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 Freed to Serve |
9 September 2007 The ancient Aztecs did it. And the Incas. So did the even more ancient tribes of the Tigris-Euphrates region well before the time of the pharaohs and the Hebrews. It’s a significant aspect of virtually every tribe and every civilization on every continent we populate. And no, I’m not talking about something as mundane as getting out of bed in the morning. I am talking about having faith. In fact, any cursory study of world religions shows us that part of the human condition includes what has been called the “God-gene,” the impulse to revere and give witness to the big-M Mystery in our lives. Albert Einstein, surely one of the greatest scientists of the twentieth century was also a man of faith. He held that ‘Anyone who is not lost in rapturous awe at the power and glory of the mind behind the universe is as good as a burned-out candle.’”[1] That quote became a theological touchstone for the late author and lay theologian Madeleine L’Engle. But choosing to be one of Einstein’s burned-out candles appears to be one of the siren calls of our post-modern era. Even with the multitude of faith systems that our pluralistic culture and modern communications lay before us, not to believe is seen as an increasingly viable option. Anthony Stevens-Arroyo, Director of the Research Center for Religion in Society and Culture, puts it starkly: atheists and non-believers in the modern world have opted for the easy path….it is harder today to have faith in God than to lapse into disbelief.[2, italics added.] I don’t know how true that is on a global scale, but at first blush, it appears to ring true for our own Western culture. Atheists and non-believers take the easy way out. We appear to have a choice: to believe in a God who is not subject to the scientific method of inquiry, no matter how many proof-texts are thrown around from any camp. Or to believe only in what is subject to the scientific method that has been the foundation of much that is successful—and problematic—in contemporary culture. It’s as though we have to buy the polarity and make a choice: secular, scientific worldview or God. For me, it isn’t that simple. We know so much more about this awe-inspiring, incredible world because of scientific inquiry. I still remember dissecting a frog in biology, and I was amazed. As Einstein indicates, this world continues to be a source of breath-taking wonder. And we know so much more about an equally awe-inspiring, incredible God because we are inheritors of a story and an experience that is now thousands of years old. Obviously, our understandings of the world shape our understandings and experiences of God, just as our understandings and experiences of God shape our understandings of the world. But in our era of rapid change, we struggle to see how the one relates to the other. Maybe that’s why Godtalk is everywhere. From talkshow programs to profanity to faith communities gathered in worship. We may not be singing the same song, but we’re all making some kind of music. Small wonder that in this cacophony of vying claims, and with apologies to Kermit the Frog, it ain’t easy being…a person of faith. I doubt that it ever really was. Not really. Just look at the source of our scripture reading for today. A letter written by the great evangelist of the early church—Paul of Tarsus. We know from the writer of Luke and from Paul’s own accounts that the man was brought up before various courts. He wasn’t trusted by the Jewish community from which he came. He was feared and distrusted and challenged by other early church leaders, including Jesus’ brother James. He was beaten and shipwrecked and jailed. For all we know, Paul may even have entertained the same deep doubts and dark nights of the soul we now know plagued Mother Teresa. But like that contemporary saint, Paul didn’t use his energies to whine about the privations he suffered or cash it in for some cushy job as a liaison between Rome and Jerusalem. Even in prison, we don’t find Paul writing briefs to Rome to secure his own release. Instead, we find Paul bringing hope and comfort and faith to a fellow prisoner. Someone even more poorly disposed than Paul, because Onesimus is imprisoned in the bonds of slavery even when he is not in jail. But Onesimus is in jail with Paul, and Paul is a believer: a believer in the power and glory of God, which he experiences in the person of Jesus the Christ. Now, those who have read any part of Paul’s letters knows one thing for sure about Paul: he can’t shut up about Jesus. Like the lovers in the 1960’s musical, South Pacific, happytalk for Paul is Godtalk. And Paul can’t talk about God without talking about Jesus…. So right there in prison, Paul’s need and desire to talk about God’s redeeming love meets up with Onesimus’ need and desire to hear some good news. To hear that he is worthy of God’s time and attention and care, even though everything and everyone around him is giving him the opposite message. Of course, most of us will say that’s fine for Paul—he has that transformative experience of the risen Christ on the road to Damascus. That’s fine for Paul—as a Pharisee, he is trained in the language of faith. That’s fine for Paul—he obviously has a way with words. And the kind of pushy personality pundits love to skewer and party hosts avoid at all costs. In other words, it doesn’t matter if he is preaching in the public square, arguing with the Jerusalem church, or talking with a fellow prisoner, Paul is comfortable with Godtalk; we often are not. Last Wednesday, we had the first session of Saving Jesus. I’m the first to admit I thought twice about offering the course—there are plenty of people who don’t think it’s Jesus, but we who need saving. At the same time, many of us are tongue-tied when it comes to conversations about our faith. And all too often, we find ourselves thinking that this preacher or that speaker isn’t really speaking for us…but we aren’t comfortable offering an alternative perspective. This class presents a wide array of alternative perspectives, and invites us to be in dialogue with each other around the question, who is Jesus? I used to argue – mentally, not verbally – with the debate coach in college. I never was on the debate team, but I worked for him one semester. One of his mantras was that if you couldn’t say it, you didn’t know it. That was years before we used terms like muscle memory and knew about different ways of learning. But I did have to concede that the coach had a point, especially when it comes to faith. One of the most important ways “of discovering what we know about God, what we believe about God, what we trust about God” is to put our faith into words.[3,6] That’s what we are doing in Saving Jesus and in One Anothering and in church school and in worship. We’re putting our faith into words, exploring it from different angles, learning from the faith experiences and questions and clouded places. For the slave and fellow prisoner, Paul also put his faith in words. Not moral platitudes such as: when life hands you a lemon, make lemonade. Not that there’s anything wrong with these platitudes. But when we are locked in prisons of despair, self doubt, anxiety, or fear, moral platitudes aren’t life-giving. Paul’s words to Onesimus—and to Philemon—are words of life, words of grace, that free each of them from their prisons. With that life-giving freedom, they are freed to serve. # # # [1] Bernstein, Adam, “Writer Madeleine L’Engle, 88; Author of ‘A Wrinkle in Time’, The Washington Post, Saturday, September 8, 2007, Page B5. |