Our Four Basic Needs
David Orendorff · Matthew 17:1-5 · June 11, 2006
This sermon is for the recent graduates among us. Non- graduates may listen or not listen, as you choose.
As you make this significant shift in your life, I want you to know how to get to heaven. Heaven is not only a place we go after death, but it is the experience of deep joy in this life. I and everyone here want you to have that joy, that heaven.
The drama indicates that the way to make the leap to heaven is for Jesus to carry you. Those of us who have been carried by Jesus to heaven can tell you how Jesus will carry you. Jesus will carry you to heaven, if you let him, if you show up to be carried; by meeting the four most basic needs of your life once you have shelter and food.
But first, let’s look at how God carried Jesus to heaven. In today’s scripture, Jesus, like you, is at a significant turning point in his life. He has been ministering in Galilee and now turns toward Jerusalem, where he will be arrested, tortured, and murdered. Jesus goes up a mountain with his friends to be with God at his graduation. Moses and Elijah appear, and Peter offers to make a place for them to stay and talk.
At this moment in Matthew 17:5, it is written: While Peter was still speaking, a bright cloud overshadowed them and from the cloud, a voice said, "This is my Son, I love him; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!" 1Matthew 17:5
God claims Jesus, "This is my son." Jesus belongs to God. The belonging is filled out with “This is my beloved son.” God loves Jesus and tells all who will hear; tells the entire crowd. Next God says “With him I am well pleased.” God appreciates Jesus. And finally God declares, “Listen to him.” God says that Jesus is to be listened to, he is significant. God carries Jesus to heaven, to joy, by meeting the same basic needs we have; to belong, to be loved, to be appreciated and to be significant.
Each of us has these same four basic needs and they are met in our life by the grace and love of God as embodied in Jesus and lived among us.
To illustrate this, I repeat what Terri Vandermark wrote about her little brother, Cory. Terri writes:
On June 18th, I went to my little brother's baseball game as I always did. Cory was 12 years old at the time and had been playing baseball for a couple of years. When I saw that he was warming up to be next at bat, I decided to head over to the dugout to give him a few pointers. But when I got there, I simply said, "I love you."
In return, he asked, "Does this mean you want me to hit a home run?"
I smiled and said, "Do your best."
As he walked up to the plate, there was a certain aura about him. He looked so confident and so sure about what he was going to do. One swing was all he took and, wouldn't you know, he hit his first home run! He ran around those bases with such pride his eyes sparkled and his face was lit up. But what touched my heart the most was when he walked back over to the dugout. He looked over at me with the biggest smile I've ever seen and said, "I love you too, Ter."
I don't remember if his team won or lost that game. On that special summer day in June, it simply didn't matter. 2Terri Vandermark, The Home Run, in Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul, (Health Communications, Inc., Deerfield Beach, FL, 1997), 83
- Cory needs to belong. When Terri walks over to speak with her brother in the batting circle, she is saying to the entire crowd, "Cory belongs to me." You can imagine how important it is to Cory to be claimed as belonging to his big sister. We all want to belong to a family, a group, to friends. Loneliness is the feeling of not belonging. There is great joy when we are told we belong.
- Cory needs to be loved. Terri, instead of being the big sister with advice, is the big sister with love. All the advice in the world cannot equal the simple truth that Cory is loved by the one who claims him. It is love made real, made flesh, that births joy.
- Cory needs to be appreciated. It doesn't matter whether he hits a home run or strikes out, only that he does his best. What ever happens, Terri appreciates her little brother and he feels it, and there is joy in his heart.
- Cory needs to be significant. Cory must believe that in the eyes of the one who matters, in this case his sister, he is doing something important. Terri gives him that belief with her public claiming of him as her brother, in her love of him, and in appreciation for him.
Belonging, being loved, being appreciated, and being significant fill Cory with confidence for his turn at bat. Whether he strikes out or hits a home run will not lessen that he belongs, is loved, is appreciated, and is significant to his sister.
The four basic needs are all in today’s scripture and in the short story Terri tells. The psychiatrist William Glasser, among others, documents these same four needs in his work with children, teachers, and parents. If these needs are met, regardless of your material or professional success, you will be full of joy, you will be happy in life, you will know heaven now.
Jesus again and again tells us we belong to his family, loves us no matter what, appreciates us just as we are, and works
servant love through us so that we are truly significant. And as the drama pointed out, Jesus carries us to heaven by meeting our four basic needs.
You belong to Jesus if you will accept that you belong with Jesus to God. Jesus claims you if you will accept that claim. Jesus’s compassion is the same as God’s compassion so that you belong to Jesus before you know his name or are even conscious of your desperate need to belong. Jesus is your brother, the true beginning of your forever family.
You are loved by Jesus. It doesn’t matter how good you are (or not), how smart you are, how rich you are, what gender, religion, nationality or sexual preference you are. Jesus loves you before you know his name, before you are born and beyond this life. Jesus says of you, as God said of him, “This is my beloved child.” You are loved by Jesus.
Jesus appreciates every one of you. He sees you as you truly are and says of each of you, “With you I am well pleased.” Of course you could be better. Of course you could do better. But Jesus knows you better than you know yourself and is well pleased with you as you now are. Because Jesus appreciates who you are now, he will carry you forward into tomorrow, into being someone who sees the wonderful truth of him or herself, just as Jesus sees that beautiful truth. And by your prayer and permission, the mercy of Jesus you will carry you to be someone who appreciates yourself.
And Jesus finds every one of you significant. In the ritual of baptism, when you are washed with the forgiving and empowering love of God, we say that by this divine bathing “We are incorporated into God’s mighty acts of salvation.” We are significant in the eyes of Jesus because we are a part of the body which brings the healing of the Holy Spirit, the “mighty acts of salvation” to the world. We are significant just as we are and with the aid of Jesus our significance grows.
Your four basic needs are met by Jesus not only as Spirit, not only as big sister, family, or friends, but is also be nurtured and met by a faith community.
At Bear Creek, the first part of our mission statement says that it is our purpose to "create a diverse family place of belonging for all people." We are saying that everyone here belongs here, that everyone here is loved, that everyone here is appreciated, and that everyone one here is significant. We say this because God has said it to each of us, because Jesus carries us to heaven, because we believe it, and because in such a place and people as this we find joy.
Graduates, you now leave one life and enter another. In a sense, you are leaving us. Many of you will soon be literally leaving town. You will be moving out of your parent’s home to attend a new school or take a new job. Some of you, though not moving out, will change from student to employee and your life
will take on new directions and challenges. But though everything else will change, the four basic needs of your life will remain constant. You will always need to belong, to be loved, to be appreciated, and to be significant.
Though your family and this church may be miles from you, you will still belong to them, they will still love you, appreciate you, and find you significant to the world. From all of us you will have what you truly need. So don't forget us as you make your life because you need us.
But your family and this congregation, no matter how perfect, is not enough. You need your own friends, your own community to whom you belong, are loved, are appreciated, and are significant. A part of your journey will be to find and form this greater family. So build friendships with those who give you joy in good ways. Do not accept the meeting of your needs at the expense of your happiness. If a friend does not meet your four basic needs, move on. Do not settle for less than belonging, loving, appreciation, and significance in friend or romance. You deserve the best.
And as you seek to meet your four basic needs in this new world, let Jesus carry you forward by spending time in worship and prayer, study, and service. Be quiet inside and feel how much you belong to God, how much God loves you, how much God appreciates you and how God has made you significant to our heavenly joy and the heavenly healing of the world.
And my last advice for you is to do for others what God has done for you. Offer belonging, loving, appreciation, and significance to the least and to the greatest. Tell your little brother when he steps up to bat, "I love you.” Help someone, teach a Sunday school class or work a Chrysalis, Kairos, Journey, or Walk weekend. Do your job with a Christ-directed presence, which makes every companion belong, loved, appreciated, and significant. And when you do these small acts of loving kindness, you will know that your life, no matter how big or small to the world, is big to God. And by this you will be carried into a life with joy and strength, into heaven now and forever.
Shalom and Amen.