O God, grant us the serenity to accept the things that we cannot change, the courage to change the things that we can, and the wisdom to know the difference ☩ in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
What a tremendous gift we have in faith! Truly, it’s an embarrassment of riches. I mean, just look at this place – we are surrounded by so much beauty and have received this wonderful church as the legacy of those who have come before. We have all received the gift of life – of the opportunity to live, and move, and have our being in the knowledge and reality of God’s love for us. We are lavished with the love of our Creator who is with us and for us in all things. And many of us are fortunate to have financial resources that afford us comfortable lives.
One of my personal prayers has been “O God, help me to see the blessings you have given me, and help me to use them faithfully.” The first step is to recognize what we have received – not taking things for granted, not with a sense of entitlement. As our annual giving campaign for 2026 begins today, we would do well to start with a recognition of the gifts we have received. And this is why the church encourages you to fill out one of those intention of giving cards. Yes, it does help us in budgeting to know what resources we’ll have available for next year’s budget. Afterall, we want to put your generosity into ministry and we can’t plan to do that if we don’t know how much you intend to give.
But the primary reason we invite you to fill out that card is for your benefit – not the budget’s. In filling out that card, you have to do some work. You, literally, have to count your blessings and consider how much you have been given to steward as a faithful witness to Christ through your money. It’s easy to have a lens of scarcity when it comes to money; to always end up with deficit mentality. The invitation is to, instead, start with recognizing the abundance we have given and joyfully share that with the church and other charitable organizations that you value. In filling out an intention of giving card, we do the holy and joyful work of noticing the blessings we have received.
As I said last Sunday, the only way to demonstrate that we are in charge of our money instead of money being in charge of us is to give it away. Giving away an intentional and sacrificial amount of money not only liberates us from the scarcity mindset that money puts over us, but it also enables us to participate in the joys and blessings of being a part of something bigger than ourselves.
So, once we are aware of the resources we have been gifted, we give as a means of participating in the work that God is up to. And, friends, God is clearly on the move here at Grace and St. Stephen’s. Many of you have commented that you feel a sense of excitement, a sense that the Holy Spirit is stirring; and I feel it too. That’s we decided to move 2,000 miles across the country to get here – we felt a clear call to come and be a part of what God is up to here. And just as was the case for us, it’s true for all of us – it takes an investment to be a part of something.
That’s why we hope you’ll fill out an intention of giving card, and it’s why the mailing that you either already received or will soon receive is designed to look like an invitation. Because that’s what it is. When it comes to giving, we don’t trade in the language of oughts or shoulds. We won’t use shame or guilt to get you to give. No, this is an invitation to be a part of the exciting and joyful work of God in this place. It’s the invitation to participate in the legacy of Grace and St. Stephen’s that God has blessed from generation to generation.
And this is where the message about annual giving connects to today’s Scripture. In the second reading, we heard St. Paul’s words to his student, Timothy. He wrote, “I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, lives in you. For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you… Guard the good treasure entrusted to you, with the help of the Holy Spirit living in us.” As Paul is encouraging Timothy, he reminds him of the great gift that he has received: the gift of faith that was given to him by his grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice. Faith is a gift – not the result of us “figuring it out,” not a decision we made to think certain things, not the product of a perfectly cultivated prayer life. No, faith is a gift, something that has to be received from someone showing us the way of Jesus.
Who is your Lois and Eunice? Often, it really is a grandmother and mother. But maybe it was a friend, a college chaplain, a Sunday school teacher, maybe even a stranger. Whoever your Lois and Eunice are – thank God for them. And if they are still living, let them know how much you appreciate the gift of faith that first lived in them.
This sense of being a part of the legacy of faith is why I love old churches. As I’ve said, I really wasn’t interested in a move when a member of the Search Committee reached out to me in January, but I knew that I’d only be open to serving an old church. I’ve served churches that were founded in 1816, 1753, and now 1873 or 1923, depending on which date we choose. Nothing at all against newer churches, but there’s just something about being in a place that has been steeped in prayers for generations. I love the plaques with names from previous centuries that remind us that we are a part of something bigger. And I think there’s a healthy dose of humility that comes with old churches – a reminder that this doesn’t belong to any of us, rather we are its caretakers and stewards for this time, but not for all time. Many generations have come before, and we pray that many will follow us.
But for that to be true, we must rekindle that gift that God has given to us and act as Lois and Eunice for others. Again, this connects to our annual giving campaign – this building and the ministries that are housed here are tremendous gifts, and also sacred responsibilities. As I said, the Holy Spirit is presenting us with the opportunity to receive and reflect a word of relief to an anxious, confused, scared, and unstable world. We have the faith of Lois and Eunice, of Paul and Timothy as our endowment that has been entrusted to us.
We heard St. Paul describe this faith – it is the trust that Jesus Christ has “abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel.” What I find interesting about that wording is that St. Paul includes both “life” and “immortality,” suggesting that there is a difference. It’s one thing for finality of death to be abolished and to receive the gift of immortality in the love of God. But why add that we receive “life?” Well, it’s the difference between being alive and living, or we might say the difference between existing and thriving, being asleep and being awake. St. Paul says that life is brought to light – so it’s like the difference between a candle burning and a candle giving off warmth and light.
What our world is desperate for and what God has given us to reflect is the light of life, of being truly alive. St. Irenaeus, a 2nd century bishop, expressed the essence of faith by saying “the glory of God is a human being fully alive.” Being fully alive means being awake and recognizing the gifts of God all around us. One of my favorite lines in poetry and that is a description of how I try to go through life comes from Elizabeth Barrett Browning – “Earth’s crammed with heaven, and every common bush afire with God; but only they who see take of their sandals, the rest sit round and pluck blackberries.” Beloved, earth is indeed crammed with heaven. Being fully alive is seeing those burning bushes and being warmed and intrigued by God’s presence among us. It ties right back to the point about giving – it starts with recognition. This is why practices like prioritizing coming to worship, time for silent listening, and reflecting on life through journaling or therapy are so important. Society does not train us, nor give us the time to notice. But slowing down and noticing things is a part of what it means to be fully alive.
Being fully alive also means participating in what we notice and reflecting that light to the world. It’s why Jesus tells us, “You are the light of the world.” We are given such a tremendous gift in being able to participate in the only things that truly matter and the only things that shall endure: mercy, generosity, and love. This is the “good treasure” that has been entrusted to us that we are told to guard.
Given where we are in this cultural moment, we do need to be on high-alert. While I do try to keep up with the news and I find politics to be fascinating as a window into the human psyche, I’ll admit that I’m not what you would call a “news junkie.” When Charlie Kirk was assassinated, I had never heard of him. It goes without saying, but to be very clear, murder is always wrong and is never to be celebrated or dismissed as something anyone deserves. And while Christians must always vociferously stand up for free speech because our faith is built on the claim that the “Word became flesh,” that’s not why I’m bringing this up.
A friend sent me an article that piqued my interest as a preacher and pastor. Kirk’s murder is more than a news headline, it’s a moment when the track that we are on shifted. In other words, it’s something important to notice. It reminds me of the famous line from Robert Frost, “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” To be clear, the Gospel is the road less traveled, and the decision we have before us is will we continue mindlessly along the track of division and rage, or will we follow the challenging way of Jesus which leads to being fully alive?
In this article, the author says that American Christianity is at such a fork in the road and we risk there being a cataclysmic split that rivals the Sunni-Shia split in Islam, or the Roman-Protestant split of the 1500s that led to people being burned at the stake. There are two versions of Christianity with the chasm growing wider and wider. This division not only threatens to propel our society into an uncivil war that will ultimately lead to the unraveling of our republic, but it will defile the gift of faith we have received. Instead of being fully alive, we will struggle with fighting on our hills and digging the ditches we will die in?
The article names the two versions of Christianity that were on display at Kirk’s funeral. One speaker quoted Jesus as saying “Father, forgive” and said that they forgive the murderer. That is one path before us; the radical, loving, liberating, and life-giving path of Jesus. Another speaker said “Charlie did not hate his opponents. He wanted the best for them. That’s where I disagree. I hate my opponents and don’t want the best for them.” There are those who claim to follow Jesus who have questioned his words about loving our enemies and turning the other cheek by saying, “That doesn’t work anymore. That’s weak.” That is the other path, which Dietrich Bonhoeffer described as “cheap” because it costs us and gains us nothing.
As we heard St. Paul say, “I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for I know the one in whom I have put my trust.” Beloved, we must not be ashamed because our world needs us to point to Jesus and his most excellent way. Being a follower of Jesus is going to be a lot harder going forward because we will have to be intentional, clear, and explicit about who the Jesus is that we follow. It is one thing to love our enemies in the abstract, but it is something else to love our enemies who are committed to not loving us. It is a challenge to be merciful to the merciless, forgiving to the unforgiving, open-minded with the closed-minded, and non-violent in the face of violence. But it is, undeniably, worth the struggle. The good treasure we have received is the gift of abundant life, of being fully alive, of participating in the very Kingdom of God as it is coming on earth as it is in heaven. And we guard this faith by coming here – to gather as the beloved Body of Christ, to rehearse the story of grace, to confess that we don’t always get it right and receive mercy, to practice generosity, to be nourished in the Body and Blood of Jesus, and to be sent out as witnesses to and for love.
And to bring this full circle to annual giving – it’s a question of the return on our investment. What do we expect to come from choosing the path of violence, of stinginess, of estrangement? We don’t need any more haters, the world has enough of those. Instead, we seek first the Kingdom of God as we invest with our words, with our wallets, with our actions in the abundant, joyful, and peaceful love of God that that passes all understanding.
