St. James the Apostle & Martyr

St. James the Apostle & Martyr

July 24^th 2005

Once Upon a Time,

there was a little struggling church.

After a big meeting they decided to

put up a sign on the lawn saying

“Join us for Starbuck’s Coffee

Tim Horton’s Doughnuts and
Eternal Life!

Membership has its privileges.”

But this little story pokes a bit of fun

about something that nearly every church

has and that’s the desire to be popular.

That desire itself is nothing new.

In fact, in the year 313

Christianity suddenly found itself popular

as the official religion

of the Roman world.

The Emperor Constantine made Christianity

legal and for the first time

Christians could practice the faith openly.

Suddenly, it found itself

overrun with converts –

after all, if it was good enough

for the emperor, the person on the street

figured it was good enough for them!

But over the last fifty years or so

when suddenly, at least in North America

and in Europe, it went into a tailspin

as far as popularity goes.

And here we are, trying to find out

what happened: congregations are aging

we’re not attracting members

we face legal messes and financial burdens

on what once was a thriving church.

And it’s sad when we remember

full Sunday schools big youth groups.

Welcome to post-Christendom.

Now, many churches are doing

all they can to attract members.

Some have employed pop music

and dances and bands.

and have lots of style

but little content for the soul.

One church I heard of has

an arena like meeting hall

and the pastor roars in on a motor bike

and delivers a sound-byte sermon

while revving his engines.

Some churches make their

worship services more like

discotheques rather than churches

complete with loud music and light shows.

What we do to be popular!

In some ways churches have

bowed to the god of entertainment

in order to win popularity.

We make worship user-friendly

and individualistic and soundbyte messages.

We emphasize benefits and

not obligations: I can imagine

in the future we will be saying

join our church! 5% tithing

and keep any 7 commandments

of your choice!

The price we have paid is that

we have watered down the message

and we have made it conform to our

society and we focus on aspects

of the message that don’t rock the boat

too much: we paint a Jesus that doesn’t

challenge the society around us instead, as

Ed Searcy, a United Church

preacher, describes churches that

worship a sort of Rotarian Jesus figure.

We offer perks: Membership has its privileges.

But does it really have anything

to do with the gospel?

Let’s look back at history again.

One of the reactions to

the gospel becoming the official

religion of Rome was a sense of shock!

Many devote men and women

felt that Christianity had suddenly

sold out to the bigger culture!

Many gave it up as a lost cause and fled to the dessert

to become nuns and monks

to keep their faith undefiled from

the society that had taken it on.

In their eyes, the ship of faith

suddenly had been shipwrecked

and they swam as fast as they could

away from the sinking ship

lest they get pulled under as

the faith would inevitably become

toned down and conventional

what Pierre Burton would one day

call the comfortable pew.

The scripture readings today

are not about membership having its privileges.

In Jeremiah, Jeremiah’s secretary, Baruch.

is being given a kick in the pants

to buck up and face up to the challenge

of being a man of God in his troubled times.

And in MatthewMrs. Zebedee and her boys

are asking Jesus for a favour

Can her sons have a place

in the kingdom of heaven –

one at the right hand side

and the other at the left side?

After all, they are good boys.

Jesus looks the two in the eyes

and says “Can you drink the cup

that I am going to drink of?”

Now in those days that meant

can you take the lumps? Can you hack it?

“The cup” meant a cup of

grief and sorrow – it is the same

metaphor that Jesus uses

in the Garden of Gethsemane

“Let this cup pass away from me.”

James later finds out that

Jesus meant it when he tells him

“You will indeed drink from this cup.”

James, for whom this Sunday

is honouring, was one of the first

of the Christian martyrs.

“King Herod began to persecute some members of the church. He had James, the brother of John, put to death by the sword. When he saw that this pleased the Jews, he went on to arrest Peter…”

James, was put to death by the sword

or as early Christian tradition holds

was beheaded: Peter was crucified up-side-down.

And all of this makes us wonder

what sort of privileges are in store

for those who accept Christ.

Many people today lament that

our church is a church in exile.

It has been compared to the church

that was taken far away

into the land of Babylon

as Jeremiah records and suddenly

the faith was one of many

and one small faith and many people got very comfortable

with the world around it

and decided Babylon was not

a bad place to live after all.

While Ezra and Nehemiah

tell us of those who came back

to the promised land after they were freed

the fact is many stayed there

because it was comfortable

and they started worshipping the

local gods and keeping local customs.

Some argue that for us, here today,

the church hasn’t been taken to Babylon

Babylon has moved in with us

over the past fifty years and many

have slowly adopted the

expectations and values of

the culture around us

and allowed it to erode the faith.

Many people lament that

we are no longer the society church

“mainline church” is a misnomer for us.

We miss its privileges.

But perhaps membership also

had its cost: after all

if you want to be accepted by

the larger society you are in

you can’t rock the boat too much.

And when the society deviates

from the way Jesus would have us live

when it passes laws, for example

that are contrary to scripture

or when we go by the board

with keeping the Lord’s day we are more apt to turn

a blind eye to it and keep politely quiet.

In all three readings today,

we are not promised an easy ride

if we are to be really people of faith.

Baruch is not to be sheltered from his trials.

James and Peter were martyred

and James and John are not given

comfortable positions of power

but rather offered a cup of suffering.

Many who practice their faith

in what we call the third world

know all about the cup of suffering.

Myanmar, for example, knows

that keeping the cross on the door

of the church makes them a target

for government hatred or even death.

But what was it that nonetheless

led James and John to keep following?

For that matter, what made

the disciples transform from

broken men and women

after Good Friday into the people

who defied their fear

and teach the gospel?

It was the power of the resurrection

that they knew, suddenly,

that death had no more power over them.

It was the fact that their world

now knew a power that

made everything else seem suddenly less important.

They knew that life, real life was their if they wanted it

and they did.

They knew that nothing else mattered.

They wanted that and

we need to want that too…

Jesus did not say that

his church would be comfortable.

If you think Jesus will make

your life simpler, you’re wrong

but he will make your life worthwhile.

If we want to truly follow Jesus

then we will have to be uncomfortable

and perhaps it’s a good thing

that we are now in a position

where we are not the society church

because now we can stand up

for what we should stand up for.

We are like the disciples

faced with following Jesus when

the going suddenly gets hard

and Jesus comes to them and asks them

“And what about you? Is this too hard for you?”

Like Peter we can only say

“Lord to whom would we go?

You have the words of eternal life.”

And isn’t that the bottom line?

Jesus has the words that give eternal life

and life to the fullest.

Membership does have its privileges.