Interrupted thoughts about the Body of Christ and our Forgiveness
The truth is that some weeks lend themselves to a prepared and researched sermon that tackles a text and unfolds all of its secrets through history and context. There are other weeks when we are overtaken by events, and I'm grateful grateful for Susan Wyderko for giving me that language.
I think this week is one of those weeks where I have been overtaken by events and I want to just share some of that with you.
Here is a background for all of this.
This is the third week that we are talking about what is a milepost on the discipleship journey - a disciple experiences the acceptance and forgiveness of God.
We talked the first week about the lighter subject - the acceptance - the fact that God receives us with love. Last week we talked about what might be the harder part - acknowledging that we have a need for forgiveness, that we actually do things occasionally that harm the world (I can't even like say that without putting qualifiers like occasionally in the sentence), that we do things that harm others sometimes with intention and sometimes not. We talked a little bit about how when we take that moment to recognize that we need God's acceptance and we need God's forgiveness, that that frees up something in us and creates some space so that we might be able to reach out and claim others around us and draw them in.
Our text for today from first Corinthians 12 talks about the diversity of the body of Christ. It addresses how we are intended to be a body not made up of a bunch of ears or a bunch of eyes or a bunch of brains or a bunch of mouths, but rather that we are a body that has all of the parts - all of the parts and their sort of unique and quirky composition - a foot that might be larger than we anticipated or a hand that might be more clumsy.
I've been thinking a lot about how our body may not be complete. And I think that in the season that we're in we see more disparity we see more places where people's lives aren't whole and they are not part of communities of belonging that embrace them and hold them.
This morning I woke to a conversation about health care disparities that were resulting in horrible outcomes for COVID patients in the Navajo nation. There will be presentations and conversations about how the current health care system has underserved black and brown people. This is statistically true, and we can say that we have no place in that -w e can say that we're not creating a problem - but if you're not anti the problem, I'm beginning to wonder if we can claim any acceptance and forgiveness in that space.
I think we have to name our role.
The thing that struck me of course this week was the conversation about the shooting death of Ahmed Arbery in Georgia, a young black man out for a jog in his own neighborhood, shot down by folks who were convinced that they knew that he had done something wrong. If this were a one - off scenario, if this were a story we had not heard before, it would be a tragedy all by itself. But when we look at the data and we know that young black men are targeted in this sort of violent crime more often that our white brothers and sisters we have to start asking questions.
What does this have to do with forgiveness?
What does it have to do with acceptance?
What does it have to do with building the body of Christ?
I feel like we're living in a season where it is entirely too easy for us to cling to what is comfortable and good. It is entirely too easy for us to hold on to what we know. I'm also aware that the pandemic has caused us to have to live differently, and it's given us a different kind of time to think and examine.
My prayer is that we are thinking and examining and wondering at how it is we might use our very precious gifts, not for another program, but how we might use our very precious gifts to become the open-hearted, all-embracing, loving human beings that we are called to be. Which means recognizing that somewhere inside of each of us there are biases that shape us and mold us and keep us from loving the other fully. Those are hard explorations for us to make.
Last week we talked about forgiveness and returning. We talked about the prodigal son returning home and the joy that was found in his coming back.
We've talked in the past about the word repentance which doesn't just mean I say I'm sorry or I admit I'm wrong. It means that I turn on to a new path of being.
What does repentance look like?
What are we seeing in this season that is unique?
How is God speaking to us right now about ways that we need to turn on to a different path, a different way?
Because when we do when we turn on to a different way, I wonder who we’re joined by on that way. And I wonder what we might make different together. I wonder if together we might and sure that there are fewer hungry bodies and hearts, fewer unhoused bodies and hearts, fewer bodies and hearts that are looking for basic health care, fewer persons who are shut out of good employment, fewer people who are shut out of good opportunities, fewer people who are shut out of good a good education, because of the color of their skin or because of the income strata from which they have come.
I don't have answers these are hard things.
But I do feel like The Holy Spirit is moving in ways that will prevent us from gathering the sanctuary and feeling comfortable in our own skin and in our own places and with our own rhythms.
And I think that that is jarring us up. It has the opportunity to cause us to think and see differently. It has the opportunity to cause us to empathize with those who don't have place in this world.
Beloved, I think that acceptance and forgiveness are gifts that God offers us and they've come to us at great price.
I think Jesus walked a path that time and time again shows us how to be open hearted, to not worry about our own well-being so much - to be a Lily of the field that does not toil, whose beauty shines forth.
I think Jesus calls us to be hands and feet and elbows and brains and ears and we need more and more of those not idly sitting by, not watching others do the work, but leaning in, finding the way, finding the ways that your unique gifts make a difference, strengthening the body…
Not for our own sake, but for the sake of the world - the whole world.
May it be so. Amen.
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