Sermons

July 18, 2010

“Grounded in God: Praying with our Feet”

Psalm 19

Have you ever started out walking, say, to the drug store, and all of a sudden found yourself standing in front of the post office? Maybe that would only happen in a small town, or NYC where people walk a lot.

I once was driving home to the San Fernando Valley from downtown L.A., when I looked out the window and realized I had no idea where I was. This was not the onset of Alzheimer's. I was so lost in my thoughts I had literally gotten lost - neglecting to make a freeway connection.

My friend Bonnie, who some of you have met, was driving to work in Orange County from the valley when she realized she was low on gas. She pulled off the freeway into a gas station, paid at the window, got back in her car and drove away. Several miles later she noticed what she had forgotten to do.

There’s an epidemic plaguing this country right now. It’s called “not living in the present moment.” As Barbara Brown Taylor states in her book An Altar in the World, “Most of us spend so much time thinking about where we have been or where we are supposed to be going that we have a hard time recognizing where we actually are.”

Those who have been infected are easy to spot: the guy walking his dog, tugging on the leash to keep moving as Fido is busy inspecting a bush over in the grass; the mom practically yanking her three year olds arm out of its socket at the supermarket as the child stands captivated by a candy display.

Children and dogs live very much in the present. They notice what is around them - the sights, the smells, the sounds.

I’ll never forget the two guys walking around the bay in Tiberon, both intently talking on their cell phones, oblivious to each other, or to “God’s glory in the skies, or the sun shimmering on the water and sail boats or the glorious view of San Francisco on the horizon. They missed it all.

Most of us live in that fast, multi-tasking track. It’s difficult to just be in the present moment. Those of us who identify ourselves as people of faith profess to want a relationship with God, but God cannot be found racing around from one task, obligation, appointment to another.

There’s a song that our UCC church in Tiberon used to sing at the beginning of their services. It starts “Take, take off your shoes. You are standing on holy ground. It’s what God said to Moses when he came to inspect a burning bush that was not burned up.

Maybe what we need to do is take off those stilettos, or those thick padded running shoes and really feel the earth under our feet. Bev does it all the time - it’s the spiritual practice of going barefoot. Then take a walk. barefoot, or in a comfortable pair of walking shoes. Ground yourself in God. After your walk, you might take a moment to think about those who have no shoes, or car, to whom walking barefoot is a way of life.

This was Jesus’ main mode of transportation - Moses, Abraham too. As far as we know with the exception of one brief stint on someone else’s donkey, Jesus walked. While I was riding in a little bus on a modern highway from Galilee to Jerusalem I thought; “This would have been a long walk!” But if Jesus had been on a fast horse, think of all he would have missed along the way. Ever try to take pictures out the window of a moving car? Whenever I travel the first thing I want to do is walk, so that I can feel, see, hear, smell, allow myself to be enveloped in my new surroundings.

How many of you go for walks, with or without dogs and children? - go hiking in nature? - walk a labyrinth?

Most people can walk, which makes it one of the most easily available spiritual practices. Buddhism has a word, apranihita, which means wishlessness or aimlessness. They apply it to walking meditations. The idea is that we do not put anything ahead of ourselves and run after it. We enjoy the walking without any particular aim or destination. If your mind is heavy with worry or anxiety, or thinking about where you’ve been or where you’re going, you miss the beauty around you. This kind of walking pulls you into the present moment.

Thich Nhat Hanh, the Buddhist monk and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, describes it this way: “Walking meditation is meditation while walking. We walk slowly, in a relaxed way, keeping a light smile on our lips. When we practice this way, we feel deeply at ease, and our steps are those of the most secure person on Earth. All our sorrows and anxieties drop away, and peace and joy fill our hearts. Anyone can do it. It takes only a little time, a little mindfulness, and the wish to be happy.” (from The Long Road Turns to Joy)

This is a practice that can be done anywhere. Thich Nhat Hanh suggests concentrating on your breath while you walk or using a phrase as a mantra. My spiritual adviser likes to keep a phrase or thought in mind while hiking in the Sierra’s. One that she uses is a Celtic benediction: “If the grace of seeing were mine today, I would glimpse You, O God, in all that lives.”

Imagine keeping this in mind as you walk around Atascadero Lake, or along the beach. Imagine seeing God’s presence in the wild flowers along the path, the clouds reflected in the water, the sea gulls gliding over the waves. Brown Taylor suggests that “To detach the walking from the destination is in fact one of the best ways to recognize the altars you are passing right by all the time.”

A pilgrim is a person who prays with their feet. Pilgrimage is one of the most ancient and universal of prayers, used by all the major faith traditions.

One of the five pillars of Islam is the hajj or pilgrimage to Mecca undertaken during the 12th month of the lunar year. Dressed only in a white cloth that many will use later as their burial shrouds, pilgrims walk seven times around the ancient Ka’ba in the center courtyard of the Great Mosque. They walk counterclockwise, against the march of time, scraping away the crusted sins that have accumulated during all their lives.

Hindus make a holy journey to the river Ganges where one’s sins are bathed away, or they climb high into the Himalayan Mountains to the source of the Ganges.

Buddhist pilgrims perform full prostrations as they make their sacred journeys to Bodh Gaya in India or Mount Kailash in Tibet. Bev tried this when she was in Tibet and I’ve asked her to demonstrate.

Jews travel to the wailing wall in Jerusalem where they write their prayers on little pieces of paper and pray.

Christians have a rich history of traveling to shrines and holy places like Rome, Jerusalem, Lourdes, Fatima and Guadalupe. This past year a friend of mine walked the Camino de Santiago, a 500 mile stretch from St. Jean in France to Camino de Santiago in Spain in 43 days. This pilgrimage began in the 8th or 9th century. Over the years thousands of pilgrims have walked it each year, from St. Francis to Charlemaine to my friend Art. Today approximately 100,000 Christian pilgrims walk it every year. This year was a Holy Year and it’s estimated that possibly 250,000 made the journey.

Not all of us are able to make such pilgrimages. Back in the 13th century a labyrinth was placed on the floor of Chartres Cathedral in France, to be used by Christians in that part of the world who couldn’t travel to Jerusalem. Today you find them all over the world. We have four here on the central coast, that I’m aware of. One is in Barbara’s back yard.

The labyrinth is an ancient spiritual practice. It’s a kind of maze without walls. It’s a curling path outlined with stones, or painted on the floor. There is one way in to the center, with switchbacks and detours, just like life. As you walk you’re never quite sure how far you’ve come or close you are to the center, so your focus is on the journey, not the destination.

I’ve walked many labyrinths, alone and with groups of people. Each experience is different. We may be walking the same path but each of us experiences it in our own way. You don’t have to know what you’re doing, you just begin and doing teaches you what you need to know.

Barbara Brown Taylor tells a story related to her by a friend who was walking the labyrinth in Chartres Cathedral with a group of other pilgrims. “She noticed an older man and woman standing near the entrance watching. After about twenty minutes of looking, they walked straight to the center of the labyrinth and bowed their heads in prayer. Then the woman took off her shoes and handed them to her husband, along with her purse. As he watched, she took the long way out of the labyrinth, following the path this time. She cried on the way. He cried just watching her. When they had pulled themselves together, my friend went up to ask them what had just happened.

They had come to celebrate the end of the woman’s treatment for breast cancer, they explained. They had never even heard of a labyrinth before they walked into the cathedral that day. The women could not explain why she was drawn to walk it, but when she did her husband decided to hold down the center, giving thanks for her life while she found her way out.

‘I began to feel at peace in my body again after being very angry that it had let me down’, the woman explained. Walking, she found herself remembering all the people who had walked with her through her surgery and treatment. ‘I know this is why we came here, ‘ she told my friend.”

As Father Edward Hays so eloquently points out in his book Pray All Ways, “The purpose of the pilgrimage is to come home, but to come home with new eyes and a new heart.” It doesn’t matter if our pilgrimage takes us to Chartres Cathedral or Atascadero Lake, walking can be an ‘inner-venture,’ a journey of the Spirit we are making towards a deeper connection to God, a journey that can fill us with a sense of awe, wonder and child-like interest in all we meet along the way.

Brown Taylor tells of walking in total darkness one evening with her husband while on retreat. Even though they couldn’t see, they could feel, hear, smell, touch all that was around them. Their walk was illuminated by their other senses and through them they could feel the presence of God.

What if you can’t walk, you might ask. At Plum Village where Thich Nhat Hanh teaches walking meditation, he has people in wheel chairs sit and choose a walker to intensely watch as they deepen their own breathing. After about twenty minutes of this most people discover that they can do walking meditation without even leaving their chairs.

So I’d like to do a little experiment today, taking you on a virtual walking meditation around Atascadero Lake. I assume most of you have walked it before. I invite you to walk it this morning from your pews.

For those of you who can’t see the photos, try listening to the music and in your mind take yourself to somewhere peaceful and serene and spend some time walking there. As Thich Nhat Hanh says: “The miracle is not walking on water but on the earth.” And as our psalmist says today:

The revelation of God is whole

and pulls our lives together.

The signposts of God are clear

and point out the right road.

The life-maps of God are right,

showing the way to joy.

The directions of God are plain

and easy on the eyes.

When I was in seminary, back during a brief time when I was a Methodist, I had to take these tests to see if I was “ordainable material.” After taking the first one I went to my mentor - this wonderful, caring pastor of a nearby church - and told him, rather sheepishly, “I’m going to rate a 0 on evangelism.” - and I did, a big, fat 0. I remember, he paused and pondered, then said: “We need to talk about this - find out what it is about evangelism that you have an aversion to. What does it mean to you? What negative connotations does it conjure up?”

I wasn’t the first - or the last, I’m sure - to score 0 on the big E word.

I’ve read some poll numbers in the Christian Century magazine from recent surveys that have been done. They tell us, in mega churches with 2,000 plus members (that excludes most UCC churches) 87% of people attending had invited someone in the past year. A different survey found that 55% of attendees of mostly mainline churches (that’s us) had invited someone in that same time frame. 55% - 87% - does that say something about why the big fundamentalist churches are growing while the rest of us are lucky to maintain the status quo? I wondered how many of us in this church had invited someone in the past year. How would we rate, percentage wise? I won’t put any of you on the spot by asking for a show of hands, but I do want to know;

What do you think about when you hear the word Evangelism? EVANGELISM! what do you think? (pass the mic) What words does the term Evangelism bring to mind? (pushy, uncomfortable, going to hell, pressuring) The word makes many of us queasy. It did me.

Five years ago, when we were restructuring our ministry teams, the word evangelism had such a negative connotation, we re-named the team Building Our Community. I actually like that name. It’s says more to me, has more possibilities than “evangelism.” But at the same time, we have to get over our aversion to doing the work of building our community. Therein lies the rub - the stumbling block.

Brian McLaren, who has written books on the topic, defends the word; “Evangelism isn’t a dirty word!” - and then he warns us; “Unless Christian moderates and progressives begin to share their faith and love and enthusiasm, America’s religious landscape will be populated by fundamentalists.” It’s already happening. It’s been happening for decades.

I’ve just finished a third book on evangelism in mainline congregations. It’s entitled “Unbinding the Gospel: Real Life Evangelism” by Martha Grace Reese. It presents the results of the Mainline Evangelism Project, a four year study of hundreds of mainline congregations who are doing the best job of reaching people with no church background.

According to their study, if you look at membership as a % of the population, mainline church membership decreased almost 50% in the past 40 years. More and more children are being raised with no faith at all. Each generation is less involved in religious life than the one before it. Look around our church and you will see a living example of what they are talking about.

I just attended the Earl Lectures at Pacific School of Religion. The topic this year was Spiritual but not Religious: Chasing the Divine. I learned that 30% of Americans, according to some polls, would describe themselves as Spiritual but not Religious. Omar McRoberts, a sociologist and researcher at the University of Chicago says, “We are witnessing a decoupling of ‘spiritual’ from religion.’” A new study found nearly a quarter, 22% of Americans have never attended a religious service. This is an increase from 9% in 1972. These are alarming statistics.

Those in fundamentalist churches have a rather persuasive hook for bringing in new members. It’s called hell. If you don’t come to our church and profess Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and believe what we tell you to, that’s where you’re going. It’s a great motivator. We don’t have that hook. In todays story Jesus didn’t use one. He used a net, but I’ll get to that later.

First, we know many of us are uncomfortable with evangelism. The word strikes fear in some of our hearts. We have a nice church here. Our friends are here. Visitors stop in on occasion. Some even stay. We feel good reaching out to the community. We’re comfortable here. If you don’t believe that becoming a Christian saves you from hell, what reasons do you have to break out of your comfort zone and do evangelism? That’s my second question today. Why should any of us do evangelism? (pass mic)

The most frequent answer to that question in this study was “So people will join our church,” so we can have more Sunday school teachers, more families, more workers, more pledgers. Many of their answers were all about the church, about the building, the activities, the friends, the important life we’ve found here, the ministries we do. This is all important, don’t get me wrong, but it shouldn’t be our primary focus for doing evangelism. If it is, people become bait.

What have we left out of the mix? God. Evangelism is first and foremost to help draw people into a relationship with God, or in the case of Christians, Jesus too. It’s about transforming lives.

In the story we read this morning, the lives of Peter, James and John were transformed. This is a call story. They were called by Jesus and sent out to call others. It starts with Jesus doing what he does all the time - teaches, but he needed a little breathing room, so he asks Peter to row him out into the shallow water while James and John continue to wash their nets.

It’s been a disappointing night of fishing, with nothing to show for it. After Jesus finishes his lesson, he tells Peter to venture out into deeper waters where he directs him to let down his net. After some skepticism Peter obliges. Apparently words were not enough for Peter, Jesus had to engage in a little show and tell, or more like tell, and then show.

“I’m here for you. Trust me and do as I say and you’ll reap great rewards.” That’s not to say there wasn’t some risk involved. The abundance of fish almost sank the boat! They had to call in for help. Peter knew at that point he might not be up to what Jesus was leading him into. “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man.” But Jesus reassured him not to be afraid. “From now on you’ll be catching people.” And Peter, James and John’s lives were transformed from fishermen to disciples.

As the fisher mens’ nets physically envelope the fish, Jesus spiritually envelopes the fishermen. Amidst the immobilizing fear of sinking, they are called by Jesus to a new career path.

We scout the deep water when we venture out to share the Christian faith with our neighbors - when we’re willing to leave our comfort zone, take risks, try new things, explore new territory. That’s where the fish are - where growth happens, not only in attendance numbers but in our relationships to God, each other and those outside the church community.

It’s not easy to strike out in the deep when we’ve become convinced that no one out there wants to hear the good news we have to share, especially when our popular culture offers such enticing invitations in other directions.Think of all the things we could be doing with our Sunday mornings. (or maybe I shouldn’t even suggest that)

This leads to my last question, which has to do with sharing our faith. If your faith is really important to you, and I hope that it is, then you should want to share it. Then why do we become so tongue tied when it comes to talking about our faith? I would propose that we don’t practice enough. Many of us don’t know how to articulate it. We’re reticent to even begin.

If we talk more often with each other about our faith, we will be able to articulate it to strangers. We don’t have to be well read or have a theology degree to do this. We need to put it in simple, heartfelt language that even an unchurched person can understand and respond to. That’s where small group sharing, like our upcoming Lenten series is so valuable.

I suggest that we start with the question “Why does it matter that I am a Christian?” Try answering this question during this next week, for yourself, and then talk to someone about it. If we know why it matters that we are Christians than we will know why it could matter that others become Christians - or come back to their faith after a time away. How is your life better, richer, more fulfilling living within a faith community?

In Unbinding the Gospel, an evangelistic mainline pastor shares his story:

Ok, so there I was, raised in a fundamentalist church, ordained at 21, served in churches until I was 29, and my wife left me. Even though the divorce was not my “fault” according to church order, my denomination removed me from serving a congregation for a minimum of two years. My pastor friends and I had a really hard time staying connected. I didn’t fit categories and I threatened them. I was ashamed and a wreck. A friend in my apartment complex was a mainline seminary student. He and his wife and their friends were so loving. They included me, prayed with me, listened to me for hours on end, and finally drew me into a part of the church I had always looked at with suspicion.

Long story short, I became part of a mainline denomination, and you don’t find people much more progressive biblically than I am now. I haven’t believed or preached that people are going to Hell for 30 years. I wouldn’t change theologies at this point. The theological freedom and the grace of this church still amaze me. But I’ll tell you, there is one thing that was really hard for me to adjust to. I couldn’t believe - I STILL can’t believe - how the liberal church that knows so much about God’s grace doesn’t understand the power of what it has to share. And they don’t share it! ....I now live in this wonderful mainline church. I can’t believe so many of my friends don’t have the drive to share the Gospel. They’ve shown the Gospel to me, but they don’t share it with strangers. It’s Gospel constipation!

Is that what we’re suffering from? If so, what is our laxative? That is another sermon, which I will leave for a later date, but I hope that you will all think about this, and talk about it with each other. The Building Our Community team is, and they invite anyone who is willing to join them. They’re the most spirit filled meetings in the church right now.

I spoke earlier about Jesus not using a hook, but a net. Try thinking about evangelism this way: “The calling is not to hook people and drag them in. It is rather to cast the net of God’s love all around...open to the world -- and then wait with patience for the Spirit’s work and see if any are caught by God’s vision and grace.” Ann Svennungen

Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream. I included a snippet of that dream in the centering thought today. It resembled a dream that Jesus talked about to his followers, the dream of the creation of the Kin-dom of God here on earth. Dr. King called it his Beloved Community. In Chicago, on July 6, 1965, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed the 5th General Synod of the United Church of Christ. The UCC was a mere toddler at the time, only eight years into existence. Rev. King told this young denomination,

“Although the Church has been called to combat social evils, it has often remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained-glass windows.... How often the Church has been an echo rather than a voice, a tail-light behind the Supreme Court and other secular agencies, rather than a headlight guiding men and women progressively and decisively to higher levels of understanding.”

These were challenging words to a young denomination who prided itself on a history of being on the forefront of social issues. His words to the 5th General Synod resonate today, more than ever. Like much of our scriptures, his words are for all times, not just the decade in which they were written. They are wisdom for our age, as we face the problems and challenges of the 21st century. We need his wisdom - desperately.

Bernice Powell Jackson, who served on our national staff for almost 20 years as Executive Minister for our Justice and Witness Ministries, and for a tune as president of the World Council of Churches for North American, called Martin Luther King Jr. a revolutionary. “He wasn’t a revolutionary who favored armed struggle or overthrowing governments”, she writes, “but he was a revolutionary all the same. He was a revolutionary who called for a radical rethinking of our values.”

Addressing our Riverside Church in New York City on April 4, 1967, Dr. King spoke of those values:

We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism aren’t capable of being conquered.

That was 1967, 43 years ago. And where are we today?

Powell Jackson writes,“This radical revolution of values would, he believed, lead us to a new vision and a new way of being - the Beloved Community. The values of this community would not be based on greed, power or material acquisition. Rather, the values of his Beloved Community would be quite different.”

She names three values: First, the Beloved Community would be based on love. In his address to Riverside Church he spoke about love:

When I speak of love....I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to the ultimate reality...We can no longer afford to worship the god of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation.

If those aren’t words for our time, I don’t know what is. And in his last presidential address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference he elaborated:

For I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind’s problems...I’m not talking about emotional bosh, I’m talking about strong, demanding love. I have seen too much hate...hate is too great a burden to bear.

Second: his Beloved Community was based also on peace. Listen to his wisdom:

Non-violence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love. (Dec. 11, ‘64)

Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars...Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.

And on Passion Sunday, 1968, he preached at the National Cathedral in Washington:

Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind....it is no longer a choice between violence and non-violence. It is either non-violence or non-existence.....Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men....We must live together as brothers (and sisters) or perish together as fools.

And the third principle his Beloved Community was based on is justice. To the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in the late 60’s he pleaded:

...if our nation can spend $35 million a year to fight an unjust war.... (a small figure by today’s standards) $20 billion to put man on the moon, it can spend billions to put God’s children on our own two feet right here on earth...

I ask you, how much are we spending each day in Iraq and Afghanistan, while millions of Americans go without health insurance?

King wrote from the Birmingham jail in 1963: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” “All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.”

Since his death that network has grown with the advent of modern technology; computers, satellites, the internet. The world is at our fingertips. Many of us have been glued to our televisions this week watching in disbelief and horror the evolving catastrophe in Haiti. We live and work in a global economy. We can no longer ignore those suffering in Darfur or Haiti, anymore than we can ignore those standing at our freeway exits asking for spare change.

Love, peace and justice - the three are inextricably linked. The vision of Dr. King is dependent on all three. He laid the groundwork, then abruptly and tragically left us, his Beloved Community still a remote dream. We remain immersed in a thing-oriented society - the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism still with us. The names and the faces have changed over the years, but the root causes of our challenges and problems are still the same.

His Beloved Community was based on a deep spiritualism and connection to God. When I read 1st Corinthians I thought of Dr. King. “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activated all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”

As if from a deep well, King drew from that Spirit: wisdom, knowledge, faith, prophecy, discernment and healing. He embodied them all.

He put his unfailing faith and his great hope in God. Ironically on April 3, 1968, the day before his assassination, he shared these thoughts,

“....And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land. So I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man.”

Martin Luther King Jr. was indeed a revolutionary and he invited us to join in that revolution. He spoke to Christians everywhere:

“We who are members of the church are the lighthouse of the world. We are responsible for one task above all others - to keep the light of the gospel burning. All else must be secondary...”

He warned of the dangers of apathy: “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter...In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”

The United Church of Christ may be accused of a lot of things, but apathy and silence are not one of them. Throughout our short history, our denomination has spoken out about far ranging issues of social justice when many others remained silent.

As the problems of the world and our country grow more numerous and complex with each passing day, as horrific disasters, both man made and natural mount up, we need to return again and again to the words and wisdom of this once fearless prophet.

In humbleness, Martin Luther King Jr. recognized the true meaning of greatness.

“Everybody can be great because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a great heart full of grace; a soul generated by love.”

Martin Luther King certainly had a great heart full of grace. His was a soul generated by love. So our national holiday commemorating his life has been designated a day of service. We are collecting food and spare change for Loaves and Fishes. Many, or maybe all of you, have received a grocery bag at your door to fill with items for the food bank. Our church is serving as a collection place for that food tomorrow.

Just when we thought the news couldn’t get any worse, an earthquake hits our neighbor Haiti, the most impoverished country in the western hemisphere - a country with practically no infrastructure - a country who has trouble feeding its people on a good day. We all know about earthquakes, but nothing of the magnitude of this one, hitting in a highly populated, poorly constructed city.

As I watched the news this week I thought, “Can anything good come out of such a tragedy?” What would Rev. King say to us at such a time? What would he have us do?

I was struck by the fact that with so much talk of war in recent months, of the upcoming deployment of more troops to Afghanistan; with this tragedy, I witnessed a shift in the world’s consciousness from war to reaching out to our fellow human beings in need. Hearts were opened and an outpouring of aid is flowing, in both money and human resources.

I asked myself, “Does it take a catastrophe on such an epic scale for the world to open their hearts; to begin to see the injustices that were suffered by a whole nation even before this natural disaster occurred?” Thank God, for once, nobody is asking “What will this kind of humanitarian aid cost? Can we afford to help? No, human lives are at stake. How can you place a dollar figure on a human life?

I am so proud that one of our own, Michael May, is over there working with our military to bring relief to these people. As I write this I’m hoping their presence will help to keep the peace at a time when desperation could easily set in and violence erupt.

I was touched by a story I heard Friday morning of people in the streets marching and singing and praying. When all else seems lost, where do we turn? - to God and our faith, and that’s what many of them were doing. It touched the reporter too.

The United Church of Christ reached out immediately to help, but in these tough financial times, they need our help too. They are encouraging us to send whatever we can - a dollar, twenty, a hundred - and they will make sure it is used wisely. You can donate on line at our ucc.org website or send checks. If you write a check today and drop it in the collection plate, we will make sure they get it. Write it to Wider Church Ministries. The info is printed in the bulletin.

What would Martin Luther King have us do? Just what we are doing; open our hearts, our wallets, keep the peace, and work for justice for the people of Haiti. May his spirit live on in each and every one of us.

I love the internet. It seems like whatever I’m looking for, it’s there at my fingertips. This week, in honor of Christian Unity, I went looking for some insight into the diversity within Christian denominations. And I found just what I was looking for. Remember those old light bulb jokes?

How many Episcopalians does it take to change a light bulb?

I asked Barbara and she had the correct answer:

Change a light bulb??? Why, my grandmother gave me that light bulb!

How many Baptists does it take to change a light bulb?

One to change the light bulb, seven to form a committee on the changing of the bulb and one to make a casserole.

How many Pentecostals?

Three. One to turn it and two to catch it when it falls.

How about Nazarenes?

Which light bulb? Who put that one in? Who is supposed to change light bulbs? Where is the ladder? Which ladder? Who used it last? Who is in charge of the ladder? I make a motion we adjourn. (that sounds suspiciously familiar)

How many Methodists does it take to change a light bulb?

Undetermined. Whether your light is bright, dull, or completely out, you are loved - you can be a light bulb, turnip bulb or tulip bulb. A church wide lighting service is planned for Sunday, August 19th. Bring the bulb of your choice and a covered dish.

And then there are the Quakers:

None. Who needs a bulb when you have an inner light?

How many Calvinists?

None. If God wants the light bulb to be changed, he will do it himself.

How many from the Church of Christ?

Where is the scriptural authority for the light bulb?

I didn’t find any responses for the United Church of Christ, but as I read these, I got to thinking that many of them could apply to us. Maybe that’s because so many of us in the UCC have come here from other denominations. Maybe there’s some unity in our diversity, even when it comes to changing a bulb.

This past week Christians have been celebrating Christian Unity throughout the world, and here on the Central Coast. Tonight we will welcome members of many of these light bulb changing denominations to worship with us. The Episcopalians down the street at St. Luke’s are providing the music and Fr. Matt and I will be officiating the service. I hope many of you will come and welcome our fellow Christians to the Community Church. We are the hosts. It is up to us to show them genuine UCC hospitality. And it’s fun to worship together. That’s how this church began.

I went to the internet also this week searching for statistics. As of 2005, approximately 2 billion people, 33% of the world’s population, identify themselves as Christians. We’re the largest religion in the world. Back in the early days of the church, when Paul was writing to the Corinthians, Christians were already starting to squabble and disagree. Factions were forming. Almost 2,000 years later there are approximately 38,000 Christian denominations worldwide - that is taking into consideration cultural distinctions of what it means to be a denomination in different countries. There are more than 1,500 different Christian faith groups in the US today.

Paul’s letter to the Corinthians is a fitting passage for this week of Christian Unity. In it he uses the human body as a metaphor for the church. It can be applied to our individual churches and membership, but also to the church universal. In it he pressed his point for the importance of both unity and diversity within the body of Christ. I’m sure he never imagined in his wildest dreams the diversity that was to come over the next two millenniums.

Diversity is crucial to the life and growth of the church. It’s impossible for any one denomination or church to be all things to all people. We’re cut from different cloth. Christians come from different cultures across the globe. For Christians to be different is not only acceptable, it is expected, even necessary for the richness, wholeness and vigor of the body. Christian unity neither requires uniformity nor encourages it.

I started thinking: What would Christianity look like today if we were all cut from the same cookie cutter? Boring! I’ve attended services in churches from many different denominations over the years. I’ve been a member of three denominations, and each had their own distinct personality, their own way, not only of worshiping, but of just being church.

If we were all the same we would miss the silence and quiet, thoughtful reflections that are shared at a Quaker meeting house. We would miss the liturgical splendor of the high masses in the Catholic and Episcopal traditions. We would miss the stirring, passionate sermons and gospel music in the African American churches. I would miss going to meditative Taize services each Sunday night at St.

Lukes. We, as Christians, can draw from them all. I certainly have over the years. I wouldn’t be the same Christian today if I hadn’t.

Some people walk in our doors and immediately know they have found their spiritual home. Others walk in - and leave - and we never see them again. The Snows tell of inviting friends to our Bright Sunday service after Easter. Those same friends joined the Lutherans the next week. I think we are all striving for the same thing. We are all looking for different ways to fill our souls, to connect us to God’s presence, and be of service in the world. What works for one person may not for another.

But within our diversity, Paul tells us we are all one, called by Christ who unites us all. “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body - Jews or Greeks, slaves or free - and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.”

The motto of the UCC reflects that spirit of unity that Paul speaks

of: “In essentials unity, in non-essentials diversity, in all things charity.” In love we strive to understand and accept our differences in determining what is essential to our faith. That spirit brought four different denominations together back in 1957 to form the United Church of Christ.

In First Corinthians Paul makes it abundantly clear not to confuse unity with uniformity; he does not think that believers must all have identical views on all things or that they must walk in lock step. He values the distinctiveness of believers and appreciates their various gifts.

Coming back to church after a long hiatus in my 20’s, one of the things I loved most was the diversity in the congregation. Aside from families, where else do you find such a diversity of people across generations who come together and form relationships for a common purpose? Churches are unique in this way.

In this letter Paul is stating what the ideal community should be.

We’re not a one man or woman band. We all play different instruments.

The Spirit has endowed us each with our own unique gifts and they are all equally important if we are to produce glorious music in the service of God. Finger cymbals are just as important and effective to the overall goal as the drums. Each serves in its own distinct way.

God uses our uniqueness to do God’s work. The gifts we bring are as varied as the attendance. Take a typical Sunday morning worship service. Katie rehearses the choir, or chimes, or Candi the Band, and they come to lead us in music. Sally accompanies. Dorothy calls and lines up ushers and greeters who do their part. Brenda calls liturgists, who help lead worship. The ushers invite others to take up the collection. Naomi makes our name tags. Mary Jane lines up people to encourage others to wear them. Wilma sets up the communion elements and invites others to serve communion, and cleans up after. Barbara prepares the bulletin with the material I give her. Donna or Greta or I prepare the altar. People bring flowers. Beverly or her replacement make sure we can all be heard. Sometimes we have extra readers or special music or drama. Some Sundays Dick sets up the screen and projector and runs the power point. Others staff the nursery and teach Sunday School. During your birthday month you bring edibles for fellowship - others set up and clean up. Dewey and Wilma come in on Monday mornings and clean up after all of us. The cleaning crew come in on Thursdays. I meanwhile spend an average of 15 to 20 hours writing a sermon and preparing the service. A worship team meets every other month to plan ahead and give input. wow, that’s a lot of people!

- a lot of gifts.

And this is only one of the components of being and doing church. No one person can do all of these things, but we can all do something - in our own way. We need all the body parts Paul mentions. We are all equally important to the well being of the Body of Christ. We are all vehicles through which the Holy Spirit works to enrich this body.

And it is through the uniqueness of being church, being a part of the body of Christ that we come together in unity for our common good and that of the world. Eugene Peterson paraphrases it this way:

“The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don’t, the parts we see and the parts we don’t. (And here is what I think is one of his most important

messages) If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.”

I’ve been reading about the number amputees happening in Haiti. Think of how the loss of a limb affects the functioning of that persons body. How other body parts have to strengthen and step in to help the body function as a whole. We are to be here for each other, in good times and bad.

Paul tells us: “You are Christ’s body -- that’s who you are! You must never forget this.”

I had a conversation with Jane Fisler Hoffman recently. She’s our interim conference minister. She shepherds all the churches of our Southern California Nevada Conference, through good times and difficult ones. She’s a busy lady. She told me she keeps hearing “It’s all about me.” - about individual’s needs and desires - a reflection of our culture really, which promotes individualism over community. We must constantly remind ourselves that we are in community, in covenant with each other.

It’s a complete body we’re striving to create, dependent on each of us accepting our role in it, compromising when necessary and promoting the good of all. That’s creating unity within our diversity. Paul’s is an important message on this morning of our annual meeting, as we begin a new church year during this week of Christian Unity. What are your gifts? What instrument are you playing? What part of the body are you? How do you contribute to the whole? Where is God leading you?

You will be receiving a survey this week and I hope that as you respond you will think carefully about this body of Christ we have created. Like our own bodies, it is constantly changing and evolving.

Are we missing a part? Are some of our parts not working to their full capacity? Do we need to add new instruments to improve our sound?

Please share your ideas. And remember, you are a vital part of it all.