Because...therefore...

Now let's pray for well-trained doctors, skillful surgeons, compassionate nurses and other care givers, helpful friends and family, rest, quiet, and healing...so that you can continue your work as a member of the body of Christ, whatever portion of that work which fits with your gifts, abilities, and opportunities.

It is not about you; it is about the body of Christ.

Now, I admit that I don't get it said to a patient that straightforwardly, though sometimes I wish I could.

There are prickly feelings to be tended and often it is difficult for a patient to think and hear through one's own pains.

Still, we need to try to achieve that understanding.

Some may think that the little video clips that I have been doing are just for the sake of the pastor showing off.

It is not about me.

We are working at that video project for the purpose of enticing people to listen a bit, think a bit, and then to pick up the Bible and see for themselves that this is the story of Jesus the Christ, the story that means to include every one who will listen within his body.

It is meant to be the same basic job of evangelism, simply done in a new way.

Thirty-five years ago I was in a small group of persons in seminary training who were each assigned to present a Bible-study to the group.

I became very angry when I suddenly realized that it wasn't a Bible-study at all; we were supposed to use the Bible as a pretext to talk about our innermost feelings.

I thought it was a dishonest and inappropriate method.

The Bible does not have me at its center;

instead, it means to include me within the story of Jesus.

You and I are grafted into the vine which is Christ.

We are neither the root nor the trunk, but a fruit-bearing branch that draws its sustenance from the vine.

I discovered this week a statement from another pastor who found himself in a similar situation.

When pressed, he finally said,

“I really feel that some of the most interesting things about me are the things that are outside of me – my relationships, my family, my God.

I think that the most interesting thing about me is that God has chosen me, me with all of my inadequacies and failings, to do good work for God.

I think that is what makes me special.

The significance of my life has come from outside of my life.

If I stripped away all those who are outside of me – my family, and the people of the church, I don't believe there would be much of me there.”

I think that pastor said it well.

A shorter way to say it would be: “It's not about me.”

The council just concluded a review on the second anniversary of Mission at the Crossroads. Perhaps you might remember that some of our process included taking surveys around the congregation.

There is always a danger when one operates by taking surveys precisely because they can be so “me-centered.”

When we interpret surveys, it is so easy to slip away from the proper questions into “what do I want?”

We always need someone to be asking, “What are we supposed to be doing as the church of Jesus Christ?

We need to say more to our community than

“Wherever you are itching, we exist scratch it.”

The church exists to sign, to signal, to witness and proclaim to the world that something has happened in Jesus Christ.

We're dancing around a concept that springs from our second lesson today.

It is the story of grace.

From beginning to end, the Bible is the telling of God's promises freely given, and renewed, and finally fulfilled.

That is what we have been hearing in the past several weeks in the second lesson from Ephesians.

We have heard how it is God's plan to gather up all things in Christ,

that everything makes sense because of its connection in Christ Jesus.

We have heard that those who have been far away from God have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

We have heard how God has used people like Paul to bring this best of news to people all around the world.

Gift, sheer gift!,

because we certainly have messed up things regularly and do not deserve such gracious treatment.

Not one of us dare to think that we have been good enough.

Remember the Bible-verse at the beginning of worship each week: If we say we have no sin. we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

Things from God are not earned or deserved, they are a gift.

Today's second lesson begins with a little word therefore.

In Greek it is only three letters long.

Because of all of the good gifts of God which Paul has been exploring in the first 3 chapters of Ephesians, now in chapters 4-6 we begin to explore the implications for daily living.

Because God has done all this, therefore, how shall we live?

The guidelines for living are not arbitrarily given – there is a basis for what should be said and done.

Think of the structure of the 10 comm.

They begin with promise:

I am the Lord your God.

and then talk about God's relationship with us:

You shall have no other God.

and finally move to how we relate with each other, beginning with family and then the rest of community.

All of that is shaped by what is said first about God's promise to be God for us.

Paul comes to this pivotal therefore in exactly the same way.

What concerns him is how the body of Christ is to be tended and nurtured precisely because it is the body of God's promises to us.

We are to do all these things, Paul suggests, “for the building up of the body of Christ, until we all come to the full faith and knowledge of the Son of God.”

The church will never be a club where everyone sees things the same way or you leave.

The church is the body of Christ, brought together by God for his purposes.

It would be wonderful if we all became best friends with each other,

but it is neither likely nor crucial.

What is vital is that we share the Gospel promise with each other, practicing it here so that we can say it clearly elsewhere.

That is a good summary of why I spent three full days this past week with three more of our catechetical students.

We used that word grace over and over; learning and naming God's gifts and promises so that we can recognize them outside of the church building,

and then be able to decide how best to live with others because we are receiving those gifts.

Anyone who has been involved with catechetical study or Divine Drama or Crossways will recognize our bulletin cover today.

It shows Jesus busy washing Peter's feet, and Peter is properly embarrassed.

Just like us, Peter was often a slow learner about what being in the body of Christ will mean for everyday living.

Jesus doesn't just talk; he acts out what he means to say, and at length, Peter does “get” it.

It all turns on that word therefore.

It is the grammar of the Gospel:

because God continues to do such great and wonderful things for us, in us, and around us,

therefore, we have much to say and do,

and a good framework for getting it done.

Therefore...

I beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called, Paul says.

It is not about me or you or any one of us; it is about the body of Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.