Leaving Church
Have you ever felt like you worked
so hard on yourself, and it was still never enough? Barbara Brown Taylor,
Episcopal priest and writer, once shared her own experience right before
leaving her parish ministry in this way: “My tiredness was so deep that it had
seeped into my bones. I was out more nights than I was home. No matter how many
new day planners I bought, none of them
told me when I had done enough. If I spent enough time at the nursing home
then I neglected to return telephone calls, and if I put enough thought into
the vestry meeting then I was less likely to catch mistakes in the Sunday
bulletin.”[1]
You may not have had the exact same experience, but somehow you would have felt
a similar way. For me personally, what Barbara said does resonate with what I
felt this past week. I was busy with many different things from morning till
night. But when I got to the end of the day and it was a blur. I thought, “I
did a lot today, but what did I do?” And there even were moments when I felt
overwhelmed and was not sure where to start, what to start with. But today’s
scripture revived my soul and gave me new desire, new strength to stay the
course. Are you tired? Worn out? My prayer is that the God of encouragement and
endurance may fill you with new hope
by the power of his living Word today!
Meet the Three-Mile-an-Hour Jesus
In fact, the background of the Book
of Hebrews have something in common with ours. At that time the early church
was in danger of declining, backsliding and falling apart because of severe
persecution and the trials of life. Our church today too is facing trying times
within and without: the church is aging, our faithful saints are passing away,
the church is not replenished with younger generation, but rather it is divided
over different issues. So the church is struggling. More and more people are
leaving the church. So in this time of trouble where do we find hope? Today’s passage is a call to persevere. In fact, the entire
of the Book of Hebrews is filled with the Word of encouragement from God. The
author says, “My friends, hope in God, because we have such a great high
priest, Christ Jesus… let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without
wavering, for he who has promised is faithful” (19-23).
So who is this high priest Jesus in whom we can put our hope? I like
the way Kosuke Koyama, a Japanese theologian, put it. He says, “Jesus is our 3
mile-an-hour Savior.” Then he continues,
“Love has its
speed. It is an inner speed. It is a spiritual speed. It is a different kind of
speed from the technological speed to which we are accustomed. It goes on in
the depth of our life… at three miles an hour. It is the speed we walk and
therefore it is the speed the love of God walks.”[2]
While Jesus was here on earth, he
always walked at 3 miles an hour. Jesus walked “slowly” because he was love. He
slowed down enough to see all people – one
person at a time. Jesus walked 3 miles an hour to see Samaritan woman – her
pain and brokenness. Jesus walked 3 miles an hour to allow one woman suffering
from a hemorrhage of blood for 12 years to touch him and be healed. Jesus
walked 3 miles an hour to see Zacchaeus – his loneliness and thirst. Jesus was
never in a hurry, but he was able to say on the cross: “It is finished!” (“It’s
done… complete!” Jn 19:30, MSG) The ministry of Jesus was the ministry of presence. Still today, he walks at 3 miles an hour
– at the speed of love. He walks with us. And he sees us. He sees our pain and
fear. He hears our cry. He knows our name. We have such a high priest! So let
us walk with him!
Walk at Three Miles an Hour
When we slow down and walk with
Jesus, we begin to see his work – his ministry of presence – in the world. When
we walk with Jesus, we begin to see how we may join him in his work. And we
begin to see the people around us – one person at a time. Recently, I have
learned a valuable lesson from my trip. Just before I went to my conference
down in Princeton, NJ, our church started a new small group, called “Emmaus,”
especially designed for new Christians and inquirers. I had been praying and
preparing for that particular group for a long time and prayerfully and
personally invited several candidates. And I was hoping we might have a
good-sized group. But when we had a first welcome evening, only four people
showed up. Out of four members, only one person was considered a new inquirer. To
be honest, I was a little bit disappointed. Then, I went to Princeton, NJ to
attend the conference. On my way back home my flight (Newark Liberty to Presque
Isle) was almost canceled because there were not enough passengers – only seven
on board. Thankfully it was not cancelled. But when I saw a pilot, I got
nervous, because he looked so young and inexperienced. He seemed to just
graduate from pilot school. I was also concerned if he valued my life lightly
because there were only seven people on board. But, contrary to my concerns, he
was very thorough, careful, skillful, professional and kind. After the flight
landed safely and smoothly, I heard the Inner Voice saying, “Victor, I want you
to value one soul highly and start with one person. Know him by name. Eat and
drink with him. Listen to his story and tell your own. Walk with him. Walk the
journey together – one person at a time.”
Once, Henri Nouwen had the
opportunity to meet Mother Teresa. At that time he was struggling and
overwhelmed with all kinds of social issues. As soon as they sat down, Henri
Nouwen started explaining all his problems and difficulties—trying to convince
her of how complicated it all was. After ten minutes of elaborate explanation,
Mother Teresa looked at him quietly and said, “Well, when you spend one hour a
day adoring your Lord and never do anything which you know is
wrong . . . you will be fine!”[3]
Here Mother Teresa was saying, “Hold fast to God and be faithful to your
calling.” On another occasion she said, “I never look at the masses as my
responsibility; I look at the individual. I can only love one person at a time
- just one, one, one. So you begin. I began - I picked up one person. Maybe if
I didn't pick up that one person, I wouldn't have picked up forty-two
thousand....The same thing goes for you, the same thing in your family, the
same thing in your church, your community. Just begin - one, one, one.”
One Person at a Time
That’s exactly what Jesus did.
Jesus started with one person. He walked at three miles an hour and saw Peter
and called him, then Andrew, then James, then John – one person at a time. Jesus’
ministry was done within a radius of 100 miles. And his main mission field was
Nazareth, a rural area, middle of nowhere. But his ministry to a particular
people and place, as Brad Roth points out, was in fact a ministry to the world.
Later, when his disciples went out to preach the gospel to the ends of the
earth, Jesus came to be fully present through them among every tribe and
tongue.[4]
So here is the word of encouragement: our
ministry to Houlton, this particular corner of the world is in fact a ministry
to the world.
We
are all called to the ministry of presence. Basically, everything we do
“with love” is the ministry of presence. [list] If we slow down and walk at
three miles an hour, we will see people who feel shut out from God’s presence.
We will see people who feel they have no access to healing, hope, or new life.
If we slow down and walk at three miles an hour with the three-mile-an-hour
Jesus, we will experience that Christ will be fully present and extent his
healing and salvation through us to those in need. So let us walk with Jesus and
walk with those in need. “Let us consider how to stir up one another to love
and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but
encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near”
(24-25, ESV). Amen.
[2] Kosuke
Koyama, “Three Mile an Hour God,”
in Three Mile an Hour God: Biblical Reflections (Orbis, 1979),
6-7.
[3] Henri J.
M. Nouwen, Here and Now: Living in the
Spirit (The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1994), 102.
[4] Brad
Roth, God's Country: Faith, Hope, and the
Future of the Rural Church (Herald Press, 2017), Kindle Locations 997-999.
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