John 17:17-23
A study published in 2020 by the health insurer Cigna—which surveyed over 10,000 people—found that more than three in five Americans are lonely. More and more people report feeling left out, being poorly understood, and lacking companionship. Since 2018 when the survey was first conducted, there has been a 13% rise in loneliness.[1] The COVID-19 pandemic generally increased feelings of loneliness. Political and social divisions in our country have certainly contributed as well. And technology is viewed as both a factor which can help people feel less lonely and also a contributing factor to more loneliness and isolation in some ways.
At the same time, involvement in community organizations has declined. Across the country churches and other places of worship, service organizations like the Lion’s Club and Rotary, and local volunteer organizations like food banks and homeless shelters have all reported a steady decline in membership and participation over the past several decades. Yet there is a real need for human beings to be in community. And when we don’t experience community, we naturally experience loneliness, stress, and lack of meaning in our lives.
This fall we’ve been highlighting the various ministries of St. Matthew. And today’s ministry spotlight is on fellowship. We heard Anne share a bit about the fellowship ministries of our congregation. The fellowship committee, coffee hour volunteers, women’s group, men’s breakfast, and the church historians who record the history of this community. All of these groups help unite this community of faith, build relationships, and bring us together for a common purpose.
In our first reading today we heard Paul’s famous phrase of the Body of Christ used to describe the early Christian community. He was writing to the people of Corinth, who were in many ways, a divided people. They were divided with some of them thinking they were following Paul’s tradition or Peter’s tradition or Apollos’ tradition—and Paul said no that’s not how it works, you can’t divide up Christ like that. Paul himself, and Peter and Apollos, were all followers of Jesus not leaders of their own brand. In this letter Paul also addresses disagreements about whether Christians could eat meat sacrificed to idols. And Paul calls them out on their practices surrounding the Lord’s Supper, the agape meal. Where the rich ate their fill, and the poor were left hungry.
Paul spends much of the letter instructing and correcting the Corinthians on how to be unified in Christ. And then he then gets to what we read this morning from chapter 12, where he introduces the concept of the Body of Christ. It’s a wonderful metaphor for the church. That we are all individually members of this body, and yet one body together. This is what we are called to be as followers of Jesus—his body in the world today. A people so united that we are like one human body with many organs and parts but work together as one whole.
This unity is what Jesus prayed for in the Gospel reading we heard this morning. In that text, Jesus is praying the night before he died. He asks God the Father to make his followers one, so that they may experience the same oneness with God and with each other that Jesus and God the Father experience eternally. Such oneness with God is God’s plan for humanity. Oneness with God and oneness with each other. This is not a oneness where we completely lose our distinctness, but oneness where we are individuals in genuine union with God and each other, so much so that we are extensions of God’s will together.
Theologians teach that such perfect union with God is in fact humanity’s destiny. And we get to experience this union now, however imperfectly, in the form of the church, that is the Body of Christ. This is the fellowship we embody together. The friendship, the care, the comfort that it is to be church together. And also the challenges, the difficulties, the heartache that it is to be community together.
It is in the arena of human relationships that we get to practice love. Love not as a feeling or emotion, but as a genuine spiritual practice. We get to practice love in our families and intimate relationships. We get to practice love in friendships and even with complete strangers. And we get to embody the spiritual practice of love in our relationship with the church. In the love we put into action as we put others first, build up the community, and serve God and our neighbors.
And the church is the perfect place to do this. Even and especially in today’s society. You see, in the world today there are not many places where all generations get together to be in community. Most of the time in all our activities, people are siloed by generations. Children go to school. Adults go to work. Retired adults are similarly siloed in most activities. Besides for within our families, most people don’t interact much with other generations. And for many people church is perhaps the only place they interact with non-family members across all generations. That’s one of the many special things about this fellowship we have in the Body of Christ. We are all equal and valued members of the Body of Christ. And as members of this Body of Christ we are called both to be a model of right relationship for the world and to be ministers of reconciliation, serving the world and proclaiming the good news of God’s love in Jesus Christ for all people.
Today is the Sunday following St. Francis Day, which was October 4th. Francis is the saint famous for loving animals and recognizing all creation as our sisters and brothers. As members of the one community of Christ. After church today we celebrate with a special blessing of the animals outside at 11:30. A moment when we pray for our pets and recognize their membership of this community, their participation in this fellowship, their being beloved members of God’s creation. Francis recognized the importance of true community. He understood it so deeply that he was as inclusive as he possibly could be, and included every single created thing in his understanding of God’s family.
Today we also celebrate the Baptism of Jack Roger Dickinson and welcome him into this fellowship of the Body of Christ. Through his baptism into Christ, little Jack will become a full member of the Body of Christ. Called to let his light shine and reflect the love of God in the world. We are blessed to welcome him into this particular faith community and into the church universal. So that he may experience the joys of being one with the people of God, the Body of Christ.
It is our mission as the church to be community together. Fellowship is not just a nice thing we do to enjoy each other’s company. We are in fact called by God to be together, to build each other up, to practice sharing divine love with each other, and together to share God’s love with the world. Even and especially in a world that is so divided and lonely, we are brought together by Christ and made into one body. Jesus Christ, who died and rose again, grafts us all into the one Body of Christ, so that we may be His Body in the world today. What a tremendous gift it is to be the Body of Christ together! Thanks be to God.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Pastor Brian Rajcok | October 6, 2024 | Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost
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