North Puget Sound Seattle 10/10/98 Sat. Aft.
Gal. 6:14
Story
Once there was a church
where they couldn’t find the bible
one Sunday.
The minister asked if anyone
had good news from the Lord.
No one admitted having any,
so they all started leaving.
One man said his wife
had just had a baby this morning.
The people decided that this
wasn’t a word from the Lord
and they went home.
The man stayed for a whole hour.
He was sure that was good news
from the Lord.
This sad but sometimes familiar parable by Herbert Brokering describing what happens on Sunday morning speaks about one worshipping community’s inability to recognize that God is actively in the world. There are times when we are blind in seeing the most common things in life are full and bursting with the divine word.
When we live by the Spirit, we are boasting Jesus Christ together. Boasting implies bragging and showing off. Boasting also can mean speaking out because of pride. We are proud of being followers of Jesus Christ! Aren’t we? Yet how come in many of our churches tomorrow morning, the sad story we just heard describes what is so true?
Paul’s Teachings
Paul was convincing the Galatians that the only motive that those who were infatuated with keeping the law was to look good before others. They wanted to boast how they have been circumcised and show off to others how they were able to recruit the Christians to do so too. Paul said, these people themselves don’t even keep the law! And they were highly selective in the laws that they do observe.
For Paul, he said that he was going to boast about nothing but the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul was ready to live by the faith that shares Christ’s suffering and death. Because of the Cross of Jesus Christ, we are set free from the stifling expectations of pleasing others and fitting into the fixed plans that others dictated. It is not what you and I do—submit to circumcision or reject circumcision. It is what God is doing in our lives. God is constantly creating something totally new in us everyday. Because of the Cross, we are the good news. When we live by the Spirit, our lives shout out Jesus Christ!
Listen to another Brokering poem:
Once there was a teacher
who knew lots of stories,
and they were all true.
The story she told best
was always the one that was just going on
or had just happened,
and the class was always in it.
Whenever they were learning,
they talked about what was happening,
so that it was a story.
It was always the only story
all of them could remember
and they knew it by heart.
Whenever things aren’t going well
and they want to learn,
they think about the story that is going on,
and then what is happening is important.
As congregations, we must embrace not only the Christmas and Easter high seasons but also the “ordinary” Sundays in the year to anticipate the divine-human encounters. On a weekly Sunday basis, when we assemble around the word and the table, we can embrace “the story that is going on.” It is the way we are formed and sustained in the story of Jesus for our life in the world.
The Story that is Going on
I came to First Chinese Baptist Church of San Francisco with my eyes wide opened. In its 118 years of witness and mission, it has survived being originally Southern Baptist, it rebuilt after the enormous fires resulting from the 1906 SF earthquake, it became self-supporting from the denomination, and it discovered new vigor after new churches were formed within its shadows. Today, we find ourselves with a collection of new stories:
*By giving birth to a new church plant, how will the mother church survive without the young leaders it has counted on to continue its legacy? What is God’s plan for us?
*Will we be able to sacrifice up to $1.3 million dollars to retrofit for seismic improvement and renovate in order to keep our doors opened for ministry? What is God teaching us about giving and prayer?
*And will we be able to rediscover our passion to reach out to the new Chinese immigrants who are living in our midst? What is God’s mission through us in San Francisco’s Chinatown for today?
This is the “story that is going on” in my ministry in San Francisco. What is your story?
It is when we are able to embrace our ordinary human stories as the only sacred stories that we have are we able to boast Jesus Christ! Our lives are sacred stories. Whenever we confess that it is Jesus Christ who has died for us so that we may have everlasting life, we are boasting Jesus Christ.
Common Clay Jars
Last Sunday was my installation service as the senior pastor at First Chinese Baptist Church of San Francisco. I shared with them that when I was a younger Christian, I liked the passage from Ephesians 6,
Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power.
Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the
wiles of the devil.
Now it didn’t matter that Paul was writing allegorically; that the
Belt around the waist was about truth
Breastplate was about righteousness
Shoes were about proclaiming the gospel of truth
Shield was about faith stopping the evil flaming arrows
Helmet was about salvation
And the sword was about the Spirit.
All I was thinking was that I needed protection if I was going to be a Christian. I needed all the super-heroes in both the DC and Marvel comics combined!
When I became more matured, I discovered that no real physical armor was necessary to be a Christian. Rather, the complete sacrifice of Jesus Christ by God so that we may have life eternal revealed that God took on vulnerability to show how much he really loves us. God walked among us unlike the comic book super-heroes.
I selected 2 Corinthians 4 for my service because, for me, it juxtaposes Ephesians 6. Instead of putting on the whole armor of God, we are merely fragile clay jars.
Paul said, “We have this treasure in clay jars, so that it may be made
clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us.
Easy to shatter. Probably common looking with no glaze. And perhaps there are blemishes and little chips here and there. Paul said that although we are like common clay jars, it is the stuff that is in them that is the treasure. The treasure is our faith proclaiming Jesus Christ as Lord.
I announced to them that I am only a common clay jar. I am a very typical second generation Chinese American born in Boston where the Red Sox play. My father worked in the laundry and at a Chinese restaurant and my mother was a seamstress. I ran track in high school but never came in first. I studied real hard to be on the honor roll. I like Starbucks coffee, cold sandwiches, and chocolate. Whatever “extraordinary powers” that they may perceive from me belongs to God! In my vulnerability as a clay jar, my life is to make visible the life of Jesus in the world. My life is to boast the treasure of Jesus Christ that is inside me, a common clay jar.
Boasting Jesus Christ
If we live by the Spirit, we are boasting Jesus Christ together! When we are boasting, we speak with humility. There’s a Hasidic tale told by Parker Palmer,
“We need a coat with two pockets. In one pocket there is dust, and in the
other pocket there is gold. We need a coat with two pockets to remind us who
we are.”
Too many times, we as American Baptists have emphasized the dusts that are in all of our pockets! Every place that we can catch a little dust, we fill it with dust. My friends, there is also gold in our pockets. If we live by the Spirit, we are boasting Jesus Christ together. Our lives and our pockets are full with the glimmering Good News of Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Let us pray.
O Lord, our Redeemer and Creator. Create in us a clean heart that is simply full of your presence. Remind us that we are to boast and shout to the world that you are among us. It is through the freedom from Christ that you have called us into this ministry to walk together in your loving Spirit. In the name of Christ who have made us one in you and with one another, we pray. Amen.