Caring for Each Other
Preacher: Rev Phil Swain Reading: 2 Cor 1:1-11
We believe in a God who cares for us, cares for communities and cares for all of creation – and we are called as followers of Jesus to share with those around us the same care and compassion that we have been shown by God. But what does that mean in a world where “the love of most is growing cold”. In this video, our pastor Phil will not only encourage us to strengthen our “care net” within our church community but to push back against the hate and division of this world by showing love and compassion. Through the power of love we can make a difference and help love grow.
If you are someone who follows the world news – it has been an interesting week of contrasting images. As I spoke about in the weekly email on Thursday, I have been moved by the images that have been coming out of the Olympics – not only the feats of endurance and skill … but the love and support given to the competitors by their families, coaches and the other Olympians.
I was watching the skateboarding and it was so great to see these young people who have grown up in competitions together all encourage and support each other. If one of them crashed out they would all gather around to care for them and if one scored high, they would all celebrate with them. They managed to hold together this idea that they were both competitors and friends who cared for each other.
And then we switch channels and then we see images of Southport, England where three young girls were stabbed and killed at a dance workshop. False information was spread that the 17 year old suspect was a Muslim Immigrant which led to some people from across England being vocal about their hatred of immigrants and mobs of far-right hooligans rioting and attacking mosques, police stations, libraries and businesses owned by people of colour. This culminated in the mobs surrounding and attacking a hotel in Tamworth housing asylum seekers
The best and the worst of humanity in a week. But the part that worries me is that sometimes it feels that over the past 10 years … we are seeing much more of the worst of humanity and things like the skateboarders at the Olympics are the exception, not the norm.
Jesus in Matthew 24 is talking about the signs of the last days and in verse 12, he says a line which is both worrying and a little too close to reality. Jesus says “Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold…” That’s what I sometimes see when I look around the world, that the love we used to have for each other, the care and support we used to give to each other … is growing cold.
So, who cares? Do we care?
That’s what we are talking about today … who cares? This is the second week of a three-week sermon series about caring. Last week we heard how God cares deeply about creation and invites us to be part of the care for and the renewing of all of creation.
Today, we are looking at what it means to care for each other. And I hope I can be helpful for all of us here as we ponder this but doing three things:
- I want to first go back to a foundational question and ask the question of “WHY” … why should we care?
- Then I want to briefly look at the question of “HOW” … how do we show love, and care, and support to each other
- But ultimately I want to come back to this difficult issue of the “love of most growing cold” and find the hope that Jesus can bring to our world.
Sound good?
So … why. Why should we care? Dr Ian last week when answering the question of why should we care for creation answered, “Because God and the Bible says so” … and I could use the same answer.
The Bible is full of commands, parables, teachings and exhortations for us to love and care for each other. I am not exaggerating to say that there are hundreds of them. We had some in our bible reading today…
Paul starts this second letter to the church in Corinth by giving God praise because God is a God of compassion and comfort. God cares deeply for us and shows that compassion through acts of love and care throughout our lives. Jesus reflected that love, care and compassion throughout his ministry
Paul goes on to say in verse 4 that God comforts us in all our troubles. Just sit with that for a moment. God is not unaware when we are suffering. God is not ambivalent if we have troubles. God knows. God is aware and God shows us compassion and offers us comfort. Note that Paul is not saying that God will always take away the suffering or troubles … but rather that God will be there for us, to comfort, strengthen and support us in all our troubles. This is great – but Paul sentence is not finished. Yes, the God of compassion and the God of all comfort, comforts us in all our troubles … SO THAT … we can comfort those in any trouble with the same comfort that we ourselves receive from God.
If God freely and abundantly shows compassion and care to us … we should also show care and compassion to those around us who are in trouble. We said the same thing in Lucy’s baptism. We love because God first loved us. We care because God first cared for us.
So HOW do we care? How do we go about sharing the care and compassion to other with the care and compassion that God given to us?
As a church, we have both an organic and structure approach to caring for each other. We encourage all of us within TUC to organically form care networks that make sense to you – people that you connect with, whom you look out for and who look out for you. But we also have a structural approach headed up by the Pastoral Care Working Group. Do you know what this group does? I invited Wayne Prowse – who leads that group, to share a little about the PCWG in a short video.
PCWG – Video
The PCWG is great and is an important part of our CareNet … but as I said earlier … the most important part of this care net is all of us, and the way that we all take up the case to look out, care for and support each other.
On Thursday, several member of the church met in the lounge for “Coffee with Kevin and Phil”. As part of the conversation, ponded the different way we show care and how these expressions of care can vary from person to person depending on our gifts, skills, passions and opportunities.
We were using silly names, but we came up with a list of different types of carers, or different ways that people care. I thought it was helpful and would love to share it with you.
16 Different types of Carers…
- The Elephant – Someone who never forgets anyone or any important date or detail
- The Santa Claus – Blesses others with little gifts
- The Librarian – checks up on people if they are late or missing
- The Detective – the person who notices when people are not great, even though they are trying to hide it.
- The Chef – caring with food or hospitality
- The Teddy Bear – simply caring with a hug
- The Clock – shows care through the giving of time
- The Author – Writes notes for people / Bible Verse / cards
- The Branflakes – regularly checks in with people
- The Joygiver – brings joy, laughter, happiness
- The Handyman – cares with practical help, odd jobs, chauffer etc
- The St Bernard – someone who is there in a crisis or when we are in trouble.
- The Coach – gives encouragement and inspires us to be better
- The Listener … who is genuinely interested in what we are saying
- The Invisible Superhero – helps without people noticing
- The Pray-er … who intercedes in prayer on our behalf.
I wanted to show that there are a multitude of ways in which we can care for each other. If you are sitting there thinking … I am no good at caring because I am not a hugger … there are 15 other ways on this list … and more (this list is not complete)!
I hope that reading this list might inspire that all of us can share compassion and care with those around us in a way that makes sense to us, in a way that works for us. We just have to do it. God wants us to show the same care and compassion that we have received with other. We just have to do it.
Could finish the sermon here … but I think we need to circle back to the issue I raised at the beginning about the disturbing trend of the love of most in our society growing colder.
This sermon about “Caring for Each Other” is easier to put into action if the “each other” is people like us or if we are just talking about caring for each other in the church community. We can do that.
But this message is harder to put into action if we are talking about people who think differently to us, or who are challenging or … who are full of hate.
Imagine if what happened in Southport England happened here in Turramurra Australia. Not only the unimaginable tragedy of the three little girls being killed … but the explosion of misinformation and hate directed at Muslims, police and immigrants. How would we respond? Imagine that there are gangs of thugs roaming our streets and targeting shops or people whom they have decided should not be in our country. What would we do? How do we show love and care and compassion in a hostile environment like that?
Did you see what the community in Southport did?
The morning after the first riot, dozens of locals came out to help clean up the debris caused. As one local said, “Southport really doesn’t need this after what we have been through”.
When the wall outside the Southport Mosque was destroyed in another riot, the next day, local brick workers turned up to rebuild it for free – while other locals cleaned up smashed glass, or cleaned graffiti, or moved away debris. As one of the group said, “This is what true community looks like”
When the Spellow Lane Library near Liverpool was attacked and books and equipment burnt but more hateful rioters, a GoFundMe was set up to raise 500 pounds to help replace some of the books. It raised around 240,000 pounds as people from around the world wanted to show their care to those Librarians.
But the most powerful response came about a week into these hateful attacks – which had now spread across England. A list was published in a far-right chatroom that revealed of about 30 potential targets for attack that day – sites that included immigration law firms and refugee centres. Police were dispatched to these sites and feared the worst.
I hope you saw these pictures on the news, because what happened instead was tens of thousands of counter-protesters took to the streets of Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol, Brighton and London to protect their communities. The local communities decided to not let hate win and organised peaceful human shields around these sites.
In Brighton, the handful of anti-immigration protesters who gathered outside a targeted law office were surrounded by police for their own protection after they were vastly outnumbered by the peaceful counter-protesters.
This was repeat right across Brittian. One of the anti-protesters summed it up perfectly for me when she said, “We needed to make sure that love wins over hate.”
We might get overwhelmed when we see hate splashed across our TV screens and sure, the love of some might be growing cold … but we need to make sure that love wins.
The God we believe in is a God of compassion.
Jesus showed us again and again through his actions that he genuinely cared for people, and invites us to follow his example.
We have been recipients of this amazing compassion, love and care from God and we are invited to share this same compassion and care to with others – in our families, in our churches, in our communities and in the places where love is growing cold.
We need to make sure that love wins.
Amen.