You Belong: Valued and Celebrated
I want to begin by naming the joy of how things come together, how the calendar and the inspiration of the Spirit and the joy of meeting new people who want to become part of Faith United Methodist Church all intertwine and blossom. It is as if God is showing off a little, helping us see how we are called and what happens when we seek to follow that call.
Getting to welcome Kim and Michael Medina into membership today, getting to baptize baby Vivian and thereby wrap her in the claim of God’s big family is an amazing gift. And it is also a reminder of how the church grows and continues and evolves from generation to generation.
It is a new beginning and it is the continuation of an ancient tradition. And more locally, it is both a “new” act to welcome a family in this post COVID world and it is part of who Faith has always been.
Let’s unpack that a little.
60 years ago this summer, eager new suburbanites building homes in the Old Farm neighborhood came together because they were invited and because they wanted to connect to one another and they wanted to do that in a church in their shiny new neighborhood.
At that time, the regional container for Methodism – the Baltimore Annual Conference – struck a deal with the Kettler Brothers who were developing Old Farm and surrounding neighborhoods. In the deal, the Baltimore Conference received a parsonage in the neighborhood and purchased (at a great discount) a 4.5 acre parcel of land on what was then a sleepy road named Montrose.
I want to highlight a point of history that you may not be aware of…
The Baltimore Conference came before what we know now as the Baltimore Washington Annual conference, and it was a white, segregated body.
Likewise, the Washington Conference was a black segregated body, part of a segregated black Central Jurisdiction that emerged from the 1939 reunification of the north and south churches. It was a compromise that segregated black churches in order to appease southern churches who refused to integrate their individual congregations.
So Faith was born, was formed, within a segregated body of Methodism. It feels important, especially this weekend, to name that – because I suspect it is a piece of our history born of being part of a bigger church body (Methodism) that a lot of us may not have really processed before.
Although it would be another year before Faith officially chartered, the emerging congregation that would one day be this congregation first gathered on June 30, 1963.
In August that same summer, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke to throngs of people on the National Mall, in the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial, delivering his iconic “I have a dream” speech.
We make space as a country this weekend to remember the work and the sacrifice of Dr. King, who gave his life to the mission of calling Americans to the ideals of liberty and justice for all, where ALL truly means ALL.
As I revisited some of his writing this week, I was reminded of how he often spoke of the civil rights movement - a movement to change hearts and minds and to also change laws and policies– in biblical terms. Listen closely to just a few sentences:
Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quick sands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
He rooted his call for equality and justice in scripture because God is a God of justice, and God created all of God’s children for equality and beloved community.
That is not political.
That is who God is.
Today, we are beginning a five-week exploration of what it means to be a community of belonging. If you have been around this place for a while, you might be saying, “well, we’ve always been a place where people belong.”
Yes.
Yes, I absolutely believe that is true.
I believe that this church,
…launched by a pastor who rode his bike through new neighborhoods extending hundreds of personal invitations as he stopped into people’s shiny new homes,
…this church has a rich history of being a place to belong. A place to belong in the 60s, the 70s, and every decade along the way…
Ways of belonging have been different over the years. Because the world changes around us.
And as the world changes around us, what does it mean to be a place to belong today? That is our work in the weeks to come – actually for decades to come.
Belonging – the belonging that we are claiming as part of what we value here at Faith - is rooted in a biblical truth – we are all made in God’s image.
And it is rooted in a biblical understanding of the church as an expression of Christ’s body in the world. Our scriptures today remind us of some of the essentials of those truths.
Accepting that each of us is made in God’s image is a radical thing. It is a radical thing in every age. Today, in our connected global society, I am guessing most of us know more about biology, about ethnicity, about global politics and about world religions than our parents and grandparents knew.
Wow…God’s represented in all of that diversity, all of that difference. And that necessarily expands our perception of the image of God.
And to be clear, some of us have lived through more of those changes than others.
As I was pondering all of this, thinking about how a community must shift its understanding of belonging over time, I was reminded of my love for cookbooks old and new.
Do you remember when the idea of a salad was a leaf of iceberg lettuce, a few canned pineapple rings, and a dollop of cottage cheese, maybe with a maraschino cherry on top?
Do you remember when the idea of a salad was gazpacho? A cold, spicy, tangy soup of pureed veggies? Or half an avocado stuffed with chicken salad?
Do you remember when the idea of a salad was a heavily dressed Caesar, complete with anchovies in the dressing, made tableside in fancy restaurants?
Do you remember when the idea of a salad was massaged Kale and shredded beets with goat cheese, pecans, and a drizzle of fruity vinaigrette? (oh, wait…that might be now)
The world has changed since 1963. And so has Faith.
The world has changed since 1990. And so has Faith.
The world has changed since 2019. And so has Faith.
But at the center of who we are and how we seek to “be” in the world are the words from scripture you heard today.
We are all made in the very likeness of God.
We are gathered by the power of the Holy Spirit to share life, to break bread, to share in common all that we have and all that we do. As such, we all belong. All belong.
These things do not change. And so, we are called to find ways to connect to one another, surrounded by the changing world, in ways that meet people where they are, with the needs they have, with what they have to share.
And for some of us, that is a pineapple ring salad. And for others a heavily dressed Caesar. And for others a kale chopped salad.
For some of us that is with a love for classical music. For others a love of folk, Americana or Indie. For still others it is a love of Calypso Jesus arranged for our organ.
For some that is a deep reverent silence. For some it is wordless. For others it is the sounds of children’s joy and laughter. For still others it is the work of service in the community and not anywhere near this building.
We are a place for all of that. And more. Eager to greet people like us and so very different from us with a love in our hearts that is only possible with our hearts wide open to God’s beautiful muchness.
May it be so.
Amen.
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