Bringing More Talk To The Table

First spoken on 2018/09/23 at Breslau Mennonite Church 

Warning: This blog post discusses sexual misconduct/abuse of power by church and educational leaders. 

Good morning. So I want to start off by asking: 

How many of you enjoy having tough conversations? 

How many of you try to avoid having overly personal, or uncomfortable, or confrontational conversations as much as you can? 

And how many of you do not appreciate being asked to participate during the sermon?

It’s ok, I wouldn’t either. I think this short video clip that we’re about to watch does a good job of illustrating how a lot of us often feel when we’re faced with having a tough conversation: 

It has become pretty much second nature for me to start a conversation with someone with the phrase “Hey how’s it going?”. Most of the time this is followed by “pretty good, how are you?”, then I respond “pretty good” and we move on to talking about sports, or school, or work, or the weather, or whatever else we normally talk about. I enjoy this kind of conversation and I think having casual, good-humoured conversations like these is important because they help us make connections and keep friendships going. 

I’ve been thinking about it more though and I’ve started to wonder: what does it actually mean when someone says they are “pretty good”? 

I think subconsciously we interpret it to mean that this person must be having a fairly average day - there’s nothing going on in their life that they’re overly excited about, and there’s nothing going on in their life that they’re anxious about or is causing any internal struggle. Really though, I think most of the time “pretty good” is just code for “I don’t want to talk about what’s really on my mind or what’s really going on in my life with you right now.” 

Now I'm not implying that during coffee hour or other fellowship time we have with each other, we need to open up and share all our inner personal thoughts, feelings, and opinions, or our deepest, darkest secrets and desires with each other.  Like I said, I do see the importance in having light-hearted conversations even if they can be shallow. 

It’s totally fair and valid to not want to talk about everything that’s on your mind all the time. Life would get very tiring and wouldn’t be much fun if every conversation we had turned into a counseling session or a heated intellectual discussion. I do think it’s important though that we make sure that there are good opportunities for each one of us to be able to have real conversation with another person or a group of people from the church community even if this means being vulnerable with each other and exposing our insecurities. 

Because, as mentioned, this kind of conversation often makes us uncomfortable and it can be hard to break the ice and find a good time or the right person to talk to about what’s really on our minds, I think what we need is to try to intentionally create specific times and places for this kind of conversation to happen. This will allow those who may be lacking opportunities to have these kinds of conversation, and it will help strengthen the community in general.

You’ve probably heard of the campaign Bell puts on one day every year called “Let’s Talk” which is a fundraiser for mental health services and research and gives people an opportunity to share their own stories of mental health struggles to show how common but how hidden mental illness can be. 

It’s a good initiative but I think this needs to be more than just a one day thing if we really want to end stigma around mental health issues. We need to be comfortable talking about our mental health with not only with our doctors, our counselors, our employers, our teachers, our parents, and other family members, but also our peers, our friends, and our fellow church members.  This will be very hard to do though if we don’t make “real talk” with each other a normal, frequent habit of ours.

Being able to have more meaningful, in-depth, or personal conversations with one another on a regular basis will make it easier to support each other when we’re going through other sorts of challenges in life as well. 

Bruxy Cavey, the teaching pastor at The Meeting House which I attended a few times while I was living in Mississauga for co-op last year, published a book called Reunion which really resonated with me and helped clear some things up for me about Jesus. 

The book is structured around his summary and analysis of the good news of the gospel in one word, three words, and thirty words. Today, I’m going to give you a brief synopsis of the thirty-word explanation he wrote.  

So, the good news in thirty words (I know it needs a bit of explaining but why don’t we read it together just to catch anyone who’s close to nodding off at this point): Jesus is God with us, come to show us God’s love, save us from sin, set up God’s kingdom, and shut down religion, so we can share in God’s life.  

Let’s start with the opening phrase: Jesus is God with us. 

It’s common knowledge but it hasn’t always sunk in for me and I haven’t always fully understood the ramifications behind the fact that Jesus and God are one in the same. 

It was always part of God’s plan to come to us in human form not only to set an example for how we should live but also to experience what it’s like to be human, to live a physical, finite, human life, to go through the same pain, suffering and temptations that we go through in life. 

This allows him to show us not only that he’s capable of empathizing with us and understanding what we go through, but that it is possible to get through the difficulties of life on Earth if you follow his lead and ask him for advice through means such as prayer. 

Although we might not be able to understand all the reasons why, he decided it made most sense to come to us as a Jewish male in Israel, approximately 2000 years ago.

So why did he come?

Firstly, Jesus comes to us to show us God’s love. 

Bruxy likes to explain that God cares so much about every single one of us and his relationship with each one of us that the kind of love he has can be described in human terms as wanting to be married to us. His love for each one of us is so strong, so unconditional though, it is deeper than any marriage or relationship that exists between humans. 

No matter how hard we try, when we as human beings are in a relationship with another person, even a committed, intimate relationship with someone, we always end up putting ourselves first at some point, and it’s not possible for us to be able to give the other person the full support and attention they need at all times. 

This is possible for God though and although it’s tough to comprehend, he is able to love every single person in the world in this way. Jesus came to teach us this, as well as to show us the best way we can love others in spite of our limitations as human beings. 

Even though Jesus isn’t with us in physical human form at this time, he is still in this deep relationship with each of us. He is there walking beside you wherever you go, he is there sitting at the table with you as you eat and talk with others, and he is there to comfort you, to put his arm around you and listen to you when you’re having a bad day. 

Why else did Jesus come? 

He came to save us from sin. We don’t normally like to directly talk about sin here in the Mennonite church. It’s too negative, too controversial, too uncomfortable. 

Often times when we think of sin, we think of things that we do that are wrong that we should feel guilty about, that we deserve to be punished for, and we think we have to make some sort of sacrifice to make things right with God again. 

How could God possibly expect us to want be in a trusting, loving relationship with Him though if we are constantly scared of letting Him down and being punished? 

As Bruxy explains in the book: “the word ‘sin’ translates into the Greek word "hamartia" which means “to miss the mark”, “to fail to hit the bull’s-eye”, “to be off-target”. 

Sin refers to any way we fail to live the life of love for which we were created.” (Reunion, 99). 

We all sin so much that sin seems natural: we all are constantly doing things in our daily lives that aren’t loving, that aren’t the way we were created to live. 

Sometimes it’s hard to know what sin is and what it isn’t: our physiology often causes us to sin and our past traumas or past exposure to sin can engrain sinfulness into our psychology which influences how we think and behave. 

However normal it may seem though, sin is nothing but bad news. Living in ways we weren’t intended to has natural negative consequences, because sin separates us from the creator of nature, the source of life: God.  

If you think of sin as all the ways we do damage to ourselves and to God’s creation, and you put this into monetary terms, we would all have a lot debt to repay because we are constantly sinning and unfortunately we don’t do enough good deeds, to pay this debt off ourselves. 

God has so much love for us, so much grace that he allowed himself, through Jesus, to be brought to death on the cross, and in doing so not only removed the barrier that prevents us from being in relationship with Him but also forgave our debt of sins, He wiped the slate clean.

Now I know this concept can be hard to actually wrap your head around, even though you’ve probably heard it many times before. It all sounds great but what does this actually mean and how does this impact how I should live my life? 

Try thinking about it this way: although, theoretically Jesus could’ve lived on Earth forever (he’s God after all) Jesus had to die, resurrect, and then return to be one with God, to show us that his Spirit (the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, the third aspect of the trinity), lives inside all of us and is what allows us to make choices that bring us closer to God. 

This was God’s plan. If things had not occured this way, we would feel the need to be constantly searching for Jesus to figure out the right way to live. It would not sink in that Jesus’ or God’s spirit is right here inside of us if things hadn’t happened this way. 

So just as the essence of sin itself is separation from God, the consequences or the incurred cost of sinning is being separated from God. Because of Jesus’ death, resurrection, and return to the Father though we don’t have to suffer these consequences, because we know God is within us as the Spirit. We are able to live a life of love in a world indebted by sin. 

This does not mean we will not ever suffer these consequences though: we can still be tempted to not trust the Spirit, to submit to all the other influences and temptations of sin that exist in the world, including within ourselves. We can still allow things to get between us and God. 

To be inseparable from God, to live the way we were created to live, to do our part in putting an end to the pain and suffering that exists in the world, to love, and to be loved, all we have to do is choose to be in relationship with God, by trying to live how Jesus lived and allowing the Spirit inside each one of us to guide us in doing so.

So next: 

God also came through Jesus to set up his kingdom on Earth. This isn’t a kingdom with physical, boundaries, a kingdom with laws and citizenship requirements though. 

We may live in the country of Canada and we should do what we can to obey its rules and customs, but first and foremost we are members of God’s kingdom so we should be putting the peaceful, loving ways of God’s kingdom ahead of anything else, even if it contradicts the ways of the institutionalized geographical kingdom we happen to live in, or the social norms that exist in our culture. 

Hardcore patriots may not like it, but I think it’s makes more sense to simply call myself a human being, or a child of God before I call myself a Canadian. God’s kingdom exists in our individual relationships, not within a particular culture or geographic area. 

“The most sacred geography on the planet,” as Bruxy puts it, “is not a building or a sacred site or a religious pilgrimage. The most sacred space on the planet is the space between you and me when we love each other as Jesus does.” 

So we don’t have to wait for after death to experience heaven, Jesus modeled for us how we can bring the kingdom of heaven to Earth by working towards loving each person we meet right now. 

So that sums up my synopsis of the good news in thirty words which I hope can help us engage in more Jesus talk. 

When I say “ more Jesus talk” though I don’t only mean we need to talk more about Jesus, we also need to be more like Jesus in how we talk to each other. 

We need to be able to call each other out on our sins, help each other deal with the sinful ways of living that feels natural to us, and lead each other to the way of Jesus: all without being judgemental, because judgmentalism is a sin as well. 

He needs to be our guide, the centre of our moral theories and how we talk to each other because I believe he really is “the way, the truth, and the life”. 

So finally, more "Table Talk".  How can we encourage more real talk and more Jesus talk? I think Table Talk is one way we can. 

Joining a home church in Mississauga last year was what got me involved with The Meeting House church and it was a very good experience for me since it not only put me out of my comfort zone, but showed me the value of having deeper conversations in a small group setting. This is where I got the inspiration for helping to start Table Talk here at Breslau. 

Around fifty of us participated in the Table Talk program we tried our earlier this year here in which for three weeks, groups of about ten people met after church at one of their member’s house for lunch and conversation around the sermon that had been preached that Sunday (here are some pictures of the groups). 

From the feedback survey that was sent out afterwards, overall the response was positive: people found Table Talk to be a good way to get to know people from the church who they may not have necessarily known well beforehand and it provided a chance for us to have insightful conversation and hear different perspectives. 

The main issues that were brought up were the time and frequency the Table Talk meetings were held, as well the nature of the questions being asked and people not always feeling comfortable opening up and sharing their thoughts to these questions in that kind of setting, especially in the first week.