Last Sunday after Epiphany
Isaiah 62:1-5
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
John 2:1-11
+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
LAST WEEK I was in northwestern Connecticut at a leadership conference, and I’ll go back there three more weeks over the next couple of years. Our class of thirty Episcopal priests plus about half dozen faculty members met at the Trinity Conference Center, a lovely, even idyllic retreat center nestled in wooded mountains alongside the beautiful Housatonic River. After last week’s storm, the snow made it even more story-book perfect.
We were well cared for and well fed. I confess that I had stuck in my suitcase a bottle of wine and a couple bottles of beer. I couldn’t imagine being stuck in the woods for a week – and I feared possibly being stuck with a bunch of loonies – and not having at least a nightly glass of wine or beer to cope. My anxiety, of course, was entirely unfounded. There was plenty of wine and a large refrigerator full of good beer. No one with his senses could ever confuse the Episcopal Church with a temperance society!
I came away more grateful to be part of the Episcopal Church, and hardly because of the constantly replenished beer refrigerator. My colleagues, from every region in the country, impressed me with their ability, intelligence, humor, faith, and decency. I think that I began to understand and learn some things and experienced some renewal.
The truth is that much of me really didn’t want to attend this conference. I’d first been asked to apply in 2005. I delayed – repeatedly. I dreaded having to be away from my family, and I find that when I go away it means twice as much work the week before and the week after.
As I reflect on the past week, it occurs to me that even just five years ago I would not have appreciated the experience, learned from it, or put up with it. I attribute my growth largely to my life in our parish family – to the mass, to prayer, to learning from you and being supported by you.
New qualities are taking shape and growing in us – individually and corporately, qualities that increasingly make this parish a home where we become open to do new things, even things we’d rather not do. As Jesus commissions S. Peter to lead and care for his sheep, Jesus tells him, “When you are young, you gird yourself and go where you like; but when you are old, another will gird you and take you where you do not wish to go.” (John 21:18) In other words, spiritual maturity means becoming more willing to be led by another, to be in the service of another, to do things we’d rather not.1 In the past week, I thought about three ways our parish family is growing up.
First, we’re growing in our capacity for uncertainty. We’re learning the value of mystery, ambiguity, and wonder in making us more faithful Christians. Imagine an Episcopal Church – or a Roman Church or a Baptist Church or any other denomination – that allowed for and honored a little more uncertainty. That would be a more united, peaceful, forgiving, loving Church, a Church that better proclaimed and lived the gospel.
We notice from the gospels that just about every significant event in Jesus’ life filled the disciples with wonder and uncertainty. The Transfiguration of Jesus, followed by the overshadowing cloud, excited and terrified the disciples. They didn’t speak about it to anyone until after the resurrection. Peter, John, and James lived with the tension and uncertainty of not knowing, of not understanding. The Transfiguration made no sense at all to the disciples until after the Resurrection. Only then did they recognize it as good news, only then did they talk about it.
Today’s Old Testament lesson tells us about Moses encounter with God on Mount Sinai and how he reflected God’s glory. God’s glory shining in Moses frightened Aaron and the people of Israel. That dynamic was nothing new. Constantly, the people of Israel were upset with Moses and were afraid of what he was doing. The people of Israel, like us, were highly averse to uncertainty and hardship.
The people of Israel directed their anxieties at Moses. They didn’t know where God was taking them, and they were tired, hungry, untrusting. So Moses became their scapegoat. They murmured and complained against him, and they rebelled against God. They wanted to return to slavery and bondage in Egypt rather than deal with the unknown. They preferred to live in slavery rather than to take risks to move toward the Promised Land. Freedom and faithfulness require us to learn to make peace with uncertainty, to live comfortably with it. When things seem a mess, we need not fret. We can trust God. A mark of spiritual maturity is gracefully living with uncertainty.
Second, more and more we live above and beyond party labels and party identity, and we honor the diversity and richness of the whole body of Christ. Fr. Timothy Radcliffe laments the way party identity is becoming more divisive in the Roman Catholic Church. He writes, “Catholics began to think of themselves as progressives or traditionalist, liberal or conservative, terms that are fundamentally un-Catholic. . . . I deeply resent it when other people ask me whether I am liberal or conservative. It is the wrong question.”2 Sadly, we, too, in the Episcopal Church try to fit people into such categories instead of trying to rise above them.
Henri Nouwen was a Roman Catholic priest. About twenty years ago, he wrote,
I have the impression that many of the debates within the church around issues such as the papacy, the ordination of women, the marriage of priests, homosexuality, birth control, abortion, and euthanasia take place on a primarily moral level. On that level, different parties battle about right or wrong. But that battle is often removed from the experience of God’s love….
Words like “right-wing,” “reactionary,” “conservative,” “liberal,” and “left-wing” are used to described people’s opinions, and many discussions then seem more like political battles for power than spiritual searches for the truth.3
I think back to why I became Christian, and why I felt called to priesthood, and it partly had to do with a desire not to be defined by an agenda of the left or of the right, but to be engaged and to be devoted to something bigger, something that transcends human divisions. We might find it a blessing if we saw our differences more as gifts and opportunities rather than as threats. The prophets of today are not dividing the world into ‘good’ and ‘evil,’ but finding ways forward beyond division.4
Our opinion about something, especially about our day’s burning, controversial issues, is not what defines us. Our sense of self must not come from opinions, but from an ever-growing, ever deepening knowledge of God’s love. And we know God’s love, God’s presence with us, most profoundly in prayerful silence – not in declarations.
Jesus came into the world to proclaim God’s unconditional love for each and every person.5 When he rose from the dead, not once, but three times he asked Peter, “Do you love me?” Jesus wants us to love him. Our task is to proclaim and reveal God’s love.6 That holy work has no party, no label.
Third, our parish family is becoming more open, more collaborative, more reflective, more self-critical. We’re not a ‘father-knows-best’ congregation. Rather, we all share ministry here and chart our way forward together.
I have two stories from the computer industry.7 A couple of decades ago, the Digital Equipment Corporation employed 120,000 people and rivaled IBM for pre-eminence. Ken Olsen, the founder, treated his people extremely well and figured out ways to increase creativity and quality. He was extremely popular in the company and became the sole decision maker. He decided that the company should not get involved with personal computers. He doubted people would want to own a PC – a reasonable conclusion at the time.
Most regard that decision as the beginning of the end of Digital. But every CEO, just like every person and every group, makes mistakes in life. We all make mistakes and wrong decisions. What sunk Digital is that the atmosphere of the company was too dependent upon Olsen. Olsen was too revered, too removed. His colleagues didn’t challenge him; they didn’t know how to think for themselves, to learn from each other, to allow for contradictory opinions.
Second story. Microsoft didn’t become an enormous monopoly simply because of hard-ball business practices. Some years back, Bill Gates decided that Microsoft should stay out of the internet business and leave it to others. It was the wrong decision, and it could have sunk Microsoft. It didn’t become disastrous because Gates listened to his colleagues and changed his mind. His pride didn’t get in the way of back-tracking. Indeed, his ability to listen and to learn from others and to change course enhanced his reputation.
Christian ministry is not for lone rangers. It requires community. When Jesus sent out his disciples, he didn’t send them out alone, but two by two. We need feedback and support from one another. How we live with each other proclaims the gospel. Put another way: when we know one another, pray for one another, care for one another, learn from one another, forgive one another, welcome one another – is that not the most powerful way to proclaim the gospel?
I love serving this parish, and I’m grateful for ministering together with you. The Holy Spirit is at work here. We’re growing in our capacity for uncertainty. We’re growing beyond party identity. We’re growing in openness and shared ministry. That’s profound transfiguration – full of glory.
+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
1. Henri J. M. Nouwen, In the Name of Jesus, Crossroads Publishing Co. (1989), pp. 80, 81.
2. Timothy Radcliffe, O.P., What is the Point of Being a Christian?, Continuum (2005), p. 173.
7. Both of these stories are from Ron Heifetz and Marty Linsky, ‘A Survival Guide for Leaders,’ The President and Fellows of Harvard College (2002). The point about these stories is not merely the decisions of the CEOs, but the culture, the atmosphere of their companies.
© 2007 Lane John Davenport
