IF WE’RE REALLY SERIOUS - Part One
Jonah 3: 1-5, 10
Mark 1: 14-20
January 18, 2009
Rev. Dr. Dennis Winkleblack
Prospect United Methodist Church
Bristol, Connecticut
Click below for audio version of sermon.
It’s no secret that our church is in dire straits. We might like to say that we’re just facing a new challenge, but the truth is we’re in dire straits. As was stated time and again during our stewardship campaign last Fall, our future as a congregation as we have known it is in serious jeopardy.
When I arrived last summer after having closed a church in Norwalk, I jokingly said that you shouldn’t worry because I did not come here to close this church. Truth is, last July I had no idea that the church in Norwalk and this church, besides having almost virtually the same architecture, are alike in more ways than not.
One big difference, however, is that this church has time to turn things around. The Norwalk church’s time was maybe 30 years ago when they should have seen the hand-writing on the wall and begun to make deep changes. They didn’t change, and although it took them 30 years to die, they did die.
Similar stories are being written in the majority of cities in the Northeast and the old rust belt cities of the midwest. Mainline churches – Methodist, Congregational, Episcopal, Presbyterian, Lutheran – are increasingly in dire straits.
First Church Norwalk lasted as long as it did because it used its once large endowment fund like a check book. When the money ran out and the people ran out (because there hadn’t been all that much going on in the church for many years), they had no choice but to close the doors. Sadly, this tale which sounds eerily familiar to us, is being told time and again by mainline city churches: if a church has endowment funds and can spend the money they continue to function as they always have. If they don’t, they are living on borrowed time.
Unless. Unless. Unless the members become very serious about being a new church of Jesus Christ.
Last summer, few among us fully realized the depth of troubles faced by Prospect Church. Since then, we have surmounted any number of hurdles that might have crippled churches with less character than ours. But, here we are. Living heirs to all who have come before us. We didn’t found this church nor build this building. But here we are. Our new president urges us to “be the change we seek.” And, indeed we must. For if not us, then who?
So, proud heirs of generations of Christians who have come before us, what now shall we do in the face of the dire straits we face? How shall we begin to live into the future faithfully, intelligently, courageously and boldly?
One way to do so is to focus on each problem that we have, one at a time. And this is what we’ve been doing since I’ve been here. And, we need to keep at this for a bit longer. Sooner or later, however, and the sooner the better, we have to get started on the make it or break it part of our journey. The really tough stuff.
Which brings me to our scriptures for the morning. First, Jonah. Almost everybody knows about Jonah and his 3 days in the belly, the guts of the whale. Turns out, nothing about a whale is mentioned in the Bible. It’s just a large fish – maybe like a whale. In any case, this fish tale is really only a minor part of what we should know about Jonah.
In the beginning of the book of Jonah we find God calling Jonah to go to the city of Ninevah to tell them that unless they repent of their ways God is going to wipe them off the face of the earth. Ninevah, you see, was the capital of Assyria, an evil empire. However, Jonah doesn’t want Ninevah to repent and to change. He hates the Assyrians. He can think of nothing better than for them to be wiped off the face of the earth!
So, Jonah goes in the other direction. Long story short, he gets tossed in the sea by some unhappy sailors who believe he’s responsible for their misery. He is then swallowed by this large fish. Jonah cries out to God promising to do anything God wants if only God will get him out of this smelly fish. So God makes the fish spit Jonah out. And Jonah, however reluctantly, goes to Ninevah, tells them to change their ways or God will wipe them off the face of the earth. They listen and repent. And God is very happy even though the book ends with Jonah very unhappy about what has transpired.
The Gospel story about the calling of Simon, Andrew, James and John is a much happier one. Jesus calls them to follow him and we learn they immediately leave their fishing careers behind, leave their families behind and go and follow Jesus.
Where these scripture lessons cross our lives in this point in time is like this: God calls many people to serve God’s purposes through the church of Jesus Christ. This church, in every age, is thus called to do things they might prefer not to do, to adapt its methods, its ways, if not its message. Where churches have adapted well, they’ve continued to be used by God. Where they haven’t adapted well, they’ve died, replaced by other churches that will serve God faithfully in the new situation.
This adaptation to new times is hard. Many churches, like Jonah, don’t want to do it, no matter what they say. Why? Because it means sacrificing their preferred ways of doing things. Churches that do survive are those who have been willing to make whatever sacrifices are necessary for the sake of Christ – as did Simon and Andrew and James and John.
Now, once again, Protestantism in America is being called to adapt to new times. And these new times are fairly unprecedented in terms of the changes in our society to which we must adapt. We could spend several sermons on how different the world is now from what it used to be. As an example, newspapers in major cities, let alone middle-sized cities are ceasing publication in shocking numbers. Other major American institutions – museums, symphonies, theaters – all report declining memberships.
The institution of the church is no different. To say the very least, church participation is no longer at the top of the list of American cultural values. This is a huge difference from previous crises in Protestantism in modern history where the church, even if not widely attended, was considered crucial to society’s welfare. No more.
Accordingly, one of the first facts we have to face as a 21st century church is that Church as we know it isn’t working for a majority of people, especially for young people and young families. We could argue all day about whether people are as spiritual as ever before. But, however, that debate turns out, it’s obvious to say an increasing number of people aren’t finding their spirituality in our churches.
And so the conclusion: how churches respond to the new world in which we find ourselves will determine whether they go into the future with strength or just sort of meander and then eventually close. Churches that respond by being willing to risk everything in order to do what it seems God is calling them to do will survive in one form or another. Churches that try to hold on to the past and the familiar surely will not.
At this point, I’m going to presume that we want to sign up to be on God’s side and do what God wants, even if it’s not clear exactly what God does want from us for the future.
To begin to discern, however, I think we can learn much by learning from experts on successful churches. One of these experts is Dr. William Willimon, former Dean of the Chapel at Duke University and now United Methodist Bishop of the Northern Alabama Annual Conference. Bishop Willimon and other church leaders did a study of what makes for effective churches in the Southeastern Jurisdiction and came up with eight characteristics of what they call effective churches. I’ve printed these eight characteristics (at the end of this sermon) for you to keep, read, study and pray over. A minor point: if I had been doing this study, I think I would have used more biblical words like “faithful” or “fruitful” rather than “effective.” But, we get the point: so I’ll mostly use the word, “effective” because they did.
Hence, beginning with this introduction today and for three Sundays (next week and Feb 8 and 15) we’re going to think together about these eight characteristics of effective congregations. Not that these eight characteristics are somehow holy scripture themselves. They’re not. However, I do think they’ll be more than sufficient to help us jump start our congregational discussion.
Our goal will be fairly simple:
- to begin to learn what makes for an effective church;
- to compare our church with effective churches;
- decide what changes we need to make and how and when to make them.
To assist us in this task we’ll start by doing some new things now. Beginning tomorrow I will email a copy of this sermon to everyone whose email address I have. We will also print copies of each sermon for you to pick up the Sunday following. Also, beginning tomorrow you’ll be invited to participate with each other and me via a blog on the web. I have never been a blogger and likely most of you haven’t either. But we’ll learn together. Instructions on how to do that also will be contained in tomorrow’s email. Finally, we’ll study these sermons and their scriptures during the five Sundays of Lent that are in March.
And then what do we do? I don’t know. But, with you, I am trusting that God will show us.
Well, enough for beginnings. Next week we jump in to the Eight Characteristics of an Effective Church by focusing on the first two. For now, let me leave you with this:
God can save the world without Prospect Church. But God doesn’t want to have to do that. God prefers that Prospect Church be part of helping God to save the world. Things will go better and smoother if Prospect Church is part of the solution.
To do so, though, means you and I are going to have to do things we might otherwise prefer not to do. Like Jonah, we will have to suck it up and do what God tells us to do.
With us, without us. With you and me, without you and me. God is going to refashion the Church of Jesus Christ one way or another.
Whether we and Prospect Church are along for the ride and the BLESSING will be up to us.
EIGHT CHARACTERISTICS OF EFFECTIVE CHURCHES
Effective Congregations:
- Love their particular community. Their pastors have found a way not only to love their congregations but also their neighborhood. Effective pastors help their congregations move beyond love of themselves, turning their congregations outward.
- Rise above mere contentment with things as they are and do what is necessary to expect and welcome change, disruption, and movement, similar to that of the Risen Christ.
- Find a way to welcome the stranger and to practice radical hospitality in the name of Jesus Christ. They find a way to be as interested in those who have yet to join the church as those already in the church.
- Enable lay leaders to lead, not just manage. Have lay leadership that feels a strong sense of responsibility for the future of their congregation.
- Have a strong, change oriented, gifted pastor.
- Make growth a priority and figure out how to grow.
- Have a clear sense of their primary purpose and keep focused on their primary God-given mission.
- Keep focused upon Jesus Christ as the originator of, and the purpose for the church. Church is not just another human oriented institution.
-- Bishop William Willimon