Last year, for a school project, my son Ian had to go back in his genealogy to find an ancestor who had emigrated to North America from the “old country.”  I was amazed that in just one google search and a few clicks on genealogy.com, we were able to find information about his great-great-great-grandfather, Alisdair Steele.  Born in Scotland around 1780, Alisdair came over to Nova Scotia where he settled with his wife and eleven children. 

We wondered what it must have been like for Alisdair to leave everything behind to come to a new and strange land.  Did he shed any tears when he left his homeland and traveled across the Atlantic Ocean?  Did he have any idea of the road ahead, what life would be like in his new country, where he and his family would live, what they would do, how the children would fare in a new place?

Alisdair Steele “was not what one would call a slacker,” states a description we found online.  “It is said that in his youth he used to work all week, ten and twelve hours a day.”  Alas, great-great-great grandfather Alisdair died rather young, at age 42, after being kicked by a horse.

I am sure many of us can find a similar story of our ancestors coming over from the “old country” and settling in a new and strange land.  Indeed, Charlene Smith related to us last week two modern-day stories of leaving everything behind and coming to a new place.  Displaced from Louisiana by Hurricane Katrina, the Levy family has settled in Milton, and Jack Kellum hopes to find housing here in Stoughton and be reunited with his family to begin a new life. 

Such life-changing moves can bring out all sorts of emotions – heartache mingled with hope, anxiety and expectancy, apprehension and anticipation.  We see all those emotions in this morning’s scripture lesson from the Book of Ruth. 

Naomi seems to have lost everything.  First, she and her husband Elimelech lose their livelihood to famine and decide they must leave Bethlehem.  And then, far from home, Elimelech dies.  Naomi then suffers the deaths of her two sons.  God has seemingly plucked everything she loves out of her life.  But God has not left Naomi alone; she has her two daughters-in-law, who wish to remain with her.  She beseeches them to move on with their lives without her, and Orpah follows Naomi’s advice.  But Ruth, a Moabite, is fiercely loyal to her mother-in-law and insists on staying by Naomi’s side with these lyrical and love-drenched words, “Where you go, I will go; Where you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. ¹⁷Where you die, I will die-- there will I be buried. May the LORD do thus and so to me, and more as well, if even death parts me from you!"

These words are a poetic and powerful statement of devotion, born out of sorrow, loss and grief.  And they are also a testament to Ruth’s faith in Naomi’s God.  Naomi’s God of mercy and redemption is unlike the gods of Ruth’s native Moab.  Here is a God who provides, who cares, and who loves God’s people.  Here is a God to be trusted. 

Ruth refuses to leave Naomi and return to Moab, because she now has a new homeland, a new hope, and a new faith.  Because Ruth’s confidence rests in the God who provides, she can risk.  She can step out in faith, moving forward, accepting change and embracing the unknown.  And so, bonded together, Naomi and Ruth move out toward a new life, knowing only that with them goes a God who will provide -- and does. 

What is the outcome of Ruth’s story?  She eventually remarries, to a man named Boaz.  She and Boaz have a son named Obed; Obed has a son named Jesse.  And Jesse has a son named David.  Ruth becomes the great grandmother of King David.  And from the lineage of David comes Jesus.

The Bible is full of similar stories of people who step out in faith.  Abraham and his wife Sarah left everything and everyone they knew behind to follow God’s call into the unknown.  Joshua – fortified by God’s words to “be strong and of good courage,” stepped out in faith to lead his people into the promised land.  Peter, comforted by Jesus’ presence and responding to his call, is able to step out onto the water. 

And a woman suffering with a hemorrhage for 12 years is considered by society to be unclean, untouchable, and unlovable.  But that doesn’t stop her from pushing herself through the crowd to reach out and touch the fringe of Jesus’ garment.  And by stepping out in faith, she is able to be healed and made whole by Jesus’ compassionate touch.

 

Over and over again throughout the Old and New Testaments, we read of people who are able to step out in faith, to move beyond that which is familiar and comfortable, or that which afflicts them and keeps them from wholeness; they are able to step out because they are following God’s call and know that God will be with them.

During our 261-year history, this church – generations of our spiritual forebears -- has stepped out in faith many times – from its gathering in 1744; to when we affirmed our trinitarian beliefs in the Congregationalist/Unitarian split of the 1820s; to when, in 1960, we unanimously voted to affiliate with the United Church of Christ.  We have stepped out in faith every time we have begun construction on one of our six church buildings, and every time we have embarked on a new pastorate.  You stepped out in faith when you voted to call me as your Pastor last December, and I stepped out in faith when I answered “yes” to that call.

And now we have an opportunity to step out in faith anew, together.

This past week, many of you received a packet of information about this year’s Stewardship Campaign, which formally kicks off today.  “The former things have passed away.  Behold, I am making all things new!!”  We are using these words from Revelation to frame this year’s stewardship campaign because they sum up, I believe, where we are as a church.

We – the First Congregational Church of Stoughton, United Church of Christ -- are embarking on a new era, a new future.  Whatever may have happened in the past, whatever anger or hurts or disappointments may have occurred – now is the time to put them behind us, to leave them in the past, so we can move forward. 

In 1994, we adopted as our motto for our 250^th anniversary “Looking forward in faith.”  I’m inviting us to take that motto and bring it to the next level.  Let’s not just look forward; let’s take action.  Because it’s time for this church, once again, to step out in faith.

It is a simple fact, and there is no getting around it, that our church needs money to pay our bills.  But at its core, stewardship is less about money and more about faith.  Stewardship is rooted in our covenant to walk forward together.  Stewardship is believing in God, even when we don't know where God is calling us to go.  Stewardship is caring for God's people.  And Stewardship is giving -- giving of ourselves, of our time, and of our talent, as well as our treasure, even when we don't know what we'll get in return.

 

Stewardship doesn't begin with money.  It begins when we decide, both as individuals and as a congregation, that we will move into the future with the faith and confidence that God is calling us forward and God will be with us, leading and guiding us every step of the way.  It begins when we decide as a congregation that we will recommit ourselves to being the body of Christ, being the hands and the feet and heart of Jesus, doing what he would do if he were here with us in earthly form. 

 

Theologian John Westerhoff III writes that “Stewardship is what we do after we say we believe, after we give our love, loyalty, and trust to God.”  This Stewardship season, may we give our love, loyalty and trust to God.  And may we -- the First Congregational Church of Stoughton, United Church of Christ -- step out in faith together into this new era for our beloved church.  Amen.