One of the many hats I wear is the student hat. As you may know, I'm pursuing a doctorate of ministry, and since the birth of our son, Mac, that pursuit has become more of a slow pilgrimage. This semester I'm taking the one transfer credit I'm allowed out of an Episcopal seminary in Austin. The seminary is open to all denominations, but it's primarily Episcopalians who make up the faculty and student body. In this class, there is a lot of room for discussion and sharing our perspectives. It's a blessing to be in that classroom on Thursday afternoons.

This week we were talking about gender issues in the Bible and how we're supposed to preach on those difficult texts. A woman named Bonnie spoke up and shared a story about a recent trip she took to the diocese in Fort Worth. As soon as she said, "I worshiped at the Fort Worth diocese," people in the room started muttering a bit, and I was out of the loop as to why these students apparently took issue with the Fort Worth diocese. Finally, the student sitting next to me gathered from my blank look that I was clueless, so she whispered to me, "The Fort Worth diocese doesn't ordain women." Oh! Now I see what the muttering was all about.

Bonnie said that in this particular Episcopalian church on the outskirts of Fort Worth, they were observing the Eucharist – they were having Communion – on the Sunday that Bonnie was there. So when the time came to approach the altar, Bonnie went up to receive her wafer of bread, but when she moved to dip her wafer in the chalice of wine, the pastor snatched it out of her hand. The custom in that church is that only the men may dip their wafer in the chalice. Only the men may intinct. The women must be served from the chalice by the male priest if they're going to have wine at all.

Well, this got the women and men in our classroom shaking our heads in disgust. But then Bonnie shared the kicker with us. After the service, people gathered in the fellowship area to have coffee and whatnot. Children are running around and there's a huddle around the pastor. And the pastor, who's still on fire from his sermon I guess, is talking about the National Episcopal Church's recent move to elect a woman to be the head of the National Episcopal Church. The pastor, with his coffee in his hand, starts saying, "It's just a disgrace. Women can serve, but they can't be the head of the Church. That role is reserved for men. That's what the Bible says!" And Bonnie says she looked around and saw that men and women were nodding their heads in agreement, and the children running around, saw their parents whole-heartedly agreeing with the antagonizing words of their pastor. Bonnie was mortified. But she said, "At that point I just had to get out of there because I was afraid of what I might say." She was afraid of what she might say, so she had to get out of there. And just like that, Bonnie, who had just worshipped with this congregation, became an outsider.

On a day like this – Access and Disability Awareness Sunday – we are called to recognize the outsider. This day is specific in theme, but every day for the Church should be about recognizing the outsider. That's what Jesus spent the bulk of his ministry doing: Jesus, who is the head of the Church. And on a day like this, we at Friends Congregational Church might be called back to what we mean by our Mission and Vision Statement that says, "Our vision is to offer God's extravagant welcome to all." Well, reflect on this church's history and think about where we are right now. I'd venture to say that Friends stands by our Mission and Vision Statement. I'm not trying to boast on this church's behalf, but I think it's fair to say that we're pretty welcoming. When I send out an email to our congregation about our worship services and I say, "All are welcome," I sleep pretty well at night.

But a Vision and Mission Statement isn't supposed to reflect who we are. A Vision and Mission Statement is supposed to challenge us to strive for what we can become. So, what do we mean by “extravagant welcome”? Maybe it means that we're not only supposed to open our doors to everyone, we're supposed to speak up and speak out for everyone, too. Specifically, we're supposed to speak up and out for the outsider, so that people like Bonnie won't have to hold their tongue and get out of there because they're afraid of what they might say.

That's what Jesus did. Jesus spoke up for a woman who'd been allegedly caught in the act of adultery. He spoke out for her when a bunch of men oozing with machismo violence wanted to stone her to death, and after he spoke, she was saved. Jesus spoke up for the children that a crowd of adults wouldn't let come close to Jesus. He said, "Bring the little ones to me. Step aside and let them through!" And when Jesus was hanging from a cross on Calvary, he spoke up for a thief who was being crucified right next to him. Jesus spoke out for this accused outsider by saying to the silent heavens, "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in Paradise." So, perhaps we're supposed to speak a good word on behalf of the outsider.

What's our cultural definition of an outsider? An outsider is "them," and for the people that care for them, them is "their problem." Them bears the mark that causes our society to dismiss them. Them is seen but rarely heard. And on a morning like this, them causes us to take a candid look at what is meant by "outsider": the autistic child, the person with HIV AIDS, the transgendered, the illegal immigrant, the teenager, the elderly, the homosexual, the single mother, the Muslim, the disabled. If Jesus were here, wouldn't he speak for them?

The text out of Jeremiah is a tough one to wrestle with because it tells us about God taking God's own people into exile. The culture of that time looked at God's favored people as outsiders. How does that speak to us today?

It's there, in exile, that God says, "Pray, pray for your community and have faith where you are and good things will come to you." It's there, in exile, that God's people become what the psalmist calls the great congregation.

Well, again, look at this church's history. This church, which will be thirty years old next year, this church nearly had to close its doors at one point years ago. This church went through its own kind of exile, so to speak. And it was at that time that Friends decided to become an open and affirming congregation, welcoming the gay and lesbian community into this home. And people began coming here; not only folks from the gay and lesbian community, but many more who simply said, "I want to raise my child and I want to worship in a place that accepts everyone." The doors of this church have been open ever since. They stayed open because the church, in exile, remained grateful to God for what it had, and through prayer and devotion, Friends began to become a great congregation.

But we shouldn't let this go to our heads. We're not a "great" congregation because we accept the outsider and everyone else doesn't. After all, when Friends was going through its decision to become an open and affirming church, the pastor at that time said, "We've got to make it an issue in here so that it won't be an issue out there." In other words, Friends shouldn't be just about making things great in here; it should be about making God's world better for everyone out there.

And along that journey we might get taken off guard at what could happen in this congregation. We might be a little surprised. But surprise is a good and joyful thing, and it's that kind of goodness and joy that Jesus experienced in his ministry.

Here's what I mean: Jesus went around preaching and teaching about social justice for the poor, rights and reconciliation for the afflicted, and he went out of his way to include and associate with Pharisees, tax collectors, prostitutes, lawyers, lepers, children and people of different nationalities. But in all that good work, even Jesus was caught off guard by those he wasn't ready for. He was surprised by them because he hadn't factored them into his message of God's Kingdom.

Jesus comes across a centurion, a Roman soldier who commanded a garrison of about 100 troops. And by Jesus' perception, this centurion was an outsider; he was outside the parameters of covenantal care that God had for God's people. But when that centurion said to Jesus, "Hey, I've got a servant at home who's in bed paralyzed, suffering painfully. I'm the kind of guy who can practically move mountains but I can't do anything to help my servant. But I have faith that you, Lord Jesus, you can heal my servant," Jesus was so surprised that he said to everyone around, "I've never seen faith like this! This is amazing!"

Or how about when Jesus comes across a Canaanite woman whose daughter is possessed by a demon? Throughout history the Canaanites are viewed by the Jews, Jesus' people, as being godless and sinful. They're outsiders. So, when Jesus hears this Canaanite woman's plight, he sticks with his people and writes her off in a kind of arrogant way. But, when she persists and defends not only herself but Canaanites in general by sharing her deep faith, Jesus says, "Wow! You have great faith. Your wish will come to pass. Your daughter will be okay."

In both of those examples, Jesus is shown how the Kingdom of God blurs the line between outsiders and the in crowd. John C. Haughey, the Professor of Christian Ethics at Loyola University in Chicago writes:

Jesus learned what many Christians have to learn: to be uncomfortable with assuming that the identity we have in Christ is co-extensive with the identification God has with us. God's heart is so much more expansive than ours. The "outsider" was and is not beyond the pale of the salvific action of God. In God's mind, there is no 'them' there.

So, maybe our extravagant welcome isn't just about including outsiders and speaking up and out for them. Maybe our extravagant welcome is about blurring the lines between us and them in our world and providing a space for everyone to have a bold, faithful, surprising voice of their own. In other words, maybe by preparing space and empowerment for those we can't immediately see among us, we cane continue becoming a great congregation.

That's what our Needs Assessment Committee is trying to do with the new survey that's floating around. And I hope you all will fill one out soon. But think of the survey as a way of answering this question: If Jesus were to walk through that door, how can we be ready to welcome him and give him room to speak?

Did you know that the new portable building has a unisex, handicap-accessible bathroom, but the men's restroom in this building is not handicap-accessible? Did you know that three new babies have been born into the life of this church in the past three weeks (with more on the way), but our nursery has one changing table, two rocking chairs, no crib, and tons of adult storage? And I know that you're aware of the challenging acoustics in this place and we try to accommodate that with our sound system that works pretty well, but have you thought about this?

["The Lord's Prayer" said with no voice]

Hear what I'm saying? That's how the sermon would sound to you every week if you were deaf. I was lip-synching the Lord's Prayer, by the way....

Friends, our extravagant welcome has meant wonderful things over the years; and part of that welcome has been about speaking up for the outsider. Maybe it's time for that welcome to be about listening so that the outsider can speak. We might be as surprised as Jesus was. We might even meet Jesus.

I've told you before about the Shower of Stoles. It's a traveling service that has to do with the men and women in ministry who've been defrocked – stripped of their ordination credentials – on account of their sexual orientation being discovered. They donate their stoles to the Shower of Stoles. They had a worship service in Fort Worth when I was in seminary there. A peer of mine, Darryl, was in charge of writing a litany that would kick off the worship service, set the tone. He wrote a wonderful litany that was led by two people at the same time: a lesbian and a gay man. It was to be from their perspective, and the struggles they went through as a lesbian and a gay man. He found a woman named Lisa in the seminary who was a lesbian. He didn't try to find a gay man for the other part.

The day came, and minutes before the service, with a packed house, he said, "Dan! I need you to read this!" I said, "I shouldn't be reading this!" He said, "It's okay, just go ahead. It'll be cool." So, I did. I got in the pulpit next to Lisa, and she and I read back and forth our litany that talked about the oppression and discrimination that we felt from our perspectives as a lesbian woman and a gay man.

After the service there was a reception, and one of the teachers came up to me and said, "I kind of had a problem with that worship service. It was a little bit off-putting, a little bit awkward." I couldn't imagine what was awkward or off-putting about the litany that Darryl had put together. It was wonderful. He said, "Yeah, it was specifically at the beginning of the service, too. It kind of started on the wrong foot. It didn't feel right. I wasn't 100% there in worship." I said, "Oh?" He said, "Yeah. You're not gay, are you?" I said, "No, I'm not."

I wasn't supposed to speak for the homosexual man. I was supposed to invite him to speak so that all could listen.

May this be the work of Friends Congregational Church and all of God's Church. May we all strive to become the great congregation. Amen.