For those who want a change from the Gospel

Trinity 11 – Isaiah 56:1, 6-8 (Related)

For much of my pre-retirement career I worked in different ways as a church consultant, employed by different dioceses to help stimulate growth and health among their parishes. I would often spend extended periods with local churches helping them with Mission Action Planning, developing in two different dioceses two different programmes for this process. I noticed something again and again: every single church I worked with told me how welcoming they were. They might have acknowledged that their worship was dull, their teaching boring, their children’s work non-existent, but at least they were very very welcoming. I often had to ask why, if that was the case, I was so often left standing like a lemon with my cup of appalling coffee at the end of the service while everyone spoke to those they already knew? Like this passage, we all feel that welcome is important, but what we don’t often acknowledge is that it can be difficult and highly disruptive.

Our passage comes from Trito-Isaiah, the third section of the book, which was written by another unknown prophet in the years following the return from exile in Babylon, when Israel was trying to re-establish her identity and rebuilt her homeland after years in slavery far away. Quite understandably they were suspicious of foreigners, partly because of the cruel treatment they had received at the hands of their captors, but also because the prophets had long been saying that it was their corruption by the foreigners around them which had got them into exile in the first place. So the natural, and perhaps forgivable, reaction was to separate themselves as much as possible from all non-Jews, in order to retain their national and spiritual purity. You can see this attitude in the commands of Ezra (10) and Nehemiah (13) to separate from foreign wives.

But, somewhat counter-intuitively, our reading, whilst insisting on the maintenance of righteous behaviour (v.1), nevertheless shows a welcoming attitude to those from outside the community. There is a real tension here, though. This can appear a lovely ‘let’s-all-live-together-in-love-and-harmony’ passage, where anyone is welcome and anything goes, what we might fashionably call an ‘inclusive’ church. But this is to misread the text: the ‘foreigners’ who are welcome are those who have ‘bound themselves to the Lord’ (v.6), those who love and serve him, keep his covenant and don’t break the sabbath. In other words, we might put it, outsiders who have become Christians are welcome, and will have an equal share in the Kingdom of God. So this isn’t quite the kind of ‘everybody welcome’ passage we might have thought.

But note the final words of this passage: it is God’s purpose to gather ‘still others’ to his people (v.8). It isn’t a closed shop after all: there are still more to be welcomed in. So what does all this say about local church welcome?

The first thing to say is that welcome can be disruptive and unsettling. We all prefer that with which we are familiar, and few of us actually like change that much, particularly if it makes us feel threatened. I can remember a church I once attended where we counted 23 different nationalities in a congregation of around 70 people, and it was lovely, but I could imagine an English church in 1946 suddenly having an influx of German people. There might be some hesitation, to say the least!

Secondly, though, we need to remember to what we are inviting people. If we see church as a nice social club, then of course anyone is welcome. But if our purpose is to make disciples, then we need a strategy for that which applies to all, regulars and visitors alike. All of us together need to be growing to bind ourselves more closely to the Lord, to love him and work out our particular ministry to him, to behave righteously and maintain our relationship with him. This is so often forgotten in my experience, but the glowing promises for foreigners and eunuchs (those who under the Law would have been excluded from worship) of a full inclusion into the people of God and the promise of acceptance of their worship is a conditional one.

So let’s be welcoming, although that at times will be uncomfortable and difficult, but let’s also remember that we are all pilgrims together on the Way of Christ. That’s why the welcome imperative is so important. We’re not about boosting our numbers to make us feel better: we’re about introducing people to the living God and helping them to walk with us on the road of discipleship.

One practical suggestion: in my first parish we had a rule that people were not allowed to speak to their friends after services until they had first spoken to someone they didn’t know. At times it was as much aspirational as actual, to be honest, but nevertheless the fact that we had that rule said something important about what we did aspire to as a welcoming church.