May 2010 Archives

The Pentecost Story - Ordinary People, Extraordinary Love

Acts 2:1-16 & 41-42

May 23, 2010

Rev. Nancy Pfaltzgraf

What a day it was! What a day!!! There we were all of us, the men, the women, all of us who had traveled with him, learned from him, loved him. There we were back in Jerusalem. It seemed crazy for us to be there. It was just 50 days ago that we came with him to celebrate Passover! So much has happened since then; the pain and fear, the grief and despair we experienced when he was arrested and murdered; then the surprise and shock, the joy and the hope we felt when we discovered that God had raised him, brought him back to life! What a miracle! He was alive and with us again. How we hung on his every word; cherished every moment!  We were certain then that God was truly with him and Jesus could accomplish anything!

But then he started talking nonsense again; something about us and what God wanted us to do; something about him leaving us for our own good! How could that be good? He kept saying that when he was gone, we would receive a gift from God. I'll never forget the last day he was with us; we had gone with him up to the mountain to talk and pray and he told us that after he was gone we were to head back to Jerusalem. He said we were to be his witnesses; that we were to carry his message to the ends of the earth. Us, was he crazy? We were just ordinary people, who would listen to us; who would believe us? After all, they killed him; what would they do to us. Smiling he simply said "trust me" and then he was gone. How alone we felt! We were confused, unsure, bewildered and more than a little afraid. But, after all we had experienced, how could we not trust him and do what he told us to do?

So we made our way back to the holy city, hoping that no one would recognize us as we looked for a place to gather. It was no easy task since there were about 120 of us. We talked, we prayed, we waited and waited and waited. Each minute seemed like an hour, each hour like a day, each day an eternity. Someone suggested that maybe we should select someone to replace Judas so we would have the necessary 12 man leadership team. To me it seemed like a useless exercise. How would that help? But we did it, casting lots to see who it would be. Some of us, myself included, were getting pretty discouraged. He had given us this task, promised to send us the help we needed, but here we sat doing nothing! I felt completely powerless. We sang the psalms and prayed and talked, but still nothing happened.

Meanwhile the city was filling up with pilgrims from all over the world; our faithful Jewish brothers and sisters who had come to celebrate Shavuot, the festival you call Pentecost, the time when we remembered the how God gave the tablets of stone to our great teacher, Moses. It would have been such a great opportunity for Jesus to get his message to so many people; if only he were here!

Then it happened! Without warning, the wind began to blow. None of us had ever experienced a wind like that -violent, terrifying, yet gentle all at the same time. We could feel it, hear it. It swirled around the room. It seemed forceful enough to overturn the tables and extinguish the lamps, but nothing moved. If anything the lamps grew brighter. The room was ablaze with the most intense light, like fire, but nothing burned. We looked at one another and we suddenly knew. This was what he was talking about. This was the divine fire. This was the breath, the wind of God, what you call the Holy Spirit.

We knew, each and every one of us knew. Here we were ordinary men and women filled, consumed, overpowered by the Divine presence. We had heard stories of how it happened to kings, to prophets and priests, not to people like us! But we felt it. It was real. The love we felt was nothing like we had ever known. The joy we experienced was beyond words but we had to share it. Without a second thought we rushed out the door. Without wondering how in the world we would be able to make ourselves understood we walked up to the people we saw gathered outside the temple and began talking. I was drawn to some brothers and sisters who seemed to be from Egypt and when I opened my mouth to tell them about Jesus, my words came out in Egyptian. Me, speaking Egyptian! Not far from me I heard John talking to some people form Mesopotamia in what I could only assume was Sumerian because they seemed to understand what he was saying. All 120 of us were talking at once and we each seemed to be speaking a different language. It was a sound even louder than the wind had been.

People were astounded -but no more so than we were. "They're just uneducated Galileans," I heard someone shout. "How can they be speaking so many languages?" Good question, I thought. Then someone else shouted, "They must be drunk!" But that was crazy, how could being drunk cause us to speak so many different languages? That's when Peter, bold impulsive Peter climbed up on the wall and somehow got their attention and a hush fell over the crowd.

"We aren't drunk" he said. Then he began to preach in a way that everyone seemed to hear and understand. He reminded us of the words of God spoken through the prophet Joel:

"I will pour out my Spirit on every kind of people: Your sons will prophesy, also your daughters; your young men will see visions, your old men dream dreams. When the time comes, I'll pour out my Spirit on those who serve me, men and women both, and they'll prophesy.

Peter went on for a long time, telling the people about Jesus and the extraordinary love of God that all of us had experienced because of him. His words stirred their hearts and 3,000 people asked to be baptized and joined our little band of believers.

What a day! But it didn't stop with that day; each of us in our own way felt God's extraordinary love empowering us to use our gifts as we dreamed God's dream, caught God's vision and worked together to spread God's love. It was as if in opening to that love and allowing the holy breath to fill us and guide us, the divine fire to stir and empower us we each lived into the fullness of who we were created to become.

I still have a hard time believing it, even though I experienced it. I know that some of you have doubts and sometimes when you read our stories you think we were something special but we weren't. We were ordinary people just like you; ordinary people transformed, empowered, set on fire by God's extraordinary love to live into God's dream for the world. That love, that power, that fire, it's here today. I can feel it. God needs you -each and every one of you- to dream dreams, see visions and allow God's extraordinary love to fill you, the holy breath to breathe you and the divine flame to empower you. There are people yearning for God's compassion. There are people aching for God's justice. There are people longing for God's healing. There are people waiting for God's grace. God needs you -your gifts, your passion, your hands, your feet, your heart, your voice. God needs you to shine the light of hope, bear the torch of grace and ignite the fire of love! God's extraordinary love will give you all you need to live into the fullness of God's dream for you. Open your heart and feel it, open your mind and sense it, step out in hope and trust it!

Agree and Disagree in Love!

Part 3

Philippians 4:1-9(MSG)

May 16, 2010

Rev. Nancy Pfaltzgraf

On May 6^th I opened the Upper Room[1] to begin my daily meditation and I read this reflection written by Ted De Hass:

The pastor was gone today, and our local high-school music teacher preached. He spoke about "the fifth voice," an idea I had never heard of. He drew the concept from the singing of barbershop quartets. "The fifth voice" refers to the one harmony created by the four voices as they join together in song. The unified sound becomes like a fifth voice.

Just as a group of singers can be more than each of them is alone, Christians living in love create something more than they could on their own. The day before Jesus was crucified, he told his disciples that the world would know that they were his followers by the way they related to one another, that they were to cherish and care for one another.

First Corinthians 13 describes the characteristics of this Christian love. Paul exhorted the Corinthians to be patient and kind, to turn aside from jealousy, boastfulness, pride, rudeness, selfishness, and irritability. Love forgives and lets go of hurts and offenses of the past. When Christians live together in love, the world hears a voice it needs to hear: the fifth voice that reveals the presence of the Savior.

As I thought about Ted's words and that famous "love chapter" from 1 Corinthians, I thought about the fact that Paul wrote these words to a group of Christians who were in the midst of a heated conflict on the subject of spiritual gifts. I also thought that it is perhaps in the midst of conflicts and disagreements that we have the greatest opportunity to witness to the kind of love that allows the light of God to be revealed in us and through us. Then I thought -"that is easier said than done!"

To agree and disagree in love takes prayer; it takes humility; it takes commitment; it takes learning and making an effort to use the best practices in communication; it takes a belief that God walks with us in the midst of our conflicts and disagreements; it takes the belief that such conflicts and disagreements are opportunities that God can use to grow all of us more fully into the people God knows we can become; and it takes a deep desire not only for one's own wholeness, but for the wholeness of all people. It is because we sensed God's call to grow in each of these areas that one of our 2008 Vision Goals was to "maintain and promote healthy communications and implement a formal conflict resolution process." To help us live into that goal the members of our Governing Board have been exploring a document called Agreeing and Disagreeing in Love.[2] It is also why this is the third of three sermons that explore various aspects of what it might mean to agree and disagree in love.

Part of our exploration over the past two weeks has pointed us to an acknowledgement that a large portion of what we call the New Testament either recalls a time of conflict for Jesus and/or the disciples or it was written in direct response to a conflict among believers in an effort to help the followers of Jesus learn how to live in love even as they dealt with differing ideas, points of view and understandings of the gospel message. Even though I have known this since my earliest days in seminary, I was nevertheless surprised when I discovered that Paul's injunction to the Philippians to fill their minds with "things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious--the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse," were written because two leaders in the church, two women who had labored for the gospel were in conflict with one another! I have known and loved these verses for years, but I had never seen their connection to conflict transformation. Yet as I read them a few weeks ago that is what began to surface.

Then this week as I was meditating about how to deal with some current day conflicts it hit me like a bolt of lightening. What I often do -and I don't think I am alone- is when someone has verbally hurt me by engaging in name calling or bullying or any of the other unhealthy and unhelpful communication patterns or by giving me the cold shoulder or ignoring me and my ideas then I stew about it; that is I go over and over the offense and the more I do, the more hurt I am and the more anything else they say or do just gets added to the pile of dirt their words or actions have laid at my feet. What might happen, I wondered, if I took Paul's counsel to heart and began looking for the best in the other person, focusing on appreciating what is good about them and our relationship, assuming the best intentions for their words rather than assuming they were out to hurt me? What might happen if I focused on what I want the relationship to be and, taking a page from Paul's wisdom, instead of fretting and worrying began to pray; not for the other person to change, but for God to give me wisdom and insight, humility and understanding, a heart open and ready to forgive and a mind free and willing to be changed? Perhaps Paul is saying that the attitude we carry into any attempt to resolve a conflict is a key factor in whether or not healing and reconciliation will happen.

But then I noticed something else about this passage. It is part of a letter written to the whole community of faith in Philippe. In a sermon on this passage Richard C. Brand makes these observations:

There was a deep tear in the Body of Christ and Paul mentions it. ... We know it is a significant issue because Paul chose to mention it in the letter to be read publicly before the whole church. ... Paul mentions the conflict publicly because it is the public work of the people of God to work to make peace. ... It is not that the people of God will never have conflicts or quarrels (why should we think anything so absurd?), but it is that the people of God, the Church, ought to be the place where it acknowledges those quarrels and resolves them. Paul believes that is how the church makes visible the reality of the love and grace of God.[3]

It is true isn't it, that we sometimes need others who will stand in loving communion with all parties in a disagreement to help them work through the issues and find their way to reconciliation. One of the most destructive things in any community is when other people begin to take sides, adding fuel to the fires of dissension. Rather, we need each other to pray, when prayer is too difficult for us to do alone. We need we each other to remind us of the good, when hurt seems to obscure every other reality. We need we each other to help us listen with head and heart as each person seeks to speak their particular truth. We need each other to call us on our blind spots and to remind us that we see and know only in part. We need each other to remind us to speak in love and call us to account when we do not. We need each other to remind us of the best that we are and the best we can be.

Paul often uses the image of the body of Christ for the community of faith. Now we know it is true that when one part of our body suffers, not only does our whole body suffer, but all of the resources of our body get to work to bring healing and the relief of pain. So it is that as we learn more and more about healthy communication, as we allow kindness, compassion, humility, patience and peace to guide our way, we will be equipped to get to work to bring reconciliation and healing to the whole body. As we do we will become a healthier, stronger, more vibrant community of faith, through whom the world will hear that fifth voice -the voice that reveals the power of God's love. May it be so. Amen.

Agree and Disagree in Love - Part 2

Matthew 18:15-22

May 9, 2010 - Mother's Day

Rev. Nancy Pfaltzgraf

Lynn was the chairperson of the personnel department of a large company. It was her responsibility to see that the employees were able to communicate openly and honestly with one another so that they could work together efficiently and co-operatively.

Lynn worked proactively. Whenever she saw a conflict in the making she stepped in to help the protagonists come to an understanding before their differences interfered with their job. In her experience, differences of opinion that weren't talked about candidly often festered under the surface until they erupted in a full-fledged argument. When that happened, words that should have been left unsaid were frequently spoken in anger. This often resulted in hurt feelings or misunderstandings that were hard to forgive and even harder to forget. That's why it was so much better to talk openly about a situation. Even if protagonists had to agree to disagree, it was still better than talking about it behind someone's back. All too often that resulted in groups of people taking sides against each other. Then no one won and everyone lost.

Lynn was also the chairperson of her congregation's church council. In many ways her position on the church council was like her job because part of her job description involved helping the congregational members to communicate openly and honestly with one another. Lynn had thought that that part of her role would be easy. But it wasn't. The church's members were more reluctant to talk with one another about their differences than the people at work were. Somewhere along the line they had learned that Christians shouldn't disagree with one another.

Where did that idea come from? Why is it that conflict in the church seems so wrong? As we began to explore this issue last week I said that, part of the problem was the fact that "we often label as conflict only those situations which include such negative elements as bitterness, hurt and division."[1] If we successfully negotiate our differences without such negative components we tend to call them either arguments or disagreements. But Lynn's story seems to indicate that at least some of us even shy away from disagreements, thinking they are somehow unchristian. But nothing could be further from the truth. So why is it that we are so afraid of disagreements, arguments and conflicts?

On more than one occasion when his children and their friends were playing and the inevitable squabbles broke out, Lawrence Ressler,[2] a professional mediator and family therapist, would sit the children down and engage them in what he understood to be a good conflict resolution process. He would invite each person to tell their version of what happened, with no interruptions allowed. He then asked each of them to say what they heard the others saying in an effort to make sure that they had really listened and heard one another. Then after all had expressed their views, he worked to help them clarify the issues and then taking each issue in turn to come up with a number of ways to resolve it. They would then explore which solution seemed best for all involved and come to an agreement about what they would do. When he was satisfied that all were feeling good about the decision he would send them off to play.

On one such occasion, after their friends had left his kids said to him, "Dad, we hate it when you make us sit down and talk like that. It embarrasses us. Nobody else does it that way. We just want to be normal."

Healthy resolution of our disagreements is, in fact, not "normal" because the vast majority of us have never learned the steps, the attitudes and the actions which allow such results. When we look at the world around us what seems to be normal are the unhealthy processes folks engage in when they disagree; blaming, labeling, name calling, scapegoating, bullying, backstabbing and threats -both overt and subtle- and finally out and out violence, if nothing else works to silence the enemy. Now to be sure that is not the kind of "normal" to which Jesus calls his disciples. But neither is avoiding disagreements and pretending they don't exist, sweeping them under the carpet and hoping they will just go away.

If we seek to be disciples of Jesus, that is if we seek to take to heart what Jesus taught and model our life after his; if we seek to follow his command to pick up our own cross and follow him; if we seek to live Christ's compassion and promote justice, healing and wholeness of life then we need to listen to his instructions about what to do when we disagree. In today's scripture from Matthew 18 we find such instruction:

Ø   Go directly to the one who has hurt you or with whom you disagree.

Ø   Go in a spirit of gentleness, patience and humility.

Ø   Be quick to listen, slow to judge, and willing to negotiate.

Ø   If that does not work, bring a trusted third party to help you resolve your differences.

Ø   If that does not work be willing to submit to the wisdom of the community, gathered in prayer and seeking to embody God's forgiving, reconciling love.

What I find interesting about this teaching of Jesus is where Matthew puts it in the preaching of his gospel. Matthew 18 begins with a conflict about who is greatest in the realm of God, moves to a discourse about how disciples are to treat the littlest and the least among them and then moves to the story of leaving ninety-nine sheep to go in search of one who is lost. It ends with Peter asking, "Master, how many times do I forgive a brother or sister who hurts me? Seven?" [Matt 18:21] And Jesus responds: "Seven! Hardly. Try seventy times seven." [Matt 18:22]  With Jesus' instructions embedded within a context of the extravagant graciousness of God, Matthew seems to say that honest love and genuine forgiveness, born out of facing our differences with care, are to be the marks of those who seek to follow Jesus.

Sister Miriam Therese MacGillis, puts it this way: "Jesus did not avoid conflict. He confronted people all over the place, but he didn't violate them or seek to annihilate them; he simply invited them into a new way of being." As we seek to listen, really listen to each other with respect for ourselves and each other; as we learn to speak our partial and limited truth with compassion and care; as we commit to make our experiences unconditionally constructive we are all invited into a new way of seeing, a new way of being.

 In our 2008 Visioning Process we discerned goals to guide our life together through 2011. One of our goals was to "maintain and promote healthy communications and implement a formal conflict resolution process." As part of that goal the Governing Board has been exploring a document called Agreeing and Disagreeing in Love.[3] Either last week or today, I hope you picked up a copy of the first two pages of that document. As I said last week, I hope you will read it, pray about it and discuss it.

But more than that, I hope that, using it as a starting place, we can all learn and grow our capacity for healthy communication and our conflict transformation skills. Just imagine what our congregation, your family, our community, our nation or the world would be like if we learned, practiced and taught our children how to agree and disagree in love. Just imagine the way life could be if we honored the piece of the truth planted in each heart and mind and allowed the pieces and parts to come together to make a more beautiful whole. After all, a painting needs more than one color, a song needs more than one note and our world needs more than one voice.

With God's help and the Spirit's guidance may we be part of creating a new "normal" for the world. Amen.

Agree and Disagree in Love!

Colossians 3:8-17

May 2, 2010

Rev. Nancy Pfaltzgraf

"A conflict was starting to boil over in the new little congregation. Members of the minority group -who spoke a different language than the majority group that controlled the leadership of the congregation-, were starting to complain about how some among them were being treated. Specifically, the minority members were angry because the needs of some of their group were being neglected by the congregation."[1]

Now, I don't know about you, but I grew up believing conflict was bad, especially when it happened in the church! I don't know if anyone actually said it, but I most certainly got the idea that God was displeased when we argued; after all we called Jesus the Prince of Peace and Jesus did say "Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God."