Community Church of Wilmette

Nov 21, 2009

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So, last week I asked you all to give some thought to the question: Does the World Need a Church? I invited you to come up with your own answers. I imagine that you may need one or two moments to get your thoughts together. Feel free to use the cards that are in the pew in front of you to help out. In fact, go ahead and write down your thoughts. Put them on the card...or put them on your pledge card. At the end of the sermon, we will all come forward in the Walk of Faith. Bring your answers with you. Place them in the basket.

You have just heard read one of my favorite passages of Christian scripture. Do not worry for your life...I often rely on this passage to comfort myself. Anxiety is something I struggle with and it helps me to have this ancient wisdom floating around in my mind. It helps me. And it challenges me. You see it's not simply a word of comfort to the anxious. It also helps us refocus our energies. Today's trouble is enough for today.

What are today's troubles? Honestly, there are some serious concerns in the world, and I can focus on those things if I set my own distracting anxieties aside. I have my own real concerns and loved ones I need to care for and strangers in other lands that need my help. These are today's troubles. There are plenty. And I think that they give us the beginning of an answer to the question, "Does the world need a Church?"

The world does. In fact it needs a vital and enthusiastic Church. One thing we have to keep in mind, however, is that the world may not necessarily want a Church and if we are honest with ourselves, there is good reason for this. So one of the concerns for the day is addressing the concerns that the world has about the Church.

Rabbi Brad Hirschfield spoke here a couple of weekends ago and said something important for us all to hear. (He said a lot of things, actually.) He said that we all must take responsibility for the most fanatical members of our own traditions. This is not the same as taking the blame for them. We need to take responsibility for them. I think that this may mean asking for the forgiveness of others that are hurt in the name of religion, in the name of God, even if we are not the ones directly responsible.

You see, for me this is one of the troubles of today. We are to be apologists. That is part of our work together. I've said this before. Every time I go to a theater gathering with Trish, or meet someone on-line at YouTube or Facebook, I have to take a lot of heat for doing what I do. Some are offended. I am the enemy. I'm not exaggerating. I am occasionally met with hostility. Today's troubles are enough for today, indeed. We have our work cut out for us.

So, perhaps as Hirschfield suggests, we have to ask for forgiveness and not simply sit back and say "We don't believe that so..." We have to be in the thick of these conversations. Why? Well if we want to have a positive answer to the question "Does the world need a church?" We may need to respond to all the people who say, "The world would be better off without the Church."

And the only response that I believe that will carry any weight is to ask for forgiveness, to take responsibility for our traditions, and the mistakes of our institutions. Reconciliation between the Church and the World is in order. How else do we move forward?

Think about it. How many of you had to reconcile with the Church on some level in order to be part of this specific community? Now we, actually you who are the Church must find a way to reconcile with the world. This is why I want us to find creative answers to the question: "Does the world need a Church?"

Now it’s your turn…

Here the congregation preaches. Fun ensues!

In Christianity for the Rest of Us, Diana Butler Bass says:

Vital Christianity is not about being conservative, about being soldiers for the religious right. It is about being responsive to people's spiritual longings and experiences, drawing from tradition and history to help make sense of it all. A congregation grows when it draws its worldview and practices from scripture, engaging the Bible, as Marcus Borg says, 'seriously but not literally.'

Mainline churches decline when they neglect scripture and prayer, discernment and hospitality, contemplation and justice. I have witnessed the old mainline recovering faith through an emerging set of practices of passionate Christianity, in communities that are both spiritual and religious. (p. 45)

What are the practices?

Hospitality
Discernment
Healing
Contemplation
Testimony
Diversity
Justice
Worship
Reflection
Beauty
FORGIVENESS (I want to add this to the list.)

Here at Community Church we're going to try some new things. We're going to reshape some familiar things. In December we're starting a Tuesday morning prayer service. It will meet at 7:15 at Fuel, a small restaurant across the parking lot from the Wilmette METRA station. Our usual book study group will continue to meet at Ridgeview Grill. The next topic is Jesus and Non-Violence. In these small ways, we're trying to get outside our walls. We need to continue to nourish the ways that we are a vital congregation. We need to continue to God where God is and participate in what God is doing there. The "practices of vital congregations" lead us outward into the world.

We'll continue to uphold what individuals members of the congregation are doing on their own. Believe it or not, those too are ministries of the Body of Christ, of the Church, whether or not this institution puts it's money there. We can nourish one another and encourage one another to good works in the name of God.

Here’s another way to think about vitality. It’s a poem that has emboldened me again and again. "Jesus Christ The Apple Tree" is by Elizabeth Poston and has been set to music as an Advent hymn.

The Tree of Life my soul hath seen
laden with fruit and always green
The Tree of Life my soul hath seen
laden with fruit and always green
The trees of nature fruitless be
compared with Christ the apple tree.

His beauty does all things excel
By faith I know but ne're can tell
His beauty does all things excel
By faith I know but ne're can tell
The glory which I now can see
In Jesus Christ the apple tree.

For happiness I long have sought
and pleasure dearly I have bought
For happiness I long have sought
and pleasure dearly I have bought
I missed of all but now I see
'Tis found in Christ the apple tree.

I'm weary with my former toil
Here I will sit and rest a while
I'm weary with my former toil
Here I will sit and rest a while
Under the shadow I will be
Of Jesus Christ the apple tree.

This fruit does make my soul to thrive
it keeps my dying faith alive
This fruit does make my soul to thrive
it keeps my dying faith alive
Which makes my soul in haste to be
With Jesus Christ the apple tree.

- Elizabeth Poston

I am interested in a vital Christianity. You know, a faith tradition that people recognize and feel good about even if they don't participate in it. I want people to look at these buildings and say "Good people are there...Did you hear that they...? You see, they love God."

I want people to experience Church as Poston describes her experience of encountering Christ. People come bearing their souls, looking for a place and a community that will help them nurture their souls, to rest from weary toil. They have discovered The Holy in themselves and they need language for it, a tradition, and disciplines to nourish it. The world needs a Church that will meet them out where they are, that will go where God is working in the world.

We're not anxious. We not fanatical. We are vital. I hope you heard something of Community Church in the list that Diana Butler Bass offered.

We are to look to the needs of the day as Jesus asks of us. We let the other anxieties fade to the distance. Forgiveness and reconciliation are what marks us. The World needs a Church. Will we be a Church for the Word? I think we're ready. Thanks be to God.