Easy Like Sunday Morning

A Sermon Given to Madison Baptist Church

By Rev. Stephanie Little Coyne

July 15, 2018

Much of my sermon today comes from the experiences that our youth and children and I had during our youth trip and at Kids camp.

While I was at Kids camp, I began brooding about my message today and shared with Jacob Beckham, willing chaperone, and thus now, my best friend, that I always start with more than I need and the process of paring down of my words and scripture is always a difficult one. 

So, our scripture passages today are a little choppy, for no other reason than to be respectful of our time together this morning. I encourage you to read these passages in their entirety for your devotional time with God. The lessons are overwhelmingly poignant. 

I John

1:5-10

⁵This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. ⁶If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not do what is true; ⁷but if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. ⁸If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. ⁹If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. ¹⁰If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

2:1-2; 12

¹My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; ²and he is the atoning sacrifice for our sins and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.

¹²I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven on account of his name.

3:11-18

¹¹For this is the message you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. ¹²We must not be like Cain who was from the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. ¹³Do not be astonished, brothers and sisters, that the world hates you. ¹⁴We know that we have passed from death to life because we love one another. Whoever does not love abides in death. ¹⁵All who hate a brother or sister are murderers, and you know that murderers do not have eternal life abiding in them. ¹⁶We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. ¹⁷How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?

¹⁸Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.

Luke 18:16

¹⁶But Jesus called for them and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.

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And Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me.”

His name is Charlie. 

He is an addict, but now, thankfully, has many years of recovery to claim. He was homeless; he was lonely; he lived in lands East of Eden.

And now, the world that held him captive for so many years has now become his church without walls, and his congregants fellow unsheltered people. Charlie walks around his church—wooded areas behind Wal-Mart, Academy Sports, and alongside well-traveled roads in Cartersville—and greets his congregants by call or by name. His hands get dirty while he worships.

On our trip, our youth followed, always several steps behind Charlie, allowing him to enter the homes of the homeless first. He would gently shake their tents, even clap or call their name out loudly if he did not receive a quick response. Several of his church members were not home, some came out and greeted us all, and a few could not be awakened or could not come out of their tents. 

The water, coffee, and food were always welcome gifts, and they each said “thank you,” some, able to look at us, some, unable to let their gaze meet ours. 

At the end of each encounter, Charlie would tell each person that he loved them and that Jesus loved them too. He invited them to dinner at the homeless shelter and to the recovery program. He invited them, and I believe Charlie offered invitation each time he saw them, to come forward…to church, to a different path, to a more loving home, to sanctuary.

Her name is Angela. 

Her church is less than a mile from the homeless shelter. Fluent in both Spanish and English, she makes sure that both languages are heard and can be read in their church services, bulletins, and during their activities. 

There is nothing that can be described as “elaborate” in the church. Their symbols of worship are not fancy liturgical linens or architectural ornaments. Rather, their displays of active ministry in their community are their offering. They love as they have been taught to love. They love as they have been commanded to love.

Though the offering plates of Douglas Street UMC may not be filled to the brim each Sunday, they share and give and do the work of the church faithfully and often.

Their ministries are both financially and emotionally burdensome. The needs of the community are constant and extensive. Most of the money that comes in, goes out. The phrase, “Easy Like Sunday Morning,” means nothing to this church. And as long as people hunger, that would have their church be no other way.

Our group helped serve lunch to children and adults. Children, 18 years of age and younger, eat food supplied by the local school system. There is not always food available for adults. The church relies on donations from local restaurants and grocery stores, or groups like ours who are able to bring lunch for the day. Because of our church’s financial donations to mission work, we were able to leave enough food with the church for two more days of adult lunches.

Her name is Jessica. 

A graduate of both the University of Georgia and Truett Theological Seminary at Baylor, she uses her skills as minister and social worker to aid the community of non-profit organizations in Cartersville. The Good Neighbor homeless shelter was in desperate need of financial and structural management. 

Jessica revamped the program, setting up stages of transition for the people who entered the program. She worked with the other non-profit organizations so that monetary and emotional support could be more efficiently and effectively offered to those individuals who needed such help. In doing this, she and the other directors were able to eliminate some of the duplicate services, making sure that the funds they received were distributed in a more fiscally responsible manner.

Jessica was able to secure funding and materials to build eight transitional homes for those who were entering into that particular stage of the program. The homes have filled a gap in the tiers of homelessness.

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But Jesus called for them and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.”

“Despised Zacchaeus, come to me! Come down from that tree! I’m going to your house today!”

“Despised Adulterer, come to me. I can give you living water. Go and sin no more!”

“Despised, blind beggar, come to me! Let him come to me! Sir, receive your sight; your faith has made you well.”

Jesus called for the despised to come closer. He called for the addict and the rebel and the mentally ill. He called for the rich and he called for the poor.  He called for the refugee and the citizen and the exiled. Jesus even forgave them and healed them. Christ Jesus even praised them—“Go, and be like the Good Samaritan.”

The life of Jesus—his teachings and his actions—are as offensive today as they were in his time. And why are they offensive? Because they shed light on our hypocrisy and our acts of “un-love.” They offend us because his words speak to us personally and we don’t like to be wrong!

Just as in the very politically-charged time of Jesus, our own “us and them” culture seeks division in our communities and nation and world, and in the Church. We are all party to and agents of our society’s segmentation.

Conversely, in welcoming all, Jesus was closing the gap between the minority and the powerful, the clean and the unclean, or, as we might say, the blessed and the…unblessed.

If I say that my privilege, my wealth, my health indicate the amount of blessings that God has heaped upon me, I cheapen God’s blessing and I cheapen grace. I equate blessing with luck. I distinguish between myself and those who have nothing, not even good health. And why? This is a distinction that God does not make, for we are all God’s children, fearfully and wonderfully made.

When I highlight my perceived blessings, I raise myself above others and my “isms,” my racism, classism, and ethnocentrism, rear their ugly head and I become like the Publican praying at the temple—conceited, proud, and superior—rather than like the tax collector, humble, unjustified, and reverential. Blessing does not come in the form of wealth or material goods, of pain-free lives. Blessing is found in those moments when we are drawn closely, near to the heart of Jesus, and we hear, and we are heard, and we know, without a doubt, that we are loved.

Our political environment—on either side of the metaphorical, and sometimes literal, aisle—contains divisions of people who require their members to assimilate their ideology, sometimes subverting one’s personal theology. They, we, require adherence to human law rather than God’s greatest laws—to love God with our whole beings and to love our neighbors and ourselves. 

We are all God’s children—sinners, in desperate need of forgiveness.

“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the atoning sacrifice for our sins and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven on account of his name.”

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They are our pre-teens and teenagers. Annabelle, Eli, Claire, Grace, Shea, and Eli. They sometimes have trouble hearing. They are often loud and messy. They get tired during the day and yet stay up late at night.

But they are bold enough to serve. On our trip, they filled plates, held babies, played with animals, jumped in on basketball games, learned about history, ate at tables with people who do not look like them.

They sometimes came close for head rubs or hugs. They asked thoughtful questions and gave mature responses. They played with kids who idealize every part of their beings. They gave drive-by smiles and hugs to children—and ministers—who were unaware of their need for one.

“For this is the message you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us—and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. How does God’s love abide in someone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

Henri Nouwen, in his book, Prodigal Son, reveals that his interpretation of Jesus’ parable, and even Nouwen’s own understanding of his ministerial calling, changed when he saw Rembrandt’s painting of the Prodigal’s return. Among his visual revelations was his noticing the people in the background of the painting, the “bystanders,” as he refers to them. 

Nouwen writes:

Certainly there were many hours of prayer, many days and months of retreat, and countless conversations with spiritual directors, but I had never fully given up the role of bystander.

[Those in the painting] all represent different ways of not getting involved. There is indifference, curiosity, daydreaming, and attentive observation; there is staring, gazing, watching, and looking; there is standing in the background, leaning against an arch, sitting with arms crossed, and standing with hands gripping each other. Every one of these inner and outer postures is all too familiar to me. Some are more comfortable than others, but all of them are ways of not getting directly involved. 

Charlie, Angela, Jessica, and our youth, understand that the work of the church is not always in being the bystander. It’s dirty and it’s burdensome! It calls for time and strength that we do not always have. But in our exhaustion, our hearts turn us toward the need for communion with God. We pray and we listen, and we kneel as we return to God’s welcoming house.

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“Little children, come to me.” “Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”

They are our children. Hollis, Payton, Robert, Asher, Mary Ella, Joe, and Michael. They are often whiny, clingy, needy, and muddy. But they are eager and reflective. They listen and understand far more than we adults believe. They absorb and are touched by the presence of God far more than we adults can expect for our own selves.

They are not always welcome because they are loud and unaware. After all, they are all still learning about themselves and their surrounding. But the fews years that they have accrued on this earth means that they are closer to the Creator than we are. They still have forming clay in their innermost parts and hearts. They are often willing to share their emotions, but they are also keenly aware when adults are emotionally needy too.

Thus, they are both impressionable and receptive and we, as Disciples of Christ, have the responsibility to teach, nurture, and model faithful journeys with the Almighty. We are all called to be present for their needs and present in the life of our church. We are called to participate in and even call for mediation and reconciliatory opportunities. We are to pray as Jesus taught us to pray and call to and love children as Jesus called to and loved and still loves us all:

“Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.” “Little children, come to me.” 

“Easy Like Sunday Morning,” may be a relaxing tune, but it is not Truth for the Church. It is not always “easy!” But our aim is that God’s kingdom will be on earth, just as it is in heaven—a loving place, without walls, and without conditions for love.

Come, little children, come. Rest in the arms of Jesus, ye servants of the Lord. Amen.

Pastoral Prayer

Oh Lord, you are mindful of us and we praise you for your presence. Your Spirit knows of and understands our deepest emotions and stays with us as we walk through the degrees of each one. 

We give thanks that you are in our hospitals, rehabilitation, and nursing facilities. 

We give thanks that you are in our funeral homes, chapels, and at gravesides. 

We give thanks that you are with us in our homes as we recover and as we mourn.

Lord, you know that we do not understand everything, and we will continue to wonder and wander, but we pray and we believe that you reside with us still, and that your presence will be made known to us. 

When all we have left is prayer, we kneel and humbly come before you: hear us as we pray, conscious of the strength of the words Jesus taught us to say:

Amen.

Created for Good

A Sermon Given to St. Charles Avenue Baptist Church

By Stephanie Little Coyne

August 9, 2015

   For several weeks this summer, I traveled just a few blocks down the Avenue to St. Charles Avenue Presbyterian Church, where I taught youth groups participating in Camp RHINO, a ministry of St. Charles Pres that is involved in restoration efforts throughout the city.

Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings, we ate a little, played a little, sang a little, and discussed topics lured from Genesis, chapter 1.

   The youth groups traveled from all over the U.S.—Texas, Colorado, Indiana, Oregon, and Alabama, and I looked forward each night to meeting them and hearing from them.  I am appreciative of the opportunity to share some of our lessons with you this morning in what I am deeming a “teaching sermon.”

   To Genesis, chapter 1: (a paraphrase)

          In the beginning, God created:

“Let there be light and darkness.  Let there be waters and earth and skies.  Let there be green plants and fruits, trees and vegetation.  Let there be fish and birds and creeping creatures and wild animals.”

And God paused.

“Let there be humans—male and female.  Take care of the waters and the earth and the skies!  Take care of the green plants and fruits, the trees and vegetation.  Take care of the fish and birds and the creeping creatures and wild animals.  Take care of all these things and enjoy them, delight in them as I delight in you!  Take care of each other.”

And it happened, just as God said it would happen.  And God believed it all to be beautiful and good.

Lesson 1

   Out of nothing, God created; this was the beginning of everything.  I usually think about there being absolutely nothing right before I try to go to sleep at night.  Perhaps you have an active night-mind too—when “nowhere” conversations begin.  What was the beginning?  What will be the end?  It is those kinds of conversations that bring on feelings of nausea well before they bring on thoughts of sleep.

   Just as I do not understand the “beginning” or the “end,” it is likewise hard for me to understand a God who is everywhere, in control of everything, who knows everything and who is in everything.  But, I do believe that the God in whom I put my trust is, above all else, a God of love.  And I believe that out of that great love, God created.  Somehow, in some amount of time, God put thought and energy and affection into the creation of the heights and the depths.

   Rabbi Arthur Waskow, born in 1933, is the founder and director of The Shalom Center and a public advocate for peace and equality.  He is the author of the poem, “On Deciding Whether To...”.  The first part of this poem:[1]

B’reshit/in the beginning

God was lonely, suffering

though everything in the universe was held within.

Unfulfilled, overpowered by chesed-(benevolent) energy

God breathed out, kissed out, sent it all out,

Every possibility that ever was and would be.

I imagine God was frightened.

What a terribly momentous step,

even with overflowing love as catalyst and reference point.

What if something went wrong

if the universe made its own choices at breakneck speed

if there was no breathing any of it back in again.

Once it began, this process more powerful than its Creator

with beginning middle end all at once, all possible—

how could there not have been Divine panic?

So in the split second eon after that first out breath kiss

a proclamation “Let there be light!” and there was

a moment when sight would be unhampered

a snapshot flash of eternity in which to see

before darkness was once again welcomed

the realm of comfort from all the see-ing.

   This poem offers to us the idea that God took a chance—that God could not be sure whether or not this creation-thing would work.  So in this, God’s Great Chance, Creation was full of possibilities.  With each day, with each step into its development, God declared that It was good.

   In short, God was full of an energy that was love, God therefore created something to love, but God did not create a world that was a stuffed teddy bear—incapable of thought or process.  God created a world and let that good world flourish in possibility.

   What would God say of this world today?

   When we curiously rake our fingers through sandy beaches or dig through tough Georgia clay, when we marvel at the long-necks, the short-beaks, the softly furred, and the quick-footed, when we wade in shallow tides or sail on steady currents do we find that we are still enchanted with nature?  In such an enchanted state—in awesome wonder—is there not some element of joy?  Surely God delights in our enjoyment!  Even amid over-use and injury, misinterpreted dominion, and casual interpretation, this world still exists as God’s rolling creation and It is still good.

Lesson 2

Genesis 1:26-28:  Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the wild animals of the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.”

So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.  And God blessed them.

   In the very first chapter of the very first book of the Bible, life is given to humanity.  But humans are not created as the skies, the waters, or other creatures; humans are not created out of nothing.  There is a pre-beginning; humans are created in the likeness or image of God.

This congregation has talked before about the imago dei that is in us, but we, like many or most congregations, do not talk too much about the image we have of ourselves—our body image, our self-image, our self-esteem.

   As a 20-something-year-old seminary student, I sat in Dr. John Claypool’s class, “Preaching Genesis,” and something in the way he taught these few verses to the class struck me.  Something about being made in God’s image struck the girl whose friends and family members struggled with addiction and anorexia; something struck the girl who herself struggled with depression and body image.

   We are, I am, made in God’s image.  What of that fact?

   Catherine of Siena, a Catholic mystic born in 1347, was an advocate for the poor and sick, a mediator of the Great Western Schism in the Catholic church, a public advocate for unity, and an author of many letters wrote these words:[2]

What is it

You want to change?

Your hair, your face, your body?

Why?

For God is

in love with all those things

and might weep

when they are

gone.

   A woman in the year 1347 thought and wrote down words that are amazingly poignant for us in the year 2015.  The idea that God weeps when I am dismayed about my appearance makes me pause.

   I put thought into you, my child.  From my own being, I created you.  I know every hair on your head.  Why are you trying to present yourself as another?  You are unique and with purpose, you are you, just as I intended for you to be.

   I gave the youth groups this summer several questions to ask themselves as they sat in small groups of their closest friends.  I asked them to consider their overall body and self-image, to talk about what they would change, to “call-out” the people that wanted them to change their appearances.  To my delight, they talked to each other.  They listened to each other.  I watched their faces as their minds wrestled with thought.  I heard them name negative sources in their lives, including parents, coaches, friends, and various media sources. 

   Even in the midst of more positive ad campaigns, there is still an enormous amount of pressure on all of us to conform and to change.  With the youth, as is probably true with all of us, they reported more often than not, that they were worst enemy, their biggest critic.

As we assembled back into the larger group, I asked for the students to call out ways in which they thought God was proud of them.  One or two might answer, but for the most part, I was met with silence. 

   I changed my question to, “of your friends here, who is God proud of and why,” and answers came quickly and freely.  This generation who we often label as “entitled” and “self-absorbed” could not publically profess positive statements about themselves, but they were able to identify positive traits and skills of their friends openly. 

How is God proud of you?  Are you able to answer that question?  Can you answer it on behalf of others?  Why do we struggle with naming the good in ourselves?

   Let’s return to more of the Rabbi’s poem:

So, too, in the beginning

the universe breathed its kiss into me

and with that kiss, possibilities

thousands of them

limited only by the chance of time and place.

I can only comfort myself with the thought

that even God didn’t know if the plan would work,

but moved forward into the darkness on faith.

   Just as with the rest of creation, so too are we blessed with possibility and in the possibility, we have opportunity for growth, to be healthier, to let our souls shine through our outward appearance—to be created anew.  And as we mediate the dialogical battle in our minds, we can be assured that there is newness and possibility in each day.  Just as the chrysalis, we are in process. 

   God has seen you and you are good.

Lesson 3

   We’ve talked about our relationship to creation, the relationship we have with ourselves, but what of our relationship with other people? 

   Who are the isolated people in your lives?  Who are the lonely, the different, the bullied?  Are we able to see the image of God in those who are so very different from us?

   A life-long mediator, I hold fast to the goal of two people finding common ground in order to establish or re-establish relationship, but surely the greater feat is supping with someone with whom common ground is only the size of a pebble. 

   We know that Jesus taught us to love one another and to love our neighbor, but he specifically taught us to love people who are different than us. 

   Clarence Jordan, born in 1912, Greek and New Testament Scholar, founder of Koinonia Farm, and public advocate for civil and economic rights for all, translates in his Cotton Patch version of Matthew and Luke, “Listen here, if you love only those who love you, what’s your advantage?  Don’t even scalawags do that much?” (Matthew 5:46) “You all, love your enemies, and be kind, and lend, expecting nothing.  And you’ll get plenty of ‘pay’; you’ll be the spittin’ image of the Almighty, who himself is friendly towards the unlovely and the mean.

   As we journey on the road towards love, there is often a corresponding path that leads to advocacy—a designation that comes when we pour our lives into another, when we plea on behalf of another.  I’ve mentioned three advocates in these lessons: Rabbi Waskow, Catherine of Siena, and Clarence Jordan.  All bravely spoke up for those whose voices could not speak loudly enough on their own.  James Dunn, who passed away last month, was former executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee and who was another advocate for the public is quoted as saying, “Churches faithful to the Gospel cannot remain silent in the face of injustice.  Silence is sin.”[3]

   There are those among us who are bullied.  If you imagine a person’s life to be one of misery because of his or her interactions with others, or if you would hate to trade places with that person because you would hate to feel what they feel and carry what they carry, then know that that person needs an advocate and perhaps needs you to be their advocate. 

At school, at parties, at church, and at home, kids have always been vulnerable to bullies.  But there is a new element of invasion in town—the internet gives bullies access to the wounded 24 hours a day.  Kids are not alone in absorbing this invasion into their lives—we are all exposed—but it is up to all of us to create safe spaces and be active listeners and responders.

   To deny that bullying occurs is both naïve and dishonest.  Every week this summer, I asked the youth to think of those kids around them who were isolated or bullied and to take the first step towards being their advocate by calling out those individual’s initials.  Week after week, I filled up page after page of letters, scanning back and forth through the alphabet many times over.

   Students, as you begin this school year, know these things: It is never okay for you to cause someone else to be miserable and sad.  It is never okay for you to put your hands on someone else in a harmful way.  It is never okay for you to tell someone else that their life is worth nothing. 

   And.  It is never okay for someone to make you miserable and sad.  It is never okay for someone to put their hands on you in a harmful way.  It is never okay for someone to tell you that your life is worth nothing.

   We are all created in the image of God and we are all good.

Conclusion

   There’s a circle on your page...for the doodlers among us...

   We see circle illustrations across differing cultures of religions, time, and thought.  Labyrinths, dream catchers, micro-worlds—circles are everywhere.  Circle pictures hold possibilities; circles have no definition of beginning or end.  Circles group things into relationship and there is relationship between us and each other and the world. 

   In one of the last weeks of camp, a group traveled into New Orleans from Birmingham, Alabama.  I noticed the church name immediately—St. Luke’s Episcopal, the last church where Dr. Claypool served as rector before coming to Atlanta to teach at McAfee, School of Theology.  John Claypool, public advocate for race reconciliation and voice for the mourner who somehow elevated Genesis 1 into more than beautiful mythology...his beautiful soul was present in my picture this summer.

Let us pray.

   Oh God, open our eyes that we may see the goodness in this world, the goodness in ourselves, and the goodness in the people around us.  Today, we ponder our paths, our dreams, and our lives and we consider also the chance you took in creating us—as part of the whole of creation and as individuals.  Thank you for taking a chance on us.  We do enjoy this world.  And perhaps the seal you placed upon us is one that marks us as courageous.  May we be so brave as to consider our role in the preservation of the Good.  May we be so brave as to be better caretakers of all that is in this Earth.  In your name we pray, Amen.

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[1] https://theshalomcenter.org/node/282

[2] https://theshalomcenter.org/node/282

[3] http://bjconline.org/truth-with-the-bark-on-it-the-wit-and-wisdom-of-james-dunn/

Reflections of God’s Love

A Sermon Presented to

St. Charles Avenue Baptist Church

 

February 2, 2013

 

On this most testosterone-filled of Sundays, I felt it only appropriate to bring balance into the day by reflecting on I Corinthians 13, entitled in some Bibles as “The Gift of Love.”

 

1 If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ²And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,^* but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant ⁵or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ⁶it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. ⁷It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. ⁹For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; ¹⁰but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. ¹¹When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. ¹²For now we see in a mirror, dimly,^* but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. ¹³And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

 

Sometimes, a preacher takes on the role of a teacher, presenting a congregation with historical and textual insight, giving a fresh perspective, or enlightening the mystery behind a passage.

Other times, a preacher’s role is just to remind the church of truth that has already been established.  I believe that in this 13^th chapter of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, he wanted to do just that—he wanted to remind the church in Corinth of the truth that already was.

Paul’s letter until now is full of direction, insight, and even admonition for the church.  He talks about immorality and divisions within the Corinthian church and he reminds them of expectations established long ago. 

In the 12^th chapter, presented to us last Sunday, Paul discusses the variety of gifts within the body of the church—all necessary and all important.  But at the end of the 12^th chapter, Paul sets us up for a return to the beginning, the beginning of our faith, before the establishment of the church and before the telling of prophecies.  Paul says, “before we discuss further how this body of believers will specifically run, let me remind you of your foundation.  ‘I will show you a still more excellent way’ to be a body of believers.  Let me remind you of we already know, of what you already know.” 

What do we already know?  Let’s start at the end of chapter 13: “Faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”  

Our foundation is not rooted by our faith or our hope.  Surely, these are a part of our solid ground—even essential pieces—but love is the firmament, the very beginning, the root of creation.  Paul sends us back to Genesis so that we might remember this:  we are created because of love.

God is patient: God is kind.  God does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in truth.  God bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  God never ends.

We are created in God’s image.  We know this too from Genesis and Paul reminds us in verse 12:  “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, [that which] we will see face to face.”  When we look in a mirror now, in the present, we all have the possibility to see God in our reflection.   

What do we see in ourselves that is God-like?  If God is Love and we are created in the image of God, then we are love.  We are creations that are capable of reflecting the image of love back to God and back to humanity.  Be reminded of the truth of which you are capable:

You are patient; you are kind; you are not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.  You do not insist on your own way; you are not irritable or resentful; you do not rejoice in wrongdoing, but you do rejoice in truth.

Isn’t this freeing?  Say it over and over, again and again:  I am patient, I am kind.  Let love win in you and let love be your reflection.  Love frees us all from fear, from sin, from the burden of being un-loving.

When we look in the mirror and we stare at ourselves, it is easy to get lost in our un-holiness and our un-godliness or to get caught up in our human nature and beauty.  The things we so easily see in ourselves make it therefore hard to see God in our own image.  But our humanness is not something to be ashamed of—we carry the image of love, dim though it may be, with us every day.  And when we grab onto this image, when we choose to be of love and when we act in a spirit of love, we truly reflect the image of God to others.

It’s also easy to get lost in the discussion of spiritual gifts.  It’s easy to get stuck in chapter 12.  No, we are not all apostles, prophets, teachers, miracle workers, healers, interpreters; but, if not one of us is all, then what is each of us?  When we look in the mirror, we want to see a specific calling.  We want to know our role and we want to be known for our role.  This definition of roles extends beyond the roles that are within the church.  We want to know that we will be either great architects or teachers or lawyers and we want others to know that we are great in the roles that we play.

This is why chapter 13 has to be included in this letter.  If we speak, if we prophesy, if we teach, and if we heal, but we do not have love, we may be noisy but we have no substance.  If we do not first answer our call to love—and to love is our calling—then we have failed to firm our foundation.  What is the line from the hymn?  “They will know we are Christians by our love.”        

A story from the news this past week was about a man who went into a pizza restaurant and demanded money of another man whose role was cook.  The potential robber broke down crying, saying that he just wanted to feed his family.  Instead of acting out of fear, the cook told the man to wait while he prepared him a meal to take home to his family.  This is love, personified and reflected in the role of cook.      

Today, on this Sunday, a meal is prepared for us too.  The communion table is here before us because fear has been conquered, death has been conquered, and because love has won.  Prepare your hearts, not with a sense of obligation, but instead with a sense of freedom.  Be reminded of the truth that was, is, and is to come.  Be not afraid, be not proud, but be faithful, be hopeful, be filled with the gift of love. 

Amen.

  

Pastoral Prayer and Lord’s Prayer

Oh Lord of all Lords,

In our conversations with you, we often confess to you our sins and our desires.  But allow us to confess our fears to you this morning, recognizing that those fears are often as disruptive and impeding to living full lives as our disobedience and our greed.

We confess to you our fear of loneliness and pray that you remind us that we are never alone.

We confess to you our fear of inadequacy and pray that you remind us that your call brings with it sufficiency.

We confess to you our fear that we will lose control and pray that you remind us in those moments that your spirit makes burden rest with ease.

Oh Guiding Presence, Caretaker, Deliverer, be with us with our fears, be with us in our sins, be with us in our praise.

Oh Joy, be with us this morning through it all.  Hear our prayer as we pray together, saying the words given to us by your Son, “Our Father…”