Do Good

Welcome to the weekly Dulin Podcast, a ministry of Doolin United Methodist Church in Falls Church, Virginia. Each week, we share a short reflection on faith and life in community, exploring how God's grace moves among us and through us. We're glad you're here.

Hello, Dulin Church. It's me, James Henry, your pastor, and I'm here with another weekday moment to share with you. Last week, I began a series about the general rules of the United Methodist Church. There are three that I want to bring focus to. The first one last week was do no harm.

I've already heard from several of you that trying to do no harm was a challenge. It was a challenge when you thought about ways that you might do harm. And that's exactly what intentionally entering into these rules is about for our lives. Trying to pay attention to what we're doing, asking the question, is this doing harm? What does harm look like?

And what does harm amount to? Now, in a way, doing no harm, the very first rule is an invitation in sort of a passive way, just to be intentional, to avoid doing something. The second rule on the other hand is very intentionally set up about doing something. Do all the good that you can, in all the ways that you can, in all the places that you can, at all the times that you can, to all the people that you can and etcetera. Do all the good you can.

If the first one is an invitation to at least look out that you don't do something to harm others, This one is an intention to go out and actually act to do good for others. And it blends interestingly enough on that first do no harm, Because sometimes we are convinced that we're about to do good, to the world without thinking about the ramifications for the person to whom or with whom we want to do that good. And it may actually do more harm than good. There are times when that may actually be the case. So what I'm suggesting to you is doing all the good you can is built on that foundation of intentionally doing no harm at the same time.

I have to admit, I don't have an example off the top of my head of something that you might do that is good that instead does harm. That, does not arise for me at this moment, and I'm sorry. But perhaps you can come up with your own. And I'd always, as always, I'd be interested in hearing your responses. You can always email me at pastordualinchurch dot org.

Things that you might do that you consider to be a good thing to do, but also might be doing harm at the same time and how you might work with these two rules in your life together. So what does it look like to do all the good you can in your everyday life and what is that invitation all about? You and I in our lives interact with lots of people, places. We interact with the environment around us. We interact with technology.

This is a technology moment. I'm at my home studio space, my own home office space, and I'm recording this message. And so if I'm doing all the good that I can, what are some ways I can do good? Well, you might begin by just taking stock of what kind of gifts you bring into this moment. Perhaps you have extra financial means and doing good for you might be helping out the local homeless shelter or helping out if you live in the Falls Church community, an organization like Home Stretch, or you might donate to one of our very specific ministries we do at Doolin that include things like the Ministry of Hope that, we serve over 300 people monthly through that ministry.

And maybe you'd like to, give some extra money that you might have for that. So that's one way to do good. And sometimes we do good, you know, with our financial means. That's a way to do good, but there are other ways to do good. When you're in the parking lot, I, it used to be a pet peeve of mine.

I have to admit sometimes it still bothers me, but it's not really a pet peeve anymore. When somebody unloads their cart and they leave the cart and drive away, right in the middle of the parking lot, waiting to roll down and hit someone else's car or something like that. Now I can't know what's in the person's heart who has left that cart there and I can't say, hey, how about you do some good and put that cart away? But what I can do is after they've left or after I find that cart, I can put it away. The other day I went to Wegmans, actually for the church to pick up communion supplies.

And when I was at Wegmans, I passed one of the special parking places for people with handicapping conditions. And I saw a cart left there. I immediately assume that a person who is already facing some kind of physical challenge about getting to and from their car and getting their groceries there, I don't expect I have no expectations that they'll try to put that cart away. I didn't have any issues whatsoever. So I picked up that cart and I was rolling it towards one of the huge cart houses.

They have houses sort of at Wegmans, little covered spaces so that rain and other things don't necessarily land on it, I guess. I don't know. But, and as I was passing, I saw another one in the parking lot, another cart of the same size. And so I just picked up that one too, took it back to the car, and put it in the little cart holder space. Now, of the things that was a challenge in trying to put it in the cardholder space is not that the cardholder space was full, but that it was full because people had just randomly thrown all the carts in there.

So, I took five minutes of my time. This is not a pat me on the back moment, but it was a little good that I did. It wasn't amazing good. It didn't change the world in any way. I don't know necessarily, but to me it did good to rearrange the carts so that more carts would fit in there.

And it was a little teeny tiny thing. And normally I wouldn't tell anybody about it, but it was one little way, an example from my life of something that I can do good. When I'm walking in the neighborhood here in Paul's Church where I live, I see lots of neighbors out and I speak to them. Now, I used to speak in the old neighborhood I lived in and there were people who knew me who would speak back, but most other people just didn't. I find it to be completely the opposite here.

Everyone speaks back to me, everyone, and seems like everyone knows that, oh, you're the new pastor at Dual In Church. Why, yes, yes I am. And who are you? And so I get to meet and talk to people. Just simply greeting people and talking to people, recognizing our common humanity, to me that's doing good.

Now you can make choices in the way that you shop and the way that you spend your money, whether or not you buy locally or if you, don't. All of those are ways that you can do good. Some would say that, you know, not buying locally actually does some harm when in terms to how far things are coming to you, other things like that. I'm not here to tell you how to measure those things in your life. You have to decide for yourself where those lines are.

What does it mean for you to do no harm? Because one of the things you may discover over time is that what it means to do no harm for you grows and also what it means to do good for you also grows in your heart. As you start to practice these and they are practices, this is not about being perfect or getting everything exactly right. It is instead about practicing. We practice our faith.

And so when I practice doing good, it might stretch me to see that there are more ways that I can do good that I hadn't even thought about, but you have to start somewhere. So what is the, some people would say the low hanging fruit. What are the low hanging fruits in your life? What can you challenge yourself today to do that will do good in the world? Maybe one of those things is not to reactively comment on social media to the things that you see that pop up there.

It might be something as simple as complimenting someone about something, speaking to them and making them feel seen, being present with them when they need you, trying to respond to the needs that are in your community. These are all ways that you can practice doing good in your everyday life. I want to say that John Wesley didn't believe and we don't believe that somehow doing good is going to earn you a special place in heaven, whatever that looks like. This is not about brownie points of any kind, any kind of special points that you're going to earn along the way. This is simply responding to the goodness you've already received, the abundance that God has poured out on you by doing good back to the world.

And you do it in the ways that seem most right to you. There are members of our congregation at Doolin who think, who see that one of the important things to do here, you know, around this area, we plant lots of plants. A lot of them because we like them, but they're not native plants. And sometimes they have effects we didn't imagine on the environment in which we live. So there are people at Dualin Church who are intentionally looking at what we plant around Dualin in the future, now and in the future, and trying to aim for native plants, plants that were always here in Virginia where we are.

That may not seem like a whole lot to you, but it's doing good. It's doing good. It's doing good to the environment. It's supporting our life here on earth and that's a form of doing good. Doing good is saying kind words of affirmation even to yourself and to people that you like and to people that you don't like.

Doing good can look like so many things in your life. It's a way to be active in your faith, not because you're trying to earn some kind of extra points in your life, but because doing good is the right thing to do. Doing good is as much doing good for yourself as you give back a portion of the gift that you are to the world. And you can respond by doing just that thing. So now you have two rules to kind of balance into your life.

Next week, we'll hear the third and final rule, and I will share some thoughts about that. But now you have two. Maybe you looked up on all the rules were and paid attention and that's fine. But now you have these two rules. How can I do no harm and do all the good that I can with all the time that I have and all the places that I have and all the people that I know and don't know, how can I do good and not do harm in an intentional way?

Maybe will you begin tomorrow morning? You could bring in right now, but maybe you begin tomorrow morning when you wake up in the morning and ask yourself as you're awakening, how am I going to do good today? What good do you have in store for me to do, Lord, as I get up out of bed and go into the world? What good can I do? How can I do no harm today?

What good can I do? Just a way to be more intentional about our faith and to speak a little bit more about the roots of being, Methodist people. It's part of our method. So do no harm, do all the goods you can in all the places you can, to all the people that you can, in all the ways that you can, etc. So one and two.

Looking forward to talking to you next week about three. As always I hope that you'll remember your infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are. Let yourself be the gift that you are, not only to yourself, but to the world around you. Until the next time we join together, I wish you all the very best.