THE PLACE WHERE EVERYONE IS IMPORTANT

(Preached on Sunday, January 18, 2004)

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.                                                                         -I Corinthians 12:7

 

If you were to ask me, who were the “saints” in the previous churches I served, I would have to name two people who, if you knew them, might surprise you. 

Both of them are recovering alcoholics.

Ministering to people with alcohol addiction takes a special gift, a gift usually found in those who are recovering from that disease.

I listened well to my Pastoral Care Professor twenty-five years ago in seminary when he told us to seek out and get to know members of AA in the churches we served for they would prove to be some of our greatest allies in ministry.

I have always done that and in whatever church I serve, whenever anyone is afflicted with alcoholism, or is in love with someone who is addicted to alcohol, I put them in touch with one of these saints.

 

Only in the church would those whom the world considers to be “failures,” “addicts,” be considered saints, wounded healers whose wounds are the source of someone else’s healing.

Sometimes, in the church, our wounds, our failures, become our spiritual gifts.  Of course, we are, as Christians, followers of Jesus, well-acquainted with failure. 

The cross, great sign of suffering and failure, by the love of God, is transformed into the sign of our salvation.

So we really shouldn’t be surprise that our weaknesses often become our gifts and our real strengths.

 

When each of us was baptized, the church prayed for each of us the gift of the Holy Spirit. 

Once one has the gift of the Holy Spirit, one has the Spirit’s gifts.

Some congregations have recovered the ancient baptismal practice of delivering to the newly baptized the instruments of baptism — a Bible, with the words “proclaim the gospel,” and a candle, with the words “you are the light of the world.” 

These gifts are reminders that each of us, through baptism, is a minister, someone who is called, equipped to share in Jesus’ ministry to all the world.

 

So I ask you, What is your spiritual gift?

One of the greatest challenges for a pastor and congregation is to be the sort of people who discover, claim, and cultivate the spiritual gifts of one another.

The church, as Paul reminds us today, is a place of diverse spiritual gifts.

Sometimes the church fails to recognize the diversity of gifts among us.

We fail to see that the characteristic of someone in the congregation that we find a nuisance is, in reality, a great gift of the Holy Spirit.

And sometimes communities close their doors to some people because in some way or another those people don’t fit in and are unacceptable to the community. 

Perhaps they don’t speak the language, or perhaps they embrace a different culture, or perhaps they live an off-beat lifestyle from the norm, and the community reacts with suspicion and hostility.  So some communities may struggle, bemoaning the lack of people able to support the needs of the community, when actually they need to open their doors or encourage folk more.

 

God’s gifts aren’t necessarily what you might expect.

For instance, the gift of humor is extremely important in any community, as are the gifts of reliability and getting on well with other people. 

Some people have a knack with figures, other people have a knack with words. 

Some people are good with children, others have endless patience with the very elderly. 

There are those who are good at sitting on boards and committees and making decisions. 

Some people are good with their hands, some are good with their heads, some are good with their voices, and some are good with their hearts.

Everyone is given some gift, and usually more than one.

 

Many times, though we are shy about using our gifts.

Many times we feel that our gifts just don’t measure up or are not important.  There is an old Peanuts cartoon where the children are all lying on a grassy hillside looking at puffy white clouds in a blue sky.  They all see pictures in the shapes of the clouds.  Lucy sees the map of a coastline with bays and gulfs and capes and peninsulas.  Linus sees the crowd in a painting of the stoning of Stephen — even with Saul of Tarsus standing by holding the coats.

But Charlie Brown?  We see that he thinks to himself that he sees a kitty and a ducky, but what are these simple things next to coastlines and paintings?  He meekly decides to keep it to himself.

 

But no gift is unimportant. 

If it’s to be a healthy community, the Church needs every variety of gift.

One time, during a relational Bible study, the members of the group were asked to respond to this passage from Corinthians by identifying themselves literally with body parts, as members of the Body of Christ.  One woman, being aware of her own limited experience in church matters and thinking she had little in the way of spiritual gifts, rather  hesitantly said, “the left big toe?”  After all, that was about as far away as one could get from the heart or head or right hand, the things that she understood as vitally important to the life of Christ’s body or anyone else’s.  But instead of the laughter she expected, the leader took her self-deprecation seriously.  He said that dancers and athletes know just how important the left big toe, or any toe, is to one’s sense of balance, to running or jumping or twirling, or just standing firmly on the ground.  He reminded her that when we stub our toes, it’s hard to concentrate on anything else until the pain subsides; and when our toes are broken, our entire body gets out of alignment, as we try to compensate for the unevenness in our gait.  So, too, he said, in the body of Christ.  The entire Body is in pain when the left big toe is injured, and until that small, seemingly insignificant member is able to contribute its own true gifts, the Body of Christ is somehow incomplete.

 

The truth is, I think we understand this very well around here.

We actually are a community that understands that each person is precious, unique and important. 

We understand that each person has gifts to share for the good of the whole community and we encourage and nurture one another to do that. 

We are not a large church with all the variety and diversity that goes with that reality.

But we do have a lot of variety and diversity within our community and we affirm and cherish every bit of it.

I’m not sure we understand what all of our gifts are or that we are brave enough to exercise them often.

 

We have people here who write notes and send cards to others, just to cheer them up, to let them know they are not alone in whatever they are facing.

We have people here who have a strong heart of concern for children and parents and are willing to help parents in their struggles to be good parents whenever they are needed.

We have people here who have an open, ecumenical heart who continually remind us to be welcoming of anyone who comes here looking for the church to help them celebrate an important moment in their life.

We have people here who pray for the rest of us and for the church on a regular daily basis.

We have people here who are always ready to help out with preparing food so that the community can gather to socialize and build relationships, over breakfast, or luncheons, or in picnic settings.