Hold Your Tongue - September 17, 2006
James 3: 1-12“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never harm me.” My mom taught me that when I would come home crying because kids had picked on me at school. She had to tell me that a lot, because I got picked on a lot when I was in the lower grades. When my Mom told me those words, in an effort to get me to ignore the cruel kids at school, it didn't really make me feel better. Instead it made me wonder if my mom had never actually been on a playground before.
The truth is, words are extremely powerful. We have them, and the animal kingdom doesn't. Essentially it is words and opposable thumbs that separate us from our closest animal primate relatives. Last week I talked about the man who had no words, and the woman who used words nobody expected her to use, in order to get what they needed from Jesus. The writer of James reminds us that the tongue can be compared to a rudder of a ship or a horse's bridle, able to control the very direction of the rest of our bodies just through the use of words.
I saw a poster once that said, “Make sure your words are tender and sweet, for eventually you may have to eat them.” Anybody here besides me ever have to eat some words or wish you could take back something said in the heat of anger or when you though nobody else was listening?
What we say can be powerful, friends. Even more so when others are watching to see if our behavior matches what we say. Did you ever see an ad for a product that just didn't live up to the words used to describe it? How many of us ever pulled out the credit card for something we saw that was just too good to be true, based on the words that were used to describe it to us. How disappointed were we when we found out it didn't live up to all the hype? Ever meet someone who turned out to be not exactly what people said they were, or find out that someone you knew said one thing, but did another?
Churches are not immune to this. Yesterday Pete and I were driving through downtown Waukesha and then down 164 to Big Bend , and we drove past probably at least two dozen churches. Many of those have signs out front, in which a pithy phrase appears. I noticed something. As the churches got bigger, and the signs got fancier, the pithy phrases got shorter. In fact, one church, which has a sign that is lighted in color flashes a single word: Life! Praise! Worship! Or something to that effect. (Quite frankly we got into a discussion of what else they could have doe with the thousands of dollars the sign must have cost and the words were lost on me after that. Coincidence? I think not.)
What would our pithy sign say? If someone asked us to describe Jerusalem Church, what would we say? Someone I know personally and have worked with extensively at the Presbytery level of the church has a very wise statement on church identity that might surprise you. This person says that a church does not have the right to describe itself as friendly, warm or inviting. Those are adjectives that can only come from the outside, from a person who is being warmly invited by friendly church people. That is not to say that a church cannot be friendly—in fact it is important that churches are friendly—but that churches should think very carefully about describing themselves in terms that are not by their very nature and function very self-descriptive.
I can tell you from personal experience of reading dozens of Church Information Forms, every church in this denomination describes themselves as friendly. And many are not. The point this morning is not friendliness or unfriendliness, it is how we see ourselves in relation to the gospel, and how we express that vision to the wider world. As the writer of the letter of James, suggests, we as individuals are guided by what we say, and what we say about ourselves is guided by how we envision ourselves. To paraphrase an old joke: Which comes first, the being or the saying?
Now, there has been a flurry of activity here lately amongst several of us who along with the support and endorsement of the Session are making some plans for an event next month I want to tell you about . In our past couple of meetings, session has been discussing something exciting, something risky…something a little scary to some people. Over the past several years some amazing things have happened in this place:
- a renovated interior of the building,
- a addition to the back of the building,
- becoming fully accessible to those with mobility issues,
- leaving the Kettle Moraine Parish,
- and calling a solo full-time pastor,
- building her a beautiful office,
- adding an Office Administrator,
- making her office a great place for people to have a first look at the place when they walk in the glass doors,
- and finishing the restoration of the building's exterior.
We have been very, very blessed. Blessed with time, resources, people, energy, imagination, and enthusiasm. Now that so many wonderful things are in place, and so many projects have been marked off the long list, it seems that the time may have come for wondering out loud: “What next, God?”
Rest assured, when that question is sincerely asked, one never knows what the answer will be. Session has decided to take that risk, to put God to the test, and so we as a church are going to spend some time asking ourselves: How can we best describe to the world who we are and what God's unique mission is in this place? How can the “mouth of the church” be a guide for the church, the community, and the whole world?
The Session will be sponsoring an opportunity to do just that next month. On October 14th, we will gather (and by we I mean the session, the deacons, and all interested members) for a half-day retreat at Kettle Moraine United Methodist Church. Gregg Neel, Executive Presbyter for Milwaukee will be our facilitator, and will guide us through a morning of fellowship, shared mealtime, prayer, remembering our past, dreaming our future, sharing the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and envisioning God's mission in this place. It is our hope and prayer that all will come. It is my hope that if you have competing choices for your time that day, you might instead prayerfully consider choosing the retreat. No one else can use your voice.
This morning I leave you with a question: if you had three dreams for this church, what would they be? I have another question: What three dreams are you willing to write down? I'm going to relinquish some of my sermon time this morning so we can do that together. It's different. It's risky. But it might turn out to be a blessing. Thanks be to God.
Mark 8: 27-38
27Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?” 28And they answered him, “John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.” 29He asked them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered him, “You are the Messiah.” 30And he sternly ordered them not to tell anyone about him. 31Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” 34He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”
