The reading
1 John 1:1-5
We declare to you what was from the beginning, what we have
heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with
our hands, concerning the word of life this life was revealed, and we have seen
it and testify to it, and declare to you the eternal life that was with the Father
and was revealed to us we declare to you
what we have seen and heard so that you also may have fellowship with us; and
truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. We are writing these things so that our joy
may be complete.
The message
As we start our time with John’s
first letter, I am going to share these opening verses as though they were
written for us today, here in Woodside. For those of you have heard the Gospel
of John (we just spent about 4 months on it). For those who read this book and
it changed you, brought you to faith in our Lord and savior Jesus Christ,
revealed to you the power of God in our world, welcome to fellowship and unity
in mind and spirit with us. Some of you have heard John’s Gospel with its focus
on Jesus 7 signs of power and 7 “I am” statements and started to think that
Jesus was a spiritual being, that Jesus was not really quite human, not exactly
the word made flesh and dwelling amongst us. For you, we are sharing these
things, the full story so that our joy may be complete, we want you to know the
truth as revealed to us. Words matter. What we believe and what we do are connected.
Each and every Sunday, we declare
to you the good news shared by God with us since creation. We know these things
from what we have heard in scripture and life, what we have seen in the life,
death and resurrection of Jesus and in what we have experienced. All of this is
concerning the word of life, the good news of God’s redeeming love revealed
through the birth, life, death, resurrection and the everlasting promises of
Jesus Christ. Jesus is the word of God made flesh and dwelling amongst us.
I know it is almost always just me
up here and I keep saying we. That’s
because this is God’s word and there are the teachers and other faithful people
who have shaped what I say. There were
Sunday School teachers as a child, people like Mr. Anthony in 4th
grade who asked the class, what did Jesus say to the thieves crucified with him
and I won a full sized candy bar (the top prize) for saying “I forgive you”. There
were the priests I listened to as child, my mother who taught me my prayers and
made sure my brother and I went to church. There were professors in a secular college
and religious seminary who introduced me to different ideas and traditions.
There were other pastors who gave me advice when I was starting out (and do now
too). There are colleagues I meet with, people I call in times of trouble.
There are people I talk with here
in this community, whose faith and dedication can inspire another generation.
There are the people of St James and St Matthews, as they face a long,
complicated transition with faith hope and trust. There are other places, outside of churches
that I work for, where people’s personal faith, life and response to bad things
teach me. There are the commentaries and
research I read, people faithfully working in this building, teaching in our
school, inviting others in to play, to learn about Jesus.
There is a whole group of people
who faithfully built this place and generously maintain it. Some of them are our
family ancestors. One of the amazing moments of the 150th
anniversary here was meeting the family
of the guy who made this plaster Lord’s supper that has sat in the center of
this church for over a century, that is remembered by people from years ago. They are part of we as well. This building is here so that God’s word can
be declared to those who know it well and those who have never heard it. We are here to tell the story of God’s
redeeming love.
We are all here to share these things with you. We are
sharing them in many ways. The giving of
food in Elmhurst and Jamicia, the Thursday nights at the Pan am shelter,
neighborhood clean ups, the support of the ELCA and Metro NY Syond through our
giving and my work as dean, offering early education to our community,
gathering for worship, walking with people through life passages and difficult
times, saying you are in our prayers and doing it.
Do not be complacent, be changed. This story is one of love,
of welcome, of forgiveness, of God here with us and waiting for us. It can be easily twisted for personal gain,
misunderstood by good intentioned people, abused by power hungry sinners, used
as a tool to deceive the faithful or combined with other things in faithless
ways. The most recent example is the way our attorney general used Romans 13 to
justify the policy of separating families on the border. These verses on
obeying government, when taken alone would allow any free and fairly or
unfairly elected government to justify anything. This was written by Paul to throw the
authorities off the scent of just how subversive and inclusive Christianity was
(it was never meant to be taken at face value, how could Paul who explains and
expresses the ultimate power of God in so many innovative and thoughtful ways
give unchecked power to human government). When taken in the larger context of Romans 13,
the letter to the Romans and the whole story of God’s love, they mean something
else. They are a call for us to hold leaders accountable to God’s law of love,
to speak for the voiceless and participate lawfully in the world (as best we
faithfully can). The word Government is only found in one or two translations
(most other bibles say “powers of the world or something like that” Of course Jeff Sessions is not the only person
doing this with scripture, pastors do it, priests do it, I do it, people on the
left and right, liberal and conservative all do it. (this just happens to be
the big event this week)
We must always check
our work and ideas, asking does this point to God’s power and beautiful
vision. Are what we believe and what we do really connected. We care about you, not just your comfort or
material needs, we care that you know with certainty that God walks with you,
that eternal life is yours with the father, that your sins are forgiven, that
you are saved by grace through the faith given by our Lord Jesus Christ. .
This is not a meeting of people who want to make our communities
better, this is not a gym, This is a place of fellowship, We mentioned this
word, fellowship at confirmation class and no one knew what it meant. The students got a definition from their
phones (which is like cheating) fellowship is something you experience, everyone
here is loved by God. Everyone here is
with us in God’s care. Everyone is
deserving, saved by that same grace through the faith given by our Lord Jesus
Christ.
In about 30 minutes I
am going to run downstairs to lead the English worship for the church of grace
to the Fujianese. This means a 45 minute plus sermon, no or few notes, with
about 50 people from 5th grade through college. The only thing we
have in common is Jesus and that is enough
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