Sabbatical Doubting

This is my last full week of work before beginning a sabbatical that will run until Labor Day. The ability to take a sabbatical after seven years was built into my call as pastor at the church I serve. I've been its pastor for a bit over seven years now, but that timing coincides with significant changes our congregation's leadership has planned.

We are nearing the end of a several year's long process that we have labeled "Renew," and this summer marks a time of transition from and old, heavy-on-the administrative-side committee structure to a new structure that is more focused on ministry. Summer is when the new teams will come up with priorities and implementation plans for the program year that begins in September. And I will be gone for much of that time.

All this is context for my recent church newsletter article which I've copied below.

Sisters and brothers in Christ,

As summer approaches, I find myself feeling a little uneasy. I’m not quite certain how to describe it. Neither worry nor concern nor trepidation seems quite right, but it’s something like that. My upcoming motorcycle sabbatical might seem a likely culprit, but I think not. I am truly looking forward to the trip, and I worry less about riding the highways of the American Southwest than I do the freeways of DC.

Another potential source of uneasiness is our Renew process. This summer will be an important time as the new Mercy, Worship, Justice, Spiritual Growth, Community Building, and Ministry Support teams begin to set priorities. The will develop focus and plans to help live into our mandate: Gathering those who fear they are not enough, so we may experience grace, wholeness, and renewal as God’s beloved. And I will be absent for much of that process.

I’d be lying if I said I had no anxieties about this. But Renew has been a collaborative project of the Session. I have certainly had input, but I’ve not been the primary leader. Elders have done the leading and the planning, and I have little reason to worry that the process will falter without my presence.

That said, I do think that my uneasiness is related to the Renew process. It’s not about the capabilities and commitment of our elders, our deacons, or our dedicated staff. The Renew process is in as capable a set of hands as any congregation could ever hope. Still, my uneasiness remains, and I wonder if this isn’t a faith issue.

Our missional mandate speaks of gathering people “…so that we may experience grace, wholeness, and renewal…” Appropriately it does not say “…so that we may provide grace, wholeness, and renewal…” These are not ours to give. They are gifts from God. No amount of capability and dedication on our part can bring about the transformation at the heart of Renew. It is dependent on God, on Jesus’ call, and on the movement of the Spirit, none of which is under our control.

Will we, along with those we gather in with us, experience grace, wholeness, and renewal as God’s beloved? And why wouldn’t we? Shouldn’t God be the most reliable part of this process, even more sure than the capabilities of elders, deacons and staff?

I see two different faith issues here. One is about making room for the Spirit. It is easy to get so focused on the things I need to do, the things we as a congregation must do, that God nearly gets shoved out of the picture. Many times I have caught myself functioning as though God was not present, that it is all dependent on us. If we do not work to stay connected to Jesus’ call, to the guidance and empowerment of the Spirit, we may find ourselves attempting to do, on our own, what only God can do.

But there is a more fundamental faith issue. Is God reliable? The Session has listened very carefully, spent much time in prayer and discernment, and has clearly heard Jesus calling us to our new missional mandate. But that mandate asks us to step out on faith, to risk that God will provide what is needed. Will God provide? I sometimes have my doubts, and perhaps that’s the heart of my uneasiness.

I have known people who say their faith is without doubt. I do not trust such people, and many great Christian thinkers would seem to agree with me. Paul Tillich once said, “Doubt isn’t the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith… Sometimes I think it is my mission to bring faith to the faithless, and doubt to the faithful.” John Calvin said, “…we cannot imagine any certainty that is not tinged with doubt, or any assurance that is not assailed by some anxiety.” And my favorite is from Frederick Buechner, “Doubts are the ants in the pants of faith. They keep it awake and moving.”

I hope my sabbatical allows me to do a lot of wrestling with doubts this summer. Perhaps the continuing Renew rollout will provide opportunities for you to do a little wrestling of your own.

May the summer bless you with fruitful doubting,

Sermon video: Jesus Shaped Community

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Sermon: Freed and Led by the Spirit

Romans 8:14-17; John 14:8-17, 25-26

Freed and Led by the Spirit

James Sledge                                                                           June 9, 2019 – Pentecost

When I entered seminary at age 35, it took me a semester to adjust to the huge amount of reading. A lot of it was simply something to get through, but some had a profound impact on me. I vividly remember reading Resident Aliens. This seminal, 1989 work by Stanley Hauerwas and Will Willimon of Duke Divinity School explored what it means to be Christian in rapidly changing world. Let me read just a bit of the books provocative opening.

Somewhere between 1960 and 1980, an old, inadequately conceived world ended, and a fresh, new world began. We do not mean to be overly dramatic. Although there are many who have not yet heard the news, it is nevertheless true. A tired old world has ended, and an exciting new one is awaiting recognition…

When and how did we change? Although it may sound trivial, one of us is tempted to date the shift sometime on a Sunday evening in 1963. Then, in Greenville, South Carolina, in defiance of the state’s time-honored blue laws, the Fox Theater opened on Sunday. Seven of us—regular attenders of the Methodist Youth Fellowship at Buncombe Street Church—made a pact to enter the front door of the church, be seen, then quietly slip out the back door and join John Wayne at the Fox.

That evening has come to represent a watershed in the history of Christendom, South Carolina style. On that night, Greenville, South Carolina—the last pocket of resistance to secularity in the Western world—served notice it would no longer be a prop for the church. There would be no more free rides. The Fox Theater went head to head with the church over who would provide the world view for the young. That night in 1963, the Fox Theater won the opening skirmish.^[1]

As Christendom faded, church more and more became optional. A numerical decline set in that continues to this day. It seems that many were at church only because it was required or expected. Realizing this was no longer so, people left. So were they ever really followers of Jesus? And what about the church congregations that nurtured such believers?

What does it mean to be Christian, to be church? There was a time, not so many years ago, when people spoke of Presbyterians as “the Republican party at prayer.” That referred to a very different Republican party, one with strong liberal and progressive wings. Regardless, such a label describes an identity rooted less in following Jesus and more in an easy, comfortable compatibility with mainstream, middle-class America.

At the height of Christendom, American-style, people were assumed to be Christian, and Christianity was often a generalized belief in Jesus mixed with morality, citizenship, and patriotism. “American Civil Religion,” as it has been called, was a necessarily vague faith that claimed Jesus and belief in God without too many details or particulars, permitting it to be compatible with a culture that subjugated women and people of color, while it happily blessed patriotism, capitalism, consumerism, and war.

But now, thanks to a changed world that no longer subsidizes and props up the church, we’ve been freed from the constraints of that old civil religion and its Faustian bargain with culture. We have been given the opportunity to discover who we are on our own, no longer wedded to a culture that expects us to water down and domesticate the gospel.

Such freedom has proved disorienting, and many would love to go back. I’ve lost track of all the times retired colleagues told me how glad they are not to be serving a church nowadays. No doubt, things were easier, but I don’t want to go back. I want us to figure out what it means to be Jesus’ church. Not an American church, not a white, middle-class church, but a church that follows Jesus and calls all manner of people to the new life he brings.

Sermon: Jesus Shaped Community

John 17:20-26

Jesus Shaped Community

James Sledge                                                                                       June 2, 2019

As a pastor, I’m fascinated by how congregations work, what makes them tick. Fortunately for me, there are all sorts of research and books about this. One particular area of research focuses on how congregations have predictable behavior patterns based on their size, patterns that cut across denominational and theological lines

This research identifies four types of congregations labeled, from small to large, family, pastoral, program, and corporate,. Corporate church are very large and staff driven in the extreme. Nearly every program area is directed by paid staff with the pastor as CEO.

Program churches have similarities with the corporate, with a number of thriving program areas. But being smaller, lay leaders provide some of the program leadership, and pastors can’t be CEOs because they are often leading volunteers. In both program and corporate churches, people tend to join because of one of more of the many program offerings.

The pastoral church may have some strong programs, but its identity is focused very much on the pastor. Most have only one pastor, but if there is an associate, and that person visits a member in the hospital, the person may not think they been visited by the church.  And people tend to join or leave such churches because they like of dislike the pastor.

The final category is the family church. A lot of churches use the term “family” to describe themselves, but this category applies to only the smallest congregations. These churches literally function like families, often with a matriarch or patriarch who is the real power regardless of governing structure. The pastor, if there is one, is a kind of paid chaplain.

A lot of people assume that a small, family church would be the warmest and friendliest. In truth, they are the hardest to enter. Like real families, becoming part of one requires being born into it, marrying into it, or somehow getting adopted. You can get your name on the roll in the same way as in any church, but ten years later you will likely still be “the new guy” and not quite part of the family.

Now if you’re not fascinated with how congregations work, your eyes may be starting to glaze over. But want us all to think for a bit about what it is that creates a faith community, what it is that binds you to this congregation or to some other. What drew you to the church and what holds you there? What is it that makes you feel a part of it? How strong are the bonds that connect you? Would it be easy to leave if you were unhappy or would wild horses be unable to drag you away?

Sermon video: God with Skin On

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Sermon: God with Skin On

Luke 24:36-48

God with Skin On

James Sledge                                                                                       May 19, 2019

I’ve likely told this story before, but it seems worth retelling. A mom is putting her young child to bed, but he’s frightened and begs her to stay with him. She does those things parents do, explain that there’s nothing to be afraid of, remind him that she’ll be just outside his room, and so on, but none does much good. Finally she says, “God will be right here the entire night.” But the boy protests, “I need God with skin on!”

You can’t really blame him. God can feel pretty wispy at times, an idea or concept without a lot of substance. If I’m really frightened, a concept may not feel all that comforting. If I don’t have enough to eat, saying “God loves you,” won’t do much good.

The whole Jesus business is, in part, about giving God some skin, about a God that removes some of the wispiness and lets us say, “Oh, so this is what God is like.” Yet modern Christianity sometimes minimizes the skin on part, preferring God as concept. And so Jesus the man, the Jewish rabbi, gets turned into Christ, a not quite human figure without all those messy particulars of skin and bodily functions and Jewishness. Sometimes it’s easier to run a religion where God is a manageable concept without too much skin.

The gospels, however, go to great lengths to insist on the fleshiness of Jesus, not just before his death and resurrection but after it as well. Our reading this morning is one of several that go out of their way to keep Jesus’ skin on. People are invited to touch him, and, in Luke’s gospel, Jesus eats in two successive stories.

On the day of resurrection, two disciples meet Jesus as they walk to Emmaus but don’t recognize him. Only when they stop for the evening and share a meal where Jesus takes bread, blesses and breaks it, do the disciples realize it is Jesus.

They rush back to Jerusalem and are telling the others what happened when Jesus shows up once more. He invites his friends to touch him, to see that he has skin on, then he asks, “Have you anything to eat?” And he eats the fish they give him.

This might seem a totally unnecessary detail unless you’re determined to present the risen Jesus as a fleshy, with-skin-on sort of God. For the gospels, and for biblical faith, bodies are not a problem to be overcome. Salvation is not about a spiritual existence apart from the body. Christian faith is a messy, incarnate faith where God has skin on, and where following Jesus with our earthly bodies is as much the focus as what happens when we die. Christian faith only works when it is embodied, when it has skin on.

Sermon video: Won't You Be A Neighbor

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Sermon: Transfroming, Holy Space

Isaiah 1:12-17; Romans 12:1-2

Transforming, Holy Space

James Sledge                                                                                       May 12, 2019

The other day I attended the annual spring luncheon of the Falls Church Community Service Council at Knox Presbyterian. Some of you bring food for their food pantry, and our congregation has long supported this and other programs at FCS.

This year’s lunch celebrated their 50^th anniversary. A representative from Church World Services spoke briefly and reminded us of all that was happening in 1969, the first moon landing, Woodstock, all the tumult and turmoil. “It was a time when we thought we could change the world,” he said. But then he added, “Not many of the people I work with feel that way these days. Many of them are depressed.” He went on to make a more hopeful point, but I was still thinking about that journey from expecting to change the world to despair.

Perhaps it was simply a matter of hopes meeting reality. That speaker mentioned that the number of refugees in the world is now larger than at any time since the end of World War II, a rather sobering statistic. But along with being sobered up by cold, hard facts, I wonder about the source of that confidence back in 1969.

I was only twelve years old at the time, but I suspect that expectations of changing the world were partly rooted in a belief in progress and the idea that we humans could do anything we put our minds to. America had helped win World War II, become the dominant super power, and put a man on the moon. On top of that, the 60s saw huge gains by the Civil Rights movement, and a burgeoning anti-war movement, Between unparalleled scientific advances and great social change, it was easy to see endless possibilities.

I wonder if Civil Rights leaders such as Martin Luther King shared the same sort of optimism. They had a different sense of the difficulties and costs involved. My impression is that Dr. King’s optimism was not rooted in a belief in progress or endless human capabilities. It was rooted in faith, in a certainty that God’s will would ultimately prevail.

Perhaps that is why Civil Rights rallies often looked a little like African American worship. Such worship wasn’t so much about personal piety or salvation but about salvation history, about the power of God at work to free the oppressed and set right injustice.

The worship I sat through growing up in the 60s and 70s was very different. Our white, middle class worship fit easily into American civil religion that often saw the Civil Rights movement and, to a greater degree, the anti-war movement as threats. Even in churches that were sympathetic to these movements, faith and worship often served as a respite from the tumult, largely disconnected from any hope or desire to change the world.

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Sermon: Won't You Be a Neighbor

Luke 10:25-37

Won’t You Be a Neighbor

James Sledge                                                                                                   May 5, 2019

Perhaps you are familiar with the old, proverbial saying, “Charity begins at home.” Many assume it is from the Bible, but it’s not. Its first written appearance is in 1600s England, when the word “charity” was used somewhat differently than today.

In the old King James Bible, the Apostle Paul’s famous words on love instead speak of charity. And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three, but the greatest of these is charity. And so the old proverb’s understanding of charity would  include “Christ-like love.”

Originally, the proverb spoke of how people learned to be loving and caring by witnessing such behavior at home. You could say much the same of other behaviors. A strong work ethic begins at home. Good citizenship begins at home. Love of learning begins at home, etc.

However, I typically hear the proverb used quite differently. “Why should our government send financial aid overseas when there are needy people here? Charity begins at home.” Here the proverb is taken to set limits on charity. Only after those close by are cared for should it be extended to others.

I take it that the lawyer who questions Jesus in our gospel reading would have used the proverb in this latter fashion. He’s concerned with rules and limits. “What must I do…?”  He’s is an expert in the Law of Moses, so he knows the answer, easily providing appropriate scriptures. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”

Jesus is happy to confirm that this is indeed the correct answer, adding, “Do this, and you will live.” But the lawyer is a “charity begins and ends at home” sort, and so he wants Jesus to clarify the boundaries, the limits. “And who is my neighbor?”

If I have to love my neighbor, I want to know where the neighborhood ends. Is it people who live on my street? Is it my religious group or church? Is it people of my race? Is it citizens of my country? Where can I stop, Jesus?

Jesus doesn’t really answer the question, but he does tell a famous story. It’s a somewhat troubling parable about what happens to a man who’s been robbed and left for dead, although some of its more troubling aspects get lost in translation and its familiarity.

Easter sermon video: An Idle Tale

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.

Easter sermon: An Idle Tale

Luke 24:1-12

An Idle Tale

James Sledge                    Resurrection of the Lord                         April 21, 2019

In recent weeks I’ve seen several versions of an Easter Facebook joke that goes something like this. “In an effort to be more biblical, only women will be attending the Easter sunrise service.”

Over the years, many have remarked that the story of women being the first witnesses to the empty tomb must be historical. No one would invent this sort of Easter story. People still dismiss what women have to say in our day. Imagine what it was like in a day when women were not even citizens, when they couldn’t be witnesses at a trial, when they were considered property that belonged to a man, either their father or husband.

And sure enough, in Luke’s version of that first Easter morning, no one believes the women. You’ve heard the story before. Some of Jesus’ female disciples, and apparently none of the men, had followed when Jesus’s body was taken to the tomb. Then they had gone back, prepared spices, and rested on the Sabbath as the commandment required.

Early Sunday morning, they took the spices to the tomb, hoping to give Jesus the tender care they had not had time for on Friday evening. But when they arrive, they find the tomb open and the body missing. As they are wondering what to do, two men in dazzling clothes, later described as angels, say to them. “He is not here, but has risen,” and remind the women how Jesus had told them that he would be crucified and rise on the third day.

And so Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and other women hurry back to tell the eleven and the others what they had found. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.

I probably wouldn’t have believed them either, even if this had happened in 2019 where women aren’t routinely dismissed… unless they are contradicting a man. I know what’s possible and what isn’t. I know that dead people stay dead. Even if I believe that a soul moves on somehow, I know that the body stays in the grave. “He is not here, but has risen.” What a cockamamie idea. Who would believe such a thing?

But Peter got up and ran to the tomb. He was among those who didn’t believe the women’s report, and yet he rushes to the tomb. Why rush to investigate an idle tale? 

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Sermon video: Accidental Parade Goers

Audios of sermons and worship available on the FCPC website.