Notes from the Wayside: Sermon: We're All Ministers Here

Delivered at Travelers Rest United Methodist Church in Travelers Rest, South Carolina on June 18, 2023

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We're All Ministers Here

Audio Version

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Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God’s sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture:

“See, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious;
and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe,

“The stone that the builders rejected
has become the very head of the corner,”

and

“A stone that makes them stumble,
and a rock that makes them fall.”

They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do.

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

Once you were not a people,
but now you are God’s people;
once you had not received mercy,
but now you have received mercy.

1 Peter 2:4-10 (NRSV)

Brother, sister, let me serve you
Let me be as Christ to you
Pray that I may have the grace to
Let you be my servant too

From “The Servant Song” by Richard Gillard

What do you want to be when you grow up?

It is the kind of question an adult might ask a child. It also happens to be the kind of question a foreign language instructor might ask her students.

In 2005, as I approached my junior year at Furman University, I decided to bite the proverbial bullet and to begin working on the foreign language requirements for my degree. I had already taken two Spanish courses in high school, so logically, in the fall term, I found myself in an introductory German course.¹ One morning, the professor asked all of us in her class what we wanted to do after we graduated, and we were all expected to respond auf Deutsch. When it was my turn to answer the question, I responded, “Wie sagt man 'computer programmer'?” Our vocabulary lesson did not cover my particular career choice, so I asked her, in German, “How does one say 'computer programmer'?” As my professor told me that the German word I wanted was Computerprogrammierer – a word that was obviously borrowed from the English language – something inside me asked, “Are you sure that's really what you want to be?”

Toward the end of my sophomore year, I declared my major, which was split between computer science and mathematics. I had always loved math, but after taking a few calculus courses and emptying several bottles of ibuprofen in the process, I could not imagine becoming a mathematician.² Though I was somewhat less than passionate about writing computer programs, it was something I understood how to do, and I knew that I would be able to put my degree to practical use. Later in my junior year, I went on to declare a full computer science major in addition to my interdisciplinary major. If I had followed my heart, I might have majored in philosophy or religion, but I did not think a degree in either of those disciplines would be of any benefit to me unless I became a professor myself.

I suspect that you might have wondered if I have ever considered going into the ministry. The truth is that, at some point before I declared my major, the thought had crossed my mind; I quickly dismissed it, however, because I was not interested in being an example or a role model for anyone else. I was well aware that ministers are held to a standard higher than that of most people, and that kind of life just wasn't for me. I knew that, if I became a minister, people would be watching me attentively.

The great Christian philosopher Søren Kierkegaard once compared the activities of the Church to a theatrical production. In a typical stage production, actors perform for an audience while taking cues from an unseen director. Churchgoers tend to think of themselves as part of an audience watching a production at the front of the sanctuary. Preachers then are thought to be the actors performing on stage.³ If you're not a big fan of the theater, a sports metaphor would work just as well. Churchgoers might compare themselves to a crowd watching a sporting event, while preachers might be compared to the athletes on the field.

In either of these metaphors, “church” is typically understood to be a spectator event. We speak of “going to church” in the same way we might speak of “going to the game” or “going to the movies.” Some of us, myself included, have even gone “church shopping,” seeking out the church that can put on the best production and draw the biggest audience. We seek out the church that has the most charismatic orators on stage delivering the most compelling messages with the most cutting-edge worship music to accompany the performance. Churchgoers often complain when the performers put on a less than stellar production or when they just don't get as much out of the production as they had hoped.

In June of 2007, I graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree, and, a few months later, I accepted a job as a software engineer with a small company that produces video games. This job might sound like a new programmer's dream, but this company does not produce the kinds of games I grew up playing – the kind where one sets out on a journey to rescue a princess, or sneaks into a compromised government facility to prevent a nuclear strike, or fights demonic legions with nothing but one's wits and a shotgun.⁴ No, this company produces the kind of video games on which people might waste their entire paychecks hoping to hit the jackpot.

I grew to hate my job. I did not really hate the work itself, but the shame of working in an industry that profits from people's weaknesses followed me around like a foul odor. I hated telling people what I did for a living. At the office, I was surrounded by workaholics who believed for some reason that keeping casinos in business is actually important. After my first major crunch period in the summer of 2008, I realized that my employer wanted more from me than I was willing to give, so I wanted out. I was afraid that abruptly quitting my job would make finding another one difficult for me, so I began to pray regularly that God would provide me a way out. Actually, I prayed that God would “call me” away from my job.

Like Jonah in the belly of the big fish, I began to reconsider my choices in life. I wondered if I had missed my calling. If I was coming up with reasons not to go into the ministry, then the idea of going into the ministry must have come to me from somewhere. Furthermore, I reasoned that, if my career was supposed to take over my life, then I should probably make God my employer. I decided to stick my toe in the waters of ministry. For my entire life, I had attended Bethel United Methodist Church, a small church near downtown Greenville that once served a mill village. I had seen people my age preach on occasion, and, wondering if I had it in me to do the same, I asked my pastor for some opportunities to preach. I realized that my opportunities to preach would be few and far between, especially after my current pastor retired, so I started teaching Sunday school as well.

St. Peter writes, in one of his letters to the early Church, “Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God's sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”⁵ He goes on to write, “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”⁶

For the Jewish people among Peter's original readers, these words would have surely called to mind the Book of Exodus. After God delivered the ancient Israelites from slavery in Egypt, they trekked through the wilderness for three months until they reached the foot of Mt. Sinai. The Israelites stopped and set up camp, while Moses ascended the mountain to speak with God.⁷ There, God commanded Moses to say to the Israelites:
You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples. Indeed, the whole earth is mine, but you shall be for me a priestly kingdom and a holy nation.⁸
Through Moses, God invited the ancient Israelites to be a “treasured possession,” a “priestly kingdom,” and a “holy nation.” Thousands of years later, Peter uses some very similar language, calling his readers “God's own people,” a “royal priesthood,” a “holy nation.”

So what exactly does it mean to be a “priestly kingdom”? In Jesus Wants to Save Christians, Rob Bell and Don Golden write,
A priest mediates the divine. To mediate is to come between. A priest comes between people and a god or gods. A priest shows you what his or her god is like. When you go to a temple or shrine and you see the priest there – what they do, what they say about it, the rituals they perform – you get a sense for what their god cares about. So when God invites the people to be priests, it's an invitation to show the world who this God is and what this God is like.⁹
At the foot of Mt. Sinai, God called the people of Israel to reveal to the world the God who called them out of the darkness of despair and oppression into the marvelous light of freedom and purpose. Peter is telling his readers that this same call has been extended to all who have chosen to follow Christ, who calls all people out of the darkness of sin and death into the marvelous light of new and abundant life. In the words of scholar Terrence Fretheim, “The church, in continuity with Israel, is to take up the mission to which the people of God have long been called.”¹⁰

St. Peter urges his readers to let themselves be built into a “spiritual house” of which Christ is the cornerstone. St. Paul uses a similar metaphor in his First Letter to the Corinthians, in which he reminds a divided congregation that together they are a temple in which God's Spirit dwells, which has been built upon Christ as the foundation.¹¹ In this same letter, Paul goes on to compare the Church to a body. In the same way that a body is made up of many different parts that carry out many different functions, the Church – the Body of Christ – is made up of many different people who have many different gifts and talents who serve in many different ways.¹² One thing we learn from these two metaphors is that the Church is empowered by the Holy Spirit to carry on the work Christ started two thousand years ago. The Church is made up of many people with many gifts who are united as one Body with one Spirit and one purpose.

By the grace of God, my career in the gambling industry lasted less than two years. The company for which I worked bought another company, consolidated offices, and moved all operations to another state. Because I was unwilling to relocate, my employment came to an end. I have come to see that my job in the gambling industry was a gift from God – in the same way that the big fish that swallowed Jonah was a gift from God – because it taught me how important it is to be intentional about my life and my faith. I sought another programming job, and, in November of 2009, I began working in the IT department of Greenville Technical College. Finally, I had a job in which I could take pride, a job in which I could use my technical skills for the common good. God called me out of the darkness of shame and into the marvelous light of purpose.

I also continued to wade into the waters of ministry. A few months earlier, Bethel received a new pastor who had recently changed careers and was still in seminary. Pastor Laura took an interest in my journey, continued to allow me to to preach on occasion, and encouraged me to start taking classes with Lay Servant Ministries. I set out on a new journey to become a Lay Speaker, a layperson who fills in for pastors when they, for some reason, need someone to preach for them. Because my church started partnering with a number of other small churches in the area, I was invited to preach at some of them as well. In early 2017, I was finally certified as a Lay Speaker, and, around the same time, I started teaching one of the classes I had been required to take for certification.

God has brought me a long way since I started praying that God would call me away from my job in the gambling industry almost fifteen years ago. At some point along the way, I had a realization. Even if the bishop never places a stole around my neck, even if I never attend seminary, even if I am never officially employed at a church, I am already a minister.

And I am here today to tell you that, if you have committed yourself to following Jesus as part of this community called the Church, then you are a minister as well.

According to Kierkegaard, we are dead wrong if we think of the Church as a spectator event. Preachers might stand on a stage while they are speaking, but on this great stage production known as life, all of us are performers. Preachers are merely doubling as our directors when they speak. It is up to all of us to put their words into action. The One who is attentively watching our performance is God.¹³ In some sense, the Shakespearean character is not just waxing poetic when he says, “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”¹⁴ Again, if you would prefer a sports metaphor, we could also say that, in this game called life, we are not meant to sit on the bleachers and watch a select few play, because all of us have been called to get into the game and to play our hearts out before our God.

Bethel's attendance had started declining long before I was born, and, in late 2015, I found it necessary to part ways with the church myself. Around Easter of the following year, I found my way to Travelers Rest United Methodist Church. I transferred my membership in late 2017, after Bethel closed its doors, and the members of my new church have continued to support me on my journey, just as the members of Bethel did.

On one of my first Sundays at my new church, I asked Pastor Jonathan to recommend a Sunday school class for me, and he directed me to the TRAIL class, which usually discusses current events in light of faith. I started attending the class, and eventually I became one of the leaders of the class. I hesitate to call myself a teacher, because, even though I try to pass along some of my knowledge when I facilitate class discussions, the discussion-driven format of the class gives all of the people in the class the opportunity to learn from each other. In some sense, everyone in the class is both a student and a teacher. Truth be told, in all of my years leading Sunday school classes, small groups, and Bible studies, some of the best meetings I've led are the ones in which I didn't do much leading at all – meetings in which people opened themselves up to one another and shared their knowledge and experiences.

A few months after I started attending my new church, Pastor Christine started up Growth Groups that meet regularly at various times throughout the year. Because I was eager to connect with people in this congregation, I joined the group that meets on Monday evenings. Eventually I accepted the opportunity to serve as the leader of this group because I wanted to try something more pastoral, and I continued to lead the group until the middle of last year. The members of the group have changed over time, but something that has remained consistent is the encouragement they have given me. In October of 2020, when my father suddenly died, my Growth Group was there for me with sympathy and kindness. After the funeral, they provided an abundance of food for my family.

Less than a year after my father died, one of my grandmothers started to rapidly decline, after living with dementia for a number of years. Shortly after she passed away, my other grandmother began fighting a long losing battle against the ravages of COVID-19. At one point, I began to feel sorry for myself, realizing that I will have lost both my grandmothers before I had even processed the loss of my father. I reached out for help, and I soon started meeting regularly with my Stephen minister Gregg. Gregg has helped me to work through the grief, guilt, and anger I felt after my father's death, and he was there for me during what turned out to be a stressful time. Gregg has ministered to me during a difficult time in my life, but more than once he has told me that he feels like I've been ministering to him.

What is the Church but a community of disciples of Jesus Christ who minister to each other and to the world around them?

In the Church, we have a tendency to draw a very sharp line between the clergy – the people “who are trained and ordained for religious service”¹⁵ – and the laity – the rest of us. Within the Church, there are people who have received special training and have been granted certain authority and responsibility by their denominations or congregations. We need their gifts and their leadership. That said, I am going to go out on a limb and suggest that the distinctions we tend to make in the Church just might be a bit exaggerated. As St. Peter writes in his letter, all of us have been called together into “a royal priesthood.”

We're all ministers here, for we all minister to the needs of others.

We're all pastors here, for we all lead and shepherd each other.

We're all preachers here, for we all proclaim, through our words and through our lives, the Good News that the Risen Christ is Lord.

We're all priests here, for we all show the world around us what our God is like.

If you regularly attend church, take some time to take a look around the sanctuary during your next gathering. The people you will see there are your ministers, and you are their minister.

The Priesthood of All Believers is what some people call the ministry we all share as followers of Jesus Christ, whether we are clergy or laity. Even at a service at which clergy are ordained, the bishop will recognize our shared ministry, saying,
Ministry is the work of God, done by the people of God and given to each Christian as vocation. Through baptism all Christians are made part of the priesthood of all believers, the Church made visible in the world. God in Christ through the Holy Spirit empowers us to live as witnesses of God's grace and love. We are to bear witness in and through the life of the Church and to be faithful in our daily lives.¹⁶
As followers of Christ, we are together a “chosen race” that transcends racial distinctions, a “holy nation” that extends beyond national boundaries, and a “holy priesthood” that is made up of people of all walks of life. We are all called to “proclaim the mighty acts of [God]” by our words and by our actions, for, like the ancient Israelites, we have all been called “out of darkness into [God's] marvelous light.” Though we are all called into a shared ministry, we are not all called to minister in the same ways. In the words of Frederick Buechner, “The place God calls you to is where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet.”¹⁷

All analogies fail at some point, and one way in which I think Kierkegaard's theater analogy falls short is the simple fact that God is not the only one watching the Church's performance. The truth is that the Church is being watched by the rest of the world as well. As I noted earlier, one of reasons I didn't want to go into the ministry is that I didn't want to be held to a higher standard. Clergy are only human, but holding them to a higher standard, as we tend to do, is not without a biblical basis.¹⁸ Perhaps where we go wrong is not that we hold our clergy to a high standard but that we are not holding ourselves to the same high standard. We have been called into a “holy priesthood,” so the world is watching us to see what our God is like. Our priesthood is not a mere nine-to-five job but rather a life we live twenty-four-seven.

If it is the duty of priests to show the world what their God is like, and if we have all been called into a holy priesthood, as St. Peter suggests, then we must be mindful of what kind of God we are showing the world. Are we showing the world an angry, narcissistic God who seemingly hates most people and is pretty much ready to be done with the world? Or are we showing the world a God who is irrelevant, powerless, and, quite frankly, dead? Or are we showing the world the same God that Jesus Christ, our great High Priest,¹⁹ came to show the world – a God of grace, peace, mercy, and love?

If we want to show the world the same God that Jesus came to show the world, then we must follow Jesus' example. In the Gospel of John, we read that, one evening, while Jesus is gathered with the Disciples, He takes off His robe, ties a towel around His waist, pours some water into a basin, and washes their feet.²⁰ Later that evening, while this act of humble service is still fresh in the Disciples' minds, Jesus says, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”²¹ Christians are known for a lot of things these days, but, according to Jesus, His true disciples will be known not by the standards they try to impose on everyone else, or by the people they oppose, or by the companies they boycott, but by their love. “Love,” we read, “is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. [Love] does not insist on it's own way...”²² Love, as demonstrated by Jesus, is humble, serving, and sacrificial.

I have been working at my current programming job for over thirteen years. This job has been a good fit for me, because it gives me the opportunity to solve problems, to create things, and to keep learning. I can still take pride in my job, because it allows me to use my skills to serve the common good. That said, what's really keeping me at my current job are my benefits, which include the opportunity to retire with a nice pension. My recent confrontations with mortality have forced me to confront the harsh truth that I have no guarantee that I will live until I'm old enough to retire. My father died just a few days before he would have received his first Social Security check. I now see that I have to live my life for something other than a pension I might not even live to enjoy. Needless to say, I have some decisions to make about the next part of my journey.

Don't spend too much time wondering if you have been called by God into ministry. Instead, consider how you are being called into ministry and how you will respond to that call. In the words of St. Teresa of Ávila,
Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours. Yours are the eyes through which the compassion of Christ is to look out on a hurting world. Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good. Yours are the hands with which he is to bless now.²³
We're all ministers here – ordained or not, ready or not, like it or not – for, as members of the Body of Christ, we all share in His ministry.

Amen.

Notes:

I later realized that doing the truly logical thing by relearning Spanish would have served me a lot better.
I'm exaggerating, of course, but sometimes my calculus homework did seem to give me headaches.
Søren Kierkegaard. Parables of Kierkegaard (Thomas C. Oden, editor). 1978, Princeston University Press. pp. 89
In case you're wondering, I'm referring specifically to The Legend of Zelda, Metal Gear Solid, and Doom.
1 Peter 2:4-5 (NRSV)
1 Peter 2:9 (NRSV)
Exodus 19:1-3
Exodus 19:4-6 (NRSV)
Rob Bell and Don Golden. Jesus Wants to Save Christians: A Manifesto for the Church in Exile. 2008, Zondervan. pp. 30-31 (Line breaks have been removed.)
Terrence Fretheim. Exodus (Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching). 2010, Westminster John Knox Press. loc. 3916 (Kindle edition)
1 Corinthians 3:10-17
1 Corinthians 12:12-30
Parables of Kierkegaard, pp. 89-90
William Shakespeare. As You Like It. Act II Scene VII
Wiktionary: “Clergy”
“The Order for Consecrations and Ordinations.” The United Methodist Book of Worship. p. 686 (Line breaks have been removed.)
Frederick Buechner. Wishful Thinking: A Seeker's ABC. 1993, Harper One. p. 119
See 1 Timothy 3:1-13 and Titus 1:5-9.
Hebrews 4:14
John 13:3-5
John 13:34-35 (NRSV)
1 Corinthians 13:4-5a (NRSV)
This is the version of the quote that appears in The Walk to Emmaus Worship Booklet for Pilgrims, Third Edition. 2008, Upper Room Books.

The photograph of the theater stage has been released to the public domain. The photographer is in no way affiliated with this blog. The image of the approach to Mount Sinai was painted by David Roberts in 1839.

Notes from the Wayside

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Sunday, June 18, 2023

Sermon: We're All Ministers Here

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