1 Peter 2:2-10
What Binds Us Together
James Sledge May 22, 2011
Some years ago – it may have been back when I was in seminary – a Sunday Doonesbury comic strip depicted a couple who was doing some “church shopping.” They were seated in the office of the Reverend Scott Sloan, the laid back pastor who has been a regular in Doonesbury for decades. “So what would you like to know about the Little Church of Walden, folks?” Pastor Sloan asks. “Don’t hold back—I know how difficult it can be to choose a church.”
“Well, what’s your basic approach here, Reverend,” asks the husband. “Is it traditional gospel?”
“In a way,” answers the pastor. “I like to describe it as 12 Step Christianity. Basically, I believe that we’re all recovering sinners. My ministry is about overcoming denial. It’s about re-commitment, about redemption. It’s all in the brochure there.”
“Wait a minute,” the woman interrupts, “Sinners?” Redemption? Doesn’t that all imply … guilt?”
“Well, yes,” admits the pastor, “I do rely on the occasional disincentive to keep the flock from going astray. Guilt’s part of that.”
“I dunno,” the man says, “There’s so much negativity in the world as it is.”
“That’s right,” agrees his wife. “We’re looking for a church that’s supportive, a place where we can feel good about ourselves. I’m not sure the guilt thing works for us.”
“On the other hand,” notes the husband, looking at the brochure, “you do offer racquetball.”
“So did the Unitarians, honey,” replies his wife. “Let’s shop around some more.”
This comic strip scene is not that far from reality. Although fewer and fewer Americans feel the need to choose a church, those who do often make the choice through a process not so different from buying a car or picking a college to attend. What sort of extras are there and how much do they cost? Do I like the look and feel? What sort of value to I get for my investment? And so on.
Now I don’t know that there is any great problem with people choosing a church congregation that fits their musical tastes or the worship style they grew up with. But I do worry sometimes that American notions of faith, salvation, and belief have become overly individualized and personalized.
Take that stereotypical faith question, “Are you saved?” Now admittedly this is not a standard Presbyterian question, but we’ve all been shaped by its very personal focus. In this very typically American take on faith, salvation is not a corporate thing. Congregation and community may have a role to play in bringing people to faith, but salvation is a matter or my Yes or No, of whether or not my name is on the divine guest list.
So what then are we to do with today’s words from 1 Peter? Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation – if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. Come to him, a living stone… and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood. But if salvation is a Yes or No answer, an in or out seal of approval, then how does one grow into it?
Grow into salvation… Like living stones, be built into a spiritual house… Stones are a popular building material around here. Our sanctuary is made of stone. And so I want you to do a little imagining with me. I want you to imagine a time when the sanctuary had not yet been built, when the building materials had been delivered and piles of stones were sitting there waiting to be used, but construction had not yet started.
Now here is where you really need your imaginations. Imagine that these stones are alive. They are somehow aware that a church sanctuary is about to be built and that they are to be part of it. And the stones are discussing this with one another. “Has anyone heard whether or not they’re putting a pipe organ in this church? I don’t want to be in a church that doesn’t have one. That’s not really a church.”
“I don’t care about that,” says another stone. I want a church that’s active in mission and evangelism, and I don’t want to be part of a place with too much focus on the building and Sunday services. I’d rather be part of a more modest building filled with people who do ministry outside the walls.”
“Well I would like a pipe organ,” says yet another stone, “but what I really want is well-ordered worship that respects tradition. I hope this isn’t going to be one of those churches that lets women be pastors or, God forbid, gays. If it is, I want no part of it.”
Imagine this conversation going on among all the stones, arguing about the kind of church they did or didn’t want to be a part of. And imagine the construction crew arriving on a Monday morning to begin work, only to discover that huge numbers of the stones were missing, having left to seek a place more to their liking.
Ridiculous, I know, but not so ridiculous when the living stones we’re talking about are you and me and all those others called to be one in Christ Jesus. It seems to me that more often than not, we do not think of Jesus as the mortar that holds us together, but rather those other things that we have in common. And so conservative stones come together to construct conservative churches and liberals stones to construct liberal ones. African American stones construct African American churches and white stones construct white ones. Wealthy, elite stones build wealthy churches, and working class stones build working class churches. And we, the living stones, seem bound together not into a spiritual house, but into a very human structure, constructed on foundations of ethnicity, possessions, politics, and personal tastes rather than on the cornerstone of Jesus.
Just over a week ago, a majority of the presbyteries – the regional, representative governing bodies in our Presbyterian Church (USA) – approved a change in our constitution that removes a requirement for all those being ordained as pastors, elders, or deacons, either to be in a marriage between a man and woman or chaste in singleness. And while this requirement did not mention gays or lesbians by name, the focus of the rule, and of its recent removal, has been on the ordination of gays and lesbians. And so you may have seen the headline in the Columbus Dispatch stating, “Presbyterians Decide to Accept Gay Clergy.”
I’ll forgive the fact that the Dispatch doesn’t appreciate that we Presbyterians treat the ordination of pastors the same as the ordination of elders and deacons. And while I fully support the change in our constitution and rejoice with gay and lesbian friends who now hope that they can use the gifts God has given them in the calls God has placed on their hearts, my deep concern at this moment lies with the conversations and arguments between those living stones.
“What a great day. God’s grace and the spirit of Jesus has triumphed over a couple of misunderstood biblical passages taken out of context.”
“Are you kidding? This vote is a travesty, an abandonment of biblical morality, and I don’t want to be part of a church that would even consider ordaining gays.”
“Are you kidding?! Well I don’t want to be in a church filled with old-fashioned bigots like you!”
Already the conversations in our denomination have turned to who is going to stay and who is going to go. How many conservative congregations are going to exit the denomination? And how will they be treated if they leave? Will presbyteries sue them to keep their church properties for the denomination? Will the squabbling amongst the stones turn bitter ?
Come to (Jesus), a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
God has chosen you in Jesus, and chosen that person near you that you disagree with, and that person you don’t like, and that person who hates the songs you like, and so on and so on, that together we might be bound into spiritual house, a holy people, a royal priesthood, to proclaim the wonders of God’s love and mercy that have joined us together into the living body of Christ.
Thanks be to God!
