Immediate Family

January 29, 2012 4^th Sunday of Epiphany

Gen 1: 1; 1:26; 2:18-24, Psalm 42; Mark 2: 1-5

Winter Gifts: A Sermon Series

Immediate Family

Good morning. Last Sunday we began our winter sermon series with the first installment. It was called: Blessed Adoration. Last week we talked about the gift of worship. Today, we will be talking about another gift: the gift of community. The sermon title for today is: Immediate Family.

In the Old Testament reading this morning we meet God at the very beginning when God created our universe, the heavens and the Earth. In verse 26, God said: let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness. From the very beginning we learned some things about the character of God. We learned first of all, that God is the creator, and our creator. Another thing we learned is that God is in community. You could say that God is in a family, and through the creation of humankind, God has extended the family.

We also learn from the Old Testament story of creation that we, you and I are created in the image of God. That doesn't mean that we look like God, or have the form of God. But rather it means that we are meant to be the images of God. We can talk about that more another day. Today, what I want us to look at specifically in relation to imaging God, is that we are created to be in community… to be in family… to be in relationships.

God understood this fully, so in our creation story we also see that God provided for us, companions. God knew that it was not good for us to be alone. Therefore, soon after God created Adam, God created another human person as a companion, a helper, a complement (as different translations call her), Eve. What this tells us is that we are not created to be alone. We are created to be in community with others, in relationship with the family of God.

You'll notice from your bulletin inserts that I have placed there a copy of this puzzle we have here in the front. For me this puzzle represents the multitudes of created beings called humans that God has made. As you can see they are all different, colorful, with various shapes and sizes, with different attitudes, etc. What a wonderful gift we have in the world! What a beautiful thing it is to understand that we are related as a human family.

Here at Pisgah, not only are we related to the human family, we are also related in another way. Today what I am calling this way we are related is: Immediate Family. Because we here have made the choice, the commitment, the promise to be together as one body, we have joined the church called Pisgah, and our relationship is closer. We have the same relationship that was found in the early church among those who were part of the early house churches. The Bible calls our relationship being sisters and brothers.Sisters and brothers, everyone knows, are in an Immediate Family.

Nowhere in the world that I know of, do people not form groups. Grouping together is in our DNA because God created us to be in community. Nowhere has this become more evident in recent years been through the explosion of social networking on the Internet.

Here's a little bit of history. One of the first social networking sites on the Internet was called Sixdegrees.com. Sixdegrees.com was built on the 6° of separation theory. It is the idea that everyone is on average approximately 6 steps away, by way of introduction, from any other person on the earth, so that a chain of “friend to friend” will eventually connect us to one another.

I remember one time when that idea became real to me. I had just arrived home after work one day (this was way before I became a pastor) and I flipped on the evening news and heard Dan Rather speaking about the death of an uncle (he was an uncle by marriage). Imagine my shock as I heard the story of intruders in the house, murder and mayhem. Suddenly I felt connected to Dan Rather and everyone who was hearing that broadcast. (This was way before the invention of social networks, Facebook or Twitter.) I was connected to a family member, who was connected to a tragic murder, that was picked up by a news reporter, sent to a national TV personality, and broadcast to the world: 6° of separation.

The reality of social networking demonstrates that we are created to connect in all the ways we can. The creators of social networking believe that if we can connect to one another that we might learn to be one world, that the things which separate us can be worked through, and that we can be more relational…to become one family. The great theologian and preacher Augustine said, "Our desire to be in relationship is what makes us human." I will add that that desire is also what makes us like God.

Today we really cannot escape social networking. It impacts our life in many ways with changes in the way we do things, the way we live, even the economy. For example one out of eight people who get married today met online. I find that amazing. Also, 50% of the world's population is under the age of 30 and 96% of them participate in social media of one sort or another. Facebook's community… in numbers... has the third largest population of any country in the world. It just proves that we are created to be and desire to be in relationship with others.

How cool is it that we have this unique avenue, that has the potential to allow us to connect and fulfill the desires to connect we have been born with. The use of the Internet and social media have many positives. Through the connection we have it is possible to coordinate large numbers of people to help meet the needs of people in trouble. Just last year when a tornado hit Joplin, Missouri, a tweet went out saying that a group was traveling from Kansas City to Joplin to help with the cleanup. Over 800 people responded and went to help those in need.

Online communities help connect people who would never have connected before. It enables us to keep up with persons that we would never speak to on a regular basis. For those persons who might be reclusive, who might suffer from agoraphobia or fear crowds, those who lonely, might be disabled, the Internet and social media provides for them opportunities to be in community with others. That is a blessing for many people.

As with anything created by humankind, there are also negative aspects to social networking. Though it can give us more quantity in our relationships, it does not necessarily give us greater quality. The wider we go in our relationships, the more the depth of the relationships seems to diminish.

Social networking detracts from our ability to build community in real life. Everywhere we go we see people texting, checking e-mails, heads down, concentrating on that little square pad in their hands. One of my colleagues in ministry told this story about going out with his wife for a nice, quiet, romantic dinner. He said he noticed a couple near to them, who after their food arrived bowed their heads. He said he was always gratified by seeing young couples bowing their heads for prayer before eating. Just as he was feeling good about that, he happened to notice that they were both checking e-mail. Having those devices, as one of our youth called them, constantly at our fingertips limits our ability to talk to one another face-to-face and connect in real wayw. Somehow our desire to be connected is interfering with some of our most important relationships.

A negative aspect of social media is that we have gained more friends, or relationships, but the quality of those relationships does not necessarily fulfill our innate desire for community. More is not always better. A study was done about this phenomenon, and it was found that most people reported having only about three confidants in their lives. And over the last 20 years, that number has diminished from 3 to 2. What was reported 20 years ago was that only 10% of the people surveyed said that they had no confidants, and today 25% of people say they have no close confidants. It seems the more we are connected, the lonelier we have become.

When I had a birthday this past year, I received more birthday wishes than I had ever received… But from those who wished me happy birthday on Facebook, no one's sang, they brought me no birthday cake, and gave me no hugs. Yes, we can build a big group of people to be connected with, but building close family-like relationships, that are based on a deep and abiding love and caring, usually comes in a smaller, more intimate group of folks.

Our desire for connection is a desire for that deeper level of relationship. It is important to us as human people that we learn how to build our relationships particularly in a community such as ours, the community of our church, in that immediate family that I spoke about earlier.

The apostle Paul in his letters to the churches provides many kinds of instructions about the ways we are supposed to live and act together. In Corinthians 3:8 – 15 and in Ephesians 4:25 – 32, Paul says to take off the old clothes, and to put on the new, giving us a list of things to avoid in our relationships and also things to do:

Don’t Do

· telling lies

· stealing

· letting angered take control over us

· rage

· using foul or abusive language

· harsh words

· slander

· malicious behavior

Do Do

· telling our neighbor the truth

· using our hands for honest work

· giving generously to others in need

· speaking words that are good and helpful

· encouraging each other

· making allowances for another's faults

· being kind to one another

· being tenderhearted

· being humble being gentle

· being patient

· forgiving one another

For those of us who you like things nice and orderly,

I appreciate these lists. However, a list of things often

seem a bit arbitrary. Unless we have built a close and caring

relationships with one another they are difficult to do.

In our Gospel lesson this morning, Mark gives us a real life story about what it means to be in close relationship with one another. Jesus had come home to Capernaum after having been away for quite a while. I know that he had gained a reputation as a teacher, as a healer, and I believe that being in his presence must have been something everyone desired. He was in his home, and people were gathered to the point that they have blocked the doorway, because people clamored to be near him.

Though many people were there, not everyone was. There was a man in town that was unable to get to see Jesus at his home, though he wanted to. The story tells us he was paralyzed. Whether he was paralyzed because he could not walk, or paralyzed out of fear or depression or loneliness, he was paralyzed and unable to go.

Then, the Bible says, four of the paralyzed man’s friends came to Jesus’ house, carrying him on a mat. Seeing that there was no way to get their friend into where Jesus was, they climbed upon the roof and they hoisted the litter they had carried him on up there too. I imagine it this way, Jesus is sitting in his house, smiling, speaking, teaching, and suddenly from above particles of dirt begin to fall on his head and face. First there is just a few pieces, and then more chunks of dirt and grass, and then bigger and heavier pieces of earth fall down.

I'm sure the falling ceiling interrupted Jesus's words. Everyone's eyes, I imagine, were suddenly thrust upward as they watched the large hole develop in the ceiling. I imagine that by the time the whole was big enough to allow the men to drop their friend safely down to the floor of the room, most everyone in there was covered with dirt and grass.

I wonder how much yelling, screaming, fussing and chaos those four men had to endure in order to bring their friend to Jesus. I'm sure there was plenty of conflict and anger in this situation. But, these friends had the tenacity to stand firm. They had the grit (pardon the pun) to do what it took in order to accomplish what they had planned to do. They meant to make sure their friend was able to come to the place of grace and healing. This is the power in real relationships. Because of what they had done… because of their faith… not the faith of the man, their friend was healed.

We can only ask ourselves, are we living in our relationships like these friends were living in theirs? Do we do what it takes in order to continue in our deep and caring relationships with one another? When we die, no one will remember what we posted on Facebook, nor how many times we tweeted, nor how many e-mails we sent. Our legacy will be determined by the depth of our relationships, the way we have treated one another, the way we have loved one another, or the ways we have not.

God has given us the great gift of immediate family. I want us all to think about our relationships, most particularly, the ones we have here in this community, in this fellowship of Pisgah United Methodist Church. What will be our legacy with our immediate family here?

· Are we willing to give our life as Jesus did for our friends?

· Are we willing to build our community into a strong loving place to belong?

· Are we unwilling to allow things to tear us apart?

· Are we willing to hang in there when the dirt is flying and the sticks and stubble are falling?

· Are we willing to stay in loving relationship with our immediate family, our brothers and sisters?

If we are friends…then it will be because of our faithfulness, that people are healed.

Amen.