As so often happens when the years pass and generations come and go, the sense of a unique heritage dims and is reduced to one simple idea: in the case of our Congregational heritage, reduced to the idea of freedom.  Many of us seem to think that freedom—both theological and ecclesiastical--is the sum and substance of Congregationalism's uniqueness. This alone we clutch to ourselves, thinking that it is our most priceless treasure.    But to our spiritual ancestors the Pilgrims, (and to most modern Congregationalists as well, by the way) church polity was no sacred thing.  Their main concern was far different from ecclesiastical politics--their passion was for God in Jesus. Their only reason for separating from the Church of England and suffering persecution was that they might know the abiding presence of the Living Christ. 

Now we in this church, who are direct spiritual descendants of the Pilgrims and Puritans, have differing viewpoints--a plurality of opinions--about concepts like "the spirit of God" and "the Living Christ".  Many of us are agnostic when it comes to such concepts. We are a seeking people, after all, we say--that's what the plaque in front of our church proudly proclaims. 

Polity and structural organization in and of itself meant very little to the Pilgrims.  It was a means, not an end. Rather, the Gospel meant everything.  I believe it is at this point that many of us Congregationalists risk betraying our heritage.  We often stand for freedom not so that God can tell us something, but so that no one can tell us anything.  And when this has happened to a Congregational Church, it forfeits its claim to being a true church.  Such a church may be a kind of club, but not a church.

True Congregational Christians have a view of the way God makes himself known to His Church that demands a high responsibility from each member.  It is a responsibility to seek God’s will without the help of ecclesiastical authority; a responsibility to study scripture, to pray, to give, to worship, and to work as a result of the

discipline that Spirit itself imposes on us.  We reiterate these responsibilities when we join the church and any time we read our church covenant, because it is our basic promise to each other and to God.  The concept of covenant, as opposed to creed, is one of the two geniuses of the Congregational Way.  The other genius of our tradition is the church meeting.  The church meeting is "the" unique institution in Congregationalism.  It grew out of the conviction that if Jesus really meant that "where two or three are gathered together in my Name, there am I in the midst," then it was in a gathered company of the two or three, meeting in love, that He could most directly govern the church.  The "Lordship of Christ" was no mere theological formula.  The Pilgrim and Puritan conviction was that if the people of a local church gathered together in the spirit of seeking to know God's will for them, He would come into their midst and guide their minds and hearts in such a way that they would all discern what the Spirit intended them to do. 

The important thing, whether in worship or in a business meeting, is our attitude as a gathered people: the attitude of expecting God’s Presence and guidance; the attitude of openness; of loving each person as a child of God; of believing that the Spirit can and does speak through any one of us.  It is the attitude of coming to worship or to a meeting to seek God's will, not merely our own. These things are said because I believe that a Congregational church--that our Church--at its best, is a fellowship in which God’s Spirit can speak and act with a very special power. 

Through those courageous and deeply committed Pilgrims who set forth for the unknown with only God as their guide—the same God has given us a heritage beyond any price, one that we can be truly grateful, not only around Thanksgiving but at all times. Let us be thankful for all we've been given, and let us remember to Whom we are thankful!

     ~ Happy Thanksgiving,  Pastor John