Pentecost Year A -- June 8, 2014

Let us begin with prayer:  Bountiful Spirit, give us your gifts.  Help us to receive and use them.  Build us up in love and unity that we may witness your goodness.  Make our lives examples of Christ in our world today.  Thank you for your gifts, and may we dare to ask for more.  In Christ, we pray.  Amen.

Today is Pentecost – the completion of the Easter season, which began 2 months ago when we saw Jesus entering into Jerusalem riding on one (or two) donkeys.  Ever since that less than regal entrance into the city, our expectations for Jesus have been upended, recalibrated, frustrated and fulfilled far beyond what we could imagine.  And the same holds true for Pentecost.  Whatever the disciples were expecting from the “Advocate” that Jesus promised to them, we can be pretty sure they weren’t expecting this crazy mix of wind and fire and doves descending.  They didn’t expect the chaos that, at least in the book of Acts, looked an awful lot like a drunken party at 9 a.m.  I have no idea what plans the disciples had in mind after Jesus’ ascension, but it’s pretty certain that the plans for the early church didn’t require a PowerPoint presentation, or a ministry plan scribbled on the back of a cocktail napkins.

What they had on their hands was a mess.  A holy mess.  That’s Pentecost.  Look at your bulletin covers.  The mass of color and type fonts.  That’s Pentecost.  The Holy Spirit is messy and disruptive, hard to read, and defies any attempt to be explained by us.

Which is why I love Pentecost. Despite the fact that I am as Presbyterian as they come, and love it when things are done decently and in order, I also love that God is forever fueling the imagination and faith of God’s people with this same confusing, wanton, winsome wind that sparked the early church.

And this morning, I am going to invite you to dip your toe into this unholy mess as well.  We’re going to think together about what it might mean to be a “Pentecostal” people.  And the good news, is that you are already Pentecostal people!  You already have been gifted in your baptism with the incredible wind and power and peace and fire of the Holy Spirit.  In your baptism, you have been given the Holy Spirit who teaches us and leads us into all truth, filling us with a variety of gifts so that we do what we've been sent out by Jesus to do --  proclaim the great and good news of the Gospel.

In his letter to the members of Pittsburgh Presbytery this week, Sheldon Sorge told the story of a Presbyterian pastor who was accused by a member of his congregation as being “too Pentecostal.”  This pastor wasn’t quite certain if his parishioner was right or wrong, so he put the question out to his Facebook friends – “Do you think I’m Pentecostal?”  Many of his Facebook friends didn’t think he fit the bill, if by “Pentecostal” we mean those worship styles in which people speak in tongues and handle snakes.  However, if by Pentecostal we are talking about believing that God’s Holy Spirit is at work in everyone for everyone’s benefit, yes – this Presbyterian pastor could be considered Pentecostal.

So can we – a bunch of popsicle Presbyterians --  be Pentecostal?  That’s my goal this morning – to help us name and claim our gifts of the Spirit. 

Scripture helps us do that.  We’re going to begin by reading three texts that help us understand what gifts the Spirit gives to us.  And as I’m reading each text, I want you to shout out and wave your flames when you hear a gift of the Spirit.

(Each person in the congregation had been given "flames" to wave.  Some folks had noisemakers as well.  As the scripture was read, folks shouted out gifts of the Spirit that they heard in the text.  These were written down on a large tablet at the front of the sanctuary.  Everyone seemed to enjoy this exercise).

John 20:19-22

¹⁹When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” ²⁰After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. ²¹Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²²When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

           

Acts 2:1-21

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. ²And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. ³Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. ⁴All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.

⁵Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. ⁶And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each. ⁷Amazed and astonished, they asked, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? ⁸And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language? ⁹Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, ¹⁰Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, ¹¹Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.” ¹²All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” ¹³But others sneered and said, “They are filled with new wine.”

¹⁴But Peter, standing with the eleven, raised his voice and addressed them, “Men of Judea and all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and listen to what I say. ¹⁵Indeed, these are not drunk, as you suppose, for it is only nine o’clock in the morning. ¹⁶No, this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ¹⁷‘In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. ¹⁸Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy. ¹⁹And I will show portents in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and smoky mist. ²⁰The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the coming of the Lord’s great and glorious day. ²¹Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

1 Corinthians 12:7-11

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 8 To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, 10 to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. 11 All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses.

Take 3 or 4 minutes, pair up, and tell each other what gifts of the Spirit you have seen in the other person.    You are not limited to the list up here.

(2-3 minutes of conversation)

What did you hear?
(Folks shouted out the gifts they had heard, many of which were not on the list generated in the original list).

But there are other spiritual gifts mentioned in the Bible.  And these gifts are universal, meaning that they are available to everyone.  Not just preachers or leaders.  Not scholars and saints.  But to all of us. 

List of gifts revealed:  wisdom, understanding, right judgment, courage, knowledge, reverence, and wonder/awe.

Isaiah 11:1-3

A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots. ²The spirit of the Lord shall rest on him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. ³His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear.

These are all gifts everyone may have.  Think about the gift you would most like to have.   Which one is most important for the life of this church, this community, this congregation – right now?

Come forward and claim your gift of the Spirit.  And then take a spark with the sign of the dove and add it to your flame.

Litany of the Gifts of the Spirit

L: With the gift of wisdom, which helps us to see clearly,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth

L: With the gift of understanding, which helps us to know God and God’s people,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth.

RESPONSE                                                                                    300

We Are One in the Spirit (verse 1)

L: With the gift of right judgment, which helps us to make good decisions,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth.

L: With the gift of courage, which gives us strength and helps us not to be afraid,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth.

RESPONSE            We Are One in the Spirit (verse 2)

L: With the gift of knowledge, which helps us to see our part in God’s creation,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth.

L: With the gift of reverence, which helps us in our just relationships with God and God’s people,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth.

RESPONSE            We Are One in the Spirit (verse 3)

L: With the gift of wonder, which helps us to be astonished at the marvels of God,

P: Let us renew the face of the earth.

RESPONSE            We Are One in the Spirit (verse 4)

Easter 7A -- June 1, 2014 with Jennifer Frayer-Griggs

Where Did Jesus Go?

Jennifer Frayer-Griggs, Guest Pastor  

Listen to the sermon here:
https://soundcloud.com/emsworthup/june-1-2014-11-24-03-am/s-Hx4bv

Acts 1:6-14

⁶So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” ⁷He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. ⁸But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” ⁹When he had said this, as they were watching, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. ¹⁰While he was going and they were gazing up toward heaven, suddenly two men in white robes stood by them. ¹¹They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”¹²Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a sabbath day’s journey away. ¹³When they had entered the city, they went to the room upstairs where they were staying, Peter, and John, and James, and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. ¹⁴All these were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers.

This passage always reminds me of Star Trek, the whole “Beam me up, Scotty” Teleportation. I mean, where does Jesus go?

Now that we know that up past the clouds are more clouds, and then the atmosphere, and then outer space, and then more outer space - where does Jesus go?

Does he just keep going up and up and up forever? Where is heaven? How long did it take him to get there? Lightyears? Can Jesus travel the speed of light? The speed of sound? Where does Jesus go?

For me, and my perpetual doubting self, the Ascension is rough. This is harder than the virgin birth, harder than the incarnation, harder than the resurrection.

Not only do we have to come to grips with some strange, mythical, theological concept of Jesus being raised into the clouds, but we have to do it after Copernicus, after Galileo, after the Scientific Method and the Age of Reason.

Where does Jesus GO?

It’s hard enough to wrap our heads around “God with us,” but how do we do that when he’s been sucked up into the clouds, and according to the art depicting him, often without shoes, in these glowing robes, and angels all around. (Why doesn’t he need his shoes?)

I guess there aren’t any rusty nails or hookworms in heaven, so maybe you just don’t need your shoes?

Is that where Jesus goes? This place called “heaven”?

Where does Jesus go?

And. Why does he leave us?

I mean, the disciples just got him back, for heaven’s sake.  They’d gone through the worst day of their lives, they’d buried their best friend, their only hope for the redemption of Israel, heck, their only hope for their very salvation. They’d seen the sky go black and the curtain rent in two. They’d carried his broken body while the Roman officials laughed in their faces. They’d laid him in a cold, hard tomb.

But, hooray! That’s not the end of the story! Jesus comes back! Full in the flesh. All eating and drinking and laughing. The same ol’ Jesus who tells stories and catches fish and speaks in strange metaphors.

Finally. Our hope is restored. “Jesus!” they ask, “are you finally going to do what we’ve wanted you to do all along? Are you finally going to restore Israel? And give us back our land? And give us back our fortunes? And give us back our power? Do we finally get what’s coming to us? Do we finally get what we deserve?!”

Ha. The disciples still don’t get it. Not after all they’ve been through. Not after all they’ve learned from Jesus about the last being first and the first being last and the putting away of swords and the sheep and the goats and all that.

Nope. Jesus is about a different sort of kingdom. A different sort of heaven.

Luke, the writer of Acts, tells us, Jesus says, “nope, that’s not what I’m about” and then he’s gone, whoosh, vanish, thwoop. Jesus is now the rabbit back in the magician’s hat, the ghost writer, the professor emeritus. Jesus has left the building.

Where does Jesus Go? And why does he have to leave us?

He’s promised to leave us the Advocate. To give us power when the Holy Spirit comes upon us.

But the disciples are in this in-between space. Jesus is gone. The Holy Spirit is coming. We’ve got a layover. We’re stuck at the train station. We’re sandwiched between what has been and what is yet to come.

Where does Jesus Go? Why does he have to leave us? And why the wait ‘til the Holy Spirit comes to give us some purpose, some direction, some guidance? Why the wait ‘til the plane is ready, ‘til the train is at the station, ‘til the table is set and the food is prepared?

So often, we find ourselves staring up at the clouds, at the place where the bottoms of Jesus’ soles used to be, looking for Jesus to come back down the same way he was sucked up.

But the two angels ask, “Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?”

Because it’d be so much easier if we could get sucked up too.

It’d be so much simpler if we could just think about what it takes to get to heaven and leave it at that. It’d be so much better for us if we could just believe the right things and pray the right prayer and then wipe our hands on our pants and leave all this behind.

It’d be so much easier if I didn’t have to listen to the complaints of a homeless guy we’ll call “Mike.” He comes to The Table - our free community meal - every Tuesday and Thursday and, often before I can even get into the door, produces a list of needs for me to fill.

He needs dental floss. He needs multi-vitamins and trash bags. He needs toothpaste, but not the whitening kind because he read a study that whitening agents cause cancer. He needs socks and size 9 1/2 dark blue running shoes with a combination last and high arches.

But he rarely stays for the food.

He’s a vegetarian, he says. And it’s only when he is absolutely destitute and has no other option that he condescends to eat here with us.

Well, gee. Thanks.

And then just this Thursday he hands me a note, wadded up tightly, with the strict instructions “not to read it until after he has left.”

I’m hoping it’s a thank you note. Maybe a note of encouragement, since that’s what I’ve been trying to get this congregation to embrace lately.

But nope. It says, “Why I don’t eat here: Mike Smith’s 95 Theses”: “ You use aluminum pans, sheets, cookware etc. Aluminum is poisonous to every cell in the human body - reacts with acids, especially when heated. This leaches aluminum into the food. Aluminum has been linked to Alzheimer’s, arthritis and general decrepitude.”

Why do we stand looking up toward heaven? Because otherwise, we might get so jaded that we shut our doors. Because we might have to see this man as a manipulator and someone who just works the system. Maybe because looking into Mike’s eyes as he demands and manipulates and criticizes just makes us want to pack up our pots and pans and potato salad and spend our evenings watching Law and Order reruns. Because we might have to accept that this guy may never change. He may live under a bridge and criticize all the good around him and be lonely and afraid of death for the rest of his life.

 On Wednesday a woman came to the meal at Brookline with her beautiful one year old daughter. This little girl had adorable brown curls and an easy smile, and followed her momma wherever she went. And it’s a good thing, too, because momma was twitching and bouncing and rocking and talking fast and slurring her words. She was chain smoking and the cigarette was bouncing between her fingers as she paced up and down the sidewalk.

Why do we stand looking up towards heaven? Because otherwise, we might see that little baby get hurt. We might have to watch this woman destroy her life on drugs. We might have to accept that there isn’t much we can do for either of them. We might have to feel helpless.

Just last week we had an elderly couple, or at least, I thought they were elderly come to dinner. Sharon and Phil came in, both with canes, both with bloodshot eyes and unsteady knees. Sharon made it to a seat. But Phil wasn’t so capable. He was ready to collapse right on the floor mats in front of the church entrance. And three others came up to him and grabbed his arms and caught him before he fell. And we set him in a chair, right there, right on the floor mat, certainly in the way of anyone else who might want to come in, certainly a fire hazard.

But this time, I didn’t look up toward heaven. I looked into the yellowing eyes of Jack, who pulled up a chair next to Phil and talked to him in a quiet voice. Who grabbed Phil’s meal and fed him lasagna by the spoonful and told him he was ok, and reminded him to sit up before he passed out in his meatballs and knocked over his iced tea. Who went into the kitchen to wet a cloth so he could gently clean the man’s hands and face.

If we always stand looking up towards heaven, we are gonna miss the face of Christ right here, right in front of us. In the midst of the drug addicts and the paranoia and the criticism and the fear and the men so drunk they wet themselves and fall on floor mats right in front of the church entrance.

The Holy Spirit, the very Presence of Christ, enables us to look in the yellowed tired eyes and the precocious one year olds with addicted mothers and the homeless drunks who stack the chairs and clean the tables, and see the face of Christ.

This gift, this Advocate, this dove and flame and wind, could even help us see the face of Christ in this privileged white girl with too many master’s degrees, in the hands of the wealthy Republican who ladles out the soup, in the liberal millennial covered in tattoos who washes the dishes, and in the autistic and deaf thirteen year old who comes to help, but often spills more than he delivers, and his caretaker who isn’t even sure if she believes in God.

Where does Jesus go?

I really don’t think that Jesus goes up towards heaven - not in the literal, physical, temporal way that we think.

I think Jesus goes into the eyes of the kind drunk who stays after the meal to help clean up. I think Jesus goes into the hands of the paramedics we had to call after Phil fell in the parking lot and couldn’t get up. I think Jesus goes into the heart of the woman who wrapped piles and piles of leftovers in tin-foil and packed it in the woman-with-the-baby’s bag.

Men and Women of Galilee. Men and Women of Pittsburgh and Portland and St. Louis and Detroit. Men and Women of Somalia and Syria and Ukraine and Nigeria. Men and Women of Emsworth and Homewood and Upper Saint Clair and Brookline and The Southside. Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?

You are the hands and feet of Christ now. You are the eyes of Christ. You are what God is doing in the world.

It’s terrifying. And lonely. And sometimes we just want to look away. We want to Look out. Look beyond towards some kind of “heaven” that we’ve made up for ourselves.

But Jesus, Jesus, God with us, God here in the flesh with us, Jesus who represents the fullest connection between God and this world, keeps calling us to the messiness of this world, to the flesh and the bone and the alcohol on the breath and the bouncing knees of the drug addicted. To the hungry and the tired and the malnourished and the paranoid and to those of us who think we’ve got it all together. He keeps calling us to this because that’s where Jesus is. That’s where Jesus goes when he gets sucked up to heaven and seems to be so far from us and leaves us feeling alone and abandoned and lost.  He’s in those eyes we’ve been looking at all along.

Thanks be to God

For more information about "The Table" at Hot Metal Bridge Faith Community, please visit their blog at http://thetableministry.blogspot.com

Unglued Church Launch -- May 30 and 31, 2014

On May 30 and 31, more than 50 leaders from eight churches in Pittsburgh Presbytery, together with Ayana Teter (Associate Pastor of Pittsburgh Presbytery), Philip Lotspeich (Coordinator for Church Growth, Presbyterian Mission Agency), Jim Kitchens and Deborah Wright (Adaptive Change Consultants, Pneumatrix) as well as eight Adaptive Change apprentices (Sarah Robbins, Tom Moore, Jake Clawson, Brenda Barnes, Larry Ruby, Linda Ruby, Ayana Teter, Susan Rothenberg) gathered to launch the "Unglued Church" pilot project.  Funded by a grant from the PCUSA, this two-year project will not only seek to help churches redefine their mission as they face the tsunami of change in our culture, but also train a cohort of teaching elders in our presbytery to work with churches into the future and help them use adaptive change and positive deviance to effectively live out the Gospel of Jesus Christ in their communities.  

Rev. Wright and Rev. Kitchens of Pneumatrix

The first phase of the project was for each church to participate in a "New Beginnings" assessment http://whatisourfuturestory.com/beta/the-process/.  The New Beginnings assessors visited with each church in April and created a comprehensive report detailing each church's assets, challenges and ministry opportunities.  This weekend, Rev. Lotspeich instructed the church leadership and apprentices how to read the reports, and outlined the next steps in the New Beginnings process.  

Each church -- including Emsworth U.P. -- will now hold a series of "house meetings" -- and that's where the fun really begins!  We are praying that the Spirit will bubble up in these holy conversations over the next few months as churches begin to dream and talk and listen to one another as they seek to become what God would desire them to be.  We pray that their conversations will be fueled by their love for Jesus Christ and not fear of the unknown.  We pray that each church will discover new things about the communities around them and the people they serve.  We pray that each church will open themselves up to a new beginning and a new future, whatever that may look like for each of their congregations.

My colleague, Rev. Sarah Robbins and I were privileged to lead worship this weekend, and we drew our inspiration from a sermon preached by Walter Brueggemann at The Festival of Homiletics last week. In the sermon, he reminded us that our churches are fragile clay jars, and that we are privileged to carry the treasure of the Gospel within us.  The treasure cannot be destroyed.  The clay jar, however, needs to be smashed from time to time.  The good news is that the Potter can put us back together, but we will not be the same clay pot we once were.  We will be reworked into another vessel, as seems good to God.

Please pray for this effort -- for the churches, the apprentices, and all of us who dare to imagine that God has not stopped dreaming of a new thing for a bunch of old clay jars.

Here is the liturgy we used in our opening worship on Friday night: 

Call To Worship                                                                                     

Gift us, O God, with divine imagination.

Mold us with holy intention.

Change us with your compassion.

Release us from our fears.

Break our stubborn habits.

Pry our idols out of our anxious hands.

Destroy all within us that is not your will.

Live through us, today, always.

Unison Prayer                                                                                    

Merciful God, weary from efforts to change our own lives, we hand ourselves over to you.  You are the only One who can center us firmly, rooting us in this moment, mindful of our potential.  Your hands hold us with warmth and you eyes see us with imagination.  We can feel ourselves beginning to turn with the energy of your purpose.  Weighty is your love for us, yet with lightness of heart we feel ourselves transforming, rising, and opening up to your grace.  Let us become vessels of your own design.  In Christ, we pray.  Amen.

Reading From Scripture

Jeremiah 18:1-10                                                                                    

The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: ²“Come, go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.” ³So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was working at his wheel. ⁴The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him. ⁵Then the word of the Lord came to me: ⁶Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the Lord. Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. ⁷At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, ⁸but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it. ⁹And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, ¹⁰but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it.

2 Corinthians 4:7-12                                                                                    

Therefore, since it is by God’s mercy that we are engaged in this ministry, we do not lose heart. ²We have renounced the shameful things that one hides; we refuse to practice cunning or to falsify God’s word; but by the open statement of the truth we commend ourselves to the conscience of everyone in the sight of God. ³And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. ⁴In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. ⁵For we do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’ sake. ⁶For it is the God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. ⁷But we have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. ⁸We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; ⁹persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; ¹⁰always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. ¹¹For while we live, we are always being given up to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may be made visible in our mortal flesh. ¹²So death is at work in us, but life in you.

Reflection: Smashing Our Clay Pots,  Ungluing The Treasure                        

We have this treasure in clay jars. 

That’s what Paul says.  That’s what he tells the church in Corinth.  We have this treasure in clay jars.

The people in Corinth were in quandary.  They were stuck, endlessly obsessing about the small stuff: class distinctions, differences between Jew and Gentile, questions about circumcision and proper foods, who could be an insiders and who were the outsiders.  What kind of hymnal, what color flowers, proper doctrine, polity and policy – you know, all the nit-picky stuff that can quickly sink a church. 

Paul believes that the church in Corinth has forgotten that our stuff and our rules and our doctrines and our traditions are not the point. They have forgotten that the church is not the treasure, but a clay jar that holds the treasure.  And it’s a good thing because a clay jar is…what?  (HIT THE POT WITH A HAMMER) Vulnerable.  Fragile.  A clay jar does not last forever.  The treasure inside the jar – the Gospel of Jesus Christ – is the thing that cannot be broken.

The clay jar exists for one purpose and one purpose only-- to carry the richness and fullness of the Gospel.  And, as the text from Jeremiah tells us, the clay jar sometimes has to be broken and reshaped.  Again and again.  Breaking and reshaping the clay jar is the work of the potter.  That is God’s transforming work in us and with us.

Congregations can get caught up in thinking our job is to take care of the clay jar instead of the treasure.  Sometimes we think that the extraordinary power of the gospel begins with us.  But Paul reminds us that the extraordinary power comes only from God.

Tonight, it seems to me that the church’s best hope for the future is to be broken open and made new if we want to be suitable vessels for the treasure.  We need the potter -- who created these clay jars to begin with -- to reshape us and reclaim us. It is only in smashing our clay jars for the sake of Jesus that the power of the treasure can break loose in the world. Because that is the only treasure the world really needs – the power of Jesus in his generosity, forgiveness, hospitality and justice.

To borrow a brilliant phrase from Walter Bruggemann, -- it is time for us to get smashed for Jesus.  And tonight and tomorrow marks the beginning of our becoming unglued for the sake of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, remembering Paul’s words:

⁸We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; ⁹persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.

I invite your group to place the clay jar in the bag provided for you, and take turns striking the jar with the hammer.  You can hit hard or softly.  You may end up with only a few large pieces, or many shards.  When everyone has had a turn, take out the fragments and lay them on the table.  Then we will pray together.

Unison Prayer

Let us begin this task of breaking open our lives in the service of our God.

Let us build something new from the fragments of these broken times in our church and our world;

Let us cry out for those who have no voice;

Let us work with what we have,

to help bring healing, justice and mercy

to those whose lives are filled with fear and suffering;

and know that God is with us, even in the dark of doubt.

Here are the broken pieces, God.

We trust that you will use them to renew in us a right spirit.

And now, give us peace for the evening and good rest through the night. 

Amen.

Benediction

May the peace of Christ comfort you.

May the love of God sustain you.

May the energy and orneriness of the Holy Spirit embolden you in all you do in the service of our Lord, Jesus Christ.

On this day and even unto the ages.

Amen.

Easter 6A -- May 25, 2014, Guest Preacher Jay Poliziani

Matthew 25:37-40

³⁷Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? ³⁸And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? ³⁹And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?” ⁴⁰And the king will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family,^* you did it to me.”

On Sunday, May 25th, we were overjoyed to welcome Mr. Jay Poliziani to our pulpit.  Jay has been the Director of Northside Common Ministries for three years. NCM is an affiliate operation of Goodwill of Southwestern PA and Jay has worked for Goodwill for over two decades in various social service roles.

Jay is a single father of one teenage son, and his educational background includes degrees in education, marketing and theology, all of which have proven to be helpful in different ways in his work at NCM.

Listen to Jay's message here:https://soundcloud.com/emsworthup/may-25-2014-11-18-37-am/s-RsaMV

You can read more about Northside Common Ministries by going to their website: http://www.ncmin.org