Text: Nehemiah 11:1-2, 12:27-43
Nehemiah and company finished rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem in fifty-two days.
But when the work was complete, what they were left with was basically a shell of a city.
It had walls and gates.
It had a temple and temple staff and priests.
But what it didn’t have was people.
There were some who had lived amongst the ruins, but the majority of people were scattered in surrounding towns and villages.
And so with this nearly blank slate of a city, Nehemiah had to figure out how best to create their ideal city.
On Tuesday, I joined with other clergy from our circuit for our monthly meeting.
We represent twelve churches, almost all on this northwest side of Des Moines.
These gatherings help us think about how we can support one another’s ministry and what kind of work we might do together.
This Lenten season, we will be joining with some of these churches for a community Ash Wednesday service here at Immanuel with a choir made up of members from four different churches.
And for Good Friday, we will gather at Walnut Hills for a Tenebrae service with special music led by five different congregations.
But one of the main conversations that occupied our time was about how we are making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
As we think about the faithful disciples we have in our congregations, how are we empowering you all to go out and transform this city into what God desires it to be?
And Pastor Lee from Valley UMC reminded us of a principle of community organizing.
The question we should be asking is not always what I can do to impact this individual person today.
Sometimes, the question is, what do we want our community to look like in thirty years?
What does God want our community to look like in thirty years?
And what might need to happen in order to get to that place?
That was the kind of question Nehemiah was asking.
He heard God invite him to rebuild the community and the truth was, this isn’t the kind of work that could be accomplished in fifty-two days.
And he knew from past experiences with the officials and leaders exploiting the common folks that you had to be careful with power.
They needed to set up a system where all sorts of people were included and welcomed and had a voice.
So what did God want Jerusalem to look like in thirty years?
And what would it take to get there?
Nehemiah had a lot of options before him.
They could have focused on including just the wealthy and educated.
They could have picked the best and the brightest.
But as we see when they start this effort of resettling, they intentionally worked to make sure that people from every part of their nation were included.
To ensure they didn’t just pick out their favorites…
or just who they wanted to live in the city…
or just those who looked like them…
Nehemiah had the people cast lots.
As we demonstrated with the children, casting lots was a way of randomizing the decision.
One out of every ten people were chosen in this way to move from the surrounding villages up the road and into the fortified walls of the city proper.
And in one sense, this was a sacrifice for these people.
They had to uproot from their small towns and establish themselves in a new place.
But they were also invited to take on the responsibility of this rebuilding in the city in a way that allowed them to leave their own unique mark.
It was a way of saying: your tribe matters to the good of the whole.
We value having your part of the community at the table.
We not only welcome you, we celebrate you.
You are important to us.
This community belongs to you… just as much as it belongs to me.
And your presence here now will ensure that your part of the community will continue to be part of the future of this city and this people.
That is the conversation we are having right now with our welcoming statement.
In the first sentence of the statement, we are invited to claim this kind of truth:
“We celebrate God’s gift of diversity and value the wholeness made possible in community equally shared and shepherded by all.”
First… what does it mean that we celebrate God’s gift of diversity and value the wholeness made possible in community?
This church has welcome and hospitality as one of its core values.
So many of you, in our Nehemiah community groups, shared about how you first connected with the congregation.
Time and time again, I heard the story of how you planned to visit a few congregations, but once you arrived at Immanuel, you never went anywhere else.
You felt love and support and welcome.
When I first got to Immanuel, I experienced that to be true as well.
I’ve learned you are quick to show up at the bedside of a friend and have often visited before I even hear someone is in the hospital or sick.
I see the care that is taken to make this a hospitable and welcoming place: from coffee time and funeral lunches to how you make space for others.
On the sign outside our building, it says, ‘All Welcome!’ and you really want to everyone to feel welcome here.
Just this week, I was working on our statistical tables and I thought about just how much our diversity has increased this past year as we officially welcomed IGF to be part of our church.
But we also have a wide range of ages… from nine-week-old babies to nonagenarians.
We are wealthy and we struggle financially.
We are healthy and we need healing.
Some of us have been educated on the streets and some of us have taught in universities.
We vote republican and we vote democrat and some of us don’t vote.
And even Cyclones and Hawkeyes and Panthers all attend here and are still somehow able to worship together.
More than that… we celebrate that diversity.
We learn from one another, we partner with one another, and share our diverse gifts.
But, sometimes I think the love and welcome of Immanuel is one of our best kept secrets.
There are folks in this neighborhood and larger community who do not know they would be welcome here…
Even though the sign says, “All Welcome,” there are people who might wonder, “even me?”
We might not force them to cast lots and make them come inside our church, but being explicit about who is welcome and showing and affirming that broadly might help our neighbors to see this as a place that they, too, could find belonging.
A place where they could share in ministry.
So one of our congregational goals for 2023 is that we want to become a place that is known as safe, comforting, and supportive for all people.
And our welcoming statement is a part of that, because it helps us be more explicit about what we truly mean by welcome.
But, it also invites us to truly become a community equally shared and shepherded by all.
There is another way that Nehemiah emphasized this kind of welcome and celebration of people from every walk of life.
You see, the time finally came to throw a party.
A real celebration for the completion of the wall.
And he could have just held auditions and picked the best band and singers and the most famous speakers.
But instead, he intentionally made sure that there were people from every part of the community present.
They were sought out from all the places they lived.
And they could have just had the party in one prime location… like the square where they rededicated themselves to God…
But instead, Nehemiah made sure that every single square inch of that wall was celebrated.
And in doing so, he honored and celebrated the work of all of the everyday people who played a part…
the goldsmith and the perfumer…
and the folks who carried stones and who held shields and who stayed up all night…
and the daughters and grandchildren who came to help…
He made sure that everyone who had been part of the work was valued and celebrated in the process.
When I think about the impact of a welcoming statement like the one before us, I think about how even inside this caring, loving community, there are folks who might have a part of their lives they aren’t sure is welcome.
They might hesitate to talk about their divorce.
Or worry about how their pew mates might accept their non-binary grandchild.
There are folks who might hesitate to participate in a small group because English isn’t their first language.
They might hold back their concerns about whether they can afford to stay in their home.
An explicit welcome helps us convey:
We not only welcome you, we celebrate you.
You are important to us.
And you have something to offer this community that we need.
This community belongs to you… just as much as it belongs to me.
But it also says, we will continue to have your back… just like we did before.
We will work to support you and walk alongside you in the future we are claiming together.
And if needed, we will go to bat for you in the struggles that you face in this world.
The celebration and dedication of the wall was also a celebration and dedication of the future for the city of Jerusalem.
They held before them a vision of the kind of place they wanted to be in thirty years.
A community where all parts were cherished and had a role to play.
A community that would hold one another accountable to the commitments they had made.
A community that would have one another’s backs whenever hardship would come.
And I hold this community in my prayers as you discern and think about the kind of place you want to be in thirty years as well.
