October 14, 2007 – Advent’s 25th Anniversary
Luke 17:11-19
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Grace and peace to you from God the Creator and the Lord Jesus. Amen.
Twenty-five years of ministry! A quarter-century as a steady witness in the Lutheran tradition within the worldwide Christian movement! Happy Anniversary to us!
Those who have attended older churches may well look at this particular milestone in the history of Advent as pretty small potatoes. After all, Christ Lutheran Church in Woodstock, New York, which bills itself as the oldest Lutheran church in the United States, last year celebrated its 200th anniversary. So to those hardy New York Lutherans and others who celebrate long tenure, we say “Hooray for you!” However, we are not you, we are us, and to us, 25 years qualifies as a rather big deal. Today is our moment in the sun, and amid the beauty of the choir’s voices and the majesty of the chancel bells, we plan to make the most of it.
And we’ll make the most of this day by recognizing that anniversary celebrations are filled with temptation, because they are filled with the allure of past accomplishment.
To be sure, it was no small thing to start this church. Plans to purchase land at 119th and Metcalf were scrapped in favor of buying a small parcel here at the corner of 151st and Quivira; conflict that ebbed and flowed during the early years, then the stabilizing presence of Pastor Roger Gieschen; then the bold decision to call a clergy couple! … from California! … from Berkeley! But God is indeed merciful, and things have worked out nicely.
Over the years countless hundreds of people have been fed here – on Bread and Wine, and Word of God shared in sanctuary and classroom and Christian fellowship; the waters of baptism have blessed so many children and adults with the announcement of new life in Christ. Who knows now many lives have been changed by our mission trips, our Service Ministry projects near and far, our benevolence offerings to the national church, our simple care for one another in times of pain, our happiness with one another in times of joy.
Yes, the past here has indeed been robust, productive, faithful. However, and this is where we deal with the temptation embedded in anniversary celebrations, we must see the last 25 years for what they really are: a good start. We take our perspective on this from our Lord, who lived in this world by always leaning forward, into God’s future. The past is a foundation which we honor and appreciate, not a dwelling place in which we take refuge; we as a congregation are always on the move, and the direction of travel is always forward, trusting in the God who invites us into tomorrow.
The energy with which we engage that future is all-important. And there is no more positive energy the energy we see at work in the Gospel lesson for this morning, the energy of gratitude.
As Jesus makes his way to Jerusalem where he will become the means by which all of humanity will be brought into full relationship with God, he encounters 10 people whose lives are defined by broken relationships. For one reason or another, we don’t know why or how, they have the disease of leprosy, which forces them to live isolated lives. They are cut off from families, cut off from employment, cut off from friends, cut off from most of what makes life rich and worth living.
Somehow they know about Jesus, and they at least suspect that he has the power to heal them. And so they call out. He, in turn, demands nothing from them – no evidence of faith, did you notice?, no commitment even to try to believe – but simply tells them to go to the priests so they can be certified as healed and thereby restored to their communities, their families, their lives. As they go, they discover that they indeed have been made whole again.
They have received from Jesus the one thing they could not provide for themselves: the wholeness that restores broken relationships. But only one of the 10 is so conscious, so aware, so in tune with his own condition and the divine power that has changed it for good, that his actions are now dictated by a new energy, the energy of gratitude. Now, his response can only be worship.
Experts tell us that gratitude is a quality, a chosen attitude that by its very nature is life-giving.
I recently heard of a very wealthy man who was approached by members of his church’s stewardship committee. The man had never been known for his financial generosity; in fact, he was well known for his stinginess. But the church had mounted a capital campaign, and the stewardship committee decided to appeal to him. They met one afternoon, and the church people said that, in view of his considerable resources, they were certain that he would want to make a substantial contribution.
“Oh really?” he said, “you’ve got it all figured out? Well, did you realize that I have a widowed mother who has no means of support but me?”
“Well, no, we didn’t know that,” the church people said.
“And did you also know that I have a sister whose husband has left her and the children with no way to provide for them?”
“Uh, no, we didn’t know that either.”
“And did you also know that I have a brother who was injured in a car accident and now can no longer work to help support his family?”
The church people were totally embarrassed by now. “No, sir, we’re sorry; but we didn’t know any of that.”
“Well,” the man crowed, “I don’t give anything to them; why should I give anything to you?!”
That was not an attitude of gratitude!
Gratitude always opens outward in welcome and invitation. What a faithful attitude, what a faithful energy to power a congregation into its second quarter-century of ministry; forward-leaning, externally focused, open to the opportunities that God will present.
For Advent, this openness to ever more effective and faithful everyday living will be based on a very simple but profound movement among ourselves, one that has already begun and will continue to be emphasized: the growth from membership to discipleship. With membership, the primary relationship is between the member and the church, and it is an excellent place to start; with discipleship, the primary relationship is between the member and God. The church is essential to that relationship, because the church is the incubator in which that relationship grows and matures as we live it out in the world. I believe that it is our task to accept and engage God’s invitation to grow from membership to discipleship.
Discipleship – a lifestyle of gratitude – is nurtured and developed by seven very concrete and foundational practices, practices that we might find challenging but ones we will definitely find rewarding: Weekly worship, daily prayer, daily Bible reading, continuing Christian education, service within and beyond Advent, supportive relationships with other Christians, and the giving of our resources to the work of God in the world.
A brief word about each:
From the very beginning of the Christian movement, the regular gathering of believers to share Bread and Wine and the Word of God has been the essential means by which God strengthens us to live distinct lives in this world, and to love this world as God loves it. Growing from membership to discipleship means growing from seeing worship as an obligation or spectator sport to seeing it as a way to intentionally, actively enter into the presence of the living God. It is the way God has of reminding us of who we are, and to whom we belong. We need that reminder weekly.
We also need regular conversation with God in prayer. We know how to express our needs and desires and ideas to other people, and hopefully we have special friends with whom we can share our intimate joys and our sorrows. Daily prayer is simply doing what we already know how to do, only with God. Growing from membership to discipleship means being less concerned with getting prayer “right” (whatever that means) and more concerned with allowing God to hear us through his filter of unconditional love.
God has already, and eloquently, started the conversation with us by giving us God’s Word. The most recent statistics show that 92 percent of households in the United States own at least one Bible, and the typical household owns three. But only 16 percent of the population say they read the Bible daily, a figure that might be optimistic, given what’s called the Halo Factor, which says that we tend to over-report our involvement in charitable organizations and activities. Growing from membership to discipleship means no longer seeing the Bible as the property of the pastors but as an essential part of the Christian believer’s daily toolbox.
Another essential tool is continuing Christian education. In order to live the story of the faith, we must learn that story. Growing from membership to discipleship means abandoning the idea that Christian education is restricted to Sunday school for children and instead seeking out opportunities for life-long learning.
God invites us to live our faith in concrete ways, by serving within this community of Advent and well beyond it. God tells us in the Gospel of John that he so loved the world that he gave his only son, and that he will continue to love this world through Jesus’ followers. And so we’re not surprised by the words of the prophet Micah: What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Justice and love are not optional activities for the disciple. Growing from membership to discipleship means growing from theoretical agreement in private to practical action in public.
Fellowship with other Christian believers is essential if we are to grow spiritually. Christian friends are indispensable as we encourage each other, build each other up in the faith, genuinely reflect the love of God for each other. Growing from membership to discipleship means leaving behind interactions that simply go through the motions and instead becoming actively interested and engaged in the spiritual and physical well-being of one another.
The offertory prayer that we will share later in the service says that “in gratitude for all you have given we return to you a portion of our time, our money and our abilities.” Growing from membership to discipleship means no longer seeing our financial giving as a contribution to an organization but rather as a response to our God who has provided us the one thing we cannot provide for ourselves – a restored relationship with God and therefore full life, both now and in the world to come. Our generosity is deeply rooted in God’s generosity.
Seven characteristics of discipleship: Weekly worship, daily prayer, daily Bible reading, ongoing Christian education, service within and beyond Advent, Christian friendships, and the giving of our resources to the work of God in the world.
Discipleship, empowered by gratitude, shines like a light in a dark room, and it changes the world.
On our most recent mission trip down to New Orleans, we stopped at a rest area in northern Mississippi. We had all piled out of the vans and were stretching our legs, and after a while I noticed one of the maintenance workers at the rest stop just leaning on his rake, watching us with a smile on his face as we simply hung out with each other before hitting the road again.
I wandered over and introduced myself. The maintenance worker’s name was Bob. “Say, who are you people?” he asked.
“We’re a church group from Kansas,” I said, “on our way down to New Orleans to help out with Katrina clean-up.”
“I thought so,” he said, then added, “you God people really love each other, don’t you?”
The question caught me a little off-guard. “Yes, as a matter of fact, we do,” I said.
“It sure shows, just by the way you are with each other. So thanks,” he said, “You people made my day. If I ever get up to Kansas, I might look you up. You just might have something there, even for somebody like me.”
What we have here is the generosity and love of God, a love that came to full expression on that cross, a love that now changes the world, one life at a time.
As we begin a new quarter-century of ministry here at Advent, we move forward in gratitude, growing from membership to discipleship, honoring the past, eager for the future. It’s time to roll up our sleeves; God’s world is waiting, and it’s waiting for us.
Amen.
