“...That our joy may be
complete”
Scripture Lesson: 1 John 1:1 - 2:2
Dr. Matthew S. Brown
At the risk of being labeled
O. F. D. (that’s Old Fuddy Duddy) I begin our brief time together with one of
those dreaded “I remember when” stories, the kind of story I have always railed
against, looked down upon, swore I’d never use.
You know the whole “I remember when in the good ol’ days” song and dance
that unreasonably glorifies the past and therein insults the present. It is less reminiscence and more
passive-aggressive indignity.
Don’t those stories become so
tiresome? “I remember when you had to
walk to school uphill two miles in the snow...yada, yada, yada...” It’s actually a way of boasting, “My life’s
been so much tougher than your pampered and coddled little excuse of a life.” The truth is that the good ol’ days were not
necessarily any more good than this day. A case in point, I don’t hear many people
pining away for a return to the practices of dentistry of the 1920’s.
So I offer you this image
while fully acknowledging it springs forth from my most limited perspective, my
selective and jaded memory. But many
here will remember a time before our leagued centered,
post-traumatic soccer syndrome existence when our playtime was concluded not
with a referee’s whistle but with the faint distant sound of a parent’s
voice. Do you remember the sound of
it? You’re in the middle of the 23rd
inning of Indian Ball or digging a hole (I can’t figure out why that was such a
fascinating adventure for us. I sure
don’t have any desire to dig a hole these days.
I spend more time trying to keep out of one, but it certainly seemed
great fun at the time.) Anyway, you’re
there mining clay or fouling off a curve ball and that voice finds it’s way through the oaks, elms, and early evening
breeze): “Luke, Marsha, Tom... It’s time to come home!” And you’d jump on your banana seat bike or
wind your way through the neighborhood yards hungering and searching for the
scent of such pre-pesto era childhood favorites as Shake and Bake, Hamburger
Helper, Rice -a-Roni, or Fish Sticks.
A voice
calling for, expecting, wanting your inclusion. O, a closer
look at the portrait will reveal flaws and imperfections. But there was something to be said for the
idea that home just wasn’t home unless you were there. Isn’t it amazing that for all the fussing and
fighting that siblings do, when one is absent, another
will be heard asking, “When is she coming home?” Yes, there is something to be said for the
idea that home just isn’t home unless you are there.
Jana Childers, the Dean of
San Francisco Theological Seminary came across a devotional from the early 20th
Century. Admittedly, it’s a little
over-saturated with Hallmark sentimentality but it has a point.
I think oft times as night
draws nigh of an old house on the hill, Of a yard all
wide where blossoms bloomed and children played at will. And when at last the night came down, hushing
the merry din, Mother would look around and ask, “Are all the children in?”
It’s many and many a year
since then, and the old house on the hill no longer echoes the children’s feet,
and the yard is still -- so still. But I
see it all as shadows creep through many years since then. I can hear Mother ask, as she did before,
“Are all the children in?”
I wonder if, when the shadows
fall on that last short earthly day, When we say goodbye to the world outside,
all tired with our children’s play, When we step out into that other land where
Mother has long been, Will we hear her ask, just as of old, “Are all the
children in?” (Author unknown)
It’s the kind of poem, as
Childer’s suggests, that you would find tucked away in your grandmother’s
Bible, remembering the tears such sentiments would so easily bring to her
eyes.
And yet, it reflects the
desire deep within us, a desire sometimes hidden and latent, but a desire
nonetheless, for union, inclusion, reunion.
To be welcomed, to be embraced, to be considered as
integral to the whole. What
person wouldn’t want to hear someone say, “It’s just not the same without you.”
Such is the sentiment
expressed in 1 John’s introduction here.
“We declare to you what we have seen and heard so that you may also have
fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his
Son Jesus Christ. We are writing these
things so that our joy may be complete.”
Put another way, “Our joy is
not complete unless you share in this fellowship with us. It just won’t be the same without you.” Eugene Peterson’s translation, The Message,
translates the verse this way. “Our
motive for writing is simply this: We
want you to enjoy this, too. Your joy will double our joy!”
Isn’t it wonderful to be
wanted?
Theologians of the
Reformation tell us that our creation was not necessary, inevitable, or needed,
but desired. Our creation is predicated
on the idea that God desired relationship, fellowship and from Genesis 2
forward it is implied that it is not good for one to be alone. The incarnation, suffering, death, and
resurrection of God’s son Jesus Christ was the work of God to overcome all that
which separated us from God and one another.
Thus, as disciples of the risen Christ, a crucial, if not the critical,
component of our calling is to serve as emissaries of reconciliation, to
communicate to everyone somehow that this party wouldn’t be as good of a party
without them.
I have a friend who while
serving a church in eastern
Well, my friend enjoyed the
experience, was nourished by the fellowship, and was particularly touched by the
story of one man. Mr. Wooten, as he was
known by all in the community, was a distinguished man, a man of serious mind
and countenance. He was an 80 year old
turkey farmer and he had been in the church all his life, but he had never
joined or made a profession of faith.
And people never asked about it.
Sometimes, you just know. Let the
man be!
Well, on the last night of
the Revival in this rural
Mr. Wooten - serious, never
make a scene in all his eighty years Mr. Wooten - rose from his seat and went
forward. My friend says that at first
there was this stunned silence except for the sound of one big collective
gasp. The massive intake of oxygen
probably made the altar flowers flutter.
But then, the shock was
quickly replaced with an out flowing of utter joy. The celebration that ensued was like that of
a soldier returning home, a grandchild visiting the grandparents for the first
time, a runner arriving at home plate after the winning home run. It was surely a profound experience for Mr.
Wooten, but it was a joyous moment for a congregation also.
To be told the party is just
not a party without you. That is
joy. To experience the elation of
helping others know what you have found.
That is double joy. That’s why
some of us have found this to be our church home. That’s why we put that sign out that says,
“Come find your home with us.”
John addresses all who read
his letter, “We want you to enjoy this, too.
Your joy will double our joy!”
When you win the race,
receive the gift, are welcomed home, you experience joy. But isn’t it true that when your child
experiences those things your joy is doubled?
One is about knowing your are loved. The other is about coveting that experience
for others. That’s the progression about
which John speaks.
“We declare to you what we
have seen and heard so that you may also have fellowship with us... so that our
joy may be complete.
Long before Jana Childers was
the dean of a seminary, she was a seminary student facing the same trauma as so
many other students of leaving kith and kin, leaving home behind and heading
off for the strange and alien environment of graduate school.
Late that first Fall, she was a bit melancholy after having returned to the
Seminary after a Thanksgiving visit with a relative. She was still sporting the blue thumbnail
polish that her cousin’s teenager had painted on her thumb just for fun during
the visit. She says, “I had half
forgotten to take it off, or maybe I couldn’t be
bothered. I was just a little depressed,
I think, a little far from home, a bit of an outsider, not really having found
my tribe yet at the new community.”
She managed to drag herself
to lunch one day at the seminary cafeteria and sat herself down at one of those
huge wooden, round tables. She couldn’t
help but notice the flash of color as the student across from her put his tray
down. “Howard,” she started to say as
she pointed at his hands, but before she could get the words out three other
people at the table quietly lifted their hands one at a time, each with an
electric blue thumbnail. A moment later
a professor of the faculty did something that few faculty
ever did at that seminary. Childers
says, “He sat down opposite me at the round table and joined our circle. He nodded to me briskly and wiped his mouth -
one blue nail.” (Jana Childers - Covenant Network Conf.)
What an awesome way to say,
“Welcome, the party wouldn’t be the same with out you.” Can you imagine the warmth and the sense of
community she felt in that moment? Can
you comprehend the joy her peers and her teacher felt in offering that gesture
to her?
“We want you to enjoy this,
too. Your joy will
double our joy!”
Folks, when we are at our
best that is what we are about. Embraced
and embracing, celebrating the joy and double joy that is community in Christ.
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