Henrietta United Church of Christ

Rev. David Inglis June 18, 2006

Philippians 3:10-16

“The Next Step”

(The sermon was accompanied by photos of various aspects of our church life.)

Here we are on the last Sunday before summer. This past year has been the most exhilarating year of my ministry. I’ve watched you warmly welcome more visitors than ever before, and there doesn’t seem to be any limit to the extent of your embrace. As a result of that, our average worship attendance for the first five months of 2006 grew to 150–25% over 2005's attendance. We have now received 21 people into membership so far in 2006, and the year isn’t even half over. And new people are finding ways to plug into the ministries and missions of our church. Our church fielded 50 walkers in last month’s CROP Walk, almost double what we had last year, and they raised almost twice as much money for Church World Service and our Food Cupboard. People in our denomination and even other denominations are starting to take note of HUCC.

Last March, our Council sponsored a Future Planning Meeting to help us proactively plan for the changes our growth requires. I was personally greatly relieved and heartened when by far the highest priority the people present identified was to add a part-time Associate Pastor. The truth is, even though I’ve been working 60-70 hours a week this year and delegating as many things as I can, I still can’t keep up with all the things I need to do as your pastor. I’ve been stretching myself like a rubber band, tighter, and tighter, and I just can’t sustain it. So that’s why I’m very encouraged that we’re going to look at a proposal for creating a part-time position after worship today. I think it’s important that everyone who can be in on this discussion and decision, so that we can get everyone’s input and make it together.

As I’ve thought about the possibility of more pastoral help, I’ve found myself feeling something like Paul felt when he wrote the words we heard from Philippians 3. He had tasted the power and life and joy of knowing Christ as a living presence. But he knew that there was more that he hadn’t reached yet. And so, Paul said, “Forgetting what lies behind and straining towards what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.”

There is something about spiritual growth that never lets us rest on our laurels and say we’re finished. God’s Spirit has a life of its own, and if we’re not spiritually growing, we’re spiritually shrinking. A church might say or think to itself, “Okay, we’ve reached our goal; we have enough members now, and we’re loving and generous and faithful enough, so we’ll just maintain things the way they are.” As soon as a church thinks that way, it will begin to decline, because it has unplugged itself from the energizing Spirit that gives it its purpose, its mission, and its vitality.

So I’ve started thinking about how adding a part-time Associate Pastor could help us press onward toward our calling of being fully connected with the living, renewing, life-changing Spirit of Christ, and embodying that Spirit in our world. We’ve come a long way together. What are the next steps on our journey of faith as a church?

Let’s begin with worship. One of the main reasons our church is charged with spiritual life is because, when we come together on Sunday mornings, we really worship. We let our spirits be touched, opened, deepened, guided, and renewed by the living God.

It is said that “music is the language of the soul,” and uplifting and inspiring music has been a major part of our spirited worship.

So what is the next step in our growth as a church that opens itself to God in worship? There’s a lot of wonderful new music that’s been written to help people more fully connect with God’s Spirit. We’ve tasted some of it–“Shine, Jesus, Shine,” “Here I Am, Lord,” “On Eagle’s Wings.” There’s also some meditative music that comes out of the Taize community and other songwriters that can help us enter into prayer more deeply or be touched by God’s healing presence.

Also, our worship has been energized by all the children in our congregation. But we haven’t really adapted worship to help them enter into it fully. That’s why we hear a lot of restlessness before the children leave. Some churches have found ways of making worship both simple and powerful, so that all ages can worship together as one. I’d love to have time to develop more truly intergenerational worship, as well as increase our children’s and youth’s participation in worship. These things wouldn’t take a lot of time–just more time than I have.

Our educational ministry with children and youth has also become a big part of our mission. We have the best Sunday School teachers I know, and they have stretched to effectively love and teach more and more children, including those with special needs. And this year we started a very successful monthly Kids’ Kamp.

I can’t tell you how important I believe it is for us to be about nurturing the faith and shaping the values of children these days. I don’t have to tell how much violence, greed, divisiveness, exploitation, deception, cynicism, and selfishness there is in our world. And families are struggling against powerful forces that make them stressed out, preoccupied, fragmented, and seemingly powerless over their children’s attitudes and behaviors. Rampant materialism, intolerance and hostility are carrying our world down a path of self destruction.

I feel God calling our church to guide, support and empower our families as they raise their children, not just to cope with the future, but to help create it as a future of hope. We need to work together to instill the values of faith, gratitude, service, reverence, honesty, generosity, compassion, peacemaking, and stewardship of the earth. These spiritual values are the key to true happiness, to meaning in life, and to a world that is peaceful, sustainable, and affirming of life.

I’m hopeful that an Associate Pastor could help integrate our Christian education program so that we’re doing everything we can do to help our children from preschool through youth make the link between their faith, their lives, and our world. And I would love to see us offer programs and support groups to help parents raise their children to realize their full potential as children of God and to be agents of God’s kingdom and carriers of hope for the future.

Another source of our spiritual growth has been our small groups and retreats. When we come together in honesty, trust, and a desire to grow, we can feel our spirits open, expand, deepen, and start to become truly radiant and beautiful. I long to see every one of you experience that. As our congregation grows, the number of small groups we offer needs to grow too–more than we could run even with an Associate Pastor leading another one or two. Alan Dailey has offered to come back in the fall and share what he learned at a small group leaders training by Ron Farr, probably the best small group trainer in the UCC. This will help equip lay people to run groups that help people grow from the inside out. If you feel the tug to help people grow in their faith, stay tuned for the announcement for a training event in the fall. The Associate Pastor could then help guide and oversee the small group leaders, to help us multiply the number of faith-growing groups that we offer.

Another crucial part of our ministry is pastoral care. One thing that really saddens me is finding out that people have been in need of pastoral guidance or support, but didn’t let me know because they perceive me as being too busy for them. There are times in everyone’s life when one-on-one counseling or support can make all the difference. I want to be readily available to each of you when those times come, or have an Associate Pastor who is tuned into the congregation be available.

Finally, we have become known for our warm, genuine welcome and our Christian love for each other and the world. We have learned an important truth these last few years–our Christian love and fellowship isn’t diluted by sharing it with more people; it is strengthened as we share it. Our church’s wonderful spirit only grows as we welcome searching, spiritually hungry people into the warm embrace of this spiritual home, and as we invite them to be our partners in Christian service and mission. This is one area that we must never leave to the pastor or pastors, no matter how many we might have. But I have no fear that you will. Just keep inviting people who need a spiritual home. Keep treating strangers as new friends you haven’t met yet–no matter who they are or where they are on life’s journey. And HUCC will continue to grow, because it will embody the living, energizing, renewing Spirit of Christ.

Three weeks ago, we celebrated the faithfulness, hope, and generosity of this congregation 40 years ago when they released their hold on the past and pressed forward toward the goal that God was calling them to–building a new church that would one day provide a spiritual home for us–the HUCC of today. I wonder if members of the HUCC of the future might one day look back on us with the same gratitude.

When it comes time to discuss and vote on the proposal for an Associate Pastor, I don’t want you to vote on what I want. I’ve shared my thoughts on our next steps with you, but I’m just one person; you are the congregation. As you look towards what lies ahead, what goal do you sense God is calling us to press towards as a growing community of faith? That’s what we need to share with each other as we discuss our future together after worship.