Historic First Lutheran Church of Pasadena

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Contrary to what it says in your bulletin, our text this morning is Hebrews 10:25 – “Let us not give us meeting together as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another – and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” That is our text.

Trust me when I say that as a pastor I hear all kinds of crazy things. Sometimes those crazy things are very intimate issues about people’s personal lives, things that probably don’t get told to anyone else. Sometimes those crazy things are people’s interpretations of what’s in the Bible. Sometimes those crazy things are people’s ideas of what it is and what it means to be a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ.

One of those crazy things that, honestly, I hear way too often is when I contact a member of this congregation or even a regular visitor who hasn’t been seen in church for a while. Whether its via the telephone or via email, once the niceties are out of the way (the obligatory things like “How are you?”; “How’s the family?” ; “How’s work?”), then we get to the heart of the matter – which they’ve kind of been expecting all along – and I’ll say, “We’ve missed you in church lately.” The crazy thing that I have heard in response to that statement way too often goes something like this: “Well, Pastor, don’t give up on me. I’ve still got my faith. I’m just practicing it by myself.” That’s really truly a crazy thing to say, similar to playing a game of tennis by yourself. You really can’t do it.

That response reminds me of the man who was walking out of church on Christmas Eve and was warmly greeted by the pastor at the door, “Welcome back! We haven’t seen you since Easter!” To that, the man responds, “Well, I’ve been here almost every week.” The pastor, puzzled by that response, asks further, “What service have you been attending? I honestly haven’t seen you!” To that, the man smiles and responds, “Well, Pastor, that’s because I’m in the secret service.”

The secret service. Can you imagine if that’s how Jesus carried out His ministry? Beautiful scenes like we see in today’s Gospel [Mark 7:24-37] would be missing from the Bible. Jesus wouldn’t walk into places like Tyre and have people know that He was there – or, if they knew, they wouldn’t care. Jesus wouldn’t have had the chance to say to that distressed woman, “You may go. The demon has left your daughter.” Jesus wouldn’t have placed His hands on the deaf mute and stuck His fingers into his ears and said the word Ephphatha, opening the man’s ears and loosening the man’s tongue. No, all that would have to be struck from the pages of the Bible, if Jesus were in the “secret service,” if he practiced His faith by Himself.

That crazy response is certainly out of sync with the First Reading today [Isaiah 35:4-7]. If faith were to be practiced in private, in response to the coming of God, there would be no opening of the eyes and ears of the blind and deaf. There would be no leaping of the deer; no mute tongues shouting for joy. There would be no water gushing forth in the wilderness, no streams in the desert. The burning sand would simply remain burning sand. The thirsty ground would not be quenched. What a boring world that would be!

Imagine for a second if Jesus had taken His disciples up on that mountain when He was getting ready to ascend back into Heaven. Imagine for a second if Jesus had said to His disciples, “Well, boys, it’s been a good three years. I hope you’ve enjoyed it as much as I have. Now take your memories and go sit in your homes for the rest of your lives.” Imagine for a second how different this world would be today if the disciples, at the explicit command of Jesus, had not gone and made disciples of all nations, baptizing them and teaching them everything He had commanded them.

No, my friends, there is nothing private about faith. You will never find anything in Scripture that
tells you that your faith is something for you personally, that your faith is something to keep to yourself. You will not even find anywhere in Scripture that you can practice your faith by yourself. Oh sure, we are to practice our faith every day, even when we’re not surrounded by fellow Christians, but then the exercise of that faith is to be shared with others, for mutual celebration, for mutual encouragement.

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard stories from people who weren’t going to come to church because they had had a really bad week, but somehow they got themselves to church and found themselves sitting next to someone who encouraged them, who either had had a really good week and simply by their attitude, encouraged them that things would get better in their own lives or they found themselves sitting next to someone who had had an even worse week than they had had and it gave them the opportunity to be jarred out of their own self-sympathy and encourage the other person. God Himself is present and works in mysterious ways when His people gather together.

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard stories from people who weren’t going to come to church because they had had an exciting, blessed week and were still caught up in that celebration, but somehow they got themselves to church and found themselves connected to that one person who needed to share their joy and their excitement. God Himself is present and works in mysterious ways when His people gather together.

That symbiotic relationship – where faith is connected with action and where my personal faith is connected with each of your personal faith – is exactly what Jesus intended for His people. I was reminded of that through an email I received this week, a fairly simple email that acknowledged the tough two weeks I’ve had with the deaths of three church members within 14 days, an email that reminded me that the person was praying for me, an email that told me how important it was that I stay strong for all of you who are looking to me to bring comfort and hope. Imagine if I had responded, “I’m practicing my faith by myself. I wish you well.”

No, my friends, there is no secret service is God’s army. While we can and should read the Bible in the privacy of our homes each and every day, while we are encouraged to go into our closets when we pray our most intimate prayers, while we are told that our acts of charity should be done in such a way that our right hand doesn’t know what our left hand is going, there is no such thing as practicing your faith privately, cutting yourself off from the Body of Christ, saying “I don’t need you,” going your own way, doing your own thing.

That’s just not how God designed us. Perhaps the poet John Donne said it best, “No man is an island.” Let me remind you that no woman or child is an island either! Jesus didn’t just die and rise again for you personally. Jesus died and rose again for all the world, to bring us together with one common denominator, one common need, one common solution, one common experience.

My friends, without any doubt, I can tell you that I need each of you. And my friends, without any doubt, at least based upon the volume of telephone calls and emails I have received the past couple weeks from many of you, you need me. There is nothing private about faith. Faith is meant to be a joint, corporate activity, something that is to be practiced together.

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Pastor Christopher Schaar
Historic First Lutheran Church of Pasadena