A Peculiar People

sermon by Carrie Eikler
Matthew 18:10-20
Heritage Series week 3: Community

My first encounter with Mennonites happened as a result of one of my family’s mid-summer rituals as a child. When the summer was at its cruelest, and the day at its hottest, my brother, mother, and I would retreat inside turn on all the fans, and watch our summer blockbuster. That blockbuster was always the same, year in and year out. It was the epic mini-series adaptation of James A. Michener’s novel Centennial. This story told of the creation of a town in Colorado, named Centennial, tracing it’s roots back to the native Americans who inhabited the land for millennia, through the trappers and ranchers who established a new economy, all the way through the present day (present, being around 1980 or so). Now this mini series had probably 20 installments, and since we watched one installment a day, it kept us occupied nicely for about a month.

I lived in a part of Illinois that had few Brethren and even fewer Mennonites, so through the Centennial movie, I was introduced to my first Mennonite. Mennonite character, at least. His name was Levi Zendt, a young Lancaster Mennonite man sometime in the mid- to late- 19th century. Levi would later become one of the founding fathers of the Colorado town Centennial and what drove him West was a powerful act of his Mennonite community. Back in Lancaster, after driving a young, non-Mennonite woman home from helping him with some of his family’s deliveries, he is seen by the woman’s caretaker expressing his affection for her through some innocent kissing. Well it didn’t seem so innocent to the onlooker, who was obvious not pleased with this young woman cavorting with Mennonites. Levi is subsequently accused of a higher level of indiscretion than simply public display of affection, and the charges against him heighten.

At the peak of the accusations, Levi is cornered in his family’s barn by relatives and members of the Mennonite community. They tell him how he has shamed them all, how he has fallen away. And then they lay upon him the most severe punishment of their community. “Levi Zendt…” one man says. “You will be shunned!” All these years later I remember the sound of the word-- “shunned.”

So what else is a Lancaster Mennonite young man to do after he is shunned? Well, buy a rifle, get a wife and a Conastoga wagon and move to Colorado, of course. OK, this is simply a story, and who knows how much James Michener really knew of the practice of discipline among Mennonites and Brethren communities in the 19th century. But I think it paints a widely held picture of community held by these “peculiar people,” as Mennonites and Brethren were often referred to.

And we were peculiar, and perhaps we are still peculiar, in the eyes of the rest of society. Our community was defined by similar simple dress, men with beards and no mustaches, women with prayer coverings, we resisted the new fangled and the worldly, we resisted military conscription, we had many voices preaching during worship, not just one, and no paid clergy. We valued shared life-style over shared doctrine. And we had discipline. Discipline that was found in Matthew 18, today’s scripture lesson. If a brother or sister offended another, the offended should go to that person and tell them how they have been hurt. If they do not listen, they are to take another member of the church and go to them and bring the accusation. If they still don’t listen, the offended party should take the matter to the church, and if they still don’t listen, then the ultimate penalty…cast them aside, throw them out of the community. Brethren didn’t use the word “shun,” but they did use the word “ban” or “avoidance.” Members would be banned from the community for the perceived larger good of the community. But as E.F. Roop reflects in the Brethren Encyclopedia, the practice of the ban, or avoidance, or shunning, proved quite problematic. What sins were greater? What level of avoidance should they be convicted to? Should they be banned from all church activity or just certain things? And what about family life? Should offending members be banned from the dinner table?

But the focus on maintaining a strict code of community, finding ways to kick people out of our church, or to give a measuring rod to see if individuals are uniform with who we are is focusing too narrowly on the scripture. It’s not about who is in and who is out, but looking at the question, how can we live together? It’s not a check list to go through so the uncooperative, or marginal members can be rightfully kicked out. Rather, it takes many measures to ensure that relationships are healed, and people are reconciled. I can read through this entire passage and reflect on what it means for community procedure, and how people should change to get in line. But perhaps it is where the passage ends that our journey as a community is to begin, and in reality, is where it began when we became a new church all those years ago. It doesn’t begin in some process or checklist. It begins where our passage in Matthew 18 ends, “For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”

This concept, this belief that God was present in the gathering of the body, of those seeking God’s truth was a major component for the Brethren. Early in our history we would have to gather in secret, in barns, under bridges, in back store rooms, even on boats in the middle of lakes to worship. No priest was needed. No sacraments. Not even particular scripture readings. What was important was that we believed, we trusted Christ’s words that God’s presence rests with the people who gather. That trusted we that we had God incarnate within us, and by joining together, that God is made even more evident to one another.

Have you ever gone into a conversation about God or politics or anything, so sure of your convictions, so steadfast in your position? And in conversing with another, they give a bit of their selves, you give a bit of your self, and before you know it, your position is not necessarily changed, but your understanding is enriched. I like to think of this as a barn-raising, a notable image from our Anabaptist roots, primarily with the Amish. We each hold up pieces, and while they may not be close to one another, in fact, they may be completely opposite from one another on the foundation, they are all necessary for the building up of the one house.

But isn’t it hard to see God working, or at least think someone else in the church is helping us come closer to God, when we get down to the nitty gritty of community making? Especially when something seems to be so annoying, or so aggressive, or so passive! When it seems like people don’t listen or don’t want to share. It is a rare case, I’m sure when we actually feel God’s spirit moving during a board meeting for example. So it seems sort of naïve to say that just get a couple folks together and *bam* it will feel just lovely, a space powerfully infused with the Holy Spirit. The word community, if you think about it, is quite vague and we throw it around so much that I don’t know if we really know what we’re talking about.

For example, during our prayer for community, we try to pray for ourselves, our church, our neighborhood and town, our country and world. We talk about community spirit, or community development. And while the church community shares elements with all these types of communities, the community of faith, that community that was formed not just 300 years ago, but thousands of years ago, has a unique and powerful characteristic. I’m reminded of the words of Abraham Joshua Heschel: we are people who gather in humility and listen to God as best we can and do God's work in the world as best we can along with others who likewise feel compelled to do God's work in the world.

Matthew 18 seems to be filled with humility, of restoring relationships, or recognizing what is at the heart of our faith lives together: communication between each other, strengthened in the presence of God. But between the part of Matthew 18 that talks about restoring relationship and the part where we are told God will be among us perhaps lies the most difficult part of our community: “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”

Binding and loosing. Could it be that’s the bridge between God’s presence and the building up of the community of faith? To return to Heschel’s idea, could it be that the problem lies in a dynamic where there are many different people doing what they each think is best alongside others who are trying to do what they think is best, feeling compelled to do what each one of them thinks of as the most important work in the world? Maybe that’s the invitation of the scripture for us today, inviting us into a process of binding and loosening.

Are we kept stuck because of what we bind to ourselves? When we bind ourselves with our self interests rather than binding to ourselves the spiritual-interests of grace, mercy, compassion and love, that bridge between God’s presence and relationships that help each of us grow spiritually and emotionally, erodes more and more.

Or do we too easily loosen from ourselves the difficult spiritual disciples? Are we quick to release ourselves from the call for patience, to contemplate the other, the necessity for prayer and waiting on the spirit, and instead bind to ourselves time management and process, positions, and politics.

The bridge isn’t based on whether binding is bad or loosing is bad, but rather what is it that we bind, and what is it that we loosen. What do we keep close to protect ourselves? What do we neglect that keeps us from promoting a fuller life in the spirit with our brothers and sisters?

If we think about it, many of us have been guilty of neglecting many life-promoting actions in order to protect ourselves. Imagine with me that this bowl represents the structure of the congregation, and we, the members are the fruit. If we put each member inside, wearing his or her protective skin, the result is not a church but several individuals sharing the same space.

While we are crammed in here together, there is still a lot of space, a lot of barriers binding us up. If this is the way to make a fruit salad, to create community, then the only way members with tough skins can influence one another is to exert enough pressure to bruise others or squeeze someone else into a different shape.

In many ways, we are each like the fruit in this bowl. Something protects each of us, barriers that we work hard to maintain. Now, some of us may be prickly, like this pineapple. Maybe your skin, intended to protect you from painful words and actions of other people, has grown thick through years of careful nurturing. Does this sound like you? Are you a pineapple? [Carrie sets pineapple down, walks down with bowl of fruit]

Now if I was one of these fruits, I’d probably be one of these exotic pears wrapped in a foam covering. Not that I think I’m all that exotic…but they have such thin skin, anything could pierce them or bruise them. Their thin skin has to be protected from the outside elements. I’m a lot like one of these super sensitive fruits. I try to protect myself from disappointment with as many devices as I can. (hand fruit to Marge)

Or maybe you are like one in a bunch of grapes. I think we all can resonate with this one. We cling to the rest of the group that is like us. We hold fast to the stem that unifies us. Maybe we cling to those who think about God the way we do, or see politics the way we do, or maybe we don’t want venture to know the long-term, older members, or the newer, younger attendees because they aren’t like us. I think there is probably a bit of grape in each of us. (hand fruit to Linda/Del?)

Now a banana. Favorite fruit of marathon runners and toddlers, so I understand. A banana puts forth an impression through its skin that is far different from what we find inside, because when we peel away the sturdy, thick skin, a soft, sweet fruit is revealed. (hand fruit to Will?)

(Carrie walks back to the front, places bowl on table)
We each have our protective skin, or packaging, or strong stems holding us close. Jesus calls us to relinquish it. We are called to loosen those things that keep us from welcoming God in our space, our church community. This requires that we surrender the very skin intended for our protection, not because God wants us to be hurt by others but because the skin actually imprisons us rather than protects us.

Individuals become a church the same way pieces of fruit become a salad, by allowing the removal of their protective coverings [Carrie peels an orange as I speak and cut it in half. Others come forward to cut fruit up and place in bowl] and exposing their hearts to God. Although this condition appears risky, making us vulnerable to the slings and arrows of others, it is in this state of powerlessness that we receive God’s power. It is in loosing our protective skins that we bind up the essence of another’s faith to our own journey. It means we can yield the skins that isolate us and allows us to join together to absorb each other’s flavors. It doesn’t mean we give up who we are, or we must relinquish the essence of ourselves. But it does require some difficult, and faithful, work of exposing our hearts and vulnerabilities and each other. [Fruit cutters can sit down when they are done with their particular fruit]

As we surrender more and more of our self-interests, we are able to give ourselves to God’s work of promoting life. Where two or three are gathered God is there. Our community, our fruit salad our church. We are like the individual pieces of fruit in the fruit salad. But the peculiar thing about it, is that if we loosen, we can bind. If we relinquish, we can be blessed. AMEN
(Lorele Yager, adapted)