A Fourth Church Sermon by John Wilkinson

September 5, 1999 | 9:30 and 11:00 a.m.

Two or Three

John Wilkinson
Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Matthew 18:15–20

“For where two or three are gathered in my name,
I am there among them.”

Matthew 18:20 (NRSV)

Prayers of the People by John A. Cairns

Does it matter? Does any of it matter? I am talking about the church, this church, any church, every church, the human institution wrapped around the story of faith, fraught with human foibles and frailties now for nearly two millennium. Does it matter? My ministers union, if I had one, would rightly encourage a positive response, as would my own enlightened sense of self-interest at year-end performance review. But I would say yes anyway, and I believe it more and more each day, that what we do as a community, as the body of Christ in the world, for others, with ourselves, on grand scales and on modest scales, matters, matters deeply.

When I was a seminary student, a small church in Northwest Indiana invited me to come and preach on Easter Sunday. I was thrilled and a little daunted. “Why Easter,” I asked, which really meant “why me?” It’s the Sunday we open up, was the reply. It turns out that the church, not unlike a resort church (although in a decidedly un-resort-like location, although I love Northwest Indiana, but I digress!), it turns out that the church closed at the first snowfall of the winter and re-opened each Easter morning. So I was the preacher for opening day. I didn’t know what to expect.

We arrived, entirely too early, the church doors were locked, and we waited in my pale green ’74 Plymouth Satellite. And then it happened. Church happened. There were twelve of us, including myself and my future spouse. Twelve of us. And it mattered. The pianist, with great joy, if not accuracy, played the Easter hymns. Prayers of thanksgiving were uttered and warm embraces of friendship were shared. The sermon fumbled through the story of resurrection, which, thankfully, can never be thoroughly fouled up, while real resurrection was playing itself out in the hearts and minds and lives of that handful of faithful Hoosier Presbyterians. And it mattered, even later when the snow fell and the doors were locked and they scattered for the winter to the larger churches in the area, where they were not simply add-ons, but members of the body of Christ.

We know in our lives and in our living that it matters. It is the glimmer of mattering that brought us here today, when there were other choices, other allegiances to commemorate. And we know it matters as well because the story tells us that it does, and the story carries truth.

Jesus has been doing big things. He has stilled the water, he has multiplied food, he has cast out demons. Now it is talking time, time for big words. It is clear that his audience, the disciples, never totally get it. They are not unlike us. But it is now also true that after they have chased him up and down the shoreline, followed him in huge crowds, begged him for miracles, hung on to every word, that something transformative has happened. They are ready, and Jesus knows that they are ready, receptive to his teaching, teaching that will matter.

It is a kind of rambling ethics lesson, made manifest in the flesh and blood of the one who taught it. If you become like little children, you will understand what heaven is like, he says. I will die, he tells them, and you will need to die as well in order to live truly. Take up your cross.

And then this. If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. An extraordinary claim. It’s not the focus this morning, and many good sermons are not preached on a given Sunday, but for a moment, it’s not a bad word. For our cynical, gossipy, tabloid, talk show world, which lives for confrontation rather than reconciliation, how refreshing, how faithful, to work out differences with that someone, honestly.

It is ethics on the most personal level, because Jesus understands our aversion to the truth. But it is also ethics on the most public level, the most communal level—for business, for politics, for families, for relationships.

In an interview one time, I asked the inevitable question about conflict resolution, and the interviewee said, “I take a Matthew 18 approach.” I nodded my head enthusiastically. When she left, I raced to find my Bible. This was, of course, prior to coming to work at Fourth Church. I looked it up and found this morning’s passage. Pretty good, I thought. That is to say, faith is never simply between God and us. How we relate with one another matters, and it matters deeply, and so on this Labor Day weekend, when work and politics and family are in the air, might we not ponder a moment about the truthfulness of these words. But just a moment, because Jesus is on a roll and this sermon is going to try to keep up with him.

He continues. He is concerned about community. Our relationship with God through Jesus is made real in the ways we relate with each other and with the world. Remember that. How we live in community is a reflection of our relationship with God, the call by Jesus to each one of us to be the church, the body.

And so this: “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.”

In his landmark book, Treasure in Earthen Vessels, James Gustafson reminds us that the church is community, no collection of individuals to whom God has extended a private invitation. Gustafson speaks of the church as a political community, a community of language, a community of interpretation, a community of memory and understanding, a community of belief and action. “The Church is a chameleon,” he writes. “It finds colors that fit into various environments. It continues, yet changes. . . Yet it stands always under the order and judgment of God to whom it professes loyalty and in whom it believes. It is a human community, with a particular vocation, purpose, and power.” (p. 112)

That is to say, bind on earth to be bound in heaven.

German Reformed theologian Jurgen Moltmann continues, in his landmark work called The Church in the Power of the Spirit: “The church is the people of God and will give an account of itself at all times to the God who has called it into being, liberated it and gathered it. . . (The church) is called the wayfaring people of God. It will comprehend the meaning of its commission in the light of its hope and it will interpret the sufferings of the time in light of the coming kingdom. It will comprehend the meaning of its divine commission in world history and at the same time will understand the world in the context of God’s history.”

That is to say, anything we ask will be done by God in heaven.

This is a tall order for the church. The message sometimes gets lost in our human incapacity. It also becomes increasingly complex in our post-modern, post-Christian, technological, individualistic, secular, funny little world. The conversation is not about influence, although it is about power. It is not about succeeding, although it is about building. It is not about numbers, although it is about growth. Two or three. Church matters.

As you might know, this congregation is growing. An odd phenomena is at work in that fact, particularly in a culture where such is not always the case, and as a member of a denominational enterprise that is not sharing that experience. There are countless books on the bookshelves that analyze the state of play—assigning blame, putting people on the hook or letting people off the hook. They have titles like Keys to an Effective Church, The Church Confident, Reclaiming the Church, The Once and Future Church or The Death of the Church.

And so the invitation for us here, as it is, perhaps, everywhere, whether experiencing growth or not, is to express gratitude at the opportunity growth affords, to be good stewards of our location, our heritage, our program, our future, to tend to this moment as the gift from God that it so clearly is, to be thankful and bold, and to remember the promise of two or three, and the one who calls us here, the one whose church this is.

The invitation is to care for ourselves even as we seek to care for others, to reach out and reach in, to share, to make a difference, to love—in all the glorious forms love can take.

In The Company of Strangers, theologian Parker Palmer writes that “The church has been called to live as a gathered community of people who celebrate and support, challenge and resist, forgive and heal. . . when people look upon the church, it is not of first importance that they be instructed by our theology or altered by our ethics but that they be moved by the quality of our life together.” (p. 119)

It is about power, not of a number, whether two or three or 12 or 4300, but the power of the one who gathers us. The power of what can happen when we gather in that spirit. Writing about this morning’s passage, New Testament scholar Eduard Schweizer said that “(Jesus’) statement denies importance to the presence of an institution, the size of the community, the sanctity of the place, the blessing of an official functionary, or visible success in the world. It is only the presence of love that confers the presence—and the power—of Christ in the community.” (p. 375)

The presence of love.

The presence of love as a Sunday school teacher gathers her classroom of second-graders in a circle on the floor and begins her lesson for the day.

The presence of love as a tutor and student look at each other across the table and begin hashing out reading and math problems.

The presence of love as a group of volunteers gathers in the kitchen to prepare tonight’s community meal.

The presence of love as two or three gather in a hospital room with a loved one, and the prayer is one of hope, and even as voices tremble, that tender power is surely present in the room as well.

The presence of love as one person, then two or three, present themselves at the baptismal font, and water seals that love—love already and ever-present—and tears appear to sanctify the moment.

The presence of love as a hymn is sung, as a prayer is uttered, as concrete is poured, as tennis balls are whacked, as a meal is shared.

That is why when two or three are gathered it is not about flow charts and infrastructures and processes, ultimately, though I can’t make such a claim with total and reckless abandon, being administratively inclined and all. It is about the church simply as gathering place, as bridge, from one place to another, as a playground for faithfulness and transformation. In the end it about gathering, gathering in the presence and power of the one who gathers.

T. S. Eliot wrote:

In the vacant places/We will build with new bricks
There are hands and machines/And clay for new brick/And lime for new mortar
Where the bricks are fallen/We will build with new stone
Where the beams are rotten/We will build with new timbers
Where the word is unspoken/We will build with new speech
There is work together/A church for all/And a job for each
Every (one) to (their) work
(From “The Rock”)

Because it matters. Here and there. To gather and to build. And we gather in our little groups of two or three. In the vision of our dreams we gather, and the constellation, the wild constellation of our gathering, is able to do things that are interesting and useful and joyous, things that matter, move mountains, make symphonies echoing deep justice, create and build, heal.

For the greatest line in the history of cinema, and this morning’s obligatory baseball reference had it right: “If you build it, they will come.” If you gather, in two and threes, modestly, hopefully, Jesus tells us, what is done here on earth will be hallowed in heaven.

That is not a guarantee. It is a promise. “Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” That is our hope. That is why this matters. The power of gathering. The poetry of gathering. With the one who teaches us, who heals us, who knows us, who loves us, who dies for us, who lives for us. The one who is there among us, so that, we may be there for the world loved so deeply by him, in simple twos and threes, as heaven’s loveliest reflection. Amen.

Prayers of the People
By John A. Cairns, Associate Pastor

Holy Trinity—God in three persons, yet one God—we come to you as many seeking to be one. There are people sitting next to us whom we do not know, visitors from near and far, and then we hear your promise that where two or three are gathered together, you are in their midst. Does this count as “together,” God? Are you here in the midst of us today? That is our most basic prayer, O Lord, that you would be here with us; that we might know that we’ve been here with you.

Intimate God, some of us here are wishing for anonymity today—not from you, only from this sea of others. Some of us are looking for a friendly smile, a warm word, a new friend. Some of us expect to gather with a circle of good friends in just a few minutes. And each of us offers this prayer, asking you to be present in just the way we wish. Compassionate One, we are selfish and difficult children, aren’t we?

O God, hard as it is for us, we want to say something in this prayer about your will—your
agenda. We are not ready for radical promises or dramatic transformations, but we do want to try to hear what you are saying—see what you are showing us; to act on the spirit’s nudge that has become harder and harder to ignore. Give us, dear God, the courage to act; to take the fist step toward serving rather than being served. To love without always seeking to be loved. Help us to pay attention. Help us to notice people without first expecting them to make it through the screen of our own preferences. Faithful One, work in us and on us.

Mother/Father God, with halting words we pray for hungry people because we want them to have enough to eat. We pray for the homeless because we want them to have a roof over their heads. We pray for the children who are afraid at school and on their way to and from and even when they are at home, because we don’t want anyone to live that way. Is it possible, God, that you—with some help from us—can make a difference for all these people? That is our prayer.

On this holiday weekend we offer prayers of thanksgiving for meaningful work for those that have it, and humbly pray for fresh opportunities for those who don’t. As we remember with gratitude those whose labor benefits us, we cry out for those whose labor enslaves them. Give us a common vision, O God, that attaches your love and value to each member of our human family, not because of what they do, but because they are your children. Empower us to work till those who gather in your name become an all-encompassing global community.

And now hear this community as we bring to you all our many petitions and unite our voices in the prayer Christ taught us, saying—Our Father . . . Amen.