(Luke 10: 1-11)
School for Congregational Development
“Momentum”
San Diego, CA
August 18, 2018
We don’t live in an agricultural society anymore. Few of us grow our own food. But anyone who has had to farm or grow and produce food understands the urgency of harvesting the fields on time.
At the time of Jesus’ ministry, people were familiar with growing food. They knew that it was urgent to bring in the harvest. They knew to hire extra workers to bring in the harvest, because unlike now, you could not get food trucked in or flown in from around the world. All food was local.
If you did not harvest your field on time-- if the grain rotted in the field--your family might not make it through the winter. You and your family or those in your community might go hungry or starve.
Jesus knew this and knew that his listeners knew this. That is why he used the image of the harvest to communicate urgency. He wanted his disciples to understand that the harvesting of the mission field was just as urgent as harvesting a field for food.
So here he is in this passage in Luke, commissioning the church. This was not just 12 disciples, but 72. They were being sent out in twos and told to take nothing with them. “Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road,” Jesus said (Luke 10:4). You don’t have time. You don’t have time to pack. You don’t have time to tarry in conversation. Harvesting these fields is too urgent.
What Jesus was trying to tell his disciples was that the needs of the world and the urgency of the Gospel should compel them to go with urgency, and to go now!
Friends, we are at a difficult and urgent time in our world. And, I believe that though we know this, we sometimes misplace the urgency. We sometimes make the mistake of thinking that the urgency is about us-- about how many people are in our pews--about our fears of decline. We sometimes think that the urgency is about our own survival. But, the urgency is not about us. The urgency is about the needs of a hurting world. The urgency is about what I believe to be a type of nihilism that is plaguing our world.
Nihilism is a kind of hopelessness. It is a belief that life has no meaning or purpose. It is also, according to one philosopher, a rejection of any moral or ethical order in the world. The philosopher and social critic, Cornel West describes it like this:
“Nihilism is…the lived experience of coping with a life of horrifying meaninglessness, hopelessness, and (most important) lovelessness. The frightening result is a numbing detachment from others and a self-destructive disposition toward the world. Life without meaning, hope, and love breeds a coldhearted, mean-spirited outlook that destroys both the individual and others.”[1]
What else friends could it be but this kind of nihilistic, lovelessness and coldhearted dismissal of any sense of moral order that would drive people to take immigrant children from their parents and put them in cages?
What else could it be but a frightening and nihilistic type of hopelessness that would drive young men and young women living in some of our rural communities to pump opioids into their bodies, debasing themselves for a mind-numbing high?
What else could it be friends but a nihilistic kind of meaninglessness that would lead a mass shooter to take 58 innocent lives at a country western festival in Las Vegas or that would lead a young man to murder African-American worshippers during a prayer service in Charleston, South Carolina?
What else could it be but meaninglessness, hopelessness and lovelessness that would drive people to such numbing detachment from others and to such a self-destructive disposition to the world (to use West’s words).
Friends do you realize that it is not salvation from eternal damnation that people need today—but salvation from a nihilistic life of horrifying meaninglessness, hopelessness and lovelessness—salvation from a life that rejects a moral or ethical order—salvation from a life that is coldhearted and mean-spirited, detached from others and ultimately self-destructive and destructive of others and of the world.
This is the salvation that people need today. And God has called the church to rush with urgency into a cauldron of pain in the world, and to offer the salvation that comes from a life lived in faith and from an identity grounded in God.
Indeed, it is our faith and our relationship with God that gives meaning to our lives. We find meaning in the knowledge that we were created in the image of God. We find meaning in a relationship with a risen savior. We find meaning in our call to make disciples of all people, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We find meaning in our faith, in our identity as children of God, and in this vocation of discipleship.
We find meaning and we find hope. We find hope in the reality of a resurrected Christ. You remember the stories of the empty tomb, don’t you? The women go to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body. But they encounter an angel who says,
“Why do you look for the living among the dead? He isn’t here, but has been raised. Remember what he told you while he was still in Galilee, that the Human One must be handed over to sinners, be crucified, and on the third day rise again.” Luke 24: 5b-8
Christ rose from the dead. Oppression, and strife could not keep him down. When we face the same oppression and strife in our lives, we know that these things cannot keep us down, because we find hope in the resurrected Christ and in our promised resurrection.
Friends, we find meaning and hope in our relationship with the God revealed in Jesus Christ. We find meaning and hope in our faith. And, if we can find hope and meaning in our faith and in our relationship with God, then we can help others find meaning and hope in their lives by sharing our faith and by sharing with them Jesus. And if we can help people find meaning and hope by sharing our faith, we also can help them find love. We can help them find love by telling them the good news that we have heard and internalized for ourselves:
“For God so loved the world that God gave his only begotten son that whosoever believe in him shall not perish.” John 3:16
We can help them find love by telling them the Good News that has gotten us through some of our toughest times:
You are precious and honored in God’s sight, and God loves you. Isa 43:4
We can help others find the love of God by bringing to them the bread of life. We can help others find the love of God by being with them as the embodiment of the living and loving Christ.
His love can come to others through us. His hope can lighten the load of others through us. He can bring meaning into the lives of others through us and through our witness to the Gospel.
We are God’s 72. God has sent us--the church into the mission field. The harvest is a world that needs to hear a message of hope and a message of love. The harvest is a world that desperately needs to grab hold of some sense of meaning.
And bringing in this harvest is urgent. You know what the Apostle Paul reminds us of in Romans:
“How are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone to proclaim him?...“How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”Romans 10: 14-15b
Now, I know that over these last days at this School for Congregational Development, you have gotten a sense of urgency and momentum about bringing that Good News. Indeed the theme is “momentum.” You have gotten some momentum from being at this event, haven’t you?
Do you know what momentum means? It is a term from physics. It involves an interplay between mass and motion. The more mass or the faster the motion, the greater the momentum. Or put another way, you can increase your momentum by increasing either your mass or the speed of your motion. Momentum is, according to one definition --“mass in motion.”
So, let’s play with that image for a moment-- in the context of what is happening with our church. We like to tell ourselves that we are in decline. We like to tell ourselves that The United Methodist Church is getting smaller. Maybe that is true. But, guess what—God doesn’t care. Because if momentum is an interplay between mass and motion. If your mass is getting smaller. Then God calls us to speed up our motion. Run into the mission field! Run faster! Go with urgency! Speed up your motion and momentum, because the task is urgent.
Now let me say one more thing about momentum. You know of course that you can measure the momentum of an object by how hard it is to stop it. An object that is harder to stop has greater momentum.
Friends, when you go from here someone or something is going to try to slow down your momentum. Somebody or something is going to try to stop your momentum. But you must keep going, and go quickly--preaching the Gospel and telling people about the coming kingdom of God. Do not let anyone or anything get in the way. Go with so much momentum that nothing can stop you.
And I mean nothing-- not even the uncertainty about what will happen at the special session in 2019-- not even the uncertainty about what will happen in 2020 as we try to discern how to better be a worldwide church.
Yes, we are at a crossroads right now, and we don’t know what we will become. Yes, many of us are anxious. But friends we cannot afford to stop moving. We cannot afford to lose our momentum.
We cannot afford to lose our momentum because no matter what happens at GC 2019 or GC 2020, as important as those events will be--no matter what happens, I can guarantee you that after it is all said and done, there will still be a United Methodist Church. I don’t know what it will look like, but you can be sure that there will still be a United Methodist Church, and God will still be calling our church to be in mission in the world.
That means that no matter what happens in our internal struggles, God is still calling our church to bring a message of love to people who are plagued by lovelessness. That includes our LGBTQIA+ siblings who have felt unloved by their own church.
No matter what we decide about legislative proposals, God is still calling our church to bring a message of hope to a people who have fallen into hopelessness. That includes the immigrant parents who are still separated from their children.
No matter what happens in our legislative sessions, God is still calling us to bring meaning to the lives of people who have lost their sense of meaning or never had one to begin with. That includes people who are so caught up in nihilism that they would march through a park with torches and spew hate against God’s children because of the race, religion, or ethnicity of those children.
Friends, the needs are urgent, and God is calling The United Methodist Church to be a place where people can leave behind nihilism and have an encounter with the risen Christ—an encounter that will bring into their lives hope, meaning and love.
At our spring meeting of the Connectional Table we drafted a statement to the denomination. This was entitled The Mission is Yet Alive. It is an affirmation of our faith and it reads in part:
“The MISSION is yet alive, and we believe....
Despite the uncertainty of our times, God is still calling us to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
Our central mission is to join in God’s work in the world. No matter what, we are still invited into the mission of God.
We must take faithful steps to live as a worldwide church in mission to the world….
Each morning, we wake up in a world mired in the sins of violence, racism, war, and more. Children go without food, families lose their homes, young and old struggle with addictions. The world is in need of the saving love of Jesus Christ, and The United Methodist Church has always been an effective witness of Christ’s love. It is vitally important that we continue to be so now. Therefore, today and every day, the mission is yet alive.”[2]
Friends Jesus said, “Go into the mission field. Heal the sick and preach the Gospel.” Don’t pack a bag, don’t stop to tarry with a friend. I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Don’t waste time. Go! Go with urgency. Because the task of the Gospel is urgent! And, the urgency of the Gospel should compel us to go--with a word of hope on our lips. With the healing touch of God’s love on our fingertips. Ready to touch lives, to transform lives and to bring meaning to the lives of God’s children. We are coming out of SCD with momentum, with great urgency and with a call. And now friends…. Just Go!
[1] Race Matters, by Cornel West, Beacon Books, Boston, 1993, p. 14-15.
[2] Full statement posted on CT website