I want to approach the sermon differently this week. God has been very present, keeping me away from books, and instead enmeshed in listening to speakers. Two very different kinds. Both were speaking about approaches to understanding religion, spirituality in our lives today.
One was a panel of scholars at Harvard Divinity School. Diane Bagley sent me the link because her son in law Chris was on the panel.
One of the topics of discussion was this idea of people falling away from religion, because of an experience they had where they felt excluded or betrayed somehow by their religion. And since all religions are built around a myth or a story that may no longer be working for people… this idea arose that maybe a new story, a new myth, or a new religion needs to be written that will bring people together. For example, Our religion is built upon the Jesus story and the resurrection. But since that is no longer working for people, maybe something new is needed.
And one of the panelists said;
The myth we need is not necessarily a big cosmic explanation for everything, but people need lots of little stories.
And I couldn’t agree more. There is nothing wrong with the story of Christianity, but t won’t hold up over time unless we break it down into those small stories and moments of our lives where the bigger story become true in the details of our life.
And that brings me to the other thing I listened to all week, only this one I liked more, (Sorry Diane) but it was simple, it was practiced, it was tangible because it was lots of little stories.
It’s the podcast I’ve been telling you all to listen to for three years now called On Being. This particular interview was with Sylvia Boorstein who is a Jewish Buddhist psychotherapist who, along with others, brought Buddhism to the west in the 70’s. For those who practice Buddhism, Sylvia Boorstein is a household name and she often teaches out at Spirit Rock here in Marin County.
So all week I was listening to these two things as I drive in the car, did the dishes, or gathered three months worth of receipts for Elaine…
And then, of course, the whole time I’m also listening for this week’s scripture which is the background noise for everything I do all week long in preparation for this day. Background noise, background music. depending on the day.
This week, it was pure music. Because it's such a simple passage. It starts with all this traveling around and mention of so many different places and it's the spirit that’s leading the apostles all over the place. And finally they come to a river, or a place of prayer where women have gathered and we meet this God worshipping woman named Lydia who deals in purple cloth (which means she’s wealthy businesswoman) and God opens her heart, while she listens. How beautifully simple that is. As she listens, God opens her heart. And her response to God opening her heart is also a very simple one. Come to my house. All of you. Come on over. Let me feed you, you can put your feet up, rest, there's plenty of space and food and drink, let me do this for you, because of what you have done for me, or what God has done for me- through you.
And that’s really the point. The apostles pray with her, and maybe share some teachings, or some stories about Jesus, and she hears what they are saying but it’s God that opens her heart. Some would say they did that. But scripture always makes a point of reminding us that these are the things that God’s doing, not us. The apostles were part of the equation to be sure, like a conduit or a delivery service for what God was doing, but in the end, it’s God doing.
And she repays the grace by being gracious. And she creates a moment, a small moment in this larger story, by living out what tangibly and practically what God is doing cosmically. Smaller stories, and moments of grace in the larger narrative or story of our religion.
In other words; one in other word, one word-Grace.
Grace came up at our Pizza and theology because Michael and Kathleen shared that they had been talking about grace over dinner at home one evening. You have no idea how tickled pink a Pastor gets when they hear that two of their flock have been discussing grace.
What a gift that is to my ears. Like music.
And that’s what grace is, it’s a gift. It’s what Lydia received in hearing the apostles, it’s what we all receive all the time if we’re paying attention. And sometimes we become vehicles for God to give it to others, in what we share, like Lydia, through our hospitality, not just of home, but of heart, as God opened her heart, so too God opens ours.
Theoretically, that happens here at church, maybe especially on those days you come through the line and you tell me I made you cry. Well, first, I only said some words, but God opened your heart, which made you cry, which is a wonderful place to be, but how do we carry that open, raw vulnerable heart into the world where people are so often not so kind? it’s enormously difficult, so we find ourselves putting the armor back on and we can feel what we’ve gained here slowly dissolve and before long we find we’re cranky or angry or worse, apathetic to it all.
So how do we maintain open hearts? We practice kindness, as we talked about two weeks ago and we hold ourselves accountable to something greater than ourselves as we talked about last week.
In the interview with Sylvia Boorstein…a wonderful and light-hearted practice came up…and it fits beautifully with the opening of the scripture-The apostles are traveling here and there, and scripture doesn’t really explain this except to say the spirit is leading them, which we all know in our experience, means things don’t always go according to plan, Boorstein said this:
I was thinking about the GPS in my car. It never gets annoyed at me. If I make a mistake, it says, “Recalculating.” And then it tells me to make the soonest left turn and go back. I thought to myself, you know, I should write a book and call it “Recalculating” because I think that that’s what we’re doing all the time, that something happens, it challenges us and the challenge is, OK, so do you want to get mad now? You could get mad, you could go home, you could make some phone calls, you could tell a few people you can’t believe what this person said or that person said.
Indignation is tremendously seductive, you know, and to share with other people on the telephone and all that. So to not do it and to say, wait a minute, apropos of what you said before, wise effort to say to yourself, wait a minute, this is not the right road. Literally, this is not the right road. There’s a fork in the road here. I could become indignant; I could flame up this flame of negativity; or I could say, “Recalculating.” I’ll just go back here.
And no matter how many times I don’t make that turn, it will continue to say, “Recalculating.” The tone of voice will stay the same.
Like all journeys we hit these forks in the road, I could go this way or I could go that way. We know what our basic should and should not be. We know as Christians we’re to be kind and welcoming all the time, but that’s in theory. But in practice it becomes concrete….And as one of the panelists on the Harvard divinity panel said;
Practice lives in where theory breaks down.
Practice lives in the place where theory breaks down.
Boorstein also tells this anecdote that many of us have heard versions of for years…
I’ve heard now as a Native American story. I’ve heard it as every kind of a story, but as a wise grandfather saying to his grandson — or it could be a wise grandmother saying to her granddaughter — I have two wolves in my heart: One is loving, and one is vicious, and they’re at war with each other. The grandchild is saying, which is going to win? And the grandparent saying, the one I feed.
And this simple idea, perhaps more than anything I heard all week, stayed with me, and lo and behold, Eric and I went for dinner to the home of a co-worker of Eric’s and as I’m sitting there eating, I look upon the way in front of me, and what is on the wall but that very same piece of wisdom about the two wolves.
That’s a message from God. That’s a piece of grace that came in that moment saying, make sure you share that on Sunday.
We share the small stories of our life to make for bigger meaning. We share the small stories of grace in our lives, those small gifts that cause us to exhale, to have our hearts opened, and to feel and recognize we’re never in this life alone.
God has been gracious to me this week. That word gracious is a beautiful word. I like the word hospitality, but today, I like the word gracious even more. The word gracious holds the word grace within it. To be gracious means many things…perhaps most simply, It’s an act of kindness that we begin but that God takes and turns into grace for the person who is receiving it, and also for the person who is giving it.
To be part of what is gracious is to look for the small stories of our lives that hold within them the narrative of the larger story. Christ is with us in the sharing, in the giving. Lydia knew this or maybe she didn’t, but what she did was to be so filled with love in that moment of grace that her response to it was to be gracious. SO simple. Come on over to my house. Let me make a temporary home for you here. A place where you can find some time, some rest, some food and refuel for your journey, where you will continue to work for God as God uses you to open the hearts of others.
So simple. So incredibly gracious. And so important for all of us.
Finally, the other piece of listening this week that went on was to the choral benediction the choir will be singing for us next Sunday on Music Appreciation Sunday. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord lift his countenance upon you and give you peace The Lord make his face to shine upon you….and be gracious, unto to you. Be gracious.
In case you like the dictionary definition of words here it is; Gracious
2. (in Christian belief) showing divine grace.
"I am saved by God's gracious intervention on my behalf"
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synonyms: |
merciful, forgiving, compassionate, kind, lenient, clement, pitying, forbearing, humane, mild, softhearted, tenderhearted, sympathetic; patient, humanitarian,, easygoing, permissive, tolerant, generous, magnanimous, beneficent, benign, benevolent "God’s gracious intervention" |
Practice this, be gracious, in all the ways God is gracious to you. Pay attention to all the small moments of grace that hold in it the larger grace of a God who loves you beyond words.