Thursday 13 July 2017

Sermon Opoho Church Sunday 18 June, 2017 Pentecost 2

Readings:  Exodus 19:2-8a, Matthew 9:25 – 10:23

We pray:  may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight O God our rock and our sustainer.  Amen.

Saturday afternoon, sun shining outside, sermon to be written before going out in the evening.  Blank! Procrastination. Still blank. Oh good - phone call! Oops long phone call.  Panic. Still blank.
Back to basics.  Question – for me this time. How has God’s word spoken in these scripture readings today?  What shouts out, what challenges, where do we find hope and assurance?

And two things come forward to think about – one is the gap between the vision of God as lived out by Jesus and the ability of the people who follow to live that vision.  And secondly, a troublesome concept, the fact that they were to speak and minister to their own, not look beyond.

Our readings for today are the stories, hundreds of years apart, of two peoples on the brink of new beginnings, called to a path of faith and action in the name of God.  The exodus of the Hebrew people and the commissioning of the disciples by Jesus.  The call of God is on all their lives and they are asked to go and share the good news, in the assurance that God is with them.  For the people in the Sinai the task was to be a priestly kingdom and a holy nation, to keep the covenant – ‘as the Lord has spoken so we will do’ was their reply.
The disciples too were being asked to not only proclaim the good news but to accompany that by healing, casting out demons, raising the dead, cleansing the lepers.  To remember that no distance is to great, no audience too sceptical, no disease too severe for Jesus.  All that he had done – they were to do.  
And while they may have been apprehensive, daunted even,  they were also ready for it – for they had captured his vision – the harvest is plentiful but the labourers are few – the people were sheep without a shepherd, harassed and helpless.  So they were prepared to go share the good news that the kingdom of heaven has come near in the person of Jesus.  
Jesus was confident of their being able to do this and I am sure that they would have been empowered by that and their understanding of the vision of the kingdom lived out in the life of Jesus so far. 
But then - more instructions follow – take no payment, no money, no backpack.  Do not tarry where there is no harvest but move on.  Poverty, no place to call home. That makes it harder.
Then to what may well have been the tipping point for many: you will be harassed, persecuted, flogged, betrayed, put to death – and in the end you will not necessarily succeed in your task.

You can almost see the vision slipping away - suddenly they are tipped from empowerment to inadequacy – to an enormous gulf between the mission of Christ and their ability to succeed in that mission. Being as bold as Jesus, attempting miracles, choosing poverty, persecution….
The initial euphoria fading fast – it’s simply too much to expect.  How could they possibly achieve even a part of what they were sent out to do? 
And I wonder if this is a pattern we can apply to ourselves – we are inspired by the vision of a world reconciled with God and each other yet we struggle to find our place in that world because the vision seems too large and too hard and too impossible.

Then there is the instruction to go to the houses of Jews only – no gentiles, no Samaritans.  And every instinct we have shouts out – that’s wrong.  And then every experience we have of scripture replies that we need to dig deeper to discover the wisdom and truth that we know is there.  And I find it in the understanding that before the people of God are able to share the good news in the world, we need to be strong in faith, able to know the strength of God in our lives, trust in the one who has confidence in us and be able to know and articulate what it is that we believe and therefore live it.
Imagine this as a conversation:
Hi how are you?
Great, good to see you – its been a while.
I know – hey, help me with something here.  I heard you go to that church up the hill.  I wouldn’t have thought you would subscribe to that mumbo jumbo – after all you are a pretty intelligent person – how can you possibly believe in this ‘God’ stuff?
Well….I just do!

We could all think of multiple occasions when we have been cornered or challenged in our beliefs, no less by our own selves.  Unless we talk and share and question with each other and with God, we can continue to be tongue tied, unable to share the vision we know in our hearts. And we don’t have to be experts with words – it is in our everyday living that we show our commitment to the coming of the kingdom – so don’t let us be hampered by our half heartedness and our inability to show the world the transforming power of Jesus.

So I don’t see this part of the passage as being exclusive but rather as a time of empowerment for the body of Christ so that we can then go out and share the good news – and, to bring us back round to too much being asked of us, we can then step beyond our limited vision and instead be grounded in the impossible vision of Jesus Christ – for the healing of the world, the sending out of the shepherds to the hapless flock, the ability to deal with hardship and possible failure – in the end our vision is not big enough.
The thing is, the more we step out beyond our expectations in faith, the more we see the impossible as possible, the more we explore scripture, talk, discuss, support and encourage each other and live our lives in the way of Christ,  the more we feel confident to share the good news in an authentic and transforming way. Maybe the lack of vision on my part as I began this sermon was a case in point, yes?

I want to take this thinking and apply it to a practical issue that is in front of us here in the Southern Presbytery.  Most of you know that I have become increasingly involved in roles within Presbytery and I have to say, at times I despair.  Not in the people who are stepping out in faith in so many ways, not in the many wonderful stories of hope and grace but in the habits and structures and processes that are literally bleeding us dry.

Buildings and money have become much too important. Power and control is causing division and siloed thinking in both the larger bodies and in congregations.  People sit on committees which take up all their energy and time.  Burnout, fear, isolation is taking its toll.  Leadership is hurt, congregations are hurt, Jesus weeps.
Our vision is I believe, too small.  We are immersed in the minutae and overwhelmed by the load – and so we find it difficult to live into the impossible possibilities that Jesus sends us out to.   The heart of mission has become subservient to our need to shore up our structures and habits and processes.

And yet as a good Presbyterian, I recognise that our polity is important, that our processes have purpose and a strong wisdom – but I can’t help feeling that they have somehow lost their way, gotten out of touch with the reality of being the people of God in this place.  We have to peel back the layers of time and interpretation and somehow find the values that fire our hearts and our passions in the name of Christ.

So are we up for making hard decisions about the buildings when they are draining the life out of the mission of the people that are the church?  Are we willing to live within our income and put our reserves where they are most needed?
Are we going to trust each other and care for each other, each one of us rather than leave it to the committees?  Are we going to stop hurting each other and begin healing instead?

Don’t get me wrong – we are being the body of Christ in this place, this region, all the time,  but oh we could be so much more if we but stepped out in faith into God’s vision – a reconciled and hope filled world where all people are loved and healed.

When Jesus saw the crowds he had compassion for them for they were harassed and helpless – let us make compassion our byword – for each other and all whom we encounter. For all are part of God’s story.  Amen.


Margaret Garland

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