Day 636 - There is No Place for Part Time Passion

A sermon delivered at Northside Presbyterian Church, Chattanooga, TN, Sept. 7, 2014 

OT reading: Exodus16:1-4, 13-20

NT Reading: John 6:31-35, 41-51

Like many congregations, Presbyterians love a good feast. I use the word “feast” because eating is a necessity of living. A feast is almost always an occasion of joy and celebration over a meal. I think Jesus regularly engaged people at a meal because he was drawing on the underlying theological connection between physical and spiritual sustenance.

Jesus draws on ancient Old Testament Jewish heritage to make this point in John. Even though I read the preceding four verses, you likely would have recalled the story of manna in the Exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt. Jesus clearly explains God not Moses gave the hungry and angry Hebrews the bread from heaven in the desert.

God provided manna to the Israelites in the desert, implicitly demanding faith that God will sustain them by providing manna only sufficient for the day. If it was gathered to keep for tomorrow to sell or use, it rotted. Those who had little had enough, and those who had much not too much. Jesus differentiates himself from manna in the desert in in our Gospel reading. In verse 49; the Israelites ate the manna but they died. Jesus is the sufficient, living bread of life sent by God.

Many times we are tempted to focus entirely on the first and last verses of this passage in John, making it a gate-keeping passage: by one’s own will, you have to accept Jesus as your Savior to get into heaven. After all, verse 35 does says, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” And verse 51 says, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

But good Presbyterians read and attend to the intervening verses, particularly 44 and 45:  No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; and I will raise that person up on the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me.” This scripture says only God calls us to Jesus and provides by grace for our complete sustenance.

However if we do not read those two verses carefully, we will miss the main point. God calls the people through the door of our congregations. They are seeking fellowship, the Holy Spirit and a life without end. They are our responsibility. Mark makes it clear when he quotes Jesus saying “Feed my sheep.” We are supposed to feed them spiritually, emotionally and physically. When God calls a person to walk through our open door it is to feast with us celebrating the gift of life.

What makes it such a tragedy to turn this passage into one about gatekeeping is we usually decide the message needs further amplification. The next step is making a list of the things you have to exhibit in your behavior and belief to “prove” you are a Christian, although we usually mean to prove you are a Baptist, a Methodist, a Catholic or a Pentecostal, or a Presbyterian. (We only baptize by immersion (or sprinkling), communion must be a service with wine, if you drink alcohol you are risking damnation, there must be a foot washing service, one sin is worse than another, etc.)

Have you ever come across a person who feels like they have such a perfectly exact view of what it means to be a Christian that they are ready to tell you at the drop of a hat whether you are going to Heaven or Hell?  I know a person around town who will stand up and quote the Leviticus holiness code and the passage in 1 Corinthians that says no wrongdoers will make into heaven, especially fornicators, adulterers, sodomites. He actually had the audacity to say none of those kinds of people are in his congregation. He said if sinners were in his congregation, the congregation would let them know they are not welcome to worship there. I asked about spouses who argue, people who swear and take the Lord’s name in vain, those who are jealous or envious of other people’s wealth, appearance or friendship with the pastor, the ones who pocket the extra quarter the vending machine pops out, but the fellow just got mad at me.

Finding people with this attitude should not surprise me. After all, last year we saw an example on the UTC campus plastered all over local and national TV news and in the newspaper. I’m talking about the poor woman who stood in the quad loudly spewing venomous condemnation to passing students that they were lesbians or homosexuals on the highway to hell.

My first though about her was, “Who put her in a position to judge what is in another’s heart? Is she trying to drive away people from the church or welcome them in? I’m sure very few students saw her as a light on the hill beckoning the seekers of the Spirit to come to her congregation.”

Perhaps these examples should not have surprised me because I can recall sitting in my little Baptist congregation in Rome, GA as a young boy. I remember listening to the deacons plan their action of how to close down the service if an African-American tried to enter the building to worship, though the word they used was not African-American.

Perhaps I should not have been surprised since I can recall a session meeting in San Diego laced with a profane tirade by the associate pastor’s wife no less, directed at an elder on the other side of an employment dispute. Every member of the session including the interim pastor just sat as she cursed; their silence affirming her profanity.

I asked a group University of Tennessee at Chattanooga students over a meal at Hope 808 to write on a piece of paper whether or not they attended a congregational worship service or found comfort in one. Their answers shouldn’t have surprised me.

One student wrote, “I hated going to church the few times I did growing up because I felt very judged and every time I went I felt unwelcome. The church ought to be a place to go to make a person feel better about themselves and being a Christian, but nobody seems ever to practice what they preach. God is about love and acceptance and most places I’ve been do not give this vibe.”

Another student answered, “I’ve generally found that organized religion tends to be hypocritical, close-minded and unable to compromise with differing views. I no longer find myself gaining anything from attending church.”

The more I read these answers the more I wondered, “What would they find if they walked into our congregation, or our homes? Would they hear and see Christian compassion and joy at work?  As Dave wondered a few weeks ago, will they find our doors opened wide? Will they hear our hymns down on Tremont St. and come to find the Spirit moving in us?

Or, would they see us as the hypocritical Pharisee in Matthew standing on the corner praying loudly, “Thank the Lord I am not like these people who judge and condemn like the street preacher does"?… We all have feet of clay.

As soured as these students are on the church, they are still seeking this living bread of life. They, and for that matter, every member of the congregation and every visitor with us should not be surprised to find hypocrisy, sin and error in a congregation because the church is a hospital for sinners... But how can that discovery be a positive experience?

The only way that can be a positive experience for them is to find every person in the congregation working as hard as possible to forge a sanctified life that drives hypocrisy, sin and error further and further from daily habit. Being a Christian can be hard work.

It is not a positive experience to see members so mad at each other that they refuse to talk because they do not like what the person said or did, or did not do. It is not a positive experience to hear former members of this congregation tell them they left because it seemed the pastor and folks were more interested in fighting than worshiping and glorifying God.

If they do encounter those attitudes in us, it is because we have forgotten that (v 44, 45) “No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me; ... It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me.” Church School teachers, choir members, elders, pastors, ministers (*remember we are all ministers) should hear these words, “And they shall be taught by God’ and know the words are directed at us….Why?...Because we walk in the world as Christ’s representative as a person and as a congregation. We are called to duty to teach by word and example on behalf of God. Think about it.

No visitor should be surprised ever to discover that the members and leaders of the congregation embrace this obligation to acknowledge our flaws and to work visibly to mend wounds. They should see us reaching out to reach out to those who have left us hurt, and living in the Spirit of grace.

I received twenty responses to my questions out of thirty students.  It really came home to me as I read these words of John preparing this sermon that most of those twenty students are not anti-religious but are hungry for a relationship to God. God is calling them.

They say their earlier congregations made them feel judged, separated them from God rather than drew them nearer to God, but the irony is that they felt free enough to explain why they did not find comfort in a congregation or have a reason to attend church while they were sitting at a dinner table at Hope 808, the UTC Presbyterian student mission house. Whether Muslim, Hindu, Protestant, Catholic, Jew, atheist or just searching, thanks to the support of the PC(USA) congregations of East Tennessee, a hundred or so students have discovered a place where they are welcomed and not judged. They come because they can expect a smile, fellowship and meal. They come because there is always an ear of a pastor or elder to hear their worries and concerns. Most importantly, it is a place that they can hear God’s call if they listen carefully enough.

Their responses say a lot about why PC(USA) congregations in Chattanooga have decreased 75% since 1980, about why most of our congregations now have between thirty and a hundred or so members with an average age over 60, and why mainline denominations are shrinking worldwide. We are chasing people away, or even worse, we seem irrelevant to them. These students, however, are also a glimmer of hope for what happens when we hold true to our duty to God.

Two responses capture the essence of our duty: (1)“I have generally found organized religion to be hypocritical, closed-minded and unable to compromise with differing views,” - we can do something about thiat; and (2) “I’ve been to churches looking for one that moves with the Holy Spirit and the full Gospel. I cannot say why I have not been able to be consistent with a church yet, but I know the Lord will provide one in due time...” “but I know the Lord will provide one in due time.”…

Don’t be surprised but overjoyed to hear, “…but I know the Lord will provide one in due time,” rather be confident that not just the students, but every person who graces our door will find the Holy Spirit working here at Northside.

We are the real street preachers, like it or not. We have a big sign on our back, “Look at me, I am a Christian, model my behavior.”

 When we realize there is no such thing as part time passion in a Christian life that walks humbly in the world as Christ’s representative, people will come to us.

Remember these words of Jesus, “…they shall all be taught by God” and of the student,  “I know the Lord will provide one in due time.”

Everyone the Lord brings to us should find and enjoy an abundant, everlasting life. Be sure every stranger knows there is a way home and that it can be found right here in our house.  Do this for them and do it for yourself, and you will find a smile upon God’s face. Amen.