Category: Interim Ministry

The First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC   July 7, 2024

Mark 6:1-6 (The Message)

He left there and returned to his hometown. His disciples came along. On the Sabbath, he gave a lecture in the meeting place. He made a real hit, impressing everyone. “We had no idea he was this good!” they said. “How did he get so wise all of a sudden, get such ability?”

But in the next breath they were cutting him down: “He’s just a carpenter—Mary’s boy. We’ve known him since he was a kid. We know his brothers, James, Justus, Jude, and Simon, and his sisters. Who does he think he is?” They tripped over what little they knew about him and fell, sprawling. And they never got any further.

Jesus told them, “A prophet has little honor in his hometown, among his relatives, on the streets he played in as a child.” Jesus wasn’t able to do much of anything there—he laid hands on a few sick people and healed them, that’s all. He couldn’t get over their stubbornness. He left and made a circuit of the other villages, teaching.

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.

Years ago, I knew a young person who’d won a full ride scholarship to one of those prestigious prep schools – the kind of school which generally costs upwards of $70K a year and points you towards future success.  

We were all excited for her and her family – and, of course, it was a feather in the cap of our school system.  And then she turned the whole thing down, and went instead to our local high school.  It’s a good school, to be sure, but more invested in preparing people to work in the local industry.

I thought for sure she’d decided she didn’t want to leave home and friends.  But one day I found myself at the local version of Starbucks or Dunkin’s and her mom was at the next table, talking to her friends.  That’s how I learned that the girl’s parents had refused her permission to take the scholarship… because they thought, probably rightly, that if she went off to that fancy school, she would change so much she wouldn’t belong at home anymore.

Her mom said she’d do well wherever she went, and they’d had to think about what would be best for her overall.  And, who knows, maybe that was the right decision.

But it reminded me how strong our community expectations are.  It’s the sort of thing we see here in this morning’s readings.  Back home everyone is impressed by Jesus, at least at first, but their expectations – after all he’s just the carpenter’s son – made it impossible for them to really take Jesus seriously.

What we expect people to be puts fences around what we’re able to hear them say.  Those folks in Jesus’ hometown couldn’t hold onto the Good News he preached because all they could really see was a carpenter’s son, and so he couldn’t possibly be saying anything enduringly important.  Now, if he’d been talking about the differences between walnut and chestnut wood…. or now to sharpen tools, they’d have saved his thoughts forever.

But they thought they already knew him, and so they couldn’t really hear him.

That’s one reason why it can be hard to hear the Good News.  But it’s not the only one.  Sometimes we struggle to hear because we fear what that new idea might mean to us.  I’m not just talking about bad news, but any news that might be unwelcome… 

You’ll notice that because the folks back home couldn’t hear what Jesus was saying, Jesus himself had no power there. And he went away.

Joseph Bessler, who teaches theology in Phillips Seminary, puts it this way:  “established habits of mind are powerful in resisting any gospel that would alter the balance of social power”^[1]

Does that make sense to you?  Does it still make sense if I tell you his school is in Oklahoma?  Or do our cultural assumptions say he should be discounted because, well, Oklahoma??

That’s what this is all about.  It’s about helping us become aware of the assumptions that make it hard for us to hear the call of Jesus.  Maybe the assumption that stops you is an accent, maybe a skin color, or an origin.  Maybe, the assumption that makes it hard for you to hear is a sense that if you once listened, really listened, you’d find yourself changing in ways that are scary.  Maybe if you could hear, you’d have to stop hiding behind “we’ve always done it this way”.  I know that’s how it works for me.

Being a Christian isn’t always easy.  Sometimes we’re forced to face things we’d rather ignore, sometimes we have to try new things when we’re really uncomfortable.  And sometimes we have to give up what we adore…. but we’re not left without resources.

First of all, we’re supposed to do this work in community – we are not alone, we are never alone.  And then we have the power and comfort of worship to support and encourage us along the way.  And always, always, we have the bread of heaven to nourish us.  This communion we will share today gives us strength, reminds us that we are part of a centuries-long family of believers who have dedicated themselves to the idea that love changes everything.

So let us eat together and face the idea that the world is changing with courage and determination, that we might follow Jesus all the way.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

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^[1] Joseph A. Bessler, “Theological Perspective,” in Feasting on the Gospels: Mark, ed. Cynthia A. Jarvis and E. Elizabeth Johnson, First edition., A Feasting on the Word Commentary (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2014), 168.

June 30, 2024 First Congregational Church at Auburn UCC

2 Corinthians 8:7-15 Now as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in utmost eagerness, and in our love for you—so we want you to excel also in this generous undertaking.^,

⁸ I do not say this as a command, but I am, by mentioning the eagerness of others, testing the genuineness of your love. ⁹ For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich. ¹⁰ And in this matter I am giving my opinion: it is beneficial for you who began last year not only to do something but even to desire to do something. ¹¹ Now finish doing it, so that your eagerness may be matched by completing it according to your means. ¹² For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what one does not have. ¹³ For I do not mean that there should be relief for others and hardship for you, but it is a question of equality between ¹⁴ your present abundance and their need, so that their abundance may also supply your need, in order that there may be equality. ¹⁵ As it is written, 

“The one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little.”

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.

In today’s lesson, from Second Corinthians, Paul calls all of us to faith lives of excellence.  He calls us, in God’s name, to do our best.  He says it’s not a command, but rather that it is good for us to do the best we’re able to do.

It not only pleases God, but it is good for us, to do good.

Now it’s one thing to hear, or read, or even know that this is God’s call for us – to be the people who do good – but it’s something else to respond to that call.

Today is a special Sunday, a day in which we are baptizing and taking in new members.  Now, there are many reasons for celebration, but one – today’s focus – is this:  baptism and membership are the most important parts of responding to God’s invitation to be people who do good.

We baptized Ryleigh, not because we believe she’s capable of knowing God’s call yet, but because we believe that God’s call comes to each of us even before we are capable of choosing between good and evil.  We believe that children who are baptized can grow up as people who do good.  We believe that their baptism shows that God loves them even before they have done anything to earn that love.

And we will receive our new members because they have found here a way to live into that way – to support their callings to bring good into our world.

Baptism, and membership in a local church, are two sides of the same thing – a publicly declared intention to follow the way of welcoming and inclusive love.

There’s some sense in which saying that is the really simple part of the process.  The easiest thing about being baptized, even if we were to practice full immersion baptism in icy cold lakes in winter, is the baptism itself.  The easiest thing about being a new member, even if you’re terribly shy, is standing up in front of the church and saying the words.

The hard part, the fun part, of being baptized, being a church member, is figuring out how to live it out.  Being baptized, being a member, means we get to think about what we do, and why we do it.  We get to figure out what kind of person God wants us to be, and discern how to get there.  

Once we join up, we don’t have to figure out all this stuff for ourselves.  We’ve adopted a way of living, joined a community where everyone has a voice, because God says everyone matters.  We’ve set our faces towards a practice of generosity, because God teaches that everyone should have homes, adequate clothes, enough food, and opportunities to make useful lives.  We’ve agreed to think things through, to see if what’s being proposed will make for a stronger community, will create a place of love and acceptance — because that’s what God is all about – accepting love.  

Baptism gives a foundation to our lives.  It’s said that the great reformer, Martin Luther, wrote the words “I AM BAPTIZED” on his desk in chalk, so that when he felt anxious or overwhelmed by his world, he could look at and remember God’s love, freely offered to him.  Love is what it’s all about.

It’s harder and harder to live in peace these days.  We look back at years gone by and think “we all got along so much better then,” but that memory is something of an illusion.  Back in those wonderful days we remember, we worked hard to keep from seeing how the assumptions of that world kept people in boxes.  Today we’ve opened the boxes, and we’re in a struggle to dissolve those dividing walls of ignorance and assumption.  A recent essay on baptism put it this way:

We practice our baptism by sharing in the reconciling mission of God, reaching across racial biases, cultural traditions, political parties, economic status, and gender identity. We cross boundaries by following Jesus in service. We transcend divisions by trusting in the transforming power of the Spirit, poured out upon all flesh. (Baptize:  David Gambrell, Follow Me – Baptize, Foundational Essay, 2021)

We set our hearts to live as honest people, kind people, thoughtful people, generous people, ethical people, because that’s the model we see in the Bible.

Yes, we know that’s hard to do.  It means giving up our old assumptions, it may mean reaching out to people we learned to shun in years gone by.  Changing ourselves is never easy.  Neither is changing our world.  Sometimes we hesitate to step out on this journey because we’re sure we will fail.  And isn’t it better to not try if doing it is over our heads?  

But here’s the good news.  God loves us, win or lose, succeed or fail.  God loves us absolutely, continually.  We cannot lose that most important center of our lives, and so trying – reaching out in love to our world – is the clearest and best response to God’s everlasting love.

So let us rejoice that today we are declaring that we want to belong to God, to follow God’s way and to be God’s people.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

First Congregational Church in Auburn (UCC), June 9, 2024

2 Corinthians 4:13‒5:1 ¹³ But just as we have the same spirit of faith that is in accordance with scripture—“I believed, and so I spoke”—we also believe, and therefore we also speak, ¹⁴ because we know that the one who raised Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and will present us with you in his presence. ¹⁵ Indeed, everything is for your sake, so that grace, when it has extended to more and more people, may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God. 

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.

There is an old story about a disciple and his teacher, a story [the apostle] Paul might have liked.  “Where shall I find God?” a disciple once asked. “Here,” the teacher said. “Then why can’t I see God?” “Because you do not look.” “But what should I look for?” the disciple continued. “Nothing. Just look,” the teacher said. 

“But at what?” “At anything your eyes alight upon,” the teacher said. “But must I look in a special kind of way?” “No, the ordinary way will do.” “But don’t I always look the ordinary way?” “No, you don’t,” the teacher said. “But why ever not?” the disciple pressed. “Because to look, you must be here. You’re mostly somewhere else,” the teacher said…^[1]

The prophet Jeremiah once said:  ²¹ Hear this, O foolish and senseless people, who have eyes but do not see, who have ears but do not hear. ²² Do you not fear me? says the Lord; Do you not tremble before me? I placed the sand as a boundary for the sea, a perpetual barrier that it cannot pass; though the waves toss, they cannot prevail; though they roar, they cannot pass over it. ²³ But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart; they have turned aside and gone away. 

They are people who go to Sturbridge Village and see the pretty houses, the lovely green, and look at the Freeman Farm and admire the proportions of the Salem Towne House, but they do not see the reality of the lives portrayed there.  They don’t see the hard work required to grow crops, or prepare food, or make cloth.  They don’t see the satisfaction of a day’s work done, or the sorrow of a child’s life cut short by diphtheria.  They look at the fields and watch the demonstrations but never have a moment’s wonder about the people.

I’ve spent the last week doing my yearly continuing education, taking a 5 day course in the Gospel of John, led by Professor Harold Attridge of the Yale Divinity School.  I tell you his name because I’m so impressed by him, and kinda in awe of the idea that I can study with one of the most important, most highly respected scholars of the Bible into English in the entire world.  It was a hard week, but a good one, and I hope to do it again.

All throughout the week, he kept emphasizing something that led me to this sermon, something I want to share with you, and it’s this:

There’s more to life than what we see on the surface.  When John the Baptist calls people to repentance, he’s really calling them to dedicate themselves to paying attention.  When Jesus steps up, in John’s Gospel, he’s taking that call and doubling down on it.

We are called to pay attention.  We are called to notice what’s deeply going on.  And the biggest reason we don’t, is that it’s really hard to see all the pain and stress in the world.

We don’t want to see it because it’s hard to imagine we can do anything about it.  We do not see, or turn our eyes and ears away from things, because it’s so frustrating to feel useless.  So, sure there are poor people. What can we do? And, yes, Black people are not treated fairly, but we have no power.  And it’s so hard to believe that they put that (oh, let’s say a) dump for worthless tires over there because no one who lives there has the power to complain, and the land was cheap.

Or, maybe we don’t want to recognize the fissures which divide us as a people, or acknowledge that our side has problems…. because it feels like giving up.  

You know, better than I, probably, how meanly people can think.  And we all know how hard it is to talk about things right now, for fear of a terrible argument.

Here’s the thing, though.  It’s right at those points where the greatest pain is, the greatest anger bubbles up, the hardest problems to acknowledge – it’s right there that God is.  And it is when we focus on God’s way, when we take up God’s humility, that we are able to see what really is there.

With God, when we focus, what we see is the humanity of the other.

Back when I lived down in Putnam, I was often visited by a Jehovah’s Witness missionary.  Well, I’ve been visited by them most everywhere I’ve lived, but this woman was different.  We grew to be friends because somehow we were able to recognize in each other common concerns about our world.  We had different answers to those problems, of course, but the more we talked, the more we also began to realize that even those answers were not so different.  They weren’t the same, either, but most of all they didn’t need to be barriers.

In today’s lesson, the apostle Paul writes that because he believes, he speaks… speaks up, speaks out, engages in conversation, talks with others.  And he believes, according to the Gospel of John, because, he now sees the world differently.  It’s no meaningless detail that Paul is blinded on the road to Damascus, and his vision is restored by faith in Jesus.  

Jesus says God is love.

Love is lived out when we take one another seriously, really see each other.

When we see one another, we care about one another.

And when we care about one another, we are driven to action,

It is when we mind, pay attention to, the light of God in our lives, in the lives of those we meet, that we truly are saved, saved to the work of redeeming the world in the name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

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^[1] Mark Barger Elliott, “Homiletical Perspective on 2 Corinthians 4:13‒5:1,” in Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year B, ed. David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor, vol. 3 (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 115.

First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC, June 2, 2024

2 Corinthians 4:5-12 (NRSV)

⁵ For we do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’s sake. ⁶ For it is the God who said, “Light will shine out of darkness,” who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. 

But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. ⁸ We are afflicted in every way but not crushed, perplexed but not driven to despair, ⁹ persecuted but not forsaken, struck down but not destroyed, ¹⁰ always carrying around in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. ¹¹ For we who are living are always being handed over to death for Jesus’s sake, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our mortal flesh. ¹² So death is at work in us but life in you.

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.

It was years and years ago, back when I was a pastor in rural Maine.  My churches – there were three of them – were in one of the most beautiful parts of that beautiful state, and surrounded by kids’ camps.  Between the beauty of the area, and the numbers of young adults who’d learned to love our area, my summers were always busy with weddings – sometimes as many as three on a weekend.

The one I want to tell you about today was one of the best.  The weather was great.  The bride was beautiful, the groom, handsome, the attendants lovely.  Everyone was happy, the families were excited to see these two young people, who’d dated all through college, finally begin their lives together.  They had planned the service down to the last detail, wanting everything to be right.  The year before the wedding, they’d discovered that in the late afternoon, the setting sun’s rays made the interior of the church turn a lovely pink, just for a few moments.  And so they timed the wedding for that moment.  And it all went as they’d planned, the perfect wedding, bathed in perfect pink light.

About a year later, I got a phone call from the groom.  He and his wife had gone to live up in Millinocket, where he was working for one of the paper plants.  Their first child had been born, but now the baby was in the Maine Medical Center and they wanted, needed, me to come and pray for him, because it wasn’t clear he was going to make it.

I went, of course, and ended up baptizing the child there in the ICU.  As I visited with the parents, it became clear that they were very angry… yes, they were frightened for their son; it was clear that, if he survived, he was going to have some obstacles to overcome.  But there was more.

They were angry with God.  They told me, “we made a deal with God. We would do everything right for our wedding, and God would bless us. We didn’t even live together, like everyone else, because we believed that would protect our future family.  And now God has gone back on the bargain.  Our son – even if he makes it, they’re telling us he’ll have problems.  Why did this happen to us when we did the right thing?!”

Their son made it.  And yes, he ended up having to have rehabilitative therapy.  Not long after he got out of the hospital, the whole family moved to upstate New York, and I never heard from them again, except once, to let me know he was making progress.

But I’ve never forgot that little boy and his parents’ wrenching question.  Why did this happen to us?

Now, you might thing that this is an odd story for Confirmation Sunday.  It’s not really, because Confirmation is a time when you’re saying yes to life, and life is not just good stuff, sometimes it’s really bad.  You need to know that joining this church, saying “yes” to God is not going to automatically protect you from things going wrong.

What it’s going to do is give you the way to survive, to find joy in the midst of sorrow.  It’s going to give you help in making decisions that are complicated, it’s going to guide you on God’s path.

In our lesson for today, the Apostle Paul wrote:  we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed but not driven to despair, persecuted by not forsaken, struck down but not destroyed…”  Even in the midst of the worst that can happen, you will still have the presence of Jesus in your lives.  Even if you do not feel that presence, it will be there.  God never fails us.

Now, that’s not easy, and as I said, you may not always feel it.  That’s why we’re here, why we want you to continue building friendships in this church, or in the church where you go to college, or where you eventually live.  You need the rest of us, and we need you.  When it’s tough, we’re here for each other.  We become the spirit of Jesus for you when you’re in need, and you do the same for us.   

Local churches exist to be community, friends, maybe even family for one another.  There is no other group you can be a part of that welcomes everyone as they are.  If you walk into a place that says it’s a church but you do not find welcome there, go find a better church.  We’re not all perfect, we’re human, and we have to be honest, some churches are better at being church than others.

One last story for you to remember and hold onto when life gets challenging.  

Alexander Coffin was driving home one night, coming home from a tennis game. It was a terribly stormy night, very dark, and he missed a curve and went into the ocean in South Boston.  He was trapped and couldn’t get out of the car. 

Alex’s father was then the pastor of the Riverside Church in New York City, one of the biggest of the big churches.  People asked him how God could have done that, why God had killed Alex, just as he was about to graduate from college…. and this was his response:

The one thing that should never be said when someone dies is “It is the will of God.” Never do we know enough to say that. My own consolation lies in knowing that it was not the will of God that Alex die; that when the waves closed over the sinking car, God’s heart was the first of all our hearts to break.

. . . And of course I know, even when pain is deep, that God is good. “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Yes, but at least, “My God, my God”; and the psalm only begins that way, it doesn’t end that way. As the grief that once seemed unbearable begins to turn now to bearable sorrow, the truths in the “right” biblical passages are beginning, once again, to take hold: “Cast thy burden upon the Lord and He shall strengthen thee”; “Weeping may endure for the night but joy cometh in the morning”; “Lord, by thy favor thou hast made my mountain to stand strong”; “For thou hast delivered my soul from death, mine eyes from tears, and my feet from falling”; “In this world ye shall have tribulation, but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world”; “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

And finally I know that when Alex beat me to the grave, the finish line was not Boston Harbor in the middle of the night. If a week ago last Monday, a lamp went out, it was because, for him at least, the Dawn had come.

So I shall — so let us all — seek consolation in that love which never dies, and find peace in the dazzling grace that always is.

So, on this beautiful day when you will pledge yourself to the Christian way and become members of this church, remember that we are here for you in good and in bad, that here you are loved and welcomed without measure, that here, and in every church that follows Christ’s way, you will always have a place to ask questions, a place to feel joy, a place to share sorrows, a place to know love.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

First Congregational Church in Auburn MA (UCC), May 26, 2024

The Rev. Dr. Virginia H. Child, preaching

John 3:16-17:  “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Second Inaugural Address of Abraham Lincoln – – With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

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.

I want, today, to talk about the ties that bind — and the ties that divide — this country on this day, on the weekend in which we are called to remember those who have died to make all free. And I want to talk about the power of God’s love to change our world.

In long-ago days, Memorial Day was a fixed holiday, focused on the Civil War, always celebrated on May 30, and marked by parades in which elderly veterans of that war tottered down the streets of our larger cities, or rode in the back of automobiles in long and somber parades.  Speeches were made, and if there were picnics, they were at the cemetery where the graves of our honored dead were decorated with flowers.

Today, Memorial Day has been altered to remember all those who died in the service of their country, and for many, it has morphed into the first raucous summer celebration.  But it is still worth remembering that terrible war and what it has to say to those of us who seek to live in peace.  For it is in nurturing peace that we give the best respect to those who died in war.  

The world has changed; the celebrations have changed.  But let’s not lose the lesson that is stored away in this weekend.  Let’s honor the dead and remember, sometimes war must happen, but that doesn’t mean it’s all good.  War is dark and terrible; it destroys people; it destroys community.  War makes us want to see each other in sharp distinction, as if one side is all good and the other all bad.  And that’s just not how it is.

Abraham Lincoln wrote, in his Second Inaugural Address, that both sides of that terrible war, read the same Bible and prayed to the same God.  We might add that they spoke the same languages, belonged to the same churches and often were members of the same family.  Despite all the ties they had in common, the union broke apart.  Churches were torn apart — Baptists north and south created new organizations – the Southern Baptist Convention and the Northern Baptist Convention — as did the Presbyterians in our country.  Families were destroyed.  

The conflict which began in 1860 was not just about states’ rights, or slavery, but at its foundation about how human beings treat one another.  And the struggle which tore our country asunder in those days, continues today, because we’re still not sure that all people are really created equal.

We can look back and say, “look, we no longer segregate our schools.  We no longer put signs in the windows saying no <fill in the blank> need apply.”  But that’s not the end of things.  Just last winter a black man was stopped for driving through West Hartford, the police were called, just because a homeowner knew he couldn’t possibly belong there.  We are sophisticated and educated and yet we sometimes stumble over the pre-conceptions and assumptions of our society.

It’s no wonder that in the wider world, more people stumble than get it. There are two basic human assumptions that keep us from getting it.  The first is simple:  our way is best.  

What we like is right…. the right name for that drink with milk and ice cream is a frappe, right?  Except, in Rhode Island, that’s a cabinet. . . and where I grew up in Florida, it was a milk shake.  

Our way, what makes us feel good, is best.

The second assumption is that people who do things differently, especially if it’s very differently, are less capable than those who do things our way.  “Their” food isn’t as good; their “color sense” is tasteless; “they” don’t do this, think that, whatever. . . 

The first assumption makes those who are different feel unwelcome.  The second assumption makes them feel unworthy of being welcomed.  Together they are the foundation of the toxic stew we call racism.

And racism — rejection of the other simply because they are other is one of the gravest wrongs a Christian can commit.  

Our text for the day is one many of us know by heart – for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have ever lasting life… but that’s not the whole of it… it goes on … for God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world, through him, might be saved.

What does that have to do with war – it is, at least, this – that even as we fight with one another, we must recognize that we are all children of God, we are all loved by God, we are all sisters and brothers under the skin. 

And when we fight – which we will because we are not perfect – we have to recognize and respect our commonalities.  My colleague, Jan Edmiston, who is a denominational exec for the Presbyterians, writes:  naming our enemies as savages 

. . . is the time tested way of othering our neighbors whether we are talking about Hutus and Tutsis, Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats, Native Americans and colonists, slaveholders and enslaved, or Republicans and Democrats. “Savages” are also known as “vermin” or “deplorables.”

Name-calling is dangerous if for no other reason than it breaks down the unifying love of our neighbors and makes it possible to hate one another.

St. Paul says, in the Letter to the Ephesians, that Christ is our peace, that he has broken down the walls that divide us one from another.  It is Christ’s hope and God’s plan that we be one people in all things that matter, united in our recognition of a common humanity, even while separated by taste and habit, custom and ethos.

It’s all about love.  It’s not about closing doors; it’s about opening them.  It’s not about throwing people out; it’s about inviting them in.  It’s not about saying “no”, but about saying “yes”.

And there’s the clue; there’s the pointer on the way, the guide to let us know how we can join the conversation, how we can take our part in the creation of a world where “whoever you are or wherever you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here.”

The answer is love, and the way is conversation.  The task is to love those we do not love, to listen to those whom we do not like, to reach out to those we fear.  It’s a wonderful feeling to experience those dividing walls falling down.

Every other year I attend the General Synod of our denomination — the biennial meeting of delegates from all across the church.  I’ve rarely actually been a delegate, but visitors may participate in much of the preliminary work, and we’re always welcome to sit around and listen to the many conversations — because, you know, even at that national meeting, decisions are made after a LOT of conversation, and just about nothing is cut and dried.  

In 2003, at the Synod meeting in Minneapolis, I found myself on a Committee formed to decide whether or not our Gay/Lesbian Caucus would be allowed to change their name from Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual to Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgendered.  Now I thought this was close to the dumbest assignment I’d ever had.  First of all, I didn’t understand why the Synod should be wasting time deciding what one small group should call itself.  And secondly, I didn’t care what they called themselves, and if they wanted to list “Transgendered” in their name it was fine with me.  

So, off I went to the meeting, assuming that this would take 10 minutes, we’d all be in agreement, and we’d be free for the afternoon, for more interesting things – like visiting the used book stores in and around Minneapolis.  There’s no such thing as too many books, you know!

Of course, it didn’t turn out the way I thought.  And I was annoyed for a while.  I really didn’t want to spend a beautiful afternoon in that over air-conditioned committee room.  But then I began to listen to the stories of the people who were there to explain why it was so important to them that their existence be recognized in the name of the group.  And, gradually, I realized that — for me — the experience was not about giving them permission to have their name mentioned, it was about giving them the gift of my listening ear, about hearing, really hearing, how unwelcome transgendered people are, about getting to know the people behind the exterior, about building the connections which break down those dividing walls. 

I hadn’t even known the wall existed.  I didn’t think I was walling them off, and I don’t know that I was, even now, but I do know that they thought there was a wall, and it was only by taking the time to listen, really listen, that they experienced that wall being destroyed.  And by being there and seeing that happen, I shared the joy.

God calls us in many ways. . . sometimes it’s a whimsical committee assignment that opens our eyes. However it happens, when God calls us our curiosity perks up and we want to know more — who are these people; how could the same man do that and say this. . . and in the exploration, in the conversation, we break new ground.

Recognizing and accepting difference as good and valuable is God’s call for us today.  Seeking to build bridges, talking with and listening to those with whom we disagree, is holy work for holy people.  Listen once again to Abraham Lincoln:

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC, May19, 2024, Pentecost Sunday

Acts 2:1-21:  “They’re speaking our languages, describing God’s mighty works!”

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.

In the story of Pentecost, we hear how the Spirit of God came upon the gathered believers.  You can just imagine the chaos as those folks, perhaps gathered just as we gather, quietly chatting with their neighbors, gradually realized that others were getting more and more excited, and quickly it all sounded incoherent; people were now speaking other languages, all describing God’s mighty works.

It was so chaotic that people began to mutter that the speakers were drunk.  Not so, said Peter; it’s only 9:30 in the morning.   Rather, this is the sign that God is doing great things, that there’s been a radical change and something new is happening.

That was then; this is now.

Is this just another historical story? Is it only about something that happened when the believers held their first big gathering after the resurrection?  Whatever it was then, what does it mean now?

Is the Holy Spirit of God still active in our churches today?  Because, let’s be clear, if a group of people came here this morning and started shouting in excitement, so that we thought they were rambling in German or Korean, or Navajo, and that maybe, probably they were total drunks, we would be both shocked and offended.  As, I’d bet, folks felt on that first day.

If that’s what the manifestation of God’s Holy Spirit always looks like…. well, I’m not so sure we would be able to deal with it.  Fortunately, this isn’t the usual way we experience the Holy Spirit – unless, maybe, we go off to Association or Conference Annual Meeting or to our national General Synod.  But here, in this church, here we experience the Spirit in homier ways.

We know the Spirit in more home-made ways.  Instead of loud, boisterous assemblies, we see the Spirit in action when one or another of us is surrounded with love in a time of need.  We experience the Spirit, when we gather around tables at Coffee Hour.  We participate in the Spirit’s work when we sing together.

The key signs of the Spirit in action in our fellowship are these – that we care for one another, that we reach out in love to serve our community, that we praise God together in song, and that we are ready for something amazing to happen.

We care for one another.  Over and over, I hear that our church is known for the love we show one another.  We care, we reach out in friendship, we support and love.  This love is one of the essential qualities of a church, and we have it in abundance.

Pentecost reminds us how important it is that we love one another.  It reminds us that there is a time when that is not true – that in our world today, it is not always easy to know where we are truly welcome, much less loved.  At its best, our church provides a breathing space where we can reach across the divisions which so mar our world.  At our best, this is a place where it is safe to admit our pain and know that others will care.  This trust is one of the fruits of God’s Holy Spirit.

God’s Holy Spirit calls us to reach out beyond the community of people we know , to serve the world beyond our doors.  You’ll remember that when Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan, he wanted us to know that the people outside, the strangers, those with whom we differ, they are our neighbors.  Our neighbors are not just those people whose homes and businesses surround this building, not just the current inhabitants of Auburn, not even just the folks in Worcester who struggle to make a stable life in difficult times.  Our neighbors are the whole of the world.

God’s Holy Spirit calls us to worship God regularly, joyfully and prayerfully.  You know, what we do here on Sunday morning, is done to please God, to respond to the call of the Spirit.  Sure, we want to enjoy what we’re doing – God does not want us to be gloomy worshippers!!  But the first purpose of our time together is praising God.

You can often see that purpose in the music we sing, in our hymns.  We opened today with “Come, O Spirit, Dwell Among Us”.  If our worship is about the Holy Spirit, then it makes good sense to begin with a song which calls that Spirit to be here with us.  And you may have noted, the words of the hymns we sing teach us about the substance of our faith.  And after the sermon, we’ll sing “How Can I Keep From Singing?”, because our common song together is the powerful engine of our work together.

I was raised in a denomination which feared the power of music, which thought singing led us astray.  It was when I joined the United Church of Christ that I realized that belief was both true and false.  Music has power, singing together makes us one body in ways that are hard to understand until we’ve experience it.  But that  power is not inevitably bad; in fact, in this place it is the voice of God speaking to us.  It is in music and song that we are so often drawn in new ways. 

Song helps set the tone of the service – so sometimes the music is somber, sometimes it’s really upbeat.  Always it is intended to help convey the truth of the Gospel to all of us.

All of these things help prepare us for the final tasks of the Spirit – to open us to that which is part of our evolving world. Now it’s part of the human condition to always be best ready for the last big thing.  

Have you ever heard of the Maginot Line?  It’s a system of forts and defenses that the French built along the French-German border in the 1930s.  Building on their experiences in World War I, they planned for a future invasion, expecting that it would run about the same as the one in World War I.  And they expected that people would move in the same ways; they paid no attention to the advances in military equipment.  So, when Hitler invaded France at the beginning of World War II, the Germans simply drove their powerful tanks around the Maginot Line; they went through Belgium, and the Maginot Line turned out to be useless.  

The Holy Spirit calls us to constantly pay attention, to know when we’re living in yesterday and when we’re paying attention to tomorrow.  It’s about asking questions – what does it mean that we are, as a people, engaged in thinking through how the structures of our society reflect our assumptions about people?  Do we define other people through our own assumptions and beliefs or is it ok that they have different assumptions and conclusions?  Unless, of course, they support the Yankees? 

Last week, for instance, a football player gave a Commencement Address in which he declared that women should not have careers.  He belongs to a conservative Christianity which teaches that there is a line of authority which governs the world, where authority comes from God to men, and then men exert their authority over women.  Women only have authority over their children, and only to the extent that their husbands allow.

Women, in their minds, are subordinate to men – all men, not just their husbands.  For these men, it’s impossible to imagine a woman serving as a police officer or serving in the military, because then women would have to exert authority over a man, and that destroys the femininity of women and the masculinity of men.  Some of these men believe that it is immoral for women to divorce an abusive husband.

What does it mean in our world today that these kinds of ideas are being promoted?  What does it mean that we disagree with them, completely and absolutely?  We believe women and men, all people, are made in the image of God, that all people have equal authority and agency.   How does that difference affect our world?

The gift of the Holy Spirit, which we celebrate today is the guidance of God to discuss and discern, to be able to see what is needed and how we might go about meeting that need.

Today we celebrate that gift of the Spirit – the Spirit which teaches us to love, joins us in worship, calls us to service, makes our gatherings into church.  Let us continue to abide in that Spirit, now and always.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

May 12, 2024 First Congregational Church in Auburn (MA) UCC

John 17:20-22

“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one. . . 

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.

Easy for Jesus to say that we are all to be one — and oh so hard for us to do.

As I write this I’m watching the dog agility competition at the Westminster Kennel Club – on my computer, I didn’t go to New York!  

Dog agility is really so much fun to do – when I lived in Grand Rapids, MI, my springer spaniel and I did it. You train your dog to navigate jumps and tires – and various other obstacles and at the competitions those parts are put together in various ways. No two courses are the same, and the dogs don’t know what will come next.  Here’s the thing – no matter how well trained the dog, no matter how skilled the human being, no matter how well they work together, stuff happens.

Westminster calls the best to come and compete.  Every dog who enters the “Masters Agility” Competition has won repeatedly at courses all across the country.  And  in every class, there’s a dog or owner who screws up.  They are literally the best of the best, and there they go – off course, running the wrong obstacle, going backwards… one I saw totally lost his concentration and ran around the ring trying to cuddle up to the ring steward, the photographer and a random guy walking alongside the ring.  

Doing what’s expected, what you’ve trained for, doing it again and again, right every time, is hard stuff…. Hard for dogs, harder for humans.  We have so many more distractions than they do!

I saw another example of this sort of complicated life on my way home last Wednesday.  My route takes me through the Rhode Island School of Design and Brown University campuses and on Wednesday there was a student demonstration in front of one of the main RISD buildings.  They’d found a place where traffic is always stopped, so they had maximum visibility.  They were loud, but didn’t try to block traffic. It was clear that the demonstration had been well planned.  

And yet, I really doubt that many of them had any idea how complicated the history of the Middle East is.  I doubt that many of them knew how complicated the idea that RISD would divest itself of any Israeli-owned stocks was in practice.  

And I’m sure that many of us, even those of us who do have some sense of the complexities, didn’t really get how upset the students are by our world today.  These demonstrations are gathering together feelings about a whole lot of things and focusing them on the Middle East.  

And here’s one last example of the complicated life:  today is Mother’s Day.  It’s a day to honor Mothers and those who are mothers to us; it’s a day when we all hope to be with our moms or our children; it’s supposed to be a day of joy.  But it’s not always what we hope and dream about. 

It’s not just that our moms may have died, but that perhaps they were never what we might have hoped for in a mom.  And maybe we have children, but we’re alienated from one another… or we’ve never had children and it’s a constant source of pain.  So for many this is a day of joy, but for others it is a time of excruciating pain.  It’s so complicated.

Now back to Jesus, back to our Scripture for today.

Today’s lesson is part of what is called the “Farewell Discourse” – or the last words of Jesus to his disciples.  It runs from chapters 14 through 17 in John’s Gospel; today we’re only reading part of the last section. And the key verses here for us today is this one:  I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one.   

It is our unity that matters most in this verse… despite the complications that threaten to pull us apart.  This is not a unity that depends on us all thinking the same, doing the same, believing the same.  If you think about it, that’d be too easy.  It’s much easier to demand uniformity than it is to recognize and appreciate the ways in which we differ.  In Galatians 3, Paul writes that our differences do not, cannot matter:  So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

He’s not saying that we cease to be those things.  We are still male and female, but we are not separate.  We are still either Jews or Gentiles, but those differences no longer separate us. And in God’s world, we are still mothers and not-mothers, we are still Palestinian, Israeli, we are still  good dogs who do it all well and the goofy ones who run backwards through the obstacles.  

God loves us all, as we are.  All God asks of us is that we love one another the same way.  It is love for one another and for our world which unites us across all the dividing walls of humanity.

On this day dedicated to the love of mothers, let’s make our mothers proud as we practice the love that binds, breaking down the walls of ignorance and hate, bringing together people of all genders, all orientations, all races, clans and classes, all across the world.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

May 5, 2024  First Congregational Church in Auburn (UCC), Auburn MA

John 15:9-17

 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other.

Acts 10:44-48

While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came on all who heard the message. The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on Gentiles. For they heard them speaking in tongues and praising God. 

Then Peter said, “Surely no one can stand in the way of their being baptized with water. They have received the Holy Spirit just as we have.” So he ordered that they be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked Peter to stay with them for a few days. 

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.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ turned the world upside down.  

And that turning continues today.

Jesus was born into, preached to, and died for a world where people had their place and were expected to stay in it.  Whether they were rich or poor, educated or illiterate, they were not supposed to move out of their class.  Knight or soldier, priest or teacher, slave or Roman leader… everyone knew who they were, and no one was supposed to change.

It’s not all that different today.  Even now, we are born into different worlds and we’re supposed to stay there.  Sure there are those famous people who move from poverty to wealth, but have you noticed how those folks are held to a different standard of behavior than folks who were born wealthy?  And very few of our multi=billionaires came out of backgrounds of abject poverty, where they had to struggle to get enough to eat, or to own a book of their own.  This is just the reality of our world.

But Jesus said it was not the reality of his world.  And his teachings have created a space where those differences do not divide us.  Here in this community, we are reaching across those lines of social class, educational levels, kinds of work, marital status — and we’re growing into building real relationships across racial and ethnic divides, welcoming in gay, lesbian, trans people.  

The challenges we face in naming our work reflects the strength of these dividing walls in our world.  

But we stick to it, remembering stories like the ones we read this morning.  The portion from Acts recounts memories of the emergence of a fellowship that will, in the years to come, become the Christian Church, gathered in many places across the eastern Mediterranean.  And in all those places, these stories were told and retold, to remind them that here, in the church, dividing walls are not supposed to matter.

In Acts, we hear about a time when Peter was speaking, not just to the folks who already followed Jesus’ Way, but to a mixed group of believers and the curious.  The believers were all Jews, the curious were outsiders, gentiles.  They were people who really didn’t belong, and yet, when the time came, it was clear that all of them had been blessed, despite their differences.

Acts has a number of these stories – there’s Cornelius the Centurion, who responds to Peter’s preaching, the Ethiopian eunuch, not only a gentile, but a person of color.. and there are others, each one of them making it clear that in God’s world, everyone is accepted.

If it were not clear enough from Acts, we also have the words we heard this morning from the Gospel of John, where Jesus says, Love each other as I have loved you.  And later on he adds Love each other.

Can it be clearer?  We who follow the Jesus Way are called to create communities where everyone matters, where rich and poor sit at table together, where old and young craft friendships, where our color, our affectional choices, the clothes we wear, the jobs we do, or whether or not we were born here, are simply part of who we are, and not barriers to full participation.  

It is not just God’s dream, or Jesus’ dream – something to hope for in the maybe of our future.  It is our dream, if we claim it, to be that place where everyone is welcome.  

Now, how we do that will differ according to where we are, the nature of the community in which we live, our resources and so on.  It’s always going to begin with the small stuff – holding doors open, smiling at the checkout person, being kind to those who help us.  But what’s next?  That’ll depend on what’s going on around you, what the needs are in your world.  Most of it, that’s your challenge, today and in all our tomorrows.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

April 28, 2024 First Congregational Church UCC in Auburn, MA

Acts 8:26-40

²⁶ Then an angel of the Lord said to Philip, “Get up and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.” (This is a wilderness road.) ²⁷ So he got up and went. Now there was an Ethiopian eunuch, a court official of the Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians, in charge of her entire treasury. He had come to Jerusalem to worship ²⁸ and was returning home; seated in his chariot, he was reading the prophet Isaiah. ²⁹ Then the Spirit said to Philip, “Go over to this chariot and join it.” ³⁰ So Philip ran up to it and heard him reading the prophet Isaiah. He asked, “Do you understand what you are reading?” ³¹ He replied, “How can I, unless someone guides me?” And he invited Philip to get in and sit beside him. ³² Now the passage of the scripture that he was reading was this: 

“Like a sheep he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth. ³³ In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who can describe his generation? For his life is taken away from the earth.” 

³⁴ The eunuch asked Philip, “About whom, may I ask you, does the prophet say this, about himself or about someone else?” ³⁵ Then Philip began to speak, and starting with this scripture he proclaimed to him the good news about Jesus. ³⁶ As they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, “Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?”^,*38 He commanded the chariot to stop, and both of them, Philip and the eunuch, went down into the water, and Philip baptized him. ³⁹ When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away; the eunuch saw him no more and went on his way rejoicing. ⁴⁰ But Philip found himself at Azotus, and as he was passing through the region he proclaimed the good news to all the towns until he came to Caesarea.

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.

Some years ago, I accompanied a colleague and her youth group when they attended the UCC’s General Synod, our national meeting that happened in those days every other year.  My friend was serving the South Dakota Conference and she’d brought ten kids from the high plains to our meeting in Norfolk, Virginia.

None of the kids had ever been east of the Mississippi River before.   All went well, and the kids were really invested in the meetings, spending evenings talking over the issues that were being discussed that year.  Until the day we took them to Virginia Beach.

Until that day, the ocean had been some mystical invention, and they’d not been able to imagine what it would be like to see that much water at once.  Nor had they anyway to imagine how different swimming in salt water would be, how different the scents, how amazing the sandy beach.  Yes, they have beaches in South Dakota, but they are all for fresh-water ponds and lakes.  Beautiful, but very different – much more closed in than the Atlantic Ocean.  And it didn’t hurt that the Virginia Beach boardwalk is lined with great places to eat and have fun.

From that day on, all the kids wanted to do was go to the beach.   Their focus had been completely changed.  When the meeting ended, they got back on their plane, sandy and sunburned, and with a new perspective on the world.

Today’s scripture reading is something of an odd story…. The evangelist Philip talks with a magic angel, and keeps getting taken off to new places… the other guy in the story doesn’t even have a name.  He’s just the “Ethiopian eunuch”.  But maybe that’s really what matters – what he was, instead of who he was.

So, Philip finds himself on the road to Gaza, yes, the Gaza where the fighting is right now.  And he meets this man we only know by his nationality and his physical state.  But they, especially the latter, were more than enough to put him outside the lines of acceptability in polite society, in religious society.  The rule was, you had to have all your body parts to be acceptable.  All of them.  If you didn’t have pair of hands, or something more important, you weren’t able to offer sacrifices in the temple.  And there was always a good deal of malicious gossip about eunuchs, just to make things worse.

The Ethiopian is an unacceptable man.  But the story makes it clear that he’s also a man of faith.  The traditions and practices that have come together over the years have limited him to an in-between space where he’s not out, but he’s also not really in.

Philip changes all that.  He explains the gospel of Jesus to the Ethiopian, whose immediate reaction is to ask for baptism.  History tells us that this man continued to share the story of Jesus, and while Christianity wasn’t really established in Ethiopia for another two hundred years, this is part of the beginning of that story.

When Philip told the Ethiopian that God accepted him, as he was, it changed the direction of that man’s life.  It changed his purpose and over the centuries, it changed his homeland.

Change is our theme for the day.   The Search Committee is circulating our profile, and we can anticipate a new pastor. Part of my job as an interim is to give you a taste of change, so that you’ll be ready for someone who will bring with them different perspectives.  

Change can be scary.  It can be unsettling.  It can cause us to mourn beloved traditions that are now sharing time and space with other ideas, other perspectives.  Opening up to new ideas can be life-changing, invigorating.  And it can be hard.

What happens when you see things from a new way?  Instead of automatically turning away, assuming that the outsider/imperfect could not benefit, Philip turned towards, and assumed there could be good.  How does such an idea affect us?  

Some change is going to happen naturally because it in things like new decorations in the pastor’s office, or a different selection of hymns.  We pastors do our best to keep singing the favorites, but sometimes it takes a while to identify them – and you’ve a great hymnal with a lot of good songs in it.  But out of those changes, you’ll learn new favorites.

Some change will be more intentional.  If  you want different results from on-going programs, or if you want to try a new project, then there will have to be changes.  Some changes, like the shelves Nathan Minor is building for his Eagle project, will be immediately useful.  Some things will take time.  And some of them will be failures.  

When those opportunities come along, I hope you’ll remember Philip and how, when faced with something he’d been taught all his life couldn’t happen, gathered the courage to turn in a different direction, welcoming in, taking advantage of the opportunity to think about what we do, why we do it this way, and where we want to be heading.

You get to practice now with me, so that you’ll be ready for what your new pastor will bring with vigor and enthusiasm and ideas for tomorrow.

Let’s all be Philips in the days and months to come.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child