LAKEWOOD UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST
2601 54th Avenue South St. Petersburg, FL 33712
On land originally inhabited by the Tocabaga
727-867-7961
lakewooducc.org
lakewooducc@gmail.com
Date: Sept. 17, 2023 Charter Sunday celebrating the founding of the church
Scripture Lesson: Mark 4:1-9
Sermon: An Astounding Yield
Pastor: Rev. Kim P. Wells
A year ago at this time, we were walking the Camino de Santiago Del Norte across the northern coast of Spain. It was one glorious day of walking after another surrounded by stunning scenery. I had with me a little book called How To Walk by Thich Nhat Hanh. This book was recommended by Yoko Nogami, a former member of this church. She read it each day when she was walking the Appalachian Trail. So each day on the Camino I would read a page from How to Walk. Inside the covers of the book, I made a list of each date we would be walking and beside each date was a name of someone from our Lakewood Church family. So each day, I would hold that person or family in my thoughts as I walked. On Sept. 17, today’s date, the name was Barbara Donohue. Barbara is not here today because she wanted to go to Trinity Church one more time as they come to the end of their Sundays worshipping at their church on 49th Street before coming here to join with us.
Each day on the Camino I would think about someone from our church family. And I was in awe, day after day, thinking about the amazing people that make up this church. You are an incredible group of people! The stories, the spirit, the generosity, the concern for others, the activities and interests of folks – it’s really quite remarkable.
This led me to think about how our church attracts such a beautiful mix of people. What draws them? How does it happen that we’re all here? I contemplated this for some time on the Camino and beyond. There are some things that could be said about this, but really nothing has come to mind that provides a satisfactory explanation for me.
Then I started to see this situation from another angle. Maybe it is through being part of this faith community that people become so amazing. Maybe it is being part of this congregation that moves us toward our highest good. Maybe here we feel safe to share and be who we are in our fullness. Maybe in this context we are being formed and shaped into our better selves.
I know that has happened with me. It is this community that has formed and shaped who I am as a pastor and as a person. Here’s an example. When I first started serving here in 1991, the church faced the decision about whether to continue to have a child care center here at the church. The Fellowship Hall building housed a day care for about 60 children from the neighborhood. There were issues with the program and we had to discern whether the church had the wherewithal to sustain the program. It needed a major overhaul or to be closed. Just to say – I would not have wanted my children to attend preschool here the way it was at that time.
Closing a childcare center is a major decision. It has a variety of implications for the congregation. It is a decision that would have a huge impact on about 50 families from the community. And, this decision would be a major public relations bust. Oh, that’s the church that closed the day care. The church that left all those families high and dry. Not to mention the staff.
So here was this huge decision to be made by people who had just been through months of conflict and contention over the former minister. How was this going to go?
Well, the lay leadership of the church council decided this decision needed to be made by consensus among the council and then presented to the congregation as unanimously agreed upon by the leaders. And these church leaders had a plan for how these discussions would go. They consulted certain Quaker methods of consensus decision making. They researched mediation techniques. And the church council met, pretty much weekly, and sat in a circle here in this sanctuary, and had conversations week after week after week about all of the perspectives, implications, and facets of this decision. And it was decided that we would keep meeting, weekly, until we had reached consensus.
And – it worked! The leaders did reach consensus. Finally. To close the childcare center. And the congregation overwhelmingly agreed.
Well, I can tell you this. This was all new territory for me. I had never seen a church go about anything this way. Nothing like this was ever covered in my seminary training. I had never seen this level of commitment – a weekly meeting to hash over the minutiae of this day care decision. The techniques for managing the conversation. I had never experienced anything like this – in or out of church.
And I could see the wisdom in it. They did not want another divisive situation, with the congregation embroiled in another conflict. And they had learned some things from their previous experiences. And we have used some of those techniques subsequently when we have faced other contentious situations.
So, I didn’t come into this as the ‘expert’ with a bag of tricks. I have learned from the congregation, from this community, about how to go about decision making in ways that are not divisive.
Another situation like this involved creating a new structure for the church which resulted in the system we have now with a group of advisors overseeing the operational matters of the church and leaving all other initiatives and events and ministries to the will of the congregation at any given time. The task force that worked on this new structure intentionally sought to create a structure that was non patriarchal and non hierarchical. They came up with those criteria. And, of course, I agreed. But I was learning from these church leaders about how we could more fully embody the beloved community as a functioning institutional church. And I must say, after over 20 years, the system we have works very well for us.
I could tell you story after story like this – about how I am continually learning, growing, and deepening in faith because of this community.
My brother is a UCC pastor of a large church in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. As he put it, “Your church is always moving you further to the left.” Yes, it is. Thankfully! I could never serve in a situation like his where he is always trying to nudge his church just a smidgen to the left.
What I have come to realize is that this church doesn’t just attract amazing people like a flower attracts a bee. This church is forming and shaping us into an amazing, incredible community of people. It is just as it says in the story of the sower. The seed has been scattered. We have all received it. And this church, this faith community, is our fertile soil. This is where we take root and those roots grow deep. This is where we are watered and fed. This is where we are sustained. This is where we are pruned when we need it. This is where we are provided with all that we need to thrive and grow and bear fruit.
So I am done worrying about how to attract amazing people to our church. Instead, I am thinking about how we can support each other in manifesting our highest good, in healing from the battering life too often brings, and in taking care of ourselves, one another, and this precious, fragile, beautiful world. How can we continue to be fertile soil?
In this blessed congregation, may we all find what we need to live, grow, thrive, and bear the fruits of love. Amen.
A reasonable effort has been made to appropriately cite materials referenced in this sermon. For additional information, please contact Lakewood United Church of Christ.
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