MyQuest

Something My Mama Taught Me

Something My Mama Taught Me

Acts 2:1-21

by the Rev. Dr. E. Scott Jones

Cathedral of Hope – Oklahoma City

    11 May 2008    

 

 

    Today I want to talk to you about something that my Mama taught me. It requires me to do something a little different. I don't want to talk to you as a pastor, but as a church member. I'm not going to give a sermon – I'm going to share a personal testimony.

    So, I'm taking off this stole, this sign of ordination and pastoral authority. I'm taking off this robe, this sign of academic accomplishment. And I'm stepping out of this pulpit and to this lectern.

    So, I'm speaking as Scott Jones, not as the Rev. Dr.

Why? Because I want to share with you my stewardship testimony, not a stewardship sermon.

[Note: some personal financial information edited for on-line version]

 

    Stewardship, tithing, is something that my momma taught. In our household we were paid our weekly allowance into four envelopes that our mother had created for us. One envelope was spending money, another envelope short term savings for something that we wanted to buy, the third was for our savings account at the bank, and the fourth was our tithe. Ten percent of the weekly allowance, dedicated to the church. It would be a mistake to list it as the fourth envelope, though, because it was really first. The tithe was paid before anything else was.

    From the earliest age, I was a tither. It became a habit. A spiritual practice and discipline, the source of spiritual strength and joy.

    When the stewardship campaign rolled around every year and the deacons and other folk stood up to talk about tithing, I knew what they were talking about. When they spoke of how it brought joy and blessing to their lives, I knew. When they talked about how it made them a better person more generous and gracious, I knew that too.

    In 1990 when the First Baptist Church of Miami celebrated our centennial, we had a number of events throughout the year, many involving long time church members sharing their stories. Some were a little shocking. For instance, one of our oldest members talked about one time when the Klan appeared during Sunday morning worship to donate money to the church. Which, thankfully, the church gave away.

    One story that has always stuck with me was told by Claudine Stepp. Claudine was called upon to talk about the period in the 1960's when the church built the new sanctuary. Now the Stepps were not wealthy, you wouldn't even describe them as comfortable. But Claudine shared how her family decided to support the building of the sanctuary. They were already tithing and understood that a commitment to a building campaign would call for sacrifice beyond the tithe that God normally asked of them. They didn't decide to give up some luxuries, because they didn't have any to give up. Instead they reduced the size of their weekly food budget and committed that money to the church. Claudine said it meant that they ate a lot of beans for awhile, but as she stood there in the sanctuary almost thirty years later, she shined with pride that her sacrifice had contributed to a ministry which touched the lives of thousands of people. She spoke of this as one of the great joys of her life.

    These are the sorts of stories that I grew up hearing, the sort of spiritual training that I received. Thus, I was always a tither. I have helped to save the lives of African children through medical missions. My gifts responded to the Oklahoma City Bombing. My stewardship has supported micro-loans and libraries in the Mississippi Delta. My tithe went to new, young ministers receiving seminary education. My financial gifts have helped thousands experience profound moments of worship in the churches to which I've belonged. The fruits of my labor have helped to build the kingdom of God. What greater source of joy is there? I have found none.

 

    In the late nineties when I started graduate school I worked as a graduate assistant in the philosophy department at OU. That first year I made $XXXX. By my fifth year, thanks to David Boren's commitment to raise our salaries, I was making the huge amount of $XXXXX and health insurance. All of those years I was living below the federal poverty level.

    And I still tithed. And that tithe does not count the other money that I gave to charity above that tithe. I was amused during that period when one year Al and Tipper Gore's tax returns were made public, as they are with politicians, and it was revealed that the Gore's had only contributed $500 to charitable causes that year, causing a minor scandal. I was proud that I, who lived below the poverty level and made far less than the Vice President of the United States, had given away more money that year.

One of the spiritual fruits that comes with tithing is learning to live simply. Learning to live with less means that we are less greedy, that we participate less in the injustices of the world economy, that we learn that we are not owned by our things. Sure, there are times I'm envious of my friends and their plasma screen televisions, their new cars, their fabulous trips, and their expensive clothes. But I'm not envious of their credit card debt or their consumer mindset that compels them to want the latest or the best thing.

Tithing is a risk. It would be easy to take care of yourself and use the money that you would otherwise tithe. Tithing reminds you that you do not own yourself, that you must trust God to provide for you. Tithing, then, builds your faith.

    In 1998 I decided to buy a house. Now I was fortunate to have some savings because I had inherited a little money from my grandmother. My dad was an only child and had died before grandma, so the money from the sale of her farm went to me and Kelli and paid for our educations and our first homes.

    That year I made about $XXXX. Despite my poverty income, I was able to buy a house. Maybe this can only happen in Oklahoma where the cost of living is so low. I paid $33,500 for the house, less than some people's cars. It was 1,064 square feet, had oak floors, cedar-lined closets, and mahogany crown molding. I loved that little house. My house payment was $275 a month!

    I do not believe in a prosperity gospel. I do not believe that there is a magical formula where in you give some amount of money and God will give you ten times back. That's not Christianity, that's paganism.

    What I do believe is that when you tithe you are blessed in many ways, most of them spiritual. What I know without a doubt is that there have been times in my life that I have received financial blessing. No one will ever convince me that being approved for the loan to buy that house or the ability to afford it on an income below the poverty level, was a result of anything except my lifelong commit to tithing.

 

    Three years ago I made the decision to accept this job and move to Oklahoma City. I did not have to struggle over the decision at all. It was clear to me that God was calling me here. And I was passionately excited about the vision and the mission of this church. It was something I wanted to commit my life to.

    And it took sacrifice. There were a number of things I gave up in order to come here, including my comfortable income and benefits package. But these financial sacrifices did not give me a second thought for two reasons: 1) I passionately believed in this church, and 2) I had lived more simply before and knew that I could again.

    You remember what happened next. My house in Dallas stayed on the market for eight months and I lived with my parents that entire time. Remember how stressful that was? I was one of the early victims of the collapsed housing market.

    Though I could easily support my Dallas house payment on my Dallas salary, that house payment was 2/3 of my monthly income here. Quickly I ate through my savings and began to build debt. When I did finally sell the house, I sold it for a loss, liquidating what few assets I had remaining in order to cover the loss. The debt I incurred I have still not recovered from.

    I must confess that there were a few months in there that I was unable to tithe. It was a great pain to me, because tithing is a foundational spiritual discipline for me, the source of great joy and pride in my life. So, I understand when financial hardship gets in the way. The next year, after the house had finally sold, I made up for what I had been unable to do.

    At the first of this year, with Michael living with me, I developed a plan for finally getting out of the debt from three years ago.

 

    Then, this January when we received the end of 2007 financial report, I did what my Momma had taught me to do.

    You see, in 2007 we brought in more money than any other year in the church's history – something to be celebrated. And most of the year giving stayed ahead of expenses. But in the fall expenses finally went ahead of giving and remained there, and we ended the year farther behind than we had expected, largely because of the bad weather in December that kept many people out of worship for three weeks.

    The January financial report gave sobering news that we had very little savings left and that it would be gone within a couple of months. I wrote a letter about it, as did David Disbrow, we called the Special Congregational Meeting to discuss the situation, and we developed a few fundraising ideas. I also, as your pastor, went out and asked some people for money. This is not something I had ever thought I would do. In fact, as an Associate Pastor I would have said I would never do it. But I did it. One of our regular attendees contributed a sizeable gift, without which we would have been out of money some time ago.

    At the end of March things looked much better, but during April giving dropped again while end of first quarter expenses meant April was an expensive month. We now find ourselves around $6,000 in the hole for this year and the potential of being unable to pay our bills within just a few weeks. But I'll let the Finance Team and the Congregational Officers tell you more about that. Let me get back to my spiritual testimony.

    Back in January when this worry became apparent, I did what my Momma taught me to do, what First Baptist Miami and folk like Claudine Stepp taught me to do. I called up Nancy Sanders, our financial secretary and upped my pledge for this year. That debt-reduction plan I had developed, I set aside. Money that I had allotted to pay down my debt, I now gave to the church. I began turning back in some of my reimbursements for church expenses and supplies. And, when I found out about the $600 we would all receive from the federal government as a economic stimulus tax rebate, I decided to give all $600.

    Why? Not simply because it's what my Momma taught me to do, but because tithing and then going beyond the tithe to make the occasional financial sacrifice to support the church is foundational to my spiritual life. I believe it is what God expects of me, so I expect it of myself. It is an expression of my faith and trust in God; that no matter what happens in my life, God will provide. Stewardship has born fruit in my life, as I have been blessed to become more generous, to live more simply, and to participate in ministry to others. St. Francis is right; it is in giving that we receive.

 

    Now, you might be wondering, "What does any of this have to do with Pentecost?"

    On Pentecost God's Holy Spirit was poured out. The Spirit indwelled and empowered those who share in the faith of Christ. In the process the church was born.

    Tithing and stewardship are for me the activities of God's Holy Spirit working through my life for my own spiritual growth and maturity and in order to build up God's holy church and usher in the reign of God.

    As Scott Jones I invite you to share in that adventurous, joyful work of God. Why would you want to miss out on something so good?

Last Night's Storms

Last night's tornados were not near our home, but it was still a little nerve-wracking when the straight line winds and "wall of water" hit the house. Michael and I were sitting together on the couch watching the tv weather reports. More than once we looked out the windows when we heard loud, ominous sounds.

Today, during my walk, I got to see the damage in our neighborhood. Limbs down. A collapsed fence. A few trees uprooted, including one of the old ones in my favourite grove in Edgemere Park (all of the trees in this grove survived the ice storm). I spent some time touching the tree and walking around it, grieving its loss.

A block away from our house a tree uprooted and came down on a house. That must have been one of the noises we heard.

Ever since the ice storm so many trees are weakened and misshapen and each major wind storm does more damage. The sadness continues.

Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama, & Liberation Theology

The recent Jeremiah Wright – Barack Obama episode has raised questions about Christian theology. And it is clear to me from this episode and the media’s handling of it, that most Americans are unaware of what mainstream Christian theology actually says.

In Sen. Obama’s press conference denouncing Rev. Wright, he was asked about liberation theology. Sen. Obama claimed some ignorance of the term, but said he believed in a social gospel and that the social gospel is what he had always heard in church. I guess it was an instance of Rev. Wright preaching liberation, and Sen. Obama hearing something else. So, let’s start by distinguishing between the social gospel and liberation theology. . . . [Read the rest of my HNOKC.com column]

Why Jeremiah is Wright

“Why Jeremiah is Wright”
A Sermon delivered by Reverend Marlin Lavanhar
At All Souls Unitarian Church in Tulsa, OK. Sunday, April 6, 2008

The last time I stepped into the pulpit, this upset someone came up to me after the service and said, “Marlin, you’re so much more fun when you’re angry.” I hope that’s true, because I’m heading that direction again.

I can’t believe the ignorance in our country about the prophetic traditions of the Bible and of the black church. The firestorm that has erupted over Barack Obama’s pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr., due to some sound-bites from his sermons, taken out of context, is more than a political ploy, it’s a character assassination of a man whose 36-year ministry has been, on the whole, prolific and profound. To understand Rev. Wright’s preaching we need to understand the prophets of the Bible and the role of the black church in America. But before I turn to Rev. Wright and the Hebrew prophets, let’s talk about Moses.

Remember what it took for Moses to lead his people out of slavery? The Bible says he parted the waters of the Red Sea. Now I realize there are people who say, “well it was actually the Reed Sea, a kind of marshy area that can be walked over at certain times, etc, etc...” But this explanation misses the larger point, which is that it takes something truly extraordinary – nothing short of a miracle – to overcome the forces of oppression and domination. It takes something truly extraordinary to break the chains that bind us, even when those chains are something like drug addiction, an abusive relationship, hatred, prejudice, greed or overwhelming grief. There are chains that bind us.

The Hebrew prophets knew something about what it takes. These peculiar men used fiery, incendiary and excessive rhetoric to get the attention of their society. They had a breathless impatience with injustice of all kinds. The prophets’ violent outbursts are often harsh, relentless and alarming. And it’s because the Hebrew prophet believes nothing less than the soul of his nation is at stake. The Hebrew prophet sees that his people have turned their backs on the ideals of their nation. His people have a covenant with God to create a just society, and their covenant is being broken by greed and arrogance and lies. And so, to get the attention of the people, his words can be vile and slashing and are designed more to shock than to edify.

For example, the prophet Jeremiah calls his nation Israel everything from a prostitute, to a harlot, to a donkey in heat, to a corrupt vine, and he goes on to curse their children and grandchildren. And this is just in the first few chapters! At this point, he’s just getting warmed up. But how do we go about wrenching people from their addiction to corruption and greed? How can we conquer callousness and arrogance and ignorance? Have you ever tried to convince an addict to stop doing drugs? Or tried to make an alcoholic quit drinking? If so, you know it’s like banging your head up against a wall. Now imagine an entire nation of people inebriated by a culture of violence. (Well come to think of it, that shouldn’t be too hard for Americans to imagine.) And imagine a society that exploits and neglects the poor and the immigrant. And does it under an illusion that they are the righteous of the world. (I guess that’s not too hard for us to imagine either, is it?)

Hopefully you’re getting the point of what the Biblical prophet’s were up against. What can anyone do to wrest people’s attention when they believe that civilization could come to an end and that the human species could and might just disappear? It takes something truly extraordinary. If only one could separate the waters of the sea, then maybe people would stop and pay attention.

Yet, the prophet’s work is even more improbable. He needs to separate a people from their delusions and selfishness. A prophet believes that people must be aligned with the will of God or else they will face total destruction. The prophet reminds his people that by sowing the seeds of immorality they will reap their fatal and noxious fruits. But behind the stinging and sour words of the biblical prophet, there is always a deep and abiding love for his nation and its people. He’s not calling down the wrath and damnation upon his people, as some misunderstand. He’s trying to get them to wake up and change their ways to avoid such doom. His message begins with disaster, but concludes with hope.

Yet, in their zeal and hysteria, the prophets of the Bible, are known for overstating their case. They are known for hyperbole and for making broad and sweeping generalizations.

Jeremiah in the Bible says:
Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem,
look and take note!
Search her squares to see if you can find one man,
one who does justice and seeks truth;
every one is greedy for unjust gain;
and from prophet to priests, everyone deals falsely…
(Jeremiah 5:1, 5; 6:13; 8:10)

Were all the people of Israel greedy and unjust? Of course not. But the prophets’ wails are not about accuracy – they’re about attention. We see it in Amos, Isaiah, Micah, Jeremiah and all the prophets of the Bible. But we must keep in mind that these men believed (as many Americans believe) that their nation was to be a moral exemplar to all the nations of the world. And when their nation acts immorally and illegally, it can only lead to one thing: great destruction. Because if they don’t set a high standard, who will?

Yet the cost of prophesy was high for the prophets in Biblical times, just as it is for prophets in all times. They always provoked the hostility and outrage of their contemporaries. Rabbi Abraham Heschel, one of the great Jewish scholars of the 20th century explains that, in their time the Hebrew prophets were seen by patriots as pernicious, by the pious as blasphemous, and to the men in power they were seditious. Prophets like Amos and Jeremiah were often mistaken as enemies of their people. The Hebrew Jeremiah was considered a traitor. and he received death threats from priests and villagers. (26:11; 11:21).

One reason people became so upset with the prophets was that, when their country was attacked, instead of cursing the enemy, they condemned their own nation for their actions that led to the attack. The prophets constantly call on their own countrymen to look at what they had done to bring on the wrath of other nations – which they equated with the wrath of God. A prophetic voice, in any era, is meant to challenge and to raise questions that society needs to consider and talk about. A prophet’s job is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. We have a proud history of such prophetic leadership in this country too. Frederick Douglass, after escaping American slavery, went on to challenge the hypocrisy and failures of this nation. “I will hold up America to the light and scorn of moral indignation,” he said. “In doing this I shall feel myself discharging the duty of a true patriot; for he is a lover of his country who rebukes and does not excuse its sins.”

We could ask, “How does one separate a government and a nation from a culture and economy, based on centuries of slavery and racial degradation? If we ask Frederick Douglass, he’ll tell us it takes something truly extraordinary. It may seem even more incredible than parting the waters of a sea.

Then there’s Martin Luther King Jr., who said of America: “[T]he greatest purveyor of violence in the world today – [is] my own government.” In his speech to sanitation workers in Memphis he said, “If this nation does not change its ways, it is going to hell.”

How does one get a nation to give up a culture of white supremacy and racial apartheid? It takes something truly extraordinary. Of course, despite their chafing rebukes of our nation, both Frederick Douglass and Martin Luther King Jr. are considered two of the greatest and most influential Americans that ever lived. Yet, like the Hebrew prophets, they were both highly controversial in their own time. Like the prophets, they were viewed by many to be a threat to the nation, and as unpatriotic. So, the uproar over Rev. Jeremiah Wright needs to be seen within the context of prophetic religion both in ancient Israel and in America. And it needs to be understood within the context of the black church in America.

Just recently, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in a Washington Times interview: “Black Americans were a founding population. Africans and Europeans came here and founded this country together – Europeans by choice, and Africans in chains.” You see, in founding this nation, Europeans brought their religion, while Africans were intentionally stripped of theirs. For generations African slaves were kept from Christianity and they were separated from each other so they wouldn’t practice their tribal faiths. When they finally were introduced to Christianity, the church taught them that being a slave was ordained by God. So was respect for one’s master. They were taught that they were a people cursed by the sins of Ham, the son of Noah. And thus, their divine punishment was to be enslaved, and their reward, if they were obedient, would come in the next world.

At first, slaves could only attend white churches. It was an arrangement that didn’t work well for either group. In the minutes from the Presbyterian Synod of South Carolina and Georgia in 1834 it reads:
The Gospel, as things are now, can never be preached to the two classes successfully in conjunction. The galleries, or the back seats on the lower floors of white churches, are generally appropriated to the Negroes, when it can be done without inconvenience to the whites. When it cannot be done conveniently, the Negroes must catch the Gospel as it escapes through the doors and windows.

Of course, black Christians desired more than the white man’s convenience would allow. Black Christians wanted places of worship more compatible with their sense of freedom and dignity. However, black churches were considered dangerous and were outlawed in every Southern state and were suppressed and severely regulated by law until the Civil War. Before then, black church meetings would happen in secret, in the swamps and bayous and under the cover of darkness.

So, black churches emerged in response to white racism. Black Christians created their own churches so they could meet God on their own terms. Because God, as mediated through the white church’s theology, scorned and subjugated black people. Just as Moses separated the waters of the sea to lead his people to freedom, black Christians had to separate themselves from the white churches in order to create a path to their own freedom and dignity. They had to separate themselves from a Christian religion that tried to make their dehumanization seem reasonable and inevitable. They had to separate themselves from preachers who would teach them how the Apostle Paul rebuked a slave who wanted to become Christian to first return to his master. They needed to break free from a church that told black people their captivity and debasement was ordained by God.

And now, today, when a proud and powerful black church is on trial in the media, it is imperative for Americans to remember that the black church was born at a time when most white churches were preaching a gospel that was evil in the ways it subjugated and debased non-white people. And in many ways the black church and black leaders have helped call Christianity back toward the truth and the light that all people are children of God.

We have to remember that black churches affirmed black people as human and beloved, at a time when the society told them they were nobody. And it was the only public institution where black people had total authority. It was the only place in society where a black person was not just seen as someone’s servant, janitor or maid, but was seen as a blessed child of God. Scholar Eric Lincoln writes of the importance of the black church in that it:
[B]ecame the community forum, the public school, the conservatory of music, the place where the elocutionary arts, the graphic arts, the literary arts, and the domestic arts were put on proud display. It was the Lyceum and Gymnasium as well as the sanctum sanctorum It was the prime developer of black leadership.
[One historian wrote]:
[I]t became to the Afro-American race what Faneuil Hall was to the Anglo-American – the cradle of liberty. It produced Nat Turner and it produced Martin Luther King Jr. [T]he black church has been a womb and a mother to a vast spectrum of black leadership in every generation since its inception.
And it’s important to note, as Lincoln does, that:
[D]uring the slave era, the black churches were monitored by the white man, and not infrequently closed or destroyed if he considered them a threat to his interests or well-being.

And it feels like they’re being monitored today. As sound-bites are being compiled and used for character assassination against a prominent black preacher. The message to all black preachers is, “We’re watching you! Watch what you say, because were going to take it, out of context if we have to, and broadcast it to the world in order to discredit or demean you. And in order to demean the members of your church, including popular political leaders.” And that’s why I’m preaching this sermon today. Because it’s become clear that the majority of people in this country have no idea about the importance and the role the black church and the prophetic tradition have played in advancing the American ideals of democracy. Not just in advancing the interests and ideals of black Americans, but the interests and ideals of all Americans. That’s why the black church had to separate itself, like Moses separated the waters of the Red Sea, because it took something that extraordinary to lead all of us and our nation out of captivity.

But the story doesn’t end with Moses parting the waters. And our work isn’t over either. Moses lifted his hand a second time once his people were free, and the waters rushed back together to swallow the powerful forces of the Pharaoh that were oppressing them. Ultimately, if racism in this country is to become a thing of the past, it will require black people and white people and people of all colors, hues and ethnicities to feel at home together in work, in worship and everywhere. In other words, the only way we’ll be able to permanently drown the evil forces of racism will be for our communities to truly reunite as one human race.

Now some people will say (like the old Nike ads) let’s “just do it!” But here’s the problem: The goal is not integration as much as it is inclusion. I heard a Methodist Bishop, Forrest Stiff, on the radio this week and he said, “Integration puts us together, but inclusiveness makes us community together.” For real inclusiveness to happen, white people need to come to terms with how and why the sea got separated the way it did in the first place. From the reaction to Rev. Wright, over the past few weeks, it’s clear that most Americans don’t understand the role of black anger or the role of the black church in leading this country toward the Promised Land.

Fortunately there are people in America today who are pointing us in the right direction.

There are people who are calling for a national and local dialogue on race. A dialogue that for the first time might make room for both black people’s anger and white people’s frustrations without the conversation breaking down. And the very fact that a black man is winning the majority of votes and delegates in a major political party for the presidency says something is shifting in America.

But there are other people, and forces at work, that are calling us back toward Pharaoh.

The sound-bites of inflammatory lines from Rev. Wright’s sermons, taken out of context and shown over and over on the news and turned into character assassination on the internet is one such negative force.

But let’s remember that Moses became such a great liberator because he was a border-walker. Moses had a foot in two worlds. He was a Jew, but he was raised in the Pharaoh’s home. He knew both cultures and this prepared him to lead his people to freedom.

Martin Luther King Jr. was a border-walker. He was raised in the black church and black schools in the south and was also educated in elite white institutions in the North. And this background in two worlds prepared Dr. King to lead this entire country closer to its dream. Mahatma Gandhi was a border-walker. Gandhi was raised in a traditional Indian family, but was educated in British schools. We need more border-walkers like Moses and King and Gandhi, people who understand the complex dynamics of race and history.

You and I need to become border-walkers too. By at least learning as much as we can about the complete history of this country, including the Black, Native American, Latino, European, Islamic, Jewish and Asian contributions. Because these are truly extraordinary times.

By the way, did you ever notice that there are prominent pastors in this nation who preach misogyny, homophobia, anti-Semitism, anti-Catholicism and Islamophobia every day? And Fox news isn’t questioning those preachers -- or the presidential candidates who sit in their churches and take their endorsements. There’s a double standard in this nation. There always has been.

And that’s why it’s time for a change.

Voting Irregularities in Oklahoma House

Fox News the other night reported that members of the Oklahoma State House are not following rules in voting for legislation. Members are voting for other members, sometimes without their consent. And even the high school student pages are voting for members.

I can't embed the video, but you can find it here listed as "Who's Voting for Your Legislator?".

Daily Oklahoman supports diversity

Today an editorial in the Daily Oklahoman supported Oklahoma City becoming more gay-friendly. This is one more surprising improvement in the paper that used to be one of the most right wing in the country. Read the editorial here.

They Have Threatened Us with Resurrection

Here is the poem from which part of my sermon title came. It was our first reading in worship on Sunday.

Our first reading today is a poem entitled "They Have Threatened Us with Resurrection" by exiled Guatemalan poet and theologian Julia Esquivel. Written in a context of civil war and political oppression, this poem reminds us of the power of resurrection that compels our faith. I invite you to sit back and listen to these powerful Christian words.

 

They Have Threatened Us With Resurrection
by Julia Esquivel


It isn't the noise in the streets
that keeps us from resting, my friend,
nor is it the shouts of the young people
coming out drunk from the "St. Pauli,"
nor is it the tumult of those who pass by excitedly
on their way to the mountains.

It is something within us that doesn't let us sleep,
that doesn't let us rest,
that won't stop pounding deep inside,
it is the silent, warm weeping
of Indian women without their husbands,
it is the sad gaze of the children
fixed somewhere beyond memory,
precious in our eyes
which during sleep,
though closed, keep watch,
with each contraction of the heart

in every waking.

Now six have left us,
and nine in Rabinal,
and two, plus two, plus two,
and ten, a hundred, a thousand,
a whole army
witness to our pain,
our fear,
our courage,
our hope!

What keeps us from sleeping
is that they have threatened us with Resurrection!

Because every evening
though weary of killings,
an endless inventory since 1954,
yet we go on loving life
and do not accept their death!

They have threatened us with Resurrection
Because we have felt their inert bodies,
and their souls penetrated ours
doubly fortified,
because in this marathon of Hope,
there are always others to relieve us
who carry the strength
to reach the finish line
which lies beyond death.

They have threatened us with Resurrection
because they will not be able to take away from us
their bodies,
their souls,
their strength,
their spirit,
nor even their death
and least of all their life.
Because they live
today, tomorrow, and always
in the streets baptized with their blood,
in the air that absorbed their cry,
in the jungle that hid their shadows,
in the river that gathered up their laughter,
in the ocean that holds their secrets,
in the craters of the volcanoes,
Pyramids of the New Day,
which swallowed up their ashes.

They have threatened us with Resurrection
because they are more alive than ever before,
because they transform our agonies
and fertilize our struggle,
because they pick us up when we fall,
because they loom like giants
before the crazed gorillas' fear.

They have threatened us with Resurrection,
because they do not know life (poor things!).

That is the whirlwind
which does not let us sleep,
the reason why sleeping, we keep watch,
and awake, we dream.

No, it's not the street noises,
nor the shouts from the drunks in the "St. Pauli,"
nor the noise from the fans at the ball park.

It is the internal cyclone of kaleidoscopic struggle
which will heal that wound of the quetzal fallen in Ixcán,
it is the earthquake soon to come
that will shake the world
and put everything in its place.

No, brother,
it is not the noise in the streets
which does not let us sleep.

Join us in this vigil
and you will know what it is to dream!
Then you will know how marvelous it is
to live threatened with Resurrection!

To dream awake,
to keep watch asleep,
to live while dying,
and to know ourselves already
resurrected!

Threatened with Resurrection: Or the Power and the Glory

Threatened with Resurrection: Or the Power and the Glory

Acts 1:6-11

by the Rev. Dr. E. Scott Jones

Cathedral of Hope – Oklahoma City

    4 May 2008    

 

 

    Slapstick comedy. That's how Canadian writer Laurel Dykstra describes this famous passage in Acts chapter 1. Here's how she tells it:

 

In a final, over-the-top demonstration of "not getting it," an unspecified group of followers demand of the resurrected Jesus, "Lord is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?" My crude paraphrase is: "Great, you're not dead. Now are we going to kick some Roman butt and take our rightful place as kings?"

In response, Jesus promises an entirely different kind of power and then promptly disappears into a cloud, as though in exasperation. I imagine later there was a fair amount of forehead-slapping among his followers, with them saying, "I can't believe that was the last thing we said to him."

So the stooges are standing gawking up at the place where Jesus has disappeared when two men appear and ask why. . . The men's appearance is sudden but not necessarily supernatural – they may simply have walked up on the distracted cloud-gazers. "Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?" they said. I expect the unrecorded response from the disciples was, "Agh! Where did you come from?"

 

    It can sometimes seem like every week we gather to gaze into heaven and ask, "Is it now?" like a bunch of children in the back seat of the station wagon, "Are we there yet?"

    My former colleague Harry Wooten has a number of Harry Wooten-isms for which he is famous. For example, when we were planning a worship service and we had providentially stumbled, despite our best efforts, upon a particularly powerful song, reading, or other worship experience, Harry would say, "This will make them clutch their pearls."

    But the most oft-repeated, and famous, Harry Wooten-ism is his weekly reminder of the "relentless return of the Sabbath." With wit and wisdom, Harry reminds us that sometimes our faithful discipleship is a joy, and sometimes it does feel like a burden.

      

 

    Graham Greene tells a story of a whisky priest in Mexico in the nineteen thirties. Mexico had entered into a period of intense religious persecution, particularly of the Roman Catholic Church. Priests were forced to renounce their vows and marry or face prison and execution. Some became underground priests.

    The whisky priest was one of these. Colleagues compromised in order to save their lives, but this priest did not. And it was all the more ironic because he was not a saint. In fact, he was a drunkard and a philanderer. He had an illegitimate son. Many people despised him because of his intemperance.

    Yet something compels this priest to keep at his duties. He is constantly on the run, evading the military authorities. He hides out with various peasants and performs the sacraments in secret.

    He might arrive in the village and spend the night getting drunk, sleeping it off in some shed or stable. The next day he would arise and perform baptisms, confirmations, and communion.

    Over time he looses everything -- his money, his belongings, his clothes, and finally the last bit of sacramental wine he possessed. He is arrested, brought to jail, convicted and sentenced to die.

    His last night on earth he spends getting drunk and making his own confession. He knows that the people really needed a saint, but all they had was him. And so he is killed.

    In the closing of the novel a young boy is listening to a woman tell stories about martyrs and heroes of the church.

    

    "And that one," the boy said, "they shot today. Was he a hero too?"

    "Yes."

    "The one who stayed with us that time?"

    "Yes. He was one of the martyrs of the church."

 

    The novel which tells this story is entitled The Power and the Glory. That phrase and this story have stuck with me. Two years ago I preached an entire sermon series with that title, and pretty much every Sunday I use that phrase during the Prayer of Thanksgiving:

 

Glorious God of love, thank you for these gifts. May they fill us with your power and glory that we might truly be your people of hope.

 

    Every week, for me at least, there is an irony in those words. I'm praying that we will receive the power and the glory of the creator of the universe. I imagine passages like Exodus 19 when God's presence descends up on Mt. Sinai in thunder and lightning, or Ezekiel 1 where the prophet has his vision of the great throne of God and its flaming wheel within a wheel, or Isaiah 6 where God is surrounded by the mighty cherubim and seraphim, or Revelation 21 and 22 and the image of the end of time and the new Jerusalem.

    But on the other hand, I think of the whiskey priest.    There is no dignity for this priest. He is a failed human being. Yet, he will not give up his identity in order to save his own life. Despite little hope, no consolation, and in constant danger, he fulfills at least this one vow – he worships God in the sacraments. And, thus, he is the vessel for God's power and glory.

    And if the whisky priest, then also us.

 

    For three years this week you have blessed me with the opportunity of realizing the great hope and joy of my life – to stand here each Sunday and proclaim the Word of God. All of our individual spiritual gifts must be lived in community, but maybe none more obviously so than this ministry of word and sacrament. And it is you, the community, which shapes the sermon. Your stories, your anxieties, your questions, the thought of one of you or all of you during the hours of sermon preparation.

    We have undergone a great deal of change in three years. It's overwhelming to think about really. We've done some great things together, had some magical moments. I think of the fifth anniversary celebration when we had 150 people in this room and a marvelous banquet that followed. Or the way we have ministered to Curtis during his time of need. There's the Sunday that we licensed Mary Frances, as joy beamed from her face. Or when Bruce Lowe received our very first Hero of Hope award and had the entire room in tears.

    Loss has accompanied the change as well. The transition to independence was not easy. We've grieved those who have chosen to leave us. We are anxious that things aren't exactly how we had dreamed they would be.

This realization is part of the lesson of the Easter season. Nothing was quite the way the disciples expected it to be. Jesus dies. Jesus reappears. Then Jesus disappears into heaven. Imagine how annoying that would be.

    Christian discipleship teaches us that we must die in order to be born again. That we are never closer to new life than when we have died. It is when we finally realize that we do not posses our lives or our church, that God can finally act. Our present, our future, is not ours to control – it is God's.

    So long as we are faithful, God will use us.

    Graham Green's novel concludes with the young boy who wondered if the whisky priest was a hero. The boy hears a knock at the door in the night and goes to answer it. A stranger is there asking for his mother. The boy says that she is asleep and tries to shut the door, but the stranger blocks the door with his foot and whispers, "I am a priest." And the boy rejoices.

 

    Let us pray:

    Risen One, may you find us faithful, so that we too might be the vessels of your power

and you glory. Amen.