An Anniversary Sermon--2013--A Year of Yes--1-20-13

The Reading: Romans 12: 1-3 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for [your Creator]. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what [God] wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what [God] does for us, not by what we are and what we do for [God]. THE MIDDLE READING—Psalm 36: 5-9 Your love, LORD, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. Your righteousness is like the highest mountains, your justice like the great deep. You, LORD, preserve both people and animals. How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights. For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light. The Gospel Reading: Mark 5: 25-34 A woman who had suffered a condition of hemorrhaging for twelve years—a long succession of physicians had treated her, and treated her badly, taking all her money and leaving her worse off than before—had heard about Jesus. She slipped in from behind and touched his robe. She was thinking to herself, “If I can put a finger on his robe, I can get well.” The moment she did it, the flow of blood dried up. She could feel the change and knew her plague was over and done with. At the same moment, Jesus felt energy discharging from him. He turned around to the crowd and asked, “Who touched my robe?” His disciples said, “What are you talking about? With this crowd pushing and jostling you, you’re asking, ‘Who touched me?’ Dozens have touched you!” But he went on asking, looking around to see who had done it. The woman, knowing what had happened, knowing she was the one, stepped up in fear and trembling, knelt before him, and gave him the whole story. Jesus said to her, “Daughter, you took a risk of faith, and now you’re healed and whole. Live well, live blessed! Be healed of your plague.” An Anniversary Sermon—2013: A Year of Yes January 20, 2013 God, we thank you for this day—for the celebration and the challenge. Keep our eyes focused on you as we journey with you into our collective and individual futures. May my words be from you and our thoughts be inspired by the Holy Spirit. Amen Happy Anniversary! Today we are celebrating lots of anniversaries—almost too many for one service. We are celebrating being a fully affiliated MCC Church for two years. We are also celebrating our three years of being a church. I am celebrating my second anniversary of the transfer of my ordination from the Southern Baptist Convention to the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, and all 79 of us who joined Open Circle MCC on January 9, 2011 are celebrating our second anniversary of church membership in this church. Almost a hundred more of you have joined us as we grew into the church we are today. So, this is a celebration for everyone—from first-time guest to those who once sat in a living room with a dream of forming this church. Some of you might think it strange that I would preach on this healing story—a very strange and unique healing story at that—on the day of our anniversary. Nevertheless, I think this story has much to say to us as we ponder how we can best give thanks for the blessings already bestowed upon this church in its short history as well as consider what our individual roles may be in the communal future of this church. Open Circle MCC initially grew at lightning speed. For the first two years, both before and after affiliation, we gained new members, started new ministries and, in general, enjoyed watching the blessings of God unfold before our eyes. In our third year, 2012, I believe a very important series of events began to happen which were crucial for the sustainability of Open Circle and the enlargement of our ministries. We continued to reach out beyond the boundaries of The Villages and began, with increased intention, to be a church for the region. We now have members from at least 4 counties and it may be 5. We purchased land and renovated buildings which we use almost daily in an ever-increasing array of programs and ministries. Things changed and we found ourselves no longer a smallish pastor-sized church. We began with excitement to talk of moving forward into the next size church—a Program Sized church, where the emphasis moves to the leadership that arises out of the congregation. Some things in the last year have been uncomfortable. We have lost a few folks who did not share in the vision of a church intended for a region. I’m sorry that they were disappointed, but our ministries will, I believe, continue to prove that we have followed God’s leading in our expansion. Many of you have found Open Circle in the last year and we celebrate your presence here in this place. I love hearing your stories of how you found us and the ways God, through Open Circle, has changed your life. Hallelujah, as a church, we have prayed and followed and are steadfast in our vision of “ministry for all by all”. I believe that God has used this past year to solidify our congregation. Growth in numbers has slowed, but growth in ministries and spiritual maturity has continued in wonderfully blessed ways. I trust God to provide the exact kind of growth that we are called to year after year. God is a good God and knows us better than we know ourselves. And, so, we stand ready for the leading of God in this, our fourth year as a church, our third year as an MCC church. God is calling us to a year of “YES!”—a year of stepping out in faith and hearing God’s call in many areas of our lives and in the life of this church. And, it is into this Year of Yes, that our Gospel story brings insight and challenge. The story of this woman’s interaction with Jesus is about healing—being healed and bestowing healing. It is about faith, risk-taking, and breaking rules. It is also about kinship, community, and welcoming those who we might otherwise not welcome. And, finally, it is about showing up one last time when one has exhausted every other avenue in the search for healing, belonging, and peace. Our Gospel story is sandwiched in between the beginning and ending of another story—the story of Jesus’ journey to the home of a very important man whose daughter is very sick. The crowds are all around—it’s a mob scene. Jesus is trying to get somewhere and the hoards of people, jostling and pushing to get a glance of him are slowing down the journey. The disciples are at their best—shooing people away and trying to make a clear path for Jesus to follow. Suddenly, something strange happens. No one saw her coming, this woman who has hemorrhaged for twelve years. If you know the Jewish Law, you know this makes her unclean and untouchable. But she persisted—pushing her way, this way and that—until she is right behind Jesus. Unlike others, she isn’t looking for an audience with this great Teacher; she only wants to touch the very hem of his garment. She kneels down and touches the tassel on his robe, just a small touch, and she knows she is healed. She sneaks back the way she has come, but she doesn’t get far before Jesus turns around. “Who touched me?” he asks. The disciples are incredulous—“Who touched you?” they repeat in frustration. Everyone is touching you—we can hardly keep the crowd from knocking you down and you want to know who touched you?” Jesus insists on knowing who it was that caused him to feel the flow of healing energy go from his body to theirs. The woman, realizing that she must step forward, returns through the crowd and stops in front of Jesus. Kneeling before him, she tells him the whole story of all the places she has been and people she has seen seeking healing. And then, a wonderfully amazing thing happens. Jesus says, “Daughter, you have taken a great risk, you broke all the rules. But your faith is persistent and has made you well. Go in peace.” Can you imagine what it must have felt like to hear Jesus say, “Daughter”? I can barely take it in. She is a Child of God, she is whole, and she is healed. Is that not what we are about at Open Circle? I pray the invitation to kinship with God is always present in all that we do. We say “yes” to the invitation to be a child of God and invite others to do the same. Let’s look more closely at the interaction between this unnamed woman and Jesus. Some scholars argue that she is unnamed because she was a woman. That may be, but I think she is unnamed so that we can understand that we do not have to know the names of those who are receiving our love and concern. This woman is one tired woman—all of us who are women can identify. Twelve years, wow—makes me tired just thinking of it. And, gentlemen, I know that you can identify with an illness that just won’t go away no matter what you try. She is frustrated as we all would be and she has looked everywhere for help. How many times have I heard one of you say, “Open Circle was my last chance at finding peace, or finding Church, or finding a faith community.” But something or someone caused you to come, one last time, just as something caused this exhausted, ill woman to try one last time. She didn’t want a show, she just wanted to sneak up, unnoticed, and let God heal her through the healing energy of this man Jesus. I’ve seen many of you do the same thing—you might even slip in late, sit away from other folks, and just quietly—with no show—absorb the love of God present all around you in Open Circle. We say “yes” to your presence and enlarge the circle again. It may be that you identify with this woman in the story or you may identify, as part of the Body of Christ, with Jesus. It is an astounding blessing to know that through your words or your touch God is using you to give healing to another person. We are a wounded people, all of us. Some of us come with achy scar tissue and some of us come with open oozing sores. We arrive seeking God’s presence, acceptance, and peace. This is the Gospel that Jesus shared with our unnamed woman—Daughter of God. We come to God just as we are and we are healed. We use our last emotional resource to get us here for one last stab at this thing called faith and this man called Jesus and what do we find? We find Jesus, beckoning us with a sacred “Yes” to become the daughters and sons of God. Here, God is here, and we will not be the same when we say “yes”. As soon as we say yes, a strangely surprising change occurs. We become healers to each other. We become the ones who beckon with the sacred “yes”. And Open Circle becomes a place for healing and rejoicing and joy. God, our creator, is waiting for our “yes”. God is far from done building this church. Will you say “yes” to God’s leading in our future ministries and leaders? Will you spend some time at least several times a week listening to God’s call for you in this sacred healing, holy circle? And will you say “yes” when God calls? Will you open your hearts and reach out and invite others to come? Will you say “yes” as we enter this new year of challenge and change? Will you become healers to each other and become the body of Christ in the life of another? May God grant us courage and grace and may it be so. Amen and amen.