Beyond Civic Faith
Rev. Anthony Robinson
First Congregational, Wauwatosa, Wisconsin
February 10, 2008
Philippians 3: 4b - 14

It's great to be here with you at First Congregational in Wauwatosa! I've so enjoyed my time with you on Friday and Saturday. What a pleasure to get to know better your Pastor, Steven, his wonderful wife, Julie, and your teaching minister, Sam. You are blest in your pastoral leadership! A number of you have commented to me about your weather. You have tried to tell me that you don't really have this much snow in Wisconsin, as if this winter were some sort of mistake, a cosmic computer glitch. Sure. Whatever. And I'm from Seattle, where we don't really have much rain.

While leading an event for a congregation recently I was asked this question, "Why do you think we members of mainline churches often have difficulty in articulating our faith, in sharing our faith?” I pondered his question for a moment, and offered an answer off the top of my head, not a particularly good answer. So I turned the question around and asked the man who posed it why he thought it was the case that mainline Christians seemed to have difficulty in articulating and sharing their faith. He said, “I wonder if it is that we don’t want to offend people, to make others uncomfortable.”

I have often heard it said, as he did, that the reason for our reticence is that we do not wish to offend. And yet that particular congregation, as with many in my own denomination, had taken positions on various social and ethical issues that many would consider strong, and some, offensive. On such matters avoiding offense at all cost was not the prevailing value for everyone.

The reasons for our reticence in speaking of our faith are surely multiple and complex. But let me suggest a different one. I was raised in a Congregational, United Church of Christ congregation in the east, near Washington D. C. It was in many ways a wonderful church, and I remain indebted to it. And yet, the faith that it formed in me was in some ways thin. It was in many ways typical of the understanding of Christianity in many mainline churches. Years later I came to call that version of the Christian faith “civic faith.”

“Civic faith” is the strong encouragement to be an especially caring and considerate person. I was expected to be a good citizen. I was asked to be concerned for the state of our society and for the less fortunate among us. I was encouraged to be responsible, volunteering here, serving there and accepting leadership roles. Civic faith meant being a better sort of American.

There’s a great deal about civic faith that is admirable. But, and here’s the catch, there’s really nothing about civic faith that is specifically Christian. For a number of years I served a congregation in Hawaii, where Buddhists are the largest religious group. I can assure you that there are many fine, caring and considerate Buddhists. We Christians have no corner on decency and moral behavior.

And then there’s the story of Mr. Miller. Mr. Miller owned the dry goods store in Carnation, Washington, the small town in which my first church was located. A couple of years before we arrived, the town decided to have a contest to recognize “the best Christian” in Carnation. Mr. Miller, a truly kind and winsome person, was chosen. The only problem was that Mr. Miller was a Jew, in fact the town’s only Jew! Some might suggest that if you are the only member of a religious or cultural minority in a community you are likely, if not wise, to be particularly gracious. I can only begin to imagine how Mr. Miller must have felt when he accepted the award for “Best Christian in Carnation.” You see "Christian" did not mean particular beliefs or practices, so much as it meant being a decent and nice person.

Here’s what I think about that original question, about why many of us mainline Christians may have trouble articulating our faith. There’s not much theological content in civic faith. The substance of civic faith is not for the most part about God. It is a moral message, sometimes a moralistic one, about what we are to do, to think, and to feel. For all the emphasis on concern for others, civic faith is about us, about you. It is not about God. And yet today there is a stirring, a yearning, for more, for more than civic faith. There is a hunger for God.

By way of contrast to civic faith, let’s consider the Scripture reading for today from Paul’s letter to the Philippians. This is one of the several places in Paul’s letters where Paul refers to his own life, tells the story of his own faith.

Paul tells us that he came from good stock and lineage. He was a Hebrew of Hebrews, tribe of Benjamin, Benjamin being the favored son of patriarch Jacob. He would be a little like saying, "My people came over on the Mayflower." Moreover, Paul had excelled at the expectations of his faith. He was a member of the leading lay reform group, the Pharisees, who were rigorous in keeping the highest standards. It didn't stop there. Paul was, moreover, zealous to see that others toed the mark.

But now, on the other side of his experience of God's presence, Paul spoke of all this, his proud ancestry, his perfection, as “confidence in the flesh.” What does that mean, "confidence in the flesh?" It is Paul’s way of talking about the realm of the ego, his own ego. His faith had been things he accomplished, things he took pride in. To say "I had confidence in the flesh” was like saying, “I had a terrific resume! Important family name, went to the right college, got a great graduate school pedigree, live in a terrific neighborhood.”

Paul was in many ways a Type A, high-achiever, who had got it all right. There was only one problem, he was an angry man, angry in the way that Type A high-achievers can sometimes be angry, angry in the way the older brother in the Prodigal Son story was angry. Angry because he had worked very, very, very hard to get it right, to do everything asked of him and still he knew no peace inside his own skin. He did not know God’s love or grace for him.

Now it may sound as if we've traveled a long way from the "civic faith" with which I began. But in a way, Paul's faith was its own first century form of civic faith, about being a better sort of person.

Now let me intrude upon Paul’s story with another, my own. to share a bit of my own. I mentioned that I served a congregation in Honolulu. When I went there, I went to a troubled congregation. It had been so divided by painful conflicts that membership had fallen from 700 in the late 60’s to under 200 in 1980. I did not learn until much later that my predecessor had taken her own life. But I had been told by the Conference Minister, “You’re the person who can turn this around.” I believed him.

I worked my tail off. I strove to be and do everything I could, all that I knew how. What I got for my labors, or so it seemed, was more conflict in a conflicted congregation, and a serious depression. I hit a wall. I wasn’t sure I was going to get up again. It was a long slow, painful process.

What I realized was that as selfless as I was in some respects, my civic faith and the story I was living was more about me than it was about God. It was about my intelligence, my ability, my good intentions, my hard work. My confidence lay, with Paul, “in the flesh.”

During that dark night of soul, I went on a retreat at a Spiritual Life Center there in Honolulu. My spiritual director had given me John 15 to pray. That’s the one where Jesus says, “I am the vine; you are the branches.” I had always heard that as a kind of sweet, sort of Hallmark card type of, saying. But this time I heard it differently. I heard a blunt, direct, somewhat irritated Jesus saying to me, “Me: vine, you: branch—what part of that don’t you understand!”

Or to put it a slightly different way what I head was, “It’s not about you!” It is about a gracious, mysterious, relentless, persistent, majestic, suffering, amazing God. It’s God’s story.

Listen to Paul tell it, “Yet whatever gains I had (that would be his stellar resume), these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ. More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.” Paul traded in the resume, for a relationship. Paul traded in a civic faith that was all about what he was supposed to do, for a different faith and different focus, a faith and focus on what God had done in Jesus Christ. In Christ God had reached out to him, in his anger and despair, and loved him without condition or demand.

Finally, Paul had found it, but that's not the way he would put it: rather God's grace in Jesus had found him. Lost in his efforts to get it right, to prove his worth, to get on God’s good side by his own efforts and achievements, Christ had come to him and said, “Stop it Stop it right this minute!” Stop trying to get God on your side or to get on God’s good side; I am at your side and shall never leave it.” In Christ God has taken your side. Compared to this, Paul now said that everything else is as so much rubbish.

Several years ago I young woman at the church I served was asked to lead our prayers one October Sunday morning. She wrote an amazing prayer that expresses so much better than I the power of God's grace and how different it is than civic faith. Listen . . .

“God of ancient times and of this October morning, help us to remember how to understand that mystery which is called grace.
Grace.
We have forgotten again that your everlasting grace is not something we can earn.
Though we know better, we have saved up the evidence of our good thoughts and good deeds like bright coins in a bank,
Waiting for the day when we could cash them in.
Our houses and our hands are clean.
Our taxes are paid.
We voted, we mulched, we cleaned the gutters, we composted and recycled and did our homework.
We volunteered, we called our mothers, we kept our promises and paid our bills.
We only read good books, we pulled all the weeds, and stayed away from the TV.
We ate sensibly, worked hard, and went to bed on time.
We drove politely. We were sensitive, and of course, when we failed at any of this, we added our guilt to the bank.
Like children, earnestly offering our handfuls of pennies, these are some of the coins we plan to exchange for your everlasting love.
We hold them in our hands, demanding our reward, disappointed in the silence. Didn’t we try hard enough?
Please.
Some of us are out of strength for the fight.
Our hands are bleeding from holding on so tightly to the ends of the ropes.
Others of us are feeling competent and in control today, but every one of us needs to know again that grace which is not the reward for our efforts, not the end of our efforts.
Grace is the beginning, the astonishing gift that asks only to be used.

Desmond Tutu of South Africa said that there is a difference between a religion of virtue and a religion of grace. The difference between those two mirrors the distinction I have made between civic faith and the gospel.

Tutu said that Christianity is not a religion of virtue but a religion of grace. A religion of virtue says to us, “If you are good, then God will love you.” A religion of grace is different. A religion of grace says, “God loves you; live therefore as a beloved child of God.” Do you hear the difference between the two? One sounds like Santa Claus. You better be good if you want to get a present. The other is the love of a wise parent. I love you and will always love you. There is nothing you can do that will make me stop loving you. Trust my love for you and live, live with all the faith, hope and love that God has placed within you.

One of the leaders of the Protestant Reformation, John Calvin expressed something similar when he said, “Salvation is all about grace; ethics is all about gratitude.” That is the grammar of the gospel. First, what God has done, is doing, and has promised. Second, what we do, in grateful response. Civic faith has been too much about our doing, not enough about what God has done and is doing. Moreover, civic faith can turn into a harsh task master, demanding that we strive harder and harder to be good, to be perfect. In grace, God says to us, you don't have to win me to your side. In Christ Jesus I have taken your side and will never leave you.

I understand you missed Ash Wednesday this week, that some of this weather that you aren't supposed to be having got in the way. So let me conclude with an Ash Wednesday story.

A couple years after coming to to Plymouth Congregational Church in Seattle, I suggested that we have an Ash Wednesday service, which was not something that congregation had done. People's reactions to the idea were cautious, guarded. Ash Wednesday? Isn't that a Catholic thing. Ashes on foreheads? Sounds kind of primitive?

But I was able to talk the Worship Board into giving it a try. To sweeten the pot, we arranged for a member of the choir, who had just released a new CD of African American spirituals to give a 45 minute concert following the half hour Ash Wednesday service. What I didn't expect was that his new CD and our free concert would get full page coverage in the arts section of the Seattle papers.

So when Ash Wednesday came and I got up to lead the service, instead of the 50 or 75 intrepid souls I had expected, there were over three hundred people in the Sanctuary, and most of them were folks I had never in my life laid eyes on before. I panicked. I thought, "Oh Lord, what will they may of Ash Wednesday, with its long, tortorous confession of every sin known to man? With the imposition of ashes? Will they think we've done some kind of bait and switch. "Concert?" "Ashes!"

So I understook to explain Ash Wednesday, to soften the blow. Still when we got to the part of the service where the pastors when down from the chancel to the nave for the imposition of ashes, I wasn't sure that anyone at all would come forward. Would we all just stand there awkwardly? Imagine my surprise when not one or a couple came forward, but virtually all of the 300 surged forward. Imagine my surprise as I saw in the faces, in the often tearful eyes, a yearning for grace, for forgiveness, for God.

Meanwhile, we had stationed members of the church's music committee at the Sanctuary doors in case some came only for the concert and were early. There were to hold the people until the service concluded. So another 300 people were waiting in the church's large lounge. Someone said to our man at the door. "What's going on in there?" He muttered, "Something with ashes . . . Ash Wednesday." People said, "What kind of church is this?" to which our man at the door said, "Its our new minister. He has introduced a lot of religious effects. (Now I might have called them the Sacraments and Rituals of the church, but why quibble). He continued, "When he first did it, people wanted to lynch him; but now they love it." Well, he had the first part of it right, anyhow.

Two nights later my wife and I went out to dinner and were walking on Broadway in the Capitol Hill section of Seattle, sort of our avant garde district. Lots of purple hair, chains, leather, that sort of thing. Suddenly out of the crowd on the sidewalk a woman is standing in front of me. She says, "You're the minister at Plymouth right?" Truth to tell, if my wife hadn't been with me I would have lied.

But she was so I said, "Yes." "I was at your church Wednesday night. That thing you did with ashes--awesome. The words you said, "Turn away from your sins; believe the good news of God"--perfect. I want to come back. I'll see you Sunday." And with that she disappeared back into the moving crowd. And I staggered on down Broadway, muttering to myself, "God you are amazing."

May God surprise you and bless you in all that you are and do here at First Congregational Church! Amen.