Sermon Title: "Why Go to Church?  2- Real People"
Date: September 19, 2010
Minister:  The Rev. Charles Ensley

Lesson:  Luke 16:1-13

Last Sunday I began my sermon series on why we go to church.  The first reason was community.  Today’s reason is real people.  And in case you want to know where this sermon is going, it has two points, and here they are:  1) Hypocrisy in the church is mostly a myth; and 2) Most people want to be better people.

Hypocrisy is perhaps the single biggest reason people say they don’t go to church.  In fact, according to UnChristian, a book based on surveys (by Barna Research Group) done among people with no religious affiliation in the 16- to 29-year-old bracket, 85 percent say one reason they don’t go to church is because Christians are hypocritical.

It’s such an easy word to say:  hypocrisy.  However, there’s a kind of truth to what they’re claiming.  If you’re looking for a group of people who always live up to their highest values and who never say one thing and do another, you’ll need to look elsewhere—though you probably won’t find a group of any sort totally free of inconsistency anywhere on this planet.

Maybe we had better understand what this charge of hypocrisy is if people are going to hurl it at us who are part of a church.  In the New Testament, the only time Jesus hurled the charge of hypocrisy was when people were doing something deliberately to appear outwardly different from what they were inwardly.  For example, he spoke about people who gave to charity “so that they may be praised by others.” (Matthew 6:2)  Likewise, he spoke against those who “love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others.” (v. 5)  He also chided the scribes and Pharisees for putting on appearances, saying, “For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth.” (Matthew 23:27)  Jesus called all of those people hypocrites, and the Greek word that’s translated “hypocrite” actually means “actor” or “stage player.”

How many church attendees do you suppose get up on a Sunday morning such as this and think, “I’m going to go to church so I can pretend to be righteous and appear to be holy”?  That would be acting, or playing a part, or being “two-faced.”  And I think it’s too difficult to sustain such an act for very long.

The church is not full of hypocrites.  The church is full of real people.  This church, like all churches, has people with successful careers and successful marriages.  We have people who have never been married, those who are widowed, and those who are separated, divorced, or still staying in a less-than-fulfilling marriage.  We have divorced people who have found a wonderful mate in a second marriage.  We have parents who have buried their children, either as young persons or adults.  We have straight and gay and lesbian people.  We have people who have been treated for cancer and suffered depression.  We have women who have agonized over decisions regarding an unexpected pregnancy.  We have people who have lost a job, or college graduates who in this economy have not yet found a job in their chosen field.  We have people who are in very tight financial straits.  And in most every case, any one of those persons would be willing to support someone else here who is facing the same.  That’s what being part of a community means.

Seventeen years ago, a couple in our church, Scott and Liz Hopkinson, who now live in Massachusetts, had a third child, Anne.  Shortly after her birth, Anne began to have severe seizures.  All kinds of tests and medications were tried to no avail.  Finally, when she was about two, the doctors decided that one side of her brain was malfunctioning, and the only solution to end the seizures was to remove one hemisphere of her brain.  They explained to the agonizing parents what physical and learning limitations this would likely impose upon Anne, but also the possibility that the remaining side of her brain could pick up some of those functions.

Liz’s parents flew out from Massachusetts to head up the household while Scott and Liz spend days and nights at UCLA Medical Center.  I spent time with them during the interminably long surgery.  The Sunday prior, we announced in church that we needed help bringing in meals for the family.  After worship that day, out in the Concert Hall we got a month of meals signed up in an instant.  One day I was taking our meal over to Liz’s parents, and they exclaimed, “There are people picking up the kids for school we don’t even know!”  They—church people themselves—were astonished by the generosity, care and concern of the people of this church:  real people, just like you and me.

When somebody is outside the church and has no intention of coming in, it’s easy for him or her to say it’s because of hypocrisy in the church.  And because there are some gaps between our best intentions and our follow-through, the person can no doubt find an example of inconsistency in the behavior of a Christian.  But church insiders are more likely to see those gaps differently.

In other words, if you really get involved with members of a congregation, you are less likely to see problems in the church in terms of hypocrisy and more in terms of human failure.  And when you’re talking about human failure, it’s easier to include yourself in that category.  In fact, many people stay in the church because, though they recognize imperfections among both fellow attendees and themselves, they also see it’s a place where we’re called higher.  And if you pay attention in church, you’ll often see real people who are working very hard to follow Jesus faithfully.

Most real people in the church want to be better people.  Thus, one good reason to come to church is because it puts us in company with other people who also see that gap between what they profess and what they practice, and care enough to want to narrow it.  In church, we find people who aren’t that different from ourselves and who are on faith journeys similar to ours.

Today’s lesson from Luke includes Jesus’ parable of the dishonest manager, a guy who’s such an outright rascal that we would never point to him as a model churchgoer.  We can’t call him a hypocrite because he isn’t playacting at anything, and he doesn’t appear worried that he isn’t living up to a call from God.  He’s simply looking out for his own hide, and he’s quite straightforward about it.  Verse eight is most confusing to scholars because the rich man, the employer whom the manager is cheating out of expected income, can’t help but be impressed by the manager’s resourcefulness.  We can imagine the employer speaking to a friend about the incident, saying, “That guy cost me a bundle, but you’ve got to hand it to him for his shrewdness.  If only he’d put that kind of effort into the work I hired him for.”  Yes, we can admire his cleverness, but we don’t go to church hoping to find people like him as Christian models.  He’ll be well thought of by those for whom he reduced what they owed, but he really wasn’t honest.

As Jesus draws out the implications of that parable, he says, “[W]hoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much.” (v. 10)  Clear enough.  That fits the manager in the parable, so part of the point is “Don’t be like him.”  But Jesus also states the application positively:  “Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much,” and in those words is the description of most of the people we actually meet in church—real people who are working hard at being consistent in their approach to both minor and major matters.  Sure, even the most sincere Christians don’t always hit that mark.  There are days when I don’t.  Nonetheless, it is good for our souls to be among people who keep striving to be faithful disciples of Jesus Christ.

If Jesus says being faithful in a little thing is good, consider what effect being faithful in a big thing can have.  About a month ago I watched a television movie entitled “Amish Grace.”  It was about the aftermath of the five Amish girls shot to death in their Pennsylvania schoolhouse in 2006 by a gunman, who also seriously wounded five other girls.  The grieving Amish grandfather of one of the slain girls, standing next to the body of one of the victims, turned to some Amish boys and said, “We must not think evil of this man.”  There’s not a much bigger thing to be faithful about than forgiving the murderer of a loved one, so don’t you think that man can be trusted in little things, too?

The movie depicted the mother of one slain girl who could not bring herself to easily forgive, but through struggling over time she did.  In a scene that actually happened in 2006, the Amish attended the funeral of the murderer, both to support his wife and to demonstrate their forgiveness.

There are real people in this and every church who accept responsibilities—sometimes thankless—and show up week after week to fulfill them.  Real people who quietly go about their business in the days between church services and do their best to be faithful, honest and caring, whatever life and circumstances throw their way.  Real people who respond with unwarranted kindness to someone in need who unexpectedly happens across their path.

Within the community that is the church, we find real people much like ourselves who work together at being faithful in things both great and small.  Sometimes the teachings of Jesus show so strongly through their actions that it both shames and guides real people like you and me.

A Note from the Preacher:

Portions of my fall sermon series are conceptually based on some sermons preached by the Rev. Dr. Melanie Rosa at Lakewood United Methodist Church in Lakewood, Colorado.  Dr. Rosa is now District Superintendent of the Mile High/Pikes Peak District, having served churches large and small, rural and urban for 25 years.  Dr. Rosa allowed use and adaption of her material in Homiletics, from which I adapted ideas for this sermon.