First Presbyterian Church of Watertown

Romans 13

“Provisions”

The Rev. Dr. Fred G. Garry

December 2, 2007

            I was standing with Tom Carman, Samaritan’s CEO, after a meeting here in fellowship hall.  The hospital asked to hold one of a series of community meeting at First Pres.  When only five people showed up, I made a point to talk to Tom afterward.  He was presenting a plan to expand the hospital with a new patient’s tower and a parking garage; he was revealing the plan to raise 12 million in local dollars; and, there was the quiet issue that this is the single largest building effort in recent Watertown memory as well as the State outside of New York City.  Altogether this is a sixty million dollar project and five people showed up to listen.

            “Well,” I said, “you should be encouraged.”  He gave me a wry smile and said, “oh yah?”  “You should be encouraged: the people of Watertown have such an explicit trust in your leadership that when you say, ‘let’s spend 60 million dollars’ only five people even have a question, let alone a concern.” 

            After we laughed for a moment I said, “While I believe that is true, there may be another issue.”  For the next twenty minutes or so we talked about the way it is difficult for people to see the hospital.  They can drive down the street; they can go to the emergency room; they visit a friend after surgery, but they don’t see the hospital in all that it does and what it means for our economy, what it brings in terms of service, how it all hangs together.  At times it can be a world unto itself, so when the hospital says, we want to expand, to grow, to be better, it doesn’t really hit home.  People can’t see this as theirs or that as the hospital grows so does the community.

            There is an old saying, “you have to see it to believe it.”  The idea is not that you doubt the existence of something until it is proven, like Thomas wanting to see the wounds of Christ before he believed.  The idea is that some things are so far beyond our imagination we cannot even conjure them as fantasy.

            In some ways 60 million dollars feels a bit that way for me.  I can imagine six, but sixty, I have to admit, is illusive.  It’s hard to envision.  Serving on the hospital board my vision is starting to clear up a bit; the expenses are starting to seem more and more real as does the benefit and direction.

            And I have to commend Tom for his gumption.  It takes a bit of courage to say to a community please donate 12 million dollars.  Now he would be the first to say it wasn’t him doing the asking; it was community leaders, it was doctors and foundations in town.  And this is true.  But I have been part of a capital campaign and I will never forget the first question the consultant asked.  Before he spoke to anyone else he asked me, am I willing to lead this?  Am I willing to say this is the way we are going to go as a church?  Even though I was an enthusiastic supporter, I swallowed hard when I said yes.

            I swallowed hard because no matter how good the idea, no matter how needed the project, how right the timing, there is still a moment when you realize, I am committing myself to something much bigger than me; I am jumping into an endeavor that may just as likely lead to ruin as it does to success.

            And there were many here in town that scoffed at the figure being proposed.  Can’t happen.  There just isn’t that kind of money.  It’s pretty safe to say those scoffs had an impact, gave a sense of what am I doing?  Five people showing up to hear about the project must have had a similar impact.  There needs to be an element of enthusiasm in a community to achieve such a goal.  I commend Tom not only for his success, but also for the way he stood in the gap.  It’s not an easy place to be.

            Vision and leadership are starting to phase out a bit.  The visionary leader today is often being seen as the delusional one off chasing grand schemes.  And this happens.  It is a thin line between vision and delusion.  When you jump into a big change, a great endeavor it’s hard to know sometimes if you are being led to a great future of a high-speed crash.  Sometimes the voices that sing are sirens leading to a rocky shoal. 

            It is most likely safe to say we have all encountered the frustration of being part of a planning session when a leader says, now let’s work on a vision statement, what are we going to be?  I can remember an elder in my first congregation whose name was also Tom.  Tom was an employee of AT&T at their corporate offices in Columbus.  When someone at a session meeting suggested we develop a mission and vision statement as a church, I thought the meltdown he experienced was going to lead to a nuclear incident. 

            “We don’t need to waste our time.”  This was a mild version of his reaction.  While it wasn’t true, we did need one as a church; what was true was that Tom could not suffer another one.  It would appear that on a corporate level this process had burned one too many afternoons for his taste with no tangible return.

            This is a fair critique for the most part.  The effort to articulate a vision is not the same as the will power, the faithfulness, the endurance to bring it to the fore.  As a young president John Kennedy said, “by the end of the decade we will put a man on the moon.”  Many of you may have been alive and old enough to scoff at such a vision, such a dream, because it was a ridiculous notion in itself, but coming from such a novice as Kennedy, even more so. Yet as a nation few things have galvanized us and changed us more than seeing this vision become reality.

            At a recent meeting Dick Halpin reminded a group of this vision statement as well as the vision of Ezra Cornell.  Cornell proclaimed I would found an institution where any person can find instruction in any study.  Now he said this standing in an empty farm field the year the Civil War came to an end in 1865.  Perhaps this is the origin of the claim, “crazy farmers” but then again it came to be.

            As Dick went on to discuss other attributes of vision and vision statements, I couldn’t help but think of the vision statement we have used here at First Pres for quite some time.  The vision that was adopted before I came, a vision statement that was part of the inspiration and the calling to come here as your pastor, ( the vision statement) is very simple: we will be a force for Christianity in the community.  Simple, bold, clear.  We will be a force for Christianity in the community.

            In the last few years the session has discussed augmenting our vision statement to say, “in the community and the world” given how much we do in places around the globe.  Yet as Dick was speaking about what a vision statement was to be he said it should be about what is not yet; it is supposed to be something that is out there, something to which we aspire; as he was speaking I couldn’t help but think we need to do more than augment the statement because we can see it, we are what we aspire to be.

            The statement shouldn’t read we will be force, but we are a force.  It sounds a little arrogant, but it’s not meant to be.  We need to recognize we are a force for Christianity both here and in the world.  We need to see this dream, this vision, as realized and rejoice; we need to give thanks and revel in a vision come to the fore; and then we need to get back to work.  For now we need a new dream, a new vision.

            I was back a few days from Turkey when Bob Gorman came by the house and we sat and talked.  The word from Zoe, I told Bob, was that the stewardship Sundays were great.  I impressed upon him that my children are very tough critics by and large and down right blunt when in it came to worship.  He should take the praise of a fifteen-year-old pastor’s daughter to the bank I said.  Yet, as Bob talked there was a bit of melancholy. 

            He has a vision for you and it is a bit disconcerting that it is still far off.  I tried to encourage him, but I didn’t coddle his frustration.  On the one hand I told him that a vision takes time; that the congregation has been very faithful in their response and we need to give them thanks; but on the other hand, this is a big dream that is not easy to see and he shouldn’t resign himself to what is.

            Here is Bob’s dream: we would equip the church with faithful giving.  We would all tithe and there would never be another stewardship campaign.  People would fill out one pledge card, one time, that said, I will tithe.  While such a system may create a moment of ambiguity for a bookkeeper, the fruit would be all too clear. 

Now this is a big dream; this is the stuff of vision. And there are two ways to look at this: for those of you who are not tithing yet Bob wants you to keep growing and perhaps give a lot more money.  That is kind of the cranky way of seeing this.  The other way of seeing it is that he believes in you.  He believes a whole congregation can be this; he believes we can become this.  And for the most part, I must confess, Bob has more faith than I do.  Every time he has said, “and then there will no more stewardship campaigns” every time he says this I fail to concur.  I don’t see it yet.  And it is a matter of faith.          

When the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome he was already well on his way toward becoming the Apostle to the Gentiles.  Saying it this way it is hard to see just how crazy this was.  Being the apostle to the gentiles is in essence being a minister to the world.  I am the senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Watertown.  At a recent session meeting one of the elders put forth the idea that I also see myself as a pastor to the community.  Yet, this is a bit of stretch for me to see, to envision.  For Paul not so much; he wasn’t struggling to see himself as a pastor to a few neighborhoods, but a few continents. 

And, in our passage today we can see that he not only saw himself in a really fantastic, grand scale but saw the individual church that way too.  To the Church of Rome he gives them a vision statement; he put forth this way of looking at themselves.  He said, make no provisions for the flesh.  Put on Jesus Christ.  He was telling the church, in essence, that they need to become the body and blood of Christ, the living presence of Jesus.  Imagine this as the adopted vision statement of a local church: we will put on Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh.  We will become the gospel; we will make no concessions for what is less than kingdom of God.

I have to say I would be less intimidated about raising 12 million, or developing a whole congregation that tithes, than saying, we will become the living presence of Christ here in Watertown.  Now add to this, for Paul would have added it, and to the world.

We need to write a new vision statement.  I believe that.  I wonder, though, will it be grand or mundane?  Are you ready to do or be something far beyond what we are?  It’s hard to see it, to even imagine something other than what we are.  Yet, what if this is the real stuff of faithfulness?

When I listen to Bob describe his stewardship dreams what I find really convicting is that such faithfulness is truly what it would take to equip the church unto a whole new life.  And I don’t mean money; I mean faithfulness.  For money pays the bills; faithfulness puts on Christ.  By our faithfulness we will offer the provisions necessary to put on the armor of light whatever in the world that means.  What a radical vision statement that would be: we will put on Christ and the armor of light.  I can tell you that being a force for Christianity is pretty cool; I can’t imagine how cool it would be to put on Christ and the armor of light.  Amen.