(prayer)
The catcher puts down the
sign for the pitcher to throw a down-and-away fastball on a three-two count to
a left handed batter with a history of hitting ground balls the opposite
way. As a result, the third base player
is going to be expected to line up in a certain spot as the pitch is thrown.
//
During the huddle, the
quarterback calls for a 25 Dive Counter with a Bootleg Option. As a result, the left tackle and tight end
are going to have to make a hole for the fullback to run through and the right tackle will want to kick
out and look for the smart block just in case the QB is coming his way.
//
Am I right?
//
//
The New England Patriots
are probably one of the most maligned National Football League teams of the
last decade and a half.
At the same time, it is
hard to argue that the New England Patriots are not one of the most successful
NFL teams of the last 15 years. Counting
last weekend's game, the Pats have made seven Super Bowl appearances since
2002, winning five times... all with the same head coach and quarterback.
But... as one sports
commentator postulated a week ago: unless you lived in Massachusetts or Rhode
Island, you were probably rooting for the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl LI.
I appreciate that perpetual
winners are not always popular outside their home fan base. Was anyone (outside of Edmonton) rooting for
the EE to win their sixth straight Grey Cup in 1983 or was anyone other than
rabid Habs fans cheering for the Montréal Canadiens in 1980 to win Stanley Cup
number twenty-three after having won six from 1971-79.
Of course, the New England
Patriots' negative reputation is not just because people are bothered by New
England's history of success. Just
Google "deflategate" if you want to study part of the reasons why.
//
//
Love him or loathe him,
(New England Patriots head coach) Bill Belichick is fond of sharing his
three-word mantra for team success: Do
Your Job. You may even have heard
the new US Secretary of State mention this on his first day on the job two
weeks ago.
//
Team work does rely on the
various parts fitting together to serve the wider goals.
Football - as much as any
sport I know - is like this. Of the 12
players on the field (11 in the US), different players have very specific roles
on every given play.
//
Every organized sports team
has game plans - they work on set plays that they hope to use in certain
situations.
In hockey, for example,
teams will practice two-on-one drills with hopes that the flow of the game will
give them the opportunity to use what they have practised.
But, unlike more the more
fluid, flowing sports (like soccer or hockey or basketball), football
(similarly baseball and curling) has regular stops and starts allowing for a
specific plan to be implemented at a specific time. Each new play has a plan and each player has
a part of that plan. In baseball, curling
and football, there is a pause before the ball is snapped or pitched (or the
rock is thrown) allowing for each player to be ready to act as part of a
greater whole.
Everyone is asked to meet
the goals their job (to do their job),
so that the big job can be accomplished.
//
//
//
A few weeks ago, we read
from First Corinthians chapter one about conflicts over leadership in the early
church. Reports had made it to the
Apostle Paul that certain people were praising some leaders and maligning
others, sorting themselves into subsets of the church: I
belong to Paul, I belong to Apollos, I belong to Peter.
Today's reading from First
Corinthians chapter three continues Paul's point about the issue. And as I mentioned in my Annual General Meeting
devotion last week (from First Corinthians chapter twelve: many parts of one body), Paul spent 13 1/2 of
the 16 chapters of the letter on this topic.
//
In today's chapter three
reading (which is part of this wider narrative), instead of making a case for
people to line up behind him instead of Peter or Apollos, Paul speaks of the
ways that each beloved leader has contributed to the whole.
Apollos and Paul are servants
through whom you came to believe.
Paul planted, Apollos watered.
God who gave the growth.
The one who plants
and the one who waters
have a common purpose.
For we are God’s servants,
working together;
you are God’s field.
//
This is not a call for all of us to live out our faith in exactly the same
way. It is not an invitation for us to all get behind the same activities
within the ministry of Christ.
//
//
And, as a church minister for almost 30
years, I have seen many situations (in churches I have served myself and places
I have observed elsewhere)... people within a church can become annoyed with
their fellow pew-mates for not sharing the same depth of passion for a
particular part of church work.
I have heard people proclaim sentences
that begin: "obviously, the church should be doing..."
//
Why do we feel the need to
see others as competitors rather than collaborators? To pit one ministry emphasis against another.
Is not the household of God
able to be more diverse and inclusive than that?
Just because we are sharing
this experience we call united church
doesn't mean we are going to be united in everything.
//
I know that on any given
Sunday, within the same congregation, one person could think, Blaine's sermon was
too political, while someone else will be thinking it wasn't political
enough. Or the service was too deep
or not deep
enough. Too much music, and not enough. Exactly what I needed and I
couldn't relate.
We have all chosen to be
here, but that choice is not identical to everyone else.
//
More than five thousand
years ago, west of the Jordan River laid the land of Canaan... where the great
ancestors of the Hebrews (Sarah and Abraham) had ended their journey and found
the right combination of welcome and opportunity to establish a new home.
It was only three
generations later that this family found itself on the move again... fleeing to
Egypt to escape the hunger of a devastating drought.
Abraham's descendants
stayed in Egypt, but never lost their connection to Canaan. They became an identifiable people with
unique cultural and religious traditions.
That unity created fear among the rulers of Egypt and the Hebrews
(aka... the People of Israel) were forced into a slavery of forced labour,
until Moses (emboldened by God) convinced the Pharoah to let the people go.
As the narrative reaches
the book of Deuteronomy, the Israelites have completed their liberating exodus
journey through the Sinai wilderness. They
were forty years removed from being slaves to Pharoah in Egypt when they first
saw the waters of the River Jordan from its eastern bank.
It is - in the setting of that view - that
the people are reminded of a basic choice.
Before
you today is life and death, prosperity and adversity, blessings and
curses. Choose life. Hold fast to God. And live long in this land of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob.
It is not a difficult
choice. It is a rhetorical question,
with an expected answer.
On one hand is life,
prosperity and blessings - the other death, adversity and curses - of course
everyone would choose life.
//
What may come, after
choosing life, will rely on a trust in the promise of a holy presence as they
moved into this traditional land.
//
The life they were choosing
- naturally - would not be identical for everyone.
//
It is God who finds unity
in our diversity. God is big enough to
handle the task.
//
Being baffled by the
choices is not just a church thing.
When I see those internet
memes and comments that ask we should
help our own homeless instead of refugees, I am baffled. Because I am more prone to ask... why can't it be both?
//
Part of this defensive
attitude comes from an attitude of scarcity: a belief that there is not enough
to go around.
There are times when people
seem very quick to force a choice... to pick one direction or another...
because then we can unite under a common direction.
While that is certainly
true - to a degree, sometimes - my experience of dynamics (within the church at
least) that I have observed... scarcity is generally overplayed... as a reality
of church life.
Yes! Energy, money, space all provide the outer
limits to what might be possible at a given time. But... the edge is often further away than
some people think. When we are afraid to
go too far out, we may never discover that we know more abundance that we
think.
//
Even liberals-minded
churches tend to be conservative when it comes to making choices that might
bring new uncertainty into church life.
While there is wisdom to
plan for a rainy day, some churches are so rainy-day-focused that they never
get to enjoy the sunshine.
//
God invitess the Israelites
to choose life, but that choice does
not mean that the chosen life will be certain.
Again, this was not
new. During the years of the Exodus,
Moses and the other leaders were confronted with people who were willing to
choose going back to their lives as slaves in Egypt (the only home they had
ever known) because it offered more certainty than the promised prosperity on
the path that was leading to Canaan.
//
//
We can choose life
together without expecting perfect unity to be part of that choice.
//
//
The Church of Christ Jesus,
the Apostle Paul would say, is made better by our diversity. We should see ourselves as part of something
greater than any one person. Paul
invites the Corinthians to embrace the gifts, skills and activities that each
person holds in service for the greater whole ("the common good" is the phrase Paul uses in chapter 12).
Paul has some credibility
in this regard, because behind the theme of the first thirteen-and-a-half
chapters of the letter, were people who were maligning the gifts that Paul
offered as compared to what Apollos brought to the table.
Paul could have wallowed in
defensiveness, but he stepped back and saw how his part fit into the bigger
whole.
"[You and your faith are like a field.]
I planted.
Apollos watered.
God gave the growth."
This horticultural metaphor
is easily understandable - in both the first and twenty-first centuries.
On their own, neither
Apollos nor Paul did it all. And
neither's efforts would have any impact without God's involvement.
The reality of how plant growth happens in our evolving
world includes aspects beyond the influence of both the planter and
waterer. Jesus used this fact in one of
his parables (Mk4:26-29): The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the
ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and
grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then
the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once
he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.
Now, Jesus was making a different point
than Paul, but the reality is that even the most skilled botanist starts with
laws of nature beyond her/his control (Jesus: the earth produces of itself; Paul: God gives the growth).
//
//
On the edge of the promised land, the
Hebrews of the Exodus were invited to cross the river with feet guided by the
promise of a good life.
The goodness they were promised would
be experienced in different ways, but (as the Christian Apostle would write
3000 years late), they were tied to a common purpose and and common good.
//
The potential of God's growth is a
garden in which we live. Seeds of faith
and passions for certain aspects of ministry are planted in each of us. As we walk the garden of God, some of our
passions are watered and nurtured resulted in even greater growth.
We bloom where we are planted. But our growth foliage can be very different
than others in the same garden. The
garden of God's people is beautiful and diverse.
Bloom where you are planted.
Do your job.
Know that you are part of something
greater than yourself.
//
//
//
Let us pray:
Loving God, we desire devoted hearts
that seek to listen, think and feel anew.
Amen.
#703VU “In the Bulb There is a Flower”
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