It’s Such a Good Feeling

Every episode of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood began with him taking off his suit jacket and putting on his sweater. And every episode ended with him taking off his sweater and putting back on his suit jacket. Many of the sweaters he wears on the show were knitted by his mother, Nancy. Mr Rogers recalls, “Mother would make 12 sweaters a year for an extended family. Each Christmas, as we opened the boxes, Mother would say, ‘What kind of sweaters do you want next year?’ “And then she’d say, ‘I know about you, Freddie. You want one with a zipper.’ ”

The first four years of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood ended with Mr. Rogers taking off his shoes and his sweater as he sang ” We’ll start the day tomorrow with a song or two Tomorrow, tomorrow We’ll start the day tomorrow with a smile for you.” But one day he changed the song. He realized that children might wake up on Saturday expecting him to be there.

His concern was not just that he would disappoint them. Mr. Rogers was building a foundation.

Several years ago, we took a group on a Journeys of Paul cruise of the Mediterranean. The final port was Venice, not a place Paul traveled, but the place from which we would fly home. Our ship docked near the Piazza San Marco, and we spent the day exploring Venice before flying out (very early) the next morning. The piazza, the plaza area is a marketplace, flanked on three sides by cafes and shops, with the Basilica of St. Mark anchoring the space, spanning the entire East end, and one of the most famous landmarks of Venice, other than the canals that run throughout the entire city is the bell tower.

I mentioned that there are canals throughout the city. Venice is a city built on water, and that bell tower at St. Mark’s Basilica rises 323 feet into the sky, roughly a football field turned on end. But one day, after 750 years of towering over the city, that bell tower fell. Why? The foundation failed – not because of one design flaw or environmental factor – over and over again the tower, built on oak beams set in clay, withstood water damage and lightning strikes, fire and earthquakes – until one morning it was too much, and it collapsed.

Foundations are important. Mr. Rogers knew that he was building a foundation with his young audience. He laid the base of that foundation with routine, with the zipper sweater and the snap snap as he encouraged his neighbors to wake saying “I think I’ll make a snappy new day.” The predictability of the routines, the trustworthiness of everything that was said, were like the cement and iron that the Venetians used when they rebuilt the tower.

They rebuilt an exact replica, the only difference was the foundation, and that is what makes ALL the difference. Mr. Rogers knew that, and Paul, when he was writing to the church at Rome knew that.

Paul is responding to a particular situation in Rome. Tradition says that the Apostle Peter took the Good News of the Messiah to the Jews who were living, part of the diaspora, in Rome. The long-awaited, anointed One was the fulfillment of their Scriptures. So, as they met in house churches, they continued to follow all of the Jewish customs. And as they shared the Good News and Gentiles were converted, they were folded into the community. But then, in 49, approximately only 16 years after Jesus’ death and resurrection, Emperor Claudius threw all of the Jews out of Rome, Jewish-Christians included, leaving Gentile Christians to continue to worship without the influence of the Jewish-Christians. Five years later, when Claudius died, the Jews began to return. Jewish-Christians started to return. And when they came back, life in the church had gone on. It led to some confusion, and some debates, and some concern about what was foundational for faith? What was ok to eat, and what wasn’t? What day was to be the Sabbath? What about the Scriptures (what we refer to as the Old Testament)? You can imagine the dynamics. One group thought they were better than the other. Paul warns them in Chapter 14, “let us no more pass judgment on one another.”

And then, in Chapter 15, he pronounces that “We have a new foundation – the Messiah!” Whatever was written before Jesus, the Scriptures, were written for us to learn from and give us fortitude and hope as we waited for him. Therefore, prays Paul, may you have fortitude and patience with each other…keep on keeping on – together – until you come to a common mind among yourselves, until you are in harmony, until you are able with one mind and one mouth glorify God. In the meantime, admonishes Paul, “Each one of us should please our neighbor for his or her good, and to build them up.”

He doesn’t take sides. If you are the strong one, bear with the weak one, even when it doesn’t please you. Sacrifice your will as Jesus sacrificed his will. He doesn’t pronounce one group right and one group wrong. Instead, he says the only way that you are going to be a tower rising above the city is to build one another up on the foundation of Jesus Christ.

Fred Rogers’ call to ministry was one of building up his television neighbors. He said once, – “All of us, at some time or other, need help. Whether we’re giving or receiving help, each one of us has something valuable to bring to this world. That’s one of the things that connects us as neighbors–in our own way, each one of us is a giver and a receiver.”

For Fred Rogers, the foundation was always that each neighbor was formed by God with a purpose, an intent, a hope that we would have the mind of his son, Jesus, bringing glory to God. He said, “It’s our insides that make us who we are, that allow us to dream and wonder and feel for others. That’s what’s essential. That’s what will always make the biggest difference in our world.”

And so, for almost three decades, he ended each show building up his neighbors as he sang, “It’s such a good feeling, to know you’re alive, it’s such a happy feeling, you’re growing inside”.

Why? Because we are a part of a tower, the foundation is firmly set on Christ Jesus our Lord, and we are being built into a neighborhood, into a community, Jesus describes us as a city on a hill, with one common mind, the mind of Christ, and one common mouth, to glorify God. Amen.