2 Thessalonians 3:6-13; Luke 21:5-19
Late Thursday morning I joined the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce on a tour of the soon-to-be-opened Lawrence Police Department. The tour began with an introduction from Chief Hofmann, who told us the story of the construction.
The
state-of-the-art facility will be one of the best in the country. With the newest technology, the multi-level
building will provide office space, a work-out room with locker rooms for all
officers and staff, a phenomenal 9-1-1 operation, processing rooms, evidence
supply closets (with appropriate ventilation), weapons storage, a room designed
to invite officers from around the country for training and can also be used
for community meetings, and so much more.
Moving
from cramped offices, one of our tour guides was telling us that the current
roll-call room was about the size of an average bedroom—and is shared space
with her office. The new roll-call room
is about the size of our parish hall.
The
project took a couple years to complete.
Located behind the D-FAS building, just on the other side of the
railroad tracks on Post Road, the new building completely changed a blighted
piece of property with a tarnished reputation.
In a time-lapsed slide show, we watched as a dilapidated former bar was
torn down, trees were removed, water drainage was developed, and the foundation
was laid. Delayed by the significant
rain we received early this year, the building and its garage, the parking lot
and landscaping are finally near completion.
The ribbon cutting is this week.
The
excitement of the chief and the others who will soon be inhabiting this
facility was almost tangible. Like kids
in a candy store, they pointed out this and then that, with glee and
wonder. Their anticipation for what this
new space will provide lit up their faces.
Sharing rooms that will never be shared with the general public once the
facility is open was especially fun for them.
When I
spoke with Chief Hofmann at the end of the tour, he said we probably should
have started the tour at the current station so that we could really understand
the magnitude of the changes. He
recognizes that this new facility will positively impact the morale of the department
and that it just might draw quality candidates to his team in the future.
The
Lawrence Police Department is one of the departments featured on the television
show, Live PD. If you watch that show,
you will probably get to see this new facility and get a chance to see how
something this new, innovative and thoughtfully constructed impacts a whole
community and beyond.
What I
saw in this brief time at the station is a renewed sense of hope. These men and women in blue are feeling a
different kind of respect from their city leaders and community because they
are getting the kind of space needed to do the complicated work of protecting
the citizens of Lawrence.
They
have lived in cramped quarters for decades, and while that space is not being
demolished brick by brick, some of the ways they have had to do their jobs is
being taken apart and being rebuilt. Purging
of unnecessary or outdated supplies, evidence, equipment and bringing in innovative
ways of doing their jobs, new supplies and equipment and finding better ways to
serve the community, these men and women are learning what is required of them
to live in a newly constructed space.
I’m
sure some of the people will have a hard time adapting to some of this, because
that’s human nature. Because overall,
their current space is being disassembled, torn down, like a familiar temple,
and it just might not be as recognizable or familiar. There will likely be a sense of grief and
loss as they close their current office.
It’s
change. And even when change is good,
anticipated and full of hope, like this new police station, change can bring
many of the emotions that come with a death or a loss—a time of grief.
Jesus
tells the disciples that the Temple will be torn down. The ways of old, destroyed. Of course, when the author of this Gospel
wrote it, the Temple had already been destroyed, so it was written with a sense
of hindsight, with the knowledge of how the people responded to the loss of
their spiritual center.
Jesus,
however, is telling his followers that this temple, the place of worship, this
center of their faith, will be destroyed.
That the walls will be toppled. Imagine their response! Fear, disbelief, worry, wonder. Probably not much hope or joy!
I
suppose that if we were told this building was going to be destroyed, we might not
see the bigger picture, either. We might feel fear, disbelief, worry and
wonder. I know that when the church had
the fire in the early 1980’s, those were real responses, along with
thankfulness that the church was not completely destroyed in that fire. I also know that when this building was
skipped over during a destructive tornado, this community and the community outside
these walls rejoiced.
We experience
much of our faith journey inside the walls of our worship space. I was told just this week that someone once
said that our prayers reside in the bricks of this place. We bury our dead in our columbarium. We have institutional memory and spiritual
memories that are stored within these brick walls.
Like
the people of the Temple Jesus speaks of, we might believe our church building
holds God. The loss of the Temple made people
wonder where God was. If we lost our building,
would we wonder that, too?
Now I’m
not suggesting our building is going anywhere!
I just want you to think about the importance of the “building” as “God’s
home” in Jesus time as much as in our own time.
Jesus comes,
remember, to turn the world upside down and to change our way of understanding
the power of God, the reign of God, the LOVE of God in the world. And the most important way that Jesus does
this is to take the show on the road. He
got out of the Temple and he showed what it takes to do and be and live like
Christ in the world…out in the world.
God
isn’t trapped in the building. We gather
in the building to learn about God, yes, but God is not held captive in the
building. We build these beautiful edifices
to the glory of God, as places to gather to be with people of God who worship God. But God isn’t contained in this
building. God is in the world. And the building is only a small part of the
world.
An
important part, yes, but the building, the temple, the police station, as it
were, cannot contain God. God is
boundless.
It is
when we accept that God is in the world that we can accept that our role is to
live out God’s love in the world to all of God’s people. Which, remember, is everyone, because we are
all created in God’s image: beloved in
all our manifestations.
Our
Gospel today tells us that when we live for God, loving God and loving
neighbor, we just might come up against people who do not see God in the same way.
People who don’t understand God the way we understand God. But we are to go out into the world anyway. We are to share who God is to us and learn
who God is to them. Find our center, our
common ground, to build our bridges between and find that we can live with the
understanding that God created each of us in God’s beautiful, diverse image.
Jesus
promises us that when it is hard or scary to tell others about who God is to us
and how we understand who we are to God, Jesus will give us the courage, the
strength and the words…the WORDS…to help us tell our faith stories, to tell of our
unique journey with God. To share who
Jesus is to us and endeavor to express our understanding of the Holy
Spirit. No. Not everyone will understand that our way to
God is Trinitarian—God, Jesus and Spirit.
But when we tell the story of our faith with love and confidence and with
our own truth, Jesus will be with us, guiding those words and actions. We do not need to be afraid.
We are
called to disassemble the structures we have built around God, around ourselves—our
own temples, so that we can allow the Holy Spirit to use us, to let Jesus give
us the words, to show the world that God is love. Because, as our Presiding Bishop says, “if it’s
about love, it’s about God.”
Let us
pray.
Surely
it is you, God, who saves us. We will
trust in you so that we will not be afraid.
You are our strength, our protector, our sure foundation. You are our Savior. So, when we experience changes that turn our
understanding of Your place in the world upside down, like in today’s story of
the destruction of the Temple, remind us that you are not contained. No. You
are everywhere and that’s where we can meet you. Everywhere. Amen.
Photo credit: Lucas Carter