Unveiling the New Season

9 September 2007

In this, his first sermon as Interim Rector, the Rev. Peter Huiner outlines his vision of the coming year at SsAM, the Episcopal Church of Saints Andrew and Matthew.

A new season has begun at SsAM. Don't miss it!

I was going to get a VIVID flyer printed with STUNNING graphics announcing all the EXCITING NEW programs we will be offering this season at SsAM. It was going to look something like this:

Well, maybe it is just as well that I did not get around to printing that flyer: it would probably just have gotten lost in the busy shuffle of our lives. Are you on as many mailing lists as I am? The YMCA, Longwood Gardens, Opera Delaware -- all of them are trying to grab a piece of our time and some of the contents of our wallets. They promise excitement, good times, friendships, inspiration and personal growth: all the things you want to enrich your life and make it fulfilling.

The Church does often try to compete with all the events clamoring for our attention. I get drawn into the competition myself. I hear myself talking about the EXCITING new Sunday School, about the GREAT food and INSPIRING speakers at the ECW Prayer Breakfast. Notice how we've come to think of Church more and more as a product to be sold? We think we must make it sound as attractive as possible. We think people may be comparison shopping, that we need to extol the Church's programs, its diversity or even its friendliness.

But when we advertise the Church like a product, we should not be surprised when people evaluate the Church like a product, like a civic organization to buy into because it has good program goals, because the people are pleasing, because our needs are met. Church becomes simply another organization competing in the market place for a chunk of everyone's off-work time, as though we were asking people to choose between church, an Eagles' game, a charity event, bridge club and a furniture refinishing course. When we hawk the Church like a product this way, the Church will usually come out the loser.

So let's remove the hype.

We are beginning a new season of activities today: Adult Education, Sunday School, Youth Group, Episcopal Church Women, the Choir, and committee meetings. Activities that were on summer recess are again active. If we remove the hype, we will admit that this program year is basically the same as it was last year and they year before that. Always there are some minor changes. We DO have a new design for the Sunday School and some of the special events will vary but much of what we do will be unchanged. It was good and will continue to be good.

But wait just a minute. This year WILL be different from last year and the year before that. In some ways, it will be very different. This is the first time I speak to you as your Interim Rector. I'm honored and humbled by this opportunity for a new ministry together. I'm a little nervous, too. Just the fact that I'm here will make the year different. I have a different personality and a different style than previous leaders. I have some different ideas, too. I plan no sweeping changes, but there will be some change, if only because I am a different person.

Another reason this season will be different is that my work as Interim Rector is not full time and because SsAM now has the smallest church staff it has ever had. This means our church will rely more on lay leadership than ever before and on lay service. I ask you to re-dedicate your efforts if you are already active at SsAM and, if not, to pray about what you can do to make this church what it should be.

Even our mission is different this season. For the past two years, we have been reflecting on and giving thanks for our past ministries. We celebrated the 10th Anniversary of the Episcopal Church of Saints Andrew and Matthew and, after that, switched to farewell activities for our much-loved Rector. But that's over. We're shifting gears. We are now called upon to think about the directions for the future as we begin the search process for a new Rector. This will be an enormously important year.

Today's Lesson

I was hoping we would have some great inspiring scripture lessons assigned for this day as we begin the important season. About three weeks ago I looked them up to see what was on tap. I groaned right out loud. "Jesus said, 'If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brother and sister, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple." How will that sell to the folks?

Yet, THAT passage is about the Christian faith. The excitement and action and fellowship and self-realization we are tempted to sell is not the call of Christian faith. Nowhere does the Bible describe the Church as a spiritual service center designed to meet people's spiritual needs. Never! The Bible always describes the Church as a people who are bound together through faith in Christ Jesus and a people who exist to offer worship to God and carry on his work of establishing justice and bringing love and healing to the world.

Jesus never called anyone to join a church. He called them to follow Him, to become a disciple.

The Bible and the Christian faith invite people to become members of a new kind of life, what Jesus calls "the Kingdom." It's a choice offered to people and a decision they must make. Some accept the invitation, others refuse. Once they decide to follow, it changes everything, forever. This is no simple "Go to the Jordan and get baptized" kind of religion. Their whole behavior and even their most intimate priorities change.

Jesus spoke the words of today's gospel (Luke 14:25-33) as he was on his way to Jerusalem for the last time. He knew it would be the last time. Great crowds of people were following the spectacular new rabbi, the same way people flock after charismatic religious leaders today. He stopped them cold. "Whoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple." You'd better figure out what the discipleship business is really all about before you jump in.

Jesus' program is one of risk-taking obedience and God-centered love. So that must be the program of Church again this year, whether it sells or not. We will try to call people into real, vibrant discipleship and devotion to our Lord. We'll be supporting each other to make the choice.

A Year of Discipleship

This program year we can make the Holy Eucharist the very center, not only of our church, but of all our lives. That's basic. We don't decide about whether or not we need or like it. It's a gift we respond to. No matter how distorted our perceptions about life or faith, we must come to live in the reality Christ creates and let ourselves be formed by his presence, to share his broken body, broken because of our brokenness and the world's brokenness. We are made new in hope and love.

Make Eucharist the heart of your life this season. Take God seriously enough to make sharing the bread and wine an act of trust and obedience that comes before anything else.

Let's make the Eucharist the heart and soul of our program this season, in obedience to our Lord's command.

Then, if we were struggling to put God's will into action in everything, more people will attempt a serious theological study of Scripture. More people will to get together with fellow believers to talk and pray about how their Christian faith is put into practice and the problems they face. More people raising children will actively make our Sunday School a place where children learn to know and love God more than they love pop music and football. More and more people, moved by suffering and the need for justice, will risk love and the rest of us will be stirred to join them in affirming life for the suffering and the needy.

People have always had the potential for change when they get connected, really connected with God. They don't begin by changing or improving the Church. They meet Jesus and let him meet them and then the people change. That's our season program.

We might even give it a title. Our Adult Bible Study gave me a suggestion. It's called, "Discipleship Bible Study." I'm hoping we can make this whole year, "A Year of Discipleship." A Discipleship Sunday School and Youth Group. A Discipleship Choir. A Discipleship Women's Group. Discipleship Committees and Vestry. Who knows what the year will bring? Jesus calls us forward.

Let's follow and find out.

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