Preached at First Presbyterian Church of Rolla. Based on Mark 9:38-50. The YouTube link (click on the image) should take you directly to the sermon.
Why do we make the choices we make? Seems like a simple enough question, right? Since the Enlightenment, we have thought of ourselves as rational creatures who mentally tally up the pros and cons of a given set of options, then choose the one that’s best. The reality is, most of the time, we don’t really know why we make a given choice. We may tell ourselves that we do, but the truth is, we often make a choice and THEN compose the rational justification.
A couple weeks ago, I told you the story about when I moved from Baldor to the University of Illinois. As I tell it, we analyzed our situation in Arkansas, evaluated our options, calculated the possibilities for advancement, and made a rational choice. It’s more accurate, though, to say that we had an emotional and spiritual yearning to be closer to family, and that when I was on campus for the interview, it just felt right. I essentially decided to take the job before it was offered, and then analyzed the offer in a way that would justify that choice.
In a recent column by David Brooks, he wrote, “One of the most unsettling findings of modern psychology is that we often don’t know why we do what we do.” There is on the one hand our conscious self, that part of us that talks and acts and interacts with other people, that we think of as our true self, that we think is in control. But I’ve read other authors describe our conscious self as a rider on an elephant. The rider can give nudges, but the elephant, which is our vast subconscious self, does most of the work and makes most of the choices. Brooks doesn’t like this conclusion. Like most of us, he feels like his conscious self is in control.
So he went looking for psychologists that could confirm this belief. That alone is a little problematic, but maybe a topic for another sermon on confirmation bias. Anyway, much of what he learned is that what we can actually control is our stories. Some stories are better than others, in the sense of being more accurate. Some stories are better than others, in the sense of being more useful for our future selves.
Here’s an example from the column. Suppose a man has a string of failed romantic relationships. One story he could tell himself is that he never got over someone who dumped him back in college. Another story he could tell himself is that he has a high level of neuroticism—a tendency to anxiety and self-doubt—that is disrupting his relationships. Both stories may have elements of truth to them, but they call for different solutions.
We are a story-telling species. What stories do we tell ourselves about this congregation? What story do you tell yourself about why you are here, and not somewhere else? Let me tell you a little bit of mine, and then we’ll see where it might take us in the future.
When we moved to Rolla, we decided it was time to make space in our lives for weekly worship. Sam was 7 and Jesse was 5. New town, new job, growing kids—time for a new approach to God. I had a few criteria, things I wouldn’t compromise on. My sister is a United Methodist pastor, and I grew up Methodist, so any church we attended would have to be accepting of women in the pulpit and be more-or-less in the same theological tradition as the Methodists. I had always attended a traditional worship service, so that’s what I was looking for—but not “high church.” I short-listed this church and First UMC. Our first visit was the Sunday after Christmas, figuring it wouldn’t be too crowded and overwhelming.
The greeter at the door was Rob Heberer. We had already met him—he lived three doors down from us and had come over to welcome us to the neighborhood. So that’s one plus. At some point, I think during the passing of the peace, Lowell Crow asked if I knew his daughter, Mariesa—well yeah, she was the chair of the search committee that hired me. So that’s two. At some point, perhaps during fellowship, we met Bob and Carlene May. We had just moved here from Mahomet, where we lived while I attended the University of Illinois, which is where Carlene grew up and Bob attended college. So that’s three.
There are lots of churches in Rolla. We differ dramatically in many ways: size, demographics, theology, worship style, schedule, programs. I think that’s great. Everyone needs to have a way to connect to God and to be a part of God’s family. Some people like pipe organs while other people like a rock band. Some people need certainty—to be told what to think and believe—while other people need freedom to question. Some people would never attend a church that allows a woman to preach, while others would never attend a church that excludes women from full participation in God’s ministry.
We all have our stumbling blocks, those things that stand between us and God. Often, the root of the obstacle lies deep within the elephant of our subconscious, and we build a story that satisfies us. For example, maybe you grew up with a rigid boundary between the secular and the sacred, and anything that makes that boundary a little squishy makes you feel a little squishy.
As you may recall, I was the chair of the Way Forward Committee for a while. We floated several different proposals, many of which related to restructuring the sanctuary. I’ll try not to get riled up here, but I have often called whoever designed this sanctuary a sadistic madman. Everything is crooked. There are no right angles, but instead things meet at 30 or 60 or 120 degrees. The pews are too long to really use completely, so everyone sits right on the aisle.
The other issue we have with the building is that the fellowship hall is the furthest point imaginable from the sanctuary. Getting to fellowship time after worship is a real chore, especially for the increasing number of congregants with mobility issues. Our fellowship time under the portico has been going OK, but I don’t know what we’ll do in November.
So we proposed to replace the pews with chairs and use the back half of the space for fellowship. Now, I expected there to be pushback over the pews vs. chairs. What I didn’t expect was the objection to the idea of fellowship in the sanctuary space. People would say, “What if someone takes coffee with them into the service?” And I thought, “Uh, then they’ll stay awake?” It took me a long time, and I still don’t completely understand, but it has to do with a certain understanding of proper decorum. It’s probably generational.
What I’m starting to grasp is that the people who objected weren’t making some rational evaluation, but instead had a deep reaction. To them, the only food that is appropriate in a sacred space is the communion elements. Anything else just feels wrong.
A few years ago, a group of us read through Christianity After Religion by Diana Butler Bass. At least I think that’s the book where I picked up this concept, which I also heard her give a talk about this past spring. She talks about the three B’s: belief, behavior, and belonging. Historically, that was the order: a person would come to a set of beliefs that were aligned with a particular church, start attending, start following its rules of behavior, and ultimately become a member. In her books, Bass writes that the order is reversed: first a person finds a church where they belong, then they adopt its written and unwritten rules of behavior, and then they gradually adopt its beliefs. More recently, Bass has said that it’s more of a triangle with multiple entry points and directions of development. Whatever. The point is, belief, behavior, and belonging are all important components of entering God’s realm through its expression in a particular congregation.
What I want to highlight is the importance of belonging. A podcast I listened to recently discussed the difference between belonging and fitting in. Fitting in is like wearing a mask. Not the kind of mask we’re all wearing to protect each other, but a mask like you would wear on Halloween. We all do that in different situations. I mean, I interact with Rhonda’s family much differently than with my own. When I go elk hunting, I’m careful to avoid politics, knowing that most of the guys would disagree with me on practically every topic. When I’m at the Mission, I’m a cook, not a professor, and actually I’ve been asked if I work as a cook somewhere.
Belonging, though, is bringing your whole self, and being accepted for who you are. When I’m here, I know that I’m valued as a beloved sibling in Christ. We may disagree about a lot of things, and there may be things that we just don’t discuss, but I know that you love me for who I am, for all of who I am. At the same time, I hope you all know that I love you, too, for all of who you are, including the parts I don’t know about. That is belonging. That is being a part of the body of Christ.
When we came that December Sunday so many years ago, we immediately felt that sense of belonging. But I think we all need to be aware that there are other people who would not feel that same sense. People who haven’t grown up in the church, and so they are unfamiliar with the music and the liturgy. People who don’t know what to wear, where to sit, or what to expect. People who have been hurt by other churches, for whatever reason, and need to heal in order to truly experience God’s love.
When Jesus told his disciples not to place stumbling blocks, he was talking about anything that creates an obstacle between us and God. Sin is ultimately about separation from God. The things we let come between us and God become idols. Anything that does not enable us to express our love for BOTH God AND neighbor blocks both relationships. What value does it have if it makes us comfortable while preventing us from fully embracing another beloved child of God?
Now, I’m not saying that we’re going to tear out the pews, put in chairs, and have fellowship in the back. I’ve set that aside in favor of other priorities, because that vision was becoming an obstacle between my congregational siblings and me. As long as I was thinking of people as pro-pew or pro-chair, I wasn’t thinking of them as pro-Christ. And that’s who we are, or at least who we need to be. Nothing should matter more than loving God and loving our neighbors. Everything we do should be an exhibition of God’s reign in our lives, and God’s love available to everyone. If anything—anything—is causing me to love someone else less, I need to set it aside. If anything—anything—is preventing people from encountering God through our congregation, we need to set it aside.
The question before us, individually and as a congregation, is this: What is blocking our ability to exhibit God’s reign to the people of Rolla and beyond? Or from another perspective, what is blocking our ability to see God in each person we meet? Those are two sides of the same coin. As members of Christ’s body, we need to enter fully into relationships with all other parts of Christ’s body. We must bring our full selves, and allow others to bring their full selves—even those parts we don’t like.
So, what are the stumbling blocks in your life? What parts of your life are you keeping God out of? What is preventing you from seeing the image of God in each person you meet? And how do you see those stumbling blocks reflected in the life of this congregation? Let us all seek to make our church more welcoming, and the path to God more clear, for all of God’s children in Rolla and beyond. Amen.
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