In meetings with our worship team, I listened as they talked about today’s worship service, and how it was going to have a camp theme, and it was really cool, because I could tell that our camping ministry was important to them, that it was meaningful to them, and that it had had an impact on them—even if they themselves have never been to camp.
It reinforces what I often tell other pastors, that our regional church’s camping ministry benefits the entire congregation, not just the campers we send. It enriches congregational life. It enriches the spiritual life of the whole church.
At camp, there are formal times dedicated for spiritual learning, like keynote times and worship. But spiritual learning also takes place every minute of every day, as we form and sustain a Christian community for a week. And spiritual enrichment takes place as we eat meals together, as we play games together, and as we walk from one area of camp to another.
Today’s scripture talks about a time when Jesus and his disciples were walking from one place to another. It wasn’t a time of formal instruction, just Jesus and his followers having conversation as they made their way down the road.
To me, it really does seem like something that could have easily happened at camp, because at camp, that’s when some of the most meaningful conversations take place—the conversations and the lessons that campers will remember for the rest of their lives.
To give you an idea of how meaningful walks like these can be: at Community of the Great Commission, the Disciples camp in northern California, the dining hall was at the far end of the camp. From the main program area, where the cabins were and where most of the activities took place, to the dining hall, was almost a half mile.
And so we’d start making our way to the dining hall about 15 or 20 minutes before each meal.
Well, a few years before I left that region, they built a brand new dining hall, right in the middle of camp, cutting the distance in half.
And the older campers, the ones in high school who had been going to camp for many years, were actually sad, because those walks to the dining hall had become so meaningful to them, and they recognized the value of just walking together and talking.
So Jesus and his disciples were walking. They were on their way to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And in the course of their conversation, Jesus asked his disciples:
“Who do people say that I am?”
And they gave various answers, perhaps thinking to themselves, “this is an easy question.” They’d heard various people say that Jesus was John the Baptist, or Elijah, or one of the prophets, come back to life.
But Jesus wasn’t done. That question was just the warm-up.
Jesus asked them a second question, and this one was intended to make them really think: “Who do YOU say I am?”
It just got more personal, didn’t it?
I still remember those exams I took in high school, in A.P. U.S. History. Some of the questions had a very simple answer: “In what year did Lincoln give the Gettysburg Address?” 1863. November 19, 1863, to be exact. Easy.
But then, there would appear a question like this: “How did Lincoln use the language of the Declaration of Independence in the Gettysburg Address to redefine the purpose of the Civil War?”
This question involves more than memorizing dates or regurgitating data. It involves analisis, it involves critical thinking, and it requires you to form your own conclusions based on what you have learned.
Jesus’ second question to his disciples is like that.
It was Peter who responded. Peter said, “You are the Messiah.”
That’s all he says here in Mark’s gospel, but in Matthew and Luke’s gospels, when Peter responds to this question, he adds: “You are the son of the living God.”
Based on Peter’s statement, we in the Disciples of Christ denomination ask only one question of people who want to join and become members. We ask:
Do you believe that Jesus is the Christ (“Christ” is just another word for “messiah”), the son of the living God, Lord and Savior of the world?
And, hopefully, when you answer, you’ve given it some thought. Hopefully you’ve thought about what the words in that statement mean. What does it mean to believe? What does Christ mean? What do the words “Lord and Savior” mean?
In a minute, I’m going to ask some of our youth who went to camp some questions. Questions they’ve thought about. Questions that, hopefully, their time at camp has prepared them for.
But I will say one more thing…
On the website of our denomination—disciples.org—if you search around for a bit, you’ll find a page about our denomination’s identity statement, followed by twelve principles of identity. The first principle of identity listed states the following:
“We confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and proclaim him Lord and Savior of the world, requiring nothing more – and nothing less – as a basis of our life together.”
I am thankful that, this summer, I had the opportunity to accompany an amazing group of 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders on their week-long journey at camp. I am thankful that we are all on a journey together, here at First Christian Church, engaging in discussion, asking questions of one another, and growing in faith together just as the disciples did as they journeyed with Jesus. I’m thankful that we are in covenant with a larger movement of several thousand congregations, scattered across the United States and Canada, because the more companions we have on this journey, the more enriching our conversations become.
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