Joel 2:23-29; Luke 3:21-22; 4:1-2a; 16-19
This morning our healing journey moves from soul to spirit. There is an important shift here, and it involves a change in direction. Thomas Moore summarizes it: “In our soulfulness, we endure the most pleasurable and the most exhausting of human experiences and emotions; in our spirituality, we reach for consciousness, awareness, and the highest values.” (Thomas Moore, 231) In other words, soulfulness makes sure we are grounded in the earth, while spirituality makes sure we are connected to heaven. Both are essential in order to be whole people.
Much of the world views this through a series of energy centers in our bodies – places where spirit either flows or gets blocked. The heart is considered the central center if you will. The energy centers below the heart involve self esteem, money, sex, power, and connection to family and tribe. All of that seeks to be rooted in the earth. The energy centers above the heart involve love, forgiveness, self expression, intuition and wisdom, all of which seek connection with the divine. Today we are going to focus on this latter group as we focus on healing through the spirit.
Why is healing through the spirit so badly needed in our culture? Where do we see that need most clearly? Some of it seems so obvious that it hardly bears saying. We must begin by unblocking the spirit energy that has been trapped and blocked in our own lives so that life can flow again. The traumas and stresses life brings our way cause spirit energy to get stuck in our energy centers. The stuckness takes different forms in our lives but always manifests itself concretely. Think of the ways you see it in yourself and in others. Most of us know some kind of stuckness resulting from a fear or phobia. We’ve all been laid low at some point by an illness. If we’ve lived long enough we usually acknowledge that illness is often the result of our refusal to stop from winding ourselves up into frenzy. Our bodies simply force us to stop so we don’t kill ourselves. We have also seen in ourselves and/or in others the way chronic anger and frustration, as well as irritating passive aggressive behavior, can stymie our best efforts to get on with life.
We also see the need for spirit healing in the way people desperately seek the spirit because it has been driven out of modern life. Life has become technical, mechanical and routine. More and more people live in cities, and cities only function well with a certain degree of mechanization. Even people who live in rural areas are spirit starved because their lives are also mechanized to a great degree.
The desperation is manifest through the ways people seek spirit. People try out mind-altering drugs because they sense a need to connect to something more than the life they live. Traditional cultures used to help people make those connections. Now we have to figure it out for ourselves. Others seek healing precisely by reconnecting to traditional and alternative spiritual practices like rituals and initiation rites from ancient cultures. Still others are rediscovering ancient approaches to medicine that have been forgotten in the west. Music has always been a window to spirit. It used to be channeled through the church. Now it is a constant companion through Ipod-connected ear phones or speakers that pipe it into every place people gather.
People are less and less willing to engage religion that only speaks to the area north of the neck and doesn’t really connect their spirits to deeper meanings. So Pentecostal, charismatic and African American worship styles are on the rise. The ancient practice of spiritual direction is being rediscovered as people act on their longing for guidance in spiritual matters, not just instruction in religious matters. The church is even taking another look at religion and politics, realizing that the answer isn’t removing politics from the church but infusing it with spirit.
A third arena that reveals the need for healing through the spirit is creation. Sacred texts of all major religions speak of creation as a spirit infused reality. When creation is sick it is a spiritual problem. The Hebrew text we read from Joel speaks in these terms. The Christian version of this is most clearly stated by Paul in Romans: “Creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God, who have the first fruits of the Spirit. Creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.” (8:19-23) The current condition of creation as viewed in the destruction of the environment is a matter of spirit sickness; healing will only come when that connection is realized. Indigenous people have a lot to offer us here, as they see matter as the skin of spirit, a permeable boundary between the dimensions of spirit and matter. Something of that is evident in Romans.
One final symptom of our need for spirit healing is the way our society has rejected its youth and forgotten its elders. The prophet Joel describes a spirit-infused society: “Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old ones shall dream dreams, and your young ones shall see visions.” The flip side of this has been well described by Michael Meade: “The fabric of a culture tends to unravel where its young people are rejected and its old people are forgotten. When a culture rejects the dreams of its youth and forgets the visions of its elders it becomes destructive to life regardless of its heralded ideals. A culture that rejects the spirit of its youth will come to lack spirit and imagination when faced with life’s almost impossible challenges. A culture that forgets the necessity of converting “olders” into genuine elders will have leaders who can’t learn from the past and, therefore, can’t imagine a meaningful future.” He gets very specific about our own country: “Either the United States will learn from the lived knowledge of its elders and the nascent dreams of its youth, or it will stay the course and blindly follow the predictable path of hubris and tragedy into the desert of time.” He expresses some hope that “perhaps the United States, with such a large population of potential elders, is trying to wake up.” (Water of Life, iv-v) Let’s hope so.
So what does it mean to wake up to spirit healing? How does spirit energy get released? Clearly the healing must address the deep needs we have just described. Many are rediscovering the power of initiations as a way to awaken spirit healing. One way to consider the struggles of youth, the troubles of the aged, and the changes and dangers sweeping through both culture and creation is through the lens of initiation. The awareness of the need for some kind of initiation intensifies whenever and wherever radical changes disrupt the flow of life.
That was the situation into which Jesus arrived to be baptized. Jesus received the Spirit in his baptism. The Gospel of John says we receive the Spirit by being born again, which is a symbol of baptism. Remember that Nicodemus took Jesus too literally – he thought birth is something that only happens once. We still take Jesus too literally if we think it only happens twice. The message in that is that the initiation symbolized by baptism doesn’t only happen once. It has to keep happening throughout life.
What does initiation accomplish? What we notice through Luke’s story of Jesus is that the Spirit tends to drive people into the fray of life. Jesus was first driven by the spirit into the wilderness. That is where we reconnect with the invisible spiritual realities that infuse life with transcendent qualities by facing our naked selves, unprotected from all the props that come from outside ourselves. At the end of forty days Jesus was sent into a different part of the fray – his hometown. From there the Spirit sent him to the poor and oppressed, which in turn got him in trouble the rest of his life.
The healing of the Spirit is not a gentle healing. It involves scary change. Jesus said, “Blessed are the Peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.” Peacemaking involves entering the fray to work for peace where there is no peace. Almost everyone wants peace. But often we seek cheap peace. We want it at no cost. We want it by ignoring or denying or escaping conflicts of which we are a part. That is not Spirit-infused peace.
Thomas Moore makes this connection clear: “The Jordan is the archetype of our willingness to live fully, to have our own work and mission, and therefore to be blessed, as the Gospel story tells, by a higher parent and a protecting spirit. The Renaissance artist Piero della Francesca painted this scene at the Jordan, showing Jesus standing straight in his full dignity, while in the background another man is about to be baptized – any of us taking our turn – has his garment almost off, lifted over his head in a posture of exquisite ordinariness. It’s an inspiring image of the willingness to step courageously into the river of existence, instead of finding ways to remain safe, dry and unaffected.” (The Care of the Soul, Thomas Moore p. 243)
There are terrible consequences to remaining safe, dry and unaffected. The prophet Joel speaks of selling people to others: “You have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks, removing them far from their own border.” What could that mean in our context? Could it include things like destroying the reputations of individuals and communities by creating rumors about them? The message of Joel is that the only way to stop the cycle of violence and destruction is to enter the stream of the spirit where nothing is gained by exercising vengeance. History itself brings judgment so people don’t have to. Judgment is never the last word with God – just as gossip and destruction are not the last word. In a biblical view of history, healing the land, the animals, broken relationships and broken spirits is the promised future. When we believe that, we don’t have to resist the Spirit that drives us into the midst of a broken world.
When we allow the Spirit to do her work, she leads people into all kinds of activities they never thought they would do, and that are not their actual jobs. I think of Richard Prince, who works as a handy man and has qualifications for all kinds of things. Richard can’t stop himself from taking people to Tijuana to build houses, and to investing in the lives of youth. Those aren’t the ways he earns his money but they are ways he manifests the Spirit. Most of us go about looking for a job by gathering qualifications & credentials and submitting them to people looking for someone to do a particular job. But many of us have experienced the kind of leading Richard demonstrates, which is also the kind Jesus had in the wilderness and in Nazareth, and the kind his mother experienced when the Spirit came upon her to conceive Jesus.
The final piece of spirit healing involves reconnecting the pieces of creation to each other & to their true purpose so that healing & reconciliation can come to the whole cosmos, because God has created us all to work together in harmony. Joel describes how first the soil is infused with spirit and released from its fear and healed; then the same thing happens for the animals; then the environment is restored to its original intention of sustaining the life of creation; and finally the generations of human ones will be unblocked so the spirit can flow again, and society can be ordered properly, such that the young have bold visions and the elders dream dreams. Luke reveals the same truth thru the story of Jesus in the synagogue in Nazareth where a young man announces his spirit-led dream quest of reconnecting to full inclusion in society those who have been thrust to the margins - the poor, the captives, the blind and the oppressed. Indeed, when the Spirit is present, for each child that’s born, a morning star rises and sings to the universe who we are and we become makers of peace and healers of spirit.
October 29, 2007
October 21, 2007 - Healing through the Soul: Discovering our own Story - Frank Alton
Jeremiah 31:27-34
As we make our journey through different elements of healing our whole selves, today we come to the matter of healing our souls. I want to ask two questions this morning: what do our souls need healing from? And, what are some ways to find healing for our souls? The well known Greek word for soul is the word from which we get our word “psychology.” In the modern world psychology has been the primary way we deal with our souls. But that is a very recent development. What Thomas Moore calls the “Care of the Soul” is something that has usually been the purview of religion – priests and shamans have been the primary “psychologists” for most of human history.
But there is a problem with religion being the realm for caring for the soul. Religion is often perceived as primarily a moral enterprise. Religion imbues society with moral values and then guards those values. At the same time, moralism is one of the most effective shields against the soul because it protects us from its intricacy. A great deal of soul is hidden behind moralistic attitudes. This means that many people who are drawn to religion fear the soul and are afraid to reflect on their moral principles because they might change. At the same time, people who are drawn to the soul often resent religion because it tries to impose its morality on them. I have always loved today’s passage from Jeremiah because I believe it offers a path for religion that doesn’t get trapped in moralism and offers true life and healing for the soul. What does our soul need healing from?
Our souls need healing from the dishonoring they received in childhood. I have been repeating every week that each of us is born with a gift that only we can give to the world. If we are able to respond to that gift our souls thrive. If we fail to give it the world won’t receive it. And if we fail to discover and appreciate it our souls will shrivel up.
Most cultures believe that our souls are given a companion that guides us in discovering, giving form to, protecting and exercising our gift. The Romans called this companion “genius.” The Greeks called it the “daimon.” Christians call it the “guardian angel.” Some views of parenting call for breaking the spirit of the child in order to help the child function effectively in society. Unfortunately, if & when the person wakes up & discovers that what was broken was his or her true self, there is a need for deep healing.
Sometimes the genius is so strong it refuses to be broken. Yehudi Menuhim, the great violinist, used to go with his parents before he was even four years old to hear violin concerts. The concertmaster Louis Persinger would break into a solo passage as little Yehudi sat with his parents up in the gallery of the Curran Theatre. Later in his life he wrote how, “During one such performance I asked my parents if I might have a violin for my fourth birthday and Louis Persinger to teach me to play it.” It was a very grandiose request for a four year old. His hands weren’t even big enough to hold a violin. But his genius knew what it wanted and needed. His family responded to his request, but with a gift that they considered appropriate for his age and size. On his fourth birthday a family friend gave him a toy violin made of metal with metal strings. He writes, “I burst into sobs, threw it on the ground and would have nothing more to do with it.” (Unfinished Journey, Yehudi Menuhin, NY: Knopf, 1976, p. 22-23)
James Hillman (The Soul’s Code) points out that the soul isn’t age appropriate. Yehudi’s arms could not extend and his fingers could not articulate enough for a full-sized violin; but the vision was full-sized to match the music in his mind. He had to have what he wanted because “I did know, instinctively, that to play was to be.” Sometimes this takes the form of literally crushing the gift. Parents get so impatient with the mismatch between the soul and the fingers that they break the fingers. At other times the soul is wounded when society & family teach children to adopt a common story as they grow up. When the common story is taught before or instead of the soul’s story, everyone loses. Jeremiah admits that under the old covenant or the old agreement this was the case. People started out in life with common laws and a common story. This is a living from the outside in. The new agreement Jeremiah anticipates encourages people to discover their story rather than learn it from someone outside who teaches them. Then we can develop our own relationship to the common story.
A second soul wound that needs to be healed is literalism. Walter Breuggemann speaks of the prophetic imagination. Nothing kills imagination like literalism. Many Christians have tried to turn the prophetic word into literal predictions of things to come. In so doing they miss the energy and the healing power of the prophetic tradition. One of the teachers I met this summer said, “The real problem is a loss of faith in the dream of life and the immediacy of the spirit that animates the world…We are in a struggle for the presence of genuine imagination in the face of the hardening of ideas and the narrowing of hearts that ensues when people make god one-sided and consider their own beliefs to be literally true and universal.” (Water of life, iii)
One powerful example of how taking things too literally destroys imagination is the city of Jerusalem. Jeremiah spoke of the city being rebuilt. But was he talking literally or was he engaging the imagination? Michael Meade speaks about how over the millennia, taking Jerusalem literally has created tremendous conflict. Christianity, Judaism and Islam all see it literally as a place of origin. It is the place that all three religions began according to their stories. It is a place of three feuding brothers. When the world was thought to be flat, Jerusalem was considered the center of the world because on the summer solstice the sun shines exactly vertically on the site of the temple. Maps from that time show Jerusalem as the center from which everything else in the world flowed.
When this view continues to be held literally it leads to terribly destructive strategies. The current administration in this country operates from a literalistic Christian perspective in attempting to get a foothold in Iraq that will eventually lead to Jerusalem so that we can bring freedom to the entire Middle East. That view bumps up against the equally literalistic view of Jewish and Muslim administrations in other nations. Doesn’t that miss the point of the prophetic imagination? Isn’t the prophetic imagination fueled by a mythic vision of Jerusalem as the city of God descending from above? To literalize that vision is to make people spill endless blood on that hill, to fight over other people’s ideas of what happened on that temple mount. In order to heal our souls we need to rediscover the world as a place where the sacred is seen as present and announcing itself all the time. When we disconnect from the sacred, we tend to make the wrong sacrifices over and over again. When we wake up we wonder again about the sacred, and ask if we want to send our children into a sacrifice that we no longer see as having any value. That is happening today as we wonder what is happening to our souls as we keep sending our young to die in Iraq.
So what are the things that heal our souls? This section of the Book of Jeremiah is called the Book of Consolation. In the midst of Jeremiah’s long complaint, he reminds people that judgment is never God’s last word. Restoration and renewal always await us.
Jeremiah offers a number of elements that lead to healing. The whole chapter leading up to the verses we read is full of singing and water, mostly in the form of weeping. “Sing aloud with gladness for Jacob.” “With weeping they shall come, and with consolations I will lead them back. I will let them walk by brooks of water.” “They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion.” “Their life shall become like a watered garden.”
Singing and weeping opens the heart to both the sorrow and the joy of the world. Shedding the tears shaped within each heart moves the soul and softens the boundaries between people. Most cultures that are still in touch with their roots know the healing power of singing and weeping. I’ve experienced it mostly among African Americans and Latin Americans. In the presence of anger that is about to get out of hand or sadness that is about to overwhelm, someone breaks into a song and everyone gradually joins in. The singing is often accompanied by weeping as if the waves of sound were washing ancient wounds in a river made fresh with tears.
Tears can also transform anger. But it happens mostly by releasing untold stories that shift the ground on which people are fighting. Storytelling helps us see the larger themes that circle our lives. There was a tense moment one night at the retreat when we got to talking about divorce and marriage. A number of men were telling how they had either anguished over a decision to divorce in the past, or were currently considering divorce in order to save their souls. Their stories were intense, and evoked empathy from many of us. But some of the men and youth were arguing that marriage must be saved no matter what – that it was wrong to talk about saving the soul through something like divorce. Their responses felt like a form of judgment that felt inappropriate and alienating.
Then their stories started coming out. Several young men talked about growing up without a father. They literally pleaded with the men in the room not to abandon their children by getting a divorce. One man was especially harsh and persistent in his judgment. Several men who hadn’t said anything stood up and literally screamed at that man saying how inappropriate his comments were, and how he was alienated from the spirit of the group. This went on for a long time until that man’s story started spilling out: “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be so harsh. But my wife died 18 years ago and I would give anything to have her back, and I just can’t believe that anyone would voluntarily give up something like I long for every day.” Then he started weeping – waves of lament that went on for 10 minutes while the whole room just listened and cried whatever tears his tears evoked in us. It shifted the whole mood. It didn’t eliminate the anger over the judgmentalism, but it built bridges where bridges had been blown up in the previous hour. Tears and songs and stories are powerful elements for healing the soul.
Jeremiah ends this passage offering forgiveness. Stories of forgiveness signal our longing for forgiveness. Ernest Hemingway tells the story of the Spanish father who wanted to be reconciled with his son who ran away from home to the city of Madrid. The father misses the son and puts an advertisement in the local newspaper El Liberal. The advertisement read, "Paco, meet me at the Hotel Montana at noon on Tuesday. All is forgiven! Love, Papa." Paco is such a common name in Spain that when the father went to the Hotel Montana the next day at noon there were 800 young men named Paco waiting for their fathers! Hemingway's story reminds us how desperate all of us are for forgiveness.
Another story is told about a six year old girl named Ruby Bridges taught the world an unforgettable lesson about forgiveness. In 1960, Ruby walked into the William France elementary school in New Orleans, Louisiana the first day after a federal judge mandated the desegregation of the New Orleans school district. Ruby was the only African American student in the entire school. Every day she walked through a gauntlet of angry adults who insulted her with racial slurs and foul language. Robert Coles, the Harvard psychologist, interviewed Ruby Bridges in the midst of this pressure packed situation. Coles had seen the little girl walking through the crowd with her lips moving. He asked, what she was saying? Was she talking back to them?
Discovering our own story, and connecting our stories to the stories of others is core work in the healing of our souls. As I shared three weeks ago, Immanuel is entering a year in which we need to engage each other around our stories in order to heal the soul of this church, and to find healing for our own souls. A week from Saturday we will be gathering to share some of the stories that have been emerging this month. I encourage you to join the circle of healing.
As we make our journey through different elements of healing our whole selves, today we come to the matter of healing our souls. I want to ask two questions this morning: what do our souls need healing from? And, what are some ways to find healing for our souls? The well known Greek word for soul is the word from which we get our word “psychology.” In the modern world psychology has been the primary way we deal with our souls. But that is a very recent development. What Thomas Moore calls the “Care of the Soul” is something that has usually been the purview of religion – priests and shamans have been the primary “psychologists” for most of human history.
But there is a problem with religion being the realm for caring for the soul. Religion is often perceived as primarily a moral enterprise. Religion imbues society with moral values and then guards those values. At the same time, moralism is one of the most effective shields against the soul because it protects us from its intricacy. A great deal of soul is hidden behind moralistic attitudes. This means that many people who are drawn to religion fear the soul and are afraid to reflect on their moral principles because they might change. At the same time, people who are drawn to the soul often resent religion because it tries to impose its morality on them. I have always loved today’s passage from Jeremiah because I believe it offers a path for religion that doesn’t get trapped in moralism and offers true life and healing for the soul. What does our soul need healing from?
Our souls need healing from the dishonoring they received in childhood. I have been repeating every week that each of us is born with a gift that only we can give to the world. If we are able to respond to that gift our souls thrive. If we fail to give it the world won’t receive it. And if we fail to discover and appreciate it our souls will shrivel up.
Most cultures believe that our souls are given a companion that guides us in discovering, giving form to, protecting and exercising our gift. The Romans called this companion “genius.” The Greeks called it the “daimon.” Christians call it the “guardian angel.” Some views of parenting call for breaking the spirit of the child in order to help the child function effectively in society. Unfortunately, if & when the person wakes up & discovers that what was broken was his or her true self, there is a need for deep healing.
Sometimes the genius is so strong it refuses to be broken. Yehudi Menuhim, the great violinist, used to go with his parents before he was even four years old to hear violin concerts. The concertmaster Louis Persinger would break into a solo passage as little Yehudi sat with his parents up in the gallery of the Curran Theatre. Later in his life he wrote how, “During one such performance I asked my parents if I might have a violin for my fourth birthday and Louis Persinger to teach me to play it.” It was a very grandiose request for a four year old. His hands weren’t even big enough to hold a violin. But his genius knew what it wanted and needed. His family responded to his request, but with a gift that they considered appropriate for his age and size. On his fourth birthday a family friend gave him a toy violin made of metal with metal strings. He writes, “I burst into sobs, threw it on the ground and would have nothing more to do with it.” (Unfinished Journey, Yehudi Menuhin, NY: Knopf, 1976, p. 22-23)
James Hillman (The Soul’s Code) points out that the soul isn’t age appropriate. Yehudi’s arms could not extend and his fingers could not articulate enough for a full-sized violin; but the vision was full-sized to match the music in his mind. He had to have what he wanted because “I did know, instinctively, that to play was to be.” Sometimes this takes the form of literally crushing the gift. Parents get so impatient with the mismatch between the soul and the fingers that they break the fingers. At other times the soul is wounded when society & family teach children to adopt a common story as they grow up. When the common story is taught before or instead of the soul’s story, everyone loses. Jeremiah admits that under the old covenant or the old agreement this was the case. People started out in life with common laws and a common story. This is a living from the outside in. The new agreement Jeremiah anticipates encourages people to discover their story rather than learn it from someone outside who teaches them. Then we can develop our own relationship to the common story.
A second soul wound that needs to be healed is literalism. Walter Breuggemann speaks of the prophetic imagination. Nothing kills imagination like literalism. Many Christians have tried to turn the prophetic word into literal predictions of things to come. In so doing they miss the energy and the healing power of the prophetic tradition. One of the teachers I met this summer said, “The real problem is a loss of faith in the dream of life and the immediacy of the spirit that animates the world…We are in a struggle for the presence of genuine imagination in the face of the hardening of ideas and the narrowing of hearts that ensues when people make god one-sided and consider their own beliefs to be literally true and universal.” (Water of life, iii)
One powerful example of how taking things too literally destroys imagination is the city of Jerusalem. Jeremiah spoke of the city being rebuilt. But was he talking literally or was he engaging the imagination? Michael Meade speaks about how over the millennia, taking Jerusalem literally has created tremendous conflict. Christianity, Judaism and Islam all see it literally as a place of origin. It is the place that all three religions began according to their stories. It is a place of three feuding brothers. When the world was thought to be flat, Jerusalem was considered the center of the world because on the summer solstice the sun shines exactly vertically on the site of the temple. Maps from that time show Jerusalem as the center from which everything else in the world flowed.
When this view continues to be held literally it leads to terribly destructive strategies. The current administration in this country operates from a literalistic Christian perspective in attempting to get a foothold in Iraq that will eventually lead to Jerusalem so that we can bring freedom to the entire Middle East. That view bumps up against the equally literalistic view of Jewish and Muslim administrations in other nations. Doesn’t that miss the point of the prophetic imagination? Isn’t the prophetic imagination fueled by a mythic vision of Jerusalem as the city of God descending from above? To literalize that vision is to make people spill endless blood on that hill, to fight over other people’s ideas of what happened on that temple mount. In order to heal our souls we need to rediscover the world as a place where the sacred is seen as present and announcing itself all the time. When we disconnect from the sacred, we tend to make the wrong sacrifices over and over again. When we wake up we wonder again about the sacred, and ask if we want to send our children into a sacrifice that we no longer see as having any value. That is happening today as we wonder what is happening to our souls as we keep sending our young to die in Iraq.
So what are the things that heal our souls? This section of the Book of Jeremiah is called the Book of Consolation. In the midst of Jeremiah’s long complaint, he reminds people that judgment is never God’s last word. Restoration and renewal always await us.
Jeremiah offers a number of elements that lead to healing. The whole chapter leading up to the verses we read is full of singing and water, mostly in the form of weeping. “Sing aloud with gladness for Jacob.” “With weeping they shall come, and with consolations I will lead them back. I will let them walk by brooks of water.” “They shall come and sing aloud on the height of Zion.” “Their life shall become like a watered garden.”
Singing and weeping opens the heart to both the sorrow and the joy of the world. Shedding the tears shaped within each heart moves the soul and softens the boundaries between people. Most cultures that are still in touch with their roots know the healing power of singing and weeping. I’ve experienced it mostly among African Americans and Latin Americans. In the presence of anger that is about to get out of hand or sadness that is about to overwhelm, someone breaks into a song and everyone gradually joins in. The singing is often accompanied by weeping as if the waves of sound were washing ancient wounds in a river made fresh with tears.
Tears can also transform anger. But it happens mostly by releasing untold stories that shift the ground on which people are fighting. Storytelling helps us see the larger themes that circle our lives. There was a tense moment one night at the retreat when we got to talking about divorce and marriage. A number of men were telling how they had either anguished over a decision to divorce in the past, or were currently considering divorce in order to save their souls. Their stories were intense, and evoked empathy from many of us. But some of the men and youth were arguing that marriage must be saved no matter what – that it was wrong to talk about saving the soul through something like divorce. Their responses felt like a form of judgment that felt inappropriate and alienating.
Then their stories started coming out. Several young men talked about growing up without a father. They literally pleaded with the men in the room not to abandon their children by getting a divorce. One man was especially harsh and persistent in his judgment. Several men who hadn’t said anything stood up and literally screamed at that man saying how inappropriate his comments were, and how he was alienated from the spirit of the group. This went on for a long time until that man’s story started spilling out: “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be so harsh. But my wife died 18 years ago and I would give anything to have her back, and I just can’t believe that anyone would voluntarily give up something like I long for every day.” Then he started weeping – waves of lament that went on for 10 minutes while the whole room just listened and cried whatever tears his tears evoked in us. It shifted the whole mood. It didn’t eliminate the anger over the judgmentalism, but it built bridges where bridges had been blown up in the previous hour. Tears and songs and stories are powerful elements for healing the soul.
Jeremiah ends this passage offering forgiveness. Stories of forgiveness signal our longing for forgiveness. Ernest Hemingway tells the story of the Spanish father who wanted to be reconciled with his son who ran away from home to the city of Madrid. The father misses the son and puts an advertisement in the local newspaper El Liberal. The advertisement read, "Paco, meet me at the Hotel Montana at noon on Tuesday. All is forgiven! Love, Papa." Paco is such a common name in Spain that when the father went to the Hotel Montana the next day at noon there were 800 young men named Paco waiting for their fathers! Hemingway's story reminds us how desperate all of us are for forgiveness.
Another story is told about a six year old girl named Ruby Bridges taught the world an unforgettable lesson about forgiveness. In 1960, Ruby walked into the William France elementary school in New Orleans, Louisiana the first day after a federal judge mandated the desegregation of the New Orleans school district. Ruby was the only African American student in the entire school. Every day she walked through a gauntlet of angry adults who insulted her with racial slurs and foul language. Robert Coles, the Harvard psychologist, interviewed Ruby Bridges in the midst of this pressure packed situation. Coles had seen the little girl walking through the crowd with her lips moving. He asked, what she was saying? Was she talking back to them?
"No!" she replied.Dr. Coles said that Ruby Bridges' gracious act of forgiveness transformed his own life.
"Then what were you saying?" Coles asked.
"I was praying!"
"Praying?" Robert Coles said in a surprised voice. "Why were you praying?"
Ruby said, "I usually pray before I go to school but this particular morning I forgot so I prayed as I walked into the school."
"What did you pray?" Robert Coles asked.
I prayed, "God forgive them. That's what Jesus did on the cross."
Discovering our own story, and connecting our stories to the stories of others is core work in the healing of our souls. As I shared three weeks ago, Immanuel is entering a year in which we need to engage each other around our stories in order to heal the soul of this church, and to find healing for our own souls. A week from Saturday we will be gathering to share some of the stories that have been emerging this month. I encourage you to join the circle of healing.
October 14, 2007 - Healing through the body: The fountain of youth - Frank Alton
2 Kings 5:1-19
I want to begin this morning by sharing with you why healing is so important to me. I don’t do this to legitimate the theme, because it’s central enough to the Gospel to justify being a major focus. I do it to show how I personally connect to this central theme of the Gospel. Those of you who know me well have heard me speak repeatedly of the healing journey. At some level I have been on a healing journey my entire life, though I have only realized that recently. Until recently I traced my healing journey back to the time when my first wife contracted cancer. I believed there was something in her illness for both of us. So I started psychotherapy as a way to make myself more available both to her and to my own healing during her illness.
But as I became more and more engaged in alternative healing in recent years I remembered that my father brought many forms of alternative healing into our lives at a very early age. We all saw a chiropractor when that was definitely considered a marginal profession by society. He took us to eye doctors who gave us exercises to strengthen our eyes rather than glasses to compensate for their weakness. We drank a variety of beverages mixed with protein powder to keep us healthy. None of my friends’ families did any of these things.
I reconnected to that early journey about 7 ½ years ago, though I didn’t know at the time that I was reconnecting. I had some lower back pain & went to some one offering Chinese healing. I didn’t know at the time what led me to seek that out then. But a few months’ later two things happened that I didn’t connect until over a year later. First, my mom died; and secondly, I decided to work more intensely with the Chinese healer. That healing work opened me to what I thought was a whole new realm of healing. In fact, I was reconnecting to a path I had met as a child.
The focus of my healing has not been as much physical healing as it has been emotional healing, though it is important to remember that back pain was the symptom that led to the most recent part of my healing journey. During my sabbatical a few years ago a friend gave me a book entitled, The Mindbody Prescription, by Dr. John Sarno. It helped me make sense of the connection between physical healing & emotional healing.
Dr. John Sarno teaches that many painful conditions – including most neck and back pain, migraine, repetitive stress injuries, whiplash and tendonitises – are rooted in repressed emotions. “The purpose of symptoms is to prevent repressed feelings from becoming conscious by diverting attention from the realm of the emotions to that of the physical. It is a strategy of avoidance.” He quotes Stanley Coen, a Columbia psychoanalyst, who suggests that the purpose of physical pain is to distract attention from frightening, threatening emotions & to prevent their expression. Symptoms … are players in a strategy designed to keep our attention focused on the body so as to prevent dangerous feelings from escaping into consciousness or to avoid confrontation with feelings that are unbearable.” What they are saying is that our bodies instinctively choose to suffer physical pain rather than threatening emotions because it is less scary.
Dr. Sarno tells the story of a patient he calls Helen whom he treated successfully for low back pain. When she was 47 she remembered having been sexually abused by her father as a child and teenager. After she had been treated by Dr. Sarno she joined a support group for women survivors of incest. Her back began to hurt one day but she reassured herself that she knew the psychological reason for the pain. She described the experience: “I went to the meeting, trying to keep kind of under control and not be totally emotional & miserable with people I had barely met. I wanted to see if this kind of group was really right for me. I found myself, in spite of trying to keep some distance, very much over-whelmed – by the amount of pain & havoc wrought in these women’s lives, as well as my own, by the abuse.”
Over the next 48 hours the pain gradually increased until she was paralyzed with it. She wondered out loud with her husband why the therapeutic concept wasn’t working. He replied, “You’re talking about 40 years of repressed anger.” “Then, in an instant, I started to cry. Not little tears, not sad, quiet oh-my-back-hurts-so-much tears, but the deepest, hardest tears I’ve ever cried. And I heard myself saying things like, Please take care of me, I don’t ever want to have to come out from under the covers, I’m so afraid, please take care of me, don’t hurt me. I couldn’t stop and my husband just held me. As I cried and voiced these feelings, it was as if there was a pipeline from my back and out through my eyes. I FELT the pain almost pour out as I cried. I knew that what I was feeling at that moment was what I felt as a child, when no one would or could take care of me, the sacredness, the grief, the loneliness, the shame, the horror. The feelings were there and they poured over me and out of me.” (The Mindbody Prescription, p. 12-13)
The story of Naaman reveals a similar process. We learn several things about Naaman right from the start. He was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man and a mighty warrior. At the moment of the story he was in high favor with the king because he had won a military victory. The impression we have from all that is of a man who might be a little arrogant, & who might resist receiving help from people he considered beneath him. We are also told that at some point he had contracted leprosy. So we are surprised but not shocked to learn that he took advice from someone who was a child, a girl, a foreigner, a prisoner of war and a servant. She said there was a prophet in Israel who could cure his leprosy. Of course he didn’t relate to her directly – only through his wife. But he did act on her advice. As a commander he figured it was best to deal with kings to set things in motion.
That didn’t go so well. The king of Israel thought he was trying to start a war. Fortunately, Elisha the prophet heard about it and got him to go see him. So Naaman gets in his chariot-cade complete with secret service and heads out to the barrio to meet Elisha, ready to offer him his ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold and ten sets of garments, along with the letter of recommendation he had from his king. Elisha doesn’t even dignify his visit with a personal appearance. He sends a messenger to tell Naaman to go wash seven times in the Jordan River.
Naaman was enraged. “Who the hell does he think he is? He is supposed to come out, stand and call on the name of his God, and wave his hand over my spot of leprosy to cure it. You think I’m going to bathe in your muddy river? If a river is going to heal me, my country has rivers that are 100 times better than this one.” But he really wanted to be healed. So once again he listens to servants – this time his secret service agents. He decides to go ahead and wash in the Jordan. We are told that “his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.”
What would Dr. Sarno say about Naaman’s story? Like Elisha, Dr. Sarno would have seen beneath Naaman’s leprosy to what really needed healing in him. Even without laying eyes on Naaman, Elisha knew what Naaman really needed. The rage that emerged in response to Elisha’s prescription, along with the leprosy itself, were the symptoms of what really needed to be healed at an emotional level.
At what point was Naaman healed? When he went into the water or when he came out of it? It was when Naaman literally stepped off his high horse and decided to step in the water that he found healing. At that moment he embraced his child. That decision awakened childlike parts of him that led both to physical healing and to making him more human in all his relationships – with self, others, God. For Naaman, the dirty Jordan River became the fountain of youth in which he was able to get in touch with his child and become lighter and more playful in his spirit. At a physical level it also had to do with making new cells that restored his flesh to that of a child. That was more than a cure – it was a healing of his whole being.
Healing is different from curing. To cure a disease is to get over the physical symptoms. Most of us want that pretty badly when we are sick. So to distinguish that from healing is tricky. To tell someone that physical healing may not be the point, and that healing is a journey we are on for our whole lives, is often not received as good news. When we’re sick it’s not easy to accept that the healing process usually lasts our whole lives. In the Bible healing is another word for salvation. When I’m not sick I like the word in part because it resonates with what I know of Jesus, whose view of salvation involves less rejecting judgment than other parts of Scripture.
Carolyn Myss (Why we don’t heal, p. x) has authored many books about healing, and has been on her own very intense healing journey. She dares to tell people with physical symptoms that healing is bigger than a cure. Many people get to that understanding eventually, but they may reject it initially. She suggests that “illness can emerge as the answer to a prayer. It can physically guide us onto a path of insight and learning upon which we would otherwise never have set foot. It may be a catalyst for expanding personal consciousness as well as for understanding the greater meaning of life.”
She speaks of three kinds of power. Tribal power is rooted in the belief systems of our families and societies. Individual power begins to take effect when we pursue questions like, “What about me? How do I fit my needs into the obligations I have? What are my needs?” This is where illness can be an answer to prayer because through it we may discover our most valuable abilities and contribute the most to others. We have to exercise our power to choose. Finally, symbolic power reaches down to the level of archetypes to allow us to see beyond the physical meaning of events to view them as divine opportunities to evolve our consciousness. Each is more powerful than the previous, and we must overcome it without wiping it out.
All of this relates to the view we are taking in the Center for Healing. We want to focus on helping people deal with stress, trauma and meaning. Physical illness may be the presenting symptom. But we hope that becomes more an excuse that gets people to focus on their health in holistic and preventative ways. We believe that those in turn will us more physically healthy. Western medicine is often criticized as seeing everything in medical terms. But that is actually a fairly new perspective. As recently as 70 years ago most doctors were family doctors who knew about everything going on in the community. If a factory closed down & laid off workers doc knew the layoff had something to do with symptoms he was seeing. Now we call it alternative medicine. Maybe it’s not alternative; maybe we’re just recovering what is traditional. In fact, it may go back even farther than the prophet Elisha who was already practicing it in the time of Naaman.
I want to begin this morning by sharing with you why healing is so important to me. I don’t do this to legitimate the theme, because it’s central enough to the Gospel to justify being a major focus. I do it to show how I personally connect to this central theme of the Gospel. Those of you who know me well have heard me speak repeatedly of the healing journey. At some level I have been on a healing journey my entire life, though I have only realized that recently. Until recently I traced my healing journey back to the time when my first wife contracted cancer. I believed there was something in her illness for both of us. So I started psychotherapy as a way to make myself more available both to her and to my own healing during her illness.
But as I became more and more engaged in alternative healing in recent years I remembered that my father brought many forms of alternative healing into our lives at a very early age. We all saw a chiropractor when that was definitely considered a marginal profession by society. He took us to eye doctors who gave us exercises to strengthen our eyes rather than glasses to compensate for their weakness. We drank a variety of beverages mixed with protein powder to keep us healthy. None of my friends’ families did any of these things.
I reconnected to that early journey about 7 ½ years ago, though I didn’t know at the time that I was reconnecting. I had some lower back pain & went to some one offering Chinese healing. I didn’t know at the time what led me to seek that out then. But a few months’ later two things happened that I didn’t connect until over a year later. First, my mom died; and secondly, I decided to work more intensely with the Chinese healer. That healing work opened me to what I thought was a whole new realm of healing. In fact, I was reconnecting to a path I had met as a child.
The focus of my healing has not been as much physical healing as it has been emotional healing, though it is important to remember that back pain was the symptom that led to the most recent part of my healing journey. During my sabbatical a few years ago a friend gave me a book entitled, The Mindbody Prescription, by Dr. John Sarno. It helped me make sense of the connection between physical healing & emotional healing.
Dr. John Sarno teaches that many painful conditions – including most neck and back pain, migraine, repetitive stress injuries, whiplash and tendonitises – are rooted in repressed emotions. “The purpose of symptoms is to prevent repressed feelings from becoming conscious by diverting attention from the realm of the emotions to that of the physical. It is a strategy of avoidance.” He quotes Stanley Coen, a Columbia psychoanalyst, who suggests that the purpose of physical pain is to distract attention from frightening, threatening emotions & to prevent their expression. Symptoms … are players in a strategy designed to keep our attention focused on the body so as to prevent dangerous feelings from escaping into consciousness or to avoid confrontation with feelings that are unbearable.” What they are saying is that our bodies instinctively choose to suffer physical pain rather than threatening emotions because it is less scary.
Dr. Sarno tells the story of a patient he calls Helen whom he treated successfully for low back pain. When she was 47 she remembered having been sexually abused by her father as a child and teenager. After she had been treated by Dr. Sarno she joined a support group for women survivors of incest. Her back began to hurt one day but she reassured herself that she knew the psychological reason for the pain. She described the experience: “I went to the meeting, trying to keep kind of under control and not be totally emotional & miserable with people I had barely met. I wanted to see if this kind of group was really right for me. I found myself, in spite of trying to keep some distance, very much over-whelmed – by the amount of pain & havoc wrought in these women’s lives, as well as my own, by the abuse.”
Over the next 48 hours the pain gradually increased until she was paralyzed with it. She wondered out loud with her husband why the therapeutic concept wasn’t working. He replied, “You’re talking about 40 years of repressed anger.” “Then, in an instant, I started to cry. Not little tears, not sad, quiet oh-my-back-hurts-so-much tears, but the deepest, hardest tears I’ve ever cried. And I heard myself saying things like, Please take care of me, I don’t ever want to have to come out from under the covers, I’m so afraid, please take care of me, don’t hurt me. I couldn’t stop and my husband just held me. As I cried and voiced these feelings, it was as if there was a pipeline from my back and out through my eyes. I FELT the pain almost pour out as I cried. I knew that what I was feeling at that moment was what I felt as a child, when no one would or could take care of me, the sacredness, the grief, the loneliness, the shame, the horror. The feelings were there and they poured over me and out of me.” (The Mindbody Prescription, p. 12-13)
The story of Naaman reveals a similar process. We learn several things about Naaman right from the start. He was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man and a mighty warrior. At the moment of the story he was in high favor with the king because he had won a military victory. The impression we have from all that is of a man who might be a little arrogant, & who might resist receiving help from people he considered beneath him. We are also told that at some point he had contracted leprosy. So we are surprised but not shocked to learn that he took advice from someone who was a child, a girl, a foreigner, a prisoner of war and a servant. She said there was a prophet in Israel who could cure his leprosy. Of course he didn’t relate to her directly – only through his wife. But he did act on her advice. As a commander he figured it was best to deal with kings to set things in motion.
That didn’t go so well. The king of Israel thought he was trying to start a war. Fortunately, Elisha the prophet heard about it and got him to go see him. So Naaman gets in his chariot-cade complete with secret service and heads out to the barrio to meet Elisha, ready to offer him his ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold and ten sets of garments, along with the letter of recommendation he had from his king. Elisha doesn’t even dignify his visit with a personal appearance. He sends a messenger to tell Naaman to go wash seven times in the Jordan River.
Naaman was enraged. “Who the hell does he think he is? He is supposed to come out, stand and call on the name of his God, and wave his hand over my spot of leprosy to cure it. You think I’m going to bathe in your muddy river? If a river is going to heal me, my country has rivers that are 100 times better than this one.” But he really wanted to be healed. So once again he listens to servants – this time his secret service agents. He decides to go ahead and wash in the Jordan. We are told that “his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.”
What would Dr. Sarno say about Naaman’s story? Like Elisha, Dr. Sarno would have seen beneath Naaman’s leprosy to what really needed healing in him. Even without laying eyes on Naaman, Elisha knew what Naaman really needed. The rage that emerged in response to Elisha’s prescription, along with the leprosy itself, were the symptoms of what really needed to be healed at an emotional level.
At what point was Naaman healed? When he went into the water or when he came out of it? It was when Naaman literally stepped off his high horse and decided to step in the water that he found healing. At that moment he embraced his child. That decision awakened childlike parts of him that led both to physical healing and to making him more human in all his relationships – with self, others, God. For Naaman, the dirty Jordan River became the fountain of youth in which he was able to get in touch with his child and become lighter and more playful in his spirit. At a physical level it also had to do with making new cells that restored his flesh to that of a child. That was more than a cure – it was a healing of his whole being.
Healing is different from curing. To cure a disease is to get over the physical symptoms. Most of us want that pretty badly when we are sick. So to distinguish that from healing is tricky. To tell someone that physical healing may not be the point, and that healing is a journey we are on for our whole lives, is often not received as good news. When we’re sick it’s not easy to accept that the healing process usually lasts our whole lives. In the Bible healing is another word for salvation. When I’m not sick I like the word in part because it resonates with what I know of Jesus, whose view of salvation involves less rejecting judgment than other parts of Scripture.
Carolyn Myss (Why we don’t heal, p. x) has authored many books about healing, and has been on her own very intense healing journey. She dares to tell people with physical symptoms that healing is bigger than a cure. Many people get to that understanding eventually, but they may reject it initially. She suggests that “illness can emerge as the answer to a prayer. It can physically guide us onto a path of insight and learning upon which we would otherwise never have set foot. It may be a catalyst for expanding personal consciousness as well as for understanding the greater meaning of life.”
She speaks of three kinds of power. Tribal power is rooted in the belief systems of our families and societies. Individual power begins to take effect when we pursue questions like, “What about me? How do I fit my needs into the obligations I have? What are my needs?” This is where illness can be an answer to prayer because through it we may discover our most valuable abilities and contribute the most to others. We have to exercise our power to choose. Finally, symbolic power reaches down to the level of archetypes to allow us to see beyond the physical meaning of events to view them as divine opportunities to evolve our consciousness. Each is more powerful than the previous, and we must overcome it without wiping it out.
All of this relates to the view we are taking in the Center for Healing. We want to focus on helping people deal with stress, trauma and meaning. Physical illness may be the presenting symptom. But we hope that becomes more an excuse that gets people to focus on their health in holistic and preventative ways. We believe that those in turn will us more physically healthy. Western medicine is often criticized as seeing everything in medical terms. But that is actually a fairly new perspective. As recently as 70 years ago most doctors were family doctors who knew about everything going on in the community. If a factory closed down & laid off workers doc knew the layoff had something to do with symptoms he was seeing. Now we call it alternative medicine. Maybe it’s not alternative; maybe we’re just recovering what is traditional. In fact, it may go back even farther than the prophet Elisha who was already practicing it in the time of Naaman.
October 24, 2007 - Use your gifts or lose them - Hayward Fong
Matthew 25: 14-30
A talent as read in this parable is not a coin, but a measure of weight, which if it is silver would be worth over a thousand dollars. The master, planning on being away for some time, and not wanting his estate to lie fallow, divided it among his three servants in proportion to their abilities. The first two doubled their share, but the third being afraid to take the risk of trading with it, merely buried it in the ground. He didn’t even invest it in a FDIC insured interest bearing Certificate of Deposit. The first two were praised and given promise of greater things to come, but the third man was condemned and shut out in the outer darkness.
What was Jesus aiming at with this story? Most commentators suggest that the third servant stood for the Scribes and Pharisees and the Orthodox Jews. Their singular aim in life was to keep things as they were….build a fence around the law. Jesus was a threat because He came up with new ideas about God, about life and about man’s duty in life.
This is a challenge to adventurous religion. In the Christian faith there must be steady development. God is infinite; no one can ever get to the end of God. The riches of Christ are immeasurable; no one can exhaust them. And therefore, every generation should be penetrating deeper and deeper into the truth of God. Throughout every person’s life, learning more and more about God should be a priority.
Yet the whole tendency of orthodox religion is the exact opposite. It is so easy to worship the past, to look back on the “good old days of the golden age” instead of looking forward to greater things. One of our religious hang-ups is first asking where our decisions are going to take us. Our guide should be to follow truth, wherever the truth may lead.
Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick draws this analogy. “What would happen to medicine if doctors were not allowed to take cognizance of any discovery made later than the seventeenth century? In the life of the church there is something far wrong if in three hundred years men have not learned more about the meaning of their religion. In the individual life there is something wrong if a person’s faith remains exactly the same at twenty as it was at ten, or at forty as it was at twenty.” This parable is a challenge to be adventurous enough to follow our thoughts and the guidance of the Holy Spirit wherever they may lead.
This parable teaches another lesson. The man who already has will receive still more, while the man who has not will lose what he has. This is an old Jewish idea. “God gives wisdom only to him who possesses wisdom. He who increases not, decreases.”
As strange as this may sound and unfair as it may seem, this is a universal law of life. The more knowledge a person has, the more that person is able to receive. One who does not read beyond the comic book cannot appreciate the wealth of the classics. One who knows only a little about science cannot understand the vast things of the scientific world. But the more one learns, the greater the wonders one is capable of understanding. And the reverse is true. If we have a little knowledge and make no effort to develop it, we end up losing what we have. Each of us knows this to be true; whether it is our childhood piano lesson long neglected or the high school foreign language we failed to use and now find it left in the classroom.
This is a great and important truth – in life we can never stand still; if we are not going forward, we will end up going backwards, relative to those who are moving ahead. Thus, we must see to it that every day we are advancing, learning something new, doing something a little better.
Besides what we have noted, another lesson stands out. The servants were given differing amounts, according to their individual abilities. The master did not expect them to do what they could not do. Jesus never held that all people were equal in ability. We are all born with different abilities and the test in life is how we use what we are given. It becomes clear that the duty is not to envy someone else his skill but to make the best of our own. The United States Army’ recruiting slogan for many years was, “Be the best you can be.” Though we cannot be equal in achievement we can be equal in effort. The ultimate aim should be to say at the finish, “I have done my best.”
The condemnation of the third servant is that he didn’t try. He didn’t feel like it was worth trying. The world is not made of geniuses. For the most part it is composed of ordinary people doing ordinary jobs, but these ordinary jobs must be done if the world is to go on and God’s plan carried out. It has been said with great wisdom, “God does not want extraordinary people doing extraordinary things nearly so much as He wants ordinary people who do ordinary things well.” Abraham Lincoln probably said it best, “God must love the common people because he made so many of them.” The world depends on people with one talent.
What we do not use we are bound in the end to lose. We may have certain skills and abilities, but if we do not use them we will soon lose them. Whether it is Tiger Woods of golfing fame or Yo-Yo Ma at the cello, if they didn’t practice they would lose their abilities. It is so with knowledge; if we do not keep our knowledge honed, we lose it. The Africans have a proverb “You cannot cut today’s meat with yesterday’s knife.”
If we honestly examine our lives we will see that there is some talent which God has given each of us. It is death to hide that talent; it is life to use it in the service of God and humankind
A talent as read in this parable is not a coin, but a measure of weight, which if it is silver would be worth over a thousand dollars. The master, planning on being away for some time, and not wanting his estate to lie fallow, divided it among his three servants in proportion to their abilities. The first two doubled their share, but the third being afraid to take the risk of trading with it, merely buried it in the ground. He didn’t even invest it in a FDIC insured interest bearing Certificate of Deposit. The first two were praised and given promise of greater things to come, but the third man was condemned and shut out in the outer darkness.
What was Jesus aiming at with this story? Most commentators suggest that the third servant stood for the Scribes and Pharisees and the Orthodox Jews. Their singular aim in life was to keep things as they were….build a fence around the law. Jesus was a threat because He came up with new ideas about God, about life and about man’s duty in life.
This is a challenge to adventurous religion. In the Christian faith there must be steady development. God is infinite; no one can ever get to the end of God. The riches of Christ are immeasurable; no one can exhaust them. And therefore, every generation should be penetrating deeper and deeper into the truth of God. Throughout every person’s life, learning more and more about God should be a priority.
Yet the whole tendency of orthodox religion is the exact opposite. It is so easy to worship the past, to look back on the “good old days of the golden age” instead of looking forward to greater things. One of our religious hang-ups is first asking where our decisions are going to take us. Our guide should be to follow truth, wherever the truth may lead.
Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick draws this analogy. “What would happen to medicine if doctors were not allowed to take cognizance of any discovery made later than the seventeenth century? In the life of the church there is something far wrong if in three hundred years men have not learned more about the meaning of their religion. In the individual life there is something wrong if a person’s faith remains exactly the same at twenty as it was at ten, or at forty as it was at twenty.” This parable is a challenge to be adventurous enough to follow our thoughts and the guidance of the Holy Spirit wherever they may lead.
This parable teaches another lesson. The man who already has will receive still more, while the man who has not will lose what he has. This is an old Jewish idea. “God gives wisdom only to him who possesses wisdom. He who increases not, decreases.”
As strange as this may sound and unfair as it may seem, this is a universal law of life. The more knowledge a person has, the more that person is able to receive. One who does not read beyond the comic book cannot appreciate the wealth of the classics. One who knows only a little about science cannot understand the vast things of the scientific world. But the more one learns, the greater the wonders one is capable of understanding. And the reverse is true. If we have a little knowledge and make no effort to develop it, we end up losing what we have. Each of us knows this to be true; whether it is our childhood piano lesson long neglected or the high school foreign language we failed to use and now find it left in the classroom.
This is a great and important truth – in life we can never stand still; if we are not going forward, we will end up going backwards, relative to those who are moving ahead. Thus, we must see to it that every day we are advancing, learning something new, doing something a little better.
Besides what we have noted, another lesson stands out. The servants were given differing amounts, according to their individual abilities. The master did not expect them to do what they could not do. Jesus never held that all people were equal in ability. We are all born with different abilities and the test in life is how we use what we are given. It becomes clear that the duty is not to envy someone else his skill but to make the best of our own. The United States Army’ recruiting slogan for many years was, “Be the best you can be.” Though we cannot be equal in achievement we can be equal in effort. The ultimate aim should be to say at the finish, “I have done my best.”
The condemnation of the third servant is that he didn’t try. He didn’t feel like it was worth trying. The world is not made of geniuses. For the most part it is composed of ordinary people doing ordinary jobs, but these ordinary jobs must be done if the world is to go on and God’s plan carried out. It has been said with great wisdom, “God does not want extraordinary people doing extraordinary things nearly so much as He wants ordinary people who do ordinary things well.” Abraham Lincoln probably said it best, “God must love the common people because he made so many of them.” The world depends on people with one talent.
What we do not use we are bound in the end to lose. We may have certain skills and abilities, but if we do not use them we will soon lose them. Whether it is Tiger Woods of golfing fame or Yo-Yo Ma at the cello, if they didn’t practice they would lose their abilities. It is so with knowledge; if we do not keep our knowledge honed, we lose it. The Africans have a proverb “You cannot cut today’s meat with yesterday’s knife.”
If we honestly examine our lives we will see that there is some talent which God has given each of us. It is death to hide that talent; it is life to use it in the service of God and humankind
October 17, 2007 - No RSVP Needed - Be Spiritually Dressed and Come! - Hayward Fong
Luke 14:15-24; Matthew 22:11-14
The story of a homeowner inviting guests to a great feast in this manner was quite normal in Palestine. The date would be set, but not the exact hour. The more honored guests were personally summoned and escorted by the servants. The remainder divided themselves into two classes. Those who had no great opinion of their importance would arrive early so as not to miss the event but humbly grateful for the invitation. Those who had a great opinion of themselves would wait until the last minute or actually come in late to make a grand entry and let everyone see that they were there.
In putting the cart before the horse, I want to focus on verses 11-14 in Matthew 22 and leave the Parable of the Wedding Banquet for another Wednesday. Though the Parable of the Wedding Banquet is recorded in both Matthew and Luke, these particular verses are only recorded in Matthew. It reads as if the event took place at the Wedding Feast, however Bible scholars believe that these verses were originally a separate parable. So, I’m going to treat it as a separate parable for today’s lesson.
You will recall from an earlier homily, Jesus had been invited to the home of a Pharisee for dinner and it was at this dinner that they were hoping to entrap Him for blasphemy. During the course of the evening, one of the guests made the remark which brought forth this parable..
The Jews had a picture of what it would be like when the golden days of the new age arrived. There would be this wondrous Messianic banquet that God would give to His people. This guest was probably thinking of this banquet when he made his remarks to Jesus. His thinking would never have envisioned gentiles and sinners having a place at the banquet of God.
Following the Parable of the Wedding Banquet, Jesus told this story of a man who came to the king’s feast in his workaday soiled clothes. The king asked him why. The man was speechless because he had no excuse; and for his discourtesy he was ejected from the feast. How could a king condemn a man for not having a wedding garment when he had just been unexpectedly picked from the streets with no chance to get properly dressed?
Some have tried to get over this difficulty by saying that at such feasts wedding garments were actually provided for the guests to wear, but there is no evidence that this was such a custom.
The idea of guests who came unfittingly dressed and were condemned for doing so was familiar to the Jews. Because only Matthew tells this story, it has been suggested that it was directed to the Jewish people in light of the Gentile influx into the early Church, and to serve as a warning to the Gentiles. True, the Gentiles are allowed in, but they must try to fit themselves for entry into the Kingdom of God.
It was always so easy to make a travesty of the gospel. The Jews had their laws and life became one long arduous continuous effort to keep them. Then Paul came along and told them it was not by keeping the laws that they were saved, but by faith in the free grace of God. Now it could be easy to pervert the truth and say, “All the laws are finished; I can do what I like and I can depend on the grace of God to forgive me!” There were those who argued like that. They said, “You say that the grace of God is wide enough to cover every sin? Well then, let us go on sinning to our hearts content because, after all, the more we sin the more chance we give this wondrous grace of God to operate.” This was using Christian freedom as an excuse for un-Christian license. Paul deals with this in Romans 6. It may well be, then, that Matthew is saying, “It is true that there is free invitation from God to the most unlikely people; nor does it absolve them from the duty of trying to fit themselves to be His guests.”
The duty was no longer a legal duty but a duty born of love. If a person is to be presented at a formal gathering, he must be dressed in a certain way. Attorneys appearing before the United States Supreme Court must be attired in a prescribed manner or they will not be admitted. That is a legal obligation. But suppose two people love each other. When they’re meeting each other, they will dress as attractively as possible. There is no legal obligation; but because they love each other, they want to be at their best. So it may be that Matthew is saying, “Yes, you are released from all these laws; but surely the higher law of love will make you want to fit yourselves to deserve the undeserved love of God.”
Though the setting was in Palestine and the time some two thousand years ago, there is a message for all times and places.
The man without the garments was guilty of three faults.
One needs to have a sense of the fitness of things. Edward Seago, renowned artist tells this story of his travels with gypsies, and painting pictures of them. In one town, he took two gypsy boys into a great cathedral. On the way there, the boys chattered and laughed as normal boys do. But once inside the cathedral, they were as quiet as could be. The atmosphere of the place told them instinctively what was fitting; and instinctively they knew what is the right kind of conduct for the presence of God.
But what we forget is this…we are apt to associate the presence of God with churches and cathedrals and to forget that the whole earth is His temple and that everywhere we are in His presence. It is not only in churches but in all the world that life must be fit for God to see. One should move through life as if living in the temple of God. That does not abolish laughter and joy, for God loves these things; but it does abolish the mean things that are not fit for God to see.
One needs to have a sense of what’s going on. This man came in with one idea…he wanted a meal. He had no thought of joining in the tribute to the king of which the feast was a part. It is almost impossible to share an occasion in any real sense if we don’t know what is going on.
That means, for instance, that we must learn what worship really means. If we go to a concert, we would enjoy it much more if we know something about the instruments, the structure of the symphony, and how the conductor conducts. When we go to a church service we should try to have a clear idea of what is going on in every part of it so we can really share in it.
The man without the garment had no reverence; he had no respect for the king. Reverence is an awareness of the greatness of the person in whose presence we are. When we come to worship we are in the presence of God. We show whether or not we are aware of that in the smallest of things. I suppose the term, “our Sunday best” expresses that awareness. The fact that we may not have good clothes doesn’t prevent us from doing the best with what we have to indicate our awareness of the presence of the King. People will stand for the National Anthem but slouch through the singing of a hymn sung to the King of kings who is present at the worship service. Reverence means being aware into whose presence we are coming and making our conduct, as far as we can, fit that presence.
One general lesson the parable teaches…the necessity of preparing ourselves to come into the presence of God. Too often we leave home at the last moment, rush down the street and arrive without preparation at all in the house of God. Probably, all of us would do well if we take a moment or two to ask God to prepare us to enter into His presence.
The story of a homeowner inviting guests to a great feast in this manner was quite normal in Palestine. The date would be set, but not the exact hour. The more honored guests were personally summoned and escorted by the servants. The remainder divided themselves into two classes. Those who had no great opinion of their importance would arrive early so as not to miss the event but humbly grateful for the invitation. Those who had a great opinion of themselves would wait until the last minute or actually come in late to make a grand entry and let everyone see that they were there.
In putting the cart before the horse, I want to focus on verses 11-14 in Matthew 22 and leave the Parable of the Wedding Banquet for another Wednesday. Though the Parable of the Wedding Banquet is recorded in both Matthew and Luke, these particular verses are only recorded in Matthew. It reads as if the event took place at the Wedding Feast, however Bible scholars believe that these verses were originally a separate parable. So, I’m going to treat it as a separate parable for today’s lesson.
You will recall from an earlier homily, Jesus had been invited to the home of a Pharisee for dinner and it was at this dinner that they were hoping to entrap Him for blasphemy. During the course of the evening, one of the guests made the remark which brought forth this parable..
The Jews had a picture of what it would be like when the golden days of the new age arrived. There would be this wondrous Messianic banquet that God would give to His people. This guest was probably thinking of this banquet when he made his remarks to Jesus. His thinking would never have envisioned gentiles and sinners having a place at the banquet of God.
Following the Parable of the Wedding Banquet, Jesus told this story of a man who came to the king’s feast in his workaday soiled clothes. The king asked him why. The man was speechless because he had no excuse; and for his discourtesy he was ejected from the feast. How could a king condemn a man for not having a wedding garment when he had just been unexpectedly picked from the streets with no chance to get properly dressed?
Some have tried to get over this difficulty by saying that at such feasts wedding garments were actually provided for the guests to wear, but there is no evidence that this was such a custom.
The idea of guests who came unfittingly dressed and were condemned for doing so was familiar to the Jews. Because only Matthew tells this story, it has been suggested that it was directed to the Jewish people in light of the Gentile influx into the early Church, and to serve as a warning to the Gentiles. True, the Gentiles are allowed in, but they must try to fit themselves for entry into the Kingdom of God.
It was always so easy to make a travesty of the gospel. The Jews had their laws and life became one long arduous continuous effort to keep them. Then Paul came along and told them it was not by keeping the laws that they were saved, but by faith in the free grace of God. Now it could be easy to pervert the truth and say, “All the laws are finished; I can do what I like and I can depend on the grace of God to forgive me!” There were those who argued like that. They said, “You say that the grace of God is wide enough to cover every sin? Well then, let us go on sinning to our hearts content because, after all, the more we sin the more chance we give this wondrous grace of God to operate.” This was using Christian freedom as an excuse for un-Christian license. Paul deals with this in Romans 6. It may well be, then, that Matthew is saying, “It is true that there is free invitation from God to the most unlikely people; nor does it absolve them from the duty of trying to fit themselves to be His guests.”
The duty was no longer a legal duty but a duty born of love. If a person is to be presented at a formal gathering, he must be dressed in a certain way. Attorneys appearing before the United States Supreme Court must be attired in a prescribed manner or they will not be admitted. That is a legal obligation. But suppose two people love each other. When they’re meeting each other, they will dress as attractively as possible. There is no legal obligation; but because they love each other, they want to be at their best. So it may be that Matthew is saying, “Yes, you are released from all these laws; but surely the higher law of love will make you want to fit yourselves to deserve the undeserved love of God.”
Though the setting was in Palestine and the time some two thousand years ago, there is a message for all times and places.
The man without the garments was guilty of three faults.
One needs to have a sense of the fitness of things. Edward Seago, renowned artist tells this story of his travels with gypsies, and painting pictures of them. In one town, he took two gypsy boys into a great cathedral. On the way there, the boys chattered and laughed as normal boys do. But once inside the cathedral, they were as quiet as could be. The atmosphere of the place told them instinctively what was fitting; and instinctively they knew what is the right kind of conduct for the presence of God.
But what we forget is this…we are apt to associate the presence of God with churches and cathedrals and to forget that the whole earth is His temple and that everywhere we are in His presence. It is not only in churches but in all the world that life must be fit for God to see. One should move through life as if living in the temple of God. That does not abolish laughter and joy, for God loves these things; but it does abolish the mean things that are not fit for God to see.
One needs to have a sense of what’s going on. This man came in with one idea…he wanted a meal. He had no thought of joining in the tribute to the king of which the feast was a part. It is almost impossible to share an occasion in any real sense if we don’t know what is going on.
That means, for instance, that we must learn what worship really means. If we go to a concert, we would enjoy it much more if we know something about the instruments, the structure of the symphony, and how the conductor conducts. When we go to a church service we should try to have a clear idea of what is going on in every part of it so we can really share in it.
The man without the garment had no reverence; he had no respect for the king. Reverence is an awareness of the greatness of the person in whose presence we are. When we come to worship we are in the presence of God. We show whether or not we are aware of that in the smallest of things. I suppose the term, “our Sunday best” expresses that awareness. The fact that we may not have good clothes doesn’t prevent us from doing the best with what we have to indicate our awareness of the presence of the King. People will stand for the National Anthem but slouch through the singing of a hymn sung to the King of kings who is present at the worship service. Reverence means being aware into whose presence we are coming and making our conduct, as far as we can, fit that presence.
One general lesson the parable teaches…the necessity of preparing ourselves to come into the presence of God. Too often we leave home at the last moment, rush down the street and arrive without preparation at all in the house of God. Probably, all of us would do well if we take a moment or two to ask God to prepare us to enter into His presence.
October 12, 2007
October 10, 2007 - Loosen up your spiritual life and live - Hayward Fong
Matthew 13:1-9; Mark 4:1-9; Luke 8:4-8
According to Matthew, this is the first parable that Jesus told. As you will recall from my earlier homilies, it was the custom in Palestine for crowds to follow famous Rabbis wherever they went so that they could gather some pearls of wisdom from the teachers’ lips. In all probability, a great crowd was following Jesus as he walked by the seashore that day. In order to escape the press of the crowd, Jesus went aboard a boat. As He sat on the boat, as teachers often sat while teaching, it is possible that he was describing something that drew His attention in the fields.
Four types of ground are discussed in this parable.
First there was the wayside ground. In Palestine, the ground was divided in long narrow strips which each landowner could cultivate as he wished. There were no fences to define the boundaries. However, there was a strip between each parcel two to three feet wide that was a public right of way. As such these walkways eventually became as hard as pavement from the traffic. Any seeds that fell on them had no chance of getting into the ground.
Second there was the rocky ground. Jesus was referring to a common geology of the region, ground that consisted of native limestone overlaid with a thin layer of earth. The soil had no depth. Seeds falling on this ground would sprout, but without the moisture and nourishment it needed would wither and die under the heat of the sun.
Third, there was the thorny ground. It would look good, but if weeds had been allowed to seed they would remain and take over, choking out the good seeds. There is a proverb that one year’s seeds make seven years’ weeds.
Finally, there was the good ground, able to take the seeds allowing them to let down deep roots and clean enough to give the seeds a chance to grow.
A man would find these different kinds of ground in Palestine and hearing what Jesus described, would immediately recognize the picture Jesus was drawing.
The traditional interpretation of this parable relates to the word of God and the mind of man. The word of God is always good, but the outcome of it depends on the heart and mind into which it falls. The different kinds of ground allude to the different states of the hearts and minds of men.
The wayside ground alludes to those with shut minds. We have sometimes said of a person, “I might as well talk to a stone wall as to him.” That person’s mind is shut and the truth cannot get through. There are many causes of a shut mind.
One is mental laziness. Some people are so lazy that they refuse to think, leading to an ultimate stage when the man’s mind is shut. But man is a thinking creature and not to think is to shut one’s mind to God’s truth.
Then there is the mental arrogance, an attitude of a “know it all.” This might be described as the attitude of the Pharisees toward Jesus. They didn’t want to know what Jesus had to say because they thought they already knew it all. This is the spirit that leads to intolerance and which shuts the mind to truth. There are many ways to God; no man should shut his mind to every way but his own.
Third, there is the mental fear, or wishful thinking. It is possible for a man to shut his mind, either consciously or unconsciously, to what he does not wish to be true. In the words of the Psalmist, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’ (Psalm 53:1).” The fool as used by the Psalmist does not intellectually deny the existence of God, but rather does not want God to exist. There is a Scottish expression, “There is none so blind as one who does not want to see.”
The rocky ground alludes to those whose faith is shallow. In Christianity it is always necessary to think things out and to think things through. We may be deeply moved and attracted by Christ, but unless we think things out and think them through, whenever a storm comes, or when difficulties arise, faith is likely to collapse. To be a sure faith, the Christian faith must be deeply rooted.
Jesus was always telling men to count the cost of following Him.
When a man wished to become a member of the Benedictine Order of monks, he would be taken in, given a cell and the teaching and training that he required. For the entire first year they left the clothes he had worn in the world in his cell. At any time during the year, he was free to take his clothes and leave. Only after a year did they take his clothes away and leave him with nothing but his monk’s habit. They wished to make sure that the man had counted the cost and knew what he was doing.
When Jesus was talking about thorny ground, He was reminding the people about the danger of allowing a life to become so crowded that the important things are shunted out. It is possible to be so busy living that we do not think about how we are living. We can be so busy doing things that we forget the necessity of prayer and quietness and devotion and study. That is not to say that things that crowd out the important things are bad in themselves. But we must be careful that our lives not be so full of other interests that the main interest is neglected.
And finally we have the good ground. Each of the three writers gives an interpretation of this parable. Bible scholars generally agree that these are not the actual words of Jesus but rather the interpretation the Church has placed upon it. However, if we put the three interpretations together, we get a composite picture of a good listener.
Matthew 12:23 says a good listener understands the word. He does not merely listen, but uses his mental processes to determine what it means? It is well to say, “I will not stop thinking about this until I discover what it really means.”
Mark 4:4-20 says that a good listener accepts the word, that is to say, he takes it right into his mind. He is not one who lets things go in one ear and out the other; rather he is a person who lets it become a part of his thought process and life.
Then Luke 8:15 says a good listener holds the word fast. He accepts the truth in such a way that he obeys it under all circumstances. He doesn’t turn it on and off at his convenience.
So if we bend our minds to find the meaning of the word of God, if we accept it in such a way that it becomes part and parcel of our very being, and if we hold fast to it all times and in all places, it will enable our lives to bring forth a wonderful harvest.
There is however another interpretation of this parable, one that views the parable as spoken mainly to His disciples. To them, Jesus was the most wonderful person in the world, who spoke with wisdom and authority. And yet He was being met with increasing hostility. It was becoming apparent that all His preaching was going for naught. And so, Jesus was telling His disciples the element of risk in following Him, not only to them, but to all those who would follow Him down through the ages, to you and to me.
His disciples were probably thinking about how little was resulting from their efforts. The Master’s message to them and to us today is, “No matter how much seed may seem to be wasted, in the end a great harvest is sure.” A farmer will not stop sowing his seed just because he knows some of it will be wasted. He knows that even if some of the seeds never grow, nevertheless a harvest will result. We must never be discouraged even when nothing seems to be happening. Even if much effort seems to go for nothing, the harvest is sure.
We must be prepared to take the risk. Start with what you have. Don’t wait for perfect conditions. When Abraham Lincoln wanted to learn to read and write, he scraped the surface of a wooden shovel to form a writing surface and created a pencil from a burnt stick. In the Book of Ecclesiastes, we find these words, “He who observes the wind will not sow; and he who regards the clouds will not reap.” (Eccles. 11:4). Risk everything for what you believe to be right. And in the end, God will provide the harvest.
Amen
According to Matthew, this is the first parable that Jesus told. As you will recall from my earlier homilies, it was the custom in Palestine for crowds to follow famous Rabbis wherever they went so that they could gather some pearls of wisdom from the teachers’ lips. In all probability, a great crowd was following Jesus as he walked by the seashore that day. In order to escape the press of the crowd, Jesus went aboard a boat. As He sat on the boat, as teachers often sat while teaching, it is possible that he was describing something that drew His attention in the fields.
Four types of ground are discussed in this parable.
First there was the wayside ground. In Palestine, the ground was divided in long narrow strips which each landowner could cultivate as he wished. There were no fences to define the boundaries. However, there was a strip between each parcel two to three feet wide that was a public right of way. As such these walkways eventually became as hard as pavement from the traffic. Any seeds that fell on them had no chance of getting into the ground.
Second there was the rocky ground. Jesus was referring to a common geology of the region, ground that consisted of native limestone overlaid with a thin layer of earth. The soil had no depth. Seeds falling on this ground would sprout, but without the moisture and nourishment it needed would wither and die under the heat of the sun.
Third, there was the thorny ground. It would look good, but if weeds had been allowed to seed they would remain and take over, choking out the good seeds. There is a proverb that one year’s seeds make seven years’ weeds.
Finally, there was the good ground, able to take the seeds allowing them to let down deep roots and clean enough to give the seeds a chance to grow.
A man would find these different kinds of ground in Palestine and hearing what Jesus described, would immediately recognize the picture Jesus was drawing.
The traditional interpretation of this parable relates to the word of God and the mind of man. The word of God is always good, but the outcome of it depends on the heart and mind into which it falls. The different kinds of ground allude to the different states of the hearts and minds of men.
The wayside ground alludes to those with shut minds. We have sometimes said of a person, “I might as well talk to a stone wall as to him.” That person’s mind is shut and the truth cannot get through. There are many causes of a shut mind.
One is mental laziness. Some people are so lazy that they refuse to think, leading to an ultimate stage when the man’s mind is shut. But man is a thinking creature and not to think is to shut one’s mind to God’s truth.
Then there is the mental arrogance, an attitude of a “know it all.” This might be described as the attitude of the Pharisees toward Jesus. They didn’t want to know what Jesus had to say because they thought they already knew it all. This is the spirit that leads to intolerance and which shuts the mind to truth. There are many ways to God; no man should shut his mind to every way but his own.
Third, there is the mental fear, or wishful thinking. It is possible for a man to shut his mind, either consciously or unconsciously, to what he does not wish to be true. In the words of the Psalmist, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’ (Psalm 53:1).” The fool as used by the Psalmist does not intellectually deny the existence of God, but rather does not want God to exist. There is a Scottish expression, “There is none so blind as one who does not want to see.”
The rocky ground alludes to those whose faith is shallow. In Christianity it is always necessary to think things out and to think things through. We may be deeply moved and attracted by Christ, but unless we think things out and think them through, whenever a storm comes, or when difficulties arise, faith is likely to collapse. To be a sure faith, the Christian faith must be deeply rooted.
Jesus was always telling men to count the cost of following Him.
When a man wished to become a member of the Benedictine Order of monks, he would be taken in, given a cell and the teaching and training that he required. For the entire first year they left the clothes he had worn in the world in his cell. At any time during the year, he was free to take his clothes and leave. Only after a year did they take his clothes away and leave him with nothing but his monk’s habit. They wished to make sure that the man had counted the cost and knew what he was doing.
When Jesus was talking about thorny ground, He was reminding the people about the danger of allowing a life to become so crowded that the important things are shunted out. It is possible to be so busy living that we do not think about how we are living. We can be so busy doing things that we forget the necessity of prayer and quietness and devotion and study. That is not to say that things that crowd out the important things are bad in themselves. But we must be careful that our lives not be so full of other interests that the main interest is neglected.
And finally we have the good ground. Each of the three writers gives an interpretation of this parable. Bible scholars generally agree that these are not the actual words of Jesus but rather the interpretation the Church has placed upon it. However, if we put the three interpretations together, we get a composite picture of a good listener.
Matthew 12:23 says a good listener understands the word. He does not merely listen, but uses his mental processes to determine what it means? It is well to say, “I will not stop thinking about this until I discover what it really means.”
Mark 4:4-20 says that a good listener accepts the word, that is to say, he takes it right into his mind. He is not one who lets things go in one ear and out the other; rather he is a person who lets it become a part of his thought process and life.
Then Luke 8:15 says a good listener holds the word fast. He accepts the truth in such a way that he obeys it under all circumstances. He doesn’t turn it on and off at his convenience.
So if we bend our minds to find the meaning of the word of God, if we accept it in such a way that it becomes part and parcel of our very being, and if we hold fast to it all times and in all places, it will enable our lives to bring forth a wonderful harvest.
There is however another interpretation of this parable, one that views the parable as spoken mainly to His disciples. To them, Jesus was the most wonderful person in the world, who spoke with wisdom and authority. And yet He was being met with increasing hostility. It was becoming apparent that all His preaching was going for naught. And so, Jesus was telling His disciples the element of risk in following Him, not only to them, but to all those who would follow Him down through the ages, to you and to me.
His disciples were probably thinking about how little was resulting from their efforts. The Master’s message to them and to us today is, “No matter how much seed may seem to be wasted, in the end a great harvest is sure.” A farmer will not stop sowing his seed just because he knows some of it will be wasted. He knows that even if some of the seeds never grow, nevertheless a harvest will result. We must never be discouraged even when nothing seems to be happening. Even if much effort seems to go for nothing, the harvest is sure.
We must be prepared to take the risk. Start with what you have. Don’t wait for perfect conditions. When Abraham Lincoln wanted to learn to read and write, he scraped the surface of a wooden shovel to form a writing surface and created a pencil from a burnt stick. In the Book of Ecclesiastes, we find these words, “He who observes the wind will not sow; and he who regards the clouds will not reap.” (Eccles. 11:4). Risk everything for what you believe to be right. And in the end, God will provide the harvest.
Amen
October 11, 2007
October 7, 2007 - Holistic healing: A vision of shalom - Frank Alton
2 Timothy 1:1-7
This morning I begin a sermon series on healing as a way to prepare both Immanuel & myself to open a Center for healing here early next year. Healing has become a core theme for me over the past seven years; this project is close to my heart. I’ve been exposed to a variety of healing techniques. The people who’ve taught them to me have consistently connected them to healing the world. It’s no coincidence I’m introducing this on World Communion Sunday when we receive the Peacemaking Offering. Many healing practices the Center will offer come from other cultures in the world – something worth celebrating & connecting to on World Communion Sunday. I’m convinced the world will never know peace until it knows healing. Shalom involves more than the absence of conflict & healing involves more than curing disease.
Starting a healing center at Immanuel allows us to offer preventive and holistic healing to people in this community. With health care costs and human stress levels at crisis level in this country, ancient healing techniques offer affordable ways for people to care for their bodies, minds, souls and spirits. But beyond the economics of health that concern this community this project responds to a vision of Shalom, a way to integrate our lives around a vision of holistic health. A group of healing practitioners has been quietly gathering around this dream over the past year. Our hope is to formally launch the “Immanuel Center for Healing” early next year. It will not be something brand new. We have been putting many of the elements in place for years.
· 12 years ago we began including anointing and praying for healing during Sunday worship several times a year. This morning are beginning to add that practice to the Sundays that we celebrate Holy Communion during the All Together worship.
· 10 years ago our first parish nurse began offering health services to the community.
· 5 years ago the El Camino counseling center opened, serving the emotional & relational needs of the Spanish speaking population of the Immanuel community.
· In recent years we’ve begun to incorporate more ritual into our All Together worship & spiritual practices like the labyrinth into our life together. We have rediscovered the ancient truth that rituals help communities bring healing to their members.
· 2 years ago we began to offer Yoga classes, and this year added Tai Chi as practices that offer both physical and spiritual benefits.
· Last year several folks at Immanuel began to receive spiritual direction from trained spiritual directors here.
· This year we’ve offered “restoring body and soul” workshops that empower people to access healing capacities of their own bodies.
· Next year as we open the Center we will be launching an integrated approach to healing to help people participate in this variety of healing practices that are custom designed for their own needs. Acupuncture, meditation & other healing practices will be added.
What do we mean by holistic healing? Every time I invite you to participate in the healing services here at IPC, I refer to spiritual, physical, emotional and relational healing. That’s one way to describe it. The “Sh’ma Israel” that we sing every time the Hebrew Scriptures are read at Immanuel includes the well known verse: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, & with all your soul, and with all your might.” That suggests holistic healing might involve unblocking our heart, soul & strength in order to love God fully. If we add the 2nd commandment – that we love our neighbor as ourselves – then being fully human involves the need to unblock all the things that keep us from loving well.
I’ve learned so much about how body, mind and soul offer different yet inter-connected door ways through which healing energies enter our lives. I didn’t know that emotions actually dwell in certain parts of our bodies; or that they release chemicals into our bodies that affect our health. I didn’t know that the indwelling spirit is a form of measurable energy central to our health. On each of the next 3 Sundays we’ll explore one of those doorways: healing through the body, through the soul & through the spirit. The final sermon on All Saints will address healing our relationships with those who have died. Those continue to impact us.
2 Timothy isn’t a passage about healing; but it includes a number of elements of a healthy outlook on life. The author writes as “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, for the sake of the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus.” What is the promise of life? Often in the Bible it refers to the Spirit. The Spirit is not just a pre-scientific concept that only relates to the spiritual realm. The Spirit is the life force that enlivens every aspect of our lives – physical, emotional, relational and spiritual. God’s spirit is at work in us to awaken our own spirit, and at work in the world to awaken the spirit of life. There are elements that block the work of the spirit, and there are practices that help to break through the blockages. Our bodies contain what we need to heal us. The spirit brings life and healing by breaking through the blockages. Judy and I have been attending a series of workshops that are training us in a popular education approach to empower people to unleash the healing energies in our bodies. In popular education one doesn’t become an expert before teaching others; one starts right away. So we have already begun to teach these practices. Our next session is this coming Saturday at 4 PM. I encourage you to come to learn how you can unblock the healing capacity of your body.
A 2nd element of healing the author mentions is a clear conscience. I think that means one has a unified life, in which the different parts of ones life are in agreement with each other. The author saw himself as having achieved that. But it’s not as easy as it sounds, especially when we connect this with another phrase: “rekindle the gift of God that is within you.” Each of us is born with a gift to offer the world. As we grow up that unique gift is challenged from all sides. Healing requires that we become subjects of our lives & of our healing. As that happens we will begin to have more clarity about our gift. Maybe that’s why we lay hands on people both to ordain them for service and to heal them. We are wounded healers. “Each of us carries suffering. This suffering is personal. But where do we end and the rest of creation begins? Going into the wound, we see we wear a common skin and have a common wound. The wound is in us and through us; it is both a personal wound and a World Wound. It connects us to others and opens the eyes of compassion." (Joan Halifax, The Fruitful Darkness, p. 14)
I recently heard this put in terms of first agreements and second agreements. The first agreement is the unique gift from God. That agreement is non-negotiable to the core meaning of our lives. We have to discover it and find a way to live it out. But during our lives we acquire a series of second agreements –commitments to careers, jobs, families, marriages, communities, etc. Sometimes second agreements conflict with first agreements. The challenge of a unified life is to figure out how to bring them together. The challenge may be different for women & men, but it is present for everyone.
Last Friday Judy & I saw the movie, “Into the Wild,” the story of Christopher McCandless. Christopher’s commitment to his 1st agreement, combined with his rejection of what he saw as the hypocritical state of the world exemplified by his parents, let him to leave his family behind and travel into the wilds. It cost him his life; the story ends with the question unresolved as to whether he made the right choice. But in a world where people give up on their first agreements too easily, Christopher’s journey is inspiring & challenging.
The intergenerational connection is another essential element of healing. Timothy is presented as child of Eunice, child of Lois. Lamin Sanneh says that Timothy is not his own. He is united in his parents, scattered in the tribe and gathered under the covenant. His name is fed by blood, nurtured by human milk & inscribed in the soul. When Africans ask "Who are you?" they answers, "I am my mother’s and father’s child, of the lineage of so-and-so, of the house of X and Y, of the tribe of Z." The Western notion of personal independence and psychic autonomy distorts this truth and blocks our healing. We need to be reminded of the Christian perspective on names. Genesis speaks of the unnamed void as chaos, a profound psychological insight. Naming lies at the center of healing and wholeness. With it we remember, recollect, respond, act and celebrate. Without it we invoke the chaos of Genesis, the chaos of modern disenchantment where diseases are named and individuals unnamed in hospitals and clinics; offenders are deprived of their names in courts and jails; the namelessness in workplaces drives people to despair.
Of course we also inherit traumas and wounds from our ancestors - “the sins of parents affecting the generations.” Healing involves becoming aware of these and attending to their healing. When we ignore “traumatic affect & memory we don’t make it disappear; we just create a psychic abscess that infects the rest of the person and subsequent generations.” (Dr. Sandra Bloom, 1997) Healing requires that we address the “sins of the parents” within the person, as well as within the society.
Emotions are another central element in healing. “Recalling your tears I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy.” Tears, longing and joy show how much emotional connection there was between Paul and Timothy. Most of us need emotional healing, an expansion of our emotional vocabulary, & more open access to our emotions. Ritual is a powerful way to heal emotions. I’ve already mentioned the men’s retreat I attended in August in the Redwoods near Mendocino. The 100 men, including 30 young men, spent a lot of time preparing for & participating in rituals. One night we had a grief ritual. At the beginning the facilitator, who has worked with a lot of youth, shared a provocative thought about our culture. In most cultures part of the definition of elder has to do with being a person who has experienced death to a degree that provided wisdom and perspective. But in our culture many young people have witnessed more death than their elders – a consequence of failing to work on emotional healing.
As the next ninety minutes unfolded his description was validated over and over again. Young men from the barrios named brothers, cousins, best friends, uncles and companions who had been killed. Each one spent up to ten minutes naming the names and telling the stories briefly and expressing their grief. My eyes were not dry for even 1 minute. After all had spoken we went outside and cleansed our hands with salt and fire. Then we re-entered the hall and took a candle for each deceased person we wanted to honor. For the next hour we slowly made our way to a makeshift altar of stones the youth had made in the corner, chanting together the whole time. After everyone had laid their candles on the altar the facilitator said that it had been important to honor the ancestors in that way, but that we are called to move on & choose life. He invited us to celebrate life. We switched chants and formed a circle into which one after another moved to perform his unique dance. What those men and the ritual we shared taught me was that we need to acknowledge our losses in community and through ritual in order to recreate a society in which elders once again witness more death than youth.
The final element of healing is a spirit of power in contrast to cowardice. The courage to be ourselves is a huge part of our healing. Some people are able to access that courage earlier in their lives than others. Paul saw Timothy as one of those people & was encouraging him to continue choosing power over cowardice. The core experiences of psychological trauma are disempowerment and disconnection. Experts tell us that recovery is “based upon empowerment of the survivor & the creation of new connections.” (Judith Lewis Herman, 1992) The fundamental stages of recovery are establishing safety, reconstructing the trauma story, and restoring the connection between survivors and their community. The healing stories in the Gospel involving Jesus involve these same stages.
The world tends to think of healing in terms of physical health. Many of you think more broadly than that. I hope I’ve stimulated you to access that broader thinking more fully. Do you want to be healed? That is a question that life continues to ask us. I’m trying to answer in the affirmative more often.
This morning I begin a sermon series on healing as a way to prepare both Immanuel & myself to open a Center for healing here early next year. Healing has become a core theme for me over the past seven years; this project is close to my heart. I’ve been exposed to a variety of healing techniques. The people who’ve taught them to me have consistently connected them to healing the world. It’s no coincidence I’m introducing this on World Communion Sunday when we receive the Peacemaking Offering. Many healing practices the Center will offer come from other cultures in the world – something worth celebrating & connecting to on World Communion Sunday. I’m convinced the world will never know peace until it knows healing. Shalom involves more than the absence of conflict & healing involves more than curing disease.
Starting a healing center at Immanuel allows us to offer preventive and holistic healing to people in this community. With health care costs and human stress levels at crisis level in this country, ancient healing techniques offer affordable ways for people to care for their bodies, minds, souls and spirits. But beyond the economics of health that concern this community this project responds to a vision of Shalom, a way to integrate our lives around a vision of holistic health. A group of healing practitioners has been quietly gathering around this dream over the past year. Our hope is to formally launch the “Immanuel Center for Healing” early next year. It will not be something brand new. We have been putting many of the elements in place for years.
· 12 years ago we began including anointing and praying for healing during Sunday worship several times a year. This morning are beginning to add that practice to the Sundays that we celebrate Holy Communion during the All Together worship.
· 10 years ago our first parish nurse began offering health services to the community.
· 5 years ago the El Camino counseling center opened, serving the emotional & relational needs of the Spanish speaking population of the Immanuel community.
· In recent years we’ve begun to incorporate more ritual into our All Together worship & spiritual practices like the labyrinth into our life together. We have rediscovered the ancient truth that rituals help communities bring healing to their members.
· 2 years ago we began to offer Yoga classes, and this year added Tai Chi as practices that offer both physical and spiritual benefits.
· Last year several folks at Immanuel began to receive spiritual direction from trained spiritual directors here.
· This year we’ve offered “restoring body and soul” workshops that empower people to access healing capacities of their own bodies.
· Next year as we open the Center we will be launching an integrated approach to healing to help people participate in this variety of healing practices that are custom designed for their own needs. Acupuncture, meditation & other healing practices will be added.
What do we mean by holistic healing? Every time I invite you to participate in the healing services here at IPC, I refer to spiritual, physical, emotional and relational healing. That’s one way to describe it. The “Sh’ma Israel” that we sing every time the Hebrew Scriptures are read at Immanuel includes the well known verse: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, & with all your soul, and with all your might.” That suggests holistic healing might involve unblocking our heart, soul & strength in order to love God fully. If we add the 2nd commandment – that we love our neighbor as ourselves – then being fully human involves the need to unblock all the things that keep us from loving well.
I’ve learned so much about how body, mind and soul offer different yet inter-connected door ways through which healing energies enter our lives. I didn’t know that emotions actually dwell in certain parts of our bodies; or that they release chemicals into our bodies that affect our health. I didn’t know that the indwelling spirit is a form of measurable energy central to our health. On each of the next 3 Sundays we’ll explore one of those doorways: healing through the body, through the soul & through the spirit. The final sermon on All Saints will address healing our relationships with those who have died. Those continue to impact us.
2 Timothy isn’t a passage about healing; but it includes a number of elements of a healthy outlook on life. The author writes as “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, for the sake of the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus.” What is the promise of life? Often in the Bible it refers to the Spirit. The Spirit is not just a pre-scientific concept that only relates to the spiritual realm. The Spirit is the life force that enlivens every aspect of our lives – physical, emotional, relational and spiritual. God’s spirit is at work in us to awaken our own spirit, and at work in the world to awaken the spirit of life. There are elements that block the work of the spirit, and there are practices that help to break through the blockages. Our bodies contain what we need to heal us. The spirit brings life and healing by breaking through the blockages. Judy and I have been attending a series of workshops that are training us in a popular education approach to empower people to unleash the healing energies in our bodies. In popular education one doesn’t become an expert before teaching others; one starts right away. So we have already begun to teach these practices. Our next session is this coming Saturday at 4 PM. I encourage you to come to learn how you can unblock the healing capacity of your body.
A 2nd element of healing the author mentions is a clear conscience. I think that means one has a unified life, in which the different parts of ones life are in agreement with each other. The author saw himself as having achieved that. But it’s not as easy as it sounds, especially when we connect this with another phrase: “rekindle the gift of God that is within you.” Each of us is born with a gift to offer the world. As we grow up that unique gift is challenged from all sides. Healing requires that we become subjects of our lives & of our healing. As that happens we will begin to have more clarity about our gift. Maybe that’s why we lay hands on people both to ordain them for service and to heal them. We are wounded healers. “Each of us carries suffering. This suffering is personal. But where do we end and the rest of creation begins? Going into the wound, we see we wear a common skin and have a common wound. The wound is in us and through us; it is both a personal wound and a World Wound. It connects us to others and opens the eyes of compassion." (Joan Halifax, The Fruitful Darkness, p. 14)
I recently heard this put in terms of first agreements and second agreements. The first agreement is the unique gift from God. That agreement is non-negotiable to the core meaning of our lives. We have to discover it and find a way to live it out. But during our lives we acquire a series of second agreements –commitments to careers, jobs, families, marriages, communities, etc. Sometimes second agreements conflict with first agreements. The challenge of a unified life is to figure out how to bring them together. The challenge may be different for women & men, but it is present for everyone.
Last Friday Judy & I saw the movie, “Into the Wild,” the story of Christopher McCandless. Christopher’s commitment to his 1st agreement, combined with his rejection of what he saw as the hypocritical state of the world exemplified by his parents, let him to leave his family behind and travel into the wilds. It cost him his life; the story ends with the question unresolved as to whether he made the right choice. But in a world where people give up on their first agreements too easily, Christopher’s journey is inspiring & challenging.
The intergenerational connection is another essential element of healing. Timothy is presented as child of Eunice, child of Lois. Lamin Sanneh says that Timothy is not his own. He is united in his parents, scattered in the tribe and gathered under the covenant. His name is fed by blood, nurtured by human milk & inscribed in the soul. When Africans ask "Who are you?" they answers, "I am my mother’s and father’s child, of the lineage of so-and-so, of the house of X and Y, of the tribe of Z." The Western notion of personal independence and psychic autonomy distorts this truth and blocks our healing. We need to be reminded of the Christian perspective on names. Genesis speaks of the unnamed void as chaos, a profound psychological insight. Naming lies at the center of healing and wholeness. With it we remember, recollect, respond, act and celebrate. Without it we invoke the chaos of Genesis, the chaos of modern disenchantment where diseases are named and individuals unnamed in hospitals and clinics; offenders are deprived of their names in courts and jails; the namelessness in workplaces drives people to despair.
Of course we also inherit traumas and wounds from our ancestors - “the sins of parents affecting the generations.” Healing involves becoming aware of these and attending to their healing. When we ignore “traumatic affect & memory we don’t make it disappear; we just create a psychic abscess that infects the rest of the person and subsequent generations.” (Dr. Sandra Bloom, 1997) Healing requires that we address the “sins of the parents” within the person, as well as within the society.
Emotions are another central element in healing. “Recalling your tears I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy.” Tears, longing and joy show how much emotional connection there was between Paul and Timothy. Most of us need emotional healing, an expansion of our emotional vocabulary, & more open access to our emotions. Ritual is a powerful way to heal emotions. I’ve already mentioned the men’s retreat I attended in August in the Redwoods near Mendocino. The 100 men, including 30 young men, spent a lot of time preparing for & participating in rituals. One night we had a grief ritual. At the beginning the facilitator, who has worked with a lot of youth, shared a provocative thought about our culture. In most cultures part of the definition of elder has to do with being a person who has experienced death to a degree that provided wisdom and perspective. But in our culture many young people have witnessed more death than their elders – a consequence of failing to work on emotional healing.
As the next ninety minutes unfolded his description was validated over and over again. Young men from the barrios named brothers, cousins, best friends, uncles and companions who had been killed. Each one spent up to ten minutes naming the names and telling the stories briefly and expressing their grief. My eyes were not dry for even 1 minute. After all had spoken we went outside and cleansed our hands with salt and fire. Then we re-entered the hall and took a candle for each deceased person we wanted to honor. For the next hour we slowly made our way to a makeshift altar of stones the youth had made in the corner, chanting together the whole time. After everyone had laid their candles on the altar the facilitator said that it had been important to honor the ancestors in that way, but that we are called to move on & choose life. He invited us to celebrate life. We switched chants and formed a circle into which one after another moved to perform his unique dance. What those men and the ritual we shared taught me was that we need to acknowledge our losses in community and through ritual in order to recreate a society in which elders once again witness more death than youth.
The final element of healing is a spirit of power in contrast to cowardice. The courage to be ourselves is a huge part of our healing. Some people are able to access that courage earlier in their lives than others. Paul saw Timothy as one of those people & was encouraging him to continue choosing power over cowardice. The core experiences of psychological trauma are disempowerment and disconnection. Experts tell us that recovery is “based upon empowerment of the survivor & the creation of new connections.” (Judith Lewis Herman, 1992) The fundamental stages of recovery are establishing safety, reconstructing the trauma story, and restoring the connection between survivors and their community. The healing stories in the Gospel involving Jesus involve these same stages.
The world tends to think of healing in terms of physical health. Many of you think more broadly than that. I hope I’ve stimulated you to access that broader thinking more fully. Do you want to be healed? That is a question that life continues to ask us. I’m trying to answer in the affirmative more often.
October 3, 2007 - From a single seed, a shining tree - Hayward Fong
Matt. 13:31, 32; Mark 4:30-32; Luke 13:18, 19
We heard three accounts of the parable of the mustard seed. Matthew and Mark’s accounts are essentially the same. Luke’s account is different in a major aspect and we will look at that in a few moments.
In the Middle East, the mustard seed was proverbially the smallest of all things, though in fact it was not. However, it was used as a point of reference in this part of the world for anything infinitesimally small.
In Matthew and Mark, the clear point of the parable is the fact that in time the smallest seed grows into the largest of herbs. Mustard in Palestine is not a garden herb, but a field crop. It grows easily to a height of eight feet with branches of a tree. And birds come and nest in its branches; they love the little black seeds they pick from the pods. So the first lesson the parable is that though a thing may start from the smallest beginnings it may end up being something great.
When Jesus was telling this parable, he was conveying a special message to his disciples. They were bewildered and discouraged. They had hoped for so much and so little had happened. Even the little that had happened was in danger of being engulfed by the growing opposition to Jesus. The mission of John the Baptist has been extremely impressive, crowds flocked out to listen to him and to accept his baptism. And John himself had clearly preached that greater days were ahead and greater things were to happen. He told them that his mission would decline and the one who came after him would do greater things.
With these accounts by John, the disciples could not help but be expecting impressive and sensational happenings. At first when the crowds flocked after Jesus it must have appeared that this was coming true. But as opposition increased, the crowds began to abandon Jesus and it became apparent that His mission that had started with such promise was likely to end in failure and disaster. And so it was that Jesus told this parable to help them see that the beginnings might seem small but no man knew to what they would grow. If His message took hold, they could not help but conclude that they were the small beginning and that everything depended on them.
Apart from the truth that the parable sent to the disciples, it is a truth that is universal. The greatest things start with the smallest beginnings. Our music starts with the eight notes forming the octave. Our literature starts with the twenty-six letters comprising our alphabet. We live in an age that seeks size and numbers. Yet history shows us that it is not the big things but the small beginnings that are of great importance.
Our nation had its genesis on December 11, 1620 aboard a ship called the Mayflower with 101 people seeking religious liberty. History has shown what that little ship with that little group has done to change the world, more than all the Titanics in the centuries to come.
Think of the few people who have heard or seen Jesus. The total number of His followers after His resurrection and ascension was one hundred and twenty (Acts 1:15), less than the number of members on Immanuel’s official church rolls or about the number of our attendance at the All Together Worship on a good Sunday. Today in our world of television, a person with an important message can reach millions. Out of that small beginning came the Christian Church as we know it today. We must never be discouraged by small beginnings and by the apparently infinitesimal effect that we can have. If a thing is right it has God behind it and in the end it will make its mark.
Measured from hour to hour, and day to day, we cannot see the mustard seed growing. But when we compare the beginning with the end, the growth is plain to see. We live in an age where we want to see instant results…lose 40 pounds in 30 days, double our investment returns every year. Great things seldom happen that way.
If you recall your physics class and one of Lord Kelvin’s experiments, you can see the cumulative effects of small efforts. He made a bunch of paper pellets about the size of a pea. He hung a large paper weight and began to pelt the mass of iron with the paper pellets. At first nothing happened but after a time it began to vibrate, then it began to sway until eventually it was swinging freely. We may think that all we can do is so little as to be ineffective. But the cumulative effect of the small efforts of every person can be used mightily by God in bringing in His kingdom.
What is the relevancy of this parable to the church today in bringing in the His kingdom? We live in a society where things are manufactured and sold as “one size fits all.” The church down through the years has adopted a somewhat similar approach to the matter of conversion. They have taken one type of experience and insist that it alone is the pattern to which all other experience must fit.
How many of us have experienced the blinding flash that Saul encountered on the road to Damascus? Stop and think…what was Saul doing at the time on the road…he was en-route to a mission of persecuting Christians and destroying the infant Christian community. His conversion was one which literally turned is life upside down. Many of the early converts were heathens with a set of creeds and ethical system that did not involve a higher power. Their conversions were also sudden and an abrupt change from their former beliefs.
These conversions may still be the case among society today. But what about the children who are brought up in a Christian home, prayed as their parents taught them, attended Sunday School, never took the Lord’s name in vain, never sought to destroy Christ or the Christian church…what about these individuals? Thoreau, when asked, “Have you made your peace with God?” replied, “I never knew that He was my enemy.”
These represent two different ways in building up the church of Jesus Christ. In the first instance, man comes from a position of hostility to Christ to a position of love for Christ. In the second example, the children grow in the nurture of a Christian environment in which their roots sink deeper and deeper into Christianity as they learn more and more about Jesus Christ until that day when they make their personal decision in a natural manner to accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
There is more than one way to open the door into a room. We can make a violent entrance by jerking it open or kicking it down or we can open it gradually, little by little, until the room is open to our view. Not everyone needs an experience as Saul in his conversion to Paul. Persons who have known about Christ can blossom like a flower, petal by petal, until they know Christ.
I mentioned at the beginning that Luke’s version of this parable was different in a major aspect. He made no reference to the smallness of the seed. His point was that some day the birds of the air came and lodged in the branches. In eastern thought one of the commonest pictures was to depict a great tree with many branches; the birds on the branches signify the people who are part of a great empire and who find peace and safety within it. Luke’s idea is that the parable means the Kingdom is like a great tree with many branches in which people shall find peace and rest.
This is a great thought. By implication it means that it does not matter how many branches there are in the Church so long as they are all stemmed in Christ. This also serves as a warning against exclusiveness. So often people insist that their way is the only way and their Church is the only true one. John Wesley said, “You can be saved in any Church and you can be damned in any Church. What matters is, how is your heart with Christ.”
The fact that we have so many branches should be looked upon as a great virtue and blessing. Not all people worship alike. The important thing is that the person finds God. The diversity is the glory of our Church when stemmed in Christ.
In World War II, regimental traditions were a source of pride. And it was good to identify with the history of the unit. But we never lost sight of the fact that the regiment was a part of a larger unit…the division, and the division was a part of larger units, the corps, the Army, the Army Group, the Theater Army, and the Theater.
Always remember that it is Christ who unites us, the tree in whom all the branches are stemmed and from whom all draw their life.
Amen.
We heard three accounts of the parable of the mustard seed. Matthew and Mark’s accounts are essentially the same. Luke’s account is different in a major aspect and we will look at that in a few moments.
In the Middle East, the mustard seed was proverbially the smallest of all things, though in fact it was not. However, it was used as a point of reference in this part of the world for anything infinitesimally small.
In Matthew and Mark, the clear point of the parable is the fact that in time the smallest seed grows into the largest of herbs. Mustard in Palestine is not a garden herb, but a field crop. It grows easily to a height of eight feet with branches of a tree. And birds come and nest in its branches; they love the little black seeds they pick from the pods. So the first lesson the parable is that though a thing may start from the smallest beginnings it may end up being something great.
When Jesus was telling this parable, he was conveying a special message to his disciples. They were bewildered and discouraged. They had hoped for so much and so little had happened. Even the little that had happened was in danger of being engulfed by the growing opposition to Jesus. The mission of John the Baptist has been extremely impressive, crowds flocked out to listen to him and to accept his baptism. And John himself had clearly preached that greater days were ahead and greater things were to happen. He told them that his mission would decline and the one who came after him would do greater things.
With these accounts by John, the disciples could not help but be expecting impressive and sensational happenings. At first when the crowds flocked after Jesus it must have appeared that this was coming true. But as opposition increased, the crowds began to abandon Jesus and it became apparent that His mission that had started with such promise was likely to end in failure and disaster. And so it was that Jesus told this parable to help them see that the beginnings might seem small but no man knew to what they would grow. If His message took hold, they could not help but conclude that they were the small beginning and that everything depended on them.
Apart from the truth that the parable sent to the disciples, it is a truth that is universal. The greatest things start with the smallest beginnings. Our music starts with the eight notes forming the octave. Our literature starts with the twenty-six letters comprising our alphabet. We live in an age that seeks size and numbers. Yet history shows us that it is not the big things but the small beginnings that are of great importance.
Our nation had its genesis on December 11, 1620 aboard a ship called the Mayflower with 101 people seeking religious liberty. History has shown what that little ship with that little group has done to change the world, more than all the Titanics in the centuries to come.
Think of the few people who have heard or seen Jesus. The total number of His followers after His resurrection and ascension was one hundred and twenty (Acts 1:15), less than the number of members on Immanuel’s official church rolls or about the number of our attendance at the All Together Worship on a good Sunday. Today in our world of television, a person with an important message can reach millions. Out of that small beginning came the Christian Church as we know it today. We must never be discouraged by small beginnings and by the apparently infinitesimal effect that we can have. If a thing is right it has God behind it and in the end it will make its mark.
Measured from hour to hour, and day to day, we cannot see the mustard seed growing. But when we compare the beginning with the end, the growth is plain to see. We live in an age where we want to see instant results…lose 40 pounds in 30 days, double our investment returns every year. Great things seldom happen that way.
If you recall your physics class and one of Lord Kelvin’s experiments, you can see the cumulative effects of small efforts. He made a bunch of paper pellets about the size of a pea. He hung a large paper weight and began to pelt the mass of iron with the paper pellets. At first nothing happened but after a time it began to vibrate, then it began to sway until eventually it was swinging freely. We may think that all we can do is so little as to be ineffective. But the cumulative effect of the small efforts of every person can be used mightily by God in bringing in His kingdom.
What is the relevancy of this parable to the church today in bringing in the His kingdom? We live in a society where things are manufactured and sold as “one size fits all.” The church down through the years has adopted a somewhat similar approach to the matter of conversion. They have taken one type of experience and insist that it alone is the pattern to which all other experience must fit.
How many of us have experienced the blinding flash that Saul encountered on the road to Damascus? Stop and think…what was Saul doing at the time on the road…he was en-route to a mission of persecuting Christians and destroying the infant Christian community. His conversion was one which literally turned is life upside down. Many of the early converts were heathens with a set of creeds and ethical system that did not involve a higher power. Their conversions were also sudden and an abrupt change from their former beliefs.
These conversions may still be the case among society today. But what about the children who are brought up in a Christian home, prayed as their parents taught them, attended Sunday School, never took the Lord’s name in vain, never sought to destroy Christ or the Christian church…what about these individuals? Thoreau, when asked, “Have you made your peace with God?” replied, “I never knew that He was my enemy.”
These represent two different ways in building up the church of Jesus Christ. In the first instance, man comes from a position of hostility to Christ to a position of love for Christ. In the second example, the children grow in the nurture of a Christian environment in which their roots sink deeper and deeper into Christianity as they learn more and more about Jesus Christ until that day when they make their personal decision in a natural manner to accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
There is more than one way to open the door into a room. We can make a violent entrance by jerking it open or kicking it down or we can open it gradually, little by little, until the room is open to our view. Not everyone needs an experience as Saul in his conversion to Paul. Persons who have known about Christ can blossom like a flower, petal by petal, until they know Christ.
I mentioned at the beginning that Luke’s version of this parable was different in a major aspect. He made no reference to the smallness of the seed. His point was that some day the birds of the air came and lodged in the branches. In eastern thought one of the commonest pictures was to depict a great tree with many branches; the birds on the branches signify the people who are part of a great empire and who find peace and safety within it. Luke’s idea is that the parable means the Kingdom is like a great tree with many branches in which people shall find peace and rest.
This is a great thought. By implication it means that it does not matter how many branches there are in the Church so long as they are all stemmed in Christ. This also serves as a warning against exclusiveness. So often people insist that their way is the only way and their Church is the only true one. John Wesley said, “You can be saved in any Church and you can be damned in any Church. What matters is, how is your heart with Christ.”
The fact that we have so many branches should be looked upon as a great virtue and blessing. Not all people worship alike. The important thing is that the person finds God. The diversity is the glory of our Church when stemmed in Christ.
In World War II, regimental traditions were a source of pride. And it was good to identify with the history of the unit. But we never lost sight of the fact that the regiment was a part of a larger unit…the division, and the division was a part of larger units, the corps, the Army, the Army Group, the Theater Army, and the Theater.
Always remember that it is Christ who unites us, the tree in whom all the branches are stemmed and from whom all draw their life.
Amen.
October 2, 2007
30 de septiembre de 2007 - El mismo sentir, diferentes opiniones - Frank Alton
Filipenses 2:1-15
¿Es posible que personas se queden juntas cuando están en desacuerdo sobre asuntos que consideran centrales a su vida? Hablo de parejas, familias, comunidades y naciones. Todos sabemos que sí pueden. Pero también sabemos que no siempre lo hacen. En mi familia daba susto pelear. Generalmente llevaba a una rotura temporal en la relación. Mi hermana y yo peleábamos mucho. Al principio nos costaba semanas reconciliar. Después costaba meses o años para volver a la relación. La familia con quien vivo ahora es diferente. Mis hijos pueden estar gritando, y 5 minutos después están abrazándose. Me ha tomado años darme cuenta que un pleito entre mis hijos o con mis hijos no iba a crear una alienación semi-permanente.
¿Cómo se manejaban los pleitos en tu familia? Pregunto porque creo que la respuesta dice mucho sobre como peleamos en la iglesia. Tras los años la gente ha discutido muchos asuntos en la iglesia. Todavía lo hacemos. Algunos parecen ridículos; otros todavía se toman en serio. ¿Pueden gente de color y gente blanca adorar a Dios en la misma iglesia? ¿Está bien que las mujeres usan pantalones en la iglesia? ¿Debemos callar a los niños en la iglesia? ¿Las mujeres pueden ser pastores? ¿Debemos permitir que gente divorciada sea ancianos y diáconos?
Hoy escuchamos muchas noticias sobre iglesias que se dividen o amenazan dividir sobre el asunto del sexo. En las últimas décadas el debate ha girado en torno al sexo entre personas del mismo género – hombres con hombres, mujeres con mujeres. Hace poco escuché a un obispo Luterano hacer una broma con la audiencia, señalando lo fácil que es para la gente heterosexual enfocar la atención sobre las prácticas sexuales de la gente homosexual para que no tenga que enfrentar todos los asuntos relacionados con su propia sexualidad. La verdad es que la mayoría de iglesias nunca hablan del sexo, a menos que sea para prohibirlo. Mucha gente preferiría que siguiera así, igual que preferiría que la iglesia nunca hablaría de la política, la economía o la guerra. La gente tiende a pelear sobre esos temas. ¿Quién quiere más razones para pelear en la iglesia?
¿Es cierto que tenemos que hablar sobre nuestros desacuerdos en la iglesia? La gente a veces me dice, “No vengo a la iglesia para escuchar sobre la política y el sexo. Voy para salir de todo esto.” Una vez a la semana quieren escapar la violencia y disgusto del resto del mundo para escuchar una palabra de esperanza y consuelo. ¿Alguna vez has sentido así? Yo sé que sí. Me simpatizo con ese sentir. Oigan: yo soy la persona que algunos quieren que hable más sobre el sexo y otros que hable menos. Y yo no lo encuentro fácil hablar del sexo. Cuando yo era niño no se hablaba del sexo en compañía mixta. Pero veo lo que está pasando a la iglesia y al mundo porque no estamos hablando del sexo, y no está bonito.
Apenas a noche me acordé. Estaba distribuyendo volantes cerca del Parque LaFayette sobre una vigilia que íbamos a tener para un hombre matado el jueves en la mañana al salir del Winchell’s en la Hoover y séptima. Tenía mi camisa clerical que uso para eventos públicos donde ayuda a la gente enfocarse en cosas espirituales fuera del templo. Entregué unos volantes a un grupo de hombres embriagados. Uno me miró y dijo, “¿Por qué debo ir con usted? ¿No es uno de los que abusan a los niños?”
Esto pasa porque la iglesia no ha sabido hablar sobre el sexo y tratar el tema en la iglesia. ¿Todos los sacerdotes abusan niños? Por supuesto que no. ¿Todos los que abusan niños son homosexuales? Tampoco. Hemos escuchado esto mucho desde el anuncio que hay una persona en nuestra comunidad que fue arrestado hace 22 años por abusar a un niño. Pero la verdad es que es mucho más probable que un niño sea abusado por una persona heterosexual. Es difícil cambiar los estereotipos cuando no hablamos del sexo.
En Immanuel hemos decidido que no podemos esperar más. El Consistorio se ha comprometido invitar a la congregación participar en conversaciones sobre el sexo durante este año. Tenemos que hablar sobre la orientación sexual porque es un tema tan controversial. Pero nunca entenderemos la orientación sexual si no ampliamos la conversación para incluir otros aspectos del sexo – incluyendo nuestras propias luchas en esa área de la vida. Por la mayoría de su historia la iglesia ha puesto el sexo en la categoría de prohibiciones en vez de cosas para celebrar. Es hora de cambiar esto.
Pero al preparar l conversación el Consistorio se dio cuenta que antes debemos invertir tiempo pensando en como mantener nuestra unidad mientras discutimos. El sexo no es el único tema que discutimos en Immanuel. Solo es uno que evoca mucha pasión. También tenemos diferencias de opinión sobre la inmigración. He tenido que responder a preguntas de miembros sobre por qué estamos hospedando a Yolanda en la iglesia cuando el gobierno le ha dado orden de deportación. Tenemos que hablar.
Pero mientras discutimos tenemos que vivir en una manera que tenga integridad. Immanuel se ha atrevido cuestionar la autoridad cuando la autoridad pide que actuemos en maneras que creemos que nos lleva a desobedecer la enseñanza de Jesús. Mucho antes de que yo empecé a ser pastor aquí, Immanuel estaba ordenando e instalando como diáconos y ancianos a personas de varias orientaciones sexuales. Algunos miembros todavía no están de acuerdo con esa práctica. La Iglesia Presbiteriana misma no ha resuelto la pregunta. Mientras tanto, en la mayoría de las iglesias, la gente gay, lesbiana, bisexual y transgénera son marginadas. Así no es como Jesús trataba a la gente. Por eso, tenemos una práctica diferente en Immanuel. Los miembros no tienen que estar de acuerdo con nuestras pólizas y prácticas. Tienen el derecho de luchar para cambiarlas. Pero en el camino tenemos que mantener el respeto mutuo para todos.
Lo mismo pasa con la inmigración. El Consistorio ha aprobado pólizas que apoyan a los indocumentados. Nos unimos al Movimiento de Santuario para poner esas pólizas en práctica. ¿Por qué? Porque en la misma manera que los líderes religiosos no han llegado a un acuerdo sobre la orientación sexual, los líderes políticos no encuentran un acuerdo sobre pólizas justas de inmigración. Mientras tanto, millones de inmigrantes viven situaciones degradantes y amenazadoras. Así no es como Jesús trataba a la gente. Entonces hospedamos a Yolanda porque creemos que hay una ley más alta de compasión, y algunos tenemos que experimentar con alternativas creativas.
A pesar de estas pólizas y prácticas radicales, la congregación no ha tenido mucha conversación ni sobre la sexualidad ni sobre la inmigración. Algunos ni están enterados. Otros están en desacuerdo. Tenemos que actuar aún cuando no hemos logrado un acuerdo. No podemos ordenar y no ordenar gays, lesbianas, bisexuales y personas transgéneras. Y no podemos tanto apoyar y no apoyar a los indocumentados. Entonces hemos implementado pólizas y prácticas sin discutirlas mucho en la congregación. Esto está a punto de cambiar.
Hoy estamos iniciando un proceso en tres partes para ayudarnos a manejar las diferencias mientras vivimos juntos. La primera parte va a llevarse a cabo este otoño, culminando en una reafirmación de nuestros votos bautismales en enero. Vamos a estar aprendiendo unos a otros como hemos manejado nuestras diferencias. Todos lo hacemos; no hay solo una manera correcta. Entonces vamos a aprender unos de otros. Luego, en la segunda parte de enero empezaremos una serie de conversaciones sobre el sexo, aplicando algo de lo que hemos aprendido unos de otros sobre como mantener la unidad mientras tenemos diferentes opiniones. Finalmente, en la primavera, el Consistorio tomará unas decisiones sobre la manera en que vamos a manejar nuestra identidad pública como una iglesia que da la bienvenida a gente de todas las orientaciones sexuales.
Quiero preparar el camino para las conversaciones en esta mañana. En el pasaje de Filipenses Pablo dijo que es posible tener el mismo sentir aún cuando la gente tiene diferentes opiniones sobre algo. Hubo algún conflicto serio en la iglesia en Filipos. Pablo parece estar diciendo que no tenían que estar de acuerdo sobre el asunto para mantener la unidad de la iglesia.
¿Qué significa esto? La mayoría de nosotros anhelamos una comunidad que nos ofrece ánimo, consolación, compasión y empatía.(vs. 1) Los pleitos amenazan eso. Entonces Pablo nos invita a tener el mismo sentir que Jesús. Con esa frase se refiere a unas actitudes y acciones específicas, que forman la base de las pólizas y prácticas de la comunidad. Primero (vs 3-4) nos anima buscar lo valioso en cada uno e interesarnos en lo que le interese al otro. Esto significa cambiar una perspectiva competita de la comunidad a una más cooperativa. Si honrar a otro al valorarlo/la más hace que yo sea menos honorado, no lo voy a hacer. Una perspectiva cooperativa permite que todos sean honrados.
El segundo paso es más arriesgado. Jesús soltó lo que parecía ser su recurso más valioso: la igualdad con Dios. Y no solo soltó un poco. No se convirtió en un rey humano en vez de divino. Se convirtió en un esclavo y criminal. Francamente, la mayoría de nosotros no vamos a entregar tanto. Pero sí podemos reconocer que el camino hacia ser más humano se dirige hacia abajo en vez de hacia arriba. Podemos empezar a arriesgar (vs. 6) soltar cosas que hemos valorado mucho – poder, reputación, riqueza y creencias. Podemos (vs. 7) vaciarnos de un sentido de superioridad moralista al darnos cuenta que ciertos aspectos de la moralidad son mas fáciles dependiendo de su trasfondo. Es más fácil entregar poder si ya has tenido poder. Es mas fácil arriesgar su reputación si nunca ha tenido que ganarla. Es más fácil cambiar de opinion si nunca fuiste rechazado por su familia por hacerlo. Es más fácil para algunos ver a inmigrantes sin papeles con una moralidad inferior, y para otros ver a la gente gay con una moralidad inferior. El sentir de Jesús no mira a la gente en términos de superioridad o inferioridad moral. Ese sentir es tanto valiente como paciente sobre este camino hacia ser más humano.
El tercer paso tiene que ver con como opera esto en la comunidad. Debemos ocuparnos de nuestra salvación (vs. 12) en vez de ponerlo en piloto automático. Por demasiado tiempo la iglesia ha enseñado que lo único que tenemos que hacer para ser salvos es convertirnos en cristianos, memorizar algunas doctrinas, seguir unas reglas y no cambiar de opinión una vez convertidos. Esto no vale para cristianos. Pablo urge a la gente a ocuparse de su salvación con temor y temblor. Da susto cambiar de creencias. Da ansiedad tener que tomar decisiones éticas en areas donde la Biblia no ofrece claridad. Pero no estamos solos. Dios está trabajando en nosotros. No dependemos solamente de un libro escrito hace miles de años. El Espíritu de Dios sigue guiándonos a la verdad. Claro, uno nunca sabe exactamente donde el Espíritu te va a llevar. Los libros son más seguros. Pero Jesús nunca prometió que el camino sería sin peligros.
Cuando tenemos esta perspectiva de la vida cristiana – que es más un camino que un destino – podermos empezar a discutir sin quejas ni contiendas. (vs. 14) Para Pablo eso es lo que nos hace “intachables y puros hijos de Dios que brillamos como estrellas en el mundo (vs. 15). No es la pureza moral que nos hace intachable e inocente. Es el rechazo a las quejas y contiendas. ¿No sería eso una correccion que ayudaría en un momento cuando los cristianos se conocen más por su juicio que por su amor; por oponerse a la legislación contra las crímenes de odio para poder seguir predicando contra ciertos grupos?
Quiero terminar esta mañana diciendo que he visto el sentir de Jesús en Immanuel. No cada parte del cuadro está en su lugar, pero hay miradas de como se ve. La gente que tiene fuertes desacuerdos sobre algo se tratan con compasión cuando haya una necesidad. Personas que chismosean o atacan por la espalda a otros demuestran lealtad cuando uno de ellos está en peligro. Parece que hay muchas maneras de “tener el mismo sentir.” Pero todos tiene que ver con poner el ejercicio de amor por encima de tener la misma opinión sobre algo. Les invito a tener el sentir de Jesús al caminar juntos a través de terreno que nos da miedo. Ocupémonos en nuestra salvación con temor y temblor.
¿Es posible que personas se queden juntas cuando están en desacuerdo sobre asuntos que consideran centrales a su vida? Hablo de parejas, familias, comunidades y naciones. Todos sabemos que sí pueden. Pero también sabemos que no siempre lo hacen. En mi familia daba susto pelear. Generalmente llevaba a una rotura temporal en la relación. Mi hermana y yo peleábamos mucho. Al principio nos costaba semanas reconciliar. Después costaba meses o años para volver a la relación. La familia con quien vivo ahora es diferente. Mis hijos pueden estar gritando, y 5 minutos después están abrazándose. Me ha tomado años darme cuenta que un pleito entre mis hijos o con mis hijos no iba a crear una alienación semi-permanente.
¿Cómo se manejaban los pleitos en tu familia? Pregunto porque creo que la respuesta dice mucho sobre como peleamos en la iglesia. Tras los años la gente ha discutido muchos asuntos en la iglesia. Todavía lo hacemos. Algunos parecen ridículos; otros todavía se toman en serio. ¿Pueden gente de color y gente blanca adorar a Dios en la misma iglesia? ¿Está bien que las mujeres usan pantalones en la iglesia? ¿Debemos callar a los niños en la iglesia? ¿Las mujeres pueden ser pastores? ¿Debemos permitir que gente divorciada sea ancianos y diáconos?
Hoy escuchamos muchas noticias sobre iglesias que se dividen o amenazan dividir sobre el asunto del sexo. En las últimas décadas el debate ha girado en torno al sexo entre personas del mismo género – hombres con hombres, mujeres con mujeres. Hace poco escuché a un obispo Luterano hacer una broma con la audiencia, señalando lo fácil que es para la gente heterosexual enfocar la atención sobre las prácticas sexuales de la gente homosexual para que no tenga que enfrentar todos los asuntos relacionados con su propia sexualidad. La verdad es que la mayoría de iglesias nunca hablan del sexo, a menos que sea para prohibirlo. Mucha gente preferiría que siguiera así, igual que preferiría que la iglesia nunca hablaría de la política, la economía o la guerra. La gente tiende a pelear sobre esos temas. ¿Quién quiere más razones para pelear en la iglesia?
¿Es cierto que tenemos que hablar sobre nuestros desacuerdos en la iglesia? La gente a veces me dice, “No vengo a la iglesia para escuchar sobre la política y el sexo. Voy para salir de todo esto.” Una vez a la semana quieren escapar la violencia y disgusto del resto del mundo para escuchar una palabra de esperanza y consuelo. ¿Alguna vez has sentido así? Yo sé que sí. Me simpatizo con ese sentir. Oigan: yo soy la persona que algunos quieren que hable más sobre el sexo y otros que hable menos. Y yo no lo encuentro fácil hablar del sexo. Cuando yo era niño no se hablaba del sexo en compañía mixta. Pero veo lo que está pasando a la iglesia y al mundo porque no estamos hablando del sexo, y no está bonito.
Apenas a noche me acordé. Estaba distribuyendo volantes cerca del Parque LaFayette sobre una vigilia que íbamos a tener para un hombre matado el jueves en la mañana al salir del Winchell’s en la Hoover y séptima. Tenía mi camisa clerical que uso para eventos públicos donde ayuda a la gente enfocarse en cosas espirituales fuera del templo. Entregué unos volantes a un grupo de hombres embriagados. Uno me miró y dijo, “¿Por qué debo ir con usted? ¿No es uno de los que abusan a los niños?”
Esto pasa porque la iglesia no ha sabido hablar sobre el sexo y tratar el tema en la iglesia. ¿Todos los sacerdotes abusan niños? Por supuesto que no. ¿Todos los que abusan niños son homosexuales? Tampoco. Hemos escuchado esto mucho desde el anuncio que hay una persona en nuestra comunidad que fue arrestado hace 22 años por abusar a un niño. Pero la verdad es que es mucho más probable que un niño sea abusado por una persona heterosexual. Es difícil cambiar los estereotipos cuando no hablamos del sexo.
En Immanuel hemos decidido que no podemos esperar más. El Consistorio se ha comprometido invitar a la congregación participar en conversaciones sobre el sexo durante este año. Tenemos que hablar sobre la orientación sexual porque es un tema tan controversial. Pero nunca entenderemos la orientación sexual si no ampliamos la conversación para incluir otros aspectos del sexo – incluyendo nuestras propias luchas en esa área de la vida. Por la mayoría de su historia la iglesia ha puesto el sexo en la categoría de prohibiciones en vez de cosas para celebrar. Es hora de cambiar esto.
Pero al preparar l conversación el Consistorio se dio cuenta que antes debemos invertir tiempo pensando en como mantener nuestra unidad mientras discutimos. El sexo no es el único tema que discutimos en Immanuel. Solo es uno que evoca mucha pasión. También tenemos diferencias de opinión sobre la inmigración. He tenido que responder a preguntas de miembros sobre por qué estamos hospedando a Yolanda en la iglesia cuando el gobierno le ha dado orden de deportación. Tenemos que hablar.
Pero mientras discutimos tenemos que vivir en una manera que tenga integridad. Immanuel se ha atrevido cuestionar la autoridad cuando la autoridad pide que actuemos en maneras que creemos que nos lleva a desobedecer la enseñanza de Jesús. Mucho antes de que yo empecé a ser pastor aquí, Immanuel estaba ordenando e instalando como diáconos y ancianos a personas de varias orientaciones sexuales. Algunos miembros todavía no están de acuerdo con esa práctica. La Iglesia Presbiteriana misma no ha resuelto la pregunta. Mientras tanto, en la mayoría de las iglesias, la gente gay, lesbiana, bisexual y transgénera son marginadas. Así no es como Jesús trataba a la gente. Por eso, tenemos una práctica diferente en Immanuel. Los miembros no tienen que estar de acuerdo con nuestras pólizas y prácticas. Tienen el derecho de luchar para cambiarlas. Pero en el camino tenemos que mantener el respeto mutuo para todos.
Lo mismo pasa con la inmigración. El Consistorio ha aprobado pólizas que apoyan a los indocumentados. Nos unimos al Movimiento de Santuario para poner esas pólizas en práctica. ¿Por qué? Porque en la misma manera que los líderes religiosos no han llegado a un acuerdo sobre la orientación sexual, los líderes políticos no encuentran un acuerdo sobre pólizas justas de inmigración. Mientras tanto, millones de inmigrantes viven situaciones degradantes y amenazadoras. Así no es como Jesús trataba a la gente. Entonces hospedamos a Yolanda porque creemos que hay una ley más alta de compasión, y algunos tenemos que experimentar con alternativas creativas.
A pesar de estas pólizas y prácticas radicales, la congregación no ha tenido mucha conversación ni sobre la sexualidad ni sobre la inmigración. Algunos ni están enterados. Otros están en desacuerdo. Tenemos que actuar aún cuando no hemos logrado un acuerdo. No podemos ordenar y no ordenar gays, lesbianas, bisexuales y personas transgéneras. Y no podemos tanto apoyar y no apoyar a los indocumentados. Entonces hemos implementado pólizas y prácticas sin discutirlas mucho en la congregación. Esto está a punto de cambiar.
Hoy estamos iniciando un proceso en tres partes para ayudarnos a manejar las diferencias mientras vivimos juntos. La primera parte va a llevarse a cabo este otoño, culminando en una reafirmación de nuestros votos bautismales en enero. Vamos a estar aprendiendo unos a otros como hemos manejado nuestras diferencias. Todos lo hacemos; no hay solo una manera correcta. Entonces vamos a aprender unos de otros. Luego, en la segunda parte de enero empezaremos una serie de conversaciones sobre el sexo, aplicando algo de lo que hemos aprendido unos de otros sobre como mantener la unidad mientras tenemos diferentes opiniones. Finalmente, en la primavera, el Consistorio tomará unas decisiones sobre la manera en que vamos a manejar nuestra identidad pública como una iglesia que da la bienvenida a gente de todas las orientaciones sexuales.
Quiero preparar el camino para las conversaciones en esta mañana. En el pasaje de Filipenses Pablo dijo que es posible tener el mismo sentir aún cuando la gente tiene diferentes opiniones sobre algo. Hubo algún conflicto serio en la iglesia en Filipos. Pablo parece estar diciendo que no tenían que estar de acuerdo sobre el asunto para mantener la unidad de la iglesia.
¿Qué significa esto? La mayoría de nosotros anhelamos una comunidad que nos ofrece ánimo, consolación, compasión y empatía.(vs. 1) Los pleitos amenazan eso. Entonces Pablo nos invita a tener el mismo sentir que Jesús. Con esa frase se refiere a unas actitudes y acciones específicas, que forman la base de las pólizas y prácticas de la comunidad. Primero (vs 3-4) nos anima buscar lo valioso en cada uno e interesarnos en lo que le interese al otro. Esto significa cambiar una perspectiva competita de la comunidad a una más cooperativa. Si honrar a otro al valorarlo/la más hace que yo sea menos honorado, no lo voy a hacer. Una perspectiva cooperativa permite que todos sean honrados.
El segundo paso es más arriesgado. Jesús soltó lo que parecía ser su recurso más valioso: la igualdad con Dios. Y no solo soltó un poco. No se convirtió en un rey humano en vez de divino. Se convirtió en un esclavo y criminal. Francamente, la mayoría de nosotros no vamos a entregar tanto. Pero sí podemos reconocer que el camino hacia ser más humano se dirige hacia abajo en vez de hacia arriba. Podemos empezar a arriesgar (vs. 6) soltar cosas que hemos valorado mucho – poder, reputación, riqueza y creencias. Podemos (vs. 7) vaciarnos de un sentido de superioridad moralista al darnos cuenta que ciertos aspectos de la moralidad son mas fáciles dependiendo de su trasfondo. Es más fácil entregar poder si ya has tenido poder. Es mas fácil arriesgar su reputación si nunca ha tenido que ganarla. Es más fácil cambiar de opinion si nunca fuiste rechazado por su familia por hacerlo. Es más fácil para algunos ver a inmigrantes sin papeles con una moralidad inferior, y para otros ver a la gente gay con una moralidad inferior. El sentir de Jesús no mira a la gente en términos de superioridad o inferioridad moral. Ese sentir es tanto valiente como paciente sobre este camino hacia ser más humano.
El tercer paso tiene que ver con como opera esto en la comunidad. Debemos ocuparnos de nuestra salvación (vs. 12) en vez de ponerlo en piloto automático. Por demasiado tiempo la iglesia ha enseñado que lo único que tenemos que hacer para ser salvos es convertirnos en cristianos, memorizar algunas doctrinas, seguir unas reglas y no cambiar de opinión una vez convertidos. Esto no vale para cristianos. Pablo urge a la gente a ocuparse de su salvación con temor y temblor. Da susto cambiar de creencias. Da ansiedad tener que tomar decisiones éticas en areas donde la Biblia no ofrece claridad. Pero no estamos solos. Dios está trabajando en nosotros. No dependemos solamente de un libro escrito hace miles de años. El Espíritu de Dios sigue guiándonos a la verdad. Claro, uno nunca sabe exactamente donde el Espíritu te va a llevar. Los libros son más seguros. Pero Jesús nunca prometió que el camino sería sin peligros.
Cuando tenemos esta perspectiva de la vida cristiana – que es más un camino que un destino – podermos empezar a discutir sin quejas ni contiendas. (vs. 14) Para Pablo eso es lo que nos hace “intachables y puros hijos de Dios que brillamos como estrellas en el mundo (vs. 15). No es la pureza moral que nos hace intachable e inocente. Es el rechazo a las quejas y contiendas. ¿No sería eso una correccion que ayudaría en un momento cuando los cristianos se conocen más por su juicio que por su amor; por oponerse a la legislación contra las crímenes de odio para poder seguir predicando contra ciertos grupos?
Quiero terminar esta mañana diciendo que he visto el sentir de Jesús en Immanuel. No cada parte del cuadro está en su lugar, pero hay miradas de como se ve. La gente que tiene fuertes desacuerdos sobre algo se tratan con compasión cuando haya una necesidad. Personas que chismosean o atacan por la espalda a otros demuestran lealtad cuando uno de ellos está en peligro. Parece que hay muchas maneras de “tener el mismo sentir.” Pero todos tiene que ver con poner el ejercicio de amor por encima de tener la misma opinión sobre algo. Les invito a tener el sentir de Jesús al caminar juntos a través de terreno que nos da miedo. Ocupémonos en nuestra salvación con temor y temblor.
September 30, 2007 - Same mind, different opinions - Frank Alton
Philippians 2:1-15
Can people stay together when they disagree on matters they believe are central to their life? I mean couples, families, communities and nations. We all know they can. But we also know they don’t always choose to. In my family of origin disagreement was scary. It usually led to a temporary break in the relationship. My sister and I used to fight a lot. At first it took weeks to reconcile. Later on it took us months, then years, to come back into relationship. The family I live in now is so different from that. My kids can scream at each other, and 5 minutes later they’re all “lovey duvy” again. It’s taken me years to realize that a disagreement among my children or with my children wasn’t going to create a semi-permanent alienation.
How were disagreements handled in your family? I ask that because I think the answer impacts the way we disagree in church. Over the years people have disagreed about a lot of things in church. We still do. Some look downright silly; others are still taken seriously. Can black people and white people worship in the same church? Should women wear pants to church? Is it okay for liturgists to come to church in jeans or shorts? Should children be allowed to make noise in church? Should women be allowed to be pastors? Should divorced people be allowed to be elders and deacons?
Today we hear a lot about churches splitting or threatening to split over the issue of sex. If you’ve been reading the newspaper you are aware of the tensions in the Anglican Church. Presbyterians are just as divided. It just hasn’t made the newspapers as much lately. For the last few decades the debate around sex has mostly been over the legitimacy of sex between people of the same gender. Recently a Lutheran bishop teased the audience by pointing out how easy it is for the majority heterosexual population to focus attention on the sexual practices of the minority homosexual population so it doesn’t have to face all the issues around its own sexual issues. Let’s face it: most churches never talk about sex except to prohibit it. A lot of people wish we’d keep it that way. Just as they wish the church would never talk about politics, economics or war. People tend to disagree strongly about those subjects. Who wants more reasons to disagree in church?
Do we have to talk about things we disagree over in church? People sometimes say, “I don’t come to church to deal with politics and sex. I go to church to get away from all that.” Once a week they want to get away from the violence and unpleasantness in the rest of the world to hear a word of hope and comfort. Have you ever felt like that? Come on, I know you have. I sympathize with that sentiment. Hey, I’m the guy some people wish would speak more about sex and others that I would speak less about it. I don’t find it that easy to talk about sex. When I was growing up you didn’t talk about sex in mixed company. But I see what’s happening to the church and to the world because we won’t talk about sex, and it’s not very pretty.
Just last night I had another reminder. I was over near LaFayette park handing out flyers for a vigil we were going to have for a man who had been killed Thursday morning as he came out of Winchell’s at Hoover and 7th. I was wearing a clerical collar, which I do at public events where it helps people focus on spiritual things outside church. I handed some flyers to some men who were intoxicated. One looked at me in my collar and said, “Why should I go with you? Don’t you and your kind molest little children?”
The church has asked for that because we haven’t known how to talk about or deal with sex in the church. Are all priests pedophiles? Of course not. Are most child abusers homosexuals? No. We’ve heard that assertion repeatedly since announcing the presence of a registered sex offender at Immanuel. It’s actually more likely for a child to be abuse by a heterosexual. It’s hard to change stereotypes when we don’t talk about sex.
At Immanuel we’ve decided we can’t wait any longer. The Session has committed to invite the congregation to engage in conversations about sex during the coming year. We have to talk about sexual orientation because it’s such a big issue for people. But we will never figure out sexual orientation if we don’t broaden the conversation to talk about other aspects of sex – including our own struggles in that area of our lives. For most of its history – at least since the time of St. Augustine – the church has put sex in the category of things to prohibit rather than things to celebrate. It’s time to change that.
But as Session prepared to take on the subject of sex we realized that we better spend some time thinking about how to stay together while we disagree. Sex isn’t the only subject we disagree about at Immanuel. It’s just one that evokes a lot of passion. We also disagree about immigration. I’ve had to respond to questions from members about why we are sheltering Yolanda in the church when the government has issued her an order of deportation that says she has to leave. We gotta “tawk”.
But while we talk and disagree we have to live in a way that has some integrity. Immanuel has dared to question authority when the authority asks us to act in ways that we believe lead us to disobey the teaching of Jesus. Long before I became pastor here, Immanuel was ordaining and installing people of various sexual orientations as deacons and elders. Some members are still not in agreement with that practice. The Presbyterian Church itself has not settled the matter of whether that is okay yet. Meanwhile, in most churches, people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual & transgender are marginalized. That’s simply not the way Jesus treated people. So we have a different practice at Immanuel. Members don’t have to agree with our policies and practices. They even have the right to work to change them. But we need to respect each other as we disagree.
The same has happened around immigration. The Session has approved policies that support undocumented immigrants. We joined the Sanctuary Movement to puts those policies into practice. Why? - Because just as church leaders don’t agree about sexual orientation, political leaders don’t agree on just immigration policies. Meanwhile, millions of immigrants face degrading situations and constant threats. That’s not how Jesus treated people either. So we shelter Yolanda because we believe there is a higher law of compassion, and some people have to experiment with creative alternatives.
Despite these radical policies and practices, the congregation hasn’t had much conversation either about our policies of sexuality or of immigration. Some members are not even aware of them. Others are in disagreement with them. We have to act one way or another even when we disagree. We can’t both ordain and not ordain gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people. And we can’t both support & not support undocumented immigrants. So we’ve implemented policies & practices without discussing them much in the congregation. That’s about to change.
Today we are launching a three part process to help us engage differences as we live together. Part one takes place this fall, culminating in a reaffirmation of our baptism vows in early January. We’ll be learning from each other the ways we’ve each figured out how to manage differences. We all do it; there is no one right way. So we’ll be learning from each other. Then, in late January we’ll engage in a series of conversations about sex, applying some of what we’ve learned from each other about how to disagree and stay together. Finally, in the spring, the Session will make some decisions about our public identity as a church that welcomes people of all sexual orientations.
I want to set up the conversations around dealing with differences this morning.. In the passage from Philippians Paul said it is possible to be of the same mind even when people have different opinions about something. There was some serious conflict in the church at Philippi. Paul seems to be saying they didn’t need to agree about the issue to maintain the unity of the church.
What does that mean? Most of us long for community that offers encouragement, consolation, sharing, compassion and sympathy (vs. 1). Disagreements threaten that. So Paul invites us to take on the mind of Jesus. By that he refers to some specific attitudes and actions, which are the foundation of our policies and practices. First, (vs. 3-4) he encourages us to look for what is valuable in each other & to be concerned for what the other is interested in. That means moving from a competitive view of community into a cooperative one. If honoring another by valuing him/her more makes me less honorable, I’m not going to do it. A cooperative view allows all to be honored.
Step two is even riskier. Jesus let go of what looked like the most valuable asset he had: equality with God. He didn’t just give up a little. He didn’t become a human king instead of a divine king. He became a slave and a criminal. Frankly, most of us aren’t going to go that far. But we can at least recognize that the human journey moves down rather than up. We can begin (vs. 6) to risk letting go of things we've held dear – power, reputation, wealth, and beliefs. We can (vs. 7) empty ourselves of moralistic superiority by realizing that certain aspects of morality come more easily to different ones of us. It’s easier to give up power if you’ve already had some. It’s easier to risk your reputation if you’ve never had to earn it. It’s easier to change your mind if you’ve never been rejected by your family for doing so. It’s easier for some to see immigrants without papers as morally inferior, and for others to see gays as morally inferior. The mind of Jesus doesn’t look at people as morally superior or inferior. And it is both courageous and patient about this journey toward humanness.
Step three has to do with how this gets worked out in community. We are (vs. 12) to work out our own salvation instead of putting it on auto pilot. For too long the church has made it look like all we have to do to be saved is to become Christians, memorize some doctrines, follow some rules and not change our mind once we’ve done so. That may be alright for the Energizer bunny, but not for Christians. Paul urges people to keep working out their salvation with fear and trembling. It’s scary to change our beliefs. It’s nerve wracking to have to make ethical decisions in areas that the “good book” hasn’t been clear about. But we’re not on our own. God is at work in us. We’re not dependent on a book that was written thousands of years ago. The Spirit of God continues to lead us into truth. Of course, you never know exactly where the Spirit is going to blow. Books are safer. But Jesus never promised the journey would be safe.
When we take on this perspective of the Christian life – that it is a journey rather than an arrival – we can begin to disagree without murmuring and arguing (vs. 14). That for Paul is what makes us “blameless and innocent children of God [who] shine like stars in the world.” (vs. 15) It’s not moral purity that makes us blameless and innocent. It is the refusal to murmur and argue. Wouldn’t that be a helpful corrective at a time when Christians are best known for their judgment rather than for their love; for opposing hate crime legislation so they can continue to preach against homosexuality?
I want to end this morning by saying that I have seen the mind of Jesus at work in Immanuel. And I’ve seen it in some pretty unlikely places. Not every piece of the picture is in place, but there are glimpses of what it looks like. People who disagree noisily about something go on to treat each other compassionately when there is a need. People who gossip and even talk behind each others’ backs show loyalty when one of them is in trouble. It seems that there are many ways to “have the same mind.” But all of them have to do with putting the exercise of love above having same opinion about something. I invite you to take on the mind of Jesus as we journey together through terrain that frightens us. Let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling.
Can people stay together when they disagree on matters they believe are central to their life? I mean couples, families, communities and nations. We all know they can. But we also know they don’t always choose to. In my family of origin disagreement was scary. It usually led to a temporary break in the relationship. My sister and I used to fight a lot. At first it took weeks to reconcile. Later on it took us months, then years, to come back into relationship. The family I live in now is so different from that. My kids can scream at each other, and 5 minutes later they’re all “lovey duvy” again. It’s taken me years to realize that a disagreement among my children or with my children wasn’t going to create a semi-permanent alienation.
How were disagreements handled in your family? I ask that because I think the answer impacts the way we disagree in church. Over the years people have disagreed about a lot of things in church. We still do. Some look downright silly; others are still taken seriously. Can black people and white people worship in the same church? Should women wear pants to church? Is it okay for liturgists to come to church in jeans or shorts? Should children be allowed to make noise in church? Should women be allowed to be pastors? Should divorced people be allowed to be elders and deacons?
Today we hear a lot about churches splitting or threatening to split over the issue of sex. If you’ve been reading the newspaper you are aware of the tensions in the Anglican Church. Presbyterians are just as divided. It just hasn’t made the newspapers as much lately. For the last few decades the debate around sex has mostly been over the legitimacy of sex between people of the same gender. Recently a Lutheran bishop teased the audience by pointing out how easy it is for the majority heterosexual population to focus attention on the sexual practices of the minority homosexual population so it doesn’t have to face all the issues around its own sexual issues. Let’s face it: most churches never talk about sex except to prohibit it. A lot of people wish we’d keep it that way. Just as they wish the church would never talk about politics, economics or war. People tend to disagree strongly about those subjects. Who wants more reasons to disagree in church?
Do we have to talk about things we disagree over in church? People sometimes say, “I don’t come to church to deal with politics and sex. I go to church to get away from all that.” Once a week they want to get away from the violence and unpleasantness in the rest of the world to hear a word of hope and comfort. Have you ever felt like that? Come on, I know you have. I sympathize with that sentiment. Hey, I’m the guy some people wish would speak more about sex and others that I would speak less about it. I don’t find it that easy to talk about sex. When I was growing up you didn’t talk about sex in mixed company. But I see what’s happening to the church and to the world because we won’t talk about sex, and it’s not very pretty.
Just last night I had another reminder. I was over near LaFayette park handing out flyers for a vigil we were going to have for a man who had been killed Thursday morning as he came out of Winchell’s at Hoover and 7th. I was wearing a clerical collar, which I do at public events where it helps people focus on spiritual things outside church. I handed some flyers to some men who were intoxicated. One looked at me in my collar and said, “Why should I go with you? Don’t you and your kind molest little children?”
The church has asked for that because we haven’t known how to talk about or deal with sex in the church. Are all priests pedophiles? Of course not. Are most child abusers homosexuals? No. We’ve heard that assertion repeatedly since announcing the presence of a registered sex offender at Immanuel. It’s actually more likely for a child to be abuse by a heterosexual. It’s hard to change stereotypes when we don’t talk about sex.
At Immanuel we’ve decided we can’t wait any longer. The Session has committed to invite the congregation to engage in conversations about sex during the coming year. We have to talk about sexual orientation because it’s such a big issue for people. But we will never figure out sexual orientation if we don’t broaden the conversation to talk about other aspects of sex – including our own struggles in that area of our lives. For most of its history – at least since the time of St. Augustine – the church has put sex in the category of things to prohibit rather than things to celebrate. It’s time to change that.
But as Session prepared to take on the subject of sex we realized that we better spend some time thinking about how to stay together while we disagree. Sex isn’t the only subject we disagree about at Immanuel. It’s just one that evokes a lot of passion. We also disagree about immigration. I’ve had to respond to questions from members about why we are sheltering Yolanda in the church when the government has issued her an order of deportation that says she has to leave. We gotta “tawk”.
But while we talk and disagree we have to live in a way that has some integrity. Immanuel has dared to question authority when the authority asks us to act in ways that we believe lead us to disobey the teaching of Jesus. Long before I became pastor here, Immanuel was ordaining and installing people of various sexual orientations as deacons and elders. Some members are still not in agreement with that practice. The Presbyterian Church itself has not settled the matter of whether that is okay yet. Meanwhile, in most churches, people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual & transgender are marginalized. That’s simply not the way Jesus treated people. So we have a different practice at Immanuel. Members don’t have to agree with our policies and practices. They even have the right to work to change them. But we need to respect each other as we disagree.
The same has happened around immigration. The Session has approved policies that support undocumented immigrants. We joined the Sanctuary Movement to puts those policies into practice. Why? - Because just as church leaders don’t agree about sexual orientation, political leaders don’t agree on just immigration policies. Meanwhile, millions of immigrants face degrading situations and constant threats. That’s not how Jesus treated people either. So we shelter Yolanda because we believe there is a higher law of compassion, and some people have to experiment with creative alternatives.
Despite these radical policies and practices, the congregation hasn’t had much conversation either about our policies of sexuality or of immigration. Some members are not even aware of them. Others are in disagreement with them. We have to act one way or another even when we disagree. We can’t both ordain and not ordain gays, lesbians, bisexual and transgender people. And we can’t both support & not support undocumented immigrants. So we’ve implemented policies & practices without discussing them much in the congregation. That’s about to change.
Today we are launching a three part process to help us engage differences as we live together. Part one takes place this fall, culminating in a reaffirmation of our baptism vows in early January. We’ll be learning from each other the ways we’ve each figured out how to manage differences. We all do it; there is no one right way. So we’ll be learning from each other. Then, in late January we’ll engage in a series of conversations about sex, applying some of what we’ve learned from each other about how to disagree and stay together. Finally, in the spring, the Session will make some decisions about our public identity as a church that welcomes people of all sexual orientations.
I want to set up the conversations around dealing with differences this morning.. In the passage from Philippians Paul said it is possible to be of the same mind even when people have different opinions about something. There was some serious conflict in the church at Philippi. Paul seems to be saying they didn’t need to agree about the issue to maintain the unity of the church.
What does that mean? Most of us long for community that offers encouragement, consolation, sharing, compassion and sympathy (vs. 1). Disagreements threaten that. So Paul invites us to take on the mind of Jesus. By that he refers to some specific attitudes and actions, which are the foundation of our policies and practices. First, (vs. 3-4) he encourages us to look for what is valuable in each other & to be concerned for what the other is interested in. That means moving from a competitive view of community into a cooperative one. If honoring another by valuing him/her more makes me less honorable, I’m not going to do it. A cooperative view allows all to be honored.
Step two is even riskier. Jesus let go of what looked like the most valuable asset he had: equality with God. He didn’t just give up a little. He didn’t become a human king instead of a divine king. He became a slave and a criminal. Frankly, most of us aren’t going to go that far. But we can at least recognize that the human journey moves down rather than up. We can begin (vs. 6) to risk letting go of things we've held dear – power, reputation, wealth, and beliefs. We can (vs. 7) empty ourselves of moralistic superiority by realizing that certain aspects of morality come more easily to different ones of us. It’s easier to give up power if you’ve already had some. It’s easier to risk your reputation if you’ve never had to earn it. It’s easier to change your mind if you’ve never been rejected by your family for doing so. It’s easier for some to see immigrants without papers as morally inferior, and for others to see gays as morally inferior. The mind of Jesus doesn’t look at people as morally superior or inferior. And it is both courageous and patient about this journey toward humanness.
Step three has to do with how this gets worked out in community. We are (vs. 12) to work out our own salvation instead of putting it on auto pilot. For too long the church has made it look like all we have to do to be saved is to become Christians, memorize some doctrines, follow some rules and not change our mind once we’ve done so. That may be alright for the Energizer bunny, but not for Christians. Paul urges people to keep working out their salvation with fear and trembling. It’s scary to change our beliefs. It’s nerve wracking to have to make ethical decisions in areas that the “good book” hasn’t been clear about. But we’re not on our own. God is at work in us. We’re not dependent on a book that was written thousands of years ago. The Spirit of God continues to lead us into truth. Of course, you never know exactly where the Spirit is going to blow. Books are safer. But Jesus never promised the journey would be safe.
When we take on this perspective of the Christian life – that it is a journey rather than an arrival – we can begin to disagree without murmuring and arguing (vs. 14). That for Paul is what makes us “blameless and innocent children of God [who] shine like stars in the world.” (vs. 15) It’s not moral purity that makes us blameless and innocent. It is the refusal to murmur and argue. Wouldn’t that be a helpful corrective at a time when Christians are best known for their judgment rather than for their love; for opposing hate crime legislation so they can continue to preach against homosexuality?
I want to end this morning by saying that I have seen the mind of Jesus at work in Immanuel. And I’ve seen it in some pretty unlikely places. Not every piece of the picture is in place, but there are glimpses of what it looks like. People who disagree noisily about something go on to treat each other compassionately when there is a need. People who gossip and even talk behind each others’ backs show loyalty when one of them is in trouble. It seems that there are many ways to “have the same mind.” But all of them have to do with putting the exercise of love above having same opinion about something. I invite you to take on the mind of Jesus as we journey together through terrain that frightens us. Let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling.
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