Come Together… Right Now…
Introduction
It almost seems too simple to say
this… but together we are stronger than we are apart.
Last weekend I was in Sackville for
the Annual General Meeting of Maritime Conference. For those that don’t know,
the United Church is separated into regions, and ours goes from Bermuda to the
Gaspe. So it is Bermuda, Nova Scotia (Cape Breton… they get angry if you think
saying NS includes them), Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and the Gaspe
region of Quebec.
It is geographically huge… but at
the same time, we tend to forget our own size. When you come to church in
Whitney and these 20 people are your fellow United Church folks, you forget
that we are the largest protestant denomination in the country.
But in a Hockey Rink in Sackville,
with some 700 people, the view seems quite different.
Margaret McCain, yes, one of those
McCain’s, gave a speech about why she donated money to the United Church.
Essentially it was this: Although she goes to another church, she thinks the United
Church has done so much for the world, for Canada… we led the way in terms of
Women’s rights… Mount Allison was the first university to grant a degree to a
woman and we were the first denomination to ordain women… It was a United
Church member who went on t politics and created welfare and medicare, we have
fought for including and treating as equal everyone, no matter their race, or
sex, or ideals…
We, together, have made a
difference.
Acts 2:42-47
Awe came upon everyone, because many wonders and signs
were being done by the apostles. All who believed were together and had
all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and
distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they
spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate
their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the
goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those
who were being saved.
With Kids
Socialist Jesus
So when the followers sat around
for a while and thought about what Jesus was saying… here is what they came up
with… we should work together!
Let’s pool all of our resources,
let’s all work together, and live together, and create a new way to be in the
world but not part of the world.
If we did that right, there would
be no poor people, no one would have to worry about food or housing, everyone
would get enough….
It didn’t last too long, partly
because Christianity spread too fast… it was located in Jerusalem for a year or
two tops, then it spread to all the Roman Sea Ports, and then inland. Hard to
all live together when you are talking thousand mile differences…
But the idea stuck… monasteries and
convents were the main places of learning and prayer, they were the social
agencies and food banks of the middle ages… and followed this same principle
that we should all work together and be together and support one another…
The same is true of congregations.
We are meant to be a community where we come together, work together, help each
other, are there for each other.
It still does not work as well as
it should. I have often thought we could figure out a way to do it better. But
it is hard. There are a lot of things each of us are involved in… there are a
lot of directions pulling us to head out of here…
But in the end, the sentiment is still
the same, together we are stronger than when we are on our own.
Hebrews 10:23-25 A Call to Community
Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without
wavering, for he who has promised is faithful. And let us consider how to provoke
one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the
habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day
approaching.
Provoking One Another
There was a story on the CBC this
week about an American Spelunker… that is a cave explorer… who went to the
Ukraine to explore some cool caves… he just thought they would be fun… but when
he got down in them he discovered something he did not expect… shoes…clothes…
lots of other things that suggested someone, sometime, had lived in these caves
known as Priest’s grotto.
So he started asking questions, and
doing the research… what he discovered was amazing. In the 1940’s in the
Ukraine, Nazi soldiers had begun to round up the Jews for concentration camps.
In fact, in a few weeks they had taken half the town.
One mother sent her son into the
forest to find a place to hide, he found a cave. So eventually 38 people ended
up spending 344 days in this cave, the lived for over 2 years underground. The
cave it huge, the 10th largest in the world, and could be accessed
only by a sinkhole the size of a fireplace chimney.
Ok, seriously, how long could you
stay in one cave, in the dark? I think any one of us alone for that long would
go insane, not to mention it is only 10 degrees in there…
But together, working together,
taking turns, caring for each other, telling jokes and stories, those people
hid, and lived, for 10 years.
It makes it seem to me, that when
we help each other we can do superhuman things; that when we work together we
create things and do things that we would never have believed that we can do.
We could all tell stories like
this… perhaps some of them less life threatening… but stories of people
bringing food after we lose a loved one, or stories of someone helping you to
fix a deck, or move… or gong fishing with you when you are sad. Being together
changes everything. Working together changes everything.
The author of Hebrews, writing to
the early church, says we should meet together and provoke each other to love,
and good deeds. We should encourage one another and push one another and help
one another. That is what church is all about.
Mark 3:31-34 The Spiritual Family of Jesus
Then his mother and his brothers came; and standing outside,
they sent to him and called him. A crowd was sitting around him; and they
said to him, ‘Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside,
asking for you.’ And he replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And
looking at those who sat around him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my
brothers!
Why are we here?
I also notice that there are quite
a few people who do not go to Presbytery, or to Conference, and I wonder the
same thing… why do we go to church? You see, in these passages we are told the answer… we go to church
because it is there that we meet people who are like us, who believe like us,
who work on the same things as us, who are our spiritual sisters and brothers…
and we go to lift them up, and to be lifted up by them.
No matter how many walks in the
woods I take, it is not going to challenge me to be a better person. Going to
church is. Meeting someone who has a great idea for something and wants to do
it is going to challenge me to do something more…
I guess in simple terms, we are
here in church for each other.
Jesus was not really a mean person.
Later on he arranges for one of the disciples to take care of his mother after
Jesus is executed. But he is saying something important… he is saying to the
people gathered around him that they are as much his family, as much a part of
him, as his own mother and brothers and sisters….
And he is there for them, and they
are there for him. That… is the reason we go to church.
Conclusion
So there are two things I want you
to remember from today – one is that the United Church is not dead, nor is it
going anywhere. We are still the second largest denomination, we are a huge
group of committed people, and we are trying to make a difference in Canada and
the World so that everyone gets to live the way God intended.
Secondly, being here is important…
I don’t mean you have to com every week, I don’t mean you need to do it when
you are sick, or anything else. Heck, there are lots of weeks I want to go do
something else… but being part of this community, being connected to other believers
and worshiping together… that makes a difference… and you need to be a part of
it in order to be a better person.
Put those two things together and I
believe anything is possible. That old where two are three are gathered God is
there adage means a lot to me… I think that when we set our minds to it and
work together, we can change the world…
And I think that is what God is
calling us to do.
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