Orchard Ridge United Church of Christ

Preached by Winton Boyd
Text: Matthew 16:13-17

Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.

Introduction –
I had the opportunity, for the second time, yesterday to attend the graduation ceremony of one of my children. If we are honest about it, we know that there are a few minutes of peak interest in an otherwise unremarkable ceremony – those minutes that one’s child lines up, walks the platform and receives the handshake. We may be mildy interested in the graduation speeches, but mostly we are there in recognition of years of studying and work.

One of the fun mental activities is to watch other students – some you have known there whole lives and some you hardly know – and wonder or ponder how high school for them compared to high school for your child. That young man who was in your daughter’s fourth grade class – you haven’t seen him for years – what did he do in his free time? What extra curricular activities did he participate in while your daughter was doing athletics or drama? And that girl, intriguing and memorable, whose path crossed your child’s for one season, one grade, or one event? What did they do the rest of their time? You look at hairstyles, beards, ear-rings or piercings in general – and wonder – how many experiences of high school are there in this room anyway? And you ponder the experiences of parents – both as parents and as former students themselves. And of teachers…and then its time to pull out the sheep bell again – “here she comes.”

If 502 students at one high school represent thousands of experiences of the same school – the same is true of course for different experiences of the Christian faith – in our time and throughout history.

Doing the memorial service for Sam Godfrey – ORUCC member, retired United Methodist pastor, and a regular attendee of Luther Memorial Church for its high liturgy and pipe organ – was a reminder that there are so many ways of expressing and living out the Christian faith. It was a reminder of different liturgies (or lack thereof), forms of music, settings for congregational worship, and expressions of justice. Sam was deeply committed throughout his whole ministry and his whole life to ecumenism and started inter denominational services in almost every community he served. One of the gifts of Sam Godfrey was his deep belief that regardless of our differences, we all served and lived before a much larger God than the particular expression we share on a Sunday morning.

As we move into the summer here at ORUCC, one of the things we will be thinking about and preaching about is how are we related to all those other people of faith – around the world, throughout history, and in different parts of the world. We will explore different expressions of faith with the recurring question – how have we been informed, guided, shaped, and challenged by the deep and abiding faith of others. Just as assuming that my experience of high school is the only one is short sighted, so also assuming our expression of faith is the only one is also short sighted and unhelpful.

As a tradition, we are organized around the idea of covenant – people promising to journey in faith together. But, from early on, beginning with this passage in Matthew, followers of Jesus have asked the same question Jesus asked his disciples – “who do you say that I am?”

One of the ways the church has sought to express this connection to others throughout history has been through reciting creeds. In its worst form, creeds, become tools of discrimination and religious litmus testing. They are used to impose orthodoxy, even violently. In their best expressions, creeds call together spiritual seekers and give them language in which to express their faith in God, their commitment to one another, and the fact that at its root, the Christian faith is about love. Jaroslav Pelikan, deceased professor of history at Yale University and long time authority of creeds, when asked how creeds have any meaning for modern Christians, once shared words that seem quite appropriate to our lives:

“My faith life, like that of every one else, fluctuates. There are ups and downs and hot spots and cold spots, and boredom and (weariness) and all the rest can be there. And so I’m not asked on a Sunday morning, “As of 9:20, what do you believe?”

And then you sit down with a three-by-five index card saying, “Now let’s see. What do I believe today?”

No, that’s not what they’re asking me. They’re asking me, “Are you a member of a community which now, for a millennium and a half, has said, ‘We believe in one God’?”

Every Sunday at worship (he’s a member of the Orthodox Church in America) — in the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, which goes back to the fourth century, the chant is: “Let us love one another, that with one mind we may confess the Holy Trinity, one in essence and undivided. Let us love one another that we may confess.

Pelikan continues that no one claims that the nature of God is to be a creed. The New Testament says the nature of God is love. And so, even as people recite a creed or share a statement of faith, they begin with, “Let us love one another.”

… And the language of love, which is, in our human experience, a curious combination of spontaneity and convention. There just aren’t terribly many ways to say “I love you” besides saying “I love you.”

He concludes the radio interview by noting to his host, “We’re recording this in the state of Minnesota, in which the old story is of the Norwegian who loved his wife so much he almost told her. And so in one sense, it’s a very conventional, repetitive, rote thing to do, to say “I love you.” “You are the one I love. There is no one else I love.”

I love you God, so much, that I will tell you that. In the community of my congregation, I will tell you that.

In our tradition, the natural extension of that shared love for God is to inherit or receive creeds, statements of faith, and documents of belief and action as testimonies of the faith of those who have gone before us. They are testimonies of those who have paved the way for us – often in different and complex settings. As we respect, and receive these testimonies we embrace them not because they articulated their faith in hard fast, etched in stone ways; we embrace their experience of God, their life of faith as a reminder that we are part of a much larger tradition, a much larger movement, an experienced and tested and faithful and noble and courageous and humble and mistake ridden movement.

So as we begin a summer of considering our connection to others in faith – we turn to our own roots. As the Congregational Christian church and the Evangelical and Reformed Church merged to create the UCC in the mid 1950’s, one of the things they sought to do was craft a statement of faith that would honor the relationships people in these denominations had with each other, their ancestors in faith and their God. They wrote what has become known as the UCC Statement of Faith. What is in our order of worship today is that statement, revised for gender inclusive language and recrafted as a doxology, or a prayer of praise.

Rooted in the belief that our faith begins and ends in relationship, this statement creates a large umbrella over the question, ‘who do you say that I am?’ – ‘how is your faith organized?’ ‘what are the ways you live out the statement, “I love you God,” “What is it that really matters in your faith?’

In almost every new member class here, we hand out the statement and invite folks to read it and note the phrases they like, dislike, or find confusing. We do that to emphasize that while we are deeply rooted in the ancient Christian faith, there is plenty of room for disagreement and discussion about the particulars. Today, however (as we did in Java and Jesus last week), I would invite you to read it with me – looking not for where you diverge, but pondering the “who” behind the “what.” Who are our spiritual forebears, and what are the gifts we receive from their faith?

Focusing on the character of faith that is transmitted allows us to overcome the natural and expected differences in how we define the what. One of my mentors in faith through my college years was a man named Jeff. Jeff was the staff person for Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship – a rather conservative, but deeply faithful ministry that exists on college campuses around the country. I got to know Jeff as a junior in college when he was in his mid to late twenties. He came to the University of Vermont at a time when Inter Varsity was small, struggling and not very well defined. He focused on relationship building. He was not a great public speaker, but was very engaging one on one. He and I met weekly for discussion and study. He listened to my rants about the church or other Christian groups on campus, he challenged me to be a leader, he invited me to help him as he renovated an old farm house, he took me and other students to weekend retreats at other colleges, old farmhouses, and his house. I remember one time we agreed to meet at a famous Burlington hamburger joint that spared no grease in the making of its fries and burgers. Our custom was to say a prayer whenever we shared a meal, no matter where we were. But on this occasion Jeff looked at these decadent, artery clogging fries, looked at me and said – I don’t think I feel right giving thanks for these – I’ll let you say the prayer today!! I admired his honesty, marvelled at his willingness to raise finanical support to pay his salary, loved his enthusiasm and playfulness, and watched closely the way he and his wife crafted a relationship and a life together.

Jeff and I never agreed theologically. I often thought he was the only Inter Varsity Campus minister who could have engaged my heart and mind in the whole movement. At the time I went to seminary to become a UCC pastor, Jeff and his wife were attending a UCC church in Vermont.

I take comfort in being able to read this statement alongside Jeff and so many others like him. I worry less about whether we interpret “sin” or “sharing our common lot” or “cost and joy of discipleship” or “justice and peace” in the same way – but feel a kinship and a brotherhood as followers of Jesus in the large movement called Christianity.

For every preacher or author or relative who has tried to convert us to their way of understanding words of faith [words like “you bestow on us the Holy Spirit” or “you call us to be your servants in the service of others” or “holy love”], there are thousands others who simply share our desire to love God, serve the world, live in harmony with others, and make an imprint on those around us.

For every person who has tried to use these words as a litmus test of faith, there are thousands of Jeffs who can and do inspire us and motivate us.

If this is true for those people we know in our lives, how much more true is it for all those in history who have lived the faith, served the world, built churches, fought for justice in their day, or raised young people in faith? Despite our need to honor the questions, to honor the journey, to ask assertive and aggressive questions of our tradition – how deprived are we if we think we have nothing to learn from our predecessors? How spiritually bereft are we if we think we have no kinship or communion with the faithful servants of God did their best to love God in their life and time?

Each word in a statement like this points to a rich history, a rich heritage – of discussion, argument, living, praying, singing and hoping. Each word opens a window to the richness of our tradition and each time we affirm the heritage we share, our understanding of the Christian faith has the opportunity to broaden and deepen and become yet more inclusive, more respectful, more hopeful.

United Church of Christ Statement of Faith in the form of a doxology
We believe in you, O God, Eternal Spirit, God of our Savior Jesus Christ and our God, and to your deeds we testify:
You call the worlds into being, create persons in your own image, and set before each one the ways of life and death.
You seek in holy love to save all people from aimlessness and sin.
You judge people and nations by your righteous will declared through prophets and apostles.
In Jesus Christ, the man of Nazareth, our crucified and risen Savior, you have come to us and shared our common lot, conquering sin and death and reconciling the world to yourself.
You bestow upon us your Holy Spirit, creating and renewing the church of Jesus Christ, binding in covenant faithful people of all ages, tongues, and races.
You call us into your church to accept the cost and joy of discipleship, to be your servants in the service of others, to proclaim the gospel to all the world and resist the powers of evil,to share in Christ’s baptism and eat at his table, to join him in his passion and victory.
You promise to all who trust you forgiveness of sins and fullness of grace, courage in the struggle for justice and peace, your presence in trial and rejoicing, and eternal life in your realm which has no end.
Blessing and honor, glory and power be unto you.