23 January, 2011: "Quarrels Among Us"

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

“Quarrels Among Us”
When Cindy Sheehan, the mother of Specialist Casey Sheehan who died in Iraq, “resigned” from her role as the face of the anti-war movement nearly four years ago, she did so with painful commentary on the state of the so-called peace movement. Citing infighting and jealous turf wars, she wrote:

I have … tried to work within a peace movement that often puts personal egos above peace and human life … It is hard to work for peace when the very movement that is named after it has so many divisions…One of the things that pushed me over the edge was that people on the left were calling me names. How many kicks in the teeth do you have to endure?

When we stand for peace, or for unity, or for one God, we often get caught up in rhetoric and ideology and forget what is most important. This plays out even in movements, as we hear from Ms. Sheehan, that profess to be for peace, and against war. It plays out on the national stage of a so-called “United” States, in rhetoric, vitriol, and escalating violence as we have seen so recently in Tucson. And it plays out within our own Christian church, with the extremes of so-called progressive Christianity and more fundamentalist denominations at times at each other’s proverbial throats. There are serious and painful quarrels among us.
Perhaps unbeknownst to many, this week is the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. This week of the year was initiated by the World Council of Churches to promote ecumenical dialogue, as well as to embrace the diversity, not disunity, within the myriad of Christian denominations. And whether or not we agree on how important this work is, how much we think it matters to the world of the poor, exploited and war-torn, the truth remains that if we cannot practice the central message of our faith, which is love, with our Christian brothers and sisters, where can we practice it?
Many of us understand Paul, particularly in this first letter to the Corinthian church, as the author of moral diatribes against sexual immorality that seem far-fetched to our modern ears. We are often challenged to bring his words and the specific, ancient context of them into relevance today, even if we do learn that Corinth was the Las Vegas of the ancient world: “What happened in Corinth stayed in Corinth,” except apparently when Paul heard about it.
In these first few verses of this letter to the Corinthians, however, we learn that Paul is also addressing disunity in the church. He is addressing this first and foremost. Instead of following Christ, we learn that Paul’s church of missionized gentiles and Jews were becoming followers of persuasive men within the church, fracturing the unity of the church and distracting it from its true head: Jesus Christ. In his argument to the church of Corinth, Paul appeals to the members to set aside their love for human knowledge or “cleverness” for a kind of holy “foolishness:” the foolishness of the cross, the foolishness of faith. Men such as Apollos and Cephas whom he refers to were apparently guilty of siphoning off allegiance to Jesus, and the cross, for themselves. No doubt it seemed to them and many others in the church “foolish” and irrational for a man such as Jesus to die for their sins, as though an attorney would die for their defendant. Paul agrees that it does seem foolish indeed. Yet the message that this cross and the event that happened on it is to Paul nothing short of the “power of god.” Paul wanted those in the Corinthian church not to be persuaded by the rational voices of the time, but to believe in the awesome and mysterious grace that had been offered to them through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ: the gift of salvation. The ability, after all, for those who believed, who were baptized, to be cleansed of their sins through the event of the cross was the whole point, the most spectacular gift of Jesus’ life, the Good News! To see his former congregation beginning to fracture around the persuasion of human words and wisdom, the illusion of rationality, the distraction of rhetoric, when the greatest miracle of all time was there for them, there for their salvation, was too distressing for Paul to behold.
“Has Christ been divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?”
We in the “progressive” Christian church may find ourselves nonplussed by these persuasive words of Paul. Not only is this not perhaps the face of Christian disunity today as we experience it, but Paul’s atonement theology, that Jesus indeed died to save us from our sins, is one we have questioned for decades, and have largely replaced.
It is a theology of individual spirituality, not of communal spirituality, and not one that addresses the very political nature of Jesus’ crucifixion. We in the UCC in particular embrace an understanding of the cross that is very different, that reveals God’s power of love over the human power of domination and violence. Jesus loved humanity enough to surrender to the violence of domination precisely in order to reveal its very limitation, and to teach us a different way.
So, what do we do with Paul? Do we throw him away? Is it not more important to discard his theology of atonement, to focus on the problems of poverty and oppression than disunity in the Church? Is it not more important for religions to get along with one another than the warring factions within the Christian communion?
Whether or not Paul’s message was based on a different emphasis of the cross, and limited to the baptized, whether or not we consider Christian unity of paramount importance, we are still convicted by his words. We are still vulnerable to losing track of what it is that is most important while we profess to a religion of love. And we also may need to open ourselves up to the notion that our baptism calls us to participate in a daily dying to our sins of exclusion and division.
Our baptism may not mean we are automatically cleansed of our sins, as Paul would have professed, but it calls us on a regular basis to die to that which is not love. We may not believe that in baptism we participate in Jesus’ death and resurrection in the same way that Paul believed, but the “power of God” is still present for us in the message of the cross, it is not? The power of God to transform our hearts and our souls when we allow ourselves to be open, the power of God to replace violence with redeeming love, the power of God to allow us to, over and over again, to be born to a different reality than the one in which we live. This is the Good News. Paul said, “I came not to baptize but to preach the Good News” and to that we can say “Amen!” In other words, “I came not to cause division but to share the good news of communion, of resurrection, of redemption, of hope, of healing, of shared resources, of new life in a world that is filled with death and loss.”
What might this look like, for us, to be in this spirit of Paul?
Rev. Dee Eisenhauer of Eagle Harbor Congregational Church on Bainbridge Island honors this week of Prayer for Christian Unity every year by calling the pastoral leaders of all the other Christian churches on Bainbridge, including the Catholic Church, the Church of the Latter Day Saints, the Baptist, Lutheran, Episcopal and Presbyterian churches, to find out how they are doing. She offers for them to share what they would like Eagle Harbor church members to help celebrate in prayer, and what they would like help with praying for. She then shares this “report” during her Sunday sermon this week. It is a simple gesture, to overlook what divides us in the way of theology and political beliefs and find common ground in the joint practice of prayer. Does doing so bring the churches closer in belief? I don’t think so, nor do I think Dee thinks so. But does it bring us closer as sons and daughters of God, and as followers of Christ? I think so.
This is, in essence, the message of Paul. Are we willing to be Christians first, and the members of the United Church of Christ second? As humans first, and partisans a distant second?
That does not mean we don’t honor our differences. We are not, as the saying goes, “holding hands and singing Kumbaya” while ignoring deep divides. When Pastor Dee picks up the phone each year to reach out to the leaders of the LDS church on Bainbridge, neither party has any illusions about what divides them. But they and their respective congregations are brought closer around what is arguably more important: the wellbeing and dignity of the other, and faith in that which is greater than all of us.
But it does mean to stretch our necks out. We all have felt that Obama’s speeches that preach unity over division have been prophetic. That they come from the mouth piece of what we can only know is the establishment might make us cynical, but they strike a chord in us nonetheless. We can still take the words to heart. It feels risky, and yes, foolish, to stick our necks out to those we consider our enemies, to be vulnerable in a world that appears to be nothing but cruel.
And perhaps if we flex these muscles within our Christian communion, where it may seem the most unlikely to succeed, it may also work to flex these muscles in all areas of our life, both public and private. We can take these lessons of listening first to our mutual humanity to all areas where we face strife and division.
For sure, Paul’s understanding of the cross and who stands to benefit from its good news might be different from ours. But we would do well to remember that what seems wise and strategic to us will likely not bring us new life. The divisions that we fall prey to are exactly that which we must let die on the cross. It is the foolishness of a radical inclusive love that does not take sides, and that places our trust in the love of Jesus Christ to heal wounds we don’t know how to heal ourselves that will bring us new life. May we learn to give up these quarrels among us and in the spirit of foolishness, of radical love and transformation, allow ourselves to enter into a new life with Christ.

January Reminder Newsletter

January, 2011
Keystone United Church of Christ

From Sophie…
When I arrived here at the end of September there were a lot of projects percolating within this church family. Some of this has been ongoing activity, and some of it hints at long-term change for the community. It feels like an exciting time for the church, and a time to both reflect on the past and build momentum for what will move us into the future. The following is a brief summary of some of what has been discussed and accomplished in recent months.
The Building Committee has been moving forward with efforts to revitalize our “physical plant.” A long-term need to make our building more energy efficient has spurred us to approach PSE for some insight and resources to help us do that. There is also a desire to make our building, including our sanctuary, more multi-purpose and accessible: to this end we are moving toward a planned renovation of the sanctuary floor, including leveling it and replacing some of the pews with chairs. This would allow larger groups to gather there than are possible elsewhere in the church, as well as make it more suitable a space for what the Keystone worship Community has become.
The health and appearance of the exterior has also been a concern: our front entrance and Narthex have a neglected appearance and have been somewhat closed in by surrounding vegetation. Nuts and bolts projects for addressing this concern have included the removal of a few trees that were impinging on the church roof and walls, and replacing the broken and dark Narthex glass with more transparent, tempered glass. The latter will improve our appearance and allow more light inside at the same time. A future step will be to renew the paint on that façade of the church and evaluate how to spruce up the exterior cross.
Another exciting dimension of making the church more accessible to the community is a renewed interest in equipping the stairs to the second floor with a wheelchair lift. This would increase the accessible space of our church by a huge percentage!
The Communications Committee has spent some time looking at a couple different dimensions of how the church presents itself to the rest of the surrounding community. We continue to energize our online presence through keeping up our blog and our Facebook page, and to prioritize our interaction as a community through email and a future printed photo directory. We have also looked at improving our physical visibility in the community through increased signage and creating and distributing affordable flyers strategically throughout the community. In the process of discussing these ideas we’ve also asked one another, “What is our ideal size of church community?” I suspect we would get as many answers as there are members now: some enjoy and value the size we are now and its comfortable family feel. Some wouldn’t mind a larger size membership that would help us feel more energized. Others feel that the sky should be the limit. All agree that we want to be welcoming community to all newcomers, without putting too much emphasis on numbers as a measure of the health of our community.
The Social Justice Committee continues to spearhead efforts that extend our mission for social justice into the community. Members poured effort into political initiatives during the last election; we were treated to information and food nuggets during a presentation on the connection between the food industry and global warming on 10.10.10, and outreach continues to local community shelters for the homeless. With the help of the Social Justice Committee we are continuing to build on our certification as a “Green Congregation” by recommitting to low impact foods for our shared meals, and pursuing related topics through the Book Study Group. The legacy of Keystone: the ability of our energy and commitment to social justice matters to defy our small numbers continues!

From Rich

On the third Sunday in Advent (December), I preached about our calling as people of faith. As part of that sermon I put out an idea. In case you were not there here is the quote from the sermon.

“I have been thinking about starting a new program at Keystone. This new program would train people (probably young people) for a life a faithful action. In this program we would call 5 or so people to work for a year as our missionaries. They would work in justice based organizations, organizations that cannot afford to have enough staff. They would live together in a house. They would live very simply. They would participate in classes that would teach them about a justice based Christianity and provide them with the tools of social change. And they would be required to participate in the life of this church.

We would make sure that they have a place to live, food to eat, access to healthcare, and a little spending money (very little). We would make sure that they had good organizations to work with and we would make sure that they had our support.

Given that there are so many young people out there who have graduated college and cannot find meaningful employment. Given the need to teach others about the importance of justice for people of faith and the importance of faith for people seeking a just world. Given that we have (I hope) the skills and resources to pull this off. I think now may be the time. But the cost to us for this may be over $60, 000 for one year. And the program may end after the first year. $60 thousand is a lot of money from our savings. It will not add one cushion to our hard pews, it will not add one layer of paint to the sad exterior of this building. It offers nothing but the possibility to do good work and train young people do such work in the future.

Think about it.”

This project would take money and time from our resources. The $60,000-$70,000 figure is an estimate of worst case costs. I don’t want to sugar coat it. It could cost us a lot. It also takes a great deal of faith to think that providing one year of training and experience for five people will make the world a better place.

It is something we can do. The question is whether it is something we are called to do.

See the Upcoming Schedule for Friday Night Meaningful Movies: http://meaningfulmovies.org/

Report from Committees:

1. Communication Committee: The December meeting of the communications was attended by half a dozen rousing Keystone community members, as well as Julia’s sister MaryBeth. We divvied up various media outlets (including bulletin boards, online networks, free newspapers) for distributing more information about happenings at Keystone. We are continuing with our existing communication efforts within our own community through email and “social networking,” as well as brainstorming other ways of reaching out to our surrounding community. We plan to introduce a couple of signage options (based on material and basic structure) for the church to the next congregational meeting in January or early February.

2. Building: Improvements to the physical structure of the building and its surroundings are noted above in Sophie’s newsletter message. The Committee would like to note that the landscaping work was donated by the church’s neighbor Bill. We are looking for more volunteers to assist with further landscaping projects near the front of the building to help upgrade our daytime appearance. Stay tunes for updates on further church building projects.

3. Social Justice: The social action committee plans to serve another meal at Sacred Heart on January 21st. Members were encouraged to attend the Environmental Priorities Coalition Workshop on Saturday Jan 8th from 9:30 - 2:45 at Seattle Pacific University, Gwinn Room. Following this, attendees can then go to Olympia for Environmental Lobby Day on February 15, 2011.

Scripture readings
9 January: Jer 31:7-14; John 1:10-18
16 January: Isa 49:1-7; John 1: 29-42
23 January: Isa 9:1-4; 1 Cor 1:10-18; Matt 4:12-23
30 January: Micah 6:1-8; Matt 5:1-15

Reader/usher schedule
1/9 Gus Wall/Jo Winston
1/16 Rita Patterson/Steve Bauck
1/23 Chandra Vandermost/Bill Gough
1/30 Sandra Schumacher/Janet Stillman
2/6 Rich Voget/Gloria Bollens

Christianity: Is it What you Thought?

A discussion series meeting on Thursday evenings from 6:30 – 8:30pm
20 January – 17 February, 2011

This series will provide an opportunity to challenge what we think Christianity says about Creation (& Science), Wealth, Women, Forgiveness and War/Nonviolence in a series of five evenings. As a group we spend time identifying what some of historical understandings of Christianity are: the so-called “myths” that have become tools of oppression and exclusion over the centuries. Because so much of what we know about Christianity is based on the written tradition, we will look at how some of these myths originated in the Bible. We will then explore these passages in such a way as to invite a different vision, a “counter-myth,” that understands Christianity more as a faith based on radical inclusion and love.

Join us for engaging discussion, hands-on exercises, and myth-busting dialogue with the 2000 year old tradition of Christianity!

This series will be led and facilitated by Sophie Morse, Associate Pastor at Keystone United Church of Christ. 5019 Keystone Place N. Wallingford. We will be meeting in Battson Fellowship Hall (downstairs from the sanctuary).

Call 206.632.6021 or email keystone5019@yahoo.com for more information.

Sermon: Christmas Truth

Christmas 1 Year A
Matthew 2:13-23
Christmas Truth
By Rich Gamble

Truth is a tricky thing. A list of facts in a newspaper may be deceiving. A poem may speak a universal truth. One the books Kate picked up at the Festival of Hope book sale was called “Lying with Statistics.” Kate was trained in statistics and uses them all the time for her job and she tends to be cautious in accepting the conclusions of some else’s statistics.

For a couple of hundred years we have believed that facts were the source of real truth and stories were just something to pass the time. Before that, stories were believed to be sources of truth and facts were occasionally handy but not necessary. Many modern people reading the Bible refuse to believe it is true because they don’t believe the facts; others want to believe that it is true as they define it and so demand that that the stories be accepted as facts. Prior to the modern age people sought truths not necessarily facts and they didn’t confuse the two.

The two gospels that have accounts of Jesus’ birth have some differences in the details of the story. The Gospel today tells Matthew’s version of the birth of Jesus. If you were distracted by all the Christmas carols it is good to review. Luke has Mary and Joseph living in Nazareth and forced to go to Bethlehem by the dictates of Caesar. This makes the parents of Jesus homeless during his birth. Mary gives birth in Bethlehem in a barn and then Mary and Joseph go back home to Nazareth.

In Matthew’s version Mary and Joseph live in Bethlehem, where they give birth to Jesus at home. But then out of fear of Herod they flee to Egypt. Once they hear that the coast is clear they leave Egypt but since they are fearful of Herod’s son they decide to move to Nazareth instead of going home to Bethlehem.

So in the two Gospels that talk about the birth of Jesus there are different stories with commonalities. Jesus is born in Bethlehem but raised in Nazareth in both accounts. And in both accounts Jesus’ parents are shown to be victims of political tyrannies. Caesar makes the holy couple homeless during the height of Mary’s pregnancy, which was a direct threat to the survival of the infant. Herod plots to kill Jesus directly because he fears that Jesus will be a threat to his claim of the throne of Israel.

In both cases a cruel and thoughtless policy by the rulers leads to hardship and homelessness, and in today’s readings, the death of all the male infants in Bethlehem.

Did Caesar and Herod care about the suffering imposed by their policies? The story doesn’t indicate it. For them, the suffering and loss was an acceptable cost of asserting their idea of how the world should be ordered.

But in these Gospels we see the world not through the eyes of Herod or Caesar but through the experience of the peasants of Palestine. Our history has a particular perspective, that of the victims and not the potentates, the occupied and not the occupiers, the homeless and not the lavishly housed.

You can read historical accounts that will tell you what the Caesars had for dinner. You can read about the wars they fought, the policies they implemented, you can see even today the evidence of their influence in roads and buildings and monuments. There isn’t much evidence of the suffering caused by their economic priorities. There isn’t much information about the life expectancy of the slaves who quarried the marble for the monuments or the impact of the Roman taxation policies on the health of peasant farmers. In the worldview of domination, God is a dominator, therefore those who have dominating power are important and those who have little or no power are not.

Who would care about a couple of Jewish peasants expecting a baby? Who would care about a few peasant babies in the backwater town of Bethlehem?

That is where our story comes in. What’s important isn’t whether either of these accounts is factual. What’s important is the truth they reveal.

This truth is that not only are the lives of those most vulnerable humans important but that God’s purpose for all of humanity is located not on the throne of Rome or the palace of Herod but in a barn (or house) in Bethlehem. The truth of this story is that the power of God is the opposite of domination just as a helpless peasant baby born in nowheresville is the opposite of king on his throne.

The truth is that our God takes a side in history, the side of the nobodies. God’s side in this story is not with those who have the power to destroy human life but with those who have to run for their lives.

Already the cuts in human services is beginning. The wealthy won in the elections and there will be no new taxes to make up for the lagging income caused by the current greed caused recession. And it is unlikely that any more money will be coming from the federal government who just bent over backwards to give wealthy people tax breaks. Programs are closing, services cut back, and the outcome will be more suffering. The corporate media will cover the facts but largely miss the suffering. It is unlikely we will hear much of what it is like to have no medical care for your children, no hospice care for your loved ones. The nightly news will not cover what happens to a working mom when her daycare support is cut, and no one will track down those who are mentally ill and homeless and cover what it means to lose outreach workers.

The cuts will be made to seem like an act of nature, an act of God and not a choice by the powerful to cause the suffering of the powerless. And what few stories do hit the airwaves will rapidly be swallowed up by a sea of cheerful commercials and sports scores.

Here on this day after Christmas we are challenged to seek the truth which comes not from the perspective of judge or President or CEO, not from the guy who has his own media empire nor any of his minions, not from the neighbor who believes what sees on the TV or what he hears on the radio.

Here on this day after Christmas, we are called to look past the tinsel, look past the distractions, look past the lying statistics and instead see the truth that sleeps under our porch or in a car, see the lines of people seeking aid, hear stories of those who live without medical or dental care.

The President and the Congress will probably not send soldiers out to murder babies but they will pass a budget that will not feed uncounted thousands, not ensure everyone on the planet has basic medical care, not build housing for the poorest, not provide clean drinking water for all. This lack of action, this prioritization of the wealthy and warrior over the poor and vulnerable will lead directly to the death of thousands of children every day.

The slaughter of the innocents isn’t just a story from our book of faith, it is the ongoing outcome of the policies of the powerful. Only those of us who bother to look for it will see these deaths. Only those of us who believe in alternative truth than that of fiefdoms of wealth and dominating power will protest and act.

From the beginning of the Jesus story in the our Gospel we are called on to take a side and live that choice. Helpless infants or powerful rulers whose reality will govern our actions?

The good news is that through these truth-filled stories and through the heroic efforts of those who have lived this truth, we have a choice. Try as they might, the powerful have not silenced the alternative narrative.

Christmas, the holiday has passed. Christmas, the choice is ever in front of us.

Amen.

Christmas Eve Service

Once again we celebrate Christmas Eve in our own twist on tradition.

Christmas Eve Celebration
7 p.m. Friday
December 24

We hope you can join us.

"Reminder" Newsletter December, 2010

Keystone United Church of Christ

From Rich,
In the South Pacific the native peoples saw outsiders (many for the first time) during World War 2. The warring sides brought to these people, clothes, tools, medicine, and food. This cargo was believed to be the gift of the gods. Then the war ended. The supplies stopped coming in and the people, eager for cargo, built ceremonial landing strips and airplanes made out of straw. By making these things, they thought to lure the gods into bringing back the goods.
Every year at this time the celebration of the coming into history of a radical alternative to practices of domination is transformed into a celebration of a fat guy in a red suit bringing consumer goods. At Christmas we decorate, celebrate and exchange goods in hopes of filling the desire for the happiness, connectedness, purpose and peace which often cannot be found in our day to day lives. The cargo cults tried to lure back planes filled with goods by building symbolic planes. Just as the straw planes had no chance of luring back real ones, so our exchange of goods has no chance of filling the void in our lives and community.
My web search of the definition of Advent came up with this: “The coming or arrival, especially of something extremely important.”
This is the season in the life of the Church known as Advent. The coming or arrival of something extremely important is a perfect way to talk about this season of the Church. It is both coming and here, this thing we yearn for, this peace on earth, and good will to all.
It is here when we are open to it. Here when we work for it. Here when seek it deep within.
And yet, alienation, loneliness, poverty, violence, war, fear, and hate are all around us as well. In these dark days it seems to be getting worse and worse for more and more people. We hunger for a better world, for something that has not yet arrived, for a greater peace, a greater justice, where good will is not just a feeling but a political and economic reality for all.
Something here, something coming.
It is important to celebrate the goodness that is here. The justice we’ve won. The places where there is peace, the joy of being a part of such a wonderful community. But it is important also to yearn for more, for it is in our yearning that new steps are taken, new risks dared.
This year let’s lean into the light of a new way of living. That new way is as close as our willingness to live in its light. That new way is as far as today is from that first Christmas. Seek and celebrate the wonder of existence; work, plan and build a better existence for all, as if it will take many generations to arrive.
Advent isn’t just a season, it is a way of life.
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FRIDAY MEANINGFUL MOVIES
All Events Free and Open to the public, but Donations are kindly accepted!

Friday, December 3, 7:00 to 9:30 PM
Film: “THE MEAN WORLD SYNDROME - Media Violence & the Cultivation of Fear” (51 min, Jeremy Earp, 2010)
A new film based on the late George Gerbner's groundbreaking analysis of media influence and media violence. For years, debates have raged among scholars, politicians, and concerned parents about the effects of media violence on viewers. Too often these debates have descended into simplistic battles between those who claim that media messages directly cause violence and those who argue that activists exaggerate the impact of media exposure altogether. THE MEAN WORLD SYNDROME examines how media violence forms a heightened state of insecurity, exaggerated perceptions of risk and danger, and a fear-driven propensity for hard-line political solutions to social problems. Please join us following the film for a facilitated discussion.
Friday, December 10, 6:30 to 9:30 PM (...Film starts at 7)
TRANSITION FRIDAY! Film: "WATER ON THE TABLE" (79 min, Liz Marshall, 2010)
Is water a commercial good? Or is it a human right like air? WATER ON THE TABLE is powerful new, character-driven, social-issue documentary that explores our relationship to our most precious natural resource. The film intimately shadows Canada’s own water crusader Maude Barlow over the course of a year during her term as the UN Senior Advisor on Water to the President of the General Assembly. While still giving voice to the powerful interests that insist that water is just another resource to be bought and sold, it solidly and factually lays out the undeniable conclusion that what is at stake is our very future, and potable water must be included as a human right. For more information on the film, go to: www.wateronthetable.com. Please join us for a facilitated discussion on local water security with Transition Settle and sustainable Wallingford, and others.
Friday, December 21, 2007, 7-9:30 PM
Film: "JOYEUX NOEL" (116 min, Christian Carion, 2005)
In 1914, World War I, the bloodiest war ever at that time in human history, was well under way. However on Christmas Eve, numerous sections of the Western Front called an informal, and unauthorized, truce where the various front-line soldiers of the conflict peacefully met each other in No Man's Land to share a precious pause in the carnage with a fleeting brotherhood. This film dramatizes one such section as the French, British and German sides partake in the unique event, even though they are aware that their superiors will not tolerate its occurrence.
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PEG NOTES
Food and Faith book study…
Peg will be leading the Broadview & Keystone UCC communities through the book Money and Faith: The Search for Enough. Coming out of “Earth Ministry,: this book contains writings from a variety of authors such as editor Michael Schut, Sallie McFague, Walter Brueggemann, Dave Barry, Henri Nouwen, and many others. The study guide integrates prayer with discussions of articles regarding abundance , justice, compassion, the myth of scarcity, and, of course, money. The study will begin on January 5, 2011, and will be held on the first & third Wednesdays of the month through May. We will meet at the home of Erv & Peg Faulmann (11718 12th Ave. NE in Lake City) from 7 until 9PM. Please let us know if you are interested so that we can order books by the beginning of December.
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Festival of Hope!!
Thanks to the many hands that made the Festival of Hope possible and such a rousing success!! For those who have not already heard, we raised a record $14,525! Nearly $4K of that consisted of donations made where no goods were received. We are extremely proud of this outpouring of generosity, both by patrons and by the volunteers who made it all happen. The atmosphere was lively and fun throughout the event, enhanced by the delicious baked goods that kept issuing forth from our beloved food tables!
Thank you for everyone who donated their considerable time and talents, and see you again next year!!
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Longest Night…
Traditionally a Winter Solstice event, the “Longest Night” worship service is for those who may find Christmas to be painful for various reasons, and for those who support them. Come and join the communities of Broadview Community UCC, St. Paul UCC and Keystone UCC in a service of prayer, scripture & music that acknowledge that God’s presence is for those who mourn and struggle. God’s light shines through the darkness. Everyone, regardless of religious background, is invited to St. Paul UCC on Sunday, December 19th at 7:00 PM.
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Holden Evening Prayer Every Thursday in Advent, starting at 7pm Service lasts for about a half hour. All are welcome.
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SCRIPTURE READINGS
12/05 Isaiah 11:1-10;
Matt 3:1-12
12/12 Isaiah 35:1-10;
Matt 11:2-11
12/19 Isa 7:10-16;
Matt 1:18-25
12/26 Matt 2:1-12
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Sermon: "An Unlikely King"

Jeremiah 23:1-6

Luke 23:33-43

“An Unlikely King”

I.

This time of year we get to play around with the term “King.” This is Christ the King Sunday, or “Reign of Christ” Sunday if you want to throw out the problematic word altogether. Whether or not we can relate to the term “king,” or can relate to the notion of Christ being “King,” many of us are still vulnerable to the same notions of leadership that plagued the Israelites and the early church so long ago. Even after we have discarded monarchy, separated Church from State, and as Protestants rejected the notion of a Pope, we are still tempted to dream up the kind of savior-figure and authority that the new Messiah was supposed to be. We are still tempted to abdicate some of our responsibility and vision to human leaders, and we still fall prey to the desire for this leadership to vanquish our enemies. And so, at least once a year, we get to unpack this idea of kingship a bit.

I grew up with folk tales – and their subset fairy tales. Many of these stories, which we had bookshelves full of, wove their themes around the mainstays of goblins, witches, princes and princesses and of course, kingdoms. There were good kings, evil kings, weak kings and strong kings. But kings and their kingdoms were as much a part of the natural order in these stories as the sun coming up.

Perhaps you, like me, also grew up reading the Narnia Chronicles and bonded with the central character of Aslan. As a Christ figure, the lion Aslan is particularly appealing and accessible to the young mind. He is wise, benevolent and compassionate. He is mysterious, has special powers and demands faith from his followers. These are of course the elements of Jesus of Nazareth that many of us are drawn to. Yet Aslan, unlike the Christ we meet in the gospels, also has a daunting physical presence, and could, in fact vanquish his enemies with a swipe of one of his great paws.

It is cultural images such as these that can inform how we view not only leadership and ourselves, but the notion of savior. I wonder how many of us, like those contemporaries of Jesus who were expecting an Aslan-type figure to rescue them from their oppressors, still wish for the human or divine version of the benevolent dictator who will, if necessary, kick butt. I wonder how many of us, despite knowing better, give into the old notions of us and them, righteous and unrighteous, those worthy of salvation and protection and those who are not.

II.

The Hebrew Scripture notion of the new Davidic king, which we hear in today’s reading, is of one who will restore justice and protection to Israel. “Israel will live in safety” we hear in the Jeremiah text. The Israelites “…will not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing.” The longing is clear: Israel wants to return to a previous sense of security, a home pasture if you will, a return to justice, and to a leader who will hold them together against all enemies.

With this legacy of expectation, the early gospel writers faced a steep task in holding up Jesus of Nazareth as this very king. It was clear to them that the one who had been so long anticipated had finally come…but in the process had shattered the mold, or what they thought had been the mold. In all of Luke’s gospel, the only human to identify Jesus as the Messiah, the Christ, the anointed one, is Peter. So aware is Luke of the need to upset the old notions of the Messiah that he does not leave Jesus’ true identity up to human witnesses, but only supernatural entities and the resurrected Jesus himself on the road to Emmaus. Humans, with the one exception of Peter, cannot make room for a legitimate leader who submits himself so freely into the hands of the powerful. The jeers of the people, the soldiers, and the first criminal we meet in the Luke passage today call attention to the fact that indeed, as the kind of King prophesied in the Hebrew Scriptures, Jesus seems to be doing a really bad job.

In fact he is, but of course that is the point. Throughout the gospels Jesus has been upsetting traditional notions of Davidic kingship: at one point in Luke he even denies that the Messiah could even be a descendant from the House of David at all. Now, in his final chapter of life, Jesus makes sure we do not confuse previous notions of kingship and the new ones on at least two points. For one, he refuses to play favorites with those who have followed him, and extends the kingdom of God illogically to his executioners and a criminal hung at his side. After he has been stripped, beaten and hung on the cross, Jesus does not seek out those who have followed him and loved him for comfort, nor to deliver last minute words of assurance to them. He does not circle the wagon around the faithful and familiar, but seeks entrance to the kin-dom for those who are its true lost sheep.

Secondly, and more shockingly, Jesus overturns the previous notion of power and victory, and indeed safety. Instead of protecting Israel from its military enemies, Jesus has been dragged helplessly in front of the authorities, his crucifixion a ghastly reminder of how vulnerable all of his followers are. Jeremiah’s promise that “Israel will live in safety” could not appear further from the truth, and could not appear more bitterly ironic in these moments. Disturbingly, what Jesus presents as victory is not a vanquished enemy swept aside by the paw of some giant lion. It is a more profound and far more costly laying bare of the system’s moral bankruptcy as it forces the suppression of one group by another. Rather than protecting Israel under a canopy of military or worldly “safety,” Jesus offers the only real safety of the kingdom of God: God’s all-inclusive love that exposes exploitation and stands for justice. Based on moral authority and relationship, this is a new kind of kingship altogether, in fact, a kin-ship.

III.

What Jesus turned upside down in his final moments of life we still struggle with today. Think about it: are we not still looking for our Davidic King? It is hard not to pin our deepest hopes and longings onto the leaders we send to represent us. Sure, we have a democratic system not a monarchy, but the ways in which we abdicate our own responsibility and attribute these leaders with power seem to suggest we are still a little hung up on old notions of savior-kings. How many of us elevated Obama to the status of savior? How many of us attributed this one person with the ability to overturn the wrongs of illegal war, poor health care, and political corruption? How many tears that were shed at his election and inauguration were tears for the reawakened dreams of MLK, Jr., John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy? Whether or not the President has fallen down on his promises, whether he has squandered an opportunity that was truly held out to him, we have to face that what he represents for us is greater than any one person could fulfill.

Jesus’ message was essentially, we are all each other’s means of creating the Kin-dom of God here on earth right now. When its numbers have been humiliated, scattered and afraid, elements of the church have in fact done this for 2,000 years. We cannot wait for the power structures, which are too invested in the system the way it is, to do this for us. We cannot wait for an inspiring leader to hold out our vision for us. We are called, as unlikely kings, to turn to one another, pool our resources, and go out to serve our fellow humans preaching the Good News. We are called to toss out our pet vision of what a king and savior is supposed to be, and with the vision that Jesus has passed down to us, partner with God and with one another to do the work.

In this process, we must not narrow the Kin-dom of God only to those who are familiar, to those who have loved and supported us. When we are persecuted, we are not circle the wagon around ourselves and our loved ones only, but to extend radical love to those we sometimes do not even know, or those who are responsible for our pain. Truthfully, do we seek the kin-dom only in the company of and for the future of those who are like us: progressive, educated, comfortable? Would we include Tim Eyman or Sarah Palin amongst those we would ask forgiveness for, for they know not what they do? Or CEO Jeff Bezos of amazon.com who poured money into the campaign to kill Initiative 1098? To those who are dividing up our clothes as we are being slowly drained of life? Jesus is asking this very question from the cross, as the Messiah-king: Will you give up your old notions of power and leadership and follow me? Will you do as I do?

IV.

So this Sunday we work to cleanse ourselves of “kingship” baggage. If we do call Christ a King, we need to remember that this king will not do the work for us but with us, did not come to make us safe, and did not come to “kick butt.” Christ’s “kingship” is, indeed, about kin-ship. A radical, inclusive love that leaves no one safe, but also no one unprotected by God, and no one excluded. It is a love that does not vanquish oppressors, but holds open the door for all, for redemption and salvation.

The bad news for us may be that Obama and the Democratic Party have not vanquished the enemy or overrun the opposition. The good news is that they have not vanquished the enemy and they have not overrun the opposition. We are one people, and rather than winning short term battles, our work is of wholesale conversion, and of a new orientation toward God. Let us lay down our swords of division and hero worship as each of us work toward this radical kin-dom of love and of God. Let us all be “unlikely kings.”

Amen.

- S. F. Morse