This past summer, I read and reread George Weigel's new book, The Cube and the Cathedral, his assessment of the growing cultural crisis in Europe. In it he made the following statement: "History is driven, over the long haul by culture - by what men and women honor, cherish, and worship; by what societies deem to be true and good and noble," (George Weigel, The Cube and the Cathedral, 30). That is a powerful insight.

If he's right, then we have to take the next step and say that what people honor, cherish, and worship has to be embodied somewhere. People need a place to gather and like-minded people to gather with and mutually-agreed upon ways of remembering and understanding and sharing what they honor, cherish, and worship. They need a community of faith. Our community of faith is the Church.

But the Church, it turns out, is  not just another human society. God brought it into existence to be the global community that is gathered around Jesus Christ and serves as His dwelling place within the human family - a kind of beachhead from which He has begun the liberation of the nations of this world from the disorders of sin.

We came into this community of faith looking for friends or a refuge or a religious club. To our astonishment we found ourselves part of a kingdom that today takes in people of every tribe and language and people and nation (Revelation 5:9). What response on our part might be appropriate for this privileged position in which we find ourselves? Four New Testament statements summarize our appropriate response.

The Biblical Center of Gravity
Ephesians 4:1: I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received, Ephesians 4:1

Philippians 1:27: Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ, Philippians 1:27

Colossians 1:10: We pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and my please him in every way, Colossians 1:10

1 Thessalonians 2:11-12: We urge you to live lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory, 1 Thessalonians 2:11-12.

I would understand, if you heard those four statements and said something like this: "Is it possible for a flawed human being like me to live in a way that is worthy of God? Isn't that for the saintly among us, the naturally religious? If you really knew me, you wouldn't ask me to live a life worthy of God."

If that's how you feel, then you need to consider this: the admonition to live that way comes precisely and only to flawed people, who feel the strain of what they are being asked to do. A life worthy of God is to be lived within the boundaries of our flawed humanity. There is no alternative. The four passages we just read went originally to ordinary people.

Certainly, a life worthy of God includes realism about your moral shortcomings. No one is asking you to pretend you are anything other than what you actually are. But being realistic doesn't mean you should give up on the whole idea.

A life worthy of God will be marked by fits and starts. It takes a while (sometimes decades) to replace old habits with new habits that are worthy of the Lord. How well we are doing will not always be apparent to others or even to ourselves. Some of the most crucial work takes place in our minds, out of sight of prying eyes. The messiness of renovating our souls means that living a life worthy of the Lord is nothing ever to boast about. But none of this means it is impossible. Thinking that is a temptation to avoid at all costs.

Models and Mimicry
Now, I would like to talk about a down-to-earth way that makes a life worthy of God possible. Once again, I'd like to read several New Testament passages that highlight this down-to-earth help.

Therefore I urge you to imitate me, - 1 Corinthians 4:16. Follow my example, as I follow the example of Chrst - 1 Corinthians 11:1. Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you - Philippians 3:17. You became imitators of us and of the Lord - 1 Thessalonians 1:6. You, brothers, became imitators of God's churches in Judea - 1 Thessalonians 2:14. We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised - Hebrews 6:12.

The truth about human nature is that most of us take our cues about what is important from other people. That's how we learn our mother tongue. That's how we learn social customs. That's how we may choose what to wear or what to drive or where to shop. It's not complicated. Often, it is an unconscious act. We want to belong. We are eager to please; and the rest is easy.

Wouldn't it be strange if God, who created us to be imitators, did not make use of our powers of imitation? "The highest does not stand without the lowest," say the mystics of the Church. If the imitation of Christ is the highest form of imitation, it is only using the power that was developed by imitating parents, siblings, teachers, and peers.

Or, here is another way to think about it. "Grace does not destry but perfects nature," say the theologians of the Church. Imitation is a habit we develop and use instinctively. The Christian faith does not belittle that instinct. It teaches us the highest us4e of that habit, which is to imitate Christ.

Or, here is another way to think about it. Think of two or three people outside your birth family, who have left their mark on your life. How many of your habits and ideas can you trace back to them?

I say all this to put us at ease with the biblical passages we just read. Imitating other people is not bizarre. The Bible is taking advantage of a natural disposition of the human soul and redirecting it in a way that is pertinent to our salvation. In the passages we read listen again to what we might imitate.

Three times the apostle said to imitate him. He said that to two churches he founded and had close ties to. Once, to the Thessalonian church, he merely observed that they had imitated the way he handled suffering. Twice, in 1 Corinthians 11:1 and in 1 Thessalonians 1:6, the object of imitation is Jesus Himself. Twice, the object of imitation is other churches.

Do you know the secret of imitation? It's who you admire. If I admire you, you'll have influence over me in some way. Without even trying, my natural powers of imitation will go to work, taking into my life what I find attractive or useful in your life. If what I find attractive or useful is worthy of God, then I will be a little further along in living a life worthy of the Lord.

I asked you to think of two or three people outside your birth family, who have left their mark on your life. Now, let me refine that question. Can you think of two or three Christians, whom you admire, and who have left their mark on how you think about God and how you live? We can benefit from each other's strength. But to imitate the strengths of other people of faith, we have to be around them. We need to be part of a community of faith.

The Worthy Life
All of which leads to another question. What does a life worthy of God look like? Turn with me to Ephesians 4:3, and let me show you which way the answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind of the Spirit. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bod of peace. A life worthy of the Church's vocation, worthy of God, seeks the peace of the Church. Here is a sambling of how to do that.

Verse 2 tells us: Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. One another means first of all one another in the Church. Verses 11-12 tell us: It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ (the Church) may be built up.

Verses 15-16 tell us: Instead, speaking the truth in love, we (the Church) will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body (the Church) joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

Verse 25 sounds like counsel that permeates everything from childhood to Chancery Court; but listen to the end of the verse. Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body (the Church). Lying violates the solidarity of the community of faith.

Verse 32 tells us: Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. The Church confesses: "I believe in the forgiveness of sins." A life worthy of God extends that forgiveness to others.

In Ephesians 5:3 the apostle distinguished himself from those who merely rand about sex. Listen to the motivation he offered. But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of gree, because these are improper for God's holy people (the Church).

Nearly every verse in the last three chapters of Ephesians tells what a life worthy of the Lord looks like; and nearly every verse has to do with life within the community of faith that embodies what we honor, cherish, and worship. The Church is a kind of greenhouse in which the delicate fruit of the Spirit is grown and nurtured and protected until it can hold its own in the harsher environment of the secular world.

Let me set this description of a life worthy of the Lord in its political context. President Bush has cast a vision for spreading democracy in the Middle East and Souther Asia. At the heart of democracy is what the Declaration of Independence calls "the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

The explosive word is liberty. But democracies need to remember that liberty is not an end in itself. What matters is how citizens use freedom. "Freedom," wrote George Weigel, "is a matter of gradually acquiring the capacity to choose the good and to do what we choose with ... excellence," (ibid, 81).

When the New Testament urges us to live lives worthy of God, who calls us into his kingdom and glory (1 Thessalonians 2:11-12), it is directing our freedom toward "the true and good and noble" that humanity was made for and which can elevate the nations of the world above the disorders of sin that debase freedom and enslave people.

The Pastoral Center of Gravity
Two weeks ago, I compared the Church to Lazarus, whom Christ raised from death. When he cam lumbering out of the tomb, bound hand and foot in strips of linen and the burial cloth fastened to his face, he looked more dead than alive, and he smelled more dead than alive. But he was alive. What he needed was for someone to remove the grave clothes and let him wash up. So it is with the Church. There is life here, not death. Let's remove more of the tokens of death that make the Church lumbering and smelly. Underneath is something beautiful, if we have the faith to seek it.

We saw a bit of its beauty last week, when I quoted Michael Horowitz, who said to evangelical Christians: "You've become, beneath the radar screens of the national press, America's most powerful force for human-rights progress." He illustrated his point with evangelical advocacy against sex trafficking and abused prison inmates and for North Korean refugees and religious liberty. Congregations like this one embody and express the spiritual culture that gives rise to these liberating actions.

We see more of its beauty today. When the New Testament urges us to live lives worthy of God, who calls us into his kingdom and glory (1 Thessalonians 2:11-12), it is directing our freedom toward "the true and good and noble" that humanity was made for and which can elevate the nations of the world above the disorders of sin that debase freedom and enslave people.

Can we live lives that are worthy of this calling? On behalf of Jesus Christ I now call on each of us all to commit or to recommit ourselves for a lifetime to live a life worthy of the vocation of the Church to be holy, and to do it by New Year's Eve.

I considered aside time for us to do that in this worship service by raising your hand or coming down front or signing a card. I decided against it, because that method easily introduces something manipulative into these sacred moments together. Some people would respond with complete integrity. Others would respond out of a desire to conform or to please or to relieve the social pressure they felt and perhaps resent it later on.

On the other hand, i know that some of you, deprived of that pressure, may not make such a commitment. That would be a loss, but the Holy Spirit will not stop working in any one of us, and He will have an unviolated conscience to work with.

When you commit or recommit yourself for a lifetime to live a life worthy of the vocation of the Church to be holy, you may do it during public worship or in a traffic jam on I-95 or in your special chair at home. You may do it alone or with someone you trust and love. When you do it, tell someone you trust. It helps you to be accountable.

I will renew this invitation with each sermon in this series. I will create a quiet time when you can make this commitment. I'll provide a simple prayer to help you do it.

True humanity and true freedom take shape in a life that is worthy of the Lord. Such a life challenges the half-baked enthusiasms and outright lies that masquerade as the good life, and which are disseminated with all the glitz mass media can muster. We have something better. It comes from the hand and heart of God. It can break down strongholds. It can fire you with joy and hope. And its name, which is the proper name for true humanity and true freedome, is holiness.