Last year at Pentecost, I gave a sermon that asked what it is about church that brings out strong opinions and emotions of all kinds, and what it is that—when those opinions and emotions become negative and potentially explosive—keeps the church from blowing apart. In that sermon I recounted the kind of conflicts that can occur when people bring their love, longing, hopes, pains, fears and past hurts into community and try to function together. I suggested that the paradox of connecting with others while recognizing our differences might provide God's best plan and our best hope for healing and being Christ's body in the world. I pointed out that even here at Oakhurst, really good people with really good intentions who really seem to want to be church, at times hurt each other immensely. I suggested the possibility that perhaps God uses this kind of conflict as part of continuing creation, to heal us as individuals, to create church, and to heal the world. I pointed out that being church with other real human beings with real human distinctions is difficult.
I ended with these words:
"What if the point of church, the work of the church is not just to enjoy harmony and comfort each other but also to plumb the depth of our disagreements and scare each other nigh unto death and still find a way to break bread together and to pray together for the Spirit to continue to come? Could this be what God had in mind in creating the church? Could Good News look like this?"
Welcome to Oakhurst, Melanie. To this place where we are known for our missions and innovation, but also for our conflicts and failures. A place many people find difficult to leave, but also a place where others find it impossible to stay.
Today we as a church celebrate joining Melanie's ministry with that of Oakhurst Baptist Church. It is appropriate as we do so to reflect on what we are doing and why. Why are we here? Why do we take the time and energy and awareness required to be church together? What brings us to this time of promise with each other?
Each of us has our personal answers to these questions. The answers are multi-layered and vary over time. But as a congregation, we make a statement of faith that these complex answers exist for one reason within one theme: "We are together only to be the church of God in Christ. We are not here by chance, but God through grace is making of us a fellowship to embody and to express the Spirit of Christ." We believe and affirm that it is God, who for God's own reasons, has brought us here.
To be "the church of God in Christ" we have to allow God, through grace, to "make of us a fellowship." We become "the body of Christ" in this place. It is my wish that we not only be "the body of Christ" but that we be "the healthy body of Christ."
To remain healthy, a body needs many things. Among them are: sleep and also rest (which is a different thing), exercise, enough (but not too much) nutritious food and sometimes avoiding certain foods or even all food for a period of time, clean air, exercise that pushes us to strengthen and build muscles but that does not strain or over-exert, attention to building our immunity and awareness of injury or illness without becoming distractedly obsessed about our well-being. Since our health is not just physical but also emotional, mental, spiritual, we need serious concerns and playfulness. We need to relax or meditate or otherwise enjoy quiet. In addition we need stimulation of mind and soul, as well as muscle. We need time to be with others and time to be alone. We need to know and respect our limits and also push ourselves appropriately.
This is not an exhaustive list. If I had the time, it would be intriguing to take each of the items and look for its parallel in the corporate body. Perhaps another time.
For today, I want to note that even in attending to one individual body, it is complicated. Some needs seem to conflict. To be healthy, a body has to find and re-find balance. One can err in going to an extreme in any direction. Instead of looking for the one right way to do things, the task is to learn to live in the tension of unresolved paradox. We have to learn balance. And once we have it, we have to know it is not achieved forever but only until the next events occur and we have to pay attention and balance all over again. We need to learn this in our individual lives and we need to learn this as a corporate body.
If as church we are to be a healthy body, we have to manage the at times seemingly contradictory needs of the various individuals and groups as well as the whole. We have to manage the tension of the paradoxes life presents us and not become too anxious. As a corporate body each of us has to learn what is mine to do, what is yours, and what is ours. To do this we have to establish and maintain trust in each other. We have to trust God to call each of us to tasks that best use our gifts and we have to trust ourselves—and each other—to listen to God's calling in this regard.
We also have to discern when to speak and when to remain silent. For instance, in a given situation when we are unclear whether to talk about circumstances involving ourselves or others and we don't want to speak, are we being motivated by respect for privacy or are we caught by a shameful secret. Or are we unwilling to work through a disagreement. When we do want to talk about another's circumstances, are we sharing concern in a supportive way or are we giving in to what Pitts Hughes refers to as "holy gossip." If we want to talk about our own injury or if we are listening to another talk about injury, are we doing so in a way that is healing and restorative or are we only prolonging or evening deepening the hurt. If the group has decided to move in a direction different from the one we wanted to take, is this a time to speak forcefully one's own preference or a time to trust the wisdom of the group and support the decision. Are we willing to do what is required to stay community when we disagree?
To manage all this we have to be able to trust God, ourselves, and each other.
We have to come to know when our inner leading comes from the voice of the Spirit. When our own desire and wishes come from the image of God within us and when they are expressions of fear.
This is not easy. I doubt anyone does it alone. But, we are not alone. It is by being together that we become one body. While functioning as a body can be the source of some of our difficulties, it is frequently also the source of our repair. Bodies contain within them their own healing processes which can be trusted.
As the reading from I Corinthians indicates, we have to work together to accomplish what no one of us could or should attempt to do alone.
Melanie, here as part of this corporate body, you have a particular role. Though we are proud that here at Oakhurst "every member is a minister," no one who knows much about the church would think that the role you take on as pastor is easier because of that. In fact, you have more people who will want to tell you what to do. More people who, at least from time to time, think they are your boss. More people with ideas they think should go to the top of your list. Etc. Etc.
Today we are making a covenant to let you function as one of our pastors. We are promising to remember that while we might all be ministers here, what that means is that we are all responsible for helping the church be that healthy body, not that we all have the same role. When we forget, remind us. You, along with Lanny (and to some degree the rest of the staff), are in a position to have a perspective the rest of us can't have. We need to keep you informed, but help us remember that it is a different role to be the pastor.
From my perspective (and I have heard others talk about this as well) for years Oakhurst has had a kind of adolescent identity. We were defined by all that we were rebelling against. We did not want to submit to any outside authority. At times this meant we made it difficult to allow anyone in the church, including the professional ministers, to exercise appropriate authority.
I think we have matured. It is my hope that we have come to understand that this role you take on, you do on our behalf. You have authority because of who you are as a person and as a pastor. But you have it here because of this agreement we have made with you. We have chosen you and you have chosen us. Your authority with us becomes real on a case by case basis as we agree to let you function for us in that role. It is a sign of growth when we can be open enough to admit we need pastors and I hope we will be able to relax and accept the pastoring you and Lanny are offering and know it does not change our own responsibility for our well-being as individuals and a church.
This is not an easy place to pastor. Much will be requested of you. It is your job to stay clear about when you can appropriately answer "Yes" and when the truth is "No." Support Lanny in doing the same. Work with him when both of your truths are "Yes" and when both are "No." If you can do this, you will not only last longer as our pastor, you will also model for us something many of us need to know in our own lives. Today we promise to let you not only offer us care and comfort, but also to challenge us, to disappoint us. To share with us some of our burdens and to put others squarely back in our laps.
As one of the co-chairs of the committee who discerned that you were God's choice for us, I am particularly interested in how this new model of ministry, where two people share one comprehensive job description, is going to play out. Our conversation, first as a committee and then in larger groups, was about the possibility that this would provide new ways, not just of pastoring, but also of being church. It was our hope that the kind of shared communication, mutual self-awareness, and deepening respect that will be needed for this to work, would not only be life-giving for you and Lanny but also that the congregation could learn from you as a team. That by observing you and sharing with you in the process those same qualities of mutuality, self-knowledge, and open expression could become available to us, not only at Oakhurst but throughout our lives.
I think what I am about to say is self-evident, but in case it's not, let me say that we could not be making this covenant with you, if Lanny had not been willing for us to make a new covenant with him. Before the search committee recommended this new model to the church, we had lots of conversation with Lanny about whether or not it would be good news for him. It is not easy for a person who has been somewhere for 18 years to make so radical a shift in how he relates to a congregation. If he had not been willing to take on a new way of pastoring and if the committee had not believed he really was able and wanted to do so, then we would not be here today making this covenant with you.
I am grateful to each of you for taking this on and seeing what can be done with it. No matter how it sometimes seems, we really do need to be pastored. Otherwise it is very difficult for us or for any group to be church.
The world needs for Christ's body to function in a healthy way. As I said about bodies earlier, this requires many at times seemingly contradictory things. To attend to ourselves, each other, the community, the world. To have enough—but not too much—inner focus, outward service, self-care, self-sacrifice, hearing God's voice in our own hearts, heeding the counsel of others, valuing tradition, being open to the new, laughter, tears, shared heartache, flowing joy.
We need to stretch and grow and accept the challenge to be the healthy body of Christ.
We come today to promise each other that this is what we are going to do: we are committing to be Christ's healthy body, God's church. As we do this, I want to turn to one of Oakhurst's other sacred texts, Walker Knight's questions for sounding the call for a new mission group. Is this thing we feel called to do almost impossible to accomplish? Is there a good chance we will fail? Nonetheless, is the call incredibly Good News? In applying these questions to our new pastoral model, for me the answer to all three questions is "Yes." We don't know for sure whether this thing can be done. Specifically, we don't know if Melanie and Lanny and Oakhurst can do it. So it seems to me a certainty that from time to time you as a team, you as individuals, and we as a church, will fail to live up to what we have hoped and promised.
Nonetheless, for me, for us who were on the search committee, for many members of the congregation I have talked with, the very fact that we are taking it on to see if we can do it, is incredibly good news – no matter what the outcome.
We are together only to be the church of God in Christ. We are together to be growing into a healthy, alive, energized, body. No one of us is here by chance. It is God, whose grace is limitless, whose very nature is love, who never tires of creative outpouring, who is calling us into relationship to become that body, to live and express as that body, here, at this time, in this place.
Thanks be to God.