aint gonna call it quits or decode it

alright all my chips will be thrown in

The Holy Gospel according to St. John

Well, it’s not the return any of us would hope for…

The search for a permanent musician continues, we’re back to square one in our search for an office administrator, and that isn’t to say anything about our financial situation that has become too serious to just sit back and hope for a good month for one more month…

No, it isn’t the return any of us would hope for; but it is the one we have.

So there you have it. 

We’re in a tight spot.

We’re going to have to make some tough choices in the days ahead.

In fact, as many of you know, soon there will be discussions with our sisters and brothers at Faith and Bethany.

In the days ahead we will have hard choices to make; choices where there is no clear cut, right answer; choices everyone will not agree with; choices that will have consequences, either way.

Will we decide it’s time to close shop, find a partner, fold our community into another congregation, and put our property on the selling block?

Or will we bury our head in the sand for a few months more, hoping that somehow the picture will improve, while we make no changes?

Or will we do something in-between, find a partner -or partners- and arrange some sort of yoked ministry?

Had our situation here are Trinity not been so precarious, we would still be considering these arrangements, as there are fewer pastors, interim ministers and musicians these days. The time of making the decision not to decide has passed…

So there you have it, difficult choices. Choices without clearcut answers, choices with consequences that evoke serious and faithful discernment.

Yes, we have some choices ahead of us…

What occurs to me, though, is that as I climb into this pulpit that has become my home; this pulpit where you all have blessed me with your ears that long to hear the Good News, is that none of those tough choices are necessarily faithful. 

They are not faithful to the biblical witness we have, they are not faithful to the vows we make at confirmation and baptism; today though, the problem is that these choices are not faithful to the Gospel we just read…

I’d rather not say these things, but necessity has been laid upon me, and woe if I do not preach the Gospel, as St. Paul would say.

See, as long as our decisions are based on what we think we can do to protect our hides, to try and carve out our own survival, saving ourselves, doing what Jesus does; our decisions will be as fruitful as they will be faithful…

After all, Jesus is pretty clear in today’s Gospel, sister’s and brothers. “This is my commandment,” Jesus says, “that you love one another as I have loved you.” And he goes on explaining what the love looks like, lest folks who our obsessed with saving themselves should try and define love, “No one has greater love than this,” Jesus says, “than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”

The picture of faith, Jesus paints isn’t a bunch of scared folks trying to save their own life; but rather disciples whose lives are hidden in his, and so are freed to lay down their life. 

It’s like the line in Jame’s Bond movie, “You can’t kill me, I’m already dead.”

Martin Luther kicked off the reformation in Germany, and he insisted the church wasn’t just where the corrupt church leaders did their nonsense. So in the turmoil of it all, the question got put to him, ‘where is the true church then, Luther.’

Martin Luther said the true church always has three marks, and where these marks are, the true church abides.

The first is where the sacraments are given; communion, baptism, confession and forgiveness - check.

The second is where the Good News is preached to folks longing to hear God’s promises that create new life - check.

And the third mark, which we’d never guess, is suffering. Check (?)

In fact, when folks would write Luther a letter, and a lot did, asking for some help in one struggle or another; Luther’s advice was often the same, rejoice.

Rejoice, because God has found you worthy of such a trial; rejoice, because in that crucible, God was busy shaping the christian’s life into the shape of the cross; rejoice, because those false gods were being revealed for all their impotence to bring about salvation in the face of such a trial.

And perhaps that is not bad advice for us, either.

Rather than lamenting, and I will be the first to admit I’ve done more than my fair share of lamenting, perhaps we might look at our trials and not turn in on ourselves, try to save ourselves; but rather rejoice. Perhaps we might see this as our chance to finally obey Jesus, and lay down our lives, trusting in the only one who can pick them back up from the other side of the trial, the cross, the grave.

Because here’s the thing, just like all those unfaithful choices I listed earlier; well, they’re not necessarily unfaithful, either…

See, we could decide that the resources and vitality we’ve been given will be better used by folding into another congregation; that we can be more faithful with what God has given us by leaving, than we can by holing ourselves us here.

Or We could decide that we’re planted here, and we won’t close our doors just paying a lighting bill, but rather going out and doing ministry. We could decide that all this is the opportunity to stop trying to save ourselves and just risk it all, following the one who described great love as laying down your life.

Or we could decide to yoke with a partner in ministry, because we are enriched and strengthened by partnering, that we are more faithful together.

Either way, they’re hard choices to make; choices where there is no clear cut, right answer; choices everyone will not agree with; choices that will have consequences either way.

Choices that can be made faithfully as easily as they can be made unfaithfully…

It’s like C. S. Lewis said, in his book ‘The Problem of Pain,’ “You will certainly carry our God’s purpose, however how you act; but it makes a difference to you whether you serve like Judas or John.”

Yeah, we have tough choices to make in the days ahead. Here’s what matters, though, all of these choices pale in comparison to the choice, the only choice, that can make a future in the midst of our difficult choices, Jesus’. 

“You did not choose me,” Jesus said, “but I have chosen you.”

Jesus has chosen us, sisters and brothers.

And not only that, either, because Jesus goes on to say that he choose and appointed us. Jesus has appointed us to go out and bear fruit, fruit that will last, fruit that will last amidst any decisions.

We’ve got some hard choices to make, but those choices cannot undo the choice that matters; Jesus’. We’ve got some choices that will have real consequences, but none of those consequences can destroy the fruit that you have been appointed to go out and bear.

That is where our future abides, sisters and brothers. 

No choice of our can undo that, no merger or hiding in our own little castle can keep it from bearing fruit, either.

You’ve been chosen. You may not have chosen him, but that matters not. He’s come along, and while we were trying to save our own skin, he choose us. That’s the choice that really matters.

Amen.