Pursuing God’s Vision

John 14: 1, 15-19; 17: 1, 20-26

Beaumont Presbyterian Church

May 9, 2010

The Rev. Susan Warren

            Today’s texts are from what is known as the Farewell Discourse in which the Gospel of John recounts how Jesus prepared his disciples for his death. The first reading is from John 14, encasing what one commentator calls one of those good news/bad news stories. The bad news is that Jesus is going away. The good news is that the Holy Spirit is coming to make known the ongoing presence of God in our lives. The second text from the 17^th Chapter of John is the final part of Jesus’ high priestly prayer, in which he prays for his disciples and for believers in generations to come. It’s a beautiful prayer and I encourage you to take some time later to read all of it. Let us try now to extract a message from Jesus’ prayer for us, and begin to think about how we are to live it out. Hear these words.

(Read John 14:1, 15-19; 17:1, 20-26)

            The Gospel of John portrays the Holy Spirit as the guarantee that the words of Jesus will always be available as fresh words – to us individually and to our community of faith. Another way to say that is we have an ongoing conversation with Jesus. And so we must be sure that our work and our lives, the decisions we make about our future, all of our efforts in any regard, are grounded in Jesus. Because that’s who we are.

The idea of pursuing God’s vision is difficult because, to be perfectly honest, we don’t usually know until after we’ve made important decisions what God’s vision might be. That’s true for us as individuals and as a church family. It’s always easier to look back and say, “yes, that was the way to go,” or, “oops!”

            Part of the problem is that we get caught up in the details and lose sight of the purpose. What is the purpose of your life? What is our purpose as a church?  Listen again to the words that Jesus lifted to God in prayer: “I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” And this . . . “I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.”

            This prayer is about Jesus asking God to help him reveal God’s love, to help his disciples and future generations of believers to feel the power of God’s love just as Jesus has. That should be our prayer as well. And it is our purpose. Most of us, when we think about it and pray about it, understand that our primary purpose is to reveal God’s love.

And then we take the next logical step and say, “Well we can’t do that without a new HVAC system.” Or, we can’t do that without painting the Sunday School rooms and upgrading the website and putting together a new directory and figuring out who’s going to fix dinner Wednesday evening.

            Our purpose is to help the world feel the power of God’s love. And so we’ve got to make sure the grass is neatly trimmed; the window sills are dusted; the Christ candle is well-placed; the sound-system is fine-tuned and our colors are liturgically correct.                  Really? That’s what it takes to reveal the power of God’s love? Actually, maybe so. I’m certainly not saying all that isn’t important. And if you’re working in one of these areas that I’ve just mentioned you know I’m right there with you. Ironically, it is at least partially true. If we want people to come to our church to hear our message we have to be accessible. And in this country, in this day, we must also be in some way alluring, attractive. That’s the way our world works.

            It would be so much easier, wouldn’t it, if we were the only act in town. Or if we were ministering in a country that was so hungry for the Gospel that we wouldn’t have to worry about all of these superficial issues. It would be a lot easier, right?

            I’m not so sure. You see, I think it’s actually easier for us to deal with the superficial issues. It’s easier for us to focus on these side issues -- because that’s what we do best. It’s what we’re trained to do. We’re trained to take care of buildings and make up budgets and plan menus and such.

            We solve little problems. At least they seemed like little problems as I set out to write this sermon about God’s grand vision for our church.

            As I was praying and pondering about daring to dream big, daring to step out of our comfort zone, daring to be willing to sacrifice; as I was praying and pondering about challenging ourselves, about investing ourselves in figuring out what might be God’s vision for us, I realized that somewhere in the back of my mind I was actually worrying about how to schedule Sunday School and choir rehearsal so they don’t overlap.

 I had a professor in seminary who, if he could read my thoughts would have scolded me and said, “Susan, this is not a kingdom issue! Don’t waste your brain cells!” He was always telling us not to waste our brain cells.

             My thoughts had strayed, as they often do, from the Big Purpose of spreading God’s love – although I suppose you could make the case that scheduling and spreading God’s love are not totally out of sync.

            When I was in Lawrenceburg I had a lot more personal contact with folks who appeared at the church only when they needed financial assistance. I often made a point of inviting them into my study and listening to their stories. I remember one woman who told me how a minister had visited her and nearly broken her heart when he told her she was doomed, convicted, that her life was hopeless – because he didn’t approve of the way she was living.

 I suppose that preacher’s intentions were honorable. To give him the benefit of the doubt, I suppose he was offering up his interpretation of some scriptural passage that she had violated, and he assumed that trying to frighten her would cause her to change. Whatever his motive, it didn’t work. It served only to anger her and make her uncomfortable in any church and, perhaps, to think of churches only as sources of money to tap for monthly bills.

            This woman was by far not the only person with whom I have had this conversation. And yet I’m always surprised. I’m surprised at some of the venom that gets spewed from pulpits and in one-on-one encounters from preachers whose understanding of Christ couldn’t be more different than mine. In many ways you and I are still getting to know each other, and I don’t expect us to agree on everything. But I do hope we agree that our overriding purpose is to model God’s love and to send forth the message of Jesus as stated in today’s text – that God loves us as much as God loves Jesus.

            That’s why we say God’s grace is so amazing – and we must say it over and over and over again until everyone within hearing distance gets the message!

            I don’t want anyone to leave here thinking we’re not still going to work on scheduling and website and fellowship and all the other issues, because we are. But I do want us to understand that the only reason those issues have any relevance at all is to serve the Big Purpose – Capital B, Capital P. Big Purpose. And I want all of us to commit to the Big Purpose, the purpose of showing and spreading the power of God’s love. That’s a purpose that doesn’t belong just to the pastor to carry out, or the elders, or the choir, or the Sunday School, or any other particular group. That’s not the way it works.

            It’s not the way, that we have a Property Committee so that we have a nice building where the pastors can spread the word. It’s not the way that the Finance Committee compiles a budget to pay the pastors so they can spread the word. It is the purpose of our committees and of each and every person in this church to focus on making this place, and this family, a blessed community of God.

            That sounds much harder, doesn’t it? Daunting. Even intimidating. And it feels that way because we don’t know exactly how to do it. I suspect we might feel a little guilty about not knowing how to do it. It seems that, as Christians, we should know. It seems that, as a minister, I at least should know, Jay T. should know. Well, let me tell you something. That’s not what they teach you in seminary. In fact, they seem to think – sometimes they even say -- that with enough knowledge of the Bible, and of theology and ethics and Christian education and the Book of Order, you’ll just figure it out when you get there. I have come to believe they say that because they don’t know either.

            That’s why we’re going to have to learn together.

            What does it take to become a blessed community of God?  This is where all of us will need the daring, the willingness to change and grow, the courage to step out and welcome God into our midst to teach us. As we embark upon this journey together, the problem of pursuing God’s vision will be much easier because we will have the Big Purpose context in which to solve our pesky little problems.

            And so in the coming weeks and months I’m going to be asking a lot of you. I’m going to ask you to do some reading, some gathering and talking, some in small groups, some all together, and I’m going to ask you to do a lot of praying.           

            Friends, there is no question that the Holy Spirit fills this sanctuary and this building. Let us join together, opening our hearts and minds to the fresh words that are being spoken to us. Let us study and discuss, let us speak and listen, let us move forward with confidence into the unknown, into a future to which the Spirit is calling us, counting us among the faithful, numbering us among the chosen, comforting and consoling, exhorting and encouraging, holding us in the assurance that God’s good purpose for us prevails now and forever.

           Let us work together to be a part of the answer to Jesus’ last prayer, when he said to his heavenly God, “I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” May it be so.           Amen.