To Believe is to Care. . . To Care is to Do

October 13, 2024 First Congregational Church of Brimfield MA

Mark 10:17-31 — As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him and asked him, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”  Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: ‘You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. You shall not defraud. Honor your father and mother.’ ” He said to him, “Teacher, I have kept all these since my youth.” Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” When he heard this, he was shocked and went away grieving, for he had many possessions. 

Then Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it will be for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!” And the disciples were perplexed at these words. But Jesus said to them again, “Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.” They were greatly astounded and said to one another, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus looked at them and said, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.” 

Peter began to say to him, “Look, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for my sake and for the sake of the good news^,*  who will not receive a hundredfold now in this age—houses, brothers and sisters, mothers and children, and fields, with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.  But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first.”

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.

Today, we get to hear one of the great stories of Jesus.  What a great cast of characters:  Jesus, of course, but that “rich young man”, the boy who has everything, and the disciples, who, as usual, are standing around the edges of the crowd with their mouths hanging open.

Their mouths are hanging open because Jesus has just told this really sharp guy that he has to give away everything he has to the poor if he wants to have treasure in heaven.  

And that was astounding because then – as now – the surest external sign that you are loved by God (or really lucky – too often, people assume it’s the same thing) is that you’ve got lots of money, a big car, great clothes, the latest iPhone, and a really really sleek kitchen. 

And Jesus blows that idea, that picture of success, right out of the water.

Jesus says that the surest sign of God’s love is not what we have, but what we do.  The thing God calls forth from us is not belief is any particular Christian doctrine, but that we love others, with our hearts, our souls, our strength, our minds – with, indeed, all our resources.

You’d think that loving our neighbors would be clear, even if doing it has its own set of challenges, but it’s not always that easy to see what loving our neighbors will mean, and for a reason we might not expect.

You can’t be generous with what you don’t know you have.  You can’t use your power if you don’t know you have power.  And you can’t help people if you can’t see their needs.

I’m willing to guess that the rich young man didn’t think he was rich.  He didn’t realize how much more he had than everyone else, if only because he didn’t know anyone who had less than he did.  And yes, he probably had servants, but he never really saw them as people, apart from their work, so it never occurred to him that they were part of the working poor.

Here’s an example:

Do you remember the movie “Hidden Figures”? . . . the story of three African-American women working at NASA and how they helped send men into space.  Well, that’s the front story, anyway, because there’s another story there. 

Do you remember how Katherine Johnson keeps having to disappear from her desk from time to time to visit the bathroom?  But instead of just going down the hall, and being gone for, say, 15 minutes, she’s forced to go half a mile to the only building at Langley that has a rest room set aside for “colored people”… and it sometimes takes her almost an hour, going and coming.  

All her boss sees is that she’s gone, and one day he gives her a hard time about it.  She loses her temper and tells him exactly why she’s gone for such a long time.  And this white man takes up his power to change the world, and knocks down the sign for the “colored women’s restroom”, making it possible for Johnson to use the women’s room right outside her workstation door.

I don’t think it ever occurred to the boss that he had the power to change Katherine Johnson’s life until he got mad enough to do it.  And even then, what made him mad was probably not the injustice of making her walk a half mile each way to the bathroom, but the time that was wasted by that rule.  None the less, he used his power to make a change, and in the making, changed the lives of every African American woman on the campus, permanently. 

Jesus called to the rich young man to use his power, in his case wealth, to make change for the poor in his area.  We are called to do the same, to use our power to make our world better.  But first, we have to realize that we have power, that we have convictions.  In order for that to happen, we are called to see and understand our world.

Think about it:  what do we see, really see, when we look around?

Years ago, I was the interim in Bethany CT, a teeny little town on the road from New Haven to Naugatuck.  Bethany’s not much different from Brimfield, I guess… except they had more horses than people, and maybe more college professors, because homes there had been inexpensive once upon a time and they were close enough to the many schools in New Haven for an easy commute.

The year I was there, we were celebrating an anniversary, and decided to do a BIG PROJECT.  We wanted something that would be spectacular, that would make a huge pile, that would really impress the Conference Minister when he came to preach – and decided to collect disposable diapers… 

Now, not all our folks were convinced – some worried about the environment and said we should be collecting cloth diapers instead of disposables.  

Some folks really didn’t believe there was that big a need.  And some, of course, thought that collecting diapers for New Haven instead of anything for Bethany was not quite right – take care of ourselves first, right?  And then there was the discovery that, wow, those diapers were expensive… Shouldn’t we concentrate on tuna?  

So we launched an educational event.  We discovered that local day cares insisted that each baby bring in at least 2-3 disposable diapers every day.  And we learned that without reliable child care it was really hard to get and keep a job, any job, even the most menial.

We discovered that poor people can’t, by and large, use cloth diapers.  Really poor people don’t have washers and dryers.  And most public laundromats won’t allow you to wash cloth diapers in their machines.

We got into it to do something that would make a splash because we wanted to show off.  We discovered that ready access to disposable diapers was essential for a mom to be able to work.  Our church was mostly college-educated and hardly any of us had been that poor.  Our diaper campaign opened our eyes to one of the barriers that keeps poor people poor – and to the privilege we enjoyed because we had ready access to washers and dryers, and the money to fix them when they broke.

What are we here in Brimfield seeing?  And what are we missing?  What power, what gifts are we not using because we don’t realize we have them?  Who is missing from the picture?

Can we see the reasons why people who are poor, stay poor?  Can we see how hunger makes it hard for kids to learn?  Can we recognize how hard it is for parents who don’t read easily to read stories to their children?  Can we imagine a world where it’s hard to come up with clean clothes, or even diapers?

Can we see that we have the power to make a difference?  Can we see how much we have been given?  We have money.  We have prestige, stability, a reasonably safe future, where others have no safe place to take a shower or wash their clothes, much less plan for their retirement.

We are called and commissioned by God to use our eyes to see, to use our hearts to love, to use our wealth, our power to change our world, to create with God a world where all are truly welcome.  It is the work God gave us when we pledged our lives to God’s church; it is our thanks for God’s never-ending love that surrounds the whole world wide.

Give your lives, your world, true value.  Go, see truly, love wisely, build God’s community always.  

Amen.

September 1, 2024 First Congregational Church in Auburn UCC

Scripture Reading:                                               James 1:17-27; Mark 7:1-8 (The Message translation)

. .  from James:  You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.

But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who lok into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act– they will be blessed in their doing.

If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

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.

On August 28, columnist Jeff Jacoby wrote in the Boston Globe:  In a heartwarming photo essay on the Globe’s front page, my colleague Stan Grossfeld wrote about the angels in long dresses and bonnets who came to Monica Hampton’s ravaged home in Brookfield, Vt., bearing hope, hammers, and sheets of drywall.

The eight women in their 20s are members of a horse-and-buggy Mennonite community in Pennsylvania that eschews many elements of 21st-century life — no cellphones, no television, no air travel, no college. By design, their rigorous lifestyle separates them from modern social culture. At the same time, their Christian faith instills in them a deep commitment to serve others in love. Which is why these modest women, volunteers with the Mennonite Disaster Service, willingly gave up their summer vacation and traveled to Vermont to help Hampton and her family, whose lives were upended by disasters: After a fire destroyed their home in January 2023, floods ruined most of what was left.“Then all of a sudden, the Mennonite Disaster [Service] came out, and they said, ‘We’ll help you get along,’” Hampton told Grossfeld. “I thought, maybe we’ll get a couple of hours … but they’re still here.” The women — who declined to give their names because, as one said, “We’re not here for fame” — hang drywall, paint, and install insulation. And they do it with the joy that comes from the conviction that God smiles on their selflessness and hard work. 

It’s really not possible to over-estimate the flood damage in New England this summer.  You probably saw the damage of the most recent floods in western Connecticut, along the Naugatuck and its tributaries.  And Vermont has been devastated now at least twice, particularly because roads, homes, farms and rivers run along together along the narrow valleys of that mountainous state.  

Any help to any of these places is great, but that this group of Mennonite women took their vacations and came up to Vermont is truly impressive.

And yet, after Jacoby’s article, most of the letter-to-the-editor responses were contemptuous, even filled with hatred of religion, not just Christianity, but all religions.  And many of those responses named when they’d seen our words and our deeds beating each other up.  We spoke of love, they said, and then told some group they weren’t welcome.  We spoke of justice, and they saw greed.  We offered aid, and they saw manipulation and coercive action – we’ll feed you, but only if you join our church….

And isn’t that kind of hypocrisy just what James is talking about?  Yes, it is.  Now, hypocrisy itself isn’t a Christian problem.  It’s a human problem.  And James names it, and tells us how to get out from behind it, into the Christian way.

All we need to do, he says, is match our words and deeds.  Be undivided people, wholly committed to the Christian way.

This sermon is about salvation:  now some folks believe that salvation, for the Christian, is entirely about going to be with God after we die.  Give your heart to Jesus, they teach, and that’s all you need to do.  James tells us that really, saying that going to heaven is all of what it means to be saved, is like saying that jimmies are the only important part of an ice cream cone.  

Jimmies are great, but jimmies alone – not so much.

And going to heaven is great, but that’s the “jimmies” of being Christian.  The base (the ice cream??) of our Christian faith is living that faith out every day.  It’s about matching those words “I am saved” with the belief  “I am saved to serve my world”.  That’s the fullness of the salvation that Jesus brings.

In the Message translation, James puts it this way:

But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.

When we bring our words and our deeds together, no matter how difficult those deeds, there is a sweetness to our lives that comes no other way.  Salvation, the Christian salvation, is a way of live that makes our world better.  

When you take Communion this morning, re-dedicate yourself to bringing together word and deed, and being a whole-hearted, whole-lived Christian.

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen!

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

Note: This is my final sermon at the First Congregational Church UCC in Auburn MA. Stay tuned for my next assignment.

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

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

John 6:1-14 — After this Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, also called the Sea of Tiberias. ² A large crowd kept following him because they saw the signs that he was doing for the sick. ³ Jesus went up the mountain and sat down there with his disciples. ⁴ Now the Passover, the festival of the Jews, was near. ⁵ When he looked up and saw a large crowd coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?” ⁶ He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he was going to do. ⁷ Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little.” ⁸ One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, ⁹ “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many people?” ¹⁰ Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” Now there was a great deal of grass in the place, so they sat down, about five thousand in all. ¹¹ Then Jesus took the loaves, and when he had given thanks he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. ¹² When they were satisfied, he told his disciples, “Gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost.” ¹³ So they gathered them up, and from the fragments of the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten, they filled twelve baskets. ¹⁴ When the people saw the sign that he had done, they began to say, “This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world.” 

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 to set the scene in your minds – so imagine yourself watching from the door of one of our church school classrooms… watching the teacher tell the story of Noah and the Ark to a group of ten year olds, there for Vacation Bible School.  It’s a mixed group of kids who’ve always attended and some from the neighborhood, who’ve maybe never been inside a church before.

As the teacher tells the story, describes the animals two by two, talks about how Noah was told in a dream to build the ark – all that story we’ve known forever – look over there at that boy with the green t-shirt.  Check out the look on his face – a mixture of utter disbelief and disgust.  There can be no doubt – that boy thinks he’s being sold a bill of goods.  There’s no such thing as that ark.  There were no animals, two by two.  And nobody ever heard God’s voice in a dream.  

If you came back the next day, you might notice that boy is gone.  He’s turned his back on church because that story made no sense to him.  In fact, the story we thought would strengthen faith actually drove him away.

I was the one watching the boy as I assisted in the VBS classroom that year in my home church.  And, yes, he never came back.  

We tried to tell him a story about how miraculous God is; instead he heard a story about how unbelievable God is.

Now, what I’m thinking about today is whether or not we’ve completely missed the boat on what makes  those stories miracles… about what makes them miraculous…   Today’s reading is one of those miracles, but you know there are others…. children healed, Lazarus brought back to life, Jonah and the whale…. and I want us to think about whether by focusing on arks, and bread, and medical healing, we’ve missed what’s really amazing.

And I wonder if we haven’t totally missed the point of the stories because we keep insisting that it’s the ark, or the fantastic amount of bread, or the healing that is the point of the story.  You see, I don’t think it’s the ark or the bread or the act of healing that’s the miracle; I think it’s always and every time the relationships folks have with God or Jesus that is the key to the miracle.  

If we listen to the story of the feeding of the 5000 and marvel at how Jesus managed to come up with bread and cheese and fish for all, then what we’re thinking is that miracles are about someone coming in and saving us at the last minute.  It means we think that miracles are passive events. Maybe we pray, but after that, it’s all up to Jesus to do something for us

Do you remember the story about the man at the pool of Bethzatha?  (or Bethsaida, or Bethesda… the way the Hebrew letters got transliterated into Greek and then English is irrelevant… they’re all the same place.)  So, there’s this pool in Jerusalem, and the story is that if you dip yourself in the water when it is turbulent, there’s a chance that you’ll be cured of whatever ails you.  But you’ve got to be first.  

Jesus is talking to a guy who’s been pool-side for thirty-eight years, never making it into the pool…. thirty-eight years.  Jesus listens, and then he says to the guy, “Do you want to be healed?”  After 38 years, it’s a reasonable question…he’s spent decades laying by the side of the pool, never in the water.

So, what’s more miraculous – that Jesus heals the man?  Or that Jesus frees him from the captivity of being poolside?  Is this another anti-scientific story about healing?  Or is it a story about the way following Jesus can change everything?

It’s way too easy to picture miracles as always being about the manipulation of physical realities, or special treatment for God’s chosen people… I’ve actually seen people suggesting that in the attempted assassination of Donald Trump the other week, it was God’s guiding hand that kept Trump from being seriously injured, and that is a miracle.  So, why didn’t God save Corey Comperatore?  He was just attending the rally.  I don’t know how that feels to Comperatore’s family, but I do know that it’s insulting to God to suggest that God has love and compassion for one person and not for all people, that God would protect one person but allow another, an innocent person, totally not involved, to be killed.  That’s not a miracle, that’s just sloppy thinking.

So, what’s the powerful word of hope to come to us from today’s miracle story?  Why stop with the idea that it’s only about the miraculous production of food?  As I read and re-read it, it seems to me that it’s not about sudden interventions, or the sorts of things that need a protector to show up.  It is, instead, about the way that listening to Jesus, about the way that following Jesus’ path, feeds us with the strength for each day.  Jesus feeds us, gives us to the strength we need for each day.  That’s the miracle here.

The even bigger miracle is that this isn’t something that only happened to long-gone disciples on a hill in Palestine.  It’s not something that happened back then and never again.  It happens to us, every day.  All we have to do is reach out to Jesus to know and experience the miracle of strength in our lives.  All we have to do is reach out for a guiding word to help us live lives of worth and value.  And that’s the miracle for us today.  The miraculous changing of our lives from nothing to something, that no matter who we are or where we are on life’s journey we are loved by God, accepted by God, and commissioned to be God’s loving disciples right here in Auburn.  That’s a miracle to hold on to.

That’s what God is telling us today.  We all have a part in God’s miracles and that part comes as we aim to live out the Gospel call to be people of love, people of mercy, people of generosity.  That we take up this calling, that we live it out, that we persist in it to the end, now that’s the real miracle.

Amen.

© 2024, Virginia H. Child

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

---

^[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

---

^[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.