Not Just For Weddings

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
January 21, 2007

Not Just For Weddings
Luke 4:14-30
1 Cor. 12:12-27

Is there a more familiar text than chapter 13 in Paul’s first letter
to the church at Corinth?
“If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels,
but do not have love,
I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal…”
It is a text that we may have heard
even more than the gospel stories of Jesus’ birth,
a text that is a staple in countless weddings.
And it is so appropriate for weddings, as Paul speaks
so eloquently, even poetically, so richly of love.

But what was on Paul’s mind when he wrote those words?
Was he inspired by a wedding he had attended?
Was he thinking of the extraordinary power of love
that calls a woman and a man to cleave to one another
in marriage?

No! Paul did not write those words for weddings;
in fact, he probably was not even thinking of marriage
when he wrote those words.
What Paul had in mind was the church:
the community of followers of Jesus Christ,
specifically the group in Corinth, a city located
at the southern tip of Greece, not far from Athens.

The text that we think of as having been written
for men and women called by God
to life together as husband and wife,
was written for men and women called together
by the Holy Spirit to be the body of Christ,
the community of faith we call the church.

Or, put another way: Paul wrote this text
with us in mind: this body of Christ
that we call the Manassas Presbyterian Church.
Paul’s words provide us with operating instructions for how
we are called to live and work together
as followers of Jesus Christ,
called to ministry here and now.

Listen to Paul’s words:
“Love is patient, love is kind,
love is not envious, or boastful
or arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way;
it is not irritable or resentful. …”

Our Elders and Deacons reflected on these words last weekend
during our retreat.
We spent the majority of our time talking about
the importance of community, the importance of working together,
the importance of teamwork.

We talked about how the Body of Christ
has to be grounded in love,
for God is love: doesn’t John tell us that in his first letter?
And if we are grounded in love,
then aren’t we are called to be:
patient with one another?
kind to one another?
If we are faithfully grounded in love,
then aren’t we called to avoid being resentful,
or irritable?
Aren’t we called not to be rude?
This one in particular gets harder and harder to do in a world
that seems to grow ruder by the day
where we always seen to have our focus on
the lowest common denominator;
Where our mindset seems to be:
“I want to drive 75 on 234 South,
even though the posted speed limit is 55,
so if you are driving 65 or even 70,
I will stay right on your bumper
until I intimidate you to move over and get out of my way,
because I am more important than you
my schedule matters more than yours,
I am busier than you,
I have more pressing appointments than you.”
Simply put, how rude is that?
How selfish and self-centered is that?
But that is the world we are part of;
that is the mindset we are always up against.
And we cannot think for a minute that the person
I’ve just described is the person in the car behind us.
It is also each of us, and not only when we are in the car.

If we ground ourselves in Paul’s words from the 13th chapter
of his letter to the Corinthians, then we can live and work
together the way he describes in the 12th chapter,
the text we heard in our first lesson:
with us as the body of Christ.

We are the body of Christ as a church;
with every part of the body important:
no part of the body more important than another part,
and no part of the body less important.
Every part of this body is vital to our health and well-being.

And each group that meets, that comes together
to carry out ministry for our church
in the name of Jesus Christ, is also a body:
The Session, the Board of Deacons,
each ministry team, the Stephen Ministers,
our choirs, mowing teams, ushers, Youth Groups:
every group that comes together to work,
to do ministry in a thousand different ways,
each in its own way, the body of Christ.

In the first exercise we did together as a group on Friday night,
the officers worked through different parts of the Book of Order
and the Book of Confessions, the two books that make up
the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (USA).
There was one word that seemed to be
everywhere in those two books,
appearing in the Book of Order, the Directory for Worship
and in many of the eleven different confessional statements
that are part of our Reformed faith.
The word is “community”, community:
a reminder that as the body of Christ, we are a community.

Now that does not mean that we are a group of people
who all think exactly the same thing
We are not a group of people who always do the same thing,
and say the same thing,
who agree on everything.
No: the very richness of the diversity that God
graces us with means that we will not always agree.
But still we are community:
community: a diverse group sharing a common faith.
a diverse group bonded by our faith in Jesus Christ,
who is our head, the head of the church,
a diverse group bonded by and grounded in love.
We need those voices, that challenge our thinking,
that challenge our assumptions.

One Confessional statement that is often overlooked
is the Theological Statement of Barmen,
a Confessional that came out of Germany in 1934,
when Hitler’s government was working to control the churches,
to make the practice of faith part of the state,
to eliminate disagreements, and encourage the groupthink
that led to the rise of Nazi state.
Most church leaders found it easier and safer
to go along with the demands of the state.
But a small group of theologians challenged the state,
at the very risk of their lives.

Christ himself was that single, small voice in our gospel lesson.
There he was in his own hometown, where he at first was treated
with the respect accorded a visitor to the community.
But as soon as he spoke words that the majority didn’t like,
didn’t think were appropriate, what did they do?
Did they say, “Let us reflect on the words this man has spoken,
let us pray about them and
discern how God might be speaking to us”?
No, they were furious and moved as a group, a mob really,
not even content with running Jesus out of town,
but trying to run him over cliff.

We are the body, we are community,
community, a word that means fellowship:
we work together, we listen to one another,
we take care of one another, we respect one another.
To use Paul’s words: we are patient with one another;
we are not rude or irritable toward one another;
we are kind to one another;
We are aware that we each have been called here by God,
given gifts by the Holy Spirit to help us minister
in the name of Christ.
So that means that what we are called to do
is nurture those gifts in one another, draw them out,
or to use another of Paul’s favorite phrases: build up,
build up,
build up one another,
and in doing so,
we will build up the body of Christ that is our church.

Some of you may have seen the ad this past week
in the Washington Post
that had three very powerful words in bright red ink
demanding our attention: “Divided We Fail.”
It is a program that AARP is working on
with business and labor groups
to seek a solution to the health crisis that
has grown worse and worse with every year.
The solution the ad proposes has nothing to do with insurance,
or taxes, or cost controls,
or any of the mechanics of our health care system.
Rather, what the ad reminds us, even demands of us,
is that any solution to the problem will elude us
as long as we are divided.
If we work together, though, then
we can find a solution to that problem,
indeed any problem.

It is sound advice for us in the body of Christ: divided we fail,
divided we fail one another and more important,
we fail God.
I think the word for us needs a slight change, though,
a change that reflects more accurately how we are called to work
here in the body of Christ:
dividing, we fail:, dividing, not divided.
if our words, our actions, our deeds
cause division, fractures, splits,
if our words and actions fail to build the body,
then we fail completely,
we fail the Head of our Church, our Lord Jesus Christ.
If our words and deeds work to build up the body,
build up one another,
work to build up community,
then we are on the road of faithfulness.
If we work toward that, then we will be
what author Graham Standish calls,
a “blessed church”, a church where we aren’t just going about
the work of ministry, but a church where everyone here
will truly encounter the Spirit of God as we worship and work.

We are going to work on building community,
building this body of Christ in the year ahead.
Our focus will not be on building up the numbers:
we will leave that to the power of the Holy Spirit,
the one who calls other disciples to come join our community.
No, we will work on the building up of our membership,
building the Body in spirit and grace,
for that is our calling, all of us together.
We will be a people who, in a fast food, culture, will work with
patience, conviction and commitment through prayer,
through our work, our worship, our every act.

“If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels,
but do not have love,
I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
And if I have prophetic power,
and understand all mysteries and all knowledge,
and if I have all faiths so as to remove mountains,
but do not have love, I am nothing.
If I give away all my possessions,
and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,
but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient; love is kind,
love is not envious or boastful
or arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way;
it is not irritable or resentful;
it does not rejoice in wrongdoing,
but rejoices in the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things,
hopes all things,
endures all things.
Love never ends.” (1 Cor. 13:1-8)

Paul’s text is not just for weddings;
it is for us, this body of Christ.
AMEN