Exactly twenty-five years ago, two things happened which were destined to have a profound effect on my life, and I want to share them with you this morning. These two unrelated happenings took place without the people involved in either one being aware of the other one, but, as I have said, both made a real impact on my life. And, as you see, at least one of them speaks to all of us today.
One of those events a quarter century ago took place in a little town in eastern Kentucky, in the hospital run by the college in that little town. On the 17th of April in l964 Margaret Smith gave birth to her first-born, Bryan, and when the doctors said, "Where is the father? We saw him around here just a while ago," Margaret had to say, "Oh, he's over at the Baptist church, playing the organ for the revival services." I’ve taken a lot of teasing over the years for trying to handle a revival at the same time my son was being born, and I don't have the slightest idea right now what the preacher said that night or even who he was, but all I know is that that week, wherever I spent it, was a week in which the gift of new life from our gracious God was being given. New life from the giver of life.
Now at precisely the same time, some 600 miles away, completely unknown to me, something else was happening that would be an evidence of new life from the giver of life. On the 12th of April in that same year, 1964, this church, Takoma Park Baptist Church, received a very special new member. His name was Robert Faulkner; and no one knew at that time how exceptionally special he would be. But they did focus, I'm confident, on one aspect of his specialness. Robert Faulkner was the first black person that this congregation had received into membership.
Let me tell you: off in eastern Kentucky they were holding a revival service, and I do not know at this point whether those services made any difference to the life of the Kingdom. But here in Washington real revival was beginning, real renewal was happening.
Off there in eastern Kentucky a new little life came into the world that has of course made a profound impact on me, and still does, every time the tuition bill shows up (and I pray daily this is the last one); it has a profound impact. But here in Washington new life was coming also, new life in God’s church, new life in the Kingdom, and that new life impacts me and you and a whole network of people.
This morning I simply want to mark that quarter-century anniversary; I want on your behalf to thank Bob Faulkner for being the willing instrument through whom the Spirit could work those many years ago; and then I want to let the Scripture shed light on the meaning of that occasion and .the challenge it still presents to us. Because, you see, I am going to contend that 25 years ago you began a process which continues and is not finished, that you got some real joy out of that happening a quarter century ago, but that you and I are still waiting for the full joy that the Father wants for us.
Robert, we salute you and thank you, because in no small measure this church today is what it is because you had the courage and determination to stay with this church until it would do what God had called it to do; and it is not too much to say that every person in this room is in some way the beneficiary of your pioneering steps. Thank you, Bob, and may our God continue to bless your influence, your ministry, and when we get to the 50th anniversary, I hope I have enough energy to keep up with you and to be here with you!
Now the great high priestly prayer of Jesus, a prayer which he offered on the verge of his agony on the cross, expresses his hopes for his church, for our church as well as for the whole church, and I want to share a portion of it with you and suggest that it remains the Lord's prayer and hope for this congregation. And I want you to enter into the spirit of this prayer not just by thinking about the responsibilities that it implies but by focusing on the joy that it promises. Jesus is praying these things for us so that our joy might be complete and full. Listen:
John 17:6-18
Father, keep them which thou has given me, that they may be one …that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.
The trouble with us is that we think that church is meant to be just as we want it to be, something that makes us comfortable, and that if it is it will make us happy. Our problem is that we believe we would be happy if we were to find a church or make a church that was full of folks who are just like us: look like us, sound like us, think like us, smell like us. So often you hear people say, "Well, I just wasn’t comfortable at such-and-such a church. I just didn't think I could ever be happy there. They were so different."
We have tried to find joy in church life and we thought we would find it if we were all pretty much alike, but the issue is we are off target. It's close, kind of, but not quite right. It's close, but off target. When whoever kicks field goals for the Redskins this coming season, we will probably see a few times when it's close, but not quite. And not quite just doesn't get it.
And so if we try to find happiness in a church where everybody is alike, that’s close, maybe, but not quite, and not quite doesn’t get it.
The question is not sameness, but oneness. Not carbon copies, but unity. Not a church where everybody thinks and looks alike, but a church where everybody can come together around some common mission. And that's where you'll find happiness. That's where you will discover joy. Joy as a Christian and as a church member comes from experiencing oneness, unity and true fellowship. That's what the Lord was praying in the magnificent prayer for unity that you find in this 17th chapter of John’s Gospel ... the kind of oneness that leads to full joy. Listen again: Father, keep those which thou hast given me, that they may be one, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves.
I
Jesus in this prayer teaches us first, this morning, that the oneness that leads to joy is a oneness that will include all of God's children. If we want real happiness in our church, it will come when we decide that we will reach out and include every one of those for whom Christ died. He says, "I pray for those whom thou hast given me … all mine are thine … all mine are thine, and I pray that they may be one … that they may have my joy fulfilled in them."
Quite frankly, I cannot any longer even imagine church without the very special kind of joy that I find here because we are a multiracial church. There is something very profound and very exciting about this place, once you really get into it, and I believe that it is a joy cultivated by our history and fostered by our intention to reach all people. Without question, the Spirit knew exactly what he was doing when he brought a man with the heart for service and the spirit of joy that we find in Mr. Faulkner, and I can no longer imagine serving in or even being a member of a one-race church. Why would anybody go to Howard Johnson's 28 flavors and order vanilla?
I know that you hold that value too. I know that this matters to you. If I did not know it before the incident a couple of months ago with the Hawk film, I know it now. When I reported to you on that Sunday morning that the producers of that film wanted only black members to show up for filming, you reacted. And even though to me it was only play-acting, it was only a pretend church and not a real one, you said to me, "I don't even want to pretend to be something other than what we really are. I don't even want to play at being exclusive." And I heard you, I really heard you.
But now it's your turn to hear me. Now it's time to turn the tables and let me ask you, "What are we doing to keep on working at being truly multiracial?" With whom have you shared the Gospel? If you chose to invite somebody to church with you, were you selective? Did you consider everybody, or did you just ask those that you thought might feel comfortable already? If we did not think of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ as truly available and needed by all people, then I am afraid we denied ourselves some of the real joy that He waits to give us.
Father, keep them all one …all of them, all of them are mine … keep them all one so that our joy might be fulfilled in themselves.
A pastor friend of mine recently was asked by his deacons to resign from his church. It's a church somewhat like ours, except that instead of twenty-five years of being multiracial they've been at it for only about ten years or less. But these deacons asked the pastor to resign … and I have to throw this in, how's this for great theology? They said, "Reverend, we want you to start praying that the Holy Spirit will lead you somewhere else and how long will it take for you to get out of here?" So much for waiting on the Lord! But here's my point: my friend said, You know, my greatest disappointment is that I have found that our white members would not invite anybody to church, because they were half ashamed of it, and that our black members would not invite their white friends to our church, because they didn’t really want them. Oh, my Lord, what joys we will deny ourselves because we think we'll be happy only if we are all alike! But the Lord says, no, joy comes not from being alike, but from being one, from being united, from affirming one another's diversities and drawing from them and loving one another. That's where joy comes from.
And we in our church are on the way to that joy, but we are still waiting for full joy, because we are not yet including all we could. I speak not only of being racially inclusive; I think of other dimensions as well.
We are, at least in our leadership, largely an older congregation. But we are adding regularly youth and young adults to our membership. We need to continue that; we need to hear our youth, as we did last week … really hear them deep down. We need to see what is happening among our young adults; those who were here yesterday for the drug abuse forum they put together saw the competence and the skill which they are bringing to us. And if young and old, new member and older member, committee chairman and pew-sitter … if we do not learn to embrace one another and hear one another, we will miss so much of the joy the Lord wants for us. As much as we have going for us, we are still waiting for the full joy that comes when all are included. I challenge each one of us to begin this morning with the simple task of learning someone's name, getting to know at least one person you've not known before, maybe someone different from you in age, someone who just might bring you closer to the full joy of the Lord's wish for you.
II
But Jesus in this prayer also teaches us that the oneness that leads to joy is a oneness that will take the risks of redeeming. If we want joy, real joy, in our life as a church, we will take risks and we will get about the business of redeeming and saving those who are lost. Listen to this prayer; there is so much in it: "I do not pray that thou shouldst take them out of the world, and the world has hated them … but they are not of the world ... As thou didst send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world".
The conventional wisdom in 1964 was that you ought not to rock the boat, that you ought to do everything you can to keep the peace and serve the church members you already have. And I am sure that some screamed loud and long that this church should sell its building and move out to the suburbs, where the fields were white unto harvest, and I do mean white. The conventional wisdom said, "We're doing all right just as we are. Why change anything?” And everything from the world's point of view pointed in that direction. Your statistics looked pretty good. This place was filled with worshippers. You had an education building that was only ten years old and was chock full of children and young people and programs and activities; why rock the boat?
But praise God you saw deeper than that. You saw deeper than the world's values. You saw that your mission here was not simply to bless and to baptize those you already had, but t6seek and to save. You saw that God had called you to redeem. You saw, and here is the source of your joy, that with new people there would he new needs and new opportunities. And as the Father had sent Christ into the world, so also He was sending you.
And so not only did you open the doors of the church to all races of people; you also along the way began programs that would redeem and minister. You became concerned about the quality of life in the community, and one person tells me that she was so impressed with folks who would come around and knock on the door and say, not so much, is there anybody here who will come to our church, but rather, is there anybody here who needs to learn to read? You cared enough to begin redeeming this community and that became the ground of your joy.
As thou didst send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.
But once again, I believe that we are now waiting for full joy. We are waiting for the kind of oneness that will come when we get involved redeeming this community, and that oneness will bring us profound and wonderful joy.
Some years ago you began a ministry with mental patients; the Wednesday Club continues to this day serving and redeeming, and if all goes according to plan, before long you will be offered an opportunity to do something else for people who have suffered mental illness. That's going to be a source of oneness, a source of joy.
Yesterday we were challenged by a distinguished panel of knowledgeable people to be the church, to be the church where drug abuse is concerned. Police officers, a physician, some others, told us the key element is a spiritual foundation and presence. We are somehow going to pick up that challenge. You see, the objective is to share the oneness and thus share the joy that comes from redeeming.
Yes, we have a joyful church now. But we're only close, not quite on target. We're waiting for full joy. I could not have preached this sermon three years ago, not when we were deeply divided over a number of things. We would not have heard it. It would hot have meant anything to us. We were too concerned with ourselves, too wrapped up in our own problems.
But I believe that now is the time for us to get about the business of becoming a redeeming, outreaching, caring church. Now is the time, in fact, to take the risks and rock the boat and to stretch ourselves. Because if I understand what our Christ is saying in this prayer, it is that it is when things are going well that we are most subject to an attack from the world and its values. In 1964, as I've said, you had a successful church going, and you might have adopted the world's values and said, let's take our money and our energy some place else. But you chose to stay here arid to invest in redemption.
Now, today, things are going well with us. We have no conflict beyond a little skirmish here and there. Out worship attendance is up by about ten percent over last year. Our giving is up by more than fifteen percent, and I am confident that we will give more money to the cause of Christ this year than any other year in our seventy years of history. And the temptation is to sit back and enjoy and say: No risk, no stretching, no testing, let's just enjoy.
But I tell you, if we do that, we will deny ourselves the full joy that the father wants for us. We will become a self-congratulation society, but we will find out that we cannot make a joyful noise in here while the world is chaos outside.
Father, keep them …that they may be one … as thou hast sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world that they may have my joy … tremendous, powerful joy, fulfilled in themselves.
