The following reflection was shared by Imam Ali Roach at our 8th Annual Rally of the Justice Ministry Networks.

It’s certainly inspiring to see so many of us gathered here this evening…

It’s inspiring to see a community spurred to action by faith-not one driven to apathy by despair.

It’s inspiring to see a community busy cooperating and working together—not one distracted by competition and rivalry…

…to see a community by caring and compassion—not one divided by selfishness…

…to see a community committed to giving and helping—not one obsessed with taking and hoarding.

Let’s give praise to the Lord for this gathering, and let’s give thanks for all the spiritual and material abundance he has showered us with.

But while we give thanks for our numbers, and we pray and hope that we continue to grow

Let’s remember that there are things more important than numbers…

Let’s remember that it is our faith in God that has brought us together tonight, and that it is His glory we celebrate, not our own…

Let’s remember that His purpose is always triumphant, and that the cause of faith and good is always the winning cause, no matter how many or how few of the children of Adam appear to be behind it.

Let’s remember that His side is the one we always want to be on, whether we can look around and see hundreds of others with us, or whether we appear to be alone.

And let us always remember that our God is vast and abundant, and that we are always poor, small, and few before Him.

Lord, bless us and strengthen us,

Be with us, guide us and forgive us,

Blessed is Your name, and we have no god beside You. Amen.

IMPACT Rally

The Rev. James Richardson

St. Paul’s Memorial Church

April 9, 2013

Abraham’s Stars

Genesis 15:1-6

After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great…” He brought him outside and said, “Look towards heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” And he believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.

I want you to look around – look at each other tonight and count the stars among you, for you are Abraham’s stars. The Lord has reckoned you as righteous and good and beloved. Do not be afraid, God told Abraham, and God tells us: Do not be afraid. You are Abraham’s stars.

Tonight I want to spend a few minutes talking about IMPACT, what we are, how we got here, what we’ve accomplished and why we do what we do the way we do it.

I’d like to start with a show of hands.

How many of you are here at the rally for the first time?

How many of you will be going to the Nehemiah Action for the first time?

How many of you will be bringing people to the Nehemiah Action who have never gone to a Nehemiah Action before? How about everyone?

So let’s have a little refresher on IMPACT.

We were founded in 2006 by a group of congregations who came together wanting to make a difference in our community.

Many were already involved in ministries of mercy like PACEM and the Salvation Army. They wanted to see if they could change the system so that ministries like PACEM and the Salvation Army would no longer be necessary one day.

The group affiliated with a training organization based in Florida called DART that began showing our congregational leaders and clergy how to create a listening-based community organizing structure that would tackle tough issues in Charlottesville.

Rabbi Dan Alexander of Congregation Beth Israel came up with the acronym, IMPACT, which stands for:

Interfaith Movement Promoting Action by Congregations Together.

IMPACT’s method is based on listening to members of our congregations to find out what issues are most on their minds and hearts.

We do that every year in our congregations. In my congregation we have a series of house meetings.

From there we narrow the issues. In the fall, we hold the Annual Team Assembly and hear presentations on the problems we’ve heard about from you.

Everyone in our congregations is invited, and we vote to narrow the issue to one or two for the year.

Then members of our congregations volunteer to serve on research teams to find out all we can about the issue for the year.

They come up with proposed solutions, and they meet with decision makers to further refine these solutions. Our goal is to not blindside anyone.

That’s where we come in tonight – to hear about the progress on the two issues we are working on this year: youth unemployment and homelessness – and how we are pushing for action with decision makers in our community.

You will hear more on these topics soon.

Then comes the Nehemiah Action where we ask you to bring at least three people with you to fill the John Paul Jones Arena.

We ask that the decision makers who can make changes in the system come to the Nehemiah Action and appear in on stage.

We ask them if they will commit to the solutions. We will applaud them for positive answers and remain scrupulously polite at all times.

We do this in public because this is a public process we are engaged with. We ask they make their commitments in front of you, the people who have raised these issues and worked on finding solutions.

We ask that you bring as many people as possible to show that there is support in our congregations for these solutions.

This is about grassroots support for realistic solutions, but that also can make some people very uncomfortable because it may not be the way they are accustomed to conducting business.

There is another level to this that I want to talk to you about.

What we do with IMPACT is to share the influence that we have together – power that we have by being together rather than working apart.

We are being asked to come together to share our collective power especially with those in our community who are not accustomed to having much influence or having their voices heard, like our unemployed young people or the homeless.

And IMPACT is remarkable for another reason: In world torn apart by religious differences, we come together looking for what we have in common as heirs to Abraham.

That may make some of us uncomfortable for many reasons.

But this is not about our personal comfort.

You are being asked to be uncomfortable by standing with those who don’t have much influence on their own.

All of us are being asked to stand up with one voice, to use our voice, and to use keep standing together to change our world.

And you know what? We already have, right here in Charlottesville. Let’s count our successes in the last four years:

In 2007, IMPACT won new bus routes serving low-income neighborhoods so that people can get to school and work, or go to the grocery store.

In 2008, IMPACT won approval of a free dental clinic serving thousands of people who have no dental insurance.

In 2010, IMPACT won approval from local law enforcement agencies to develop translation services for non-English speaking people who encounter the Justice system.

Many of our successes take more than one year.

It took two years to win expansion of pre-school education programs.

It took two years to win approval from the city and county for the healthy transitions program for the mentally ill.

It took three years to win approval of an affordable housing trust fund and the refurbishment of hundreds of housing units for low-income people.

And now we are engaged in the most difficult and complex issues we have ever engaged with: jobs and homelessness.

The outcome of this year’s Nehemiah Action is still uncertain. You will hear more on these issues a little later, but let me underline this year – more than ever – it especially important that you bring as many people as you can to the Nehemiah Action on April 29.

Last spring, we brought 1,537 people to the Nehemiah Action to speak with one voice and have an impact in our community, and that got us part of the way on our issues.

But we still have a long distance to go. We will not get there without you.

If we were to bring the equivalent of one day’s average worship attendance we would have 4,000. Think of the impact we would have with that many voices and the bigger issues we could tackle in the years ahead. Think of what we might accomplish together.

Tonight we are on a journey like our ancestor Abraham. We are walking together on a road with many bumps and curves. We will make our share of mistakes and a wrong turn or two.

But know this: This same God, the God of Abraham, the God of Moses, the God of Jesus, the God of Mohammed is with us, and will guide us, and will bring us safely through. Do not be afraid, God told Abraham. Do not be afraid, God tells us.

You and I are Abraham’s stars.

The Very Rev. James Richardson
Rector, St. Paul’s Memorial Episcopal Church
Sermon for the Second Sunday of Epiphany

Readings:
Isaiah 62:1-5,
Psalm 36:5-10,
1 Corinthians 12:1-11,
John 2:1-11

+ + +

“They feast upon the abundance of your house; you give them drink from the river of your delights.

For with you is the well of life, and in your light we see light.”

Psalm 36:8-9

          Many years ago, Lori and I took our teenage youth group on a mission trip to an Indian reservation through an amazing organization called the Sierra Service Project.

We were camped at the Shoshone-Piute reservation in the middle of Nevada – and it is about as far from the comfortable suburbs where our kids lived as you can get.

We would fix houses by day and then in the evening we would have an educational program.

One evening, a Shoshone-Piute elder came to tell us stories of the tribe. These weren’t just any stories, but stories about how the Great Creator brought the people to this place to live.

Our universe was about to expand beyond our imagining.

He began each story this way – and I want you to hold onto this. Here is how he started each story:

“I don’t know if this happened exactly this way, but this is a true story.”

Let me say that again:

“I don’t know if this happened exactly this way, but this is a true story.”

This morning we hear the story of Jesus going to a wedding and turning water into wine.

I don’t know if this happened exactly this way, but this is a true story.

Cana is about a day’s walk east from Nazareth, in the hill country on the road that descends to the Sea of Galilee.

The story of the wedding feast appears only in the Gospel of John, and it is the first miracle story in John’s gospel.

Before you get too hung up on the chemistry – or alchemy – of turning water into wine, please hold this thought:

I don’t know if this happened exactly this way but this is a true story.

In the story, Jesus is at a wedding feast, and the guests have consumed all the wine. His mother, Mary, asks him to save the party by doing one of his miracles, so Jesus converts six large stone jars of water into wine.

Biblical scholars will tell you this story from the Gospel of John has many theological layers pointing to the meaning of the Eucharistic meal, and so it does.

But I want to point out two simple elements to this story that make it a true story:

First, it is a story about hospitality – the spiritual gift of hospitality; expansive enormous hospitality – about how God’s grace extends beyond the limits of our imagination.

It is a story of how God feeds us and sustains us even when we are at our lowest moments. It is about how our Great Creator will turn the water of our tears into the food that is wine that will carry and sustain us.

Second, Jesus gives the guests the good wine.

God is not cheap. God opens the best bottle, not the worst. God gives not the leftovers, but the first fruits.

And the guests notice this, and they are startled. They expect the cheap wine, but at this party, they get the finest. They expect stinginess, and they get a feast.

Here in Charlottesville, many of us enjoy a very high standard of living. We have schools and roads and health care. Many of us have enough money to take vacations and enjoy the best that life has to offer, and some us can afford to buy the good wine.

We have all that we need and more. We have a feast.

But there are many around us who don’t share in this feast. Twenty-percent of the population in Charlottesville lives below the poverty line.

We are called to share our feast, and not the cheap wine, but our first fruits. We are called to share the best of who are, and the finest gifts that we have, to bring God’s Kingdom alive in this world, and not just the next.

Tomorrow is Martin Luther King, Jr., Day, and there is no better way to honor Dr. King than by sharing this feast in our community.

We can do no better to honor his memory by sharing the best of who are, as Dr. King did with us. We can do no better by bringing the best of who we are to neglected islands and hamlets of this earth.

We can open our hearts, open our hands, and open checkbooks and do what needs to be done.

We are doing that in many ways here at St. Paul’s. Many of you are involved in through PACEM providing emergency shelter for the homeless in the winter, and the Haven, a day center for those who live on the street that also provides counseling and other services.

Some of you work on one of our Salvation Army teams feeding those in need.

Our parish is involved in IMPACT, a coalition of 26 congregations here in Charlottesville working on systemic issues that hold people down. We’ve won funding for a dental clinic and transitional services for the mentally ill.

This year we are working on the knotty issues of solving homelessness and joblessness.

And look beyond Charlottesville by considering how we are called to turn our wine into water.

Turning wine into water is a miracle that happens every day. Here is how: Episcopal Relief and Development provides safe drinking water and sanitation in many rural impoverished countries. ERD suggests taking the money you might have spent on a bottle of wine and sending to ERD to buy water filters.

So here is my pledge: A bottle of Silver Oak Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley costs about $75. I will send that amount to ERD today. Will you join me? Write a check to St. Paul’s, put ERD on the memo line, and we will get it there.

My friends, the church is not a sanctified social club. It is a place to give thanks to God, to find sustenance for our souls, and then get up and get out and share our hospitality with the world as God gives us the spiritual gifts to do so.

The most important words we hear on Sunday morning might be these: Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.

In this new year, ask yourself: What is stirring in your heart that will make your faith come alive and change lives around you and far away? What spiritual gifts has God given you? How will you share yours?

What will expand your universe beyond your imagining?

I bring us back to the story of the wedding at Cana and our Eucharist – our Communion meal. The word “eucharist” means thanksgiving, and so it is that we give thanks this day by how we share our gifts.

So let us give thanks for all that we have, and give the best of who we are, and then get to work making our Lord’s prayer real: “thy will be done on earth as it is heaven.”

AMEN