The Church of the Redeemer

July 6, 2003

The Fourth Sunday after the Pentecost 

Imagine that you have become the main character in the movie, Oh, God!  For those younger members of the congregation who may not know what I am talking about, the Oh, God! series of movies came out in the late seventies and early eighties.  The movies stared George Burns as God and John Denver as God’s unwilling messenger in modern times.  The request of God was simple; to tell the world that God was still alive and active in the world today.  So imagine that you are God’s chosen messenger, and the fate of your community, and the way you understand and worship God is dependent on you for survival, and all you are being asked to do is let those around you know that God is alive and active on the earth.

            This is the task that Ezekiel was given in today’s first reading.  God came to Ezekiel at a time when the kingdom of Israel was under Babylonian rule.  It was during a time when, the children of Israel had been scattered through out the Babylonian Empire.  A time when, the younger generations of Israelites were being acculturated into Babylonian ways, worshipping Babylonian gods, and not sure if they wanted to return to the God of Israel.  These were the conditions and the times in which Ezekiel was called by God to tell God’s people that their God still existed and still planned to restore them to the Promised Land.

            We are also like Ezekiel in that God has given each and everyone of us a message to tell the world.  It was a message we received at Baptism.  It was a message we affirmed as our own at confirmation, and agreed to make known by word and example to all with whom we come in contact.  The message we were given is contained in the Bible and summed up in the Gospel of St. John, “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, so that all who believe in him should not perish but have everlasting life.”  The message is simple, and it is what gathers us here each week.  And like Ezekiel, it is a message we have to spread throughout the community around us if the Episcopal Church is going to be here for our children and grandchildren in the years to come.  

            It should come as no surprise that for the last forty years the Episcopal Church along with most of the main line protestant churches has been declining in membership.  During a meeting last May with Bishop Adams of Central New York, I learned that the Bishops of the church have been told that if the church does not redirect this downward trend in the years to come, it is likely that the National Church will either be non-existent or obsolete within the next twenty to twenty-five years.  Now we could stand back and claim that this is a problem for the national Church and not for us at the Redeemer.  After all, as we look around this building on an average fall Sunday, we find plenty of new families, young children filling our nursery and church school classrooms.  But when we look more closely at our basic growth statistics, what we find is a flat line growth trajectory in the areas of stewardship, attendance, and new members.  In essence we are in a maintenance mode, keeping pace with those who transfer out with newcomers transferring in.  However, as they say in business, if you are not growing, then you are declining, and the Redeemer is facing decline if we do nothing to change our current trajectory.

            Of course the answer to staving off continuing decline is complicated, and multiple actions are required for the solution.  However, the churches in our area and where the Episcopal church is growing today, such as in Texas where the diocese of Texas is growing at a rate of 10 – 20% per year there is a simple common element, the members of these congregations are able to and willing to share the Gospel message with people outside their parish communities.  If the Redeemer is to begin seeing true growth again, then we too need to share our stories as it relates to the Gospel message with people outside these walls.

            But how many of us believe we have stories to tell, stories of when God directly intervened in our lives.  None of us have ever experienced a true theophany when God spoke to us as if a burning bush, as God did to Moses.  Few of us have been swallowed up by a whale and spit out after three days as Jonah was.  And it is rare for God to unmistakable swoop down and overwhelm us to bring about a radical conversion, as God did in the case of St. Paul.  Don’t worry if you have not had experiences like these.  These are the unusually and dramatic ways God has communicated with us in the past, and continues to do so today.  However, on average at some point in our lives, we have had first hand interaction with God in subtle ways.  Try to recall those moments in your life when God was unmistakable present, such as at the birth of your children, or during a crisis in which you were mysteriously carried through, even though you did not think you had the strength to endure.  Or those more mundane times when everything in your life just seems to be working out with little effort from yourself.

                        Maureen and I experienced a time like that once.  It was the first year we were married.  I was in seminary and Maureen was working her first job at a bank.  It was during a time when our combined income just covered our rent, food and car insurance.  It all happened one cold December day, when the car we were both dependent on to take us back and forth to Hartford each day; Maureen for work and me for my field placement, suddenly broke down for an amount well over five-hundred dollars.  It was money we did not have and had no idea how we would find it.  That was of course until I went to my mailbox at school and found an envelope from a scholarship society I had applied to twelve months earlier.  Inside this envelope was a check for the exact amount we needed for the car repairs.   Many could claim that this was mere coincidence, but Maureen and I know that this was the hand of God acting in our lives, providing for us, as we needed.

            We all have stories like this to tell.  They are not dramatic or flashy, but they are the stories that remind us God is active in our lives.  These are the stories people outside these walls need to hear.  These are the stories that can bring hope, to those who are without hope, comfort to those who feel comfortless, and life to those who have ears and are willing to hear.  Finally, these are the stories that bring new life and vitality to this church that we love so much. 

The Rev. Craig R. Swan

Return to the Sermons Page