Honoring Them

Revelation 7:9-17, Psalm 34, I John 3:1-3

Good morning!

Turn to your neighbor and say, “Neighbor, will I see you in New Jerusalem?”

When I received my first appointment to ministry, I was appointed to two small churches in Pleasants County. One of those churches was Nine-mile United Methodist Church. It is located 9 miles from St. Marys on old Route 16 towards Ellenboro. Of course, it is now only six and a half miles from St. Marys on the new highway, the highway that came through in 1947. But it is still Nine-Mile United Methodist Church.

I had been to Nine-Mile before. I had gone there when I was growing up. Every May, my Grandmother Boley would need a ride to the church cemetery, and when I was old enough, I drove her. She would lay wreaths on the graves of her mother and father and a brother. My grandmother was a Brammer – a relative of those who lived in Shinnston, and her mother was a Locke, and her father was the first pastor at the Nine-mile church, a man named Charles Locke, part of what was then the Western Pennsylvania Conference before West Virginia had its own conference. He was descended from Swedish pastors.

We think that Pastor Locke eventually left Nine-mile and became pastor at a large church in Pittsburgh, then in Portland, Oregon, then San Francisco, then in Brooklyn, NY, when he was elected bishop and appointed to the Minnesota conference.

My Grandmother continued in the Swedish Locke tradition. She had red hair and pale, white freckled skin, and a sunny, Christian outlook on life. And she taught me a few things about a Christian outlook on life, leaving this world almost 20 years ago. And she prayed for me.

Each of us is here because of the prayers of others. Those prayers make a tremendous difference. When we were ministering to the Chinese students at Marietta College, some were tough, harsh, and bitter. Others were open, friendly, and had a pleasant spirit. In almost all cases, we found that those of the pleasant sort had a grandmother, an aunt, an uncle, a cousin, or a dear older friend who was a Christian. Some of the students did not even discover this until they went home and told the family that they had been to a Christian church with us. But those prayers had somehow directed God to move in those young adult’s lives.

In your life, there was someone who was praying for you. In your life, there was someone who set an example for you of what it means to be a Christian. In your life, there was a saint who was a special influence in your life. That saint was probably older than you – but in some cases, that saint may have been younger than you.

Today is a day when we honor those who have gone before us and led us to the Christian path. Perhaps, like me, it was your grandmother. Perhaps it was your grandfather, or your uncle or your aunt, or the kindly woman who taught Sunday School, or the man who drove a half dozen of you to church every Sunday. Perhaps it was a friend that you worked with, or the man at the bakery or a teacher. For some of you, it may have been the policeman who talked straight with you or the coach who sat you down for a one-on-one talk. For others, it was a pastor.

Each of these people understood something very important. It is the responsibility of every Christian to not only become close to God and Christ, but it is also our responsibility to pass on the faith to several other people, perhaps even dozens of other people, even hundreds of people in our lives. Christianity is strongest when it spreads throughout a community, when the entire town decides to change for the better, when the views of “the people” becomes the view of Christ because of His influence upon the people.

One day, we will all see each other again. That is one of the eternal promises of eternal life that faith in Jesus Christ brings to us. As John said, “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” How often have you dreamed of an eternal springtime, where you have time to walk down the street and catch up with long lost friends and relatives, when you can share the stories of the last years with them, when you can take time to really listen and talk with the people you love.

We each have people that listened to us when we were younger. Perhaps we listened to them. It is through those people that we connected to another group of people, people we never knew, people who were long gone before we were born. I know that my great-grandmother Brammer suffered from lung ailments – that’s why they moved from a farm beside the Ohio River to Nine-mile, which is on the hilltops. A doctor suggested it. My great-grandfather worked the farm by the river as the county farm, the way Pleasants County and many other places took care of those who were unable to take care of themselves in those days. I know these things about by great-grandparents because my grandmother told me.

In the same way, my wife knows stories about her great-great-grandfather Tiger Whitehead, who killed 99 bears and was offered the chance to shoot the hundredth bear on his deathbed, but refused, because he believed in giving the bear a chance. Her father and grandfather passed down the stories that they’d been told and so she is connected to Tiger Whitehead and understands a bit about the man he was.

Thinking about our ancestors always reminds me of something deep and wonderful about Christianity. You see, in our normal lives, we feel disconnected from the people of the past. If we just look at what we can see, it is as though those ancestors no longer exist.

But the Bible tells us that we are surrounded by a cloud of witnesses to the reality of God and Jesus Christ. Those Christians who have gone before us are still alive, and we will see them someday. We are still in Communion with our ancestors, and we are in Communion with those Christian who will come after us, who may not even be born yet, and yet are people whom we will one day meet and talk to in New Jerusalem.

Just as our ancestors had the forethought and vision to build this church almost a hundred and twenty years ago, and through the years other people taught our grandparents, our parents, and ourselves about Christ’s love, we have an obligation to the souls who come after us to step forward and reach others with Christ’s love, others in the future, children of today, the grandchildren even of those children who are sitting beside you on the pews this morning.

Our obligation is five-fold. According to the vows which we take as mentioned in the United Methodist Book of Discipline (P217) we have an obligation to support this church with our prayers, our presence, our gifts, our service, and our witness.

Do you pray regularly for the ministries of our church, for the Holy Spirit to come upon our church, for the growth, both spiritually and numerically of our congregation? Without sustained, solid, and ceaseless prayer, our ministries will have no power.

Do you regularly attend church? Your presence is vital, for people come to church expecting to be lifted up – partially by the activities up front during the worship service, but also by the chance encounters with people like you who have a word of wisdom, a touch of grace, or a friendly hug for a friend in a Sunday school class. We are not to be a church of spectators like some churches are. We are to be a community of Christian friends who lift each other up.

Do you provide gifts to the church for the financial support of our ministries? Children’s ministries like Pioneer Clubs require money and supplies. That money buys Bibles, it buys workbooks, it buys sashes and badges and other rewards, and it buys all those miscellaneous supplies that help a program be high quality – and bring the children back, begging their parents to not be late for the club. And other gifts allow us to heat this building in the winter and cool it in summer. They allow us to reach new people through advertising, they allow us print bulletins, and they even mean we have coffee and donuts for Sunday School. Plan long term to try to contribute 10% of your income – the traditional tithe – by increasing your giving a percent or two each year until you are there. If you contributed $10 a week this year, consider contributing $15 a week next year. If you contributed $20 a week this year, consider how you might contribute $25 or $30 a week next year. Or perhaps your contributions could be much more. But never let your finances be a barrier to attending. We understand that sometimes you simply can’t give. We’d rather see you go an entire year without giving anything – and be here every week – than stop attending because you can’t afford to give. But we do need money to operate. If you haven’t been giving anything, consider if you can contribute something each week – put it into your budget.

And then there is service. Are you acting as a consumer of religion, as a spectator? Or is there some way that you could help other people in the church through your service. Yesterday, we had some training on visitation. Soon, we’ll be having some training on how to reach people with the Gospel. We always need help with Wednesday evening suppers and could use a couple of people to do artwork, more people in the choir, and we have other projects we’d like to do. See me or Dennis/Roy. What are your skills? What are you good at? Let us know and we’ll remember to plug you into the next projects and/or events that can use your skills and services.

The fifth way to support this local church is through witness. Have you been telling people about the exciting things happening here? Have you told people about what Jesus has done in your life? Our witness is three-fold: What has God and Jesus done? What has the church done as a body? What have your individual Christian friends in this church done? Tell people about those exciting things, those miracles, those changes that you’ve seen and experienced.

If you follow through with that five-fold commitment – Prayers, Presence, Gifts, Service, and Witness – you’ll see even more remarkable things happen here than you’ve seen in the past. And you’ll be fulfilling your obligation to the people yet to come. You’ll be helping sustain and grow this church – and increase the number of souls whom you’ll want to talk with in New Jerusalem one day when you have time to talk.

I was surprised to find out that my ancestors had been pastors in Sweden. But it helps to make sense of some parts of my life and the directions that God has led me.

One day, I plan to meet with Bishop Locke, and ask him about the story of how he founded Nine-mile Church. And I’ll tell him my stories about Quiet Dell and Monroe Chapel, and the fantastic, committed people there, and how honored I am to finally meet him. And I’ll introduce him to you – and to your great-grandchildren who attended this church in the latter years of the 21st Century,

17 For the Lamb at the center of the throne
will be their shepherd;
‘he will lead them to springs of living water.’
‘And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’”

So turn to your neighbor and say, “Neighbor, will I see you in New Jerusalem?”

And turn back to your neighbor and say, “Neighbor, I’ll be there, and there will be thousands of people from this church to talk to.”

Let us pray:

Oh Passionate Son of God! Give us the burning desire to spread Your Word to all the people we meet, that through our trust that You will provide, we may find the life Your Word has promised.

Help us to remember those people who have carried your love to us and help us to carry your love to others, never breaking the web of love that only grows throughout the centuries. Guide us to be here with our prayers, our presence, our gifts, our service, and our witness, that Your will shall be accomplished.

We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ,

Amen.