Preached Sunday, April 6, 2003 by the Rev. Steven J. Lashbrook, Pastor

First Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, Manistee, MI

I want to offer a disclaimer at the beginning of this sermon and say that I am not responsible for the recent changes in the weather. I have appreciated the few warm days we have enjoyed and did not pray or plea for any snow and ice in order to make this sermon more relevant. I will admit, however, that this sermon did have its beginning in one of our frequent trips to Northern Michigan this past winter. Traveling the interstate highways made the trips fast, but after a while I became eager for any kind of diversion to make the trip different. During one of our trips, I passed a truck somewhere between Manistee and Cadillac. As I passed, I glanced to read the side panel. Written there were the words that are the title of this sermon: "Al’s Snowplowing and Firewood."

As I pulled ahead of the truck, the business’ name ran back and forth in my mind, and it wouldn’t go away. I thought to myself that I had never seen that particular combination. Snowplowing and auto repair, yes. Landscaping and snowplowing, yes. Landscaping the firewood I had seen, too. But snowplowing and firewood seemed somewhat unusual and an unlikely combination.

Snowplowing, especially in this part of Michigan is essential for life. It is what keeps life going after all in these winter months. Without constant, consistent plowing everything would always and forever come to a halt. Plowing is the way life is kept open. It is what allows people to go about their lives and be free to connect and work.

But firewood is something quite different. Firewood is what you need not to go out but to stay at home. In the cold winters of Michigan, it can be what makes a house a home and further what makes a home safe and secure, protected from the freezing cold and frozen pipes. Firewood is what creates a place of warmth and inner goodness. With the sound of crackling wood and snapping flames, there comes the sound of life and comfort for all who dwell within.

Snowplowing and firewood is Al’s business. But in a real way it is also the church’s business. It is what we are to do. It is what we ARE doing. We are snowplowing. With our ministry, with our words, with our lives, we are trying to set people free.

That is what Jesus said would be done when his life was lived and his words were spoken. The hungry would be satisfied. The weeping would laugh. The rich would not be tied down by striving and doing, but would feel peace. The full and satisfied would no longer be able to disguise their want, but would be able to express their longing and then, in the wonder of Jesus’ ceaseless promise, they would be truly satisfied.

The church’s business is salvation, hope, and freedom from what life is and was and has become. It is telling people what God in Jesus Christ already has done. In the words of the Psalm and prayer we have already offered, it is to create in us new hearts and renew our spirits within us. It is taking us from where we are and letting us go free. It is exactly like getting plowed out from everything that has buried and kept us. It is being set free from a time of being closed in and shut down.

When the church forgets that it is about such freedom, it is not doing its work, the ministry, the business that God has called it to do. It may be successful in every other way. It may have built big buildings, big budgets, big programs and big numbers, but it isn’t doing what Christ believed was needed. If it is not doing everything it can to live and express the freedom that Christ brings it is not doing its work. If it is making rules that confine and is encouraging guilt that cripples, if it is telling people more what is wrong with them than the good that God has given them, it is not doing its work. On the other hand, if it believes it has nothing to say to what is wrong, if it shrugs its shoulders at violence and frantic sexuality, at mean-spirited prejudices about new immigrants or at deep seated prejudices of race and gender and sexual orientation that have become the casual norm, it is not doing its work to set people free. If the church thinks it has nothing to say to a world at war and no need to proclaim the peace of Christ then it is not making the gospel relevant for its own day. If the church thinks there is nothing it can do about starving children in an African nation or murdered children in an American city or damaged children in an abused home, it is not doing its work to let people go free.

If you have an attitude, a behavior, or a way of life that encourages decisions that keep some in and others out, that makes no room for differences of gifts, and that believes that no one can change, then you are not doing the work to let people go free. If you are not helping to set people free, if you are not telling them they are free in Christ’s love, if you are trying to keep them penned in, tied down and snowed under, you are not doing the work of the church.

The church’s work – our work – the work of deacons and trustees and leaders who serve, the work of every single one of us who are in this church is to set people free, to plow them out and let them know they are saved from death for life, and bring them the possibility to see new things about themselves and God’s whole creation.

But there is more. There is more that needs to be done. God has placed us in this world. God created us and loves us and wants us to be at home here. But sometimes – is today one of those times? – you may not feel very much at home. You may feel uneasy, unsettled, and unworthy. You may not think there is much of a place for you here or anywhere. You may feel like a stranger, even in your own family.

For you, in those times, the church has some other work to do. It is asked to deliver some "firewood." It is to help you know there is a home in this life for you. It is to create the way and the time and the place for you to discover your place.

Our work is to bring firewood, to offer signs that every other person within our reach is at home within this church. It is the responsibility of everyone in every place in this sanctuary to make a home for each other. As you sit here you may think that you are the only one who feels alone. You may think that one closest to you is every different from you. But you may also be very mistaken. The one closest to you may be the one who needs you more than you now know. It is the work of the whole church to make certain no one is forgotten or ignored or shoved out of the way.

Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you that hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you that weep now, for you shall laugh. It is our work that is grounded in Christ’s life and power to offer blessings in the midst of every struggle and sorrow and search. It is our work to make every person know that she has and he has a place with us and therefore a place in life.

There is a lot of work to do. Our work is tedious and time consuming. It is work that must be done all the time, in every season and for every life. As these days unfold I ask that each of you also make a decision to recommit to that work. I ask that you rededicate yourself to all Christ asks us to do. I ask that through prayer and worship, through our being together here and in our being apart, we do the work of the church. I ask that we find ways to help and support each other as we strive to do this difficult, life-changing, life-saving work. I ask that in every way, with every life, the work of Christ always be our own.

And it is very simple for us to begin that work now. Here, at this table, we may begin. Here, with this bread and this cup, we are asked to remember. We are asked to recall once more that great love given for us in Jesus Christ. We are called to remember his death: his suffering and crucifixion, and to remember that for us, it means life. Life now, in this place and this time, and life for all time to come. Here, at this table, we may recommit ourselves to the life and work of Christ, through this church, and know that we partake of one body and all are made to drink of one Spirit.

Amen.