Date: September 15th& 18th
Preacher: Pastor Ashley Rosa-Ruggieri
First Reading: Amos 8:4-7
Psalmody: Psalm 113
Second Reading: 1 Timothy 2:1-7
Gospel: Luke 16:1-13
Many people have asked me this past year when I knew I wanted to be a pastor. The story is a long road that could take a while if I told the whole thing, but the basic beginning of it was when I was in High School. I took a Spiritual Gifts inventory while attending a church leadership camp over Spring Break my sophomore year. My inventory told me that one of my top gifts was “pastoring,” and it was from that point that I started to be curious about what that could mean in the world and in my life. This leadership camp, which was called DELTA, was a big part of my spiritual formation. It was a three-year program, and I was in the first class to start and then graduate from the program. The motto of DELTA was—disrupt the continuum. We even had that on our t-shirts and a chant that would get us pumped up. Who are we? DELTA! What do we do? CHANGE? How do we change? DISRUPT THE CONTIUUM!
Since this program was the start of my journey to ordained ministry, it began to lay a foundation that prepared me for the ways that disruption is a normal part of life, and one that we should not only expect, but prepare for. In some ways, our Gospel story today is all about disruption, and how it affects our lives and actions. When Jesus tells a parable, it is meant to teach us something. Often this means that the main character sets an example for us to follow, but in the case of our reading today, deciphering the lesson may be a little bit harder. We do not want to be seen as a money manager who cheats people, that is not moral, ethical, or admirable. That is not the example we are called to follow or imitate. With this in mind, let us consider the whole situation rather than automatically expecting this manager to be someone we are to emulate. Theologian Justo González suggests that this is a parable about stewardship, highlighting the difference between what we have now, and what disruptions may be coming. If we start at the beginning of the story, we can see how this would be the case. The manager in this passage is spurred into action because he is under the impression that he is going to be fired soon. This news has made the manager worried for the future, and how he will live when the life that he knows has been disrupted. And so, he goes to those that owe his master money and he cuts their debts so that he might find favor with them after he is fired, after life has been disrupted.
In our own lives, there is always the possibility that a disruption can happen that changes the life that we currently know. This story focuses on the negative change of losing a job, but disruptions can be positive too. Sometimes disruptions can even be both. Losing a job, a death of a loved one, illness, or a fight with a friend might all be disruptions that could happen in our lives unexpectedly that might cause pain. And chances are, if we knew those possible things were coming, like the manager suspected in this story, then we too would try to find ways to prepare now for the inevitable change to come. But what about when the disruptions that can be good? A marriage, a graduation, a new job offer, or moving into a new space. We often must prepare for those things just the same as the hard things to come, because no matter what, some sort of change is inevitable. Disruption is inevitable.
This week’s worship services mark the beginning of my second year serving with you here at Trinity. It is strange to think that it has already been a year since I first stood here and preached about the possibilities of what was to come. And although you had some time before I was called here, to prepare for a new pastor, you had no way of knowing when the right fit would come along, who they would be, or what they would be like. You did not know exactly when the disruption would strike. Eventually, you all found me, and decided to call me here to praise God and serve the Lord together, which was an act of preparing for the future amid anticipated disruption, like the manager in our story.
I would like to think that this first year of my call here has been full of opportunities for us to ask as a congregation—what are we called to right now, and what are we called to in the future? Our world is full of disruptions and changes that can be good or bad or both. We cannot change the inevitable parts of the world that interrupt our day to day lives. Instead, we can try to always be prepared for the possible disruptions that will come some day in the future. My call here to Trinity is to offer accompaniment through all of the ways that life changes our plans, and at times, part of that means asking if things should be changed before a disruption even happens, by finding the continuums that are already in need of disruption here and now in the church and in the world.
Over this past year, we have been asking these questions and responding to it. Who is our church now and who is our church going to be? Through our answer we have done things that are new, and we have done things that are meant to renew. And the wisdom in this practice is confirmed in our parable today. The manager is not to be imitated because he cheats people out of money or acts in an unadmirable way, rather we are to learn from the way that he prepares for the coming changes that are promised in our life.
Welcoming a new pastor is a big change, it disrupts the way things are, and you all prepared for that change before I arrived. And now, as we head into year two of praising God together, we must continue to ask the questions that help us prepare for the future disruptions to come. To try new things, to renew ministries already established, to find anew our dedication to serving God and sharing the Gospel. May our continued ministry together offer moments of living in the present time as a church called to follow Jesus, and also prepare us for the inevitable ways that disruptions will come to the church. Thanks be to God.