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May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord our Rock
and our Redeemer. Amen.
Master story teller, preacher, and teacher of preachers Fred B. Craddock tells this
story:1 “My mother took us to church and Sunday school; my father didn’t go. He
complained about Sunday dinner being later when she came home. Sometimes the
preacher would call, and my father would say, ‘I know what the church wants. Church
doesn’t care about me. Church wants another name, and another pledge. Right? Isn’t
that the name of the game? Another name, another pledge.’
“That’s what (my father) always said. Sometimes we’d have a revival. Pastor
would bring the evangelist and say to the evangelist, ‘There’s one now, sic him, get him,
get him,’ and my father would say the same thing. Every time, my mother in the kitchen,
always nervous, in fear of flaring tempers, of somebody being hurt. And always my
father said, ‘The church doesn’t care about me. The church wants another name and
another pledge." I guess I heard it a thousand times.
“One time (my father) didn’t say it. He was in the veteran’s hospital, and he was
down to 73 pounds. They’d taken out his throat, and (my father) said, ‘It’s too late.’
They put in a metal tube, and X-rays burned him to pieces. I flew in to see him. He
couldn’t speak, couldn’t eat. I looked around the room, potted plants and cut flowers on
all the windowsills, a stack of cards twenty inches deep beside (my father’s) bed. And
even that tray where they put food, if you can eat, on that was a flower. And all the
flowers beside the bed, every card, every blossom, were from persons or groups from the
church.
“(My father) saw me read a card. He could not speak, so he took a Kleenex box
and wrote on the side of it a line from Shakespeare. If he had not written this line, I
would not tell you this story. (My father) wrote: ‘In this harsh world, draw your breath in
pain to tell my story.’
“I said, ‘What is your story, Daddy?’
“And (my father) wrote, ‘I was wrong.’
It’s sad, really. And I don’t mean just this sad story about a man who had
hardened his heart and pigeonholed the church for so many years that he couldn’t see
beyond his own prejudice until, at the end of his life, he finally did see how those church
people had been caring about him.
What saddens me is how often over the years I’ve heard people lash out with the
same words: “The church doesn’t care about me. The church wants another name and
another pledge.” But what grieves me most is when I hear these same or similar words
thrown like stones by people who regularly sit in church pews.
I’m sure it won’t surprise you when I say I don’t agree with the accusation: “The
church doesn’t care. The church wants another name and another pledge. That’s the
name of the game.” And my disagreement isn’t because wearing this backwards collar I
take them personally. No. I disagree because I’ve seen so much caring in the church;
caring that often never gets any attention and goes unthanked; caring shared simply and
quietly and given without expectation of repayment; caring given because it is part of
how we live as disciples who walk in the footsteps of Jesus.
Now, does the church – that means you and I – do we practice our caring or
anything we do as the Body of Christ – the Church – do we practice our faith perfectly?
Of course not. And God forbid if we ever do believe and go about acting as if we have it
all together. There is good reason we begin our worship with words of confession and
forgiveness. We never outgrow our need for both.
But there’s yet another reason I don’t agree with the claim that the church doesn’t
care, that all the church wants is another name and another pledge. I disagree because my
family – all of near and far – and I have received much caring from the church, from the
people of God who gather week after week, month after month, year after year around the
Word, Water, Bread and Wine of God’s grace, forgiveness, and hope – those tangible, so
very real things of God’s caring sacred heart.
In the book The Screwtape Letters, by C. S. Lewis, a devil named Screwtape
briefs his nephew Wormwood, a demon-in-training, on the subtleties and techniques of
tempting people. In his letters, the devil tells Wormword that the goal is not to make
people wicked but to make them indifferent. Screwtape cautions Wormwood he must
keep the man he is working on comfortable at all costs. He warns Wormwood that if the
man starts thinking about anything of importance, he should encourage the fellow to
think more about his plans for lunch and not worry so much because it will only give him
indigestion. And then Screwtape gives this instruction to his devil-in-training nephew:"I, the devil, will always see to it that there are bad people. Your job, my dear
Wormwood, is to provide me with people who do not care."
We Christians – people sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the Cross of
Christ, forever – rejoice and give thanks that God calls us to be good stewards, to be
people who give generously because we care deeply and genuinely, with all our hearts
and with all our minds and all our strength; we care because caring is the Christian’s
joyful response to God’s caring call to discipleship.
Did you hear that word – joyful?
We Christians give generously and joyfully of our time, our talent and our money
not because we have to. We give because we want to give with joy as part of our caring.
We give not because the Church needs to receive, but because of the Christian’s (our)
need to give and to care. We give because in a world that assaults us with an unceasing
barrage of messages telling us we don’t have enough, that we need to be concerned about
getting ours while the getting is good, in this topsy-turvy world that teaches “what’s in it
for me?” and “are you comfortable with that?” are to be the first and last questions
ordering our lives; no, in this world we crazy Christians rejoice and give thanks because
by God’s grace we see and believe that everything under heaven and on earth belongs to
the one God who has already given us everything – our selves, our time, and our
possessions.
The words of the Psalmist (105) ring as true for us today as on that day when
they were first sung in Jerusalem’s Temple:
O give thanks to the LORD, call on his name,
make known his deeds among the peoples.
Sing to him, sing praises to him;
tell of all his wonderful works.
Glory in his holy name;
let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice.
Sisters and brothers in Christ who love God and care deeply, let us rejoice in our
living, in our believing, and in our giving for we are truly and greatly blessed.
The Lord be with you. Amen.
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