Who's Better?

When it comes to the Kingdom, no one; since all are equal

In Paul’s day, some thought the answer was to be found in less variety, in exclusion, in isolation and the building of fences. In Martin Luther King Jr.’s day, many felt the same way, and built communities and churches by marking off who was not welcome. And so it is still in our own day.

All gifts are not acknowledged, the body is not complete, and love does not always prevail. 

But in this twenty-first century after Christ, let us live the way suggested by Paul: with diversity, with inclusivity, and with love. Let us ensure that all are welcome in the church, our communities, our neighborhoods and friendships.

Let us remember that all of humanity is made in the image of God. Not just the people who look like us, who think like us or act like us. Let us see the image of God that is in the other - especially the one that is different than us - because when we do so, we embrace God, but when we fail to do so, we reject God.

Embrace God in our Music

Lots of special music this past Sunday, in honor of Dr. King and Human Relations Sunday. The choir (with Kathy Niness on guitar) rocked the house with Garth Brooks' We Shall Be Free, and Janice Conner did a beautiful rendition of Abraham, Martin, and John. Some of the hymns were taken from a special hymnal: Songs for the Holy Other, an all-inclusive hymnal with special music celebrating diversity of all kinds.

The sermon included the song Don't Laugh at Me, an inclusionary anthem with special words written for the occasion by Mary Sugar.

Next week, Kim Trolier will be with us, enhancing the service with her lovely flute music! Don't miss a week!

Teaching Children to be Inclusive

The children spent a little extra time in worship so that they could participate in the litany in remembrance of Dr. King and to also witness our new friends, Erin, Charlie, and Sara join our church family formally.

When it came time to call the children forward, Vica only called the girls forward.  Everyone giggled as Vica extolled that girls rule and boys drool.  The girls thought it was great. However, Vica was quick to say that it was in fact not.

After having the boys finally join the girls, Vica shared that because all people were created in God's image, all people are important. No one is greater than anyone else. We all have a light inside that is the image of God and when someone tries to dampen it within someone else, two lights are dimmed. We are called to love like and because Jesus loves us.

Who's in the Details?

SERMON

We don't know who the magi were. We know they were seekers and we know they were Gentiles. They were not Jews.

Matthew wants us to know in the second chapter of his book that this Gospel is for everybody. It is not just for a select group. It is not just for the "in" crowd. It is not just for those who think and have all the answers. It is not just for the religious elite.

CHILDREN’S MOMENT

This past Sunday, Vica focused our children on the necessity of smaller details. She asked about the new addition we made to the nativity. It was a small detail of three new figurines that needed their attention. Some of them already knew what it was: the Wise Men come to visit Jesus. She shared about her own childhood tradition of placing their Wise Men in another room, on the top shelf in the far back corner. Do the math, and you figure it would take them at least 2-3 years to get to the nativity in the living room.

She pointed out how, before they arrive, noone ever seems to notice the missing figures from the nativity scene, despite their importance.

This is similar to the importance of the details in the Christmas story. It is a small passage that we read every year, but that doesn’t mean the details lose their importance. If we aren’t paying attention to the words, we’d miss that when the Wise Men. arrived Jesus is no longer a baby but a child and they are in a house. She stressed the hope that we all take time to pay attention to the small things. God does amazing miraculous huge things like what happens in the Christmas story, but so much of God happens in the small moments.

MUSIC

Coming up in the next few weeks, we've got special music for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day/Human Relations Sunday, and we're getting ready for Black History Month in February, where all the choral and bell anthems will be Spirituals. There'll also be guests galore in February! Don't miss a Sunday!

You Missed . . . A Very Disturbing Parable

And Mary played Santana in Worship!

With September as Hispanic Heritage Month, St. Matthew's hosted the talented Steven Kendikian, a double-major of Spanish and Voice at West Chester University, to sing during service. He did it all! from singing a verse of each of the hymns in Spanish, to teaching the kids Spanish "This Little Light of Mine." Our own Mary Sugar, played vibrant instrumentals as well to accompany our services:  Eres Tu, Amigos Para Siempre, El Condor Pasa, and Oye Como Va. To quote the pastor, "Really? Santana? In church?? COOL!!"

To paraphrase Pastor John, he preached on a disturbing parable of Jesus (Luke 16: 1-13) about a dishonest manager whose master commends him for his shrewd business dealings. Is Jesus commending dishonesty? However, as is often the case with Jesus' parables, more is going on here than meets the eye. Instead of celebrating the manager's dishonesty, Jesus is suggesting that his disciples take action for the sake of God's Kingdom rather than sitting back and wringing their hands when things get rough. Even if it means being smart once and a while.

With so many committed staff-members, you never know what you might miss on a Sunday at St. Matthew's!

Patience in Advent

Not Everything has to be Instant

The season of Advent is all about patience as we prepare to celebrate the Christ’s entry into our world so long ago in Bethlehem and anticipate his coming in final glory at the end of the age when God establishes his Kingdom. The problem is that most of us (including myself) are not very patient. We live in the instant age where we can pull our smartphones out of our pockets and look anything up, anywhere and anytime. We can order something from Amazon and have it delivered the next day for $3.99 (if you are an Amazon Prime member). Amazon and Google have even rolled out same day delivery to select cities in the country so lucky customers only have to wait a few hours to receive their purchase. We can stream millions of songs instantly via Apple Music or Spotify and get sneak peaks at unreleased albums that the artist has just finished recording.   We can download a movie from the internet to watch in just a few seconds. No more driving to the video rental store and waiting in line to check it out. We can choose from a smorgasbord of pre-prepared meals from the the grocery store and pop them in the oven instead of diligently gathering the necessary ingredients and following the step by step instructions of a recipe and then waiting for it to finish cooking. For these and so many other reasons we are terrible at waiting and have become extremely impatient as a society.

Nowhere is this impatience more on display than the Christmas season for which retailers now start decorating the week before Halloween. My boys didn’t have a chance to collect their candy and come down from the resulting sugar buzz before Santa, Christmas lights and holiday music appeared in stores. Churches start singing Christmas carols on the first Sunday of Advent rather than dwell for a time in the slower, less joyful hymns of Advent. And so we rush around in a constant state of stress because we can’t and won’t slow down. Indeed some of us have forgotten how to do so.

However, we must recover the art of waiting and cultivate patience in this season of Advent if we are to truly experience the joy of Christmas and the birth of our Savior. The ancient Hebrews waited for centuries before the Messiah appeared. Surely we can wait a few weeks to bask in the joy of Christmas. Join me in trying to slow down this month and work to linger more in the moment. Let us try to recover what it was like to wait for something we knew we wanted and deeply needed. If we can do it we will find that Christmas is even more joyful and our shouts of praise will be even more exuberant when the Christ child is born into our hearts once again.

Grace and Peace,

Pastor John

Priorities

We make time in our lives for what is important

Several years ago I decided to become a runner. I needed a way to improve my cardiovascular health and relieve the stress that comes with being a pastor. The decision to take up running was easy. Actually becoming a runner and putting in the miles to see the benefits that come from running was not nearly so easy. Over and above the fact that my body was not conditioned to run distances, I faced the challenge of finding the time to run in my hectic schedule. Like almost everyone else these days, I didn’t have a lot of free time on my calendar. My schedule was already full of important events and tasks and it took an iPhone and Google Calendar to keep track of it all. Running was going to be one more thing to try and squeeze in.

At first, I tried to find the time in my schedule to run. The truth is that finding the time to run didn’t work so well. My days and weeks were already filled with things to do and places to be. I didn’t have any empty slots in my calendar where I could just lace up my running shoes and run. When a time slot did occasionally open up in my schedule, the circumstances were always less than ideal to run. I was too tired or I only had a short period of time before I had to be doing something else. Consequently, my runs were sporadic and I couldn’t make significant progress towards my fitness goals.

After a month of struggling to find the time to run, I realized what the problem was: I was trying to find the time to run and I wasn’t making the time to run. If this was going to be a priority in my life I had to treat it as a priority and not an afterthought. That meant scheduling the time to run before I filled my schedule with other things. From that point on, I decided to schedule time to run before I scheduled other things. Of course, some things - like Sunday morning worship and my prayer time - are inviolable and I would have to schedule around them but the truth is that I usually have some say in the rest of my schedule. Instead of being the last thing to go on my calendar, running became one of the first things to get scheduled. It should come as no surprise that this worked. Before long, running was a regular part of my weekly schedule. I started accruing the necessary mileage to see improvements to my cardiovascular health. As the weeks passed, I started could farther and faster. My ability to handle stress also improved. The more I ran, the more stress I could handle.

For this to happen I had to make running a priority. When we make something I priority it shapes the way we use our time and resources. We allow it to claim our time and attention. The good news is that often we see a return on our investment of time and dedication.

In Matthew 6:25-33 Jesus asks us to examine our priorities:

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? 27 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? 28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, 29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. 30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is  thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ … 33 But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”

There are a lot of things that consume our focus, energy and resources. There are many things that compete for our time and money. Some of them are important. However, Jesus is saying that the most important is the Kingdom of God. He reminds us that God’s Kingdom should be our priority. He is also saying that a paradoxical things happens when we prioritize God’s Kingdom: we end up receiving all the other things about which we normally worry. So as we engage in our stewardship campaign at St. Matthew’s, I invite you to ask yourself, “How am I using my time, talent and financial resources in service to God’s Kingdom? Is God’s Kingdom the top priority in your life? I invite you to answer those questions as you prayerfully consider the gifts and talents survey and financial pledge card for the coming year.

Grace and Peace,

Pastor John