Rev. Scott Summerville

This is the tenth September that Mary Ellen and I have been at Asbury Church; thus it is the tenth Sunday School picnic we have attended, and as far as we can recall the picnic has never been rained out in all those years. Not bad. A few years ago at the picnic, I took a photograph of the whole congregation. After a bit of arm twisting I managed to drag just about everybody into the outdoor chapel area to get a group photo. I had a new camera at the time. I used one of the advanced features of this camera to get a panoramic view of the entire group. I published the picture, and I even framed some copies and given them the people. Then someone said to me, “How is it that you have so many twins in your congregation?” I said “What do you mean; I was not aware that we had any twins.” They said, “There were a lot of twins in that picture you gave me.” So I went back and looked at the picture, and sure enough a number of individuals were in the same photograph twice. I had not used the advanced features of the camera correctly, so parts of the photograph were duplicated. It is certainly one way to make your congregation look larger.

I hope that today we can get another congregational photograph, so don’t be shy. Don’t stay away from the picnic because you’re afraid of posing for a picture. No one will force you to. It is good that we open the season with a picnic. These are serious times. Our country is wrestling with so many profound issues: many of our fellow citizens are far from home at war, living under extreme and extraordinarily stressful conditions. Daily some of them die. Millions of people are out of work. Millions of people don’t have access to proper health care, and the whole health care system is under enormous stress. These are serious times.

And this is a particularly solemn week. There seemed to be something particularly intense this year about remembrance of 9/11. Sometimes things happen and as time goes on they are forgotten or they seem less significant. In the case of 9/11, I have a sense that the experience was so horrible and overwhelming that we could not entirely take it in at the time, and that as the years go by in some ways we come to realize and appreciate the depths of the suffering and the loss and the extraordinary depth of commitment and sacrifice on the part of many people on the day of 9/11 and in the months afterward.

It may seem odd or counterintuitive in such a time as this, but I want to talk for a little while today about playing. Yes, playing. Human beings are the only creatures that we know of that are able to construct machines, program computers, and write books. We have some rather unique abilities. But we are not the only creatures who play. I once saw a remarkable film clip of ravens rolling down a hill in the snow. There was no practical benefit for the birds in rolling down the hill in the snow. The birds were simply having fun going down the hill.

Creatures of all sorts play together, at least in their childhood. Human beings as well as a whole lot of other creatures need to play. When we play we get a physical release; we get an emotional release; and we strengthen relationships with other people. I like to think of our church as a place where people pray together and serve God together and play together. Each of these things is necessary.

Worship is the core of our life as a community. It is the crucial place for the renewing of our spiritual energy and the deepening of our spiritual connection to God and to one another. Without worship, we are a club or a society. In our worship we establish and reestablish the spiritual nature of our community. Out of this spiritual connection comes our commitment to put our hands and hearts and our treasure to the tasks of being a church. Out of sacred worship come sacred commitments to sacred work. Out of the love of God and the love of the sisters and brothers of the congregation there arises each of our individual commitments to serve and to live out the Gospel. The worship of God and doing the works of God go hand-in-hand.

But today I went to emphasize that there is a third component: we are a community that prays together and plays together. Work and play are not opposites. Good work requires play. It always amazes me when we do our annual work project weekend at Camp Olmsted. When the work is done, I collapse exhausted. But there are plenty of people who get the work done, and then they climb the mountain or run around the field playing soccer or frisbee for another four hours, or sit at tables late into the night playing games, chatting and laughing their brains out. Work and play, play and work, serving together and playing together – that is how communities are formed and how they thrive.

I had the pleasure of attending the annual September picnic of AST (Asbury Summer Theater) on Friday. As most of you are aware AST put together the most amazing musical shows year in and year out for more than three decades. It was a tour de force. It was a rare example of volunteer community theater of the highest caliber. It took some remarkable people and some remarkable commitments to make that happen, but one of the reasons that project was so successful for so long is that they knew how to play, and the leadership had the wisdom to know that people who work the hardest and who work the best together are people who also play together.

I may have told you the following story, forgive me if I repeat myself. This took place fifteen or sixteen years ago when we were still serving the Methodist Church in Bay Ridge Brooklyn. The church experienced a sudden and dramatic financial calamity. The trustees gathered one evening in the church office which was downstairs in the parsonage. After the meeting was over I came upstairs and Mary Ellen looked at me with bewilderment. She said, “What in the world was all that laughing down there? I thought we were in a terrible mess?” It was a mess. And it took a long time and a lot of aggravation in order to sort things out, but the trustees were a group of people who played together. They had come to enjoy one another’s company. They were personally supportive of one another. And no matter how tough things got, they could laugh together. I don’t know whether they could have held things together as they did without that capacity to play and to laugh together.

The most effective church meetings are the ones where there is a lot of laughter. I’m not exaggerating. The more serious a meeting is, the less it probably accomplishes. Meetings that accomplish the most are marked by much laughter.

So enjoy the picnic today. Get your face in the picture. Who knows, you may even discover your long lost identical twin! And whatever work God is calling you to, do it with your whole heart and soul. Don’t do it half way. Live as if you believe in God’s lavish love and as though your life matters, because it does.

And don’t be too serious about yourself and your projects, because it’s not the most serious people who get the most done.

Treasure this time, this precious time God has given us to pray together, to work together and to play together.

Shalom.