January 26, 2025 First Congregational Church of Brimfield UCC
Nehemiah: 8:1-3, 5-6, 8-10 — . . . all the people gathered together into the square before the Water Gate. They told Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had given to Israel. 2 Accordingly, Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could hear with understanding. This was on the first day of the seventh month. 3 He read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand, and the ears of all the people were attentive to the book of the law. . . . 5 And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was standing above all the people, and when he opened it, all the people stood up. 6 Then Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, “Amen, Amen,” lifting up their hands. Then they bowed their heads and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. . . . . So they read from the book, from the law of God, with interpretation. They gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.
1 Corinthians 12:12-31 — For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. 13 For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.
14 Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot would say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear would say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? 18 But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. 19 If all were a single member, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many members yet one body. 21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” 22 On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 23 and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect, 24 whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, 25 that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. 26 If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.
27 Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. 28 And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues. 29 Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work powerful deeds? 30 Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? 31 But strive for the greater gifts.
Luke 4:14-21 — 14 Then Jesus, in the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee, and a report about him spread through all the surrounding region. 15 He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.
16 When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:
18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” 20 And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
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.
This has been a hard week for many of us. One of my colleagues is wondering what the end of federal support of IEPs will mean for her severely autistic son. What’s happening with that job I agreed to, but that was suspended this week? Will that high school friend who’s been in the Army all this time have to leave because he’s trans? You helped prosecute a January 6 seditionist. Is he going for retribution? Will gay marriage continue? What about gay adoptions? What about immigrants and refugees? What about the threat to eliminate citizenship for people born in the USA? Will Indians – Native Americans– lose their citizenship because they were born on the reservation? Without going into a lot of details, a lot of people are frightened…. And on and on and on. For those who are living in fear, this is exhausting.
This morning I don’t want to get lost in arguing each proposal; instead I only want us to remember one thing – whether or not what’s happening is what you wanted or voted for, or if it makes sense to you — or if it terrifies and keeps you up at night – and the one thing to remember is we are all in this together. If you thought what’s happening would be a good idea, then you have a responsibility to acknowledge the pain and fear of the people for whom it is total disaster. And if this is disaster to you, then let’s seek to understand why our sisters and brothers thought the situation was so awful that this would improve things. We are in this together.
There is no separation of people into the good, the better, and the best – or even into the good and the bad – the deserving and the undeserving. We are all one family. And the thing that will bring us through, will sustain us, is the strong sustenance we find in the Bible.
We have three readings this morning; separately they may not make much sense; together they give us tools to create a better way to live
The first clue for us is in that reading from Nehemiah. The way it’s read, you’ll maybe have noticed that we skip some of the verses – that’s not about substance, it’s just that the missing verses give us the names of the leaders, each and every one of them difficult to pronounce, so we skip them over. But we don’t skip over the core of the reading – “So they read from the book, from the law of God, with interpretation. They gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.” The people sat there and listened because they were desperate to hear some word that would provide meaning to their lives. And here was the word, and a word that had been explained so they could understand.
Let’s face it. To think that we need this kind of leadership, these kinds of actions, you have to be pretty desperate. So, lets listen to Nehemiah as he tells us there is meaning in the words of the Bible, meaning that provides focus, satisfaction, prosperity and love for our lives.
The second clue comes to us from the Gospel, from Luke’s story of that fateful sermon Jesus preached in the synagogue back home in Nazareth. Here he says, as clearly as possible, that God and faith are all about how we relate to one another, how we build community, how we love, and care, and practice justice and mercy. Jesus says it this way in the Message translation:
God’s Spirit is on me; he’s chosen me to preach the Message of good news to the poor, Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, To set the burdened and battered free, to announce, “This is God’s year to act!”[1]
Faith in God is about how we live. And it made people angry… because they’d figured that what made them good was following the rules with no compassion, or making lots of money, or being one of the folks with power in their world. What Jesus said contradicted everything they’d built their lives on; listening to Jesus brought them face to face with another way of life.
The folks who were angry at Jesus tried to throw him off a local cliff. They were every bit as happy as the President was last Tuesday when Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde laid before him the Christian call to practice our lives with mercy as well as justice. No one like to be told they’re wrong, even – or maybe especially when – they have a sneaking suspicion that they are wrong. Sometimes, however, it’s the job of the preacher to point out that there’s a better way that to throw people out of work, drive them out of the country, destroy their lives, their homes, their families.
There’s one last thing to plug into today’s sermon – the lesson from First Corinthians which tells us that each one of us is a valued part of the whole. So, that good news from Luke? It applies to everyone. Justice is for everyone.
All the blind, who could not tell right from wrong, all of them were intended by God to see.
All the oppressed, whether they are undocumented people coming here to work, or motel room cleaners, struggling to get along on $15 an hour… all the people of whatever category, were to live without oppression.
That’s what God wants for them. That’s what God wants for us. And God wants us to notice what’s happening in our world. God wants us to be aware and that means paying attention to the news, following it well enough to tell truth from fiction.
You could think of the Bible’s teaching as how we’re supposed to live, and then the world around us – newspapers, tv news, media, etc etc – alerts us as to where we can make a difference.
The Bible tells us we are to help people when disasters strike, when folks are in desperate need; and the news media helps us know where our help is needed. That’s why the theologian and Swiss pastor, Karl Barth, said, “Take your Bible and take your newspaper, and read both. But interpret newspapers from your Bible.” (Time Magazine, May 1, 1966.) We remember this as something like “preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other.”
What Barth wants us to be sure of is that we pay attention to our world. Being a Christian is not some quiet thing that we only pay attention to on Sunday morning. It’s part of our everyday life. We need to know what’s going on. In these days, that means reading, watching tv, doing research, keeping your eyes open.
Following the Christian path is part and parcel of the public life of the world. It is not just about praying at the kitchen table or reading the Bible before bed, but it is about paying attention to what’s going on around us and allowing our faith to direct how we interact with the world. We come here on Sundays to worship to give praise to God and to support one another, but we go out the door into a world that desperately needs our commitment to welcome, love, justice and mercy.
Remember our calling when you go out and about this week. Pay attention. Know that there are people you will meet who are terrified right now… people who need your kindness, your willingness to listen and to care. The core and heart of our faith is love. This week, every week, meet everyone with a welcome, with a love that overflows forever.
Amen.
© 2025, Virginia H. Child
[1] Eugene H. Peterson, The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language (Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2005), Lk 4:18–19.
To Believe is to Care. . . To Care is to Do 