Two Rivers Pastoral Charge
Sunday June 14, 2026 – 3rd Sunday after Pentecost
Scripture Reading: Matthew 9:35-10:14
So Elaine – I promise you that this sermon isn’t going to be all about
you. Well, maybe a little bit about you,
but mostly about God and about Jesus because that is what makes us a church!
In the story about Jesus that we heard this morning, we’re about half-way
through Jesus’s ministry in the gospel of Matthew. Jesus called his disciples way back in the
earlier chapters; and ever since then, they’ve listened to Jesus teach the
crowds, and have received some private teachings too. They have watched Jesus heal people they encountered
along the way – healing people from leprosy and from loneliness, healing people
who were paralysed and people in pain. They have seen Jesus perform miracles –
calming the wind and the waves when a storm came up at sea, and even raising a
young girl from the dead.
And now Jesus is sending his disciples out to try their hand at ministry. They aren’t done their learning yet – they are
going to come back to Jesus’s mobile classroom later to learn more of what he
is about, so this moment is almost like a placement for student teachers to try
teaching in a classroom, or a placement for student doctors to see what it is
like in a hospital, or a placement for student ministers to practice the skills
and presence of ministry. Jesus sends
his disciples out to “cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast
out demons, and proclaim the good news, saying that the kingdom of heaven has
come near.”
Jesus doesn’t keep his ministry to himself – he empowers his disciples to do
the same as he has been doing, and sends them in to the world to do it. They don’t always get it right – in other
places in the story, we see them coming back to Jesus, saying, “We tried, but
this demon is just too stubborn,” and then Jesus takes them by the hand and
shows them, “This is where you went wrong, this is what you have to do instead.”
But the disciples, faithful to their teacher, do the best with the task that
they are given.
And I think that the same has been true in every era of the church, across time
and across space. The ministry isn’t the
ministry of one person, or of a small group of people – the ministry belongs to
all of us. No one person has all of the
gifts and skills to do all of the ministry – no one in the past 2000 years has
been Jesus! But if we each take the
gifts and the skills that we have been given, and coordinate them so that we
are working together… well, then, together we form the whole body
of Christ and we can be Christ’s presence in the world, and we can do Christ’s
ministry in the world. But it depends on
each one of us.
Here’s where I get to put Elaine on the spot.
For 11 years, Elaine contributed her gifts to the ministry of our church
– her gift of compassionate listening, her gift of organization, her gift of
communication, her gift of administration.
Because she shared her gifts with the church, our collective ministry
was stronger. She’s not off the hook now
that she is retired though, as she is still gifted by God, just as all of us
are gifted by God, but now she has a chance to use her gifts in different ways.
Not all of us are Elaine, but we each have different gifts and play different
roles in the ministry of the church.
Some people have the gift for inviting and making people feel
welcome. Some people have the gift of
music. Some people have the gift of writing
cards and making phone calls to help people feel connected. (Westfield folks – if you feel that this is
one of your gifts, talk to me or to Chris!)
Some people have the gift of gardening and working the land and growing
food to feed hungry people. Some people
have the gift of cooking that food. Some
people have organizational gifts, or public speaking gifts, or the gift of
recognizing the gifts of others. My list
could go on!
And your gifts, no matter what they are, are essential for the ministry of the
church, because the ministry isn’t the ministry of one person, but it is the
ministry of all of us together. You don’t
have to be perfect or prepared – I doubt that Jesus’s disciples felt fully
prepared as he sent them out on their own – you just have to be called and be
willing to go.
Together we are the church; we are the literal body of Christ in the world today. All of us – the Elaines, the Bertis and
Joans, the Chrises, the Daniels, the Margarets, the Karols, the Kathys, the
Roxannes… All of us together make up the church, each with our own unique place
in the overall ministry, for God gifts to us what we need.
We are sent out into the world to be agents of God’s love, and then we come together
to worship and to be nurtured and strengthened by the bread and the cup. And then we are sent out to serve again.
We are the church. The ministry is ours
to do together. And may we have the strength
and courage so to do. Amen.
Sent out in Peace to be the church
Photo Credit: K. Jones
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