Awake, Arise, Act

 

SERMON

October 01, 2023

Matthew 21:23-32 

The Episcopal Church continues to decline in membership. A press release issued by the Episcopal News Service two weeks ago indicated that “The Episcopal Church’s 2022 annual parochial reports…continue to show a church experiencing gradual long-term membership decline...The Church’s tally of baptized members dropped just below 1.6 million in 2022, down 21% from 2013….” And “The church recorded an even sharper drop in average Sunday attendance in the past decade, down 43% to 373,000 in 2022.”

Perhaps most graphically the data indicated a drop from 33,000 marriages performed in 1980 to 5500 in 1922; with numbers much the same for baptisms. It is a small wonder why we do not have more youth in our congregations.

That same week Stewardship Reality, a New York City based organization our diocese has contracted to perform an assessment of St. Simon’s community demographics and potential ways in which to sustain our parish in the long run, also reported some alarming data. Within our immediate community over 60 percent of the population falls in the category “nones”, meaning no religious affiliation; and over 50% of the population falls well beneath the U.S. poverty guidelines and struggles to pay either rent or mortgage burdens.

At Elliott Point School 97% of all children qualify for the school lunch program, and currently the Okaloosa County School district has identified approximately 465 elementary and secondary school children who live without a permanent roof over their head.

Sharing and Caring, our local food pantry, sees over 25 families each day. Families who struggle to feed their children and themselves.

What is the message in the midst of these grimmest of realities?

I believe that Dr. Kwok Pui-Lan a scholar and theologian who is also a life-long Episcopalian responded both accurately and powerfully when she spoke at a conference in Baltimore last summer.

In an incredibly passionate voice Dr. Kwok implored us to Awake, Arise, and Act. She said, “It is time to Awake, to Arise, and to Act. It is time to make Jesus known, once again, in our communities and in the world.” It is time to leave behind the comforts of home and to venture into a community that is in desperate need of love, compassion, hope, and peace. The hope and peace that only faith in our Lord Jesus Christ can bring. Love and peace that offers reconciliation, forgiveness, and healing among all in our community. All in the world.

Dr. Kwok does not believe in the “nones.” Bravo Dr. Kwok.

I also refuse to believe that the “nones” are lost to the love that God has for all his beloved children. Rather, I choose to believe that the “nones” are seekers. Seekers whom we have failed to help “see” how stories like the Good Samaritan, the Woman at the Well, and the Prodigal Son apply to them, just as they apply to us. 

I refuse to believe that the “nones” are not seeking God. And more importantly that God is not seeking them. I refuse to believe that just because people are not sitting in church pews they are not seekers – seekers of God’s love.

I refuse to believe that God’s love is only for those who attend church. God’s love is for all. We are all made in the image of God. We are all God’s beloved children.

Awake, Arise, Act. We are all Jesus’ disciples whom he loved and whom he sent into the world as healers for those who suffer. We have been sent into the world to love as Christ loved us. To love those who have failed to understand that they, just like we, are beloved children of God. 

Of course, Paul did not believe in the “nones” either. In his evangelism journeys he traveled over 10,000 miles on foot, donkey, and boat to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Gospel, to the “nones” of his day, the Gentiles. He suffered numerous encounters with hardship – stoning, jailing, and more – all in the name proclaiming the love of God, and the love and salvation brought to us through the incarnation of his Son, Jesus Christ. And, he met with tremendous success. He alone is responsible for the initial spread of Christianity throughout the Roman Empire, and its future as a world religion. 

Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians, written while he was in jail in Ephesus, is a letter filled with joy and praise for a group of people in Philippi who held fast to his teachings. Gentiles who were now Christians and who refused to bend to the pressures of the Roman Empire and their imposed worship of many Gods. In his letter he wrote,

“Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:12-13) 

He went on to say, 

“Do all things without murmuring and arguing, so that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, in which you shine like stars in the world” (Philippians 2:14-15)

In The Message, Eugene Peterson translates these verses into language more accessible to us in today’s post-modern world. Peterson writes:

“Be energetic in your life of salvation…that energy is God’s energy; an energy deep within you…Do everything readily and cheerfully – no bickering, no second guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night…” (The Message, Philippians 2:12-16)

Awake, Arise, Act.  Shine like stars in the night. Carry the light-giving Message into the night. What joyous and exciting directives to those of us who know that as beloved children of God we are filled with sufficient energy and enough love to light the entire world. To demonstrate a way of being, a way of life that provides the guidepost and the path to reconciliation and peace.

We at St. Simon’s face tremendous challenges as we head into 2024. How will our Stewardship Campaign fare? What decisions must be made to ensure a solid and vibrant future for St. Simon’s in the Ft. Walton Beach community? How do we bring God to the “nones?” What is the Spirit Saying to St. Simon’s Church?

I end with Thomas Merton’s Prayer from his book, Thoughts in Solitude:

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.

And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,

though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.

I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.