Hearing the Music

What Makes the Church the Church

This Sunday we wrap up our Sunday school offerings for the school year as we embrace our rhythms of work and rest. It is appropriate, as we pause, to take a moment to appreciate all those who serve on a regular basis, because they are really what makes the church the church. Sunday to Sunday there are folks that you see: doing music, greeting, teaching, cleaning up, etc... But there are many more serving that are rarely seen: in the nursery, the sound booth, in our children’s ministry, more cleaning, feeding college students, etc... Without the various members of the body pulling together, on Sundays and throughout the week, the church simply wouldn’t be the church. 

While every function of the body is important, training up the “next generation” is among the most crucial things that a church does. As we pass down the tenets of the faith to our kids, we not only connect them to the most vital truths of the universe, but we ensure that a witness that will continue long after we ourselves are gone. However, children’s ministry is also one of the most labor intensive activities of the church. Recently Debbie Bukovietski, our beloved Children’s Ministry director, reminded us that on any given Sunday morning we have greater than 100 souls to account for between the ages of birth to 10. Over the course of a Sunday morning, nurseries, Sunday School and Christ Kids Worship all function with a predominantly volunteer work force. Praise the Lord for the way that He has provided for these needs through you! Let us continue to pray that we will have the collective zeal for this work as we look through the summer towards the fall!

Whether it is the children among us or engaging those with disabilities or the wounded or the lonely, we follow our Savior outside the camp where the needy are. It will be this theme of following the Savior outside the camp that will be our focus in this penultima study in Hebrews (cf. 13:7-21). Ultimately it is among the needy that we will all be found!

Presence

As some of you heard, this past week we had to put down our faithful companion of 14 years, Daisy.  While the rational side of the brain knows that it was the right thing to do, for her and for our sanity, the reality is she is missed. Daisy was a great lookout at the window and greeter of guests. She loved to take walks, threaten local squirrels and stand proudly astride the bike cart as the wind whipped her ears back. But what I miss most is her presence. I can't tell you how many times in the last few days I have instinctively looked for her, moved my feet for her, thought I heard her, went to close the door so she wouldn't get out, etc ... only to realize she was no longer present.

The negative space, i.e. missing her presence, has highlighted for me a Presence that I may at times overlook, but will never go away. Listen to how David, a man who knew life on the run, put it: "Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. (Psalm 139:7–10)". It will be many a morning until I forget what I am missing with Daisy gone, but I will let that loss remind me of the Presence I will never lose.

We are coming into the home stretch with the book of Hebrews. This week we finish out chapter 12 and take up the first 6 verses of chapter 13 (Hebrews 12:25-13:6). Here the preacher leverages the high theology he has been expounding into incredibly practical applications - be hospitable, care for prisoners, maintain a sexual ethic, and be content with what you have. It may be just me, but it seems pretty relevant for today!

Diminisher or Illuminator?

Perhaps you know the story that is sometimes told of Jennie Jerome, who later became Winston Churchill’s mother. It’s said that when she was young, she dined with the British statesman William Gladstone and left thinking he was the cleverest person in England. Later she dined with Gladstone’s great rival, Benjamin Disraeli, and left that dinner thinking she was the cleverest person in England. It’s nice to be like Gladstone, but it’s better to be like Disraeli.

Such is the point made by David Brooks in his new book, How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen. Brooks sees the world a little like this, "In every crowd there are Diminishers and there are Illuminators. Diminishers make people feel small and unseen. They see other people as things to be used, not as persons to be befriended. They stereotype and ignore. They are so involved with themselves that other people are just not on their radar screen. Illuminators, on the other hand, have a persistent curiosity about other people. They have been trained or have trained themselves in the craft of understanding others. They know what to look for and how to ask the right questions at the right time. They shine the brightness of their care on people and make them feel bigger, deeper, respected, lit up."

My guess is that your mind started rifling through people in your sphere and began to place people in categories. It is not that diminshers are necessarily bad people, but we certainly know when we have been in the presence of an illuminator, and it is sweet. Perhaps you next started to give yourself a personal inventory. Am I a diminisher or an illuminator? Is it that black and white? What about specific interactions that I have had recently? Did people walk away thinking about me, or did they leave feeling better about themselves?

It probably is not as black and white as dividing the world into diminshers and illuminators. It is probably more fair to say that some among us tend toward the diminishing side, while others trend toward illuminating. It is probably even more accurate to acknowledge that over the course of any given day we have a multitude of interactions, some in which we diminish our neighbor, and others in which our neighbor is illuminated. While that is a bit discouraging, it is also encouraging, because it means we are not stuck in a category, we can grow! Brooks puts it this way, " Being an Illuminator, seeing other people in all their fullness, doesn’t just happen. It’s a craft, a set of skills, a way of life. Other cultures have words for this way of being. The Koreans call it nunchi, the ability to be sensitive to other people’s moods and thoughts. The Germans (of course) have a word for it: herzensbildung, training one’s heart to see the full humanity in another." If you really want to dig into acting more like an illuminator, I would recommend Brooks book. But for today, maybe it is enough to pay attention to our interactions aware of the possibility of diminishing or illuminating.

Let me make one last connection. The basis for all illuminating is the Gospel. The Gospel is the truth that Jesus as the only begotten Son of God allowed himself the ultimate diminishment so that we, his adopted daughters and sons, could be fully illuminated. This is the message of the book of Hebrews that we have been studying. It is the message of our passage this week as we come to chapter 12:18-24. In these verses the preacher increases the wattage of Gospel truth, so that his congregation might radiate all the confidence, love, peace, and joy that being known by God offers. How do you illuminate in a world of Roman oppression? By focusing on the deepest truths of the Gospel. How do you illuminate in a world of political divisions, mental health crisis, and relational breakdowns? By focusing on the deepest truths of the Gospel.

Photo by Joanna Kosinska on Unsplash