Sermons

"Family Fortune"

Delivered from the Pulpit of First Congregational Church

of Anchorage by The Rev. Mark E. Long

on May 31, 2009

Lections:  Prov. 18.24

                  I Tim. 6.17-19

                  Jn. 13.31-35

Family is a slippery idea.  Oh we understand well enough the family of "blood relations."  We know that "blood related' people are family simply by definition.  It doesn't matter whether they like each other or even know each other.  They're family.  I am reminded of the "child bearing" years of my cousins.  I would return now and then from wherever I called home for the year to my real "home" in St. Louis and discover little bodies running around the tables of Christmas and Thanksgiving that I didn't know.  But ya know what?  Each of the little "into-everything one of them" was family - my family.

So that is one kind of family - an inescapable variety - we can't help but be family.  But there are others which claim to be a kind of family that may not be so readily recognizable - the 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates, for example.  I remember well the Pirates, not the Cardinals, going to the World Series with the strains of "We Are Family" (Sister Sledge) in the background.  They claimed to be a family but certainly not in the conventional sense.

So what made them a family?  Was it because they shared a lot of money or they all lived around Pittsburgh or they played together on the same team?  I don't know about you but I have shared profits, lived in the same geographical area, and even "played" into the night with fellow employees but I don't think I ever thought of them as "family" - buddies maybe but not family.

Family then must be a matter of something more than shared experiences then, unless it is "blood relations."  But when is it that we make the leap to call our group a family?  Are we a family simply because we say so?  Don't scoff because that is pretty much it.

But why would we say so?  Well shared experiences may not automatically make us a family but it is a good start.  Families form around a common or shared idea or experience.  This shared idea or experience, however, must be of sufficient force to draw the family members together and hold them there come what may for human associations to be a family.  Clearly, the '79 Pirates had the shared lofty ambition of going to the World Series; I on the other hand did not have shared experiences strong enough for me to see my insurance buddies as family.

Today is Pentecost.  It is the story that tells of the day the Christian church was born.  It is the day we tell the story of when individual men gathered together because they were told to without knowing why but then after learning why left together as a family.  What made them a family?  It was a shared experience of spiritual power, says the story, memorable enough to cause them to make a commitment of their lives to living and sharing the Way that Jesus had lived.

As we know, it all came together for them or actually they came together in a rather dramatic way.  Foreign languages were understood in native languages, fiery tongues hung in the air above heads.  Did it happen?  I don't know.  What I do know is the point of it all.  The individual as many became as one; individuals came together as a family of God.

There is a lesson for us who hear the story centuries later.  We should be a family too - not so much in a sentimental way, although that is fine also - but in the shared commitment to the Spirit that binds together God's people and sets us on the path to do our part to continue what Jesus started.

It is not really in doubt whether we should be a family - Proverbs makes clear how close our shared commitment should be to one another.  Not "friends" who play at "friendship" but friends so close we are as "nearest kin" to one another.  Remember how close "next of kin" relations are; they are inescapably related.

So given that we should be family and bonded together by the Spirit of God, inescapably so, the question moves to what kind of family will we be?

It is given that we are to be a family of love.  As Jesus says, "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another."  Then, quite importantly, closes the passage:  "By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."  Seems pretty clear to me, any community formed in Jesus' name is commanded to go forth in the Spirit of love that binds, sends, and empowers it.  But how does our love, our common calling, look?

Just as those who try to be all things to all people usually end up pleasing no one, so families of God that try to be all things to all people usually end up having little impact.  It is the simple matter of scattered energy and it is particularly so for churches not large enough to function as multiple families.

Some churches are large enough to do multiple ministries effectively.  In doing so, they, in a very real sense, act as more than one family or church.  Part of the family does social ministry, another part sets up worship and runs it, yet another part reaches out for new members, and still another part teaches the children and hangs out with the youth.  But for most churches, there just aren't enough bodies to go around for all that needs to be done.

It is appearing more and more apparent to me as I listen to other ministers, read about other churches, and books about churches that this is the age for targeted ministry.  Healthy churches focus on something in particular - whatever that may be.  They find something they either do well already or will commit significant resources to and then pursue it with a singular mind.  Forget what some may say - there are healthy churches driven by theologies that are conservative and liberal, and the reverse is true as well.  Health is not a matter of theology; it is a matter of identity and priority.

What seems to be the case today is that healthy churches are filled with people who have a shared identity - who know who they are, what the "family" commitments are, and who the Spirit has told to go tell the Good News.  And the evidence indicates the Spirit has not told them to go tell everybody.

Most of these churches do not reach out without an idea of who they are reaching for.  Some churches target twenty-somethings; others target young families and their children.  There are churches that water down church traditions to draw the unchurched or barely so.  Still other churches commit to uncover and meet the urban social needs in their part of town.

These choices reflect specific identities, identities that may lie at the end of a road of listening for the Spirit to guide the best use of what any particular family has to offer. I don't remember who said it, but it has been said that the place of ministry for a church lies in observation of where its gifts and talents meet the needs outside its doors.

One of the better ways to understand where Spirit guides us is to look for the vacuum that we can best fill.  We can take a survey and learn some things about our self-perception and maybe even dreams but the visioning process is then only half done for the church is not a democracy, even a Congregational one.

It is a theocracy; the family binds together in love not to put forward its agenda but God's under the power of the Spirit.  We will find our vision when we have appraised our skills and gifts and find the best match for them in our community.  We might begin by asking ourselves; what do we do best or what do we think we could do best given the full commitment of our energies?  What causes our hearts to engage and soar?

Whatever that is will likely be our "family fortune" - it is the gift by which the Spirit binds us, gives through us, but also blesses us for taking family seriously.  Read, mark, and digest well over the summer months the words at the end of I Timothy.  As it says, so that you may have "life that really is life."

This is how I see it on Pentecost eager to see where the Spirit moves us to serve.  Amen.