10:30 am, World Communion Sunday, Oct 1, 2023 ~ FBCA

(Philippians 2:1-13; Mtt 21:23-32) J G White

O Lord, it's hard to be humble when you’re perfect in every way.

So sang Mac Davis in 1980, and the truth of the irony shines out. When you believe yourself to be perfect, even in just a few ways, it is hard to be humble with other people.

Perhaps we don’t think of humility and deep joyfulness as two things that go together, but I think they should. Paul’s letter we read from, Philippians, is his letter of joy, and on the second page we have this ancient hymn to Christ Jesus, describing His humble journey.

6 …though he existed in the form of God,

did not regard equality with God

as something to be grasped,

7 but emptied himself,

taking the form of a slave,

assuming human likeness.

Jesus humbly went on to the painful events we remember at the Communion Table today, and that Christians around the world participate in, on this World Communion Sunday. His life’s blood shed, His body broken.

Real humbleness is to be satisfied with your place and your purpose. So we have to know it, and not strive for something else. It often includes letting others be who they are. We think someone is better than we are? We learn not to be envious or jealous. We learn not to be angry and think ill of them. We learn not to feel like we are just nothing.

And if we think someone is less than we are, we learn from Christ not to value them less, not to think of ourselves too highly, and how to receive help from that person.

True humility is not beating ourselves up or putting ourselves down. We are created beautiful by God, and made new in Christ for good things. To be joyfully humble: respect yourself and others.

I’ve just come home from the activities of the Canadian Association for Baptist Freedoms. This is a group of Bapitsts who Christ has used to teach me some respect and humility. This little group of people and congregations is spreading across Canada now, after the first forty years was mostly fellowship in NS and NB and PEI. First Baptist has been part of the CABF since its beginning; one of the first Presidents was Jack Matthews. I appreciate this group of Baptists because of the freedom and, dare I say, humility that’s here.

Why would I say this? For one thing, there can and should be a humility about being free thinkers. I know, here in Philippians 2:2 it says, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. You might think this means we must all be copycats. Yet it is possible to agree to be free thinkers, to share the purpose of being diverse, to have in mind being respectful of many opinions. This is what I have found in the CABF group. And what I find here at First Baptist.

I’ve got it. OK, I’ve got it. You really like Let us build a house where love can dwell and all can safely live… You don’t even want to skip it for a month. All are welcome, all are welcome, all are welcome in this place. When this is true and real, it takes a lot of humility. Humbleness to respect and include someone different.

One person loves to hear, ‘My soul doth magnify, doth magnify the Lord,’ and someone else wants to sing, ‘I saw the light, I saw the light, no more darkness, no more night.’

One person trusts Jesus deeply for an eternal dwelling place, thanks to His sacrifice that personally cleanses them from wrong and evil. Another person has let go of concerns about the afterlife, and seeks Jesus’ Way for how to make a difference in this life.

And so on. All these can be welcome if there is a humbleness that is willing to let others be themselves, and let go of thinking ‘I know it all, me & Jesus have it all figured out, they must be wrong.’

I learned from these Baptist Christians to know and love other types of Christians. To respect them. To be humble in their midst. As a child and a teenager I was quite churched: I went to everything at the Middleton Baptist Church: Sunday service, Sunday School, Youth Group, Youth Choir, Men’s Fellowship, Youth Handbell Choir, and the boys’ Christian Service Brigade. But never once did I get to set foot in the local Nazarene Church, or United Church, or Catholic, or Anglican, or United Pentecostal. Only after I grew up and left home did I start to visit these and learn how they worshipped, and thought, & taught, & did God’s work together. You know, you appreciate your own tradition once you see what else is out there.

We humble ourselves, and look for the Christ who meets us in the Roman Catholics, and in the Lutherans, and in the Wesleyans.

So I rejoice, today, to be in a Baptist congregation that cooperates with the others. A Baptist Church that respects the others so much that we will welcome you as a new member from them, without requiring you be re-baptized in water as an adult. A Baptist Church that shares with others how they do things with God. For instance, we are rather ‘liturgical’ or ‘mainstream Church’ in our Sunday morning style. Responsive readings, unison prayers, two or more scripture passages, liturgical robes. I think this goes back a century. A brief history of First Baptist tells us about the leadership of our Pastor, Dr. C. W. Rose, just over one hundred years ago.

One noticeable factor during Dr. Rose’s pastorate was the appearance of more and more ritual and ceremony in the Church, such as the growing of the choir members, and other innovations. Some have said that much of this was due to the solemnity and ceremony which surrounded all Canadians during the war years.

(J. M. MacSwain, A History of the Amherst Baptist Church, 1959, p.51)

No matter our style, the heart of our gatherings is the Spirit of Jesus. The great sacrifice of Christ Jesus is in the worship of thousands upon thousands of Churches today, Oct 1, this World Communion Sunday. The bread and the wine come in many varieties in the Churches. So what? We all are remembering this: And being found in appearance as a human, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross. (P 2:7-8)

From our Master we are learning humbleness, from our heart out to our hands. We hear it in His teachings, over and over. Such as His story of the sons working in the vineyard: when we said we wouldn’t help out, we learn to do the humble thing and join in after all.

We may love a lot of what it is to be a practicing Christian, to be a Baptist, and to belong with First Baptist. Jesus who died and who lives takes us on a humble path, to esteem others highly and learn life from those who are different. We learn to make sacrifices and submit. We learn to be part of a Body that has so many working parts.

And now, we look again to Jesus’ broken body. We get in touch again with that life-blood that becomes life-giving. We bow, and discover there are millions who are bowing with us before Christ, and so are lifted up by God.