I’ve always appreciated the Book of Confessions, which, along with the Book of Order, serves as the Constitution of our Presbyterian denomination. While many Presbyterian churches use the Apostles’ Creed every Sunday, I’ve always tended to use different confessions from Sunday to Sunday, giving voice to efforts to be faithful to the issues of years and years of history: the Confession of l967, addressing the need for reconciliation, The Declaration of Barmen, written in response to the actions of Adolf Hitler, The Westminster Confession, written at the time of the Reformation, the Brief Statement of Faith, written at the time of reunion of the northern and southern Presbyterian churches, and the Belhar Confession, written in response to apartheid. Yesterday I used a contemporary affirmation of faith, not in our Book of Confessions: An Affirmation of God’s Freeing Love” to support the sermon theme of giving what is uniquely ours to give.
A member once told me she liked the Apostles’ Creed, because it was the “real thing,” that all the other confessions were just people’ ideas, and she just wasn’t sure about them. I shared with her that the Apostles’ Creed was just that – people’s words in their time and place, stating their understanding and beliefs.
I read in this week’s Presbyterian News Release that a special sixteen-member committee consisting of teaching and ruling elders has been called together to consider a new confession, according to Rick Jones, of the Office of the General Assembly.
“The writing of a confession that speaks of the intersection of our faith with the challenges of contemporary culture is one of the most important tasks to which a church is called. It offers an unapologetic affirmation of how we are to embody our faith in the midst of real and present challenges reflected in systemic structures that perpetuate racism, injustices of all kinds and ecological indifference to the planet we call home. We are grateful for these saints who will put their hearts and pen to paper in an effort to offer words reflecting those values for a time such as this.”
Presbyterian churches are “confessional churches” and in most Presbyterian churches each worship service includes an Affirmation or Confession of Faith, to say or to affirm what we believe. I’ve always been comforted and challenged by these faithful statements of understanding coming forth from generation to generation. I look forward to hearing the words coming to affirm our faithfulness in such a time as this.
Elizabeth
I came across a book I once read to my children, to their delight
“There was once a land called Grayland, where everything was gray. The sky was gray. The grass was gray. The flowers were gray. Every day it looked like rain. Even the people were gray. Every morning they pulled back their curtains on another gray day. They put on their gray clothes and ran downstairs to a gray breakfast. Then they shut their gray front doors and hurried past the gray shop to catch the gray bus to work. Gray spotted dogs barked as they passed. The children played with their gray toys and went to school in gray clothes. It was very dull. There was no color anywhere. No cheerful red. No orange. No blue. No green. No yellow. Not even brown! But the people didn’t mind – because they didn’t know. They had never seen a blue sky or green grass or yellow buttercups. So they were happy enough in Grayland, in a gray sort of way.”
Everything changed the day a large and colorful hot air balloon carrying four brightly dressed children came floating in. The little gray boy ran to meet it! The children told him of wonderful colors:
“A Land of Color,” sighed the Little Gray Boy. He’d been quite happy with gray before. Now it made him feel sad. If only someone could make his Grayland into a Land of Color!
To make a long story short, the Little Gray Boy went to the Mayor, the Wizard and the Witch, with no success. At last a Grandmother said, “Why don’t you ask the Maker?”
“There was a long pause. The people hung their heads. Why, they had forgotten all about the Maker. Now they began to remember. They remembered stories of long ago – stories of The Beginning, of a beautiful Land of Color where the Maker and his people were happy together. Before things went wrong and the colors faded away… Yes, they would ask the Maker. And that was what they did. They said they were sorry for forgetting him. And they asked him to make their Grayland into a Land of Color – please! …and they waited and waited and waited …After a time there came a tremendous thunderstorm, and the raindrops that fell were of different colors. Green drops fell on the leaves and the grass. Brown drops fell on the earth. Red drops fell on the poppies, and yellow drops fell on the buttercups … The people thanked the Maker- ‘Thank you,’ they said, ‘for our Land of Color. We promise we’ll never forget you again.’”
Many times these days, our world seems like a Grayland and people come in shades of gray and hopelessness. This book that once delighted my children brings hope and joy to my heart this day. That colorful hot air balloon of hope floats by for those with eyes to see, and The Maker stills rains color on our gray days, for those with hearts to understand.
Elizabeth
In recent weeks the church parking lot has been undergoing the process of repaving. This involved breaking up the old asphalt and hauling it away, smoothing and allowing the ground to settle, and after several days, repaving. I appreciated the faithfulness of those hard workers who toiled through some of the hottest days on record! I’ve wondered what became of all that was broken up and hauled away.
The old surface was bumpy and cracked and uneven. We became well-acquainted with its problems and possibilities during the early months of the pandemic when we worshipped outside in the parking lot.
I’ve thought a lot about the process I watched unfolding from day to day - a breaking up and removing a surface that had years of faithful use, then time to prepare a new foundation, and the new surface itself. I’ve thought a lot about all the cars that parked here or cut through here to avoid tricky curves coming and going. I’ve thought about Bible School gatherings and Easter Sunrise Services and Easter Egg Hunts and the drive-through Blessing of the Animals Service during the pandemic. That old parking lot served us well and if those pieces of asphalt could speak, they would surely have stories to tell. And soon the newly paved surface will have stories to tell as well!
Scripture tells of God working to make all things new. Perhaps much the same process applies to our lives as well. All that is broken and cracked is healed and restored; the ups and downs of our journeys of life and faith are smoothed and resurfaced, and we have the gift of a new beginning.
“Tikkun olam” is a concept in Judaism, which refers to various forms of action intended to repair and improve the world:
A cherished Jewish recognition
That our purpose in life
Is to repair the world
In that spirit, we might ask
What might I contribute with my life
How might I be, that my life leaves things better?
The busy street of my life
Needs to be restored.
Ground down
Swept and washed
Resurfaced
And the world is crying out
For love
Or even for a little recognition
An awareness that our lives
Are of value and have a contribution to make.
It seems there’s always something we can learn from every life experience, even the repaving of a parking lot at a 206- year-old Presbyterian Church in Jackson Springs!
Elizabeth