PILGRIMS UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST: January 2010

PILGRIMS UCC ANNUAL MEETING RESCHEDULED FOR JANUARY 31 AFTER WORSHIP.

Remember and Renew
Luke 4: 14-21 and 1 Corinthians 12: 12-31a, January 24, 2010
sermon by Rev. Robin Raudabaugh at Pilgrims United Church of Christ

One of the most important identifying marks of the Christian community is its unity. In fact, the United Church of Christ has as its motto, “That they may all be one.” This unity is at the very heart of our denomination. More than fifty years ago, the United Church of Christ was formed from the union of four earlier Christian denominations – the Congregationalists and the Christian church, and the Evangelical and Reformed church. From these four strands came the UCC – and we continue to be in sacred covenantal conversation with many other denominations – working, praying, dreaming, hoping for the day when we might truly all be one Body of Christ in the world.

And while it might sound paradoxical at the same time, one of the equally important characteristics of the Christian church is our diversity. Many different gifts, many different stories, many different journeys come together to become the Christian church – and when all of these diversities come together – we are indeed stronger than we would ever be alone.

Our scripture today from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth, is a familiar to many, beautiful reflection on both the unity and diversity of the church. “Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” We are not many like so many crayons in a child’s coloring box – each a similar individual that can be used together to create a beautiful or not-so-beautiful picture. We are more like a finely woven piece of fabric – with warp and weft threads – any of which if pulled and tugged and torn will damage the integrity of the whole.
We are organically, holistically, interrelated – the hurt one part experiences is felt by each other part.

Some of us can understand this interrelatedness within the body better than others. Suppose we are experiencing excruciating back or neck pain (like Spence Pierce) and go to the doctor seeking relief. We may be surprised when our doctor wants us to also have a test done for other ailments on our hands or feet – suggesting that perhaps our back or neck pain is really a response – a secondary pain – to the initial problem which may have originated in the hands or feet. Health professionals recognize the interrelatedness not only of our organs and physical structures, but also of our emotional, mental, spiritual and physical health. All of these are part of one “body” or person, yet they are distinct, each with its own gift and its own role. There is a wonderful hymn in our hymnal - we sing it often - written by Al Carmines about this wonderful unity in the midst of diversity, “God of Change and Glory” “Many gifts, one spirit, one love known in many ways. In our difference is blessing, from diversity we praise one Giver, one Word, one Spirit, one God, known in many ways.”

Thought this body parts metaphor is often almost trivialized when we use it in our churches, it calls us to ask some questions of ourselves. When we come together, so that we can be better together than we would be alone – is it possible at the same time to retain our individual dignity and giftedness? Would we not be a stronger community if we recognized and expanded the way the gifts and skills and talents that make up each one of us were used to connect and mesh and enhance the gifts and skills and talents of another.

Would it not make a difference if we were to re-member – really re-member - that we are the Body of Christ – that we are not multicolored crayons in a box – but sacredly, organically, integrally, paradoxically, sustainably connected and interconnected one with another. And unlike that box of crayons that don’t really care or experience loss when the red-violet or grass green crayon is removed from the box – if one of us is removed from the Body of Christ equation – the whole body experiences a radical sense of loss – a feeling of being off balance – out of equilibrium.

In the days and short weeks before my mom died from a massive brain tumor a few years ago, she developed a loss of sensation on her left side. Because of the tumor in her brain, messages were short circuited and simply did not get to her left side, thus this condition is diagnosed as left-side neglect. On one of the first days in the hospital with my mom, I watched her put chapstick on her lips and when she got to the center of her lips, she just stopped – she had no knowledge that there was any body beyond that point. She also experienced a loss of balance. As the tumor short-circuited the messages to the left side of the body, my mom’s left hips and legs and feet were simply forgotten.

The eye cannot say to the ear, I don’t need you – nor can the right side of the body say to the left side, I don’t need you.

It seems almost too much of a coincidence that on this day – which would have been our Annual Meeting Day – had not the weather intervened – that the scripture texts selected by our Common Lectionary are – from Paul – a call to renewed church unity (and diversity) and from the gospel of Luke – a new game plan set forth by Jesus.
Annual Meeting Sunday – a day the church surely needs to re-affirm and renew its commitment to unity. Coincidence – hardly. I have come to believe less and less in coincidence and more and more in epiphany or revelation (God revealing Godself to us in a variety of ways.) These are messages we need to hear at any time of year – in any season – and they are especially important to hear and internalize as we begin a new church year. As we vote on a slate of folks who have agreed to serve on our various Ministry group committees – it seems especially important to reaffirm – to remember – how much we value (how much our faith calls us to value) our diversity and at the same time – how much we are called to use that diversity of gifts and skills and talents to work toward unity - common goals and dreams and visions for this particular part of the Body of Christ.

And as we examine and vote on our budget for the next year – as we examine each section – determining how much we will spend on building upkeep, how much on supplies for teaching our children, how much we will spend on candles and coffee and communion, and how much we will spend on paying our music director and our pastor. And behind all those figures that we will vote on next week – are many, many other decisions – decisions about who we are as a church – who we are now – and who we want to be as we move into another new year. Decisions about how we want to be church – about our own comfort – do we want to be challenged or do we want to stay as we are? Decisions about our ethics – how do we make decisions about who, what, how we pay for what our church does?

Full of the Holy Spirit, Jesus stepped up to the podium – and like any good moderator, he laid out his game plan, his policy statement, his campaign slogans, his hopes and dreams, his proposed three year plan, if you will. This message is what he is all about – he has no hidden agenda – he is all about good news to the poor, release for the captives, freedom for the oppressed, and sight for the blind.

And then, like any good politician or church moderator, Jesus brought his politics – and his political message – home – with the simple announcement of exactly what was going to matter to him. He read all this language from his script – taken directly from the prophet Isaiah – and when he finished reading, he rolled up the manuscript, handed it back to the attendant and sat down. And when everyone continued to stare at him, He said, “Today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” Today, the words I just read - I begin to bring these ancient words to life – to live and demonstrate to you all exactly what it means to live compassionate, justice filled lives – just as God is these things.

If we are called to be compassionate, and if the suffering of the world in places like Haiti and Tehran and Darfur and a million other impoverished, sad, hurting places in our world are not only immense concerns – they are something we can make a difference about as a community.

And this brings us back to Paul and the body metaphor. Isn’t this exactly what Paul was talking about. There he was writing letters to all these new churches just a few short years after Jesus had gone around dismantling boundaries and hierarchies and distinctions – and already the people in these new church starts were thinking about their own agendas – their own busy lives and their own tasks and efforts and ministry groups.
Already in these earliest of Christian churches – the fractures over little things had already begun to develop into bigger and bigger fissures – threatening already to divide these early faith communities. And it is to this concern, that Paul, like a wise pastor, calls them back, instructing them gently and compassionately – and passionately – reminding them – entreating them to remember where all those gifts and skills and talents came from in the first place – “One Spirit, one gift, one love known in many ways…”

Paul reminded the churches that the stuff the rest of the world told them about how business should be done – the strategic planning – the bottom lines – the money crunching – and even some of the things that other religious traditions told them – that some of you aren’t the same as the rest of us so you aren’t so welcome, and some of you aren’t giving enough money, so you don’t quite measure up either – anyway Paul reminded these good church folks that what life in the Spirit was all about was getting rid of those divisions and boundaries and distinctions – casting them aside and welcoming everyone’s gifts – not even knowing exactly how and why and when those particular gifts will be needed or used or make a difference.

These two scripture passages today read and held in conversation with one another remind me so much of Pilgrims United Church of Christ. We know what it means to feel small and vulnerable – for many of us it makes us feel as though we need to stay firmly in control of what we can control – for some of us it makes us nervous that too much may be demanded of us. And yet, in so many ways, we are a church striving to live out Paul’s reminder that we need to work together – we are not and should not be lone rangers (the Spiritual Life committee cannot say to the Building and Grounds committee, I don’t need you and the Budget committee cannot say to the Council, I don’t need you).
Here at Pilgrims United Church of Christ, we proudly and faithfully proclaim ‘That all are Welcome Here” and yet, sometimes our actions and inactions, our decisions and our unwillingness to make decisions give a different message. We are the Body of Christ – when one part hurts another part – we all hurt (and like the distant hand that makes the back hurt - sometimes we don’t even know why). When one part supports another part, we all feel supported. When one part affirms another part we all share in that affirmation.

And then - flash back to Jesus – “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’ And I am reminded that at first everyone was admiring and in awe of Jesus about what a great job he did – telling him that he must have worked hard on that message – and then all of a sudden – someone said – “hey, it’s only Jesus – that carpenter’s son – who is he to tell us anything?”

Who are any of us – who am I to tell you what God calls you to do and be – and who are you to tell one another what your faith calls you to do and be in this church and in the world? Who are we? We are the body of Christ.
And in a take-off of a prayer from former UCC National LGBT Coalition Executive Director Ann B. Day - “We are the hand-clapping, toe tappping, heart pumping, arms embracing, justice-seeking, hymn singing, bill paying, bread baking, pancake making, banner hanging, spaghetti eating, mission giving, always praying - Pilgrims United Church of Christ – Body of Christ in Maple Grove – and in the world!