Send Us All

Not like the vaulted cathedrals,

Not like the pews with names and reservations,

Not like the hair-sprayed televangelists,

Not like the nice churches who say nice things to nice people,

Here at our doors shall stand a sign: All are welcome!

Open hearts, aflame with the burning love of God,

Open, open, open, to all who come.

Keep, O normal churches, 

your nice people, 

your beautiful people, 

your people who have their shit together and put on pretty faces.

Give us your freaks and your punks, 

your hippies and granolas, 

your Goths and your bikers.

Give us your homeless and your unemployed,

your job-hoppers and bed-hoppers, 

your addicts and your hard drinkers.

Give us your hookers and your strippers,

your gamblers and smokers,

your dippers and your chewers.

Give us your church-haters and your liberals,

your atheists and agnostics,

your fundamentalists and your prudes.

Give us your gays and your lesbians,

your transvestites and transsexuals,

your offenders and your victims.

Give us your polluters and your tree-huggers,

your executives and lawyers,

your tax-evaders and your tax-collectors.

Give us your doubters and your name-it-and-claim-its,

your hypocrites and holier-than-thous,

your skeptics and your relativists.

Give us your seekers and your strugglers,

your lovers and haters,

your saints and your sinners.

Send us all of these, for they are like us.

We lift high the cross of Christ, 

Brother of exiles, Friend of sinners.

His nail-pierced hands shout world-wide welcome

For all who long to breathe free,

For all who long to find home,

For all who didn't measure up, 

For all who need a new start,

For all who want a new world.

We lift high the cross of Christ,

So that we will all be transformed together.

Fragrant Offerings (Philippians 4:10-20)

This is a guest post by + Ron Knickerbocker, who preached in our church this past Sunday.  But skip past his self-efacing intro.  It's golden.

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I apologize this morning if the exegesis is not up to Josh’s standards, but it was a pretty busy week with Christmas and finalizing my grades. I was going to apologize for the short length of this sermon – but, who am I kidding, “you’re welcome.”

Now, let’s look at Philippians, Chapter 4, verses 10-20

¹⁰ I rejoiced greatly in the Lord that at last you renewed your concern for me. Indeed, you were concerned, but you had no opportunity to show it. ¹¹ I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. ¹² I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. ¹³ I can do all this through him who gives me strength.

¹⁴ Yet it was good of you to share in my troubles. ¹⁵ Moreover, as you Philippians know, in the early days of your acquaintance with the gospel, when I set out from Macedonia, not one church shared with me in the matter of giving and receiving, except you only; ¹⁶ for even when I was in Thessalonica, you sent me aid more than once when I was in need. ¹⁷ Not that I desire your gifts; what I desire is that more be credited to your account. ¹⁸ I have received full payment and have more than enough. I am amply supplied, now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent. They are a fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice, pleasing to God. ¹⁹ And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.

²⁰ To our God and Father be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

When Josh asked me to preach, he told me the verses for today were 4:14-23.  When I looked at that, I thought to myself, “Wow, I’ve got nothing.”  (I wish I could preach on verses 10-13, but you’ve probably all heard that sermon before.) So, I kept reading those verses over and over, and I kept getting stuck on vs. 18 – “a fragrant offering.” 

A fragrant offering. In the Old Testament, this is the language of temple sacrifice. (For example, we can look at Exodus 29.)

Exodus 29:15-18, 23-25

¹⁵ “Take one of the rams, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on its head. ¹⁶ Slaughter it and take the blood and splash it against the sides of the altar. ¹⁷ Cut the ram into pieces and wash the internal organs and the legs, putting them with the head and the other pieces. ¹⁸ Then burn the entire ram on the altar. It is a burnt offering to the Lord, a pleasing aroma, a food offering presented to the Lord.

²³ From the basket of bread made without yeast, which is before the Lord, take one round loaf, one thick loaf with olive oil mixed in, and one thin loaf. ²⁴ Put all these in the hands of Aaron and his sons and have them wave them before the Lord as a wave offering. ²⁵ Then take them from their hands and burn them on the altar along with the burnt offering for a pleasing aroma to the Lord, a food offering presented to the Lord.

 The Israelites were to bring animal and grain offerings to the Lord and the priests would burn them on the altar and they would make “a pleasing aroma” to the Lord.