His Face Was Set

I bring you greetings from the United Church of Christ’s General Synod. While I hate to miss a Sunday, it was good to go see the National Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for our 32nd UCC Synod last weekend.

Milwaukee is an amazing town. At least in the summer. I hear the winters there are a bit rough. The parks, the sights, the diversity, and all the food! A town founded on cheese and beer, now that’s a town for me! I have attended the synods in Long Beach, CA and Cleveland. I missed the one in Baltimore –I don’t support that city anyway for taking what was once Cleveland’s and acting like it’s theirs. Each Synod has been different yet has given me a greater appreciation of our denomination and history. I get to meet so many people there in real life whom I’ve only seen on social media. I also get to see old friends from the far-flung corners of our country. It is an amazing time.

What was different this time was that I had my family along with me. They would explore the city during the day and report back, and I would tell them about who I saw. We were both exhausted at the end of each day, but we had an amazing time. What I hope it showed to my kids is how big and vast and deep this denomination is. We don’t have one issue, we have all the issues. We are a complex denomination. We have churches that gather and sing the old hymns in traditional buildings with a steeple, and we have ones that are a dinner church that meet in a bar. We have activist churches that take to the streets and big tent churches where everyone gathers from all walks of life. If you’ve heard about it, the UCC has it and then some.

It was great to show Sam and Eve the denomination that Kate and I picked. Or God picked for us. Kate wanted a place to meet folks and help out the local community and I went along as a good husband should… to humor her. And much to my surprise, I am now a pastor. I’m all in. I have set my face and this is my path.

I thought I was done with organized religion. I thought I could have my own spirituality, vaguely defined.  I could stay home and read the paper and drink coffee on Sunday mornings. I could watch Netflix and spout my opinion on social media and that’d be a good life. Then a UCC church showed me… they didn’t tell me, they showed me by how they lived, but what they spoke about and who they included… how deficient and self-serving my plan was. They showed me how exciting and unexpected the bible is when put in context. How meaningful these sacred stories are, how shocking and provocative. How amazing the witness of the church has been and how every great societal change has often started within the walls of a church building. From great advances in art and science to social movements. Y’all recaptured Jesus for me when I had written him off, and you seized my imagination and my face is set. This is the way, the truth, and the life for me. It turns out Jesus knew what he was talking about when he said those words to his disciples… He IS the way and the truth and the life for me and for us.

Yet in his own day, he was rejected. Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem” and immediately meets opposition. Jesus is in Gentile territory. Hanging out with the much-reviled Samaritans, a group that practiced a religion that was close to Judaism, but different enough that the two groups hated each other. Jesus knows he is heading to Jerusalem. Knows he will die there. Knows his message ends only one way; when you try to include the outsiders, the insiders will kill you. When you call for peace, those in love with violence will respond.

Jesus “sets his face.” He decides to go. The Samaritan village he is in can’t hear his message. They want nothing to do with Jerusalem. They wouldn’t follow Jesus. James and John want to command fire and kill the village just like Elijah did.[1] But Jesus turns and rebuked them. Some ancient manuscripts have Jesus saying, “You do not know what kind of spirit you are asking of, for the Son of Man did not come to destroy lives, but to save them.”

Jesus does so many impossible things. So many miracles and signs that he’s someone special. The healing, the water into wine, the walking on water and calming the storm. The most unbelievable thing to me that I’ve been pondering, is how he sat and ate and talked with absolutely everyone. We are told in our day and age that if you disagree, then you shouldn’t hang out with them. Democrats don’t hang around with Republicans. And Tea Party Republicans don’t hang with Regular Republicans who don’t hang with Libertarians which the Libertarians are fine with. With all our talk about diversity, our society is still segregated. WE are currently in what MLK Jr called “the most segregated hour.” White and black don’t mix nor do any other groups. We even think people who love Star Trek can’t hang out with Star Wars fans! Yet Jesus went to everyone. To the religious, he had harsh words to break their hearts of stone and show them that God loves the poor and outcast because God IS poor and outcast.

Jesus laments, “Foxes have their dens, birds have their nest, but the son of Man has no place to lay his head.” It’s a lament and a statement of fact. Jesus is rejected by his own religion, by his own hometown, by those who should “get it” and give God good lip service but lead lives devoid of God in action. Jesus crosses all sorts of boundaries because his face was set to a higher call; God’s beloved community.

I like hanging out with geeks and creative folks. Those who get excited about good books and movies and TV shows. If it were up to me, I would hang out only with those with the same interests as me. Yet that is not the way of Christ. Christ encounters all. Sits with all. Prays “May they all be one.” The motto of our denomination.

The Rev. Kelly Brill of Avon Lake UCC once told me about a church consultant who said that a church can either be an activist church or a big-tent church. Meaning, a church can either practice marching in the streets and taking on the issues of the day… Or they can be a place where all people gather for spiritual nourishment. This relates to Synod and the National Church as the UCC is founded as a Big Tent, ecumenical movement that is often seen as being on the cutting edge of social issues; the first to ordain an African American, a woman, an openly gay man… the first for so many things.[2] So what type of church are we here? An activist church or a big tent church?

There are downsides to either approach.

Activists churches have set their face to the Jesus who spoke out against injustice. The prophetic Christ who called out hypocrites, spoke truth to power, and flipped the tables in the temples. Jesus was the head of a protest parade we call Palm Sunday. Yet this approach can never be satisfied. There’s always work to do. Nothing is ever perfect. Sure, we’ve included these folk; but what about these other folk. Sure, we’ve fed these folk, but there are still hungry. This approach can burn people out both physically, spiritually, and emotionally. It can also lose sight of the biblical principles the movements are founded on. This approach can get so particular, it can forget the universal.

To put it simply, if you’re a hammer, everything begins to look like a nail. And it’s not attractive to go around hitting everything and it can turn folks off. What is one person’s pet issue is not the next person’s issue. And try as we might, we can’t make anybody care like we do.

Yet the big tent church has its issues as well. Sure, Jesus said, “Go and make disciples of every nation.” And we get Pentecost with folks from every nation joining up. We see Jesus teaching to Jews and Gentiles. He hung out with religious zealots wanting to overthrow Rome and hung out with Romans and even cured a Centurion’s boy. He broke bread with the religious and sinners alike. This is the Jesus our big tent churches have set their face toward. Yet often, churches like this can become more of a social club. A nice place where nothing scandalous ever happens. This stance can be so universal, that it stands for nothing in particular. This is church as a social club, where we like to gather but our community wouldn’t notice if we ceased to exist. A club that believes in Jesus but doesn’t walk a single footstep toward the kingdom. Belief is the only currency here. It doesn’t matter if you do anything as long as you believe and are polite and nice and don’t do anything too scandalous.

As Walter Brueggamann points out, “The church isn’t called to be the happiest place in town. It’s called to be the most honest.”

If both approaches have problems, then what style of church is Medina UCC, Congregational? In some ways, we’re a big tent. We have different political persuasions. We are intergenerational. Some of us were born into this denomination or one of its ancestors, and some came from other denominations and spiritual expressions. We span all economic classes. We have three worship services, each with their own styles and expressions of faith. We are, in a sense; a big tent.

Yet we are also activists. We noticed the hungry in our midst, and we responded. We build homes in Costa Rica. We help out those who come to us looking for money for rent, utilities, and groceries. We send youth to Pipestem, WV, and the Nehemiah mission in Cleveland. This church started Project Learn to help with literacy. This church has engaged with Habitat for Humanity. This church has been active and is active in so many areas.

As I was at our Synod, I saw both big tent churches and activist churches gathered. I saw folks representing justice for hunger and others for immigration and others for LGBTQ+ rights. I saw all my friends and then I thought of Jesus. I thought of Jesus and this passage and of you, my beloved body of Christ on the Square.

When dealing with the things of God, you know you’re on the right track if you’re dealing with a paradox. God is still speaking and it’s often in paradox. God is not an either/or God. God is both/and. God wants us to be a big tent for activism. The problem with this is one person’s issue can be counter to another person’s point of view. Maybe both are wrong. We’re not called to be either activist or a big tent. We’re called to be both/and more. I think the best answer to this is to think of ourselves not as an activist church or a big tent, but a big parade.

A parade where sometimes the music leads. The marching band is out front. We saw that with our bicentennial music program at the beginning of this month. Sometimes we lead with our activists out front asking for donations of food to Garfield and the library or money for our laundry program. Sometimes it’s the voices of the marginalized asking to share their story. So we listen for folks with different skin color or orientation than us. We listen to stories not our own.

There’s still a problem with this approach. It means we’re on the move. It means we won’t have a pet issue, but we must ask for the wisdom to know when an issue is ripe to address in our midst and when we should keep silent. We won’t have a den or a nest we or even an ideological hook to hang our hats on… Instead we will have Jesus, and the road and the journey. We have set our face toward Jesus and not a particular issue nor a universal social club. Our face is set, always going toward the kingdom, glimpsing heaven on earth; but never fully arriving there.

It means that I’m not the drum major. I’m not in charge of the parade. There is only one head of this parade, and it’s Jesus Christ, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. The one who came for all and was rejected by everyone, even those who loved him.

The only way for this parade to work is if we stick together and protect one another’s dignity and pride.  To trust that someone else might be more informed on an issue than we are and we can learn from them. It requires a lot of listening. That’s the world we’re marching toward! A world where folks are no longer crucified. A world where families aren’t separated from one another. A world where we seek to find Christ in one another. To celebrate each life as a gift. A world filled with light, where evil can find no shadow to hide in.

My friends, I won’t say this path is easy. Christ warned us. Take up your cross and follow me. It means you’ll have to bite your tongue. It means you might be wounded in talking with someone else. Wounded by the names they call you. It also means that we’re wounded by another’s plight, hurt, and grief. This is the harder way. The way of the wounded healer. The risen Christ bore the scars of his ordeal. There is death in this path yet before you get there and even after death, there is life and life abundant. The way that doesn’t look back or count the cost for the kingdom, but bears all things, believes all things, for that is what faith, hope, and love do… and the greatest of these is love.

My face is set toward that goal. I give thanks to God who thought it was a good idea that we should march alongside one another in this grand parade here on our corner of the Square.

Works Cited

[1][1] 2 Kings 1:10,12

[2][2] https://www.ucc.org/about-us_ucc-firsts

Comments

  1. Listen to what I am saying. Hear me, help me. Dont let me wander alone around our Square, be with me, trust me, acknowledge me.

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