A few years ago I
read about a church in
It's a shame, an
embarrassment to the faith, really, but news of church fights is hardly news
anymore. Fundamentalists have brought division to every major denomination
because the very essence of Fundamentalism is that we all have to agree or
somebody's got to go. But it's not just denominations and its not just
Fundamentalists who get into these fights. Churches have split over such
weighty matters as on which side of the chancel the flag should be placed, and
whether there should be a flag at all.
They have come apart at the seams over the color of pew cushions and the
color of the paint.
Why, I know it will amaze some of
you, but I’ve learned that even our church has had its share of
squabbles over the years. In all
churches people disagree and argue. Sometimes they raise their voices and say
ugly things. Even worse some times they form parties and take sides through
means and methods that are secretive and gossip driven. I imagine some people
in those churches think of it as kind of fun … playing a few hands of
winner take all. But sometimes people leave in anger never to return again.
Conflict is a dangerous game, but I think if a church is going to have any
prophetic substance, it is going to have conflict over issues that matter and
take stands some will like and others will not. Just like raising a
teenager…it’s important to pick your battles.
I was on the staff as
Director of Adult Education in the Methodist church that John and I attended
before we moved to
Churches often pride themselves that
they can disagree without being disagreeable and still be
family when the fightin's done, but it doesn't always
work that way. They love their church. They care about what happens. But the
pure human truth is that people don't always agree about what ought to happen.
So they argue. And sometimes they argue more passionately because they care so
deeply. Some people think the sign of a
healthy family is that nobody ever gets angry and they never fight. But that isn't
true. A family like that has an artificial, enforced peace. When the rules of
the household prohibit anger from being spoken you will almost always find deep
wells of frozen rage doing damage just below the surface. The experts tell us
healthy families are those who know how to fight in disciplined ways so
decisions get made and problems get resolved. Anger is not allowed to fester
but it is also not allowed to run amok. And I think, like a healthy family, a
healthy church is one that knows how to fight correctly, and also know which are the right fights.
There are right fights, you know. As
followers of Jesus, we should fight Jesus' fights. We should fight the good
fight of faith against the temptations to sell out to lesser gods. We should
fight the good fight against evil, intolerance, and injustice, against the
greed that uses people and throws them away, against the selfishness that is
blind to the common good, against the demagogues who would use the power of the
state to coerce their version of righteousness. We should fight the good fight
against those who use terror and violence as instruments of domination abroad
and at home. We have some good fights to fight. But even in those fights we
must fight like Christians, speaking the truth in love, respecting all persons
as beloved of God. Even in those fights we must evidence Christ. But let us
also remember, not every fight is right. Not every battle is Armageddon.
Like almost every other denomination,
our former church drew a hard line in the sand of the issue of sexuality. A
retired minister stood up in one of our meetings and said, "The reason the
church is fighting over sexuality is so it won't have to fight over economics
and the unjust distribution of wealth and the power of corporations in our
country to get their way regardless of its effects on people or the
environment." I happened to agree with him. Sometimes families fight over
trivialities to avoid the real issues. Churches do, too.
This whole problem of petty church
fights started right at the beginning. Remember how Jesus was constantly
settling disputes among his disciples?
They were constantly squabbling and saying things like "I'm the
greatest!" "You got to be kiddin' you the
greatest. That donkey over there's greater than you." "My momma told
me I'm the greatest." "Well yo' momma looks
like that donkey over there." And so on. Those guys couldn't get from one
village to the next without getting into some kind of ruckus. Peter and Paul
argued with each other over Gentiles eating with Jews … even though they
were all Christians. And one of the earliest books of the New Testament to be
written, Paul's letter to the church at
Typically, they defined themselves
by the names of different leaders. Some said "I belong to Paul!" who
was a passionate but bullheaded advocate of the gospel. As the letter goes on
we hear how Paul was just a little too Jewish for some of these Greek
Corinthians, too disapproving of their freewheeling culture. They weren't about
to live by his rules! Others said "I belong to Cephas!"
which was Simon Peter's name in his native Aramaic. Jesus had called Peter the
"Rock on which I will build my church," and maybe some of the
Corinthians thought they should be even more Jewish than Paul. Still others
claimed "I belong to Apollos!" of whom we
know little except what a fancy orator he was. I don't have this problem, but I
know eloquence can be a mixed blessing. Some people love you more than they
should while others instantly distrust you for no good reason. You don't have
to follow the political debates very long before you discover that for a lot of
people, it's not what the candidates say, but how well they say it that
matters. And then, of course - of course! - there were those who said, "I
just belong to Jesus!" with a kind of arrogant one-upsmanship
that made everybody roll their eyes and gag.
Here was Paul's answer: "We all
belong to Jesus. You don't belong to me. You don't belong to Peter. You don't
belong to Apollos. And you don't belong to Jesus more
than anybody else does. We all belong to Jesus … the crucified Christ.
And following Jesus means we meet each other at the cross."
The cross is about humility, not pride.
It's about service, not power. It's about speaking the truth in love, not
demanding to get your way. It's about forgiveness, not resentment. It's about
reconciliation, not revenge. It's about multiplication, not division. It is the
cross of Christ which saves us from our self-centered, self-destructive
futility, and sends us out with a self-forgetful compassion to find lives rich
with meaning and purpose and relationship.
Paul was unhappy about the
un-Christ-like character of the divisions in the church at
Still, if division has become one
means of spreading the church, multiplication remains the way Christ prefers.
Our gospel text today tells us about Jesus moving away from home in
It is not scalp hunting but seeking out people to follow, in the way that Jesus has sought out the disciples, engaging them in the vision and agenda of the kingdom which will widen their horizons taking them into dark and unfamiliar places, but with light and compassion."
Jesus wasn't talking about fishing with
pole, but with a net. Following Jesus doesn't mean hooking people and
reeling them in, but casting a broad net of care and communicating Christ to a
whole community. People were attracted
to the light of Christ. And people are still attracted to the light of Christ
in the church when they experience Christ in his followers. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, "What matters in the church is Jesus Christ and him taking form in the midst of a band
of people."
When we are angry and divided and
attacking one another, people only see more darkness. I can imagine people
thinking, "Why should I come to church to argue and fight? I can get all
that at home!" We should care passionately, express our anger when we feel
it, but in ways that lead to reconciliation and peace. And always we should
seek our unity not in agreeing on every doctrine, not in reading the Bible
exactly the same way, not in submitting to some arbitrary authority, but in the
cross of Christ. Christ reminds us we are all mortal, we are all equal, we are all sinners standing in the need of grace. And
Christ reminds us, we are all beloved of God.
It may strike you as a little odd that
I am talking to you about church conflict on the Sunday of our annual
meeting. Some of you may even be
thinking that something is brewing and you want to make sure you have a good
seat. But truth be told, I feel safe
talking about church conflict today because our church has a shared a spirit of
loving harmony and I hope that all of you will stay for the meeting to see just
that. Oh, here and there, now and then,
we might get a little irritated about something. But for the most part we get
along well and find the church a place of loving acceptance and spiritual
challenge. I can take absolutely no credit for this Spirit of peace among us,
but I do celebrate it. It's a mystery and a gift of God's grace, but I think it
is at least a result of our focusing on the ministry of multiplication. That
is, rather than fighting over incidentals, we have been working hard to feed
the hungry and welcome the stranger and learn the way of Christ in the
world. When I talk to some of my friends
in the ministry whose churches struggle with all kinds of nasty internal power
politics, I thank God for what we share here by the grace of God. Shall we
continue? And can we each do more to strengthen the ties that bind our hearts
in Christian love? Shall we make sure no one is left out who wishes to be
included?
Don't you wish it were always that way?
Don't you wish those few but strident voices of division who want to say God is
hate would be forgotten and ignored? Don't you wish more people could hear -
not just with our liturgies and our sermons and our signs, but with our actions
and our ministries, our relationships and especially our care for one another -
that God is love? We all belong to
Christ. We all find our true selves at the foot of his cross. And the light of
Christ shines to the world when we love people with God's love. They did warn
me about that in seminary. In fact, Jesus told me about that. One of the
clearest signs that we are the church is when people know us by our love. So
beloved, let us love one another. Let us grow in our speaking and acting and
living God's love. And let the Christ light shine through us.
May we pray?
O Christ our Savior, Light of the World, come by here and call us to follow
you as you once came to Andrew, Peter, James, and John beside their nets and
called them to follow you. And let us follow with joy to learn from you the
ways of forgiveness and reconciliation and peace, speaking the truth in love
but seeking you at the foot of the cross that we might multiply and not divide
your church. By your light, show us who God is that we might show the world in
Jesus' name. Amen.
Mary Anne Biggs, Pastor
Nekoosa United
Nekoosa