Responses to the verdict

Cut your losses?
05 Dec 2004

Matthew 3: 1-12

On Thursday this past week, the church which I have been a part of my entire life – the church into which I was baptized, the church which embraced me and raised me, the church which offered me communion and consolation and marriage, the church which has affirmed my call from God and has chosen me to be set apart as an ordained leader – the church through which I serve God as a pastor has told my children that their pastor is not “Christian enough” to be their pastor.

On Thursday this past week, the United Methodist Church removed the ordination credentials of my sister in Christ, The Reverend Beth Stroud. When I left my last full time appointment at First United Methodist Church of Germantown (FUMCOG) in 1999, Beth was appointed to the Associate Pastor’s position which I vacated. Since that time, she has been pastor to my children.

Beth Stroud is my children’s pastor. She saw Tim through his challenging teenage high school years, took him with their Youth Group to Haiti, twice on Appalachia Service Project trips, and a few summers ago to the Taize Community in France. She welcomed Lindsay into that church’s ministry in whatever ways she could participate. She has nourished Lacey from the cute 9 year old that she was then into the 14 year old young woman she is now as Beth works with her through the confirmation process so that she might decide to join or not join the church which has decided to take away her pastor.

Beth has held tightly to my children as they wrestled with whatever demons and dilemmas have been brought to life because of their parent’s marital separation and divorce. She has been there for them, listened to them, prayed with them, served them communion, cried with them, questioned with them.

Beth Stroud is my children’s pastor. On Thursday, the United Methodist Church decided that solely because of her committed, loving relationship with her partner Chris, she is no longer qualified to fully be my children’s pastor. She can be a lay minister to them. But if they want to get married or receive communion, or have their children baptized, then they can’t go to the one pastor that they have known and trusted during the most vulnerable years of their lives. When it’s time for a sacramental moment, they can no longer turn to the person who has represented Jesus to them for the past 5+ years.

This conclusion is one of the points that has angered me so this past week. When we found out the dates for Beth’s trial, Lacey asked if she could attend. It was a weekday and I wondered aloud, for just a brief second, if she should miss school to attend. God spoke to me and reminded me how much more valuable an educational lesson Lacey would receive watching the support that would surround her pastor on Wednesday – and God was, again!, right. Tim finished classes at Albright College on Wednesday and quickly made his way to Beth’s side to be with her and all who gathered at Camp Innabah this week.

When we arrived there on Wednesday, FUMCOG members were handing out badges and ribbons which said, “My name is ________ and Beth is my Friend,” or “Beth is my Pastor.” Lacey already had hers from a few Sundays before – “Beth is my Pastor”. Tim took the same version and added to it so it said “Beth is my Pastor. + Friend”

“Which one did I want?,” someone asked me. Again, a brief second pause; again, God spoke to me. “I need ‘Beth is my Pastor,’ please.”

Beth Stroud is my children’s pastor. “Well, not totally,” says my church.

So what do I do now? Do I consider this just another loss in my life, in my children’s lives? Do I count this as “simply” another loss and chalk it up to intolerance and prejudice and injustice? Do I write off the church that I have always loved? Do I simply – albeit painfully – cut my losses and move on?

“Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire,” warns John the Baptist in Matthew’s Gospel. Is it possible that my church – our church – the United Methodist Church – is no longer capable of bearing good fruit? Should it be cut down and thrown into the fire? Should I – or we – simply accept it as loss, cut our losses, and find good fruit elsewhere?

I don’t want to, I know that. I don’t want to cut and run. I want to stay and hear the Good News of Jesus’ teaching being proclaimed in a just way. I want to stay and hear that the Advent Gospel is truth “beyond all telling of it” (Ted Loder); that “God with us” means something in this world; that what happened to my sister, Beth, this week is an aberration that we can correct so that the fruit which can come from this United Methodist tree will ripen into that which can nourish the world around us.

I know that that’s been a part of Beth’s motivation and guiding light through this whole fiasco as well, she has spoken publicly about the desire to stay and change the church. She could have cut her losses long ago and run to another more welcoming, fruit-bearing denomination. Thank God she didn’t. She chose, instead, to stay with an institution which is in so many ways out-dated and hypocritical because she knows it can change as well.

And here, I suggest, is why I also know it can change. “I baptize you with water for repentance,” preaches John the Baptist, “[The One coming after me] will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”

We don’t hear much about repentance in the church these days. It’s perhaps the rarest of beasts in mainstream Christian circles. Do you know why? Because it requires too much of us. It requires a complete change from within. It requires a cleansing and a new birth. It requires an altering of the very framework of our living.

In Jewish tradition, one is cleansed in a ritualistic bath, a mikvah, symbolizing the purification which comes alongside repentance. That is possibly, scholars suggest, what John the Baptist was doing, inviting Jews to a mikvah. While it was, in John’s and Jesus’ time, usually performed in a pool or tub at a home or outside the synagogue, John’s very public invitation to a cleansing is in the Jordan River. “Come, repent, be cleansed and purified. Only then can you receive with integrity the Spirit of God and the Good News of the One who comes after me.” Only after repentance can you receive the Messiah, is John’s message.

Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourners, a Christian social action magazine, tells a story of a repentance and reconciliation which cleansed him and opened him to the power of what following Jesus can mean. “Bill Bright,” wrote left-leaning Jim Wallis, “was the founder and president of Campus Crusade for Christ, an evangelical organization on campuses around the country. Motivated, above all else, by the Great Commission, Bill Bright wanted to reach every person on the planet for Christ ‘in this generation.’ Concerned about the ‘moral degeneration’ of America, Bright wanted America to come back to God - which for him meant an ultra-conservative political agenda. Bill and I were both evangelical Christians, but we clearly disagreed on a whole range of political issues.”

In the 1970’s, Bill Bright joined forces with right-wing Congressional leaders to begin what eventually morphed into the “Religious Right” and it’s organizations like Moral Majority and The Christian Coalition. Jim Wallis and Sojourners investigated Bright’s efforts and published an issue which left Bill Bright publicly embarrassed, angry, and ready to fight. “Bright angrily denounced me,” writes Wallis, “Because we also differed on almost every political question from Vietnam to domestic issues, a bitter and public polarization grew up between Bill Bright and myself. The bad blood continued for many years. I remember a particularly painful moment one year at a dinner for evangelical leaders, when Bright again went on the attack against me in a very public way, calling me a ‘liar.’"

Bright and Wallis were on opposite ends of the great spectrum which stretches across Christian theology – one to the far right, the other to the far left. Neither had much interest in the Christian message which the other taught. Neither was willing to find his way to the center, feeling like it would require giving up too much, would require too much work and effort. Neither would surrender. Wallis tells their repentance and reconciliation story like this (it’s lengthy but bear with me):

quote:
More than two decades later, Bright and I found ourselves at yet another religious leaders' dinner. When I saw him across the room, I swallowed hard and headed in his direction. He obviously didn't recognize me after so long. I introduced myself, and he became quiet. I said, "Bill, I need to apologize to you. I was in a hotel several months ago and knew you were there too. I should have come to your room and tried to mend the painful breach between us after all these years. I didn't do that, and I should have. I'm sorry."

The now-old man reached out and wrapped his arms around me. Then he said, "Jim, we need to come together. It's been so long, and the Lord would have us come together." We both had tears in our eyes and embraced for a long time. Then Bill said, "Jim, I'm so worried about the poor, about what's going to happen to them. You're bringing us together on that, and I want to support you." I was amazed. We agreed to get together soon.

A few months later, Bill and I were again, coincidentally, at the same hotel. I called Bill and we agreed to a walk on the beach together the next morning. Bill and I shared our own conversion stories. We shared our callings and dreams for our respective ministries, and how we might be more connected. Bill then astounded me, saying, "You know, Jim, I'm kind of a Great Commission guy." I smiled and nodded my head. "And I've discovered that caring for the poor is part of the Great Commission, because Jesus instructed us to 'teach the nations to observe all the things I have commanded you.' And Jim, Jesus certainly taught us to care for the poor, didn't he? Caring for the poor is part of the Great Commission!" said Bill Bright.

When we got back to the hotel, Bill asked if we could pray together. We sat down and grasped each other's hands. First praying for each other, we also prayed for each other's ministries. Bill Bright prayed for me, and for the work of Call to Renewal and Sojourners. When we were finished, he said he wanted to raise some money for our "work of the Lord."

Bill, who was now more than 80 years old, soon began to get sick. I kept track of how he was doing. Then one day, I got a letter - from Bill Bright. Here's what the letter said:

My Dear Jim,
Congratulations on your great ministry for our Lord. I rejoice with you. An unexpected gift designated to my personal use makes possible this modest contribution to your magazine. I wish I had the means to add at least three more zeros to the enclosed check. Warm affection in Christ. Yours for helping to fulfill the Great Commission each year until our Lord returns. Bill

Inside the letter was a check for $1,000.

As I was reading Bill's letter, my colleague Duane Shank walked into my office. "Did you hear?" he asked. "Bill Bright just died." We looked at the postmark on the letter and compared it to the news reports of Bill's death. We concluded that writing me this letter was one of the last things that Bill Bright did on earth. Bill sent a $1,000 gift to the magazine that had exposed his most embarrassing moment more than 30 years before, as an affirmation of the ministry of another Christian leader who he once regarded as his enemy. I couldn't hold back the tears, and can't again as I write down this story for the first time.

The experience of my relationship with Bill Bright has taught me much about the promise and power of reconciliation. I will never again deny the prospect of coming together with those with whom I disagree. It is indeed the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ to break down the walls between us. Thank you, Bill. I will never forget you.

We are on our way to Bethlehem this Advent. I am inviting you through my sermons this season to consider the journey as one that reaches beyond Bethlehem. This is Mile 2 and we have “miles to go before [we] sleep.” We have encounters to encounter, decisions to make, obstacles to overcome. But we are on our way. At this mile-marker we discover the option to end the journey by cutting our losses and walking away. But more importantly at this mile, we also hear the call to repentance and the possibilities of reconciliation.

In John’s baptism is more than the possibility of simply getting wet. In John’s baptism is an invitation to head toward the next mile-marker and discover in Jesus a baptism of God’s Spirit. Here at Mile 2 on the journey beyond Bethlehem is the chance to reconcile and become renewed in the Spirit.

Cut your losses and throw into the fire that which serves you no purpose? Or reconcile and make new, repent and be changed. John says reconcile.

Beth is my children’s pastor. Still – and as long as she wants to be and they want her to be and God allows her to be – still, Beth is my children’s pastor. The United Methodist Church now, and soon, will have to repent of its sin of exclusion. Only then will reconciliation happen. Only then can the journey to Bethlehem and beyond continue.

It seems to me like at this moment in time we have a choice. Cut our losses, throw them into the fire, and move on in another direction. Or we can, like Jim Wallis and Bill Bright repent and move toward each other and move on toward reconciliation and the baptism of God’s Spirit. My choice is to not cut my losses, but to continue on the journey, call for the church’s repentance, and work even harder to move our church along the trying journey toward wholeness.

Here is the table of reconciliation. At the Lord’s Table this day receive and continue your journey beyond Bethlehem, receive and move forward before you find that rest and sleep which is in Jesus beyond his Bethlehem birth.

Here is the table of reconciliation and repentance. I invite you – I invite the entire United Methodist Church – to hear these prayers to God today not as if they are spoken by an ordained, white man, but receive them and come to this table as if this bread and this cup are consecrated by those who my church – our church – The United Methodist Church – would deny access to this table.

Hear these prayers today as if they are being prayed by our gay and lesbian and trans-gendered brothers and sisters who are not allowed to break the bread or lift the cup. Hear these prayers being prayed by pastors of color who are rejected by their appointed churches simply because of their skin pigmentation. Hear these prayers as if they are prayed by Roman Catholic women who are not welcome to stand at this side of the table. Hear these prayers as if they are prayed by those with disabilities whose physical form makes us cringe when they touch the bread and cup.

Hear these prayers as pleadings for forgiveness from all who would call themselves Christian yet would deny others the same opportunities, deny them justice. Hear these prayers to – and come to the table prepared by – a loving and forgiving God, prayers asking for another chance, prayers that we might be reconciled one to another and that in the coming Messiah we might receive grace upon grace through the baptism of God’s Spirit which the Messiah brings to us.

Amen.

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