Genesis
12: 1-9 & Matthew 4: 18-22
15th Sunday
after Pentecost/ 9th September 2012
One of the deep metaphors, images, archetypes of
the Christian life is journey. A follower of Jesus Christ is a
traveler. She is on the road. He is on the path. The Christian is an
explorer of the human spirit, an adventurer in the Holy Spirit, a pilgrim on
the way with the One who is the Way toward the place of resurrection. Life in the Spirit implies movement, not
stagnation. It’s a movement forward, not
backward. It suggests going
somewhere.
Some
Christians have described the journey as ascent,
of climbing the mystical ladder toward God.
Others have described the journey as descent,
of going down into the depths to discover God there. These are metaphors, ways to capture dynamics
of the journey. If you were here last week, you probably picked up on the one
that resonates with me, descent. It
doesn’t matter which you prefer; either way is the correct way providing that
you’re on the way, on the go, moving toward God. George Macleod (1895-1991), the progressive
visionary minister and founder of the Iona Community in Scotland, said it best
(in one of my favorite quotes): “For Christ is a person to be trusted, not a
principal to be tested. The Church is a movement, not a meeting house. The
faith is an experience, not an exposition. [And] Christians are explorers, not
mapmakers.”[1] Explorers,
not mapmakers.
The Chinese philosopher
Lao-tzu (604-531 BC) once said, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a
single step.” An alternate translation
could be, “A journey of a thousand miles begins beneath one’s feet.” As Neil Armstrong (1930-2012) knew, we have
to step out. [2] We have to take risks. We have to move off the mark from dead center
or stillness or paralysis and move, act, lean forward, or, as Abraham and the
first disciples knew, one has to go, you have to take the first step.
I
paired the calling of Abraham with the calling of the first disciples as a way
to demonstrate that in humanity’s encounter with Yahweh, the Living God, we know
that God is a God of action (actually all we know about God is through God’s
actions), we know that God summons people, that God calls and calls and calls
us. We know that God meets us in one place
in order to take us to another place. We
know that God calls in order to enlist ordinary human beings in God’s unfolding
mission in the universe. We know that
God has a job for us to do. We know the
calling is often difficult, that it demands something of us, and that it’s
sometimes scary, but if we follow and follow through we know there’s plenty of
grace there, we come to see that we’ve been invited to go, to travel to where
our souls might come alive.
And
taking the first step on that journey is probably the most difficult.[3] If you look closely at each of these call stories
and others like them, it appears that God offers the call and the people
immediately respond, without a thought.
God says to Abraham, “Go!” – and he goes. Jesus invites Simon Peter and the others to
follow – and they leave everything and go.
Unfortunately, the text doesn’t say how much time lapses between the
call and the response. That’s what many
of us want to know, especially with Abraham.
It’s easy to think, I’m not like
Abraham or the first disciples, I can’t just drop everything and go, I guess I
just don’t have it in me. I guess I’m not really called. Thoughts like these preempt or eclipse the
call extended to each of us and cause us to miss the point.
And
the point is this – this is the point – and not to be missed: You’ve
been invited. You’ve been called. You and me – a personal invitation has been
extended to each of us to go on an adventure, the journey of a lifetime
(literally) to discover the depths of God’s grace. The question is whether or
not we will accept it. Are we going to
be open to all that it entails or will we shut down and come up with all kinds
of excuses and rationalizations why this would not be a good time. Are we going to respond with Yes or No? Are we going to accept and enter on the journey with a spirit
of openness? Or will we reject it and
play the skeptic or the cynic?
Before
you answer these questions, there’s something for you to consider. The Franciscan writer Richard Rohr makes a
helpful distinction between ego and soul, which is relevant here in our text. The ego, our individual ego, is usually
directed by fear. As a result, the ego
wants to be at the center of things – egocentric – and it resists and fights
against anything or anyone that tries to de-center it. Now, it’s important to hear me clearly here, our
egos are not bad – we all need to have healthy ego-strength. Our egos help us survive, protect us, and
motivate us. However, there’s a problem
here, because the ego, directed by fear, isn’t always wise and it’s not as
strong as we think it is and it can’t be relied upon to take us where we need
go. A deeper problem arises – a deep,
spiritual problem – when we equate the ego with who we really are. Who we really
are is under the ego, below the ego, deeper than the ego. Richard
Rohr notes that “the ego is always strengthened by constriction, opposition,
and reaction – NO – and that when religion starts with no rather than yes, it
always ends up obsessed with purity codes and does not lead to compassion,
justice, and a truly transformed heart and mind.”[4] The ego constricts around a problem. In fear, the ego clamps down around a problem
or crisis or threat. On the one hand,
this is natural; it’s what allows us to survive. But that’s not necessarily how the soul
operates. “The ego wishes comfort,
security, satiety; the soul demands meaning, struggle, becoming.”[5] The ego has certain goals in mind; the soul
has an altogether different agenda.
I believe that when God called Abraham and
Jesus called his disciples and when the Spirit speaks to our hearts the
invitation is not directed to our egos, but to our souls. The response of our ego is usually – NO, resistance, excuses, opposition, and
reaction, a shutting down. If we listen
to the depths of our soul, however, the soul says, YES – sign me up, how soon do
we leave? For the soul demands
meaning, struggle, becoming. We were
made this way; we were created this way.
This is the part of us that responds to God’s presence, this is the part
of us that connects with God: soul to
soul.
The
soul says YES to the call; wants to
say YES; longs to say YES.
Saying YES is remaining open
and fighting against everything and every time our ego wants to shut down and
says, “Come on, be realistic.”
When
Abraham went with God and the disciples followed, they were saying YES.
And saying YES has the
potential to transform us. Dag
Hammarskjöld (1905-1961), the Swedish diplomat and former general-secretary of
the UN and a committed Christian, described the way his life changed when he
finally opened himself up to the call.
This is how he described becoming a person of faith. It happened this way: “I don’t know Who – Who – or what – put the
question, I don’t know when it was put.
I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer ‘yes’
to someone or something. And from that
hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, there, my life, in
self-surrender, had a goal.”[6]
Saying,
Yes.
Remaining open. Acceptance. This is what the soul longs for. This is what scripture means by faith and
even prayer – remaining open.
The
call is given – it’s there, now already, every moment – the road, the way is
there for you to travel, the journey requires consent.[7] And with your consent, the Spirit will begin
to move you down along the way, calling you to leave one place in order to venture
toward another, inviting you to leave familiar lands, familiar territory,
familiar beliefs and experiences, and venture out to some place new. The call is an adventure that summons us to
leave constricting, confining places – life as usual – to leave the known and
venture beyond the borders of the familiar to a new land, to leave the safe,
small places the ego has created for itself in order to venture out into the
vast, broad, expansive places that the soul requires, places that allow our
souls to come alive! All this we can
discover and more when we say, Yes,
when we consent, when, by God’s grace we listen to our souls and take the first
step.
Journey.
Travel. Pilgrimage. Way. These images have been swimming around my
head this week as we approach Kick-Off Sunday and begin a new program year
together. They’re never far away from my
experience. Our children in church
school, especially those just starting, are embarking on a journey today –
God only knows where it will all lead.
We are teaching Bible stories, sharing what we believe as Christians,
helping our children know right from wrong, to develop an ethic that is based
on love and mercy and grace. We are
modeling for them something of the Christian life, the centrality of worship,
and fellowship, and service. All this is
good, very good.
But
what I’m talking about here is different, it’s the journey of faith that can
only really begin in adulthood, after
one has grown and developed a sense of one’s self and lived a little. You see, we can encourage our children to
attend church school and know about the faith, but it is incumbent upon us as
adults, whether we are parents or not, to embody the faith and live it. As adults we
are called to go on this journey of faith and to stay on it and not be seduced
into thinking that we have arrived, even if we’re 95.
There
are far too many who equate belief in God with actually following where Christ
leads. There are far too many adults who
might be chronologically age 55, who have developed in all other aspects of
their lives, but still have the faith of a 5 or 15 year-old. It’s easy to stagnate, to get stuck along
the way. There are far too many who
equate attending worship with following the way of Jesus Christ. There are far too many who equate living a
good, decent, moral life with following the way of Jesus Christ – as if Jesus
suffered on a cross for us to be well-behaved.
The cross certainly means more than that. The call was not extended to Abraham and to
the disciples because of their beliefs or their piety or their morality. Yet, how many people think this is the sum of
religion: belief, piety, ethics.
Increasingly,
I feel it’s important to stress that God doesn’t want our beliefs and God
doesn’t want our piety and God doesn’t want our middle-class, socially
sanctioned morality. God doesn’t want your belief and God doesn’t want your
piety and God doesn’t want your ethics – God wants you, God wants your life, God wants the totality of who you are –
all of you (and not just the perceived “good” or nice parts) – in order that
your life in and with God can reveal its true purpose and experience the
abundance of God’s grace! God wants our
hearts, our souls, our feelings, our gifts, our resources, our experiences. God wants us to open up, to open it all up,
to open our arms and yield to the One whom alone knows what our souls are
looking for and hoping for. To say, Yes, to God. To go with God and allow
God to open up our lives and expand our lives and transform our lives in ways
that we cannot even begin to imagine, in ways that our egos are reluctant
acknowledge and too fearful to embrace.
Where
are you on the journey? Have you taken
the first step as an adult? Have you
taken many first steps, but have lost your way?
Are you well along the road? As
we begin a new program year, I really want to challenge us to step out and take
some risks together. Parents with
children in church school need to take responsibility for their own continuing
growth and development. You can’t pass
on to your children what you don’t possess.
You can’t “catch” the depth and joy of the Christian life unless you’re
contagious. This is also true for all of
us, whether we have children or not – it’s one of the ways we fulfill the
promises made at their baptism.
One
of the best expressions of the Christian journey is the labyrinth.
 |
| The nave of Chartres Cathedral, France. |
Labyrinths
are powerful “tools” used by the Church to help us consider the journey. It’s a
movement from the outside to the inside, to God, and then a movement to the
outside. It’s not in a straight line,
you twist and turn and meander around toward the center, but you can’t get lost
– which is why a labyrinth is not a maze.
There’s nothing tricky about it.
Perhaps the best-known labyrinth is the one carved into the floor of the
nave of Chartres Cathedral, in northern France.
We have a small one in the back of the church house. There is a good-sized one at Bon Secours Retreat
Center in Marriotsville that’s open to the public. Brown Park Avenue Presbyterian Church in
Bolton Hill has a large labyrinth in their sanctuary.
The labyrinth offered here for you to use is
finger-sized – just follow your finger slowly along the way. Some people offer a prayer before they begin
the walk or they ask a question and then begin.
Some stay in the center for a while and then move back out. There’s nothing magical about this, but there
is something mysterious about it. Years
ago we rented a large one and had it on the floor in the gym during Holy
Week. Several members left the labyrinth
in tears, surprised by their response. Many
people meet God along the way or feel something give within them as they go. The
back and forth helps to dislodge the ego from feeling in control and makes way
for the soul to speak or feel. It’s a
traveling aid for the journey. I invite you to use and reuse it.
What
is God calling you toward? Where are the
constricting, narrow places in your life, and where is that larger expansive
life God desires for you? What steps can you take to deepen your connection
with God? Are you driven by your ego or
are you listening to your soul? How do
you listen to your soul? What’s your
prayer life like? Is there enough
stillness in your life to listen for the voice of the Spirit? Perhaps you need to go deeper into scripture,
begin a study of the Bible, or join a Bible study group. Maybe you need to become more involved in the
life of the church – you can join a committee. However, let me say something about
committees – we always need help on committees, but Jesus never said, “Follow
me and join a committee.” Sometimes we
equate committee work with discipleship – they overlap, but they’re not the
same. Sometimes committee work
(especially our Presbyterian obsession with committees) can lead us away from
being attentive to what God is trying to achieve through us, beyond our
agendas. Maybe you need to get involved
in a service project, volunteer at The Samaritan Women or spend a day helping
out at the IMA World Health center in New Windsor or get involved with the
Catonsville Emergency Food Ministries.
Maybe it’s joining the choir or teaching church school, whatever it is,
try doing something that will make you just a little uncomfortable.
The call is there for
you. You know it’s there. Are you saying, No? or Yes? Are you staying open or shutting down? Are you playing it safe or are you willing to
risk something for Jesus? How’s the
journey going for you? Do you desire to
follow God in a new way? If so, then consent.
Take a step, the first step – step out.
Say, Yes.
[1] From a sermon given in
1955, cited in Daily Readings with George
MacLeod, Ron Ferguson, ed. (London:
Fount, 1991), 115.
[2] “That’s one small step
for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind.”
[3] Cf. the quotation from
the worship bulletin: “What saves a man
is to take a step. Then another
step.” C. S. Lewis (1898-1963).
[4] This is a theme found
in many of Rohr’s writings, such as The
Naked Now: Learning to See As the Mystics See (Crossroads, 2009) and Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the
Two Halves of Life (Jossey-Bass, 2012).
The summary of Rohr’s insight I use here can be found in David G.
Benner, Spirituality and the Awakening
Self: The Sacred Journey of
Transformation (Brazos Press, 2012), 65. Rohr’s ego/soul differentiation
here is essentially a reworking of the analytical theories of C. G. Jung
(1875-1961).
[5] James Hollis, Finding Meaning in the Second Half of
Life: How to Finally, Really Grow Up
(Gotham, 2006).
[6] Cited in Benner, 65.
[7] I’m grateful for
Benner’s emphasis upon individual consent in the Spirit’s ongoing work of
transformation. “…when we respond to
life and the continuous invitations of the Spirit to become more than we
presently are, with consent and openness of heart and mind, it can be our
experience….” (xii).
