The Kenwood Community, and all who wish to join them, will gather this evening, November 26, at 7:00 p.m. for a time of Thanksgiving Worship. This service, held in the sanctuary, will include seasonal hymns, a choral anthem, and Holy Communion.
Archive for November, 2008
Kenwood Community Gathers to Give Thanks
November 26, 2008Sermon November 23, 2008
November 24, 2008How Do We Work Together?
Christ the King Sunday Year A-Off Lectionary ~ Romans 8:18, 28
Kenwood UMC ~ November 23, 2008
On Wednesday I flew down to Atlanta to participate in a research project which my seminary is conducting. I flew down and back that day, and got into Richmond about 11:15 Wednesday evening.
Now, I would not say that I am a frequent flyer—but I usually fly a couple of times a year, often enough to be familiar with airport security procedures and know to wear slip on shoes and not take the bottle of water through security.
There’s a common experience that we all share when flying, and no matter how long ago you flew, I think you are going to identify with this moment. The flight ends, you’ve landed and taxied to the gate, the fasten seat belt sign has gone off, and all of the sudden everyone on the plane is filled with the same feeling—this flight is over, and it is time to get off the plane.
Now what you’ve got in this situation is a lot of people, one very narrow aisle, and one door. And even though we are all strangers, and some of us are on our way home and some are not, some are here for business an some for pleasure, at that moment we all share one goal that we have to work together to accomplish—getting off that airplane.
And what you see is people letting one another out into the aisle, people helping each other with carry on baggage stowed in overhead compartments, people telling the flight attendants thank you—people working together.
It grieves me that people who do not know one another can work together to get off an airplane, but not to relieve poverty, care for the sick and dying, or feed the hungry. These are the sufferings of the present age which Paul speaks of in Romans.
And if we, as a global community, or even as the county of Hanover or city of Richmond are going to accomplish any of those things—which I think Jesus would want us to work toward–we are going to have to set aside our differences and work together. And often one of the things which gets in the way of working together is a fear or resistance to working with people of other faiths.
We’ve spent the last couple of weeks talking about the reality of living in a world of multiple faiths, and finding evidence in Scripture that this has always been a reality for God’s people. We’ve discovered that God created the entire world and called it good, that God has promised that all nations of the world will be blessed. And those promises of scripture indicate that we need to work together with people of other faiths.
But friends, we do a lousy job of it much of the time. Just in the last 2 weeks in Henrico County we’ve seen an example of our failure. The Muslim community wanted to develop a mosque on an undeveloped area of property in Northside. Zoning had to be changed in order to do it. Recent zoning changes of a similar nature had been granted to Episcopal and Catholic congregations. When the Muslim community met resistance from the Henrico County Board of Supervisors, the interfaith community came out in force. Protestant and Catholic clergy and laity, Jewish rabbis and laypeople all wrote letters and petitioned the supervisors to let the Muslim community build. But the rezoning failed, 3-2.
Why? We could all speculate. But I suspect that it has to do with the extraordinary difficulty we have as a society in working together with people of different faiths.
Paul says “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”
Do we love God? Can we honestly believe that Jews and Muslims and Hindus and Sikhs love God? If we do and if we can, then we also have to believe that when we work together on the goals we have in common, we will work together for good.
To do that we have to set aside a need to prosteletyze or convert people of another faith to our faith. And I think that’s OK. You see, I am far more worried about the faith life of the hundreds of thousands of non-practicing people out there than I am worried about the faith life of a practicing Muslim. We will still have plenty of work to do sharing out faith in other areas. For this area—work with people of other faiths—we don’t need to worry about conversions—just conversations.
In order to work together we also have to set aside our fear, and that is very important in a post 9-11 world where we have been conditioned to fear. Are there radical Muslims out there? Sure. But so are there radical Christians. Remember the Atlanta Olympic bomber Eric Rudolph, also responsible for abortion clinic bombings in Kansas? Or Randy Weaver who sequestered his family at Ruby Ridge? I don’t know of a faith out there that does not have some radical element.
But those radical segments of faith are so small that we cannot afford to label all people of faith by that example. What we also cannot afford to do, given the desperate situation of our world, is build walls that isolate us from one another. We must work together.
“We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”
Bono, the leader of the rock band U2, has also been a leader in global efforts against poverty and AIDS in Africa. In 2006 he spoke at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington D.C., a gathering of people of all faiths hosted by members of Congress. He gave a stirring speech about the need for all faiths and all nations to work together to address issues of AIDS and poverty in Africa. Here, in part, is what he said,
“…whatever thoughts you have about God, who God is or if God exists—most will agree that if there is a God, God has a special place for the poor. In fact, the poor are where God lives. Check Judaism. Check Islam. Check pretty much anyone.
I mean God may well be with us in our mansions on the hill…I hope so. He may well be with us in all manner of controversial stuff…maybe, maybe not. But the one things on which we can all agree, among all faiths and ideologies, is that God is with the vulnerable and the poor.”[1]
I am clear, as a Christian, when I read scripture, that we have a lot of work to do when it comes to reaching the poor among us. And I am also clear that if we are to do it, we will have to work together—regardless of the faith we practice, all faiths with a heart for the poor can work together. We can work together for justice, for mercy and for peace. And I believe that when we do that, if makes God’s heart very, very glad.
[1] Bono, “On the Move”, 2006. A Speech given at the National Prayer Breakfast, Washington, D.C., February 2006.
United Methodist Women Christmas Party
November 21, 2008The UMW Christmas Party will be held on Tuesday, December 2nd at 6:00pm at the Perkins Restaurant in Ashland. There will be a sign-up sheet in the narthex for reservations or you may e-mail Pat Griffin at Patricia.H.Griffin@ccomortgage.com. Please make your reservations by today, November 23rd.
Sermon November 16, 2008
November 21, 2008Will They Be Saved?
27th Sunday After Pentecost, Off Lectionary ~ Genesis 21:9-11
Rev. F. Elizabeth Givens
Kenwood UMC ~ November 16, 2008
It was the first day of February, 2003. By then Space Shuttle flights had become routine, something we might notice on the news but not usually a huge deal. Until….until the space shuttle Columbia disentigrated upon reentry over Texas killing all seven crew members aboard. Many of us remember the search for debris, the investigation of why the tragedy happened, the focus on the insulating foam which had peeled off during lift off and punctured a hole in one of Columbia’s wings.
But do you remember the crew? And do you remember that the group of heroes was incredibly religiously diverse? We might be most familiar with the faith of the Baptist, the Roman Catholic, the charismatic Christian, and the Episcopalian who died on that tragic day. But did you know about Ilan Ramon, the son of a Jewish Holocaust survivor who was an Israeli astronaut on the mission, and now a hero in Judaism? Or Kalpana Chawla, an Indian-American who grew up in a household with Sikh and Hindu influences, and attended Hindu temples in the San Francisco area. Or Laurel Clark, a practicing Unitarian Universalist, who wrote in an e-mail to her mother on that shuttle flight “Whenever I do get to look out, it is glorious. Even the stars have a special brightness.”[1]
All seven faithful people died on that ill-fated day. All were hailed as heroes, scientists and astronauts who had followed their dreams and all done great things for the advancement of humankind. And their story brings home what can be a sticky question for us as Christians. Were they all saved? Or to put it another way, are they in heaven?
I often have people come to me asking that question on a more personal level, as they have a close friend or family member of another faith whom they care about deeply, but wonder whether they will be in heaven or be saved. It is a very personal question and one which can be very troubling for us as Christians.
I want to begin by talking about what it means to be saved. Salvation, for us as Christians, is what Jesus has done for us by covering our sins and dying on the cross. What we are offered in salvation is a right relationship with God—no matter how badly we’ve messed up, we can have our relationship with God restored. That is the offer of salvation. But in order to receive it, we have to do something. We have to have faith.
So, for us as Christians, salvation is the gift made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus, which we receive through faith. But does that mean that someone who does not know Christ and who does not have faith in him cannot have salvation and receive the gift of eternal life in heaven with God?
There are three common answers to that question. The first answer is, no, someone who does not know Jesus cannot be saved. That is a view called exclusivism.
Another opposite view is a universalist view, which says that God will love and save everyone, no matter what.
For me, and what I understand about God, both of these views are somehow incomplete and not helpful. I am grateful to my colleague Adam Hamilton, pastor of The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, Kansas for some of the writing he has done on this subject over the last few years for helping me clarify what I think about this.
I have to start with what I know about God. The Bible teaches us that God is love. That’s the most important way we understand and explain God. And characteristics of God which are a close second to love are justice and mercy. And it seems to me that a God of love and mercy would not exclude good, faithful people from salvation. It also seems to me that a God of justice would not extend salvation to a completely unrepentant sinner—for example, Hitler.
So I believe when we wrestle with this question, we have to look at these charasteristics of God—love, justice and mercy. And then we have to ask ourselves—is there any place in Scripture where it seems that God reaches beyond those who believe in Jesus to extend love and mercy and justice?
And the answer is yes. This story from the Old Testament which we shared today is one of the most powerful of those instances. God has promised Abraham that all of the nations of the earth shall be blessed through him. All the nations of the earth.
And then Abraham and his wife Sarah have trouble conceiving, and his first child is Ishmael, born to Hagar, one of the couple’s slaves. A few years later, Abraham and Sarah miraculously conceive, and have Isaac. Isaac and Ishmael play together as brothers….until Sarah has a fit of jealously and insists that Abraham send them out into the wilderness to fend for themselves. This scripture reports that Abraham struggles with the decision, but does as Sarah asks only after being reassured by God that Hagar and her son will be cared for by him. And as they go into the wilderness, there is a remarkable story of God saving them from starvation, and promising Hagar that he would make a great nation of her son. This would ultimately be the nation of Islam.
Here we get the clear message that God’s love is for all nations and all people. Not just the descendants of Isaac, but also the descendents of Ishmael. That message is reinforced in the New Testament when Jesus extends his message beyond the Jewish people to include non-Jews, or Gentiles. The clear and consistent message is, God loves those who are faithful—not just Jews, not just Abraham’s children through Ishmael, but ALL who are faithful.
And I think that brings us to a place of understanding. Salvation, as we understand it, comes through Christ. But salvation can also come to those who are faithful believers in other traditions. There are Muslims who have a much better prayer life than I do, and Hindus who are more faithful in serving the poor. And they have never had a chance or opportunity or persuasive means to receive Christ as their savior. But I believe that our God, the God of Abraham, and the God of Jesus Christ, is big enough for that to happen. In the words of Billy Graham in a Newsweek interview, “It would be foolish for me to speculate on who will be there and who will not….The love of God is absolute. He said he gave his son for the whole world, and I think he loves the whole world no matter what label they have.”[2]
Our hymn of response is about how we have received out salvation—following Jesus. Our prayer is that however salvation comes, those who are faithful will never turn back from a way of life which is holy.
[1]“Seven-Heroes,Seven- Faiths,” http://www.beliefnet.com/News/2003/02/Seven-Heroes-Seven-Faiths.aspx?p=1
[2] Adam Hamilton, “Will There Be Hindus in Heaven?” in Seeing Gray in a World of Black and White, Nashville, Abingdon, 2008; p.111.
Sermon November 9, 2008
November 21, 2008Exploring Other Faiths: Why Are There Multiple Faiths?
26th Sunday After Pentecost, Off Lectionary ~ Matthew 2:1-2, 5b-12
November 9, 2008 ~ Kenwood UMC
Rev. F. Elizabeth Givens
The next few weeks we are going to be tackling a very sensitive set of questions, questions about why there are other faiths, what that means for salvation, and how we relate to people of other faiths. I think it is important to begin by noting that this is not a series explaining what other faiths believe—there will be touches of that, but not a comprehensive look. If you are interested in that, let me know and I will be glad to set up a small group study of that topic. It is also important for us to begin by confessing that we all carry a certain amount of prejudice toward people of other faiths, prejudice usually not born of hatred but of lack of understanding. Most of us have lived in a Christian culture and a Christian context all of our lives, even if we have not always practiced our faith. And so, when it comes to exploring other faiths, that is as much an exploration of cultures different from our own as it is anything. And we need to acknowledge that this is an area which is unfamiliar—and even risky for us.
But we must address this question, now more than ever, because we live in an increasingly diverse religious world. I did not know people of others faiths when I was growing up as a child. In my elementary school, people were either practicing or non-practicing Christians. That was it. If there were Jewish or Muslim or Hindus in my community I sure wasn’t aware of it.
And then in 1984, a Muslim place of worship was built on Buford Road in southside Richmond, the road I traveled 2-3 times a week to get to church. A mosque in the middle of the community that had nurtured me. “Why?” I wondered. The answer was simple—the community was no longer the same one I had grown up in as a child. There was a growing Muslim population in that community, and they wanted a place to worship.
Today, the diversity of the world that my children live in is almost incomprehensible to their grandparents, and surely would be to their great grandparents. Our children live in an America where Protestant faith hovers at just 51.4%, almost a minority.[1] They go to school with people of other faiths—Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and others. And those children will become our children’s friends, they will come to sleepovers at our homes, they will play soccer together and in 30 years they will lead our country together. Religious diversity is simply the reality of our community today, and so we need to learn about it!
So, why are there so many faiths and how do we fit that reality into our Christian understanding? To answer that question we have to take off the hat of faith and put on the hat of a sociologist. Sociologists study the dynamics of society and culture in the world. And what we learn from sociologists is that religion has been a very cultural thing. Until people began to move more easily around the globe in the last hundred years or so, religion was very dependent on the culture you grew up in. Islam was practiced in the Middle East, Christianity in Europe and the West, the Jewish faith in Israel, Hinduism in India and so forth. The faith which you might practice was often very connected to the culture into which you were born.
Now that we are a more mobile society, those cultures are beginning to blend and interact, which makes us ask these questions more urgently. And I think the place we need to begin when we ask ourselves why there are other faiths is with our understanding of God as creator.
As Christians we believe that God created the world—and not just the world, but the universe in it’s entirity. And that means that God created all people, not just Christian people. I am a part of a Disciple Bible Study class which meets on Thursday evenings, and we have been studying the books of Genesis and Exodus so far this fall. It has become clear to us in these earliest stories that God created everyone. And that means that from our perspective God created not only those who practice Christianity, but those who practice other religions. And so then the question becomes, how does God value those other religions in scripture? Does God exclude or include them?
And that at long last brings us to our scripture from this morning, the story of the wise men arriving at the birthplace of the Christ Child. As this scripture was read this morning, you may have felt that I was just as bad as Target and Home Depot at pushing the Christmas season! But we read this scripture because it has some central information for us about how God treats other faiths.
In this central story of the Christian faith, the incarnation, when God comes among us, he is worshipped not only by his own culture in Bethlehem, but also by people from the East—wise men from afar.
Now there is nothing in scholarships which suggests that these wise men were of some Jewish sect that had gone east. They were from aother culture, and practiced another religion. They followed stars—this was also not a practice of the Jews of Jesus’ day. Clearly these are people from another culture, people who do not necessarily believe in the God of Israel, but who nonetheless come and worship.
I believe this part of the Christmas story begins to suggest to us that our God might be bigger than the story, greater that our human constraints and constructions. Our God, the same God who created us, the same God who sent us Jesus, is beyond our understanding and comprehension. And as I read our Holy Scriptures I find that this God who I do not and cannot understand seems to include in his story people who are different from me. And that suggests to me that God’s mercy and grace are not the exclusive property of us Christians—but that they might indeed extend to the whole world.
Why are there multiple faiths? Because we live in a multicultural world which only recently has communicated on a global level. These faiths developed largely in isolation from each other, not in competition with each other. What do we do about the fact that there are multiple faiths? It seems to me that the model of the baby at whose cradle the whole world came to worship is that we need to embrace those multiple faiths, listen to one another, and look for ways to love and serve one another as faithful disciples within our different traditions.
[1] Source: The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, 2007. www.religions.pewforum.org/reports.
Fall Festival an Amazing Success!
November 18, 2008The weather cleared for the window of time between 11-2 on Saturday, just long enough to bring out the crowds to Kenwood’s Fall Festival. Winners of the soup competition were declared by a team of expert judges, Lois Covington, Mark Johnston and Savannah Toms. The first place went to JoAnn Fowler for her Vegetable Soup. Second place went to Mark Waite’s Chili, and third place to Barbara Huster’s Sausage Soup. A final figure for how much we raised for ShyAnne Shane will not be available until next week, but the talley will top $4500!
Fall Festival On Saturday!
November 14, 2008Kenwood’s Fall Festival is just about 36 hours away! Join us on Saturday, November 15 (rain or shine) for fun, fellowship, food and more! The hours are 11-2, and all the proceeds benefit ShyAnne Shane, a local child battling cancer.
What will you find at the Fall Festival?
- Homemade Soup by the quart for $6
- Barbeque Plates for $7
- A Silent Auction of Bountiful Baskets, including a “Get Away Basket” with two round trip Air Tran tickets
- Bake Sale with delicious goodies
- Homemade crafts
- And more!
Serving Through Mission to Hanover
November 10, 2008On Saturday, November 8, 13 Kenwood folks joined together to do winterization and repairs on four homes in our community. Jobs included putting plastic over windows, repairing a mouse hole, removing yard debris, insulating pipes and more. The day included memorable moments–welcoming clients, including one who was the first Sunday School teacher of one of the team members. There was also a near miss with a ladder fall, which all turned out for the best. Thanks to all who helped out!
Sermon November 2, 2008
November 4, 2008All Saints? Are You Sure?
All Saints Sunday ~ Matthew 5:1-12
November 2, 2008 ~ Kenwood UMC
Has anyone ever told you that you were a saint? Maybe when you’ve done something really good for them that’s gotten them out of a jam? I said it just this week to my neighbor Jeff. It happened this way. Sara Pugh, a woman seeking ordination in the United Methodist Church in Virginia, was staying with our family on Tuesday night. She was in town for interviews on Tuesday and Wednesday, and had borrowed a friend’s car to get here. On Tuesday evening, she accidentally left the parking lights on, since she was unfamiliar with the car. So, of course, when she went to start the car on Wednesday morning, it was as dead as anything.
So, I pulled out the jumper cables and pulled my car around, and proceeded to follow the directions on the cables to jump the car. Positive connection, positive connection, negative connection, grounding. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. So she called AAA and was told someone would be there in about an hour…and just about that time Jeff came out of his house. He came over and assessed the situation and asked if he could try.
Now my neighbor Jeff is a Battalion Chief in the Hanover Fire Department—he makes us all feel very safe around fourth of July fireworks. So, he pulled his truck around and got out his cables and connected them…positive, positive, negative, negative….wait a minute, I thought, no grounding. I shrugged to myself and said, well, he’s a fireman, if he starts a fire he can put it out.
Sure enough, with a couple of revs of his engine Sara’s car started right up. And I said, Jeff, you are a saint, thank you so much!
Now, what did I mean by that, calling him a saint? We use the word like that, almost in a joking way, but I think it’s actually a truer meaning than when we use saint to talk about some extraordinary Christian example like Mother Teresa or Saint Paul. They seem inaccessible, extraordinary to us. But are saints really inaccessible, rare, extraordinary people?
Not if you listen to Jesus. Jesus says we will be blessed—we will be saintly—when we are meek, when we show mercy, when we are poor in spirit, when we are mournful. That is NOT what we usually think of when we think of being blessed—it’s the opposite. And if being a saint is really, in Jesus’ understanding, being all these things he describes, well, then there are many more saints out there than we think.
You see, Jesus never says that to be a saint you have to be extraordinary, or perfect, or do some huge thing for this world. No, to be a saint you just have to follow him—meekly, peacefully, in your own corner of the world.
That’s what Jeff was doing on Weds morning. Nothing extraordinary. But he could have just as easily watched from behind his curtains and let AAA come, and we would have never known the difference. But he didn’t—he reached out. He went out of his way to lend a hand. He was a saint for us in that time and place.
I’d like to invite you to stop and think about how many people have been that helping hand when you needed them. How many people have reached out to you in Christian love and concern when you were in a tough place? They are saints—all of them. Being a saint is nothing more than being a Christian. Only I would say that being a saint is just a bit more than being a Christian in your heart—it’s being a Christian in the way you live your life.
On this all Saints Sunday, we celebrate the saints who have touched our lives. We remember two of our Kenwood members who this year have gone to live with the saints eternal. And we are reminded that being a saint is not something extraordinary or rare—it’s something we all have been to someone at some point. And when we live as Christians, Christians who care abut others, who seek peace, who show mercy-when we live as Jesus invites us to live, we will be blessed—we will be blessed to be saints of God.
And this community needs saints. It needs the kind of saints who will give a few hours next Saturday morning to winterize some homes for Mission to Hanover. It needs the kind of saints who will bring food for ACES the first Sunday of the month. It needs the kind of saints who will serve at the Fall Festival to raise money for a little girl with a daunting illness. It needs saints who will listen, saints who will embrace, saints who will reach out. God has called us to be saints at this time and in this place. Why? So we can share with others that they are blessed, and help them to know the transforming love of Christ.
So don’t think about being a saint as being someone who is unreachable or untouchable. Think about it as being real, as practicing your faith in small, ordinary ways—ways that may not seem like much, but hold enormous power to transform lives and hearts.
Amen.
Pray for Ministries with Young People
November 3, 2008Kenwood’s Administrative Council, meeting on November 2, spent their Nurturing Spiritual Leaders Time (a time for Council to learn together) discussing Kenwood’s ministries with teens in middle and high school. Acknowledging that a new model is needed, leaders began to think about holistic family ministries as a vision for the future. As we move forward, one thing was clear: as a church we need to pray for this age group. Therefore we, as leaders, invite you to join us in this prayer:
God, reveal to us your direction for ministries with young people at Kenwood. Help us to think creatively and in a visionary way about how you are calling us to be church. Enable us to lift up leaders for these ministries. And keep the young people of our community before us. Reveal to us their needs and concerns. Help us to listen, and then to respond with compassion and grace. Amen.
