Call to Worship (based on Romans 12:1-2, NRSV)

ONE: The Apostle Paul writes:

“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God,

ALL: to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God,

ONE: which is your spiritual worship.

ALL: Do not be conformed to this world,

ONE: but be transformed by the renewing of your minds,

ALL: so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

We gather together, here and now, inviting God to renew us during this service of praise.

Scripture Reading: Romans 12:1-2 (from The Message paraphrase)

Place Your Life Before God

1-2 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for God. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what God wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

Sermon: From Broadcast Control to Social Collaboration (#7 in Weird Church series.)

Years ago while doing research for a sermon about transitions, I learned a new word: “tropophobia.” Which is the fear of change. At the time I was doing this research, I remember thinking to myself, “Who knew fear of change was a thing?” I was surprised to learn that it was a condition, a disorder recognized by psychologists. And I learned that some people had such extreme cases of tropophobia that they experienced severe anxiety, panic attacks even, if they had to do something new. I remember feeling sad for people who experienced this level of anxiety around change, because, for the most part, I had always enjoyed change--I experienced it as fun and exciting, something that made life interesting. And it made me sad that there were people who missed out on the joy that change could bring.

But that was years ago. The older I get, the more I understand tropophobia. Not that I’ve experienced severe anxiety, but these days, I would have to say that change is less fun and more stressful. Part of it is a physiological thing, I’m sure. My brain is older and doesn’t operate as well as it used to. I mean, I groan every time my smart phone goes through an update. Rather than thinking, “Great! I wonder what improvements this update will bring?” I think sarcastically instead, “Great. I wonder how many Youtube videos I’m gonna have to watch before I can figure out this update?” I’m not even kidding. Last time I upgraded my phone, I had to watch a Youtube video simply to learn how to turn it off!! (I know, I sound like a 100-year-old curmudgeon complaining about newfangled devices.)

But I don’t think my growing annoyance with change is just my aging brain. Some of it, I think, is related to the losses we all experienced in the Covid 19 pandemic. And when I say all of us, I mean all of us experienced loss to one degree or another. Some people experienced horrible losses--the death of loved ones, damage to their own health, financial burdens. And recovery from that level of loss is slow and difficult and painful. For others, the losses were more mundane, but over time such losses add up. All loss take an emotional toll, as Dr. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross outlined in her stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. And going through these stages, experiencing these emotions is exhausting, isn’t it?!

And then add to that all of the new things we’ve all had to learn during the pandemic--new routines, new technologies, new protocols--it’s no wonder that our energy levels for everything--particularly for change--are flagging right now.

And then we come to this scripture from Romans 12, verses 1&2, that reads, “…fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out.” Pre-pandemic, this was one of my favorite scriptures. But now I read it and my first reaction is, “Changed from the inside out? I don’t want any more change in my life, thank you very much. It sounds like way more work than I have energy for. God, can’t you just let me coast for a while?”

As you know, I’m doing a sermon series on this book, Weird Church, and the premise of the book is that the world around us is changing, so the church needs to make changes as well in order to connect with the people around us. The first several chapters of the book deal with shifts that the church needs to make in terms of ministry so that we can continue our mission of sharing the Love of God in the world.

The chapter I’m preaching on today--Chapter 6--is entitled “From Broadcast Control to Social Collaboration.” It talks about how the church, for most of our lifetimes, has followed the same model of communication as the culture around us. For most of the 20th century, the church operated under the “broadcast” paradigm. Professionally trained pastors preached sermons to congregations who received them, similar to newscasters sharing information over TV or radio with audiences who took in what they were saying and trusted what the expert told them. The book even used the example of CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite, who, from the 1960’s through the 1980’s, always ended his broadcast with the line, “And that’s the way it is.” How many of us remember that? The authors of this book suggest that when Cronkite said that, “…all the people sitting in their living rooms nodded, ‘Amen.’” (Weird Church, p. 63)

But our culture has moved on from there. The broadcast model of communication (one expert sharing one message with one audience at one time) is no longer the primary model of communication in our culture--or even in the world at large. With the advent of the internet and other media like FaceBook, Twitter, Instagram--and other platforms I’m sure I’ve never even heard of, information is now shared on multiple platforms from multiple sources. And the Covid pandemic sped up the pace of this trend.

There are, of course, plusses and minuses to any kind of communication the culture or the church chooses to use, but the point this chapter makes is that if the church chooses not to follow the communication trends that the culture is making, we miss the opportunity to share our message of God’s transforming love with the people around us. Further, we miss the opportunity of learning from the people around us and growing in love and understanding through discussion and collaboration with them. This chapter encourages the church to engage in multiple communication platforms because that is the way of the future.

They mention livestreaming worship services--which is something we are already doing! Yay, church! But they also say that another thing the church of the future needs to do is engage in more conversation and collaboration. The cool thing about the media platforms I mentioned earlier is that they all encourage such engagement. For example, sermons won’t be the main means of spiritual education in the future; dialogue and conversations about Bible passages and themes will also take place more and more. And when people put their heads and hearts together about such things, they can move on from there to take action.

In the words of this book:

Imagine networks of people who learn from and empower each other. Imagine small groups of people getting together to dream about God’s preferred future for them and their neighborhoods and then daring to make that a reality. Imagine an open-source movement where people are allowed to contribute as much or as little as they like. Imagine a potluck of sorts where everyone is fed spiritually and physically no matter what they bring to the table… Instead of broadcasting our truth, maybe we could just set a table of grace. (Weird Church, p. 67)

It’s a wonderful, inspiring vision, isn’t it? It would mean some change on our part, but the change doesn’t have to be onerous or something we force ourselves to do because we know it’s good for us or because some book tells us we have to do it if we want to survive in the future.

This Scripture from Romans 12 reminds us that it is God who brings about the changes in us and the church, not us. “Fix your attention on God,” says the Apostle Paul. “Place your life before God as an offering.” Then relax. Okay, so Paul doesn’t actually say, “then relax.” But he implies it. As I said earlier, part of what makes change so hard is all of the emotional and physical energy we expend in bringing it about.

But that’s not what this passage is saying. This passage is telling us to give up our control over the change. This passage is encouraging us to say to God, “I’m willing to change, for the sake of sharing your love with the world, but you’ll have to lead me. I’m feeling tired and spent, but if you, God, give me the energy and direct me, I’ll follow you.”

When we say that to God, that’s when amazing things happen, isn’t it? God helps us to let go of the things that sap our energy, and God fills us with strength and energy in doing things with others that make our hearts sing. May it be so!

Let us pray.

Loving God, this has been an exhausting year and a half, and all of us are still feeling the effects of the pandemic, which is not over yet. Bless those who suffered great loss in the past year and a half. Comfort them as they grieve. Help them to rebuild their lives. Bless all of us as we feel the lingering emotions of grief, and help us to rest in you. Help us each and all to set our lives before you as an offering, and change us in the ways we need to change. Give us joy as we collaborate with each other and strengthen us for ministry.

And, God, Hear now our prayers for our community and our world…

[LOOK AT PHONE]

- Moment of silence…lifting up in prayer those we hold in our hearts.. others in this room and in our livestream… [PAUSE]

- O God, bless the sick… those who are struggling… those who are grieving…caregivers… Give them strength and healing…. In Jesus name, Amen

PLEASE JOIN ME IN THE LORD’S PRAYER

- Our Father, 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 debts
As we forgive our debtors`
- And lead us not into temptation
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. AMEN

Rev. Dr. Marlayna Schmidt

Franklin Federated Church

Franklin, MA