Some things cannot be explained; they can only be experienced. Music, for example. How could I possibly do justice to music by talking to you about frequencies, rhythm patterns, tone qualities? I couldn’t. But I can play music for you, so that you can experience it. I can sit at the keyboard or turn on the CD player and let you bask in the sound. That’s the only way. Some things cannot be explained; they can only be experienced.
Taste. Taste is one of those things that cannot be explained, but has to be experienced. How could I possibly find the language to interpret the warm, full-bodied, life-giving aroma of French roast coffee? I could measure the beans, I could tell you the size of the grounds, I could even find out the chemical composition of latte. Hey, I could even tell you the price of a Starbucks cappuccino. But what would you know when you know all of that? You might have facts and figures, but you would not yet know the taste of gourmet coffee. Some things cannot be explained; they can only be experienced.
Some things can neither be explained nor described. They must be experienced and demonstrated. Imagine, for a moment, trying to teach a child how to tie a shoestring. Now that’s one of the things you need to know before you go to school, isn’t it? How do you tie a shoestring so that it will stay put? So you sit a five-year-old child down, and tell him how to tie a shoestring. “First, put the strings through the lowest holes on both sides of the shoe, centering the string so that the two ends come together when you pull the string tight. Next, push the right hand string through the second left-hand hole, following that with pushing the left-hand string through the first right-hand hole. Go back to the right-hand string, which is now on the left, and push it through the second hole on the right, after which you will take the left-hand string, which is now on the right, and push it through the second hole on the left. After that … oh, forget it! Forget it!
No child ever learned to tie a shoestring because someone told him how. We don’t tell children, do we? We show them. We demonstrate. We lead little fingers through the steps, and let the child experience it. Some things cannot be explained or described. They have to be experienced and demonstrated.
And so this morning my thesis is that only the loved can love. Only those who experience love can do love. If I were to give you elaborate descriptions of love, I might provide you with a dictionary definition. I might go on from there to urge you to love. I might even try to make you feel guilty about not loving. But all of that would be useless, pointless. The only thing that will help you love is for you to be loved. Only the loved can love. Only those who have known love, full and deep, rich and strong, can love. Only those in whose lives love has been demonstrated are equipped to love anyone else.
From time to time the authorities discover children who have been abused or neglected, children who have been locked up in a basement or just left alone to roam the streets. These children have never experienced love of any kind. What happens with children like that? Children who receive no love become exactly what they have experienced – hostile, angry, abusive, and dangerous. If they have never experienced love, they cannot love. The only way anyone learns to love is by being loved.
God has put His children into the church, so that here we can be loved and can learn to love. Church is a community of love, a family of faith, where we can be loved, and therefore can be enabled to be a loving people. Last week we thrilled as a brother came forward at the end of the service to profess faith in Christ and to give his testimony. One of the things he said was that he no longer had any family. Well, the Spirit just put it on my heart at that point to tell him that that was no longer true, that he now had a family. Your “amens” at that point told me that you know that the church is a community of love, where, because we are loved, we can love. For only the loved can love.
Paul prayed for the church at Philippi – and it’s right on target for us too – “My prayer is that your love may overflow more and more.” A church with overflowing love is a church that has experienced God’s love, measureless and strong.
This morning I need to spend some time interpreting recent events within our church. If you are a guest or you are one of the many folks who worship with us from time to time, bear with me. There is going to be something here for you as well as for those of us who are members. There is going to be good news. But just bear with me for a while. Let me interpret where we are.
I
For the last month or so, there has been an air of crisis around us. From the moment when our Assistant Pastor stood in this pulpit on October 10 and announced that she would be leaving us after less than a year, there has been an atmosphere of concern and maybe even of anxiety. Why was she leaving? What was wrong with us? What was wrong with her? What was the “real story”? People thought there had to be something behind this! Surely something terrible was going on!
The air of crisis compounded immediately after the October 10 service, because on that very afternoon, our Stewardship Committee met to work on the budget for the coming year. When I entered that room, they were struggling with the numbers, trying to get them to add up, and they were saying, “The only way to have a realistic budget for next year is to reduce or cut out the salary for an Assistant Pastor.” In the crisis of the moment, all they could see, and all I could see, was to reduce, to cut back, to withdraw.
Now you need to know just a little about why they were saying these things. I do not intend to bombard you with facts and figures this morning. This is a message, not a balance sheet; it is a sermon, not a financial report. This is good news, not bad. But you do need to understand the realities we were. We were facing that old saying: that if your outgo exceeds your income, your upkeep will be your downfall! There simply was not enough money coming in to do everything we had said we wanted to do. And it felt as though the only way to balance the budget for the coming year was to eliminate a staff position that had become vacant. At that moment, Rev. Haggray’s resignation looked like a godsend, exactly on time.
And it was. But not for the reasons you might think. Her decision to leave was a godsend, it was a gift of the Lord, but not for reasons about saving money.
a
You see, a year ago we had adopted a very ambitious budget. The budget for 1999 was much larger than the budget for 1998. We believed that God would bless us. We believed that all of us would do our part. We believed that growth was coming. We saw new people entering our fellowship to help us do what we had promised to do. We thought that our future was going to be very good. And much of that happened. Much of it! We did receive a blessing from the Lord. Many of us did do our part. We did grow. We continue to grow. We have received new people. Attendance is up. Activity is strong. We received so much growth, in fact, that when several families left us, because they disagreed with our calling Rev. Haggray, and they took their gifts with them, we kept going. Our giving did not fall. Did you hear that? Our giving did not fall. Takoma folks have given in 1999 almost exactly the same number of dollars for Kingdom purposes as we gave in 1998! Our giving did not fall! Now it didn’t grow, as we had expected, because some left at the same time that others were coming. But I want you to see that God has blessed us.
It is a victory for us that we did not fall backwards when some left the church. It is a measure of the blessing of God that we did not retreat. God blessed us with new people, new resources, and new vision. We are not a church in collapse. We are not a church which is defeated. And we are not a church that needs to wallow one more minute in anxiety. Whatever you feel about your church, know that we are a people loved and blessed of God. And, since only the loved can love, we need to feel that love of God; we need to get it deep down in our bones, so that we can love the way we ought to love. My prayer echoes Paul’s: that your love may overflow more and more.
b
But now let me say a little more about why Rev. Haggray’s resignation was and is a godsend. If she had stayed, we would certainly be struggling with how we are going to pay the bills next year. We would probably be cutting here and trimming there, trying to make ends meet. Worse than that, I would probably be standing up here trying to make you feel guilty, pushing you harder. There would be panic in my voice and fear in my heart. And what would have happened? What would have been the outcome if I were preaching a guilt-producing, hard-boiled sermon today? I would have gone home saying, “Boy, I gave it to them today,” because there is always a temptation to shoot off at the mouth. Faithful members would have gone home saying, “Boy, he gave it to them today – because I am already doing all I can, but I just hate to be part of something that’s failing.” Marginal members and frequent visitors would have gone home saying, “Boy, he gave it to us today – but I put in my usual ten bucks. What do they do with all that money anyway?” And guests and people looking for a church home would have gone home saying, “Boy, if that’s the way it is, let me keep on going. I need a church where things are more positive.” If Rev. Haggray had not left, and we had stayed with business as usual, I might be preaching a panicky, guilt-producing sermon, and we all would have gone home miserable. And nothing would have changed.
c
But God has other plans. God wants to love us. God wants us to feel loved. For only the loved can love. Only those who have experienced the love of God and have felt it in a church family can do what love calls for. Rev. Haggray’s decision gave us some gifts.
1
For one, it showed us that we have been depending on the generosity of the few rather than on the faithfulness of the many. We have been depending on generous gifts from a relatively few members, when we ought to have cultivated faithfulness from everyone. It should hardly have been noticed when only two or three families left. That’s not many in a church of several hundred people. And yet we did feel it. We felt it because they happened to be among the generous few. But if all of us had been faithful, if all of us had been following the Biblical pattern of tithing, we would have been able to move on and be perfectly all right. The decision of our assistant pastor to resign pointed out a grave mistake – that we have gotten by with the gifts of a few when we could have gotten a blessing from the faithfulness of many. We got by by depending on a few who were able to give much; we forgot about the widow’s mite. We did you a disservice. We didn’t ask all of you to have the faith to give a tenth of your income for Kingdom purposes. We just wrung our hands and said, “I wish.” But that’s a long, long way from communicating the kind of love that can involve every member and every friend of this church in a fair but sacrificial share. The resignation pointed that up, and that is a godsend. I tell you, I solemnly covenant that we shall lift up the Biblical tithe as God’s plan for the Kingdom. I solemnly and joyfully promise to demonstrate the joy of sacrificial giving every chance I get.
2
There’s another way in which Rev. Haggray’s decision blessed us. It blessed us by forcing us to think about justice. We got her to come here on the cheap, and we shouldn’t have. One of the reasons she left – and please hear me, it was not the only reason, and it was not the main reason, but it was one of the reasons – one of the reasons she left was because she needed a better income to care for her family’s needs. She went to another church that was willing to pay an appropriate salary, given her training and her level of responsibility. We had not been willing to do that. We had gotten by on the cheap. We were trying to pay for a Buick job with a Chevrolet salary. It was not fair. It was not just. Our Assistant Pastor’s
resignation pointed that up; that is a godsend. We need from this moment on to promise ourselves that never again will we treat with injustice a servant of the Kingdom, never again.
3
There is something else that has come as a blessing in all of this. There is another matter that has leaped to the front. And that is the matter of missions – our commitment to give beyond ourselves. Missions, our outreach to the world. We had made a promise, solemnly and before God, that by the year 2000 we would give ten percent of our total tithes and offerings to missions causes. We had signed a covenant to that effect, not because we had to, not because anyone made us do it, but because we knew it was right. And so each year, when it came time to write a budget, we would add up everything we wanted to do – got that? .. we wanted to do -- and then we would make a little stab at reaching our missions commitment. However, there was never enough, and we’d say, “Can’t do much, but, oh well, we have until the year 2000 to get there. We’ll do something next year. We have until 2000 to achieve this goal.”
Guess what, folks?! Six weeks away from Y2K! Six weeks away from Y2K! The Y2K bug that plagues this church is not whether our computers will crash! Our own special Y2K bug is whether we will keep our commitment to missions.
That your love may overflow. Love does not squeeze resources. Love does not say, “Me first, you second.” Love says, take care of the last, the least, the lost, and the lonely. Love says do something concrete for those who have no voice. Love says keep faith with what we are committed to.
It is a godsend that in the midst of all of this talk, all of this concern, and all this prayer about our church’s future, we would come back to the cause of missions. Missions is love in action. Missions is love demonstrated. Missions is the very heartbeat of God for a broken world. It is time to keep that commitment.
II
But remember my central point this morning. Only the loved can love. Have you received enough of the love of God that you can love a broken world too?
I believe with all my heart that we have a magnificent opportunity ahead of us. I believe, despite moments of anxiety, more profoundly than ever before in the shining future of our church. I believe that we are building here a community with love at its heart, and that we are going to be able to see the Apostle’s prayer answered, that your love may overflow more and more.
Toward the end of June I preached a sermon that spelled out the vision God gave – the vision of deepened discipleship, multiplied ministries, winsome worship, and systematic stewardship. To date I have seen no reason whatsoever to diminish that vision. The loss of a staff person does not destroy that dream. Deepened discipleship, multiplied ministries, winsome worship, systematic stewardship – better to say sacrificial and systematic stewardship. This is what we are about.
So, like Paul says in this passage, “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.” And I have every confidence, too, that we will do what we are called to do. This is not a sermon asking you bail out the Titanic. We are not a sinking ship. We are an ark of safety, sailing along the seas of sin, saving those who will be saved, and sharing the good news with those who are barely afloat. We have started more ministries in the last two years than in several previous years. And we can do yet more. We are not a sinking ship. We are sailing!
I have written a little paper, which you were given this morning. This paper calls for faithfulness, obedience, and sacrifice. This paper, and the budget which builds on it, calls for us first to make a priority commitment to missions. Then it calls for us to pay a just and fair salary to the next Assistant Pastor. However, it recognizes that we are not yet at the level of sacrifice it takes in order to do all of that. My proposal asks us to do things right. If God is not a God of half-measures, but one who brings His good work to completion, then we must do things right. It will take shared sacrifice. I hope you will read the paper very carefully. I hope you will pray as you read it. This is a moment of truth for Takoma Park Baptist Church.
III
Just remember, only the loved can love. Some things you can understand only if they are demonstrated. Only if somebody shows you how they are done.
Paul tells the Philippian Christians how he feels about them, “It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart”. There is power there because as their leader he loves them, and they love him. Please, never doubt for one minute that your pastor loves you, loves being with you, loves doing what he is doing, loves working for the Kingdom. Never doubt that from the pulpit to the pew, love grows in this place. You are loved. For only the loved can love.
Most of all, Paul reminds them, “all of you share in God’s grace with me”. If you hear nothing else today, hear this: all of us share in God’s grace. All of us share in God’s love. All of us are recipients of the love of Christ. “Herein is love, not that we loved Him, but that He first loved us.” This is love, “that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Look at the Cross. Look at the Cross. Who hangs there for us and for our salvation? Look at your brother and your sister – all of us recipients of grace, all of us children of the highest. Think of it! The Lord of the universe has looked down on us, little specks of dust, and loves us! Think of it!
The old song says, “I feel like goin’ on.” And I do. I hope you do too. I feel like goin’ on, because God loves me. I feel like bringing you along, because God loves us together. I feel like preaching the good news, because God loves His church. I feel like giving my tithe, because God loves all humanity, and wants to send His word across this world. I feel like goin’ on, because I have known the love of Christ for me and for you. “Upon that cross of Jesus my eye at times can see the very dying form of one who suffered there for me. And from my smitten heart with tears, two wonders I confess, the wonders of His glorious love, and my unworthiness.” He loves us. He loves us. The Lord of all things looks on us and loves us. I feel like goin’ on, because only the loved can love.
