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Let It
Shine: A Reflection on General Synod
by the Rev. Amber Neuroth
July 15, 2007
Note: This sermon was preached conversationally
and interactively, so many parts of it cannot be reproduced here. These
parts are described in parentheses.
Imagine a dark sports arena with thousands of people sitting, waiting.
Then the music comes on, and these light sticks start swaying (Holding
up light stick). We all sing “This little light of mine.” My souls
feels renewed. Then, a youth from our PA turns to me and says “I never
knew our church was like this!” I smiled and asked “What do you mean?”
“It's so cool and so big!” he responded. That amazement on his face is
why I will continue to advocate for youth and really anyone to attend
UCC General Synods. For many it will be eye-opening and life-changing.
It gives a greater picture to who we are in the UCC. We're not just
this church in these four walls, we are thousands and millions trying
to follow God's way together. The lawyer in today's scripture passage
asked Jesus (flippantly?) “Who is my neighbor?” Nobody would have asked
that question at Synod. Even in all of the diversity there, it was
clear we were all neighbors.
But not all of us have the ability to go and experience Synod
first-hand. So today we are bringing some of that neighborly spirit to
you. The opening preacher, DaVita McCallister opened her sermon this
way…. She really got the spirit going! (Interactive opening exercise:
You can respond to the sermon in one of four ways, clapping, waving
your hands, sitting silently and reveling in the spirit, or shouting
“Amen!” or “Alleluia!” Congregation practices these responses).
We worshipped God together, we discerned serious issues together. We
listened to speakers like Barack Obama, Bill Moyers, and Lynn Redgrave.
The youth loved them all, but seemed to be the most moved by Lynn
Redgrave. She has found a home in the UCC after never having attended
church in her life and then battling breast cancer. Her sharing of
doubts and joys were so real for the kids and for me.
The Synod also had delegates that conduct business and vote on
propositions. And for all of you parents that think your kids wouldn't
like this, the youth loved to see the process in action, especially on
12 giant LCD screens. The teenagers were very impressed at how
democratic the process was, and how tolerant we seemed to be of all
sides. One example was a proposition that wanted the church to define
marriage as being exclusively between one man and one woman. This would
explicitly go against last Synod's pronouncement proclaiming marriage
as a covenant between two people who love each other regardless of
gender. No action vote.
The Synod further expressed grief that we have not made the umbrella
wide enough that all feel welcome to be UCC Neighbors as the Puerto
Rico Conference officially left the UCC.
But I think most importantly, we were there to celebrate our 50th
Birthday, the UCC past, present, and future. There was a day long party
with lots of venues with everything from Walter Brugemann doing
complicated Biblical exegesis to something called Bubble Mania. We took
over Hartford with a diverse, boisterous, spiritual celebration. This
was the UCC Neighborhood.
At the Synod John Thomas preached to us, and I confess I thought his
sermon would be celebrating our UCC identity, maybe setting a vision
for the future… He did a little bit of that, but he really preached a
challenging sermon about not getting too comfortable. He talked about
the dangerous place we can get ourselves in if we self-righteously
think that we are following God's way the best; if we think that we
have God's true revelation. In other words, it's dangerous to start
thinking we are right and everyone else is wrong.
On that note, let's look again at today's Bible story. We have a
lawyer, who seems concerned about how to do the right thing and follow
God's way, or maybe he just wants to show off how smart he is to Jesus.
Either way he approaches Jesus and asks what he should do. Jesus
socratically answers his questions with a question. And so the lawyer
on his own comes up with what he should do, love God and love his
neighbor. Yes, he pleased the teacher and he got the right answer! Now
either out of anxiety or out of a desire to trick Jesus, he says “Who
is my neighbor?” Once again Jesus doesn't answer the question directly
but with a parable that we often call “The Good Samaritan” (Brief adlib
description of the story).
Now, Jesus tells this story to get the lawyer and others listening to
think about what they would do in this situation. He wanted to get them
into the story and shock them. So that's what we're going to do. Let's
think if we were to rewrite this story for our time, who would the
different players be. Who would the person be who gets attacked? Where
would they be? Who would be the two people that walk by? Who would be
the one that helps? Now, kids draw on the papers. Anybody have creative
ideas to share. Ok keep in mind that the two people who pass up the
victim here are good prominent people within your community, they are
not all evil. They may even have “good” reasons for passing by another
need. For example, a priest at that time had to follow cleanliness
laws, so touching a brutalized or dead body would violate holy state.
His motives might be correct, but his execution is wrong. Maybe it's
your minister or your favorite politician, someone you admire… By
contrast, the Samaritan is someone you don't respect. Someone you
disagree with, that you see as your enemy. Shocking isn't it?
(Interactive time in the sermon when we discuss who might be the
characters in our contemporary society. People shared times they have
seen others walk past people, etc.)
Now, really Jesus is challenging us to pick which character we identify
with in this story. I feel like we can each identify with all of the
characters at different times. We all know how it feels to be
vulnerable maybe hurt and in need of help from others. We've all walked
by a fellow brother or sister in need like the priest or the levite
did. And hopefully, we've all been like the Samaritan and helped those
we see that are in need. The character I think we act most like is not
in the parable at all, it's the lawyer. Many of us here can identify
with the student asking a teacher a question just to show off that we
know the answer. How many of us have felt the joy of knowing that we
gave the right answer in class or did a good job for our boss. We love
to hear just what Jesus said to the lawyer, yes you are right. So, you
would think that everyone would be happy. The student knew the “right”
answers and the teacher told him so. But that's not the end of the
story. Just by telling the parable Jesus says that knowing the right
answer isn't the end of it. We have to go out and live that answer. We
have to act!
The Samaritan was far outside the Jewish community at the time, but he
was the neighbor. We are challenged to look far outside of ourselves
and our community to find our neighbors. If we are in need, help might
come from an unlikely place. And in our time, we are aware of the
suffering of so many at once, how do we know where to start? We accept
that we cannot save every person, only God can. And then we start with
the people who physically and immediately cross our path. But if we all
follow the Golden Rule and help those we see in need, then suffering
wouldn't be so overwhelming. We need to start acting. The lawyer
overthought the problem and put too much stock in having knowledge of
the law. Jesus says you must know what to do and then do it. The
Samaritan didn't stop and decide that it wasn't his role or that he
could be more helpful to humanity by supporting and NGO that would come
help this person. He helped the person in need. He helped his neighbor.
And by doing so, he spread the light of God further and deeper into
this world.
We celebrate that God's light is shining in the UCC and that we have
many neighbors and friends in our faith. We pray that God will continue
to bless the UCC for many more birthdays to come. But, we can't just
keep the light to ourselves. Jesus challenges us here to look for
neighbors in unexpected places, people who aren't like us, people with
whom we disagree politically or religiously. God's kingdom is not a
place where everyone is the same or where everyone gets their own way.
It is a place of light where we could turn to anyone next to us and
great them as a neighbor. And until that kingdom comes on earth, we
must continue to let it shine!
Last updated Wednesday, Februrary 29, 2008
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