Grace-St. Paul's Episcopal Church
Mercerville, New Jersey

For there they all were -- mostly over 50, some as old as 70 (Think of Deacon Veretta.) Several of their knees weren’t working well, and they had the look of the seriously concerned. Though a majority were white and some well-educated, they were from every race, ethnicity and background imaginable, They were evenly divided among the sexes. and looked like a cross-section of this parish - which is to say like people anywhere. They were schoolteachers, nurses, cops, accountants, businessmen, consultants, newspaper owners, public health officials, stay-home moms, the odd professor, two men from an ad agency, and one horse trainer!

What they had accomplished took my breath away.

One man had figured out how to break the logjam in Social Services for the poor street folk and veterans who need medical care. His and his churches’ organization and responsibility nowadays enable a North Carolina town & its hospital to recover over 8 million dollars every year in reimbursements for Medicaid patients. This helped many of the patients to become much healthier, and to become able to return to, and live in, the community

Another two deacons were cited for organizing and running a coalition of all churches and eleemosynary institutions in N’awlins. At last count they had demolished (with the owners present, and able to check for surviving objects) over 600 homes, fed almost 500,000 people, delivered untold tons of supplies water and food, set up 14 health clinics, and had just acquired 24 more vans to provide simple listening, counseling and mental health evaluation and support to the ravaged people and city now some two years after Katrina. Indeed, their organization and its sub-groups are said to be the only widely functioning, competent help around.

A third deacon was given an award for getting herself into jail - twice! (It was reported – not entirely jokingly - that she “had broken into” the women’s incarceration institution.) Through prayer services, serious listening, visiting with families and small children on the outside, education and counseling on the inside and simple Christian witness, this deacon/chaplain has single-handedly doubled the service and services in the county jail. So many persons attend services or are otherwise involved in the group’s counseling and activities that her Bishop has taken up making yearly “visitations” to the county jail’s congregation. (Note: that bishop is our own + George Councell.)

I could go on for a long time, reporting ministry by Episcopal deacons together with their parishes or institutions, and often, other Christians, from one end of the globe to the other. What matters here is that people – regular people – without fancy degrees or lots of money – put their common sense, and great caring, the conviction that if they address a problem, the situation will /indeed must, get much better – because that is what God desires – give themselves to the service of some serious, often intractable-seeming problem in our communities. And God continues to support and empower them. What a few people who care can accomplish is unbelievable. What I heard and saw happening among those and other deacons convinces me, and would convince anyone that if the church really behaved as we are called to behave, this world would absolutely be different, no matter what greed, and evil stalk among us.

These congregations are literally changing their world. Of course, none of these deacons are doing this stuff alone they are behaving like “deacons” which is to say they take their church family with them, when embarking on some service which will builds toward that alabaster city whose maker and builder is God.

Why is this work still comparatively rare? Many reasons come to mind, pride, greed, sloth, covetousness, self-centeredness and lack of awareness come instant to mind. Yet I think we have an even greater enemy in this country- and in the world- than habitual human sins. Oh those sins are still the vehicles, still the way to influence human beings - especially when they are mixed in with American “consumption-it is” and our crazily overworked lives.

I am becoming convinced, however that a great evil is at work trying to convince good and decent people that we really can’t do much, that the problems are all too complex, we need “experts,” we don’t have enough money, we’re too busy, that bureaucracy can’t work well, We need to “study this”, to wait till the next election/the end of the war. On and on and on the lies come. until we all give up, and leave littlest, last, least and lost, to their misery – because we “really can’t buck the system.” My brothers and sisters – like it or not - WE ARE THE SYSTEM. If it’s a mess, ours are the values that are fouled up. If “society” is seriously anti-social, we, and not some imagined “other people” are the problem. And yes, we can change almost anything and make big dents in almost any problem – if we don’t fall prey to the “THIS IS JUST NOT SOMETHING WE CAN DEAL WITH” sickness. This – no one can work with or repair the system is an evil thought. It is also a LIE.

Our ancestors who came across the Red Sea, complaining incessantly to Moses, the Pilgrims who survived the Atlantic passage on the Mayflower, the folks who went west the people who ran the underground railway north, those who fought in two world wars, helped to rebuild Japan and much of Europe, the men who walked on the moon, the researchers who eliminated smallpox, who invented and organized the Internet. The Liberians in this congregation who fled from Charles Taylor via forest, jungle, and under the river, and lived to tell the tale and rebuild their lives - all these were just people and not even particularly brilliant, holy, or even nice people at that! They were people like those deacons and their congregations who are working to re-build their communities and our society, by tackling one awful problem at a time. They were and are offering their intelligence, their labor, and their faith that this building & rebuilding is and will remain the work to which God has called all of us. Our ancestors knew, as we know, that when God calls us to build toward the Kingdom, God also promises us the knowledge and the power to answer that call.

Answering God’s call is the way America – or any country – will become beautiful. God is building the city, set upon a hill, to which all the nations will come. Americans dream of our nation’s being part of that great project. Christians are called to make every society in which we may live part of God’s great dream. Are we really ready to celebrate Independence Day? Are we ready to rise up from our picnics and fireworks, and turn our faces toward rebuilding Jerusalem – here, and on the African Continent, in the Middle East, and throughout our world?

If our answer is “no,” then shame on us, And if it is “yes,” then (to quote ++ Katharine [quoting +Paul Moore]) “Get Up, Get Out and Get Going” And may the power of the Holy Triune God, keep you safe, and fill you with power now, and in all the days to come. AMEN