Charge to the Congregation on the Installation of the Rev. Dr. Kori Phillips McMurtry

Christian Community Presbyterian Church 

Bowie, Maryland 

October 29, 2023 

Charge to the Congregation on the Installation of Dr. Kori Phillips McMurtry as Pastor 

Presbyterians have spent a lot of time determining the qualifications for pastors. Yet we have not spent an equal amount of time describing the qualifications of congregations. 

Father Victor Pax, my Roman Catholic colleague during my first pastorate, said that he had a lot of parishioners whom he saw three times during his ministry and every time he saw them he threw something at them: water at their baptisms, rice at their weddings, and dirt at their burials. 

Often the average church member sees a pastor as the in-house religious professional. By that I mean that pastors are seen as surrogates: they are supposed to “do church” for everyone else. They are the designated students of scripture, proclaimers of the Word, prayer-makers for people and events, and blessers of rituals ecclesiastical and civic. The church which has a pastor to do religion for them is a happy church. 

Sadly, that definition of church is not found in scripture. The Letters of Peter, hidden near the end of the New Testament, were written for wide circulation among the early churches, unlike the Pauline correspondence which was addressed to specific churches. Peter has some words which are addressed to you. Yes, you, each of you who consider yourself a member of CCPC. Let me read Peter’s words as Eugene Peterson presents them in The Message: 

[Y]ou are the ones chosen by God, chosen for the high calling of priestly work, chosen to be a holy people, God’s instruments to do his work and speak out for him, to tell others of the night-and-day difference he made for you—from nothing to something, from rejected to accepted. 

You are the church, not Pastor Kori. As long as she is in your midst she is one of you, but she doesn’t replace you. She is not a one-woman church. She does have special functions of preaching, teaching, caring. But so do you. 

You are the ones chosen by God to be Christian Community Presbyterian Church. That is indeed a high calling. Your priestly work is to minister along side of the pastor. She has two ears, two hands, one voice, and 24 hours in a day minus what she owes Ben and Arthur. You gathered here have over 200 ears, over 200 hands, over 100 voices, and up to 24 hours a day per each of you. Pastor Kori can be in only one place at a time. You can be in over 100 places at any given time. That’s a lot of sensitive listening, hand-holding, care-giving, living witnessing. 

Each of you is a first-responder for feeding people who are spiritually or physically hungry and thirsty. You are often the closest ones able to wipe away tears of grief and to offer safe haven in times of despair. You are the Johnnys and Janies on the spot to visit people imprisoned in sick beds or loneliness. Jesus has told you the when and the why: “Whenever you did one of these things to someone overlooked or ignored, that was me—you did it to me” (Matthew 25 :25:40, The Message). Pastor Kori can help you with the how. Like Mary of Bethany at the feet of Jesus doing the one essential thing—listening and learning. You can listen and learn from Pastor Kori. Work alongside Pastor Kori, learn from her, share your skills, knowledge, and faith, be the extension of the ministry to which she has been called, and help her grow in her faith and service. 

You have one job: telling others of the night-and-day difference Jesus had made in your life, using words if necessary; otherwise, just live it, for you have come from nothing to something, from rejection to acceptance. 

Thanks be to God. Alleluia! Amen.