Two of the last three Sundays have been marked by weather-related disasters: the

Transcription

1 1 Corinthians 12:4-13 Thank You Notes January 12, 2014 UUMC Two of the last three Sundays have been marked by weather-related disasters: the great power outage of December 22 and the blizzard of January 5. In between was the Sunday after Christmas, the 29 th of December, traditionally a low-attendance day. Which means that many of us haven t seen each other for quite awhile. We have a lot of catching up to do! So I invite you to find one or two others sitting near you and engage in a little presermon conversation. Share with your neighbors, just for a minute, what you got for Christmas. What are some of the gifts you received? (congregational conversation) When we talk about Christmas gifts, we re usually talking about material things. When we talk about gifts in terms of church life, we re usually talking about nonmaterial things spiritual things, the people of Corinth called them; we might refer to them as God-given talents. Many of us might think about the gifts of the Spirit and the list that we read in Paul s First letter to the Corinthians: wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, etc. 1

2 If you re part of a Gateway group and have been reading First Corinthians, you know that long before it was a book in our New Testament, it was a letter from Paul, the missionary, to a congregation out on the frontier, far from Christianity s birthplace. The church was born in Jerusalem, the heart of Judaism, and was nurtured there on tradition, scripture and faith in God. In its earliest years it depended on the scaffolding of temple and synagogue until its own foundation and walls had grown enough to stand on their own. But out on distant frontiers, like the city of Corinth, the culture was pagan, and there were no mothers and fathers in the faith to give clarity and stability. There were preachers passing through, to be sure but, as Professor Fred Craddock says, that s just it; they were passing through. The church had experiences for which they had no texts and problems for which they had no precedents. Some concerned members wrote to the Paul, who started the church, and their questions were many, touching on marriage, divorce, litigation, support of local shrines, proper foods, leadership of women, order of worship, and the nature of a resurrected body. What a list! And among the questions was this one: What are the activities of the Spirit? Some powerful, spiritual experiences were breaking out in their house churches: healings, miracles, prophecies, speaking in tongues. What they wanted to know was -- are these spiritual things from God? Are they works of the Spirit or 2

3 something else? And, as far as we can tell from Paul s response, they also want Paul to tell them which of these spiritual things were better than others. Which ones were more important? Which ones demonstrated a superior faith? Before he can answer that question, Paul feels the need to change the word used in the letter to him. The Corinthians inquired about spiritual things ; Paul wants to talk about gifts. The Greek word Paul uses is charisma, a form of charis, which can also mean grace. It s where we get the word eucharist. He uses the word in the plural, charismata, there are many gifts, a variety of them, a diversity of them. As he often does in his communications with his churches, Paul walks a diplomatic tightrope. These spiritual things are gifts from God, he insists. And in each case, it is the same spirit of God that acts in everyone. No one gift has a better pedigree than another. But that doesn t mean that the particular nature of each gift does not matter. Each different gift, activated by the spirit in different persons, contributes in its own unique way to the functioning and the unity of the whole community, the whole body. No doubt it was tempting for the leaders of the Corinthian Christian community divided and fractious as it was to look for a way to build unity by imposing 3

4 conformity. Perhaps that was some of the reason for asking Paul to tell them which gifts were superior to others to establish an orderliness in the face of the disorder and chaos that described their congregation. But Paul says no. Even a quarreling church must not relinquish its diversity. We cannot opt for unity if it means losing or even minimizing our diversity. And the reason? Because diversity is not a condition we tolerate, up to a point; diversity is a given in the overflowing abundance of God; it is built-in to the way God gives. Having received this multiplicity of various gifts, what then are the Corinthians to do with them? Use them, Paul says, use them for the building up of the community of Christ. We modern Americans tend to think of God-given gifts in an individualistic way, as something for the growth and success of the individual person the gifted athlete or the gifted musician, for example. We do the same for spiritual experiences. You might hear people describe a faith experience by saying "Jesus was born within my heart," or "My heart was strangely warmed," or "If you ask me how I know he lives, he lives within my heart." To put it in other words, "Faith is only a matter of God and me, the Holy 4

5 Spirit and my heart. But the life of the Spirit is rooted in the servant life of Christ. God s gifts are meant to be offered for the sake of the community. What you ve been given matters for other people. Besides, what better way to say thank you to the Divine Giver than to use your gifts in service of the divine kingdom? Writer Anne LaMott says that she saw something once from the Jewish Theological Seminary that said, A human life is like a single letter of the alphabet. It can be meaningless. Or it can be a part of a great meaning. LaMott describes her own church as a funky little church, filled with people who are working for peace and freedom, who are out there on the streets and inside praying, at home writing letters and at the shelters with giant platters of food. When I was at the end of my rope, she writes, the people at St. Andrew tied a knot in it for me and helped me hold on. When I announced during worship that I [a single woman] was pregnant, people cheered. All these old people, raised in Bible-thumping homes in the Deep South, clapped. And then almost immediately they set about providing for us. They brought clothes, they brought me casseroles to keep in the freezer, they brought me assurance that this baby was going to be a part of the family. And they began slipping me money. 5

6 Now, a number of the older women live pretty close to the bone financially on small Social Security checks. But routinely they sidled up to me and stuffed bills in my pocket tens and twenties. It was always done so stealthily that you might have thought they were slipping me little bags of cocaine. One of the most consistent donors was a woman named Mary Williams, who is in her mid-eighties now, so beautiful with her crushed hats and hallelujahs. She always brought me plastic Baggies full of dimes, noosed with little wire twists. I was usually filled with as sense of something like shame until I d remember that wonderful line of Blake s that we are here to learn to endure the beams of love and I would take a long deep breath and force these words out of my strangulated throat: Thank you. Mary Williams always sits in the very back by the door. She is one of those unusually beautiful women beautiful like a river. She raised five children as a single mother, but one of her boys drowned when he was young, and she has the softness and generosity and toughness of someone who has endured great loss. I watch her pray sometimes. She clutches her hands together tightly and closes her eyes most of the way so that she looks blind; because she is so unself- 6

7 conscious, you get to see someone in a deeply interior pose. You get to see all that intimate resting. She looks as if she s holding the whole earth together. It s funny: I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox, full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools friendships, prayer, conscience, honesty and said, Do the best you can with these, they will have to do. And mostly, against all odds, they re enough. Mary still brings us Baggies of dimes, even though I m doing much better now. Mostly I give them to street people. Some sit like tchotchkes on bookshelves around the house. Mary doesn t know that professionally I m doing much better now; she doesn t know that I no longer really need people to slip me money. But what s so dazzling to me, what s so painful and poignant, is that she doesn t bother with what I think she knows or doesn t know about my financial life. Her gift is to give another bag of dimes, and to hold the whole earth together in her prayers. Each of us has received gifts from God that equip us with exactly what we need to discover our place in the world. In this sanctuary is a wide rainbow of differing gifts, each of them incalculably valuable and unique: 7

8 wisdom, knowledge, faith, honesty, humor, commitment, insight, humility, hospitality. You know you re talking about a gift from God when you can find a way to use it to further God s kingdom. You know you re talking about a gift from God when using it gives you the sense that you are fulfilling God s purpose for you. You don t just sew, you make quilts for the homeless and formerly homeless. You don t just know how to use a hammer, you repair houses for those who can t do it themselves. You don t just cook, you take meals to the sick. You don t just teach, you open minds to the possibility of a life-long faith. You don t just organize, you care for the staff we hire and the building we call home making the beautiful quilts and the repaired houses and the warm meals and the open minds possible. Take a quiet moment now to think what are the gifts with which God has graced you? 8

9 Now consider this how can you say thank you? How might you give thanks by using your gifts to build up the community of Christ? Now find your conversation partners again, and consider this question together What gifts has this congregation been given? (congregational conversation) The spirit is at work in each of us; the spirit has given different gifts to each of us: gifts that should be celebrated; gifts that are meant to be used for the building up of the kingdom because they are given by the spirit, not to create division but unity, for we are the community of God. Christmas is over. Clean up the wrapping paper and put away the decorations. Now it s time to open the gifts God gave us for life. Now it s time to say thank you to so great a Giver, who knew exactly what we needed. 9

10 References Anne LaMott, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith. Anchor Books, Fred B. Craddock. From Exegesis to Sermon: 1 Corinthians 12:4-6. Review & Expositor 80 no 3 Sum 1983, p William G. Carter, The Gifted: Day of Pentecost. Sermons On the Second Reading, Series 1, Cycle A. Available at Karoline Lewis. Commentary on 1 Corinthians 12:1-11, January 17, Valerie Nicolet-Anderson. Commentary on 1 Corinthians 12:3b-13, June 12, Karoline Lewis, David Lose, Matt Skinner. Sermon brainwave #97 - Second Sunday after Epiphany, January 10,