Watchnight Message

NEWS FROM BETHLEHEM!

Now, with a start like that here in a Moravian sanctuary all decorated for Christmas you might reasonable expect the next thing to be a warm fuzzy. But it’s not.

If you paid very close attention to the news this week, you will have heard of the fight that broke out at the Basilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem.

Armenian monks and Greek Orthodox priests got into a really vicious fight with brooms – Palestinian police finally had to come in to break up the scuffle.

This parallels tensions that have existed for years at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

The primary custodians are the Eastern Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, and Roman Catholic Churches, with the Greek Orthodox Church having the lion's share. In the 19th century, the Coptic Orthodox, the Ethiopian Orthodox and the Syriac Orthodox acquired lesser responsibilities, which include shrines and other structures within and around the building. Times and places of worship for each community are strictly regulated in common areas.

But fights break out all the time over territorial and scheduling disputes. A few years ago, as one group prepared for their resurrection service, and had set up candles all around the central area of the church, another group disputed their scheduling and so came in, disrupted the service, and knocked down all the candles.

A less grave but also telling sign of this state of affairs is located on a window ledge over the church's entrance. Someone placed a wooden ladder there sometime before 1852, when the status quo defined both the doors and the window ledges as common ground. The ladder remains there to this day, in almost exactly the same position it can be seen to occupy in century-old photographs and engravings. None of the groups can agree whos responsibility it is or indeed who has the authority to remove it.

Some of our brothers and sisters of faith who live in the area refer to themselves as “Believers” rather than as “Christians” in order to differentiate themselves from rude tourists and the sad testimony of the broom-battling monks.

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This is the INSTITUTIONAL CHURCH at its worst; and though we may chuckle about it, at the same time it produces a sinking feeling in our hearts as we consider what a terrible witness this is for those who belong to Christ, the Christ who said, “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

We’ve just finished a year of extraordinary developments and non-developments, and some other things that gave the institutional Christian Church a black eye:

Harold Camping of the Family Radio Network announced the Rapture on May 21. We had a workshop here on May 22 entitled “Why the Rapture Didn’t Happen Yesterday,” had a lot of fun with it, someone put out some empty clothes in chairs – empty shoes and socks and the works - – we named them “George and Martha.” Then poor old Harold had to change the Rapture to October 21, and lo! We were still all here on October 22.

According to some folks, the world is supposed to end on December 21, 2012 at the end of the Mayan Calendar. See you on December 22!

OR – you may not have heard of this -- the world will end December 21 through a collision with the planet Nibiru -- according to Nancy Lieder, founder of the website ZetaTalk. Lieder describes herself as a “contactee” with the ability to receive messages from extra-terrestrials from the Zeta Reticuli star system through an implant in her brain.

I was delighted yesterday to find a wonderful article on The Huffington Post about the Watchnight Service by The Rev. P. Kimberleigh Jordan, a UCC Pastor. I was delighted because she acknowledged the Moravian origin of the service, and went on to describe how the Methodists had borrowed the idea, and how the African-American Church had picked it up – and how they had sat up a Watchnight in 1862 waiting for the Emancipation Proclamation to take effect on January 1, 1863.

But my heart sank when I saw that the first response was from a shrill fundamentalist who is sure that Christian observances of New Year are CONTRARY TO THE WILL of GOD. I was saddened because I thought of how that post would come across to many people as simply proving the worst about Christians.

CHRISTIANS are often unaware of how they come across to others – particularly when on the defensive! When on the defensive, we typically become OFFENSIVE!

INSTITUTIONAL CHURCH is on the decline.

In his new book, You Lost Me: Why Young Christians Are Leaving Church and Rethinking Faith, David Kinnaman, the president of the Barna Research Group, says that 18- to 29-year-olds have fallen down a "black hole" of church attendance. There is a 43% drop in Christian church attendance between the teen and early adult years, he says.

PRIME REASONS – Institutional church seems to be defending something irrelevant and even destructive. Many young people regard Christians as being mean-spirited, judgmental, and out of touch. “Anti-science” factions, “hot-button-issue” factions seem to have no relevance to their lives – or to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

WHY? Because they encounter Westboro Baptist Church picketing funerals of fallen soldiers. They see politicians setting forth positions that seem hateful and discriminatory and labeling them as CHRISTIAN. They see a piece of the world that eagerly identifies itself as CHRISTIAN which often seems to borrow more from the atheist Ayn Rand than from the words of Jesus.

They see the monks and priests at Bethlehem beating each other with brooms, and having order restored by Palestinian police.

They hear looney tunes like Harold Camping proclaim silly predictions of the Rapture, proclaiming it to be “The Word a’ Gawd” and then waffle like idiots when it doesn’t come true.

When the institutional Church is threatened, when it is in decline, the natural thing for it to do is to hunker down into self-defensive mode. Because we all know that the primary function of an institution is self-preservation. Keep the bills paid, the lights on, the heat bill paid.

One church I served had a weekly Men’s Fellowship Coffee and Donuts meeting. Every Wednesday at 9 am we would meet for coffee and Dunkin’ Donuts – sorry Krispy Kreme, this was New Jersey – and tell tales of World War II.

One week one of the men, a valiant WWII vet, was talking about his frustrations with the hard time they had keeping the local VFW Post going. They had a declining, aging membership. He said, “We’ve got to get some young folks to join to keep the Post going.”

Though I didn’t say anything to him at the moment, this statement just hit me between the eyes – that’s how we think as a church, I thought. But the fact is that new members do not join to keep the institution open! They join because the institution is fulfilling some need in their lives.

YOUNG FOLKS ARE NOT GOING TO JOIN TO KEEP THE INSTITUTION ALIVE.

We may laugh sadly about the broom-fighting monks of Bethlehem, but we are not that different sometimes.

When we hide in our sanctuaries and expect people to come to us, we may know where we are, but we have lost our way.

When we defend bricks and mortar at the expense of winning souls for Christ, we have lost our way.

When we preserve beloved warm fuzzy traditions but fail to work for justice in our communities, we have lost our way.

When our music is perfect, but it is not sung because we have the song of Christ in our hearts, then the notes are empty echoes because we have lost our way.

When we care more about doctrine and rules than about human suffering, we have lost our way.

Last week, we each lifted up CHRISTMAS CANDLES in one sanctuary or another.

Shall we take those glowing candles and find a hand-woven, authentic, 18^th century basket to hide them under? DO WE HIDE THE LIGHT CHRIST HAS GIVEN US UNDER A BUSHEL???

I BELIEVE:

· We have a vital, important, desperately needed message for our world in 2012!

· A message that our divided, jaded, over-entertained, out-of-work Walmartized world needs.

· A message that has to do not with doctrine or institutions or even warm fuzzy traditions that we love, but with the idea of community, the COMMUNITY of the CROSS.

· A message of believers living in the world in community, known not by their bumper stickers but by their love.

· A message of the transforming grace of God!

We need to put our feet on the ground and be bringing to people the good news!

"How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!"

Young folks will stand up and be counted to be a part of meaningful mission, of transformative worship, of working one-on-one to change the world.

As we go forward into 2012, there is all kind of uncertainty

Economic,

Political,

Environmental

In 1732, Leonard Dober and David Nitschmann left for St Thomas – expecting to have to sell themselves into slavery. NO CERTAINTY OF ANYTHING except the call of the Savior. There is no greater uncertainty in 2012 than what they had!

In 1939, at the start of World War II, there was no greater uncertainty of the future that for those in England who faced the onslaught of Hitler’s Third Reich. In his Christmas Message on the radio, King George VI – a man we all know more about from the movie The King’s Speech – read a part of a 1908 poem by Minnie Louise Haskins to the British people, a poem that hangs on the wall of my office:

And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
“Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.”
And he replied:
“Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.”
So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God, trod gladly into the night.
And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of day in the lone East.

BUT when we put those feet on the ground and set forth on a journey into the unknown to preach the Good News, we are not and will never be alone, our way is illuminated by something better than light and guided by the Father of all Being, the one who was, who is, and who is to come! AMEN.