A People of the Last Word (Revelation 21:1-6a)

A People of the Last Word

        The book reviews keep coming in.  Reviewed in last weekend’s Bennington Banner, or perhaps you read about it in the New York Times, Slate.com, or on NPR.  A “graphic novel” (comic book) of The Book of Genesis, readers might be surprised to find out the illustrator is the “underground comic” artist R. Crumb, whose body of work makes an odd statement indeed to add the title of “bible illustrator” to his resume.  Crumb spent the past four years drawing the book of Genesis, taking care to read biblical scholarship to develop his take on Genesis.  Surprisingly, for such an iconoclast, Crumb offers a fairly earnest depiction of Genesis, demonstrating his skill as an artist as well as the complexities of the actual text of Genesis.  For a book about God, creation, and humanity’s “origins”, Genesis does not R. Crumb’s help being controversial.  On its own, Genesis is a challenging set of tales replete with human failings, violence, and an “R” rating.  Sacred stories are closer to our lives than we sometimes want them to be.

        On the other end of the Bible, we encounter a story of “the End”.  Ironically, some folks tend to sugarcoat Genesis, yet people tend to remember the Book of Revelation more for its violence than its scenes of great hope.  I grew up in Kansas churches that loved the rainbow over Noah’s ark yet lived in fear of Revelation’s scenes of “the End Times”.  (You would not believe some of the books I found in shopping mall Christian bookstores growing up out in the Midwest….)   The book of Revelation is filled with stories of the nations of the world going into disarray, armies battling, and Evil’s forces battling it out with the heavenly powers.  To say the book of Revelation tends to be inscrutable and difficult to understand is an understatement.  Nonetheless, if you read the whole book, you see a different story at work, not like the version of Revelation you might hear preached about on many AM radio stations in parts of the Midwest and the South.  The violence, the battle between forces above and below, all of this is in the text, yet a powerful theme resounds throughout: not of fear, but of hope.

        The end vision of Christianity is hope.  In the End God shall have the last word.  After much tumult, suffering and pain, the world described by Genesis shall pass away and a new heaven and earth, a new frame of reality, shall take its place.  Reading Revelation, the careful reader recalls T.S. Eliot’s poetic line:  “In my end is my beginning”.  The book of Revelation unveils the brokenness of our world and the transformation, the magnificent future, God alone shall bring about.  Revelation is a passionate book, calling the reader not to live in fear or speculation.  Rather, the Christian is encouraged to live in anticipation and hope.   We live as a people who already know what the last word shall be.  It will not be “anxiety”.  It will not be “fear”.  It will not be even “death”.  In the end, we shall hear “Behold, I make all things new”.  This is the story that Christians live by.  You cannot understand us without it.

        Stories have a powerful way of shaping our lives.  Over the years, I still remember my Grandmother Hugenot reading the story of “Stone Soup”.  I have the book among my books, and I will never part with it.  The physical book is precious to me.  The story of “Button Soup”, a tale of a miser who learns to be generous by sharing of his abundance with his neighbors, is one that I claim as a “core story” I retain from my childhood.  I remember with great fondness my grandmother reading me many stories over and over, yet that particular story, a variant of “Stone Soup”, is the one that nestled down deep within me.  The story makes sense of the world, or the way the world ought to be.

        As a grownup, I find myself telling people another story, one that I find deep down in my bones just like “Stone Soup”.  You heard Marion tell that story to you a bit earlier, as told by the book of Revelation.  Where I tell this story is less a matter of standing in a pulpit and more when I stand on a hillside.  It’s a quiet time when I tell this story.   It’s time for that final ritual up there among family and friends.  We have been telling stories already, sometimes told with rollicking detail during an eulogy delivered by a friend (clergy sometimes blanche at the stories of the deceased that get told at funerals).   Now it’s approaching time for that last word.  What will it be?

At the graveside, I tell one story.  It’s really the best one for times like these.  As the liturgy draws to a close, I am nearing the amen, but I still have this story to tell.  I say in the midst of the sadness and as that sense of finality hangs a bit thick in the air:

“We look forward to that time, when the one who has made us shall not leave us in the dust.  For as scriptures promise, there shall be an end to death, and to crying and to pain, for the old order has passed away”.

The Christian cannot speak of any other last word.  We sometimes forget when the anxieties of the day make us think things are otherwise contrary to our knowledge of the promised End.  Indeed, there are times when we lose sight of that which is promised, or we let another story take precedence.  Those who are able to stay the course, those who are able to keep “their eyes on the prize”, we have a word for these sort of folks:  saints.   The book of Revelation mentions saints quite frequently, the people who live a faithful witness on the earth, even in its broken down state, and once up in the heavenly choirs, just can’t stop praising the Lord. 

The saints are those who live in this world with the same frailty and fallibility as any other human being, yet they are able to live a faithful and unshakable witness to Christ.  It does not happen overnight for these folks: the process varies, yet the result is the same:  people who are able to be the faithful and beloved of Christ.  They take the long view, knowing that God will have the last word, not the powers and ideologies of the day, or the belief that things will end in disarray or without meaning.  They see the world as a place where the gospel can indeed take root, no matter how tough and stubborn the soil appears to be.  The Baptist saint Clarence Jordan lived through the difficulties of mid-20^th century racism as a witness to racial reconciliation and peace.  Only a saint could take the long view, despite the many forces against him.  Jordan spoke prophetically when he observed, “Hope is believing in spite of the evidence and watching the evidence change”.  In other words, God shall have the last word, and it shall be one that is glorious and just.

Now the Church has various traditions and practices about counting the saints.  Some parts of the Church have quite a process to declare a person officially a “saint” of the Church.  The New Testament, though, takes a fairly broad definition of the term, depicting the saints of the Church as those who live a faithful life, one testifying to the gospel.  In other words, no list shall be ever exhaustive of the saints.  Saints are great and obscure alike.  Saints are plentiful, yet not all of them can ever be named adequately.  So, I want to make sure that we remember “All Saints” aright this day.  We are not just looking at the people known far and wide.  I ask us to enter into a time of recalling those saints who made the gospel come alive in your witnessing of their lives.  Let us remember “all saints” this day, those who know how the story shall end, and remind ourselves that we are likewise called to be a people of the last word.

What Happened at #137 Bakkerstraat? (Bennington Banner column, 8/22/2009)

What Happened at #137 Bakkerstraat? 

By the Rev. Jerrod H. Hugenot 

In late July 2009, Baptist leaders from around the world gathered in the Netherlands for the annual meeting of the Baptist World Alliance. The BWA serves as a global network of Baptist denominations, conventions, and organizations. It is a miracle that so many Baptists are represented in this international effort. If you have hung around Baptist congregations long enough, you will hear the old joke: “If there are three Baptists in a room, there are probably also four or five opinions as well.”  

Despite the contrary-minded nature of its adherents, the Baptist movement is filled with many wonderful people, who are convictionally and globally diverse. The face of the Baptist family is multi-hued and graced with a blessed variety. Baptists are known for their commitments to believer’s baptism, mission, humanitarian work, and the defense of religious freedom. In recent years, the BWA has created the platform for Baptists to respond to global issues such as human trafficking. The BWA serves as the “Baptist” voice in Christian/Muslim dialogue taking place in various parts of the world. In North America, American Baptist leaders have led the way creating Baptist/Muslim engagements. Together, we Baptists do more than we can apart or under our own auspices. We are different, yet through the BWA, we embrace the common belief in “one Lord, one faith, and one baptism”.

This year, the BWA assembled in the Netherlands to remember our roots. The Baptist movement started in Amsterdam, where in 1609, a pastor named John Smyth and his congregation began practicing baptism by immersion and articulating beliefs we now identify as the first “Baptist” congregation. Smyth’s congregation found safe haven in Amsterdam, which had become a place for religious toleration by the late 16^th century. The congregation would later immigrate back to England in 1612, under the leadership of Thomas Helwys, establishing a church in Spitalfields, an area then outside the city of London.

The BWA held a celebratory service on the Thursday portion of the official program. We worshiped at a Mennonite church in Amsterdam, among whom Smyth’s group found friendly and likeminded folk. Some Baptist historians claim Smyth’s group was influenced by the Mennonites, placing Baptists and Mennonites together in the Anabaptist family of Protestantism. Indeed, we felt quite welcome as delegates entered the front entrance where the church sign told passersby this place was a “doopsgezinde” church. This word was used to describe Mennonites as their movement began. The word means “baptism-minded”.

After the service, a walking tour of Amsterdam was offered, touring sites significant to early Baptists. At #137 Bakkerstraat, the BWA tour met two Dutch Baptists dressed in period clothing. The exact history of the early Baptists is a bit of a puzzle, however, from the best records, it is thought the early Baptists enjoyed the hospitality and friendship of the Mennonites, including permission to use space at a local bakery owned by a Mennonite. The re-enactors told of the Smyth congregation’s activities here, where the group is thought to have worshiped and perhaps had living quarters. In the modern day, the bakery is long gone, now a quiet residential side street.

Standing at #137 Bakkerstaat, I felt a kinship with the Catholic going to Rome and the Anglican pilgrim on the way to Canterbury. For my Baptist heart, the simple setting of #137 Bakkerstraat seems befitting for a place where my faith tradition began. Here at this place, the Baptists began as “church” (lowercase ‘c’). I was quite moved to stand at the place where the divergent, wide river of Baptist convictions and spirituality began its course.

I said a little prayer of thanksgiving there at #137 Bakerstraat. In 1609, a small group of English dissidents worried about what the future held, safe for now, but yearning to return home. Four hundred years later, Baptists are the largest Protestant movement. Standing at #137 Bakkerstraat on this side of history, I behold the Baptists of 2009 as the many gathered from around the world, saying together the Lord’s Prayer in dozens of languages, working together on common ground issues, and gathering for table fellowship. (We Baptists are “well rounded” from our meals together.) For that little congregation, lost in the midst of the anxiety of what the future held, they persevered. They believed in the Christ who supplied their needs and gave them spiritual strength. The many who gathered in 2009 serve as testimony to the witness and legacy of these early forbears. While estranged from comfort and societal acceptance, they labored not in vain. Indeed, Christ was with them all along the pilgrim way.

The Rev. Jerrod H. Hugenot serves as coordinating minister of the First Baptist Church of Bennington, Vermont. Correspond: fbpastor@sover.net

The Fear and the Fool (Proverbs 9:1-6)

The Fear and The Fool

 When you walk into a large bookstore (Borders, Barnes and Noble), you will often find a “super sale” section of books. It is an odd collection of overstock books. For example, you will find hardback copies of former best sellers—usually the ones that you bought for top dollar when the book first released and now there you spot that great book, dozens of copies piled in a corner, all at rock bottom prices. You can find a number of “how to” books: cookbooks, “fix it yourself” house repair books, books on popular people, places, or historical events. Then, almost hidden, sandwiched between a book on plumbing and a book on Civil War nurses, you spy a small volume of “quotable quotes” of famous persons throughout the ages.

 These collections of quotations are fun reading for a rainy Saturday afternoon. An old quote by Shakespeare might be the first time you read the Bard since high school and entice you to read Hamlet again. Quotations from famous people in history can make you laugh a bit or give you something funny to say while having dinner with friends. Books like this might cost just a dollar or two on sale, but the treasures of thoughtful and wise sayings inside can be appreciated for years to come.

 In the Bible, we have a similar book of quotations. The book of Proverbs is a source of ancient wisdom, little sayings about human existence, observations about daily life as well as the big questions. Here, the reader encounters sayings delightful and astonishingly relevant as well as other proverbs a bit perplexing, a product of a bygone generation.

One of the recurring themes of the Wisdom writings is its affirmation that you have to be of certain maturity (age, life experience, and horse sense) to understand them. When I read and teach Proverbs and the other “Wisdom” writings found in the Bible (Ecclesiastes and the Book of Job), I note my youth. Thus, at this point, I am going to call in assistance. When I think of age, life experience, and horse sense, I invited Mary Harrington to help me with part of the sermon. Mary will read a few proverbs to help us experience the wide range of observations about life offered by the book of Proverbs:

First: A proverb about the stages of life (or why age matters):

The glory of youths is their strength, but the beauty of the aged is their gray hair.

Second: A proverb about the importance of laughter:

A cheerful heart is a good medicine,
but a downcast spirit dries up the bones.

The book of Proverbs speaks to what seems like modern day issues. Take for example this proverb that seems to speak about couch potatoes:

The lazy person buries a hand in the dish,
and will not even bring it back to the mouth.

Sometimes, the book of Proverbs shows the problem of quoting ancient scripture. Could you imagine this proverb for marriage counseling?

It is better to live in a corner of the housetop
than in a house shared with a contentious wife.

Proverbs takes a straightforward approach to the idea that humans can do foolish things:

The clever see danger and hide;
but the simple go on, and suffer for it.

In their strangeness, the proverbs challenge us to appreciate the beauty of words able to speak deeply to the foibles and glory of human existence and the life of faith. While some proverbs are inescapably bound to a past era and its culture, the little sayings witness to the pursuit of Wisdom. As we explore them, we find the pursuit of Wisdom and her ways is a worthy journey.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,
and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.

The book of Proverbs offers a variety of wise sayings about human life. Some proverbs make you laugh. Some make you scratch your head, a bit befuddled. More than a few proverbs make you nod, hearing in ancient sage wisdom a word that speaks to you about the perplexities of your life. The question, however, is what separates this biblical book from other collections of wise sayings. Why would ancient Israel add this book to their sacred writings?

The Hebrew Scriptures were written as part of a culture deeply in love with and respectful of wisdom. In the ancient Near East cultures, wise persons were highly revered as “those who understood the basic order of the created world and lived in fidelity with it.” (The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, S-Z, p. 863). Proverbs are deceptive: a few words that hold deep wisdom, illumining truth, laden with truths pointing toward a better way through life.

In the book of Proverbs, there are many warnings against being foolish: seeking out ways to shortcut your way through life or acting brashly or without considered thought. The book of Proverbs “presents a traditional view of the path of wisdom, the path to a good life: live in harmony with others, obey the commandments of God, and be sensitive and caring for those less fortunate than yourself.” (Ibid., 865).

To describe Wisdom, the book of Proverbs claims the wise path goes clear back to the very creation of the world. The wisdom humanity seeks is rooted in the divine, as God is heralded as the source of all good and fruitful knowledge. Like other ANE cultures, Wisdom is personified, described as a woman who dances at the beginning of creation, and in whom God takes great delight.

The book of Proverbs depicts Lady Wisdom calling out to anyone and everyone, not merely in the temple or the royal courts, but out in the midst of the market and streets. Wisdom is not reserved for the powerful or the pious. Instead, the path of wisdom, the way toward a deeper and more meaningful life, is open to all persons.

Later tonight, the Emmy-winning Mad Men begins its third season on AMC. Set in the 1960s, Mad Men follows the stories of executives and their staff at the offices of the Sterling Cooper advertising agency on Madison Avenue in New York City. The lead character is Don Draper, a rising star in advertising. He cuts a fine figure: a tall, handsome man with impeccable taste in suits. He is a “rain maker”, tasked with bringing in major business accounts. Draper is a talented “ad man”. He creates dynamic campaigns nearly effortlessly, leaving his colleagues awestruck or intensely jealous.

From all outside appearances, Don Draper is the epitome of the ideal man. He has the trappings of the 1960s upper middle class Euro-American ideal: a beautiful wife, two children, and a beautiful home to go along with his executive perks and privileges at work. He is successful, good looking, and seems to have it all under control. Draper, however, is a complicated man. He lies compulsively. He hides many secrets about his past. He habitually steps out on his wife and evidences a variety of other self-destructive habits.

The show keeps pressing questions of whether or not the culture that Don Draper moved within was really that great. Racial minority, female, and gay characters are shown bearing the brunt of Draper’s world of “white male privilege”. While Draper enjoys the high life, it comes at the expense of others.

I cite Don Draper as sermon material as the original audience for the book of Proverbs is thought to be the privileged young men of Israel. These proverbs serve as brief lessons for living your life without the foolishness and the vanities of success. Proverbs is the word to those whom need “age, life experience, and horse sense” so they do not become the fools of their day. Draper smokes and drinks his way through his upscale life, able to pull off remarkable feats with his business dealings. Last season ended with Draper returning home to find his wife and children had left. He sits there in the darkness, the reality of how he has lived his life sinking in.

To be a follower of Wisdom is to go back to the basics of very existence, seeking a simple path and refraining from the many temptations of gaining power, wealth, or success by quick fixes or scheming. (Note: If this is the case, a good old Bible study on biblical wisdom might do Wall Street and Washington, DC, a world of good.) It can be a word of grace to us that our lives are not meant to be struggling constantly after unattainable things. Indeed, we can live earnestly without pretense and be at peace with our humanity. We do not need to be anything but ourselves, God’s beloved children.

Wisdom builds a house where everyone is welcome. It is a place where a fine meal awaits, and we have on good authority Wisdom herself is a good dancer. What more could we want from our lives? To seek out wisdom is to move ourselves further away from the illusions we chase and closer to the fruitful and rewarding life for which we yearn.

Taking Leave (Mark 1:14-20)

Taking Leave  (Mark 1:14-20)

“It’s already here.”

That is the gist of what Jesus says, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news”. The kingdom of God is not off in the distant horizon. It is already here.

Such audacious words set not in the present tense, or the future tense, but the definitive, conclusive past. “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near.”

In his masterful commentary on Mark’s gospel, Ched Myers points out that no sooner Jesus makes this audacious claim, the scene changes, and it does not appear that what Jesus said has come to pass. Myers writes, “Instead of a kingdom epiphany, the second act opens with Jesus wandering by the sea, bidding some common laborers to accompany him on a mission. The world appears still very much intact.” (Binding the Strong Man, p. 131)

Mark seems a bit blunt in his storytelling. The words of Jesus’ good news might echo in the readers’ ears and the familiarity of this story of “fishers of men” might warm the Christian’s heart, yet the next sound we hear is not angel chorus singing alleluias above but the grunt and swearing of fishermen, trying hard to haul back a respectable day’s catch.

Despite the announcement the kingdom is here already, the world of fishermen—its hard toil and little pay—does not cease to be. Instead, the world goes on with its hustle and bustle. Hardened, callused hands are not suddenly relieved of being worked to the bone. Backs still ache from the long day’s work, casting nets. If there is any spiritual moment for these fishermen, it is the muttered prayer hoping “the big catch” is still possible in over-fished, over-worked waters.

“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” Why do these words have any meaning, any grounding, in a world without a moment to look up from deadlines and quotas?

It is astonishing what happens next. Jesus calls to the fishermen to follow him, and immediately, they put their nets aside and leave with him. At this point, the earnest reader feels a number of honest questions start percolating within. How can people leave their jobs? How will they make ends meet? Is there something awry here? How can they afford to do this?

Mark’s gospel says “immediately”. Sight unseen, teachings unheard, Jesus summons, and they respond without a moment’s wavering. No argument, no scoffing or banter from ship to shore takes place. Quite simply, Simon, and Andrew, and then James and John “mutely…abandon their nets” (Douglas R.A. Hare, Mark: Westminster Bible Companion, 23).

What would prompt such a remarkable and contrary decision? Curiosity? Boredom? Foolishness?

The words of Jesus give us a clue: Follow me, and I will make you fish for people. At first glance, it sounds as if Jesus is offering a similar job opportunity. You know how to fish. Would you like to help reel in some believers? Many of us learned a song in Sunday school to that effect.

The English translation does not reflect the Greek’s way of recounting Jesus’ words. Instead of “I will make you fish for people”, the better translation would be, “I will make you to become fishers of people.” What Jesus asks the fishermen is not a question of livelihood. Rather, he is asking them if they want a life, a new way of living. Hearing this spin on the text moves us away from a vision of discipleship as “task oriented” and ask us a deeper question. Follow me, and you will become something different. You know the world as you know it. Now take up my ways and you will see the world as God knows it. (Here, I am indebted to the insights of Ted A. Smith, Feasting on the Word, Year B, vol. 1, p. 289.)

I suspicion that is why the nets in their hands got tossed aside. Jesus came to them not looking for something. He came looking for disciples, not an entourage to tend his needs. He looks for people who catch the subtle difference between “doing” and “being”. Jesus is offering another way of life, one given to becoming persons shaped by bearing the cross, seeking to live out the contrary ethic of Jesus, despite the world itself seeming indifferent to this Jesus’ claim that the kingdom of God is already here.

These fishermen are the beginnings of a long list of people who decided to follow Jesus. As Mark’s gospel unfolds, Jesus develops a small core group of disciples as well as crowds who are around for his teachings. It is not an easy path, as Jesus asks them to take leave of many things: family, comfort, power, or privilege. Not everybody stays around Jesus faithfully. Not many persons are willing to take Jesus’ ways as their own. Sight unseen, these fishermen hear something that causes them to get out of the boat and head off in another direction with Jesus. They hear not just another day’s labor, but a different, and more fulfilling way of life offered. It is a risk, it is a gamble, but they take leave of their nets nonetheless.

I found myself reading this story from Mark’s gospel and wondering what it says to our congregation. Instead of imagining a boat out at sea, I recollected a different image altogether: rows of empty bookshelves.

A couple of years ago, I heard of a minister who was learning about a completely different understanding of ministry. He had read about it, attended trainings, and spent time discussing these ideas with colleagues. Then one night he had a dream as he slept. He imagined sitting at his pastor’s office desk, surrounded by empty bookshelves.

As he woke up, he tried sorting out what this dream meant. Why did he dream that his bookshelves were empty? He realized this new way of understanding ministry was challenging everything he knew. The dream helped him see something that he had not quite named. What he had taken for granted as “the way” for doing ministry now was no longer something he wanted to take for granted. As he had been learning about new ideas, part of him had begun to realize that it was time to start anew, to take leave of his long-held understandings and doing ministry in a “business as usual” type manner. It was time for him to become a different sort of minister and lead the way for a different way of being “church”. It was time to take leave of what he knew—the skills, the methods, and the understandings—and go on altogether different adventure, learning to share the gospel of Jesus anew.

I learned this story from Ron Carlson, our occasional consultant. He recounted the story as a good illustration of what happens when you start thinking differently about the purpose and identity of congregations. You ask yourself good, big picture questions like: Who are we? What is our purpose? What does it take to become the disciples that Jesus summons us to become for today’s world? What nets, books, or other objects need to be let go so we can start becoming what Christ summons us to become as his disciples?

See? This story of the calling of Jesus’ first disciples could be relegated to being a story best told in primary age Sunday school, however, but I find this story as one with some lingering questions for even the most mature of Christian believers. Listen and ponder the edginess of Jesus’ words to the fishermen. The difference between “doing ministry” and “becoming disciples” is vast.

Are we still holding onto some nets that we need to let go of? Can we accept “starting anew” with our understandings of discipleship is part of saying ‘yes’ to Jesus’ summons to follow him? As I note in the annual report, it is important to ask one another these essential questions of identity. How do we live out the gospel in an era increasingly indifferent to religious traditions and institutions like Christianity and churches? How do we bring the gospel to the world, “which dearly needs the gospel to be practiced, lived, and proclaimed in its midst?”

I go back to the question of discipleship as “doing” vs. “being”, and I look at what First Baptist is becoming. I can cite a number of good indicators something new and exciting is happening in the life of our congregation. New ways of utilizing and sharing our space with community non-profits allow our building to be a community asset. I see several persons who completed a few weeks of sewing skills training now ready to keep going and create more opportunities for teaching needed life skills. I see two-dozen patients in the past two weeks who came here to receive free health care from the clinic. I see congregants willing to give of their time, despite living in the midst of the world of deadlines and quotas, to help others in our community improve their lives because these congregants are finding these are ways to “practice, live, and proclaim” the gospel.

Getting involved in the community, getting the church more active on the other six days of the week, these efforts might not look like what “church” used to look like when all was well when it was standing room only on Easter Sunday morning. I would daresay these past couple of years, there is something literally “becoming” about this work.

I see Jesus calling to us in our boat, a place of toil yet of familiarity, calling us with winsome words, “The kingdom’s here. Will you become my followers?”

Bennington Banner: Making Great Neighbors

 SPEAKING OF RELIGION Column  published in the Bennington Banner, 11/15/2008

Growing up in rural Kansas, the nearest neighbors were a distance away, rarely seen. Being good practitioners of the Protestant work ethic, we rarely took time out for socializing. Life was about by the unending toil of the day: fence to mend, fields to plow, cattle to pasture, grain and hay to haul. On rare occasion, a little potluck would be held on a Saturday evening where the men talked of grain prices, the women talked of the vacations they wished they could take, and the kids played in the yard, sliding down ancient slipper slides and screaming with glee. The meals rarely happened but they were wonderful!

My childhood memories prompt a theological observation: how we choose to live in this world matters. In God’s good wisdom, God made us social creatures. Created to be in relationship with others, we humans tend to spend most of our time doing so only in part. Instead, we spend much of our time racing around, tending to the affairs of life, and settling for repeating the mantra of “I’m too busy” rather than engaging in conversations and a common meal that is not “fast food”.

A worse habit, however, happens when we look around us and see persons who we choose not to see. We engage in practices, written and unwritten, keeping those persons acutely aware of our disinterest in making them our neighbors. Much too often, some people are kept at arm’s length from being “our” neighbors.

In the Christian tradition, Jesus teaches that the sum of faith is to love God and our neighbor. If we take it seriously, a sacred text that says, “take your neighbor as seriously as you do your devotion to God” should press us, letting an ancient word tweak our modern sensibilities and myopias. Practicing well such a faith might wind up freeing us to live in ways we have left unexplored or forgotten.

To love your neighbor as yourself is to realize “one’s own welfare is intertwined with that of the other”, writes scholar Warren Carter. In his masterful commentary on Matthew’s gospel, Carter claims that this theme of radical hospitality weaves throughout the narrative. Jesus instructs the disciples and the crowds how to love the poor, the dispossessed, the unclean, and yes, even one’s own enemy. He encourages his followers to lead what Carter calls “a life of indiscriminate loving”.

To love indiscriminately is a noble vision, but living it out is another thing altogether! Jesus weaves together the sum of faith (“love God with all of our own being”) with the realities of life, where we falter too often in loving someone completely, especially if they seem too much the part of “the other”. Jesus teaches that the righteous way of leading life has little to do with exacting purity and ironclad authoritarianism. Only in humility and due deference to one another can we start embodying, rather than merely citing, the values of the sum of the faith we seek to keep.

Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, offers a helpful word. Williams writes, “We can cling harder and harder to the rock of our threatened identity—a choice, finally, for self-delusion over truth; or we can accept that we shall have no ultimate choice but to let go, and in that letting go, give room to what’s there around us—to the sheer impression of the moment, to the need of the person next to you, to the fear that needs to be looked at, acknowledged and calmed (not denied). If that happens, the heart has room for many strangers, near and far”.

This past week, I found the words of Jesus coming alive at First Baptist. The congregation invited other religious communities involved with the Greater Bennington Area Interfaith Council to gather for a potluck meal. I thought we would have two dozen at best, given that it was a midweek evening. Nobody will make time as we are all much too busy. Sigh!

Instead, we found ourselves putting up more chairs to accommodate the fifty persons who attended. Around each table, persons from differing religious faiths broke bread and had some great conversations. By the end of the evening, the question was being asked, “When can my own faith community host the next meal?”

Religious communities can be places of great exclusion (written and unwritten) or great inclusion. Indeed, I suspicion one reason for the Church’s decline in North America has been a neglect of the radical hospitality embodied by Jesus and the earliest Christians. If we listen attentively, our sacred text schools us well. Our neighbor is the one in whom the very reason we keep the faith is embodied. In our neighbor and our engagement and treatment of them, we discover how well we love God fully and authentically. The “wholly other” becomes our way toward becoming holy. As Rowan Williams says, when we realize this, “the heart has room for many strangers, near and far.”

The Rev. Jerrod H. Hugenot is coordinating minister of the First Baptist Church of Bennington, Vermont. To correspond: fbpastor@sover.net