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Rev.
Judi is from
Virginia
and I come from Upstate New York. We
were comparing notes on
Michigan
weather. It seems that there
are two seasons: road
construction season, and the rest of the year!
In fact, even before the snowdrops and crocuses start to come up,
those orange and white barrels start popping up through the snow!
Our Scripture passages this morning remind us that in our spiritual life
it is always construction season.
And that, to tell you the truth, is Good News!
The First Letter of Peter wasn’t addressed to one church in particular.
It was passed on from house church to house church, amongst
Christians who were far away—far from
Israel
and Peter himself. Historians
calculate that at the end of the first century there were 70 million
people in the
Roman Empire
, and only 40,000 Christians in all. Talk
about being a minority!
They were immersed in a culture that instead of supporting them in their
faith, was hostile and even persecuting them for being followers of Jesus.
So to be grounded in their faith, to grow strong in Jesus even in
very difficult times, they went through a period of rigorous preparation
to join the church. They went
to “new members’ classes” for a whole year!
And late on the night before Easter was the climax.
At the Easter Vigil they were baptized and received into Christ’s
church. They were robed in
white, symbolizing that they had been cleansed and that they were
beginning a new life. And they
were fed milk.
Why milk?! These were adults,
after all! But even after that
intensive year of preparation—it was clear that they were just
beginning. Peter could write,
“Like newborn babes, long for the
pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation” (1
Peter 2:2). This wasn’t an
insult. This was reality.
And it’s reality for us too. Whether
it’s after a 4 week new members’ class or after 40 years of being
members here, we still aren’t “done.” We haven’t “arrived”
yet. We’re not finished
growing.
Presbyterian author Ann LaMott describes it in her own inimitable way.
She writes this about her dog, Lily:
“My brother says that whenever he stays with Lily in the car when I go
into a store, she stares at the store as if it were on fire, and then at
him, desperately, like, ‘Can you please
take me in there?’ Lily loves me the way I love Jesus.
I fall into a trance of despair when I can’t feel Him.”
Have you had a taste of that kind of love?
Have you had a glimpse of how precious you are to God, and how
fully alive you are in Jesus’ presence?
In our “construction process” we get that “taste,” and then
build on it--to help it continue, to help it grow.
It’s not easy. Jesus and
Peter both tell us so. That’s
why we have one another. We’re
called to be “living stones,” holding one another up, leaning on one
another, putting our full weight down on Jesus our cornerstone.
We’re much stronger this way, built together to be more than we
could ever be alone. We become
a visible sign of God’s presence and activity in the world.
So, clearly, in spite of our beautiful bulletin cover (prepared each week
by our own wonderful Pam Kaufmann), this message is NOT just about babies.
This is about all of us! But
it is about babies, too. Our
babies. In the Eastern
Orthodox tradition the baby is baptized, and anointed with oil, and then
passed around from person to person. It’s
kind of like passing a greased watermelon!
Hard to do! But as we
carry a newly baptized child down the aisle we are saying the same thing
as our Orthodox brothers and sisters:
This precious child is God’s and this precious child is ours.
We get the responsibility and the joy of helping this child of God
taste God’s goodness and grow in that experience of grace.
In case you haven’t noticed, we have celebrated lots of baptisms in the
past few years! And our Joyful
Journey church school rooms are overflowing!
It’s a wonderful “problem” to have! And
it reminds us of how important youth ministry is—now and in the years to
come.
In the past year we have had two search committees working hard at the
same time. Session recently
voted, however, to combine our two searches into one.
Instead of searching for a director of youth ministries as well as
an associate pastor, we will now search for an associate pastor who will
do youth ministry. At our
congregational meeting we will look to add to our Associate Pastor
Nominating Committee several people who will help bring a youth ministry
perspective.
We are excited about what this will mean for the future of youth ministry
in this place! And we are
hopeful that this will help us continue to be good stewards, reducing our
operating budget expenses as much as we can.
We will also be looking at hiring a part-time parish associate to
help with pastoral care, to ensure that all of our ministries stay strong.
A group of adults calling themselves the “Loft Ministry Team” has
begun meeting to look at how they can support youth ministry.
We know that this is our ministry together—no one person
can do it all. In baptism we
have joyfully received the gift of these young people and we have made a
commitment to them, and to their parents, and to the God who created them.
We want to be “living stones,” of all ages and sizes, built
together into a spiritual house for God.
A traveler from
Italy
came to the French town of
Chartres
to see a great church that was being built.
He encountered a workman, covered with dust, and asked what he did.
The man replied that he was a stonemason.
He had spent his days carving rocks.
A second man responded that he was a glassblower, and spent his days
making colored glass.
Still another replied that he was a blacksmith who hammered iron for a
living.
Finally, the traveler came upon an older woman with broom in hand.
She was sweeping up stone chips, wood shavings and glass.
He asked what she was doing and she responded, “Me?
I’m building a cathedral for the glory of Almighty God!”
Dear friends in Christ, you and I are too!
As we share out time, and our talents, and our financial resources,
these are not “jobs,” these are not mundane “tasks,” these are ministries.
We are doing something of eternal consequence! We are building, for the
glory of God! As Peter reminds
us, “Like living stones be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a
holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through
Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5).
People have been commenting to me about the magnificent music ministry of
this congregation, and the daily difference that this faith
community makes in the world, and the energy and compassion of God’s
people gathered here. I
encourage you to look around. Look at one another.
See the “construction” that is taking place! And then proclaim
with the psalmist, “This is the Lord’s doing; it
is marvelous in our eyes!” (Psalm 118:23).
Thanks be to God!
Amen!
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