15th Sunday after Pentecost

Rally Sunday

September 09, 2007

Rev. Elizabeth Macaulay

“Shine!”

Genesis 1: 1-3

Matthew 5: 14-16

It is good to breathe the air of fall.  The gift of new beginnings and for many of us who are parents the gift of a schedule!

Over the summer our family of six young adult children has been living with us or visiting us and so we have been living in what my beloved calls a college house all summer.

So fall and schedules are particularly sweet to us.

I dropped my middle daughter Rachel off for her Jr year in college.  The day I dropped her off, my husband's middle daughter Lizzy moved in.  So we stand yet at three under our roof.  And we are blessed.  And it is fall.  And there is a schedule.

One of the incredible things about this fall is this.  Lizzy has finished up all of her course work at Augsburg College.  She has a passion for teaching about health and so is doing the last bit of work needed before she gets her degree.  Student teaching.

So her assignment is to teach health at South High school.  The school her step-brother (my son) Jameson is a senior.  A senior who needs to take health.  And so, voila! of all things, Lizzie gets to get Jamie's health teacher.  So far so good.

You need to know this about Liz.  She is a born teacher.  She is so fierce in her desire to help kids live into the health their bodies are built for.  She wants them to be good to themselves and honor themselves and learn how to work with the gift of who they are.  She interned this summer with some master teachers and she learned about building community and working with kids, meeting them where they are and inviting them to consider broadening their minds and worlds.  She is beautiful.

And on Friday she was tired.  After her first week of teaching, she was feeling drained not by the teaching, but by some of the sense she gets that it is such a struggle between kids and administration and teachers and administration and the system and how it seems to be not enabling education but somehow derailing it.

So we got to talking, and Cooper, her dad, shared the story of a friend of his who taught in England for a year.  He was learning about educational methods because he was starting a charter school. 

And what moved this man was, among other things, a practice the school adopted that seemed to change the very air the school breathed.

Every morning, first thing, they gathered together.  They came together across grades and disciplines and they shared and cheered and learned and celebrated being community together. 

The teachers and students took turns putting on skits and crafting activities to build upon their sense of being community together.

And when their time together was finished, they set out to continue the learning that was possible because their hearts had been opened and their sense of being community celebrated.  They had remembered that they were an important part of a powerful thing.

So it's Rally Sunday.  And we are gathered here together to remember why it is being church is so incredibly powerful and important. We are committing to a vision greater than ourselves – the power and promise of being a gospel living people. We gather because we are called to spark that light of the holy within us each and care for that light as the precious gift it is and see and nurture it in others and leave this place willing to be testimony to the God colors of this world. That’s why we come here. We come here to worship God and to carry the light of hope into the streets.

I share with you three stories of God shine through this light on Lyndale and beyond.

Scott Kirchner grew up in this church. He is twenty years old now, a Jr at Mankato state where he is studying law enforcement and a community service officer in the Owatonna police department.

His mom sent me a copy of a most handsome picture of him in the Owatonna newspaper, and that reminder of his work paired with the text of this day got me to thinking. Why is it Scottie is doing this work?

So I called him. It turns out that he feels called to help people. And he does in very powerful ways.

Much as the spirit of God moved over the face of chaos and created life, Scott steps into the chaos of people’s lives – the domestic disputes and the accidents and the suicide attempts – and he helps to create life bigger than conflict. The police department puts high value on getting out into the midst of people and listening to their stories and providing a sense of security through their presence, and Scott is a part of that building of community where people feel held rather than preyed upon.

I asked him about what in his faith life has meaning for him during the stress and challenge of his days. He had an example fresh in his mind.

Friday he and his partner were fresh on the scene of a horrific accident. Two people were severely injured. One later died. Scott and his partner did what they could until the ambulances arrived.

It’s why he does this work – to help people. And sometimes, he knows that what he cannot take away the pain of the time or the fear of the time and he cannot sustain life in those who are mortally wounded.

So he gives it over to God. Having done what he could, as he drives away he lifts the injured and their families in prayer. He calls for back=up from “higher up”. And it helps. A lot.

Scott Kirchner – he shines.

Yesterday at the UMW luncheon, Ruth Nave spoke about WINPRO. Ruth is a native of India who married Bob Nave. Bob created a powerful ministry effort called Nave Institute, which sought to empower the impoverished of India by, among other things, helping natives learn food drying techniques that would extend the life of food stuffs.

Ruth told us about WINPRO – Women in Need of Production. She began by telling us that as in most of the world, women in India are often subordinate to men. They are dependent upon men for their economic security, and when that dependence is strained by violence or abuse, many women are powerless to provide for themselves and their children. So they stay in abusive relationships or risk starvation.

They hide, Ruth said. They hide because “they have fear in their hearts that society won’t accept them and that they will be humiliated by society. They bear physical and mental scars. They bear heavy economic and physical loads.”

Knowing that educating and empowering women can bear astonishing fruit not only in their lives but in the lives of their children and culture, Ruth set up an organization that trained women in yarn and fabric work. Women were given the education to create clothing and make a wage doing so. Ruth opened her home as a safe place where women made invisible by their culture – the divorced, the abandoned, the abused, and the forsaken – could gather in a safe place and earn the precious money and livelihood needed to feed their children and their sense of dignity.

Our church, through the mission grant program and the gift of a knitting machine Amy Carlson donated, has enabled many women to sustain their children and obtain freedom from abuse.

Ruth Nave sees need. She sees the abundance being offered by this church and others. And she knows the power she has to bring the two together. Ruth Nave shines. And we get to shine along with her.

Last, a story from one of our youth. This youth – type person works in the food industry in South Minneapolis.

He notices what we sometimes don’t want to see each day. He notices and acknowledges and sees the people at the top of each freeway exit. They hold signs that ask for help. Money for housing or food. People who must get very used to being made invisible because of our discomfort with their presence.

This young man sees these folk and their need. And he knows as well as any of us that there is no guarantee that money given will go toward the need expressed. He doesn’t much care about the right or wrong of how these folks use the money they make. His lack of judgment doesn’t obscure his vision. He sees need.

So what he does is this. At the end of his shift, when it is clear there are leftovers that would go into the garbage and feed no one, this young man makes the rounds of the freeway ramp exits and gives that food to the people with the signs.

He sees need. He sees abundance. He sees his ability to do something to bring the two together.

And this young man of our church shines.

We all do. Given to you as you came into worship this day is a star. Given to you when you were born are unique and stunning gifts.

I ask that you write on your star a gift you willing to give through your life that will bring shine to this world. It might be music or honesty or friendship or outrage at the injustices you see around you.

Examine the world and see where there is need. Examine yourself and see where there is abundance. And bring those two together by sharing what you have.

Write your gift on the star. Bring it forward during the hymn and plaster it on this replica of this church. And when you leave this place where we gather to remember the reason why we are in this world, be willing to shine, my brothers and sisters.

Ruth Nave said it best in her talk yesterday: we are all missionaries.

So take your light – and let it shine!

Amen