Psalm 31 p 439
In you, O LORD, I seek refuge; do not let me ever be put to shame; in your righteousness deliver me.
Incline your ear to me; rescue me speedily. Be a rock of refuge for me, a strong fortress to save me.
You are indeed my rock and my fortress; for your name’s sake lead me and guide me,
take me out of the net that is hidden for me, for you are my refuge.
Into your hand I commit my spirit; you have redeemed me, O LORD, faithful God.
My times are in your hand; deliver me from the hand of my enemies and persecutors.
Let your face shine upon your servant; save me in your steadfast love.
This is the word of the Lord: Thanks be to God
We’ve all done it, I think- or at least been on the receiving end –that speech, those final words, that try to imbue all the information and wisdom we want to give someone- when we’re leaving the kids for the first time alone—“don’t burn down the place, don’t let anybody in the house, here’s 5$ if you need milk from the store…” or when the children go away: “don’t drive too fast, wear your seat belt, call when you get there…” or even when we are undergoing something unknown, a biopsy or medical procedure, the nurse makes sure to walk us through: “you’ll feel a pinch, and begin to feel a little sleepy, and then the dr will come in, and the next thing you know, you’ll wake up in the recovery room. You’ll be fine.” This morning’s text from John is just that: Part of Jesus’ final words to the disciples: Listen now, for the word of the Lord
John 14:1-14 p 877
14“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. 2In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.
4And you know the way to the place where I am going.” 5Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” 6Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” 8Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.” 9Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works. 11Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves.
12Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 13I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.
This is the word of the Lord……Thanks be to God
We want to know—we want to be prepared. Jesus will soon go away, and he is trying to reassure the disciples, trying to prepare them. “Do not let your hearts be troubled…” Don’t worry, Jesus says. Really- it’ll be okay- why? Because I am going ahead of you, and I am going to prepare a place for you.
This passage is frequently used at funerals. In my Father’s house there are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?”
Trust me Jesus says. In fact the word used for believe- “believe in God, believe also in me” is really better rendered as “trust”- a trust built on a relationship.
The disciples have a relationship with Jesus. They have been with him for a while, now. This morning’s passage is set after Palm Sunday, after the foot washing, while the disciples are still sitting at the table, but after Jesus has told the disciples about his impending death. They are starting to get nervous-why is he talking like that? What can he possibly mean? What is this talk about going away?
Thomas- and here I want to call him Realistic Thomas rather than Doubting Thomas, asks a common sense question- “Lord, we do not know where you are going” Makes sense. Sensible Thomas wants a road map- where are you going, and how are we going to get there? Where Jesus is going is much less than a destination, and much more of a way of being, however. And Thomas’ words are actually- “we are not able to know where you are going”. It’s not a cognitive, fact based knowing- we are unable to know where you are going-
And Jesus has compassion for them- “I am the way” he tells them. You already know me, Jesus tells them, and in that relationship is all you need to know.
Robert Jenson says that “God is not known by us because he/GOD is amenable to the exercise of our cognitive powers. In a word made flesh, God…is disclosed in the self-giving, self-emptying love that is God’s Son.
Many scholars think the Gospel of John has post-resurrection statements interpolated into the text. That means that the faithful community went back and put in after-Easter, post-death and post-resurrection words into the gospel text. So that Jesus, in saying to his followers, “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself-“ is the Jesus who has already died, and been resurrected, has already defeated death and sin, has already been raised to glory- and has, indeed, come again to take them to himself.
And where does he appear? In the midst of them, the faithful community. The word “you” in this morning’s text is always plural- you, the disciples, the “all ya’ll” you, the whole church you- not just to one of us, but to all of us, together.
Because did you hear what Jesus had to say? “In my Father’s house are many rooms….” There’s an African-American gospel song, Plenty Good Room. There is a wideness in God’s mercy, another hymn says, like the wideness of the sea. Plenty good room, says the song, plenty good room in my Father’s kingdom. We are called to have that largeness of heart, we are called to make sure there is indeed plenty good room in the kingdom.
If this message to the early church, and to us, is that in God’s house there are lots of rooms, then there must be room for all kinds of people. And there are all kinds of jokes about this: that a Presbyterian dies, and goes to heaven, and is taken on a tour by St Peter—and they pass one room, and there’s all kinds of music and singing: “Oh, those are the Baptists” says St Peter, and they pass another room, and they can hear through the door chanting and smell incense “Oh, those are the Episcopalians” says St Peter. And they go down the hall, and they pass a room, and St Peter motions for the Presbyterian to be silent. “Shh…those are the (fill in the blank denomination here) they think they’re the only ones who got in”.
So what are we to do in this roomy, capacious kingdom? Many point to this text as the text that shows just how wide God’s mercy and grace are, and point to it as a way for us to respond, with grace, to people of other faiths. If God has room in his mansion, if Jesus comes and calls other sheep that are not of this sheepfold, then how are we to think and live?
Shirley Guthrie, Presbyterian pastor and teacher, says this: If we look at non-Christians in light of God’s plan, we are permitted and required to believe that God is for them too- that God loves them, that God desires their salvation, too, that God works in their lives and in the world around them. It is not their unbelief and disobedience but the will and work of God in Jesus Christ that tells us what God’s attitude toward them is and will be. How can we Christians take non-Christians unbelief more seriously than we take what God has told us God plans and wills for them?
Rob Bell recently published a book called Love Wins. Rob Bell is a huge, huge big deal in the Emergent and Evangelical church. He is the founding pastor of Mars Hill Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a mega-mega church, by many people’s measure the mother ship of mega-churches, the epitome of success of what it means to be a Christian and a church. And in his book, Love Wins, Rob Bell writes that the church was doing a series of teachings on peacemaking, and having an art show, in which artists were to reflect on what it means to be a peacemaker. One of the artists chose to include a quote from Mahatma Gandhi in her work. A number of people found that quite compelling. But not everyone—someone attached a sticky note to the picture that said “Reality check: He’s in hell”.
And among Bell’s questions are: really? We have confirmation of this? Somebody knows this without a doubt?
Rob Bell is saying the same thing John Calvin and the early Westminster Confessions say: “We are to have a good hope for all”. We have that good hope because we rest in the graciousness, the wideness of God’s mercy.
Other sheep I have, that are not of this sheepfold. In my Father’s House there are many rooms, says Jesus.
But we also have Jesus’ words from this same passage- “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me.”
Karl Barth, easily one of the most famous theologians of the 20th Century, was lecturing once to a group of students at Princeton University. One student asked him a question that has probably crossed your minds: "Sir", said the student, "don't you think that God has revealed himself in other religions and not only in
Christianity?" Barth's answer stunned the crowd. With a modest thunder he answered, "No, God has not revealed himself in any religion, including Christianity. He has revealed himself in his Son."
I am the way, Jesus said. The early Christians were not labeled “Christians”: they were called “People of the Way”. And what do we do, as people of the way? What do we do on our journey? Is heaven just a destination? Some of you may have heard that yesterday, May 21, was judgment day, according to Harold Camping. We understand that Jesus will come again—but that no one knows the hour, not the angels in heaven, not even the Son, only the Father. But we do rest in this relationship, this trust- Jesus says he has gone on ahead to prepare a place for us—and we trust him. So, as people relying on this trust, this relationship, living out this relationship, how do we live? Do we live out the Kingdom of God, right now, right here? The church is by definition the community of those who live by God’s forgiveness for guilty people. …It is the place where people can risk putting aside their defenses and masks, knowing that they will be accepted just as they are.
The truth is this: following Jesus means that we need one another in community, and that our life together is for the healing of the world. So what if this life we have in Jesus is as simple as sharing our lives and faith and serving people in our families, circle of friends, co-workers, and community.
Our life as Christians is this: the work we are called to is to help one another follow Jesus into the lives of people who are hungry and thirsty for life that is real and lasting. We offer others the same grace and love that has healed and changed our lives. Maybe, just maybe, this is how healing comes into a very broken world. And this is how Jesus intends for the Kingdom to advance.
Maybe, just maybe, that is what the church is called to be: a roomy place, a spacious place, where the wideness of God’s mercy, where the plenty good room of God is lived out for all the world to see. Amen.
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Sunday, May 15, 2011
I Am the Gate
1 Peter 2:1-10 p. 984
Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. 2Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— 3if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
4Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6For it stands in scripture: “See, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” 7To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner,” 8and “A stone that makes them stumble, and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do. 9But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 10Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
John 10: 1-16 p. 872
“Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.” 6Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. 7So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. 11“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
In the Gospel of John, there are many “I AM” statements by Jesus. Jesus says “I am the bread of life”, “I am the living water”, “I am the light of the world”. All of them are statements that are life giving and life affirming, and all of them use ordinary objects drawn from everyday life, to begin to enter into the mystery that is Immanuel- God with us.
One of the most familiar I AM statements is Jesus saying “I am the Good Shepherd”. We have stained glass windows, artwork, hymns, that reflect this image. Those of us who know real-life shepherds (like Andy & Mary, or Anne & John Knight) see that this makes sense, and is a beautiful illustration of God’s love for us. We see from those human shepherds what care, what diligence a shepherd takes: out in all weather, making sure the fields contain nutritious grass and water, making sure the sheep are safe, that the lambs and mothers are alright, that there are no predators menacing the flock.
After talking about being a shepherd, Jesus uses another image: “Very truly, I tell you- I am the gate for the sheep,” however, inspires no art work, no stained glass windows, no hymns. It is not, at first, a really compelling image. It is hard even to imagine that. When Jim and I recently traveled in China, we experienced lots of gates: going through customs and immigration, in lines at gardens and at tourist attractions, even going through security at the Metro. There were a lot of gates, and all of them were designed to control, to restrict, people and the flow of traffic.
So the image of Jesus as a gate might seem strange, even unpleasant to us. It may help, though, to know that in Jesus’ day shepherds sometimes actually, physically were gates for the sheep. Out in the fields, a shepherd would make an enclosure—or rocks, or of brush and briars, and then, at night, would gather the sheep into the enclosure. The shepherd would lay down in the small opening, keeping the sheep in, and the predators out—literally becoming the gate for the sheep.
But if we are talking about Jesus as the gate, then what is the sheepfold? The sheepfold, historically, has been thought of as the church—a place of safety and refuge, a place of togetherness. The sheep, cared for by the shepherd, were safe from predators, and would be healthy and thrive.
One of the ways to begin to understand this text is to understand that in the Gospel of John, there is nearly always first a sign, a miracle, and then a discourse, an explanation. In this morning’s text that Jesus performed, is way back in John 9- we heard it in Lent- the story of the man born blind. If you remember, the man was cured of his blindness by Jesus, and then the man and his family were quizzed by the Pharisees, and then the man was cast out of the synagogue. This text, about Jesus as the gate- or, in Greek, door- is about a way for those early Christians, cast out of the synagogue, kicked out of their families, to find a home, to find safety, to find abundant life in Jesus.
But, if there is a door, or a gate, then there is also a fence, right? The way that we think about gates is that they are the opening in the fence. And Jesus tells the Pharisees, and the early church this: “Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.” So the gate both lets in, and lets out. The gate both opens and closes, protects and sets free.
The church, the sheepfold, for many centuries, did something I find, if not abhorrent, then at least objectionable. It has to do with fencing and gates: it is commonly known as “fencing the table”. And it began, as most things do, with good intentions. Calvin, in Geneva, wanted to have the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper celebrated every Sunday. The problem, though, was that the elders were to examine all people before they came to partake of communion. Those elders had read 1 Corinthians, in which Paul writes to the church there, that “they eat and drink damnation unto themselves” if they do not take the Lord’s Supper in a worthy manner. By the way, Paul was talking about the rich people in the church in Corinth hogging all the food, before the poor working people and slaves could get off from work and come to church, which was held in the afternoon.
The elders took very, very seriously, that warning, and took very seriously their charge to care for the spiritual welfare of the church. All were to examine themselves, and the elders were to examine all members of the congregation. “How is it with your soul?” the elders would ask the members. Anyone continuing in “unrepented sin” would be excluded from the table—the table was “fenced”, for the good of the members. In some times and places, even up to the early 20th century, communion tokens were given to those declared worthy by the elders—and members presenting tokens on Sunday morning could join in communion. In other times and churches—and Jim and I grew up in one—the people were to “rightly examine themselves” in prayer the week before communion—there was an exhortation to self examination and confession that is still used today. Needless to say, this much examination and self examination took time—and communion was not celebrated weekly, as John Calvin had hoped.
The church has a different understanding now of eating at the Lord’s Table, and while we do exhort you all- us all- to confess and repent of any sin, we understand that Jesus the gate, opens to us the way of abundant life and righteousness. The door opens, and we go in and out, to find pasture.
But to go back to our metaphor, if Jesus is the gate, and the church has been seen as the sheepfold, I want to ask in what ways the church has been closing the gate? In what ways have we been fencing the table, fencing off access to Jesus, who brings abundant life? With our talk, in our gossip and our words? The writer of 1 Peter says this: “Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander.” Is it in our polity and life together? Or what we say after the meeting is over and we are in the parking lot?
Some of you may know, that this past year, the PCUSA has been voting, presbytery by presbytery, on changes to the Book of Order, and to the Book of Confessions, the two parts of our church’s constitution. Some of those changes are just boring, rearranging lines in the Book of Order that nobody really reads or cares about, you may think, and some of them are controversial.
Certainly the most controversial one is the one that deals with ordination standards: the wording proposed is “Standards for ordained service reflect the church’s desire to submit joyfully to the Lordship of Jesus Christ in all aspects of life (G-1.0000).” What is changed is any language about chastity in singleness and fidelity in marriage for those seeking to be ordained—words that are good in and of themselves, but were most often used to bar gays and lesbians from being ordained in the church. This past week, the 87th Presbytery voted yes on this amendment, meaning that two-thirds of the presbyteries in the PCUSA approved it, and it will become part of our Book of Order at the next General Assembly in 2012. I know there are some who welcome this change, and I know there are some who are opposed to it. But what I hope—no, what I pray for, is that we do not fence each other out. That we remain Christ’s church, one flock, one shepherd, listening to his voice calling us.
In a church wide letter to congregations everywhere, the General Assembly Staff- Cindy Bolbach, moderator, Gradye Parsons, Stated Clerk, and others, write this:
Reactions to this change will span a wide spectrum. Some will rejoice, while others will weep. Those who rejoice will see the change as an action, long in coming, that makes the PC(USA) an inclusive church that recognizes and receives the gifts for ministry of all those who feel called to ordained office. Those who weep will consider this change one that compromises biblical authority and acquiesces to present culture. The feelings on both sides run deep.
However, as Presbyterians, we believe that the only way we will find God’s will for the church is by seeking it together – worshiping, praying, thinking, and serving alongside one another. We are neighbors and colleagues, friends and family. Most importantly, we are all children of God, saved and taught by Jesus Christ, and filled with the Holy Spirit.
For here is an interesting thing: in the same discourse, in the same speech about being both gate and good shepherd, Jesus says this: “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them in also, and they will listen to my voice.” “Other sheep I have, that are not of this sheepfold” is the old translation. If Jesus is the gate, bringing in other sheep, sheep we don’t know, sheep we don’t recognize, sheep we don’t like, sheep who are different from us, sheep that we actively disagree with, if Jesus is opening the way for them, then who are we to stand in their way, who are we to close the gate? The unity of the church on this issue rests in our one Lord Jesus Christ, and not in our agreement or unanimity. We are one because we are bound to each other in Jesus Christ. We belong to each other because Christ has called us, and we belong to him. There will be voices that, in decrying this change in our Book of Order, declare that the time has come to break fellowship with those with whom they cannot agree . Let us all listen to the voice of Jesus, and be one flock, with one shepherd. Amen.
Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice, and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander. 2Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation— 3if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.
4Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and 5like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. 6For it stands in scripture: “See, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” 7To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner,” 8and “A stone that makes them stumble, and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do. 9But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 10Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
John 10: 1-16 p. 872
“Very truly, I tell you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climbs in by another way is a thief and a bandit. 2The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. 3The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep hear his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and the sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5They will not follow a stranger, but they will run from him because they do not know the voice of strangers.” 6Jesus used this figure of speech with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. 7So again Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who came before me are thieves and bandits; but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate. Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly. 11“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. 13The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. 14I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, 15just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. 16I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.
In the Gospel of John, there are many “I AM” statements by Jesus. Jesus says “I am the bread of life”, “I am the living water”, “I am the light of the world”. All of them are statements that are life giving and life affirming, and all of them use ordinary objects drawn from everyday life, to begin to enter into the mystery that is Immanuel- God with us.
One of the most familiar I AM statements is Jesus saying “I am the Good Shepherd”. We have stained glass windows, artwork, hymns, that reflect this image. Those of us who know real-life shepherds (like Andy & Mary, or Anne & John Knight) see that this makes sense, and is a beautiful illustration of God’s love for us. We see from those human shepherds what care, what diligence a shepherd takes: out in all weather, making sure the fields contain nutritious grass and water, making sure the sheep are safe, that the lambs and mothers are alright, that there are no predators menacing the flock.
After talking about being a shepherd, Jesus uses another image: “Very truly, I tell you- I am the gate for the sheep,” however, inspires no art work, no stained glass windows, no hymns. It is not, at first, a really compelling image. It is hard even to imagine that. When Jim and I recently traveled in China, we experienced lots of gates: going through customs and immigration, in lines at gardens and at tourist attractions, even going through security at the Metro. There were a lot of gates, and all of them were designed to control, to restrict, people and the flow of traffic.
So the image of Jesus as a gate might seem strange, even unpleasant to us. It may help, though, to know that in Jesus’ day shepherds sometimes actually, physically were gates for the sheep. Out in the fields, a shepherd would make an enclosure—or rocks, or of brush and briars, and then, at night, would gather the sheep into the enclosure. The shepherd would lay down in the small opening, keeping the sheep in, and the predators out—literally becoming the gate for the sheep.
But if we are talking about Jesus as the gate, then what is the sheepfold? The sheepfold, historically, has been thought of as the church—a place of safety and refuge, a place of togetherness. The sheep, cared for by the shepherd, were safe from predators, and would be healthy and thrive.
One of the ways to begin to understand this text is to understand that in the Gospel of John, there is nearly always first a sign, a miracle, and then a discourse, an explanation. In this morning’s text that Jesus performed, is way back in John 9- we heard it in Lent- the story of the man born blind. If you remember, the man was cured of his blindness by Jesus, and then the man and his family were quizzed by the Pharisees, and then the man was cast out of the synagogue. This text, about Jesus as the gate- or, in Greek, door- is about a way for those early Christians, cast out of the synagogue, kicked out of their families, to find a home, to find safety, to find abundant life in Jesus.
But, if there is a door, or a gate, then there is also a fence, right? The way that we think about gates is that they are the opening in the fence. And Jesus tells the Pharisees, and the early church this: “Whoever enters by me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture.” So the gate both lets in, and lets out. The gate both opens and closes, protects and sets free.
The church, the sheepfold, for many centuries, did something I find, if not abhorrent, then at least objectionable. It has to do with fencing and gates: it is commonly known as “fencing the table”. And it began, as most things do, with good intentions. Calvin, in Geneva, wanted to have the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper celebrated every Sunday. The problem, though, was that the elders were to examine all people before they came to partake of communion. Those elders had read 1 Corinthians, in which Paul writes to the church there, that “they eat and drink damnation unto themselves” if they do not take the Lord’s Supper in a worthy manner. By the way, Paul was talking about the rich people in the church in Corinth hogging all the food, before the poor working people and slaves could get off from work and come to church, which was held in the afternoon.
The elders took very, very seriously, that warning, and took very seriously their charge to care for the spiritual welfare of the church. All were to examine themselves, and the elders were to examine all members of the congregation. “How is it with your soul?” the elders would ask the members. Anyone continuing in “unrepented sin” would be excluded from the table—the table was “fenced”, for the good of the members. In some times and places, even up to the early 20th century, communion tokens were given to those declared worthy by the elders—and members presenting tokens on Sunday morning could join in communion. In other times and churches—and Jim and I grew up in one—the people were to “rightly examine themselves” in prayer the week before communion—there was an exhortation to self examination and confession that is still used today. Needless to say, this much examination and self examination took time—and communion was not celebrated weekly, as John Calvin had hoped.
The church has a different understanding now of eating at the Lord’s Table, and while we do exhort you all- us all- to confess and repent of any sin, we understand that Jesus the gate, opens to us the way of abundant life and righteousness. The door opens, and we go in and out, to find pasture.
But to go back to our metaphor, if Jesus is the gate, and the church has been seen as the sheepfold, I want to ask in what ways the church has been closing the gate? In what ways have we been fencing the table, fencing off access to Jesus, who brings abundant life? With our talk, in our gossip and our words? The writer of 1 Peter says this: “Rid yourselves, therefore, of all malice and all guile, insincerity, envy, and all slander.” Is it in our polity and life together? Or what we say after the meeting is over and we are in the parking lot?
Some of you may know, that this past year, the PCUSA has been voting, presbytery by presbytery, on changes to the Book of Order, and to the Book of Confessions, the two parts of our church’s constitution. Some of those changes are just boring, rearranging lines in the Book of Order that nobody really reads or cares about, you may think, and some of them are controversial.
Certainly the most controversial one is the one that deals with ordination standards: the wording proposed is “Standards for ordained service reflect the church’s desire to submit joyfully to the Lordship of Jesus Christ in all aspects of life (G-1.0000).” What is changed is any language about chastity in singleness and fidelity in marriage for those seeking to be ordained—words that are good in and of themselves, but were most often used to bar gays and lesbians from being ordained in the church. This past week, the 87th Presbytery voted yes on this amendment, meaning that two-thirds of the presbyteries in the PCUSA approved it, and it will become part of our Book of Order at the next General Assembly in 2012. I know there are some who welcome this change, and I know there are some who are opposed to it. But what I hope—no, what I pray for, is that we do not fence each other out. That we remain Christ’s church, one flock, one shepherd, listening to his voice calling us.
In a church wide letter to congregations everywhere, the General Assembly Staff- Cindy Bolbach, moderator, Gradye Parsons, Stated Clerk, and others, write this:
Reactions to this change will span a wide spectrum. Some will rejoice, while others will weep. Those who rejoice will see the change as an action, long in coming, that makes the PC(USA) an inclusive church that recognizes and receives the gifts for ministry of all those who feel called to ordained office. Those who weep will consider this change one that compromises biblical authority and acquiesces to present culture. The feelings on both sides run deep.
However, as Presbyterians, we believe that the only way we will find God’s will for the church is by seeking it together – worshiping, praying, thinking, and serving alongside one another. We are neighbors and colleagues, friends and family. Most importantly, we are all children of God, saved and taught by Jesus Christ, and filled with the Holy Spirit.
For here is an interesting thing: in the same discourse, in the same speech about being both gate and good shepherd, Jesus says this: “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. I must bring them in also, and they will listen to my voice.” “Other sheep I have, that are not of this sheepfold” is the old translation. If Jesus is the gate, bringing in other sheep, sheep we don’t know, sheep we don’t recognize, sheep we don’t like, sheep who are different from us, sheep that we actively disagree with, if Jesus is opening the way for them, then who are we to stand in their way, who are we to close the gate? The unity of the church on this issue rests in our one Lord Jesus Christ, and not in our agreement or unanimity. We are one because we are bound to each other in Jesus Christ. We belong to each other because Christ has called us, and we belong to him. There will be voices that, in decrying this change in our Book of Order, declare that the time has come to break fellowship with those with whom they cannot agree . Let us all listen to the voice of Jesus, and be one flock, with one shepherd. Amen.
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