It Takes A Family
The First Congregational Church
United Church of Christ
Columbus, Ohio
April 13, 1997
Memory Verse: "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother." (Mark 3:35)
Today's Texts: Acts 16:6-15, Psalm 128:1-6, and Luke 24:13-23, 28-35
Opening Prayer: God of all, we come as your children seeking your word. Your wisdom is a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. Speak to us now and encourage our hearts with love. Amen.
Hillary Rodham Clinton fired the first shot by releasing her book, It Takes A Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us, (Simon & Schuster New York, 1996) in time for the 1996 presidential election. The book got its title from the African proverb: "It takes a village to raise a child." She chose that title because it "offers a timeless reminder that children will thrive only if their families thrive and if the whole of society cares enough to provide for them."
This seemingly incontrovertible and innocuous statement was picked up by Bob Dole at the Republican Convention in San Diego and immediately became a political football. "After the virtual devastation of the American family, the rock upon which this country was founded, we are now told that it takes a village," he asserted, "the collective, and thus, the state to raise a child. The state is now more involved than it has ever been in the raising of children, and children are now more neglected, abused, and mistreated than they have been in our time."
"This is not a coincidence," he concluded, "and, with all due respect, I am here to tell you: it does not take a village to raise a child. It takes a family." This, of course, immediately led someone to produce another book, entitled It Takes A Family: How To Create Hope and Celebrate Your Future (Al Hartley, Barbour & Co., Inc. Uhrichsville, OH, 1996).
So the debate raged during the fall of 1996. It Takes A Village. It Takes A Family. It Takes A Village. It Takes A Family. She Loves Me. She Loves Me Not. As Jim Wallis' young nephew reportedly quipped, "They just don't get it." And so a third book came rushing to the scene: It Takes A Church Within A Village: God's Grand Design for Building Values and Character in our Children (H. B. London, Jr. & Neil B. Wiseman, Thomas Nelson Pubs. Nashville, TN, 1996).
This whole discussion, which started out with the best of intentions, ended up with the pall of political posturing. Instead of demonstrating a genuine concern for the welfare of children and families, the participants were demonstrating more concern about their own welfare with various interest groups and voter blocks. Rather than finding common ground on an issue of common concern, the debate became polarized around issues of constituency and ideology. The losers, in all of this, are people like you and me -- people who are witnessing and experiencing some of the greatest challenges and changes in family life since the beginning of time.
These statistics perhaps serve only to tell you what you already know, and what Gene Kraus illustrated last week with his sermon on It Takes A Courageous Faith: families are a difficult place to be. All the talk about family values belies the fact that families have never been the epitome of values nor even the primary focus of salvation history. Families come in an out of the biblical narrative, but so do individuals, clans, nations, and empires. Those families which do play a prominent role often have problems the likes of which would drive most of us absolutely crazy.
This is only the tip of the iceberg. The fact is, scripture is not a good place to turn if you want to find stories which illustrate and authenticate what the Religious Right means by family values. But it is a great place to turn if you want take comfort in the fact that whatever your situation -- somebody's been there before and God has managed to make us of them anyway.
For the next four weeks, I will be preaching on the theme of Families in the Family of God. My long introduction is designed to lay aside several misconceptions right from the beginning:
The story of the two pilgrims on the road to Emmaus is a case in point. I don't how many times I've heard that story in my life. It takes place after the crucifixion and the resurrection. Two people are leaving Jerusalem after celebrating the Passover, when Jesus comes up and walks with them on the road to Emmaus. They fail to recognize him, even though he explains the scriptures to them beginning with Moses and going through all of the prophets.
When they come to Emmaus, the two pilgrims insist that Jesus stay with them, since it was evening and the day was almost over. Jesus reluctantly agreed. Their eyes were finally opened when he sat with them at the dinner table. Jesus took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. The imagery was too poignant to ignore. Their hearts exploded with joy. And they raced back to Jerusalem to tell the others who were already saying: "The Lord is risen indeed!"
Now I ask you, "What image comes to your mind of those two pilgrims on the road to Emmaus?" For more than forty years, my image was of two unrelated male disciples traveling around in sandals and robes. So you can imagine my surprise in January, at the minister's conference in Florida, when I heard the news that scholars now view these two pilgrims as most likely husband and wife.
It was news that has changed my image of this story forever. In keeping with the male domination system of first century Judaism, only one of these pilgrims, the male, is given a name. Cleopas. They had gone to Jerusalem as a family, with thousands of other pilgrims. They had been touched by the prophet from Nazareth and had mourned his death upon a cross. After it was over, they went back home, and it was there -- in their home -- that Jesus revealed himself as the crucified yet risen Christ.
This Easter story holds out the hope and the horror of my entire series on Families in the Family of God. The horror is that we will find the oppression of the ages, in which people are nameless and patterns are obscured. The hope is that we will find Jesus, in our families, in our homes, sitting down with us at the dinner table, when we have hit bottom, breaking bread and revealing the mysteries of God.
When the apostle Paul dreamed of going to Macedonia, he went to the women, outside the gate, where he supposed there was a place for prayer. There he met a woman named Lydia, a worshiper of God, who opened her heart to the gospel. Immediately she and her entire household was baptized after which they prevailed on Paul to stay with them, at their home. Can you imagine what it must have been like to have the apostle Paul staying in your guest room!
This pattern is repeated over and over again in the book of Acts. Individuals are not baptized apart from their families; entire households are baptized including men, women, children, servants, and neighbors. Faith is a family affair. And it is in the home, with our families and friends, that we have as much or even more chance of finding God than right here at church.
It takes a family to find God, of every size, shape, and configuration. In the next four weeks we will explore what it takes to strengthen our families and to open ourselves to the movement of God's Spirit. Like the couple who sat with Jesus at the dinner table, God comes to us in the midst of the problems and disappointments of life. God opens our eyes and makes our hearts burn with hope. Amen.
It Takes A Church
The First Congregational Church
United Church of Christ
Columbus, Ohio
April 20, 1997
Memory Verse: "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother." (Mark 3:35)
Today's Texts: Acts 2:37-47, Psalm 23, 1 John 3:11, 14, 16-24
Opening Prayer: Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Amen.
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." So begins what is arguably one of the greatest works of English literature, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. The novel is set against the backdrop of London and Paris during the period of The French Revolution. Dickens lambasts both aristocratic tyranny and revolutionary excess -- the latter memorably caricatured in Madame Defarge, who knits beside the guillotine.
What makes this novel so great is the interplay of history and psychology. We catch glimpses of what it was like to live during the Reign of Terror in 18th century France and we delve into the dichotomies upon which the title of the novel rests. A Tale of Two Cities. The choice between changing society and changing oneself. The gulf between revolutionary ideals and the realities of the human heart.
The themes of Dickens' masterpiece came back to me over the past two weeks as I read various stories in The Columbus Dispatch. You may have seen them all. But perhaps you did not think of them in quite these terms. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." It was a tale of two churches. It was the ancient dichotomy of law and grace, explored all over again.
Two weeks ago yesterday we read about the First Baptist Church of Berryville, Arkansas. Right next to color photos of Dr. Jack Kevorkian burning a cease-and-desist order outside the state office building in Detroit, and of Coretta Scott King placing a wreath on the grave of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., commemorating the 29th anniversary of his slaying, we find an Associated Press story entitled "Church closes (daycare) center to keep moms (at) home."
The story explains that the church felt they were giving people a mixed signal about home and family values by operating a daycare center. On the one hand they were preaching about the role of mothers as homemakers, arguing that the practice of mothers working outside the home was unbiblical; on the other hand they were running a daycare center which enabled mothers to do just that. If families were to go without such luxuries as "two vehicles, a big TV, a microwave, new clothes, eating out, and nice vacations," the church stated in a letter to daycare parents, they could get by on one salary and everyone would be a lot better off.
The church hoped to keep the daycare center open until May, in order to give parents time to adjust their lifestyles or to make other arrangements, but once the word of their decision got out the situation at the center became so untenable as to require its immediate closure. They refunded a week of tuition, gave every family $50, and shut the doors. The story was picked up not only by the Associate Press but also by Good Morning America, the Religion News Service, and numerous other media outlets around the nation. (The Columbus Dispatch, April 5, 1997, and Religion News Service, April 11, 1997).
Now move forward two weeks to yesterday's paper and read the story of the First Church of God, right here in Columbus. The pastor of the church is The Rev. Timothy Clarke, whom many of you will know or recognize from his frequent visibility in the local media. The occasion of the story was Clarke's 15th anniversary as the church's pastor, and the title of the story was "Family (is the) key in (a) growing church."
The story details the saga of turning around a 60-year-old church that had only 60 active members at the time Clarke arrived. Today Clarke oversees 900 active members, a new building, and numerous nonprofit corporations serving the neighborhood. To what does Rev. Clarke attribute this success? It was not his oratorical skills, which are nevertheless legendary. Instead he spoke about the congregation's openness to change, its willingness to follow leadership, and it's attentiveness to the needs of people.
It took seven years to lay the foundation for church growth, and then things really took off. "Part of the reason" for this growth, explains Rev. Clarke, is that we have "a family motif. (We give people) a sense of belonging, a sense of excitement and emotion. (We tell people that) the joy of the Lord is your strength."
What this means in real terms is that people think of the First Church of God as a place they can turn to with their problems, family or otherwise. The church responds with compassion rather than condemnation or condescension. The church develops programs rather than excuses. Children started to come by, and the church started to feed them. Families started to come by, and the church started to serve them. Over time the church developed a children's choir, a large junior church, a latchkey program, and, yes, a daycare center. "We believe in children," Rev. Clarke concluded. "Even though (they are only) 30 to 40 percent of our nation's population..., they are 100 percent of our future." (The Columbus Dispatch, April 19, 1997).
Which of these two churches sounds more like the church you want to be? Which of these two churches sounds more like law and which sounds more like grace? Which of these two churches sounds more like the one we heard about in this morning's scripture lesson from the book of Acts?
The lesson told the tale of a third church, not long after the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Let's call it the First Church of Jerusalem, pastored by Simon Peter and filled with the Holy Ghost. Following an impassioned speech in which Peter explained from the scriptures how the Messiah must suffer, die, and be raised from the dead, the people were cut to the quick and clamored to find out what they must do to be saved. "Repent and be baptized," was the familiar answer, "so that your sins will be forgiven and you will be filled with the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away." (Acts 2:38f).
Ah, how scripture slips in its gems of wisdom! "The promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away." This was not was not some pie-in-the-sky, bye-and-bye salvation, this not an exercise in psychology, this was the invitation to build an inter-generational community that transcended the boundaries of geography and culture. For you, for your children, and for all who are far away. So the church was built by those who committed themselves to the teaching of the apostles, the life together, the common meal, and the prayers.
They eagerly sought to meet the needs of those who were coming forward in faith. They even sold what they owned and pooled their resources in order to meet people's needs. They would go the Temple and then gather in their homes for a joyous common meal. Their lifestyle was so different from the self-serving culture around them that people were drawn to them, day by day. People generally liked what they saw. And a movement that started out with a handful of broken disciples went on to take the world by storm.
So which church sounds more like the First Church of Jerusalem? The First Baptist Church of Berryville, Arkansas -- which closed down its daycare center and gave every family a $50 bill? Or the First Church of God, of Columbus, Ohio -- which started up a daycare center and countless other social ministries to meet the needs of people? The choice seems rather obvious to me.
The First Church of Jerusalem was apparently spared this debate. It was not victimized by notion of the nuclear family, with a male breadwinner and a female homemaker, as God's design for the Christian family. That is a rather late invention of the 20th century. Instead, the First Church of Jerusalem worked with whatever households God brought their way. They worked to strengthen those households and to meet their needs without discrimination or fear. This same possibility exists today when churches are willing to suspend judgement and to take risks in order to meet the needs of people.
Between September of 1989 and March of 1990, the Search Institute of Minneapolis, Minnesota conducted a comprehensive study of 47,000 young people in grades six through twelve. They measured the assets, the deficits, and the at-risk behaviors of these youth.
The assets included psychological support, control, structured time use, educational commitment, positive values, and social competence. The deficits included being alone at home, hedonistic values, overexposure to television, drinking parties, stress, physical abuse, sexual abuse, parental addiction, social isolation, and negative peer pressure. The at-risk behaviors included alcohol, tobacco, illicit drugs, sexuality, depression, suicide, antisocial behavior, school absenteeism, eating disorders, and vehicle safety.
As one might suspect, the greater the assets and the fewer the deficits, the fewer at-risk behaviors a youth is likely to exhibit. As one might not suspect, the traditional nuclear family -- mom, dad, and 2.3 children -- was not the key to avoiding at-risk behaviors. When single-parent households or non-traditional families provided nearly as many assets as two-parent households or traditional families, the youth thrived in equal proportions!
The determining factor was not what the church in Berryville called "home and family values;" the determining factor was the network of support a family enjoys, whether parented by one adult, mom and dad, or any other configuration of adults. Children do well when they have high-quality schools, positive friends, involvement in extracurricular activities, and involvement in religious institutions. Children do not do well when these things are lacking. (Cf. Richard P. Olson & Joe H. Leonard, Jr. A New Day for Family Ministry, The Alban Institute Bethesda, MD, 1996).
What this means has been demonstrated over and over again: Church participation is good for you, regardless of the configuration of your household. This is what social scientists are coming to call the "faith factor." It is a combination of religious attendance and commitment. The more involved a person is with his or her faith, the more adverse they become to at-risk behaviors. Over 30 studies have shown a correlation between religious participation and avoidance of crime and substance abuse. It has been shown to significantly lower the rate of recidivism among convicted felons as well as the rates of depression and suicide among teenagers. (U.S. News & World Report, September 9, 1996 and Journal of Youth & Adolescence, October 1993).
"It's remarkable how much good empirical evidence there is," observes John DiIulio of the Brookings Institution, "that religious belief (and practice) can make a positive difference." Churches provide a set of values and moral beliefs. They also provide a supportive community. But perhaps most importantly they provide the motivation of being united with God. When relationships have been violated and trust has been broken, the blessing of God's acceptance can be a powerful motivation indeed.
And yet we come to one last story, this time in Friday's Dispatch, that Americans are sleeping in on Sunday mornings in record numbers. Weekly attendance at worship has slumped to its lowest levels since before World War II. The Gallup Organization reports that 38% of U.S. adults in 1996 attended a church or synagogue in the last seven days. That's down from 43% in 1995 and it's the lowest percentage since 1940, when worship attendance hit an all-time low of 37%. The all-time high came in 1955 and 1958, when 49% said they had attended a weekly worship service. (The Columbus Dispatch, April 18, 1997).
Is it any wonder that so many households are struggling with an explosion of at-risk behaviors? All these stories and statistics come down to one simple truth: the vast majority of us have stopped doing and believing the things that make for peace. And we're paying the price. It's not about the decline of the nuclear family, as though this was the normative prescription of God for all people in every place and time. It's about the decline of our participation in church and of our belief in God, along with the other assets that help people thrive.
It takes a church to strengthen our families, and it takes families to strengthen our church. The first letter of John poses a rhetorical question that confronts us yet today. How can we say that we believe in God if we fail to respond to the needs of God's people? This is God's commandment: that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and that we love one another, just as he has commanded us. (1 John 3:17, 23).
Sounds like a prescription straight out of the latest scientific survey! Believe in God and go to church. Act on your convictions. Don't close the doors of your daycare center and tell people to fend for themselves; reach out with the confidence that God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves. Let's not just talk about love; let's practice love. This is the only way to live in harmony with God and one another.
It is my heartfelt prayer that we will heed this scriptural counsel. If you have become lax in your church participation or your religious conviction, it's not too late to turn things around. Make your appearance here this morning the start of a new pattern that will call you out of yourself and infuse you with the blessings of God. It takes a church to strengthen a family, and I know of no better place to go than here and no better time to start than now. Amen.
It Takes A Village
The First Congregational Church
United Church of Christ
Columbus, Ohio
April 27, 1997
Memory Verse: "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother." (Mark 3:35)
Today's Texts: Acts 8:26-40, Psalm 22:25-31, and John 15:1-8
Opening Prayer: Holy God, may this time of preaching be filled with your Spirit. Open our hearts and minds to you. Amen.
Children's Sermon: Dramatize Are You My Mother? by P.D. Eastman (Beginner Books New York, 1960). Point: In finding God we find someone who truly loves and cares for us.
For those of you who've come to hear a 20-minute sermon, I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed. Between choir awards, a children's sermon, Ella's baptism, a mission spotlight, and our Heritage Day plans at the Jeffrey Mansion -- I could almost sit down right now in order to end on time. I'll risk saying a bit more than that, but you may have to come back next week if you want to hear me tie up the loose ends.
It's hard to say how many times I read Are You My Mother? to my own children when they were young. It's been around for almost 40 years, and it's a classic. It has all the right ingredients. Suspense. Fear. Longing. Humor. Drama. And, of course, the obligatory happy ending as mother and baby bird snuggle happily together in the nest.
Children can hardly get enough of this book. It evokes their worst nightmares -- to fend for themselves in a strange and hostile environment -- and it resolves them all. Gathered under the wings of their mother, the children rest as though they are being held in the everlasting arms of God.
Two weeks ago I attended lectures at Trinity Lutheran Seminary given by Dr. Renita Weems of Vanderbilt University. Dr. Weems put a different spin on this story with her observation that it contains a not-so-subtle condemnation of mothers who work outside the home. Remember the mother bird's predicament: her baby's about to come into the world, but there's no food in the pantry and there's no father around to take care of the situation. So mother bird leaves the nest to provide for her young charge. It is pure, economic necessity.
While mother is away at work, baby bird falls out of the nest and experiences increasing anxiety over its plight in the world. Look at all the terrible things that happen while mother is away at work! First rejection and then indifference! If it wasn't for a good-hearted old Snort, baby bird might never have been found at all.
Dr. Weems' analysis may spoil an otherwise favorite tale, but it highlights one of the critical problems facing our households today: economic pressure has put all of our households -- from single adults to large, extended families -- under the gun. This is what Hillary Clinton means when she writes that the "modern village, so frantic and fragmented," has removed the support many families need to be viable. (It Takes A Village: And Other Lessons Children Teach Us, Simon & Schuster New York, 1996).
The picture that emerges is not a pretty picture. Financial pressure has done more to destroy the American family in the latter part of the 20th century than any other single factor. When you hear talk about the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer, that doesn't just have economic consequences. That has far-reaching social, moral, and spiritual consequences which impinge upon each and every one of our households.
This problem accommodates only two solutions: either our society has to be reorganized in order to give households more money or our households have to be reorganized in order to require less money from society. One hundred years ago Washington Gladden, the pastor of this church, was a staunch advocate of labor unions because he viewed them as a positive and necessary influence for the equitable distribution of wealth in society. (The Labor Question, Pilgrim Press New York, 1911). He saw it as a matter of economic justice, mandated by God, to give workers sufficient wages and benefits to live decently.
Gladden's position, as we will hear at this afternoon's Heritage Day program, was not always popular among the industrialists of our congregation. It has continuing relevance today, as increasing numbers of families slip below the poverty line. But the march of economic and social justice takes a very long time. We would therefore do well to consider just as seriously the other side of the equation. What can we do to reorganize our households in order to require less money from society?
That question goes against the grain of the American dream. Very few people choose to move down the ladder voluntarily. Down is a word for losers. But that may be exactly what we need to do if we hope to reduce the financial stress that is tearing at the fabric of our families. This is, after all, the message of the gospel. That those who humble themselves shall be exalted, while those who exalt themselves shall be humbled. (Matthew 23:12). That the first shall be last while the last shall be first. (Matthew 19:30). That Christ came down from heaven, setting aside the privileges of deity, and took on the status of a slave for our salvation. (Philippians 2:6f).
In this morning's gospel lesson, Jesus said: "I am the vine and you are the branches. Whoever stays connected to me will be pruned back, in order to bear even more fruit. Whoever separates from me is deadwood, to be gathered up and thrown on the bonfire." In pruning our expectations and financial requirements, in allowing God to be God, we will be set free from the demands that so often take us away from our families and we will finally be able to reap the harvest that love has sown. Amen.
It Takes A Community
The First Congregational Church
United Church of Christ
Columbus, Ohio
May 4, 1997
Memory Verse: "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother." (Mark 3:35)
Today's Texts: Acts 9:19b-31, Psalm 98:1-9, and John 15:9-17
Opening Prayer: Loving God, parent of the entire human family, we ask for you to strengthen our bonds as sisters and brothers in Christ. Make us open and receptive to your word. Amen.
We are in the midst of our series on Families in the Family of God. The series began with the simple recognition that families come in every size, shape, and variety. Contrary to what the religious right may say, there is no biblical standard which normalizes the nuclear family for all people everywhere. On the contrary, scripture reveals at least 40 different family types which are used by God, in many and various ways, to advance the cause of salvation history.
The question is not, "Who's in the household?" The question is, "How does the household live?" After bringing people into the promised land, with all of the household breaking and blending brought on by 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, Joshua issued a clarion call to faith: "Choose this day whom you will serve ... but as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD." (Joshua 24:15).
Two weeks ago we explored the growing body of evidence that Joshua's choice represents an important decision for families to make. Serving the Lord, which means learning and practicing what God wants us to do, has proven to be an important indicator of household well-being. Regular attendance at church is one of the good things a family can do for itself. It may require discipline, particularly if you haven't been in the habit of going to church every Sunday, but it is worth the effort.
Last week we began to look at the other side of the coin. Religious conviction and church attendance is one thing a family can do for itself, but there's only so much a family can do on its own. Without adequate support from the society at large, even the most disciplined of families can be worn down and wasted away. Financial pressure takes a tremendous toll on people, to name only one factor which is disrupting the happiness and viability of the places we call home.
Recently I came across a cogent analysis of how society impacts the individual and the household. The author observed that during his own lifetime he had witnessed an explosive period of growth and a transformation from one economy to another. "When the wheels of progress are whirling at such tremendous speed," he writes, they tend to separate people, and to create "a great many diverse and apparently unrelated elements. (People) tend to become unsympathetic, jealous,.and antagonistic; the social bond is weakened. ... People move so often that there is not much neighborly affection. ... The feeling of a common interest, which is the cement of the social order, has largely disappeared from large sections of society."
People were suffering, in other words, because of the enormous changes in technology, communication, transportation and production. It's not that these changes were in and of themselves bad, it's just that the author did not see them as being counterbalanced by comparable changes in how people understand and relate to each other. The forces that were tearing people apart and destroying our families were greater than the forces that were bringing people together and creating our families.
Having analyzed the problem, the author spent the rest of the article trying to come up with solutions. If individuals and households are being destroyed by the changes in our society, then where can they turn for help? The author didn't take much comfort in State-sponsored programs. Instead of being the union of all for the common good, the State has become an institute of rights. One person or group is protected from another through an increasingly complex set of laws and regulations. The State functions more as a police force than a source of social integration..
Although the author did not completely give up hope that the State could be redeemed, he saw more hope in the Christian Church and other communities of faith for counterbalancing the forces of disintegration and disunity. This is, after all the Church's specific charge: "to promote the unity of the spirit in the bonds of peace." To organize people around the law of love. To disregard the external and visible differences in order to esteem the internal and invisible similarities.
Unfortunately the church has all too often abandoned its specific charge, which goes back to Jesus himself. What did Jesus say to his disciples in this morning's gospel lesson? "This is my commandment: that you love one another as I have loved you. That you lay down your lives for your friends. That you bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that God will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is the root command: that you love one another." (John 15: 12f, 16f). Could anything be clearer than that?
Do you think that someone who spoke this way to his disciples would be happy with the animosities that exist between Christians? Do you think he would be happy with those who feel as though they cannot even share communion together? Do you think he would be happy with our many different sects and denominations? Do you think he would be happy with those churches where some people are more welcome than others? Do you think he would be happy when Christians do not even take the time to care for the people we sit with in the pews?
The author didn't think so. And he went on to argue that the recognition and realization of our common unity in Christ was the first duty of the church in times like these. "The day is not far off," the author concludes, "when the world will see that the way of love is the only way of life."
Perhaps, by now, some of you have discerned that the author of this analysis was neither a contemporary nor a social scientist. For those who've looked at the books mentioned in the Order of Worship, you may have discerned that the author was none other than our own Washington Gladden, writing 100 years ago, in 1897, under the title of Social Facts and Forces (The Knickerbocker Press New York).
I have included this review of Gladden's concluding chapter for two reasons. First, for the reassurance it offers to know that we've been here before -- and we've managed to survive. Washington Gladden lived through the Industrial Revolution. He was born in 1836, just after the introduction of the steam-powered railroad on American soil. Our society was still primarily an agrarian economy with little centralization and differentiation. There was really only one social class.
By the time Gladden died in 1918, everything had changed. The country had moved to the cities and the economy had moved to the factories. Great, big factories that required great, big labor forces to produce great, big machines. Suddenly, management and labor were separated by the gulf of anonymity and the spirit of hostility. They no longer shared the same interest. Gladden saw the Church as one of the few humanizing institutions left to ameliorate the negative side-effects of rapid and revolutionary social change.
Today, we find ourselves in the throws of the next great economic revolution. We are moving from the Industrial Age to the Information Age, and the pace of change is even greater than the whirlwind experienced by Washington Gladden. If Gladden thought things were coming apart at the seams in 1897, he should have lived to see 1997! The whirling dervish has been cranked up to record speeds. Only now things are moving in the direction of decentralization and consumerism.
This revolution is proving to be no greater friend of social integration than the one witnessed by Washington Gladden. "The technological imperative (of this revolution)," writes two of the nations' leading futurists, "seems to have no room for families, community, or the past." (Richard Carlson & Bruce Goldman, Fast Forward: Where Technology, Demographics, and History Will Take America and the World in the Next Thirty Years, HarperBusiness New York, 1994). It would seem we need the Christian Church, as envisioned by Washington Gladden, now more than ever.
Which brings me to the second and sadder reason for my review of Gladden's analysis. 100 years later, can we honestly say that the Church in general, or our church in particular, is any closer to realizing the ideal of Christian love? Although we have made some progress in the relations between our various sects and denominations, it has hardly been universal and there are still many areas in which we come up short. If there is to be a counterpoise to the "technological imperative," it's going to take a lot more commitment and a lot more effort than most of us have been in the habit of giving.
As Senior Minister, I have occasion to visit many of our older church members, some of them shut-in for health reasons, and to talk with them about their more active years in the church. One question I usually ask is, "Who were the people you knew best in the church?" Often, they will mention the names of people with whom I am very familiar -- people who are still on our membership rolls today. But when was the last time these people heard from or saw their acquaintances and friends? They often have hard time remembering, and it's not unusual for me to conduct funerals of church members with no one from our congregation in attendance.
This phenomenon is not limited to our older church members who have been out of circulation for many years. Sometimes very active members drop by the wayside, and no one notices or calls. Sometimes very active members cry out for help, and no one bothers to respond.
Please don't misunderstand me. I am not trying to lay a guilt trip upon you and I am not saying that this is universally true. No doubt each of us can think of examples when we have taken the time to truly care for the people we sit with in the pews. Not just to talk about caring for them, but to actually do something for someone. The recent creation of our parish visitor group is a case in point. This church is no worse than any other church when it comes to the question of community. But neither are we any better. The Christian Church can and should do more if we hope to counterbalance the revolutionary forces which are tearing at the bonds of kith and kin.
Recently, we had a visitor at our church who was greeted quite warmly following our traditional 11:00 worship service. That has always been, at least in my experience, one of our better moments. When the visitor was asked about what brought him to First Church, he replied, "It was the contemporary worship service. I came to the traditional service, just this once, to see what it was like." Suddenly the warm greeting became a bit cooler. "Well, that's not our tradition," he was told, leaving our visitor a bit curious about the kind of community we seek to have in this body of Christ.
Such divisions are not becoming a community which seeks to put on the mantle of Christ. Love one another, as I have loved you. Promote peace and good-will among all people everywhere, beginning with those who walk in your doors. Do not make anyone feel more welcome than anyone else. Instead, rise to the challenge of seeing and believing your common bond in Christ.
This is the Great Commission of Gladden's "social gospel," a commission which we seek to carry on yet today here at First Church. Families simply cannot make it alone. And the village is too far-flung and chaotic to really know or care for anyone. So where's a person to turn? Hopefully, you can turn to the church, as a primary network of values and relationships that support and affect our lives.
One church has taken this on by developing an intentional relationship between children and a wide circle of adults. Each child in the church is assigned three adults on an annual basis. One adult is the child's Sunday school teacher. That adult is not only responsible for teaching the child, but for making sure the child gets to class. The second adult contacts the child every week, by mail or phone, as something of a mentor and confidant. The third adult prays for the child by name every day. Is it any wonder, with such a network of values and relationships, that the children in this church are thriving and that the church is growing by adding new young families who appreciate the sense of being cared for?
Parenting is no longer something we can take for granted or do without support. Aging is no longer something which takes place in the context of families. Singles have their own anxieties and fears. All this walks in the door of every church of every stripe on every Sunday of the year. The question becomes one of recognition and acceptance.
Do we welcome the different needs of people, with all their attendant brokenness and messiness, or do we try to keep a lid on this kind of thing? Do we seek to become the kind of community where it is safe for people to be who they really are, or do find too much comfort in the appearance of unanimity and success? Are we willing to reach out and listen rather than to shut down and control?
These are the ingredients that make for true community. And true community is the key to making it in the world. When the apostle Paul was converted to Christianity, he created quite a stir, first among the Jews who lived in Damascus and then among the Hellenists who lived in Jerusalem. Both times it took the community of faith to rescue Paul from his own destruction.
That is the hope and dream of what the community of faith will do for us all. When we learn to care for each other, without judgment or condemnation, but with the gracious Spirit of our Lord Jesus Christ, we will be built up in the fear of the Lord and the comfort of the Holy Spirit. This is the gospel of God. Amen.
It Takes A Sanctuary
The First Congregational Church
United Church of Christ
Columbus, Ohio
May 11, 1997
Memory Verse: "Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother." (Mark 3:35)
Today's Texts: Acts 1:1-14, Psalm 16:1-11, Ephesians 1:15-23
Opening Prayer: O God, we are thankful to come into this place and to worship you. We thank you that you care enough to provide a safe haven for our souls. Be with us now and speak to us of life. Amen.
There has been, at times, a curious correspondence between the subjects of my sermon series and the news of the day. This may have as much to do with me as with the news, but the correspondence is curious nonetheless.
When my daughter Bryn was born, I thought we had given her a very unique name. Within days, however, I was seeing the name "Bryn" wherever I looked. On street signs, sports' programs, billboards, and television. My increased awareness of the name "Bryn" suddenly brought that name to the foreground in my field of vision. It was jumping out at me all over the place, even in places I had been many times before.
This does not seem to be the exact same phenomenon when the subject of my current sermon series, planned months or even a year in advance, suddenly makes front page news or becomes the focus of a popular book. This turn of events is a little harder to explain than simply my increased awareness. It looks more like divine intervention, and the material usually works its way into my sermons. God apparently knows when I need a little help.
I had this experience again last week when the cover of U.S. News & World Report boasted a crying diaper pin next to the headline, "The Lies PARENTS Tell About Work, Kids, Money, Day Care, and Ambition." (May 12, 1997). Having just talked about the fact that families are not getting the support they need from society in order to be fully functional, we find a prominent news weekly going on a full-scale offensive.
The gist of the article is that parents are not taking good care of their children because they are more concerned about their own contentment than they are about the welfare of their children. Parents work outside the home less to pay the bills than to enjoy the good life and to escape the home life. Parents put their children in day care centers without really knowing whether those centers provide adequate care. Parents don't take the opportunity to be home more, even when companies offer flexibility in the time and location for work. Fathers tend to talk the talk, but rarely to walk the walk, when it comes to sharing the responsibility for nurturing and child raising.
By the time I got to the end of the article, I was both exhausted and angry. For all its objectivity, it was another case of blaming the victim. Families who are doing the best they can, under extremely difficult circumstances, are being criticized and condemned for not doing enough. Women bear the brunt of this criticism for stepping out of their supposedly "God-given" roll to nurture and clean. Just this morning, in The Columbus Dispatch, we find a Russian cosmonaut being quoted as saying, "It's my opinion that a wife should stay at home for the most part, not at work and not in spaceflight. That's my opinion. There's nothing new in that because I think the majority of men will support me, because the majority of us would prefer that everything in our home is taken care of and everything is quiet." (May 11, 1997).
Such attacks make the business of juggling the responsibilities of work and home all the more guilt-ridden and problematic. In my experience, they do more harm than good. What families need are safe places to turn with their questions, needs, and aspirations. Judgment and condemnation is not the tone we need to strike right now. Refuge and release is more to the point.
I remember my experience in Middle School, which started in the seventh grade. One of my classmates was named Tom Borchert. I'm not sure how many times Tom had repeated the seventh grade, but I do know that he was big, hairy, fully-developed, and totally intimidating. He wore a leather jacket, smoked cigarettes, had a real girl friend, and would occasionally punch someone out lest we forget his position as the class bully. The locker room was Tom's domain, as he would strut around and occasionally snap kids with his towel.
My theory is that every seventh grade class has a Tom Borchert. I'm sure you know the type. Bill Cosby has gotten more than one laugh off of guys like this. But it's really not a laughing matter. There were times when I wondered where the teachers were, and how he was getting away with all this. There were times when I looked to them for refuge and relief, to keep things from really getting ugly.
Even if you have no personal experience with bullies, you can probably remember nightmares of being chased. When you're doing the best you can to get away, and they're still gaining on you -- there's nothing like waking up to the realization that it's all a dream.
For most of history, people have spent their lives in this very mode. It's based on the old command of an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, and it takes the form of a family feud. One person wrongs another, which must be avenged in like kind. In the ancient Near East, families even appointed a blood avenger to settle the score from one infraction to the next. The task was as gruesome as its name. Injury was punishable by injury; murder was punishable by murder. The assailant was hunted by the avenger until justice was done.
This system was cruder than our own, but it kept law and order. People knew they would be held accountable for their deeds. They also knew that one mistake could put the blood avenger hot on their tails. An accidental homicide could be punished just as fiercely as a vicious, premeditated murder.
God resolved this situation for the ancient Israelites by creating six "cities of refuge" scattered geographically throughout the land for easy access. "Then the LORD spoke to Joshua, saying,... "Appoint the cities of refuge, of which I spoke to you through Moses, so that anyone who kills a person without intent or by mistake may flee there; they shall be for you a refuge from the avenger of blood." (Joshua 20:1-3)
Reaching one of those cities would be like waking up from the nightmare. The avenger of blood might be bearing down upon you, sweat might be streaming from your brow, but once inside the city gates you were safe from the avenger's wrath.
So began the great tradition of sanctuary in the history of our faith. Flowing from the very heart of God was the concern that people could not live by justice alone. People needed the mitigating factor of mercy and they needed safe places to go when they were feeling hunted down and oppressed. The "cities of refuge" paint a beautiful picture of God's compassion and love.
After the conversion of the Roman Emperor to Christianity in the 4th century A.D., the tradition of the "cities of refuge" was carried on by the churches themselves. Their buildings, their sanctuaries, their sacred and holy places for worshiping God, became asylums for criminals, refugees, and fugitives. The sanctuary knocker on the front door of the church was all a person needed to touch in order to be safe from the magistrates, who may have been in hot pursuit. There was an aura of protection around the sanctuaries which most people were afraid to violate.
This is what our families need more of in times like these. Not the kind of finger-wagging which we find in society at large, but the kind of sanctuary that takes people in and shelters them from the stormy blast. We all need safe places in which to go.
Psalm 91 rests this aura of protection squarely on the outstretched arms of God. "Those who live in the shelter of the Most High will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty. This I declare of the Lord: God alone is our refuge, we trust in God and we are safe! God rescues us from hidden traps. God shields us from deadly hazards. God's huge outstretched arms protect us -- under them we're perfectly safe." (cf. Eugene Peterson, Psalms, NavPress Colorado Springs, CO, 1994).
This spirit recently led Church Council to approve a mission statement regarding our commitment as a church to be a sanctuary for families, children, and youth:
"As members of The First Congregational Church, UCC, of Columbus, OH, we intend that this church will be a safe place for all people, including children and youth. As members, we covenant with each other to support and care for people of all ages as they participate in worship, service, educational programs, and fellowship. We recognize an obligation to protect them and to that end we will endeavor to keep them safe in all ways: spiritually, physically, and emotionally." (Approved, April 1997)
That statement may not seem like much. It may seem obvious or innocuous. But at its core lies a strong intention to make this place the kind of place that families, children, and youth can turn to for strengthening and support. We're inviting people to come, to hide here for a time, to get out of danger, to regroup, to recuperate, to find new strength in the One who died, rose from the grave, and ascended into heaven.
Certainly this was the message which Jesus tried to share with his disciples after his death and resurrection. He talked with them about the reign of God and they ate together. "You must not leave Jerusalem, he told them, until you are baptized in the Holy Spirit. Then you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." (Acts 1:4f, 8). Not long after he said this, Jesus was taken away, leaving the disciples and the women in a state of wondrous confusion.
This confusion eventually gave way to the affirmation that Jesus now had the ability to fill the church with his presence and to make it the body of Christ. (Ephesians 1:22f). When we gather as the church, we do not gather under our own power; we gather under the power of God.
With this power as the source of our inspiration and direction, it is a crime of the highest order whenever the sanctuary of the church is violated. When the church doesn't feel like a refuge for families, children, and youth -- when the church says or does things which harm our families, children, and youth -- we aren't just causing problems for ourselves, we are causing problems for God.
It is my deep conviction that each and every one of us have enough pain to last a lifetime. The church dare not add any more fuel to the fire.
This past week was another one of those weeks when I was getting up early and going to bed late. There were two special conferences, twenty-four hours on racial justice and six hours on the 50 Day Spiritual Adventure. I had a memorial service on Wednesday, my "day off," a Guild luncheon on Friday, and a CCAD graduation on Saturday. On top of this, there was the usual correspondence, meetings, publication deadlines, special needs, and pastoral calls. Not to mention preparation for worship and the writing of a sermon.
As the hours begin to add up, it's easy to feel guilty about not having enough time to clean the house or play with your children. Making that time takes effort and commitment. Some weeks I do better than others. The last thing anyone needs is for the church to make them feel worse than they already feel. When that happens, we are not helping to strengthen our families. We are hurting them.
A totally different approach accepts the struggles of our families, affirms the efforts they are making -- however feeble -- and attempts to help them find God along the way. Too often we give the impression that God can only be found when all is quiet and we are away on a wilderness retreat. This certainly has its place, but the church is a sanctuary of a different sort, where people turn for direction and refuge in the midst of their everyday lives.
Family spirituality is a different sort of experience. It is noisy and active. It is finding God as we care for and attend to the needs of others. It is finding God as we clean our house or drive to work. It is finding God as we say our prayers or go to church. These things are the everyday stuff of life, but with the right support and attention we can turn these things into the witness of God's compassion and grace.
This past week a group of mothers from our church got together in the parlor with their infants and pre-school children to share stories and support as parents. I stopped in to say hello and the room was filled with that wonderful energy when people share a common bond and there are babies everywhere! It felt like a refuge and a safe harbor from the storms of life. We need more of this kind of thing.
The storms do, after all, eventually come upon us all. You may feel no need for a refuge right now, but there will come a day when you're the one running from the avenger rather than somebody else. There will come a day when things are not going as smoothly as you would like. And on that day you will be glad that somebody fashioned a church where you could come without judgment or condemnation. Where you could seek help without fear of rejection and embarrassment. Where you could be yourself in the journey of life.
It takes a sanctuary for our families to grow into the image and stature of Christ. That's far more than a building. That's a place where we can come to find rest for our souls. Amen.