sermon by Torin Eikler
Final Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
Matthew 5:13-16 Psalm 42
For nine weeks now, we have been talking about passionate spirituality and some of the practices that can help revive our relationship with the author of our faith when we find ourselves feeling stagnate or cut off from God. In the process, we have explored discernment, healing, living and dying well, saying yes and saying no, prayer, child-likeness, forgiveness, and hospitality in keeping with the interests you all shared with Carrie and me in June. And, while I know from the comments that we have received that many of you have found some aspect or another of our tour helpful or maybe even inspiring for your own spiritual journeys. But, I wonder if we have left something important unsaid. I wonder if, for all the time we have spent with particulars, we have missed the bigger picture. What, after all, is passionate spirituality? And, why should we worry about pursuing it?
If we hear those questions and feel like we don’t even know where to begin the answers (which may be the case from the looks on some of your faces), I have to admit that I’m not really surprised. Passionate Spirituality is a vague, amorphous term that can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. And, when I began our journey together two months ago, I chose not to delve into what it might mean because I wanted you all to be able to discover it for yourselves, and I hope that you have. Yet, it may be good for us to step back and look at the bigger picture. And, though we may not be able to define passionate spirituality, we all know it when we see it – or at least the fruits of it because the lives of those who have found it are marked by power and an unmistakable sense of connection with God that stands our self-satisfied lives on end.
If you take a moment to think about it, I’m sure you can identity a few people who embody this life. Some are so well known that they have become a part of our communal identity: Martin Luther King, Jr., Dorothy Day, Gandhi, Mother Teresa, and any number of others. Yet, as easy as it is to name those famous figures as examples, they have become almost unreal – clichés that have lost a good deal of their meaning in the process of becoming short-hand references dropped in passing. There are others in our traditions whose stories are fresher and can offer us more illumination.
One of these is Sister Anna Mow. Now, don’t let the name throw you. Sister Anna was not a nun. She was a plain woman of the Church of the Brethren in an age when we still called each other brother and sister as recognition that we are all adopted into the family of Christ.
Sister Anna was, as I said, a plain woman. She wore the plain dress of the old Brethren, and she sought to follow the example of Christ by opening her heart to all that she met. She had little for herself because she chose to give most (if not all) of what she could spare to those in need, and she spent much of her time working with young people in the church.
She was dedicated in her devotion to God and ardent in her prayers for the church as a whole and the individual people she knew. Those whose lives she touched found her to be inspirational. They honored and loved her with all her quirks because she was an example of the faith and selfless-ness they felt was at the heart of Christianity. And she, in turn, accepted them for who they were and pushed them to become all that they could be. Yet, no one resented her because it was clear to everyone that her love was not conditional and her guidance came from the dreams she had for others. As one folk song said it, “[she] had a hole in her stocking and a pocket full of dreams…. And a heart so big, that it could cure your soul.”
If you want to know more about Sister Anna, you can just ask Sue Overman. She knows a lot of the stories about her and I bet she would happy to share them with you.
Another example from the history of the Church of the Brethren is that of Sarah Rider Major. Sister Sarah was born in the early part of the twentieth century and lived most of her life on the farmland of Ohio. One day, during her prayer time, she felt the call of the Spirit to preach the good news of Christ. That might not seem like such a big deal to us now, but at that time, women were not allowed to be in leadership of the church – let alone preach the gospel.
Sister Sarah did not let that stop her. After a time of more prayer and discernment (on her own and with others), she decided that she had to obey God’s call. So, during the time in worship when the ministers shared the message, she rose to speak. Though the leaders of her congregation responded by asking her to stop, she continued to obey the calling she felt every time she went to prayer by traveling to other congregations.
As news of the woman preacher spread, many people expressed concern about this breach of the Church’s teaching. Eventually, it came up as a part of the business at Annual Conference where the elder body of the church directed her to stop. Once again, Sarah spent time in prayer and reflection and found that she simply could not go against the will of the Spirit in whose presence she sought to dwell. And, though the annual meeting sent a delegation of elders to discipline her, after listening to her preach they found that they could not bring themselves to silence a voice that spoke the gospel with such power. So, Sister Sarah continued to preach, paving the way for other women to become preachers and leaders in the church.
Two women of extraordinary conviction and vibrant faith …. Both of them longed for a closer, deeper relationship with the God. Both of them thirsted for the presence of the Spirit filling them with the water of life, bringing dreams of what could be, and opening their eyes to the activity of the divine all around them at all times. And, both of them found themselves propelled into the world to follow Christ in lives of discipleship that were rich and juicy with the fruits of their passionate spirituality … whatever it led them and whatever the cost.
In the end, there is really no way that I can tell you what passionate spirituality is because each person experiences it differently and is uniquely affected by the touch of the Spirit. What I can say, is that the remarkable thing about people who have found it is that they live vibrant lives that call to us, resonating with that part of each of us that longs to know God more deeply. What each person’s response to that calling is cannot be known in advance. But, if we can say anything with certainty, we can say that passionate spirituality is marked by deep faith and a commitment to feed that hunger for God which gives it birth and which it, in turn, feeds and nurtures. And we can go one step further and say that passionate spirituality is evidenced by vibrant discipleship, by lives committed to seeking out the will of God and doing what needs to be done in order bring the Realm of God more fully into being here and now.
When you find the key that unlocks that kind of spirituality within your own soul, you will know it. It will come over you with a power and a sweetness that you never thought possible. Or, it will sneak up on you, growing stronger and stronger, reshaping your heart and your life until, one day, you will get a glimpse of yourself and wonder who, exactly, you are. And, a little voice inside you will tell you that you are a chosen one, a beloved child of God who has answered the call to walk closely with the One who is at the heart of all life.
As we come to the end of this series, I pray that at least one of the practices we have explored has inspired you – has helped you find your way closer to your own passionate spirituality. Whether it is a new type of prayer, the reawakening of the child-like nature within you, a recognition of the freeing power of forgiveness, the pursuit of healing and wholeness, a sense of being drawn to welcome others with Christian hospitality, or a commitment to discerning the Spirit’s guidance for how you say yes and no as you seek to live and, ultimately, to die well, or some combination of all of these, I hope that it has awakened for you a thirst for a deeper relationship with God. And that, as we leave this time of worship together, you will not simply leave behind all that has been said or the possibilities for a deeper, more vibrant faith. But, that you will take something with you, putting at least one of these practices in your spiritual backpack to carry with you as you continue walking with Christ on your journey of discipleship.
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Prayer – the Passionate Heart of Spirituality
sermon by Torin Eikler
9th Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
Deuteronomy 6:4-9 Matthew 6:1-18
I want to begin today’s meditation by asking a question (and I am going to ask you raise your hands, so be ready)…. What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of “the spiritual discipline of prayer?”
Alright … how many of you thought of kneeling in a prayer closet or at your bedside with your hands folded and speaking to God (out loud or in your head)? How many of you thought of some similar form of private prayer? Anybody think of singing hymns? How about knitting or sewing blankets? Walking through the woods? Writing poetry or journaling? Growing food? Does anybody have a different image of prayer? (Would you like to share it with us?)
Okay, you get the point. The practice of prayer is difficult to nail down because it is a different experience for everyone. Yet, prayer is essential to the exploration we have been doing in this series because it is right at the heart of passionate spirituality. It is the steadily flowing river that quenches our thirst for God, refreshes our spirits, and restores us to a holier frame of mind.
In essence, prayer can be any activity that serves to focus our hearts, minds, spirits, and lives on God and draw us into a closer relationship with the source of the river of life. And, with so much freedom in the form of prayer, it should be easy for us to follow the scriptures’ guidance to pray without ceasing, but I think many of us find it is actually more difficult when the parameters are so loose. I often find myself committing to make my life a prayer and then going days without really sitting down to pray. What I have found helpful in my own journey is to look at eddies and currents of prayer that have been mapped out, sounded for depth, and ridden by believers in our tradition across the centuries.
Robert Benson, one of my new favorite authors has written a book called Living Prayer in which he tells the story of his experience with one of these traditional types of prayer – a practice that has come to be known as “praying the hours.” If you’ve never heard of that form of prayer, its refers to the centuries-old practice of cloistered monks and nuns who put down their work several times each day in order to re-center themselves in a time of prayer. Usually, the schedule of prayer is the same each day and the monks or nuns gather together at dawn and dusk as well as at the hours of 7, 9, noon, and 3 o’clock (hence the name) to hear scripture read, chant a psalm or two and repeat the prayers that their orders have said generation after generation.
In his book, Benson, has this to say about his experience with the hours at a monastery in Kentucky.
"I never saw a more ordinary group of men in my entire life. No one’s face glowed, no grand current of electricity ran through the place, no thunder crashed, no angels sang…. The community simply stopped its work, gathered to pray, and dispersed, going on to the next part of the day, letting the act and the art of their prayer speak for itself…. When it was over, and it was over too soon for me, it was time to go back to work…. I stood on the steps outside the chapel … [and tried] to think contemplative thoughts, [tried] to savor the sense and spirit of the moment when a monk went past me and knelt down to pull weeds from a flower bed.
[And I realized that] the lives of the monks of Gethsemani are very different from mine. But the difference has less to do with celibacy and fashion and location, and everything to do with what happens when the bell rings. When the bell rings, they pray. Everything is different because of that one thing…."
This “Praying of the hours,” though, is not solely the purview of “the religious.” And though it sounds daunting – maybe even impossible – for modern Americans with our overly scheduled days, the practice of the millions of Muslims who pause for prayer seven times a day shows that it is reasonable if we but commit ourselves to mark our days by the ebb and flow of the tide of prayer.
Another branch of prayer that has been around for quite some time (and seems to be enjoying renewed interest on the part of western Christians) is meditation. Again, this practice is probably more associated with Buddhism or new-age religion in many of our minds, but it has been quite common among Christians at times in the past. In fact, it was the bread and butter of the desert mothers and fathers – 3rd and 4th century desert hermits revered for their wisdom and spiritual authority – and it was very popular among the pilgrims who practiced it as they walked between shrines day after day.
Though there are many forms of meditation as well, one of my favorites is walking the labyrinth. Now a labyrinth and a maze are two different things. A maze is a complex construction designed to confuse people in their search for the way through by offering many possible paths as distraction. A labyrinth, by contrast, has only one path leading to a central space and is designed to be easy to follow. Rather than presenting a puzzle to be solved, it encourages people to walk, skip, or maybe even summersault their way forward, progressively leaving behind the cares and concerns of the world and approaching their spiritual center. Arriving at the central space of the labyrinth, the pilgrim spends time in meditative prayer focused on opening to the presence and guidance of God. The challenging part is holding onto the sense of focus and peace as you walk back into the world and pick up your worries and responsibilities again.
Now, most of us are probably not going to rearrange our lives to follow the rhythm of the hours, nor do we commonly have regular access to a labyrinth (though Carrie and I have planted a garden in that shape if you ever want to come by and try it). But other traditional forms of prayer are an option for everyone no matter their location or their schedule. One of those is intercessory prayer or prayer on behalf of another. Every one of our churches (or at least most) have people who are gifted in this type of prayer that carries us outside of ourselves and our concerns as we hold the sufferings and trials of brothers, sisters, and total strangers before our God (- a deeper and truer prayer than those offered before WV football games, I might add).
When I was young, we called them “prayer warriors,” and I generally avoided them because I didn’t understand the sense of awe they inspired. As I have grown older, though, I have come to realize that the gift they offered to the rest of us is actually something we are all called to do – it’s something that we do each Sunday when we pray together for the concerns brought by our sisters and brothers. I also realized that the “prayer warriors” of my youth were mostly people who had committed themselves to praying for others at least once each and every day and had become more comfortable and more skilled at the practice than the rest of us.
But, there is no reason that all of us should not be able to include this practice in our lives. There is no reason that we can’t find a moment or two each day to ride an eddy of the river of prayer into stillness and lift up another for the blessing and grace of God. Even just those few moments serve to break our self-centered habits and refocus us, to some degree, on God’s perspective and the service to which we are called.
Throughout this service of worship, we have already been praying in many different ways. We have sung our praise, petition, and gratitude. We have shared in the call and response of prayer litanies. We have called forth a special blessing on one of our brothers through the laying on of hands. We have opened our hearts to our community of faith and the one who brings us back to wholeness. And, some of us may even have prayed for the relief from heat and hunger promised by our picnic together at the park.
What I would like to invite you to now is a special time of intercessory prayer with two or three of those around you. There are some simple instructions on the insert that will help you do this, and though I know praying for one another in person sometimes makes us feel uncomfortable, this is an important part of life together in a faith community.
But, before we move into that time of prayer, I want to share with you one more quote from Robert Benson.
"Our work has become almost everything to us. Our lives are built around it and the fruits of it. Productivity, success, efficiency have become the watchwords of the day. It is no wonder that our days seem very often to be devoid of meaning. At best, they are built around about a fourth of who we are. It is not necessarily the work itself that is killing us, it is the way we give it such meaning and power and control over our lives.
Our lives hang in the balance, on might say. And if there is no balance, then they are indeed hanging by a thread."
Sisters and brothers in Christ, whatever form of prayer you choose – be it folding your hands as you kneel by the bedside or meditation as you wash dishes or even repeating a phrase from the psalms as you walk from place to place – I encourage you to seek that beautiful stream, to launch yourselves into the refreshing waters of prayer regularly. It is the only way to keep yourself close to the God we claim to serve – the God who loves us, and it is the first step to building a life on and around the passionate faith that saves us.
9th Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
Deuteronomy 6:4-9 Matthew 6:1-18
I want to begin today’s meditation by asking a question (and I am going to ask you raise your hands, so be ready)…. What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of “the spiritual discipline of prayer?”
Alright … how many of you thought of kneeling in a prayer closet or at your bedside with your hands folded and speaking to God (out loud or in your head)? How many of you thought of some similar form of private prayer? Anybody think of singing hymns? How about knitting or sewing blankets? Walking through the woods? Writing poetry or journaling? Growing food? Does anybody have a different image of prayer? (Would you like to share it with us?)
Okay, you get the point. The practice of prayer is difficult to nail down because it is a different experience for everyone. Yet, prayer is essential to the exploration we have been doing in this series because it is right at the heart of passionate spirituality. It is the steadily flowing river that quenches our thirst for God, refreshes our spirits, and restores us to a holier frame of mind.
In essence, prayer can be any activity that serves to focus our hearts, minds, spirits, and lives on God and draw us into a closer relationship with the source of the river of life. And, with so much freedom in the form of prayer, it should be easy for us to follow the scriptures’ guidance to pray without ceasing, but I think many of us find it is actually more difficult when the parameters are so loose. I often find myself committing to make my life a prayer and then going days without really sitting down to pray. What I have found helpful in my own journey is to look at eddies and currents of prayer that have been mapped out, sounded for depth, and ridden by believers in our tradition across the centuries.
Robert Benson, one of my new favorite authors has written a book called Living Prayer in which he tells the story of his experience with one of these traditional types of prayer – a practice that has come to be known as “praying the hours.” If you’ve never heard of that form of prayer, its refers to the centuries-old practice of cloistered monks and nuns who put down their work several times each day in order to re-center themselves in a time of prayer. Usually, the schedule of prayer is the same each day and the monks or nuns gather together at dawn and dusk as well as at the hours of 7, 9, noon, and 3 o’clock (hence the name) to hear scripture read, chant a psalm or two and repeat the prayers that their orders have said generation after generation.
In his book, Benson, has this to say about his experience with the hours at a monastery in Kentucky.
"I never saw a more ordinary group of men in my entire life. No one’s face glowed, no grand current of electricity ran through the place, no thunder crashed, no angels sang…. The community simply stopped its work, gathered to pray, and dispersed, going on to the next part of the day, letting the act and the art of their prayer speak for itself…. When it was over, and it was over too soon for me, it was time to go back to work…. I stood on the steps outside the chapel … [and tried] to think contemplative thoughts, [tried] to savor the sense and spirit of the moment when a monk went past me and knelt down to pull weeds from a flower bed.
[And I realized that] the lives of the monks of Gethsemani are very different from mine. But the difference has less to do with celibacy and fashion and location, and everything to do with what happens when the bell rings. When the bell rings, they pray. Everything is different because of that one thing…."
This “Praying of the hours,” though, is not solely the purview of “the religious.” And though it sounds daunting – maybe even impossible – for modern Americans with our overly scheduled days, the practice of the millions of Muslims who pause for prayer seven times a day shows that it is reasonable if we but commit ourselves to mark our days by the ebb and flow of the tide of prayer.
Another branch of prayer that has been around for quite some time (and seems to be enjoying renewed interest on the part of western Christians) is meditation. Again, this practice is probably more associated with Buddhism or new-age religion in many of our minds, but it has been quite common among Christians at times in the past. In fact, it was the bread and butter of the desert mothers and fathers – 3rd and 4th century desert hermits revered for their wisdom and spiritual authority – and it was very popular among the pilgrims who practiced it as they walked between shrines day after day.
Though there are many forms of meditation as well, one of my favorites is walking the labyrinth. Now a labyrinth and a maze are two different things. A maze is a complex construction designed to confuse people in their search for the way through by offering many possible paths as distraction. A labyrinth, by contrast, has only one path leading to a central space and is designed to be easy to follow. Rather than presenting a puzzle to be solved, it encourages people to walk, skip, or maybe even summersault their way forward, progressively leaving behind the cares and concerns of the world and approaching their spiritual center. Arriving at the central space of the labyrinth, the pilgrim spends time in meditative prayer focused on opening to the presence and guidance of God. The challenging part is holding onto the sense of focus and peace as you walk back into the world and pick up your worries and responsibilities again.
Now, most of us are probably not going to rearrange our lives to follow the rhythm of the hours, nor do we commonly have regular access to a labyrinth (though Carrie and I have planted a garden in that shape if you ever want to come by and try it). But other traditional forms of prayer are an option for everyone no matter their location or their schedule. One of those is intercessory prayer or prayer on behalf of another. Every one of our churches (or at least most) have people who are gifted in this type of prayer that carries us outside of ourselves and our concerns as we hold the sufferings and trials of brothers, sisters, and total strangers before our God (- a deeper and truer prayer than those offered before WV football games, I might add).
When I was young, we called them “prayer warriors,” and I generally avoided them because I didn’t understand the sense of awe they inspired. As I have grown older, though, I have come to realize that the gift they offered to the rest of us is actually something we are all called to do – it’s something that we do each Sunday when we pray together for the concerns brought by our sisters and brothers. I also realized that the “prayer warriors” of my youth were mostly people who had committed themselves to praying for others at least once each and every day and had become more comfortable and more skilled at the practice than the rest of us.
But, there is no reason that all of us should not be able to include this practice in our lives. There is no reason that we can’t find a moment or two each day to ride an eddy of the river of prayer into stillness and lift up another for the blessing and grace of God. Even just those few moments serve to break our self-centered habits and refocus us, to some degree, on God’s perspective and the service to which we are called.
Throughout this service of worship, we have already been praying in many different ways. We have sung our praise, petition, and gratitude. We have shared in the call and response of prayer litanies. We have called forth a special blessing on one of our brothers through the laying on of hands. We have opened our hearts to our community of faith and the one who brings us back to wholeness. And, some of us may even have prayed for the relief from heat and hunger promised by our picnic together at the park.
What I would like to invite you to now is a special time of intercessory prayer with two or three of those around you. There are some simple instructions on the insert that will help you do this, and though I know praying for one another in person sometimes makes us feel uncomfortable, this is an important part of life together in a faith community.
But, before we move into that time of prayer, I want to share with you one more quote from Robert Benson.
"Our work has become almost everything to us. Our lives are built around it and the fruits of it. Productivity, success, efficiency have become the watchwords of the day. It is no wonder that our days seem very often to be devoid of meaning. At best, they are built around about a fourth of who we are. It is not necessarily the work itself that is killing us, it is the way we give it such meaning and power and control over our lives.
Our lives hang in the balance, on might say. And if there is no balance, then they are indeed hanging by a thread."
Sisters and brothers in Christ, whatever form of prayer you choose – be it folding your hands as you kneel by the bedside or meditation as you wash dishes or even repeating a phrase from the psalms as you walk from place to place – I encourage you to seek that beautiful stream, to launch yourselves into the refreshing waters of prayer regularly. It is the only way to keep yourself close to the God we claim to serve – the God who loves us, and it is the first step to building a life on and around the passionate faith that saves us.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Dying Well
sermon by Carrie Eikler
Passionate Spirituality series #8
Psalm 23 Romans 8:36-39; 14:7-9
It may not surprise you, but I found myself wanting to do anything else this week, except write a meditation on dying well. There was that phone call to make, the email to send, the next cup of coffee to warm up. It was harder than even writing a eulogy for a funeral, because at a funeral I can spend time reflecting on the person’s life, and not simply on the reality that we all will die. But today we are not focusing on that inevitability of death. We are focusing on the possibility of living a full life.
Through Paul’s letter to the Romans, we are reminded that nothing separates us from love. Eugene Peterson’s bible translation The Message speaks of it this way: “I'm absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God's love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.”
It is likely we each know someone who has faced death, or we know someone who is facing death, with courage and grace. They knew that what would happen would not separate them from God or God’s love. But somehow, and this is where I struggle in my own reconciling with death, they knew or know that it does not separate them from the love of those around them: their children, their spouses and lovers, their parents, their friends. They knew that it would not separate them from their love of beauty, of poetry, of the smell of fresh bread baking. They know that it will not separate them from the songs that they love to sing in church, the love of a good belly laugh, the love of cuddling with a small child, or the love of a passionate kiss with the one they spent much of their lives with.
Mahatma Gandhi said, “Live as if you will die tomorrow. Learn as if you will live forever.” You have to admit, Gandhi was a spunky guy. There is also a spunky person out there among you. When we did the survey asking which spiritual practices you’d like us to address during this series, one of you, and I don’t know who, checked “dying well,” but also added at the bottom of the page, “living well.”
I like being in an a spunky congregation where we can begin to understand that death is not all there is to life, it’s not a period at the end of a sentence. It is a semi-colon, separating two different yet similar thoughts. The theologian among us who rightly encouraged living well as part of dying well encourages us, as Gandhi did, to continue learning into death, and loving into the next world.
Amy Plantingo Pauw reflects that “dying well grows out of the Christian community’s attempt to live well before God in the present.” We have all heard stories or known people preparing for death, who feel the urgent need to get things in order, and not just their finances. They want to see the things they never saw, say the things they never said, forgive the person they never forgave. When death is imminent, not just some vague inevitability, we are somehow forced to live passionate lives.
If we were to live as if we will die tomorrow we might seek reconciliation, welcome others into our lives, make decisions based on what our heart tells us, pray to God for our families and the world we will leave behind…we might see God in the world around us, we might cherish children and revel in awe, we might be bowled over with gratitude and rise into the beauty of simplicity. That sounds like a passionate life to me.
Soon after Torin and I arrived here to be pastors, we recognized there were two large “spirits” that we felt powerfully present. One was of your previous pastor Cameron, who now lives with his family in Canada. And the other, as you may guess, was the spirit of Dennis Overman. For those of you who are new our congregation, Dennis and Sue were married for 33 years. He died in 2000 from complications with a heart valve replacement. Dennis’ death came quite quickly, and Sue and this congregation were given little time to prepare. Sue has written a wonderful book on her experience, a compilation of her email correspondence with friends and family up to Dennis’ death and in the year following.
Many of you had the blessed experience of loving Dennis into the next life, and walking with Sue as she grieved, and lived, and learned to love once more. And what is apparent to me, even not knowing him but in Sue’s reflections and through your memories, is that Dennis didn’t just die. Dennis died well. Dennis died a death that can guide our living. Here is Sue’s entry on Saturday December 4, about a month before he died.
Dear Everyone, I had a really great night’s sleep—seven hours. I awoke a little before six and called ICU. They said Dennis was doing great and asked if he always talks my ear off. He had been talking all night long. I got up there soon after seven, and was amazed when I discovered I had been there over two hours. He told me marvelous things. He told me that the fact he was still here was a miracle… He said it is a turning point in our lives and life is going to change. He said … “Will I be saying when I die, ‘I wish I had sat at my desk more and taught more anatomy’ or will I say, I wish I had taken that cruise?’ I won’t be saying that because we will take that cruise.” To be honest, [continued Sue] I had no idea we wanted to take a cruise, but I am happy to go along…I couldn’t believe some of the things he was saying.
I’m sure that even before Dennis was facing the real possibility of death, in many ways he was living a life, as Gandhi said, as if he would die tomorrow. But we know he never took that cruise, they never taught in Finland or Sweden. But he did die well. You all helped him die well. Part of dying well is getting outside of ourselves and realizing death isn’t all about us. It isn’t about separating us. It’s about helping others die in love, and being God’s love for them.
“Those who face death experience the living presence of God through the living presence of the community that cherishes and mourns them,” says Amy Plantingo Pauw. Shortly before Christmas, about two weeks before Dennis died, Sue wrote: “This is just a quick note to tell you we were on the other side this evening. When the church group went caroling they came here first. It is such a beautiful evening that Dennis went outside and sang with them. Then he sent them off to the “old and sick people.”
Dying well means living well. Dying well means loving deeply in this life, loving deeply in our souls this gift of life that God gave us so that however our souls live on, that love with be there…the voice, the poetry, the scent of bread, the tingle of a kiss, the exhaustion from laughter. That love is in our souls, and not separated from us, from God, from God’s love for us, for our love for each other.
Sometimes I struggle, because I don’t know if I would rather have God’s love for the rest of eternity, or the love of Torin, Sebastian, and Alistair; to know more fully Jesus’ love for me or to be able to love the things that I love right now, in the way that I love them right now. I don’t want to be without those things. Can God’s love give me those things in death? Can God assure me that the love that helps me get out of bed every day will be waiting for me after I die? Can God assure me that what helps me love God as I live in this earthly realm won’t be taken away from me in death? This may sound all jumbled up to you, but I bet you understand.
Passionate Spirituality series #8
Psalm 23 Romans 8:36-39; 14:7-9
It may not surprise you, but I found myself wanting to do anything else this week, except write a meditation on dying well. There was that phone call to make, the email to send, the next cup of coffee to warm up. It was harder than even writing a eulogy for a funeral, because at a funeral I can spend time reflecting on the person’s life, and not simply on the reality that we all will die. But today we are not focusing on that inevitability of death. We are focusing on the possibility of living a full life.
Through Paul’s letter to the Romans, we are reminded that nothing separates us from love. Eugene Peterson’s bible translation The Message speaks of it this way: “I'm absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God's love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.”
It is likely we each know someone who has faced death, or we know someone who is facing death, with courage and grace. They knew that what would happen would not separate them from God or God’s love. But somehow, and this is where I struggle in my own reconciling with death, they knew or know that it does not separate them from the love of those around them: their children, their spouses and lovers, their parents, their friends. They knew that it would not separate them from their love of beauty, of poetry, of the smell of fresh bread baking. They know that it will not separate them from the songs that they love to sing in church, the love of a good belly laugh, the love of cuddling with a small child, or the love of a passionate kiss with the one they spent much of their lives with.
Mahatma Gandhi said, “Live as if you will die tomorrow. Learn as if you will live forever.” You have to admit, Gandhi was a spunky guy. There is also a spunky person out there among you. When we did the survey asking which spiritual practices you’d like us to address during this series, one of you, and I don’t know who, checked “dying well,” but also added at the bottom of the page, “living well.”
I like being in an a spunky congregation where we can begin to understand that death is not all there is to life, it’s not a period at the end of a sentence. It is a semi-colon, separating two different yet similar thoughts. The theologian among us who rightly encouraged living well as part of dying well encourages us, as Gandhi did, to continue learning into death, and loving into the next world.
Amy Plantingo Pauw reflects that “dying well grows out of the Christian community’s attempt to live well before God in the present.” We have all heard stories or known people preparing for death, who feel the urgent need to get things in order, and not just their finances. They want to see the things they never saw, say the things they never said, forgive the person they never forgave. When death is imminent, not just some vague inevitability, we are somehow forced to live passionate lives.
If we were to live as if we will die tomorrow we might seek reconciliation, welcome others into our lives, make decisions based on what our heart tells us, pray to God for our families and the world we will leave behind…we might see God in the world around us, we might cherish children and revel in awe, we might be bowled over with gratitude and rise into the beauty of simplicity. That sounds like a passionate life to me.
Soon after Torin and I arrived here to be pastors, we recognized there were two large “spirits” that we felt powerfully present. One was of your previous pastor Cameron, who now lives with his family in Canada. And the other, as you may guess, was the spirit of Dennis Overman. For those of you who are new our congregation, Dennis and Sue were married for 33 years. He died in 2000 from complications with a heart valve replacement. Dennis’ death came quite quickly, and Sue and this congregation were given little time to prepare. Sue has written a wonderful book on her experience, a compilation of her email correspondence with friends and family up to Dennis’ death and in the year following.
Many of you had the blessed experience of loving Dennis into the next life, and walking with Sue as she grieved, and lived, and learned to love once more. And what is apparent to me, even not knowing him but in Sue’s reflections and through your memories, is that Dennis didn’t just die. Dennis died well. Dennis died a death that can guide our living. Here is Sue’s entry on Saturday December 4, about a month before he died.
Dear Everyone, I had a really great night’s sleep—seven hours. I awoke a little before six and called ICU. They said Dennis was doing great and asked if he always talks my ear off. He had been talking all night long. I got up there soon after seven, and was amazed when I discovered I had been there over two hours. He told me marvelous things. He told me that the fact he was still here was a miracle… He said it is a turning point in our lives and life is going to change. He said … “Will I be saying when I die, ‘I wish I had sat at my desk more and taught more anatomy’ or will I say, I wish I had taken that cruise?’ I won’t be saying that because we will take that cruise.” To be honest, [continued Sue] I had no idea we wanted to take a cruise, but I am happy to go along…I couldn’t believe some of the things he was saying.
I’m sure that even before Dennis was facing the real possibility of death, in many ways he was living a life, as Gandhi said, as if he would die tomorrow. But we know he never took that cruise, they never taught in Finland or Sweden. But he did die well. You all helped him die well. Part of dying well is getting outside of ourselves and realizing death isn’t all about us. It isn’t about separating us. It’s about helping others die in love, and being God’s love for them.
“Those who face death experience the living presence of God through the living presence of the community that cherishes and mourns them,” says Amy Plantingo Pauw. Shortly before Christmas, about two weeks before Dennis died, Sue wrote: “This is just a quick note to tell you we were on the other side this evening. When the church group went caroling they came here first. It is such a beautiful evening that Dennis went outside and sang with them. Then he sent them off to the “old and sick people.”
Dying well means living well. Dying well means loving deeply in this life, loving deeply in our souls this gift of life that God gave us so that however our souls live on, that love with be there…the voice, the poetry, the scent of bread, the tingle of a kiss, the exhaustion from laughter. That love is in our souls, and not separated from us, from God, from God’s love for us, for our love for each other.
Sometimes I struggle, because I don’t know if I would rather have God’s love for the rest of eternity, or the love of Torin, Sebastian, and Alistair; to know more fully Jesus’ love for me or to be able to love the things that I love right now, in the way that I love them right now. I don’t want to be without those things. Can God’s love give me those things in death? Can God assure me that the love that helps me get out of bed every day will be waiting for me after I die? Can God assure me that what helps me love God as I live in this earthly realm won’t be taken away from me in death? This may sound all jumbled up to you, but I bet you understand.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Spirituality of Healing
sermon by Torin Eikler
7th Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
James 5:13-16 Mark 6:6b-13
For the past six weeks, we have been exploring the power of Christian Spiritual Practices in our search for a fuller, more passionate spirituality as individuals and as a faith community. Each week, we have tried to share time-honored guidance that help us all engage these practices, or we have tried to provide the opportunity to actually experience them during worship. Sometimes, we have been able to do both. And today is no different.
Earlier in the service, we shared in a time of anointing. The service has remained essentially unchanged since the time of the early church, and as simple as it is, it displays all the wisdom of the Christian community about the spiritual practice of healing. Over the millennia, believers have accepted the power of prayer, anointing, and the laying on of hands as the soul of that practic. And yet, in modern history, we have come to see this ancient form of healing as more than a little questionable given our current understanding of medicine and the body.
There is a congregation in Connecticut that has dealt with this struggle in its own quest to embrace the ministry of healing. In the 1960s, they decided to begin holding healing services in response to the increasing despair they felt was surrounding their church. For forty years now, they have gathered every Wednesday to share in the Eucharist, intercessory prayer, anointing, and the laying on of hands. Though the results of their services are generally characterized by slow improvements in general health, over the years there have been “dramatic instances of physical or psychological recuperation.” And, the congregation has had its assumptions about spiritual healing questioned by what they have seen.
Member Avery Brook, a founder of the healing services program, talks about it in this way. “At the beginning, none of us wanted to admit that God was performing the healings which occurred in our prayer and study sessions. As sophisticated people, we preferred more secular explanations: psychosomatic mending (in other words, the power of people’s minds directing their bodies to get better), relaxation from stress, that sort of thing. [But, after awhile we realized that] when we pray for healing something always happens, even if it isn’t what we asked, [and] it is not the individual praying who is doing the healing, but God’s power working through us. We [just] needed to learn to get ourselves and our concern for results out of the way and just let God act through us.”
Brook’s last comment get at the heart of one of my own struggles with practice of healing – letting go of my concern for results. Growing up as the son of a doctor, I was steeped in the philosophy of the medical profession. And even though my father has repeatedly commented that “the science of medicine” is less a science and more an application of the gathered wisdom of the ages – wisdom gathered by trial and error (his favorite example being that even after years of study, no one really knows why aspirin works)… even with all that, I still have the expectation that a treatment should match a symptom and provide a cure. When I have an infection, I take antibiotics, and I expect the infection to go away. When I have a headache, I still take aspirin, and I expect that the headache will go away.
But the Christian tradition of healing doesn’t seem to work that way. Headache, infection, cancer, or whatever the ailment, we apply the same formula – prayer, anointing, and laying on of hands – and we can never be sure of exactly what will happen. Letting go of my desire for specific results is not only difficult, it tends to make me less eager to go through the process. When I am sick or in pain, I just want it to go away – and a quickly as possible.
I might call that a pretty straight-forward example of my desire for instant gratification, but I think there is something deeper at work. And, I am drawn back to Brook’s assurance that whenever they prayed for healing, “something always happened.” I’m not sure what that meant, but it seems like he was saying that letting go and letting God do the work, doesn’t always mean that we receive healing in the sense that we usually mean. And, I think that’s another hang-up for me.
I think of healing – for the most part – as having to do with curing the physical body. That’s the way our medical system sees it, and that’s what all of the stories of miraculous healings in the Bible describe. And yet, as we see in the account from Mark and many other scriptures, healing is often linked with casting out demons or restoring the social position of outcasts. So, the disciples were sent out to cast out demons and (almost as an afterthought) to heal the sick. Time and again, Jesus is said to have traveled throughout the country healing the sick and casting out demons. The woman with the constant flow of blood that made her unclean and untouchable received healing that allowed her to reenter society. And, the Gerasene demoniac was not only freed from Legion but also from the chains of custom and society that kept him on the edge, living in a graveyard.
Biblically – and throughout Christian history – healing is concerned with much more than the physical body. The central image is not a cure but a return to wholeness and peace. It’s the concept that’s all together in the Hebrew word “שאלמ” – which theologian and priest John Koenig describes as “a right relationship with God and our neighbors which gives birth to an all-embracing peace that spells the end of meaningless suffering.”[i] According to that definition, the goal of the Christian practice of healing is a return to Shalom and only secondarily the cure of physical ailments. That doesn’t mean that physical healing never happens. To the contrary, the experience of that Connecticut congregation along with many others across the centuries speaks to the continued gift of miraculous cures. But, it does mean that I – and most of us, I expect – need to enlarge our perspective when it comes to healing.
At its root, salvation means healing – healing in that holistic sense that Koenig describes, and the promise we have is that salvation is not just a hope for the future, it is a reality for believers in the here and now. When we look at things from that perspective, it is easier to see that healing events – physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual – happen daily and are, in some sense, a gift of reassurance that the promise of salvation is real.
The practice of healing that we have received – passed down to us across the years – is a powerful way we can enter into that promise. When we act with God to bring about healing – for ourselves or for others – we become a part of the divine plan to bring about the restoration of all creation. That is not only a beautiful prospect placed in front of us as an invitation, it is a part of our baptismal promise to live, with the Spirit’s help, according to the example and teachings of Jesus. We have been given the tools of prayer, anointing, and the laying on of hands to help us, but most of us still need to work on getting out of the way – on letting go of our fears, our doubts, and our desire to control the outcome – so that the power of God is free to work through us making something happen – something that will bring each of us … all of us closer to the restoration of shalom that God desires for all creation.
Since it’s one thing to say all of that and quite another to come to terms with it in our minds and in our lives, I would like to invite you all to spend the next several minutes with a pencil and your journal. Explore in the privacy of those pages your own thoughts, your own fears and skepticism, and the hopes that rise up within you when you think about the practice of healing. There are, as usual, some questions in your bulletins if you need them to help you get started. We’ll come back together for our final hymn – “Here I am, Lord.”
[i] Koenig, John. Healing in Practicing our Faith (Dorothy Bass, ed.) pg 150.
7th Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
James 5:13-16 Mark 6:6b-13
For the past six weeks, we have been exploring the power of Christian Spiritual Practices in our search for a fuller, more passionate spirituality as individuals and as a faith community. Each week, we have tried to share time-honored guidance that help us all engage these practices, or we have tried to provide the opportunity to actually experience them during worship. Sometimes, we have been able to do both. And today is no different.
Earlier in the service, we shared in a time of anointing. The service has remained essentially unchanged since the time of the early church, and as simple as it is, it displays all the wisdom of the Christian community about the spiritual practice of healing. Over the millennia, believers have accepted the power of prayer, anointing, and the laying on of hands as the soul of that practic. And yet, in modern history, we have come to see this ancient form of healing as more than a little questionable given our current understanding of medicine and the body.
There is a congregation in Connecticut that has dealt with this struggle in its own quest to embrace the ministry of healing. In the 1960s, they decided to begin holding healing services in response to the increasing despair they felt was surrounding their church. For forty years now, they have gathered every Wednesday to share in the Eucharist, intercessory prayer, anointing, and the laying on of hands. Though the results of their services are generally characterized by slow improvements in general health, over the years there have been “dramatic instances of physical or psychological recuperation.” And, the congregation has had its assumptions about spiritual healing questioned by what they have seen.
Member Avery Brook, a founder of the healing services program, talks about it in this way. “At the beginning, none of us wanted to admit that God was performing the healings which occurred in our prayer and study sessions. As sophisticated people, we preferred more secular explanations: psychosomatic mending (in other words, the power of people’s minds directing their bodies to get better), relaxation from stress, that sort of thing. [But, after awhile we realized that] when we pray for healing something always happens, even if it isn’t what we asked, [and] it is not the individual praying who is doing the healing, but God’s power working through us. We [just] needed to learn to get ourselves and our concern for results out of the way and just let God act through us.”
Brook’s last comment get at the heart of one of my own struggles with practice of healing – letting go of my concern for results. Growing up as the son of a doctor, I was steeped in the philosophy of the medical profession. And even though my father has repeatedly commented that “the science of medicine” is less a science and more an application of the gathered wisdom of the ages – wisdom gathered by trial and error (his favorite example being that even after years of study, no one really knows why aspirin works)… even with all that, I still have the expectation that a treatment should match a symptom and provide a cure. When I have an infection, I take antibiotics, and I expect the infection to go away. When I have a headache, I still take aspirin, and I expect that the headache will go away.
But the Christian tradition of healing doesn’t seem to work that way. Headache, infection, cancer, or whatever the ailment, we apply the same formula – prayer, anointing, and laying on of hands – and we can never be sure of exactly what will happen. Letting go of my desire for specific results is not only difficult, it tends to make me less eager to go through the process. When I am sick or in pain, I just want it to go away – and a quickly as possible.
I might call that a pretty straight-forward example of my desire for instant gratification, but I think there is something deeper at work. And, I am drawn back to Brook’s assurance that whenever they prayed for healing, “something always happened.” I’m not sure what that meant, but it seems like he was saying that letting go and letting God do the work, doesn’t always mean that we receive healing in the sense that we usually mean. And, I think that’s another hang-up for me.
I think of healing – for the most part – as having to do with curing the physical body. That’s the way our medical system sees it, and that’s what all of the stories of miraculous healings in the Bible describe. And yet, as we see in the account from Mark and many other scriptures, healing is often linked with casting out demons or restoring the social position of outcasts. So, the disciples were sent out to cast out demons and (almost as an afterthought) to heal the sick. Time and again, Jesus is said to have traveled throughout the country healing the sick and casting out demons. The woman with the constant flow of blood that made her unclean and untouchable received healing that allowed her to reenter society. And, the Gerasene demoniac was not only freed from Legion but also from the chains of custom and society that kept him on the edge, living in a graveyard.
Biblically – and throughout Christian history – healing is concerned with much more than the physical body. The central image is not a cure but a return to wholeness and peace. It’s the concept that’s all together in the Hebrew word “שאלמ” – which theologian and priest John Koenig describes as “a right relationship with God and our neighbors which gives birth to an all-embracing peace that spells the end of meaningless suffering.”[i] According to that definition, the goal of the Christian practice of healing is a return to Shalom and only secondarily the cure of physical ailments. That doesn’t mean that physical healing never happens. To the contrary, the experience of that Connecticut congregation along with many others across the centuries speaks to the continued gift of miraculous cures. But, it does mean that I – and most of us, I expect – need to enlarge our perspective when it comes to healing.
At its root, salvation means healing – healing in that holistic sense that Koenig describes, and the promise we have is that salvation is not just a hope for the future, it is a reality for believers in the here and now. When we look at things from that perspective, it is easier to see that healing events – physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual – happen daily and are, in some sense, a gift of reassurance that the promise of salvation is real.
The practice of healing that we have received – passed down to us across the years – is a powerful way we can enter into that promise. When we act with God to bring about healing – for ourselves or for others – we become a part of the divine plan to bring about the restoration of all creation. That is not only a beautiful prospect placed in front of us as an invitation, it is a part of our baptismal promise to live, with the Spirit’s help, according to the example and teachings of Jesus. We have been given the tools of prayer, anointing, and the laying on of hands to help us, but most of us still need to work on getting out of the way – on letting go of our fears, our doubts, and our desire to control the outcome – so that the power of God is free to work through us making something happen – something that will bring each of us … all of us closer to the restoration of shalom that God desires for all creation.
Since it’s one thing to say all of that and quite another to come to terms with it in our minds and in our lives, I would like to invite you all to spend the next several minutes with a pencil and your journal. Explore in the privacy of those pages your own thoughts, your own fears and skepticism, and the hopes that rise up within you when you think about the practice of healing. There are, as usual, some questions in your bulletins if you need them to help you get started. We’ll come back together for our final hymn – “Here I am, Lord.”
[i] Koenig, John. Healing in Practicing our Faith (Dorothy Bass, ed.) pg 150.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Children's Sunday
6th Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
This Sunday we "for-went" much of our normal routine in celebration of children. Children were a large part of the service through singing, acting, reading, dancing, and leading. Below are some of the materials involved* (*much was used from Children's Sunday resources provided by UCC)
Call to Worship (Nick holding Shailoh, Carrie holding Alistair, and Kim holding Beatrix)–
Nick: Climbing High, reaching for the sky
Carrie: Jumping in puddles, laughing so merrily
Kim: Rolling in tickling green grass, dizzy with joy
All: The exuberance of children: God’s pure delight
Kim: Singing out loud and dancing wildly
Carrie: Running or toddling, legs all a blur
Nick: Hugging and sharing, faces aglow
All: The joy of children: a blessing from God and a reason to sing.
*Hymn Lord we bring to you our children SJ #90
(children walk in, waving ribbons: up the center aisle, around pews, back up the center aisle, placing sticks on vase on worship center, children return to steps)
*Opening Prayer (Katie reads, Nick leads congregation in repeating, Carrie leads children in motion as Katie reads)
For our opening prayer, Katie is going to read a line while the children do some movement. You then are invited to repeat the words and the movement that the children do. May our hearts and bodies join together in prayer!
Holy God,
you were with us when we were born,
you are with us as we grow,
you are with us when we hurt
you are with us when we are whole.
Thank you.
Thank you!
THANK YOU!
Would you help us to see?
Would you help us to hear?
Would you help us to love?
So we might change ourselves.
So we might change the world!
WELCOMING
Peace Lamp - American journalist Dorothy Thompson wrote, “If we wish to create a lasting peace, we must begin with the children.” May our congregation be a place of molding and making, shaping and supporting young peacemakers. May we be a place of peace for all God’s children.
Dedication of Alistair Phillip Eikler
Hymn I was there to hear your borning cry SJ #89
PRAYING AND GIVING
Prayer saying “Thank you” and “I’m sorry” and “Please help” (Scotty, Nick, Carrie)
(everyone focuses on the picture they brought of a child they know)
As I look at this picture, I say, “Thank you, God!”
For the gift of this person in my life.
Thank you for who they are.
Thank you for how they change who I am.
Thank you for all that is good in them,
and for all that is good in the world.
Thank you for making them my teacher,
and thank you for helping them learn from me.
Hold this child in your love!
All: Hold all children in your love!
(Ask everyone to focus on the silhouette given to them when they came in.)
As I look at this picture, I realize I can’t really see the face.
So, today, God, this picture represents someone I’ve hurt—
maybe because of something I did,
maybe because of something I didn’t do.
God, could you help me to realize what I’ve done?
Would you forgive me for what I’ve done?
Could you help me, tomorrow and every day afterward,
to make wiser choices—
ones that bring healing, rather than hurting,
to your world?
Hold these children in your love.
All: Hold all children in your love.
(all focus on picture of child they don't know)
God, this child is your child.
I’m not sure where they come from.
I don’t know what is happening in their life.
But I do know that, just like me, they need your love.
If there is some way that I can make a difference in their life,
guide me to that action—
so I can help to be your hands, your heart, and your love in the world.
Hold these children in your love.
All: Hold all children in your love. AMEN
Offering
In celebration and in hope, let us continue our prayer. Let’s each of us bring forward an offering today—an offering of the faces in our prayer. We’re going to place the photos on the communion table so we might see the faces of God’s children. As we do so, let’s bring our financial gifts in the offering plates as well.
EXPLORING
Children’s Choir - - Jesus loves the little children
Children’s Story - The Colors of Us
Sharing Scripture (Cockroft Family)–
As we engage the words of scripture today, we are going to do something a bit different. Nick will be reading the scriptures and we have some interpretive drama to go along with the words. Following each scripture, as we have been doing throughout this entire series, you are invited to gather with one or two other people and discuss one of the questions printed in the bulletin.
Exodus 2:1-10
· What aspects of childhood have you lost (pushed away)?
· What aspects of childhood would you like to receive again? How might you encourage child-likeness in your life?
Luke 2:41-52
When you think about all the things you’ve learned from the stories of Jesus’ life, which teachings are most important to you?
· What does that teaching (or those teachings) mean for how you relate to other children in the world?
SAYING GOODBYE
*Hymn and Dance - You shall go out with joy 427
*Sending Prayer
This Sunday we "for-went" much of our normal routine in celebration of children. Children were a large part of the service through singing, acting, reading, dancing, and leading. Below are some of the materials involved* (*much was used from Children's Sunday resources provided by UCC)
Call to Worship (Nick holding Shailoh, Carrie holding Alistair, and Kim holding Beatrix)–
Nick: Climbing High, reaching for the sky
Carrie: Jumping in puddles, laughing so merrily
Kim: Rolling in tickling green grass, dizzy with joy
All: The exuberance of children: God’s pure delight
Kim: Singing out loud and dancing wildly
Carrie: Running or toddling, legs all a blur
Nick: Hugging and sharing, faces aglow
All: The joy of children: a blessing from God and a reason to sing.
*Hymn Lord we bring to you our children SJ #90
(children walk in, waving ribbons: up the center aisle, around pews, back up the center aisle, placing sticks on vase on worship center, children return to steps)
*Opening Prayer (Katie reads, Nick leads congregation in repeating, Carrie leads children in motion as Katie reads)
For our opening prayer, Katie is going to read a line while the children do some movement. You then are invited to repeat the words and the movement that the children do. May our hearts and bodies join together in prayer!
Holy God,
you were with us when we were born,
you are with us as we grow,
you are with us when we hurt
you are with us when we are whole.
Thank you.
Thank you!
THANK YOU!
Would you help us to see?
Would you help us to hear?
Would you help us to love?
So we might change ourselves.
So we might change the world!
WELCOMING
Peace Lamp - American journalist Dorothy Thompson wrote, “If we wish to create a lasting peace, we must begin with the children.” May our congregation be a place of molding and making, shaping and supporting young peacemakers. May we be a place of peace for all God’s children.
Dedication of Alistair Phillip Eikler
Hymn I was there to hear your borning cry SJ #89
PRAYING AND GIVING
Prayer saying “Thank you” and “I’m sorry” and “Please help” (Scotty, Nick, Carrie)
(everyone focuses on the picture they brought of a child they know)
As I look at this picture, I say, “Thank you, God!”
For the gift of this person in my life.
Thank you for who they are.
Thank you for how they change who I am.
Thank you for all that is good in them,
and for all that is good in the world.
Thank you for making them my teacher,
and thank you for helping them learn from me.
Hold this child in your love!
All: Hold all children in your love!
(Ask everyone to focus on the silhouette given to them when they came in.)
As I look at this picture, I realize I can’t really see the face.
So, today, God, this picture represents someone I’ve hurt—
maybe because of something I did,
maybe because of something I didn’t do.
God, could you help me to realize what I’ve done?
Would you forgive me for what I’ve done?
Could you help me, tomorrow and every day afterward,
to make wiser choices—
ones that bring healing, rather than hurting,
to your world?
Hold these children in your love.
All: Hold all children in your love.
(all focus on picture of child they don't know)
God, this child is your child.
I’m not sure where they come from.
I don’t know what is happening in their life.
But I do know that, just like me, they need your love.
If there is some way that I can make a difference in their life,
guide me to that action—
so I can help to be your hands, your heart, and your love in the world.
Hold these children in your love.
All: Hold all children in your love. AMEN
Offering
In celebration and in hope, let us continue our prayer. Let’s each of us bring forward an offering today—an offering of the faces in our prayer. We’re going to place the photos on the communion table so we might see the faces of God’s children. As we do so, let’s bring our financial gifts in the offering plates as well.
EXPLORING
Children’s Choir - - Jesus loves the little children
Children’s Story - The Colors of Us
Sharing Scripture (Cockroft Family)–
As we engage the words of scripture today, we are going to do something a bit different. Nick will be reading the scriptures and we have some interpretive drama to go along with the words. Following each scripture, as we have been doing throughout this entire series, you are invited to gather with one or two other people and discuss one of the questions printed in the bulletin.
Exodus 2:1-10
· What aspects of childhood have you lost (pushed away)?
· What aspects of childhood would you like to receive again? How might you encourage child-likeness in your life?
Luke 2:41-52
When you think about all the things you’ve learned from the stories of Jesus’ life, which teachings are most important to you?
· What does that teaching (or those teachings) mean for how you relate to other children in the world?
SAYING GOODBYE
*Hymn and Dance - You shall go out with joy 427
*Sending Prayer
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Passionate Spirituality – Born of Forgiveness
sermon by Torin Eikler
Hosea11:1-11 Luke 15:11-32
Fifth Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
One of the places that our family tends to frequent in town is Black Bear Burritos. It’s not just their policy that children eat free until they are six years old – though that certainly doesn’t hurt. Or that their food is pretty good, and they have relatively “green” practices for a restaurant. I think what draws us back there is their friendly, welcoming, and low-key atmosphere. (Frankly speaking … it just helps a lot to know that your kids can make a bit of noise and a bit of a mess and you still get a smile and a warm greeting when you are recognized at the counter.) And, there is usually family-friendly music starting at 6:30 – which serves as a great distraction for a three-year-old boy who only eats a few bites and doesn’t like to sit at the table while we finish our meals.
More often than not, we have found ourselves enjoying the performance of one particular duo – The Weedhawks, and Sebastian enjoys their music enough that we bought a CD to listen to (as a welcome addition to the other three we hear all the time). Over time one particular song on the CD has risen to the top of Sebastian’s favorites list. It’s called “ ,” and it tells the story of the relationship between a man and his truck-driver father. It’s a fun song with a nice beat and a catchy refrain, and I think that (as well as its position at the beginning of the CD) is what has Sebastian hooked. But, it tells a sad story of brokenness, pride, and stubbornness.
One verse in particular catches my attention almost every time we listen.
He called out on his death bed to make amends with me,
But there’re too many memories I can’t hide.
So I put it off and I put it off … for over a year.
And that’s when my daddy died ….
I’m not sure what gets to me about these words. Part of it is that it expresses so much pain – pain from the mistakes that his father made while he was alive and pain that he feels at not having reconciled the relationship before his father died. But there is more to it than that.
Each time that I hear that song, I start to feel a little bit trapped, and lately I find myself thinking of broken relationships in my own life – particularly the ones where I still hold on to my anger at what people have done to me. There is something there that needs to be explored. And, I am reminded of something said in a conversation that I had with a remarkable woman I have met a few times across the years – Diana Ortiz.
In the 80s, Diana went to Guatemala as a young nun to work with the poor, indigenous people. It was a time of upheaval in the country with kidnappings and political killings on the part of the government and the guerrilla Guatemalan National Revolutionary Union. In 1989, Diana herself disappeared. Some time later, she managed to escape by jumping out of a vehicle that had taken her out of the prison where she had been held, and a nearby woman took her in until she could get in touch with her order and eventually return to the United States.
During her time in the prison, Diana was repeatedly raped and tortured with dogs, rats, and burning cigarettes. She was forced to participate in the torture of others and even made to kill another prisoner - all on video tape. For years, Diana lived at a community in Chicago under a constant suicide watch while she worked with the Kovlar Center for Survivors of Torture in the hope of recovering from her ordeal.
While all the work she did was an important part of her recovery, what she told me was that, “it wasn’t until she was able to come to terms with what was done to her and find it in [herself] to forgive them that she finally felt free of their hold on [her.]” It gave here a sense of rebirth and resurrection, and while the memories of that time still haunt her, she is finally able to move forward with her new life.
(light candle in the middle of dancing trinity statue)
I’m definitely not putting the little slights that I have experienced or the relationship between the truck driver and his son on par with the horrors that Sr. Diana experienced in Guatemala. Yet, her words hold a truth that has power across all of our broken places. They get at the heart of the feeling of being trapped that comes when I hear that last verse – the same feeling that rises up in me whenever I think of running into those people who have hurt me in the past. And, they get at the heart of the freedom that lies in forgiveness because until I – until we can find a way to forgive those who have hurt us we are trapped in the emotions of those painful moments. A part of our selves and our lives is held back, and all of our relationships are affected by the distrust, the fear, and the bitterness we carry with us. We can only really move forward when forgiveness frees us from the power of the past.
Forgiveness is, of course, about finding reconciliation. And it is nice for all of us when someone else asks for forgiveness. It makes it easier to let go of the pain we feel when we know that the other person feels regret or remorse for what has been done. Often, once that happens we are almost eager to let the past be the past and rebuild our relationships.
But even then, it is important to pay attention to the process – to take care that we follow the steps of the dance of forgiveness. There are many steps that can make up that dance. L. Gregory Jones lists six in his chapter of forgiveness in Practicing Our Faith, and though each of us must find the steps that work for us, they are a good place to start. They are (and you can follow along on your inserts if you like) …
- Become willing to speak truthfully and patiently about the conflict(s) that have arisen.
- Acknowledge both the existence of anger and bitterness and a desire to overcome them.
- Summon up a concern for the well-being of the other as a child of God.
- Recognize our own complicity in conflict, remembering that we have been forgiven in the past, and repenting of our own mistakes as necessary.
- Make a commitment to struggle with changing anything that we do to cause and/or perpetuate our conflict(s).
- Confess our yearning for the possibility of reconciliation both to ourselves and to others involved.
This list reminds us that forgiveness, as a practice born out of passionate spirituality is more complicated that we often want to make it. They also underline the fact that (and this is something that many of us may not realize or often forget) forgiveness is ultimately a practice that happens within us as we, each dancing to our own tune, release the anger and the bitterness that hold us back and open up to the promise of wholeness and peace. And, it can be granted without the cooperation or the knowledge of the other person. It can even be granted against their wishes. It is a radical act of love and grace that has the power to draw us and those whose lives we touch closer to the Realm of God.
Our scriptures speak of this truth in many places. Paul proclaims it when he says that “while we were yet sinners and didn’t know Christ,” he forgave us and opened the way to new life for us all. The father in the parable models it, forgiving the prodigal son while he was still far away and welcoming the one “who was dead” into a renewal of life. Jesus, himself, shows us the way when he prays on the cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Forgiveness is about finding reconciliation, and it is more deeply about finding freedom. It frees us to love people in spite of themselves. It opens the way to put aside our grievances against our brothers and sisters, our neighbors and friends, our enemies and those who persecute us and to embrace them as cherished, if imperfect, children of God. It offers the chance not only to put away the Big-Boy Boomeroos we hold at the ready and step down from the wall – but to tear down the wall itself and dance with one another among the rubble.
Forgiveness frees us from the hatred and bitterness that can consume our lives, turning us into twisted, vengeful people, and it frees us to embrace love and compassion for all of God’s children – a love and compassion that transforms us into the children of light following the Prince of peace. And though it is difficult work that requires us to risk being vulnerable enough to offer words, gestures, and actions that change the patterns of brokenness for just the chance of reconciliation, it is holy work given to us by God. What’s more, it is easier to do when we have the support from others seeking to embody the same practices – a gift and a blessing that we can see if we just look around us this morning.
And so, I invite you all to look around you now. Get together with one or two other brothers or sisters and find a space a little bit apart from other groups (this may mean that some of us need to get up and move). As you sit together for the next several minutes, I encourage you to share your thoughts and experiences with forgiveness with each other, be they stories of struggle or success, frustration or hope, freedom or on-going captivity. There are some leading questions to start you off on the insert in your bulletin. When the time comes, I will gather us together again for our closing hymn.
Hosea11:1-11 Luke 15:11-32
Fifth Sunday in Passionate Spirituality Series
One of the places that our family tends to frequent in town is Black Bear Burritos. It’s not just their policy that children eat free until they are six years old – though that certainly doesn’t hurt. Or that their food is pretty good, and they have relatively “green” practices for a restaurant. I think what draws us back there is their friendly, welcoming, and low-key atmosphere. (Frankly speaking … it just helps a lot to know that your kids can make a bit of noise and a bit of a mess and you still get a smile and a warm greeting when you are recognized at the counter.) And, there is usually family-friendly music starting at 6:30 – which serves as a great distraction for a three-year-old boy who only eats a few bites and doesn’t like to sit at the table while we finish our meals.
More often than not, we have found ourselves enjoying the performance of one particular duo – The Weedhawks, and Sebastian enjoys their music enough that we bought a CD to listen to (as a welcome addition to the other three we hear all the time). Over time one particular song on the CD has risen to the top of Sebastian’s favorites list. It’s called “ ,” and it tells the story of the relationship between a man and his truck-driver father. It’s a fun song with a nice beat and a catchy refrain, and I think that (as well as its position at the beginning of the CD) is what has Sebastian hooked. But, it tells a sad story of brokenness, pride, and stubbornness.
One verse in particular catches my attention almost every time we listen.
He called out on his death bed to make amends with me,
But there’re too many memories I can’t hide.
So I put it off and I put it off … for over a year.
And that’s when my daddy died ….
I’m not sure what gets to me about these words. Part of it is that it expresses so much pain – pain from the mistakes that his father made while he was alive and pain that he feels at not having reconciled the relationship before his father died. But there is more to it than that.
Each time that I hear that song, I start to feel a little bit trapped, and lately I find myself thinking of broken relationships in my own life – particularly the ones where I still hold on to my anger at what people have done to me. There is something there that needs to be explored. And, I am reminded of something said in a conversation that I had with a remarkable woman I have met a few times across the years – Diana Ortiz.
In the 80s, Diana went to Guatemala as a young nun to work with the poor, indigenous people. It was a time of upheaval in the country with kidnappings and political killings on the part of the government and the guerrilla Guatemalan National Revolutionary Union. In 1989, Diana herself disappeared. Some time later, she managed to escape by jumping out of a vehicle that had taken her out of the prison where she had been held, and a nearby woman took her in until she could get in touch with her order and eventually return to the United States.
During her time in the prison, Diana was repeatedly raped and tortured with dogs, rats, and burning cigarettes. She was forced to participate in the torture of others and even made to kill another prisoner - all on video tape. For years, Diana lived at a community in Chicago under a constant suicide watch while she worked with the Kovlar Center for Survivors of Torture in the hope of recovering from her ordeal.
While all the work she did was an important part of her recovery, what she told me was that, “it wasn’t until she was able to come to terms with what was done to her and find it in [herself] to forgive them that she finally felt free of their hold on [her.]” It gave here a sense of rebirth and resurrection, and while the memories of that time still haunt her, she is finally able to move forward with her new life.
(light candle in the middle of dancing trinity statue)
I’m definitely not putting the little slights that I have experienced or the relationship between the truck driver and his son on par with the horrors that Sr. Diana experienced in Guatemala. Yet, her words hold a truth that has power across all of our broken places. They get at the heart of the feeling of being trapped that comes when I hear that last verse – the same feeling that rises up in me whenever I think of running into those people who have hurt me in the past. And, they get at the heart of the freedom that lies in forgiveness because until I – until we can find a way to forgive those who have hurt us we are trapped in the emotions of those painful moments. A part of our selves and our lives is held back, and all of our relationships are affected by the distrust, the fear, and the bitterness we carry with us. We can only really move forward when forgiveness frees us from the power of the past.
Forgiveness is, of course, about finding reconciliation. And it is nice for all of us when someone else asks for forgiveness. It makes it easier to let go of the pain we feel when we know that the other person feels regret or remorse for what has been done. Often, once that happens we are almost eager to let the past be the past and rebuild our relationships.
But even then, it is important to pay attention to the process – to take care that we follow the steps of the dance of forgiveness. There are many steps that can make up that dance. L. Gregory Jones lists six in his chapter of forgiveness in Practicing Our Faith, and though each of us must find the steps that work for us, they are a good place to start. They are (and you can follow along on your inserts if you like) …
- Become willing to speak truthfully and patiently about the conflict(s) that have arisen.
- Acknowledge both the existence of anger and bitterness and a desire to overcome them.
- Summon up a concern for the well-being of the other as a child of God.
- Recognize our own complicity in conflict, remembering that we have been forgiven in the past, and repenting of our own mistakes as necessary.
- Make a commitment to struggle with changing anything that we do to cause and/or perpetuate our conflict(s).
- Confess our yearning for the possibility of reconciliation both to ourselves and to others involved.
This list reminds us that forgiveness, as a practice born out of passionate spirituality is more complicated that we often want to make it. They also underline the fact that (and this is something that many of us may not realize or often forget) forgiveness is ultimately a practice that happens within us as we, each dancing to our own tune, release the anger and the bitterness that hold us back and open up to the promise of wholeness and peace. And, it can be granted without the cooperation or the knowledge of the other person. It can even be granted against their wishes. It is a radical act of love and grace that has the power to draw us and those whose lives we touch closer to the Realm of God.
Our scriptures speak of this truth in many places. Paul proclaims it when he says that “while we were yet sinners and didn’t know Christ,” he forgave us and opened the way to new life for us all. The father in the parable models it, forgiving the prodigal son while he was still far away and welcoming the one “who was dead” into a renewal of life. Jesus, himself, shows us the way when he prays on the cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Forgiveness is about finding reconciliation, and it is more deeply about finding freedom. It frees us to love people in spite of themselves. It opens the way to put aside our grievances against our brothers and sisters, our neighbors and friends, our enemies and those who persecute us and to embrace them as cherished, if imperfect, children of God. It offers the chance not only to put away the Big-Boy Boomeroos we hold at the ready and step down from the wall – but to tear down the wall itself and dance with one another among the rubble.
Forgiveness frees us from the hatred and bitterness that can consume our lives, turning us into twisted, vengeful people, and it frees us to embrace love and compassion for all of God’s children – a love and compassion that transforms us into the children of light following the Prince of peace. And though it is difficult work that requires us to risk being vulnerable enough to offer words, gestures, and actions that change the patterns of brokenness for just the chance of reconciliation, it is holy work given to us by God. What’s more, it is easier to do when we have the support from others seeking to embody the same practices – a gift and a blessing that we can see if we just look around us this morning.
And so, I invite you all to look around you now. Get together with one or two other brothers or sisters and find a space a little bit apart from other groups (this may mean that some of us need to get up and move). As you sit together for the next several minutes, I encourage you to share your thoughts and experiences with forgiveness with each other, be they stories of struggle or success, frustration or hope, freedom or on-going captivity. There are some leading questions to start you off on the insert in your bulletin. When the time comes, I will gather us together again for our closing hymn.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Passionate Spirituality – Hospitality
sermon by Carrie Eikler
Genesis 18:1-8 Hebrews 13:1-3
Fourth Sunday of Passionate Spirituality Series
A couple of weeks ago, the news was abuzz with a story, proving to us that hospitality, neighborliness, and welcoming aren’t as easy or clear cut as we may think them to be. Many of you probably have heard the stories about the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr , a Harvard history professor.
As they say, “the facts are these”: a woman in the affluent community of Cambridge, MA called 911 because she saw two men trying to force their way into a neighbor’s home. Somehow in the police reports it was recorded that she suggested those in question were two black men. The police came to the house and discovered that one of the two men was in fact the homeowner, Professor Gates. Gates was returning home from a trip and with the help of his driver, was trying to open the front door that was jammed.
When the police arrived, Gates had already gained entry into his home, and the police asked to see his I.D. The interaction spiraled downward as Gates asserted that he was the homeowner, and called the police racist when they demanded to see identification, saying “This is what happens to a black man in America.” Sgt. James Crowley then handcuffed Gates and arrested him for, what he described as, disorderly conduct. Charges were later dropped, and the media coverage began full tilt.
If you are like me, you probably had an initial reaction to this story. We may not have the same reaction, but you likely formed an opinion quite quickly. Let’s try to draw out some more questions about the situatiojn
If your neighbor called the police because they saw someone (and that someone turned out to be you) trying to force in the door to your home, would you be thankful for your neighbor’s attempt to protect your home?
Would you wonder why your neighbor didn’t know you?
Would you be thankful for the police responding to such a call?
Would the police have persisted in their engagement with you if you are white?
If you shouted at the police in your own home where a crime was not being committed, something that legally does not constitute disorderly conduct, do you think you would be arrested?
Would you have taken offense at being called a racist?
Were any of these people acting in hospitable ways?
I’m not asking these questions because I have the answer. I’m asking them because, I think when it comes to hospitality, we play a variety of roles in the homes of our lives, shown in this story: we’re either trying to get in, trying to keep people out, trying to protect people, trying to defend our innocence, trying to feel safe. How many of us are on the inside seeking the best way to welcome others, whether or not those at our door are invited guests or strangers, trying to barge in?
Our homes are sacred places to many of us. Homes are meant to be sanctuaries: holy places, a place of divine service, a place of refuge and protection. Unfortunately, not everyone’s home is safe, or holy, or protected. Our homes, however, are places that are meant to be spaces of hospitality, for those who live within their walls, and visitors who come to their doorstep.
During the Great Depression, when millions were out of work and thousands took to migrating across the country, a sign was developed to identify hospitable homes. If the homemaker was a welcoming, generous, and kind person, wanderers who found help at that home would somehow construct a picture of a cat-- with sticks or in the dirt, around the front gate, or close to the house. When one saw this picture of a cat, one knew the people inside were kind and would likely offer hospitality. Think about how you welcome visitors, invited or especially, an uninvited guest…would someone be compelled to draw a cat outside your home?
To me, hospitality is the actions that are called out of ourselves when we recognize the sacred in each person. It is likely that Abraham didn’t have a cat drawn outside his tent on that evening as he sat in the blazing heat, but I think his actions, his extravagant hospitality, gives us this insight from the divine: God is in the stranger, the wanderer, the needy, the thirsty. God is in you and me. And when we meet one another and offer rest, and refreshment, even a listening ear and an understanding spirit, it is another opportunity to meet God. And when we meet God, we are compelled to welcome God into the sanctuary of our lives, allowing God to work and transform our deepest selves.
But again, some of us may not have homes that feel like they can be sanctuaries of hospitality. If you have ever felt that way, it can be refreshing to remember that our bodies are temples, our lives are sanctuaries—mobile, fleshy reminders that God is with us. My friend Sara, a pastor in California, is actively involved in interfaith study and dialogue. But she confessed to us this week that she showed her ignorance about her Muslim sisters and brothers. Last week she entered a meeting, and heartily greeted an Imam, an Islamic leader, by putting her hand out for him to shake it. He hesitated, looked at her hand and then slowly shook it. As the conversation began the Imam politely said that according to his religious understanding, he should not shake hands with a woman. Sara was mortified that she (someone so dedicated to interfaith learning and understanding) would make such a taboo gesture. The Imam smiled reassuringly, however, and suggested that next time they will simply try to welcome each other in a different way.
[pause] He could have scoffed at her ignorance. He could have refused to shake her hand. He could have done any number of things, but as surprised as he was, he entered into the invitational space with grace and reassuring pardon. Now, we may not agree with the Imam’s view about men and women, but we can certainly hope to have such grace and hospitality extended when someone violates our sense of what is right and wrong, what is acceptable and taboo.
Shaping hospitable spirits shapes hospitable homes and, we pray, shapes hospitable churches. The practice of hospitality goes far beyond offering a cup of water (though it likely includes that), it goes beyond offering a listening ear (though it certainly requires that), but it invites God’s people to respond with radical welcoming those whom others have turned away. To invite into this sanctuary all those who seek God, this place of pews and hymnbooks, but also this place of flesh and spirit…this sanctuary, our home.
As many of you know, the story of Sgt Crowley and Professor Gates is far from over. Even some questionable comments President Obama made fueled the story. But Obama did do one thing to reach out to strangers who became enemies, as many of you know. He invited them both to have a beer with him at the White House. To sit together as people, and to listen. The “beer summit” as it was dubbed was so fascinating to the media, and probably many Americans, because it modeled a way of welcoming that we don’t often see in the world stage, a glimpse at the third way of holy hospitality. Of course, Obama had some of his own political mending to do, and undoubtedly hoped to heal some wounds from comments he made, but it shouldn’t surprise us that perhaps welcoming strangers, even enemies, to refreshment and reflection is a beginning to moving forward.
As is the intention of this series on Passionate Spirituality, this meditation is only meant to spark the discussion and the further deepening of spirituality in your life. We aren’t having a beer summit here in the church, but I do invite you to a time of table discussions, as we continue hearing a message from the Spirit on the topic of hospitality. You are invited to, take a hymnal and take a seat at a table, and reflect with those around you on the questions at the table, for the next 10 minutes or so. Torin and I, as a reflection of a hospitable practice we find important in our home, will come around to your tables and pour you each coffee or tea or water as you discuss. So please, rise with your hymnal and join a table.
Genesis 18:1-8 Hebrews 13:1-3
Fourth Sunday of Passionate Spirituality Series
A couple of weeks ago, the news was abuzz with a story, proving to us that hospitality, neighborliness, and welcoming aren’t as easy or clear cut as we may think them to be. Many of you probably have heard the stories about the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr , a Harvard history professor.
As they say, “the facts are these”: a woman in the affluent community of Cambridge, MA called 911 because she saw two men trying to force their way into a neighbor’s home. Somehow in the police reports it was recorded that she suggested those in question were two black men. The police came to the house and discovered that one of the two men was in fact the homeowner, Professor Gates. Gates was returning home from a trip and with the help of his driver, was trying to open the front door that was jammed.
When the police arrived, Gates had already gained entry into his home, and the police asked to see his I.D. The interaction spiraled downward as Gates asserted that he was the homeowner, and called the police racist when they demanded to see identification, saying “This is what happens to a black man in America.” Sgt. James Crowley then handcuffed Gates and arrested him for, what he described as, disorderly conduct. Charges were later dropped, and the media coverage began full tilt.
If you are like me, you probably had an initial reaction to this story. We may not have the same reaction, but you likely formed an opinion quite quickly. Let’s try to draw out some more questions about the situatiojn
If your neighbor called the police because they saw someone (and that someone turned out to be you) trying to force in the door to your home, would you be thankful for your neighbor’s attempt to protect your home?
Would you wonder why your neighbor didn’t know you?
Would you be thankful for the police responding to such a call?
Would the police have persisted in their engagement with you if you are white?
If you shouted at the police in your own home where a crime was not being committed, something that legally does not constitute disorderly conduct, do you think you would be arrested?
Would you have taken offense at being called a racist?
Were any of these people acting in hospitable ways?
I’m not asking these questions because I have the answer. I’m asking them because, I think when it comes to hospitality, we play a variety of roles in the homes of our lives, shown in this story: we’re either trying to get in, trying to keep people out, trying to protect people, trying to defend our innocence, trying to feel safe. How many of us are on the inside seeking the best way to welcome others, whether or not those at our door are invited guests or strangers, trying to barge in?
Our homes are sacred places to many of us. Homes are meant to be sanctuaries: holy places, a place of divine service, a place of refuge and protection. Unfortunately, not everyone’s home is safe, or holy, or protected. Our homes, however, are places that are meant to be spaces of hospitality, for those who live within their walls, and visitors who come to their doorstep.
During the Great Depression, when millions were out of work and thousands took to migrating across the country, a sign was developed to identify hospitable homes. If the homemaker was a welcoming, generous, and kind person, wanderers who found help at that home would somehow construct a picture of a cat-- with sticks or in the dirt, around the front gate, or close to the house. When one saw this picture of a cat, one knew the people inside were kind and would likely offer hospitality. Think about how you welcome visitors, invited or especially, an uninvited guest…would someone be compelled to draw a cat outside your home?
To me, hospitality is the actions that are called out of ourselves when we recognize the sacred in each person. It is likely that Abraham didn’t have a cat drawn outside his tent on that evening as he sat in the blazing heat, but I think his actions, his extravagant hospitality, gives us this insight from the divine: God is in the stranger, the wanderer, the needy, the thirsty. God is in you and me. And when we meet one another and offer rest, and refreshment, even a listening ear and an understanding spirit, it is another opportunity to meet God. And when we meet God, we are compelled to welcome God into the sanctuary of our lives, allowing God to work and transform our deepest selves.
But again, some of us may not have homes that feel like they can be sanctuaries of hospitality. If you have ever felt that way, it can be refreshing to remember that our bodies are temples, our lives are sanctuaries—mobile, fleshy reminders that God is with us. My friend Sara, a pastor in California, is actively involved in interfaith study and dialogue. But she confessed to us this week that she showed her ignorance about her Muslim sisters and brothers. Last week she entered a meeting, and heartily greeted an Imam, an Islamic leader, by putting her hand out for him to shake it. He hesitated, looked at her hand and then slowly shook it. As the conversation began the Imam politely said that according to his religious understanding, he should not shake hands with a woman. Sara was mortified that she (someone so dedicated to interfaith learning and understanding) would make such a taboo gesture. The Imam smiled reassuringly, however, and suggested that next time they will simply try to welcome each other in a different way.
[pause] He could have scoffed at her ignorance. He could have refused to shake her hand. He could have done any number of things, but as surprised as he was, he entered into the invitational space with grace and reassuring pardon. Now, we may not agree with the Imam’s view about men and women, but we can certainly hope to have such grace and hospitality extended when someone violates our sense of what is right and wrong, what is acceptable and taboo.
Shaping hospitable spirits shapes hospitable homes and, we pray, shapes hospitable churches. The practice of hospitality goes far beyond offering a cup of water (though it likely includes that), it goes beyond offering a listening ear (though it certainly requires that), but it invites God’s people to respond with radical welcoming those whom others have turned away. To invite into this sanctuary all those who seek God, this place of pews and hymnbooks, but also this place of flesh and spirit…this sanctuary, our home.
As many of you know, the story of Sgt Crowley and Professor Gates is far from over. Even some questionable comments President Obama made fueled the story. But Obama did do one thing to reach out to strangers who became enemies, as many of you know. He invited them both to have a beer with him at the White House. To sit together as people, and to listen. The “beer summit” as it was dubbed was so fascinating to the media, and probably many Americans, because it modeled a way of welcoming that we don’t often see in the world stage, a glimpse at the third way of holy hospitality. Of course, Obama had some of his own political mending to do, and undoubtedly hoped to heal some wounds from comments he made, but it shouldn’t surprise us that perhaps welcoming strangers, even enemies, to refreshment and reflection is a beginning to moving forward.
As is the intention of this series on Passionate Spirituality, this meditation is only meant to spark the discussion and the further deepening of spirituality in your life. We aren’t having a beer summit here in the church, but I do invite you to a time of table discussions, as we continue hearing a message from the Spirit on the topic of hospitality. You are invited to, take a hymnal and take a seat at a table, and reflect with those around you on the questions at the table, for the next 10 minutes or so. Torin and I, as a reflection of a hospitable practice we find important in our home, will come around to your tables and pour you each coffee or tea or water as you discuss. So please, rise with your hymnal and join a table.
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