Foundry UMC DC: Sunday Sermons
Religion & Spirituality:Christianity
A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger Gaines-Cirelli at Foundry UMC January 24, 2016, the third Sunday after the Epiphany.
Texts: 1 Cor. 13, Luke 4:21-30“Mature” is defined by Webster’s dictionary as “completely developed, fully ripe,” “highly developed in intellect, outlook” and “thoroughly developed, perfected.” I would hope that we would strive for maturity in our lives—though, if you’re like me, you catch yourselves sometimes acting in ways that show just how far you have to go toward that goal. It is these moments when Anthony rightly names my behavior as “bratty.” Being a “brat,” acting like a child, pouting, wanting my way…those moments when it seems that there is no room for patience, wisdom…you may be able to call to mind your own immature behaviors that pop up from time to time...
Today, we have heard the familiar 13th chapter of Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth. In this letter Paul is addressing some behavior issues. Folks in the church are embroiled in power struggles and many are lording over other people their particular gifts which they assert are better than others’ gifts. They were squabbling about leadership, some thought they were especially wise, and others were carried away with speaking in tongues and still others argued that miracles and miracle-workers were most important and valuable. Bottom line: the church was fighting. And as I’ve heard people say: “There’s no fight like a church fight!” Conflicts in church can be particularly nasty and brutal—and excruciatingly painful.
A friend I grew up with in my youth
group in Sapulpa, OK who still lives in the area took his
young family back to our home church. He
volunteered, teaching in the senior high Sunday School class and working with
the youth on other things. It came to
pass that a terrible conflict arose in the church—staff members were being
attacked and small groups were gathering in secret meetings. Accusations flew and terrible things were
said. My friend was disgusted and
emotionally devastated to see adults we had grown up with and looked up to as
leaders in the church acting in such mean-spirited ways.
I also remember an international mission trip I helped lead that included both youth and adults. It was amazing during the course of the trip to observe the behaviors of the so-called “mature” adults in comparison with some of the youth! There was one instance in which two grown men—intelligent, accomplished men—got into a shouting match right in front of the teenagers (I don’t even remember what it was about)—they cursed and flung insults at one another until I felt sick to my stomach.
These examples show that you can have very mature—that is, highly developed—gifts and skills, you can be the most efficient, capable, and smart person around. But is that kind of maturity all there is—or most important? // “Blueprints” is our current sermon series here at Foundry. Blueprints present a vision of how people allocate space for their homes. If you look at home designs from different historical periods, different social classes, or from different cultures, you will see that the spaces in the home are organized to support the ways that people live and where they spend energy. For example, front porches used to be the norm—but these days you might find more developed back patios; walls come down in older homes as remodels cater to the new desire for “open concept.” Some blueprints might show plans for a music room or library or chapel or home theater. Some spaces will be larger and more elaborate while others will be small or nonexistent based on what we value. When I was apartment hunting for Anthony and me in Manhattan, I looked at one lovely little (!) apartment near Central Park in which the “kitchen” consisted of a space the size of a coat closet equipped with a dorm fridge and a hotplate! In our lives, we can have very developed “spaces” for intellect or skills. But, if we’re not careful, we can focus so much on those spaces (efficiency, smarts, skills) that we forget the need to make room for other kinds of development and maturity. The maturity that matters in God’s eyes is really quite simple: love. Love is the thing that needs to be fully developed and perfected. And the love that I’m talking about is not the love we have for our cars or our shoes such that we build bigger garages and closets. Agape is the Greek term for the kind of love that needs more room in our lives. This is the kind of love that God has for us…this is the kind of love that God IS.
John Wesley made the centerpiece of all his preaching and teaching the concept of Christian Perfection. People got hung up on this term in his day for much the same reason folks get hung up on it today: how can anyone be “perfect”? What does it mean? And doesn’t it just make those of us who struggle against tendencies of “perfectionism” that much more neurotic?? Well, Wesley never meant more or less than that we are to grow in love, that we—by the grace and power of God—are to grow in that perfect love that is God’s love…that we are to let all the spaces and rooms of our lives become so full of the love of God that the light of that love will radiate, motivate, infuse all that we do. That is the goal of the Christian life: to go on to perfection, to perfect love, to grow in love.
If you have amazing gifts, well-developed gifts that aren’t motivated, offered, and lit from within by love, you’ve got room to grow. This is what Paul makes clear in his letter to the Corinthians. If you are a great public speaker or writer, but have not love…if you’re a brilliant prophetic teacher and preacher, but have not love…if you give large amounts of money to good causes and to the church, but have not love…you are nothing, gain nothing. Even if you’re the brightest bulb on the tree, your light is nothing without love. Paul goes on to describe the love that is our goal, the love in which we need to be perfected, the love that is fully developed, fully mature. It is patient and kind. We could stop right there and focus on just those two things—if we could consistently be patient, if we could consistently be kind, then just imagine the difference that would make! And, while this passage of scripture is frequently used in sentimental ways, what Paul goes on to say strips us of any illusion of sentimentality. Because he names habits that plague human relationships: in addition to impatience and unkindness, he mentions envy, boasting, arrogance, rudeness, selfishness, irritability, resentment, deliberate wrongdoing, deceit, dishonesty. Which of these things do you struggle with the most? Where is God calling you to grow today—to adjust the “blueprints” for some remodeled living? I ask because none of us have “gone on to perfection” to use Wesley’s phrase. But it also doesn’t work to say, “well, perfect love is impossible to achieve, so I don’t need to try to be truly loving, patient, kind.” All of us need to continue to grow in this perfect love.
John Wesley would often say that if God had said that it was so, then God had the power to make it so. And in Matthew’s gospel account Jesus says this: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven… For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
“Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect” in love…If God has said it, then God must be able to accomplish it—in US. “When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.” This perfect love is what it means to be truly mature. And the only way to be “thoroughly developed, perfected” is by God’s love dwelling more and more abundantly in you. We need to open ourselves to God’s love so that that light will shine and illumine all the “rooms” of our lives, revealing and dispelling any fractious, destructive, mean-spirited ways of acting and living. The light of God’s love is what helps us to see ourselves more clearly. For we know that God sees us with absolute clarity. God sees my occasional brattiness and all my other flaws and needs for growth; God sees you too. You and I are fully known by God. And the miracle is that God loves us perfectly, even still.
This perfect love took a human face in Jesus. And when this perfect love went to his home church for a visit, they couldn’t stand the thought that he wouldn’t just share his gifts with them, they were enraged at Jesus’ implication that the miracle of his love would be offered to people whom they deemed enemies, to people they despised. When Jesus went to his home church to visit the adults with whom he had grown up, perhaps folks who had taught him the Torah, and played with him as a child, perhaps adults whom he had admired…what happened? They tried to kill him. There’s no fight like a church fight… But thanks be to God that God’s love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Because that means that there’s still love—and hope—for us. Amen.
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