University Presbyterian Church - Chapel Hill, NC

“We Believe In Togetherness”

A sermon preached for

University Presbyterian Church, Chapel Hill

by Anna Pinckney Straight

August 31, 2008

1 Corinthians 12:1-31

Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers and sisters, I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans, you were enticed and led astray to idols that could not speak. Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking by the Spirit of God ever says "Let Jesus be cursed!" and no one can say "Jesus is Lord" except by the Holy Spirit. Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses. For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body--Jews or Greeks, slaves or free--and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many. If the foot would say, "Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. And if the ear would say, "Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body," that would not make it any less a part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many members, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you," nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you." On the contrary, the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it. And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers; then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak in tongues? Do all interpret? But strive for the greater gifts. And I will show you a still more excellent way.

Here we are.  Together.  Gathered.  As one body, the Body of Christ.  One.  And at the same time, we are also many. Individuals, completely and independently, who are beloved children of God and united in Christ. 

We are a community.  And not just any community, a faith community, a particular way of being together.

As I say when we welcome new members:

Joining a church is an exciting, wonderful thing.  It can also be a little frightening.  In part, this is because joining a church is not like joining any other organization.  We’re not a club, group, or gathering.  We are a community of faith, brought together not by our successes but by the faithful knowledge that we only live into being the Body of Christ when we come together to be forgiven, seek the will of God, and truly depend on one another to be more together than we could ever be on our own.[1]

Henri Nouwen describes community as “the fruit born through brokenness.”[2]

Community is one of the most defining features of our faith.  Not only does God call us to belief, God calls us to make this journey with others.

Community is a wonderful multi-faceted aspect of the life of faith.

There is no one thing we need to know about community, there are many things that make it such a compelling part of the life of faith.  Many things which happen in community that cannot happen in solitude.

In community, we worship

Confession, word, peace, fellowship, thanksgiving.  They happen here.  Because when we gather, God is with us in a very particular way.

Jesus said, “where two or three are gathered.” (Matthew 18:20)

We are not abandoned by God when we are by ourselves, but community and solitude are not interchangeable.  The melodies and harmonies of worship can happen because we are together.   Trust me.  When I sing the harmony part to “Praise Ye The Lord, The Almighty” by myself in here?  It doesn’t sound so good.   It certainly doesn’t glorify God in the same way as when it was sung a few minutes ago, with all of our voices filling this place from baseboard to rafter.

In community, we learn together.

As a community of faith, we learn together by being forgiven sinners together.  Different people.  Different styles.  Different experiences.   In any given congregation you will have people who like to keep things organized.  Others who love the adrenalin of last minute prep work. Life-long church members and those who are new to faith.  Children, middle aged, retired.   Those who aren’t yet ready to face their baggage, and others who are healing by talking about where life has taken them.  Because we see things and live things in different ways, we learn with each other in ways we could never duplicate on our own.

We learn in formal ways, in classrooms and studies, and we learn in ways that cannot be programmed or scheduled, that happen when we are together.  Conversations out classrooms.  Inquiries made while washing hands.  Relationships modeling integrity.  Honest empowered by God that is difficult to emulate elsewhere. All of this, what happens in classrooms, sanctuaries, and spaces in between, faithful learning that goes way beyond labels of Bible or study.

In community, we lean on one another. 

Not only does the community of faith give us a place to celebrate and share, it is a place to lean when we feel lost.  When we are in wilderness times or feel we can’t pray or sing, being in community allows us to be surrounded with those who can pray, sing, and believe.  When we offer to pray for one another, it is not only to offer prayers for their well being, it is to offer to pray for them when they feel they cannot pray. 

Marilyn Chandler McEntyre tells this story, of:

One friend for whom I promised to pray as his wife was dying said to me in a moment of spiritual exhaustion, ‘You pray.  I can’t.  I’ll just have to rely on others to pray for now.’ And so he did.  His reply has stayed with me as an encouragement to pray for those unable or unwilling to pray for themselves, invoking the privilege we enjoy as members of one body to count for as well as count on each other in asking for what we need.[3]

We lean on one another and we support one another as we seek to understand and live who we are and whose we are.  From the most recent issue of The Christian Century:

Nearly 20 years ago Deborah Bial became disturbed by the high dropout rate of promising minority students recruited by top-notch universities. A light went on for her when one of these students told her he would have stayed in school if he had had his posse with him—urban jargon for one's neighborhood buddies. This gave Bial the idea of recruiting high school students in bunches, helping them develop into a cohesive group, and then sending them en masse to excellent universities. She started the Posse Foundation, which has sent about 2,200 students to 28 different universities with $220 million worth of full-tuition scholarships. Posse students have a graduation rate of 90 percent, compared to 50 percent for all students beginning as freshmen at four-year institutions.[4]

As Christians, we gather together to lean on one another and support one another as we seek to understand and live who we are and whose we are.

In community, we are empowered to take greater risks.

When I was a lifeguard, one of the techniques we were taught for lifesaving at the beach was the life line.  If someone was being pulled out or away by the currents, we were instructed not to go out by ourselves but to form a human chain, to go out into the water without ever losing hold of the grounding provided by land.  Community empowering risk greater than any one person could absorb.

Last week, John Rogers, the Associate Pastor called to Campus Ministry here at University Presbyterian, called us to be a part of the marching band, to follow a drum major Christ.  As we seek to change the world, to make the world more a vision of what God knows this world can be, we can do more together. 

One person can make a lot of sandwiches, a community can start a food pantry. 

One person can send some supplies, a community can  support- send, supply, nurture, and encourage a missionary. 

One person can believe in human rights, a community can encourage the adoption of sweat-shop free policies.

It is through community that God faithfully change the world, changes our lives, day by day.

These things.  Risking, leaning, learning, and worshipping, they are all true about community, things we know and can understand.  But none of them answer the question why.  They are results of community, but they are not why we come together.  Why do we come together?  Because God calls us into community. 

In the words parents sometimes have to use and children everywhere bristle at hearing, Because I Said So.

God calls us to be together.

Jesus does not compare us to turtles, anteaters, or tigers, solitary animals, Jesus calls us sheep.  Animals that herd, live together.  It may not be the most glamorous example, but it was one people of all times have understood.  The Lord is Our shepherd.  We are the sheep.

And that is something we are called to be for better of for worse.

Being a part of a church community is like being a part of a marriage.  For better or for worse.  It’s not that there aren’t ever reasons for divorce, but those reasons go far beyond simply being uncomfortable.

And that’s because, in community, our path is also illuminated through struggles.  

Church life is not, and is not intended to be, a utopia.  If you have been a part of any church for any length of time you know this and probably know it well.  We are humans and the church is filled with humans, all with human failings.  These failings provide the opportunity to seek God’s forgiveness, and they can also be a gift.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his book about life at the underground seminary he helped to lead, writes that many of us come together into faith communities with dreams of what they can be:

By sheer grace, God will not permit us to live even for a brief period in a dream world….  God is not a God of the emotions but the God of truth.  Only that fellowship which faces such disillusionment, with all its unhappy aspects, begins to be what it should be in God’s sight, begins to grasp in faith the promise that is given to it…. A community which cannot bear and cannot survive such a crisis, permanently loses in that moment the promise of Christian community.[5]

In church life, sometimes we learn through the negative examples, things we don’t want to emulate or duplicate, and other times we learn by working through differences and problems.

All of this through recognizing, in the words of Barbara Wheeler, that the community of faith, tied together by the waters of baptism, often has much more in common with a cold shower than a relaxing bubble bath.

She uses another image for people of faith tied together in community, “strangers, who cling to each other for dear life in the same chilly, rocky baptismal boat because we are headed toward the same destination: a better country… The church is better off -- more productive and more faithful -- when the strangers in it hold on to one another … [We have]… a lot of important work to do; and though we would like to see all of it accomplished our way, the fact is that none of the factions, including our own, has the capacity or the skills to do it alone.”[6]

Here’s the good news.  We’re not supposed to do this on our own.  Today, we are reminded that we are  not expected to know or understand everything that there is to know or understand about community.

There is a part of community which is intended to be a continual mystery, to be honored and celebrated.  As an army wife I knew in Pennsylvania taught me, some things are beyond our pay grade.

Community is, ultimately, not our own creation.  It is a gift from God, given by God, redeemed by Jesus Christ, sustained and nurtured by the Holy Spirit.  It is a gift to be received, a gift we are supposed to have help with, each and every step of the way.

Words of Heinrich Arnold[7]:

A true community cannot exist for a single day without the gift of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, whether in our being together, in our silence, or in our singing together, we expect and await this gift which God has offered us through the death of Jesus. It is said that the early church was of one heart and one soul. It may not have been a well-organized body, but it was of one heart and one soul. Its members were moved by the Spirit from above, and through this movement it came about that they held everything in common….  It was…. a matter of moved hearts.

Community is a gift from God, nurtured and sustained by the Holy Spirit

In community, our path is illuminated by struggles

In community, we are empowered to take greater risks

In community, we lean on one another

In community, we learn together

In community, we worship

A community of faith is many things.  A place to learn, lean, laugh, and sing.  There are risks and comforts, dangers and hopes.  It is a place of moved hearts.  It is something known, and it is a mystery.  It is place and a gift from God.   A gift from God for which we give thanks.  “What a fellowship, what a joy divine.”

People of faith, we believe in Togetherness.  We believe in Community.   Thanks be to God.  Thanks be to God.