From the Pulpit:

The Rev. Margaret Waters

I want you to imagine a billboard. It might be real.  I’ll bet you’ve seen something like it. It reads: Got questions? Got problems? Is something missing in your life? Come to church. We’ve got the answers. Well, statistics actually do show that people who worship regularly in churches and synagogues have less stress, stronger marriages, and better health than people who don’t. That’s reason enough to go to church, isn’t it? But I’m going to hazard a guess that if we dig deep back into the very beginnings of our starting to go to church, and we might have to go back several generations so some of us won’t have access to this, but somewhere back there there was a day when you thought to yourself, I really need something and I think I might find it at church. For some, that might be today, that you dared to drive up this hill and walk into this building and took a seat, not really knowing if it was OK to sit there, and you’re wondering if you are going to get what you came for. That was the beginning for all of us, and I believe that it was God who plants that hunger deep inside all of us to bring us together. But something happens along the way, and that’s what I want to talk about, and this is the perfect day to talk about it. 

This is one of those times when in order to get a deeper understanding of what is going on in the portion of Mark’s gospel that Ann just read, we need to step back and look at the bigger story. Jesus and the disciples are on the road, going from town to town teaching and healing and casting out demons, and it wasn’t all that long ago that practically out of the blue Peter made the astonishing announcement that he had figured out who Jesus was and that he was the Messiah, the savior who had been promised by  God to come and liberate the Jewish people from the empire that was oppressing them. Well, that set the wheels going so fast in Peter, James, and John’s minds that they became incapable of hearing Jesus telling them that this didn’t mean what they thought it meant.  It wasn’t going to be palaces and chariots and dancing girls. It was going to be grueling  work and in the end for him it would mean death on the cross because that was the inevitable result of angering the people who were in power. Jesus even took these three friends up the mountainside, where he became transfigured before their eyes in the company of Moses and Elijah and where they heard from God’s own mouth that Jesus was his beloved son, so, darn it, you guys, listen to him! And so they keep going from town to town and the wheels keep turning and the ears keep not listening. And so, here they are today, and they’ve got a scheme. When all this shakes down, when this kingdom stuff happens, we want to be your executive vice presidents. We want the privileged positions, OK? Can’t you just hear Jesus say, Oy, veh? Here we go again. What part of suffering do you not understand? And he says, can you drink my cup, can you be baptized with my baptism, and they high five and say, You betcha! And he tells them again, it’s not about the privileges, it’s about the work. 

Ever since Ann and I went to the Renovare Conference and heard some of the most breathtaking speakers I’ve ever been privileged to listen to, I’ve become more and more aware that our Christian journey is one of becoming more and more like Jesus. I imagine some of you would be the first to point out to me that I’ve got a long way to go, and I know that, but it is so hope-full, so encouraging, so inspiring to me to feel that even  though I know I’ll never get all the way there, if I am attentive and intentional, if I make myself stop and listen to all the way God speaks to me, if I pay attention to all the  blessings I have received and give heartfelt thanks for them and joyfully let those blessings pass through my hands and out to those who need them, I may become ever so slightly more like Jesus. 

This hope is at the heart of the stewardship campaign that begins today and will continue for six weeks as we talk about what it means to be the stewards of all God’s gifts and to pray and meditate on how we will share what we have been given by making a pledge to St. Alban’s for 2010. 

Judy and Mike Evans are once again chairs of the stewardship commission, and I hope I won’t embarrass them if I say that it delights me to see how this ministry has begun to transform them. When they accepted it over a year ago it was with some degree of reluctance. They were taking on a job to be done, a challenge to be met, and the measure of their success would be spelled out in numbers. I see something different this year, though. I see passion and delight, and I am pretty sure that even though the numbers do matter, their vision of success has more to do with people’s hearts than with their pocketbooks. 

(There is a large object covered by a sheet, leaning against the altar.) So, who is curious as to what is behind this sheet? Actually, I might have let it be the sermon all by itself. Paul, would you please come up and help me? (Together we remove the sheet, and reveal a large framed picture, the image of the icon of the Christ Pantocrator, a photo mosaic made up of photographs of people in our parish.) Who do you see? (Paul tells the congregation what he sees, who he sees.) We see Jesus and we see ourselves. I’m going to let Tom Brotherton tell you in more detail about the process of making this photo mosaic, but unless you are attending St. Alban’s for the first time today, it is almost certain that you are part of this Jesus. It’s going to hang in the Parish Life Center from now on to remind us that we make up the Christ who lives for the sake of healing and blessing the world. 

It’s also appropriate that we are going to have a pot luck lunch today. I can feel the hunger pangs in my tummy and am looking forward to eating and the fellowship, but I have to tell you that I take even greater joy in bringing a special dish to share with all of you. And this year, for the very first time in the 29 years of St. Alban’s at our Vestry election today we have a slate of five people who are eager to serve in this ministry.  There is no doubt but that the Holy Spirit is very much alive here, and that it is alive not only for our sakes so that we may be satisfied by getting whatever it was that drew us up here in hunger, but it is alive for the sake of the people who are out there somewhere thinking, I’m hungry for something. I wonder what it is and where I might find it. Everything we do up here is for their sake and for the sake of the children at Menchaca Elementary School who are delighted with their new mentors, and for the people who find food in the pantry at El Buen Samaritano, and for the people of Trinity Center and who wait for their Meals on Wheels and the inmates who are learning to read from our SAIL volunteers. There are so many ways we give, and it is in the giving even more than in the receiving that we find ourselves becoming transformed into the likeness of Christ. We came to be fed, but somewhere along the way we found that what truly feeds us is feeding others, sharing the good gifts God has given us.  

James and John were not bad guys. They weren’t even essentially greedy. They just didn’t get it yet. They would, though, because we know that in the end they risked and lost their lives spreading the gospel of Christ’s love. Their transformation didn’t take place overnight, but they both became saints. The slogan we’re starting out with for our pledge drive this year is ‘Giving and growing in the likeness of Christ.’ Look at him! Isn’t he beautiful? And do you know, if you were taken out, if you were not there, if you were not giving of yourself this picture would not be whole. He wouldn’t look like Jesus and neither would we. 

Amen.  

02/13/2010