Leviticus 23
23 The Lord said to Moses: 2 Speak to the Israelites and say to them: These are my appointed times, the Lord’s appointed times, which you will declare to be holy occasions:
3 Work can be done for six days, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of special rest, a holy occasion. You must not do any work on it; wherever you live, it is a Sabbath to the Lord.
4 These are the Lord’s appointed times, holy occasions, which you will celebrate at their appointed times:
5 The Lord’s Passover is on the fourteenth day of the first month at twilight.
6 The Lord’s Festival of Unleavened Bread is on the fifteenth day of the same month. You must eat unleavened bread for seven days. 7 On the first day you will hold a holy occasion and must not do any job-related work. 8 You will offer food gifts to the Lord for seven days.
The seventh day will be a holy occasion; you must not do any job-related work.
9 The Lord said to Moses: 10 Speak to the Israelites and say to them: When you enter the land that I am giving you and harvest its produce, you must bring the first bundle of your harvest to the priest. 11 The priest will lift up the bundle before the Lord so that it will be acceptable on your behalf. The priest will do this on the day after the Sabbath. 12 On the day the bundle is lifted up for you, you must offer a flawless one-year-old lamb as an entirely burned offering to the Lord. 13 The accompanying grain offering must be two-tenths of an ephah of choice flour mixed with oil, as a food gift for the Lord, a soothing smell. The accompanying drink offering must be a quarter of a hin of wine. 14 You must not eat any bread, roasted grain, or fresh grain until the exact day when you bring your God’s offering. This is a permanent rule throughout your future generations, wherever you live.
15 You must count off seven weeks starting with the day after the Sabbath, the day you bring the bundle for the uplifted offering; these must be complete.
16 You will count off fifty days until the day after the seventh Sabbath. Then you must present a new grain offering to the Lord. 17 From wherever you live, you will bring two loaves of bread as an uplifted offering. These must be made of two-tenths of an ephah of choice flour, baked with leaven, as early produce to the Lord. 18 Along with the bread you must present seven flawless one-year-old lambs, one bull from the herd, and two rams. These will be an entirely burned offering to the Lord, along with their grain offerings and drink offerings, as a food gift of soothing smell to the Lord. 19 You must also offer one male goat as a purification offering and two one-year-old lambs as a communal sacrifice of well-being. 20 The priest will lift up the two sheep, along with the bread of the early produce, as an uplifted offering before the Lord. These will be holy to the Lord and will belong to the priest. 21 On that very same day you must make a proclamation; it will be a holy occasion for you. You must not do any job-related work. This is a permanent rule wherever you live throughout your future generations.
22 When you harvest your land’s produce, you must not harvest all the way to the edge of your field; and don’t gather every remaining bit of your harvest. Leave these items for the poor and the immigrant; I am the Lord your God.
23 The Lord said to Moses: 24 Say to the Israelites: On the first day of the seventh month, you will have a special rest, a holy occasion marked by a trumpet signal. 25 You must not do any job-related work, and you must offer a food gift to the Lord.
26 The Lord said to Moses: 27 Note that the tenth day of this seventh month is the Day of Reconciliation. It will be a holy occasion for you. You must deny yourselves and offer a food gift to the Lord. 28 You must not do any work that day because it is a Day of Reconciliation to make reconciliation for you before the Lord your God. 29 Anyone who does not deny themselves on that day will be cut off from their people. 30 Moreover, I will destroy from their people anyone who does any work on that day. 31 You must not do any work! This is a permanent rule throughout your future generations wherever you live. 32 This is a Sabbath of special rest for you, and you must deny yourselves. You will observe your Sabbath on the ninth day of the month from evening to the following evening.
33 The Lord said to Moses: 34 Say to the Israelites: The Festival of Booths to the Lord will start on the fifteenth day of the seventh month and will last for seven days. 35 The first day is a holy occasion. You must not do any job-related work. 36 For seven days you will offer food gifts to the Lord. On the eighth day you will have a holy occasion and must offer a food gift to the Lord. It is a holiday: you must not do any job-related work.
37 These are the Lord’s appointed times that you will proclaim as holy occasions, offering food gifts to the Lord: entirely burned offerings, grain offerings, communal sacrifices, and drink offerings—each on its proper day.
38 This is in addition to the Lord’s sabbaths and in addition to your presents, all the payments for solemn promises, and all the spontaneous gifts that you give to the Lord.
39 Note that on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered the land’s crops, you will celebrate the Lord’s festival for seven days. The first day and the eighth day are days of special rest. 40 On the first day you must take fruit from majestic trees, palm branches, branches of leafy trees, and willows of the streams, and rejoice before the Lord your God for seven days. 41 You will celebrate this festival to the Lord for seven days each year; this is a permanent rule throughout your future generations. You will celebrate it in the seventh month. 42 For seven days you must live in huts. Every citizen of Israel must live in huts 43 so that your future generations will know that I made the Israelites live in huts when I brought them out of the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.
44 So Moses announced the Lord’s appointed times to the Israelites.
SERMON (PASTOR)
This has been one of the worst couple of church weeks I’ve ever had, but I stand before you today, inspired, humbled, and excited, excited. I pray, that you too, will leave feeling likewise.
I had felt so appreciated, cared for, and excited when both painting exterior of the manse and re-doing it’s back deck were put into the 2018 budget. It made me feel like a raise might to some people, that the church cared about and appreciated their pastor and wanted to take care of the home where they lived. It conveyed that the congregation valued the role of a pastor, not only me, but the pastors to come who might live in the manse and enjoy it’s being kept up. It felt like the church leaders were not only making an investment in me, but investment toward their pastors to come. I felt supported and seen.
In the book, The Five Love Languages, which describes the ways different people give and receive love, I have two of the five which rank very strongly, Quality Time and Acts of Service. I feel loved when I spend time with congregants and congregants take the time to spend time with me, and I feel loved when likewise congregants help me, Acts of Service. For example, when I first got divorced, I asked Bob McKim, Rick Rembold, and Jim Kauth, to be my Rent-A-Pops. When something in the manse broke, I asked if they would be people I could call, not to fix it themselves, but to teach me how to fix it. Some of those times, extended to include things like learning to drive in snow in the Nazarene Church parking lot with Rick Rembold, learning to drive stick shift with Bob McKim on Kyra Rohner‘s high school Jeep in the Rohner pasture, asking Bob frantically, “will they move,” they being the cows facing my tendency to lunge the Jeep forward, those moments and being crammed into the half bath at the manse with the toilet half apart and coming back together with Jim Kauth. These, have, despite being in deep - snow, cow pies, and toilet parts, believe it or not, honestly some of my most memorable ministry moments, touching on both quality time and acts of service.
So when I read the committee minutes that both 2018 manse projects were taken off the table, it felt devaluing, as if the heat went out in a school and the teacher’s pay was docked. The kids have to be warm, and teachers want to teach, but why was staff the first and only place suggested to minimize the budget? Could we look at the budget as a whole? Was there no way to look at how to increase the budget? Further still, who speaks for the teachers? I wondered, ‘who was there to speak for me?’ and this was the heart of it.
I have always felt loved in this church, but I haven’t always felt supported. You are very good at individually saying that you, or good job, or we appreciate that. Yet, as many of us experience in our callings, we can sometimes feel invisible to higher ups. This is true of many non-profits and their staff, and in our congregation, I surmise part of this lack of official support stems from Personnel never being one of our strongest committee. While it has been stellar during emergencies, it is not a committee that has met regularly, and currently, as in the past, there has not been a chair. Moreover, this was not the first time projects at the manse had contended against church projects, putting the pastor in a conflict of interest, as pastor, tenant, employee, moderator, pastoral care provider, preacher, etc. To say anything about upkeep of the manse, was to say something against upkeep of the church.
I will say right here I placed an exorbitant and unhealthy of amount weight on the correlation between projects at the manse and pastoral support, but this correlation had far less to do with actual painting or putting on a deck, than it did the desires, of feeling valued in my work, and not always wanting to be my own advocate or representative. During these couple weeks, I’ve made a joke that having the manse projects removed from the budget felt like taxation without representation, of the pastor. Part of me thought it would be a funny secret protest to put tea in the baptismal font! Don’t worry, I didn’t do it, or did I…but the lack of representation was the thing that got me, not the taxes.
Anyway, at a Session meeting, I was told that if I have a roof over my head and heat I should be happy. I was told that I ask for too much. I was told that if I was a homeowner I would understand that sometimes big projects come in the way of smaller ones. I was told that I was reckless and perhaps I am all those things because I believe in a God of reckless abundance.
I received an e-mail a few days later echoing others saying that all discretionary spending at the church should be frozen until the budgeting issues over the broken boiler were figured out. This meant not only the manse, but hiring a replacement secretary, and perhaps any ministry that wanted to spend it’s money on anything. Moreover, there was the oft mentioned line of not reducing the purchasing power of the endowment. And while I agree that the endowment should be managed responsibly, it is not preserving, and freezing what we have that increases the church budget, it is our investment in God, our stewardship to the church. It is not churches that focus on preserving their money which thrive, it is the ones which offer it to be lifted up. From the times of Leviticus, to today, the story is the same. The churches which share and return their offerings, with thanksgiving, with celebration, with the reckless faith of the fatted calf, are the ones which thrive. Maybe because those priests held up one-year-old lambs, one bull from the herd, and two rams as an entirely burned offering to the Lord, along with their grain offerings and drink offerings, as a food gift of soothing smell to the Lord, is why we still hear about their ministry today. And so that is what I am going to do for you, for us, for God, because I have seen the renewing Spirit of God.
After feeling so unsupported and alone, I figured I would try once more, and I asked the Personnel Committee to have a conversation. It made me feel better, walking up to the meeting, when Lynn Roehm asked how I was doing and when my eyes blurred and I shook my right to left he gave me a side hug. I felt thankful that Cliff Schoeningh, who had a meeting in Boise, found a park to sit in and called in on speakerphone. And then, First Presbyterian Church, I had an inkling that a God moment might be in store when Jason suggested we sit outside on the picnic table by the courthouse. For two hours, without really circling in conversation, we listened and we compromised, we challenged one another, and thought, and supported, and heard, and rose to the occasion, and planned, and affirmed, and said thank you, and they suggested meeting monthly in order to be proactive rather than reactive, Jason even said he would preach, and they made vows that I would not have to be alone in ministry, that if there were problems I could come to them, and they would both tell me I was wrong when I needed it, and advocate for the pastor when necessary too. I had never heard that before, from any official committee besides maybe the Pastoral Nominating Committee/P.A.R.T.Y. Group from years ago, and as we talked I began to trust. I let go of the need to feel like I always had to advocate for myself, or the manse, or this church’s future pastors. I breathed deeply and released the fear of not finding a secretary before I leave, and said, if you need to hire someone while I am on sabbatical, I trust you. I considered the possibility of not needing outside Presbytery guidance if pastoral support and the way toward congregational reconciliation was within our leadership. I felt like it was possible that by my last Sunday before sabbatical, June 3rd, it might feel like less like congregants saying good riddance and instead saying goodbye. What the meeting felt like was opening up my hands which were holding on so tightly and trusting that I could lift them, palms up and open as an offering to the Lord.
Likewise, I became inspired. And here is your watch out warning. Your pastor is inspired, that means things might shake up a little, might change if you want that too, might look different than they always have. As Presbyterians many of us are those who slow the pace down, who look carefully at the numbers, and the process, and we absolutely need those people. I am ever so thankful for those people, as much as we might run up against each other, because they have gifts I do not possess. You see, you didn’t hire me to be a numbers pastor, you didn’t hire me at 28 to slow the church down. You hired me, you called me, because what I bring is the willingness to stand in front and point. And I am standing in front of you and I am pointing, and I am saying there is a God who is bigger than our budget, there is God who is bigger than endowment, there is a God who I have seen at work in each and every one of you, there is a God who goes out before us who isn’t worried about the boiler, or the manse, or the secretary, or the pastor. There is a God who is gracious and is opening up God’s palms and lifting them out to us.
And so I want to do the same, I went to the Stewardship Conference offered by the Presbytery yesterday and they really got me thinking about generosity vs. fear. We are working in a framework of fear, and we can choose to have fear, or we can choose to have faith, but we can’t have both. What if instead of coming to the budget meeting on Wednesday, having poured over the church’s endowment investments, our restricted funds, and our current church line-items, we instead poured over our own personnel budgets, and we asked ourselves what can we give. What if we each walked in that meeting with our own contribution to start? How inspiring would that be? Each one of those church leaders, walking in pledging a little something more in this time of need, saying this is what I will give to our Lord, and our church, because I am a person of faith who trusts in it’s future. And if it’s a fixed income you are on and you already giving at your maximum, perhaps you can look into planned giving, for when pass away. The presenter at the conference told a story of a person with three kids and when in their will their inheritance was split into four. Who was fourth? the church. We have a Fellowship Hall because of a planned gift like this. It was gift for our church’s future and think of all ministry that has taken place there, things like this, like a roof over our heads, and heat for our church home are places our gifts go, and think of all the ministry that happens here.
And so, let it begin with me. I have already made my church tithe for the year, and with seminary debt, and medical fees, and high taxes on pastors, it was about what I could comfortably do, but faith isn’t about being comfortable. It is messy, as many of us have experienced this week, but it is also gracious, and hopeful, and requires a lot of trust, and so I am pledging $1,000 to the general fund to be split from this day through the months I am gone on sabbatical. It is one way of me telling you, I am with you. The pastor who led the conference talked about wanting to know who was in the arena with them, who was by their side, and I am with you in this arena First Presbyterian. I believe in you, and I believe in this congregation, and I believe we can unfreeze ourselves and move forward. Can you match me by Wednesday, so that when our church leaders meet, they know they have your support as well? What would that be like for them, to walk in, not only with their own pledge toward the projects of the church, but also to be inspired by yours. I am also dedicating the work of my hands, I only have a handful of weekends left, and I have been holding on the them tightly, but I am offering up them for whatever Buildings and Grounds chooses, be it a demolition day on the porch of the manse, or pulling weeds of the playground, you have my open hands, and if you would like, they could join with yours, side by side, like we used to do, Rent-a-pops, and you, congregation, let us roll up our sleeves, and open up your hands and lift them as a complete offering to the Lord. So are you going to step in this arena with me.
Finally, they asked us at this conference, what we dreamed our congregation would look like if we walked into the sanctuary in three years. I imagined walking up the aisle to see you all sitting together in a sanctuary, side by side. In my imagining I don’t walk all the way up to the pulpit, but I am there in the midst of you, and when it comes time for our offering, we open up our hands, and pass the plate together with pride, and thanksgiving, and if it is summer, we aren’t sweating because we finally have AC and if it winter we aren’t cold, because there is heat again. But mostly, I imagine us together, in our future, side by side, praising God. And so I hope, despite this being one of the worst couple of church weeks we can stand together today, supporting one another, appreciating each other, inspired, humbled, and excited, excited. I pray, that you too, will leave feeling likewise.
