“Don’t Give Up What You’ve Learned” - March 1, 2020

Matthew 4:1-11

            When I was a kid, Vacation Bible School opened like regular school, but with a different twist.  Throughout the year it was the same thing every morning.  First came the Pledge of Allegiance, then “My Country, ’Tis of Thee”.  We sat down, there were a few announcements, and the day began.  At Bible School, we found our groups in the church hall, and when it was time, we did the regular Pledge of Allegiance, with an added Pledge of Allegiance to the Christian flag, and then this:

“I pledge allegiance to the Bible, God's Holy Word, I will make it a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path and will hide its words in my heart that I might not sin against God.”

After that, we all sang “The B-I-B-L-E” and headed off to make ashtrays out of macaroni and straws.

            It sounds corny, I know, and there aren’t many places where you would run things that way anymore, but it really and truly does help to impress not only children but also adults that it may be a good idea not only to read the B-I-B-L-E but even to memorize parts of it, or at least to become so familiar with it that the words really do sink into your heart so that we might not sin against God.

            That is not to see the Bible merely as a rule book.  It kind of irks me when I hear that old chestnut that B-I-B-L-E stands for “Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth”.  I don’t mean to imply that the scriptures do not include some very clear rules.  They do.  I can think of ten very big ones right off the top of my head.  (See?  Right off the top of your head, too, I hope.)  How the rules are applied matters, though, and they are handled very differently at different times in the scriptures themselves, which becomes apparent if you read the scriptures and bump up against things like Malachi [2:16] declaring that “‘I hate divorce,’ says the Lord” while Ezra 10:18-44 gives a long list of men who were to be cut off from Israel along with their children because they refused to divorce the foreign women they had married.

            When someone is in an extreme position, though, and there are difficult choices to be made, the way does not always look clear.  That is when the scriptures become especially important as a light to the right path, like a flashlight shining across a dark room with slippery floortiles.  If there is any doubt about that, look to Jesus’ example.

            Jesus did not go through life without all the trials that every human being faces.  It was not just as he approached Jerusalem and the cross began to cast its shadow more sharply across him that Jesus needed to find strength to go on.  From the very start of his life, there were experiences that tested him.  As a pre-teen or teenager, there was an incident where he chose to stay in the Temple, debating scripture with the teachers.  Nothing wrong with that, but he neglected to tell Mary and Joseph.  It was a tense moment, and they worked through it, but it turns out that he would have far more intense choices ahead of him and the early study and learning of the scriptures provided wisdom that he would need.  (Here’s a parenting tip:

“Train up a child in the way that he should go,

      and when he is older, he shall not depart therefrom.”

[Proverbs 22:6]

See, even the language that we learn these verses stays with us decades later.)

            All of us are tempted by sin, but Jesus would face temptations more intense that most of us ever do, as only someone with power can be tempted to misuse it.  The gospels record many direct confrontations between Jesus and the powers of evil.  He faces them down in human form in his confrontations with Herod and with Pilate.  He faces them down in demonic forms when they have taken people over and destroyed their lives.  However, from the very start of his ministry he faces off against the devil himself, who tries to get Jesus to do what he does in a self-centered way instead of in obedience to God.  The way Jesus fights that off is by recalling the scriptures that he has learned and calls on from memory.

            Jesus had fasted for forty days and nights.  Later on, he would feed five thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fish.  At this point, though, the tempter tried to get him to use that same ability to separate himself from everyone else, to treat himself as privileged. 

“The tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.’  But he answered, ‘It is written,

           “One does not live by bread alone,

                  but by every word that comes from the mouth of                                    God.”’” [Matthew 4:3-4]

He was quoting Deuteronomy.

            He was tempted to use his abilities to show off, and maybe even have a little bit of fun doing it.  He could do miracles just for the razzle-dazzle value.

“Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written,

            “He will command his angels concerning you,”

                 and “On their hands they will bear you up,

            so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.”’” [Matthew 4:5-6]

Here’s the example of what is meant when you hear that the devil can quote scripture to his own ends.  You have to let the whole flow of it sink into your heart, and not simply take a verse or two out of context.  Jesus quotes scripture back at him, from Deuteronomy again.

“Jesus said to him, ‘Again it is written, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”’” [Matthew 4:7]

            Then there follows the big temptation, to take the easy way out.  It’s a temptation to make a deal with the devil: do wrong in order to bring about good.  Set aside what is right for a higher purpose.  The end justifies the means.

“Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; and he said to him, ‘All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.’  Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! for it is written,

            “Worship the Lord your God,

                 and serve only him.”’” [Matthew 4:8-10]

That’s from Deuteronomy as well.

            Maybe each of us could, as part of this year’s observance of Lent, pick one verse from the Bible, just one that speaks to our own weaknesses and repeat it over whenever a temptation comes along.  I cannot tell you what that verse would need to be for you, since only you and God know what happens in your own heart, but make it something that will make a real change.  Maybe your family is getting on your nerves and you need to tell yourself,

“Honor your father and mother, that your life may be long in the land.” [Exodus 20:12]

Maybe you stay up too late, playing video games or watching TV.

“He gives sleep to his beloved.” [Psalm 127:2]

Maybe it’s something profound as doubt about your importance to God.

“Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and for which you were made.” [I Timothy 6:17]

Maybe it’s about priorities.

“Seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things shall be given unto you.” [Matthew 6:33]

There will be great value in just looking over the riches that are throughout the scriptures as you look to find that one jewel God holds out to you now, and other gems to go back for as well.  But whenever you find what you need to find, hide those words in your heart, that you might not sin against God.

"Dust in the Wind" - February 26, 2020 (Ash Wednesday)

Ecclesiastes 1:2-11

            Have you ever had your own brush with mortality?  If not, you will.

            September 17, 1989.  St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands.  With Hurricane Hugo bearing down on the territory, residents were hunkered down wherever they were, with heavy rains being driven by winds that were gaining intensity every moment.  As that Sunday evening came and it grew dark, no longer could you tell how bad the situation was by looking out a window at the bending trees.  For that matter, it was unwise to go near windows because flying debris was everywhere and if anything hit the windward side it could mean a face full of flying glass.  Reports came over the radio.  The wind hit seventy-five; one hundred; one hundred, twenty-five miles per hour.  Eventually the instrumentation for measurement would break and blow away somewhere above two hundred miles per hour.  Before that, the radio station would be out of commission anyway.

            Before that happened, though, the programmer demonstrated either a dark sense of humor or a grim sense of duty (going down with the ship, as it were).  The play list switched to a handful of songs: “Bad Moon Rising”, “Stormy Weather”, “Ghost Riders in the Sky”, “Who Will Stop the Rain?”, and then came the very last song before the station went down.

“I close my eyes

Only for a moment and the moment’s gone.

All my dreams

Pass before my eyes with curiosity.

Dust in the wind,

All they are is dust in the wind.

Same old song:

Just a drop of water in an endless sea.

All we do

Crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see.

Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind.

Now, don’t hang on.

Nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky.

It slips away

And all your money won’t another minute buy.

Dust in the wind,

All we are is dust in the wind.

Dust in the wind,

Everything is dust in the wind.”

            This sermon, by the way, is less of a study of the scripture than my own, personal witness, because after that song I was left there to ride the night out, unsure if I would live to see the morning.  As I had feared, the window in my back bedroom was smashed by something, and I went to the side away from the wind, crawled under the desk, and pulled a cushion across the opening just in case the same thing would happen in that room.  Then I curled up and waited.

            There was plenty of time to think while I was there, and to examine what I was feeling.  Under that desk, I realized that I was afraid, but that my fear was not of dying, but of whatever horrible and painful injury might cause it.  I realized that when it came to consideration of death itself, that the kind of thing I had heard myself say in the pulpit about trusting that Jesus had taken care of preparing us for eternity, and that we can place ourselves securely in God’s arms when the time comes, that there is forgiveness of sin and that what matters is God’s love for us, not anything we have or have not done – that those things are for me a living reality.  I did not want to go to eternity by bleeding out underneath a desk, but I knew that if that happened, I could face it with assurance and even confidence.  Since then (and it is probably a matter of age) I have even come to see that there can be a sense of relief and even comfort in the thought that things will go on without me, or any of us.

“The wind blows to the south, and goes around to the north; round and round goes the wind, and on its circuits the wind returns. All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full; to the place where the streams flow, there they continue to flow.” [Ecclesiastes 1:6-7]

You can see that as sorrowful.

“All things are wearisome; more than one can express; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, or the ear filled with hearing.” [Ecclesiastes 1:8]

You can see it as meaning that what we do is futile.

“What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing new under the sun.” [Ecclesiastes 1:9]

But let me tell you something that I never suspected until I saw the desolation of the island many hours later.

            When the eye of the storm went over, there was a brief period where the neighbors all went outside to check on each other.  They say never to do that in a hurricane, but “they” never went through it, and don’t know how important it is.  A trailer across the street was gone.  We never saw any of it again.  The people inside had fled to another house and were alive.  The people who lived above me had hid in a closet when part of the roof came off, and they spent the second half of the storm in my place.  They were all from the island itself, and when the day finally came and hours later the winds dropped, they looked out and what they saw was a land that had been bombed, or burnt over.  The trees were stumps and the grass itself was stripped away.  Mud was everywhere, and twisted galvanized metal from the roofs.  But what the people from “off-island”, from the States and Europe and Canada, saw in the same scene was winter. 

For us there was a category of experience, even a kind of emotional familiarity with the landscape that let us say to those around us, “This will all grow back.  This is not the end.  The destruction is temporary.  Look, the roots are not gone from the plants.”  From that there could grow the awareness that yes, we are dust and to dust we return, but that is not all that we are.  It’s true that everything we build will one day fall down, but the things that we build are not the point.  What matters is not the house, but the love within it.  What matters is not the school, but the learning.  What matters is not the sanctuary, but the prayer and praise.  What matters is not the body, but the soul that it houses, and the love of God that embraces all of it together.

“You are dust, and to dust you will return,” yes.  But also, “Repent and believe the good news.”

“The people of long ago are not remembered, nor will there be any remembrance of people yet to come by those who come after them.”  [Ecclesiastes 1:11]

Once again, very true.  But God does not forget the way we do.

"Called to Listen" - February 23, 2020

Matthew 17:1-9

            A few years ago, the clergy association out in Lebanon wanted to increase mutual understanding among religious groups in that part of the state.  There were a few Muslims who had been moving into the area, and we thought that we could build bridges among communities by having some formal dialogues.  Now let me say this: one mistake we (the Christians and Jews) made was assuming that although none of us fully knew everything about the traditions and beliefs of the others, that there was some absolutely basic knowledge to build on.  We (again, the Christians and Jews) have lived in a world with neighbors of other faiths or no faith.  The particular group of Muslims who had moved into that area, though, had come here from a part of the world where they had had no such exposure.  We also assumed that the difficulties that would occur would happen between the Muslims and the Jews.  After all, we watch the news.  We know that the Iranians and the Saudis hate the Israelis even more than they hate each other, right?  So we were prepared, and in preliminary discussions of programming, we had decided to limit discussion strictly to religion and leave aside anything that had to do with the political status of Jerusalem or who had started what fight and when. 

To avoid that kind of distraction, what we did was have people dispersed among tables and write questions on index cards.  They’d be passed up to a head table where, one week, the rabbi and the president of the synagogue would read and answer them, the next week a panel of Christian clergy, and finally some folks from the mosque.  After question time, people could talk at their tables and have some snacks.  The first week it went just fine.  The second week, though, one of the Christians said something about Jesus being the Son of God.  That was when one of the Muslims asked about how that term was intended.  Surely it was some kind of poetic expression.  When the Christians said, no, we really believe that Jesus was the human embodiment of God’s whole self, that he was more than just a very, very good person, you could feel everything in the room change.  They rode out the rest of the questions that had been handed up to the front, but as a group they left right after that and didn’t come back the next week.

            The notion that Jesus is – or even could be – both human and divine is so much a part of our cultural makeup that it holds no surprise for those who reject it.  For those who encounter it for the first time it is enough to startle them at the very least.  Being put out there calmly as a matter of fact – “this is our belief” – was enough to induce a sense of blasphemy among the Muslims, enough to keep them away from that point. 

Imagine, then, what a mix of shock and confusion and fear and who knows what else it must have put into Peter and James and John, for whom there was no one to put anything into any kind of order for them ahead of time, to have seen their friend and teacher all of a sudden morph into someone more than human before their eyes.  For them, this was not a matter of words or ideas, but a physical reality that they saw and heard directly.

“And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and clothes became dazzling white.”  [Matthew 17:2]

Nor would it have lessened their shock to see the company that he was keeping.  Moses, who had died long ago, and Elijah, who had been carried alive to heaven, were right there talking with him.  Two figures who epitomized the Law and the prophets, the fullness of the Jewish religious tradition that they all came from, deferring to this carpenter who had shown up on the shoreline one day and said, “Follow me.”  This could explain what there was about him that had led them to do that exact thing, to follow him.

            Then came a second punch.  Peter had started trying to deal with his nervousness by offering to do something, build something.  It’s like they say happens when there’s a dramatic event of any sort in Britain and someone’s first instinct is always to make everyone a cup of tea.  Don’t just stand there; do something.  But Peter is interrupted.

“While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!’” [Matthew 17:5]

And that’s the point where those of us who are accustomed to think of Jesus as both human and divine sometimes metaphorically and sometimes literally leave the room.

            Listen to him?

            By “listen”, we have to understand more than turning our ears in his direction.  By “listen”, we have to understand what it means when someone greater than anyone says, “Now, you listen to this man!”  And, if you do listen, he says some amazingly shocking things.

            Both Matthew and Luke put a bunch of those into brief collections in their gospels.  They are essentially the same, although the wording differs somewhat.  Matthew’s version goes by the familiar term “The Sermon on the Mount” and the one in Luke is sometimes called “The Sermon on the Plain”.  We’ve been reading through the Sermon on the Mount throughout the season of Epiphany that ends this week and if you didn’t notice last Sunday the gospel reading was long, and I included a lot of the rest of it in my own sermon.

            All that aside, what matters here is that Jesus has told his disciples how to live, that he himself lived according to his own teachings, and that now the very voice of God validates what Jesus has said and will say, letting them know both to do what he says and to do as he does.

            Then, as if that were not enough, Jesus informs them on their way down from this mountain, perhaps still awestruck and afraid, perhaps elated at the experience of God’s glory, definitely confused, that everything Jesus is doing is going to get him killed.  That’s gut punch number three in this reading.  Jesus tells them that what happened to John the Baptist (who had recently been executed) was going to happen to him.  A few days later he makes the same announcement to the entire group of disciples, not just those three.

“‘The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and on the third day he will be raised.’ And they were greatly distressed.” [Matthew 17:22-23]

Here is that same inconceivable mixture of divinity and humanity, weakness and power, mortality and immortality, vulnerability and invincibility that continue to perplex us all.  Jesus is the Word made flesh.  He is also the one crucified under Pontius Pilate, dead and buried.  Then again, he also rose from the dead and ascended into heaven.  While we’re at it, he’s also going to be the judge of the whole world someday.  His life puts ours to shame.  But that’s not what he’s trying to do.  He’s the kind of judge who’s really rooting for the defendant and his Spirit is sometimes referred to as the Advocate.

            Is it any wonder that it is so confusing to try to figure him out?  It is so much easier to adopt absolute, either/or categories.  That’s what Islam does.  That’s the approach of the vaguely religious agnosticism of our general society, with its “spiritual-but-not-religious” folk and its “nones-and-dones”.  Maybe, they say, there’s a God but there is no way that God is tied up with our limitations.  Maybe, they say, there’s some hope for humanity, but there is no way that we will ever really achieve or fully embody the highest purposes of creation.  Let’s not even touch the possibility that by “listening” to him and obeying his words and example we might end up walking the same path.  No, it is much better for all of our sense of safety if we say he is one thing and we are another; don’t let the categories blur in any respect.

            Humanity, here.  Divinity, there.  Now, keep everything in its proper place.  Sunday, here.  Monday, there.  Don’t mix them up.  If Jesus, or even someone like Moses or Elijah, shows up, build them some sort of shrine they can stay in, so that regular life can go on as usual without interruption.

            Of course, God breaks through our efforts to do that.  Abraham Heschel wrote,

“Awe is an intuition for the creaturely dignity of all things and their preciousness to God; a realization that things not only are what they are but also stand, however remotely, for something absolute.  Awe is a sense for the transcendence, for the reference everywhere to him who is beyond all things.”[1]

So beside the great witness of Jesus’ transfiguration before the disciples come unexpected moments that transfigure those who listen to him, when the sense of mystery and awe overshadows the world, and the certainties of gloom and the comforts of fatalism are torn away, because something good and glorious and fearsome happens.  The sun comes up with a big show of red and orange.  A flock of geese flies over.  Just the right song comes over the muzak at the grocery store just when you need to hear it.  The broken-down car actually starts for once.  You pray for a sick friend and they recover, or they pass away peacefully after years of pain.  One day you think of somebody who hurt you deeply, and you realize the hurt isn’t there, and forgiveness begins to take its place, or maybe somebody else forgives you.  Possibility (which we also call “faith”) returns, and with it come joy, and hope.

            Those solid-looking walls are broken.  A silent God speaks, 

           

“This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased.  Listen to him!”  [Matthew 17:5]

---

[1] from Abraham Heschel, “God in Search of Man", quoted in Reuben Job and Norman Shawchuk, A Guide to Prayer for Ministers and Other Servants (Nashville: The Upper Room, 1983), 104.

"Called to Integrity" - February 16, 2020

Matthew 5:21-37

            I’m about to stand here for roughly twenty minutes and talk about talking too much.  Or maybe it will be about talking the wrong way. 

            Speech must have been an important topic of moral education in the household of Joseph and Mary in Nazareth.  The oldest child in the house, Jesus, had a lot to teach people about speech later on, but so did his younger brother, James.  James said things like,

“How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire!  And the tongue is a fire.  The tongue is placed among our member as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and it itself set on fire by hell.  For every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, but no one can tame the tongue – a restless evil, full of deadly poison.  With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God.  From the same mouth come blessing and cursing.” [James 3:5b-10]

And he’s very right about that.  Anyone who has ever lost their temper, or who has ever even innocently managed to say the wrong thing or the right thing in the wrong way, or who has said something the right way but at the wrong time – in other words, pretty much all of us – knows the power of language.

            My friends and I kid around a lot, and make jokes at each other’s expense.  But we know what topics may be off-limits for certain people.  Do not mention this person’s brother.  Do not mention that one’s hairline.  The name “Melissa” should not be used.  And for the sake of peace and decency, do not bring up Bernie Sanders around a certain person.  If you don’t know the person you are talking to very well at all, be extra careful.  Start with the weather. 

            Jesus was more direct than James.  His language was plainer.  He taught that what we say may govern what we do.  Our words and our actions are on one long continuum.  Calling someone a name may lead to viewing them in a certain way.  Viewing them in a certain way may lead to treating them in a certain way.

            This past week, the World Health Organization announced a name for the coronavirus that the world is facing.  Historically, we’ve referred to diseases by associating them with the places they’ve come to prominence (which isn’t always their true place of origin).  In 1918 we were hit by Spanish Influenza and fifty years later by the Hong Kong Flu.  People had begun to call this one the Wu-han Virus, but they’ve gone with “Covid 19” out of a well-founded concern that after this outbreak is over it will take a long time to break the association of Wu-han with illness.  The earlier you can cut that off, the better.

            Jesus understood that and taught his disciples that one way to go to the root of some major sins is to avoid smaller ones.  It’s like when you are preparing the soil for a garden in the spring and you see a grub or two as you dig.  You toss them aside and smoosh them so that they don’t grow up to damage the plants in the summer.  So Jesus says,

“You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’; and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.  But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to the hell of fire.” [Matthew 5:21-22]

I wish he hadn’t said that. 

There is a kind of righteous anger, to be sure, but it gets so mixed up with the regular kind that I cannot entirely separate them – certainly not in a moment of personal hurt.  So I want to allow myself some space for that to exist, walled off (I think) safely.  I want to be able to excuse myself or to justify myself for some thoroughly ugly impulses by saying, “Well, at least I didn’t act out.”  I may have had words with that so-and-so, but at least I didn’t punch him.  I may have felt road rage, but I held my foot steady on the accelerator.  I may have said, “Drop dead!” but I never tried to make it happen.  And while restraint is good, the resentment can live on.

Sooner or later, we all know, resentment and bitterness and all that goes with them, can gnaw at someone from the inside and do a lot of damage.  Billy Joel describes the process:

“Give a moment or two to the angry young man
With his foot in his mouth and his heart in his hand
He's been stabbed in the back, he's been misunderstood
It's a comfort to know his intentions are good
He sits in a room with a lock on the door
with his maps and his medals laid out of the floor
And he likes to be known as the angry young man.”

 

The end of the song says, “He’ll go to his grave as an angry old man.”

            Jesus’ way is one that isn’t just saying, “Be good!” because it produces peace and quiet.  It’s a way that points us away from the harm our words, no less than our actions, bring on others but also bring on ourselves.  His way is often the opposite of the one that I would naturally, sometimes even reasonably, choose.  But it arises because he not only asks more of us, he sees more good in us.  He wants more from us because he wants more for us.  He puts the question to you and me, “You’re better than that, aren’t you?”

           

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven.” [Matthew 5:43-45a]

And what is God like?  Try this:

           

“He makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” [Matthew 5:45b]

Our way to echo that is not only to watch out not to use our speech for harm, but to use it for good.

“For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?  Do not even the tax collectors do the same?  And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others?  Do not even the Gentiles do the same?” [Matthew 5:46-47]

The goal is not to lower the standards to meet our desires.  The goal is for us to reach toward what God shows us when he loves us completely.

“Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” [Matthew 5:48]

            “Integrity” is a state where things fit together.  In any mechanical system, where the parts are integrated, the system runs smoothly and does just what it is made to do.  The same is true for people.  Where words and actions match and where the guiding purpose of their Creator oversees them, there is a harmony and wholeness that is unmistakeable.  To be perfect doesn’t mean that we never get knocked out of alignment or never need to be set straight.  It means, in part, letting God do that for us, because we know when we go wrong, and we know what he wants is for our good and the good of all that has been made.

“Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.  For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.” [Matthew 7:7] 

“Called to Shine” - February 9, 2020

Matthew 5:14-16

                  

            There’s a point in Jesus Christ, Superstar where Judas gets upset because Jesus lets Mary Magdalene rub his feet and Judas sings, “It doesn’t help us if you’re inconsistent.”  In the actual gospels, Jesus is annoyingly inconsistent sometimes, though, and the Sermon on the Mount doesn’t steer away from that.

            Today we heard this from chapter five:

“You are the light of the world.  A city built on a hill cannot be hid.  No one after lighting a lamp puts it under a bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.  In the same way, let your light so shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.”

Then come these words in chapter six:

“Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven.  So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others.  Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.  But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

Now, there are various ways of holding these passages together despite the tension between them. 

            There is the whole question of motive: whether what is being done is being done for God’s glory or human approval.  It’s pretty clear sometimes.  If there’s a trumpet blowing to gain people’s attention, then it is people’s approval that is being sought.  The Romans were especially good at that type of thing.  There is a building in Rome that dates to the time of Caesar Augustus, to the same years as Jesus was walking the roads of Galilee, the Pantheon.  It was a temple whose construction was funded by Caesar’s best friend, Marcus Agrippa.  We know that because to this day the front of the building has words carved in stone: “M. Agrippa me fecit”.  (“M. Agrippa built me.”)

            But what if, say, a gift is given in honor of someone else?  What of a college library that is named, not for the donor, but for the donor’s parents?  The name carved above the door will still be the same.  It may be done with pure motives but still leave you wondering.  It’s like when William Shakespeare came into some money and he arranged to have a coat of arms posthumously awarded to his father, which – incidentally – meant that he himself automatically moved from the status of a commoner to that of a gentleman. 

            All the same, I am grateful for having had a chance to study at Duke University Divinity School and having had my field education funded in part by the Hamrick endowment for graduate student ministries.  I often use information provided by the Pew Foundation and listen to radio shows funded by bequests of Ray and Joan Kroc.  If I had heart problems, I would probably want to be treated at Lankenau Hospital or if I caught some strange disease I might appreciate the care of the Mayo Clinic.  But since I am well, I may enjoy a day trip to the Guggenheim Museum or the Smithsonian Institute.  Those are kind of far, though, so maybe I’ll just run up to Doylestown to the Michener Gallery or the Mercer Museum.

            There is one thing I have overlooked in my diatribe here, though.  It’s a distinction that doesn’t always stand out in English translations of the Bible.  When we are warned about blowing our own horns, the word “you” is singular.  When we are told,

“You are the light of the world,” [Matthew 5:14]

that “you” is plural.  It isn’t any one of us alone, but all of us together who are to show the world what God’s glory is like.  For that matter, to be called

“A city built on a hill” [Matthew 5:14]

implies that it is God’s people working together that successfully shows a kind of holiness that we all fall short of individually.  Whenever we try to stand on our own we run the inevitable risk of standing not just by ourselves but for ourselves, when it is God with whom and for whom we should be standing.

            We are called to let the good works shine out, but not as single and unconnected deeds.  There may be that one candle shining in the window at times, but more often than not there’s a candle in the next window over, too.  It won’t be visible from inside the house, and in any given room you may only see that one light, but on the outside, there may be a dozen candles showing.

            What may make a difference in the long term is not the grand gesture, but the constant small ones.  (That is, after all, how erosion smoothes the rocks in a creek into beautiful, rounded stones.)  That is how, century by century, acts of lovingkindness put the lie to cynicism and hopelessness.  The nineteenth-century poet Arthur O’Shaughnessy began a poem called “Ode”:

“We are the music makers,

            And we are the dreamers of dreams,

Wandering by lone sea-breakers,

            And sitting by desolate streams; -

World-losers and world-forsakers,

            On whom the pale moon gleams:

Yet we are the movers and shakers

            Of the world for ever, it seems.”

Habits matter.  Good manners matter.  Small courtesies and high expectations change people, both those who share them and those who receive them. 

            This church has taken up a mission statement for itself, saying that we are about “Seeking, sharing, and showing God’s love.”  We seek it all the time.  We seek it because we live in a world that does not value people highly for themselves, but mostly for what they can produce or pay, and there needs to be a place where someone can hear that Jesus sees and loves them for who they are.  We share that love because we’re all in the same spot, and we know that someone, somewhere, sometime managed to get that message through to us.  We show that love when we form a community that is not by any means perfect but that at least tries to live by standards other than the prevailing ones.  Sometimes – more often than we give ourselves credit for, even – we get it right.  Then God’s love can really get to work on its own, despite our egos and pride and all the stuff that gets in the way, and the whole cycle starts over again – to the greater glory of God.

            There is no magic formula in all of this.  It isn’t a one- or two- or fifty-two-week program.  It’s a way of life.  But it’s one I believe we can all live with.