gifts – Salvaged Faith

Nehemiah: Side by Side

Posted on January 22, 2023Leave a comment

Text: Nehemiah 2:11-18, 3:1-4 (5-32)

Last week, we laid out some of the context for the Book of Nehemiah…

A people who found themselves in the in a transitional time… a time of rebuilding and resettling and restoring after the Babylonian Exile.

Nehemiah is granted authority from the Persian King Artaxerxes to return to Judah and rebuild the walls.

And the King gives him some authority… he basically appoints him as the governor of the region and sends along supplies as well.

So what happens when Nehemiah arrives?

Does he immediately gather all the people and tell them what to do?

No.

He checks everything out for himself.

His brother had told him about the condition of the walls and the gates, but he takes the time to do his own inventory.

He prayerfully explores the city walls and the gates.

He climbs over the rubble.

He makes his way through the ashes.

He spends days listening, looking, pondering.

This week, our Nehemiah Community groups were tasked with just that – to spend some time looking, listening, and paying attention to what is happening in our community.

Before we dive in and even think about rebuilding, what do we see?

Each fall, our Administrative Council is asked that question.

While it can sometimes feel like an excess of paperwork… apologies to our District Superintendent, Ron!… the truth is that our annual charge conference forms force us to notice our context.

And some of the things that we saw last fall as we looked out around us was that we are largely a middle-class neighborhood, but we are growing in our diversity.

At the same time, there is a limited availability for services like transportation and health care.

These great Beaverdale brick homes are great for newer families and older established neighbors, but there has been a lot of turnover in the last year or two.

But we also find ourselves in a place that is very community oriented… our Merle Hay and Beaverdale neighborhoods put on a lot of community events and community social media groups demonstrate how people look out for and show up for one another.

Some of the needs that we see include continued food insecurity… Our Little Free Pantry gets emptied out nearly every day.

There are rising costs all around us for food, fuel, utilities, child care, and more.

Our community continues to lack affordable housing and we’ve had homeless neighbors camp out on our property.

We lack access to the mental health services so desperately needed.

Folks around us in the community need spiritual support and are looking for identity and belonging.

Nehemiah took in all that he saw.

And to be honest, he probably found a whole lot more wrong with the city than just the wall.

But he had a call from God to start somewhere.

After he looked and listened he pulled together the people to talk about what God had put on his heart.

But he also drew their attention back to what was all around them.

“Face it: we’re in a bad way here. Jerusalem is a wreck; its gates burned up. Come – let’s build the wall of Jerusalem and not live with this disgrace any longer.” (2:17, MSG)

He shared with them what he saw, but also connected with their own investment in the situation.

To be honest, these folks knew the walls were in ruins.

They had lived this way for years… decades, even!

And maybe they hadn’t done anything because they thought someone else would.

Or maybe they hadn’t done anything because it was too overwhelming.

Or maybe they had just gotten used to how things were.

But Nehemiah invited them to see anew what was all around them… and then invited them to do something concrete to make a difference.

And the people responded with enthusiasm! As the Message translation puts it, the people rolled up their sleeves, ready for the good work.

He didn’t recruit them.

He didn’t assign them.

He didn’t force them.

He simply helped them see what they knew… and THEY realized they could do something about it.

Next Sunday, leaders from our church will share with you more about our goals for this year.

We all see the needs around us and we believe God has called us to engage in and partner with our community so that all who hunger might be fed by God’s grace.

Some people are hungry for connection… for welcome… for support.

Some people are hungry to know God more deeply.

Some folks are just plain hungry.

And we think there are some concrete things that we can do… that God is asking us to do… to make a difference.

From groups to support people through illness or grief…

To outreach and mission activities where we connect with our neighbors…

To the ways we can be intentional about rebuilding relationships and truly showing welcome to all people…

What we hope is that when you hear about some of our plans and goals for this next year that you, too, will want to roll up your sleeves, ready for the good work ahead of us.

For you see, the leaders of this congregation can’t do it all by themselves, no more than Nehemiah could rebuild the whole wall himself.

The task is too big and the work is too important.

And the truth is, the church, the Kingdom of God, the Body of Christ, that we are rebuilding is not about one person or about a small group of leaders.

It is going to take all of us, taking responsibility, hearing the call, and doing our part.

Timeline

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Now, for the sake of kindness, I didn’t have Virginia read ALL of chapter 3 in the Book of Nehemiah.

But what we find in that chapter is that one by one, people figured out what their part of the rebuilding was.

They didn’t get assigned.

They just rolled up their sleeves and tackled their part of the project.

This graphic, created by Mark Barry, walks through all of chapter three of the Book of Nehemiah starting with the Sheep Gate which is in the middle on the right hand side.

Eliashib and the other priests get to work on reframing and setting the doors and focus on building the wall all the way to the Tower of Hananel.

But then verse by verse, Nehemiah lays out who decides to take responsibility for a part of this project.

The children of Hassenaah built the Fish Gate…

Next to them Meremoth made repairs…

Joiada and Meshullam repaired the Mishneh gate…

Uzziel, who was a goldsmith, made repairs on another section…

A perfumer by the name of Hananiah focused on the next section… (whew, imagine how many blisters he must have had after the first day of work!)

Folks like Benjamin, Hasshub, Azariah, and Zadok focused on the repairs to the wall outside of their own houses.

On and on it goes throughout the entire chapter.

Leaders, workers, business owners. White collar and blue collar.

Young and old.

Skilled and unskilled.

Side by side and shoulder to shoulder they worked.

They brought together their families and relatives from surrounding areas.

People from the countryside flocked in to help.

Everybody found something they could do.

The question before us in these coming weeks is to listen for our part.

As you engage with our town hall next week and hear about our plans for this year… what are you being called to roll up your sleeves and get involved with?

What is your part of the rebuilding?

Maybe it is something that is already close to you… a part of our shared ministry that you want to refocus on.

Or maybe your call is to bring together your family and relatives to join in the work.

Maybe God is nudging you to put your skills and training to work in a new way for God.

Or maybe, your part is to do something you’ve never tried before… like the perfumer who starts laying bricks to help out.

As Paul tells us in his first letter to the Corinthian church:

“Christ is just like the human body – a body is a unit and has many parts; and all the parts of the body, even though there are many. We were all baptized by one Spirit into one body, whether Jew or Greek, or slave or free, and we all were given one Spirit to drink. Certainly the body isn’t one part but many… You are the body of Christ and parts of each other.” (1 Cor. 12:12-14, 27 – CEB)

What are we, as a church community, if not the Body of Christ.

The Holy Spirit that flows through us connects us to one another.

And every single one of you are important.

Every single one of you has something to offer.

Every single person who is connected to this community has a role to play in this rebuilding.

The needs around us are great.

There is much work to be done.

Friends… Come – let us rebuild.

UMC 101: We are ALL Ministers

Posted on February 13, 2022Leave a comment

Text: Ephesians 4:4-16, Book of Discipline P126-139

Last week, I offered a very brief summary of scripture: God forgives us. God loves us. God has a job for us.

And we see this message at work in our scripture for this morning. We are forgiven by the ONE lord, through our ONE faith and in our ONE baptism. We experience God’s love through the ONE body. And empowered by the ONE spirit, we are called to live out ONE common hope.

But this oneness of God is not the sort that drowns out difference.

We are called to make disciples of all people, but we are not called to make all people look, act, worship, or practice the same way.

As our Book of Discipline describes it, the church “demonstrates a common life of gratitude and devotion, witness and service, celebration and discipleship… the forms of this ministry are diverse in locale, in interest, and in denominational accent, yet always catholic in spirit and outreach.” (P126, p.97)

It makes me think about the interplay of color.

In lighting, color has an additive effect.

White light is actually made up of many different wavelengths and like in these spotlights on a stage floor, there is an additive effect.

Conversely, you could take what appears to be a beam of white light and refract it into its many components and see a rainbow.

Color in pigments, however have a subtractive effect.

If you were to blend together various hues you would end up with a muddled black tone.

But if you allow them to be in relationship, complimenting one another, our pictures and our world become more vivid and full of life.

God’s Word – rather than being black and white words on a page that never change – is alive and varied and moving among us.

We understand how it has been shared and blended and shaped through the legacy of our ancestors and we also come to see how God’s Word is refracted in the everyday experiences of people of faith.

As Christians, the Holy Spirit calls us to travel on the same road, in the same direction, sticking together (as the Message translation puts it)… “but that doesn’t mean you should all look and speak and act the same.”

Because each of us are different people.

We are each called and gifted and blessed in different ways.

We each have unique and beautiful life experiences to share.

Some of us have spent our whole lives working independently and others have always been part of a team.

Some of us are young and have fresh eyes with which to look at the world and some of us have experienced profound pain in our lives.

Some of us work with machines, and others of us work with our minds.

And in all of those very different experiences, we have each felt the love and grace of God, although none of us in quite the same way.

Because of our difference – we are all a part of the Body of Christ.

Because of our difference – we all have a seat at God’s table.

Because of our difference – we all have a unique ability to proclaim the Word of God.

It might be with our actions… or with our words… or with our attitudes.

But Christian faithfulness demands that “the people of God, who are the church made visible in the world, must convince the world of the reality of the gospel or leave it unconvinced… the church is either faithful as a witnessing and serving community, or it loses its vitality and its impact on an unbelieving world.” (P.130, p. 98).

A week or two ago in one of our UMC 101 small group studies, we talked about the declining influence of the church in the world.

We lamented for a bit about folks who are no longer attending worship on a Sunday morning and all of the other things like sports or travel or events that have taken its place.

It feels like we have lost our vitality.

And our Discipline would call us to reflect upon whether or not we, as individual Christians, have been faithful to this call to witness and serve.

For a while, the church had followed a sort of “if you build it, they will come” attractional model.

The church was established and seemed like the norm and we all got comfortable with showing up to connect with our family and participate in the programs.

But what folks on the outside of the walls of our church saw was a fortress being established.

They didn’t know how to get in or they didn’t think they were welcome.

Or perhaps more importantly, they were out there in the world living their lives and we were so busy in the fortress that we lost track of how the world had shifted around us.

Whether we realized it or not, we built walls around our ministries, and they were only accessible on certain hours on certain days.

Many of us stopped actively inviting neighbors and friends to even join us.

We stopped seeking to meet people where they were and when they were available and how they were able to gather.

But as two of my colleagues, Michael Slaughter and Jason Moore remind us, instead of building a fortress, God invites us to be a force in this world.

We are called to be the living body of Christ, adapting and moving and going wherever the Holy Spirit might send us.

The church is called to be the community that “stretches out to human needs wherever love and service may convey God’s love and ours… the outreach of such ministries knows no limits… all Christians are called to minister wherever Christ would have them serve and witness in deeds and words that heal and free.” (P. 128, p. 97)

Can you just sense and feel the difference in those attitudes?

What would it look like for every single one of us to claim our gifts and our task of ministry and not just hole up in the fortress that is the church, but to go out as a force for God in this world?

That is what the Apostle Paul did.

And God sent him not just to those who were already “in”, but to the outsiders and the Gentiles.

In fact, that is the group of folks he is writing to in our scripture for today: the gentile community in Ephesus.

But he knows that the good news of God is meant for them as well and he puts his life on the line so that they might be able to hear and respond to the mystery of Christ.

He writes in chapter 3 of this letter that he was the least qualified person to do so, but God equipped him to proclaim that good news.

And truth be told, it wasn’t easy.

It landed him in prison.

But through the power of the Holy Spirit, he continued to share and spread words of encouragement to this faith community.

“When we trust in [God],” Paul writes to them, “we’re free to say whatever needs to be said, bold to go wherever we need to go. So don’t let my present trouble on your behalf get you down.” (Ephesians 3:11-13, MSG)

And then, he goes on to pray that they would be filled up that that same spirit and challenges them to be a force for God’s message in this world.

“Get out there and walk – better yet, run! – on the road God has called you to travel. I don’t want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes no where… Out of the generosity of Christ, each of us is given [their] own gift… God wants us to grow up, to know the whole truth and tell it in love.” (Ephesians 4, selected verses, MSG)

What I notice about the list of gifts Paul mentions in his letter to the people of Ephesus is that none of these gifts are passive or silent.

Some of us are tasked with being apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers… but NONE of us are benchwarmers.

NONE of us get to sit in the pews or stay home and watch.

ALL of us have something to share in ministry, all of us must build up one another up, all of us are needed.

We are caretakers of an incredible message that the world is hungry to not just hear, but to experience.

If we look at the journey of those first disciples, they allowed the Holy Spirit to turn them into the hands and feet of God in the world.

They directed their eyes and their hearts outward.

They traveled the world with the message and faced controversy and conflict.

Some were killed and persecuted along the way.

But with the Holy Spirit at their backs, they were a force that utterly transformed this world.

You don’t have to become a missionary to a far-flung place.

You don’t have to put yourself in danger.

But the mission of God needs you to reach out in love.

As we proclaim in the Book of Discipline, it is “the witness of the laity, their Christ-like examples of everyday living as well as the sharing of their own faith experiences of the gospel,” that will be “the primary evangelistic ministry through which all people will come to know Christ and the United Methodist Church will fulfill its mission.” (P127, p. 97)

The truth is, I can preach a thousand sermons, but the only people who will hear them are the folks that YOU bring to this church.

My role as an ordained pastor is to keep reminding you of all of the people out there… and their needs and concerns and hopes.

It is to equip and encourage you to be that force for Jesus Christ in this world.

For we are all ministers of the gospel.

We all have unique experiences and gifts that will allow us to spread the light and love of God to different people and places and in varying ways.

Maybe it is the meal you take to a friend…

Or the encouragement you offer on social media…

Or how you invite someone to pray or worship with you…

Wherever you are, in your everyday life, in your own way, you matter.

You represent Christ and God’s love to this world.

And you are vital to God’s mission and this body of Christ.

Thank you for being you.

Imagine the Transformation

Posted on October 20, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Matthew 14:13-21 (focusing on verses 18-19), Philippians 1:3-11

Last Sunday in worship, I preached about our limitations.
About how little we have… or think we have… that can be offered up for ministry.
When we see so much need around us in the world, it is easy to believe that we can’t possibly begin to make a difference.

And the truth is, we can’t.
Not on our own.
Not by ourselves.
But the good news is… it isn’t about us and what we can do.
It’s about what God can do through us.

This morning as we heard, once again, the miraculous story of how five thousand men (plus women and children) were fed, I want to focus in on just two verses of this pericope.
First, Jesus invites the disciples to hand over what they have.
“Bring those fish and loves to me,” he says. “Let me see what I can do with it.”
And then he invites people to gather around and he does something that is all too familiar to us when we gather for communion…
He prays.
He blesses the bread.
He breaks it.

What does that remind you of?

Communion!

Jesus blesses the gifts, breaks them
And he gives it back to the disciples.
Only then do they give it to the congregation…
To the crowds…
To the multitudes.

Only AFTER Jesus has taken their gifts and blessed and transformed them do the disciples head back out in service.

Or maybe it is simply after we recognize that our gifts are from God that we are truly able to share them with others.
There are times in our lives when we underestimate and we under appreciate our gifts.
We devalue ourselves and others and the most common way we do it is with a tiny little word: “just.”

We “just” have five loaves and two fishes.
I “just” have five minutes to give.
She is “just” a stay at home mom.
They “just” come to coffee time.
I “just” sing at church.

Can you hear the limitation?
Can you hear how we are denying the possibility?

What if instead we claimed:
We HAVE five loaves and two fishes – Jesus, what can you do with them?
I HAVE five minutes that I can give, how can I make the most of them?
She IS a stay at home mom and is able to be present for her children and volunteer in a really special way.
They come to coffee time and build these amazing relationships where they share about their families and check in when no one else is there and laugh until their bellies hurt.
I sing at church and praise and make music to God!

If instead of dismissing our gifts, we offered them up and let God transform and use our minutes and presence and abilities – imagine what could happen.

Now, I want to highlight that last one because it was something that might have been said by a middle aged woman who lived alone with her cat, Pebbles.
But when Susan Boyle stepped on a stage in 2009, she allowed her gifts to be used for something far bigger than she could ever imagine.

When she walked out on that stage, everyone underestimated what she could do and what her gifts were. And, I’d venture a guess that she probably also underestimated herself.
In fact, as much as she might have believed in herself, the immense joy that crossed her face when the judges all said yes was simply amazing.
Stored up inside of her for all of those years were these powerful notes and no one took them seriously.
It wasn’t until she was given a chance to really and truly share her gifts with others and to receive encouragement and affirmation did she realize what a blessing she had received and what it could do to change the world.
In the aftermath of her performance, Susan Boyle caused millions of people to take a second look at their preconceptions and to reach out to affirm the gifts they see in others.

In many ways, I think that is part of what the Apostle Paul is doing in his letter to the people of Philippi.
He sees their gifts.
He notices their generosity.
And he thanks God for the ways that they are allowing themselves to be used by Jesus to make a difference in the lives of others.
One of my favorite lines from this comes in verse six, and here it is from the Message translation:

There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.

Friends, God is doing a great work among you here at Immanuel, too.
I look out at this congregation and my heart is full of prayers of thanksgiving as well.
I think about the way a mission trip got started decades ago and how every single year communities are transformed by our Volunteers in Mission who are willing to hammer nails and lay floors and serve their neighbors. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about how a simple garage sale a couple of years ago raised over $7000 for our homeless neighbors. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about how a idea sparked at the worship vision conversation turned into a benefit concert for DMARC this summer. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about all of the adults who joined forces to work on our Vacation Bible School sets – offering up their carpentry or painting or crafting skills… sets that not only blessed our children, but those at other churches, too. THANK YOU GOD.
My mind wanders to the women who gather to knit and crochet on Wednesdays and in their own homes and all of the lives who have been comforted by prayer shawls. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about the parents who are so blessed because people give their time on Wednesday afternoons to come in and prepare meals for our evening programming. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about our neighbors who walk by this building and can look out on our beautiful flowers and plants because some generous souls have given their time and energy to plant and water and maintain our gardens. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about the homebound folks who know they are not alone because one of you has stopped by for five minutes to drop off a simple card or gift or just to say hi. THANK YOU GOD.

And I know and believe and have no doubt that the God who started all of these good works in you will keep at it and keep using and multiplying and blessing your gifts so that they will continue to spill out into this world.
What you do matters.
What you give matters.
And it matters because God is working through you to bless this world.

Untitled

Posted on September 4, 2016Leave a comment

In today’s parable, Jesus is in the middle of teaching his disciples one last time. He is only days away from his crucifixion in Jerusalem, days away from leaving them, days away from his death. Jesus wants to make sure they are prepared for life after he is gone.

He is asking these people to live out their discipleship – to follow him, to become like him, to take care of each other and to carry on his ministry in the world

Much like the master in this parable who is going on a long trip, Jesus is trying to put his affairs in order so that his ministry is taken care of while he is gone.

The master, like Jesus, is entrusting an extravagant gift in the hands of his servants.

One single talent was a gigantic weight of money. It equaled 6,000 denarii. One denarii was roughly equal to a day’s wages… so if you do the math, each one of these talents was about twenty YEARS worth of pay.

In today’s terms a talent might be thought of as nearly a million dollars.

Now… this is the kind of money that most people never saw. Especially not at once.

But the Lord and master in this story has eight times this much to divvy up among his servants. One hundred and sixty years’ worth of pay… and he is leaving it in their hands.

This is a lifetime’s worth of money. It is costly. And being given all at once, you wonder what the Lord and master could possibly have left. This could very well be everything that he has.

And we know that in reality, the gift of Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection was costly.

And this talent, this incredible gift, is placed into your hands.

The gift of discipleship… the gift of a lifetime of following Jesus has been given to you…

What are YOU going to do with it?

One of the fascinating features of this story is that not everyone is given the same amount of talents. The master in this story looks over the skills and abilities of those who are standing in front of them and recognizes they are not the same.

As William Herzog notes, the word used here for ability could also be translated as power. They are given these gifts because of their power, their position, because of what they have already demonstrated they could handle.

In other words, this is not a test.

No master would be foolish enough to use this much money as an experiment.

No, this ruler knows the servants, honestly assesses them, and puts in their hands exactly what they can realistically handle.

One of these servants receives a single talent. Another two. Another five whole talents.

What we discover in this parable is that it is not important what your power or abilities or talents are today. It doesn’t matter how much you are given. It is what you decide to do with your discipleship that really counts.

This past spring, many of you helped our church to honestly assess our ministry and our life together through a really long survey: the Congregational Assessment Tool.

We have learned a lot of things through this tool and the leadership of our church is starting to wrestle with how to respond to various pieces.

In worship over the next couple of months, we are going to be exploring a few areas that reflect our discipleship as a church.

Now, in these scores, we were compared to 500 other churches our size around the entire country. So these scores are not the percentage of you that said these things… but how our church as a whole compares with others

I work to connect my faith to all other aspects of my life (32%)
I experience the presence of God in my life (36%)
We do a good job supporting people in ministry by reminding them they make a difference (48%)
We prepare our members for ministry by helping them discern gifts (51%)
We understanding that we have a spiritual responsibility for life-long learning and formation (47%)
We welcome and are enriched by persons from many different walks of life (39%)

If I were to name a common thread that I see in these items, it would be that we as a church have abundant, extravagant gifts in our midst… and we don’t know what to do with them.

These results tell me that when it comes to living out our faith, when it comes to our discipleship, we act a whole lot like the third servant in our scripture today…. Both personally, and as a church.

And I think there are two factors at play here.

1) As a church, we have not taken the time and energy, like the master of the story did, to help one another figure out what our abilities and position and gifts really are. You need to know where you are starting in order to know what you have to work with.

2) Even if we DO know what our abilities, skills, and gifts are… even if we have this talent in our hands… we aren’t sure what we are supposed to do with it. We don’t have a clear sense of how to help it to grow

Here at Immanuel, we define discipleship with a phrase we use every single week: In Christ, live a life of love, service, and prayer.

It’s a great, easy to remember phrase… but…

What do we mean by love? How are we supposed to pray? Who are we serving?

How do I know if I’m doing it?

And above all… How can I do it better and more fully next week that I did last week.

That’s what today’s parable is all about, after all… taking what you have and helping it to grow.

So, starting today, and over the next eight weeks, we are going to break down that vision of discipleship at Immanuel into bite sized pieces.

We are going to explore what this looks like in worship and hospitality, service and generosity, formation and practice.

We’ll start next week with this whole pie and what each area of discipleship looks like at Immanuel, then over next six weeks, we’ll explore how we can take the talent placed in our hands and help it grow.

Figuring out where you start is the key to taking the next step.

You may have noticed a bulletin board in the foyer that includes four words:

Exploring.

Beginning.

Growing.

Maturing.

These words are going to help us to claim where we are in this journey of discipleship.

Are you someone who is brand new to this and has no idea what the possibilities are?

Are you someone who is just beginning your faith journey and you are starting to try some things out?

Are you someone who has been working on your discipleship for a while, but you still know you have room to grow?

Are you someone who understands what discipleship is all about and you have been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, and now you aren’t sure what comes next?

The truth is, it doesn’t matter where you start on this journey today.

It doesn’t matter if you are the servant in our story who was given one talent or five talents… or the servant that didn’t even get talked about who wasn’t entrusted with a talent at all.

What matters is what you do with what you have.

The truth of this parable is that any one of these servants could have been the ones who chose to let fear or ignorance or laziness creep in. It could have just as easily have been the one who had been given the most who chose to do nothing with his gift.

Here at Immanuel, we are going to try to help one another not only figure out what we have, but what we can do with it.

We are going to help each other take the next step in our discipleship.

You don’t have to start with a lot in order to be faithful. You just have to choose to do something with it. Together… we’ll figure out how.

Amen.

What God Has Sown

Posted on November 16, 2014Leave a comment

In this past month, I have found new appreciation for the Apostle Paul.

You see, on top of being an apostle and a scholar, a writer and mentor; in addition to the work he did as a tanner to pay his own way through ministry; he was also a fundraiser.

I think that tiny detail skipped my attention for so many years, because I didn’t know what it meant to be a fundraiser. I wasn’t aware of the strategies and the prayer and the faith that goes into soliciting money from perfect strangers.

But I do now!

I have spent my entire life hearing that phrase, “God loves a cheerful giver” out of context… and you probably have, too.

While Paul has many other topics to cover in this letter to the people of Corinth, chapters 8 and 9 represent a sort of “stewardship letter” much like many of you received in the mail last week.

Corinth was a rich and powerful city in Greece. The ports had made them wealthy beyond measure. So it is natural that they had resources to spend and to invest and to, yes, even donate to the church.

Paul was encouraged by the apostles in Jerusalem to remember the poor and needy in the city (Galatians 2), and he wanted to honor those who had sent him out in ministry by sending back gifts that could support their work. Much like our apportionments today, the funds he was raising would be used for ministry in the other places the apostles had influence. And Paul knew Corinth would be the place where gifts could be abundant.

In his letter to them, Paul first of all talks about these poor people in Macedonia who have absolutely nothing but the love and grace of God, but somehow managed to pull together an incredible offering to send with Paul. He writes that though they were impoverished and struggling, they heard his plea for money to help the needy in Jerusalem.

From chapter 8: 3-4: “they gave what they could afford and even more than they could afford, and they did it voluntarily. They urgently begged us for the privilege of sharing in this service for the saints.”

And Paul says, all the while, I was telling them about YOUR generosity, you people of Corinth. I was telling them about how much YOU had promised to do. They wanted to be a part of that… part of this incredible opportunity we have to care for the needs of others. They gave out of their poverty, and now it’s your turn.

Paul asks the Corinthians to carefully consider their obligations and to take note of where their resources are needed and then to give cheerfully and jubilantly out of their abundance to the Lord. He wants them to give only what they know they can. Paul didn’t want them to make a commitment they couldn’t fulfill. He wanted them to give freely, and not out of obligation. He wanted them to think long and hard about what they could give and then to do so generously.

I was in Paul’s shoes many times over my work with Imagine No Malaria. And I know what a fine line it was to walk between challenging people to give more than they thought they should and yet not more than they actually could.

On one occasion, a well-intentioned person filled out one of our pledge cards and sent it in with an extraordinary commitment to give over three years $5000. I added the donation to our totals and celebrated reaching a milestone! But then they called me a few weeks later when reality set in and told me, “I want to support this project so very much, I see how much good it is doing and I am so excited about being a part of it, but I simply can’t afford to do so at the level I told you I could.”

And you know what. That’s okay. I told that person we were so thankful for what they could share. We were overjoyed that they felt called to give and worked to make the adjustments they needed.

In chapter 8 of his letter, Paul writes that he wants the Corinthians to give what they can afford. If they can make some adjustments to their life and want to make a sacrifice here and there – great. If they have great resources at their disposal, then by all means, they shouldn’t look upon this call and drop in a few dollars. They need to give what they can actually afford to give. The goal is not to make them suffer or create financial difficulties. The goal is to prayerfully ask what God has blessed them with that they can bless others with.

Not one of us should feel guilty about what we can afford to give. We shouldn’t feel pressured to end our support of other good things in order to give here. Every one of us should hear the call, look at the needs, and then joyfully respond from our resources… whatever they might be.

In the early eighteenth century, a scholar and pastor Matthew Henry wrote: “Money bestowed in charity, may to the carnal mind seem thrown away, but when given from proper principles, it is seed sown, from which a valuable increase may be expected.”

Paul asks the Corinthians to think of their gift as an investment. To sow whatever seeds they can so that the Kingdom of God might bear fruit in the world… and so they might personally experience the joy and grace and abundance that come to us when we freely give.

Our commitment to give financially to this church might not make a lot of sense to the larger world. But we do so because we have seen the good it can do.

In the United Methodist Church, we understand that our gifts not only provide this wonderful space for ministry in this neighborhood, but also help to support Women at the Well and help to build churches other parts of the world. Our gifts help our children to learn more about Jesus, but they also help educate communities about diseases like Ebola and Malaria so that every child has the chance to grow up and live an abundant life. Our gifts raise up leaders among our youth here in Des Moines, but they also are providing scholarships for new pastors in Eastern Europe and the Philippines.

Every dollar given to the church is an investment in the gospel. It is a seed planted. And in time, God will reveal how Faith Hall and our children and the women in Mitchellville and communities like the Bo District in Sierra Leone… how all of these investments and seeds will bear fruit for the Kingdom of God.

That is why we are here, after all.

We are here, in this place, for the Kingdom of God.

We are here to worship and to praise God… the source every breath and snowflake and every good thing.

In our passage from Deuteronomy this morning, Moses encourages the people to remember the long road they have been on… the road that was sustained every step of the way by the grace of God.

God was the one who rescued them from Egypt.

It was the Lord who led them through the desert.

It was God who fed them and gave them drink out of rocks and manna.

And he wants them to remember when they get to the promised land… when their lives settle down and they find good work and have food on the table every night… he wants them to never forget who it was that God them there.

Everything we are and everything we have is a gift. It is grace. It is a blessing.

We are here today because God spoke and light and life came into being.

We are here today because God wanted a relationship with us.

We are here today because God moved in the lives of people like Abraham and Sarah, Moses and the Israelites, James and John and Paul and the Corinthians.

We are here because of the faithful people who were led by God to turn a farmhouse into a church in 1925. We are here because the Holy Spirit moved and breathed life into this congregation.

Today, we are the beneficiaries of God’s grace and love and power that moved through countless generations before us. All the resources and abilities we have are gifts from our Lord and Savior.

And like the Israelites, we should never forget that simple fact.

It is not our own strength that has produced our abundance. No, it is the strength of God that has brought us here.

And God has sown his power and blessing in our lives SO THAT we might bear fruit for the Kingdom.

You see… God made an investment, too. God planted gifts and resources into our lives. God has nurtured this church and helped us to grow so that we might in turn be a blessing. As Paul tells the Corinthians, “God has the power to provide you with more than enough of every kind of grace.”

Grace for living.

Grace for giving.

Grace for working.

Grace for singing God’s praise.

God has made sure that you have what you need in order to serve him.

The Macedonians gave out of their poverty.

The Corinthians gave out of their wealth.

But each gave because they believed they were sowing seeds for the Kingdom of God. And each gave out of joy and thanksgiving for the abundance of what God has planted in their lives.

So today, as we make our commitments to the Lord, may we always remember where our abundance comes from.

May we commit without hesitation.

May we commit without guilt.

May we commit what we have and trust that as God has blessed us, so God will bless others. Amen.

One present down #NaBloPoMo

Posted on November 13, 2014Leave a comment

Today, my post follows up on craft night. I finished my crochet project and officially have the first gift of the season done.

Pattern from Dabbles and Babbles

We're Afraid to Ask

Posted on November 1, 2013Leave a comment

We don’t like to talk about money.

Pastors hate to preach on it.

Finance committees only do it because they have to.

We keep our records quiet and avoid tough conversations about budgets.

And when the time comes for mission work or important projects, we pass around the white buckets and pray someone gets inspired to put more than their pocket change inside.

Why are we so afraid to ask for deep commitment, for generous gifts, for extravagant response?

Volunteers sort dairy tubs for the Terracycle/Imagine No Malaria drive.

1. We segregate finances from other types of gifts.

We do not ask those who have the ability to make music to hide their gifts or keep their names hidden. We are not afraid to praise the talents of that cook in the congregation who makes the most excellent peanut butter pie… and might even have been found once or twice on our knees begging them to make it for the next church supper. The person who gives their time to repair items around the church gets their name in the bulletin. We celebrate the gifts God has given us and the way that people have graciously given them for the Kingdom of God.

Except for when it comes to dollars and cents.

I’ve discovered that money is not some great evil. It is not the powerful, ominous thing we make it out to be. It is a resource, a gift, not unlike our voices or our hands or our creativity.

I may have shared this before, but Henri Houwen writes:

Fundraising is, first and foremost, a form of ministry. it is a way of announcing our vision and inviting other people into our mission….

We are declaring, “We have a vision that is amazing and exciting. We are inviting you to invest yourself through the resources that God has given you – your energy, your prayers, and your money – in this work to which God has called us.” (A Spirituality of Fundraising, p. 16-17)

We have segregated the almighty dollar into it’s own category, rather than understanding it as one of many ways that people are able to respond, embrace, and participate in the work of the kingdom.

Through Imagine No Malaria, I have seen people give their time, carefully crafting beautiful creations we are selling to help support our work. Folks lend their voice to the effort through being ambassadors and telling the story of our work. Kitchens are busy with those who are baking and preparing for mission dinners and pancake suppers. Runners have covered countless miles with their feet to build support across the state for our work. And people have opened their pocketbooks in response… eager to participate in the life-saving work of Imagine No Malaria.

Those dollars are vitally important. Without the financial resources we are gathering, we cannot do the life-saving work that is needed on the continent of Africa.

ALL of these gifts are kingdom work – healing the sick and preaching the gospel for hundreds of thousands of people. All of them are ways for people to respond to the vision and join in the mission of God.

2. We aren’t good at evangelism

Nouwen writes that through asking…. through inviting those individuals, families, and organizations to give… we are in reality doing the work of evangelism and conversion.

Whether we are asking for money or giving money we are drawn together by God, who is about to do a new thing through our collaboration. To be converted means to experience a deep shift in how we see and think and act… By giving people a spiritual vision, we want them to experience that they will in fact benefit by making their resources available to us. (p. 17, 19)

A young girl in Colorado experienced that transformation when she caught the vision and was invited to give. As other students added their dollars and change to the bucket at Vacation Bible School, she emptied her bank account and took the money she was saving for a doll and clothes and things she wanted and donated it instead to help save lives.

When we fail to ask… when we fail to share the vision and invite people to participate in God’s work… we are denying them the opportunity to experience that kind of transformation.

Maybe one of the reasons we are afraid to step out and talk with others about participating in this project or in others is because we are so lousy at doing evangelism in the first place.

A Barna study revealed that the average United Methodist will invite only one person to worship with them every 38 years. We just are not in the habit of talking about what our church is doing and asking people to join us in the first place. So why would we expect things to be any different when it comes to money?

This past week, I got a call from a church in Mason City that is doing some outside the box thinking and invited the local blood bank to become a partner in this effort.

Folks in Carson invited their whole community to participate in a basketball game and raised $4000.

When we carry this message, this vision, this transformative promise out into our communities – we just might be stunned at the response. God is good and the Holy Spirit is at work if we are willing to get outside of our walls and ask.

3. We are willing to settle for small gifts

One of my colleagues with Imagine No Malaria refused to accept a pledge from a church. It was a large, thriving church with a passion for mission and the ability to participate in a big way. When they turned in a goal of $1000, my friend sent it back to the pastor and said, “We need to meet.” He refused to let them sell themselves short because they had the potential for transformative ministry through Imagine No Malaria.

Most people, including myself, would be pleased as punch to get a pledge at all and wouldn’t have the guts to do such a thing. But why not?

The demands of the gospel are not small. The invitation to discipleship demands that we take up our cross and follow. And yet we allow people to get by with weak offerings: in either time, energy, or dollars.

I bet your church, right now, has five people in it who could and would be willing to invest themselves in this kingdom-work by giving $1000… either all at once, or as a pledge over the next year or three. I bet your community or your county has two businesses or organizations that would be willing to donate $2500 a piece if they were told about how this work is transforming lives in Africa and creating opportunities for community development and economic empowerment.

Too often we operate from a mindset of scarcity and cherish tiny offerings, instead of realizing that God has already abundantly provided.

Vision, Mission, Money and Imagination

Posted on December 26, 2012Leave a comment

I love my new ministry as the coordinator for Imagine No Malaria in our conference… but I often have a hard time explaining why.

While there are similarities with local church ministry (which I also love), so many aspects of this position are drawing upon gifts in new and different ways.

But because I am not in the local church, preaching every Sunday, it doesn’t look like ministry to some people.

I think I was having trouble myself with wrapping my head around how and why this was ministry. How and why a pastor should be in my position. The job uses my gifts; I get to engage 800 churches instead of just one; I am engaged in the work of transforming the world (a core part of our mission as the United Methodist Church). I had pieces of the answer, but was still missing something.

Until I read some Nouwen this morning and finally found a missing connection point… the words I need to really claim and explain my work.

Nouwen writes –

Fundraising is, first and foremost, a form of ministry. It is a way of announcing our vision and inviting other people into our mission…. We are declaring, “We have a vision that is amazing and exciting. We are inviting you to invest yourself through the resources God has given you – your energy, your prayers, and your money – in this work to which God has called us.”

God has called us to this work. And every day, I get to proclaim the vision of what will be realized when we answer that call. Every day, I get to send forth the invitation, the call to conversion, that will help us to answer that call with our whole lives.

We are participating in God’s good work and we imagine a world in which children no longer die from a preventable, treatable, beatable disease. We imagine communities of people working together for healing and wholeness. We imagine pregnant women who are healthy and can carry their babies to term without fear. We imagine a global partnership that is able to wipe out death and suffering from malaria.

And not only can we imagine these things, but God has shown us a way to accomplish them. You and me, working together, bringing the best of ourselves and our gifts. That is the body of Christ in action. That is the aim of discipleship. This is a living and giving ministry.

Yes, I am a fundraiser. And yes, I am doing ministry.