Dear Caldwell,
For yet another week, it seems I write to you in the wake of another faith-shaking event. One news report noted that there have been 900 shooting-related events at elementary schools since the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary, where a gunman killed 20 children and six adults in 2012. Now a small town in Texas is forever changed by a tragically similar attack.
While that community – and the families and friends of the victims – will never be the same, the question many are asking is how in heaven’s name can our nation remain UNchanged. Unchanged since Sandy Hook, when so many swore it would be the last time innocents had to die because of the cowardice of adults to do end gun violence.
God weeps. What are we to feel? Sorrow, surely. But how about outrage? How about Jesus-turning-the-money-changers’-tables over anger?
This Sunday, we will look at the words the Lord gave the prophet Isaiah when God’s people had become apathetic and asleep in their worship and in their faith lives beyond. When their worship became self-righteous, insulated routine that was utterly disconnected from their actions to bring about justice and peace in the world, God told Isaiah to say that God had had enough of the people’s hollow ceremony. God insisted on worship by another name – world-changing action.
God told Isaiah there was to be no more pious fasting and performative grieving unless the people got out and changed the society around them in the name of the Lord.
“Is such the fast that I choose, a day to humble oneself?” God asked Isaiah in sharp, rhetoical words. “Is it to bow down on the head like a bullrush and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord?”
It is as if the Lord reached down and shook the people by the shoulders and said, “Snap out of it!” Then God told Isaiah to say these words:
“Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?”
What might God tell a modern-day Isaiah? Perhaps something like, “Enough of your ‘thoughts and prayers’ for those in Texas (and Buffalo and California and …..) touched by this tragedy. Get out and hold your leaders accountable. Insist on reforms that curb gun violence. Do not rest until the system is changed. Do all you can with all you have and do not tire until the day arrives when innocent children or grocery shoppers no longer have to die because America has made killing so easy.”
Here at Caldwell, we might hear God’s charge through Isaiah as a rally call to complete our dream of Easter’s Home. Every night, there are thousands of chronically un-housed people walking our streets and sleeping in our parks and under our bridges. On Sunday, we will listen to God’s call through Isaiah that we worship God not just in the pews by by being “repairers of the breach and restorers of the streets to live in.”
And when we do, it’s not just our city and our neighbors that are repaired and restored. We are freed and liberated to love God by loving neighbor, to live with reckless self-forgetfulness that brings us closer to God than any lukewarm prayer or half-hearted confession. That transformation is what we will think about Sunday as I wrap up a three-part series focused on our Easter’s Home dream.
Last Sunday’s Worship
If you tried to tune in to worship last Sunday or go back and view it, you saw that we had technically difficulty with our “broadcast.” Thankfully, Anne Hunter-Eidson and Josh Ennekin moved quickly to set up an iphone on a music stand and capture most of the service that included great music, ordination of new Elder Dee Blackburn and my second sermon on Easter’s Home. That video is now up on our Youtube channel and you can watch it here.
Oue Hope Interns Are Back
After two years of pandemic-necessitated hiatus, we joyfully resume our Gambrell Hope Social Justice Internships this summer. Four college students arrive this weekend for orientation with members of the Hope Committee and staff. Next week, they jump in to their assignments at area non-profit agencies working to heal our town and, on Thursdays, thinking theologically about the intersection of faith and justice.
So, please remain after worship Sunday for a reception in their honor. Prior years of these internships have taught us as a congregation more than our interns learn. THANKS to the hard work of the Hope Committee to prepare a rigorous experience and I hope you will make a point to get to know these amazing young folks. You can read their brief bios here.
How Caldwell Works
Our Newcomers Class wraps up Sunday with some content that may be helpful to anyone and everyone. We will review how the church works (the session organization, staff roles and responsibilities, etc.) and how to get involved to be the hands and feet of Christ, either in local missions and justice work or through the various committees that keep the church going.
So, feel free to come to the second floor of the new Hall, corner classroom on the courtyard side, at 9:45 Sunday to participate. Alternatively, there will be handouts and I can send those to you if interested. Just send me an email. If you want to be a part of the class online, click here.
Final Words
Be sure to read Caldwell This Week on Friday. It will include two important items: First, you’ll find a letter from Gail and Session Clerk Doreen Byrd about the plan for ongoing ministry while I am away on sabbatical starting next week (click here for more on that). Second, you’ll find an announcement of the new name for the Hall based on your voting and input.
In these hard and heart-breaking days, let is remember that we are all together
In Christ,
John