Do Not Be Quickly Shaken
Sermon
Sermons on the Second Readings
Series II, Cycle C
Object:
Several years ago, Lyle Schaller made the observation that ministry, once a "high status, low stress" vocation was now just the opposite: "high stress and low status." Why? Clergy have a double calling, both to secure and to shake people up. They need to be prophetic and pastoral at the same time. Most people want ministers to stabilize their lives, to keep them from being shaken. The goal many parishioners come to church to achieve is stability. They don't want to be shaken. They want to be secured. Unfortunately, ministers also shake people up.
Saint Paul enters this remarkably interesting double bind to tell us that we are not to be easily or quickly shaken. In other words, we are to have a wild equilibrium in the middle of great disequilibria. We are to be peaceful in the midst of conflict. We are "all shook up" for Jesus. Christians are wildly happy, luxuriously free, and always in trouble, according to one old folk saying.
"Ministers appear dangerous to people," observes social critic, David Heifetz, "When you question their values, beliefs, and habits of a lifetime, you place yourself on the line. You tell people what they need to hear, rather than what they want to hear. Although you may see with clarity and passion a promising future of progress and gain, people will see with equal passion the losses you ask them to sustain." We must learn to be stable in destabilization. We must learn to be not shaken when we are all shook up. We want God to both stabilize us and challenge us. We don't want to put God in the cage we call our own security -- nor can we withstand too much shaking. The task of the minister is to secure people for danger, to stabilize people for spiritual adventure, and to do both at the same time.
One of the things I learned in seminary was to never act surprised. If someone tells you that he is sleeping with his daughter, say, "Tell me more." Don't say, "You are doing what?" The person who makes such a confession is trying to trust you. You will not be trusted if you freak out.
Likewise, ministers can't be trusted if they are only telling people what they want to hear. If a person makes you uncomfortable -- and still seems to love you -- you have begun to understand what the letter to Timothy is talking about. We are all shook up, and we are not shaken. It is a "both/and." As clergy and congregations, we are called to the daily resistance of death. Death is the great passivity. Death is the great harmony. Death is the time when we have no more stress and no more unanswered questions. Life is the great activity. Life is the great chaos of harmony and disharmony weaving in and out of each other. Life is a time of stress. By the gospel, we are secured for, and from, stress.
Most of us live under the commandment to get bigger and better. All this rushing for more shakes us up. There is inevitable tension in our ministries and beyond. The way we handle that tension is what makes or breaks us. When we are glad for the arrival of conflict, we show that we know how to be "not quickly shaken." We expect conflict. We know its cross-yielding capacities. We welcome conflict and stress. We do not whore after stability. It is a false God for ministers, congregations, and in life.
I took my new dog on a walk. He had come to us in Massachusetts from Miami and had never seen snow, never seen stairs, and never felt cold. In each experience, he resisted, as in sitting at the bottom of the stairs and refusing to climb, in first feeling the snow on his feet and trying to jump up in the air, in putting a dumb look on his face when he climbed out of the airplane carrier in the north after leaving the tropics only three hours earlier. What impressed me was that he was only afraid once. After he managed each cold and fear, he went on. He didn't repeat the fears over and over. He just had to do them once. I have declared him brilliant, another companion on the road to glory, where we don't have time for repeat fears of the cold. He reminds me of materially poor people whose inner spirit lets them sing in refugee camps at night. There they are free of the poverty of the rich; many of whom have forgotten how to sing. He reminds me of people who learn how to be scared and still be happy. He reminds me of people who tolerate great difficulties with serenity and gladness. He just got badly shaken up once.
Don't be afraid if every now and then you get shaken up. Life does that to people. Do be afraid if your goal in life becomes not to ever be shaken up. You will climb no stairs. You will become afraid of love. You will consent to fear. When we are not "quickly shaken," we hitch our wagons to a higher star than stability. We hitch it to peace, the one that passes all understanding.
Many lay people have similar professions to that of the securing and dangerous ministry. Teachers have to help students let go of earlier securities in order to prepare for larger ones. We have to leave kindergarten to go to first grade -- and each step is dangerous. Each new learning replaces some previous learning. College professors know exactly what it is to teach critical theory and biblical literature: Students who come from strong church backgrounds often get mightily scared at the application of critical theory to sacred texts.
Physical trainers have similar issues. They must use enough weight in weight training that it hurts so that the muscles can grow. In fact, trainers will assure you that the more you hurt after a training, the stronger you are becoming. There is a direct relationship between stress and security in physical training.
Financiers who do well place increasingly larger bets on increasingly large amounts of money. They do so in order to reap larger gains and to secure themselves from a future of constant betting. Letting go of security creates adventure, which then recreates new levels of security -- which must be reinvested or "re-bet."
Knowing these things about the strong relationship between stress and security, we are able to better understand the words to Timothy about not being too easily shaken. We may dare to be glad at the arrival of conflict because we know it is going to help us as much as stress us. We know how growth happens. It happens by the grace of stress, managed by the stability of hope and faith.
Not only may we be glad at the arrival of conflict, we can also keep a smile on our face when we are in difficult situations. Clergy are advised to have a non-anxious presence when faced with great human difficulty. We are all advised to have an inner calm when faced with outer storms. It, more than anything else, will help us. Inner calm is our insurance policy in times of trouble. Inner calm comes from faith -- and it also comes from understanding that being shaken is not the end of the world.
We may be people who are not quickly shaken if we keep ourselves free from conflict, free from fear, and continue living in grace. Inner calm is not only when the tension in our neck subsides; it is also the presence and power of the peace of God. It is a peace which passes understanding. We know we should be scared, but we are not. Whether the issue is personal unemployment or global terrorism, depression or loneliness, we are people who are unshaken. We may be shook, but we are unshaken. We live at a deeper level, in a place even we don't always understand. It is the place of God in us. It is the place of peace in us. It is belly deep and it is a remarkable gift from a remarkable God.
Saint Paul enters this remarkably interesting double bind to tell us that we are not to be easily or quickly shaken. In other words, we are to have a wild equilibrium in the middle of great disequilibria. We are to be peaceful in the midst of conflict. We are "all shook up" for Jesus. Christians are wildly happy, luxuriously free, and always in trouble, according to one old folk saying.
"Ministers appear dangerous to people," observes social critic, David Heifetz, "When you question their values, beliefs, and habits of a lifetime, you place yourself on the line. You tell people what they need to hear, rather than what they want to hear. Although you may see with clarity and passion a promising future of progress and gain, people will see with equal passion the losses you ask them to sustain." We must learn to be stable in destabilization. We must learn to be not shaken when we are all shook up. We want God to both stabilize us and challenge us. We don't want to put God in the cage we call our own security -- nor can we withstand too much shaking. The task of the minister is to secure people for danger, to stabilize people for spiritual adventure, and to do both at the same time.
One of the things I learned in seminary was to never act surprised. If someone tells you that he is sleeping with his daughter, say, "Tell me more." Don't say, "You are doing what?" The person who makes such a confession is trying to trust you. You will not be trusted if you freak out.
Likewise, ministers can't be trusted if they are only telling people what they want to hear. If a person makes you uncomfortable -- and still seems to love you -- you have begun to understand what the letter to Timothy is talking about. We are all shook up, and we are not shaken. It is a "both/and." As clergy and congregations, we are called to the daily resistance of death. Death is the great passivity. Death is the great harmony. Death is the time when we have no more stress and no more unanswered questions. Life is the great activity. Life is the great chaos of harmony and disharmony weaving in and out of each other. Life is a time of stress. By the gospel, we are secured for, and from, stress.
Most of us live under the commandment to get bigger and better. All this rushing for more shakes us up. There is inevitable tension in our ministries and beyond. The way we handle that tension is what makes or breaks us. When we are glad for the arrival of conflict, we show that we know how to be "not quickly shaken." We expect conflict. We know its cross-yielding capacities. We welcome conflict and stress. We do not whore after stability. It is a false God for ministers, congregations, and in life.
I took my new dog on a walk. He had come to us in Massachusetts from Miami and had never seen snow, never seen stairs, and never felt cold. In each experience, he resisted, as in sitting at the bottom of the stairs and refusing to climb, in first feeling the snow on his feet and trying to jump up in the air, in putting a dumb look on his face when he climbed out of the airplane carrier in the north after leaving the tropics only three hours earlier. What impressed me was that he was only afraid once. After he managed each cold and fear, he went on. He didn't repeat the fears over and over. He just had to do them once. I have declared him brilliant, another companion on the road to glory, where we don't have time for repeat fears of the cold. He reminds me of materially poor people whose inner spirit lets them sing in refugee camps at night. There they are free of the poverty of the rich; many of whom have forgotten how to sing. He reminds me of people who learn how to be scared and still be happy. He reminds me of people who tolerate great difficulties with serenity and gladness. He just got badly shaken up once.
Don't be afraid if every now and then you get shaken up. Life does that to people. Do be afraid if your goal in life becomes not to ever be shaken up. You will climb no stairs. You will become afraid of love. You will consent to fear. When we are not "quickly shaken," we hitch our wagons to a higher star than stability. We hitch it to peace, the one that passes all understanding.
Many lay people have similar professions to that of the securing and dangerous ministry. Teachers have to help students let go of earlier securities in order to prepare for larger ones. We have to leave kindergarten to go to first grade -- and each step is dangerous. Each new learning replaces some previous learning. College professors know exactly what it is to teach critical theory and biblical literature: Students who come from strong church backgrounds often get mightily scared at the application of critical theory to sacred texts.
Physical trainers have similar issues. They must use enough weight in weight training that it hurts so that the muscles can grow. In fact, trainers will assure you that the more you hurt after a training, the stronger you are becoming. There is a direct relationship between stress and security in physical training.
Financiers who do well place increasingly larger bets on increasingly large amounts of money. They do so in order to reap larger gains and to secure themselves from a future of constant betting. Letting go of security creates adventure, which then recreates new levels of security -- which must be reinvested or "re-bet."
Knowing these things about the strong relationship between stress and security, we are able to better understand the words to Timothy about not being too easily shaken. We may dare to be glad at the arrival of conflict because we know it is going to help us as much as stress us. We know how growth happens. It happens by the grace of stress, managed by the stability of hope and faith.
Not only may we be glad at the arrival of conflict, we can also keep a smile on our face when we are in difficult situations. Clergy are advised to have a non-anxious presence when faced with great human difficulty. We are all advised to have an inner calm when faced with outer storms. It, more than anything else, will help us. Inner calm is our insurance policy in times of trouble. Inner calm comes from faith -- and it also comes from understanding that being shaken is not the end of the world.
We may be people who are not quickly shaken if we keep ourselves free from conflict, free from fear, and continue living in grace. Inner calm is not only when the tension in our neck subsides; it is also the presence and power of the peace of God. It is a peace which passes understanding. We know we should be scared, but we are not. Whether the issue is personal unemployment or global terrorism, depression or loneliness, we are people who are unshaken. We may be shook, but we are unshaken. We live at a deeper level, in a place even we don't always understand. It is the place of God in us. It is the place of peace in us. It is belly deep and it is a remarkable gift from a remarkable God.
