Imagine

Acts 16: 9-15; John 14:23-29
New Ark United Church of Christ, Newark, DE
May 1, 2016

            Have you ever made a plan for a trip, but the trip took a whole other different turn? Have you ever signed up for a course or educational opportunity with a particular teacher, only to have a substitute at the last minute? Has your life gone pretty much the way you thought it would or have there been some bumpy detours along the way, some outcomes you couldn’t have predicted, some changes you couldn’t see coming?

            The apostle Paul, now well-travelled, had a vision that a man from Macedonia pleaded with him, asking that he come to Macedonia and help.  Paul and his new companion Timothy were at Troas in what is now Turkey.  They sailed to the small island of Samothrace, then on to the coastal city of Neapolis, where they then presumably walked to the city of Philippi.  Paul and Timothy stayed in the city for several days, with no mention of the man in the vision.

            

        On the Sabbath day they went outside the city gate to the river, where they thought they would find a place of prayer.  They found a gathering of women, and one of them was named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth, which indicated she was a woman of means.  Lydia is described as a worshiper of God, who was eager to open her heart and listen to what Paul had to say.  She also comes across as a woman in charge, as she had her entire household baptized as well as herself.  And though she couches the invitation to her home in the language of faith, we hear that she prevailed upon Paul and Timothy.

            Paul thought he would meet a man.  Instead he found an independent woman.  Paul thought he would be helping a group of people—the man in the vision said “help us”.  Instead he was given generous hospitality.  Paul had been meeting with some opposition at times.  Here was someone eager to open their heart and bring their entire household with them.  We’re ready to travel in one direction but then God, life, sometimes intuition sends us in another.  

 

            In John’s gospel, on his last evening with his disciples, Jesus gives some last instructions, deep prayers, and heartfelt words of friendship to those closest to him.  They have become accustomed to receiving the teaching of the Way from this peasant rabbi, this servant of God, their friend.  Now they will have everything they need from the Holy Spirit, the Advocate and Comforter.  It was Jesus who taught them, led them, showed them what it meant to act justly, love mercy, and travel God’s path.  Now they would discern for themselves and with each other the living Spirit.  The presence of God would live in them and they would live in it.  The Almighty One, creator of the universe was brought close through Jesus, who called the Great I Am “Abba” or “Father”.  Now the divine would be as close as breathing.

            The time between what we know, what is familiar, and what is to come, the unknown, is called liminal time, a threshold, a time of transition.  We are living through such a time, what some are calling the Great Emergence.  What we are emerging into is the age of the Spirit—the age of the individual, the age of freedom.  It is a time of evolutionary faith, when we become capable of tuning into the spiritual life on our own.  Just as at Pentecost when the disciples went in different directions, so each of us is on our own journey.  Beth Ann Estock and Paul Nixon, in their wild ride of a book entitled Weird Church, write, “It is a season for radical trust in God and for waiting.  Waiting for the Spirit to fall upon us.”

            When the disciples were in that liminal time between Jesus’ ascension and Pentecost, can you imagine how crazed and stunned they must have been?  Nothing was as it had been.  Some pretty weird and unexplainable things had happened.  Their numbers were down; no more crowds—just 120 or so remained.  Jesus had promised the Spirit would come but when?  There had to have been times they just looked at each other dumbfounded.  What should they do now?

            There are days us post-modern disciples feel just as crazed and stunned, when we look at each other dumbfounded.  People aren’t attracted to churches the way they used to be.  What should we do now?  It’s hard to get Sunday school teachers for children and their families who have difficulty being here some weeks.  What should we do now?  It’s not easy putting in all this effort for church when the future seems so uncertain and yet the need for justice, for healing, and for community is still very present.  What should we do now?

 

            The disciples knew that they could not go on as they had before.  Too much had changed. Those who began this church, and you who have come to this church and become a part of it, know that feeling, that feeling of restlessness, of something new coming, of wanting, seeking something more.  That’s the movement of the Holy Spirit.  The Church we love now is a church from twenty years ago or more.  The Church and the world to which the Spirit is calling us is the Church and the world of our children and grandchildren.  It will not be ours but theirs.  It will be entirely another land.

            I don’t know about you, but in times like these I usually imagine God to be this calm, collected kind of personality, like “I got this.  Trust me.”  But the Holy Spirit?  I’m imagining she’s freaking out right now:  “I’ve got places to go, people to free, and I want all these out-of-the-box, creative, loving, kind people to come with me, but I feel like I’m scaring the literal Be-Jesus out of them right now!”

 

            But it’s never really been a predictable relationship. It’s us who’s tried to make it so and made an institution of it.  Moses freed God’s people from slavery but then they wandered in the desert for 40 years, which is Bible-talk for a really long time.  Moses could only get a glimpse of their destination before he died.  Sarah thought she’d never get pregnant.  Abraham thought he’d live and die in the land where he was born.  Joseph was ready to quietly divorce Mary.  Paul thought he was going to Asia.  God thought that the garden, that paradise would be enough. 

            But God is also on the move, like this earth through the cosmos, like this church 36 years ago.  Can we imagine not where God is going, but imagine us with God, wherever God is, wherever God will be?  Can we listen freely as individuals to that windy, fiery adventure-bound Spirit but travel as community, as movement rather than as institution?  The word “church” or “ekklesia” means “a called out people of God”:  called out of the past and into the future; out of our fear and into daring; out of captivity and into freedom.  Today let’s approach this Table, literally in a new and different way, as the first step in imagining, discerning, seeking how the Spirit is summoning us to be a called out people of God in the world.

Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?

Will you go where you don’t know and never be the same?

Will you let my love be shown, will you let my name be known?

Will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?
(The Summons, by John Bell.  Tune: Kelvingrove)