REVISING EXPECTATIONS

A Sermon by the Rev. Dr. Arthur M. Suggs
Preached on Palm Sunday, April 13, 2014

 

Instant Karma Will Get You Back

The sermon is a little unusual this morning in that it is both for the children and also for the adults, so wish me luck.  I was ill last week, and one of the consequences of being under the weather is that I spent a bit too much time surfing the net.  I came across a website that was tears-in-your-eyes funny, having to do with what’s called instant Karma.

Do you know what Karma is?  It’s a notion that, if you send out something bad, bad comes back to you.  So if you put out a bad word, a bad thought, or especially a bad action, bad sort of finds its way back to you.  Not always instantly, but like oatmeal, sometimes there’s instant Karma.  Other times it takes a while, but it always comes back.  The same thing happens with good.  Good words, good comes back to you.  Good actions, good comes back to you.

So this website was about instant Karma.  The story involves an unsuspecting girl standing in a gym class facing the bleachers, which had been pushed back against the wall to make more space on the floor.  She’s minding her own business when another kid, a little bigger than she, begins sneaking up behind her holding one of those pink balls that you find in gym classes.  He’s getting ready to hurl the ball at the back of her head.  A perfect target, facing the other way and completely unaware.

Now is that a nice thing to do?  No.  Okay, it’s funny.  I’ve done it before, I admit.  But it’s still not nice to sneak up behind somebody and throw a ball at the back of their head.

Nevertheless, that’s what he’s fixing to do.  But just at the very moment he cocks his arm to fire the missile, his target suddenly stoops down to pick up something off the floor.  He lets go with a fastball.  It just grazed the top of her hair so she noticed it but was not hit by it.

Instead, the ball hit the bleacher hard, rebounded straight from a board on the bleacher, whizzed right over the girl’s head back to the thrower, and smacked him right in the face.

That’s instant Karma.

An Angry Driver Stars on Camera

Another story on this website was also reported on the news about a woman who was driving in Florida.  She’s minding her own business driving along, when she sees behind her a pickup truck whose driver is really mad trying to get past her.  Flashing his lights, honking his horn, trying to get around.  She’s going the speed limit so she’s not really motivated to go a lot faster for this guy.  It’s like, deal with it.  However, he’s evidently so angry that she whips out her cell phone, which has a camera, and within moments she is videoing him.

With her left hand, she aims the camera over her right shoulder through the rear window while steering with her right hand, looking in the rearview mirror, watching the truck, staying on the road, and driving normally.  All the time she’s videoing this guy.

Well, the next thing you know, her single lane widens into two lanes.  The woman stays in the left lane.  The pickup truck swoops into the right lane before she can move over, and instead of just passing, he pulls up beside her and makes an obscene gesture.  It was a negative thing, a very mean gesture.  By this time, though, she’s filming the guy through her passenger window and catches it all on camera.

Suddenly, in a steaming fit of self-righteous rage, the guy tromps on the gas pedal, zooms leftward in front of her, and cuts so hard that he loses control and goes spinning down onto the median between the roads.

The woman slows down and continues videoing as the guy goes off the road.  She got his license number.  She got his face when his hand wasn’t in the way.  She filmed the whole thing and sent it to the police.

That’s instant Karma.

Two Birds Hang Up and Crack Up

This one made me remember a case of instant Karma that I saw myself.  I was walking toward Bon-Ton’s in the mall, about ten feet behind a pair of girls.  They were together on one phone call, leaning close to each other so as to share the phone while talking to a third person on the other end and paying no attention to their surroundings.  We’re getting close to Bon-Ton’s entrance.

It was a very energetic conversation.  I couldn’t hear the words, but the two were extremely upset about something and were intent upon their conversation.  Finally, as they neared the door, the girl holding the phone hangs up abruptly, turns to her friend, and explodes with some very profane words.

She had called the party on the other end a string of very bad names and was heatedly recounting them to her companion at the very moment the two of them strode obliviously into the plate glass doors of Bon-Ton’s.

That’s instant Karma.

 Karma in a Four-in-Hand or on a Donkey?

I have just given you three cases of negative Karma.  It is equally positive, though, and I want to give you an extraordinary example of putting good Karma out into the world and good coming back.

First let me set the scene for you.  The first three pictures show modern armies marching.   For comparison, the fourth image represents the ancient army of the Roman legions.

The Chinese Army Marching

The North Korean Army Marching

 

The United States Army Marching in Iraq

The Roman Legions Entering Rome (from the Movie “Gladiator”)

The three preceding modern armies are all modeling themselves after the Roman legions pictured above.

You may not recognize it right away.  Have you ever seen the movie “Gladiator”?  Okay, many have seen that movie; it was very popular.  This is an early scene showing the triumphal entry of the Roman legions into Rome after it had battled to an overwhelming victory against the Germanic tribes in northern Europe.  They were completely routed by the Roman legions.

Those legions then returned to Rome.  They celebrated their military victory by staging a parade as they entered the city upon their return.  In the front of the picture are the Senators, and in the background is the Colosseum.  On the sides are the soldiers, all in battle array in a massive display of force and power and armament.  In the back, on the other side of the pillars, is the crowd.

The conquering general is in the middle of the picture, standing in a chariot drawn by four horses.  He is receiving tribute for their victory and will soon make his way amid thunderous cheering up to the Emperor, who is there with the Senators to receive the glory and accolades deserved for the triumph.

Modern Armies Model Roman Practice

Armies to this very day emulate this ancient practice that goes back many ages to the rise of the Roman empire.

Now I want you to think for a moment.  Compare the next two pictures.  The first one shows the Emperor Titus in a bas-relief carved into his sarcophagus.  It’s over 2,000 years old so there’s a lot of damage, but you can see the chariot and the four horses.

The Sarcophagus of the Emperor Titus

Marcus Aurelius with an Angel on His Shoulder

The immediately preceding picture is a relief depicting Marcus Aurelius, who happened to be the Emperor portrayed in the movie “Gladiator.”  Here he is seen entering the city of Rome as the conquering general and emperor, with four horses and a chariot.

The reason I wanted to show you this particular picture is that there’s an angel perched on Aurelius’ shoulder.  In Roman times that angel, who is depicted as giving the general divine advice for victory, was named Genius, from which we derive the modern word.

What Was Jesus’ Message About the Donkey?

Now compare all of these Roman and military scenes to the following picture from a Sunday-school book about Palm Sunday.

Jesus Entering Jerusalem on a Donkey

The question I would like you to ponder is why Jesus entered Jerusalem riding a donkey.  Everybody knew the proper way to enter a city to reap the glory of victorious battle.  Why did he do it this way?  There are no armaments at all.  Nobody is in Rome, following their rank.  There are women and children and old people and young people.

Why did Jesus enter on a donkey rather than in a chariot drawn by four warhorses?  What was he trying to get across?

I would like to answer this question for you, but I really shouldn’t.  It would be like telling the punch line to a joke.  It’s more appropriate for you to answer the question yourself when you compare the Roman way of entering a city with Jesus’ way of entering Jerusalem.  What is in your heart is what’s right for you at this time.  I can give you a Biblical answer; I can give you a theological answer.  But it would only be my answer.  You have your own thoughts about why Jesus entered his city in his own special way.

A Renaissance Woodcut of Jesus Entering Jerusalem on a Donkey

This picture shows the same kind of thing as the one before it – the donkey, average people, a chaotic crowd.  It’s not orderly, there are no armaments, no chariots, no spears, no tanks.  Once again, why did Jesus do it this way?  What was his message?

Now I want you to hang on to the answer you have developed about why he did this.  Just put it in your short-term memory for a moment while I tell you two more stories.  Then I’m going to ask you to think about three things – the answer you have formulated in your mind as to why Jesus entered Jerusalem in a special way and the following two stories.  I’ll ask you to put the three together.  It’s not going to be easy, but I want you to try.

Don’t Drop It, Tom; It’s Very Very Heavy

This story is much different, an extraordinarily rare photographic image.  Back in January, it was published in all sorts of scientific journals.  It is the very first image ever seen of another planet outside our solar system.  They’re called exoplanets.  We’ve got pictures of Jupiter, Mars, and others, but they’re all in our solar system, all nearby.  Here is a planet orbiting a star that is nevertheless very close to us in terms of the cosmos.  Our nearest star, the sun, is four light-years away.  This one is 63 light-years away. 

Photo of an Exoplanet Taken at a Distance of 63 Light-Years from Earth

This exoplanet’s sun is the big dot in the middle of the photo, but the blue area that’s all around it in the center, where all the brightness of the star should be, is blocked out by software.  The planet is the little white dot at the bottom right.  It’s about 32-60-some pixels wide, and that’s as big as it is.

By the way, here is a picture of the team of astrophysicists rejoicing at the existence of this photograph.   They say this exoplanet is 63 percent larger than Jupiter and is obviously very close to its sun.

Astrophysicists up in the Air at Success of Photo Taken at Incredible Distance

Here’s a planet that should be extremely volcanic due to its proximity to that sun.  The gravitational forces of a huge planet so close to a giant star would have to be incredibly strong.  This planet is therefore being squeezed and pulled, and squeezed and pulled as it orbits around this sun.  The two bodies are very close to each other, and both are enormous.  For comparison, Jupiter is our biggest planet, and the newly pictured planet is 63 percent bigger than that.  So we’re talking about a very volatile place, larger than Jupiter and 63 light-years away.

I pulled out my calculator.  Taking a photograph of that planet would be like making a photograph of your face except that your face would be two-thirds of the way to the moon.  It is the equivalent of taking a photograph of a grain of sand except that the grain of sand is in Los Angeles.  Also, I want you to appreciate the technology and science that were necessary to take this photograph.

Now please turn around and face the rear of the sanctuary.  There’s Tom, one of our deacons, standing in the back of the sanctuary.  When he went out to ring the bell this morning, I asked him to bring in a single grain of sand, and he’s holding it up for you to see.  You can’t see it?  Okay, he’s holding the grain of sand; you can guess how big it is.  “All right, Tom, it represents a huge planet.  Just don’t drop it.”

Now if I were to whip out the little camera on my phone and take a picture of the single grain of sand,  would you be able to see it?  No, not even close, and it’s only a few yards away.  So imagine the special camera, the science and technology that enabled the astrophysicists to take a picture that ended up giving us a view of a grain of sand, except the grain of sand is in Los Angeles.

That’s what this photograph is like, and it’s the first time it has happened in the history of humanity.  It should be in a church, if you ask me.

Female Quail Sacrifices Self to Brood

One more story to tell you.  Does anybody know what this picture shows?  It’s a quail, a male quail on the right, and the female on the left.  You’ll notice that the male is better looking – one of those universal things in nature.  (Um-m-m.  Uh-h-h.  Ha!)

Female Quail at Left; Male Quail at Right

Quail Chicks

This story happened last summer.  There was a heat wave out West, and in northern California there was a big forest fire.  After the fire had burned through and was put out, some rangers were cleaning up debris where the fire had gone through.

Up against a tree one of the rangers spotted a quail.  It was completely black.  It had been burned but was still standing right up against that tree with all its feathers completely charred.  The whole bird was thoroughly blackened.  The ranger went over and touched the quail, but it didn’t move.  It just toppled over, and out from underneath the hen waddled three little chicks.

What the mother hen had probably done was to make a terrifying choice between fleeing the fire and abandoning her covey or choosing to stay to try to protect the flightless brood.  Her choice was a primal one.  She opened her wings, the little ones climbed underneath, and all four stood by the tree awaiting the fire.

The fire came roaring down over them.  The mother quail died.  Her chicks lived.

What I want you to do now is to put these three images together.  Try to imagine the kind of love the mother quail had for her little ones, and combine that thought with the kind of tenacity, the kind of technology, the kind of human force that we can put behind a project to achieve something important to us.  And to succeed at accomplishing a significant undertaking such as a photograph of a planet 63 light-years away.

Then I want you to meld those two ideas and join them with the concept of humility, of nonviolence, of a desire to change the value system of a violent society.  To upend the way in which people routinely do business, to know that the prince of peace rides in on a donkey, not being drawn in a chariot by four stallions.

If we would take that message and combine it with unconditional love and the fortitude of which human beings are capable, that, my friends, is what Palm Sunday is about.

Amen.

KNOW ME

Preached on Sunday, March 30, 2014
A Sermon by the Rev. Janet L. Abel
 

Getting Started

This sermon is entitled “Know Me,” and I would start by saying I believe that to be known is nearly as deep a need as water.

Those of us who attended college were compelled to pick a major, usually in the junior year, in a field of study in which our knowledge would flourish.  I picked economics but am not sure why.  Perhaps because I thought it would be practical.  My interests led me to English, literature, history, and religion, but my parents said I really should be practical.  So I started out with biology but quickly changed my mind.  Art is far more scientifically-minded than I am, and I knew enough to pick something else after taking several courses in science, so it was economics for me.

Going to graduate school required further, more concentrated studies, which led me to aim for a school that was focused on an area specific to my interests.  I decided to go for a Master of Divinity degree.  Although the name implies that those who go to seminary, like Art and me, will become masters of divinity, I don’t know that one ever masters anything like divinity.

Even so, how we come to know God and come to our faith is a unique story for every one of us.

Our Different Stories

Art’s story, as he’s told us, is one of math and science, that the beauty of mathematical equations led him into his faith.  I traveled a far different path.  I admit that I prayed a lot in math class to pass, among other things, but I didn’t quite see God in my study of math.  I was more panicked.  It’s numbers and I.  I don’t even do Sudoku.  Numbers just don’t speak to me.

My faith developed differently.  Through people, to be honest, and animals.  The need to take care of our pets at home.  Visiting the hospital and the nursing home.  Setting the communion table for church.  My Sunday-school teachers, my parents.  Learning the stories of people who lived long ago – David and Solomon and Joshua, Leah and Rachel, Moses, Jesus and Paul, Peter and John.  Music also has a big part to play in my faith.  And art, including photography.

As a little girl we always got National Geographic, and I loved looking at the pictures although at first I didn’t read it.  I viewed Mutual of Omaha on television, watching animals get tagged.  I remember men in particular sitting in the bush keeping an eye on other animals, taking pictures of elephants and tigers.  And the movies.  I admit that a great deal of my faith formation as a child came from King of Kings, Ben Hur, The Robe, and The Ten Commandments.

I know Art has quoted Einstein heavily in his sermons, and I have yet to do that.  I don’t know that I fully understand E  MC², and maybe that is a blessing, but I have quoted names in Cabaret, and I’m working on others.

We do come to know ourselves and each other and God in different ways, and that’s okay.  It’s a wonderful thing, really, and we believe differently as well.  That too is okay.  How do we keep learning, keep our knowledge growing?  Many of us might watch a special on television or go to see a certain movie, and we’re compelled to learn more about a certain subject.  You get the relevant books out of the library or order them and then read and reread, study and relearn.

As a kid, history bored me silly.  It seemed to be a series of wars and dates empty of excitement.  Yet now I love it and spend more time reading about people, events, and happenings.  I read about Scotland and the year 1776 in our nation, about the Johnstown flood in Pennsylvania and about Alexander Hamilton.  You name it.  You have too, I’m sure, and my knowledge about these subjects, people, and events has grown some.

I enjoy biographies as well, having just read three very different books in a row:  Steve Jobs, I Am Malala, and Joan of Arc.  I realize that’s quite a list.  It runs a gamut, in both age and people.  Just now I want to talk a bit about Steve Jobs.  It’s a new biography for Steve Jobs’ life story and the founding of Apple.

The Steve Jobs Story

It was an interesting read.  I learned a little more not only about Steve Jobs the man but also about Silicon Valley and how personal computers really got started.  This huge explosion of personal technology affects us all as we acquire smart phones, iPods, and the like.  Jobs himself wanted a thousand songs in his pocket.  Think how revolutionary it was when he and his team came up with the iPod, which has turned the music industry upside down and has changed how we browse the Web.

Jobs had a particular challenge, as his biographer put it, in coming up with products that we want before we know we want them.  When products by Apple came out, people would watch and say, I want that.  It’s sleek, and it’s cool-looking.  Feels good in the hand.  Product development at Apple proceeded in a room with a table filled with facsimiles of new products that Steve and his team played with.  They would walk around examining prospective products, holding them and putting them up to their ears.  They had to feel good as well as look good and be endowed with strong technical advances.

Steve was also a difficult person.  As described by his biographer, he had a nasty edge that hindered more than helped him.  He had more than an edge.  He was truly offensive.  Who knows why?  Jobs was adopted, and he felt that keenly.  However, he ended up meeting his birth mother and his biological sister, and he and his sister became very close.

He hurt a lot of people, often being devastating in business and distant at home.  A factoid about Steve Jobs tells you a lot about the man.  Every day he would go to work in his car without license plates.  He refused to put them on and would park crooked in handicapped spots every day.  That’s the kind of guy he was, and that’s before he got sick.

Knowing and Caring Are Divine Acts

So why talk about this?  I have come to understand, thanks to our passage in thinking about it, that knowing is a divine act.  It’s an act of love.  It’s an act of God.  Here in church we all talk a lot about love.  (I do too.)  God is love.  We have to love one another as we love ourselves.

And sometimes it’s good to think about love in practical terms.  How do we show love?  How do we give love?  How do we feel love?  One of the facets of love is to know and be known.  Knowing takes time.  Takes interest.  Takes study.  Takes caring.  You do have to care and take the time to get to know one another right here in church.

Practical Magic

I’m going to tell you a simple story that I told the residents of the nursing home where I work as a chaplain.  It’s called “Practical Magic,” and I’d like you to think about taking the time to know somebody.  It’s by a woman, a granddaughter named Christy Caballero.  The people on the corridor didn’t know.  How could they?  Nurses and doctors and orderlies, interns and patients, all in a rush to get someplace.  While some hurry from point A to point B, others move in slow motion, measured steps, their grip on the handrail turning their knuckles white.

Glancing into the nondescript room as they pass by, people would have seen a gray-haired patient, looking like a grandfather in his 60’s, and they might have noticed a pretty young raven-haired woman sitting near him, about the right age to be his granddaughter.

But none would understand the miracle taking place in this drab world.  It was subtle and easy to overlook, mistaken for a typical visit between a patient and a visitor, probably a family member.  Yet it wasn’t typical.  It was magic of a potent, all-too-uncommon kind, far too important to detect in a passing glimpse.  As the moments passed by, the frail man painted pictures of his lifetime.  His words were his brush strokes, and that was only half the magic.

The real magic was that the woman listened and heard him.  The clock of his life was winding down.  He struggled to walk across the room, but his words still had power.  So it was with words that he whisked his visitor off to times long past and places that were half a world away.  Times and places that he hadn’t been able to take anyone to for a very long time now.

His family didn’t mean to keep the man in a box.  They were just too busy or too preoccupied with his illness.  Take a break and meander into the room along with the staff.  They already knew his stories backwards and forwards, but they didn’t understand that he had to share his memories so that in sharing them he could feel alive again.

The Patient Spreads His Wings . . .

As the woman sat in the sturdy, no-frills hospital chair, she listened.  The man stood in the footprints of a lanky high-school boy, ashamed that he hadn’t ever left the state of Oregon.  On his eighteenth birthday, there was only the lazy Columbia River between him and the state of Washington.  He dove in and swam hard enough to reach the other shore.  After collapsing and resting for a while, he swam back.  He rooted about in his memories and found every treasured arrowhead over again.  And he lived the rescue of a long list of injured animals.

As the minutes passed, the man turned into that tender recruit who went to World War II in military service.  On the day two of his buddies were drafted into the army, he decided he wanted to determine his own destiny, and he enlisted in the navy.  The only obstacle was the 60 miles between him and the recruiting station.

It was a bitterly cold winter day, and he turned his face toward Portland.  He climbed aboard his bike with big fat tires and pedaled.  And pedaled all night.  The hours passed by as he froze.  Stopping in a Portland diner, the young man counted his change and ordered a chili.  It was the only thing he could afford.  His navy stories were rich and vivid, full of Australia, a country he came to love.  And the visitor saw him at his best, the way he was before the world wore him down.

The patient saved his most precious story for last.  He sank back into a day in Norfolk, Virginia, walking along a street, making his way back to his submarine to ship out.  He suddenly spotted a woman who instantly took his breath away.  He didn’t even know her, and he didn’t get the chance to meet her.  But somehow she made his heart ache.  His heart ached for that lovely stranger for another decade until the night he met that same woman face-to-face at a dance in Alaska, half a world away.  He decided that very night he was going to marry her and told his best friend he was going to do just that.  Six weeks later, they said their “I do’s.”

The young woman beside the hospital bed sat and listened.  The magic grew stronger.  Because she listened, he was transformed.  Because she was interested, he managed to sleep behind the tubes and the monitors and the pain.  Because she heard what he had to tell, he was able to make a journey of his own.  The old man stepped out across time, and for a few moments he could feel the cloth of a younger man’s shirt on his back.  The arms of a young sailor holding his bride.

. . . Until the End

He received a great gift that day.  His closest family members hadn’t stopped by on that particular day and so weren’t present to provide this chance for their beloved relative to relive his life, simply in its telling.  Yet he wasn’t the only one gifted; the listener also received a treasure of the retelling of a life.

The patient died soon after that special visit.  But in the chilly twilight hours of his life, he had more than hospital linen to keep him warm.  The event seems quite ordinary, but he had found the strength to share himself one more time.  That man in the hospital room was my grandfather, and I wished I had been the young woman in the chair.

The Story of the Woman at the Well

Jesus was sitting by a well somewhere in Samaria, which was a country between northern and southern Israel.  As you’ve heard before, the Samaritans and the Jewish people didn’t get along very well.  The Jews looked down on the Samaritans.  They didn’t go to temple.  They weren’t really part of the faith.  They had intermarried.

The disciples went into Sicar to buy food.  It was noon but noon is not the time people in those days went to the wells.  They were mostly women with their big water jars, first thing in the morning, when it was cooler.  Of course, that’s when they would also see their neighbors and friends and catch up in these days before mass communication.  Or they went in the cool of the evening as the sun was setting and dinner was done.  Then they’d go back to the well and talk some more.

What’s this woman doing, going to the well all alone?  We’ll be told later in the story, but Jesus surprises her deeply.  He surprises his disciples too.  He breaks basically every taboo that existed at the time.  You didn’t talk to women, especially women to whom you aren’t related.  And you certainly didn’t talk to Samaritans.

But of course he does.  He takes the time.  He demonstrates that he knows her very well, yet he welcomes her and talks to her.  They actually have a theological conversation, and she gets it.  Come see a man who’s told me everything that I have ever done.  He cannot be the Messiah, can he?

Take the time to welcome, to come, to know ourselves and each other and God.  Some of the residents where I am chaplain sit all day, saying over and over, “God bless you.”  I imagine they are saying, “Know me.”  Stop a minute.  Stop a second.  Look into my eyes.  Treat me like the person I am, even if I can’t talk to you.  Take my hand.  Take the time.  Know me.

Bumper-Sticker People Ask for Notice

Why do people put bumper stickers on their cars?  Have you noticed the latest stick figures?  Mom and dad or mom and mom or dad and dad.  Three kids, two boys, and a girl.  A dog and a cat.  Even sports:  soccer balls and baseball bats, you name it.  Why do they care what I know about them?  They want to be known.

And why do people put memorial stickers on the back of their cars?  Actually, for people who have lost young persons.  We no longer as a society wear black clothing to show the world that we’re in mourning.  The black veil or armband is occasionally worn for funerals but is no longer de rigueur.

What we want is that we desperately need people to know what’s happening in our lives.  To know what we’ve lost and who we love.  Find the people who write blogs on their computers.  What if they go on “Judge Judy” and “Doctor Phil,” for goodness’ sake?  They’re desperate to be known.

We all need to be known and to know.  It’s an act of love.

Amen.

IGNORING A COMMANDMENT

A Sermon by the Rev. Dr. Arthur M. Suggs

Preached On Sunday, January 12, 2014

 

Fear Comes in a Cardboard Tube

I concluded last Sunday’s sermon with a quote from John 1, “Perfect love casts out fear,” and talked about that a bit.  Following the service and throughout the week, a number of you told me some of your stories and experiences with fear, and so I would like to continue that conversation this morning.

My own interesting story about fear was a real gut-wrencher for me when it happened in 2002.  I was about ten miles north of San Francisco in San Anselmo and was working on my doctorate at San Francisco Theological Seminary.  It was a bright and beautiful Saturday in summer.  I had the day off, and I, along with some other students, had gone into town, and we were having lunch at an outdoor cafe.

For context, remember the summer of 2002, when 9/11 was still fresh in our minds.  President Bush had given his War on Terrorism speech, and there was a horrible anthrax scare in Washington D.C.  The Department of Homeland Security had been established, and it had decided on four colors to indicate the level of threat.  It was red at the time, meaning maximum threat.

As I said, I am with friends in the sidewalk section of an outdoor cafe, having lunch, minding our own business.  At mid-lunch, from our table on the sidewalk, I looked at the exterior wall of the restaurant beyond our table.  Nothing much there at all – just a sidewalk, a brick wall, and, leaning against it, a cardboard tube.

Looking at it, I thought, “What’s that, sitting there all by itself?”  Nobody nearby, no backpack or bicycle nearby, nothing except a cardboard tube leaning against the side of a public restaurant.  My mind, conditioned by threats, assumed the worst.  I had a horrible sinking feeling, so I said to the others at our table, “Look at that.  What do you think it is?”  Immediately, my friends quietly asked, “Is it a bomb or not?”

The people at the next table overheard us, looked at the tube, got up, and left suddenly.  They were noticed by the occupants of two other tables, who also got up and left quickly.  My friends and I were not sure what to do, but I still had that horrible sinking feeling.  I knew then why they call it terrorism.

While we were deciding what to do, along came a bicyclist, who swooped in, picked up the tube, and left.  We concluded it was probably only artwork.

A Snowflake Targets You

Fear.  In the pit of your stomach.  Whether it’s an intruder in your house or you’re scared about potentially losing your job or you have an appointment with your doctor and might be told something you don’t want to hear.  Fear.  And there’s actually a lot to be afraid of in our era.

Right now we have Al Qaeda, which certainly thinks ill of us and wants to harm as many of us as possible.  There’s global warming and weird weather.  The economy has been problematic at least since 2008.  The dysfunctional government that preceded 2008 continues to this day.  And we have accidents or disease.  Speaking of which, are you covered?  Are you sure?  And so we worry.

Then comes the Weather Channel, of all things.  We have a phenomenon called a polar vortex, which I’ve never even heard of before.  The Weather Channel’s symbol for a polar vortex is a snowflake in the shape of a target.  So it’s not like we’re going to get cold weather.  No, no, no.  This thing is aiming straight for you!  It’s aiming for the Midwest.  And for upstate New York.

No, this storm has you in its sights.  Really!?  A snowflake has a target?  And it’s you personally?

Leavening the Lump of Fear . . .

So in that context, here are some interesting quotes to leaven this lump a little:

• “Fears are educated into us and can, if we wish, be educated out.”  – Karl Menninger, founder of the Menninger Clinic.
• “The enemy is fear.  We think it’s hate, but it’s fear, because when we’re afraid, those feelings of hate and anger and disdain arise within us.”  – Mahatma Gandhi.
• This one I love.  “When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he’s often surprised to find that it comes off in his hand and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers.”  – Ralph Waldo Emerson.
• We pay attention to this because of who said it.  “Security is mostly a superstition.  It does not exist in nature.  Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”  – Helen Keller.
• From the Hindu scriptures, this one is suffused with theology.  It has the essence of how not to live a fearful life.  “Who sees all beings in his own self and his own self in all beings loses all fear.”    – From the Issa Upanishad.
• From the Scriptures we have Isaiah 43, which concludes with “Do not fear.”
• We also have Revelation 1, which concludes with “Do not fear.”
• There are a bunch of other quotations as well, but to put them in an extended Scriptural context, we look in the Torah, where we have the 613 rules, or commandments.  In Hebrew they’re called the mitzvah.
• Ten of them are very special.  They’re called the Ten Commandments.
• And two of the mitzvah are really special, being ones that Jesus quoted to his followers:  “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God” and “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”
• Scattered throughout both the Hebrew and the Christian Scriptures, there are lots of other rules.

They’re not merely good advice, and they’re not just commandments either, but injunctions, rules, powerful suggestions.  For example, in Thessalonians Paul says, “Pray without ceasing.  Rejoice always.”

Jesus himself gave us some new injunctions that we generally forego.  They’re so hard to follow that we don’t stand much of a chance, so we forget about them and tuck them aside.  The two most disobeyed commandments, the two most ignored and forgotten commandments in the entire Scriptures are:  “Judge not” and “Fear not.”  Has anybody among you obeyed them?  Ever?  Nobody?

. . . And Irrational Phobias

There are of course phobias, which are generally irrational but not always.  Fear of heights?  Probably a good thing.  Arachnophobia?  Also probably a good thing.  It can be irrational if you have to jump up on the dining-room table to escape, but having a healthy respect for spiders is undoubtedly wise.

Fear of closed or open spaces?  Now it starts to get a little irrational:  Fear of public speaking clocks in at 97 percent of the population.  Fear of death clocks in at 95 percent of the population.  It makes you wonder about that 2 percent difference.  Apparently, they really would rather die.

Now it’s quiz time to see if you know this phobia:  It is the fear of being chased by a wolf around your kitchen table on a newly waxed floor, and you’re in your stocking feet.  Do you remember the Far Side cartoon?  Luposlipophobia.

But the Scriptures are very clear.  They almost never say, “Be afraid.  Be very afraid.”  They do say that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, but the understanding of it is not so much fear but respect or reverence.

In Deuteronomy, as the children of Israel go through their wanderings into the Promised Land, you can read “Do not fear” six times.  In Isaiah, fifteen times.  In Joshua, as they actually enter the Promised Land, two more times, just for good measure.

In John 4:18, there is no fear in love.  Perfect love casts out fear.

Our Imperfect Perfect Love

The question for us is:  Why are we so afraid?  You know we are.  I think one thing can be concluded about our fears, and that is that they have not been cast out by perfect love that has been attained.  We have not reached a level of perfect love such that we can stop being afraid.

Our fears seem to be rooted in a faulty theology.  Let me give you an explanation.  Consider the following list of Biblical promises that are very hard to achieve and that are often lost in the struggle of living life:

• The promise of eternal life that has been made over and over again.
• Add to that the promise of providence that God will provide, will look out for you.
• Add to that the propensity of grace to trump law over and over again in your dealings with God.
• Add to that that God knows and cares.  God knows the fears we have, the issues we’re dealing with, and cares.  Remember the sparrows and the lilies of the field.
• Add to that resurrection.  Not the Resurrection but resurrection-ness.  It’s not that death follows life, not that you live, go on a few diets, then die.  It’s that life follows death, over and over again.
• Add to that the guidance of the angels and the gift of the holy spirit.
• And add to that the final words of the Gospel of Matthew:  “And lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”

And yet we act.  We have the blood pressure and the antidepressants and the anxiety to prove it, as if we don’t believe a word of it.  “When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he’s often surprised to find that it comes off in his hand and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers.”

Helen Keller was right:  “Security is mostly a superstition.  It does not exist in nature.  Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”  Then consider the theology of that Hindu verse:  “Who sees all beings in his own self and his own self in all beings loses all fear.”  Thus, it follows that whoever considers the interconnectedness of the web of life is a person who loses all fear.

May I suggest that we begin by believing some of the ancient doctrines of resurrection, of providence:  That “Christ is with us, to the close of the age.”  That grace trumps the law.  That God cares for the sparrow and the lily of the field and even more for you.  That we might consider obeying the commandment:  Fear not.

Amen.

 

OF NO OBVIOUS RELEVANCE

A Sermon Preached by the Rev. Dr. Arthur M. Suggs
On Sunday, November 24, 2013

Sarah Prods Abe into a Poetic Proclamation

As you might suppose, the theme for today is Thanksgiving.  George Washington actually was the first President to declare a day of Thanksgiving.  It was not Abraham Lincoln.  It was Washington on October 3, 1789.  The problem for Washington’s declaration was that he didn’t make it a national day.  He just said to all the states, observe it, and they all did, more or less, in their own way.  And that was not a unified day of Thanksgiving.

But in that same year, 1789, a baby was born.  Her name was Sarah Josepha Hale, and when she was approximately sixty years old, she had the idea that all of the states should observe Thanksgiving together on one special day.  So she began writing letters to the President annually, suggesting and encouraging him to declare one day of Thanksgiving.  Then when she was 74 –she had been doing these letters for fifteen years – when Lincoln received the letter in October 1863, he decided that in the coming November, the fourth Thursday would be the right day.  Thus he is the one who made it a national holiday, not Washington

I’d like to read you the proclamation written by Lincoln to make Thanksgiving a national holiday.  This took place in 1863.  The Civil War would last through 1863 and into 1864 and 1865.  The country was in the middle of the conflict, but the proclamation was and still is beautiful.  You probably have never read the full proclamation unless you read it in school.  Here it is:

“The year that is drawing toward its close has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies.  To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the s*ource from which they come, others have been added, which are so extraordinary in nature that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart, which is habitually insensible to the ever-watchful providence of almighty God.

“In the midst of the Civil War, of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign states to invite and provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict.  While that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union, needful diversions of wealth and strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defense have not arrested the plow, the shuttle, or the ship.

“The ax has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines of iron and coal and of precious metals have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore.  Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege, and the battlefield.  And the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to experience continuance of years with large increase of freedom.

“No human council hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things.  They are the gracious gifts of the most-high God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.  It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently, and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart and one voice by the whole American people.

“I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as the day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father, who dwelleth in the heavens.

“And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to him for such singular deliverance and blessing, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners, or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and restore as soon as may be consistent with the divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility, and union.”

A Soldier Declines Disability, Lives with Thankfulness

A portion of this proclamation was read by me last Tuesday, when I was invited to offer the opening prayer and closing benediction for the Greater Broome County Chamber of Commerce annual Thanksgiving dinner.  The keynote speaker was Sergeant Richard Yarosh.  You may have heard of him.  He was in the paper a couple months ago on the front page.

Yarosh was a soldier in Iraq and was riding in an armored vehicle when it drove over an explosive device in the road.  It exploded upward through the bottom of the vehicle, going through the gas tank and into the turret, where he and his best friend were.  Covered in gas and aflame, the sergeant managed to get out and jump off the vehicle, breaking a leg in the process.

He wasn’t able to see because the flames pretty much covered his entire body.  He did the stop, drop, and roll trick, which he said didn’t work, so he kept rolling downhill into a ditch, where water in it  put out the flames.  However, the water contributed to cholera, which he later contracted.  A helicopter arrived about thirty minutes later and flew him away.  Eventually Yarosh wound up in a hospital in Texas.

When you look at the sergeant’s visage it’s striking, reminding me a little of the Phantom of the Opera.  It’s the kind of thing that sets one aback a bit.  His ears were burnt off and so there are only holes in either side of the head.  Same thing with his nose; he doesn’t have a nose at all, just the holes that go in above the mouth, which was relatively unaffected.  But all over his head, you can see where grafts were made of skin from other parts of his body.  This portion has this kind of hair, that portion has no hair, another portion has another kind of hair.  It’s a patchwork of different kinds of skin on his head.

So you look at him, and then you listen to his story.  He made a comment that struck me:  “On the day in which I almost lost my life, my life actually really began.”  He had been asked early in his recovery if he would wish that the incident hadn’t happened.  It’s one of those things that naturally comes up in conversation.  The sergeant  thought about it and realized that no, he wouldn’t wish for that.  He’s glad it happened because the person that he is now would not have occurred without the drastic burn that nearly killed him.

He lost the use of both hands, which are now basically in the form of a fist.  When you shake hands with him, you sort of grab his fist because he can’t open it.  Asked whether he would like to have the use of his hands back, his answer actually was no because of all of the things he’s learned by not being able to use his hands.  That struck me.  Yarosh is thankful.  He’s so thankful for what happened because of who he is now.

A Scientist Is Rejected, Earns Nobel in Physics

Let me change the subject for a moment.  I know you would be disappointed if you didn’t get a science illustration every week.  There’s not an Einstein quote in this mix, but I want to tell you about a rejection letter.  As many of you are aware, the physics you learn in high school and the beginning of college is basically Newtonian, based on the work of Sir Issac Newton (1642-1727).  Then in 1905, the world changed with Albert Einstein’s (1879-1955) contributions.

In 1998 the confirmation of a new theory that is actually bigger than Einstein’s began to spread throughout the world.  The person who came up with this new theory was Peter Higgs.  I’ll spare you the details, but it was fascinating in that he wrote an academic paper proposing his idea of the existence of a particle that would become Higgs’ boson and the existence of a field that would eventually be named the Higgs Field.

He sent this paper off to the leading physics journal.  A rejection letter came back announcing that the existence of this particle and this field “had no obvious relevance to physics.”  This letter is now framed and hanging on Higgs’ wall.  He went on to earn the Nobel prize in physics, even though at an early stage the leading physics journal could not see the obvious relevance to physics!

A Balance of Humility Plus Awareness Equals Gratitude

I would like to plant this relatively deep thought in your mind.  Gratitude may have no obvious relevance to your spiritual life.  Maybe the scriptures do.  Maybe God does.  Maybe meditation does.  But gratitude?  The thought I’d like to share with you is this:  That the reason gratitude is important is that it emerges out of a balance between humility and awareness.

Think about humility for a moment.  You don’t want too much or too little.  If you don’t have any humility at all, you’re basically a jerk.  You are arrogant and dictatorial.  People probably don’t like you.  And if you have too much humility, you’re a doormat.  You’re a worthless worm, and you can’t be relied upon for anything.  You’re not much help.  Once again, people probably don’t like you or don’t want you around.

You need a nice balance in humility.  Not too little, not too much.

Now connect a balanced humility to awareness:  Awareness of our place in the community.  Awareness of our place in the family, for we are children of God, of royal nature, but as individuals we’re one of many.  Awareness of our place in society.  Our place in the universe.  Our place in relationship with our creator, our God.  Awareness of our place combined with a balanced sense of humility.  Not too little, not too much.  Out of that emerges gratitude, which is of tremendous value in our spiritual life.

What are we grateful for?  As we approach this Thanksgiving Day, I would ask each of you to answer that question.  Perhaps at prayer before the meal, a turkey sitting on the table if you’re a traditionalist and you have a prayer before the meal.  What are you going to say?  What are you thankful for?  Your answer, your very intimate personal answer, will emerge out of your sense of humility, linked to your awareness of your place in the universe.

Where I Stand – Four Seeds of Thankfulness

I’m going to list four things I’m thankful for – four out of many – just to sow some seeds for your thinking this coming Thanksgiving Day.

1.  I’m thankful for this sanctuary.  I didn’t pay for it.  It was paid for by previous generations.  I have not had to spend one nickel of my money to create this sanctuary that I enjoy every Sunday.  I love walnut.  It is a premium hardwood.  And this pulpit, these pews, the ceiling, the chandeliers, the stained glass, the whole of it.  The organ.  I didn’t pay for it.  It was given to me by a previous generation, and I’d like to say thanks.

2.  Our country.  I’m pretty mad at our country right now.  I’m hopping mad.  I don’t want to talk politics from the pulpit right now.  I won’t do that.  But I’m mad at Congress.  I’m mad at a lot of different folks.  Yet I’m free to say so from the pulpit.  But despite my politics, which are personal, despite my feelings, I still need to say thanks to a lot of people who have created this country and preserved the freedoms that I tend to take for granted.

3.  And I want to say thank you for something that’s much more subtle.  A thousand different pieces of evidence, but combine them, and I feel that there is a blossoming of spiritual awareness in our land.  Once again, I didn’t start it.  I’m trying to help, but I didn’t create it.  And so I want to say thanks.

4.  Finally, family, friends, and church.  They’re really three different names for one thing – relationships.  Put all of us in a circle, and then start threading back and forth across the circle.  You’ve seen artwork done this way.  It’s beautiful.  But all the relationships, all the connections are there.  And then begin to expand the pattern outward because every person here is friends with and related to others.  It creates a tapestry, a work of art.  And it’s beautiful.

So let me seed your thoughts with those four things:  sanctuary, our country, the blossoming in spiritual awareness, and our relationships.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Amen.