"Holy By-Laws"
A Sunday Sermon Preached by
The Rev. Thomas C. Leinbach
May 18, 2008 - Harwich, Massachusetts

Preaching Text: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit…" (Matthew 28:18)

This may sound like a dumb question. Then again, it's a good thing periodically to revisit life's essentials. The question is this: what does it mean to be a Christian?

That's a pretty basic question. And answering it, I would suggest, is probably not all that easy.

So let me ask, as you go about your everyday life, are you aware of how your faith makes you different? Or not? Do you bring a different sensibility to your day-to-day affairs? Or is being a Christian in America today more a matter of blending in, of acknowledging that we are all pretty much Christians anyway, in ethos, if not by name?

Jesus, it must be said, is very clear about what it means to be a Christian. In fact, in the so-called "Great Commission," taken from the end of Matthew's gospel, he offers a kind of job description detailing precisely what it means to be a Christian.

All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me," he says to his followers. "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you."

"And remember," he concludes, "I am with you always, to the end of the age."

Here we encounter six active verbs: go, make, baptize, teach, obey and remember. At first blush, this would seem to argue against "blending in" with the surrounding culture. Instead, these six verbs suggest more of a movement born of change rather than maintenance of the status quo.

"Go" is an active word that implies a broadening or extending of something. "Make," as in "making disciples of all nations," is transformational; it's all about change. "Baptize" similarly refers to a specific act whereby a person is granted a wholly new identity. And "teach" argues that there is much to learn if one properly is to assume this new identity. "Obey" means that that which is taught is authoritative, and requires, as such, certain behaviors.

Carrying this theme a step further, "remember" implies that that to which we are obedient is not a thing or a set of precepts, but a person, the person of Jesus Christ, who, we are told, remains with us always as we seek to live out this new, strange and demanding life, and as we seek to accomplish its various duties and responsibilities.

Last week, Linda and I ate at a restaurant in Hyannis called The Common Ground. While we were eating from their all-natural menu, we started leafing through a brochure detailing their beliefs. For you see, they are a practicing Christian commune with locations across the United States and abroad.

Since it is a restaurant, the brochure begins with a discussion about the difference between white bread and whole grain bread, contrasting starkly their inherent nutritional properties. Playing on this theme, the brochure then goes on to discuss what it calls "white bread society," which offers its citizens insufficient nutrition and "starves the soul with pleasure, travel, education, drugs, philosophy, and the arts."

Some are beginning to "wake up" to the implicit dangers of this "white bread" society, the brochure maintains. People are wishing to be healthy and are looking for something with a bit more "nourishment."

The brochure presents Jesus as the "true bread," given that it was he who said, "I am the bread of life, the living, true bread, and he who eats of this bread will never die."

Two types of religion have evolved from this same Jesus: "pure" or "whole grain" religion, and "white bread" religion, the latter of which, we are told, has undergone "the same de-vitalization as that little wheat kernel" used to make white bread.

"Genetically modified to find a more prominent place in the world of easy pleasure, it barely resembles the simple life of the first, primitive church. It was whole when it was picked, but man has tampered with the message to the point that its vital, life-sustaining properties have been lost. So, we are left with…a 'White Bread' Jesus."

"The genetically modified white-bread religion of today is everywhere," the brochure continues, "just like white bread that lines the shelves of every supermarket. In its refined state it is easier to chew, softer, and more appealing to the fleshly appetite. The life of obedience called for in 'whole grain religion' will only appeal to those wise enough to see that men around them are slowing withering from lack of life."

The main problem with this diagnosis, of course, is that it assumes a "pure" religion approximating the "pure" religion from earlier, biblical times. Such an idealized view, however, ignores ample evidence that no such "pure" Christianity has ever really existed. Just read Paul's strident complaints about the ancient church in Corinth, where, among other things, sacramental prostitution was taking place, not to mention all manner of apostasy and false belief!

The group in Hyannis accepts the words from Acts 2 to be the defining characteristic of the "pure" church: "All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day to day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people. And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved."

Absent from this view of the early church, however, is the fact that there were a wide variety of configurations within the early Christian movement. Some "primitive" churches did take on a communal form, though countless others chose not to live their faith out in this way. In the end, it is a stretch for any one church, then or today, to claim a "pure" faith, regardless of how earnestly that view is held.

Nonetheless, the brochure does offer a thoughtful challenge to the civic faith of our day. Do we, for instance, really see ourselves as a part of a movement initiated by the Holy Spirit and defined by Jesus, or merely as part of an ongoing social and historical institution that over time has accommodated to American culture? To what degree, in other words, do we see our church life as distinct from the "white bread" culture that surrounds us?

Just the other day I read an article in the Times of London by a woman commenting on a new British study which chronicles the ongoing trend toward less and less religious observance throughout the U.K. The future of the church there, according to this study, is very much in doubt.

The author, however, has a different take on the matter, one that betrays a great deal about religion in contemporary Western society.

Describing herself as a "moonlighting agnostic" (an agnostic being someone who is not quite sure what to believe about God), she questions the connection between church-going and faith.

While acknowledging that church attendance currently hovers around 6% in the U.K., she argues that Christianity, even at its peak, has always had as much to do with pragmatism as faith. People, in other words, have always gone to church for a variety of reasons, not always having to do with sincerely-held belief.

"Britain is still a Christian landscape, dotted with spires," she protests. "It is a place of Christian ritual, where people go to churches to mark marriages and deaths…These things are a part of the fabric…" of society.

While not a churchgoer herself, she decides, for the sake of her son, to give it another try.

"The first surprise," she admits, "was how much my son enjoyed the ritual, the kindness. The next surprise was how deeply the rhythm and the language resonated with me. The writers and composers of the best religious works can still sharpen the senses and infuse the spirit like nothing else. The hymns that we sang at school, the cadences of Bible stories, are part of my identity. What other identity can I have?" she asks, somewhat wistfully.

Finally, she offers this oddly comforting, if not rousing, prognosis: "I suspect there are many people who would regret the passing of the Church even if they never set foot in one. The Church of England is rather like the BBC, a beloved institution, mainly mush but with flashes of inspiration."

Thus envisioning a day when a church license fee may be necessary, she says: "Like TV I may not use it often, but I'd pay for the option. Because," she reckons, "it represents something precious, something that we take for granted, and which is presented as faith but is also about the national soul."

Her words offer perhaps no better description of "white bread religion," a religion that is easy, occasional, suited to one's tastes - one that exists not so much for faith but as a largely benign aspect of the "national soul." One can only imagine the original disciples, having heard Jesus first speak the Great Commission, many of whom later sacrificing their lives, and what they would have made of such faint praise?

As I said earlier, it is helpful from time to time to revisit basic questions, since time has a way of helping us forget. In re-reading First Church's By-laws recently, I was struck by our "Covenant," and how closely it hews to Jesus' first Great Commission.

"Bound together as a Christian Church," it reads, "and depending upon the continued guidance of the Holy Spirit to lead us, we covenant together to walk in all our ways, according to the rule of the Gospel, in mutual love and respect for one another, to strive to carry out the teachings of Jesus Christ, and to love the Lord our God with all our hearts and our neighbors as ourselves."

That sounds an awful lot like whole wheat religion to me. Now all we have to do, I suppose, is carry it out!

Amen.