The Calling to Which We Are Called

(Scriptures:  2 Samuel 18:5-15   Ephesians 4:25-5:2       John 6:35-51)

“I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, ²with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, ³making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

Ephesians 4:1-3

We’re now in mid-August, and for students, the summer break is waning fast.  Lots of merchants are offering back to school sales.  Some churches do a special service for students – which I think I’d like to try here – called the “blessing of the backpacks”.  Of course, many who graduated high school in the spring are going to college, and will be living away from home.  The students look forward to greater independence, but parents worry – will my son or daughter be ok?  Will they know enough to stay out of trouble, to avoid bad influences?  Many parents are giving their son or daughter a talk to remind them: “Remember what we’ve taught you.  Remember who you are.”

“Remember who you are.” Today’s reading from Ephesians can be summed up in those four words – “Remember who you are.”  Over the past several weeks, the Epistle readings have been from Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus.  A mixed congregation of Jews and gentiles, Paul wrote them urging unity.  He wrote to praise the congregation for their faithfulness, reminded them of all God has done for them through Jesus Christ, reminded them that, through Christ, the dividing wall between Jew and Gentile had been torn down – and it was high time for the folks at Ephesus to start living that way.  Last week’s reading began with the words, “I therefore, a prisoner of the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”  In today’s Gospel reading, Paul goes into more detail about what it means to lead such a life, what it means to “remember who you are.”

Paul gets down to cases:  “Let us speak the truth to our neighbors, for we are members of one another.  Be angry, but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger and do not make room for the devil. Thieves must give up stealing; let them labor and work honestly with their own hands, so as to have something to share with the needy.  Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up.  Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with which you were marked with a seal for the day of redemption.  Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice.  Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another…..”  These words sound almost impossible, but then Paul reminds us why forgiveness is so important – “forgiving one another as God in Christ has forgiven you.”

"Remember who you are."  Paul’s words give us picture of what it is to live a life worthy of the calling to which we have been called.  A whole sermon series could be preached on each of these injunctions – speak the truth to one another, do not let the sun go down on your anger, labor and work honestly with your own hands, let no evil talk come out of your mouth, and so on – but for today I’ll spare you the sermon series – and you’re welcome.  Instead, I’d like to focus on the importance of remembering who we are, of living lives worthy of our call as Christians, in a world which preaches the exact opposite – and in God’s name.

“Be angry, but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger and do not make room for the devil”  We live in a society which continually seems to grow more divided, more angry, Talk radio and TV commentators stir up resentment, distrust, and hatred, and get paid big bucks to do it.  They laugh at their audience behind their back, all the way to the bank.  Our country’s anger has given the devil lots of space, and the devil has stirred up lots of trouble.  The shooting in Aurora CO, followed by the shooting in a Sikh Temple in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, didn’t happen in a vacuum – when radio, TV and entirely too many TV and radio preachers are filling the air with hate and mistrust 24/7, it’s inevitable that some number of mentally unstable individuals will lose their precarious grip on reality, and lash out in violence.   Amid the constant drumbeat of resentment, resentment, resentment – it’s essential that we remember that we remember the calling to which we’re called as Christians, the calling to be peacemakers and to love our enemies. It’s essential that we remember who we are.

You don’t have to drive to Colorado or hang out at Sikh houses of worship to see this sort of thing play out.  Plenty of trouble stirring right here in Bridesburg.  Exhibit A, the kerfuffle over the food cupboard sponsored by the Bridesburg Council of Churches.  I know that Bridesburg is a proud neighborhood, a “family first neighborhood” as the banners say, a neighborhood with a strong effort of standing on its own two feet.  The cherished images we have of Bridesburg don’t include visions of hundreds of people waiting in food lines – having food lines winding up and down Kirkbride Street seems like something out of some old newspaper clipping about the Great Depression.  It’s a shock to realize that people here, in Bridesburg, in our neighborhood, right now, are hurting.   There are lots of factors contributing to those food lines.  Some are personal - doubtless in many cases there are stories to be told of marriages and families falling apart under the strain of unemployment, of people numbing themselves with drink or drugs to make the pain go away.  And there are national and international forces at work - the diminished power of organized labor, economic policies that reward corporations for sending jobs overseas, predatory lenders foreclosing on mortgages and throwing people out on the street, 30 years of political efforts to destroy the social safety net, on and on.  But Wall Street bankers and multinational corporations and political leaders at all levels of government seem abstract, faceless, too remote from us even to hear our anger, let alone to be threatened by it.  It’s much easier to blame the victims, to take out our frustration on the folks in the food lines, blaming them for their own problems.  Far easier to call the folks in the food line a bunch of drunks and junkies and scam artists, accusing them of driving long distances to invade our neighborhood, hog our parking spaces, trash our sidewalks, peer in our windows, and drive home with our charitable donations. 

So when our neighbors in Bridesburg start talking like this – and they do, and they will - we need to remember who we are – followers of Jesus Christ, who could have been born into a prominent Roman or Jewish family, but instead was born into a poor family, who could have courted favor with the rich, but instead chose poor and working class persons as his disciples, whose mission it was to preach good news to the poor and liberation to the captive, who told the rich young ruler that before he could follow Jesus he would have to sell all he had and give it to the poor, who, in the words of the Magnificat, “filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.”   Yes, many of the folks who come to the cupboard are dysfunctional, drunk, obnoxious.  Yes, it’s inconvenient having them all standing on Kirkbride Street, some of them three sails to the wind by 10 in the morning, with their trash and their loud talk and their old rattletrap cars hogging up all the parking.  But life is inconvenient for them as well.  It’s inconvenient for them to be in poor, inconvenient for them to be unemployed, or perhaps working multiple dead-end jobs that don’t pay a living wage, inconvenient for them to be alcoholic or addicted, inconvenient for them to have children they can’t support, inconvenient for them to have to stand in line for hours and depend on the kindness of strangers, however good natured or well intentioned. The poor in those lines at the cupboard are the poor for whom Christ died.  The poor in those lines at the cupboard are those of whom Christ spoke when he told those at his right hand, whatsoever you have done unto the least of these my brothers and sisters, you’ve done it unto me.  When Jesus fed the five thousand, he didn’t tell the disciples to administer breathalyzer tests or drug screenings or asking the folks to show photo IDs or copies of utility bills to prove they were local and lived in the right zip code.  Christ just fed them – just as God causes rain to fall on the good and the bad, and sends blessing on the just and unjust.  If we are to call ourselves followers of Christ, we can do no less.

Jesus Christ said that the second great commandment, after love of God, was love of neighbor.   The love of which Jesus spoke didn’t necessarily depend on liking our neighbor.  Rather, the love of which Jesus spoke was solidarity, standing by one’s neighbor whether you like your neighbor or not.  Like members of a labor union realizing that an attack on one member is a threat to all. 

The powers and principalities, those who practice spiritual wickedness in high places, specialize in the game of divide and conquer.  They set native-born against immigrant, white against black against Hispanic against Asian, set Christian against Jew against Muslim, set men against women, set straight against gay, set employed against unemployed.  They specialize in pointing out the person here and there who cuts corners to get some extra food stamps or other public assistance – and confabulate all manner of stories about welfare queens.  While they’re pointing over there – “Look at that welfare cheat” - all the while they’re picking our back pockets by passing laws that favor the rich and make life difficult for the rest of us.

Bridesburg has a strong ethic of “sticking together”.  And this is what Jesus calls us to do – stick together – only we need to widen the circle, be willing to stick together with a wider range of people, be willing to practice solidarity with all our neighbors, not just a few.  We need to stick together, to practice solidarity – with the poor when they’re being abused, with the unpopular when they’re being shunned.  We might remember that most of us are ourselves just a few paychecks or pension checks away from going hungry.  We reap what we sow – and the solidarity we practice may be the solidarity that saves us when the chips are down.

“I therefore beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, ²with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, ³making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”    May we at Emanuel Church always lead lives worthy of the calling to which Christ has called us.  May we always remember who we are – and may we always remember whose we are.  Amen.

 

Wonder Bread

(Scriptures:  2 Samuel 11:26 – 12:13a, Ephesians 4:1-16,  John 6:24-35)

What a joy it is to be back with you at Emanuel Church.  I had an amazing time in Cuba – and I’m still mulling over my experiences there in my mind - but, as the saying goes, there’s no place like home.  Rev. Doug, who filled in for me over the past two Sundays, spoke highly of his time with you.  And his words made me even more eager to return.

Last week, Doug preached about the feeding of the five thousand – one of the miracles of Jesus that is recorded in all four Gospels, meaning that the feeding of the five thousand was, for the early church, key to understanding who Jesus is.

And that very question – who is Jesus – is at the center of today’s Gospel reading.  After the crowds were fed and twelve baskets of leftover scraps gathered up, Jesus’ disciples journeyed across the sea back to Capernaum, and in the midst of a gathering storm, Jesus came walking to them on the water.  They landed in Capernaum, and found the same crowds they had just gotten done feeding on the other side of the sea.

And then begins a conversation between Jesus and the crowds, in which the crowds try to get their minds around who Jesus is.  This conversation, which we will hear over the next several Sundays, becomes stranger and stranger as it continues, until at last the crowds become frustrated and stomp off in disgust.  But it begins at a very basic level – the crowds ask Jesus when he had arrived at Capernaum, and Jesus observes that the crowds are looking for him, not because of his signs, but because they had eaten their fill of the loaves – these folk were not well off and were likely used to going hungry, so having a big meal and a full stomach would be a memorable experience – an experience they were eager to repeat.

But Jesus calls on them to go deeper, to trust Jesus, not only to meet their need for bread, but to meet them at their point of deepest need.  “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you.”  And they ask how they are supposed to work for this eternal bread, “What must we do to perform the works of God.”  Jesus tells them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”  The people then ask for proof, harking back to their early wilderness tradition: “What sign are you going to give us so that we may see it and believe you?  What work are you performing?  Our ancesters ate the manna in the wilderness, as it is written, “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”   The people expect that the Messiah will be able to give manna, as it was when Moses led the children of Israel in the wilderness.  Jesus tells them that God, not Moses, gave them the bread from heaven, and God will give them the true bread from heaven.  And the crowds are eager: “Sir, give us this bread always.”  Our reading ends with Jesus’ response:  “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”

So Jesus is more or less explicitly comparing himself to the manna with which God fed the children of Israel in the wilderness.  In a place with little food or water, the manna is what stood between the children of Israel and death by starvation.  The manna may not have always been what they wanted – and, indeed, after a while they complained about the blandness and monotony of the manna – but it was what they needed.  The presence of the manna did not take them out of the wilderness – but it made the wilderness bearable, and gave God’s people strength for the journey. 

Psychologist Abraham Maslow spoke of humans as having a hierarchy of needs, which is often represented as a pyramid.  At the base of the pyramid are basic survival needs for food and water.  Just above these basic survival needs are the need for physical and emotional safety.  Higher on the pyramid is the emotional need for love and belonging.  At the top of the pyramid are needs for self-esteem and the desire to reach one’s potential, which Maslow called self-actualization.  Maslow theorized that people whose basic survival and safety needs went lacking, would not feel motivated to seek love, self-esteem, and so forth.  So in a sense, Jesus and the crowds were working from different locations on the pyramid.  The crowds were stuck at the base of the pyramid, in survival mode, focused on their own nutrition and safety – Jesus had fed them, and the crowds wanted Jesus to continue to feed them.  Jesus invited the crowds to rely on Jesus, not just for bread, but for safety, belonging, and all the rest.  The crowds wanted to fill their stomachs; Jesus offered to feed them emotionally, spiritually, in all facets of life.  Jesus spoke of himself as bread – and the crowds were left to wonder what on earth he meant.  He offered himself as a sort of wonder bread, to fill and fulfill them at their many points of need.

Perhaps the image of manna gives us a deeper sense of what Jesus means in asking people to believe in him.  Remember that the manna was provided day by day – they couldn’t store it up for the future, except that they could gather enough on Friday to carry them through the Sabbath.  If they tried to hoard it, it went bad.  So the children of Israel had to trust day by day that God would provide for them.  And perhaps this is the kind of faith we are to have in Jesus – not just reciting the words of a creed, but relying on Jesus day by day to sustain us through whatever life throws at us.

For some in America, it’s been a long time since we’ve experienced physical hunger, or perhaps we’ve never really experienced it.  We know what it is for our stomachs to growl while we’re waiting for dinner, but many have little experience of what it is to go without dinner, and breakfast the next day too, to get by on one meal a day, if that.  But many in America do know – as evidenced by the lines at the food cupboard.  For many children, the school lunch is the only meal they can rely on all day.  For many, especially in urban areas such as our own, while food may be available at low prices, it’s often processed, deep-fried, loaded with corn syrup, carbs, grease, and preservatives – sufficient for filling stomachs, but not good for maintaining health.  In many urban neighborhoods, healthy fruits and vegetables aren’t for sale, or are unaffordable even if they are for sale.  For this reason, many inner city areas have been described as “food deserts.”  And in many countries, many children come into this world with a sentence of “death by starvation” hanging over their heads.  It has been said that, “the question of bread for myself is a material question, but the question of bread for my neighbor is a spiritual question.”  And many, in Bridesburg and around the world, are waiting to see how our churches will answer.

The crowds who followed Jesus were hungry, in many different ways.  Jesus satisfied their hunger for food, and when he had their attention, offered them the gift of himself.  And that’s a good model for the church to follow.  Starving people can’t eat tracts.  People come to the church with all sorts of needs – for food, for safety, for community, for hope.  Jesus preached the whole Gospel to the whole person – good news for body and soul.  And we in the church are called to do the same.

In Cuba, I saw churches preaching the whole Gospel to the whole person.  Cuba is a country lacking many things – and our country’s embargo on trade with Cuba has only made their situation more precarious – but the people are very resilient and creative.  We were visiting churches affiliated with the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba, among the most progressive protestant groups in Cuba.   And these churches are growing – this group that had started with three churches in the late 1980’s has now, in a little more than 20 years, grown to over 40 congregations, with many of them having been founded in the last 5 or so years.  Often a church will start a small Bible study, and when the Bible study has enough members, it will leave the main congregation to set out and start a new congregation.  And so many of the newer churches are small, with attendance of 20 or 30 or so on a Sunday – indeed, we visited a house church with attendance about the same as Emanuel.  While a few of the older congregations have large buildings, many of the newer churches are meeting in houses; we visited one church that met in a converted garage.  But they’re all feeding their neighbors, physically and spiritually – many have gardens and offer the produce to their neighbors as well as their own members.  One particularly exciting recent development is that some churches have put in water filtration systems – healthy water isn’t always easy to come by in Cuba.  They have outdoor taps so that their neighbors can get clean water, free of charge.  Neighbors line up at these churches with their bottles – many of which have been reused over and over, as plastic bottles are also not always easy to come by - follow the instructions posted on the wall on how to disinfect their bottles with chlorine – also offered at the churches – and then fill their bottles.  The sign on the tap makes an explicit connection between Jesus as living water and the church’s offering of healthy water to their neighbors.

In his teaching and in his actions, most of all in his death and resurrection, Jesus offered the gift of himself.  In a few minutes, we will gather at the table to share bread and wine and to remember Jesus’ self-offering, to show forth Jesus’ death until he comes again.  May we experience Jesus as the bread of life, and when we leave, may we carry Jesus, the bread of life, to our neighbors who are hungry.  Amen.

Breaking Down Walls - A Sermon in Cuba

[Note: Pastor Dave was in Cuba from July 21-28, 2012, as part of a delegation to the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba from the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference, United Church of Christ.  The following sermon was preached in Cuba.]

Ephesians 2:13-22



13But now in Christ Jesus [those] who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups into one and has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us. 15He has abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances, so that he might create in himself one new humanity in place of the two, thus making peace, 16and might reconcile both groups to God in one body through the cross, thus putting to death that hostility through it. 17So he came and proclaimed peace to [those] who were far off and peace to those who were near; 18for through him both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, 20built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. 21In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; 22in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling-place for God.

Breaking Down Walls

What a great pleasure it is to be back in Cuba, and to be with the sisters and brothers of the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba. My first trip here was in 2008. I remember walking around the park outside the Capitolio...and being surprised to see a sculpture of the face of Abraham Lincoln. I remember asking our guide what significance this statue of Abraham Lincoln would have had in Cuba, and our guide said something like, “Why not? He was a good guy!” Lincoln was committed to keeping the United States together during a time of many divisions. In the year 1858, just a few years before the outbreak of the Civil War in the United States, Lincoln addressed the social division in the United States over the institution of slavery using the words of Jesus, as recorded in Matthew’s Gospel, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”

Our reading from Ephesians deals with houses – or congregations or countries – that are divided, needing reconciliation. St Paul in his letter to the Ephesians praised our Savior who gathers. In Ephesians, Paul was writing to predominantly Gentile, non-Jewish congregations, which apparently felt some alienation from Jewish converts to the way of Jesus. Paul wrote to remind them that both Jewish and non-Jewish followers of Christ were one family, that through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the walls dividing Jew and non-Jew were broken down, that though, like all families, they may squabble from time to time, they were nonetheless all one family,

As I was preparing to join with the group of visitors from the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference of the United Church of Christ to the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba, this passages of Scripture, which was read in many of our churches in the United States on Sunday, July 22, seem amazingly appropriate, indeed, almost divinely ordained, for this visit. Some political leaders, particularly in the United States, are really good at building walls, and not so good at breaking them down. Political calculations make it difficult for Cubans to visit the United States. Political calculations make it difficult for citizens of the United States to visit Cuba. “El bloqueo” has imposed tremendous suffering on Cuba. Unfortunately, at the present moment, that’s what the political process has to offer.

From other political leaders in the United States and elsewhere, we hear uplifting messages about globalization – and, indeed, wouldn’t it be wonderful to rid ourselves of the nationalistic barriers that divide us, to think of ourselves as one human race. What a wonderful world that would be. But the global capitalism preached by our political leaders, whose political campaigns are funded by huge corporations, isn’t about global reunification, but, rather, about global exploitation, draining resources from around the globe while being beyond the scope of any one nation’s laws, and therefore accountable to nobody. In this model human beings all around the globe are sheep to be fleeced, or lambs led to slaughter.

But in Christ, it is a different story. Christ has broken down the dividing wall, the hostility cultivated by political leaders. Christ proclaims peace to those who are far off and peace to those who are near – and given the current political divisions, the United States and Cuba are separated by a geographical distance of just 90 miles and by a political gulf so enormous it’s nearly impossible to measure, much less cross. But where political leaders proclaim locked doors and economic leaders find new ways to exploit the needy, God opens a door to a different path, a different way forward. Even our respective governments recognize the unique value of church dialogue. Because we – we in Cuba and we in the United States – are church, under the care of the church we can visit one another in a way that those outside the church cannot. It is only because of Christ that we, Cubans and Americans, can be in this one room together. Where political leaders proclaim fear and suspicion, the Gospel proclaims reconciliation and reunion. We are in different geographical locations, different social settings, different political configurations – but in Christ we are one. The Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba is committed to breaking down the walls of race, gender, class, sexual orientation – and in the United Church of Christ, we share these commitments. And these commitments to breaking down walls have been costly commitments, for the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba and for the United Church of Christ. So in Christ we are united; there is no separation between the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba and the United Church of Christ. Here, in this place, we can see Paul’s words come to life, see Paul’s words put into action. This meeting, our being together in this place, what we experience *today*, is a strong witness to the power of Jesus Christ to gather those who otherwise would be scattered.

Your congregation shows us the way forward. With your ecological gardens and sustainable agriculture, you’re showing that “another world is possible,” proclaiming the countercultural message of the reign of God, which grows like the seed in your gardens, feeding the hungry and bringing hope to the hopeless; proclaiming the gospel of Christ which is living water, like the lifegiving water offered free of charge by many of the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba congregations. And so Jesus Christ, who has broken down the walls between us, has made a way for us to be with you and to learn from you.

[At this time, the floor was opened for others to share testimonies of how Christ has broken down barriers for them. This was followed by a closing prayer.] Amen.

Pastor Dave's Report on Cuba Trip

(Note: I apologize for not having updated the blog in several weeks - I've caught up by publishing sermons from June through July 15.  Pastor Dave was part of a delegation from the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference, United Church of Christ, to Cuba, departing July 21, 2012 and returning July 28, 2012.  Below is a report Pastor Dave made to the congregation.)

Dear Members and Friends of Emanuel- Hope you've been well - I've been catching up on emails. I got back from Cuba on Saturday, arriving back in Conshohocken around 11:30 pm last night. The trip was wonderful. Thanks for your prayers for my health. I'm writing with a brief initial report.


There were eight of us in the group. I had no health problems at all - and while this was my third trip to Cuba, this is the first time I've gotten through the trip without getting sick. Two of the group had mild illness due to the extreme heat, but that was the extent of health problems.

The churches we visited belonged to the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba (FIBAC), a progressive Baptist denomination whose theology shares much in common with the UCC. One of FIBAC's distinctives is that they have many, many female pastors, which is still fairly unusual (even controversial) in Cuba. We saw ten or so churches, with a lot of amazing ministries - in addition to very lively preaching, worship, and music, there were many gardens (including some gardens with medicinal herbs) and agricultural projects to benefit the church and surrounding neighborhoods, a Christian center which ministered through art and music, a seminary which serves around 500 students in all (very few of whom live on campus full time, but the seminary offers "intensive" courses that last for 2-3 weeks)...on and on. Many of the churches are quite small - several were house churches roughly the same size as Emanuel, and even the larger churches were less than 100 people, but they did amazing ministry with small numbers and limited resources. The churches are also very adept at leadership development and at planting new congregations; many of FIBAC's congregations have emerged within the past 10 years or so. We saw one church that had extensive fields that produced a great deal of food for the church, for the Cuban government, and for the neighborhood. This church, in the far west of the island, has also planted a number of new church starts in its area, which is quite rural and doesn't have as many churches as other parts of Cuba. We also learned that even for the Cubans, finding uncontaminated water can be difficult; some of the churches have water filtration systems and have outdoor water taps with filtered water that is offered free of charge to the neighborhood. We saw neighbors line up with their bottles, following a diagram near the tap to first sterilize their bottles with chlorine (also offered by the churches) and then fill up their bottles.

There were three pastors in our group - the Rev. Dr. Geneva Butz from the Conference, who preached for Emanuel's 150th, the Rev. Darryl Cruz, pastor of St. John's UCC in Reading, PA, and me, and each of us preached at one church each. We also had several translators - a member of one of the Cuban churches who teaches English as a second language, a missionary from the American Baptist church who accompanied us, and Rev. Cruz......and a few times, when none of these were nearby, I was able to help with some limited translation assistance from the little bit of Spanish I know. On Wednesday we took a needed break, spending the morning and early afternoon at Varadaro Beach, said to be the most beautiful beach in the world.....and it really was just like stepping into a picture postcard, it was so, so beautiful. And periodically through the trip we stopped at various cultural venues, including Havana's art museum, which is quite impressive.

For our UCC churches, it was mostly a time to observe and reconnect. There had been trips from the Pennsylvania Southeast conference (UCC) in 2007, 2008, and 2009, but it had been a few years since the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference (UCC) had sent a group, and had we not gone this year, the connection could easily have gone by the wayside, given the personnel changes at the Conference. Our group brought supplies (donated from our UCC churches, including some donations I made - so Emanuel was represented!) to give to the churches - especially medical supplies and drugs, which are very scarce in Cuba. Our group also brought various eyeglasses (some used prescription eyeglasses as well as some over-the-counter drugstore reading glasses), a few thermometers, two big boxes of non-latex medical gloves, several bottles of over-the-counter aspirin and tylenol and such, disposable razors (we were told the pastors routinely made "disposable" razors last for months due to the shortages), some coloring books and such for children.....except for the specialized medical donations, we broke our donations up into ten gift bags and left a bag with each church we visited. The specialized items, we left with the executive director of their denomination and asked him to direct them as most needed. Some of us (including me) also donated some of our clothing at the end of the trip......which were very sweaty, but the Cubans were most willing to wash them as the price of wearing them; that's how much need there is for basics like clothing.

Our grouphad some money left over at the end of the trip, almost $800 in American currency. One of the churches (the one on the far western side of the island with the extensive fields of vegetable gardens) was trying to get money for their music ministry to create a "master recording" for their music, to sell to finance their evangelism and vegetable raising ministries. We heard their music ministry at an evening church service where Geneva preached, and were very impressed with their music. We donated much of our remaining funds toward this ministry so they could make a master recording - with the provision that we get a copy of the master recording so we can also produce CD's to raise money to bring a group of youth to Cuba.

As I said, Emanuel Church was present, through donations and through my being there. At each church I introduced myself: "Me llamo Dave. Soy el pastor de la Iglesia Emanuel in Philadelphia. Estamos un poco iglesia con treinta miembres, y semana a semana esta quince presente, mas o menos." (There may be a grammatical glitch or two in that introduction, but it's the best I could do with my limited Spanish vocabulary.) I told several churches about our anniversary, and our role in founding Bethany Children's Home. Of the photos I took on July 15, I had copies made and gave them to the churches.

I'll be able to say more next Sunday, if desired. Mostly, at this point, I just wanted to let you know I got back from Cuba in one piece, and to share a little from my experiences there.

See you next Sunday -

Blessings - Pastor Dave

Chosen

(Scriptures: 2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19 Ephesians 1:1-14,  Mark 6:14-29)

Today we celebrate a rare moment in the life of our congregation – the ordination of an elder and a deacon, and a recognition of our congregation’s lay leadership. I’m not sure when the last ordination and installation of elders and deacons happened, but it’s likely been a few years.  

I’d like to say a few words about the function of elders and deacons. In preparing for the service of installation, I reviewed the liturgy from the Evangelical & Reformed order of ordination and installation of elders and deacons. Even though we are a congregation of the United Church of Christ, our roots are in the Reformed tradition, and I felt it was important to give that tradition a voice in today’s service.

According to the E&R liturgy – and while I’m paraphrasing and summarizing, you’ll be hearing many of these words again during the installation, but since it’s been a while, hearing them twice may help us remember – elders are appointed to assist and support the ministers of the Word – that would be the pastor – in the general government of the church. Elders are to be the advisors and counselors of the minister in the performance of his duties, acting as the pastor’s hands and eyes. They are to watch over the congregation in the Lord, to take an active interest in the congregation’s spiritual welfare, to feel responsibility for its condition, to be at hand in all circumstances with spiritual aid for all its needs and wants. Moreover – and this is something we seldom mention in the UCC, but it does exist – to the elders, in conjunction with the pastor, belong the whole discipline of the church to censure members and to restore them to fellowship.

According to the E&R liturgy, Deacons are appointed to assist and support the Pastor in sustaining the more outward needs of the general household of faith. They are to aid in securing the funds necessary for the support of the church, and to cultivate the spirit of liberal and cheerful giving.

I’d also like to lift up some guidance from the United Church of Christ, which I’ve included in your bulletins, and from Scripture. We’re reminded that the office of elder actually pre-dates the existence of the Christian church. From the earliest days of the Hebrew people, the elders were those tribal leaders, those wise ones whose counsel, borne of long experience, was sought out in times of decision. In the book of Numbers, 11th chapter, at a time when Moses was feeling overwhelmed and nearly beside himself with frustration with the burden of leading the Israelites through the wilderness, the Lord instructed him to choose seventy elders, and the Lord took some of the spiritual power from Moses and confer it on them, so they could help Moses bear up under the burden of leading the people. In the book of Acts, as Paul planted new churches, he would appointed elders in each church, and with prayer and fasting entrusted the church to the Lord in whom they had come to believe. In the UCC, following the Reformed tradition, elders oversee the spiritual welfare of the church – preparing for and assisting in serving communion, assisting with the provision of communion to sick and shut-in members, visiting the sick and homebound, and keeping the pastor apprised of members who are in difficulty and need pastoral care.

The UCC reminds us that the office of Deacon originated in the 6th chapter of Acts, when the Gentiles complained that the Jewish widows were getting more assistance than the Gentile widows. The twelve called together the disciples and said, “It is not right that we should neglect the word of God in order to wait on tables.” So seven men of good standing were appointed – many, perhaps most of them Gentiles - and the apostles prayed and laid hands on them. Therefore, the Deacons are to assist with the more outward aspects of the church’s ministry – to distribute aid to the poor and support the church’s ministry in the community, to encourage stewardship and faithful giving to the church, to promote the church’s work of evangelism. Deacons can also assist with serving communion.

In considering these offices, it’s important to keep in mind Paul’s words about the church as one body of Christ with many parts having different functions. Which is to say that elders and deacons must work in harmony with the body as a whole. A church with elders and deacons who know how to work together and promote the congregation’s ministry is richly blessed. A church with elders and deacons who cause discord and disorder in the Lord’s house is sorely distressed. Remember Paul’s words to the fractious church at Corinth: “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” And our elders and deacons should lead the way in building up the church.

Our sharply contrasting readings from the Old Testament and from Mark’s Gospel capture the range of emotions elders and deacons can experience. In our reading from 2 Samuel, David and his entourage are bringing the Ark of the Covenant, which had been captured in battle by the Philistines, back to the Hebrews in triumph. It’s a time of rejoicing, King David is dancing with all his might, throwing reserve and propriety to the winds. We’re told that his wife, Michal, Saul’s daughter, looked on David’s gyrations and despised him for making a spectacle of himself…..not unlike some prim church folk who look down their noses upon the more ..shall we say… expressive forms of worship. No matter: let Michal be as uptight as she wants; this was a day for celebration, and king David would be second to none in dancing his heart out before the Lord. And while we may not necessarily, in the words of the praise song, dance like David danced – these days Pastor Dave dances like Methuselah danced - elders and deacons will experience those moments of celebration during those high moments in the life of our church – the anniversaries, the baptisms, the weddings, those other holy moments we’re privileged to witness. In those moments when the presence of the Lord rocks the house and fills the house with joy, our elders and deacons can lead the way in rejoicing.

And then there are those other moments – those moments when, like John the Baptist, we step out in faith and make a bold statement or take a decisive action, and folks want our heads on a platter. It happens. It’s part of the package, unfortunately. Serving the church as elder, as deacon – indeed, as pastor, or in any other capacity - is not a popularity contest. In some situations it seems that no matter what you do or don’t do, somebody’s going to be unhappy. And especially if God is using our church’s ministry to take on the powers and principalities of the world, and spiritual wickedness in high places – that is to say, if the church is truly being the church, acting according to God’s will – those powers and principalities will push back, and people will be coming for our heads on a platter.

Our reading from Ephesians gives us a broad perspective which should keep us grounded during the highs and lows, keeping us from getting carried away with ourselves when things are going well and keeping us from throwing in the towel when things seem to be crashing and burning. In the UCC, elders and deacons are chosen by the congregation – but Ephesians reminds us that elders, deacons, and indeed every member of the congregation are chosen by God, indeed have been chosen by God from before our birth. Our life here at Emanuel is a banquet, to which God invited each of us before any of us were born. We were chosen – not to get a swelled head or to indulge an overgrown ego, but – what does Ephesians say? – to be holy and blameless in love – let’s repeat that together – “to be holy and blameless in love”…..and later, Ephesians says we are to live for the praise of his glory. As we ordain Al as Elder and David as Deacon, and as we reaffirm the ministries of those who have been serving, may God be glorified, and my God’s love be known among us. Amen.

Homecoming

(Scriptures:  2 Samuel 5:1-7, 9-10, 2 Corinthians 12:1-10 Mark 6:1-13)

This weekend was the annual Arts Festival at Penn State. It’s a big annual alumni event on campus, in which the art displays are almost secondary to the chance to meet with long-ago classmates and catch up. I’ve kept in touch with a few classmates over the years, and of course when we get together, out come the old stories, often stories that I’ve long since forgotten, but that were memorable for my classmates. I missed the festival this year – with the extreme heat, I really didn’t want to be outdoors stomping all over campus – but one couple keeps in touch with me regularly via Facebook and shares memories – “hey Dave, remember that time in college when we tried to feed you cat food.” (I told them that with the economy what it is, I’d probably be eating plenty of cat food after I retire; no need to start now.) We’re 30 years older and, at least in my case, many pounds heavier, but our strongest memories of each other date from when we were age 20 or so. I’m not the same person I was when I was 20 – thank goodness! - and neither are my friends, but while our lives have moved on, our memories of one other are, to some extent, frozen in time.


Our Scriptures this morning are also, in part, stories about memories, about how memories of the past live and give shape to the present. Our Scriptures this morning give us two contrasting homecoming stories – David in Hebron, being acclaimed as king by a grateful people who remembered that during the reign of Saul, it was David who, like a shepherd, “led out Israel and brought us in.” And Jesus, in his hometown of Nazareth, being dismissed by those who knew Jesus when he was growing up, who were perhaps grateful for his skills as a carpenter, but had no time or patience to hear his God-talk.

You see, the crowd at Hebron knew David, and the crowd at Nazareth knew Jesus – so they thought. Reasonably enough, the crowds expected that past behavior would predict future performance. For those at Hebron, the grateful tribes of Israel expected that as David had led them successfully in battle, he would be at least as successful in providing civic leadership as their king. And, for the most part, their expectations would be met, as future generations would look back at David’s reign as the golden age of the united kingdom of Israel and Judah. And the crowds at Nazareth? They expected Jesus would continue to make tables and chairs, and couldn’t imagine what had possessed him to run all over the countryside, healing who knows how, and teaching who knows what.. Mark tells us that Jesus’ previous visit to his hometown had been less than auspicious – Jesus’ family tried to have him locked up, and some visiting religious leaders basically accused Jesus of being Satan’s little helper. Not exactly a Kodak moment. The hometown visit in today’s Gospel reading was even more of a letdown – the crowds turned on him, and Jesus found that his power was limited by their lack of faith. A sentence in our Gospel sticks in our mind: “And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them. And he was amazed at their unbelief.” Jesus, the Son of God, who had cured the Gerasene demoniac, healed the woman with internal bleeding, and raised Jairus’ daughter, was reduced to near-powerlessness by the unbelief of the hometown crowds.

At our Bible study, more than once the question has come up, “why don’t we experience healings and miracles like the ones in the Bible?” Perhaps our lack of faith limits God’s power to act in our lives. In the words of James, “we don’t have, because we don’t ask. We ask and do not receive, because we ask wrongly, to spend what we get on pleasure.”

Memories have power to confine, or to liberate. The Apostle Paul writes of a powerful vision he was granted, a spiritual experience in which he was seemingly caught up into heaven and granted extraordinary revelations, too wonderful to repeat. Along with the revelations he experienced physical limitations as Paul said, to keep him from getting carried away with himself, to keep him grounded and dependent on God’s grace, made perfect in weakness.

“God’s grace is made perfect in weakness.” Few people would describe Emanuel Church as a powerhouse congregation. Our building, while lovely and full of holy memories, will never be mistaken for the Vatican or even for the Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul down on the Parkway. Our congregation, even in its heyday, was never a megachurch, and even less so today. From a worldly, materialistic point of view, weakness abounds. Perhaps it is in just such a congregation as ours, amid such apparent weakness, that God’s grace can be seen most readily. We can be present for one another and look after one another in a personal way that isn’t always available in larger congregations. With no particular worldly clout to throw around, God can – and I believe, does - use our small congregation as a channel of grace to reach those in need of grace, one person at a time, one family at a time – when we believe, when our faith gives God enough room to act. And when we are willing to act on our faith – by welcoming those God sends our way, by sharing what we have, however little, with those in need. Even if we may not be able to do great things in a worldly sense, by God’s grace and in God’s name we can do small things with great love.

In the words of Elizabeth Barrett Browning:

Earth’s crammed with heaven
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees takes off his shoes
The rest sit ‘round it and pluck blackberries.

Here at Emanuel Church, we cherish our memories, our stories of those holy moments in which God met us in the past. Like Paul’s memory of being caught up into heaven, like his memory of the encounter with Christ on the Damascus road, may our memories inspire us, but not limit us. May our faith leave space for God to continue to do new things in our midst. May those who visit Emanuel Church come away saying, “Surely the presence of the Lord is in this place.” Amen.

Only Believe

(Scriptures:   2 Samuel 1:1-4, 11-12, 17-27, 2 Corinthians 8:1-15 Mark 5:21-43)

You’ve likely heard the saying “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.” It’s a saying of which I need to be reminded frequently. As a person juggling multiple crowded schedules – as an employee, as a seminary student, as a pastor – I’m usually very focused on getting from point A to point B as directly and, most importantly, as quickly as possible. .I rarely take time to stop and smell the roses. When I’m running behind schedule and in a hurry to get someplace, I’m not always known for my patience with those slower drivers unfortunate enough to find my car bearing down on them, sometimes with the horn going full blast. And I’m sure many of us can tell similar stories, as we’re all juggling multiple crowded schedules – work schedules, children’s school schedules, schedules of doctors appointments for ourselves or for family members, and so on. We all find ourselves with promises to keep, and miles to go before we sleep.


“It’s not the destination, it’s the journey.” Try telling that to Jairus in our Gospel reading. Jesus has just returned from casting out a demon on the Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee, and is back in familiar territory. Jairus, a local synagogue leader hurries up to Jesus to enlist his healing powers to cure the synagogue leader’s twelve year old daughter, who was near death. And Jesus begins to journey with Jairus……

…..and Jesus apparently gets sidetracked. You see, someone else had healing on her mind. She’d had hemorrhages for 12 years – as long as Jairus’ daughter had been alive, that’s how long this woman had been ill. We’re told that she had spent everything she had on one doctor after another, none of whom could do anything to help her. And I’m sure we all know people who’ve had similar experiences with the medical profession – in this day of high unemployment and lost medical benefits, many uninsured are one medical crisis away from destitution and bankruptcy. Because of the Levitical purity laws around illness and especially anything involving blood, the woman likely suffered not only bodily illness, but social isolation. Think of how this woman must have felt – weary, discouraged, verging on despair. No great planning as involved: the woman just happened along where Jesus was, and hoped that if she could touch, not even he himself, but just the fringe of his clothing, she might be healed. So, tired as she was, discouraged as she was, she was also persistent. She made her way through the jostling of the crowd to where Jesus walked, and touched his cloak – and was healed. Jesus himself felt that healing power had gone out of him, and asked “Who touched my clothes?” [Imagine yourself as Jairus at that moment when Jesus starts going on about his clothes, and the crowd stops dead in its tracks.] Something in Jesus voice let everyone know that he wasn’t playing, that he felt someone touch his clothes in an intentional way beyond the normal jostling of the crowd. Eventually, the woman told her whole story to Jesus, who replied, “Daughter, your faith has made you well, go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”

Good for her. Not so good for Jairus, who must have been just about beside himself at this point – especially after some people from his household came to tell that his daughter was dead. Jairus was urged not to bother Jesus any further, but Jesus reassured Jairus – in today’s language - “hey, I’ve got this. Do not fear. Only believe.” He raised the girl, and reminded those who were standing around with their mouths hanging open that, oh, by the way, she’s probably hungry and might appreciate something to eat.

I began this sermon with the saying, “It’s not the destination, it’s the journey” and so I’m going to digress just a bit to talk about the way Mark tells the stories in today’s Gospel. Of course, Mark wrote down these stories for a very explicit purpose – to bring people to belief in Jesus as Messiah, as Savior and Lord. The writer of Mark’s Gospel used many different techniques to accomplish all this. One of Mark’s favorite techniques is to sandwich one story inside another – in this case, the story of the healing of the woman with the hemorrhage is sandwiched inside the story of the healing of Jairus’ daughter. We start with the story of the girl being sick, apparently digress to the story of the woman touching Jesus’ clothing, and return to conclude with the healing of the little girl. So Mark not only wanted these two healings to be remembered, but wanted them to be remembered together. Not only is one story sandwiched inside the other, but the two stories are linked by the number twelve - We’re told that the girl is twelve years old, and that the woman had suffered from her illness for twelve years. The number twelve has significance in Jewish thought – twelve tribes of Israel, twelve months of the year – and so the number twelve appearing in both these healing stories would have helped anchor these stories in the memories of Mark’s readers as they came to belief in the saving power of Jesus.

What both these stories together tell us is that an illness that slowly drained the life out of a woman over the course of twelve years, an illness that threatened to claim the life of a twelve year old girl – neither of these is beneath the notice of our Lord Jesus. Nor are our diseases and afflictions. Nor are those of our neighbors. We pray for those who are ill, fully expecting God to act – and sometimes we’re called to put hands and feet on our prayers by acting as well as praying. The Good News we proclaim must be good news in the lives – bodies, minds, souls – of those around us.

In his earthly ministry, among many other things, Jesus was a healer, and his healings were seen, not just as grace for those who were healed, but as an attack on the powers of evil. We likely cannot heal people with a touch as Jesus did - though even in my short time here, I’ve seen God work in wonderful ways for some of the folks on our prayer list. But we are called to remember that every single person we meet is created in God’s image, bears some resemblance to the divine, even if we have to look really hard to find it sometimes. The same God who created us, created our neighbors. Certainly during this week, as there is so much political debate over the question of who has access to health care, we might remember that Jesus not only performed his healings for free, but performed them without asking any questions about the worthiness or unworthiness of the recipients of his healing grace. In our Gospel readings from Mark over the past few weeks, we’ve watched Jesus travel from one side of the Sea of Galilee to the other to ministered to Jew and Gentile alike, without distinction. Under God, our lives are all connected – there is no us vs them, but only us, all of us. Therefore we cannot, like the priest and Levite in Jesus’ parable, walk on the other side of the road when we see sister or brother struck down by illness or misfortune, but are called to stand with them in solidarity.

This past week, I got a reminder of how demanding solidarity can be sometimes. Like most pastors, I receive occasional calls for assistance. This past week I got a doozy – a single mom, with several children, no husband in the picture, about to give birth – and she and her family are homeless. Did I know of any place that could provide shelter? I responded as I often do to such requests – “Let me make a few phone calls” - and quickly got a crash course learning how much our society’s safety net has been shredded. Like Mary and Joseph seeking a place in which Mary could bring our Lord into the world, what I heard over and over was “no room in the inn”. With their funding cut, social service agencies are completely overwhelmed by the demand for their services. Shelters might find a way to squeeze in a single man or a single woman, but a pregnant woman about to give birth, with other kids in the picture – no way. Boarding houses – full. Even motels – almost without exception, full, or unaffordable. Eventually a relatively cheap motel was located, and enough money scraped together so the woman and her family would have a roof over their head – for a few days anyway. After that? Quite literally, God only knows.

With our annual July 4 celebration of Independence rapidly approaching, it seems appropriate to consider the intersection between our faith and our national life, to ask the question “What kind of a country do we want to be?” You may have read in the news about the recent fracas between the Pope and the Leadership Council of Women Religious – an umbrella organization that brings together Roman Catholic nuns of various religious orders. The Pope issued a highly-publicized statement chastising the nuns for being too vocal on social justice issues, and strongly urging them to keep a lower profile. (One might wonder if somebody’s spiking the incense with controlled substances, as apparently here at home the US Conference of Catholic Bishops is attacking that breeding ground of radical feminism – the Girl Scouts – which our church used to host until our troops ran out of adult leaders, and whom I think we’d welcome in a hot second if leaders for a Bridesburg troop could be found.) But anyway, back to the nuns - a subgroup of the nuns saw the Pope’s widely-read pronouncement as an opportunity, not to be silent, but to bring their advocacy to a wider audience, to stop preaching to the choir and start preaching to the public. The “Nuns on a Bus” tour came to Chestnut Hill College this past Friday, and shared their vision for a federal budget that doesn’t leave behind the poor and dispossessed. It’s a vision supported by a diverse array of religious communities, including the Justice and Witness ministries of the United Church of Christ. If you want to take a look, it’s at the website in the bulletin – faithfulbudget.org

Today’s account of the healing of Jairus’ daughter reminds me of the familiar UCC saying, “Don’t put a period where God has placed a comma: God is still speaking.” When the messengers told Jairus that his daughter was dead, it certainly seemed like the end of the daughter’s story. But God was indeed still speaking, as Jesus said, “Do not fear. Only believe.” When we – as individuals or as a society - react from fear, we become guarded, defensive, seeking to put distance between ourselves and the problems of our neighbors. We pull into ourselves, becoming less than what God intended. But when we – as individuals or as a society - respond out of our faith, we extend ourselves, reaching out to God and following where God leads us. This is the course of faith taken by the “Nuns on a Bus”, as they follow God’s lead from city to city. We too are called to respond to God in faith, and to follow where God leads. I don’t anticipate that God will call us to embark on a national bus tour, but God may very well call us to stretch and grow beyond what’s familiar, to open our hearts and open our doors to those in need whom God sends our way. Do not fear. Only believe. Amen.