- Sermon - Mickey Anders

Text: 1 Corinthians 1:1-9

There is an old story about a New England church that was suffering though time of dissension and backbiting. The people were constantly involved in petty feuds. One day, the people came together and consulted a former pastor as to how they could resolve their differences. The pastor agreed to think on the matter and send them a letter soon detailing his judgment.

A few days later, the pastor sat down and wrote his letter to the people, full of advice on how to make peace in their church. At the same time he wrote a letter to a farmer friend of his with advice about farming and especially about the trouble he was having with one of his bulls. Then the pastor called up two messengers, gave them the two letters, and sent them on their way.

You can guess what happened. The pastor accidentally mixed up the letters. The message for the church got sent to the farmer friend. The message for the farmer friend got sent to the feuding church.

An elder stood and read this letter to the congregation: "You had better see that your fences are put up well in the first place. Plow your ground deep; and sort your seed; be careful not to sow foul seed; and take care of that great, ugly bull. I think you had better poke him. The rest I will tell you when I come."

The church folks sat in silence for a long time, contemplating the pastor's strange message. Finally, one man stood and attempted to interpret it. The putting up of fences must refer to the rules of discipline in the church. The people had neglected these rules of discipline for too long. And plowing up the ground must be another way of saying the people need to open their hearts, to allow the good seed of brotherly love to be sown. The warning against foul seed was obvious: the members had an obligation to sort the truth from the untruth, and not believe every morsel of gossip they heard. And the great, ugly bull could only symbolize the devil, who had come into their midst and stirred up so much strife among them. The people realized this was the most wonderful letter they had ever heard.

The people were so moved by the pastor's advice that they began confessing their sins and offering forgiveness to one another. They opened up their hearts to one another and prayed for each other. And peace reigned in the once-feuding church. The story doesn't relate what the farmer thought when he got his letter.

The situation was something like that when the Apostle Paul wrote his letter to Corinth. In the letter of 1 Corinthians, we find Paul writing a letter to a divided church. When we read the rest of this letter, we discover that this was a church with problems with a capital P.

It really does remind me of that wonderful song from The Music Man where Harold Hills says:

“Ya got trouble,
Right here in River city!
With a capital ‘T’
And that rhymes with ‘P’
And that stands for Pool.
We've surely got trouble!
Right here in River City!”

It was something like that when Paul wrote to the Corinthians because they had a member living in incest, they had people speaking in tongues, they had people getting drunk at the Lord’s Supper, they had people who did not believe in the resurrection, they had terrible divisions in the church, they had people who were proud of their spirituality and thought their gift was better than anybody else’s. This was a church with trouble with a capital T and problems with a capital P.

So how did Paul begin his letter to the troubled church? Our text for today shows the introduction to his magnificent letter. First, notice what he did not do. He could have immediately jumped into criticizing the Corinthians or pointing out their problems, but he might never have been heard if he did that. No, he was much more tactful than that.

So he began by telling them who they really were. He began by focusing on one particular metaphor for the Christian life. It was a metaphor that helps people transcend their problems and rise to the highest that is within them.

You know that there are many metaphors for the Christian life. The way we see ourselves and our relation to God determines how we behave. Someone has said, “A picture is not only worth a thousand words; it is the parent of a thousand deeds.” How we see ourselves determines how we act!

Some people see themselves as soldiers in God’s army. This has been a popular metaphor in times past. William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army, used the military metaphor with great effect. I remember well my surprise last year in my first conversations with Doug Alexander about his work on the board of the Salvation Army. It sounded so strange to me when he referred to the work of “the Army.” My mind kept going to the United States military instead of the benevolent organization. I kept thinking, “What’s the Army got to do with this conversation? Oh! He means the Salvation Army!”

But they are not the only ones to adopt this metaphor. The ex-soldier Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuits, modeled his society after military ideas. There are Latin American priests who see themselves as chaplains to God's guerrilla army of liberation.

Christiane Amanpour recently presented a disturbing series of television specials about religious fundamentalists in the Christian, Jewish and Islamic faiths, and she entitled her program “God’s Warriors” because that is the compelling metaphor of these groups. Their metaphor determines their behavior. I personally think that should make us stop and think when we sing the old hymn “Onward Christian Soldiers.”

Many have used the school metaphor. I have read that life in Scottish Presbyterian churches in days gone by was very much like being in school. The pastor was teacher in residence. Sermons were long and scholarly. When the pastor visited a home, he tested the children's knowledge of the church catechism. One of the classic books on prayer was written by a Scottish trained missionary, Andrew Murray. He named his devotional classic With Christ in the School of Prayer. If the school is our model, then learning is the primary goal. Do we see ourselves as scholars in the school of Christ? If so, that will affect our behavior.

Perhaps we see ourselves as a traveler along the Christian way. That was the model that John Bunyan used in his classic work, Pilgrim’s Progress. He captured the imaginations of many generations with his image of the Christian life as a journey. I certainly think this metaphor has many merits. One of my favorite verses is Luke 9:23 which says, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me.”

Following Christ is a wonderful metaphor for the Christian life. It affects our behavior as well. We see ourselves like the first disciples who left their nets and followed this itinerant preacher in Galilee. We too are on a pilgrimage with Christ. John Bunyan suggested that Christians were seeking the Celestial City. Some would argue that we are on a pilgrimage to heaven, and that affects how they behave.

We have used something of that metaphor with our talk about the history of our church as “The Journey.” I like the idea that we are on a journey or a pilgrimage. It is a wonderful metaphor for recognizing the value of our past. Our heritage has been a journey that has brought us to this place; and our journey will carry us into the future.

But the question comes to my mind, “Where is our journey carrying us? Where are we going if we are on a journey? What is the goal of our pilgrimage?” The weakness of the journey imagery is that it can just be a trip. It may just be rambling around. We may just be tourists on a sight-seeing venture. We are certainly journeying with Christ, but where are we going?

Another valuable metaphor for the Christian life is that of an extended family. We are a family of faith. The idea of the Christian fellowship as a heavenly family housed on earth has a long history. The Shakers saw one another as brothers and sisters in a surrogate family. Roman Catholics call their priest Father; in their religious orders are Brothers and Sisters.

When I served in the Baptist church, their favorite title for me was “brother.” Everyone called me “Brother Mickey.” I will never forget the time that one of the four-year-olds in the church, who happened to be an only child, surprised his mother by announcing, “I have a brother!” After the mother settled down from her shock, the boy announced, “My brother is brother Mickey!”

I like the image that we are brothers and sisters in Christ. We are a family of faith. And that image affects how we behave as well. If we are family, then we care for one another. If we are family, then we show love for all ages. We support one another; we celebrate with those who rejoice; we grieve with those who grieve. That caring is certainly at the heart of how this church sees itself.

The New Testament is not limited to the images of soldier, sibling, scholar, or sojourner. It offers such metaphors of the Christian life as "ambassador for Christ" and "citizen of God's commonwealth." Then there is the disciple, the member of Christ's body, and the friend of Jesus. We could talk about the variety of metaphors all day.

So which metaphor did Paul use to speak to the troubled church at Corinth? Listen to the following phrases from the first chapter of 1 Corinthians:

(1) Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Jesus Christ... (2)to the church of God. . . to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ… (9) God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord… (26) Consider your own call, brothers and sisters…

Paul decided that the most useful metaphor for the folks at Corinth was “hearers of the call.”

As we gather in this place Sunday by Sunday, an outsider could argue that we were just like any other volunteer organization. We have meetings, meals, committees, budgets and newsletters. But there is something that is unique about a church. We are the people who are called.

When we hear the voice of God calling us, we are suddenly aligned with people from the Bible like Moses. He was on a hillside not thinking about anything but his sheep, when suddenly, a voice spoke to him from a burning bush. That call changed his behavior. He went back to Egypt and led his people out of bondage. Prophets all through the Old Testament were called of God. They sensed that God was calling them to do something very special.

In our church, we confess that we are on a journey, but we are not to be just rambling around. We are not sight-seeing. We are going where God calls us to go. Our task is to listen with all our being, asking what God is calling us to do now.

Individuals hear that call as well. We learned last week that our new associate, Holly Fuqua, visited this church ten years ago and sensed that this would be the place that God would call her to full-time work. One of our members, Stephanie Reedy, says that she was driving by our church when she felt God calling her. “She heard God saying, This is the place where I want you to invest your spiritual life.” She joined this church because God called her to it.

Sunday by Sunday, I proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ. Sometimes I feel that I need to twist people’s arms so they will make a decision for Christ. But what I really want people to do is simply to hear the call of God.

What is God calling us to do and be? At every stage of our lives, God is calling us to service, to commitment, or to membership in this church.

Just this morning, I remembered that the Greek word for church is ekklesia. It is a combination of two words meaning “out” and “called.” The church means “called out.” Paul’s metaphor strikes at the very heart of what the church is – a people who are called by God.

Let me end with one last image. I suspect that most of us grew up in simple times where we played hide-and-seek with our friends in the neighborhood. I can remember those warm summer afternoons playing with friends. Suddenly I would hear something! It was my mother crying, “Mickey! Come home!”

If an outsider were to look at the group of children playing, all of them would look about the same. But there was something very different about that one child – he has been called home. His behavior is changed because of that call.

As we come to this place each week, I hope we will open our hearts and hear the call of God. We are the called ones. We are the church that goes wherever God calls.

(Some of the ideas in this sermon were stimulated by “Returning God's Call: The Challenge of Christian Living” by John C. Purdy published in l989 by Westminster/John Knox Press and posted online at Religion Online.)