The Spirit of Courage

I preached this Sunday on May 27, 2012, a Sunday that was both Pentecost and Memorial Day Sunday. One goal of this sermon was to find common ground between these two holidays that are so very dissimilar. I chose to focus on the virtue of "courage." The book of Acts implies that courage was a gift of the Holy Spirit to Jesus' followers. It seems to me that the courage shown by many of our military men and women is that same kind of gift. If you choose to read the sermon, see if you agree with me.

This morning is a two-for-one Sunday: it’s both Pentecost and Memorial Day! For those of you who may not know, Pentecost is the celebration of the gift of the Holy Spirit to Jesus’ disciples. It’s frequently called the “birthday of the church,” because it marks the beginning of the proclamation of Jesus as Messiah outside the circle of his followers. Memorial Day, of course, is the day when we honor the men and women of our military who have died in the service of our country.

At first glance, these two holidays couldn’t be more different. Pentecost is a Christian holiday; while Memorial Day is celebrated by people of all faiths – and by people who have no faith at all. Memorial Day is an American holiday; while Christians all around the world join in the celebration of Pentecost. But the most glaring contrast is that Pentecost celebrates the Spirit of Jesus, who urged us to pray for our enemies and to follow in his way of peace; while Memorial Day is a reminder of all the wars that have taken place since the dawn of history.

This contrast between Pentecost and Memorial Day will cause many churches to choose this morning which holiday they will celebrate. Some will opt for Pentecost. They will place images of a dove in their sanctuary to remind worshippers of the Holy Spirit; and they will change the cloths on the altar to red. Other churches will choose to celebrate Memorial Day. The churches who do that will sing patriotic songs; and they’ll make sure that an American flag is displayed somewhere in the church. But celebrating only one holiday or the other suggests that somehow church and society don’t belong together. It forces us into a false choice. If we celebrate Pentecost on Sunday and save Memorial Day until Monday, we buy into the notion that religion is only for one day a week. We go to church on Sunday and think about the Holy Spirit; but on Monday, the Holy Spirit may have no part at all in our lives. On the other hand, if we celebrate only Memorial Day on Sunday and forget about Pentecost, we buy into the idea that our country is somehow more important than God’s Spirit.

I hope that we have found a middle way here in our worship this morning. We have prepared for both Pentecost and for Memorial Day! There are doves in the sanctuary (both on the church banners and on my stole), and the cloths on the altar are red. But we are also singing songs appropriate to Memorial Day; and the window in the narthex displays markers that remind us of the many wars in which our military men and women have fought and died. Does this make us schizophrenic? I hope not. I hope that we’re showing how our faith can inform the events of our nation. In a recent Pastoral Ponderings (my column in our church newsletter), I mentioned a man named Karl Barth. Barth was an influential theologian in the early part of the 20^th century. He advised pastors to preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. In Barth’s opinion, if we can’t apply our faith to our society, then our faith isn’t much good; and our society probably isn’t much good, either. It seems to me that on this Memorial Day/Pentecost Sunday, it might not be a bad idea to put our Bible in one hand and the morning newspaper in the other, and consider how one holiday can inform the other.

Let’s begin that process by considering the gift of the Holy Spirit. The early church understood that when a Christian is filled with the Spirit of God, it is evident in that Christian’s life. The letter from Paul to the Galatians contains a long list of the characteristics that a Christian displays when he or she is filled with the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. That’s a good list. But it seems to me that there is one virtue that Paul has left off his list – courage. I’m convinced that the Spirit offers us courage as well as all these other good things. Now, when I talk about “courage,” I don’t mean “foolhardiness.” Bungee-jumping off a bridge without first checking the strength of the bungee cord isn’t courage; it’s stupidity! No, I’m talking about real courage – the courage to do what it takes for a cause that is a lot bigger than any one of us.

The apostles showed that kind of courage in proclaiming the gospel after they were filled with the Spirit at Pentecost. Peter faced a huge crowd on that first Pentecost, and he spoke out boldly as he proclaimed that Jesus was the Messiah. He did the same thing when he was hauled in front of the Jewish ruling council; so much so that the book of Acts tells us that they were amazed at his “boldness.” The apostles didn’t let the threat of punishment, or hardship, or even execution stop them from proclaiming the good news of the Gospel to anyone who would listen. Their courage was, quite simply, astounding.

The scripture reading this morning was taken from one of Paul’s letters to the church in Corinth (II Corinthians 11:21-29). Did you take note of all the hardships that Paul experienced? It’s a very long list: prison, floggings, beatings, stoning, and shipwrecks, in addition to sometimes not knowing where his next meal was coming from. It takes real courage to face all those things! And no one was forcing Paul to spread the Gospel. After his conversion to Christianity on the Damascus road, he could have decided to stay home and drop out of sight. He might have simply written a letter to the Christian churches in the area that went something like this: “Hey, friends, I was wrong about that Jesus guy. I know now that he really is the Messiah. I’m so sorry if I’ve caused you any inconvenience with that persecution business! Let me know if there’s anything that I can do to make up for all the trouble that I’ve caused you.” But that’s not what Paul did. Paul put himself in harm’s way for the cause of Christianity – a cause that was way bigger than he was.

And that’s what our military men and women do every single day while they are serving our country. They put themselves in harm’s way for a cause that is way bigger than they are. Now, it’s true that they aren’t serving a religious cause. They are serving a country that is imperfect at best. They may not agree with all of its decisions. They may not even support the wars in which they are ordered to fight. But they put their lives on the line nevertheless for the sake of all the people who live in that country; and for the sake of people in many other countries around the world, as well. And many of them serve with a sacrificial courage that surely comes from the Spirit of God.

The most notable examples of this kind of courage are the recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor. The Medal of Honor is the highest award for valor in action against an enemy force that can be bestowed upon an individual serving in the United States Armed Services. To date, there have been 3,459 recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor. 81 of them are still alive. The most recent recipient is Specialist 4^th Class Leslie H. Sabo, Jr. Specialist Sabo served as a rifleman in the U.S. Army: Company B, 3^rd Battalion, 506th Infantry, 101^st Airborne Division. On May 10, 1970, Specialist Sabo and his platoon were conducting a reconnaissance patrol in Se San, Cambodia when they were ambushed from all sides by a large enemy force. Without hesitation, Specialist Sabo attacked one of the enemy flanks, drawing fire and ultimately forcing them to retreat. In order to re-supply ammunition, he sprinted across an open field to a wounded comrade. As he began to reload, an enemy grenade landed nearby. Specialist Sabo picked it up, threw it, and shielded his comrade with his own body, saving his comrade's life. Seriously wounded by the blast, Specialist Sabo nevertheless continued his attack, receiving several serious wounds from automatic weapons fire in the process. Mortally injured, he crawled towards an enemy bunker and threw in a grenade. The resulting explosion silenced the enemy fire, but at the cost of Specialist Sabo's own life. His courage and disregard for his own safety saved the lives of many of his platoon members. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor on May 16, just 11 days ago.

 
Jesus told his disciples, “Greater love has no one than this: that he lay down his life for his friends.” Being willing to lay down one’s life requires great courage – the kind of courage that only the Spirit is able to give us. On this Pentecost, let us give thanks for the Spirit that can fill us with enough courage to lay down our life for our friends – and on this Memorial Day Sunday, let us give thanks for our valiant military men and women who have done just that.

Abiding

How do we relate to a risen Savior? That's the question I consider in this sermon. In particular, I explore what it means to "abide in Christ." Exactly how we manage to "abide" is as individual as each person's relationship with God. But that we abide is crucial. If you choose to read this sermon, you might try to remember days when "abiding" was easy -- or days when it was very difficult. Can those memories help you meet the challenge of "abiding in Christ" in the future?

Time has gone on quickly, hasn’t it? It seems like just yesterday, it was Easter! But, in fact, next week is Pentecost already. We are almost out of the season of Eastertide. You may not think about the time between Easter and Pentecost as being a season of the church year; but it is. It focuses on one specific aspect of being a Christian, just like the other seasons of the church year do. Advent, for example, focuses on our need for a savior; and anticipates the unexpected way that God sometimes answers our needs. Lent, of course, is very different. Lent emphasizes our inability to follow the savior when he comes to us. Human sin comes to the forefront, together with our inability to follow Jesus to the cross. And next week will begin the season of Pentecost. During that season, we’ll reflect on the sometimes surprising places the Spirit leads us. But today – well, today we’re still in Eastertide. Eastertide focuses on how we respond to the risen Christ. That’s why the Christ candle has been on our altar ever since Easter Sunday. This candle signifies a risen Lord, one who is master of every time and place; one who is even master of death itself.

But how in the world do we relate to a risen savior? That’s the question that Eastertide asks us to consider. We know how to respond to the man Jesus. We listen to his teachings… we accept the guidance that he offers us… and we try to follow his example. But what do we do about a risen Christ? How can we relate to him? Jesus tried to prepare his disciples for just that problem when he instructed them in the upper room the evening before his death. The gospel of John relates a long sermon that Jesus offered his disciples. We can find it in chapters 13 through 17. You heard a very small piece of it in the scripture reading this morning (John 15:9-17). In this part of Jesus’ sermon, he instructs his disciples to “remain” in him; because that is the only way that they will be able to love one another in the way that Jesus wants them to.

“Remain” in the risen Christ. That’s what we’re told to do. And the word “remain” is a good translation of the Greek word that Jesus uses. The New International Version of the Bible uses the word “remain.” But I prefer the traditional translation “abide.” That’s the word in the King James Version. Jesus’ take-home message is that he wants his disciples to “live” with him – and in him – after his resurrection. And “remaining” isn’t quite the same as “abiding.” The word “remain” sounds like a command you’d give your dog Fido. “Stay, Fido! Remain!” And Fido, being a very well-trained dog, will “remain” there until you tell him that he can go someplace else. But “abide…” “Abide” is a place to live permanently! We might “remain” at the mall for a few hours; but we “abide” in our home. The word even sounds cozy! “Abide…” It calls up an image of a big, overstuffed chair in front of a crackling fire. As you put on your slippers and pick up the newspaper, you prepare to “abide” in a place of comfort and security. Your faithful dog FIdo comes over and flops down at your feet; and if you don’t sigh in contentment, he’ll do it for you. This is your home! It’s where you “abide.”

And many times, abiding in Christ is just like that. There are days when we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we are wrapped in Jesus’ arms, abiding in the love and comfort of his presence. On those days, the presence of Christ is as close as our own heartbeat; and we know it. We face even major difficulties as though they were only minor inconveniences; because Jesus is right there, a part of us. Those are the days we cherish!

But sometimes, abiding in Christ isn’t quite that easy. Sometimes abiding in Christ takes everything you’ve got! Let me give you an example of what I mean. When I was a child, my parents owned a boat – a 30-foot cabin cruiser that we kept just outside of Port Clinton on the Lake Erie shore. When we took it out on the lake, the point was, of course, to “abide” in that boat. When the waters were calm, that was easy. But if Lake Erie got a little choppy – as Lake Erie tends to do, fairly frequently and with very little notice – then we had to hang on for dear life to “abide” in that boat! Sometimes it was all we could do to keep both feet on the deck. As the waves tossed our boat this way and that – up and down and side to side – we’d grab on to the sides to keep from being hurled into the water.

It sounds like life, doesn’t it? We get tossed from side to side and up and down; and sometimes we’re not sure that we’ll be able to hang on! We want to abide in the risen Christ, but our problems are so huge, and we get so tired of dealing with them, that we start to lose our grip on the side of the boat. Little by little, we begin to slide towards the water. We cling more tightly, desperate to hang on; but when an unexpected wave hits us, our grip fails; and we feel ourselves falling… But we don’t fall; because when we lose our grip, we realize that we are being held by our risen savior – the one who is Lord over the wind and the waves. Jesus is hanging on to us as tightly as we are hanging on to him! “Abiding” isn’t something that we have to do all by ourselves. Jesus helps us do it. There is no trouble, no obstacle, no problem so powerful that it can knock us out of the presence of the risen Christ, because he is helping us to abide there! Jesus has assured us that he not going to lose any one who is given to him by the Father. And that’s all of us! He’s not going to lose us; and we’re not going to lose him, whether we feel his presence or not! Whether we’re abiding in comfort or being tossed around by angry waves, Jesus will always help us to stay by his side. That’s what it means to have a risen Lord. He abides in us… and we abide in him. Forever!

I Don't Believe It!

It’s always fun to ask a group of kindergartners what they want to be when they grow up. The variety of answers that they give is just astounding! Some of their answers are predictable. “I want to be a firefighter… a doctor… a cowboy… an astronaut!” Others are more unexpected. I once knew a little girl who wanted to dig up dinosaur bones when she grew up! And some children – bless their hearts – even want to grow up to be pastors. But I will bet you any amount of money that no child has ever said that he or she wants to grow up to be a heretic. “Heretic” just isn’t a career of choice.

Part of the reason for that, of course, is that children don’t know what a heretic actually is. In case some of you don’t know, either – a heretic is someone whose ideas are outside the mainstream thinking of any particular group. For example, someone who didn’t believe that Jesus was God’s son would be a heretic – at least as far as Christians are concerned. A heretic thinks way outside the box involving matters of faith. Now, knowing that definition of a heretic, I’m quite sure that no child would ever want to grow up to be one! Children – and most of the rest of us, as well – don’t want to be seen as different. We don’t want to be “outside the box” when we’re compared with other people. It’s more comfortable to be “inside the box” along with everybody else. If we have some thoughts that aren’t quite what everybody else thinks, we usually keep them to ourselves. After all, we don’t want anybody to think that we’re weird, do we? But heretics refuse to quietly stay inside the box. In fact, really good heretics burst out of the box and voice their opinions loudly!  They are convinced that their thinking has something to offer to the world; and they simply will not be silenced.

Now, don’t fall into the trap of thinking that every heretic is wrong! Many heretics, in hindsight, are recognized to be quite right! Galileo was a heretic. He observed that the earth revolved around the sun, not the other way around. But according to the Roman Catholic Church of his time, God had created the earth to be the center of the universe! Believing that the earth revolved around the sun was heresy! Another heretic was Martin Luther. He challenged the Roman Catholic Church on some of their most basic doctrines; and in the process, he started the Protestant Reformation. Without heretics like these two, the church would become hopelessly corrupt. That’s because heretics frequently correct the church when its thinking is one-sided. Heretics reevaluate old ideas in the light of their own, new experiences.

You might be surprised to learn that throughout history, some of the most influential heretics have been women! You heard the story of one of them in the scripture reading this morning. According to Matthew (15:21-28), a woman influenced Jesus to rethink the whole purpose of his ministry. And she wasn’t even Jewish. She was a Canaanite woman who lived along the Mediterranean coast north of Israel in the area of Tyre and Sidon. Now, Canaanites aren’t very well thought of in the Bible. Every good Jewish boy of Jesus’ time grew up learning that Canaanites were heathens – pagans who worshipped false gods and bowed down to idols. (Do you remember the god Baal from the Elijah stories? Baal was one of the Canaanite gods.) Canaanite women were especially dangerous.  Why, any Jewish man would rather kiss a pig fresh from the slops than associate with a Canaanite woman!

Matthew’s story shows us a Canaanite woman running after Jesus pleading with him to heal her daughter. And as a good Jewish man, Jesus wouldn’t have anything to do with her. He ignored her for as long as he could; but her yammering for help was finally more than Jesus could stand. So he told her, “It’s not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs!” Now, calling someone a “dog” in Jesus’ day was a terrible insult. It should have put a stop to her pestering. But it didn’t. In fact, she had a great comeback line. “Yes, Lord,” she said, “but even the little doggies get to eat the crumbs of bread that fall from the children’s table.”

What a marvelous heretic she was! Jewish thinking said that the Messiah’s ministry would only be for Jews. Jews were, after all, God’s chosen people; and God would send the Messiah to them. Certainly no Canaanite could expect to take part in the salvation that the Messiah was going to offer to the Jews! But that’s exactly what this Canaanite heretic was saying. “Surely, Lord,” she pleaded, “surely there is enough for everyone. Even if the Jews receive the lion’s share of God’s grace, there must be a little left over for me, too.” And because of her objection, Jesus changed his mind! We can almost see him do a double take… look at her more closely… ponder what she has just said to him… and realize that faith is found not just among the children of Israel. Even the least likely person – a Canaanite woman – could recognize the Messiah and call upon him for salvation. It takes a good, outside the box heretic to believe something like that! “Oh, woman,” Jesus replied, “great is your faith!” And because of that faith, Jesus healed her daughter.

Down through the ages, many women have indeed shown great faith. They have had the faith to believe that any religion that excludes a whole group of people isn’t a true religion at all; it’s a cult. They have had the faith to believe that sitting down quietly and keeping your mouth shut never causes any change. Some of them have even had the faith to believe that God is still speaking, even when religious authorities say that what God wants of us was settled long ago. Let me mention just a few of these faithful heretic women.

Christine de Pisan lived in 15^th century France, in an age when churchmen regarded women as evil seductresses or witches. She wrote two books. One illustrated the virtues of women as modest, gentle, and loving. The other argued against the notion that Eve’s behavior in the Garden of Eden brought sin into the world. In her opinion, it was unfair to try to pin all human sin on women. Besides, she pointed out, weren’t women the ones who remained faithful to Jesus during his crucifixion when all the men ran away?

Catherine of Sienna lived in Italy. In Catherine’s day, the church told women that marrying and bearing children was their only proper role in life. Catherine refused to marry her father’s choice of husband, and entered a religious order instead. She ministered to the townspeople when the Black Death swept over the city of Sienna and all the priests ran away to save themselves. She was instrumental in reforming the behavior of those priests. She even influenced the policies of the Pope. She is frequently pictured supporting the ship of the Christian church on her shoulder.

And let’s not forget Jarena Lee, a black woman who lived in 19^th century America, who wanted to preach the word of God. But a woman, preaching? Especially a black  woman! Religious authorities of that day wouldn’t allow it. But Jarena preached anyway. She said that she was powered by the “holy energy” of the Holy Spirit, the source of her voice and her courage.

They were heretics, every one of them! And they are joined today by Roman Catholic nuns who refuse to believe religious doctrine just because the Pope tells them to believe it. They are joined by Protestant mothers who go to Bible study and find out that, in many cases, what they learned as children is not what the Bible says at all! And they are joined by women who don’t belong to any church, but who are convinced that Christians who hate and judge and exclude others don’t have a clue as to what Christianity is really all about. “I don’t believe it,” they say. “I don’t believe that what I am being told is right. I will read the Bible for myself, I will think for myself, I will give my own opinion, and I will not be silenced!”

We don’t have to agree with them! But we should give thanks that their tradition of heresy – of disagreement and dissent and controversy – has helped to reform and guide the Christian faith that we hold so dear. I don’t know about you; but I, for one, am grateful for all the women throughout history who have said, “I don’t believe it!”

Passing on the Flame

Yesterday, I was honored to receive three young women into church membership through baptism and confirmation. They are in the sixth and seventh grades right now. My sermon considered the way that many churches marginalize young church members like these. In my opinion, they will become active church members as adults only if they are encouraged to use their Spirit-given gifts to the church right now. We older members also need to hear their perspective on faith and ministry, since they are natives in an electronic world to which most of us are only immigrants (and late immigrants, at that)! If you choose to read the complete sermon, think about how your own faith community views younger people. Do you allow them the opportunity to minister in Christ's name... or must they wait until they are older?

I hope that all of you are as proud as I am of these three young women. They have worked very hard since last September as members of my confirmation class. They have learned a lot! They have studied their faith – the sacraments, our UCC Statement of Faith, and the biblical basis behind all of it. They have learned about our denomination – our four-stranded history, the four settings of the UCC and what each one does, and how our local church governs itself. They have examined themselves for spiritual gifts, and each one has made a commitment to use at least one gift in our common ministry here at Nashville. And they will continue to work hard over the summer completing their service project to our congregation as we repaint the church nursery!

Of course, there are a couple of things that they can’t do yet, because they are, after all, young women. They’re still in school. They can’t drive yet. They still have some growing up to do. Their thinking and their experience has a long way to go! And because that is the case, the age of the youth who join the church through confirmation is a problem for lots of congregations. In these churches, young women and men like these are “second class members” until they reach voting age. These churches say, in effect, “We know you’re members… but until you’re grown up, you’re not really members.” And that’s unfortunate. We deny ourselves both their enthusiasm and their perspective when we say things like that.

It’s not a new problem. Even the apostle Paul had to deal with it. You just heard part of a letter that he wrote to Timothy, who was a leader in the church at Ephesus (in modern-day Turkey). In the middle of a long list of advice like “Don’t buy into old wives’ tales,” and “Train yourself in godliness,” Paul says this: “Let no one despise your youth.” The Message Bible, a modern paraphrase of the text, puts it this way: “Don’t let anyone put you down because you’re young.” Apparently the older Christians in Timothy’s congregation weren’t paying any attention to him because he was younger than they were. After all, he hadn’t lived nearly as long as they had. They were more experienced in the ways of the world. They thought that he needed to learn from them, not the other way around.

But the truth is that we all have something to learn from one another. We older church members need to listen to our younger church members as much as they need to listen to us. I told these young women that at our final meeting last week, and I think I surprised them. After all, they’re used to hearing people say “Listen to your elders.” And of course, they should listen to what older folks have to say. They know that. But we need to listen to them, too. After all, they are growing up in a world that is strange to those of us who grew up… well, some time ago. We “mature members” are like immigrants who have been dragged kicking and screaming into the unfamiliar country of Playstation, Facebook, and Twitter. If some of you don’t know what I’m talking about… well, that just proves my point. These young women were born into a world of instantaneous communication, global networking, and multiculturalism. They have never known life without cable TV, cell phones, and the internet! And that’s OK. Their world is where the church is headed. In fact, their world is not just the future of the church; it’s the present reality of the church! Maybe it would be a good idea for us to ask them what faith means for their generation – and then listen to them when they tell us!

You may have noticed that I titled these remarks “Passing on the Flame” instead of “Passing on the Torch.” I did that deliberately. When a torch is passed, it stays the same. The torch doesn’t change in the process. This summer, while we are awaiting the start of the Olympic Games in London, we will watch the Olympic torch as it is passed from Athens to Moscow to Beijing to San Francisco to New York and finally to its home in London. During that entire, long journey, it will be the same torch. It simply moves country to country.

Passing on a flame, however, is a different story. A flame may be kindled by one person, but when it is passed to another, it becomes their own. The person who receives it has to care for it. It might burn more brightly for its new caretaker, or it might flicker low. Without the proper care, it might even go out. But it is certain that the flame won’t burn the same way for the person who receives it. The Christian faith is like that flame. It will burn differently for these young people than it does for us. It will take different forms. It will burn in different places. It will touch different people. And while they may be able to contain it, they won’t be able to control it any more than we can. A flame, after all – especially the flame of the Spirit – has a mind of its own!

So, you three young women who have just been confirmed into church membership – today we pass the flame of our faith on to you, just as it was passed on to us. Take care of it. Don’t let it go out. Help it to burn brightly in places and ways that we older folks can never even imagine! And then – when the time is right – pass it on to someone else, so that it can burn brightly in new ways for them, too.