A Bottle of Visine

The Rev. Whitworth Ferguson III
Manassas Presbyterian Church
Manassas, Virginia
October 19, 2008

A Bottle of Visine
Philemon

There is no book in the Bible that is easier to skip over
than Philemon.
It really isn’t a book, it’s just a short letter.
There’s no chapter 1, no chapter 2 --
just 25 verses, a couple hundred words.
We just heard Philemon in its entirety,
the whole letter, beginning to end.

So what is it all about?
It is about a person, one person,
a man named Onesimus.
Onesimus was a slave;
he’d been the property of Philemon,
the man to whom Paul wrote the letter.

We are not exactly sure,
but we think that Onesimus had at some point
run away from Philemon,
and in the process, he’d stumbled across Paul,
and became a follower of Jesus Christ.
In writing to Philemon, Paul asked him
to release Onesimus from his servitude;
release him so that Onesimus could work with Paul,
work to help spread the good news of the gospel.

Slavery has always been ugly blot on human history,
but in Paul’s day it was not uncommon.
Many men and women lived in a form of indentured servitude
where over time they could buy their freedom.
Paul did not accuse Philemon of anything wrong
in having a slave;
he simply implored him as a brother in Christ,
to help Paul’s ministry by releasing Onesimus
so Paul could add one more worker to the team.
Paul clearly felt that Onesimus
was essential to the work of the Lord.

We find only one other reference in the Bible to Onesimus,
in the letter to the Colossians,
a letter that was written a few years after Philemon.
We learn that Tychicus was on his way to
Colosse with Onesimus,
who is referred to as
“the faithful and beloved brother,
[and] who is one of you”
(Colossians 4:7ff)
Colossians suggests that Paul was successful
in encouraging Philemon to release Onesimus
and that Onesimus then went on to minister
with great distinction in the name of Jesus Christ.

Paul saw in the runaway slave something special,
something that told Paul that Onesimus had a gift,
a gift for ministry, a gift for the work of the Lord,
a gift for working within the ministry that Paul had taken on
of sharing the good news of the gospel
with Gentiles throughout the Mediterranean.

Others may have looked at Onesimus
and seen merely a slave,
a man of the lower class,
or worse yet, a runaway, a vagabond, a criminal.
But Paul looked at Onesimus and saw a child of God,
a brother in Christ,
a man called to serve the Lord,
a man vital to the mission and ministry
Paul was doing in the name of Jesus Christ.

Paul seemed to have a gift
for seeing spiritual strengths in men and women.
Paul built his team by looking for the good,
the strengths, the gifts in people
and looking past the faults, the weaknesses
that are inevitable,
that every person has tucked away somewhere within.
In the process Paul built the foundation of the church
as he went from town to town,
city to city,
country to country.

His letters are filled with references to men and women
about whom we know virtually nothing,
but each of whom was essential to spreading the good news.
Aquila and Prisca,
Phoebe, Timothy, Epaphroditus, Euodia, Syntyche,
Epaphras, Justus, Titus --
these are just a few names
we almost stumble over
as we read through Paul’s letters.

Each was a follower of Jesus Christ,
Each worked to spread the good news;
Each was important,
Each was essential to the work.

A few weeks ago we talked about how many people
it takes to organize a worship service:
more than a dozen every Sunday
for even the simplest service.
If it takes a dozen or more to make a worship service happen,
how many more does it take to make a church happen,
to serve Christ through all the different ministries
we are called to?

The answer to that is easy:
you don’t even need to “do the math”.
The answer is, EVERY ONE!
We need everyone in the church
to carry out the work we’ve been called to do,
the ministries Christ himself directs us to provide:
The ministry of worship,
the ministry of care and concern
the ministry of teaching and growing as disciples,
the ministry of stewardship.

In his letter to the Corinthians,
Paul calls the church, “The Body of Christ”,
all of us making up the body,
and every part of the body equally important,
equally essential.
In Paul’s metaphor,
the eye is weaker for want of a leg,
the arm is weaker for want of an ear;
All come together, all work together
in harmony to make the Body stronger and healthier.
That is us, this body of Christ
that is the Manassas Presbyterian Church.

The past few weeks we’ve been hearing
from different parts of the Body,
different Ministry Teams,
hearing how they go about the work
of the ministry we’ve been called to do.
This week’s team is a little different,
the Personnel Ministry Team.
Their work is to look after another team,
our staff team,
a team that may not be quite as visible
as some other teams,
but is certainly no less important.

We are blessed with an exceptional staff team:
Ann Curtis, our office manager,
Deborah Panell, our Minister of Music,
Pam Rice our Christian Education Assistant,
Lisa Faust, our Financial Administrator
and Russell Jackson our Sexton.
And of course, we have the exceptional
staff and teachers of our Early Learning Center.

Lisa and Russell are the easiest to miss,
because we don’t see them on Sunday.
But Lisa assures that we are faithful stewards
of our financial resources.
Yesterday our Session spent the bulk of our meeting
talking about Finances as we heard from the accountants
whom we hired to conduct our annual review.
The accountants had great praise for the work
Lisa has done since she joined us.

Russell Jackson’s work may look custodial
but his work is ministry,
his work is the ministry of hospitality.
He’s the one who sets up tables and chairs
for meetings and classes.
He’s the one who provides us with a clean,
inviting facility,
with carpets freshly vacuumed,
floors mopped,
and bathrooms cleaned.
He’s the one who makes sure we have light
as we follow the light,

We see Deborah for only an hour on Sunday morning.
How many see her in the Sanctuary
for most of every Sunday afternoon,
working with our young people and our liturgical dancers?
How many see her on Wednesday nights working with our
adult singers and our handbell choir?
Who sees her during the week as she plans worship music
with me, and searches for new ways for us
to praise God through song?

We have a superb Christian Education program
because of Pam Rice.
She organizes teachers, purchases supplies,
recruits volunteers for ETC and the Nursery,
Wrangles sheep and cows for our Children’s Christmas pageant,
and, as you will see in two weeks,
she even has managed to convince
Moses to come down from the Mountain
for a visit to Manassas.

And if we had to build a room
to hold all the different hats
we ask Ann Curtis to wear over the course
of a typical week, we could not build a space big enough.
Secretary, receptionist,
building manager,
web updater,
newsletter production chief,
bulletin preparation specialist,
equipment maintenance and repair supervisor,
Scheduler and calendar keeper,
worship candle oiler,
lunch organizer --
and the list goes on.

We do a lot with a small ministry team.
We are a church of more than 400
and yet did you know:
only three of us are full time employees:
just Ann, Russell and I;
Everyone else is part-time.
At least, that’s what their contracts say:
the reality is, is that every member of our staff
puts in more time than they are paid for.
There are times when I feel like
what’s needed at staff meetings
even as much as prayer and lunch
is a bottle of Visine, to soothe tired eyes
from a dedicated and hard-working group.

Thank our staff, thank them regularly,
acknowledge their gifts.
See them as Paul saw Onesimus,
children of God, disciples of Christ,
called to unique vocations doing God’s work.

And of course, don’t stop with staff:
acknowledge one another’s gifts
as we work together in the body of Christ.
Look for strengths and gifts,
and leave criticism, judgment, and fault-finding behind.
No one is perfect;
as Jesus reminds us, we all have specks in our own eyes,
that would require more
than a bottle of Visine to wash away.

We are the Body of Christ,
all of us called like Paul, like Onesimus
like Tychichus and Epaphras
and Phoebe and Lydia
to do the work of the Lord.
Each of us vital to the Body,
none more important, none less important.
We begin our work offering thanks to God,
and we go about our work offering thanks to one another
staff and volunteers alike,
nurturing and feeding one another,
as we build one another
and in the process
build this Body,
this Body of Christ.

AMEN