Good morning! I am
Tim Roberts, the pastor here at Sunrise Church and I would like to join in with
the whole church and welcome you to Sunrise. I pray that as you are with us
this morning, you will feel right at home and also receive a special blessing
from God for being with us. Please pray with me.
[Prayer]
This morning, we are
continuing with this series, Our Heart and Soul, in which we are looking
in finer detail at out Mission, Vision, and Value Statements. As we have for
several weeks, we are looking in depth at our Values, which we consider as
those non-negotiable principles of which without, Sunrise would not be who we are
or the church that God longs for us to be.
The value that we
are taking to heart this morning is: Our Relational
Covenant. Please read it with me:
We
live by our Relational Covenant - where respect and safety for all is the norm.
You may remember this story, or you may remember one like
it, because it has happened many times over in many different places. Several years ago, the ministers of a major
city were gathered at a prominent church for their annual Christmas party. Sometime during the evening, one of the
custodians of the church found a tiny boy standing in the hallway crying. A quick investigation revealed that the lad
belonged to no one in the building.
Parking lots and properties near the church were checked with no
avail. The police were called and within
minutes they sent bulletins to radio and television stations throughout the
community.
Late that evening, there were reports that an out-of-state
car had stopped at a service station north of the city. Someone in the car asked if a little boy had
been found at a downtown church; then the car disappeared into the night. To my knowledge, the parents were never
found. The boy has since been placed in
a splendid home where he has been raised with love and care.
What makes this story memorable though is what happened the
morning after the little boy was found.
A newsman began his coverage of the story with these striking words:
“Someone trusted the church last night, and the church came through.”
Countless times throughout history, people have trusted the
church and the church has come through as a safe place. Unfortunately though, we also know that there
have been times when people looked to the church as a safe place and it has
been anything but. What makes the
difference – why is the church sometimes seen as a place of refuge and
sometimes is a place of anguish?
This dichotomy is not a recent occurrence though. Even in Jesus day, the religious organization
suffered a sort of split personality.
For the devout Jews, the temple was a place of refuge and
salvation. But for those outside of the
Jewish faith, they found nothing but a turned back. It was for such a reason that Jesus stood up
on a hillside one day and began to preach what we now know as the Sermon on the
Mount.
In this sermon, Jesus uttered these words that we find in
Matthew 7:12
Matthew
7.12 (CEB)
Therefore,
you should treat people in the same way that you want people to treat you; this
is the Law and the Prophets
Of course, by now, many of you recognize these words as the
Golden Rule. What you may not know
though is that this saying was not original with Jesus. In fact, some form of this saying had been
well-known throughout most of human history.
At least five centuries before Jesus, Confucius had uttered a similar
platitude saying:
“Do not do to others what you would not like
yourself.”
Also, in the Talmud, which is a
collection of ancient Jewish writings of which Jesus would have been very
familiar with, Rabbi Hillel said,
“What is hateful to you, do not do to your
fellowman. This is the entire Law; all the rest is commentary.”
But Jesus doesn’t follow the same
premise of these thoughts; instead he gives them a different slant. Up until now, all of these philosophies have
had a negative tense to them – don’t do what you wouldn’t want to happen to
you… Jesus though focuses on doing what
is right for others…as an initiatory – that is it compels us to be the one who
acts out of love first.
Therefore, you should treat people in the same way
that you want people to treat you; this is the Law and the Prophets.
Jesus’ way of understanding this
rule is that it summarizes what it means to live in real relationship with God
and all of God’s people. He infers that
those who will be real followers of God will be the instigators of radical love
and hospitality. As Jesus carefully
reworded this principle – he was denouncing an age-old adage that many had
lived by for centuries, and many still do.
It's like
that old saying that many of us heard growing up, “If you can’t say something
nice about someone, don’t say anything at all.”
In a similar twist, this saying would be more like, "Say something
about someone else that you would like someone to say about you."
I once
read about a man who shortly before World War II believed that a global
conflict was coming. He decided to find
a place where he could be safe despite what happened. For some time, he studied the map of the world,
searching for the perfect place to ride out the conflagration without being
affected or involved. He chose an island that was one of the most remote and
isolated places on the globe and then he moved there. The island turned out to be none other than Guadalcanal,
the scene of one of the bloodiest battles in human history.
Try as we might, we cannot isolate ourselves from others,
even when we believe that to do so is in the best interest.
Jesus said, “In
everything do to others as you would
have them do to you.” To do so is to
truly empathize with all those you encounter.
It reminds us that every person needs to be treated as if there is
something in us that is invaluable, despite our brokenness.
Friends, that is the deepest desire of every heart...to be
accepted for who we are and to feel that in spite of all that we are and all we
have done, that we can still be loved unconditionally. That unconditional love can only be fully
expressed in the body of Christ, the Church.
It is not just a good idea for the church; it is the unconditional
mandate that was left for us by Jesus.
Indiscriminate love for all mirrors God’s love.
So, where do we start?
We start by first once again living as the people of God, the Body of
Christ who are redeemed by his blood. We
start by once again recommitting ourselves to living in the same relationship
with each other as we live with God.
This morning, I have up here Our Relational Covenant that we
developed during our God Into Focus
event that we participated in last October. Through this exercise of prayer and
holy conferencing, we discerned this to be how God is calling us to live and
respond to one another, as it embraces the essence of the Golden Rule. You have seen this before, as we took the
time to review it back in November and those present came forward to sign it. But
for some, this may be the first time that you have seen it.
Once again this morning, we are encouraging you to covenant
with one another to begin to live in harmony and recognize that that which
binds us together (God) is far stronger than what seeks to divide us (our
disagreements).
I invite you to read The Relational Covenant with me.
Whether or not you are affiliated with this church, this is
a covenant that if you strive to live by will change the way you see others and
how you will relate to them. You will
begin to see others for who they really are, fellow children of God.
Now for those all who are members of Sunrise, and for those
all who, while may not be members, but call this church their home, we have
another opportunity for you to make this a covenant between one another. As the band begins to play, we ask for you to
prayerfully consider making Sunrise a real sanctuary, a real safe place. If and when you are ready, come to the front
and sign your name to this covenant, if you haven't already, or come up and
touch you name, if you have – as a lasting reminder that we agree that that
which binds is stronger than what separates us, and that we can live and love
as Christ lived and loved.
After you sign or touch your name, I would like to encourage
you to take a moment to bow your head in prayer as you ask God to strengthen
you to remember today – the day you covenanted to make Sunrise United Methodist
Church a safe place for all.
Benediction
Romans 15:7
So
reach out and welcome one another to God's glory. Jesus did it; now you do it!
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