This is from the movie “Facing the Giants”, about an underdog team and a coach nobody believes in. But this scene is about the Christian life. Because we are all doing a death crawl. We are all carrying burdens on our backs. We are all blindly pushing forward, not knowing how far we must go or when we will reach the end. We all experience pain and exhaustion and the threat of utter failure and defeat. We are all prone to self-doubt and a need to give up the fight, to let the giants overwhelm us. My aunt, married to my mom’s oldest brother is 54. She just had major surgery and has been diagnosed with ovarian cancer that has progressed and spread. What was abdominal pain is now cancer. I can’t imagine what is going through my Aunt’s and Uncle’s and cousins’ heads this weekend. Fear. Grief. Worry. Anger. I have seen it. Sometimes ministry feels like a war zone, simply going through life with others in all of their ups and downs.
I’ve been in this for a decade now and at its best, the best days in ministry are the ones in which I feel like I’m accomplishing something good for others. But a lot of the time it feels like jumping into deep, shark infested waters. Because if you mean it, if you are really committed to living like Jesus commanded his disciples to live, you will get hurt. Because you will find yourself loving people who will get hurt and die or just leave. Ministry, not just the ordained professional kind, I mean the kind of ministry to which every baptized Christian is called consists of a couple of general principles: Love God in Sunday worship and help your neighbor. Worship is primary, because we must acknowledge our proper place: God is God and I am not. As for the second part, love does no wrong to the neighbor. The neighbor, according to Jesus, is the one who shows mercy. So, being a good neighbor is the second principle. Being a good neighbor means to help, to serve, to provide direct relief. So you bring a meal or offer to mow the grass or watch the neighborhood children. As a congregation inAkron direct relief and neighborhood service has meant to support Ephrata Area Social Services or to offer Peter’s Porch. We give out of the abundance we ourselves have received from God. We provide global relief through ELCA World Hunger or LWR. In these ways we contribute to the needs of our neighbors near and far. Jesus himself provided relief as a sign of the coming kingdom of God; food relief, protection from storms, healing from disease, raising the dead and comforting the grief-stricken. Like Jesus, there is nothing more we can want to offer to our suffering neighbor than comfort and relief. If we could bear a loved one’s burden for them, we would . Its called compassion. And it is the way of Jesus and His church to be compassionate.
But there is another way. A form of ministry we have not yet embraced here. Lutherans are good at relief. Not so good at the next step in proclaiming the kingdom of God; advocacy. Jesus promises to send the Holy Spirit, the PARAKLETE. Not the parakeet, in case you were picturing a colorful tropical bird. PARAKLETE means one called along side. It is a law court term and means defense attorney or counselor. It has been translated comforter or advocate; but the affect is to step in on behalf of another and to speak out in their defense. To protect the vulnerable. To stand up to injustice that causes undo suffering. It can also mean coach or mentor, an encourager. Sometimes we cannot bear another’s burden for them, sometimes we cannot offer direct relief. Have you ever been in a situation where you don’t know what to say or do for someone? When you don’t know how to help? Call on the Spirit. Like Jesus before her, the Spirit advocate gives us words to encourage others, to speak out on their behalf, to raise awareness and call others to task.
I am working on three neighborhood initiatives that require advocacy. I am working on providing an after school mentoring program for Akron elementary school. I am working on introducing two hunger/food insecurity projects in Ephrata school: PowerPacks which provides weekend food relief and recipes for healthy meals to families with school-aged kids who qualify for free or reduced lunch. These kids come to school hungry on Mondays. PowerPacks makes sure they don’t. I’m working on summer food service for those same kids for the summer of 2012. This district has the second highest percentage of kids who qualify under federal poverty guidelines for free/reduced lunch. Closing in on 40%. 117 kids in Akron elementary school come from households with incomes that may not sustain them without assistance. During the school year they get fed. In the summer they are at risk for hunger. Government, federal and state, threaten to reduce spending on programs that support and supplement low income families with kids. That means the burden will fall on those families and on local churches. We serve 140 families a month already. Are we prepared to double that effort? What if we became advocates? Building a community that protects the vulnerable. What if we prayed for their protection? What if we stepped into their situations and offered more than some temporary relief? What if we stood before government officials and demanded that they show compassion for all people, that they work on behalf of the poor as well as the rich? What if we went to the schools and the churches and the agencies and we organized our efforts to protect the vulnerable? What if we became coaches and encouragers and mentors, calling people to become their best selves---Both the powerless and the powerful. What if we empowered this community to rise above political or religious differences to protect children and the elderly and the poor? Homes of hope is an example of what we can do, offering mentors, temporary housing, and homelessness prevention. But we can do more. If more Christians we willing to walk with others, to go the distance with them, to encourage people, to push and to pull and to engage in the fight this world would change. I am almost 37 and I have not lost hope in the delusion of a better world, because it has been promised and it will come to pass someday and I want to be part of it. Don’t you? Find someone to encourage this week. Pray for the words to come to you. Jump in the deep water. Trust the words of Jesus. He is coming for you; he will not leave us orphaned. We belong to Him. He is our protection and our relief, so that we can protect and relieve others in His name. Give Him your very best, don’t give up yet. You’ve still got more in you. Because your strength comes from the Spirit, the power of GOD giving life to the world. Amen.
I am working on three neighborhood initiatives that require advocacy. I am working on providing an after school mentoring program for Akron elementary school. I am working on introducing two hunger/food insecurity projects in Ephrata school: PowerPacks which provides weekend food relief and recipes for healthy meals to families with school-aged kids who qualify for free or reduced lunch. These kids come to school hungry on Mondays. PowerPacks makes sure they don’t. I’m working on summer food service for those same kids for the summer of 2012. This district has the second highest percentage of kids who qualify under federal poverty guidelines for free/reduced lunch. Closing in on 40%. 117 kids in Akron elementary school come from households with incomes that may not sustain them without assistance. During the school year they get fed. In the summer they are at risk for hunger. Government, federal and state, threaten to reduce spending on programs that support and supplement low income families with kids. That means the burden will fall on those families and on local churches. We serve 140 families a month already. Are we prepared to double that effort? What if we became advocates? Building a community that protects the vulnerable. What if we prayed for their protection? What if we stepped into their situations and offered more than some temporary relief? What if we stood before government officials and demanded that they show compassion for all people, that they work on behalf of the poor as well as the rich? What if we went to the schools and the churches and the agencies and we organized our efforts to protect the vulnerable? What if we became coaches and encouragers and mentors, calling people to become their best selves---Both the powerless and the powerful. What if we empowered this community to rise above political or religious differences to protect children and the elderly and the poor? Homes of hope is an example of what we can do, offering mentors, temporary housing, and homelessness prevention. But we can do more. If more Christians we willing to walk with others, to go the distance with them, to encourage people, to push and to pull and to engage in the fight this world would change. I am almost 37 and I have not lost hope in the delusion of a better world, because it has been promised and it will come to pass someday and I want to be part of it. Don’t you? Find someone to encourage this week. Pray for the words to come to you. Jump in the deep water. Trust the words of Jesus. He is coming for you; he will not leave us orphaned. We belong to Him. He is our protection and our relief, so that we can protect and relieve others in His name. Give Him your very best, don’t give up yet. You’ve still got more in you. Because your strength comes from the Spirit, the power of GOD giving life to the world. Amen.
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