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A sermon from First Corinthians

It’s that high holy day! …The Annual Meeting! 

For weeks children having gone to sleep while visions of the 2016 budget and nominations danced in their heads. Parents have been scrambling to get their Committee Reports wrapped before the big day. And today, the great day, everyone is here; in their Sunday best. We’ll sing those Beloved Hymns, “Good Christian Friends, React.” Then, after the big service, we’ll all go home to our traditional Annual Meeting Feast…

No? That’s not the case? That’s not how the Annual Meeting goes here? 

Bummer…

Truthfully, though, if a person were thinking about joining a congregation, they’d do well to come on Annual Meeting Sunday; rather than Christmas or Easter. On Christmas and Easter the congregation will pull out all the stops and a treat a visitor like royalty.

On the Annual Meeting, though. Look out!

At the Annual Meeting a person can peruse the budget and take note of the congregation’s priorities. At the Annual Meeting a person can watch how members treat on another, how they work through issues they may not agree on. At the Annual Meeting a person can learn what direction the members hope to take in the future.

You can learn a lot at an Annual Meeting…

…Now our budget. If you were to read the budget of Faith Lutheran, you’d have to admit, a large part of it goes to pastoral and administration expenses.

As a pastor, I wish it wasn’t the case. As it is, at the current time, most pastors have to take out a fair amount in student loans. If the loans are going to be repaid, clergy need a certain level of compensation…

If you really want to see Faith’s priorities at work, though, take notice of what expenses are increasing, and which are decreasing… 

In these days when nothing is getting any cheaper you have all plan to decrease spending for office supplies and utilities. In fact, Pastoral Compensation stayed flat and Administration expenses only increased 3.06 percent! 

No, the big increase is Outreach! 120 percent! That says a lot, folks…

Priorities well placed, sisters and brothers. 

Our Executive Committee and Council has faithfully suggested an increase to Benevolence and supporting to local ministries. 

This is a budget that express trust, a commitment to service, and dedication to figuring out church in these days when resources are tighter. 

Just last week a member and I were talking, and we were noticing how funny it is that when we give away our money for the offering, we rise and sing a song of thanksgiving.

Your budget is essentially doing what we do every week in worship. It puts our trust in God almighty, rather than the dollar. It sings we have enough, and so we can give back to God with a thankful heart. It shouts, ‘look what God has done for us!’

• You all, this is a really cool budget.

It humbles me, that folks like you would call me ‘pastor.’ 

…And that’s why I have to deliver some bad news…

You’re budget is all wrong.

If you want to succeed, you’re going to need to invest in yourself. Keep your money. Don’t give it away like that! Put it toward a trendy ad-campaign. Hire some valets so visitors feel like royalty. Purchase a little latte kiosk. Get a smoke machine and hire a beautiful band and trendy Life Coach for our Sunday ‘improvement hour.’

I know there are some of you thinking, “Finally. For once pastor is making some sense!”

Or, we could take a lesson from the stock exchange. 

Court investors. Convince them we’re a good investment. Sell stocks , focus on the bottom line; then share our profits with investors. Now that’d be a way to maximize our budget… 

Because the truth is, our budget is all wrong. Practical wisdom tell us we’ll never turn a profit this way…

Well, Paul had to give the folks at First Lutheran in Corinth some bad news, too. 

See, they had been following all the wrong advice.

They’d given priority to the members with the real gifts. The wealthy one. The one’s who could speak in tongues. The ones who had clout in town.

Paul gets wind of this; and he can’t keep quite. He has to write to them.

“You’ve got it all backward,” he insists.

It’s not the respectable members that need to be doted on. They’re fine already, he asserts. They don’t need any more respect.

No. It’s the members of the body that we think less honorable, Paul impossibly insists, that we clothe with greater honor.

See, Paul has to tell them their priorities are all misplaced.

They’re following practical wisdom. 

The thing that Paul has to say, though, is that the congregation is anything but practical. 

Paul gives an illustration of the impracticality of the congregation by way of analogy. He compares the church in Corinth to a human body… 

He begins with making an observation that’s benign enough; just like the human body a congregation is made up of various parts. The conclusion he draws from that observation, though, is totally crazy!

“But God has so arranged the body, giving greater honor to the inferior members.”

The truth is, comparing an organization like us to a human body is pretty apt. The thing, though, is that just like the human body; there is a priority of parts. Sorry Paul…

And let me tell you; only a fool gives greater honor to the inferior parts…

Paul’s analogy is sound, but the conclusions he draws are just plain strange.

Who flaunts their armpit? No, we take pride in other parts of our body…

No one cares for their shin to the expense of their chin. No one goes to the gym to strengthen their toes…

The truth is, Paul’s body analogy is based on truly odd body. A body no one has ever seen before or since.

And you know what? At the beginning of our little section Paul admits as much… 

“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body,” says Paul. “(T)hough many, are one body, so it is with…” you expect him to say, so it is with the church. 

But that isn’t what he says. “So it is with Christ,” he says!

• So it is with Christ…

And that’s the thing, isn’t it?

The congregation isn’t just an organization. It’s an organism. And it isn’t just any organism, either. The Church is the body of none other than Christ.

Christ, who did all these strange things. Jesus who was a body like no one has ever seen before, or since.

Christ, who ate with all the wrong people. Jesus, who lived his life as if God were actually real. Christ, who gave his life away for others; for you.

Paul insists that body is raised. Further more it’s still doing all these unusual things. Not as some disembodied Spirit none of us could ever hold, but rather here in The Congregation. “You are the body of Christ,” Paul declares.

And that’s the thing about that Annual Meetings, isn’t it?

It’s not a big festival. I doubt many look forward to it. 

It isn’t glamorous, and it’s kind of boring…

But it’s also a day when we come before one another and remind each other we’re nothing other than the body of Christ.
We’re not perfect, no doubt; but let’s meet and talk about what God’s up to.

We do this by putting our priority in ideals, like generosity and trust. Things the wisdom of the world can only shake it’s head at. 

We’re not guided by practical wisdom, are we? 

Just have an agnostic read our Holy Book if you’ve forgotten how odd our guiding principals are. 

We’re guided by a savior who did give greater honor to those without any. We’re guided by a savior who was homeless, who invited a wealthy man to follow him but said the rich man would probably want to sell everything and give the proceeds to the poor first. We’re guided by a savior who was glorified, not on a throne, but on the cross. 

All there is to say today is what Paul already said, you’re the body of Christ.

If we were anything else, our budget would be all washed up. 

But we’re not just any old organization. We’re the body of Christ, and individually members of it.