H – Help: From Lecturing to Modeling
Pastor Mathew Magera – 3/17/19 – Sermon 337
St. Thomas Lutheran Church, Trufant, MI
To God be the Glory!
Grace and peace to you from
God our Father, from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
Culture shock is the feeling
of disorientation experienced by someone who is subjected to an unfamiliar
culture, way of life, or set of attitudes. The Church today is being shaken and
shocked by the culture around us, fearing that the future may be in jeopardy
for those who boldly proclaim Christ. As we move toward being less shocked by
the culture and more shocked by the power of God in the world, we find that as
Jesus once shocked the world with his earthly ministry he can once again shock
us, His Church, to life once again. The way Jesus operates and ministers is a
shock to us because it does not always fall within our comfort zone. Last week,
we reflected on the strategic shift from reaching people to making disciples.
Within that shift we find yet another transformation waiting to take place in
how we help people. The shift takes us from lecturing to modeling, from just
talking to people about Jesus to actually imitating Jesus for others.
I’ve
talked to people who say they are not part of a congregation because they
believe Christians are a bunch of hypocrites. All that the Church has become to
them is people acting. Acting like the have it better, acting like all is well,
acting like they don’t make mistakes. The media also has a tendency to portray
the Church in a bad light. Scandals, hate language, money laundering. Of
course, the media tends to only talk about that which will gain viewership or
readership.
I want to get our minds in
the right place with this story. There was a zoo with a great collection of
animals. In fact, this particular zoo took pride in that it had the most
species of animals of any zoo in the world. There came a day, however, when
their gorilla died. It was very sad indeed. In order to keep the appearance of
having a range of zoo animals, the board of directors decided to hire a man to
wear a gorilla suit and walk around the enclosure until the zoo could get
another gorilla. The man did not know how to be a gorilla but he did his best.
One day, the man, or should I say, the gorilla, had gotten so good at his job
that he wasn’t paying attention when he got close to the wall of his enclosure,
tripped over the side and fell down into the lion exhibit down below. The lion
had heard the commotion and started walking over to the man in the gorilla
suit. He knew this was not going to end well so he started screaming, convinced
his life was about to end. The screaming only made the lion run faster toward
the man. Step by step, closer and closer until the lion was right on top of the
gorilla and said, “be quiet, or you are going to get us both fired.”
Pretending to be something
you are not, no matter how well you do it, has the ability to expose your true
self. This is a very good telling of what people outside the Church sense the
Church is doing. As a result of this, we have a generation of people shying
away from organized religion because of their own experience or what they hear
about who the Church is. They don’t want any part of it. They live in a society
that is raw, authentic, genuine, whether positive or negative and they see the
Church as being the complete opposite. They live and relate in a straight
forward, take it as it is world; they don’t hold much back. The Church, then,
becomes a burden for them when it can be a genuine opportunity.
Our reading from Philippians
is intended to lead us into this shift from lecturing to modeling. Paul starts
out by showing us Jesus. He says, “if you have any encouragement from being
united with Christ…” He’s setting up our relationship with Christ as an
example. In other words, if we find benefit in our relationship with Christ. If
we take any comfort in his love, if we have any common sharing in the Spirit,
any tenderness and compassion. Again, if we enjoy and take comfort in this
relationship we have with Jesus. If we feel good that he reached out to us,
loved us, died for us, saved us, and is walking with us, we should likewise do
the same. Paul says, “then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having
the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish
ambition or vain conceit. Rather,” and this is where Paul drives it home for
us, “in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own
interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” Paul is saying, hey,
Philippians, Jesus loves you. Do you like that? If you do, do that for others.
Paul is calling us outside of ourselves, just as Jesus did in his earthly
ministry. Paul is calling us to imitate Jesus.
Last week toward the end of
my message I mentioned how the unchurched community doesn’t care about how much
we know or how much we have until they know how much we care. They don’t care
that we have stained glass windows. They don’t care about our new carpet. They
don’t care about or well-manicured lawn. What they want to know first is that
we care about them. They don’t want to hear anything about God, Jesus, or the
Holy Spirit until they know who we are. That being said, where we finished
talking about the need for relationships we’ll pick up and go deeper into that
and flesh out where to start in creating them. How do we help our neighbor who
may or may not want anything to do with the Church? How can we help our
neighbor who is sitting right next to us?
The Church as
Along-siders
In our quest to help others
and to form relationships in our journey toward making disciples, it is to our
benefit to move from informing to being an alongsider, to learn where people
are and where they want to be. One of my colleagues told a story once about a
time she was in seminary. She had started volunteering at a faith-based
homeless shelter and on one of the first shifts she was scheduled she walked in
with other volunteers and she looked around the room at the people. It did not
look good, much as you might expect a homeless shelter to be. As she looked
around, one of the volunteers was walking around telling all of the people that
Jesus loved them. They spoke with such compassion and love as they went around
the room saying, “Jesus loves you.” It was a powerful witness. But, as this
volunteer was making their way around the room, there was a homeless person
nearby who was also watching. As this volunteer kept getting closer to them
they closed up more and more. My colleague noticed this person closing up and
she decided to go sit with him. She sat and pointed at the volunteer who was
telling people that Jesus loved them and asked, “what are they doing?” The
response was, “telling people Jesus loves them.” She responded to that asking,
“how do you feel about that?” In a lengthy conversation she found out that this
homeless individual was not concerned about Jesus loving them. They were more
concerned about having a place to sleep tomorrow night, food to get them
through the day, and hopefully a job to make that happen. So, the two of them
talked. She never once told this person that Jesus loved them because as she
explained when she told this story, words are only as good as the actions that
back them up. She would rather show this person that Jesus loved them, saying
that being present is the strongest ministry we have.
Jesus interacted with people
in this way. Remember how he spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well. He met
her where she was, in her life’s circumstances, in her territory. Remember how
on Easter Sunday he spoke to Mary in the garden, showing concern for her
weeping more than immediately revealing who he was. Paul instructs us in
Philippians 2 to have the interest of others in our minds, to not be afraid to
model Jesus’ love rather than just informing people that Jesus loves them. This
might work with people who are part of the Church and who would welcome such
words like many of us here. But, for those outside the Church, the tactic needs
to be different.
It might be as simple as
starting a conversation in line at the grocery store. Maybe it’s not so simple
and you fear you have to have a deep conversation. That’s not what it’s about.
No one said you have to get into deep topics of theology. In fact, most times,
all you have to do is ask a simple question and spend the rest of the time with
your ears open and your mouth shut. We can say hello to someone, give a smile,
show up somewhere. From lecturing to modeling, being on their side and taking
an interest in them goes a long way.
The Church is
Transparent
A second way we can move
from lecturing to modeling is to not be afraid of transparency. This goes for
both us and those who we may be conversing with. People are used to the rawness
of life. Sometimes that rawness is pushed aside in the church. Sometimes we
want the Church to be a place where that rawness is designated as inappropriate
behavior.
If we truly want to take
seriously the interests of others, we have to be willing to be transparent, to
be witnesses but also to be withnesses, to be with them. We have got to share
our stories about how God has been with us as well, through our strong days,
especially during our weak times also. On the mountain, in the valley. We know
that we struggle. We know that we don’t have it all together. If we could only
convince people of this truth, to show them that we are more like them than
they think, or maybe more than even we think, we might be able to let the Holy
Spirit open some doors.
So many of our younger
generation are not coming because we are not withnessing. We are not wanting to
tell people that we don't have it all together. We want to act like everything
is great and not share our struggles. Until we can tell our stories, we don't
have the impact that the Church was intended to have.
I remember last summer we
were driving back from Ohio and stopped at a Subway to get some food outside of
Detroit to power us the rest of the way home. I walked into the shop and the guy
behind the counter was having a terrible day. A lady in front of me was trying
to order for her family using her phone to have them tell her the order. I
stood there for almost a good five to ten minutes waiting for my turn and there
was nobody else working there. After the lady left and the guy came to help me
I asked him how his day was going. Well, let me tell you, asking that question
must've been the code word to open up the dam because he poured into me just
how his day was going. He really needed to vent. His co-worker didn't show up
to work that day, customers were mad at him because his co-worker didn't show
up and their orders were taking forever. Someone messed up one of the bathrooms
and he couldn't do anything about it because there was no one there to help
him. He was sinking fast, and let me tell you, and he just needed to let it out
and I was the ear that was fortunate enough to hear it and I was grateful to be
there. Now, instead of doing this I could’ve complained that he was taking a
long time. I could’ve sent a complaint to the company for the very colorful
language he was using to describe his day. I could’ve gotten upset when I
needed to use the restroom that was so bad it probably just needed to be set on
fire. I could’ve even told him I was a pastor. But, it wasn’t about me. It was
about him and giving him the opportunity to be transparent with me without fear
that I would make his day worse than it already was.
As we attempt to form
relationships with others, we cannot be afraid of transparency. We need to be
open to it, welcome it, and let it guide the relationship as we work to keep
the interest of the others in our mind.
When we can be a model to
others instead of a lecturer, when we can be open to transparency on both sides
of the relationship, we will have recognized that this process of creating
relationships with the purpose of making disciples is as endless a process as
is our relationship with Christ. In other words, the job is never done. There
is no age requirement and there is no age retirement. We are called to be
participants in the lives of our neighbors from beginning to end and across
multiple generations. A lot of times this means getting over ourselves and just
doing it. Of course, our sinful nature wants to be self-centered. But, Jesus
shows us how to make disciples, by being invested in the lives of others. Just
think of Jesus sitting with Matthew, the tax collector, at his house with some
of his business partners, their prostitutes, and other sinners from all walks
of life.
Sometimes this means
remembering to put God in his proper place. There are times we want to be
higher than God, to have God at our beck and call. We need to put ourselves
back under God because God is the one in control here. He is the one calling
the shots, he is the one trying to help us. God has taken the time to love and
be patient with us, to embrace and forgive us, to work with us. When we realize
what God has done for us, it makes it so much easier to turn it around and to
know that we could never pay it back to him but we can start by paying it
forward to others. This is the heart of our message in Philippians 2. Because
God loved us so much, because Jesus gave us so much, because the Holy Spirit
fills us so much, we should take that and spill over that love, spill over our
gifts, spill over the Holy Spirit onto our neighbor. We need to look for and
take opportunities when they come. This will be the direction of my message
next week, to think about how we can become opportunity oriented.
* * *
A wise person once told me
that the difference between people who do something and people who don’t do
something is that the people who do something do something. So, let’s do
something. Let’s help people. Let’s get into their lives, learn about them, be
transparent, let’s model Christ for them. Let’s do what Paul says in
Philippians 2, “if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if
any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any
tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded,
having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of
selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above
yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests
of the others.” Remember, Jesus is the one that came alongside you. He took
your sin upon him and died on the cross for you. He gave you something you
didn’t deserve and he gave it to you in abundance. This should be our
motivation. This should be our encouragement.
We shouldn’t be afraid to do
this. The Gospel of Matthew says that Jesus will always be with us. We always
have the one who walked alongside us. We have the one who was our witness.
Worry, shame, guilt, anxiety, blame, and confusion cannot be the order of the
day within the Church.
It is time to take off our
gorilla suits, to no longer pretend that we are someone we are not. Then, we are to put on Christ. We can't be gorillas. We can't be authentic that way. But, we can put on Christ because he gave himself for us and we become authentic in our ministry. When
we walk in authenticity, this is when God gets the glory. We are moving forward
with an intentionality to shock the culture by being real, by being authentic,
by being genuine, by sharing, by opening up. We are not trying to lecture
someone but by entrusting everything to Jesus, knowing that in him all things are
made right in him, we are trying to walk alongside people, to show them that
the Church cares for them and that God cares for them as well. In Christ is
where we find our hope of moving forward. Let us, in our shift toward making
disciples, help others by modeling the one who modeled himself for us, who
walked alongside us, who forgave us for our sins and who continues to walk with
us even in the rawness of our own lives. Let us place our trust and our hope in
him for in him we cannot fail because he did not fail us. To God be the glory,
now and always. Amen.