June 7, 2015

Jesus' true family

         Last Wednesday night, we met with the Rev. Judy Rhodes and we talked about what’s been going on here at St. Paul’s. The overwhelming sentiment is that we all appreciate the care and support we give each other. This is our family. We take care of each other and we look out for each other. This is our home. We know where we sit! This is a good place to begin to build whatever we are going to do next.

         When we think about church as family, it’s hard for us to hear the conflict between Jesus and his family. Why the harsh words? Why can’t they get along? In the end Jesus looks around and says, “Here is my family! Whoever does the will of God are my mother and my brother and my sister.”

         Mixed up in this story is the criticism about Jesus. He must be in league with the devil! Jesus points out how this is impossible. Then he refers to the unforgivable sin. What’s that? Have I done it? Is there a danger that I might? It has to do with somehow rejecting the work of the Holy Spirit or attributing the work of the Holy Spirit to another. Can we do this by mistake?

         Jesus is here to get us reconciled with God (and with each other.) The danger is not to those who are honestly seeking God. The danger is to the ones who already think they know the answer. The religious authorities are the ones in danger. They have an unshakable idea about God. In there desire to avoid idolatry in worshipping another God, they fall into another idolatry. They have imagined a God who is not true.

         This is our danger. In our fear and in our anxiety, we are tempted to create for ourselves a God who works for us – instead of following God as God leads us. We are worried about numbers and about relevance. We are worried that this lovely community won’t exist in the future. The bad news is that we are right. What we know today will not continue forever. The good news is that the promise of God does exist forever – it may not appear in a form that we have become used to.

         The prophet Samuel has grown old and the future is uncertain. The people ask Samuel to anoint a king, so that they can be like other nations. Samuel grieves for God. He knows that the people are rejecting the direct rule of God and they are opting for something they think they can understand and control. Samuel warns them what they are really getting – but they want it anyway. What is the lesson for us? Beyond easy political references about taxes and the “one percenters,” Samuel is reminding us about who leads us and about where we put our loyalties.

         It’s easier to trust a system or an organization that looks like something we know. All our institutions are failing us, but at least we know how they are failing! Samuel and Jesus are inviting us to think about our priorities and our loyalties. Who is our leader? The person we elect? If we consider ourselves to be disciples of Jesus, then our first loyalty is to God and then to the community of followers of Jesus. As we seek to create something new in this community, we are called to seek the will of God and to have less trust in what we know or in what makes us comfortable.

         It’s not bad to have harmonious community. Sometimes we seek something that looks good and feels good. We can hope for comfort in times of pain and grief. We also have to take up our responsible roles as adult disciples of Jesus. We are not called here only to be comfortable. We are also called to live into a new way of life. The apostle Paul calls our present state an earthly tent. Whatever we have now is temporary and flexible. We should expect impermanence. The eternal and unchanging is where we are headed. It is not that our bodies are somehow a kind of temporary prison from which we need to escape. Paul is writing about our temporary state of this life, which we will exchange for a new way of being in the new heaven and the new earth.

         Until we get there, we are on our journey to the promise. As we plan together to make sense of where we’ve been and where we’re going, we need to remember how we are gathered together. God did not call us here to maintain an unchanging institution. God calls us to grow in love and faithfulness. We have a great tradition of doing this here. There are things from our past that we have lost and we need to grieve. We can also free ourselves to imagine new ways to follow God together. There are other sisters and brothers who can be welcomed along the way. There are always new blessings to discover.