Reflectionary

For #1 Son: Do Not Worry About Tomorrow

(In a moment of high preacher irony, the text that has meant the most to me all my life is on the calendar for tomorrow simply because we had such an early Easter, and it may be years before it reappears as Epiphany 8, but I will not be preaching it, as we are headed to that Non-Contiguous New England State to see #1 Son graduate tomorrow morning. The famous Commencement speaker, whose presence means we will also be joined by the Secret Service, will probably not address this text, either, but it really would make a great topic for a Commencement Address.)

Matthew 6:24-34

6:24 "No one can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.

6:25 "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

6:26 Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?

6:27 And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?

6:28 And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin,

6:29 yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.

6:30 But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you--you of little faith?

6:31 Therefore do not worry, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?'

6:32 For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.

6:33 But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

6:34 So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today."

So...

Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own.

This is not my nature. I guess you know that, since you and your brother often refer me to the Onion headline "Area Mom Freaking Out For No Reason Again." My nature is to fling myself headlong into the multitude of possibilities for the future and to worry creatively and almost aggressively about each and every one. Over the years I've spent many hours pondering these words from the gospel, and I hope some of my thoughts will meet you where you are today. It's a collection of sayings rather loosely tied together, but that only makes it more like most graduation speeches, which try to pack a lot of advice about living into a very small package, thought usually larger than these verses. I'll try to follow their flow.

First, the passage cautions you to be clear about who you serve.

When you make decisions about your life, who are you trying to serve? The gospel gives you a choice, God or wealth, but it's not that simple, really. I would say that God stands for the things we are truly called to be while wealth stands in for not just money but the standards of the culture and the demands of other people. You are an artist, an actor. By your very nature you are counter-cultural, just as the people following Jesus were in the beginning. They walked away from what other people expected and took on a journey that led no one knew where. Discipleship begins with an impulse toward authenticity, and so does the creative life.

It sounds selfish, I fear. I remember my grandmother, when I made a choice she didn't like, saying snappily, "Suit yourself!" Her tone said, "And don't come crying to me when it doesn't work out!"

I want to tell you something different. If you're trying to please someone else, you'll end up pleasing no one. If you're working to acquire things or status, the way you collect prizes in a video game, you will find those achievements lack any sort of deep satisfaction. Yes, it's convenient to have a cell phone or or a laptop, and I certainly hope the day will come when you buy your own and it's not my responsibility anymore. But if you know who and what you are serving, if you are clear about that and can find a way to live into it, the rest won't matter.

Hear what I am not saying. I am not saying the rest will come to you, I am not saying that if you follow your heart you will get the small electronics, too. I am saying that whether you have them or not will not matter if you are serving the truth of who you are, of who God made you to be.

The second lesson of this passage is "Take your time."

One of the things worry does is speed us up, getting our thoughts spinning and our feelings rising and plummeting, making us feel out-of-control when really the only catastrophe is in our minds. You are an actor, and you've studied singing, too, and you know the power of breath. Without it, you cannot do your work! Without it, you cannot take your time. Slow down and breathe. Find your center and imagine the next step in your life the same way you work through the scenes in a play.

Collaborate with yourself, including your fears but not letting them take the lead. You may sympathize with them, as you would with a weaker performer, but do not let them be the focus. Find a way to work around them, the way you work with a scene partner who cannot meet you fully. Your fears are part of you, but they are not all of you. Take your time and work with them and see if, by attending to them, you haven't given them all they needed.

Third, "Know your beauty."

When you were a baby, my mother held you in her lap and said, "He has dancer's feet." I know it's been years since you took a dance class, but watching you scale the scaffolding in "Big Love," I saw that big, graceful cat who lives within you, whose paws move effortlessly, not needing to think about where to land the way most people have to think about their feet. You have a way of moving gracefully that you probably cannot see yourself. Employ that flexibility, because it is truly beautiful.

If your body is agile, how much more agile is your mind! I am continually amazed at the things you remember and the way you form ideas and the ease with which you coordinate them. Grace, flexibility, ease, intelligence--oh! and humor! You are so funny! From the earliest times in your life you have combined an oddly driven solemnity with a wicked twinkle in your eye. You know what matters, and you know what needs a hole poked in it, and you even recognize them when they appear together. That's a gift.

Fourth, "Seek ye first."

I'm cutting the phrase short deliberately. My idea of the kingdom of God, of God's commonwealth of love, is one in which enough people have found themselves to make a better world, a world in which all people have that opportunity. Try and find yourself, even when you don't like what you see at first. Am I holy and committed or am I driven and selfish? Or am I both, one might ask? How does one inform the other? When does the good quality so rule me that it becomes a bad one? How can I nurture the seeming weakness into its opposite strength?

We are full of these opposing energies. The important thing is to know with what we are working, to become aware of the limitations and the opportunities that are simply part of who we are.

Finally, as my old favorite King James Version of this passage would say, "Sufficient to the day." Do not worry about tomorrow, or next fall or next year, my dear one. This will all sort out in time, and to put too much emphasis on them now will only take away from the beauty of this day. Your little sister, in her concert a few weeks ago, sang a setting of another text from scripture: "This is the day that the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad in it."

As your mother, I rejoice in this day, a culmination of many years of your work and my own, a snapshot of a young man about to enter the adult world, ready or not. And the truth is, we are seldom ready for what is coming next, whether or not we have worried about it. Life continues to surprise us, with amazing delights and terrible disappointments and even easily-managed transitions that we never expected. It may not feel like it's possible now, but I believe you will make the next leap of life gracefully, authentically, perhaps nervously, but most of all in the fullness of who you are today, this day, dear one, that the Lord has made.

It's Later Than You Think

We had a long drive back today from visiting #1 Son at college and seeing him in a play last night. My sermon, underway when I left and much thought about, is a little further written since I returned home. But I am facing what I so often face in the preaching life: all the other parts of my life claim their time, too. I feel a bit envious of those pastors I've heard of who would go into the study and close the door and not come out or see people or do anything else until the sermon had been finished.

I am forced to the conclusion that these particular preachers are less likely to be doubling as homemakers/mothers/dog walkers, etc.

Enough. Back to it. My mind is on being chosen by God and the part that acknowledging our chosen-ness plays in feeling that way. Sermon will be posted later (maybe much later, we have a bean supper to attend).

A Preacher's Prayer

Dear and gracious God,
It's time to write my first sermon for a new church setting. It is my prayer that I will find a way to open your word to these people and to myself, that we might all feel the reality and the thrill of the presence of Christ in our midst as we hear the Emmaus story and later go to the table together.
I know this story, and I have a large handful of ideas about what I want to say. It has been a busy week, with no peace and quiet for writing. Today I have that peace and space. Help me to make the most of it! Guide my feet on the road of preaching; help me to see you when you appear.
In Christ's name I pray.
Amen.

Wholly Saturday

I find it hard to settle into writing this Easter message. It will be my final Sunday at Main Street Church, but we have said our formal good-byes (at least I hope so; I would be sorry to have Easter worship contain too much about me). My sermon style is very personal, and I'm wondering how to write something that comes authentically from me but is about them. Although I guess, really, I always try to do that, and generally succeed. The trouble this week has been the combination of Holy Week and a final week in the office has left little room for simply listening to what God wants from me on this occasion. Today is no different, as I try to combine sermon-writing with Easter dinner shopping and picking up something to wear tomorrow and cleaning the pertinent portions of the house. And maybe that's all I need to be talking about, after all: we strive in our preparations, and they have more to do with our family traditions than our theological reality. He is not here, he is risen, and although it's fine to stop and acknowledge the Resurrection in whatever way we find most appropriate, we need to remember that the Peeps are not the be-all and the ham dinner is not the end-all. These are moments of recollection and preservation, but the Resurrection is something else entirely.

In the Living the Questions DVD set, speaking about the Resurrection, Walter Brueggemann says, "Life is on the loose and cannot be restrained." That is both exciting and terrifying, isn't it?

Last Thoughts on Friday Night

I think I will use "I Have Decided to Follow Jesus" as a framework for the sermon this week. I'm compelled by the idea of how the disciples experienced the events of Palm Sunday, and I also want to weave in the historical connections to Solomon, which would have resonated for them.

Also on my mind: the significance of reputation; the importance of resolve; the fact that we're human, and won't do this perfectly, and will have to keep choosing the path we're on over and over, not just once.

It's such a political story, hard to approach for a generally less-political preacher...

This is More About Writing

As the snow flies outside this morning, I'm contemplating how I want to present what I want to present tomorrow. I realize I haven't blogged about the gospel lesson itself this week. This may reflect my ambivalence about creating a text for tomorrow. This will be my last regular sermon at the church I'm serving now. Next week there will be a worship drama (something I wrote about Mary, Martha and Lazarus; if you might like to use it, send me an e-mail, I'm glad to share it if credited) and no sermon. My final two weeks are Palm Sunday and Easter, days that attract irregular attenders and which feel much larger than the particular, local issues of a pastoral transition.

So tomorrow is the day for doing some wrap-up, and I almost wonder if it isn't better done informally? Could I come prepared with a few stories to tell and a reflection on the theme of how are eyes are opened, the different ways it can happen?

It's a Communion meditation, and I try to keep those to about 75% of the length of a typical sermon.

Now, I realize I'm probably just kidding myself when I consider being more informal, which to me means not writing a text. I have never, ever done it. Ever. Even when I meant to do it. I always end up with a manuscript, and while I occasionally step back from it, I depend upon it, for good or for ill.

More later.

Saturday Morning Thoughts

I'm playing with the idea of sources, reliable and unreliable, and the stories this past week about both politics and beef.

I'm thinking about the woman at the well and her eagerness to find her water from a new source, always trustworthy and thirst-quenching.

I'm thinking about the disciples, confused as usual when Jesus says he has food they don't know about; why don't they know?

I'm thinking about the Israelites, and the way thirst affects our brains, and the God-blessed miracle of water from the rock.

I'm also thinking about shoveling snow again...and wondering how to imagine really being in the desert when I am surrounded by water, albeit frozen. How can I make the crucial nature of thirst real to the people who will listen tomorrow?

First Thoughts on Saturday Morning

Some weeks the lectionary passages sit in the front of my mind, while other weeks they drift aimlessly around the back of my head, and usually the difference is the business, and the busy-ness, of the rest of my life.

This was one of those weeks with lots of adjustments to be made as my husband left for a month out of town, as it snowed and snowed and then rained on top of the snow, as I took over the responsibility for the shoveling and the dog walking, tasks that are his when he is at home.

These transitions are temporary, but I am also close to a work transition, as the interim I am serving winds to a close. All ministry is like this, I suppose. You get a sense that what you have been doing, or the way you have been doing it, draws to a close, and it's time to move on to the next level or the next job, and I'm sure in long term ministries pastors experience these shifts, too, whether the next move will be geographic or not.

It's true in marriage. When you meet a person and fall in love, and decide to affect a domestic merger, as my husband and I, two formerly married people in the middle of their lives, called it, you move into the unknown. You move into the night, the unknown.

My former husband is away this weekend, and due to the very cold weather, he asked if our daughter and I would go to his house and turn on a space heater each evening to keep his kitchen pipes from freezing. I can't remember the last time I let myself into his house, but I could see the need, and so we went. He assured me on the phone that the back porch light with the motion detector would be turned on, that we would have the light we needed to find our way in the back door. He even left on a kitchen light, unheard of! Still, it felt strange to go to his house in the dark. It had snowed, just briefly, leaving a coating of flakes on the crunchy ice of the path he made from the front of his driveway to the back steps. We moved along it gingerly.

I had only the vaguest description of the space heater to go by, since the instructions were given via cellphone and not while the giver was looking at the equipment.

Nicodemus went out into the night, not knowing what he was getting himself into, either. He went out into the night at risk of allying himself with a person he "knew better" than to get involved with, the guy who had just turned over the tables in the Temple, a man who was "on notice" by all the ruling powers. Why would he want to associate with Jesus?

(More later.)