It’s football season, and a good number of us enjoy watching college games — especially contests between teams in the Atlantic Coast Conference. Virginia Tech, Carolina, UVA, Boston College, Wake Forest, Maryland, NC State — our congregation is just full of fans. Yes, I know that my team, Duke, is usually in last place — but wait till basketball season!

A generation ago, there was a struggle in the ACC that was being played out on the football field, but it had nothing to do with touchdowns. The struggle was all about race relations.

In the early 1960s, a man named Darryl Hill joined the team at the University of Maryland. He was the first African-American to play football for Maryland. As he and his team traveled through the South, he received a great deal of abuse from the fans at the schools they played. Darryl Hill was especially shocked by the shouts and the taunts of the crowd at Wake Forest in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

As you may know, Wake Forest has deep Baptist ties, and its team is the “Deacons.” What a disgraceful way for Christians to behave.

As the pre-game warm-up ended, Darryl Hill noticed the captain of the Wake Forest football team approaching him. He had no idea what that opposing player, a white man, was going to say to him.

“I want to apologize for the behavior of my fans,” the Wake Forest captain said to Darryl Hill. Then, draping his arm over Hill’s shoulder, he began to walk him toward the Wake Forest side of the field, where the jeering was at its worst. By the time the two of them reached the middle of the field, the rude screaming had dropped to near silence.

Who was this courageous captain of the Wake Forest Deacons? According to The Washington Post Magazine (February 1, 2004), the player’s name was Brian Piccolo. Piccolo went on to play professional football, and developed a close relationship with an African-American player named Gale Sayers. Their story later inspired the TV movie Brian’s Song, a movie that can still make grown men cry.

The intersection of one person to another — that’s the focus of today’s message. We heard last week about what happened when Jesus appeared as the intersection of God and humanity. Now, today, we take a look at what happens when people intersect, one on one, and then with the world around them. The story of Darryl Hill and Brian Piccolo gives us a hint of the amazing things that can happen when two people come together, and take a stand for God.

In today’s passage from Luke, Jesus chooses seventy people to go ahead of him, in pairs, to every town and place where he himself intends to go (Luke 10:1). Luke says he “sent them” — a phrase which includes the Greek word “apostello,” meaning “sent.” This is the root of the English word “apostle,” which literally means a person who is sent. If you are sent by Jesus on a mission, then you are an apostle.

Jesus chooses seventy of them to serve as messengers of the kingdom of God. He may have chosen seventy because the Jews believed that there were seventy nations in the world, or because Moses had appointed seventy people as elders. In either case, Jesus intends for these messengers to be leaders of his movement — a movement that will eventually reach all the nations of the world.

Jesus sends them out in pairs, like Darryl Hill and Brian Piccolo walking into a jeering crowd. He knows that two people can support one another in a challenging situation, and that they can be accountable to each other when difficulties and temptations arise. Two people are really much stronger than one, and this strength is needed when the going gets tough. “Go on your way,” says Jesus. “See, I am sending you out like lambs into the midst of wolves” (v. 3).

Lambs into the midst of wolves. That’s what Darryl Hill was feeling like as he stood in front of those Demon Deacons.

So the first truth of the intersection of one person to another is that we are stronger in pairs than we are alone. We are meant to support each other and be accountable to each other when we face the challenges of each day. Jesus never intended the Christian life to be led in isolation, with each of us on an individualistic mission from God. That’s why we are a Small-Group-Centered Church here at FPC, not an Individual-Centered Congregation. We know that we need each other for strength and encouragement, in the very same way that Darryl Hill needed Brian Piccolo.

All alone, we can become overwhelmed, discouraged, and defeated. But together, we can silence a jeering crowd and take an important stand for God.

Jesus instructs his apostles to “Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals; and greet no one on the road” (v. 4). He wants his messengers to travel light, and to avoid distractions as they make their way toward the towns that Jesus intends to visit. “Whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this house!’” says Jesus. “And if anyone is there who shares in peace, your peace will rest on that person; but if not, it will return to you’” (vv. 5-6).

The second truth of today’s intersection is that we have a gift for this world: the gift of peace. Our challenge is to offer everyone our peace, and to let that peace rest upon them. This is what Brian Piccolo was doing when he put his arm around Darryl Hill’s shoulder — he was saying to the crowd, “I’m at peace with this black player, and you should be, too.” Notice that Piccolo didn’t yell at the crowd, lecture the crowd, intimate the crowd, threaten the crowd, or insult the crowd. He simply showed them his peace, and for a moment, his peace rested on them.

Jesus knows, of course, that not everyone is going to accept the gift of peace. Some people are going to reject it, and I’m sure that there were many who rejected Piccolo’s vision of racial harmony that day in Winston-Salem. But the amazing thing about this passage is that Jesus is saying that you don’t lose anything, even if your peace is rejected. “Your peace will return to you,” promises Jesus, so you can offer it to someone else.

The next piece of advice that Jesus gives his messengers is that they “Remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the laborer deserves to be paid. Do not move about from house to house” (v. 7). Jesus encourages the apostles to put themselves in the hands of their hosts, and even become dependent on their hosts — he knows that this kind of healthy dependency builds authentic relationships. If the messengers had come to town on camels — the RVs of their day — loaded up with everything they needed for life, then they never would have developed relationships with the people of the town, and they never would have been able to share the good news of God’s kingdom.

So this reveals the third truth of the intersection of one person to another: we are to depend on others. This means we are to sit down and have a meal with a neighbor, maybe sharing a type of food that we’ve never eaten before — Jesus says, “eat what is set before you” (v. 8). We are to be open to learning something new, and receptive to the gifts of others. So often we Christians go through life giving the impression that we have everything we need, including all the right answers.

But guess what? I don’t. You don’t. None of us does. We are not self-reliant, we are God-reliant. And often God meets our needs through the gifts of other people.

The beauty of having these kinds of relationships is that it enables us to speak the truth about what God is doing. If you approach a stranger on the street and say, “The kingdom of God has come near to you,” that person will probably turn and run. With good reason. But if you are sitting with a neighbor and sharing a meal, then you can actually talk about the presence of God in your life. No one is going to be shocked. No one is going to run.

One of the best parts of my experience with the Midlife Men on a Mission is the Bible study and conversation we have each night in Honduras. Last year, our group included a Muslim, a Mormon, a Roman Catholic … and an assortment of Presbyterians. We had no trouble talking about the presence of God in our lives, because we had bonded over shared meals and lots of hard work together.

The fourth and final truth of today’s intersection is that the kingdom of God has come near to us. This is a truth that we discover when we praise God in this service of worship. It’s a truth we grasp in our Christian education classes, in our women’s circle meetings, in our Youth Fellowship gatherings, and in our mission outreach efforts. It’s a truth we see when we elect a class of elders, deacons, trustees, and nominating committee members — men and women who have been inspired by the Holy Spirit to accept the challenge of leadership in this church.

God comes to us most powerfully in community, in the intersection of one person to another. It’s true that we are stronger in pairs than we are alone, and we are even stronger as a congregation. We have been given the gift of peace, a gift that we can share with others and enjoy ourselves as well. We can depend on others, both inside and outside the church, and develop relationships in which honest conversation can happen. And we can see that the kingdom of God has come near to us — a reality that is good news for us, and good news for our neighbors as well.

So let’s put our arms around each other and take a stand for God. Amazing things can happen when we intersect with God, and with each other. Amen.