Sermons

This morning, I want to start a long walk with the congregation.  The pastoral transition team has been challenged to lead the congregation in a discernment process that will unfold this fall.  The questions will be about who the church has been, who it is now, who it might be in the future.  The tricky part of the project is not to just answer who it is that we would like to be but who it is that God is calling us to be.  There is a church that we aspire to be, that we would enjoy being.  However, far more dauntingly, there is a church whom God is calling us to be.  How would we ever hear—or discern—that calling?

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One of the earliest experiences of our ancestors in faith was the movement from being slaves to being free.  As slaves, there were many securities.  The people were valuable brick makers.  As such, the Egyptians had a stake in feeding them and housing them and generally keeping them healthy.  This was what it took to get the bricks that the Egyptians wanted.  For generations, there was a certain security to our ancestors’ life:  “we can’t go where we want; we can’t do whatever we want to do; but our basic needs are met.”

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Let’s start here.  I want you to think about the most important friends in your life.  Take a minute.  See if you can assemble the list.  I want that list to include not just the most obvious choices—your “hall of fame” friends.  Those folks make the list because it seems like they’ve been your friend for your whole life or because the impact they had whenever they entered your life was so profound that they could not be missed.  Push deeper, though.  There were plenty of moments in your life when you ran into the right person at the right time.  Although they may not have been a friend for life they were a critical friend at a crucial time.  They were a gift.

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One of the inescapable truths about Jesus is that he cared deeply about people who were marginalized, people who were the victims of injustice, people whom everyone was convinced were worthless.  As we think together for the next few weeks, I want us to challenge ourselves to hear the stories of Jesus caring for such people.  I also want us to close the loop with the present by asking who those people are in our own world and how we, as followers of Christ, are being called to care for them.

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In my preaching time this month (with one Sunday off for work trip), I have addressed two issues that I think are timely: first, the question of the relationship between church and state and second, the focal concerns for people of conscience (in the church and well beyond) in preserving our democracy.  In short, we are not a Christian nation, either in our design or in our lived behavior.  The best relationship between the church and the state is marked by separation and a constructive, creative, prophetic tension.  The state needs a conscience and, collectively, people of all faiths and people with no faith but a deep sense of justice and compassion and concern for the common good can hold the state accountable.  Finally, no matter where we fall in our partisan views, we should be able to work together to preserve and protect the constitution, to honor the rule of law, and to follow the will of the people in our elections.

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Last week, I tried to tell the truth about the long history that Christianity of being co-opted by political powers.  Whether it was the Roman Empire or the King of England or the pro-slavery forces in American history, savvy politicans have understood the potential for using people’s faith to manipulate and control them.  Nothing says, “I get to keep my power,” quite like convincing people that God gave me that power in the first place.  Everyone wants God on their side when they fight the next war or when they identify their God-forsaken enemies or when they have a stance on some question of the day that needs to be sanctioned.  

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For a long time now, I’ve been making the case that Jesus didn’t come to start a church.  There were plenty of temples and churches and other holy places to visit.  There were rituals and sacrifices and feasts and fasts that were all about getting right with God.  I don’t think Jesus came to change where we went to worship.  I think Jesus came to show us how to actually live differently. 

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When Tracy first took her job at the First Presbyterian Church in Lake Forest, we moved into a very small house in the middle of the parking lot area next to the church.  The house had two rooms downstairs, two rooms upstairs and a bathroom.  We thought it was the most amazing home ever!  The house also had a detached greenhouse which came…believe it or not…with a master gardener.  He and his wife had lived in the same house we were in as the “servants” of the folks who lived in the adjacent mansion.  He was retired but still gardening.

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So, back in January, on Epiphany Sunday, I offered you ten epiphanies.  During Easter, I’ve offered you a take on each of the four Gospels.  This morning, I want to offer six insights into Pentecost.  Let’s start counting…

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So, we’ve looked at Matthew, Mark, and Luke’s perspectives on Easter and the events following.  Here’s what you need to know as we begin today.  New Testament scholars refer to Matthew, Mark, and Luke as the “synoptic” Gospels.  That sounds complicated but it’s really not.  We’ve all been asked in an English class somewhere along the way to provide a “synopsis” of what we’ve read.  We provide a description of the plot.  To say that these three Gospels are “synoptic” is to say that they share a common plot.  Scholars have long believed that they even shared a common source which is called “Q”—not “Q Anon,” just “Q.”  No one has ever found “Q,” but scholars have been writing about it for a long time. 

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When I was in confirmation class, my father was my teacher.  One day, he had us read the parable of the prodigal son and discuss it.  You know the story—the younger son cashes in on his inheritance and runs away and blows it.  Eventually, he makes his way home but before he can get there his father runs out to meet him, hugs him, and declares that it’s time to party.  The older son sees this and resents it all.  However, we see the grace and forgiveness and love of that father and we think, “What if God loves us like that?”

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For a few years after Jesus died, there were people alive who had heard Jesus preach and teach and heal people.  For a little while, there were people who could tell stories about Jesus, first-hand:  This is what I saw and heard and what I grew to believe.  For a brief period of time, there were even people who had experienced the presence of the risen Christ—just a handfull of people, but eyewitnesses, nevertheless.  Eventually, those people died off.

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