[Propertalk] 3 Esater b 2018 - part 2

[Robert P Morrison]

Here's part 2 of the draft for Sunday.
Bob

	 THEY wanted to mope on their own terms. THEY didn’t want to get
involved with some outsiders. It was bad enough that they had to live
with the their uncertainty and their grief, but this person – He
simply didn’t belong – even although they didn’t recognize that
is was THEY who were outside and were being invited in. It took a
simple gesture on Jesus’ part, however, to show everyone how much
all belong in the community of God’s people. 

	 This time, Jesus turned the tables on the disciples. HE asked THEM
to share their food, and at that, their hearts and their minds were
opened. The community became solidified over table fellowship. THIS is
what everyone seeks – a place at the table at which no one hoards
the food, or charges for it, or refuses to share; a place at the table
where everyone listens to everyone else with compassion and an attempt
to understanding. No one dominates in any way; no one insists that
everyone has to see things in the same way, or even agree about
anything – except everyone’s right to dignity and respect. 

	 Vogl wrote, “One thing I learned in my religious studies is that
our experience of community has changed in a single generation.”
This is what we need to remember when we meet one another. This is
what Jesus’ resurrection appearances were about. IF death and the
threat of torture and death are no longer able to control our lives,
then we have all the energy and time in the world to reach out to
others and to draw them to meet Jesus. 

	 This is all we need to do! 

	 But the “number of people who say that they have no one to talk to
about difficult subjects,” reminds Vogl, for all the supposed
increase in communication, “the number of people who say that they
have no one to talk to about difficult subjects has tripled in the
last few decades.” 2 

	 Think about that. Think about the things that trouble you, and me,
and any one of the people who live on 18th and on Hill Streets –
what is it? The loss of power and the ability to make our own
life-defining decisions? Or the recognition that there seems to be no
control over things in our lives? Is that what makes us anxious? Is
concern about being able to get to appointments, or finding some
relief from pain and anxiety, or even how on earth to negotiate
getting up and down Hill Street for the next three months during the
road work; are THESE what trouble us and our neighbours? 

	 What about those who’re unable to leave their homes because of
weakness and a lack of energy? If we’re thinking about Jesus walking
into this room, saying a few words, and then asking for something from
the table we have set up in the parish hall; if we think about how
Jesus drew the disciples together into a freed community who could and
would act without fear; how do we copy the disciples? How do we live
as disciples to those whom society AND the church, AND we ourselves,
have made to feel that they don’t belong? 

	 If, as seems to be the case, most people under the age of thirty are
not participating in formal religious organisations as much as people
did twenty-five years ago, how do we live as disciples – NOT for our
own good and well-being, but for the care, the cherishing, the
inclusivity of those thirty-year olds, and the forty and fifty, and
sixty, yes, and the seventy and eighty and ninety year olds all around
us? 

	 THIS is one of the greatest challenges of the church right now, I
feel – to make people feel that they belong, that they are not
forgotten, and that God loves them. This is something that’s more
important that getting them in through the famous red doors, at least
initially. 

	 Jesus appeared not so that the disciples would set up an Upper Room
franchise and hang a relatively inconspicuous sign somewhere outside.
Jesus appeared in order to get the disciples out to meet folk and to
find out, in detail, what they needed and to offer them ourselves –
maybe along with something to eat! – to revitalise the lives of
everyone. 

	 Perhaps half-facetiously, there may be some days when we wish Jesus
HADN’T shown up in that room. It leads, even now, to too many
implications. But then we come to our senses. 

	 The good news is that we don’t need to be twenty-five to think
about this or to realise that we’re called to be changed, just as
Jesus has already been changed. Any age – the one each of us is
right now – is the perfect age to listen, to respond, to affirm
God’s community and to invite in. 

	NOTES: 

	[1] _“The Art of Community: Seven Principles for BELONGING”_ by
Charles H. Vogl. A BK Currents Book. Berret-Koehler Publishers, Inc.,
Oakland, CA., © 2016. From _“Preface”_ pp. xii-xiii. 

	2 Vogl, Op. cit., page xv