A Homily for the Second Sunday after Pentecost
June 14, 2020
The Episcopal Church of St. Thomas the Apostle
Dallas, Texas
The Reverend Stephen J. Waller
“Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.”
Can you believe that Jesus actually uttered those words? “Go nowhere among the Gentiles?” “Enter no town of the Samaritans?” Go rather only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel…
Ok. We all know that that statement of mission was one delivered at the beginning of mission work for the disciples … that statement would be followed at the end of Jesus’ life with his telling his disciples to go into all the world and make disciples of all people. A different commission, indeed.
Something seriously important hides inside and between these two different visions of mission and ministry. It is this:
Some followers of Jesus seem still to only hear the first understanding of mission and ministry. Some of us seem to want only people like us among us in our parish churches… good Jews (good men or good women or good gays or A gays or attractive people or smart people or perfect people like us). Some act as if “the other” (read someone we have never met before) does not really belong among us.
Back in the my first year as rector of St. Thomas the Apostle, I ran afoul of some members who found me “not to their liking.” Simply put, I was not my predecessor, not Jewish enough, not Ted enough, I guess. There was even an event in which the wardens and I sat and listened to 12 members of the parish tell me how I was failing as their rector… this happened during my first year, my “anno horribilis,”a year as horrible to me as Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth 2 called one of her years. Getting settled as rector would mean being accepted as rector by some people who absolutely did not want me to be rector, did not want to accept me. Had I not believed that I had been called by God and God’s Church to be the rector, I likely would have packed my bags and returned to Wisconsin or Louisiana or Virginia or New York City or to Brittany… anywhere but Dallas, Texas.
I tell you this of this unhappy year in my life and in the life of the parish we all love so much to let you know that the disease of wanting only people “like us,” only “our kind,” only members of the House of Israel… instead of absolutely anyone… is a disease which to this day infects the Body of Christ. And, it is deadly.
The Body of Christ is not my possession. Nor is it the possession of anyone of you. Nor is it the possession of any one group of people to the exclusion of any other group. My intention when I arrived at St. Thomas the Apostle was to serve and to welcome everyone currently there and anyone God wanted to be there in God’s good time. Sadly, and I consider it one of the saddest failures of my ordained ministry, a gaggle of members of Saint Thomas the Apostle decamped because of me … because they could not or would not accept my ministry as their rector. Mercifully, there are other Episcopal parishes in the Diocese to which some of them went…so, at least, some who left because of me stayed within the Episcopal fold.
This disease of wanting to limit who “belongs,” “who fits” in a community of faith continues to infect The Body of Christ today. Ask yourself this question: Are you really pleased when someone new shows up at the parish? Are you eager to help that person really “belong.” Do you strive to get to know them? Remember, “belonging” in the church means that those who are the Church (those already “in”) when a person arrives, actually do something to let the new arrival know that they really welcome you and want you there. To integrate you into the faith community Churches have ‘gate keepers.” When the gate keeper says you are in, you are in, but not before. Gate keepers are not part of God’s plan, my good friends.
Does it bother you that someone you do not know, someone not yet a part of the community, someone who may not look like you, someone who may not act like you turns up at St. Thomas the Apostle? Does it? Be honest in answering this question. Your answer will reveal to you, at least, whether you want this parish to be a “club” or a Christian Community of faith in Jesus Christ, open to absolutely everyone.
Being open to absolutely everyone is what God asks of all of us. It is what making disciples of all people means. It also means, though, that you and I are going to have to learn how to accept one another and “the other,” someone different from ourselves when they show up. Sisters and Brothers: Accepting others does not come easily for some of us.
We do not get to pick the humans God will put into this parish, God’s parish, as our brothers and sisters. God does that picking. Our task is to learn to live with and to love and to support and to care for and to rejoice in the presence and gifts those “new” people God brings to us in this community we all love.
I confess to you and to Mary and Jesus and to All the Saints, that while I served St. Thomas the Apostle, on rare occasions, I wondered if God were testing me when certain souls showed up at the parish to became a part of it. It took most all of my nearly 24 years as rector to get to a place where I really did welcome anyone… it took admitting to myself the painful truth that I, too, had blocks about some folk which made it difficult for me to “welcome” them as I should have. Just like those blocks some had for me when I arrived September 1st of 1989. Time eventually taught me that everyone brings gifts… whether or not they were the gifts I would have wanted brought or not.
I am not the only Christian at St. Thomas the Apostle who has struggled to be glad new people show up here. Some of you listening to me today are people who also struggle with welcoming “the other.” I have known you long enough to know that about you. Part of all spiritual growth is learning how to open the door to any and everyone as if we were opening the door to Christ. Because, we are. When new people knock on the red doors of St. Thomas the Apostle, it is Christ who is knocking. Let us all open those doors to anyone God may send our way. The One who knocks is Christ Jesus. “All are to be welcomed as Christ,” taught Saint Benedict.
All, Absolutely All.
Amen.
