You Say You Want a Reformation

 Eastern Parkway United Methodist Church

 A warm welcome to each worshiper today. We celebrate you and offer you our friendship and love. We are a congregation of people who seek to grow spiritually, to become more like Christ in His compassion and acceptance of everyone while growing more aware of what it really means to be Christians today.

As a Reconciling Congregation, EPUMC affirms the sacred worth of persons of all sexual orientations and gender identities and welcomes them into full participation in the fellowship, membership, ministries, and leadership of the congregation.

 

 

 

943 Palmer Avenue, Schenectady, NY 12309 / 518-374-4306 epumc943@gmail.com / www.easternparkway.org

Order of Worship

October 29, 2023

10:00 a.m.

Reformation Sunday

*You are invited to rise in body or spirit.

 

Prelude

Greeting and Announcements

Mission Statement:

We are a faith community striving to be, to nurture, and to send forth disciples of Jesus Christ.

Call to Worship:

God has called us to be people of love.

God didn’t mean the “syrupy” stuff of movies and novels.

Truly loving can sometimes be difficult

Yet we are called to reach beyond the difficulty with compassion.

In all of this, God is with us, guiding and helping us.

Thanks be to God for God’s faithful presence. AMEN.

*Hymn                          A Mighty Fortress                     #110

Prayer of Confession:

Merciful God, it isn’t easy for us to follow the commandments of loving. Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love God and to love our neighbors. But we have allowed misunderstanding, fear, hatred, and prejudice to cloud our spirits, turning them away from those who need our love. We place a test before you, asking that you prove your love to us, or we threaten not to believe in you. Please forgive us for this foolishness and stubbornness. Give us the courage to be people who will care for others. Let us dedicate our lives in your service, always aware of your awesome love for us. This we ask in Jesus’ Name. AMEN.

Assurance:

Though our hearts were hardened to the needs of others, God has touched them with God’s compassionate care, healing our wounds and giving courage and strength to our souls. Be assured that God’s love is poured out for you and rejoice! AMEN.

Scripture Reading Deuteronomy 34: 1-12

Moses Dies and Is Buried in the Land of Moab

34 Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, which is opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him the whole land: Gilead as far as Dan, 2 all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the Western Sea, 3 the Negeb, and the Plain—that is, the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees—as far as Zoar. 4 The Lord said to him, “This is the land of which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’ I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there.” 5 Then Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there in the land of Moab, at the Lord’s command. 6 He buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth-peor, but no one knows his burial place to this day. 7 Moses was one hundred twenty years old when he died; his sight was unimpaired, and his vigor had not abated. 8 The Israelites wept for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days; then the period of mourning for Moses was ended.

9 Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom because Moses had laid his hands on him, and the Israelites obeyed him, doing as the Lord had commanded Moses.

10 Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face. 11 He was unequaled for all the signs and wonders that the Lord sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, 12 and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel.

Sermon                                 You Say You Want a Reformation

This week, coming into another Reformation Sunday, I was thinking about the Beatles song “Revolution”. I know, last week you had D’Angelo, this week you get the Beatles, lucky you. This Spotify subscription is really paying for itself! Anyway, I found the lyrics to be very prophetic for the state of the Church, because, wouldn’t you know it, our society is facing a lot of the same issues that it was 60 years ago.

You say you want a revolution

Well, you know

We all wanna change the world

You tell me that it’s evolution

Well, you know

We all wanna change the world

But when you talk about destruction

Don’t you know that you can count me out

You say you’ve got a real solution

Well, you know

We’d all love to see the plan

You ask me for a contribution

Well, you know

We’re all doing what we can

But if you want money for people with minds that hate

All I can tell you is brother you have to wait

How do we change for the better, and stay that way? Is it possible in this life?

This question stretches waaaay back, even earlier than the Beatles, all the way back to Moses, whose last moments on earth we hear about in this morning’s scripture reading. Moses takes a last walk with God, and the Divine shows him the Promised Land, at long last. Both as a punishment for hulking out and smashing the tablets that had the Ten Commandments on them, and also because he’s 120 years old, the Holy tells Moses that seeing the edge of the Promised Land over the horizon is as close as he’ll ever get. His train stops here. Moses accepts that with grace, and dies right then and there.

He teaches us something very important about change, and legacy. He spent forty years devoted to the Hebrew people. He fought for them, he freed them, he guided them through the desert, and he saved them from every peril they could possibly have stepped into. All to get them to Canaan, a land and a future set aside for them. Moses poured absolutely everything into creating something that he would never live in or benefit from. 

It’s a tough reality to face, and I don’t expect any of us to acknowledge that as gracefully as Moses did. But the best work we’ll do for this Church, this town, this country, and this world, will almost certainly take longer than any of us have left on this earth to come to fruition. We can’t create any meaningful change for our own benefit, because it just doesn’t work like that. But we can create change that will benefit our children, our grandchildren, and the generations to come. 

But that requires tremendous selflessness. Do we have that within us? Unfortunately, you could argue that not only has social progress in this country stagnated, but in some cases it’s declined. Many in my generation, and the ones following mine, have taken on unprecedented amounts of student debt and then gone into the adult world unable to get a job, buy a house, or support a family. The wealth gap is widening. The number of billionaires in the world is growing, but so is the number of children in poverty. We haven’t solved the gender wage gap, we’ve never had a woman US President, firearm deaths have skyrocketed, racism and xenophobia have amplified, and we can’t stop going to war.

And that last point sets our eyes on the conflict in Israel, especially along the Gaza strip. It’s a conflict that stretches all the way back to this morning’s scripture reading. To whom does that land belong? What can a civilization justify doing to another over their perceived land rights? And when one population attacks another, can we justify retribution? When you keep taking an eye for an eye, do we all go blind? Is a ceasefire too immense to ask for? What is the cost of peace?

On this Reformation Sunday, these questions connect us to a point in history much later than Moses, but earlier than present day. They connect us to Martin Luther, who nailed his 95 theses, or statements of protest against the Roman Catholic Church, on the front door of the All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg, Germany, on October 31, 1517. At least, according to legend he did. We know for a fact that he snail mailed them to his bishop, but history wants to remember Luther not just as a long winded pen pal to his ecclesial superiors, but also as the biggest, baddest rebel of the 16th Century. And what’s more hardcore than stapling a long list of grievances to the front door of your church? Well, actually, a lot of things. That brings this right back to us.

Because of the hard work of many who lived before us, people like Moses and Martin Luther, but also many people whose names were never documented, we’re here. Our world is different than Moses’, in that we have a place to call home. Our world is different than Luther’s, in that we have a place to worship and speak our minds. But we have a long, long way to go before anything we see around us even remotely resembles justice.

What would you like to see change? If you had unlimited resources and the ears of the most powerful people on earth, what would you want to get done? You certainly don’t need to have 95 Theses, but do you have a short mental list of things you don’t want to see continue as they are? If so, what are they?

I asked some Methodist clergy friends this week what they’d write if they submitted 95 Theses to the United Methodist Church. They responded with some things you’d expect, and some things you wouldn’t. For example:

-An end to the itinerant system

-A living wage for all employed by the UMC

-Devotion across our connection to universal, single-payer healthcare

-Inclusive language for the Sacred in all contexts

-The elimination of homophobic and transphobic language from the Book of Discipline, and the overturn of the Traditional Plan

-Getting rid of the problematic cross and flame logo and replacing it

-Allowing deacons and laity to serve communion

-An official denouncement of Christian nationalism

-A Taskforce on addressing colonialism

-More interfaith relationship building work

Did any of those surprise you? Did you feel like anything was missing? What would you add? And, perhaps most importantly, if we made a comprehensive list of demanded changes for the UMC, where would we post it? Who would need to see it? Our top down power structure is quite different than Luther’s was, we don’t have a Pope for our ideas to get back to. But we must remember–Luther intended to just change the Roman Catholic Church, but once he started talking change, he quickly became persona non grata among the Catholics, and ended up starting his own tradition. 

Really, I think we need to decide what in this world we find unbearable, commit to working for change, and nail that list to our own hearts. Then we need to get to work, for the sake of the future.

Amen.

*Hymn                   Lord, I Want to Be More Christian                      #402

Offering

Offertory

*Doxology #94

*Prayer of dedication           

Pastoral Prayer and Lord’s Prayer

O Lord our God, on Reformation Sunday we remember the complex legacy of our church. Grant us the internal space to view the ancestors of our faith as their whole selves, gifts and sins together.

We remember the courage and stubborn boldness of Martin Luther but cannot reconcile his faith and passion with his fervent antisemitism. We remember the attention to detail of John Calvin, who taught that the church has a responsibility to care for all of society from sewers to schooling. Yet we also confess Calvin’s penchant for policy sometimes made Geneva a rather dreary place without nuance for Anabaptists. We remember the boldness of John Knox, who took a stand in the political realm even venturing to lecture monarchs. And we acknowledge his iconoclasm and puritanical impulses left little room for faithful artistic expression.

We give thanks for the beautiful legacy of the Reformation: for the resurgence of the humanities and the gift of reading Scripture and offering our prayers to you in our own tongue, for the examples of those who resisted government overreach and abuse of power, for those who stayed true to their conscience in the face of great loss. We carry these lessons with us knowing they came at a great cost.

Before you, we also name those unsung heroes of the Reformation, women like Marguerite de Navarre and Katharina von Zimmern, who offered gifted insight and political protection to those who might otherwise have been put to death violently or left unable to carry out their reforms.

On this Reformation Sunday, we also pray for harmony across denominations, knowing that unity is central to your being. We pray for our Roman Catholic siblings in Christ, alongside other ecclesial traditions, confessing that in many cases, it is mainly culture, political polarization, and familial customs that separate us more than differences in doctrine, practice, or the source of our common faith in Jesus Christ.

Teach us, O God, that perhaps the greatest lesson of the Reformation comes to us from Calvin’s unmarked grave. Preserve us from our desire for earthly monuments, keep us from wasting our precious time wringing our hands over ecclesial self-preservation, and re-direct us from worshipping the past and enshrining our dead heroes. Through the gift of baptism, you have not only called clergy or special Christians or only some of us, but you have called each one of us to use our God-given gifts to reflect your grace and glory, to impact this world for Christ’s sake, and to engage in activities that enable our neighbors to thrive and flourish in this world you so love.

To that end, help us to rejoice in the legacy of the Reformation, to be a church that embraces our role in the public sphere alongside Christians of other traditions and people of other faiths. In our life together, make us an ever-closer likeness of your beloved community. And outside the walls of our community of faith, enable us each to pursue a life, not of completion, but one that looks to the future with confidence that your Holy Spirit will bring all things to their proper end. Until then, may we be “reformed and being always reforming,” not as a principle in and of itself, but according to your Word, Jesus Christ our Lord, in whose name we pray. Amen.

Our Father, Mother, Creator God, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. Lead us, not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory forever. Amen.

*Hymn                        Just a Closer Walk with Thee                      #2158

Benediction

Postlude

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Staff

Natalie Bowerman Pastor

Betsy Lehmann Music Director

Joe White Custodian

Cassandra Brown Nursery Attendant