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Sermon - Trinity Sunday (A) - 18th May 2008
St Alban's Epping 7 & 8am
The meaning of the decent of the Holy Spirit upon the early church was to give the apostles and their fellow members of their fellowship, the ability to establish the Church and to spread the Good News of Jesus, enthusiastically. Prior to the coming of the Holy Spirit they were frightened people who had seen their leader executed as a common criminal. If it were not for the coming of the Spirit, the Church would not be here today and the early followers of Jesus would have eventually died out or remained a sect of Judaism. Something was needed to enliven them to tell the stories of Jesus.
According to the Scriptures there are two reports of the Spirit coming upon the Disciples. In John’s Gospel, the decent of the Spirit is a short time after his resurrection, in the upper room, where Jesus appears unannounced and says to them,
“Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me so I send you.” When he had said this he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
In the account found in the Acts of the Apostles we read the better-known account,
“When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.”
Speaking about Jesus is what Pentecost is all about. Not to speak about Christian faith means that it becomes a selfish religion, a religion based upon the needs, wishes and wants of the members. Christianity is not our possession, it is the religion of the God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God wishes that we seek to bring others into the faith that is expressed in the life and love of God’s Son Jesus. We are all called to speak in words and actions about our belief that Jesus was and is the Messiah, God’s chosen One. He came into the world so that all who listen may become members of the body of Christ.
How then do we present ourselves to the world in which we live?
In a cartoon a woman stares at a display of fine jewellery. You can almost hear the sigh that accompanies her thoughts:
"I hate it when 'need' and 'want' get all mixed up in my mind…”
Human beings are prone to confusing their wants with their needs. Defining the church's ministry by responding to people's needs is a common notion, but because of the blurred line between want and need, no matter how much we speak of needs or perceived needs, it puts the church in the position of being defined not by its faith or history but by people's wants.
This trivializes the church, its mission and its outreach. In an article concerning evangelism, the author described how a congregation surveyed the residents of their surrounding community to determine their perceived needs and design programs to address those needs as outreach. As an example of a church in a community with young families the survey process resulted in the creation of a course in potty training.
Such trivialization is tragic. It empties the heart of the church's message and cuts the church off from its identity as the body of Christ. The attitudes engendered in people who come to congregations expecting the church to make meeting their needs (or, more likely, their wants) a priority also harms the Church. Simply put, when we say the Church is to meet people's needs, many people personalize that message. They hear, "If I go to church, then those people will take care for me". In selling the Church as a place where people's needs are met, people perceive an implied promise that if they come to the Church it will provide them what they think they need. The measurement of a congregation then becomes personal: "Is it meeting my needs?" They believe it is the church's job to listen to them, act on their ideas and their beliefs. For them, other aspects of a congregation’s life are strictly secondary to the parts that have an impact upon them directly.
What happens when these people feel their needs are not being met? That is, what occurs when they do not get what they want? They believe the church is letting them down. It is failing to do as promised, which they see as a breach of contract. In response, they may leave or challenge whatever is happening, or whoever is in charge until the promised care and attention are provided.
Jesus said “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many." He also said, "If anyone would come after me they must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me”. Christian faith has always been about giving, not receiving. Those who expect the church to respond to their needs, no matter what, frequently have little interest in giving to others. They came to be cared for, so they see being asked to help others as changing the rules.
To counter these trends, a shift in our thinking is called for and this shift must be reflected in our language. There are other, richer ways of speaking about ministry and mission than just talking about needs. When we speak of what ties us together as a church we can speak of shared bonds of fellowship and growing together in faith, of the importance of worship in our lives. The word "need" is never mentioned. The centre of our community life is not to respond to community needs but first to be a community of faith.
Looking at spiritual gifts as described by the writer of the First Letter of Paul to the Corinthians is another way to move beyond the "needs" mentality because it reminds us have much we have to give.
Reclaiming the language of call is another way to inspire a new awareness of purpose. The theologian Fredrick Buechner's comment, "The place where God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet”. This changes our understanding of mission. We can stop looking for someone to tell us what to do and start initiating ideas ourselves. Our mission moves from being something we are supposed to do to being a celebration of what we can do.
The problem with the idea of ministry as responding to people's needs is not in what congregations do but in how people come to think about the Church. It reduces the Church to a service provider where clients are free to complain whenever they are dissatisfied. Lost is the idea of people being and becoming the Church. Lost is the idea of understanding the church as a unity of faith whose members struggle together to draw closer to God and to express that closeness in how they live and interact with the world.
Jesus said, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
This sermon prepared using Congregations, The Alban Institute, Spring 2008 pp 11-15