July 27, 2003; Proper 12, Year B
The Rev. Marilou Schlotterbeck, Deacon
In Ephesians Paul is challenging us. A challenge which we can choose to accept or decline.
The challenge? Paul says, “I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.” God has chosen us to be Christ’s representatives on earth. Paul asks us to live our lives worthy of the calling we have received. The awesome privilege of being called Christ’s very own. This includes being humble, gentle, patient, understanding, and peaceful.
We should consistently ask ourselves:
| Do others see Christ in us? |
| As an individual are we showing who Christ is in our community? |
| As a congregation are we united in the Spirit? |
That is the spirit of outreach. Of helping others who are sick, hungry and desolate.
Paul says “there is one body”. But we know that unity does not just happen, we have to work at it. What unites us is: one body, one Spirit, one hope, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God!
As a congregation of many different backgrounds and viewpoints, of many exceptional and different kinds of gifts we compliment each other in doing our work for God’s church. We put them all together and we have a loving, working, humble, patient, peaceful congregation. The kind of church anyone would want to be a part of. However, no one or any congregation is ever going to be perfect here on earth, so we must always strive to be better and accept each other for who we are.
The Holy Spirit will and does lead us into unity. We must be willing to be led and to do our part. We do this by focusing on God, not ourselves.
All believers in Christ belong to one body; all are united under one head, Christ himself. Each believer has God given abilities that strengthen the whole body. Your special ability may seem small or large, but it is yours to use in God’s service. Ask God to help you to discern your unique gift to contribute to the strength and health of the body of believers.
Our oneness in Christ does not destroy our individuality. The Holy Spirit has given each Christian special gifts for building up the church. Now that we have these gifts it is crucial to use them.
For example: the outreach we do in this parish is extraordinary.
These are all run by people with a God given gift.
God has given us an enormous responsibility-to make disciples in every nation. This involves preaching, teaching, healing, nurturing, giving, administering, building, and many other tasks. As individuals this would be an impossible task. But as a whole body, it becomes possible. As a body of Christ, we can accomplish more together than we would dream possible working by ourselves. Working together, the church can express the fullness of Christ.
Christ is the truth, and the Holy Spirit who guides the church is the Spirit of truth. As followers of Christ, we must be committed to the truth. This means both that our words should be honest and that our actions should reflect Christ’s integrity.
Last week the Deacon’s of the Diocese got together with the Bishop for refreshing and replenishing the Spirit in us. We talked about our ministries. It was amazing how each of us had a different ministry. They all involved helping the poor, the hungry, the homeless, the less fortunate, the elderly, the youth and the dying.
In verses eleven and twelve in Ephesians it hits home. It was He who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ, to prepare God’s people for works of service.
The works of service has deep significance. A literal translation of the Greek word for ministry is “deaconing”, and corresponds to our English word “to serve”. It is a paradox that the humblest of the professional ministerial orders in Christian history, that of deacon, should carry the functional name which ought to characterize all Christian service.
The Deacon’s job? To prepare others to do God’s work. To take a project and make it the churches project. To help those who need our help and to bridge the gap between those less fortunate and the church.
It is also our job to preach about outreach. This is what we are all about. And I tell you, all of us have this gift. Paul Lyon could be our Deacon. His outreach program is beyond fantastic. He has brought to our attention the needs of this community and the world.
St. Philip’s is blessed. We all marvel at how well we are doing, how we are growing, how blessed we are to have Larry as our organist and his ability to bring us very special music, and the Priest that we have. We are not blessed because we have all of this. We are blessed because God allows us to have all of this.
We are blessed because we have asked and prayed for God’s help.
We are blessed because St. Philip’s has a personality of its own.
Most think of personality in terms of individualism. Not at St. Philip’s. we see personality as a people, a family, a church. We are united in the Spirit, our gifts compliment each other, so much so that God has helped us to grow, to become who we are.
However, lets not get cocky about this. Lets not sit back and breathe easy. Our work for Christ is never done. Our gifts are never used up. They are always needed. There is always someone out there who has a gift that Christ needs and maybe they have not shared it yet.
When we read the story of Pentecost, the picture is one of a group, united in a confession of faith, and then empowered by the “Spirit” of the risen Christ. And where Christ is, there is unity. No conviction is more deeply rooted in the Old Testament than that of the unity of God: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord”.
Unity in Christ is unity in one body and one baptism. Our ministry and service becomes the bond of fellowship. It is cumulative, building up the body of Christ. A true church is today as much a miracle as was the fellowship of Pentecost. Ministry itself is a gift. Not a work looking toward a reward.
Amen.