 5:22-23, Paul says, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.” 

There is no way we're going to be able to love idiots if we're lacking the patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control that the Spirit generates in us. We'll just be spinning our wheels — tractionless and frustrated, not only with them but also with ourselves. It's God at work in our lives that empowers us for this kind of unconventional love. Be intentional about acknowledging the source of this love.

3. Remove idiot and related terms from your active vocabulary. 

I appreciate the pushback received because my sermon title used the word “idiot.” That kind of sensitivity is actually a very positive indicator and a strength of our community.

One thing I've learned when working with dementia patients over the years is that sometimes even the kindest, most reserved, and controlled people can develop a vulgar vocabulary if they get dementia, not all, but some. 

And there has been a lot of speculation on why this is. One theory that makes sense to me is that we tend to store the words that we prohibit ourselves from saying in a completely different part of our brains from the rest of our active vocabulary. And I’m told there is neurological research to back this up. 

Somehow, the disease confuses people in such a way that while they lose their ability to use their normal active vocabulary, they end up inadvertently tapping into the separate prohibited list of words — in an attempt to communicate. 

Yes, this is a gross over-generalization — and I'm not so interested in getting into the issues surrounding dementia research here — but I want us to note that we all keep an active vocabulary list and a prohibited vocabulary list in our brains. 

And my point is that if we're going to love challenging people, we need to shift words like idiot from our active list to our prohibited vocabulary list. When we do this, our default response to outlandish behavior is no longer a brash outburst —but something more along the lines of empathy. 

In the Sermon on the Mount, recorded in Matthew 5, Jesus is talking about the way things operate in his Kingdom of Heaven — that is, when our lives align with the heavenly way of doing things. And he says in Matthew 5:21-22,  “You have heard that it was said to those who lived long ago, Don’t commit murder, and all who commit murder will be in danger of judgment. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with their brother or sister will be in danger of judgment. If they say to their brother or sister, ‘Raca’ — (the Aramaic phrase for ‘You idiot,’) they will be in danger of being condemned by the governing council. And if they say, ‘You fool,’ they will be in danger of fiery hell.”

In other words, if your natural response to the stupidity of others is to shoot off angry insults — IDIOT!, FOOL!, STUPID MORON!, JERK! — You're setting yourself up for the same kind of judgment normally reserved for murderers. So remove these words from your active vocabulary lists. No good can EVER come from responding to anyone with these kinds of words.

4. Instead, adopt gracious speech as your default — gracious words that surface even when those around you are acting and speaking irresponsibly. 

In Colossians 4, Paul is addressing believers who were struggling with conflict in their midst. And his instructions are, instead of calling out everyone for their shortcomings, in vs 6 he says, “Your speech should always be gracious and sprinkled with insight so that you may know how to respond to every person.”

If you keep graciousness at the top of your active vocabulary, you're going to be able to respond in a healthy, uplifting way to every situation.

5.  Nurture Empathy! That is, work on understanding what makes people tick. 

I get annoyed by a lot of the political rhetoric. And one thing that keeps me from exploding or writing people off is to focus less on what they are saying and more on understanding why they think and behave the way they do. What causes otherwise likable, intelligent people to vocally embrace political propaganda and talk endlessly about why they're so right? What causes normally careful people to drive recklessly? 

I'm not agreeing with the senseless things anyone is saying, but instead of blasting them out of the water, I want to genuinely understand what makes them tick. So I try to listen for the deeper issues that trigger their irresponsible speech or attitudes.

And I'm not just talking about politics. We need to understand what drives people into racism — if we're going to love the racist, as well as the victims of racism. We need to understand why people drink too much and make fools of themselves, rather than just writing them off as out-of-control drunks. 

And who knows, maybe in the process of acting with empathy toward the irresponsible, we'll learn something about ourselves. We might even come to humbly recognize that there are things about people which are too complex to understand — information that is above our pay grades.

6. Pray for them. Shoot up a quick prayer when the driver cuts you off. “Lord, send your angels around that car to protect everyone on the road and especially this driver. He's clearly not ready to meet Jesus, yet. Amen.” 

Jesus says we should pray for those who persecute us, that is, those who make our lives difficult. Matthew 5:44 — “Love your enemies and pray for those who harass you.” 

And BTW, praying that some jerk will burn in hell doesn't line up with what Jesus is saying here. 

7.  Train yourself to refrain from gloating. 

When people act irresponsibly, they eventually crash and burn. Even if they don't literally crash, they eventually get pulled over and cited. Sometimes we have the pleasure of seeing that happen.

Do you know how many traffic karma videos are currently running on Facebook? — where a cop just happens to be in the right spot to see the guy who cut you off — and then your dashcam captures him getting pulled over. 

When that happens — yes, be thankful that the unmarked cop car was in the right place at the right time, but don't dwell on the driver's demise. It's not healthy for our own souls to gloat over even the righteous misfortune of others.

8. Know your boundaries. 

We love people despite their behavior, but that doesn't mean we're unaware of it or that we accept it. We're just not allowing them to rent space in our heads. Sometimes we get so fixated on the stupidity of others that we can't stop thinking about them. They take over our heads. And that raises our blood pressure, which frustrates us even more. 

If the clowns running the global or national show annoy you, please shut off the 24/7 news stream that endlessly highlights how awful things are. Then, as the Spirit enables you, reach across the boundaries to show kindness. 

There were some pastors in our community clergy groups who grated on me. They were full of themselves and their accomplishments. Reverend Idiots, if you will. 

For my own sanity and sanctification, I avoided working with them on projects. I maintained boundaries. But I intentionally still made a point of asking them about their health and their children whenever I saw them.

9.  Use the observed idiocy of others as a prompt for self-examination and awareness. 

“Instead of trying to remove the splinter from someone else's eye,” Jesus says in Matthew 7:3-5, “take the log out of your own eye.” 

Instead of focusing on the shortcomings of others, the humble and loving thing is to consider if we're blind to our own shortcomings. Is it possible that some of my behaviors and attitudes have slipped into the idiocy zone? 

It's important to continually refresh our self-awareness because no one is all that far from acting like an idiot. We could easily slip over that line and not know it.

10. Pour your energy into preemptive love. 

This shifts the focus in our heads. When we're so busy loving people, we don't have any energy left over to rant about the dumb people who invade our space. 

And this brings us back to the first idea of allowing the love of God to seize our lives as the first priority. When we allow the love of God to seize our lives, once he gets a foothold, he starts to take over, and his love becomes the defining quality in our lives. 

It's no longer a stretch to love the idiots when they show up, because godly loving is already firmly established as a pattern in our lives, and love already has momentum. And that momentum makes all the difference.

Yes, it can still be a challenge to love the unthinking, irresponsible people around us. But Christ, by your invitation, is present in your life, and through your life, he is extending his love to even the least worthy.

And believe it or not, that is the good news.

Let's affirm our faith by reading together from 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 (MSG) about the love that comes to us through Christ. First, though, I want to read it to you. Then we can read together.

Love never gives up.

Love cares more for others than for self.

Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.

Love doesn’t strut,

Doesn’t have a swelled head,

Doesn’t force itself on others,

Isn’t always “me first,”

Doesn’t fly off the handle,

Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,

Doesn’t revel when others grovel,

Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,

Puts up with anything,

Trusts God always,

Always looks for the best,

Never looks back,

But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies.