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February 8, 2015
Luke 15:1-7
15 Now all the tax collectors and sinners
were coming near to listen to Jesus. 2 And the
Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes
sinners and eats with them.”
3 So he told them this parable: 4 “Which one of
you, having a hundred sheep and losing one of them, does not leave the
ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the one that is lost until he finds
it? 5 When
he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders and rejoices. 6 And when he
comes home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying to them,
‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ 7 Just so, I tell
you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over
ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
Isaiah 40:21-31
21 Have you not known? Have you not
heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
22 It is God who sits above the circle
of the earth,
and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers;
who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
and spreads them like a tent to live in;
23 who brings princes to naught,
and makes the rulers of the earth as nothing.
24 Scarcely are they planted, scarcely
sown,
scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,
when he blows upon them, and they wither,
and the tempest carries them off like stubble.
25 To whom then will you compare me,
or who is my equal? says the Holy One.
26 Lift up
your eyes on high and see:
Who created these?
God who brings out their host and numbers them,
calling them all by name;
because God is great in strength,
mighty in power,
not one is missing.
27 Why
do you say, O Jacob,
and
speak, O Israel,
“My
way is hidden from the LORD,
and
my right is disregarded by my God”?
28 Have
you not known? Have you not heard?
The
LORD is the everlasting God,
the
Creator of the ends of the earth.
He
does not faint or grow weary;
his
understanding is unsearchable.
29 He
gives power to the faint,
and
strengthens the powerless.
30 Even
youths will faint and be weary,
and
the young will fall exhausted;
31 but
those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength,
they
shall mount up with wings like eagles,
they
shall run and not be weary,
they
shall walk and not faint.
Sermon: “Not One Is Missing”
Not
one is missing.
Our Creator brings out great hosts and numbers them,
calling them all by name;
because God is great in strength,
mighty in
power,
not one is missing.
Our
Savior seeks out the lost sheep, leaving those who have community to find those
who are alone and bring them home, and not one is missing.
But
that’s not exactly true, is it? In the
church, many are missing. It often seems
an entire, young generation is missing.
When
I was a mission worker in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the church I served
recognized the need to be present among young adults. They saw that hundreds of young adults,
college students, lived in the neighborhood around the church. They were mostly Catholic, but many only went
to church when they were home in the country and not when they were away at
school in Belfast.
The
church heard from other local residents that these students were actually a bit
of a problem. The students would come
home from pubs in the wee hours of the morning and make all sorts of noise in
their intoxicated state. Some were even
causing damage. Thursday night seemed to
be the worst.
So
they decided to do something. A couple
of church leaders set up a table outside the church from midnight to 2:30 a.m.
one Thursday night, serving tea, coffee and cookies to the students to sober
them up a bit, show them some love, and get them home safely.
When
I arrived, this operation had developed into bacon sandwiches as well (there is
nothing quite like the smell of bacon to get young adults coming in
droves). Every Thursday night, we
shivered together in the cold and served those students. They told us their deepest struggles (freed
up by a spirit of the non-holy variety) and we even would pray with them
sometimes. We served in a powerful way,
showing that generation that they mattered to us, and to God.
Do
you know how many of those students came to worship, or our other
activities? How many joined our
church? None. We did get one new member, a 60-year-old
recovering alcoholic artist who decided to go on the other side of the table
one night and start serving people with us, and never stopped. But that was all. No missing generation filling our pews. No big bump in numbers.
Here’s
the question: was it worth it? Yes. Even though we didn’t get those young adults
to come to our church? Yes. Because we did something even more powerful
than getting them to come to church: we took church to them. That is how we really gather in those who are
missing from our churches.
There
are a lot of reasons why this generation is missing from our pews.
Sometimes,
people are missing because we don’t really know what we’re inviting them to be
a part of. The truth is, we
Presbyterians are really, really good at casseroles, and not that good at
explaining the difference God has made in our lives through our church.
Some
people are missing because they’ve just given up on church, or prefer to find
God in service to others or to find community in friendships.
There
are many reasons why young people are missing from church. But that might be approaching the question
from the wrong direction. What if
they’re not the missing ones? What if we
as the church are who’s missing?
Missing
from meaningful discussions of public policy and education for all.
Missing
from Carolina Lakes trailer park right up the road, where kids’ parents have to
work late and they’re left to their own devices, without guidance, or someone
to help them with homework.
Missing
from communities plagued by gun violence and gang activity.
Missing
from social media where young people are not wasting time, but forming
essential community in ways we may not understand.
They’re
not missing – this lost generation of the church. We know exactly where they are – so does God. It’s just that perhaps we’re not prepared to
go there.
You
see, going there requires admitting that sometimes, “we’ve always done it this
way” doesn’t cut it.
It
requires knowing WHY we happen to be a part of church and why that makes life
better for us, and communicating this with authenticity and joy.
It
requires an end to labeling an entire generation as selfish or lazy or
distracted and seeing them as perhaps the most creative, innovative, passionate
generation there’s ever been.
It
requires recognizing that the missing young people from our church are not our
salvation – God is. Those young people
need to know that this God loves and accepts them, and if we don’t bother to
show them, who will?
I’ve
been here at this wonderful church for 3 years now, and from day one I have
heard a constant refrain: “I just wish we had more young people.”
Here’s
the harsh reality: wishing won’t make it so.
We can’t wish an entire generation into being a part of this place. When church has lost its center of power in
society and moved now to a marginal place (which, by the way, isn’t something
to fear, because that’s where church started in the first place), we must
follow the God who calls everyone by name, seeking them out.
It’s
not enough to “wish” for young people.
Young people in our society, like Isaiah alluded to, are faint and weary
with the sorts of pressures many of us can’t even imagine. They are exhausted by the constant demand to
perform better, reform better, conform better.
God wants to gather them home.
God wants us to be a part of that.
Here’s
the difficult truth in that gathering: gathering young people home might not
mean they come into our pews, like it didn’t mean that for us in Belfast. It might not mean that, if they were never
raised going to church, they’ll find comfort here and join us. We have to stop treating the missing generation
of the church as warm bodies to fill our aging churches. We have to start treating them like the
creative prophets they are, and go to where they are, and then, by the grace of
God, let them change us.
Do
we “want” more youth?
Then
we need to first of all support those we have.
22 young people under the age of 25 are members of this church. An additional 6 were baptized here and
haven’t yet been confirmed as members.
That is about ¼ of our congregation!
Some are children and teenagers, busy with basketball, karate, scouts
and dance and other activities. They
might not be in church every Sunday. But
have we taken church to them? Have we
filled a car with people and been to a basketball game to support them? Have we been to a concert or a dance recital
to show we care?
Some
are young adults, here and away at school, working and learning and needing to
know they are still a part of this family, especially in a time when they’re
figuring out who they are and who they want to be. The PW Valentine’s gift cards are a wonderful
step in showing them our love, but we can do even more.
If
we feel young people are missing, and God’s vision is for no one to be missing,
we need to first seek out our own who might feel disconnected and forgotten.
Then,
we need to get outside of our set ways of doing things, and get outside our
walls.
This
might look like mentoring a young person who needs a positive role model. This might look like speaking of church not
as an obligation or something they “should be” going to, but as a powerful,
intergenerational community where they are wanted, not just needed. This might look like asking a young person
for their opinion long before we ever give ours. This might look like volunteering at Cameron
Elementary School to show those kids they are worth our time. It might look like praying for those in
Carolina Lakes trailer park, and then getting to know them.
This
might not look like families pouring into our pews: like I said, church is at a
marginal place in society now. But all
powerful movements begin at the margins.
Do you think the church isn’t taken seriously today? Ask a young person
what that feels like. Do you think the
church is mocked by society as being unintelligent or frivolous or too
simplistic? Ask a young person what that
feels like. They know. Adults often treat them that way.
Christ
showed us that one lost sheep is worth leaving all the rest to go and
find. If we are to follow that Christ,
we must be willing to leave behind all the non-essentials and find the lost
generation of the church. If we are to
follow that Christ, we must admit to them that, though we adults seem to have
it all together, we’re all lost in our own ways, too. If we are to follow that Christ, then we can
begin the process of finding each other, and being found by God. This might not happen within these
walls. In fact, if we’re doing it right,
it probably won’t.
In
God’s compassion, no one is meant to be missing. So let’s do something about it – not so we can
survive as a church. Christianity has
never been about survival – the cross showed us that. At our best, Christianity is about
resurrection, where stones are rolled out of the way so new life can
begin.
We are only the church when we
get outside of ourselves.
We are only
the church when no one is left out.
We
are only the church when we are sent by the Spirit, and go. Amen.
Excellent piece, Whitney. Really thought provoking and challenging.
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