I grew up in Waynesboro, VA, a small city about the
size of Owen Sound up here. One of the
cherished childhood memories that I have is of my grandparents’ front
porch. The experience of a summer
evening spent on their porch greatly contributes to the ideas that I have of
the way things ought to be. They lived
in the same house they had lived in since Granddaddy came home from the
War. It was three blocks off Main Street,
a block from the police station where Granddaddy was Chief of Police, a block
from the 7-11 where Grandma sent us to buy her cigarettes, a block from the grocery
store and the bank, two blocks from the library, four from the “Y”, a block
from their church that they didn’t get to very often. There was even a barbershop on the corner of
their street. Such was their
“neighbourhood”.
This was no a wealthy neighbourhood by any
means. It would be a stretch to call it
even middle class. Had they been into
status Grandma and Granddaddy could easily have afforded living in a much more
upscale neighbourhood, but Granddaddy wasn’t like that.
Chief Benson was a quiet, calming presence on the
street. If there were a human being that
I imagine Jesus being like, it would be him. He was wise, compassionate, humble, and
brave. He knew when to get involved and
when not. He minded his own
business. If you needed someone to
listen, he was good at that. It was a
good, safe neighbourhood because of him.
Sitting on their porch in the summer after dinner
involved swinging on the porch swing or jumping off the steps. You’d have to listen to Grandma talk. She knew everyone’s business. There’d be talking back and forth across the
street with the neighbours. Everybody
who walked by was greeted. We kids would
run circles around the outside of the house or ask to walk to the 7-11 on our
own. Sometimes we’d eat watermelon or
cantaloupe or have an ice cream cone. It
was a neighbourhood and it was good.
Let’s talk about church in their neighbourhood. The
church that I mentioned was one of four that stood side-by-side. It was the First Baptist Church. First Presbyterian was there too, as well as
the main Episcopalian congregation. The
other was Lutheran as best as I can remember.
No one from the immediate neighbourhood actually went to these
churches. Being the city big steeples
they drew mostly from the wealthy good citizens who lived elsewhere, out in the
nice neighbourhoods. All of these
churches went through major declines starting in the late 1990’s to which they
have adjusted. They are smaller now and
still drawing from the wider wealthier Waynesboro area.
These congregations exist not as churches that serve
their immediate neighbourhood, but as churches that invite you in with the
expectation that you will make it central to your life. This way of church, this “come from
everywhere else and be a welcome part of our church” mindset has an inherent,
long-term side effect that affects many churches that are not connected to
their immediate neighbourhoods. The
people in the church over time become so involved with one another that they
disengage with other networks of relationships and lose contact with the world “out
there”. These churches begin to struggle
when the people in the church begin to say “my only friends are my church
friends.” Its great to have Christian
friends, but if your only friends are your church friends, how then is your
church to grow? More over, evangelism in
this setting consists largely of trying to covertly convince people that there
is something wrong with their existing network of friendships and “our”
Christian network of friendships centered on keeping an institution going is somehow
better for them.
One of the biggest shifts happening in the North
American church that’s helping churches return to being vibrant is reconnecting
with their immediate neighbourhood through a parish model of ministry. The parish is an old way of doing things that
developed when we didn’t have denominations competing for resources. My grandparent’s neighbourhood certainly did
not need four big steeples standing side by side. It only needed one to serve them, but there
was nothing of the sort. The result of
that was I really don’t think anyone in that neighbourhood actually went to
church.
Let me plant an idea seed in you. My grandparent’s neighbourhood like every
neighbourhood had plenty of front porches.
Imagine one of those porches becoming a neighbourhood nexus for worship,
fellowship, and neighbours meeting the real needs of neighbours in Jesus’ name.
A parish church is a church put in a place simply to
serve the people that immediately surround it.
It has a minister and the church leaders, who come from the
neighbourhood, are intimately connected to the needs of their immediate
neighbours. In the parish church the
concerns of the neighbourhood are the concerns of the church. The purpose of the parish church isn’t so
much the conversion of individual people but the transformation of the
neighbourhood. Conversion/faith follows
on the coattails of transformation.
The parish church seeks to be the front porch
presence of Jesus in its neighbourhood. Just
as the Gospels portray him, Jesus, in the work of the Holy Spirit is out there
among the people doing his ministry. We
need to get away from a “come to church and get Jesus” mindset and start
thinking of ourselves as joining in with Jesus in his mission and ministry out
in our neighbourhoods. Church can’t
simply be somewhere we go. It must be
where we live. We need to imagine and
organize ourselves around mission rather than around “church” – mission to the
neighbourhood where this building sits. Church
missions thinker and author David Bosch somewhere said: “It isn’t the church of
God that has a mission in the world, it’s the God of Mission that has a church
in the world.” (see the introduction to Text & Context: Church Planting in Canada in Post-Christendom; Uban Loft; 2013; ed. Leonard Hjalmarson)
Looking at Hebrews, the Christians to whom Paul wrote
this letter met in peoples’ houses and most of the congregants came from the
immediate surrounding neighbourhood.
They didn’t travel halfway across town to meet at a church that met
their consumeristic flavour or because “this just felt like the right church
for me”. You went to church at your
neighbour’s house because by the Spirit Jesus was there among them in their
neighbourhood.
What we have in our reading today is Paul giving advice
for how Christians should be as neighbours.
First, “let mutual or brotherly love continue.” Love everyone as friends who are family. Love your neighbours as family even the ones
you don’t like.
Second, show hospitality. Once again this is not about how we make our
churches more hospitable so that when people visit they will like us. It’s about making this church or the church
that meets on my front porch hospitable or more like a home to the people who
live immediately across the street who ain’t like us. It might mean having weekly free meals where
people who are a little tight this month due to their bad habits or a
disability can come and be treated with respect and find Jesus among us.
Third, Paul tells them to remember your neighbours
who had been imprisoned for being Christians as if you were there with
them. As they were likely being
tortured, remember you are one body with them.
Admittedly, this is odd advice for us, but there are those in our midst
who suffer at home because their spouses are not sympathetic to their
faithfulness to Jesus.
Fourth, happy marriages make for good
neighbourhoods. Support your neighbours
in their marriages. Honour your own.
Fifth, the love of money, “keep your life free from
love of money, and be content with what you have.” The Lord is the one who provides for us what
we need. Jesus will never leave us or
forsake us. We do not need to fear
anything. That is advice we need to
abide by in a culture in which we just have so much stuff when so many others
have nothing.
Sixth, the leaders in the neighbourhood church are
those who walk the talk of the teachings of Jesus among their neighbours. We should imitate their faithfulness. My grandfather, even though he wasn’t very
regular at church at all, was a good example of this.
Seventh, in, with, and through Jesus we offer a
sacrifice of praise in our neighbourhoods.
This is not standing on our porches and singing “Praise Jesus”
repetitively while we strum something that sounds like the theme song to
“Friends” on guitars. Paul defines this
sacrifice as doing good and sharing what we have. These are sacrifices pleasing to God because
they join with him in what he is doing in our neighbourhoods.
I challenge you to think of ways this congregation
can reconnect with its immediate neighbourhood.
The Holy Spirit is out there already working. Where and how do we join in as the body of
Christ? Better yet, whose got a front
porch we can gather together on and start being the church in the
neighbourhood? Amen.
