We are one. We are one in the Body and one in the Spirit. This is the message for today from Nehemiah, from Paul, from Jesus, and from the Church today. We are one.

There are many things that we can do alone but being Christian is not one of them. As the Body of Christ we are called to be a people at worship, a people who care for each other, and a people who are open and inclusive of all. This being together is not a new thing. It has been in God’s heart from the beginning of creation, that we care and watch out for each other.

In today’s passage from Nehemiah we hear that “All the people were gathered to worship. This must have really been important to the community because the scripture says ‘all the people’ eight times. And ‘all’ meant specifically women, men and those who could understand.

And Jesus himself was in the synagogue, as was his custom, when he was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He was in the midst of the community gathered for worship. He is handed the scroll from the prophet Isaiah, the scroll would have been around 24 feet long so this was not like flipping open a book, and the Scripture tells us that the Spirit was upon Jesus as he found the place where it was written: “God's Spirit is on me; God has chosen me to preach the Message of good news to the poor, sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, to set the burdened and battered free, to announce, "This is God's year to act!" The Spirit moved him to read ancient words from the Hebrew Scripture, words that spoke of taking care of those who needed help the most, and he spoke those words in the midst of his own community.

What would it be like to have the Spirit descend upon a community?

I heard a story about a Pentecostal woman who went to worship in an Episcopal Church, where we are sometimes referred to as ‘God’s frozen chosen.’ The preacher got up and started the sermon. The woman yelled out, ‘Praise the Lord.’ People around her gave her the look and motioned for her to be quiet. But again, in the middle of the sermon, she yelled out again, “Amen, preach it - praise the Lord.” And again, the people around her told her to be quiet. As the preacher was beginning to wind down, the woman leapt to her feet and yelled in a loud voice, “Alleluia, praise the Lord!” The head usher came over and said, “Madam, we don’t do that sort of thing here. She replied, “I can’t help it. I’m just filled with the Holy Spirit.” Pulling himself up into his full stature, the usher replied, “Hmmph! Well you certainly didn’t get it here!”

Writer Annie Dillard describes what worship could look like if we were open to the spirit. “Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke?...It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake some day and take offense, or the waking god may draw us out of where we can never return.”

This is what happened to the apostle Paul, whose letter to the Church in Corinth we heard today, the lesson about being one body in Christ. Eugene Peterson’s The Message puts it this way when talking about being a part of the Body of Christ.

“But I also want you to think about how this keeps your significance from getting blown up into self-importance. For no matter how significant you are, it is only because of what you are a part of. An enormous eye or a gigantic hand wouldn't be a body, but a monster. What we have is one body with many parts, each its proper size and in its proper place. No part is important on its own. Can you imagine Eye telling Hand, "Get lost; I don't need you"? Or, Head telling Foot, "You're fired; your job has been phased out"? As a matter of fact, in practice it works the other way—the "lower" the part, the more basic, and therefore necessary. You can live without an eye, for instance, but not without a stomach. When it's a part of your own body you are concerned with, it makes no difference whether the part is visible or clothed, higher or lower. You give it dignity and honor just as it is, without comparisons. If anything, you have more concern for the lower parts than the higher. If you had to choose, wouldn't you prefer good digestion to full-bodied hair? The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part, the parts we mention and the parts we don't, the parts we see and the parts we don't. If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.”

What wonderful imagery, reminders of how we are to function together, especially the notion that we might even have more concern for the lower parts than the higher. This I believe is why the world’s response to Haiti has been so great, the Spirit has come upon us and we realize that we are all connected to each other.

But I mentioned earlier that something had happened to Paul, Paul whose writings are heard all across the world, every Sunday morning, in many different denominations. God in Christ took him out of a life to which he could never return.

He wasn’t always known as Paul. His previous name had been Saul and he never knew Jesus face to face. He had heard about Jesus and did not believe in him, or his mission and ministry. Paul was a zealous persecutor of those who followed Jesus, the people of the Way. He even stood by and let a friend, Stephen, be stoned to death. Saul was not a good man and being part of any Body of Christ was not remotely in his thinking.

Saul was breathing down the necks of Jesus’s disciples. He went to the Chief Priest and got arrest warrants to take to the meeting places in Damascus so that if he found anyone there belonging to the Way, whether men or women, he could arrest them and bring them to Jerusalem. In his zeal to persecute the followers of Christ, Saul was willing to go into the place of worship.

When he got to the outskirts of Damascus, he was suddenly dazed and blinded by a flash of light. As he fell to the ground, he heard a voice saying: "Saul, Saul, why are you out to get me?" Saul asked, "Who are you,” The reply was stunning: "I am Jesus, the One you're hunting down. I want you to get up and enter the city. In the city you'll be told what to do next."

Those who were with Saul, heard the sound but did not see anyone. They had to take Saul by the hand and lead him into the city because he was now blind. He ate and drank nothing for three days. There was a disciple, a follower of the Way named Ananias who lived in Damascus. The voice of Jesus came to him and told him to go the house of a man named Judas (not Iscariat), there he would find Saul. He was to lay hands on him and give him healing. Naturally Ananias did not want to do this because he had heard of Saul and knew why he had come to the city. But the voice was persistent in urging him to go.

So Ananias went and found the house, placed his hands on blind Saul, and said, "Brother Saul, the Lord sent me, the same Jesus you encountered on your way here. He sent me so you could see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit." No sooner were the words out of his mouth than something like scales fell from Saul's eyes—he could see again! He got to his feet and was baptized. His name was changed to Paul and he began preaching in the meeting places that this Jesus was the Son of God. People were caught off guard by this and, not at all sure they could trust him, they kept saying, "Isn't this the man who wreaked havoc in Jerusalem among the believers?

So Paul, more than anyone, knew about what it was like when the Spirit took hold. And he knew that supporting and caring for the whole rather than just for himself was how to be the Body of Christ. He knew what it was like to cut off a part of the body and that to cause hurt and pain to one was to cause suffering for many.

Today when we hold our annual meeting is a good time to remember that we are all one body. While it is true that I am the Vicar – I am not the church -you are. Without you there would be no worship service, no ministry. If you are new to this community please know that you are welcomed, valued, and necessary to the health and wholeness of the community. We are one Body in Christ, touched by that same Spirit that gathered Nehemiah’s community, that moved Jesus to read Isaiah’s words, and that changed Paul’s life forever. We are a living sacrament, an outward and visible sign that shows how God in Christ is working in the world today. We are one.