But two hundred years ago this Sunday, when the meetinghouse was first dedicated, Calvin Chapin preached on the old story of Jacob’s ladder from the 28th chapter of Genesis. Jacob wakes from his dream and says, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!” And that original sentiment seemed to me a firm foundation on which to build this anniversary day.

How awesome is this place! Two hundred years is a long time for a building to stand, especially one that is used by so many and that remains in more or less its original condition. So much has transpired within and around these walls: that’s 10,400 Sundays, at least ten generations of church members, and hundreds upon hundreds of baptisms and weddings and funerals, right here in this spot. The simple volume of human drama is itself awesome.

And the history between then and now is awesome, too: when Calvin Chapin preached that first sermon here, Thomas Jefferson was President, and the Union, which had only 17 states at the time, was, as we are now, in the midst of a Presidential campaign—that one between Charles Cotesworth Pinckney and the eventual winner, James Madison. Rocky Hill wasn’t even Rocky Hill; it was the Stepney section of Wethersfield. There are pictures of horses and wagons and then Model Ts, and Ford Falcons outside the meetinghouse, of men and women and children in every variety of fashion from the advent of photography onward; there are photos of a narrow-gauge railroad chugging along the Old Main St. side of the building, and another of people getting on and off an electric trolley. Our meetinghouse was at first unheated—for 19 years, no less—then warmed by a wood stove, then coal stoves, and then finally steam; and was illuminated first by candles, then whale oil, then gas lit, and then electricity.

Our meetinghouse really is an historical artifact, a silent witness to so much history of this town and state and nation. In the middle of last century it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places, and President Eisenhower praised its architectural beauty and inherent American value.

Two hundred years ago this morning, on the first day of these 200 years, Calvin Chapin was right: How awesome is this place? We who have inherited this gem are so blessed, which is why we celebrate. But as the current generation of Meetinghouse People, we also face a highly unique challenge that those in more modern church homes may experience less. It is easy for us to love this building, love the history, love the sculpted balcony and the tablets here behind the pulpit and the choir up in the balcony and the ancient pews and the creak of the floors. But respecting, loving, honoring this meetinghouse is not the same as respecting, loving, and honoring God. You and I can’t mistake the rich historical atmosphere that one drinks in upon entering for the actual presence of God; and we can’t confuse our good stewardship of this building alone as discipleship to Jesus Christ.

It turns out our God is not a God who prefers one location to another. Our God travels, and, not only that, we encounter God when God is good and ready, and not just when we’re in the right frame of mind, or make room in our schedule, or, especially today, when we’re in the right location. Throughout the Book of Exodus, from which we’ve been reading the past few weeks, God makes the divine presence known to the people, and affirms the lasting covenant with them each time, but appears and reappears at the Almighty’s will, and not at all in ways Moses can control or predict or schedule.

John Witvliet is Director of the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, and in an article he wrote about music in worship, he spoke of exactly what we need to remember in the midst of our celebration of this space. He said, “God’s presence is to be received as a gift, it cannot be engineered, produced, or embodied automatically… Music is an instrument by which the Holy Spirit draws us to God, a tool by which we enact our relationship with God. It is not a magical medium for conjuring up God’s presence.” And to paraphrase for our circumstance: this meetinghouse is a setting in which the Holy Spirit draws us to God, the stage on which we enact our relationship with God… it is no our magical location for conjuring up God’s presence.

Let me be clear, friends: surely the presence of the Lord is in this place. The flow of God’s grace is unmistakable over the course of so many seasons within these walls. But God is here—or, more properly, God comes by here—not because it’s an old building and God prefers old buildings to new, or because the architecture is classic and picture-postcard perfect, or because we keep it up so well, but simply because this happens to be the place where the people of God have gathered in faith for now centuries, invoked God’s presence, and waited—patiently and impatiently—for God to arrive, to move, to inspire, to encourage, to guide.

Church people like us with grand buildings need to resist the temptation that God lives in our sanctuary more than anywhere else, or that we hold the power to get face-time with God simply by walking into this space. No, we encounter God out of the mysterious mixture of history and future and anxiety and confidence and mood and weather and the totally unpredictable movement of the Holy Spirit. We encounter God, as our guiding hymn for the day suggests, “in one living whole.” That unmistakable grace of God in the history of this congregation isn’t just about being blessed with a long-lived worship space; that grace has come—in trickles and spurts and gushes—through the constant interplay of the Holy Spirit blowing through this place with faithful action and just plain mistakes, with local politics and congregational polity, with boom times and lean stewardship seasons, with building projects and bible studies and pot luck suppers, with times of unity of purpose and seasons of profound disagreement, with leaders and followers and artists and children and scholars and musicians and so many who have come and gone.

Our meetinghouse matters. It is a blessing worth celebrating, investing in, honoring. It is a piece of that living whole for every single one of us, and if it was to disappear tomorrow, or it we ourselves were to take leave of it tomorrow, we would still know in our bones that this space played a significant part in our journey of faith. But in the end, it is only one part in that great mix of ingredients God stirs around in order to make connection with us.

The physical building is a vital, but single, piece in the whole spiritual household. In Ephesians Paul explains: You are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon”—not timbers and New England bedrock before all else—“built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord.”

This structure around us is a blessing and a beauty, yet it is only an outward reflection of the blessing and beauty that is the mystical, grace-filled household of God built with human hearts, a house built on the rock of God’s grace, a power that no one meetinghouse or one ritual or one person can contain or control. So for today, and for so many years leading up to today, and for so many years to come beginning today, thanks be to God for this grand old meetinghouse, and for the ways in which it has been and will be part of that living whole that moves the faithful of each generation forward through the ages.