How We Worship

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
November 1, 2009

How We Worship
Galatians 1:3-10

The mighty sound of a pipe organ
shaking the very foundations of the building
with the celestial music of Bach.
Light washing through stained glass windows
that tell all the great stories of the Bible:
Noah, King David,
Mary and Joseph,
Jesus and his disciples.
Candles flickering in the stillness,
the faint scent of beeswax in the smoke,
rising with prayers and praise
as a fragrant offering to God.
Communionware on the Table glistening silvery,
offering plates gleaming in their brassyness.
The minister robed to reflect the seriousness of the moment,
the stole around the preacher’s shoulders
a colorful voice speaking joy in response to God’s call.
The worship service runs its course,
with just enough drama to inspire,
but not so much as to overwhelm.

This is what a worship service should be like.
Majestic and serious,
reflecting the traditions that have grown over the centuries,
especially the traditions grounded in the Reformation.

Heads nod in agreement not only here in this Sanctuary,
but in other churches, other denominations:
Yes, that’s it,
that’s what worship should be like every Sunday,
52 Sundays a year.

But more than a few heads shake.
“No!” they say:
That’s the way it used to be done.
That’s how our grandparents worshipped,
but that’s not how we want to worship.
That kind of service doesn’t connect with us;
it isn’t engaging;
it isn’t inspiring;
it’s often dull.

We want today’s music,
the kind of music we listen to on our iPods:
drums, guitars, keyboards,
loud and lively.
The colors that wash over us in worship
shouldn’t come from stained glass,
as lovely as it might be,
but from lighting that helps set the tone, the mood,
reflecting the spirit:
bright for joy,
hued red or blue, even purple
for more serious or somber times.

Tell the minister to put away that 500-year-old relic of a robe;
Did Jesus wear one?
No, he preached and taught in what he wore each day;
why can’t the minister do the same thing?

And don’t lock us into one book for the hymns we sing
to praise and honor God.
These days any hymnal is out of date
as soon as it rolls off the presses.
Bring hymns from all the world to us,
hymns from every source,
other denominations,
other cultures.
Put the words up on screens to save paper;
After all, we have learned through screens all our lives:
television, Gameboys, computers,
cellphones, texting and twittering:
“Screens-R-Us” describes our generation.
They work for us.

Make the service lively!
Aren’t we here to praise an awesome God?
Yes, we agree: let’s do it seriously,
but can’t we rock even a little
with the “Rock of Ages”?

Traditional versus contemporary,
what kind of worship style is right, is best?
In some churches the debate has fractured congregations,
even families.
A popular book that came out not that long ago
was entitled “The Worship Wars”,
written to help clergy and congregation navigate through
different needs, desires, histories,
that were often seen to be competing
in how we worship.

I am a product of tradition.
When I was in Buffalo two weeks ago to visit my sister,
we worshiped at the only church I knew
for the better part of 40 years,
the church of my grandparents and parents,
a grand, historic, traditional church,
established in 1847,
a foundation stone in Buffalo’s history,
a church with a Sanctuary
that can hold more than a thousand worshipers,
imposing with darkened brass and heavy oak,
gorgeous stained glass windows,
telling Old Testament stories on the North,
New Testament stories on the South.

It is a church steeped in tradition.
It is also a church that has been losing members for decades.
At its peak 50 years ago the church had more than 2500 members;
the current membership is about one-quarter that,
and the church has struggled financially the past couple of years.

It is the churches that rock with the Rock of Ages
that have grown so rapidly the past twenty years.
We see them all around us here in Northern Virginia:
In those churches you won’t find an organ, pipe or electronic;
you won’t find a chancel,
you won’t find the pastor wearing a pulpit robe.

What are we to do?
Drop traditional for contemporary?
No, of course not.
What we do is find a balance,
a balance between the traditional and the contemporary;
We are not unyielding in our hold on tradition,
but we also don’t race to embrace the latest fad
to appear contemporary.

As Deborah and I plan each Sunday’s service,
we try to blend traditional and contemporary;
the best of each.
We try to balance because we know that
what is comfortable and engaging for one person
isn’t for another.
The hymn you love may be a hymn that the person sitting next to you
finds almost an impediment in helping them worship God.
Our calling, our responsibility
is to reach across age and backgrounds,
to reach out to our most adventurous worshipers
as well as our most traditional.

Our job and the job of every worship leader
is not to please people;
it is to please God.
In Paul’s day there were many preachers
who claimed to preach and present the gospel,
but were doing nothing more than
giving people what they wanted to hear;
they saw that as long as they made crowds happy,
the crowds were willing to respond
by filling up the offering plates.

We seek authenticity,
faithfulness,
sometimes in the form of tradition,
other times in newer, more contemporary forms.
We balance, we blend,
knowing that what works for you,
may not work for another,
and what works for them,
may not work for you.
We try new things,
even as we build on history and tradition.

Could there be anything more traditional
in our worship service than when we join our voices together
and say the Lord’s Prayer?
But the Lord’s Prayer as we say it comes to us
from the days of the Westminster Confession of Faith,
written more than 350 years ago.
It reflects Elizabethan English,
the language of William Shakespeare:
“Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowed by thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven…”

We don’t speak that way any longer, of course.
And Jesus never spoke Elizabethan English:
he did not say “thee”, “thine”, or “thou”.
He spoke Aramaic, the common language of the people.
He would not have said,
“Thou art created in thy Father’s image.”
He would have said,
“You are created in your Father’s image.”

When he taught his disciples the Lord’s Prayer,
he taught them to say,
“Our Father who is in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
(Matthew 5:9)

Perhaps it is time for us to make a change,
a change from the Elizabethan,
from the traditional to the contemporary.
Here’s the irony:
If we did this we’d actually be more traditional, not less,
since we’d be going back to the prayer
as Jesus first taught it to his disciples.
See how contemporary can be traditional,
and the traditional contemporary?

As you come to this table this morning,
remember that we are all worshipers together
in our wonderful diversity
even as we share our common faith.

Our Lord invites us, in all our diversity
to come to his table
and share in this meal that he has prepared:
a meal that reflects an extraordinary history
going back more than 3,000 years,
a meal that renews and refreshes us for today,
and a meal that gives us a glimpse
of our glorious future.

Come to this table where you will find the perfect blending of
the tradition of yesterday,
the contemporary of today,
and the hope and promise of tomorrow.
That’s how God calls us to worship.
AMEN

How We Welcome One Another

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
October 25, 2009

How We Welcome One Another
Luke 14:7-14

Every book, every journal article,
every seminar, every expert:
they all say the same thing.
Research has confirmed it again and again:
How we welcome one another matters;
The warmth of our smile matters;
Graciousness matters.

How we welcome not just the visitor, the stranger,
but how we welcome one another,
greet one another,
treat one another,
Sunday after Sunday,
month after month,
year after year:
that’s what speaks most clearly,
most loudly,
and most compellingly about who we are.

Theology, creeds, preaching, music:
they are all important,
but not as important as how we welcome one another,
whether we are warm to one another,
friendly,
genuinely friendly,
reaching out,
embracing with graciousness and kindness.

Visitors pick up on this almost immediately.
A vibrant, faithful worship service helps.
An engaging Sunday School class for children
or adults: they are important, too.
But what is more important:
The greeting at the door,
the smile as a bulletin is offered,
a handshake during the passing of the peace,
an invitation to stay for coffee following the service.

Hospitality is ministry,
and ministry is hospitality.
Christianity means community (Bonhoeffer)
and community is built on hospitality,
hospitality offered across age,
vocation, length of membership,
where you came from,
even the college football team you root for.

Our hospitality –
or our lack of it –
is a reflection of our faith,
a reflection of whether we are salt and light.
Doesn’t Jesus teach us
that it is by our love for one another
that we are known as his followers?
And we show love for one another
through our hospitality toward one another.

Our hospitality towards those we know and call friends,
and toward those who walked through our doors
for the very first time this morning.

A smile,
a handshake,
words of welcome.
Asking such a simple question,
“how are you”,
and then listening attentively,
with genuine interest,
letting the speaker know that you asked the question
because you really do want to know how they are.

We are all called to the ministry of hospitality,
every one of us.
Not just the folks on the Membership Ministry Team,
or the Worship Ministry Team;
not just the greeters or the ushers,
or those who have organized the Coffee Hour.

We look to our Elders to set the example as leaders.
At our last Session meeting, we were reminded
of the charge from the Book of Order
that Elders collectively and individually
are called to nurture the faith and life of the congregation
(G-6.0304a)
and we nurture the faith and life of this congregation
by building community,
building a community in Christ,
with Christ,
and through Christ.

We have to work at being a hospitality community,
it doesn’t just happen.
We live in a society that seems more intent on shouting,
ranting, criticizing, fighting and dividing.
It makes it that much more critical for us
to work at welcoming.

It isn’t the swine flu virus
that poses that greatest danger to this church,
or any other community gathered in the name of Jesus Christ.
It is the virus of indifference, aloofness,
separateness, selfishness,
a virus that can infect us
and spread so quickly.

Jesus teaches us the importance of hospitality in our lesson;
The text tells us about genuine humility,
genuine hospitality,
genuine concern for others.
The preacher and teacher Fred Craddock
says that what Jesus is teaching us in this lesson
is “kingdom behavior”:
that Jesus is teaching us here and now
what we can expect to find
when we take our seats at the table
in God’s heavenly kingdom.
Jesus doesn’t want us to wait to learn what to do
and how to behave when we get there;
he wants us to model kingdom behavior here and now.

Now you might think,
how hard can it be,
when we take our seats at banquet table
in God’s kingdom?
After all, we’ll be in the presence of God,
bathed in light and love,
and certainly seated with family and friends.

But in a book a I read a few years back,
the author suggested that God may have a surprise for us,
that God may take a different approach,
depending upon how well we modeled
kingdom behavior in this life.
The author suggested that when we prepare to take our seats
at the heavenly banquet table
an angel of the Lord might well guide us to our places
as we might expect.
But as soon as we get seated,
another angel will escort someone else to take the seat
next to us
and that person won’t be a loved one;
instead, it will be someone
to whom we did not show hospitality in life,
someone with whom we might have argued
and failed to reconcile,
someone we might have ignored or looked down upon.,
someone we might have even considered our enemy.

God will leave us there to work on reconciliation,
to show one another hospitality
giving us as much time as it takes --
all eternity if need be!

And don’t think that as soon as you and your Kingdom Table
partner have shown one another hospitality
you are all set for eternity.
No, God will change your table partner,
and yet another person with whom
you were not reconciled in this life
will sit next to you,
and the process will begin again
until you are reconciled to all.
Only when all God’s children
are seated in genuine hospitality around God’s table
can the great banquet truly begin.

I love the imagery,
and it makes great sense to me,
for God in Jesus Christ calls us to lives of peace,
of warmth, of welcome, of friendship, of love.

In the Year-of-the-Bible group’s readings this last week,
we worked through the two letters to Timothy,
letters attributed to Paul,
who wrote to his young protégé
to provide him guidance on how to walk through each day
both as a disciple of Jesus Christ,
and as a model of the life Christ calls us to.
Be “hospitable” is the advice Paul gave,
Be “gentle”,
“set others an example in speech and conduct,
love and faith”.
And this is teaching for us, too.
All of us: for me,
for our Elders, our Deacons,
and for all of us.

We are often afraid of reaching out,
especially to strangers, to those we don’t know,
to those who look different,
perhaps speak in strange accents.
But our calling is to reach out,
reach out to all, welcome all.
Our call is to remember the image that Peter Marshall has given us
of our Lord Jesus Christ standing at the entrances to the church
with “his big carpenter hands” open wide in welcome,
welcome to all.

But Jesus doesn’t stop there, does he?
No, he passes along to us each person he welcomes,
saying to you and me,
“See what I just did,
how I greeted this person,
how I welcomed him or her?
Now you do the same thing.”

If you have not yet met all of our new members,
make sure you do so,
today, before you leave.
Then next Sunday go up and re-introduce yourself.
Remember: they have 400 new names and faces to learn;
each of us has just 8.
Our job is to help them:
Help our new members to feel welcome
help them to find their place here in this church,
wherever God might be calling them to let their light shine.

It can be a stretch for some of us to reach out,
but remember this:
with God at your back, and Christ at your side,
you are never are alone
as your extend your hand in fellowship and welcome.

Friendliness,
graciousness,
concern for another’s comfort and wellbeing,
kindness,
generosity of heart and spirit:
Are these words a visitor would use
to describe Manassas Presbyterian Church?
They will be ONLY if every one of us,
every one of us,
all of us,
are friendly, gracious, kind, generous,
always showing a concern for another.
Only if we take seriously our call to hospitality to all.

Take a look at your hands.
They may look ordinary to you, but they are not.
They are “big carpenter hands” just like Jesus’
even if they are not big,
even if they’ve never done carpentry.
They are hands God designed for many purposes,
including embracing and welcoming,
hands created to extend in gracious hospitality to all.

So put them to work today
every Sunday,
every day,
as you welcome one another,
as you welcome one another
in the name of the one who welcomes you,
welcomes you in grace and love.

AMEN

To Tithe or Not To Tithe: That is the Question

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
October 11, 2009


“The choicest of the first fruits of your ground
you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.”
Exodus 23:19

“The best of the first fruits of your ground
you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.”
Exodus 34:26

“All tithes from the land,
whether the seed from the ground
or the fruit from the tree, are the Lord’s;
they are holy to the Lord.”
Leviticus 27:30

“Set apart a tithe of all the yield of your seed
that is brought in yearly from the field.”
Deuteronomy 14:22

Do you see a pattern here?
A pattern that the children of God are called
to set aside a portion of what they had
and bring it to the Lord?
This is the biblical tithe,
the biblical ten percent.
And not just any ten percent,
but the first and best:
set aside and given to the Lord.

Actually “given” is the wrong word.
The first fruits, the tithe, the ten percent:
it was not a gift,
not something that was given to the Lord.
No, the tithe was a response,
it was a way to return to the Lord
a portion of what the Lord had given each person
in the first place.

The tithe was a reminder
that everything came from the Lord;
everything belonged to the Lord.

The tithe is a reminder
that everything comes from the Lord,
that everything belongs to the Lord.

And God was firm, adamant,
about the importance of bringing the tithe.
God was not interested in excuses or rationales:
“It wasn’t a good year;
I needed a new ox and plow;
I had to set money aside for retirement;
I’ll try to tithe next year.”

Listen to God’s angry voice speaking through the prophet Malachi:
“Will anyone rob God? Yet you are robbing me!
But you say, ‘how are we robbing you?’
In your tithes and your offerings!
You are cursed with a curse,
for you are robbing me –
the whole nation of you!
Bring the full tithe into the storehouse…”
Malachi 3:8

Bring the full tithe;
the full tithe.

So there we are: all we need to know.
We are to bring our first fruits, our tithe,
bring them to God, here in God’s house.
Bring them in response to God’s blessings,
bring them not as a gift to God,
but as a way for us to return a portion
of what we have been given by God.

But oh how hard this is for us!
Studies have shown that Presbyterians give an average
of two percent to the church,
a long way from ten percent!

We’re not done learning from the Bible;
we’ve only read through the Old Testament.
Let’s check the New Testament
to see what can find there,
to see if there ia different instruction,
that we don't have to tithe.

Jesus doesn’t speak of a tithe,
he doesn’t teach it.
Perhaps because he thought it was a lesson
that did not need teaching,
that it was so clear, he didn’t need to say anything.
You recall he lifts up the poor woman,
the widow who puts her coins in the box,
all she had,
so much more than a tithe.
She is the model for our giving:
more than generous;
giving should be selfless.

We have to turn to Paul to find anything specific about giving.
We might expect Paul to speak of tithing;
after all, he built his arguments on Scripture,
which for him was the Old Testament.
Paul certainly knew his Exodus,
his Leviticus,
even his Malachi.
Surely he must have something to say about tithing.

Let’s have a look.
In his Second Letter to the Corinthians we read:
“For, as I can testify,
the people in the churches in Macedonia
voluntarily gave according to their means…”
2 Cor. 8:3

“Gave according to their means”?
What does that mean?
Was Paul saying that they gave their tithe?

Let’s read further:
“…if the eagerness is there,
the gift is acceptable according to what one has –
not according to what one does not have.”
2 Cor. 8:12

“If the eagerness is there”
Is this the new test for giving?
And what did Paul mean when he said,
“the gift is acceptable according to what one has –
not according to what one does not have.”

So far we have not heard a word about tithing.
Let’s read further;
Here’s what he says next:
“The point is this: the one who sows sparingly
will also reap sparingly,
and the one who sows bountifully
will also reap bountifully.
Each of you must give as you have made up your mind,
not reluctantly or under compulsion,
for God loves a cheerful giver.”
2 Cor. 9:6

“To tithe or not to tithe” --
we thought that was the question.
But Paul doesn’t seem to say a word about tithing.

What Paul teaches us is this:
“each of you must give
as you have made up your mind.”

That’s it right there:
give as you see fit.
It is what the Stewardship Committee tries so hard to make so clear;
Take your pledge card,
pray,
listen for God’s guidance,
and then make your pledge of support
for the work God calls us to do
here at Manassas Presbyterian Church.
“Each of you must give
as you have made up your mind.”

Just as important,
God loves a cheerful giver;
So give eagerly.
Give joyfully.
Give not because you have to;
but because you want to,
because you are eager to respond to
the blessings God has given you.

Give gratefully.
That’s the premise of tithing,
it is an acknowledgement that it really isn’t your money,
my money, our money,
that God is the source of all you and I have,
that we are no different than the children of Israel:
we are merely returning a portion of what God has given to us.

Filling out a pledge card should be such a joyful task:
Are you grateful for blessings in your life?
Are you grateful for this church and all we do here?
It is so easy to be critical,
to say, “I don’t like this or that”
about our church.
But what’s the point of that?
We all know we are not perfect;
You can look everywhere and you will never find
the perfect church.

We are the body of Christ,
every one of us an imperfect child of God.
We do some things well,
and we do other things not so well.
But God has called us all here
to work together,
to work gracefully with one another,
to work cooperatively with one another,
each of us a vital part of this body.
We look after each other,
we pray for each other,
we nurture each other,
teach each other,
learn from each other.

Pat and I pledge separately –
she’s the member of the church; I am not.
I don’t tell Pat what to pledge;
I don’t even know what she pledges.
That’s between her and God.

I always look forward to filling out my pledge card.
I find it deeply spiritual time,
an opportunity for me to reflect on
how God has blessed me.
It is such a simple way for me to respond
as I return to God a portion of what
God has given to me.
And each Sunday I prepare myself for worship
by putting my envelope in the plate
when I walk in, even before I put water in the font.

When you receive your pledge card,
you will find a little trifold brochure
that provides a narrative overview of
how our budget is spent.
We were talking yesterday at the Session meeting
about how it seems that the numbers
don’t match line items on the budget.
What the Stewardship and Finance teams have tried to do
is provide a simple way to look
at the main components of our ministries.
As they have done this, they have allocated costs
to each of the ministry components:
building costs, salary costs and so on.

So, when you see, for example, the dollar figure for Mission,
that number is more than the money we send out each year;
the number represents costs allocated to the Mission ministry,
including Ann’s time, my time, building costs,
and so on.

Don’t get caught up in the precision of the numbers;
if you want to know exact amounts,
look at last year’s annual report,
or just speak with Charlie Harris.
One elder used a good term for the numbers
and the graphs you’ll find on the folder:
they reflect our “energy”,
where we discern God is calling us to serve,
where we are called to do Christ’s work.

When the telephone call comes
from the person before you on the trail route,
invite the person over right away;
Remember: he or she is your neighbor,
your brother or sister in Christ.
They aren’t going to talk with you about your pledge;
that’s up to you and God.
But do invite the person in, even just briefly;
welcome the person with genuine Christian hospitality
share a joy with the person,
and then do the same thing
when you take the trail bag to
the next person on the route.

Tithe if you can: it is a worthy goal for yourself
and your own spiritual journey,
I can confirm that from my own experience.
But more important
remember Paul’s call to pledge joyfully, eagerly and gratefully,
for as he reminds us,
“God is able to provide [us] with every blessing in abundance,
so that by always having enough of everything,
[we] may share abundantly in every good work.”
2 Cor. 9:8

To God be the glory and honor.
AMEN

Go in Peace

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
October 4, 2009
World Communion Sunday

Go in Peace
Selected texts

A mother sits on the dry, dusty ground in Darfur,
that brutally hot region in Western Sudan,
the region which has known nothing but death and destruction
for the past 20 years.
She is one of the more than 7 million refugees,
7 million,
displaced by endless warfare and fighting.
There is not enough water, not enough food,
not enough shelter from the relentless sun.
Her little boy is just 18 months old,
and she knows he will not live
to reach his second birthday.
Starvation, malnutrition,
dehydration will draw life from him
a little each day.
He will die in her arms.
The mother knows no peace.

A young man, mature beyond his 15 years,
comes home from another rough day at school.
He’s bright and he works hard; his grades are good.
He will be the first in his family
to finish high school.
His parents, who immigrated to this country
just ten years ago,
never got beyond the 9th grade.

What makes school so hard for him
is not the classwork,
but the bullying
the taunts about his accent,
the color of his skin, his hair, his eyes,
the country where he was born.
It is one of the boys who’s a star on the football team
the young man fears most.
The boy is enormous, a hero to most in the school,
but he is savage with his comments:
“Immigrant.
Why don’t you speak American?
Go back to your own country.”
And that’s only the beginning;
words flow foul and furious,
instilling fear in the young man,
even as all those who hear the bully boy rant
laugh and think it is all great sport.
The football player’s car sports a bumper sticker that says,
“Jocks for Jesus”.
The young man has created his own bumper sticker,
which he has on the wall in his room above his small desk.
It is a verse from the Bible,
part of the law given by God through Moses:
“You shall love the stranger, the foreigner,
for you were once a stranger,
you were once a foreigner….”
(Deuteronomy 10:19)
The young man knows no peace.

A woman sits in the Emergency Room of a hospital.
Her daughter is burning up with fever.
The woman’s husband lost his job more than a year ago
and with it went their health insurance.
“You can always go to the Emergency Room!”
Those were the last words she heard
from the insurance company
when they confirmed the policy
was no longer in effect.
She and her daughter have been sitting
in a crowded, stuffy room for more than 4 hours
and have still not seen a doctor.
The overworked nurse assures her they will be seen soon,
but there were so many other more urgent needs.
As she sits there waiting the woman worries:
What if the doctor treats the girl
by prescribing an antibiotic,
how will she pay for it?
What if the doctor says her daughter needs other tests,
or even needs to be hospitalized?
Her husband has tried so hard to find another job,
but “not hiring” are the words he keeps hearing,
even at places that offer no benefits, no insurance.
The woman knows no peace.

The elderly man sits quietly in his wheelchair in the hall.
He has lived at the nursing home
since his wife died two years ago.
She had taken care of him as his health deteriorated,
and when she died he knew he had no choice:
He could barely see, barely walk.
His children and grandchildren live far away.
The hallway in which he sits is decorated for the season.
Carols come from the small boombox
in the recreation room around the corner.
An aide walks by him and cheerfully chirps,
“I will be off tomorrow for Christmas,
so you have a wonderful day!”
The man is grateful for the care he gets,
but the loneliness gnaws at him.
The man knows no peace.

We think of peace as the absence of war,
the silencing of the sounds of gunfire,
explosions, cries, and screams no longer the night’s backdrop;
Blissful silence,
the still small voice of peace,
at least for the here and now.

God wants us to live with an absence of war.
God wants us to beat swords into plowshares,
spears into pruning hooks, (Isaiah 2:4)
“Violence shall no more be heard in your land,”
says the Lord God through the prophet Isaiah,
“I will appoint Peace as your overseer
and Righteousness your taskmaster.”
(Isaiah 60:17)

That’s God’s hope for us,
if only we would learn history’s lessons
of the futility of war.

But the absence of war is only the beginning of peace.
When God speaks of peace,
when Jesus speaks of peace,
they speak of fullness,
completeness,
health,
wholeness,
contentment.

When Jesus says in his Sermon on the Mount,
“blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called the children of God.”
(Matthew 5:9)
He is talking about those who do more than
help work for an end to war.
He is speaking of those who feed the hungry,
who bring hope to the hopeless,
who welcome the stranger,
who tend the sick,
who comfort the lonely –
who reach out to
all those who know no peace.

We live in a world that desperately needs peacemakers;
We cannot pick up a newspaper
without reading about war somewhere.
But even putting aside war,
we seem so intent on creating a more and
more hostile, angry society,
a world in which personal attacks are the norm,
nasty, stinging words,
a readinesses, even eagerness to lie
the currency of our conversation.
Our response to such clear and present problems
in our health care system is to strap on our guns,
load our AK-47s.

How can we speak of peacemaking
when we demand more and more violence
in our sports: harder hitting on the football field,
punishing checks that lead to gloves off in hockey,
even little league baseball games
that sink into shouting, pushing, brawls.
Ultimate fighting,
no sport, but only a savage brutal contest,
becoming more popular by the week;
children wanting to smash chairs over each other’s
heads just like wrestlers,
because they think that’s how to have fun.

Why are we so intent on plumbing the depths of the
the lowest common denominator,
when our Lord calls us to raise up,
build up;
Aim high;
Seek peace, make peace.

Blessed are the peacemakers,
those whose words are grounded in
kindness,
gentleness,
that reflect a generosity of spirit,
a willingness to give completely of themselves,
those who understand that as disciples of Christ
we are called to do whatever is needed,
whatever is needed,
to feed even one hungry person;
we are called to bear any cost
to heal one sick person.
Yes, this is what we are called to do,
this is what makes us children of God.

We can never hope to be at peace ourselves
if we are not actively engaged in peacemaking,
something we can do in a thousand different ways,
each of us as the Spirit calls us.

Set before us is a table
where all God’s children can come together,
where there is neither slave nor free,
Jew nor Greek, male nor female;
(Galatians 3:28)
where there is neither native-born nor foreigner,
neither liberal nor conservative,
neither VIP nor outcast.

This is the place where we can be fed,
and find that peace which surpasses all understanding
(Philippians 4:7)
A table where we can be nourished and refreshed,
so we can go out to work for peace
by helping others find their way
to wholeness, fullness, and completeness.

Come to this table;
come, for the Prince of Peace invites you,
invites us all.
Come and be fed,
come quench your thirst,
and then, as the Psalmist teaches us, go out to
“seek peace and pursue it”
Psalm 34:14

Come to this table,
for here you will find:
“peace from God our Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Galatians 1:3
AMEN

The Feeding of the 6,000

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
September 27, 2009

The Feeding of the 6,000
Mark 8:1-10

6,000 children.
The number is probably higher than that,
but still, 6000 children!

Six thousand children have passed through our doors
over the past 46 years
to spend time in the classrooms of our Early Learning Center.

The first batch of students are now adults themselves,
men and women in their late-40s.
They went on to elementary school, Middle School,
High School,
perhaps college,
then on to vocations as teachers, engineers, scientists,
police officers, nurses, carpenters, plumbers,
lawyers, doctors.

Some probably still live in the community,
others live elsewhere –
in other parts of Virginia,
other parts of the country,
perhaps even in other parts of the world.
Wherever they are now,
they are still our neighbors –
just as Jesus teaches us.
And we hope they think of us as their neighbors.

We have no alumni/ae society as most colleges do,
to keep track of students once they move on to other places.
My guess is that most of our alumni/ae don’t have much of a
memory of their time in our Early Learning Center.
The memories of things we did and learned
when we were 3, 4, or 5,
are not as vivid as our memories of things we did
at ages 15, 25, 35…

Still, while they may not remember all that clearly,
I have no doubt that they learned important lessons
that they carry with them to this day,
that even in the short time they were with us,
even at such tender ages,
we helped them grow,
we helped shape them,
we helped them to have a little stronger foundation
than they would have had without us.

It wasn’t that we taught them to read,
or had them memorizing multiplication tables.
No, our teaching is and always has been so foundational:
we teach love,
we teach goodness,
we teach kindness,
we teach sharing;
we teach each child that he or she
was created in the image of God.
We don’t teach them the Bible,
but our teaching is grounded in the Bible.
We teach them what God spoke through the prophet Isaiah,
words God speaks still to all his children:
“you are precious,
you are honored in my sight,
I am with you,
I love you.” (Isaiah 43)

We do not teach them about Jesus;
we leave their religious education to their families
and whatever faith practices each family has.
But we do teach Jesus
as we model Jesus, every teacher,
every assistant,
the staff, the Board, all of us.

As we teach these precious children, we feed them,
feed and nourish them spiritually and emotionally,
feed their sense of self,
even as we help them to learn their A-B-Cs
and their 1-2-3s.

Everyone here helps feed these children.
You and everyone who has sat in a pew over the past 46 years,
have helped feed the 6,000.
Imagine the pastor standing in this pulpit
some 47 years ago
and saying to the congregation:
“Here’s an idea;
Here’s something we can do, do together:
We can feed 6,000 children!”
I am guessing that the reaction would have been
disbelief,
and yet, that’s what we have done.
And it won’t be that long before we’ll be able to say
“we have fed 10,000 children”.
Every year, another group,
another 180 children fed.
And even as we are feeding the children,
we are also feeding their parents.
It is miraculous how God works!

We all know the story of the miraculous feeding
we find the Bible: the feeding of the 5,000.
All four of the gospels include the story.
But there is a second story of a miraculous feeding
that is easy to overlook,
the story we heard in our lesson,
the feeding of the 4,000.
Only Matthew and Mark include this story;
Luke and John chose not to include it.

The facts of the feeding of the 5,000
are pretty straightforward.
Mark tells us (Mark 6:30ff),
that Jesus took his small band of followers
on what we might view as a retreat:
“come away to a deserted place,
all by yourselves and rest a while.”
But Jesus’ reputation had already grown so
that when he and his group arrived
at what they had thought would be a deserted place,
there was already a large crowd,
eager to hear the good news Jesus was preaching.
When it came time to eat,
Jesus had the crowd sit in small groups,
and then he took five loaves and two fish,
and blessed them and broke them,
and everyone ate “and were filled”,
and there was so much left over,
that they filled twelve baskets.

That’s chapter 6 in Mark’s gospel.
Now, jump to chapter 8 and what do we find?
The same basic facts centered on
“a great crowd without anything to eat”.
This time Jesus found there were 7 loaves of bread
and “a few small fish”.
And once again Jesus blessed the food
and had it distributed among the crowd,
and once again there was enough
so that all “ate and were filled”
and this time there were 7 baskets of leftovers.

Why two stories?
Were Luke and John right to leave the second version out
since it seemed to cover the same ground as the first?

Mark and Matthew leave out one importance difference
in the second story,
one that is not at all obvious.
In fact, I was not aware of it until a former professor of mine
pointed it out the other day at a Presbytery meeting.

In the first story, Jesus is on home turf,
in the land of the Israelites.
But in the second story,
Jesus has moved to the land of the Gentiles,
to men and women who were not Jewish as he was,
men and women who were not followers of the Lord God.

Jesus treated them no differently;
He walked with them, talked with them,
shared the good news with them,
and when he saw they were hungry,
he had compassion and fed them.

In this second story
we see Jesus practicing radical hospitality.
Jews and Gentiles kept their distance,
living their lives as separately as possible,
especially at mealtime.
But Jesus shows here as he does in so many other places
that he had no use
for the artificial boundaries and barriers
that we humans create:
marking differences based on geography,
or ethnicity, or religion, or culture.
Jesus brought Jew and Gentile together in community.

Jesus walks through barriers
as though they did not exist,
which for him they didn’t.
And in the process he teaches us
that we should do the same thing:
remove barriers, tear them down,
pay no attention to them.
Our neighbor is anybody and everybody:
a hungry person should be fed,
a sick person should receive medical care;
a homeless person should have shelter;
a cold person should be clothed and warmed.

The color of a person’s skin;
the accent in their speech;
the way they dress –
none of that mattered to Jesus.
Why does it matter so to us?
Weren’t they created in the image of God,
just as you and I were?

That’s just what we teach our children in the ELC.
We teach them to care about one another;
to share with one another;
to look after one another;
We teach them to play fair and be nice,
to say “I’m sorry” when they need to,
and to say, “I forgive you”
to the person who says, “I’m sorry.”

The children in our ELC have an advantage over us
in that they are too young to have built boundaries and barriers;
they don’t see differences,
and if they do, they don’t care.

The very business we are in as followers of Jesus Christ
is boundary breaking, barrier smashing.
We are in the “reaching-out” business:
even though we often behave as though
we are in the “hunker down” business,
the “separate ourselves” business,
the “build the walls” business.

We teach our children to reach out,
to be neighbors to and for one another,
and we hope the lessons remain with them.
I have pointed out before the T-shirt,
the bumper sticker,
that says, “No child is born a bigot.”
Children are born with love and grace;
our ministry is to nurture that.
That’s how we feed them.

in the process of feeding the children,
these precious children,
we too are fed,
for those little children teach us,
teach us lessons we might once have learned,
but have forgotten.

Last year I was invited to join one of the classes for snack time
after we all had been in Chapel together.
One little boy was upset that I had not called on him
in Chapel and the tears just flowed
even as the other boys and girls ate their crackers
and drank their juice.
The teacher tried to comfort the boy;
I tried to comfort the boy,
but the tears fell like the rain on Noah’s Ark.
Another little boy finished his snack,
got up from his place,
carried his trash to the wastebasket,
and then on the way back to his seat,
stopped by his crying classmate,
and gave him a hug.
It was a wonderfully “all-boy” hug,
more headlock than embrace,
but the message was clear:
he wanted to comfort his friend,
reach out to him.
That’s what we want all our chidlren to learn!

The poet T. S. Eliot wrote,
“Love is most nearly itself
when here and now cease to matter
here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
into another intensity
for a further union, a deeper communion”

Poetic words, perhaps a little cryptic,
but we are called to move,
move to a deeper union, a deeper communion,
with God, through Christ, with one another,
and we do this by breaking down barriers,
building community,
feeding one another,
feeding all who hunger.

In the process we too are fed,
nurtured and nourished,
those we feed
feeding us in return
and we build on what we have built,
and miraculously we have baskets of leftovers,
and no one is left hungry.
AMEN

Disciples Discipling Disciples

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
September 20, 2009


Disciples Discipling Disciples
John 7:14-18

We start another year of Sunday School today.
Another year of teaching and learning,
together, all of us, from the youngest to the oldest.

Sunday School: it’s not a very good term, is it?
Especially in the minds of our children and young people.
They spend Monday through Friday in school;
The idea of spending more time in the classroom
on a Sunday morning sounds terribly uninviting,
almost like punishment.

Think back to your years in Sunday School.
What was your experience?
I know most of mine was dull at its best;
sleep-inducing at its worst,
especially when the lights went out
so we could watch film-strips about Jesus and his disciples.
Do you remember films-strips back in the pre-video days?

The term Christian Education isn’t much better
than “Sunday School”.
That term to me suggests that we have compartments,
boxes, into which we separate our learning,
like students as they go through the day at school:
go to one room to learn Algebra;
another room to learn American History,
yet another to learn French or Spanish;
Then come here on Sunday morning
go to an assigned room at 9:40,
and by 10:40 you are done with your Christian Education,
ready for other things.

What is it that we are teaching our children?
What is it that we are learning together?
What is it that we want our children to learn?
What is it that we are helping our children to learn?

We want them to learn about God, of course,
and about the love God gives us all through
Jesus Christ, God’s Son.
We want them to learn about the Bible,
and we’d also like them to learn about what it means
to live in faith as a Presbyterian.

But it seems to me that what we are really teaching our children,
what we are called by God to teach our children,
is how to live life,
a truly rich life,
an abundant life,
a joy-filled life.

In one hour on Sunday morning
we teach our children how to live
on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday, Friday and Saturday;
At school, at home, at play with friends,
on the field playing sports,
on stage making music,
hanging out at the Mall,
talking, texting, and Twittering.

We are teaching them that our lives as Christians,
our lives as followers of Jesus Christ,
isn’t limited to a couple of hours on Sunday.

We do this by teaching them about Jesus.
But we are called to teach them so much more
than just the historical and biographical
features of Jesus’ life.
We are teaching them Jesus:
the life Jesus calls us all to.
We are teaching them that they are called,
as we are all called,
to learn Jesus,
learn his life so they can model their lives,
we can model our lives, on his life,
as we follow him,
striving to be more Christ-like each day.

Jesus was and is our Master Teacher.
For all his preaching,
all his healing,
he spent most of his time teaching.
It is why he is called “rabbi”
which is Hebrew for “teacher”.

And what was he teaching?
Strict obedience to the law?
Mind the rules, conform?
Listen to the leaders at the temple?
No. Of course not.

He was teaching about God’s grace, God’s love,
God’s goodness, God’s mercy.
All those things Moses was trying to teach the
children of Israel through his final words to them
captured in Deuteronomy,
those words we talked about two weeks ago,
words Moses summed up with,
“The eternal God is your refuge,
and underneath are the everlasting arms.”

Jesus and Moses were teaching much the same thing:
That God was not some irritable deity
who needed regular sacrifices,
a mean-spirited God, as one cartoonist captured him,
with his finger hovering
just above the “smite” button on his computer.
They wanted the Israelites to know what they knew:
that God was and is a loving God,
a merciful God,
an ever-present God,
with them in good times and bad.
And we teach the same thing as Jesus and Moses.

We teach our children that they have a choice,
a choice between having a relationship with God
or turning from God and having a relationship with idols:
things, stuff, money, popularity, clothes, coolness.

All our teachers teach the same basic lesson,
but of course every teacher
goes about teaching in his or her own way.
What is essential is that our teaching is authentic.
It is honest; grounded in humility,
for humility is one of our Lord’s most important teachings.
“Blessed are the meek” is the Beatitude we remember,
but a better translation is,
“Blessed are the humble.”

We should not be hesitant to acknowledge the weaknesses
that are inherent in the church.
We are the body of Christ,
all of us imperfect men and women,
so the church by definition can never be perfect;
no denomination will ever be perfect.
No one possesses the truth,
even as we seek the truth.

In our humility we should not be hesitant
to teach that Christian history
has been marked by much goodness,
but also by much that has been truly horrifying.
The Crusades, the Inquisition,
three-hundred years of violence
between Protestants and Roman Catholics in Northern Ireland
to name just a few examples
of inexcusable violence committed in
the name of the Prince of Peace.

Just within the past century-and-a-half
Presbyterians have waved their Bibles
in angry support of the scandal of slavery;
to maintain the second-class status of women;
and to slam shut the door to men and women
because of their sexual orientation.

We should not be hesitant to acknowledge that we are
too quick to divide ourselves into camps,
to take sides on issues,
one against the other:
denomination against denomination,
church against church,
parishioner against parishioner.
Conservatives arguing
they truly represent the values of Jesus Christ,
Liberals arguing
they truly represent the values of Jesus Christ.
Neither side in the right,
both sides judgmental and arrogant,
both sides forgetting that
our Lord was both conservative,
conservative in the sense that
he was calling the children of Israel
back into the covenant relationship
God had first established with them
more than thousand years before,
and liberal,
liberal in the very definition of the word:
tolerant, accepting,
not rigid in ideology or dogma,
extending the gospel to any and all.

Jesus provides us the yardstick for how we are to teach
so that we don’t fall into camps.
In our gospel lesson he said,
“My teaching is not mine
but his who sent me.”
Even our Lord, our Master Teacher,
knew who his teacher was!

We are called to teach in the same way,
teach what God calls us to teach,
to teach God’s word to our children.
In the process we reinforce the word for ourselves
remembering that even as we teach,
we learn.
Everyone of us is a learner.
That’s the definition of the word “disciple”:
“one who learns”.
We are disciples teaching disciples,
disciples learning with disciples
disciples discipling disciples.

If we remember that we are learning even as we teach,
our teaching will be authentic,
for it will be grounded in humility,
not certainty, doctrine, dogma;
it will be grounded in acceptance and openness,
love and grace.

Jesus reminds us that
“Anyone who resolves to do the will of God
will know whether the teaching is from God…”
Even the youngest child is remarkably perceptive.
They may not remember names, dates, and places,
but they will know what is the authentic word of the Lord,
and what is not.

Studies done among the youngest generation show they think
a great deal of the teaching
coming out of Christian churches today
is not authentic,
that it is far removed from the will of God,
that it is grounded more in the will of the teachers,
the will of lay leaders,
the will of clergy.

This kind of teaching is actively turning them off,
causing them to turn away from the church,
any church.
They hear teaching that is rigid,
grounded in anger,
teaching that is judgmental,
and deeply hypocritical.

Our challenge to engage our children and young people,
engage them,
to help them know the love of God that is theirs
through Jesus Christ.
We do this in classrooms,
but we all do it, every one of us,
even if we are not teaching in the classroom,
for we each set our young people an example:
every one of us:
we are the ones who exemplify the Christian life.
It is so easy to talk the talk;
but it is much harder to walk the walk,
and our young people know it and pick up on it
lightning fast: who’s walking the walk,
and who is all talk.

Jesus says “I am the life”
and he calls us to new life.
We model that new life –
or at least that is what we are called to do.
We can do it well,
or we can do it poorly.
Our children and young people will be watching us,
and taking their cues from us.

We want our children to know this life,
this life to which they have been called,
just as each of us has been called;
this life that is rich,
rich not in material possessions,
but in grace and love and peace.

We want them to know this life
because it will fill them with confidence,
confidence to handle anything that life throws at them.
We want them to know this life
because it will give them hope,
hope even in the most difficult times.
We want them to know this life
because it will ground them in faith,
faith that they can move mountains
and change the world.

We do this, teach them, help them to know this life,
each of us, by walking the talk,
modeling the life that Jesus calls us to,
by living our own lives authentically and faithfully,
not just on Sunday, but every day.

The starting point for all of us
is to remember that we are all disciples,
learning, all of us together,
learning each of us,
at the feet of our Teacher,
our Lord, Jesus the Christ.
AMEN

Who Are We? Who We Are. Whose We Are.

The Rev. Dr. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
September 13, 2009: Genesis Sunday

Who Are We? Who We Are. Whose We Are.
Luke 6:20-26

Look around.
Who do you see?
Women and men,
boys and girls,
people who come small, medium and large;
Left-handed, right-handed,
basketball loving, baseball crazed, football obsessed,
knitters, readers,
collectors, gardeners,
joggers, golfers,
dog lovers, cat lovers,
and even chinchilla lovers.

We are Virginians,
but our roots are in New York, New Jersey,
Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan,
Ghana, Kenya, the Philippines.

We are Presbyterians,
but we are former Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans,
Episcopalians, and Roman Catholics.

We are engineers, teachers, accountants,
lawyers, nurses, dentists, researchers,
technicians,
homemakers, caregivers,
parents, children,
grandparents and grandchildren.

We are such a wonderful array of God’s children,
such a magnificent rainbow,
sparkling in all our diversity,
a rich mix that delights God.

And yet, however we define ourselves,
however we see ourselves,
however we look at ourselves,
who we are,
who we really are
is simple:
we are disciples of Jesus Christ.

Every one of us a follower of the Son of God.
Every one of us, men and women, boys and girls
every one of us walks with Christ.
We answer the question of “who we are”
by remembering “whose we are”.

And once we remember that,
all the rest of life falls into place;
Once we remember whose we are,
then we have a foundation on which we can build,
truly build, a life, an abundant, rich life.

The trouble is, of course,
it is too easy to define ourselves in any of a hundred different ways
throwing our discipleship into the mix here and there,
usually in second place behind another definition:

On Monday we find it easier to define ourselves
by the vocation we pursue, or the school we attend;
on Tuesday, by the social group we’re part of;
on Wednesday by the neighborhood where we live;
on Thursday by our political leanings;
on Friday by the sports teams we root for.

But that’s not what Jesus wants from us;
it is not what he expects from us.
He wants us to stand and declare that
we are his followers first,
his followers last,
beginning to end.
We build our lives, our careers,
our interests, everything else,
on that very foundation.

Jesus does not call us to a life of comfort and ease,
not a life of the rich and famous.
On the contrary, he tells us very clearly
that we are to take up our crosses,
and be prepared to lose our lives for our faith.
It is a life that may often be at odds
with the status quo,
with the mainstream,
with the accepted way of thinking.

Jesus calls us:
to heal the sick when no one else will;
to look after the orphan
when everyone else has turned away;
to comfort the lonely and the afflicted
when we’d really rather be doing something else.

Jesus calls us to work for peace,
peace and reconciliation
and never be content just with prayers.
Jesus tells us that we are not simply to bemoan
the existence of injustice,
we are to root out every cause,
and create a more just, more equitable,
more fair world,
for in doing so, do you see what we are doing?
we are building our small part of the Kingdom,
God’s Kingdom.

UNICEF, the United Nations Children’s Fund,
has captured Jesus’ call with its slogan
“believe in zero”:
that we can, working together,
reduce to zero from more than 20,000
the number of children
who die each day from hunger and
preventable disease.

Jesus calls us to a radical new life;
he turns the world we know upside down.
Listen again to the text from Luke:
Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
But woe to you who are live in abundance,
for you have received your consolation.
Blessed are you who are hungry now,
for you will be filled.
Woe to you who are full now,
for you will be hungry.
Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
Woe to you who are laughing now,
for you will mourn and weep.
Blessed are you when people hate you,
and when they exclude you, revile you,
and defame you* on account of the Son of Man.
Woe to you when all speak well of you,
for that is what their ancestors did to the false prophets.

Jesus isn’t lifting up poverty,
or hunger,
or mourning.
What he is teaching us is that our focus as disciples
should be on those who are hungry,
those who are poor, those who mourn,
because that’s where Jesus’ focus is;
that’s where God’s focus is, and always has been.

Jesus reminds of the words God spoke
again and again through the prophets,
words we have always found so easy to walk away from:
“Let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream."
(Amos 5:24)
“bind up the brokenhearted;
comfort those who mourn
bring good news to the oppressed;"
(Isaiah 61)
“no infant [should] die of illness,
nor an older person fail to live a long and healthy life”
(Isaiah 65:20)

Jesus calls us to do our part to create this world,
but we won’t if we don’t remember who we are
and whose we are;
If our focus is on being part of:
the party pack at the football game,
the must-have-it group at the Mall,
the “let them pay their own way and pull themselves up
by their own bootstraps” group of protestors.

In a few moments when we take our collection,
the ushers will also pass baskets along the rows.
In the baskets you will find small cross pins,
which you are invited to take.
(none for children, please; they have sharp pins!)
They are my gift to each of you
as we begin this new season together.

The pin is for you to wear on your lapel,
your scarf, your hat,
not to advertise your faith,
for Jesus tells us of course,
to beware those who practice their piety in public.
The pin is simply a reminder to you
of who you are and whose you are,
a reminder of the life to which you and I have been called.

I find the pin a helpful reminder
against getting caught up in the everyday stuff,
what C. S. Lewis has called the
“fussy attentiveness to your own state of mind.”
(Surprised by Joy, 233)
The pin is a reminder to me
that I am called to have a
“Jesus” state of mind.

Take your pin,
and put it on your lapel.
And then come to this Table,
come to this Table
and be fed, nourished, renewed and refreshed
by our Lord Jesus Christ,
for this is his Table;
his meal.

And then go out from here
go out to all the places you will go tomorrow
and Tuesday, and the days after,
but go out with a renewed awareness,
renewed confidence,
a renewed sense of calling
of who you are
and most important:
whose you are.
AMEN