Christopher H. Edmonston

One Thing We Ask

May 17, 2009

Psalm 27 – Sanctuary Rededication Service

In describing the dedication service of the Howard Memorial Presbyterian Church, The Daily Southerner records the following from May 24, 1909: “After the Offertory, ‘How amiable are thy courts,’ and Hymn No. 64, ‘O day of rest and gladness,’ was delivered the Dedicatory sermon by the Rev. E. L. Siler of High Point. His delivery is easy and graceful and the argument that he drew from his quintuple text was strong and satisfying ( 5 texts -- Luke 10:42, John 9:25, Psalm 27:4, Mark 10:21, and Philippians 3:13 - )….With this quintet of unities he pointed out the Christian’s duty with an eloquence that moved his hearers.”

Ah, the good old days! Quintuple text sermons, strong and satisfying preaching, and unity that moves hearers. Now thinking that he probably spent ten minutes on each point, on each “uple” of his quintuples, my guess is that E. L. Siler preached for at least 50 minutes or maybe as long as an hour.

One hundred years later our waistlines have grown larger while our attention spans have gotten shorter and none of us really wants to endure more than one “uple” sermon – particularly with a pig pickin waiting in the wings -- unless we really have to, now do we? So I’ll not follow his lead exactly, but I do want to take a cue from Rev. Siler, who stood in this place on a similar occasion 100 years ago and borrow one of his texts. He preached from Psalm 27, verse 4: One thing I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: to live in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to inquire in the sanctuary.” In the full wonder of the Old Testament, the 27^th Psalm is a staple of faithfulness – in fact James Mays, perhaps the living Presbyterian who knows the most about the Psalms, compares this Psalm to Psalm 23, reminding us that 27, like 23, “teaches us what real trust is like, and it leads those who follow its lines in liturgy or meditation toward that trust.” That is to say that if you paid close attention to Psalm 27 through Bryan Haislip’s gorgeous recitation of the psalm, you noted a reverential and growing trust in God that culminates in two of the most powerful and personal verses of the whole Bible – “13 I believe that I shall see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living. 14 Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the LORD!” These are words of confidence, faith, and trust – all three of them evidence of God’s abounding grace and bulwarks of the Christian life and thus worthy of our pursuit.

That is what this sanctuary ultimately is – a trust. A trust in God that we will be able to maintain it. A trust in our staff and Session that the worship here will be faithful and just and praiseworthy in the sight of God. A trust from our ancestors to us – that we will maintain what they worked so hard to give, dedicated, and preserve. Indeed it might be said that this whole Centennial for our sanctuary is a celebration of trust – trust in God, first and foremost; coupled with a trust in the church universal, the scripture, the prophets, the saints that set the pattern for our faith; tripled with a trust in this Presbyterian and Reformed tradition which we preserve now even as it has preserved us; quadrupled with a trust in each other and those we call to serve on our Session and on our staff here; finally, quintupled with a trust in our descendants that they will take that which we have entrusted to them, and faithfully pass it on to those who will follow them. That is whole lot of trust to be sure. And even though I just quintupled, breaking my own one “uple” rule, I feel confident in saying before you that if, like the Psalmist will first and foremost trust God then there will be abundant trust to go around. This is the lesson of Psalm 27 – that the God of whom we inquire, and to whom we pray, and for whom we live – this God can be trusted and from our trust in God our trust in works of God finds its source. Can it be that the God who’s got the whole world in His hands can be trusted to keep Howard Memorial, too?

Why yes, yes indeed.

It was trust in God that led three women named Anna to begin the long process of making a church. It was God who blessed their prayers and set in motion the gears that undergird us today. It was God who honored your prayers for restoration ten years ago as you endured, overcame, and restored this place following a five hundred year flood. No matter what change may come, no matter how many obstacles are yet to be faced by this church, this we must do – to live with God, behold the beauty of God, and to bring our questions, prayers, and faith to God.

It was Fred Holbrook, with bagpipe in hand last month who reminded us of the fine and faithful past we have, standing firmly on our trust in Christ, built upon rocks of grace and faith. Brian Blount, the President of our Seminary in Richmond gave us the good word that though metaphorical dragons and snakes and traps of all shapes and sizes lay in wait for us, to rob us our faith, that the antidote to their terror was to trust in the God who made heaven and earth over and against the evidence around us that the dragon was winning and had in fact one. And it was John Kuykendall, our Marrow lecturer, who brought the good word to us that while no could predict the future for Howard Memorial, we do know that the future belongs with God. And while that seems an overly obvious point, it reveals its wisdom in the listing of the alternatives that we reject when we say it. Or to put it this way – does the future rely upon technology or faithfulness? Upon the sense of humor of the pastor or upon his or her Godliness? Upon the church’s ability to dodge controversy or upon our trustworthiness in our consideration of the challenges of the moment, whatever those challenges may be? Trusting in God ultimately means rejecting the easy attractiveness of the alternatives. Or to put this most simply – when the church completely substitutes style for substance, delivery for integrity, or humor for truth it has abandoned its mooring and is no longer the church. Every church, including this one, is a trust from God a trust shared among her people. And if we don’t entrust the future to God, then what exactly will be left to preserve? If not God, then what? It is, rightfully so, a short list of alternative.

In the end, I think the flood proved the point the best, and though it was an expensive point, it was still a good reminder that the church really is the people who populate her and not the bricks and mortar that form her walls. Don’t get me wrong, both are needed – the people of God need space for worship, beautiful space where thoughts are collected and aspirations aspire – the finest church architects have always known this. But the building is the product of the faith of the people, not the source of their faith. The former presupposes the latter – or, you might say that without the people there would be neither reason nor use for the building.

Just last week our folks gathered in the Burns fellowship hall for a potluck supper – and we asked 10 of our church members to share memories about the church. And to a person, the memories that folks shared were about the people of our church. Baptisms and Sunday Schools, falling asleep on somebody’s lap, prayers that were prayed in a season of illness, watching children get married. There were stories about grandmothers and mothers, Miss Susie Hussie, Mr. Dail Holderness, Mr. Herbert Taylor, and pastors named Hobbie, Iverson, and Burns. To a person remembered more for their trust in God and faithfulness to the people of this church than for any other reason.

But it was the youngest speaker, a member of our youth group, the very ones to whom we will one day entrust this beautiful space, that perhaps said it best when recounting a children’s sermon from years ago: “The people make up the church. Now that I have grown up, I have realized that the church really is made of the people. The building is just a place an even though it is pretty, it is not what make the church. You all are my church family.”

With my one good “uple” today that is what I would leave us with. Our church is a family called together by trust. Every Sunday, about 11 AM we, in the name of God and for the sake of our trust in God, hold a family reunion in this grand old hall, and we sing our great hymns, and we share our joys and burdens alike – and once every 25 years or so we hold this reunion in a grand old fashion, as we are today. But each week, we are all the while trusting that the God that made us, the God that claims us, and the God that will lead us home is among us and blessing us with abundant grace and merciful love. The one thing we ask, the one thing we must ask, as we inquire in this sanctuary is that God will grant us the faith to trust in years to come as we have trusted through the years before. Insofar as this is the one thing that defines us well, it is the one thing we must do, and the one enterprise that we must ask God to continue to bless.

So break the bread. Pour the cup. Pray the prayer. Sing the hymn. Ring the bell. Trust the Lord. For God has been good to us in this place and we are confident by virtue of our trust that we will see salvation in the land of the living as we have heard it professed and believed it to be within these very walls of the sanctuary of the Howard Memorial Presbyterian Church for the past 100 years. May it be so and more so for the 100 years which are to come. Amen!