Ask any young
person why they do not attend church, and they are likely to tell you that they
don’t see the point. According to a
the Barna Research Group, 30% of all millennials believe
church is not important. Either they believe they can find God elsewhere, or
they think church simply is not relevant to their lives.[i]
But this week
after 7 tornadoes ripped across East Texas, killing four people, injuring
dozens more and causing untold property damage, United Methodists showed up with cleaning kits, tarps, lumber and screws
to shore up damaged buildings.
And in Zimbabwe,
erratic rains and successive droughts have hit the country hard, and the prison
farms have not produced enough food to properly feed all the inmates. So the
UMC has donated more than $1,300 worth of food to female inmates at Chikurubi
Prison. But the Church is giving more than money. They also plan to start a
Holistic Horticultural Training Program for the female inmates so they can
learn new skills and hopefully, in time, rejoin society and live as law-abiding citizens.[ii]
In Pearsall,
Texas, the Rev. Liliana Padilla is cooking up breakfast tacos every Sunday
morning for neighbors who don’t usually attend worship. Everyone who comes gets
free tacos (or oatmeal and pancakes, if they prefer) as well as a devotional
message, Bible study and prayer. And that’s all before the regular worship
service at 11 am.
And right here
in Shelby County, Heartsong Church welcomed members of the Memphis Islamic
Center into the sanctuary for nightly prayer services back in 2010 because construction
had not yet been completed on the new mosque. Seven years later, the two faith
communities are launching a new joint venture known as Friendship Park, where
they hope people will come together and build friendships that cross the lines
of ethnicity, religion, race and gender.
Capleville UMC
just hosted a job fair for recent high school grads and unemployed adults. And,
this summer, our very own UMW is bringing a mobile mammography unit right here
to Windyke because lack of access is one of the primary reasons that women do
not get screened for breast cancer.
How’s that for
relevant?
More and more,
UM churches are taking an active role in society. In fact, in 2008, our
denomination adopted an initiative called the Four Areas of Focus, which
encourages every congregation to engage in ministry with the poor; improve
global health; develop principled Christian leaders; and create new and renewed
congregations.[iii]
“This is not
just a program,” says Christian Alstead, bishop of the Nordic-Baltic Area.
“This is our way of being as United Methodists.”
And the Council
of Bishops, which met last week in Dallas, is urging every congregation to stay
focused on that mission. “The church needs us to be accountable to the mission
and ministries that transform lives for Jesus, our risen Christ,” Bishop L.
Jonathan Holston of the South Carolina Conference said in his address to the
council.
Alstead agrees.
“…one of the ways of keeping unity is to remain focused in mission.”
It certainly
worked for the very first followers of Christ. Acts 2:42 tells us that the very
first converts to the Christian faith were very focused in their work. “They devoted
themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread
and the prayers.”
They knew what
they were about. They had a purpose. A reason for being. And that held them
together. In fact, it drew them together. They had a deep longing to know more
about Jesus. And, since he had ascended to the Father, the only way the new
converts could learn about Jesus was to spend time with his apostles. They were
the ones who had heard Jesus’ sermons. They were the ones who had spent the
most time with him. They knew what he believed and how he behaved. They were
the ones Jesus had trained. Jesus had called them and trained them to carry on
his ministry. His spirit was with them.
So, if you
wanted to know Jesus, the best way was to spend time with his people. And so
that’s what the new converts did. Acts tells us that they were all together,
and they shared everything. They were so committed to the way of Christ that
they sold their possessions and gave it all to the community. No one made them
do it. God did not command it. They wanted to. They were so full of love for
God that they did not hold anything back. They gave God all they had. And that
commitment carried over to their relationships with one another. They gave God
all they had, and they gave each other all they had. If anyone, anyone in the
group, had a need, the others met the need. They wanted to help, and they did
help.
That commitment
grew as they spent time together. They worked together. They worshiped
together. And they ate together. And when they gathered, they praised God and
shared the stories of Jesus.
And it’s no
surprise, really, that much of that worship took place around a table. In the Jewish
tradition, “when the blessing is said at the table, the table becomes a holy
place and eating together a sacred activity.”[iv]
It is certainly
a place where bonds are formed. Yesterday, as we gathered together for
pancakes, I watched as friends swapped war stories and women mobilized
themselves for ministry and children played, and together we all worked to
create a safe place where young men can gather and be molded into leaders.
That’s why we
gather. That’s why we come together as a community. That’s why we need church.
“We learn to
live by living together with others….”[v]
Sure, we can encounter God anywhere. The Almighty God, Maker of Heaven and
Earth, is not confined to the four walls of this or ANY building. But being a
disciple of Jesus Christ is more than a one-time encounter with God. It is
following Jesus. It is knowing him and following him day by day.
And Jesus laid
down his life for us. He gave up everything for us. So, if we are truly
following him, we will lay down our lives for one another. (1 John 3:16)
That is the
paradox that Thomas Merton speaks of in his book No Man Is An Island: “We
become ourselves by dying to ourselves. We gain only what we give up, and if we
give up everything we gain everything.”[vi]
That’s probably
the real reason why more people do not attend church. Because dying to self is
not the most comfortable or convenient or common way to live. We would much
rather live for ourselves. Do what we want, when we want to. But following
Christ means dying to self and living for others. And, Lord knows, that is hard
work.
It is hard work
because, as Merton notes, we all have weaknesses and deficiencies. None of us
is perfect. And we are all so very different. But that is exactly why we need
each other.
“It is because
of [our weaknesses AND our differences] that we need others and others need us.
We are not all weak in the same spots, and so we supplement and complete one
another, each one making up in himself for the lack in another.”[vii]
In his first
letter to the Corinthians, The apostle Paul described the church as a body,
with every member serving a different function. Merton says that, because we
are all members of Christ, “What I do is also done for them and with them and
by them. What they do is done in me and by me and for me.”[viii]
That, of course,
is where things get tricky, because, as John Wesley once observed, we do not
all think alike, and we do not all walk alike. But he was convinced that we CAN
love alike. We can all love God, and we can all love one another. And we can
encourage one another to be more loving and to do good works.[ix]
Where we
disagree, Wesley encouraged people to hold fast to their beliefs but with the
knowledge that none of us are perfect and we might in fact discover some day
that we were not always right. And "they" were not always wrong. Peter, Andrew and Paul himself made their fair
share of mistakes, but Jesus, the Good Shepherd, did not give up on them. He
loved them. He truly loved them. He loved them with a love that is looooong
suffering. He was incredibly patient. And kind. And faithful. He never stopped
praying for them or teaching them or encouraging them. He pushed them to be
better. To love more and give more.
And we are
called to do the same.
[i]
“What Millennials Want When They Visit Church” was published March 4, 2015 at www.barna.com/research. Downloaded May
6, 2017.
[ii]
Kudzai Chingwe. “Church in Zimbabwe donates food for female prisoners.”
Published May 3, 2017 on The United Methodist Church website at www.umc.org/news-and-media.
Downloaded May 6, 2017.
[iii]
The information on the Four Areas of Focus and last week’s meeting of the
Council of Bishops was written by Sam Hodges. “Keeping focused on Four Areas of
Focus” was published May 3, 2017, on The UMC website at www.umc.org/news. Downloaded May 6, 2017.
[vi]
Merton, XVI-XVII.
[vii]
Merton, XXI.
[viii]
Merton, XXII.
[ix]
Wesley, 93.
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