Community Ubuntu

Text: Galatians 3:28

Focus: Community

Function: To celebrate our refugees

Form: Story Telling

Intro:

I find it significant, maybe even a divine coincidence, that in this process of becoming more welcoming, our first sermon on the subject, given by Carol Wise was titled “Ubuntu.”

From Wikipedia: Ubuntu UBUNTU means "I am because of who we are" (/ʊˈbuːntʊ/ uu-BOON-tuu; Zulu pronunciation: [ùɓúntʼú])[1][2] is a Nguni Bantu term roughly translating to "human kindness."[dubious – discuss] It is an idea from the Southern African region which means literally "human-ness", and is often translated as "humanity towards others", but is often used in a more philosophical sense to mean "the belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all humanity".[3]

In Southern Africa, it has come to be used as a term for a kind of humanist philosophy, ethic or ideology, also known as Ubuntuism or Hunhuism (the latter after the corresponding Shona term) propagated in the Africanisation (transition to majority rule) process of these countries during the 1980s and 1990s.

Human-ness, community, humanity toward others, are all terms for loving our neighbor as we do ourselves.

It is now a philosophy, a way of being for an entire culture, based on Ancient African Tribalism, but is very Christian in its major components.

It kind of also makes a witness to what we see in Romans 2 when God tells us that everyone has the image of God inside of them through the conscience bearing truth of the Holy Spirit.

And it seems significant to me that in this process of being a welcoming Church, we have the chance to perform what we are talking about.

And all of that is coming from a culture that celebrates Loving others as much as we love ourselves.

Of course, we have no idea what kind of trauma the Hassan family has experienced. They are refugees from some sort of violent and terrible situation.

So, praise God that we get to be part of the solution to the World's problems.

Praise God that our nation, in respect to this refugee family, is actually living out its value of the sanctity of human life, no matter what color or religion they are.

Let us stop to pray for the Hassan family. (To the hopeful Internet reader, Hope Congregation is sponsoring a Muslim refugee family, Parents and 3 children from South Africa. Their last name is Hassan.)

So, because of them, and our process here, I decided to title this message: Community Ubuntu.

It is a redundant title. They mean the same thing, but I add those words to help us to see how to see things from a completely different world view.

I worked for 3 years with another refugee woman from South Africa and after her healing process, she also embraced this Ubuntu community Spirit. “Ubuntu” was one of her favorite greetings. She was deeply spiritual, always asking questions about Christianity and we constantly discussed her own faith.

I learned a lot from her.

I want to stop for some perspective here from the progression of sermons over the last few weeks.

I am concerned for community and I know that the topic of human sexuality in itself is not comfortable. It is almost pg13.

And I know that some will be stretched. I have seen a few looks and have heard a few comments about what it means to be welcoming.

I consider the biggest concern to be what about felons and certain kinds of felons.

Some people will have to come in faith, in the faith of the community and its shared values, in the faith that God by the power of the Holy Spirit is leading us and what we are and we are becoming is not going to be defined by any other category.

We are becoming unique and we are concerned for much more than the single issue that we have used to introduce the topic.

Understand this, the discussion around human sexuality is extremely important since it has now become a political football and people on both sides are threatened by the changes that are taking place.

But, it isn't our single issue. Not at all. We spent one weekend on that, plus the bible studies over the next few more weeks. And we will spend an entire other weekend on other components.

Today is a part of that.

So, let me tell you a story about another way that I have seen God has move over the last 20 years.

In 1999, an Hispanic man and his wife walked into my office at the Mohler Church.

“Carlos” was driving by when he said that his wife heard from God that they were to turn into our Church and talk to the pastor.

I believe that God knew that I would use this as a chance to teach the congregation that I was pastoring what it means to love the other.

It was indeed an unique experience for us.

Every time “Carlos” would stand up to give testimony, eyes would roll because “Carlos” took at least 5 minutes greeting people, expressing gratitude and etc. And then another 15 minutes giving testimony. And when “Carlos” stood up, we all knew we were going to be late to the diner.

But for most of us, it was okay because we knew that “Carlos” valued his community of origin and let us face it, North Americans need to learn to slow down and experience community with each other.

Dinner with “Carlos” and his wife as a lengthy ordeal. We never knew when to start, or when they would show up, or what they would bring.

It was exciting to learn the lore and stories of the communities in Bogotá and the jungle tribe that his family adopted in order to provide medical and spiritual care.

But, I was never really properly able to deal with that tension in the worship service.

People in worship, just as in society, have different expectations and needs.

“Carlos” and his family needed a community that loved and accepted them as they were living in a new land.

Others, legitimately, needed to get out of the worship service in time for other important tasks.

Those two cultures butted heads and in the process, God's Spirit was at work.

I was led by God to have “Carlos” teach us a song in Spanish.

The thinking was this: “help people to realize that `Carlos' didn't need to come up to our standards, but that we might need to come up to his.

Let me give you a history at t hat Church.

There were several times when a great and powerful move of the Holy Spirit happened.

We did the 40 days of purpose and baptized some 15 people. We had a lay witness weekend and saw a couple on the brink of divorce forge a strong and mutually respective marriage because the husband got saved and began to love his wife as much as he loved himself. I say, love her more than ones own self is a better way to make marriage work, but that is only from the man's perspective.

Great moves of God at that Church but then something happened about welcome.

In many ways, “Carlos” really changed things.

His desire for community, for Ubuntu, all of a sudden got inconvenient.

So, in prayer, I was led to ask Carlos to teach us a song in Spanish to over come the “this is America, let us speak American here.”

And again, even those who had frustrated glances at watches when “Carlos” stood up were amazed at what God did.

It was simple, but beautiful. During that worship time, it was like a cloud of joy flooded over us.

I cannot describe it any other way. I believe that everyone, even those who had fallen into criticism, felt this sense of joy and wonder.

For me, the joy I felt, and I know we cannot measure our faith on feeling alone, but the joy I felt was similar to the joy I felt at my baptism.

God's spirit was at work.

During the 40 days of purpose as we were claiming a welcome to a new group of people, again, God's Spirit was at work in a positive, uplifting sense of approval.

And all of that happened because example after example of mercy given in the 40 Days of Purpose curriculum focused on divorcées finding mercy.

That may not sound significant, but this is Lancaster Co, PA. Divorce is the unpardonable sin.

I don't know why. I suspect it has something to do with the patriarchal abuse that can go on in some of the plain communities.

A young man got full of the Spirit on our 40 days campaign and I invited him to preach one Sunday when I was gone.

He had a powerful message and a youth came forward for salvation at the end of it.

God's Spirit showed approval of this man preaching.

The whole success of the 40 Days campaign was based on an ideal that the congregation had not yet embraced entirely -the acceptance of divorced and remarried people into membership.

And, the congregation reacted differently than me. They passed a rule that no divorced and remarried person can speak from the pulpit.

And it seemed to me that the Spirit of God sort of left that place for a while right then.

My experience is this. Every where I turn, the Holy Spirit of God is leading the Church into a greater Community Ubuntu. I want to be where the Holy Spirit is leading. The Holy Spirit is extending God's welcome here and I am excited about it.

I know that some said that accepting divorced and remarried people was giving into the world and its ideals. But I am convinced that the argument itself is based on fear and not faith.

God is moving and we want to be where God is leading. AMEN

Galatians 3:28 (GNT)

²⁸So there is no difference between Jews and Gentiles, between slaves and free people, between men and women; you are all one in union with Christ Jesus.