Just Getting Started

Sermon for June 13, 2021
Ezekiel 17:22-24; Mark 4:26-34

Almost nine years ago, we gathered for what we called a Celebration of Common Ministry.  I’d just become rector, and we were marking that moment with what traditionally would be an “installation” service, when a new rector receives gifts from the parish symbolizing his or her new authority.  That seemed like the wrong symbolism, given that we were launching a collaborative approach to being church together.  So, we called the service a Celebration of Common Ministry; and instead of you all just giving me tokens of my authority, we exchanged gifts.  For example, you presented a Bible for the lectern, and I presented you with a welcome bag and a yard sign as symbols of your call to take the Good News to others. 

One of those gift exchanges came to mind when I saw the Gospel reading for today, Jesus’ parable of the mustard seed.  Parishioners gave me books of biblical interpretation and theology, tools for preaching and teaching.  And I gave them a planter with mustard growing in it, symbolizing the power of faith, even when it seems small, to help us reveal God’s reign and rule – and, thereby, change the world.

Now, there was a little backstory to this planter of mustard.  Mtr. Anne had gone out and bought seeds of mustard plants, and we thought we had plenty of time to put them in the planter and let them grow so the planter would look full and lush by the time the service rolled around.  Turns out, mustard takes longer to grow than we thought.  So, the symbolism took something of a hit because what we hoped would be a planter full of lush mustard ended up looking more like a Chia pet instead.  Best-laid plans….

Well, maybe the Chia-pet symbolism was better anyway.  After all, today’s parable tells us that the kingdom of God starts small among us, coming with low expectations.  From that tiny seed rises “the greatest of all shrubs” (Mark 4:32).  Of course, this is a different kind of mustard than the plants I was trying to grow for our service, a mustard “tree” rather than a flowering plant.  But it’s also kind of funny the way Jesus describes the kingdom – not like one of the towering cedars of Lebanon but as a great … shrub.  Of course, his point isn’t whether the mustard is impressive; the point is the good the shrub does.  The mustard shrub “puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade” (Mark 4:32).

If you’ve been here a little while, you may also remember that the mustard seed, and its resulting shrub, was the image we used in the Gather & Grow campaign, six years ago now.  It represented the vision for a new HJ’s Youth & Community Center, a place that would offer generous welcome for our neighbors, a life-giving place where people could gather, and connect, and see that “church” can be more than what they thought it could be.

Surprising blessings come from small seeds: That paradox seems to capture some of God’s best work.  And we’ll see another example of it tonight when we get together at HJ’s for our “Evening in the Caribbean” party, celebrating and supporting our more-than-30-year partnership with St. Augustin’s Episcopal Church and School in Maniche, Haiti.  This is a great mustard-seed story.  In 1988, St. Andrew’s was one of four Episcopal churches in the KC area that volunteered to help a Haitian priest who was assigned to serve four isolated congregations there.  What began with prayer, dialogue, and personal visits has grown into a partnership that educated 250 kids this year (the numbers are down considerably because of the pandemic) and provides a hot, nutritious lunch for the students, teachers, and staff five days a week.  In the past few years, new classroom and kitchen buildings have gone up at the school, and St. Augustin’s parish has grown enough to have its own priest, Pere Petit-Homme.  Thirty years ago, no one was banking on this kind of outcome from our partnership.  But I know for a fact that our people who give their hearts to Haiti could imagine such a thing, because I’ve watched them grow the kingdom of God there.

Through that partnership, we beat boundaries of our own experience and expectations.  St. Andrew’s people looked at a remote mountain village in Haiti and said, “Yes.  Our efforts may start small, but we can be part of God making a huge difference there.”  And with that, this mustard seed began growing into the great shrub it is today.

Earlier this year, on annual-meeting Sunday, I spoke to you about how we’d be beating our boundaries in several areas of parish life this year, despite the pandemic … or in some cases, because of the pandemic.  After spending a year or so locked up, or at least locked away from each other, beating our boundaries should be what we’re all about.

Think about what’s possible.  I mean, even during the pandemic, God has done amazing work with us in beating boundaries.  When in-person worship stopped, we had a head start on many congregations because we’d already planted a mustard seed:  We livestreamed worship on our website, using one camera offering one shot.  When worship went all-virtual, we wanted to livestream on Facebook, as well as the website.  So, we taped my phone to a music stand upside down, with a little microphone sticking out to pick up the sound.  What I didn’t realize was that the video image didn’t adjust to right itself, so we began that morning livestreaming upside down.  To fix it, we taped a half-empty Kleenex box to the music stand, and I set my phone over the opening at the top of the box, with a little remote mic sticking out the bottom and hanging down the side.  It wasn’t exactly a marvel of videography. 

But now?  A few technological apostles, particularly Adam James, have spent a year improving the quality of your experience of worship at home.  Who’d have thought we’d do that as my phone sat on a Kleenex box taped to a music stand?  And yet, here we are – not just Adam now, but a team of Tech Guild members bringing you, and the world, worship from multiple angles, with the text of prayers on the screen and announcements about what God’s doing in the life of this place.  That’s a mustard seed that’s grown into quite a shrub of blessing.

So, what might be next?  Well, if we can bring worship to people at home, maybe we could bring sermon visuals and prayers and songs and announcements onto iPads here in the pew racks.  When I show pictures of a mustard tree or the school in Haiti to the folks worshiping at home, wouldn’t it be great if the folks in the pews could see them, too?

Here’s another example.  If we can bring our current worship to more people, we can also bring new worship to new people, people who might not be interested in a traditional service in a beautiful old stone building with stained-glass windows.  As much as I love it, this kind of liturgy is not everyone’s cup of tea.  So, in September, we’ll be launching Trailside, a more informal worship experience at HJ‘s, with music that’s more accessible to modern ears, and prayers and preaching that connect better with people taking a different path in their spiritual quest.

And here’s another possibility.  Our Outreach partnership in Haiti is a great example of a mature mustard shrub.  We have other strong Outreach partnerships too, like our growing relationship with Benjamin Banneker Elementary or the annual Free Store downtown.  In fact, if you glance at the bulletin board in the hall by the Jewell Room, you’ll see another dozen partnerships.  Well, about the same time as we brought out that Chia-pet mustard planter at our Celebration of Common Ministry, I also talked about wanting us to take Outreach ministry as seriously as Scripture does.  You’ve probably heard Jesus’s famous instruction in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25, that when we feed the hungry, and clothe the naked, and welcome the stranger, and visit the imprisoned, we’re doing that work for Jesus himself (25:40).  We also know that Scripture asks us to show our deep gratitude for our blessings by giving to God 10 percent of what God first gives us.  So, several years ago, I said I would love to see our support of Outreach ministry grow to 10 percent of the amount of our pledges to the church.  In other words, just as God asks us, as individuals, to tithe from the gifts God gives us, so our church, the body of Christ in this place, should tithe to show our gratitude and to bless the world. 

There’s an idea being discussed among several St. Andrew’s commissions right now about a way to make that happen by adding a third source of ongoing support for Outreach ministries.  Currently, we fund Outreach in two ways.  First, we give a percentage of your pledged gifts to support the work of our Outreach partners.  Second, individuals give generously to specific ministries, as we’ll do at the Haiti fundraiser tonight.  So, the idea being discussed would be to create an Outreach Fund, not part of our endowment but working like an endowment.  The income from it would provide a third source of support for our work to serve Jesus’ brothers and sisters in need.  And what I’d love to see would be for that extra support to fund the work of a gifted individual to support our Outreach ministries at the staff level, helping committed leaders organize events and gathering more of us to be Jesus‘s hands and feet working in the world with our Outreach partners, offering our time and our talent with the same passion as we offer our treasure.  That’s a boundary for us to beat:  Wouldn’t it be amazing if volunteering with our Outreach partners just became part of what St. Andrew’s members do?

Here’s the thing:  When Jesus described the kingdom of God as being like a mustard seed, I don’t think he had a single seed in mind.  I think he envisioned a mustard grove – not just one shrub but a place where hundreds, even thousands of mustard shrubs provide welcome and shade and nurture and habitat for the birds of the air.  All people need God’s love, and all people can bear God’s love to others.  We differ according to our gifts, according to our needs, and according to our spiritual wiring.  But we’re all called to love.  Just as God loves all, and all means all, so God asks us all to love with all we’ve got – in time, and talent, and treasure, giving from every chamber of our hearts.  

If we beat our boundaries, just imagine how this mustard grove of St. Andrew’s could bless God’s world.  After all, we’re just getting started.  And we’ve got so many seeds to plant.