Many Gifts, One Spirit
Scriptures: 1 Corinthians 12:1-11
John 2:1-11
In our Scripture from 1 Corinthians today, Paul is writing to church members at one of his mission churches. They’ve written him asking different questions about faith, and he’s answering with instructions and perspective. In this section, Paul is explaining spiritual gifts. All these gifts, Paul says, are from God. The Spirit parcels out prophecy, faith, and wisdom where they are needed. The Spirit grants knowledge, discernment, and healing as it chooses. Each gift is from the Spirit, for the good of the whole. Many Gifts, One Spirit.
Since we are looking at spiritual gifts today, I’d like to take some time to tell you about the Lutheran Volunteer Corps from the perspective of our gifts. I’ll start with a short clip from our educational dvd.
[clip: beginning to 4:28]
As the video explains, the Lutheran Volunteer Corps gives people the opportunity to live out their commitments through a year of service. The three particular gifts we bring are our tenets: intentional community, simplified living, and social justice.
Intentional community is a gift of the Spirit because it is a way of learning to foster that greatest gift of all: love. Volunteers covenant with each other to live together, and not just in the sense of being roommates, and sharing space, but in the sense of sharing their lives with each other—supporting each other in their work and in their goals for the future. Of course, just as in any church, loving community is difficult to achieve.
It is often much easier to love people who live on the other side of the world than it is to love the man living next door who never mows, or the woman sitting in the committee meeting who keeps talking even though it’s already gone a half-hour over, and your favorite TV show starts in 15 minutes, or the housemate who forgets to clean out the refrigerator, even though it was their week to do it. Maybe none of you have ever faced this. Maybe it’s just me. But if you haven’t, well then, you’re missing out! You think I’m joking, but I’m not. The gift of intentional community is that it gives us the opportunity to learn to love real people – to learn to admit when we’re wrong, to learn to speak up when we’re hurt, to learn to face conflicts and work through them – to learn to love real people. And you can’t learn these things by reading them in a book. They are part of the gift of intentional community, and they are a gift of the Holy Spirit. Many gifts, One Spirit.
Simplified living is a second gift the Lutheran Volunteer Corps brings to the whole church. It is the practice of deciding what is truly of value, and letting the rest go. For example, our volunteers each get $85 per month to spend on their food. This means they’ll be able to get enough to eat, but they probably won’t be eating out very often, and you can certainly say goodbye to the daily latte from Starbucks.
But let me take a minute to share about my Wilmington volunteers. Even though they’re on a limited stipend for their food, these folks have decided that any meat or eggs they buy will be raised humanely, even though it will be more expensive than conventional meat. This is part of their care for God’s creation. As you can see from this example, living simply is not, in fact, simple. It means giving our time, energy and money only to what is most important to us. But that is what our whole faith journey is about as Christians – learning to pay attention to what is most important to God, and living accordingly. Many gifts, One Spirit.
Social justice is our third tenet. Through the work that each volunteer does, day in and day out during their year of service, we contribute to the struggle for better lives for all people – for the poor, the marginalized, and the powerless. And as an organization we are working toward becoming more just internally through our Journey to Inclusive Community. We welcome people of any sexual orientation to volunteer and serve on our staff, board, and support committees, and we are working to become a more welcoming place for people of color through ongoing education and relationship-building. Many gifts, One Spirit.
And this weekend is a particularly important weekend for us to reflect on the state of race relations in America, since tomorrow is Martin Luther King, Jr., day. The Civil Rights movement in the United States made for lasting change in the opportunities available to people of any race. And it was able to do so because of the many gifts of the Spirit given to the people of the time. The people of the movement brought wisdom to their struggle, exposing the hatred and oppressiveness behind the Jim Crow laws without responding in kind. They brought faith: faith in God, faith in justice, and faith that their struggle would bear fruit. They brought knowledge, not only about the truth of the black struggle, but about the truth of their strength, courage and perseverance. They brought healing—true healing—by refusing to hide those truths. They gave the nation a new vision – Martin Luther King, Jr., preached that new vision – a dream founded in the roots of our faith that God has created all people equal and free – a dream that all people would be judged, not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character – a dream that one day all God’s children, black and white, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics will be able to join hands and sing together,
Free at last, free at last!
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!
Many gifts, indeed. One abiding Spirit.
So what about our gifts now? In his letter to a long-ago church Paul gives us some important instruction today on developing our gifts. First, because our gifts come from the Holy Spirit, we don’t get to brag. Paul was trying to get the Corinthians to stop playing power games with each other. “I can speak in tongues, so I’m better than you.” “Well, I’m really wise, so I should get the pew up front.” You get the picture. The Corinthians were caught up in what their status with each other was, and forgot about their status before God. The truth is, our gifts are not of our own making. They come from God. The most important gift is learning to love each other, even when our gifts differ. One-upsmanship does not lead to true community.
Second, Paul reminds us, the gifts that the Spirit gives to individuals are intended for the benefit of the entire church. As a part of the Lutheran Volunteer Corps, I don’t want us to be separated off from the church, going about our business in isolation. I hope that you as a congregation will join us in living out our tenets of simplified living, social justice, and intentional community. These are not gifts for our organization alone. They are gifts for the whole church.
Many gifts, One Spirit.
What was so radically amazing, in my mind, about the Civil Rights Movement, was not necessarily that it was a fight for the rights of a distinct group of people, but that its goals and its gifts were directed toward the transformation of all society. The freedom that Martin Luther King, Jr. preached about was freedom for white people as well as black, by returning America to its founding values, and by calling the nation to live out its ideals. Many gifts, One Spirit.
The gifts that you have as an individual are not for you alone. They are meant to be shared. Many gifts, One Spirit.
Finally, our gifts can be a source of joy. In our gospel reading from the lectionary today, Jesus begins his ministry at a wedding in Cana. Here is someone who has a few gifts of the Holy Spirit. And you would think that he would start flexing those spiritual muscles in a pretty serious way – with a healing, maybe, or even by raising someone from the dead. But that’s not what he does. Instead, Jesus transforms an incredible amount of water – six jars that probably held about nine gallons each – into really good wine. Jesus’ first gift is to keep the party going. When we think about giving our gifts, then, we should find the joy in the giving. We’ve been given many gifts by the one Spirit. Let us go now to enjoy them with humility and generosity. Thanks be to God. Amen.
John 2:1-11
In our Scripture from 1 Corinthians today, Paul is writing to church members at one of his mission churches. They’ve written him asking different questions about faith, and he’s answering with instructions and perspective. In this section, Paul is explaining spiritual gifts. All these gifts, Paul says, are from God. The Spirit parcels out prophecy, faith, and wisdom where they are needed. The Spirit grants knowledge, discernment, and healing as it chooses. Each gift is from the Spirit, for the good of the whole. Many Gifts, One Spirit.
Since we are looking at spiritual gifts today, I’d like to take some time to tell you about the Lutheran Volunteer Corps from the perspective of our gifts. I’ll start with a short clip from our educational dvd.
[clip: beginning to 4:28]
As the video explains, the Lutheran Volunteer Corps gives people the opportunity to live out their commitments through a year of service. The three particular gifts we bring are our tenets: intentional community, simplified living, and social justice.
Intentional community is a gift of the Spirit because it is a way of learning to foster that greatest gift of all: love. Volunteers covenant with each other to live together, and not just in the sense of being roommates, and sharing space, but in the sense of sharing their lives with each other—supporting each other in their work and in their goals for the future. Of course, just as in any church, loving community is difficult to achieve.
It is often much easier to love people who live on the other side of the world than it is to love the man living next door who never mows, or the woman sitting in the committee meeting who keeps talking even though it’s already gone a half-hour over, and your favorite TV show starts in 15 minutes, or the housemate who forgets to clean out the refrigerator, even though it was their week to do it. Maybe none of you have ever faced this. Maybe it’s just me. But if you haven’t, well then, you’re missing out! You think I’m joking, but I’m not. The gift of intentional community is that it gives us the opportunity to learn to love real people – to learn to admit when we’re wrong, to learn to speak up when we’re hurt, to learn to face conflicts and work through them – to learn to love real people. And you can’t learn these things by reading them in a book. They are part of the gift of intentional community, and they are a gift of the Holy Spirit. Many gifts, One Spirit.
Simplified living is a second gift the Lutheran Volunteer Corps brings to the whole church. It is the practice of deciding what is truly of value, and letting the rest go. For example, our volunteers each get $85 per month to spend on their food. This means they’ll be able to get enough to eat, but they probably won’t be eating out very often, and you can certainly say goodbye to the daily latte from Starbucks.
But let me take a minute to share about my Wilmington volunteers. Even though they’re on a limited stipend for their food, these folks have decided that any meat or eggs they buy will be raised humanely, even though it will be more expensive than conventional meat. This is part of their care for God’s creation. As you can see from this example, living simply is not, in fact, simple. It means giving our time, energy and money only to what is most important to us. But that is what our whole faith journey is about as Christians – learning to pay attention to what is most important to God, and living accordingly. Many gifts, One Spirit.
Social justice is our third tenet. Through the work that each volunteer does, day in and day out during their year of service, we contribute to the struggle for better lives for all people – for the poor, the marginalized, and the powerless. And as an organization we are working toward becoming more just internally through our Journey to Inclusive Community. We welcome people of any sexual orientation to volunteer and serve on our staff, board, and support committees, and we are working to become a more welcoming place for people of color through ongoing education and relationship-building. Many gifts, One Spirit.
And this weekend is a particularly important weekend for us to reflect on the state of race relations in America, since tomorrow is Martin Luther King, Jr., day. The Civil Rights movement in the United States made for lasting change in the opportunities available to people of any race. And it was able to do so because of the many gifts of the Spirit given to the people of the time. The people of the movement brought wisdom to their struggle, exposing the hatred and oppressiveness behind the Jim Crow laws without responding in kind. They brought faith: faith in God, faith in justice, and faith that their struggle would bear fruit. They brought knowledge, not only about the truth of the black struggle, but about the truth of their strength, courage and perseverance. They brought healing—true healing—by refusing to hide those truths. They gave the nation a new vision – Martin Luther King, Jr., preached that new vision – a dream founded in the roots of our faith that God has created all people equal and free – a dream that all people would be judged, not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character – a dream that one day all God’s children, black and white, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics will be able to join hands and sing together,
Free at last, free at last!
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!
Many gifts, indeed. One abiding Spirit.
So what about our gifts now? In his letter to a long-ago church Paul gives us some important instruction today on developing our gifts. First, because our gifts come from the Holy Spirit, we don’t get to brag. Paul was trying to get the Corinthians to stop playing power games with each other. “I can speak in tongues, so I’m better than you.” “Well, I’m really wise, so I should get the pew up front.” You get the picture. The Corinthians were caught up in what their status with each other was, and forgot about their status before God. The truth is, our gifts are not of our own making. They come from God. The most important gift is learning to love each other, even when our gifts differ. One-upsmanship does not lead to true community.
Second, Paul reminds us, the gifts that the Spirit gives to individuals are intended for the benefit of the entire church. As a part of the Lutheran Volunteer Corps, I don’t want us to be separated off from the church, going about our business in isolation. I hope that you as a congregation will join us in living out our tenets of simplified living, social justice, and intentional community. These are not gifts for our organization alone. They are gifts for the whole church.
Many gifts, One Spirit.
What was so radically amazing, in my mind, about the Civil Rights Movement, was not necessarily that it was a fight for the rights of a distinct group of people, but that its goals and its gifts were directed toward the transformation of all society. The freedom that Martin Luther King, Jr. preached about was freedom for white people as well as black, by returning America to its founding values, and by calling the nation to live out its ideals. Many gifts, One Spirit.
The gifts that you have as an individual are not for you alone. They are meant to be shared. Many gifts, One Spirit.
Finally, our gifts can be a source of joy. In our gospel reading from the lectionary today, Jesus begins his ministry at a wedding in Cana. Here is someone who has a few gifts of the Holy Spirit. And you would think that he would start flexing those spiritual muscles in a pretty serious way – with a healing, maybe, or even by raising someone from the dead. But that’s not what he does. Instead, Jesus transforms an incredible amount of water – six jars that probably held about nine gallons each – into really good wine. Jesus’ first gift is to keep the party going. When we think about giving our gifts, then, we should find the joy in the giving. We’ve been given many gifts by the one Spirit. Let us go now to enjoy them with humility and generosity. Thanks be to God. Amen.
posted by Amy Sens at 6:41 PM
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