When I came into the office, the message light on the phone was blinking red. I pushed the play button, and his voice sounded smooth and neutral. I was intrigued because when I listen to him, even if only on a machine, and just for a minute, still, I always learn something new. “Shelly, this is Ron Nutter. Mary and I were just at a charity function last night and we were being introduced to a person who also is a long-time resident of Gainesville.   When my friend introduced us, he did so by saying that we are devoted members of UCG. (uh-oh… I thought, not sure where this was going. As a church we’ve have been kicked out of places before, you know.) Anyway, Ron went on: “My friend said, ‘Mary and Ron are devoted members of UCG.’ And the man we were meeting replied, ‘I am not surprised. Wherever there is good being done all over Gainesville, you can be sure to find members of UCG right there in the middle of it.’”And then Ron added, “I just wanted to let you know that, Shelly. It is quite a reputation to have.”

In that quotation in the bulletin, Wayne Dyer says that reputation is in the hands of others and that we cannot control what others may report or believe about us—either as individuals or as a spiritual community. That is, of course, true and not true. Reputation is formed from character and  does communicate something about who we are, but it is also subjective and dependent on others’ experience and expectations. Reputation describes not everything about us, but at least some parts of us, sometimes the worst, and sometimes the best. When my father was dying, the church I was serving made prayer flags for him and on one of them a child had carefully printed, “I pray for Shelton who helps everybody.” I had those words carved on the rock that sits at his little memorial, because that was his reputation– “he helped everybody.” Like Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem says, that’s how he was famous.

The way I see it, our UCG Three Year Plan describes the heart and soul –the character of UCG and at the best, the content of our reputation. The detail of the plan is a few pages long—but the three priorities are beautifully pictured on the front of the bulletin–our collective soul’s three priorities: how we plan to provide opportunities for spiritual growth, the nature of how we intend to care for and accompany one another, the shape and size of our footprint on the Earth, the generosity of our reach, and how we plan to live justly in this world. But one of the beautiful and challenging things about this plan is that it is spacious and interdependent. It does not have hard and fast objectives to achieve as such, though we’ve named important benchmarks. There aren’t any boxes to check to say, “Okay, priority two—we’ve cared for each other—all done!” How our lives individually or corporately may affect or be affected by making the space to grow spiritually, to care for each other and be cared for, and to live justly economically, racially, and environmentally, well—those three things have a variety of implications. They live and breathe, and are as unpredictable and mysterious as any one of us. These priorities aren’t neat and clean and limited like a shopping list. At any given moment, as we choose them as our spiritual path, I expect we’ll be exhilarated, irritated, exhausted, energized, moved to tears, falling down laughing, deep in silence, listening, broken apart, and healed. Doing this three year plan means that we aren’t done in three years, that their outcomes may be exciting, may break our hearts, may cost us our lives, may be, to use the word from Vince’s hymn last week—messy. Peter Block wrote, “All that matters makes us anxious. It is our wise to escape from anxiety that steals our aliveness. If there is no edge to the question, there is no power.”

Before I was here, I served as the founding pastor of a new church start called High Country United Church in Boone, NC. They celebrated their fourteenth anniversary as a congregation last Sunday.  A couple of weeks after our first worship service, I got a letter from an anonymous seeker who wrote, “I am not finding High Country’s website to be very helpful. What does your church teach about how to be saved from hell?” (not big on hell or on being saved—not on the website for a reason.) And then he or she typed in all caps with multiple question marks after: “EXACTLY WHAT DOES YOUR CHURCH BELIEVE??” Only there was a little typo and the sentence read, “Exactly what does your church belive?” The Three Year Plan is what we belive—it is the story we plan to tell ourselves and the world over the next Three Years and beyond, to unfold it in our lives—in attitudes and spiritual practices and business meetings and hospitality and play and service and building community.  It will be the story of our congregation’s character as we grow it. It is the reputation we invite.

The Ezekiel reading talks about God’s promise to the people, “I will replace your heart of stone with a heart of flesh” and when that happens–when we live from the heart—the spiritual center within, however you know or describe that, then—the teaching says, the results will be healing—for us, for the land and for other people. And in the Matthew reading, Jesus invites his followers to spiritual practice that is self-aware and not hypocritical and that results in a generosity and openness of spirit that I think is implicit in our plan, too. For he says that whatever we most treasure, that is where our hearts lie.  Not for thanks or praise or a fine reputation are we kind and just. Not for political gain or public accolades, not so we can feel good about how progressive or generous we are, but because it is in our character to live in those ways. We grow spiritually and care for each other and do justice and protect and cherish our Earth because open hearts practice and help and go outside, open hearts stay connected to the ground of All Being, because we know that Standing Bear, chief of the Lakotas was right when he said,  “A person’s heart away from nature becomes hard.” And goodness knows we need no hearts of stone, we need hearts of flesh. To become teachable. To see the gifts that Earth and others offer to us and to be willing to receive them.

There is a wonderful Hebrew word vav-nun-tet-nun vav. It means, “and they shall give,” and it is a palindrome—a word that is spelled the same way and means the same thing whether you read it forward or backward. And that is what happens when you and I live into this Three Year Plan we have made for ourselves. We shall give of ourselves and when we do, it will pay us back.  It is the reciprocal blessing that is the basis of true community.

The plan ends with a postscript and here’s what it says to me, to you: “At our May congregational meeting, this became our Three Year Plan. But only with your commitment will it become our mission. And only with all of our hard work will we achieve our goals. So we leave you with a few final questions to ponder as we move forward: To whom, to what does your heart belong? When do you experience the holy discomfort of being unable to turn away as unjust treatment of others continues to occur? What promise will you make that constitutes a risk or major shift for you? What gift do you still hold in exile? How participative do you plan to be?

Let us pray: The blessings of this community and the opportunities to share are many. May we be aware and grateful and willing. Amen.

BENEDICTION: May our hearts be hearts of flesh, may our souls be alive and green with growth, may our hands be compassionate in their reach. May our feet be swift to run toward each other in love. Amen.