Gift And Responsibility
Sermon
Topsy-Turvy: Living In The Biblical World
Gospel Sermons For Sundays After Pentecost (Middle Third) Cycle C
Jesus tells us, "Don't be afraid," but it seems to me there is a lot to be afraid of. "Sell your possessions," he says, "give alms ... risk ... be dressed for action ... have your lamps lit ... be prepared ... be alert." Sounds very ominous, quite scary to me.
Christopher Reeves, the actor, knows what it is to be afraid. On Memorial Day weekend, 1995, in a tragic fall from his horse, he was instantly paralyzed from the neck down and fighting for his every breath.
He woke up five days later, and the news was scary indeed: he needed an operation which he only had a fifty percent chance of surviving; he might never be able to breathe on his own again. His first thought: what a huge burden he was going to be on everybody else; why not just die and save everyone a lot of trouble?
When his wife, Dana, came into his hospital room, he was unable to talk because he was on a ventilator, but he mouthed the words, "Maybe we should let me go."
Dana started crying. "I am only going to say this once," she said. "I will support whatever you want to do because this is your life and your decision. But I want you to know that I'll be with you for the long haul, no matter what." Then she added the words that saved his life: "You're still you. And I love you."
That's when Reeves made his life-affirming decision: "I can't drift way from this," he realized. "I don't want to leave."
Jesus says, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." What a gift, what a marvelous gift! That God gives us his reigning presence in our lives, a gift "that begins now and is brought to perfection in the life to come." It is the promise of God that he will be with us for the long haul, no matter what. That is a gift, and it is also a responsibility.
Then Jesus tells a story about this kingdom, a story of a master's leaving and returning, a story of both gift and responsibility. A master has gone away to a wedding banquet and has left his servants in charge of the household; there's the responsibility. Blessed are those servants, Jesus says, if their master finds them awake and alert when he comes back home. And here comes the gift: when that master comes home from the wedding party, he will be so delighted with his faithful servants, that he will hike up his robes, sit his servants down, and he himself will serve them.
The kingdom, you see, is really a journey, a journey that is both gift and responsibility. You and I have already been washed into this Kingdom journey through our Baptism, our starting-gate, so to speak -- an amazing gift, which was completely our Father's good pleasure to give us. And now, in these in-between times, in between Jesus' Resurrection and his coming again, we are to live out this gift, this Kingdom journey, with faithful responsibility.
That really makes faith into a verb then, doesn't it? Faith is never any possession of ours, but it's a journey. Oh, to be sure, from start to finish this journey is a gift, it is a work of grace, but primarily that grace is the power to finish the journey, something we could never do on our own. We are only able to begin it and to continue it, we will only be able to complete it, because of God's promise to be with us for the long haul, no matter what.
Our Second Reading this morning, from the Letter to the Hebrews, is all about faith as a verb, faith as a journey. The model there is Abraham, who was called by God to set out on a journey from Mesopotamia to the land which he had been promised, which later would be called Israel. Because of his faith he was able to set out on that journey.
Like that marvelous prayer in our Evening Prayer Service: "Lord God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. [It's a journey, folks!] Give us faith [faith -- that's the gift that enables us to start, to continue, and to complete the journey]. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us." [It's the wonderful good news of God's promise to be with us for the long haul, no matter what.]
Which is not to say that the journey is not scary, not to say that the journey is without pain and suffering. Not at all. Saint Augustine alluded to this in his autobiography, the story of his own spiritual journey, 1,600 years ago when he said: "It is one thing to see the land of peace [the kingdom] ... and quite another thing to tread the road that leads to it" (Confessions, VII, xxi).
In other words, the Christian life hurts. May we even be as bold as C. S. Lewis, who always maintained that "God hurts." Suffering does come to us on this kingdom journey. In one of Lewis' Narnia tales, The Magician's Nephew, the central character is forced to choose between obedience to Aslan's command and an action that might save the life of his dying mother. To be faithful, to be obedient, can hurt.
C. S. Lewis knew what that hurt was all about in his own life. In the movie Shadowlands, there is this conversation between C. S. Lewis and his wife, Joy, who is dying from cancer. Her illness is in remission, the two of them are on a trip, and they have a conversation about what lies ahead of them. Lewis speaks about his fears, fears of the pain he will feel when she dies. And Joy responds: "The pain then is part of the pleasure now. That's the deal."
That's the deal. In this kingdom journey that we are on, we have a commitment to one another, a commitment to love one another, and that makes us vulnerable. It sets us up to be hurt. The only possible way we could ever avoid that hurt would be by retreating entirely into ourselves, caring for no one but us. But that, of course, would not be the kingdom journey; that would be the journey in the opposite direction, the journey to Hell.
George Cole is dying of ALS, Lou Gehrig's Disease, that slow, debilitating illness that attacks the nerve ends. First, you begin to lose the function in some of your limbs; eventually you are not able to swallow, and finally you are not able to breathe. There is no cure for it.
George writes: "By coincidence, I am trying to write some memoirs targeted to our kids and the essay on my illness is titled 'The Journey.' It is tough going. I haven't written very much but have all sorts of daydreams about what to include and how to say it without being either too self-pitying or trying to create an appearance of courage which is not always there."
The Christian life hurts. The journey hurts. That's the deal. Yet we keep going -- by God's grace we keep going.
"Be dressed for action," Jesus says. "Gird up your loins" was the old translation. Lift up your heavy robes from around your feet and ankles, and stuff them into your belt. That's what a person would do when he started out on a journey. It is also what someone would do if he were preparing himself to work, or to serve. Remember Jesus, at the Last Supper, girding up his loins, and kneeling down to wash the feet of his disciples?
Like the master in Jesus' story, who, returning home from the wedding banquet, girds up his own loins, has his servants sit down at the table, and he, he himself, serves them a meal! This Bible story, people, is food for the journey. This bread and wine, people, is food for the journey. And God's promise to be with us for the long haul, no matter what, is fulfilled at each of our Sunday eucharists when the Christ serves us and comes to us in bread and wine!
As Robert Farrar Capon has so eloquently described it, "Jesus comes to us from a party, and he brings the party with him." It is the great good fortune of us waiting and watching servants that our Master comes to us from the wedding party in a marvelously good mood. He does not storm through the door to remind us of our past failures, nor to lay on us future tasks. But he comes to gird up his loins and serve us. He comes "with a song in his tipsy heart, a chilled bottle of Dom Perignon in each [pocket] of his coat, and a breakfast to end all breakfasts in his hands: bacon, sausage, homefries, and eggs sunny-side up."
Jesus has come from a party, and he brings the party with him. This party that he will keep going both now and forever: now, in the mystery of the Lord's Supper; and forever, at the Banquet Supper of the Lamb when we have arrived at our kingdom journey's end.1
____________
1. Robert Farrar Capon, The Parables of Grace (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1988), p. 89.
Christopher Reeves, the actor, knows what it is to be afraid. On Memorial Day weekend, 1995, in a tragic fall from his horse, he was instantly paralyzed from the neck down and fighting for his every breath.
He woke up five days later, and the news was scary indeed: he needed an operation which he only had a fifty percent chance of surviving; he might never be able to breathe on his own again. His first thought: what a huge burden he was going to be on everybody else; why not just die and save everyone a lot of trouble?
When his wife, Dana, came into his hospital room, he was unable to talk because he was on a ventilator, but he mouthed the words, "Maybe we should let me go."
Dana started crying. "I am only going to say this once," she said. "I will support whatever you want to do because this is your life and your decision. But I want you to know that I'll be with you for the long haul, no matter what." Then she added the words that saved his life: "You're still you. And I love you."
That's when Reeves made his life-affirming decision: "I can't drift way from this," he realized. "I don't want to leave."
Jesus says, "Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." What a gift, what a marvelous gift! That God gives us his reigning presence in our lives, a gift "that begins now and is brought to perfection in the life to come." It is the promise of God that he will be with us for the long haul, no matter what. That is a gift, and it is also a responsibility.
Then Jesus tells a story about this kingdom, a story of a master's leaving and returning, a story of both gift and responsibility. A master has gone away to a wedding banquet and has left his servants in charge of the household; there's the responsibility. Blessed are those servants, Jesus says, if their master finds them awake and alert when he comes back home. And here comes the gift: when that master comes home from the wedding party, he will be so delighted with his faithful servants, that he will hike up his robes, sit his servants down, and he himself will serve them.
The kingdom, you see, is really a journey, a journey that is both gift and responsibility. You and I have already been washed into this Kingdom journey through our Baptism, our starting-gate, so to speak -- an amazing gift, which was completely our Father's good pleasure to give us. And now, in these in-between times, in between Jesus' Resurrection and his coming again, we are to live out this gift, this Kingdom journey, with faithful responsibility.
That really makes faith into a verb then, doesn't it? Faith is never any possession of ours, but it's a journey. Oh, to be sure, from start to finish this journey is a gift, it is a work of grace, but primarily that grace is the power to finish the journey, something we could never do on our own. We are only able to begin it and to continue it, we will only be able to complete it, because of God's promise to be with us for the long haul, no matter what.
Our Second Reading this morning, from the Letter to the Hebrews, is all about faith as a verb, faith as a journey. The model there is Abraham, who was called by God to set out on a journey from Mesopotamia to the land which he had been promised, which later would be called Israel. Because of his faith he was able to set out on that journey.
Like that marvelous prayer in our Evening Prayer Service: "Lord God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. [It's a journey, folks!] Give us faith [faith -- that's the gift that enables us to start, to continue, and to complete the journey]. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go, but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us." [It's the wonderful good news of God's promise to be with us for the long haul, no matter what.]
Which is not to say that the journey is not scary, not to say that the journey is without pain and suffering. Not at all. Saint Augustine alluded to this in his autobiography, the story of his own spiritual journey, 1,600 years ago when he said: "It is one thing to see the land of peace [the kingdom] ... and quite another thing to tread the road that leads to it" (Confessions, VII, xxi).
In other words, the Christian life hurts. May we even be as bold as C. S. Lewis, who always maintained that "God hurts." Suffering does come to us on this kingdom journey. In one of Lewis' Narnia tales, The Magician's Nephew, the central character is forced to choose between obedience to Aslan's command and an action that might save the life of his dying mother. To be faithful, to be obedient, can hurt.
C. S. Lewis knew what that hurt was all about in his own life. In the movie Shadowlands, there is this conversation between C. S. Lewis and his wife, Joy, who is dying from cancer. Her illness is in remission, the two of them are on a trip, and they have a conversation about what lies ahead of them. Lewis speaks about his fears, fears of the pain he will feel when she dies. And Joy responds: "The pain then is part of the pleasure now. That's the deal."
That's the deal. In this kingdom journey that we are on, we have a commitment to one another, a commitment to love one another, and that makes us vulnerable. It sets us up to be hurt. The only possible way we could ever avoid that hurt would be by retreating entirely into ourselves, caring for no one but us. But that, of course, would not be the kingdom journey; that would be the journey in the opposite direction, the journey to Hell.
George Cole is dying of ALS, Lou Gehrig's Disease, that slow, debilitating illness that attacks the nerve ends. First, you begin to lose the function in some of your limbs; eventually you are not able to swallow, and finally you are not able to breathe. There is no cure for it.
George writes: "By coincidence, I am trying to write some memoirs targeted to our kids and the essay on my illness is titled 'The Journey.' It is tough going. I haven't written very much but have all sorts of daydreams about what to include and how to say it without being either too self-pitying or trying to create an appearance of courage which is not always there."
The Christian life hurts. The journey hurts. That's the deal. Yet we keep going -- by God's grace we keep going.
"Be dressed for action," Jesus says. "Gird up your loins" was the old translation. Lift up your heavy robes from around your feet and ankles, and stuff them into your belt. That's what a person would do when he started out on a journey. It is also what someone would do if he were preparing himself to work, or to serve. Remember Jesus, at the Last Supper, girding up his loins, and kneeling down to wash the feet of his disciples?
Like the master in Jesus' story, who, returning home from the wedding banquet, girds up his own loins, has his servants sit down at the table, and he, he himself, serves them a meal! This Bible story, people, is food for the journey. This bread and wine, people, is food for the journey. And God's promise to be with us for the long haul, no matter what, is fulfilled at each of our Sunday eucharists when the Christ serves us and comes to us in bread and wine!
As Robert Farrar Capon has so eloquently described it, "Jesus comes to us from a party, and he brings the party with him." It is the great good fortune of us waiting and watching servants that our Master comes to us from the wedding party in a marvelously good mood. He does not storm through the door to remind us of our past failures, nor to lay on us future tasks. But he comes to gird up his loins and serve us. He comes "with a song in his tipsy heart, a chilled bottle of Dom Perignon in each [pocket] of his coat, and a breakfast to end all breakfasts in his hands: bacon, sausage, homefries, and eggs sunny-side up."
Jesus has come from a party, and he brings the party with him. This party that he will keep going both now and forever: now, in the mystery of the Lord's Supper; and forever, at the Banquet Supper of the Lamb when we have arrived at our kingdom journey's end.1
____________
1. Robert Farrar Capon, The Parables of Grace (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1988), p. 89.
