Community: Living as Followers of Christ. This is the theme for our worship during the month of July as I begin my journey with the people of New Visions Community UMC. The Blog below is the written version of the first sermon in that series: "Proclaiming our Values."
I don’t know about you, but I find that a good cup of tea or coffee is a great way to begin a conversation between two (or more) people. I find this to be especially true if the conversation is going to be on a challenging topic—or if I don’t know the person particularly well. The cup of tea gives us a bit of comfort and familiarity—a bit like talking about the weather, or beginning a conversation with the phrase: “How about them Huskers?”!
Amira is the daughter of Greg Mortenson, the Founder and Director of the Central Asia Institute. He does humanitarian work in Pakistan and Afghanistan, where he builds schools in collaboration with local communities. His short mission statement is “Building peace one school at a time.” Amira has her own work to help out her father; she wrote and sang the song we just heard when she was in the fourth grade, she helped to write and produce a children’s book about her father’s work, and she goes on some of his speaking engagements because she is far more outgoing than her father!
Amira started her work when she was 5 or 6 by opening a lemonade stand and donating the money she earned to an organization called, “Pennies for Peace,” a program started by children in a Wisconsin school where Amira’s grandmother was the principal.
When the students learned that a penny could buy a pencil in Afghanistan, they thought that raising money one penny at a time would be a good way to help out the peace project of building schools.
Greg Mortensen did not set out to help educate the world. He set out to climb K2, the second highest mountain in the world. He was doing this in memory of a younger sister who had died. Greg did not succeed in his attempt, and he almost died in the effort. He was found by villagers in Korphe Pakistan, and they took care of him for seven weeks. During his time there, he became fascinated by the children, who a couple of times a week, would meet together outside with a traveling teacher. The children used sticks to write answers to questions in the dirt. When Mortenson asked why there was no school, he was told that the village was too poor. In thanks and appreciation for the care he received, Mortenson vowed to return to Korphe and build a school.
This was not an easy or straight-forward task…and there were errors made along the way. In fact, some of you might be thinking about the trouble Mortenson has been in for not having audited books for his Institute. He would be the first to tell you that he works out of passion, and that he learns by doing; so, like many other entrepreneurs bookkeeping is not his strong suit. Business people are now working with him to sort through the issues raised by those who are concerned about these things, and Mortenson continues to build schools and work with local communities.
One of the first things that Mortenson learned in Pakistan is the phrase that is on the front of today’s bulletin. “The first time you share tea with a Balti, you are a stranger. The second time you are an honored guest. The third time you become family.” Mortenson learned that he could get no work done in these countries until he would sit down and take tea with them. And, he made no progress until he learned to listen to the ways in which things were done in each village.
It isn’t just about having a cup of tea. It is not just a formal ritual. The purpose is to listen to what is important, to hear how things happen, to learn the wisdom of each place. That was a huge lesson for Mortenson to learn.
The first cup of tea that we share as strangers can often begin with a lot of assumptions. I know that some of you have heard stories about me—as I have about some of you. If we only listen to that kind of talk, our assumptions can lead us to make mistakes…particularly cultural errors. I will be coming to listen to your stories about who you are and your hopes and dreams for the New Visions Community.
And that is why I chose the three cups of tea image for our July sermon series. I am new here. We don’t know one another. I don’t know what you think is important—nor do you know what values I carry. We are going to take some time over this month to “drink tea” and listen to one another. Today, we share our “First cup of tea” and explore a little about one another.
When Bill asked me to come up with a theme for July worship, I thought about using the lectionary for a while. Most of my preaching life the lectionary has been the basis for my preaching. Using the lectionary often takes me to places I might not go in Scripture on my own; the lectionary keeps our church in conversation with other lectionary churches around the world. But when I thought about doing church differently, I thought that it might be more helpful to explore what I consider to be some of the texts that are the most formative for who I am as a disciple of Christ—what I mean when I tell people that I am a Christian. I hope that part of our conversation over this month will include passages that you find equally formative that I may not have included. To be fair—with only a month, we know that the conversation will just be beginning.
And just in case we think that the Holy Spirit might not have a sense of humor, I wanted to let you know that the Gospel lesson read for today was not the one I intended to have read. In fact, the 13th chapter of Mark—sometimes called the “Little Apocalypse”—is one of my least favorite portions of Mark’s gospel, yet the text that Don read is the one I sent to Susan, Elizabeth, Brenda, and Bill! I had intended that we move directly to what I consider the heart of Jesus’ teachings in Mark’s gospel—Mark 12:28-31, 34:
“One of the scribes came near and heard them
disputing with one another, and seeing that Jesus answered them well, the
scribe asked Jesus, ‘Which commandment is the first of all?’ Jesus answered, ‘The
first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love
the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all
your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love
your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.’…When
Jesus [heard that the scribe understood him] he said to him, ‘You are not far
from the kingdom of God.’”
But the Holy Spirit seems to
have wanted us to hear that we are to remain vigilant! (or maybe that word was
particularly directed at me because my focus has been so much on the move from one
home to another that the kingdom of God has been less in focus…hmm?)
Anyway…for me, today’s passages—when I add the 2nd Gospel lesson about love of God and neighbor!—are the heart of what we are about as disciples of Christ. We sang it this morning as we sang: “For everyone born, a place at the table, for everyone born, clean water and bread, a shelter, a space, a safe place for growing, for everyone born, a star overhead…and God will delight when we are creators of justice and joy, compassion and peace. Yes, God will delight when we are creators of justice, justice and joy.”
Greg Mortenson has lived out this teaching when he saw a need and learned how to respond to it; his daughter has learned how to do the same, bringing her own gifts to the table. While we can choose to support Mortenson’s work in Afghanistan and Pakistan—or not—we are called to do our own work in our various neighborhoods. Our vision statement proclaims that as “individuals and as a Community we focus on the needs of the world.” Because we have been transformed by the love of God in Christ, we believe in changing the world one life at a time. Let us begin by having a cup of tea together!
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