Blessed To Be A Blessing- Rev. Wendy McCormick, Sept 29,2024
“Blessed to Be a Blessing” Sept.29.2024
Rev Wendy McCormick
A number of years ago, I knew a man named Leroy. He did yard work and some odd jobs for my parents. I’m not sure how they found him, but he was really reliable and really strong. He was also friendly and enjoyable to be around. Leroy was about my age, a few years older, but while I had graduated from an excellent public high school in a nice suburb with high property taxes, Leroy had graduated from a public high school in a poor part of the city, one known to be an especially weak school. In fact, Leroy was a proud high school graduate who could not read. The kind of work he did for my parents, along with whatever else he could find, was pretty much his destiny. Leroy never parked in the driveway but in front of the house . . . because his beater car didn’t go in reverse.
Whenever I saw Leroy and greeted him, “Hi Leroy, how you doin’?” He responded with a big smile and the words, “Oh, I’m blessed, I’m blessed.” I remember one day a friend of my parents stopped by, someone who is a product of the same educational system as I am, someone who inherited his parents’ company, someone who has traveled the world. He met Leroy: “Well, hello Leroy, how are you?” “Oh, Mr A, I’m blessed, I’m blessed.”
Mr A stopped short. “Blessed,” he kind of stammered. “Well, blessed, well, that’s good.”
For many years, Leroy was the only person I knew who responded that way. How are you? I’m blessed.
But in recent years, I hear it more. And with the rise of social media, it’s become much more prevalent. These days, there’s all kinds of home décor that says “blessed” – and it’s become common for people to use the hashtag “blessed” when they post pictures.
I’m in favor of it. It’s a statement of faith. I’m blessed. It is to say, I know and I confess that all that I have and all that I am is by the grace and mercy of an amazing God. I’m blessed. It’s the antithesis of, “I’m successful, I’m self-made, I’m the master of my own destiny.” I’m blessed.
It is a reminder that can keep us humble, faithful, and, above all, grateful. Grateful to God from whom all blessings flow.
And even when we are not feeling blessed, even when things are not going well, it’s helpful spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, to remember and notice the blessings even in the midst of hardships. The friend who provides a shoulder to cry on is a blessing. The prayer circle that lifts you up when you are so far down you can’t begin to pray – that’s a blessing. That neighbor who drops off a casserole even though you said, “it’s ok, we’re fine.” That’s a blessing.
But I wonder how today’s #blessed is different from Leroy’s all those years ago, especially among those of us who have so many unearned privileges Leroy did not have.
Sometimes those social media posts of beautiful families that look as if they’ve never had any problems or of spacious, impeccably decorated homes or of glorious if not lavish vacations, all marked #blessed make me wonder. Is it enough to say, “I know I’m blessed,” especially when the blessings are material?
One of my favorite scripture passages is from Deuteronomy:
when you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them, 13 and when your herds and flocks are multiplied, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, 14 then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery . . . . . 17 Do not say to yourself, ‘My power and the might of my own hand have gained me this wealth.’ 18 But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, as he is doing today. (Deut. 8:12-14, 17-18)
In other words, when you have it good, when you have it made, don’t forget God. Don’t forget that all that you are, all that you have, is by the grace of God. And at our best, #blessed does that, along with the throw pillows and wall hangings that say “Blessed.” We remind ourselves and the world that we acknowledge God and that we are thankful.
It doesn’t fit on a pillow, and it’s too long for a hashtag, but knowing we are blessed demands that we ask: so what? Or, more precisely, “for what?” From the very, very beginning, God’s people are blessed --- the Jews and Presbyterians like to say “chosen” – confess that we are blessed, we are chosen, for a reason.
And I fear that gets lost, the reason for our blessedness. It seems to be at best subordinate. But it should take the lead.
We heard again today the well-known opening words of Abraham’s call, the beginning of the call of God’s chosen people: 2I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, [God says to Abraham], and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
So that.
Those two little words are the key. I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.
Many years later, writing to the early church, the author of 1st Peter put it this way: 9 You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
So that. In order that.
If we are just chosen or simply blessed – full stop -- we are living the faith equivalent of the dangling participle or the sentence fragment.
And history is full of the bloody results of God’s people only remembering half of the sentence. The world is full of broken and hurting people left behind by those who are content and self-satisfied in their blessedness.
Understanding themselves to be the New Israel, God’s new chosen people, the Christian people who left Europe for South Africa and for the American colonies carried a deep and well-developed theology of their own blessedness, their own chosen-ness, and their unquestioning conviction that God was giving them the promised land. And so they deeply believed themselves fully justified in what they did to and with the people who lived in those lands.
Did the countries they built become a blessing to the nations? Did they live lives and build societies that proclaimed the mighty acts of God?
Depends on who you ask. Later in the Bible’s history of God’s people – the Old Testament, we read that they came to believe that they lost the land with which they had been blessed because they forgot the other half of the equation.
Forgot that it was God who had blessed them with so much and that God had blessed them for a reason. That God expected something of them.
Still today, Christians are pretty good at making sure our own salvation is sewed up without ever asking saved for what? Saved from what we can tell you. But for what?
At our best, we Presbyterians say that we are chosen for service as well as salvation. In other words, we believe that we are saved so that – in order that – we can invest our whole selves and our whole lives in serving and blessing others instead of in currying favor to get ourselves into heaven. More than that, so that – in order that – we can take risks to make the world better, to make others lives better.
Even though it doesn’t fit on a throw pillow and it’s probably too long for a hashtag, we were never meant to truncate our blessedness from the reason for it -- so that – in order that – God’s original vision was for nothing less than for God’s people to be a blessing to the nations.
A chosen, race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people -- in order that by our living and by our actions, individually and together, we might proclaim the mighty acts of the one who brings us out of darkness and into the light. A light to pierce the darkness. And there’s a lot of darkness out there.
It is up to us – inadequate and imperfect as we are, hoping and wishing though we might be that there is someone else more qualified, someone more talented, someone more blessed.
It’s us.
Called, chosen, blessed, so that, in order that, we might show by our very living the mighty acts of the one who calls everyone from darkness to light who shines light in the darkest of the dark.
Of course, this chosen-ness, this blessedness isn’t always easy. As Tevye put it in Fiddler on the Roof, “I thank you God that we are your chosen people, but once in a while couldn’t you choose someone else?”
Jesus tells his chosen disciples, “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid,” not because it is easy but because God is counting on us. “Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to God.”
Large and small, individually and together, how do you and I let the light of God’s love which has so, so blessed us, shine in blessings to God’s world, a world caught in darkness and so in need.
Sometimes we have to start by calling attention to the darkness itself. So much darkness. And most people are used to it, ok with it, people living so far from the blessedness intended for all.
Like pointing flashlights into dark corners, we are called to bring light to the darkness. And we’re doing it. This church gets it – that we are not just here to celebrate our blessedness but to inspire and support one another to be a blessing.
I came back from two weeks’ vacation at the end of July to be asked by the staff if it would be ok with me if we kicked off the fall with a brunch and a little program called “blessed to be a blessing.” Would it be ok with me?? We have such an amazing staff.
And so Philip and all the volunteers he works with out set out to make a delicious and beautiful meal, and Ellen, together with Kort Swisher, set out to make a video celebration of all the blessings of First Presbyterian Church in Granville. Ellen was relentless in collecting and commissioning photos, determined to include everything –every. thing. we do around here.
f you haven’t seen it yet, or if you’d like to see it again, it will be playing in Heritage Hall the next few Sundays and you can find it on our website. It’s amazing and fun and inspiring.
Taking the lead from that video, throughout this season we are celebrating and lifting up all the blessings of this church – the way our common life and ministry bless us -- so that – in order that – we might be a blessing. And as a church we are a blessing in so many ways – I’m realizing it’s all intertwined – we are blessed to be in a church that is focused on blessing others. And the call to be a blessing is not just something we do alone, but something we do together. Our church is blessed to be a blessing.
Today we had a little video of the blessings of our children and family ministries. And over the next few weeks we will have more of these little glimpses into the blessings of our ministries. Even more on the podcast.
And behind it all, we are committing and recommitting ourselves individually and together to keep the two parts of the equation together – blessed . . . to be a blessing. To name our blessings and to share them generously so that we might be a blessing, in order that our lives might show forth the amazing light and goodness of our God. Amen.
