September 12, 2017          Church Order and Discipline                                                 

         Once upon a time there was an indian tribe living on a reservation in South Dakota. One day, some men from an oil company showed up and asked if they could do some tests and take some samples. A few weeks later they sent the tribe’s leader, a letter saying that they had found oil on the reservation and wanted to set up a meeting to negotiate a contract to take it out of the ground. The leader wrote back, that the oil company would have to meet with the tribal council in order to get permission to do this, then they could negotiate.

         On the day of the meeting, six lawyers from the oil company showed up to argue their case before the tribal council. They were welcomed and invited to a clearing where they found the tribe gathered in a large circle, with the tribe’s elderly and children gathered in the center. The spokesman for the lawyers turned to the tribal leader an asked, when will the tribal council arrive? And the tribal leader replied, they are already here – when it comes to making a decision that affects the whole tribe, we make up council of the weakest and the wisest among us, for when the rights of the least and last are secured than the decision will be in the best interests of the whole tribe.

         I thought of this story because of the readings in the 18^th Chapter of Matthew. The chapter begins with 14 verses about who are the greatest in the kingdom of heaven, and Jesus sets before them a child, and goes on to tell his followers that they are not to lead them astray, not to let them get lost, and certainly not to take advantage of them.

         Now in our modern day, where there is a fair amount of child worship. Where we are ready to spare any expense to see that our children and grandchildren have it all. Where some people allow their children to make immature decisions that are destructive to their lives. We have kind of a skewed vision of what Jesus is saying.

In fact, while Jesus sets before his disciples a child, he says, that the little ones who are the greatest are those who humble themselves like children. So he is not actually talking about children at all – but those without power in society, those who are the weakest, those who are the least and the last. It is the responsibility of the Christian community to be a place where these little ones are safeguarded against the worldly powers that would seek to exploit them. Hence, my story this morning of the Indian tribe and the Oil Company.

As for how Christians should conduct themselves when they have disagreements with one another, I have another story.

In Jerseyville, a local dentist, and leader of his political party, came to the local clergy group, wanting us to bless his political opinion over a local judge. In short, he wanted us to endorse his plan to call the April county holiday, the Good Friday holiday. Now, Good Friday is Good Friday, whether the state says so or not. But that really wasn’t his agenda. The dentist had been going to a number of groups trying to smear his opponent as un-christian.

So we asked this dentist, had he gone and talked to his opponent. Why no! he replied, we aren’t on speaking terms!  “Well, the leader of our clergy group said, Jesus gives us some pretty specific directions on how we are to conduct ourselves in disagreements. And the first step is to go to each other and discuss our differences.  To which the dentist replied, Well this isn’t about Jesus, it’s about politics! You can probably guess that we didn’t give him what he wanted.

My point is, that when we have disagreements in our lives, many of us play politics. We go around to involve people in our arguments, to get them on our side, and to force our opinions on others. Jesus tells us to first go to the person, who has sinned against us, and discuss it with them. If we disagree, only then are we told to go find someone who both persons respect and invite them to sit down with them and listen to our disagreement. And only when this does not resolve the matter, it goes to the church – and by church, Jesus does not mean the general public – but the leadership of the church. Who will keep the matter confidential, so that it does not divide or destroy the community of faith, or give the church a black eye in the community. You see, in the Christian community, it’s not about power, or winning or losing, it’s about what is in the best interest of the people involved and the community of faith!

Our gospel lesson concludes with Jesus talking about where two or three are gathered in my name. And in our Epistle lesson, Paul talks about putting on the LORD Jesus. After 25 years of serving congregations, I can tell that there is a huge difference between people who believe Jesus is their LORD, and people who believe they are their own LORD. Churches where individuals believe they are LORD are full of politics, bully, and strife. They are losing members, and everyone in town knows not to go to them. Churches were Jesus is LORD are filled with peace, they are places of healing, when members have disagreements there is a process for reconciliation, and they do not allow individual to tear them apart from one another.  

Now in the 4 months that I have been at Union Congregational, I have observed that the members of this church believe that Jesus is LORD! And that is a wonderful thing! And it is the Good News of Jesus Christ.