Month: August 2024

First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC, August 25, 2024

Ephesians 6:10-20 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power; put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil, for our struggle is not against blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.^,* Therefore take up the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on the evil day and, having prevailed against everything, to stand firm. Stand, therefore, and belt your waist with truth and put on the breastplate of righteousness and lace up your sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Pray in the Spirit at all times in every prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert and always persevere in supplication for all the saints. Pray also for me, so that when I speak a message may be given to me to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it boldly, as I must speak.

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.

Nine years ago, in 2015, NESN fired Don Orsillo, one half of a very popular Red Sox broadcasting team… Don did the play-by-play while Jerry Remy did the commentary.  They were a beloved team, and fans were really angry with the team’s move.

It’s 2024.  Nine years later.  And you still cannot have a conversation about the quality of present day Red Sox broadcasts on the Boston Globe’s web pages without it descending into an argument that the Sox shouldn’t have fired Orsillo, and that Dave O’Brien is evil for having taken Orsillo’s place.  

Anger is powerful.  Anger is persistent.  Anger is destructive.

That kind of anger shuts down conversation, destroys friendships, or makes it almost impossible to build good relationships – and it’s not just about the Red Sox.  In a world that is increasingly angry, more and more unwilling to trust anyone else on anything….how do we survive?  How do we thrive? How do we follow the  Christian way?

There is a power which is trying to convince us that it’s better to be mean than to be kind.

There’s a power out there that believes it is better to throw an insult than to take anyone else’s position seriously.

There’s a power out there that believes it’s better to poison the well for everyone else than to let anyone get ahead.

That power is out to destroy the community in which we live, to destroy the community that is the basis of our relationship with the whole world.

And it’s a power which can leave us feeling powerless, worthless, frustrated and angry ourselves.  It leaves us feeling as though every good thing we’ve ever tried to do has disappeared, and that our beliefs, our practices, our way of caring for one another are increasingly irrelevant, worthless, and contemptible.

I want to make two things really clear as we think about this power.  First, while you may see and hear people, maybe in your own families, who are captured by this power of hatred and anger – those people didn’t start this.  They are captured by a force that is beyond belief.  And if you find yourself under the influence of this stuff— getting angrier, responding more sharply than you used to, remember that it is not you who has changed, it is the world of acceptable behavior in which we live these days.

Second, this anger I speak of is not limited to one particular political party.  It is something that has infected all our world.  I’ve heard people from way left of the Democratic Party get really angry, and people from the far Right.  Sometimes this kind of anger is about a political party, but sometimes it’s about the best beach in Rhode Island, or who should announce games for the Red Sox.

The good news for the days is that we do not have to live in anger.  We can push back. We don’t have to start making mean remarks ourselves in order to make a difference.  The way things are now is not the way God intends for life to be, and God has given us the strength, the wisdom and the practices to begin to make changes.

Today’s good news is simply this:  in today’s lesson, St. Paul lines out for us a way to live in the midst of anger, a way to be a force for good in our homes, our work, our community, our world.  God has not left us alone in this task.  So, let’s look again at these words.

• Stand, therefore, and belt your waist with truth.  Let your words be true. 
• Put on the breastplate of righteousness.  Do the right thing.
• Lace up your sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. Act peaceably.
• With all of these, take the shield of faith.  Remember, God acts for good.
• Pray in the Spirit at all times in every prayer and supplication. Pray, be in daily touch with God.

Let your words be true.  Be sure you know what’s really going on.  God calls us to be agents of truth, so check out those rumors.  If you don’t know, for instance, why the Red Sox fired Don Orsillo, don’t speculate.  If you see a story on Facebook, remember that no one factchecks Facebook posts and check it out.

Do the right thing.  America Magazine last week had an article about how to raise kids who continue to attend church after they grow up.  Now America is a Catholic magazine, so they were thinking specifically about the kids staying Catholic, while we’d think about staying Protestant – but the idea is the same. 

The mother whose children have stopped practicing their faith said: “I did all the things,” . . .“We went to church as a family. We sacrificed to send them to Catholic school. They went to youth group. We did everything we thought we were supposed to do. What happened?”  

Well, here’s the answer: “While families who successfully raised all of their children to a faithful adulthood did have regular family prayer times (usually some kind of morning, mealtime, and/or bedtime prayers), that doesn’t appear to be the main factor responsible for their success. What mattered most was a family dynamic in which the family (especially the children) experienced their faith as the source of the warmth in their homes. Children raised in these households experienced their family’s faith as something that drew them together in good times and bad.”

Doing the right thing, living out our faith, changes lives.  America applies that idea directly to raising children, but it applies all across the board.  In this contentious time, be extra sure to live out the values of kindness, grace, mercy, justice and love, which exemplify the Christian faith.  Let your faith allow others to see you as a trustworthy person, a kind oasis in an angry world.

Act peaceably.  There are going to be a lot of time when we’ll be around someone or some situation where anger is in the air.  Be the person who takes it down a notch.  If you’re in line at the grocery, and the person in front of you is mean to the clerk, be the person who says something kind.  If someone starts to tell a nasty joke or a mean story, if someone starts to make fun of a person, be the person who walks away, or who says that’s not acceptable (but not angrily).  Build peace by helping people see the way of love.

Be in daily touch with God.  You know this – daily conversations are a building block of good, solid relationships.  So, talk with God every day.  Tell God about the deeply annoying person you met, or whatever else has pushed your buttons, and doing so will help you keep your cool.  

Our world is filled with anger and distrust.  In the days to come, be the people who turn away from that path.  Be the people who seek truth and practice what they preach.  Stay in touch with God, and build God’s world, in Jesus’ name.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC, August 11, 2024

John 6:35  Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. 

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.

For what do we hunger?  It’s not really about food, you know, though I’m sure each of us has something foody for which we yearn… something we love to eat, that perhaps is only available fresh at one time of the year, like asparagus…. or something we love but aren’t supposed to eat… or something that when we smell it or taste it reminds us of home… my grandmother’s home often smelled of apples and wood smoke, for instance.  

But this hunger of which Jesus speaks is a hunger for love, a hunger for perfection, a hunger for acceptance; that hunger is a lot harder to satisfy for most of us.

You might remember that sense that everything had to be perfect if you think back to when you were a child and maybe got a new coloring book and a box of brand new crayons…. and how important it seemed then that all the crayons be perfect, not used, not broken, but brand new and perfect.

And you might remember how easily those crayons broke, how hard it was to keep them looking good.  

Well, maybe you lived in a home with a big box of well-loved crayons, and it was more important to find a blue one than it be untouched by any other hands…. maybe it was something else that just had to be right.  And maybe that has happened to you more recently than your sixth birthday…

Maybe your first family Thanksgiving dinner dessert was a flop.  The big presentation at work – well, none of the a/v equipment worked properly.  There’s a big old dent in the side of a brand new car?  Your sixth grader got a C in English?  

And it’s not just about those kinds of failures… because it’s not all that hard to come up with a list of more serious things to worry about, things which raise our fears these days,  and it becomes harder to resist that feeling that we are all on the losing side of things, that something’s out of whack.

In the midst of all this, comes Jesus, saying to us, “Do not be afraid.”  And somewhere in our minds comes that voice responding back, “are you kidding?”  

In the midst of trial and trouble, we struggle to see or feel the truth of Jesus’ words.  It’s easy for him to say that we’ll never hunger or thirst if we follow him, but right now, we’re hungry and thirsty and lonely and tired.  And what does it all mean?

That’s when it’s helpful to add in the words found in the letter to the Hebrews:  “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”  

As followers of Jesus Christ, we are engaged in the work of building something which doesn’t yet exist.  Our task is the transformation of dreams into reality.  It’s not just the work of our lifetimes, but the work of centuries; we are but one part of that work.

Sometimes, it feels like we’re making no progress.  Sometimes, it feels like we’re going backwards.  But there are signs out there, signs for us to show that we’re really one step ahead, even when we’re in the midst of chaos.  

Here’s a story about how small steps, small changes, made a big difference:  it’s a story from out of the dog show world that I heard years ago.  

Down in South Carolina, they were having a canine obedience trial.  This is a kind of doggy competition where the dogs are asked to complete particular tasks to demonstrate just how well trained they are.  Dogs, accompanied by their human handlers, sit, stay, jump over obstacles and retrieve items on command, and they are evaluated on how well they sit, how promptly they come, how completely they stay and so on. In some kinds of obedience, the dog and handler walk a course, doing a task at each of maybe ten stations.  It’s a lot of fun, but very hard for dog and human.

So in this particular contest (or trial), one of the women noticed an elderly woman who was showing her dog for the umpteenth time…. Our friend, Bev,  reports that every year, this woman comes to their show and competes.  She’s not very good, and the dog’s not learned a whole lot over the years – they’ve never even progressed out of the introductory level, but everyone has noticed how much fun they have together.

This year it was a little different.  This year, the woman and her dog actually qualified (finished with a high enough score that they could move ahead). And, when she finished the exercise, everyone broke out in loud applause!  The exhibitor still wasn’t very good, and the dog still hadn’t learned much, but they’d done their best and they were honored for it.

And there’s more – The next day, this same woman was going to compete again.  It turns out she’s deaf, and in the noise of the fairgrounds, her hearing aids are no help at all, but she absolutely has to hear the directions from the judge to know which part of the course to work next.  She was set for failure and the judge knew it.  

So the judge went to the people running the competition and challenged them to find a hearing-ear person – someone who could walk along with the exhibitor through the exercises and do nothing more than repeat the judge’s instructions so she could hear.  Wonder of wonders, they found someone, and went ahead with the competition – and the exhibitor finished well, and to great cheers.  And then it was announced that not only had she managed to complete the course, but she’d earned fourth place.  The cheers brought the place down.

Sometimes our great gains are in solving society’s problems – in creating a safe space for GLBT teens to gather, or helping the homeless find homes, or providing a free meal to the community on a regular basis.  Sometimes, it’s helping a fellow competitor through the competition.  Sometimes, it’s as simple as offering a ride to the doctor or sharing coffee at Dunkins.

David Lose, senior pastor of Mt. Olivet Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, writes:  

. . . .one of the primary calls of the church today is to become a place where people are so rooted in the promise of God’s good pleasure, reminded of their identity as God’s beloved children, and affirmed in their inherent self-worth and dignity, that they can, indeed, see all those around them as similarly beloved and deserving of self-worth, dignity, and God’s good pleasure. 

The question for a Christian, you see, isn’t finally about some form of self-actualization but rather discovering that as we give ourselves away in relationship and service we find a deeper sense of self than we’d imagined possible. We are born for community and find a sense of self and meaning and purpose as we trust God’s promises and give ourselves away in love.

We are not perfect, but we are loved.  

Our lives are not perfect, but they are important.  

Things may fall apart, but God will always be with us.  

Failure is not an end, but more like an opportunity to try another path.

Because we know that we are God’s beloved children, because we know that love cannot be lost, we are freed to be people of love to those who are feared and hated in our world.  And that sense of belonging, of having worthwhile work, of knowing that we are loved, that is the food that sustains, that is the bread that always satisfies, that is the drink that quenches our thirst.

We’re not here just to make money, or to have the best vacation – or even the most elaborate Halloween display on the block – we are here, we are at our best, when we are working together, we are freed to build community, to help others to be their best selves.

And because we know that God loves us even when we fail, we’re able to get up, to be restored, to work together again, to continue on the path that the apostles started so long ago.  

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. 

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC, August 4, 2024

⁴³ “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I say to you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ so that you may be children of your Father in heaven, for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? ⁴⁷ And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the gentiles do the same? ⁴⁸ Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.

If there’s any one directive from the Bible that is totally discouraging, it’s this one:  be perfect…as your heavenly Father is perfect.  That God is perfect is no problem, of course, but that I should be perfect like that – well, that’s a major challenge.

All this section of Matthew is a series of impossible statements, impossible asks of us…. those who follow Jesus, it says – never get angry…. never commit adultery… never lie…. never smack back in an argument or a fight..  love your enemies.

And then – be perfect.  What we’re being asked to do here is impossible, not just for you or me, but for anyone, right?  So, why is it here?  What does it mean for us?

It is a radical re-orienting of how we live our lives.  This section calls us to leave behind the “good enough for government work” point of view, and to live into our true capacities to be better.  

A lot of the time, when we read in this section we focus on the specific things God calls us to do, but today, I want us to think together about what it means when God points us towards all of these ways of being.  Think about it this way:  when God looks at us, does God see people who are content with the way things are, the ways they’re living — or does God see in us, the potential to be better, to come closer to God’s vision for our world?

And if God sees in us the capacity to come closer to perfection, then what resources does God give us to strengthen and guide us on the way?  How will we learn to adjust our expectations?  Where will we gain the confidence to follow this call?

Because God is not throwing us into the deep end and expecting us to instantly be able to swim.  God knows it is not easy to change direction and that we will need help and guidance on our journey.  And this task is especially important in these contentious times.  So, we have help available.

We grow in our faith when we gather together, like we’re doing this morning.  Even when you don’t agree with what I’m saying, the opportunity to think together — and maybe, even more true when you don’t agree – that opportunity to think together is an important way to grow in faith.

We grow in our ability to practice our faith through attending Bible study.  It’s part of the essential nature of the congregational understanding of Christianity, that we are called to live in community, to do things like discussing faith or studying the Bible – not alone, but with the folks who share our commitment to this church and its ways.  

We grow in our love for one another when we gather regularly to share in Holy Communion, the Lord’s Supper.  It is in the telling and re-telling of the story of Jesus, the physical sharing of bread and cup, that we remember how we are part of a fellowship which not only extends throughout the world today, but extends back in time to the days of Jesus. Communion is the act which binds us together, across the ages, which brings us together even when death divides us, which reminds us who we are and whose we are.

God calls on us to be perfect, but not because we need to be perfect to be loved by God.  We are loved and accepted right now, as we are… but we are invited to move further in and higher up, to be our best, to let God’s love so shine in our lives that we bring that love to all the world.

So today, take hold of that accepting love.  When the communion is served, take and eat to be nourished to be your very best person.  Let the love of Christ change your world for the better.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child