JAMES CAMPBELL
  • Home
  • Sermons
  • Other Writing
  • FIRST CHURCH
  • Photography

"We humans need to make a difference in the world.  We need to attach to something bigger than ourselves.  What we need is what Jesus offers."

6/30/2019

1 Comment

 
Picture
TRUTH IN ADVERTISING
Sunday, June 30, 2019
First Congregational Church of Cheshire
© the Rev. Dr. James Campbell
 
 
Luke 9:51-62
 
When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” But he turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to another village.
 
As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” But Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
 
 +++
​
Once upon a time, I left the ministry for a period of ten years.  That was far longer than I ever imagined it would be. But I learned a great deal during that time – about myself and God. 
 
I did all sorts of things during those ten years: I was a professional actor, I wrote a couple of plays, I worked in a performing arts photo library, and I worked in a high-powered, Broadway theater press office.  In the press office I answered the phones and did data entry and ran errands and planned award ceremonies and even met some pretty big name stars.  It was in the environment of a Broadway press office that I learned the full power of words when trying to sell an idea.  I learned how valuable it could be to substitute one word for another, or to leave a word out entirely.  Good publicity is about selling an idea. And on Broadway, selling a good idea is about selling tickets.  
 
I was a pretty quick study in learning to promote an idea or an event or a person.  And when I finally came back to professional ministry; when I was invited to lead a congregation in need to revitalization and growth, I used those skills to sell that congregation to those who were seeking a spiritual home.
 
At that church, what we were selling was an inclusive Gospel.  It was a message of broad acceptance for people who had never felt accepted in the church.  And our campaign worked!  Many new people came over the years.  The membership doubled while I was there.  We made it easy for folks. But there were moments when I wondered exactly what it was that we were selling.  Sure, it made people feel good.  But was it the Gospel?
 
Here at First Church, we’re getting ready to put together a five-year plan for growth and sustainability.  We will try to understand our own vision and purpose.  And then we will strive to sell it to the town of Cheshire.  But the same question still haunts me: what will we be selling and will it be the Gospel?  
 
These are questions for the entire modern American church, as we seek to navigate these very troubled waters; as we seek to grow at the very same time that record numbers of people are abandoning organized religion.  What’s our pitch?  What’s our advertising strategy?  What, exactly, are we selling?
 
But we’d better not ask Jesus, because Jesus is a terrible marketer.  Jesus doesn’t seem to know the first thing about word-smithing or massaging the message or softening the sharp edges.  Instead, Jesus can sometimes scare me to death.
 
In the Gospel lesson of the day, we are told that Jesus had “set his face to go to Jerusalem.”  This wasn’t just any old trip to the Holy City.  This would be his last – and he seemed to know that. And so he gathered his courage and made up his mind and “set his face.”  Along the way, some people decided that they would like to follow him. To the first who said he would follow Jesus wherever he went, Jesus didn’t say, “Welcome friend!”  Instead he replied by declaring his own poverty and homelessness: “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” How’s that for a marketing strategy?! 
 
To the second person who wanted to follow but first needed to go home and bury his father, Jesus replied (and I can hardly believe this one): “Let the dead bury their own dead.”
 
And finally, to the third, who was willing to follow Jesus but just wanted to stop by the house one more time to tell his family goodbye, Jesus replied: “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”  Maybe we should put that on a banner on the front of the church!
 
So what on earth do these words of Jesus mean?  How might we understand them in our own life and times? Frankly, I’m not sureBut here are some things for us to consider as we hear and try to understand these difficult words of Jesus.
 
First of all, these words are framed by their setting.  Jesus was on his way to his death. What “Follow Me,” meant just days before the crucifixion and what “Follow Me” meant when he first started his ministry three years before were probably two vastly different things.  Threats of violence and the specter of death have a way of clarifying one’s purpose. Jesus knew his time was short, and so even the important distractions of family funerals and family goodbyes, paled in comparison with what was about to happen.  Death was imminent.  So, the timeline matters and might help us understand Jesus’s bluntness here.
 
Second, some scholars imagine that perhaps Jesus was talking to himself just as much as he was talking to others. Maybe Jesus, in setting his face, also had to set his mind on facing what awaited him in Jerusalem.  He couldn’t afford to think about his own family in those days.  He had to keep his own hand on the plow.  – Now we know from other stories that Jesus cared for his family because even on the cross he made arrangements for his mother to live with John.  So Jesus loved his family, but he simply couldn’t afford the luxury of an emotional return home.
 
So maybe Jesus’s words were defined by the timeline of the last days of his life.  Or maybe Jesus was talking to himself as much as he was to anyone else. But even if those things are true, there is still a message here for us.  His words are about life and death, priorities and decisions.  And they remain a hard sell.  
 
I don’t think there is anything wrong with selling your church to the world.  I don’t think there is anything wrong with finding an appealing message and marketing it to those who seek a spiritual home.  But I do think that there is something wrong when churches and preachers don’t admit that the call to discipleship is a call to sacrifice and service.  Remember that the defining symbol of our faith is a cross – the ultimate sacrifice. The cross is ugly and terrifying. But it’s also transformative because it calls us to a new way of living.
 
Lots of folks are terrified that Jesus will ruin the church if we let him speak for himself.  But here’s the thing: multiple studies indicate that church growth is directly attached to people being asked for more - not less.  People want to be challenged to change the world. For decades we have pretended that asking less will get us more.  Meanwhile our churches continue to empty.
 
But we humans need to make a difference in the world.  We need to attach to something bigger than ourselves.  What we need is what Jesus offers: Resurrection! 
 
The great German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, murdered by the Nazis, once famously said, Christ invites us to “come and die.”  And what he meant was not some morbid sense of self-hatred.  What Bonhoeffer meant was that Christ calls us to die to what we think is life and to be raised into true life.  Come and die to selfishness.  Come and die to fear.  Come and die to hopelessness.  And then rise to something new, and bold  - something that will transform you and the world. 
 
Thanks be to God.  Amen.
 
 

1 Comment

And if this story really is our story, then in the end, no matter what a mess we make of everything – there will be stillness and there will be redemption.

6/23/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
THE SOUND OF SILENCE
Sunday, June 23, 2010
First Congregational Church of Cheshire
© The Rev. Dr. James Campbell
 
 
I Kings 19:1-15a
 
Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life like the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.” Then he was afraid; he got up and fled for his life, and came to Beer-sheba, which belongs to Judah; he left his servant there. But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.” Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.” He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.” He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God.
 
At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there. Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” Then the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus…”
 
 +++
​
“Hello darkness, my old friend.”  That phrase has an uncomfortable familiarity for anyone who has ever suffered from depression or chronic pain or addiction or loneliness. Maybe you are one of those people. And so was a man named Elijah. 
 
The prophet Elijah was running for his life from King Ahab and his pagan wife, Queen Jezebel.  The reading you heard today picks up immediately after a confrontation between the priests of Yahweh, the God of Israel and the priests of Baal, the god of the Canaanites. Elijah had challenged the priests of Baal to a duel of sorts, to see whose god was the most powerful.  They set up an altar and then called on Baal to send fire from heaven to consume the animal sacrifice.  We are told that nothing happened, no matter how loudly they called out.  Their gods were silent.
 
And then it was Elijah’s turn.  And being a bit of a show-off, Elijah ordered that all that raw meat be drenched with water, again and again to make the fire more of a challenge. And then he called upon the name of the Lord – just once.  And fire came from heaven and devoured everything in its sight.  That display of power emboldened Elijah so much that he took a sword and killed all the prophets of Baal.  He slaughtered them.  What a bloody, awful mess that must have been.  
 
This infuriated Queen Jezebel, whose god had been humiliated and whose priests had been murdered.  And so she promised that she would do that same to Elijah within 24 hours.  And so Elijah did what I would do: he ran for his life.  He ran all the way to Beer-Sheba in the Negev desert, about one hundred miles to the south, in the neighboring kingdom of Judah.  And he did that on foot – fear and adrenaline driving him.
 
When he finally stopped, he was beyond exhausted.  When he finally stopped, he was frightened and alone and deeply depressed.  And if you have ever been deeply depressed, you will understand what Elijah did next. He prayed to die.  "It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life…” And then he lay down under a broom tree and waited for his prayer to be answered. But instead of dying, Elijah fell asleep.  And if you have ever been depressed; if you suffer from depression; if you have ever been overwhelmed by anything, then you know how sweet the escape of sleep is. You may not feel rested afterwards, but at least you have temporarily escaped your misery.  
 
Before too long, an angel of the Lord tapped Elijah on the shoulder and said: “Get up and eat.”  When I’m depressed, food hold no pleasure.  Maybe it didn’t for Elijah either. But there it was, by some miracle, fresh bread and water.  And angels of the Lord are very persistent.  So Elijah sat up, ate and drank.  And then he fell back to sleep again. But the angel of the Lord returned and tapped him on the shoulder one more time.  And wonder of wonder, there was more bread and more water.  “Eat this,” the angel said, “because we’re going on a journey.”      
 
Elijah and the angel traveled to Mount Horeb, also known as Mount Sinai, the dwelling place of God.  And there on the mountain Elijah found a cave to hide in.  “Maybe here I will be safe,” he thought.  But before he could really settle down, the voice of the Lord came to him, saying: “What are you doing here?”  “What do you mean ‘What am I doing here?’” Elijah bellowed back at the sky. “I am a wanted man.  I thought I was doing the right thing.  I thought I was doing your will.  But now there is a bounty on my head.  And I am all alone in this world.”
 
And God replied: “Go to mouth of the cave, for I am about to pass by.”
 
Suddenly, a violent wind began to blow.  It was so strong that it actually broke the stones into pieces. “This must be the Lord,” Elijah thought.  “For the Lord is mighty enough to break the stones.”  But the Lord was not in the wind.  And then there was an earthquake.  “Well, then this must be the Lord,” Elijah said.  “For the Lord is Sovereign of the earth and make it quake whenever he pleases.”  But the Lord was not in that either.  And then there was a fire, and Elijah knew that God sometimes appeared as fire. Hadn’t God sent down fire to consume the sacrifices of the prophets of Baal?  But the Lord wasn’t present there either.  Wind, earthquake, fire - any of these spectacles might have saved Elijah from his enemies.  Each of these demonstrations seemed like something his mighty God would do. 
 
Elijah looking for God in these displays of power are more revealing of Elijah than they are of God.  Wind, earthquake, fire – this is how we want our God to be revealed against our enemies. We want a God who beats his chest and raises her voice and rattles the saber and calls a team of lawyers.  That’s how we define power.  That’s how Elijah hoped God would reveal her power.  But God, we are told, was not in any of those displays. God was not in any of it.  And that seems an important thing for us to ponder as so many loud, violent people claim to be speaking for God.  God was not in any of it.
 
After all of these fearful and noisy manifestations, there followed what the Hebrew language calls the “qol damamah daqqah” – what the King James Version of the Bible translates so beautifully as a “still, small voice.” As much as I love that turn of phrase, it is probably better translated as “the sound of sheer silence.”  
 
Profound silence seems to have a weight of its own.  It pushes down on us.  Profound silence will get our attention when nothing else will. So after the wind and earthquake and fire, when it was suddenly and deafeningly silent, Elijah came to the mouth of the cave to see what on earth had happened.  And God said again: “What are you doing here?” But this time, something shifted in Elijah; something softened and he was ready to listen.  And God said: “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus…”
 
This is a marvelous story for many reasons, but perhaps most of all because it is our story.  It is the story of anyone, anywhere who has ever been overwhelmed and underwhelmed; anyone searching for meaning; anyone who has ever been afraid or made a life-altering mistake; anyone running from loneliness, illness, poverty, fear, depression, or anxiety; anyone wondering where God is in the midst of pain; wondering is God is anywhere at all; anyone distressed at the inequality and unfairness of life.  This is your story.  And it is mine.
 
But if this is truly our story, then that means that our stories are full of angels. Our stories are about generous gifts of food and drink in the midst of a wilderness.  Our stories are about a God who loves us enough to ask us again and again: “What are you doing here?” until we move on to something better. And if this story really is our story, then in the end, no matter what a mess we make of everything – there will be stillness and there will be redemption. 
 
Thanks be to God.  Amen.
​
0 Comments

"In a world where we cannot even have a civil conversation about our common civil life; First Congregational Church of Cheshire could reflect a different reality called Heaven."

6/2/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
ON EARTH, AS IT IS IN HEAVEN
Sunday, June 2, 2019
First Congregational Church of Cheshire
© the Rev. Dr. James Campbell
 
 
Revelation 22:12-14, 16-17, 20-21
 
“See, I am coming soon; my reward is with me, to repay according to everyone’s work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they will have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by the gates. “It is I, Jesus, who sent my angel to you with this testimony for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.” The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” And let everyone who hears say, “Come.” And let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.
 
The one who testifies to these things says, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen.
 
+++
 
I was raised with very vivid images of heaven. There was a lot of talk in our church about the way you lived your life and how you would be rewarded, or not, in eternity.  The righteous would go to heaven – a land of endless delight. And the wicked would go to hell – a place we shuddered to think about.  And because we talked about it all the time, it became my primary concern to end up on the right place.  When I was in the 5thgrade or so, I had a very memorable dream that I actually made it to heaven, which was a big surprise. The even bigger surprise was that heaven looked exactly like my elementary school gymnasium!
 
That was a little disappointing as the heaven talked about in church had streets of pure gold.  In our heaven, we all would receive mansions of our own, made of the finest alabaster, encrusted with jewels.  In our heaven, we would literally shine like the sun.  We would be as powerful as Jesus.  We would sing with the angels. There would be no more sickness, no sorrow, no death.  Everything wrong would finally be made right.
 
That was a powerful message for people of my father’s congregation – populated, as it was, with the working poor, and the sick, and the forgotten, and the despised.  For those folks, this life wasn’t so great.  But heaven would be.  And so heaven was their goal.
 
Some years ago now I was driving home from a church retreat with one of the leaders of my congregation in Manhattan. This man is a theological sort, having a seminary degree and a PhD in philosophy.  We were talking about all sorts of things, when I made a casual comment about heaven.  Suddenly, there was a heavy silence in the car.  I finally looked over to see if he had fallen asleep only to find him starring at me slack-jawed. “You mean you actually believe in heaven?” he asked.  I was so taken aback by the question that I stuttered and stammered and finally said, “Yes, I do!” 
 
I’ve met a lot of church people like him since then. Maybe you are one of them.  Maybe you are not at all sure of what happens to us when we die. Or maybe you feel sure that nothing happens to us when we die. 
 
Recently, Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times interviewed the Rev. Dr. Serene Jones, President of Union Theological Seminary in New York.  I know Serene and know that she has a new book coming out, so I wanted to read what she had to say.  Kristof asked her, among other things: “What happens when we die?”  And here is what a seminary president had to say:  “I don’t know! There may be something, there may be nothing. My faith is not tied to some divine promise about the afterlife. People who behave well in this life only to achieve an afterlife, that’s a faith driven by a selfish motive: “I’m going to be good so God (will) reward me with a stick of candy called heaven?” “For me,” she continues, “living a life of love is driven by the simple fact that love is true. And I’m absolutely certain that when we die, there is not a group of designated bad people sent to burn in hell. That does not exist. But hell has a symbolic reality: When we reject love, we create hell, and hell is what we see around us in this world today in so many forms.”[1]
 
I read her comments and I remembered my conversation with David, and I came to this inevitable conclusion: I must not be very theologically sophisticated - because I do believe in heaven.  I may have left a lot of my childhood religion behind me, but not the foundational idea that love never ends. I remain convinced that there is another reality just beyond our ability to perceive it with our senses. 
 
And that, it seems to me, is what Scripture teaches.  Dying upon the cross, our Lord Jesus turned to the repentant thief and promised: “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”  
 
That seems pretty clear.  So I believe in heaven, but I’ve also come to see the idea of heaven as multi-dimensional. Heaven is not simply a destination for eternity.  The Bible itself speaks of heaven as future tense, but also present tense.  It speaks of heaven as “there” and “here” and all around us. The same Jesus who told the repentant thief that he would be in Paradise that day (some sort of destination in the near future), also said: “the Kingdom God (another phrase for heaven) is already inside of us (here, now).”[2]  And, it seems to me, that’s the part of the message that the church has so often ignored. It’s way easier to talk about an afterlife than it is to talk about radically changing this life. And maybe that’s what Dr. Jones was trying to get at.  Working to get into heaven cancreate a self-centered faith.  But working to unleash heaven on earth – well, that’s another proposition altogether.  And while that might sound far-fetched or impossible to you, that is exactly what Jesus taught us to prayer for: “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earthas it is in heaven.”
 
So what would that look actually look like – heaven on earth?  
 
The book of Revelation is a book of endings.  It’s an apocalyptic vision of how all things consummate – a new heaven and a new earth. It’s an odd and wondrous and often hard to understand book.  And therefore, I almost never preach from it.  But this week, as I read the twenty-second chapter’s description of heaven, I couldn’t help but also remember Jesus’s words: “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven.”  
 
And how is heaven described in Revelation 22? “The Spirit and the bride say, "Come." And let everyone who hears say, "Come." And let everyone who is thirsty… come. Let anyone who wishes… take the water of life as a gift.” Everyone, anyone, take the water of life as a gift.  That’s what heaven (there) looks like.  And that’s what heaven (here) looks like.
 
For the past year, we’ve been turning our attention to what it means to “Draw the Circle Wide.” In our boards and committees and staff meetings, we have been seeking ways to expand our welcome. We’re in the midst of considering becoming an official Open and Affirming congregation of the United Church of Christ – a national designation that proclaims that all are welcome to follow Jesus with us.  And while throwing our doors open is wonderful in concept, it can also be a bit frightening in practice. And some might wonder if we are open to everyone, will we actually stand for anything?  I think that’s a good question, worthy of pondering.  And here’s my take on an answer: if we do it right, if we are prayerful and faithful, if we seek to follow Jesus as we draw the circle wide, then what we will stand for is heaven on earth.  Everyone, anyone, take the water of life as a gift.  
 
In a world of division and suspicion and hatred and fear; in a world of scapegoating and backstabbing and lies and manipulation; in a world where we cannot even have a civil conversation about our common civil life; First Congregational Church of Cheshire could reflect a different reality called heaven.
 
On the front of this building we boldly proclaim: “You are our neighbors.  No matter who you vote for, your skin color, your faith, or who you love, we will try to be here for you.  That’s what community means.  Let’s be neighbors.”  Is that just some sentimental, politically correct pabulum?  Yes.  Unless, of course, we live it out.  Unless, of course, we put flesh and bones on those words. Then it is nothing less than God’s will realized, “on earth, as it is in heaven.”  
 
“The Spirit and the bride say, "Come." And let everyone who hears say, "Come." And let everyone who is thirsty… come. Let anyone who wishes… take the water of life as a gift.”
 
 


[1]“Reverend, You Say the Virgin Birth Is ‘a Bizarre Claim?’”, Nicholas Kristoff, The New York Times, April 20, 2019

[2]Luke 17:21

0 Comments

    Archives

    July 2022
    March 2022
    November 2021
    February 2021
    July 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

"The glory of God is the human person fully alive."
Saint Irenaeus of Lyon, 2nd century