Sermons

“Why Does Evangelism Matter?”

Psalm 40:1-10; Matthew 28:16-20 – Rev. Rebecca Littlejohn

Vista La Mesa Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), La Mesa, California – June 17, 2018

“Faith Matters” Sermon Series #5

Holy God, bless the speaking and the hearing of these words that we might hear and receive your good news and be inspired to share it. In the name of Jesus we pray, Amen.

We are in the fifth week of this “Faith Matters” sermon series, and things are getting pretty real. We talked a lot about the church last week, and then we talked a lot more about the church this weekend at our annual Leadership Retreat. We even inched toward today’s topic quite a bit yesterday. “Evangelism” isn’t a four-letter word, but in Disciples circles, in many ways, it just as well could be. It’s not a word we’re comfortable with, because it brings up all sorts of manipulative scare tactics that we’re quite clear have nothing to do with our faith. And that’s fair. But it’s not a word we can afford to dispense with, so instead we’ve got to re-define it.

Because we’ve mostly tried to avoid evangelism, we’re not all that good at it. If we’re going to do it effectively, we’re going to have to learn and practice. But as with this whole endeavor, we’ve got to review the fundamentals before we do anything else. So I want to make one thing clear. Yesterday, we spent a fair amount of time talking about why we, as Vista La Mesa Christian Church, need new members, and how we could attract them. But if we’re really going to talk about evangelism, we need to flip that question around and start considering why new members might need Vista La Mesa Christian Church. Nobody is really all that interested in the good news that if they joined us and started tithing, we’d be more able to pay our bills. We’re going to have to figure something else out.

I’d like to begin with an idea our Scholarship Dinner speaker introduced a couple weeks ago. Rev. Timothy Murphy suggested that if we’re going to share good news, it’s usually in response to something that is bad news. This is where our uncomfortable stereotypes of evangelism come from actually. I don’t know about you, but when I was in middle school, I had a friend who went to a different church who would repeatedly ask me, “Are you saved?” I remember feeling offended and frustrated and misunderstood. This is evangelism that is trying to offer good news by giving an answer to a problem it’s created itself. I didn’t feel “unsaved” before that. That wasn’t a problem I had. My “friend” was trying to give me an answer I didn’t ask for by implying I had a problem I didn’t believe existed. I wasn’t interested in a faith that could only respond to problems of its own making.

But if Rev. Murphy is right that the good news we have is a response to bad news, we’ve got to identify the problems. As it turns out, people don’t need us to create new problems; there are plenty of problems to go around! Why would folks want to hang out with people who insist on making up new problems? I know I wouldn’t. The trick is matching up our good news with the problems people are already experiencing. This is another way of saying something else I’ve been repeating throughout this sermon series: that our faith becomes alive when we recognize that our beliefs have consequences. If we believe A, then we must do B; otherwise, we cannot really claim to believe A, or at least no one will take us seriously when we say we do.

One of the words we heard a lot this weekend at our Retreat, as we talked about how we’re experiencing good news here at VLM, was “family.” In fact, this word comes up over and over when we ask folks what is so important to them about this church. I think one of the things we mean when we say that VLM is a family is that we stick with each other through the good and the bad. That is really good news when you or people you love are hit with a cancer diagnosis. Or a job loss. Or a violent crime. Your blood family may be ginormous, or it may be practically non-existent, but if you have a church family too, you know someone has your back. You know someone is lifting you up when you’re sinking down. You know you’re not alone.

There is, of course, another context in which we’ve been hearing the word “family” a lot over the past couple of weeks. Families struggling to find a better, safer home for their children are being separated, children forcibly removed from their parents’ arms, because our government has decided to deny our obligation to receive those fleeing danger. And this week, blasphemy was added on top of trauma and cruelty when claims were made that the Bible condones such depravity. This is the environment into which we are called to proclaim the good news of the gospel. Our beliefs must have consequences. If we believe that God is love and invites all humanity into one loving family, we must raise our voices when that vision is violated so tragically. If we believe that our own families are our biggest blessings, we must work to protect that blessing for others. If we believe that children are a gift from God, we must insist that children be cherished and treated with the utmost care and compassion and gentleness. If we believe that all these convictions arise from our holy writings, we must loudly condemn the twisting of those scriptures into tools of oppression and brutality.

Why would new members need VLM? What bad news are people living with that our good news might respond to? Another cultural trauma we’ve been working through over the past couple weeks, once again, is the tragedy of suicide. We are reminded occasionally, as we were last week, that no amount of material wealth or accomplishment or opportunity can always stand in the way of the despair that leads to someone’s life ending at their own hand. But beyond that “celebrity” suicides that resonate across the airwaves, we know that dozens of veterans die by suicide every day. Two of every three gun deaths in this country are suicides. The current opioid crisis is just as much about suicide as it is about addiction. And the numbers we don’t have are all those who hover on the brink of suicide, whether they’re only occasionally glancing in the direction of that pit or constantly dangling one foot over it.

Can Jesus cure suidality? Of course it’s not that easy. The good news we’re called to share here isn’t about easy answers that pressure people to fake cheerfulness. But we know that our society has suffered from an epidemic of isolation. We know that life has gotten harder as income inequality grows and the housing crisis digs in. We know that mental health resources in this country are woefully inadequate. We know that people are desperate for deeper meaning in their lives. We know that people are dying, literally, from the need to be seen and loved for who they truly are.

Can we solve all these problems with a hug every Sunday? Of course not. But a church that is willing to name the problems, a church that is willing to sit and hold hands with someone dealing with them, a church that builds a community where we can all be real and vulnerable and sensitive and scared together is a bulwark against the forces of depression and existential dread that threaten God’s people. The good news we share is not a simple answer to our problems, but a commitment to walk through them together.

People need to know that their lives matter. Human beings are meaning makers. This church can help us do that. I’m not talking about the superficial, superstitious kind of meaning that makes me thank Jesus when the slow car in front of me turns onto a different road, though I’ll admit that happens too. I’m talking about the deeper meaning that comes from living a life beyond ourselves, that allows us to go to bed at night knowing we’ve done something that made a difference. Living a life in Christ means giving ourselves over to something other than our own will and limitations. It puts our own problems in perspective. It reminds us that, through the power of love, we still have something to offer another person, even when we’re mired down in our own muck.

This brings up another nuance of evangelism that is vital to keep in mind. When we say that the good news we share here is a response to the bad news people are experiencing out in the world, we must be careful not to draw those lines very rigidly. It’s not that their lives are messed up and we’ve got it figured out. In fact, I’m not sure I needed to say that, because you all know just how much we don’t have it figured out. But what we forget is that people outside the church often have the impression, because of how church folks have sometimes carried themselves in the world, that we think we’ve got all the answers and we’re coming to save them from themselves. (There’s that word again.) It’s so important to make sure that part of our message is that church is something we do alongside one another, not something we do to other people.

The good news of an authentic, generous, loving community grounded in Christ isn’t an “answer” to the bad news people are living, but it is a response. It’s good news not because it makes terrible stuff go away, but because it gives us a way of addressing the terrible stuff, together. It is true that this church needs those new members. But more importantly, there are people out there who need this church. They need a community, a family; they need companions on the journey, people with whom they can break bread and lay down their burdens. This is a mission we can be excited to take up, for it’s one of the ways we follow Jesus most faithfully. The journey begins again today. Let us follow with courage and anticipation! Alleluia and Amen!