180318 – Cross Trek: Tenacity

Yr B – Lent 5 – John 12:24-26

No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto!

Such was my El Salvador mantra. In case you didn’t know, Cynthia and I have just returned from a week long mission awareness trip to El Salvador. It’s called mission awareness because the focus of the trip is to learn about the partnership our church (specifically the Bay of Quinte Conference Region) has with Iglesia Bautista Emmanuel – a small church in San Salvador (the capital) that has an impressive missional outreach ministry with several ministries they run including a school, a youth arts centre, and a few communities in the mountains where they build houses and communities.

Our group included 15 youth and 22 adults. I won’t go into too many details about the trip because in a few weeks when I’m away at Conference annual meeting the UCW will be inviting a very special guest speaker in to talk about the trip – Cynthia!

As I said, one of the best parts of the trip for me was my mantra:
No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto!

That’s Spanish for “I have no responsibilities whatsoever!” – because for once I wasn’t in charge!
I wasn’t a leader.
It was so great to just get on and off the bus and not fuss or worry, and to just savour the experiences.
I was just a learner and a participant!

No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto!
A little slice of heaven!

Having never done anything like this before, and moving way outside our comfort zone, off we went.

The point of this mission awareness trip was not necessarily to make us all into passionate El Salvadoran champions. The point was to become aware of the positive difference that partnering in mission can make. The point was to learn from those partners and grow deeper in faith.

The point was to help us become aware of these things so that when a potential mission opportunity presents itself – like what happened to our leader, our Conference Executive Secretary, the Rev. Dr. Bill Smith, in Ottawa 32 years ago – that we’ll be more ready to respond with open minds and open hearts and be more inclined to take the leap and engage.

One single Salvadoran man who had escaped the brutal civil war that was going on there at the time, wandered into Bill’s Ottawa church called Emmanuel United. The Salvadoran attended Iglesia Bautista Emmanuel back home, so he recognized the word. He went in and was warmly welcomed. That started an amazing partnership that has touched hundreds and hundreds of lives.

Soon other Ottawa Salvadorans joined the man and in no time there were around a hundred of them at Bill’s church. In time they asked him to go and visit their homeland and see the violence and hardship they had fled, because without doing so he couldn’t really understand them.

He went, and the partnership between the United Church and them, and between Bill and their pastor Miguel Thomas Castro, was inaugurated. Our trip was part of the fruit of that missional partnership.

The purpose of this trip was not primarily to get us to fall in love with El Salvador and her people (although that was a happy by-product). The purpose was to transform us and open us to our own potential as mission partners in whatever context we find ourselves.

The need is profound.

There are myriad places and people in the world who need our solidarity and partnership, and also in our own country, and also in our own backyards.

Who knows who may walk through our doors, or who we may encounter, whose story and circumstance may change the shape of our ministry and our lives?
But after a mission awareness trip like this I know I’m in a much deeper headspace and heartspace and much more ready to respond.

Of course, I don’t have to respond, because: No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto!
I have no responsibilities whatsoever.

[pause]

And Jesus said, John 12:24-26
“Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world (meaning they’re ready to give it away) will keep it for eternal life.
Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.
Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.”

San Salvador is the city in which archbishop Oscar Romero (soon to be Saint Romero) was assassinated, literally in the middle of serving communion!
He was shot as he was holding up the chalice.
He had just finished preaching this same scripture passage that day!
Romero’s death helped usher in an attempt to celebrate peace in the midst of conflict, and gave voice to the Salvadoran people who were experiencing tremendous injustice at the hands of their corrupt government.
We visited the church in which Romero was killed, his simple home, and the place where he is interred.

In what has become a famous quote of Romero’s shortly before his death, he said that the voice of justice could never be silenced, even if the government killed him, because the voice of justice will live on in the people. It does!

“Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.
Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.”

[getting awkward] No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto!

[pause]

During their civil war, in 1989, at the University of Central America, 6 Jesuit priests and an innocent woman and her 16 year old daughter were killed in the middle of the night by a death squad from the “right wing” party (in other words, the corrupt government). It was such a shocking violation that it brought international pressure, and within a few years had ushered in a peace accord ending the civil war.

Prior to that thousands upon thousands of Salvadorans had been massacred. Peace finally came, but sadly the violence is still pervasive. Now they call it a “social war”.

“Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.
Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.”

But me?
[very awkward] No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto!

[pause]

Iglesia Bautista Emmanuel runs a K-12 school that has at their centrepoint the philosophy of building a culture of peace. They do this because their students walk to school by armed men guarding every business and store, with armed soldiers a constant menacing presence, and their school is ensconced behind massive concrete walls topped with razor wire.

But inside is a sanctuary of safety and a staff and student body utterly committed to instilling and growing a culture of peace.
They do it all as an intentional and explicit expression of their Christian faith, their discipleship, the way they follow!
When they say “the peace of Christ,” it’s much more than just words or a nice concept.

Student leaders take extra training to become peace-makers in the school. They’re kind of like prefects but focusing on peace. And at the end of the day the staff and students venture back out into that hostile environment, carrying with them a heart of peace, and positively impacting their homes and communities.

“Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.
Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.”

And me?
No tengo responsibilidades en absoluto?

Not anymore. Not ever.

I am a follower of Jesus.

Yo tengo responsibilidades!

I have responsibilities! We all do.

As we have journeyed through Lent this year I have been preaching about key concept words.
We started with cruciformity – living a cross shaped life.
Then we talked about integrity and being committed to our calling.
Then we explored receptivity and being open to the power of the Spirit to transform us.

Today our word is tenacity.
It means to keep at something even when the going gets tough.
It means that there are no benchwarmers.
It means that in order to follow Jesus you have to leave your comfort zone and really follow.

Our mission partners in El Salvador taught us the meaning of tenacity!
They embody it. They’re passionate about it.
And they’re joyful about it, even in the face of oppression and violence.

Tenacity is the people of Iglesia Bautista Emmanuel.
Tenacity is the staff and students of Colegio Bautista Emmanuel (the school).
Tenacity is the leadership of Cal Pipil, the youth art centre.
Tenacity is the church and community leaders way up the mountain in small villages rebuilding their lives in a culture of peace in the midst of a culture of violence.

And do you want to know where these Salvadorans learned their tenacity?
It wasn’t from Romero.
It wasn’t from the murdered Jesuits.
It wasn’t from their teachers or pastors.
No, all those people learned it too from the same place we can.
Jesus.

We like to say we’re followers of Jesus.
If you are then: tenomos responsibilidades!
WE have responsibilities!

And our first one is to follow, with tenacity!
And that means we don’t get to dictate where we’re going, or how we go.

We just go.

We don’t get to tell Jesus how we’ll follow.
We just follow.

With tenacity.

As Holy Week approaches that will be a good word to remember.
Having just spent the week I did, I won’t have any trouble remembering that this year.

Amen.

ElSal-group2