Bigger

I preached this sermon at St. Lydia's on Sunday, June 6.  The text is Matthew 28:16-20; read it here.

 

This week was my first week working as a pastoral care intern at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital.  This summer I’ll be visiting patients in the hospital to attend to their spiritual needs.  It’s a daunting task -- knocking on someone’s door, introducing yourself, asking them if there’s anything they’d like to talk about. 

 

Each room is the scene of a particular, private drama.  You step in for a moment, play a small part, and step out again, as that drama continues to unfold. 

This first week has been mostly orientation -- learning our way around the hospital and talking about how to begin conversations and learning how to chart and fill out paperwork, but on Friday we shadowed a chaplain and watched her do her work.  And next week, we’ll be out on the floors, whether we feel ready, or remarkably ill equipped. 

 

The disciples in this story have been doing a lot of shadowing too.

Up until this point in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus has been the teacher. 

And the disciples have shadowed him. 

They’ve watched as he’s taught,

and they’ve watched as he’s healed. 

They watched as he butted heads 

with the religious authorities in Jerusalem, 

and continued to watch as he was put on trial,

put on a cross,

put in the tomb. 

 

All this time, they’ve been watching 

and listening 

and learning 

and waiting,

and now, 

meeting him on this mountain, 

in the wake of a brutal and chaotic week, 

he’s saying, 

Okay.  Time to get out there on the floors. 

Go and teach, and baptize.

Go start the church.

 

There’s a certain shock that comes with taking on authority, no matter how much you’ve prepared for the task ahead.  There’s still a voice in your head that says, “Oh...I can’t do that!  I’m not prepared...I’m not equipped...I’m not...”  All sorts of reasons you might not feel up to the task that’s currently before you.  

 

And honestly, it seems that Jesus could have chosen a slightly more qualified bunch. Throughout the gospels they’ve been willing but bumbling students.  They’ve done their best to follow, but certainly gotten turned around along the way.  Some have rejected their teacher, some denied him.  Perhaps they weren’t...who they wanted to be. 

 

And on the mountain top with Christ in front of them, it’s still difficult for them to see and understand.  Some are worshipping, some doubting.  They are frightened and unsure, 

confused and muddled...they are anything be prepared and anything but unified. 

And still Jesus says, 

Okay, it’s your turn.  

Go and teach and baptize.

Go and get out there on the floors.

 

The thing is, it doesn’t seem to matter if you doubt. 

If you doubt Jesus, 

doubt yourself,

doubt God,

doubt in others. 

Jesus has chosen you to teach.  

 

Here’s the good news of this story:

The Gospel is bigger than you. 

It’s bigger than your doubt and bigger than your fear. 

It’s bigger than your feelings of inadequacy,

and bigger than your feelings of uncertainty. 

God is sure enough for you. 

 

 

The “Great Commissioning,” as this story is often titled, will take the disciples places they had no chance of imagining.  The Book of Acts holds the story of the birth of the church: the wide-ranging journey that Christ’s disciples embark on to bring the story of his resurrection to the ends of the earth.  The Gospel is bigger than just them!  It’s bigger than Galilee and bigger than Jerusalem, 

bigger than the Jewish people -- 

it’s big enough for a world filled with difference,

even a world filled with injustice. 

 

The Gospel is bigger than us. 

And it's bigger than St. Lydia’s 

as we are today.

Just as the disciples were,

the Gospel will carry us father than we thought we were prepared to go. 

Maybe it will carry us...

to Brooklyn. 

And there's no way to know what we'll encounter when we get there. 

There's no way to predict where we'll be carried 

in new relationships

with new people,

in a new neighborhood, 

with needs all its own. 

 

At first the call will simply be to get to know the people around us. 

To build relationships, and from there, 

to discern where the Gospel is carrying us. 

It might move us to plant a community garden,

or to start another service, 

or to start an after school program,

or to figure out how to find homes for those who don't have them. 

 

We won't know until we get there. 

 

What we do know?

That things will change. 

 

That a Gospel that's meant for the whole world 

asks us to grow, to plant:

to do a new thing. 

There will be new faces, new routines, new challenges. 

 

That’s the hard part, the scary part, the unknown part.  

The incredibly exciting part.

But here’s the good part:

I once sat with a Spiritual Director 

who told me, 

I have the easiest job in the world.

Because God does all the work.

Let God do the heavy lifting.

 

Wherever this commission carries us, 

we are not in it alone. 

St. Lydia’s belongs to God, 

and God will do the heavy lifting.  

It’s so much bigger than we are, 

and God’s got it firmly in hand. 

 

In this passage, Jesus leaves us with a promise. 

And I promise you, that it’s a promise he will not break.

I am with you always, till the end of the age.

The gospel is bigger than you, 

and Jesus isn’t going anywhere.

Comments

[Betsy Voelker]

"Here’s the good news of this story:
The Gospel is bigger than you.
It’s bigger than your doubt and bigger than your fear.
It’s bigger than your feelings of inadequacy,
and bigger than your feelings of uncertainty."

Yes! and thank you!