Community Church Sermons
February 19, 2006
Mark 2:1-12
Families just sitting down to their evening meal suddenly stopped eating. Mothers and fathers stopped talking. Children stopped playing. From outside could be heard the plaintive wail of air raid sirens. Everything stopped. Then could be heard the muted popping of distant anti-aircraft batteries. Then came the swelling drone of bombers approaching.
It was December 29th, 1940 and this was the night Adolph Hitler had chosen as the night to break the will of the British people. Scores of German bombers took off from bases in occupied Europe streaking across the English Channel, headed for London. Directly in the crosshairs was one of Britain’s most famous and revered landmarks - St. Paul’s Cathedral with its soaring dome.
The first wave of aircraft dropped incendiary devices that burst into flame on impact. Tens of thousands of these were dropped into the center of the city, lighting up the target for the following waves of bombers, and providing the flame that subsequent payloads of 550-pound bombs would fan into a raging inferno. The aim was to burn the city to the ground and crush the spirit of the British people.
This night of terror later became known as “London’s Longest Night”, and PBS has recently aired an excellent program about it.
The British people were virtually helpless that night. Their small air force was unable to stop the relentless waves of German aircraft. The Brits were at the mercy of the bombs and of the fires.
It was then that Winston Churchill issued what may have seemed like a very strange decree. He ordered the Fire Brigades to concentrate their efforts on saving St. Paul’s – at all costs. What Churchill believed was that when the Blitz was over and the people came out of their shelters the next morning, they would encounter the devastating sight of their city and their homes engulfed in smoke and flames. But if, among all the destruction, the dome of St. Paul’s was still standing, they would know that their nation had not fallen! And they would find the will to go on!
Sometimes things – even things like churches - MEAN much more than what appears on the surface.
We are in the third week of a sermon series asking the question, “Why Church?” Why does the Church matter? Why should you or I bother with the Church? Why should our commitment to the Church of Jesus Christ be a top priority in our lives?
We have already discovered in this series that the Church is for healing, and the Church is for reclaiming outcasts. Those are both very good reasons for the Church to be the Church and for you and me to give our lives to it. But today, I want to ask you to take a look at a third reason the Church really matters.
Sometimes things – even things like churches - MEAN much more than what appears on the surface!
Nearly two-thousand years before that dome of St. Paul’s withstood the Blitz that devastated London, another roof on another church became a powerful symbol as well.
That church’s story was our Scripture lesson just read.
Jesus is teaching in a house in the city of Capernaum. Large crowds flock to him, filling the house to overflowing. Outside, and unable to gain access to the house because of the crowds, a small group of friends is gathered around a paralyzed man. If only they can get their friend into the presence of Jesus, he might have a chance at being made whole.
What to do? What would you do for such a friend in need?
They pick up their friend’s stretcher, and carry him onto the roof. Then they begin removing tiles and digging through thatch, until a hole appears in the roof of the house where Jesus is teaching. Then, they ever-so-carefully lower the man – on his stretcher– into the congregation.
I wonder what Jesus must have thought as he saw the man coming down? I wonder what Jesus must have thought when he looked up and saw the faces of those friends staring back down through the hole in the roof? I wonder if Jesus waved!
Well, the Bible tells us Jesus saw faith in those faces! And of course, you know the rest of the story. Interestingly, the first gift Jesus gives the paralyzed man is not a cure, but a healing – the healing of his heart. “My son, your sins are forgiven.” Sometimes the spiritual deficits of our lives are even more debilitating than the physical ones.
But this causes a stir among the
religious folks. “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” they want to
know. “Is this blasphemy we’re hearing?”
“Well,” Jesus responds, “Which is easier to say: Your sins are forgiven, or get up and walk?”
Then Jesus says, “Well, just so you’ll know that I do have authority on earth to forgive sins, watch this…!” Then Jesus says to the paralyzed man, “Rise, take up your stretcher, and go home!”
And Mark writes in his Gospel, “The man got up, took his mat, and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone, and they praised God saying, ‘We’ve never seen anything like this!”
And up above the room - I like to imagine - that small bunch of friends let out a mighty cheer as they watch through the hole in the roof!!
I guess we could call this sermon “A Tale of Two Roofs” – one that stayed on, and one that was taken off – but both serving the same purpose: SYMBOLIZING A HIGHER REALITY! The dome of St. Paul’s showed people that even in the midst of the terrorizing Blitz, Britain was still standing. And, in a similar way, the hole in that roof in Capernaum shows that even in the midst of a cruel, unforgiving, dehumanizing world, HEAVEN IS STILL STANDING!
And make no mistake about it – that little house with the hole in the roof where Jesus taught – was every bit as much a church as our church is. And like that church long ago, our church has a crucial purpose in this day and age: to be a sign that HEAVEN IS STILL STANDING even in difficult times like these! The Church is a visible symbol on earth – a LIVING MODEL, if you will – of God’s way.
Sometimes things – even things like churches – MEAN more than they appear to be!
Why Church?
Because the world needs to know that God is alive and well, and that God’s way is preserved and lived out…in the people of Tellico Village Community Church…and the Church around the world. It is the Church that can give humanity HOPE that the fires and smoke in the world all around us will not prevail! It is the Church that models God’s better way!
So think with me for a moment about that little church with the hole in its roof, and what it shows the world about God.
First, it is a living model of God’s welcoming love.
You know, we live in a world that is highly skilled in the art of exclusion.
I can remember being a little kid at school and joining with my friends to make fun of other kids who had something about their looks, or their speech, or their family that was different. Children can be terribly cruel to each other, pushing some outside the circle of acceptance. Often we do not realize the harm of such teasing until it is turned around and WE become its target. Then we know what it means to be excluded.
And it doesn’t end in childhood. All our lives long we struggle with the temptation to think of ourselves as better than others, and to think of others as less than ourselves. Have you ever heard affluent people talk about what’s wrong with poor people? Unbelievable, the things they say! Or poor people talking about what’s wrong with rich people? Most of us are masters at pointing out the flaws of “the other guy.”
When I was growing up it was a sin for a Catholic to marry a Protestant – and even worse for a Christian to marry a Jew. As I’ve journeyed throughout my life as a Christian person, I’ve discovered in myself the extraordinary ability to find my own righteousness just a little bit higher than everybody else’s. Religious people are the most skilled of all the excluders because religion can be a powerful weapon for dividing the world into the righteous and the unrighteous, the saved and the unsaved, the faithful and the infidel. Just look out at the terror-filled world in which we live today and underneath it all you’ll find religion.
Why Church?
To show the world a better way! To model God’s way for the world to see!
Back in the 1960’s when it was fashionable for white churches to have votes affirming their willingness to welcome black people into their membership, the senior pastor at Greendale Peoples Church in Worcester, Massachusetts refused to allow such a vote. Ken Bath’s position was rather surprising given the fact that everyone knew he was a strong supporter of Civil Rights. Was he a closet racist? Why would he forbid such a progressive thing?
Well, it wasn’t that Ken was a bigot. It was that he was a Christian. And as a Christian, Ken Bath did not believe that anyone had the right to vote on who is welcomed and who isn’t welcomed into God’s Church. EVERYONE is welcomed, and it is non-negotiable!
Why Church? To be a living demonstration of the all-inclusive love of God. And in those moments when we find ourselves keeping people on the outside for whatever reason, we are obligated to tear the roof off if that’s what it takes, and find a way for them to find access to the love of God in Jesus Christ.
Why Church? To model God’s welcome of EVERYONE!
And to model forgiveness.
I think it is wonderful that what Jesus offered the paralyzed man first and foremost was the gift of forgiveness. This is so significant! You see, people can survive without mobility. But people cannot live and grow without forgiveness.
Our little grandson Ryan, who just turned four-years old on Valentine’s Day, is a pretty clever fellow. He’s learned that when he does something wrong, he may as well just go to his room on his own. It’s sort of like pre-emptive punishment – like, “Mom, Dad…don’t even bother. I’m on my way!”
Little kids have to learn about how to deal with their mistakes and sins. Otherwise, they are going to grow up SHAPED by their mistakes and sins. In the course of Ryan’s life, he is going to commit many sins and make many mistakes – just like his grandmother! Only kidding. The question is: how will he respond to them? Will he just keep making the same mistakes over and over again? Will he build his life on layer after layer of bad decisions, poor choices, and irresponsible behavior? Or will he find a way to identify his mistakes, and learn from them, and find the chance to change course toward a better way of living?
I think that’s why forgiveness is at the heart of the Gospel. People and even nations need a constructive way to deal with their sins. We can spend our lives never changing for the better, or even worse, condemning ourselves - and others - to hell for the error of our ways, but how does that make the world a better place? How does that help a person change and grow? It doesn’t.
So God in Christ offers us a way to overcome our human failures.
Forgiveness.
Why Church? To model a better way for people to become accountable for their actions, to be set free from the things that destroy them, and to change course toward healing and wholeness!
And one more thing.
Did you notice that Jesus did not neglect the physical needs of the paralyzed man? He gave him the gift of healing. On another occasion, Jesus helped a mentally ill man find peace. Another time, Jesus cooked breakfast for the disciples.
There’s a lot of religion in the world today that ignores the material and physical needs of people. Only the “spiritual” is important.
But that’s not God’s way. In the life of Jesus, we clearly see that God is concerned with the whole person. The Bread of Life is surely important. But so is just plain old bread!
Why Church? To demonstrate God’s concern for hungry people, abused children, prisoners, handicapped persons, old people, young people, ALL people! And to show the world what a community can look like when it works together for the benefit of their neighbors.
Why Church? To model for the world the greatest commandment of all - love God and love your neighbor as yourself.
So from Capernaum of Galilee to St. Paul’s in London, there are stories to be found in the roofs of churches! And today, we gather under the roof of this church!
In the midst of all the fire and smoke and rubble of the world around us, what will people see in us?
I pray they will catch a glimpse of heaven, and a living model of a better way.
I pray that when people who have given up on religion look at the roof of our church – and what goes on beneath it - they’ll say the same thing those folks said long ago in Galilee.
“We ain’t ever seen anything
like this!”