Sermon by The Very Rev Chris Yaw, 8/14/2022, Luke 12:45-53
On a very old hill in the city of Athens, Greece, lies the sturdy remains of a temple to the goddess Athena.
Inside, there once stood an altar, called the Altar of Forgetfulness. It was built in honor of a feud between the Greek gods Poseidon and Athena. Each god had sought to win the city's favor with a gift. Poseidon offered a spring of salty water. Athena offered an olive tree. She won. Poseidon lost. And he did so, says Plutarch, "with an easy-going absence of resentment."
This all happened on the second day of the last month of Summer. And Athenians have, ever since, omitted that date from their calendar. Meaning that the erased date, plus the Altar of Forgetfulness, are how they chose to remember this foundational, divine, discord, leaving it, in almost its entirety, to the past, and not to be brought forward. (John Hyde)
Historians tell us that the ability to leave behind, to forget, to purge ourselves of the things that are not presently needful are integral to the success of nations, indeed to individual achievement as well.
After all, while we Americans can often identify as English, Italian, Nigerian, or Albanian, when we cross the border, when we go to a new country, we most often choose the moniker, American. And with each succeeding generation our ability to look forward more than backward, at who we are versus who we were, is a contributor our success.
In mid-July 2013, the Boston Red Sox led the American League and were set to start the second half of the season with the return to Fenway, their home ballpark.
That's when a reporter from the Associated Press asked the team's manager, John Farrell, what he found most impressive about the team. His remark is as germane to baseball as it is to every one of our lives this morning, when he said, his team's most impressive gift is: "Our ability to forget, forget what yesterday had in store for us, good, bad, or indifferent, and to refocus on our goal for today."
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As you and I consider Jesus' harsh words in this morning's gospel we get this sense of immediacy, importance, even urgency of leaving behind the things that restrict us, and opening ourselves up to the life-giving, and needful things for success and prosperity.
The strong sense is that we get our houses in order, quit doing the things that are harmful, and embrace the things that are needful. It's as if he is saying that the time is short, bad habits and harmful actions have been around for too long. Clean it out! Burn it up!
And we can't help but ponder the ways these words may be for us - as we end the summer and approach the beginning of a new program year.
... asking: what needs to go?
What needs to stay?
What are we holding onto for way too long?
What have we been putting off?
What habits, mindsets, and routines have gotten stale, distasteful, even unproductive?
In contemplating this notion, Jesus brings up these three images in today's reading, fire, baptism, and division - three images that can sound scary, but we suspect may be imperative when it comes to making the needful changes that can make us better Jesus people: fire, baptism, and division.
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Several decades ago, a colossal fire swept across a remote area in a National Park out West. Thousands of acres of pristine forest were being consumed every day, as firefighters raced to the scene, many flown in from far flung places to combat the blaze.
On one particular day, a 14-man crew found themselves caught in a valley when the fire skipped from one hilltop to another, encircling them with a wall of fire they could not escape. 13 crew members died. And after several similar incidents forest rangers began to reevaluate their strategies when it came to battling fires in remote areas in which human life was not at risk: Was every fire bad? Was the devastation caused so tragic and harmful to the natural environment that dangerous, life-threatening fire suppression was necessitated?
And what they found was that forest fires actually do the opposite: fires remove low-growing underbrush, clean the forest of debris, open it up to sunlight, and nourish the soil. They found that reducing this competition for nutrients allows established trees to grow stronger and healthier - history teaching us that hundreds of years ago forests had fewer, yet larger, healthier trees.
Jesus said, "I came to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it were already kindled!"
The fire Jesus desires, then, is that which removes the pesky undergrowth that trips us up and slows us down; that blocks the sun and stunts our growth; that impedes the nutrients from feeding our souls - that are essential to our growth.
Some of us are going through the fire this morning.
It's raging all around us, threatening life as we've known it, carving out a new, unknown landscape.
'What is God doing?'
'Where is life taking us?'
'Does it have to be this life-altering and painful?’
A university psychologist once remarked to his class that the primary challenge of life: is dealing with loss. 'Learn to do that,' he said 'and you're all set.'
The reality that life changes, that a great deal of that change is painful, and that we don't always get the luxury of understanding it - is the water that we're all swimming in. And what every lifeguard worth her salt will tell you *NOT to do is get all panicky and freaked out - but to relax, take a deep breath, and trust that the water can carry you - believe that you can float above it all - by just relaxing - letting go, and letting God.
How is God inviting us to see the fire raging around us with new eyes - trusting that we are not here all alone - but accompanied by a presence who has a purpose - and will bring us through, quite possibly better than when we began?
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Perhaps no other event in many of our lives has altered our views of time, mortality, and societal stability than the COVID-19 pandemic we have just gone through and, indeed, continue to do in various ways.
I suspect we may all have yet to hear from a teacher, health care worker, first responder, or clergy person for that matter - for whom these past few years have not offered more than its fair share of anxiety, frustration, discomfort, sleep loss, and the serious mental distress we can all relate to - as we have had to cope with cancelled vacations, missed graduations, delayed weddings, untimely funerals, etc, etc. etc.
Oh! how we hear this echoed in Jesus’ words: 'I have a baptism with which to be baptized, and what stress I am under until it is completed!’
COVID - and this ‘baptism’ that we all would like to avoid, but nonetheless cannot, is a trial, and it's not unlike Jesus’.
Here we, too, are faced with difficulties we can’t get out of - we can’t go around, we can’t go over, we can’t go under - the only way we can go is straight through - enduring as best we can.
And when we look at Jesus’ example, it seems that we’re asked to have faith just as he did - to believe that something larger is at play - and to resolve to do the best we can to remain hopeful, encouraging, and generous amidst the threats that surround us.
Jesus, who on many occasions urged followers to ‘be not afraid’ and ‘do not worry’ - yet himself is feeling stressed - and thus, saying to you and me, ‘You are not alone. I felt your pain, I feel your pain. Yet I made it through. And so can you.’
Friends, ‘baptism’ is another word for ‘initiation’ - and the difficulties we are facing initiate us to the pain so many others feel who live in other places where circumstances are not as fortunate as our own - the 700 million people who still live on $1 a day, for example - and it is through this initiation that we are asked to think less of ourselves and more of others - getting our minds off of our own concerns and onto ways in which we may help others - which is a time-honored way of coping with our own issues.
So, we ask:
In what ways might we consider our ‘baptism’ into our present challenges as something we are not undergoing alone?
How is Jesus speaking to us through it?
How might we cultivate ways to bring hope, kindness, and grit into our baptisms?
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Radical utilitarian philosopher Peter Singer is famous for posing this question:
If you’re walking down the road in your "Sunday Best" and you stroll past a pond where a little girl is drowning - flailing her arms and screaming for help - would you jump in and save her - knowing that the damage to your clothes is going to cost you at least $30 in dry cleaning.
In other words, is that little girl’s life worth the $30?
Of course - and I suspect all of us would jump in and help.
Dr. Singer then follows up this this question:
Then, given the fact that we know a little girl in Tanzania will die tomorrow unless she gets a $30 mosquito net draped over her bed - why are we so quick to save the little girl dying in front of us - yet we so easily ignore the little girl in Tanzania whose life is equally at risk?
This story so struck a young philosophy student, William MacAskill, that he founded a group that's called Effective Altruism. Google it - it’s inspiring - and it has grown into a movement that has funneled billions of dollars into a select group of charities in which thousands of people have invested in order to get the most ‘bang for their buck.’
Effective Altruists say we shouldn’t give to personal or accessible causes - but focus on important, neglected, and solvable issues. We shouldn’t invest in non-profits who do ‘OK’ work - but only the ones doing 5-star, measurably excellent work - that’s how to change the world, they say.
And, since we all will work for roughly 80,000 hours in our lifetime, Effective Altruists say we should evaluate the profession we choose by how effective we can be at alleviating the suffering of the world.
While Effective Altruism has its criticisms, which I won’t get into in this sermon, this growing movement to live lives that are passionately informed by the voices of those who are hurting most - to consider how important our spending and vocational decisions are - is a wakeup call to the Church and the ways we order our lives.
"Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No," says Jesus, "I tell you, but rather division!"
Division is the intentional separation, the segregating, the splitting up into different places, of things needful and things no longer needful.
The division Jesus invites us to ponder are the habits, routines, and philosophies that drive our words and deeds.
How much do our spending decisions - our time management decisions — the way we live our lives - take others into account - especially the poor and the suffering?
How well do we evaluate the impact we’re making on the world, no matter how big or how small? And can we make changes in our lives based on how we might better assist those who are really hurting.
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Friends, the harsh words of Jesus are not meant to frighten and convict nearly as much as they are to shake us up and invite us into a deeper life.
Fire, baptism, division:
Jesus is here to clean up and to clean out, the fire is one of cleansing and banishing of all things not needed.
Baptism is an initiation into something new, a new way of being, cleansing off the dirt of the past, and embracing a new state of purity.
Division is the intentional separation, the segregating, the splitting up into different places things needful and things no longer needed.
What are you picking up out of this sermon?
What is the Holy Spirit stirring up inside of you - so that we can follow Jesus more nearly?
May these challenging words of Jesus inspire us to more closely follow His teaching - and more deeply love the world He’s given us to enjoy and repair.
Amen.