Homily Feb. 16 Year A—Epiphany 6
St. Luke's Burnt River, Ontario
Christ Church, Bobcaygeon,ON.

As a grandfather I’ve had a chance to get acquainted with children’s television again, after a couple of decades away. One of the shows I really enjoyed is called Wonder Pets.
The program is gentle, educational and it has a good message. Three pets, who live in an old fashioned one room schoolhouse, suddenly become animated when the phone rings with another animal in distress. They rush to the scene and help out whatever animal needs help.
The message is teamwork. Individually the pets can’t accomplish much, but together they can make a difference.
It’s a timeless message and it’s the message that Paul was trying to get across to the Corinthians. We are all part of God’s team. We need to be loyal to God, not leaders of various factions. It’s God’s team, not Bob’s team, or Ron’s team, or Todd’s team. We work together offering our gifts to the glory of God, not for our own glory.
Now that was a tough message for those Corinthians. After all in its time Corinth was like Toronto—the centre of the universe—at least in the mind of some of its leading citizens.
The Christians in Corinth thought they were spiritually advanced. They knew what they were doing.
That’s why Paul punctures their pride by referring to them infants who need to be fed with milk, not solid food.
Think about that. How would feel if you thought you were really a spiritual person, excited about your new found faith, and a visiting preacher told you that you were actually like a baby you to learn and weren’t ready yet to learn it because you were still behaving in the old ways—with jealousy and quarrelling.
That’s why this message still challenges us today. We aren’t particularly good about teamwork. Our society is based so much on competition, on individualism that teamwork can be a difficult task. Somehow we have to give up something for the good of the whole body of Christ, rather than our own individual needs.
That’s why a consumer model of church doesn’t work. If we attract people by providing for their needs, we seem to lose the element of teamwork. Instead we need to offer people a chance to share their gifts, to work others toward a common goal in mission and ministry.
To quote John F Kennedy: “Ask now what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”
As part of God’s team we give of ourselves to the greater good, and we will be blessed.
One of the best examples this week of teamwork came from the Canadian long track speed skater, who gave up his spot in the 1000 metres to a team-mate who had fallen in qualifying in the national championships, and was therefore a back-up.
His family was at the Olympics this was his race, his spot, yet he believed his team-mate would be faster, and have a better chance at a medal, so he gave up his spot for the good of the team.
What a sacrifice to make, to work for years and practice with the goal of being part of the world’s top sporting event, and then to give up your chance to a team-mate.
Paul also speaks again the danger of following what he calls “merely human” leadership—giving himself, and another Christian leader Apollos as examples.
Paul sees himself and other Christian leaders as servants, who are serving God, with their gifts, according to how they have been called.
This is a key concept in our understanding of ministry in the church. As priest I am your servant and God’s. I am called to serve in this particular ministry, but we all share in this ministry as servants of God.
One of the pitfalls of the church has been too much clericalism, where the clergy developed a following, and have become too powerful, which can lead to abuses, particularly in denominations or congregations where there is too much clerical authority.
Again the key is teamwork and a willingness to be God’s servant. As Paul says, we are God’s servants as Christian, and using the language of a primarily agrarian economy in the first century, we all labour in God’s fields, working together.
Paul also likens God to a builder, who has assigned Christian leaders to be master builders creating a foundation on which others must build.
The larger truth Paul is touching on is human presumption, something which we continue to see a lot of today. Rather than priding ourselves on our wisdom, our power, our strength, our accomplishment, we need to remind ourselves of the primacy of God. Without God none of this could be accomplished. Putting our faith in human leadership will inevitably lead to disappointment.
For the church we have to recognize that growth and development, spiritually or otherwise are really at God’s initiative. That doesn’t mean we are to be passive in our lived out faith; it means we need to be constantly praying and seeking to discern God’s will.
One of the problems the Corinthians had was that they were evaluating their leaders by the world’s standards---wealth, power, wisdom and honour, not God’s standards.
Instead Paul wants leaders who can exercise care and self-sacrifice, while working for a common purpose. Above all they must be trustworthy stewards of God’s mysteries, he says later in the letter.
Perhaps the most important takeaway from this passage for us in this parish at this time is the idea of teamwork. We have different roles and different gifts, but we can carry out our Christian mission best if we work together.
One of the best things about coming to ministry later in life is that I’ve already experienced many different roles in lay leadership. I know its challenging, and I appreciate the sacrifices many people make. Who knows what we can accomplish if we can work together in harmony?
Let us pray for God’s wisdom in working together in this parish during this time of transition and new beginnings.