Sunday, January 28th: "Humanity Over Religiosity"

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First United Presbyterian Church

“Humanity Over Religiosity”

Rev. Amy Morgan

January 28, 2024

Mark 3:1-12

Now Jesus returned to the synagogue and a person was there who had a withered hand. And the women and men in the synagogue were watching him carefully to see whether he would cure the person on the sabbath so they might accuse him. Then Jesus said to the person who had the withered hand, “Come up to the middle.” Then Jesus said to the women and men in the synagogue, “Is it permissible to do good or to do evil on the sabbath, to save a life or to kill?” But they were silent. And looking around at them with anger, Jesus was grieved at their hardness of heart and said to the person, “Stretch out your hand.” And the person stretched it out and their hand was restored. Then the Pharisees went out with the Herodians and immediately began to conspire against Jesus, how they might destroy him. 

Then Jesus with his disciples departed to the sea and a great multitude from Galilee followed, and from Judaea, Jerusalem, Idumea, beyond the Jordan, and the region around Tyre and Sidon, hearing all that he was doing, they came to him. And he told his disciples to have a boat at hand for him because of the crowd of women, children, and men lest they crush him. For he had cured many, so that as many as had diseases pressed upon him to touch him. And the unclean spirits, when they saw him, they fell down before him and shrieked, “You are the Son of God!” But Jesus rebuked them strongly not to make him known.  

This scene is such a set-up. It’s like the people of the synagogue have put a trip wire in the middle of the room, with Jesus on one side of it and a person in need of healing on the other side. And they wait to see if Jesus can resist the temptation to heal. 

Because, of course, healing is work, and God commanded that Jews do not work on the sabbath. They are to rest as God rested on the seventh day of creation. 

Jesus doesn’t succumb to temptation or try to get away with something behind the backs of the religious authorities. Oh no, he uses this opportunity to make a point. He brings the person in need of healing right up onto center stage. He asks this pointed question, which no one has the courage to answer. Then he glares at them all with the wrath of God and then his anger dissolves into deep grief for these hard-hearted religious people. And then he looks down at that trip wire separating him from the person whose hand is withered, and he just kicks it on purpose. He heals on the sabbath, and he makes sure everybody can see it in high definition. 

Because Jesus restored someone to wholeness, the religious authorities seek to destroy him. This highlights one of the themes that runs throughout the gospel of Mark and, I would argue, throughout the whole narrative of scripture. And that theme is the dichotomy of restoration and destruction. Jesus is this restorative force, while the religious authorities and others become this destructive force. God is in the restoration business, but all too often, humans choose the way of destruction. 

You’d think we would have learned to do better after thousands of years, with stories like these to guide us, with the Holy Spirit directing us. But just like the religious people in Mark’s narrative, we try to destroy those things that are most life-giving instead of acting as a restorative force. We place our religiosity ahead of our humanity. We can only see one right way of doing things, and that is, of course, the way we do them and the way we’ve always done them. 

What Jesus is doing in Mark’s gospel is innovating. He’s asking questions that no one has thought to ask, questions that don’t have an easy answer. He’s developing new ways to interpret God’s commandments that place wholeness and abundance of life and love and humanity at the center. 

Author and pastor Carol Howard Merrit once said in a workshop, “the goal of religion is not to make people more religious; the goal is to make us more human.” Jesus is in a room of religious people who see religion, doing the right things the right way at the right time, doing what they’ve always done the way they’ve always done it, as the goal. And he demonstrates in spectacular fashion that they’ve got it wrong. And they don’t thank him for it. 

One of the most common challenges I’ve heard amongst my ministry colleagues is that they are called to churches that say they want to innovate, become more relevant, change things up to share the gospel with more people. And that pastor quickly discovers that the congregation actually wants no such thing. “Sure, go ahead and innovate. As long as you still keep everything exactly the same and exactly the way I like it.” This scenario has driven numerous pastors away from churches and many away from church entirely. 

But there are other churches and ministries that are following Jesus’s innovating spirit, . asking questions that no one has thought to ask, questions that don’t have an easy answers. They are developing new ways to interpret our call as disciples of Christ that place wholeness and abundance of life and love and humanity at the center. I’d like to lift up a few examples of these innovations today.

When Pullman Presbyterian Church in Washington state realized that their budget could no longer support their full-time pastor, they began to question if the role of a pastor only included things like worship, pastoral care, and meetings. Their pastor, Rev. Matt McNelly, had heard about a program that paid people to catch certain fish that were destroying the salmon population. The church supported Matt with funding, volunteers, and lots of prayer as he launched a ministry called Go Fish! Each summer, Matt takes off from his church work to lead week-long camps for kids that teach them to fish, lets them make money if they catch the right fish, and allows them to experience God’s love through the community on the boat and the mentors from the church. The church reaches far more children through Go Fish! than through the traditional ministries of the church. They have a lot more time with them than they would in an hour-a-week Sunday school. And they are putting the needs of the kids at the center, meeting their needs for loving mentors, for life skills and social skills, and even for a little pocket money. 

Third Presbyterian Church in Richmond, VA felt called to the ministry of reconciliation. They wanted to see the church look more like the kin-dom of God, a multi-generational, multi-ethnic, socioeconomically diverse community that glorifies God and works for justice. But they also realized that just transforming their one congregation would not be enough. So they started Arrabon, named after a Greek word meaning “a foretaste of things to come.” Arrabon equips churches to become reconciling communities with coaching and curriculum. But it also created Urban Doxology, an 8-week songwriting internship that invites young people to explore the intersections of theology, race, class and culture through collaborative songwriting. The songs created by the interns enhance the worship life of Third Church, and the young people are equipped to be leaders of reconciliation in their communities. 

Union Methodist Church in Dallas, TX realized that their traditional ways of worship and being church were not resonating with the young adults in their community. The young professionals in their local neighborhood walked right by their church doors without pause, but they turned up in coffeehouses and bars nearby. The church began asking questions like, “what if church happened in a coffeehouse?” They put young adults at the center of their innovation, and they created Union – a coffeehouse that serves quality fair trade coffee, donates 10% of their proceeds to local non-profits, facilitates space for music and game nights and other community-building activities, and hosts several “worshiping communities” that look very different from their Sunday-morning worship in the sanctuary. 

There are innovators all over the place, from people creating churches in the game Roblox to folks providing showers for people who are unhoused. In some places, church looks like packing kits of necessities for kids being placed in foster care, and it others, it looks like a weekly dinner party for young adults who have lost someone significant in their lives. Church might be a podcast that explores questions about meaning, wonder, and hope, or it might look like a digital-detox wilderness adventure. There are lots of Christian innovators out there who are more concerned with being good humans than being good Christians. 

And our church is one of them. Yes, we have a congregation that is 149 years old, and we worship in a building that is almost 120 years old. Our denominational tradition dates back centuries. We sing hymns that are 500 years old, and we recite liturgies and creeds that date back to the early years of Christianity. This does not look like the sort of place that is innovating. 

But look closer, and you’ll see innovation everywhere. Because at 1^st on 4^th, church isn’t just the religious-looking stuff we do here on Sunday mornings. Church is an arts camp for kids, a stop on the Everybody Bikes Day trail, and supplying medical equipment and other resources to folks in our community. Church is line dancing, guitar-playing, and quilting, even if none of the participants show up here on Sunday. Church is planting a tree, buying laptops, and collecting shoes. Church is community concerts, trivia nights with young adults, and sharing meals in people’s homes. At 1^st on 4^th, church isn’t about being more religious; it’s about being more human. It’s about centering the folks in our community who need healing, wholeness, and restoration. 

This is what I hope you all get out of reading our annual report (and I do hope you read it). And this is what I hope we will lean into even more this coming year. You may have heard that we’ve got a hefty budget deficit for the coming year. But we also have tremendous resources that equip us for innovation. Our reserve fund is healthier than it has ever been in recent memory. But the resources of the people in this place are what will really help us innovate. Our passion and energy, our wisdom and creativity, our hope and faith and love – that’s what will bring about restoration in our community. 

May we continue to be a community that places humanity ahead of religiosity. May we interpret our faith tradition in innovative ways, asking questions that no one has thought to ask, and placing wholeness and abundance of life and love and humanity at the center of everything we do. 

Maybe no one will thank us for it. But when God transforms lives in high definition, we will be there to see it. 

Thanks be to God. Amen.