Mark 1:14-20
I want to start this State of the Parish
address with a story from our mission trip to Haiti last year. You may remember hearing about a ride on what
came to be called “the Adventure Boat.”
We were going to an island off the Haitian coast to visit a school and
hospital for disabled children, and to spend the afternoon at the beach. But as it turned out, getting there was the
real adventure.
We thought we were taking a tour boat,
like something you’d see at Lake of the Ozarks.
Instead, we ended up with two aging wooden longboats, and we were in
them a couple of hours. Finally, the pilots guided the boats carefully toward the
dock, deftly moving us into place. Some
of us were seasick; some of us were aching; all of us were drenched. Then, onto the dock stepped a young man who
pulled the boats in, tied off the line, and reached out his long, strong arm to
help us up. We each stumbled out of the
boat and up onto the dock, deeply grateful for solid footing and a helping hand.
All that may seem unrelated to the state
of St. Andrew’s parish as we begin another year together. But remember the Gospel reading we just
heard, one of two versions of Jesus calling our patron saint; and his brother,
Peter; and their colleagues James and John.
Jesus calls Andrew and Peter as they’re out in their boat, “for they
were fishermen” (Mark 1:16). He says to
them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people” – certainly the
appropriate way to phrase it, even if it does destroy the poetry of the King
James, which made these fishermen “become fishers of men.”
So now, you’re expecting a sermon about
fishing. I imagine you’ve heard that
sermon before, and I know I’ve preached that sermon before. But you know, the metaphor of Jesus calling
us to evangelistic fishing has always felt a little creepy to me. I mean, what does a fisherman do with the
fish he catches? He sells them, or eats
them, or hangs them on a wall. None of
those actions seems quite right for a church as it fishes for new members. I don’t think we’re supposed to be about
profiting from people, or eating them up, or patting ourselves on the back for
having caught them. Too often, of
course, we err that way, seeing people as resources to build up the church. It’s actually just the opposite: A church is a resource to build up people.
And that’s what Jesus is doing in this
reading, I think. He isn’t building an
institution. He’s noticing Andrew and
Peter and James and John, and he’s inviting them into deeper relationship with
God and each other than they’ve ever known before. He’s reaching out to take their hands and pull
them out of the boat and onto dry land.
So, as we consider the state of our parish,
I hope you’ll hold onto this image of how Jesus calls us to fish for
people. It turns fishing upside down – not
for the benefit of the fisherman but for the benefit of the fish.
What’s the state of our parish? Let me share a few observations that really
are thank-yous – thank-yous for your immense generosity. In the past decade or so, you have renewed
the physical infrastructure of our church building with not one, not even two,
but three capital campaigns – though the last two weren’t exactly planned. First, you gave $1.6 million toward the
Rebuild, Restore, Renew effort that replaced the slate roof on the nave,
replaced part of our HVAC system, and updated spaces around the church. Then, in the past two years – when we had to
replace the rest of the HVAC system and respond to a series of rains that
turned the church into a rainforest – you gave another $506,000 in total, far
surpassing the amounts we needed to obtain two matching gifts. In addition, parishioners Charlie and Mary
Kay Horner gifted us with beautiful new restrooms right next to the nave. Our Junior Warden and King of the Rainforest
Morgan Olander will give you more detail during the annual meeting, but I want
to say this: Thank you for your overwhelming generosity. All told, you’ve given $2.2 million in the
past decade for work on this side of the street to make our capacity for
ministry simply excellent.
And then, on top of that, there’s Gather
& Grow, our capital ministry campaign begun in 2015. Since this summer, we’ve seen the icon of
this effort, the new HJ’s youth and community center, rising from a giant hole
across the street. In addition to
housing our growing youth and Scout ministry, HJ’s will host group meetings, classes,
concerts and exhibits, community events, and private parties – as well as being
a place of welcome for people on the Trolley Trail. In fact, even before the building is open,
we’re offering classes on personal finance and the spirituality of money, as
well as the first of what I hope will be several offerings on communication
skills for couples. We’re also having a book
drive in Lent to link with the mayor’s early-childhood-literacy initiative and
hosting community forums with the superintendent of schools. The new HJ’s, and improvements to the Wornall
Road entrance to the church, are budgeted to cost $3.6 million, and that work
is on budget. Because of your tremendous
generosity, and the support of the William T. Kemper Foundation, pledges and
gifts toward Gather & Grow now stand at $4 million – leaving about $400,000
to support ministry and operations in the new facility.
All that generosity is making St. Andrew’s
truly an inviting place for this family to do its work: gathering, worshiping
God, loving one another, and blessing the world. We’re seeing progress there, too. At a time when half of Episcopal
congregations are declining in membership and attendance,1 we can
report increases in both over the past year, in part because of gifts that
enable us to livestream worship on our website every week. We’re also seeing more participation in youth
activities and adult learning opportunities.
You may not know there are more than a dozen different ongoing classes
and groups here to help adults grow in their faith. We’re also making a difference in the world,
giving more than $160,000 to outreach ministries last year and serving people
in need in downtown, in midtown, at local schools, and at a school in Haiti
that’s doubled in size in the past couple of years. Through time, talent, and treasure, you are
living into our family’s mission: to proclaim the grace of Jesus Christ,
empower people for ministry, and serve people within and beyond our church.
All that is wonderful. And now – ironically, maybe
counter-intuitively – now is the time to think smaller. By that, I don’t mean scaling back
anything. In fact, God is calling us to
reach many more people than we’ve been blessed to reach this year. God wants to see St. Andrew’s live into its
potential as a force for revealing the Kingdom, transforming lives, and changing
the world. But the key to doing that is
to think smaller. The end of the book I
wrote a couple of years ago puts it like this:
People are the new program.
People are the new program. That
doesn’t mean churches don’t need programs.
It means we need to focus our energy on people first. And that’s true both in our work to reach folks
who aren’t yet part of a church family and
in our life together here.
You know, the experts talk about the best
practice for newcomer ministry being a model of “invite, welcome, and
connect.” It’s not enough to see
ourselves as a church where everyone’s welcome.
That’s certainly true, but it’s the rough equivalent to unlocking the
doors – a good start, but hardly enough.
Instead, congregations have to keep improving how they invite people,
welcome them once they come, and connect them with the life of the
congregation. All that’s true. And I’d like to make two points about it.
First, that pattern of inviting,
welcoming, and connecting applies not just to the people out there but to the
people in here, too. The Vestry and
other ministry leaders have been working hard to sharpen our focus on engaging
and involving members of this church family more deeply. We’ve expanded “stewardship” beyond a pledge
campaign, rejuvenated the SweeneyCare calling ministry, grown lay pastoral
care, asked you to sign in on Sunday mornings, and heard your voice through the
parish survey. We have 1,688 members on
the rolls, as of Friday; and our average Sunday attendance is 325. That’s a pretty common proportion across the
Episcopal Church – attendance from about 20 percent of the membership. It’s the 80/20 rule, at church as in the rest
of life. But you know, we can do
better. We are St. Andrew’s, and we can
do better. We need to keep being more
intentional about inviting, welcoming, and connecting with members of the
family we don’t see as often as we’d like.
Second, this work of inviting, welcoming,
and connecting applies not just to ordained people and staff. It’s the call of every spiritual descendent
of St. Andrew in this place. “Come,”
Jesus said, “and I will make you fish for people.” It’s your
strong arm and your welcoming hand
that reaches out to pull people up from their boats and join us here on the
dock, where the waters aren’t quite so troubled. A few hands are not enough to reach out and
connect with the people Jesus wants us to bring along. When Jesus called disciples to follow him, he
didn’t say, “I will make clergy fish for people,” or “I will make Vestry members
fish for people,” or “I will make staff members fish for people.” He said, “I will make you fish for people” – each one of us, in whatever way we’re
involved.
If you come on Sunday mornings, invite
someone else to come next Sunday morning.
If you’re part of a book study, invite someone else to share in the
blessing of your book study. If you’re
part of an outreach ministry, invite someone else to serve Christ in the least
of his brothers and sisters. If you’re
part of a group that helps lead worship, or bakes bread, or cleans up the
garden, or oversees building repairs, or whatever – whatever you’re part of, I want to ask you to see your role in it growing
just a bit this year. I would like us
all to expand the expectations for every role of ministry to include inviting,
or welcoming, or connecting someone else into it – not just doing our own work
but bringing new hands on board. I
believe that would be the single most important thing this church family could
do this year, the single most valuable commitment we could make – to understand
that we are each called to bring someone to the table.
You know, Jesus isn’t looking for us just to
get the work done at church, and contribute our unique talents, and pay the
bills – as important as all of that is.
Jesus is looking for us to reach out from this safe and secure dock at
the edge of troubled waters, and extend our hands to the people trying to
navigate life in their own small boats, and pull those people in. After all, Jesus’ first call to his first
followers wasn’t to serve on the
synagogue’s building committee. His
first call to his first followers was to fish for other people – not because
Jesus needs them to build an institution but because they need him to shape
their hearts and souls. People first –
those outside and those inside. People first – those clearly in need and those who hold their own needs
close. People first – because everyone
needs a hand to get out of the small, rickety boat we’re trying to pilot on our
own and stand on solid ground instead.
1.
Episcopal
Church Domestic Fast Facts: 2016.
Available at: https://extranet.generalconvention.org/staff/files/download/19543. Accessed Jan. 19, 2018.
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