Sermon given at the morning prayer of the WCC Central Committee meeting on 13 February 2008

Bible text: John 17:18-26

Preacher: Bishop Sally Dyck

THE POWER OF ONE

The young son of one of the United Methodist pastors in Minnesota went to a Catholic school. He went to the Catholic school because his mother got a teaching job there when they moved to the small town. It’s usually not a popular move with the church when the pastor’s children don’t go to the public school in the US and so young Joseph had to explain why he went to the Catholic school many times by the time I had lunch with him after church one day.

He was telling me about his school and how much he liked it. Then he said to me in kind of a conspiratorial whisper, “Catholics, United Methodists, the only difference is the juice.” He meant, of course, that Catholics have wine in their chalice and United Methodists have grape juice. His theology of the sacrament is fairly simple!

While I may have just offended some of you by Joseph’s over-simplification of ecumenism, let me say that this story demonstrates at least in the US how effective the WCC has been in 60 years to help break down dividing walls of hostility between Christians. Joseph’s comments would never have occurred in my little town when I was growing up 50 some years ago. Joseph sees other Christians with such pure simplicity because of the presence, power and witness of the WCC. And that’s partly why I’m here: hoping that we can take the witness of Christ into the world in some new ways in the next 60 years.

THE POWER OF ONE IN CHRIST

Admittedly Joseph has over-simplified a few things — deep theological things — but admittedly sometimes we over-complicate them. I saw Joseph the other day at a con­firmation rally. He’s going to be joining the church, the United Methodist Church. But Joseph understands that he is joining the power of One who is Christ Jesus; the One who is the Head and Cornerstone of all our Christian witness around the world.

The “power of one” is a phrase that’s used across the world today to indicate that it only takes one to get a movement started. The movement that we are all a part of is the one that was begun, is and continues in Christ Jesus. It’s clear from the prayer that Jesus prayed on the night in which he was betrayed, when his disciples separated and abandoned him, that he never wanted our faith in him to divide us from one another. So he prayed that we would be one with him as he is one with God.

Recently Peter Steinfels who writes the religion column, Beliefs, for the New York Time commented on the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. First, it was quite remarkable to find anything in any newspaper in America about the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. He reflected that for many people the “scandal of division now (i.e. 60 years later) looks more like the virtue of diversity.” In fact, he says that sociologists of religion say that where diversity of church forms and practices are allowed to flourish, Christianity has flourished. How do we press forward in an ecumenical spirit when many Christians see our divisions as a “virtue,” not a “scandal”? Our diversity within our unity is fine as long as we live in the power of One who is Christ Jesus.

Barbara Brown Taylor is an Episcopalian priest in the US and well-known for her preaching and writing. In one of her writings, she comments on being named one of the 12 best preachers in the United States. She reflects on this honor by thinking about what the apostle Paul would say about that in light of 1 Corinthians when he asks of the church at Corinth: “has Christ been divided?” She imagined Paul saying to her and the other 11 “best preachers,” “What are you doing there with your name plastered all over the place (with this honor)? This was never suppose to be about you. All 12 of you should be ashamed that anyone knows your name at all. When you get through preaching, the only name anyone’s lips should be saying is the name of Jesus…”

I have a similar feeling about the “virtue of diversity” within the body of Christ. The power of One in Christ Jesus is that through our unique and diverse witnesses in unique and diverse cultures and countries and contexts, when all is said and done, the only name on anyone’s lips should be the name of Jesus! In our discussions, our work, in our diversity and divisions, scandal and virtue, that’s what we hold in common and therefore in the name of Jesus we find our unity.

THE POWER OF ONE IN CHRIST WITH EACH OTHER.

God seems to favor diversity as we see in creation and as we look around at each other! Yet God also makes love of one another a sign of how much we love God in Christ Jesus. That almost seems like a cruel joke! Diversity or love but diversity and love is very difficult to do! Yet Jesus commanded us to love one another and be one with each other as well as one with him.

I believe that it breaks Christ’s heart when we cannot unite around the common practices of our Christian faith; worship, baptism, ministry and the Lord’s supper. I believe it breaks Christ’s heart that some cannot accept my baptism (which was in the Mennonite Church), my ordination and my consecration (in the United Methodist Church). How can my baptism, ordination and consecration possibly be accepted? What if I were a better Christian; would I be fully accepted then? What if I were a better scholar or ecumenist, could I then be accepted? No, we know that none of that is what divides us! It’s not how we live the Christian faith that divides us as much as what we believe! We know it’s because the body of Christ is broken by us and our limited or limiting understanding and acceptance of what it means to be Christ’s body in the world.

There’s a prayer from China that’s in my daily prayer book that always takes my breath away when I read it:

Help each one of us, gracious God, to live in such magnanimity and restraint that the Head of the Church may never have cause to say to any one of us: “This is my body, broken by you.”

We must forever keep before us the scandal of our own divisions and not get too com­fortable with them. And to live “in such magnanimity and restraint” that we can knit together the brokenness of the Body of Christ to be a witness to the world.

One of the strengths of the WCC over the last 60 years has been to speak justice to the structures of injustice around the world, to speak words of non-violence to forces of violence, to speak hope to that which is crumbling in despair, and to speak reconciliation and peace to the machines of war. Yet how can we do that - what right do we have to speak - if we don’t demonstrate being one with each other? The power of One in Christ Jesus calls us to love one another and to make our mission to be in relationship with each other … starting with us here.

On August 1, 2007 a major bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis collapsed within 4 seconds. Hundreds of cars were sitting on the bridge during rush hour and when I first heard about the collapse, I was sure that hundreds of people would die. Miracu­lous­ly only 13 died and 150 are still seriously injured and in rehabilitation.

As a result, those of us who live in Minneapolis have become amateur bridge engineers of sorts. We’ve learned that steel gusset plates in the truss bridge act as braces to hold the bridge joints together. But the gusset plates can weaken and fail. When these gussets give way, a design flaw existed that caused this bridge to collapse within 4 seconds. There was no redundancy system; nothing to catch the structure if only to give enough time for people to get to safety. Without a redundancy system, it fell like this - in moments. But with a redundancy system, something would catch it.

Relationships - one on one relationships - are the redundancy system of our life together in Christ. The Central Committee of the WCC offers an opportunity to build a re­dundancy design which can influence all of our work and provide leadership to mend the broken body of Christ.

My sense of ecumenism was developed while I was a student at Bossey 30 years ago. Bossey is an incredible redundancy system of world-wide ecumenism! We had a mini-reunion of our class when we were in Brazil. How many of you are graduates of Bossey?

Jesus prayed that we would develop a redundancy system of relationships. Jesus knew that the only way we could be one with each other is when we love one another, pray for one another, care for one another, accept one another, know one another, visit one another, strengthen one another … one another each other! It’s at lunch, it’s at dinner, it’s at break that we are the WCC; when we know and care for each other, we will also do our work in a way that is pleasing to God. It’s telling each other’s stories when we return home so that the world’s a little smaller in all our corners where we live and serve Christ. It’s bringing together a wide world into the heart of Christ.

THE POWER OF ONE IN CHRIST JESUS, ONE WITH EACH OTHER AND ONE IN MINISTRY TO ALL THE WORLD …

People around the world are asking the question, “What is the power of one?” The one aspect of the world that has gotten smaller due to transportation and communication in the last 60 years, it would seem to me, is that we are more aware of the suffering that exists throughout our world. And people want to make a difference in alleviating human suffering of all kinds.

Young people in particular have given up on big organizations like our denominations and the WCC in favor of believing in a simpler, focused movement of the power of one plus one plus one. Here in Davos, Switzerland a few weeks ago at the World Economic Forum there were a number of such young people who have exercised the “power of one” to make a difference about some area of human suffering in the world. One saw the plight of teenage girls, for instance, in Thailand and organized (mostly through the Internet) a way to provide education for them. Another organized a way to provide eye care to 200,000 people in poor countries.

They are young social entrepreneurs who see a problem and roll up their sleeves, usually by turning on their computers, and address it. As they say, they neither hand out fish or teach people to fish; their aim is to revolutionize the fishing industry! A new book has been written about some of these young people’s efforts entitled, “The Power of Un­reasonable People.” They’re unreasonable because they believe they can change the world! Do we as the WCC?

As the WCC we need to become known as “unreasonable people,” i.e. people of audacious hope and belief in the power of God and each other. The WCC is uniquely poised as it has in its most influential, albeit controversial, times to call forth a new vision that can revolutionize poverty, violence, injustice, human rights violations, human suffering through the power of Christ. May we trust in the power of God and each other to empower our organization to be in ministry to all the world and unleash the potential of all the “one plus one plus ones” that we represent!

“One with Christ, one with each other and one in ministry to all the world.” Those are the words of the Great Thanksgiving in many of our traditions. May we become what we say we believe: that we are One in Christ Jesus, One with each other and One in ministry to all the world!