The Rev. Dr. Austin Leininger
Children’s Sermon of the 6th Sunday of Easter
6 May 2018
Readings:
Acts 10:44-48
1 John 5:1-6
John 15:9-17
Psalm 98
Well, Calvary family, the long anticipated day has come. After our 10:30 service today, we’ll be taking out the vestments, vessels, sacramental elements, and pretty much anything of value in the church in preparation for the termite tenting tomorrow and roof tear off the following week!
Is anyone feeling excited about watching them take our old roof off of the church and put on a new one?
Is anyone going to miss being here in the church for the next few months while the work is going on right up there (point up)?
Does it help that we’ll still get to come here for church and worship right next store in the parish hall? Does that feel exciting, or just kind of weird—or maybe a little of both?
What else are we feeling? Maybe a little nervous? The space will certainly feel different than in here, right?
The good news is that each of you will still be there. Each of us will still be there. The choir will still be there. The familiar words we use each week will still be the same. We’ll still gather around the table to share communion together. We’ll still have everything we need to be a family and have church, because church is actually about the community being in relationship together. In fact, aside from the space changing, everything will pretty much be the same…
Well… last week’s and today’s readings share some stories about families and communities a lot like ours, except that they lived a long time ago and half way around the world. But the message they heard and the message we are hearing today are pretty much the same.
Jesus didn’t want them to let the worries of the world get to them. In fact, they had a lot more to worry about than we do. It wasn’t just a temporary relocation while a new roof was put on their worship space that had them worried—many of them feared for their lives, and Jesus had been telling them that he wouldn’t be with them much longer and that was confusing and upsetting to them as well as scary.
But Jesus reminded them that God was with them. In last week’s part of the story, he reminded them that when we feel cut off from things or even people who are important to us, we can either choose to stay focused forever on what we’ve lost, and lose our hope along with what we have left, or we can come to refocus our energy on what we have left, find our hope renewed, and find ourselves renewed and even closer to God and those still with us than we had been before.
This week’s gospel picks up that same conversation with Jesus reminding them that not only is God with them, but that when they love one another, they carry on in the hope and friendship that Jesus started with them. The friendship of true friends is like the love of a family—we would drop anything we are doing to come to help each other. And that is what God’s love for us is like as well.
Our Psalm sings about it in the voices of people, animals on land and in the sea, in the voice of nature itself thanking God for always being there for us when we are in need.
Our other readings talk about it being surprising sometimes when we realize God loves everyone—even people we didn’t think God could possibly love because they’re so different from us.
But, as our other reading today reminds us, when we join together in communities that share in this kind of love, the cares of the world and the fears and worries that bother us become lighter. In fact, we feel like we could take on the world.
So whether all the talk about what’s coming in the next weeks makes us feel excited, uneasy, worried, afraid, or even just a bit of each, the message we’re given is to hold on together as a community, keep on loving and taking care of each other, and that God is with us.
My friends, we have all the tools we need to thrive during this time. The key is simply to do it together, and that is something our Calvary family has gotten very good at over the years.
As we re-assemble next week for our first Sunday in the parish hall, may we find hope in one another, may our community deepen, may we find God near to us to sustain us, and may we celebrate our time together, no matter what space we use. We are one in Christ, and God is with us. May the coming days be full of stories we want to remember and share for years to come.
Amen.
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