Reflections on "the Next Fifteen" Acts 14: 19-28

We had a terrific worship service with wonderful music, litanies, energy, and excitement as we celebrated our Bicentennial.  In that context, the sermon gets a boost.  I wish I had chosen a different text, as the sermon did not connect with the Acts passage as well as I would have liked, but overall, the sermon went just as I had would have liked.  The conclusion was a bit different live than on paper because that last page of my sermon notes got lost in the shuffle.  But in keeping with the day, the conclusion I preached was better than the conclusion I wrote.

“The Next Fifteen” September 15, 2013; Acts 14: 19-28; FPC, Troy; Bicentennial celebration

Introduction:   “Fifteen pioneering spirits” as the written history of our church describes our organizing members;

Fifteen pioneering spirits started what we celebrate now 200 years, and 2 days later.

The church I served in Ky celebrated its Bicentennial while I was there.  For their final, celebratory worship service, they had the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church preach a grand and glorious sermon.

Today, here in Troy, you get me. 

So here goes.

Move 2:  I could have titled the sermon “The first fifteen” or “the desire of the first fifteen” because I find it both overwhelming and powerful to remember the desire of those first fifteen to worship God and form a church.

a.      They had settled in this part of OH.

1.      still a frontier.

2.      Threat of Indians

2.      War with the British

4. it was a hard life.

            b. In the midst of it all, they desired to worship God, to form a community of faith.

1.      And a Presbyterian one at that.

2.      They looked around and said, “this is what we want,”

No, “this is what we need, “

No, “this is what we have to do – we have to worship God and be the body of Christ in this place.

c. When we read about Paul’s journeys in Acts we read of his desire to form the body of Christ in place after place.

1.       Even when he gets driven out of one place, he immediately goes somewhere else.

2.      Reminder that as the first followers of the resurrected Christ tried to figure out what that meant, they discovered that they needed to be in community with one another and they needed to worship God.

4. We spend a lot of time finding excuses for not attending church.

1. Or the church leadership spends time and effort trying to figure out how to entice people to come and be a part of the church.

2.               Those fifteen needed no enticement; they needed God and community.

I could have titled the sermon “the desire of the first fifteen”

Move 2:  Or I Could have titled the sermon the “Imperfect fifteen,” in recognition of the failings we see as we trace the history of our congregation.

2.                                  Fast forward from 1813 to the 1830s.

3.      The church has grown from the first fifteen to 172 members.

4.      Over 1000% growth.

5.      Things should have been going very, very well.

6.      For two years there is talk about building a new sanctuary to accommodate the growth.

3.      But then the church splits.

1.      The divide and go their separate ways.

2.      They disagree on theology and polity; on who decides who can be a minister and what a church must believe to be considered Presbyterian; on the role of the General Assembly in how the churches respond.

3.      The imperfect church at its worst; the body of Christ, split in two.

      

4.      As we read the letters of the early church, we read of their controversies and compromises; their petty struggles; their work to stay together, even as some leave.

1.      it is hard to be the body of Christ because of our humanity.

3.         Our sinfulness,

3.                  Our thirst for power and control.

4.  Our inability to stay focused on what really matters.

5. It still happens today, even in the Presbyterian Church.    

d.      But we have hope in the God who calls us to be the body of Christ despite our failings.

1.      As we celebrate 200 years of ministry in this congregation, we celebrate the steadfast faithfulness of God who entrusts, by the power of the Holy Spirit, the work of the church to people like us.

2. All the ministries in which this congregation has engaged, all these activities that we celebrate now, point to the God who is at work in our midst despite our imperfections.

I could have titled the sermon the imperfect fifteen.

Move 3:  I did title the sermon  “the next fifteen”

           

            a. With all due respect to those first fifteen for what they started, with all due respect to what those who have came after them, what matters most as we move forward is the next fifteen....and the next fifteen.

1.      God does not work in reverse, somehow moving backward in time to change what has happened in the past.

2.      No, God pushes us forward to new plans and new possibilities.

3.      God has called us. 

4.      God has called you, to this place, in this time because God has a plan unfolding in our midst.

5.      A plan that moves us into the future God has for us.

6.      When they celebrate 225 or 250 or 275 or the Tricentennial, we do not know what they will look back on and claim as our ministries that mattered.

7.      But we recognize our responsibility to live into our calling as the body of Christ at work and worship in the world.

b. Our task is clear.

1.      To be the place where the next fifteen can worship God;

To be the place where the next fifteen can be nurtured by this community of faith;

To be the place where the next fifteen can hear God’s call for how to follow Christ into the world.

2.      In fact, we are the next fifteen, even as we prepare for the next fifteen after us.

3.      God is not done, so we are not done.

Conclusion:  too early to tell the behind-the-scene stories from our Bicentennial celebration, but I will tell the story Rev. Lillian Daniel tells as she describes how the church she served in New England prepared for the 75^th anniversary of the laying of the cornerstone of their church building.

Two years of preparation; special anthem commissioned; guest speakers lined up; feast planned. Sounds familiar doesn’t it?

Then, one month before the celebration, someone doing research discovers that the 75^thanniversary of the laying of the cornerstone had actually taken place the year before.

The news travels through the church like lightning. Is the celebration ruined?  Will it be called off?

At the next board meeting, they begin to discuss the anniversary plans.  No mention of the error that had been discovered.  But, someone notes that it took over a year to build the building; that the first worship service was not until one year after the cornerstone had been laid. So they are looking forward to celebrating the first worship in the building. On the correct date. Lillian Daniel, When “Spiritual But Not Religious” Is Not Enough (14-16).

Our Bicentennial celebration.  A celebration of an imperfect 200 years that propel us into the future following the perfect One.  Amen.