Enduring Change

This past week I went before the Board of Ordained Ministry seeking certification in Camp and Retreat Ministry and Christian Education. One hopes that after Full-connection interviews are passed that dealing with the BOOM is also a thing of days gone by. They can be and are an intimidating bunch.

I started out just fine telling of my ministry expertise in Camp and Retreat Ministries. As it turned to Christian Education I began to fall away from my beautiful explanations, and fell into the trap of not knowing what to say. I felt set adfrift. The BOOM team then invited me to return another time to share my reasons for seeking certification in Christian Education. I realized I needed to dig out and nurture my understanding of Christian Education. I was going to be entering a season of reflection about resourcing Christian Education leaders, nurturing my skills, and digging into precedents about Elders in Full-Connection who are serving with Christian Education Certification.

Lent is just such a time for reflection, and our texts this morning invite us into that season of reflection. Our reading from 1 Corinthians reminds us of the Exodus experience, which was reinforced from last week's reading from Genesis which forecast some trials for the Israelite people. Lent is our wandering time, just as Jesus wandered in the wilderness for those 40 days as well.

We are moving from our living place, which is so comfortable, maybe a little dangerous and ugly at times like it was for the Israelites, but it is familiar, and we are being called "home" with God's plan. Home may not be as comfortable and travels produce bickering and grumbling and frustrations, but when we arrive we land, like the Israelites in the land of Milk and Honey, graced with all of God's blessings, into the Promised Land.

But, we need to realize that we have not yet arrived. We have left the days of the foreign lands, where we were mistreated and fought through some terrible trials, and we began our wanderings, as we were first "The Little Brown Church in the Vale" until someone decided the old building needed a new coat of paint, and painted the building white, losing some of the identity we had held onto during that time. We moved locations down to the building on Date St, that is now the Native Sons building, until the vision was lifted up that we needed to move 1 mile north to our current location. The need for the people of this community to hear the Good News of Jesus Christ, and to have the support of a church in the community was the driving vision bringing us North.

We continued in the wandering as we fought through fires and floods and finances. Our footing never seemed very sure, and we always were struggling, like the Israelites as they suffered through food shortages, lack of variety to eat, challenges in finding drinking water, and generally feeling unsafe. The Israelites left Egypt and wandered for 3 years, and then sat at the edge of the promised land for 37 years.

Folks, we are still standing on the edge of the promised land. The Israelites wouldn't go, because there were giants, and the people were scary and there were too many foes. They couldn't muster the courage to go into the land, so they sat for 37 years. They waited for all the naysayers and the giant viewers to die off. They waited for all but two to die off. Even their vaunted leader, Moses, had to die off before they could enter the land. Only two survived, Joshua and Caleb. are we waiting for those people who can't see the promised land as a place of good, but a place that causes us to fear to die off.

Going into the promisedland recalls our vision for ministry in this community. It isn't for us to sit in this church, but to go out and to share the Good News of Jesus Christ with those who are out there.

1 Corinthians reminds us of what not to do: Idolatry, Sexual Immorality, Test the Lord God, and Grumbling. We may think we are free from some of these,but do we hold up things as more important than people, the people that God has called us to meet and be the Christian witness to? We may think that because the incidences cited for the Corinthians come from their own orgies, and the orgy that caused 23000 to be killed in one day from Israel are not our own sins, but we have to think that every time we lust, and we look at the others in the body of Christ as simply bodies we are cossing the line warned against in this text. We don't test the Lord God, but we may think that going out to win the people for Christ makes them "ours" is no different than the text put before Jesus in the wilderness by Satan, that all this land would be given to Jesus to rule if he would but worship Satan. The land is not ours to own, or the people either, but God's chosen people eager to hear about Jesus Christ. Oh, and folks we grumble, about how we can't worship with the stage set this way, or with these songs, or those songs. We wonder when the pastor will recognize the work we do around the church. We grow weary of doing good, and grumble about how hard it was to go see this person or that person who was sick, or in prison. We stumble.

Fortunately, Jesus reminds us with grace how to do what is right. We must repent, dig out a little, and nurture. We have to understand that what we have done is and was wrong. We have to ask for forgiveness, and try to gain "just one more year" as the gardener does with the owner of the vineyard. We have to dig out from around the fig tree.If we know the fig tree is the church property, we have to go and cultivate and talk with those who are around us, preparing the ground to give life, rather than choke off the growth of the fig tree. We have to nurture the fig tree, watering, and fertilizing, giving it the nutrients we need, like discovering our spiritual gifts, studying the scriptures, sharing in community. If we do this, in order to have yet another year we have to bear fruit. We have got to be winning disciples for Jesus Christ, and making those who already are disciples stronger and teachers of the way we have learned.

Peace,