“Training Camp”

Matthew 28:16-20

Once upon a time, down on the rugged coast of Maine where shipwrecks often happen because of a dangerous shoal, there was a crude little lifesaving station. The building was just a hut really, and there was only one old, leaky rowboat. Nonetheless, a few very devoted people kept a constant watch over that dangerous stretch of sea, and with no thought for their own safety, went out day or night in the worst possible weather, searching for survivors.

Many lives were saved through this wonderful little station, and it became rather famous. Many of those who had been saved, along with various others in the surrounding area, took an interest in the station and became associated with it, giving generously of their time, money and effort to support its work. New boats were bought, and new crews were trained. The little life-saving station grew.

Well, some of the people thought it was too bad that the building was so crude and poorly equipped. They felt they could do better for those saved from the sea. So they got to work and fixed up the hut. They enlarged it, and replaced the fold-out emergency cots with nice comfortable beds. They did such a nice job with the improvements that some of the people even felt that – in between storms – the lifesaving hut could be used as a sort of clubhouse for the members where they could get together and tell stories about their lifesaving adventures. So they put up wallpaper, and a furnace to keep the place nice and toasty warm during the cold winter, and wall-to-wall carpeting, and some really nice sofas and easy chairs for the members to gather in. The lifesaving hut became a really nice place, and its membership swelled with people who enjoyed each other’s company.

Well, one stormy winter night, a loud horn was heard from the shoals. A large ship had lost power, and was being smashed against the rocks. Crew members were jumping overboard into the treacherous sea. The members of the lifesaving station huddled together, looking out the huge Palladian window they had installed on the back wall of the hut so they would have a nice ocean view.

“What a tragedy!” said one. “Do you think we should do something?” said another.

“Well, there’s hardly enough room in here for ourselves, let alone another fifty people!” someone else said. “Besides, if that new carpet gets wet, it’ll be ruined.” Others mentioned that opening the doors would let in the cold and waste all the heat. Not only that, but it could be downright dangerous rowing out into the sea at night.

So the people in the lifesaving station closed the curtain on the window to keep from seeing the awful loss of life. Someone called the Coast Guard to come retrieve the bodies. And they got back to their time of fellowship and talking about the day they had been saved from the sea.

He or she who has ears to hear, let them hear.

We have been focusing our attention these past few weeks on the role of the church in the world today. You have a little insert in your bulletin again this morning that illustrates what a biblical church would look like – and what we hope our church will continue to be and become. The guiding Scripture passage is from 2 Corinthians 5 where we are taught that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself. Isn’t that a beautiful description of Jesus’ life? In other words, the reason Jesus came and lived and died and rose was to connect people to God – to God’s love – to God’s life – to God’s power to make us whole and to transform our world into the beautiful kingdom of God. God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself.

And we all have wonderful stories about how Jesus found us and loved us and transformed our lives, and brought us home to God. How I love hearing the stories our church members tell of how Christ reconciled them to God.

But now, the Bible says, WE WHO HAVE BEEN RECONCILED TO GOD have been given the ministry of reconciliation. What we have received, we are to give. Christian people are agents of reconciliation, and the church is a community of reconciliation.

So our little insert has a cross at its center. The cross represents Jesus’ gift to us. Jesus has brought us to God, illustrated by the vertical bar. And Jesus has brought us together, illustrated by the horizontal bar. This is a picture of our church!

Two weeks ago, we looked at that bright yellow rectangle in the lower left quadrant of the cross. It contains the word “BELONG.” This is the most basic ministry of our church – reaching out and opening our arms to help people find a place of belonging, acceptance and love. This is how Jesus connected people to the love of God. He made friends. Shared meals. Forgave mistakes. Accepted people for who and what they are. Jesus healed their hurts. Looked after them when they faced hard times. Listened to their problems. Loved them with all his heart.

Jesus helped people find a sense of belonging. He surrounded them with the gracious, unconditional love of God. And that’s the first task of the church in the ministry of reconciliation. We try to help people find a sense of BELONGING in a community that loves them and cares for their needs in Jesus’ name.

Now take a look at the green rectangle that says “GROW.” You see, when people are accepted, loved, and cared for in the Christian community, the soil is prepared for the seeds of faith to grow. Last Sunday, we witnessed the Confirmation of nine beautiful kids who made a decision to accept Christ as their personal Lord and Savior. What a special experience that was! This was not the end of their spiritual journey, but the beginning of it. And what I want you to understand about it is that their coming into a personal relationship with God came about as a result of your opening your arms to them. Faith grows out of belonging! Love sows the seeds of faith! This is why Jesus said the most important commandment of all is to love!

So when people BELONG to a community that loves them, they can start to GROW in faith. The church exists not just to make people feel good, but to help people GROW into a living and powerful relationship with God that transforms their lives. So a second primary ministry of the church is to help people who don’t yet know God, come to know God, and those who know God well already, get to know God even better. The ministry of reconciliation works hard to help people GROW in faith!

But here is where we must come back to that little lifesaving station on the coast of Maine.

Oh, they had a nice experience of BELONGING, didn’t they? They loved to get together and share their food, and sing their songs, and take care of each other! They had great fellowship!

And they had GROWN! Why, being saved from the dangers of the sea will change you forever! If you never believed in God before, all you have to do is to go down for the third time and start heading for Davy Jone’s locker when a hand reaches down from up above and pulls you up to life and you’ll KNOW there is a God! And, oh, how they loved to tell the stories of how they’d been saved from the sea

But now comes a turning point.

Having been rescued from the sea, now they were called to return to the sea to rescue others. And it was a difficult decision to make!

Now the church faces the same challenge. It is not an easy thing to move from the left side of the cross to the right side. It is not easy to move from receiving to giving. But this is what Jesus said:

“Go into all the world and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

The ministry of reconciliation sends us out to the world. And I don’t know about you, but that intimidates me. Go into all the WORLD? Does that mean outside of Tellico Village? I mean, I’ll go as far as the Wal-Mart in Lenoir City, but beyond that…I don’t know! Make disciples of ALL NATIONS? Who am I, Billy Graham? Teaching them to obey all I have commanded you? I have a hard enough time managing my own life letting alone teaching others how to live theirs.

It fascinates me that Jesus did not mention any of this when he began his ministry. At the start, he called the disciples to simply come and follow him. That’s all! But at the end, he tells them not to come, but to go, and not to him, but to the world. I think if Jesus had said that at the beginning of his ministry, he would have had a hard time finding disciples!

Because, you see, we’re not sure of ourselves. We don’t feel comfortable telling people about our faith. We don’t know enough about our faith to tell! Who are we to contend with the forces of evil, and who among us has a big enough faith to heal people, forgive people, and bring people to salvation? We’d like to help others, but we so often don’t know how.

So we need TRAINING. Do you see the bright blue box on the upper right quadrant of the cross? One of the most important things the church is called to do is to TRAIN people in the ways of God.

I don’t know about you, but I felt there was an awful lot of anguish in our world over the case of Terry Schiavo. On one side were people who felt that it was right to hold onto and stand up for her life. On the other side were people who felt it was right to give her to God. Which side do you think was right?

More importantly, what will you do when those questions come into your life? What if it was your daughter, your wife? What if it was yourself?

We live in a world today where scientific and medical technologies can extend life to the nth degree. And yet, we ask, “Is it really life?” And you and I and our families are faced with these questions every day. One of our church members recently had to make a decision about continuing treatments that might give a week or two more of life, or of trusting the woman he loved to the arms of God.

The church is the place where we need to engage questions like this, and seek to discern the wisdom of God. That’s one of the reasons we’ll have the discussion this week on the ethics surrounding end-of-life issues. The church is the place where we seek to learn what it means to be faithful.

And how do we find our way, and guide our kids and grandchildren to healthy moral values in a world that is morally ambiguous? The church is the place where we seek to learn what it means to be faithful to God.

And how do we identify injustice, and learn to do something about it? How do we learn to love unconditionally, and accept people who are unacceptable to everyone else? How do we learn to be Christ-like?

We learn it in the church.

Along with the yellow and green boxes of belonging and growing, Jesus had a really big blue box. He spent 24-hours a day, seven days a week, over the course of three years TRAINING the disciples. He taught them how to listen to God – and how to listen to people. He taught them how to risk love – and how to identify situations that cried out for love. Jesus taught them to unlearn unhealthy things they had learned from their families, culture and synagogues. And he taught them the better way of God. Jesus taught the disciples how to forgive, and how to bring healing into broken lives, and how to gently lead people into a living faith.

I think our world is in desperate need of people who are trained in the ministry of Christian reconciliation. So also is the world in desperate need of Christians who know the bible, and who understand people, and who use their minds as well as their hearts. We need smart Christians. We need strong Christians. We need Christians who know how to make a difference.

So the church must accept the challenge of training!

You know, I love the story of the church member who bitterly complained about his minister’s sermon that was titled, “Sometimes All It Takes Is A Hug.” He felt that sermons like that serve to trivialize Christianity, and he was certainly not stupid enough to think that the reason Jesus came and died was just to teach us how to hug each other. Besides, he had grown up in a family where there wasn’t ever a whole lot of hugging and kissing and touching. That stuff didn’t come naturally to him, and it made him feel very uncomfortable. So he hated that sermon and told the minister so.

Well, one morning at church, a visitor came in and plopped down in the pew right next to him. He turned to say, “Hello”, but noticed the man was crying. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“My wife died yesterday,” the man sobbed, “and I’ve been driving all night. When I came by this church, I knew I had to come inside.” Then, with a big gush of emotion, the man blubbered,. “I need to know why God did this to me. And what did she ever do to deserve the cancer? And why does God cause people to suffer? How can you believe in a God who takes away the people you love?”

Well, how would you do in a situation like that? This church member found himself completely unwound, feeling embarrassed, trying to think of something to say. But every thought that came to his mind seemed so trivial in the face of the other man’s pain.

Many long minutes passed, and then this man – the church member – let out a great sigh. And then he reached over…and hugged the man.

And it was enough.

Training. Trained in small ways and big ways in the art of Christian ministry.

It is what the church is called to do.

Would you support our growing as a TRAINING CAMP for reconciliation?

You see, the ocean of life rages before us. And the question God is asking is this:

“Who will dare return to the sea?”