(1 Cor 12:12-31a; Lk 4:14-21)

Sun, Jan 26, 2025, FBC Amherst, JG White

These cold days and nights have been so beautiful. Stunning stars and planets in the sky are the flip side of winter’s icy cold weather coin. I wanted to come up with some decorations in our space to replace all the Christmas greenery and lights. So we created some stars and planets. And the moon. The planets visible to the naked eye are getting nicely lined up all at once in the real sky right now. They keep following their predictable paths. All nature sings, and round me rings the music of the spheres.

We learn, from experts, that it all makes perfect sense, up there. But there is an idea in astronomy, in physics, about stars and planets up there, called the Three Body Problem. (I recently watched a science fiction series named after this which has very little to do with this sermon. (And has far too many F words.))

To make the Three Body Problem short and sweet: if you have a couple similar sized objects out in space, circling each other - a couple planets or a couple stars - math and physics can describe their movements quite well. But add a third object of similar size and try to set them orbiting one another - and it is far too complicated and chaotic. It will end with one or more of them spinning off far away, or crashing into each other. Four objects, or more: same problem.

Humanly speaking, we have a similar problem. Perhaps even just a two body problem, not to mention a hundred body or 8 billion body problem. Of various groups it is sometimes said, put two people in a room, and you will get three different opinions! “Why can’t people just get along,” we sometimes lament. And for good reason.

These Sundays right now, one Bible bit we are reading from is called 1 Corinthians. Today, chapter 12 carries on with help for a congregation of people that were not always getting along well. Their gatherings were, uh, well, dividing people, it seems, not uniting them. From what we heard today, there must have been some one-upmanship.

They get told: God is the source of their diversity and differences. The group of them is like a human body, with many parts (members) that all need each other. There should be no hierarchy of spiritual gifts: their abilities to do different things. There needs to be mutual care for one another, not dissension and strife. Each member of the congregation is important, is significant, belongs.

The Apostle who wrote this to the Church in that city uses such vivid imagery. The eyeball that thinks it is more important than the hand, and everything else. The head up top thinks itself far better than the feet down there. All the parts need all the other parts! And we are not going to class some as best or better than others. God sure hasn’t done that. So it says here.

Even the unseen, tiny bits, should not be forgotten. One day this past week, after going for a run for an hour with friends, on a -15 C morning, we looked at each other with frost all over our heads. Especially our hats, and any hair sticking out. I looked at one guy, with spectacular white frost on his eyebrows, moustache, and a few hairs on top of his nose. Fine little hairs no one can ever see, until the frost forms on them, a few runs during the winter. Those three little hairs, with no purpose at all, had a moment of joyful, frosty glory!

It is one thing to embrace your own physical body, with all its beauty and skill, its limitations and uniqueness. It is another thing to embrace the fellowship that is named after Christ, and respect - not to mention love - the other members of this Body.

Some days, you could feel like a pretty strong bicep muscle of First Baptist Church. Other days, you may feel like a sprig of hair growing out of an ear. We don’t need to classify ourselves as a greater or lesser part of this body. Or judge the status of others. We find our ways of belonging, and we discover how to include all the rest. We honour one another. We weep with those who weep. We rejoice with those who rejoice. We learn to live this life in Christ together, often by our mistakes and by forgiveness.

I saw some beautiful things this past week. Such as how one person, a member of this body, was not forgotten. Four women from here went down to Tatamagouche and surprised Marilyn Boudreau, on her birthday. I guess it was a wonderful party.

Just yesterday, I got to see Nova Tambeau, where she happily lives, at Dykeland Lodge, in Windsor. She is quite settled in there - far from us, in a way - but still connected with us, First Baptist.

These bright moments can shine a light upon our failures and errors. Who does fall through the cracks? Some do. Easy to do when many ‘body parts’ drop out. We keep learning, or we can, about how to rely upon the Spirit who unites us and reconciles and blesses us.

Twentieth-century Russian Orthodox Priest, Georges Florovsky, wrote: Christianity entered history as a new social order, or rather a new social dimension. From the very beginning Christianity was not primarily a ‘doctrine,’ but exactly a ‘community.’... Indeed, ‘fellowship’ (koinonia) was the basic category of Christian existence.

This afternoon, Christians of our area gather for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity service, just next door. A theme for this week has been one of the historic statements of faith, the Nicene Creed, 1,700 years old in 2025. Last week here we recited the first part of it, beginning with: We believe in one God, the Father almighty…

Perhaps the most powerful word here is simply the very first one, “We.” You don’t say ‘I believe this about God…’ Together we say ‘We believe…’ Together, we seek to put our confidence in something more than us, something good, something incredible. We likely don’t even believe all that the creed says, or don’t really understand all this language. But we can say we are together in whatever this blessed real Thing is who loves us. Today we said a bit of the creed that starts, For our sake he (Christ)... For us all, things happened. Whatever happened, whatever is still happening, is for all of us, for the whole world. ‘For God so loved the world,’ Jesus said.

So we are together, thanks be to God. Out of this new community, the fellowship of Christ, comes our power and our teamwork to make a difference on this planet. Keeping in touch with our saints who move away into long term care is one wonderful thing. Giving hope and working for change in a world of so much trouble and turmoil right now is another grand task for us.

We heard a Jesus story today. Remember? He got recruited as scripture reader in the synagogue of his home village, Nazareth. He read from the prophet Isaiah. And then says His work is to do just what it said there, all those years before.

He is anointed by the Spirit to

bring good news to the poor

proclaim release to captives

sight to blind people

set oppressed folks free

declare a year of good things from God.

How different from our daily world news! Or is it?

Wasn’t this in the news also, this week? A certain Church Bishop in the USA, Mariann Budde, preached:

have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now. There are transgender children ...who fear for their lives.

And the people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings; who labor in our poultry farms and meat-packing plants; who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants and work the night shift in hospitals—they may not be citizens or have the proper documentation, but the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals.

Help those who are fleeing war zones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here. Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were once strangers in this land.

It is mercy, it is the life of Christ in us, Who makes better things happen than you and I can make happen just on our own. This is grace. This is goodness. This is miracle. This is hope. This is real.

With all the bodies in our church, all the bodies in the Amherst area, all the billions of human bodies circling the globe - there will be problems. Unpredictable, unending problems. People and groups fighting and flying off in all directions. The solution to the problems is the Source. Source with a capital ‘S.’ There is Goodness, with a capital ‘G.’ Life, with a capital ‘L.’