All Together Now
1
Mark Twain once observed, “April Fools Day is a day on which we celebrate what we are the other 364 days of the year.”
Our family has always taken the opposite view of this odd holiday. For us, April Fool’s Day has been the day when we’re allowed to be everything we are not all the other days of the year. We’ve had food fights. We have eaten our meal under the dining room table. We’ve eaten supper on doll dishes. We’ve sat down to meals of spaghetti, applesauce and pudding, with no silverware. We’ve served purple oatmeal and blue pancakes on our best china. We had children roll dice to determine what they could eat with their next forkful. We have had the kids sit with fishing poles on one side of a bed sheet strung across the table, while Linda and I were on the other side attaching food to their lines.
April Fools Day has been the one day when we forget decorum and manners and allow ourselves to descend into chaos and anarchy.
Now why, you are asking, would I be talking about April Fools Day in the middle of January? Well, today is our Annual Congregational meeting. And it’s amazing how often official church meetings, whether in a congregation, at a synod convention, or a national convention, remind me of April Fools Day. Especially if any major or controversial issue is on the agenda.
You’d swear that church meetings are a special day of the year when we all decide that it’s okay to go nuts. We forget everything we know about decorum and manners and descend into anarchy. Except when it happens to a group of Christians, it isn’t funny.
I’ve been to church meetings where the atmosphere was poisonous, where insults flew fast and thick, where different groups got on the phone ahead of time to stack the meeting with their supporters, where people used parliamentary tricks to silence opposition and ram through their agendas. I’ve been to church meetings where the hard work of sincere, dedicated people was ridiculed and sabotaged.
I remember meetings where the winners gloated and high-fived, and the losers stormed out, never to set foot in that church again over issues as trivial as whether a stained glass window should be restored. I’ve probably told you about a church meeting that ended with one member standing in the parking lot, giving obscene gestures to everyone as the walked out. I know of a church where a group demanded an up or down vote on a motion. When the motion failed, by a vote of 149 to 148, all 148 on the losing side immediately quit the church and went around to neighboring communities, bragging about how they had wrecked that church.
Can you understand why church meetings get me thinking about April Fool’s Day?
It isn’t always that way. The meetings in this congregation since I’ve been here have been pretty respectful. And I don’t care how hot or volatile the issue is, it should never be like April Fools Day. The kinds of ugly scenarios I described are not going to happen if we take to heart Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, which just happens to be a lectionary reading for today.
Let me read this part again: “I appeal to you, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.”
Now there’s a supernaive thought! “No divisions? Perfectly united in mind and thought?” This congregation? Whose members range from those who would like return to the old red book liturgy to those who don’t want any liturgy at all? This congregation? Whose members represent all colors of the political spectrum and who can be found on all sides of any societal issue?
Unity in the ELCA? Where congregations regularly drop out of the synod and national church because of one beef or another?
Unity in Christianity? A religion that has over 9,000 generally recognized denominations, many of which are not even on speaking terms with each other?
What planet was Paul living on when he wrote these words?
Paul was prompted to give this advice when he received word that his
congregation in
Apparently a major cause of the rift was bragging over who baptized them. I was baptized by X, you were baptized by Y. X is better than Y, that makes me better than you.
Sounds silly? Of course it does, to an outsider. But the Corinthians were not unique in this regard. An awful lot of the arguments within churches sound just as silly to outsiders, or to anyone who has any perspective at all on the issue.
Paul thought so as well. In his letter to Titus, he summed up his feelings about the Corinthian mess with this clear directive: Avoid stupid controversies,(that’s exactly the word he uses: “stupid”) avoid stupid controversieys, genealogies, dissension, and quarrels over the law, for they are unprofitable and futile.
When Paul appeals to Christians agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought, he is not suggesting that we stick our heads in the sand and ignore every issue that might possibly produce an argument. He is not suggesting that we suppress all questions, and paper over any possible disagreements we might have, and float along through life with a saintly smile pasted on our faces. Nor is he suggesting that all of the difficult issues we find ourselves facing as a church are trivial.
What he is saying is what we talked about in adult ed last week, concerning Galatians. Where is your focus? We in the church are not a group of people called together to proclaim and enforce the law. We are not a group of people who have come together for the common purpose of deciding how we should think or act on matters of procedure, or budget, or even morality.
Yes, we do those things. We have to. We as a congregation, and as members of the larger church, have to decide how we are going to act, what rules we are going to follow, what policies we shall undertake, and the best ways to implement our goals and allocate our funds. We must do those things in order to function in this world.
But as Paul’s letter to the Corinthians reminds us, that’s not the reason for our existence. That’s not who we are.
When those knotty issues and sharp disagreements come up within the church, he says, remember who you are. Remember whose you are. “You people who think you’re my guys, my allies,” he writes. “You’re not. You don’t belong to Paul. Did I die for you? “What’s the big deal about who baptized you, or how it was done?” he says. “I don’t even remember who I baptized and who I didn’t, and what’s more, I don’t care. The point is that you have been baptized into the family of God; it doesn’t make a shred of difference who baptized you.”
“You belong to Christ,” says Paul. “You have been bought and redeemed by him. You have been called in love to be a part of God’s church and to be a witness to the world about God’s saving grace. That’s who you are.”
If we keep Paul’s words in mind, we won’t find ourselves bogged down in ugly infighting or political mudslinging or petty quarrels that only serve to dishonor God’s name and hinder the crucial work that we are called to do on this earth. If we focus on our identity as the people who love as Christ loved us, we won’t be getting into gutter brawls over who runs the church.
If we remember who we are and whose we are, we will discover some freedoms that we could never achieve on our own.
1. We will discover that it’s okay to disagree. One of my favorite sayings is that if you and I agree on everything, then one of us is unnecessary. People who focus on their identity as the people who love as Christ loved us share what they know, what they think, and what they feel, and listen to others do the same.
In our polarized society, it’s hard to do. The prevailing attitude in our country seems to be, when I want your opinion, I’ll give it to you. If we remember who we are and whose we are, then a contrary opinion on a matter of law is not artillery fire to be taken out with a barrage of criticism, but experience to be honored. The purpose of debate in the church is to educate each other. I bring what I know and think and feel to share with you; I invite all of you to do the same.
2. We will discover that we are free to be passionate in our discussions. Personally, I like to see people in a church display the passion of their convictions, when it comes to carrying out the mission of the church.
Passion of convictions can be rather obnoxious when it has to do with personal likes and dislikes. But when the passion of our conviction is focused on our identity as the people who love as Christ loved us, passion is powerful and moving. It’s a sign that the Spirit has moved someone to care deeply about God’s church and doing God’s will.
It is only when we become, as Paul says, “slaves to passion” that things spin out of control. Remember who we are, and whose we are. Who is driving that emotion? Followers of Christ are not slaves to passion, driven by malice, envy, ego, and hatred. They use passion in the service of love.
Whatever the issue, we know who we are and whose we are. That decision has been made for us. All we decide in our meetings is how we are going to respond to God’s grace. We do the best we can, while asking God’s guidance.
My understanding of Paul’s call for unity is this. Last week one of
our members wore a Green Bay Packer shirt to church. It brought back fond
memories of my internship congregation, which was located in
As a result, pro football loyalties were split about 50-50 between Packers and Vikings. Pro football is big up there, and we had families who wore Green and Gold to every service during the fall, and an equal number who wore their Viking’s purple. Neither side would give an inch in that border rivalry.
Yet every Sunday, the green and the gold stood up with the purple and all together, they declared their faith in the words of the Apostles Creed. They knelt at the same altar, side by side, to accept God’s grace in communion. They shared the peace with one another. And when something needed doing, or someone needed help, they joined together to do.
Paul is not asking for uniformity; he’s asking for unity.
I mentioned two ways of looking at April Fool’s Day. Is it a day in which we go wild and crazy and forget who we are the other 364 days? Or is it a day in which we celebrate what we are the other 364 days? For April Fools, I happen to like wild and crazy.
Those same two choices stare us in the face every time we meet as a congregation for whatever reason, every time we come together in worship, every time we talk about what is going on in this place.
Is this going to be a day where we as a church go nuts and forget who we are the rest of the year? Or is it a day where we celebrate what we are the other 364 days of the year? Where we celebrate being the people whom God has loved, not because of any works of righteousness we have done, but through his mercy, through the water of baptism, and the renewal of the Holy Spirit which he poured out upon us richly?
That is the choice. May we live in the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace.