For the week of October 26 – 20th Sunday after Pentecost
Morning Prayer: Good and gracious God, You promise to pour out Your Spirit upon us; You are the hope of the world. Give us strength, that we might serve You; make us humble, that we might live for Your glory alone. In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen. (Discipleship Ministries)
Opening Hymn: #133 Leaning on the Everlasting Arms
- What a fellowship, what a joy divine, leaning on the everlasting arms;
what a blessedness, what a peace is mine, leaning on the everlasting arms.
Refrain: Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms;
leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.
- O how sweet to walk in this pilgrim way, leaning on the everlasting arms;
O how bright the path grows from day to day, leaning on the everlasting arms.
(Refrain) - What have I to dread, what have I to fear, leaning on the everlasting arms?
I have blessed peace with my Lord so near, leaning on the everlasting arms.
(Refrain)
Psalm 51:1-12
51 Have mercy on me, God, according to Your faithful love!
Wipe away my wrongdoings according to Your great compassion!
2 Wash me completely clean of my guilt;
purify me from my sin!
3 Because I know my wrongdoings,
my sin is always right in front of me.
4 I’ve sinned against You—You alone.
I’ve committed evil in Your sight.
That’s why You are justified when You render Your verdict,
completely correct when You issue Your judgment.
5 Yes, I was born in guilt, in sin,
from the moment my mother conceived me.
6 And yes, You want truth in the most hidden places;
You teach me wisdom in the most secret space.
7 Purify me with hyssop and I will be clean;
wash me and I will be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and celebration again;
let the bones You crushed rejoice once more.
9 Hide Your face from my sins;
wipe away all my guilty deeds!
10 Create a clean heart for me, God;
put a new, faithful spirit deep inside me!
11 Please don’t throw me out of Your presence;
please don’t take Your holy spirit away from me.
12 Return the joy of Your salvation to me
and sustain me with a willing spirit.
Prayers of Intercession: Thank You, Lord, for hearing our prayers for those dear to our hearts. We now pray as You have taught us: Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us. Lead us, not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.
Offering spotlight: The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has been suspended. If you are able to purchase extra food to stock and re-stock the Blessings Box, please do so. Some of our neighbors are facing devastating food and nutritional needs.
Offering prayer: Humble and merciful God, You do not require perfection, only a heart that is open. Receive these gifts, not as a sign of our righteousness, but as a humble offering from those who know they need Your grace. Teach us again that generosity begins not in pride, but in gratitude—not in proving our worth, but in trusting Yours. May what we give today grow into mercy, justice, and joy in the lives of others and in our own. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen. (Discipleship Ministries)
Hymn of preparation: #347 Spirit Song
- O let the Son of God enfold you with His Spirit and His love.
Let Him fill your heart and satisfy your soul.
O let Him have the things that hold you, and His Spirit like a dove
will descend upon your life and make you whole.
Refrain: Jesus, O Jesus, come and fill Your lambs. Jesus, O Jesus, come and fill Your lambs.
- O come and sing this song with gladness as your hearts are filled with joy.
Lift your hands in sweet surrender to His name.
O give Him all your tears and sadness; give Him all your years of pain,
And you’ll enter into life in Jesus’ name. Refrain.
Scriptures:
Galatians 6:1 (NRSV)
1 My friends, if anyone is detected in a transgression, you who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness. Take care that you yourselves are not tempted.
Matthew 18:15-17 (NRSV)
15 "If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one.
16 But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses.
17 If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.
Message: Chris Klock
INTRODUCTION
An odd thing happened the other day. For a variety of reasons, I was stewing on the issue of accountability and how the lack of it has adversely affected our society. I went about my business, but the next morning I woke up with the thought again that wouldn’t go away. I continued down that path considering the impact of accountability on our faith and in our Christian walk and wondering what scripture said on the subject. As a result, I made a very quick decision to do a little research then and there and see if I couldn’t make a Sunday School lesson out of it, departing from our current study of Mark. I sat down with my phone and did starting searching. Every query I made was another point to be made and in under 30 minutes I had two pages of scriptural references and concepts enough to teach for two weeks. Folks, I am not that good. I have learned in my faith journey that when something comes together that quickly, that is the Holy Spirit at work.
Last Sunday, we started the lesson. And that at the end of worship, Terry Bogart came up to the pulpit quietly and announced that Pastor Becky announced her desire to leave Lightstreet next June. And then he said, “We have failed our minister. We must do better.” And walked off. When I recovered from my shock, I had an epiphany that I misconstrued the Spirit’s direction. I was not meant to create a SS lesson, I was meant to deliver this message as a sermon. I showed Pastor Becky the lesson and asked if I could deliver the sermon the following week on this material, and she graciously agreed to allow it. It was only 2 hours later that it dawned on me what I had gotten myself into. I relayed this to Angie with what I imagine was a sort of “deer-in-the-head lights” look. My ever-supportive wife of 29 years just raised her eyebrows and said, “You’re only realizing this now?”
So, here we are. If you think this is directed at you, it may be. But it is not me directing it at you. I suspect we all have room for improvement in the area of Christian accountability and no one more so than the man I see in the mirror. It is my earnest hope and prayer, that we each hear from this message that what we need to hear and that, in doing so, our relationship with our Lord and Savior may be restored or strengthened.
LET US PRAY.
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. AMEN.
Accountability
Accountability and repercussions. Where have they gone? And why? I think most of us of a certain age can commiserate on this subject. We certainly see it in the secular world. As a Scout leader for 20 years, I have seen a change in parenting strategy over my tenure. We have an increasing in the number of parents who want to be friends with their children rather than mentors. That want their children to see them as peers they can be open with rather than teach and train them as apprentices in the trade of life they can teach and instruct. I see that when there is a discipline issue, more parents take on the role of defense attorney than partner in correcting the behavior. They think they are doing well by their child by coming to their defense, but they aren’t doing them any favors. Quite often, that approach does their child an incredible disservice. Rather than take the opportunity to correct and look at negative actions as a teachable moment, the choice is to defend and deny. Or to say nothing. I can be the hero if I defend, if I downplay. We can still be friends. The outcome in my experience is the child becomes emboldened. More often than not, aberrant behavior becomes normalized. I would be willing to bet, you can think of a time when you saw that transpire. That sentence, bears repeating. When you don’t hold people accountable for bad behavior, that behavior is construed as acceptable and, if and when that acceptance becomes widespread, what was aberrant behavior becomes normalized within society. We have a new normal. Swearing is a great example. People openly say the Lord’s name in vain. My wife regularly hears medical students and resident dropping the F bomb at the nurse’s station in earshot of the public: behavior that would have been unthinkable a generation ago is now common place.
But accountability is not just a societal need, it is a personal one as well. And not just in our secular life, but more importantly it must be present in our Christian walk. The Lord knew well that each one of us has a propensity to stray from our True North. Our personality flaws and sinful nature, left unchecked, provide Satan a foothold to take us off course. I am convinced that is a large part of the reason the Church universal was formed. By living in a community of believers, we can hold one another accountable so that our relationship with the Father may remain secure and we can continue to grow in a relationship with Him.
Having just discussed why we are commanded to hold another accountable, we are going to talk about the perils, pitfalls, and difficulties of accountability. Then I have a challenge for all of us to hear about where accountability has been lacking here at Lightstreet and where we can strive harder to ensure we don’t fail God, one another, Pastor Becky and the next minister.
We have some great instruction from Paul and the Lord Himself on how we are to conduct ourselves on this issue.
When Paul wrote is letter to the Galatians, he wrote, “Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted.” Let me read that again and listen to every word.
That is quite the needle to thread. And, brothers and sisters, we in the faith do not have a great track record. Many of us remember Dana Carvery’s character the Church Lady from SNL. Skits with her were on the show regularly from 1986 to 1990 and periodically ever since. She was anger under a veneer righteous anger. She was mean spirited and judgmental thinly veiled as proper and polite. And for our younger congregants, I am personally convinced that she was inspiration for this character: JK Rowling’s Professor Delores Umbridge. These characters resonate through the years because we know them. They walk among us and wherever they go the weaken the Kingdom of the very God whose “love” they purport to imbue. Those of the world are to know we are Christians by our Love, not our scornful disapproval. And we have failed to keep people with that mentality accountable. Their version of accountability is not God’s intent. Nor is it God’s intent to just let sin go. Horrified by the judgmental and self-righteous, many of us try to go along to get along. Or we just don’t want to get involved, or we want to avoid the drama, or we don’t want the confrontation, or we fear reprisal, or we fear damaging our human relationship, or we just don’t want to be out of our comfort zone. We make excuses and we misquote scripture to justify our position.
- Blessed are the peace makers. Yes, they are blessed. But there is big difference between keeping the peace and making peace. Often peace is obtained through the difficult process of gentle correction. Kicking the can down the road, putting our heads in the sand typically kicks the peace down the road just as far.
The truth is we are called to be out of our comfort zone; we are called to prioritize our brothers’ and sisters’ relationship with God over their relationship with us, and we need to realize that God puts us in places to act on His behalf.
But, the how and why is critically important. Back to Galatians:
Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin – Another version of scripture replaces sin with trespass…interesting. Notice this is not if someone rubs you the wrong way, has wronged you in some real or imagined way, or even if they disagree on something related to the church kitchen or the use of the Lighthouse. That’s not what this verse is about. This is a sin against God, not against one another. We have guidance for sins against one another. And you just said it earlier when you prayed earnestly to God to “forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” This doubles down on Christ’s instruction to turn the other cheek. You LITERALLY asked God to forgive you in the way you forgive others. If you have someone that you can’t forgive and are filled with hate and anger, you need to change your ways and learn forgiveness. In the meantime, you may want to reconsider voicing that prayer in the future until you mean it lest the Lord answer that particular prayer.
Once caught in a sin, let’s look at the rest. You who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness.
You who have received the Spirit – Accountability is not a you driven activity, it is a Spirit driven activity. My advice is that if you can’t tell whether this is coming from your anger or frustration or if it is Spirit led, then it would likely be best handled by someone else. The last part of this verse says, “Take care that you yourselves are not tempted.” While Paul may have meant to address temptation to join in the sin, I suspect it is equally valid to interpret this as not tempted to make this about you.
Restore – Consistent with this being Spirit led and not personal, “restore” is the verb that signifies the goal of the conversation. Restoration. It is not self-righteous. It is not about being right or morally superior. The goal of accountability within the community of the faithful is to RESTORE the sinner’s relationship with God. There is a lot of scripture that explains that being caught up in sin hinders are relationship with God. Isaiah 59:2 says “But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden His face from you, so that he will not hear.” When Christ was on the cross and He took on all of our sins sacrificially, He asked why God had forsaken Him. Our sinful nature and adherence to sin impacts our relationship with God. We are called to ask forgiveness and repent of our wickedness. AND…we are called to help our brothers and sisters recognize their sin, so they may turn from it, repent, and get right with God. If we seek correction without the goal of restoration, we are getting this wrong.
In a spirit of gentleness – It is not a coincidence that gentleness is a fruit of the spirit and Paul asks those that received the Spirit to lead the faithful’s restoration. Putting people on the defensive, angering and insulting them, calling them names is incompatible with scripture. James 1:26 tells us, “If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless.” 3:8 states, “But no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.” Instead, James tells us in 1:19 to “let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.” AMEN.
Spirit led, spirit driven gentle correction is the expectation with the only goal being restoration of their relationship with our Savior. That is the clearly the command and that is admittedly, really tough to do. I still say it’s threading the needle, but it is what we are called to do by God through Paul’s letter, but Christ agreed.
Let’s look at the words in red in the Gospel of Matthew
Verse 15 - "If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one.
In this case the sin is against you, but verse 15 says to wait until the two of you are alone. This is compatible with Paul’s direction. Correcting someone in public is not gentle. “you have regained that one” – again, the goal is restoration. But Jesus goes further recognizing that gentle correction doesn’t always take.
Verse 16 - But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses.
This escalation helps the accused take things more seriously, but also helps validate the affronted. If the perceived sin is not correct, one or two people have the ability to address both parties and ensure God’s Will is still paramount.
Verse 17 – If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.
This is quite the verse. Haul the person out in front of the congregation. If they refuse to listen to even the church…this supports that the congregation is united. Then it doesn’t say excommunicate them. How did Jesus treat gentiles and tax collectors? With love and with an eye towards reconciliation.
I realize that is a lot to unpack in 4 verses. But our instructions are clear. We need to hold our church family accountable when we are Spirit led to do so and we must do it in the correct way. Here at Lightstreet, we have failed in both extremes. In some cases, there are instances where we have dealt with people harshly and self-righteously while showing no love or grace OR we have looked on silently and allowed unchristian behavior to become normalized. That is why we are losing Pastor Becky. Recognizing that and learning from it is how we obey Terry’s admonition to do better.
The details
A clergy wears many hats and that truth is reflective in the many names we have for them: Pastor, Minister, Preacher. In my opinion Pastor Becky is just that: a pastor meaning she takes her pastoral role seriously. The word derives from the Latin pastor or shepherd. Ben talked a few weeks ago about what it means to be shepherd. Among its other roles, a pastor protects its flock from the lions and the wolves. A shepherd is extremely protective of their sheep and woe to the predator praying on the innocent or injured sheep. True to that image, Pastor Becky has been protective of members of this congregation, especially during difficult or stressful times whether they be illnesses, hospitalizations, or funerals. I have felt that protection and been comforted by it. I am certain many of you can say the same. But when it comes to sheep-on-sheep violence, she has also been quick to use the crook admittedly lacking the gentleness ascribed in Galatians. But when the time came, we didn’t back her call. We had the opportunity to respond to offended parishioners with our own teachable moment and a chance to address the issue with an eye towards restoration as required in Galatians and starting down the path laid out in Matthew. Instead, almost without exception, we chose to keep silent, or to downplay the rightness of the issue laid bare, or to just make excuses. That’s just the way that person is. Oh, she didn’t really mean it. Rather than focus on getting that person to see the sin they have committed, our silence has emboldened and encouraged more of the same. In the name of keeping the peace, we have unmade it. Congregants avoid participating in some of our ministries because we are not inclusive, not welcoming people we “don’t like”. Our reputation in the community is hampered by our those in the public seeing unkind behavior because our folks are associated with this congregation. A pastor can not lead the herd when the sheep ignore her. In light of that frustration, she has chosen to move onto another pasture and, frankly, I get it.
That said, to quote Star Trek’s Jean Luc Picard, “The line must be drawn here! This far, no further!” We must become a Christ-centered community of believers again if we are to continue to serve God as He commands. How do we do that? We, each one of us, must embrace Romans 12:9-12 in our lives and in our dealings with one another.
“9 Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. 11 Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12 Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.”
We MUST follow Christ’s commandment in John 13:34-35, “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
And, if we see someone falling short of this command, we need to have the courage to try to restore them with gentleness. We need each one of us to show love towards one another and act in a way consistent Christian teaching. Barring that, we need to support one another by gathering 2 or 3 towards further correction. Barring that we need to stand steadfast as a congregation and insist that showing God’s Love is paramount and obvious in what we say and do as His representatives here on Earth. If that doesn’t work, then we all need to except that gentiles and tax collectors it needs to be along with prayer that hate and anger would give way to love and forgiveness that they might once again reconcile, not with us, but the Lord almighty. We need to make peace and not try to keep peace, so we as a church can restore our corporate relationship with God. And next time, we need to support our Pastor when they try to do the same.
If we can take these lessons to heart, live by them as best we can, living a holy life and holding one another up to the same standard, catching each other as we fall, and lifting up one another in prayer, especially those we find tough to love, we will once again be the beacon of God’s love in the community that we envisioned for this congregation when we named the Lighthouse. May it be so starting today.
AND ALL GOD’S PEOPLE SAID, AMEN.
Closing Hymn: They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love
- We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord, we are one in the Spirit,
we are one in the Lord, and we pray that all unity may one day be restored:
And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.
- We will walk with each other, we will walk hand in hand, we will walk with each other,
We will walk hand in hand, and together we’ll spread the news that God is in our land:
And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.
- We will work with each other, we will work side by side, we will work with each other,
We will work side by side, and we’ll guard each man’s dignity and save each man’s pride:
And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.
- All praise to the Father, from whom all things come, and all praise to Christ Jesus,
His only Son, and all praise to the Spirit who makes us one:
And they’ll know we are Christians by our love, by our love, yes, they’ll know we are Christians by our love.
The blessing: May the Lord bless you and keep you and make His face shine upon you this week.
