Proverbs 22:6
Luke 2:41-52
Seventh Sunday of Easter 2010
For most of my adult life, I have considered successful parenting to be little more than a crapshoot. It starts as a roll of the dice in the gene pool, and out comes a baby. Sometimes it’s 7 or 11 on the very first roll, and you win. But sometimes it’s 2, 3, or 12, and you “crap out.” (That’s technical terminology for losing on your come-out roll, so don’t get upset with me for thinking I just said something ugly. I didn’t. It’s a technical term.) Sometimes there’s not an immediate win or loss but you just keep on rolling: 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10. You just keep on rolling with no winning or losing either one. That’s pretty much how I’ve looked at successful parenting for most of my adult life. Sometimes you win; sometimes you lose; other times you just keep on rolling. It's a crapshoot.
How do you bring up a man instead of a monster? I was reminded of that line from Columbia native Debra Lynn Hooks’ wonderful little book titled Bringing Up Mommy as I read this week about George Huguely IV, a fourth-year at the University of Virginia who was given every evident advantage an American family can offer its children, only to murder Yeardley Love, his ex-girlfriend, while he was in a drunken stupor. I understand that in legal terms he’s innocent until proven guilty, but George Huguely IV had a long and public track record of being a drunken and violent monster before he was ever accused of being a murderer. How do you bring up a man instead of a monster? How do you bring up a woman instead of a witch? Because I’m a parent of boys, I haven’t worried over the second one as much; but if I had a daughter, I’d spend half my time worrying about monsters like George Huguely IV and the other half trying to hide every broomstick in town.
Recently, though, I’ve had a change of heart. I’ve come to think of successful parenting less as a game of chance played by individual parents and families and more as a bell-curve exercise lived out in communities. The famous biblical proverb, “Bring children up in the way they should go, and when they are grown they will never depart from it,” is a description of a bell-curve probability within a community, not prescription for individual, fail-safe parenting. There’s no such thing as “fail-safe” parenting.
We’ve all heard the African proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child.” Nowhere in the Bible is that proverb any better illustrated than in this morning’s gospel lesson. The parents of Jesus leave Jerusalem for home assuming that their preteen son is in the company of family, friends and neighbors who had traveled together from Nazareth for the annual Passover festival. A day’s journey later, they realize that he is nowhere to be found among the villagers from Nazareth, and they rush back to Jerusalem to find him “in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions” (Luke 2:46). What mother or father among us has not at least thought the question that Mary asks in v 48: “Child, why have you treated us like this?” And what parent hasn’t heard back some variation or another on what sounds like a typical preteen, self-possessed, smart-aleck answer, “Don’t you know I must be about my Father’s business?” Like he thinks he’s some kind of son of God or something! It takes family, friends and neighbors, travel, teachers and temple, and an individual sense of calling or mission: that’s the gospel take on the African proverb. The proverb is true enough. “It takes a village to raise a child.” But villages also raise idiots . . . and witches and monsters, as well as daughters and sons of God.
On each end of the bell curve, there are outliers. There are outliers of unexplainable success: “How did this child from that family turn out so well?” There are also outliers of inexplicable failure: “How did that child from this family turn out so poorly?” But in the main, in the main body of the bell curve, it turns out that there is an accumulation of odds that can turn the table toward bringing up men instead of monsters and women instead of witches. You have one way of describing those odds in front of you this morning. Some of you will recognize it from the Rev. Mary Carol Anderson’s sermon in the Friday evening worship of the South Carolina Cooperative Baptist Fellowship General Assembly three weeks ago. Mary Carol grew up in this congregation, was ordained to the ministry by this congregation, and now serves as Associate Minister in Student Ministries at First Baptist Church Aiken. I’ve learned a number of things from listening to Mary Carol over the years, and this is one of them.
Since it was founded in 1990, Search Institute has studied more than 2.2 million children and young people and their behaviors. And what Search Institute has found is that there are statistically reliable outcomes based on 40 different inputs or “developmental assets,” as they call them, in the course of bringing up children and youth. What if I told you that together, as a community committed to bringing up men instead of monsters and women instead of witches, we could significantly reduce the likelihood that our youngsters would engage in high-risk behavior such as problem alcohol use, violence, illicit drug use, and sexual activity?
(http://www.search-institute.org/research/assets/assetpower) Would you be interested? Every one of us would. Search Institute data show that we could reduce those behaviors to single-digit incidences—3%, 6%, 1%, 3%—if we could maximize our children’s and young people’s engagement in the developmental assets you have in your hand this morning. In addition to contributing to the avoidance of negative behavior, these 40 developmental assets correlate with positive attitudes and behaviors such as exhibiting leadership, maintaining good health, valuing diversity and succeeding in school. Now, remember, there are no guarantees in life except death and taxes—and the Internal Revenue Service if you try to avoid the latter of those two inevitabilities. There are always outliers in success and in failure, but we can turn the odds in our children’s favor.
Search Institute research shows that with the accumulation of 31 or more of these 40 assets there is a statistical “tipping point,” if you will, toward the avoidance of high-risk behavior and the promotion of positive behavior. (http://www.search-institute.org/research/assets/asset-levels) Unfortunately, their data also show that only 8% of children and youth reach the number of 31 or more that tips them statistically in the right direction. But we can do better than 8%. We can do a lot better than 8%. In fact, we are already doing better than that. I came back from Mary Carol’s sermon that Friday evening all fired up about Search Institute research, only to find that our Children’s Ministry and our Youth Ministry have known about Search Institute for years. And our staff actually employs criteria grounded in Search Institute research as one of the factors they take into account in planning and implementing the ministry they do with our children and our youth. I was thrilled to hear it. Sometimes I’m the last to know. But I want us to do more. I want our entire congregation to know what we are doing with our children and youth and how as we try to bring up daughters and sons of God instead of witches and monsters. And just as importantly, I want our young people to know what they are doing and how to grow up as sons and daughters of God instead of as monsters and witches.
So this morning’s sermon comes with a homework assignment. What I want you to do this week is to take this insert home with you. Adults, here is your assignment. I want you to sit down and identify which of these assets you can see that each of your children or your grandchildren or your First Baptist children has available to them as they are growing up. Mark them and count them up. And then begin to identify which assets they don’t have that you might be able to help bring to bear in their lives to get them to 31 or more. And then I want you to look at how you can do just that in your family and in your neighborhood and right here in your church. Children and youth, I want you to sit down and mark on this page which of these assets you have available to you now, and then I want you to look at which ones you don’t have that you could add to your assets either by your own effort or by involving people you know in the effort with you to get to 31 or more. Sit down with your parents or your grandparents or your minister or your teacher and talk about which ones you do and don’t have and about what you can do together to cultivate ones you don’t have.
At Search Institute's website (http://www.search-institute.org/), each of the 40 developmental assets is accompanied by a link to a pull-down menu titled “Take Action” that suggests practical things you can do to cultivate that asset in your children, your grandchildren, your church children or yourself. For example, for asset #9, “Service to Others,” the menu offers the following five ideas. Idea 1: “Together with your kids, do something for someone else, whether it’s making a financial contribution, baking cookies, or helping someone out.” Idea 2: “Make and send cards to hospitalized children, nursing home residents, or people in the military.” Idea 3: “Organize a community or neighborhood ‘closet cleaning day.’ Deliver everything you collect to a shelter or a thrift store.” Idea 4: “Provide foster care for a pet through an animal shelter or for a friend or neighbor who is out of town or ill.” Idea 5: “Organize or participate together in a fundraiser such as a walk or run.” And in case you want or need other suggestions, the menu refers you to an entire book of them.
You know what I saw as I looked through that list? What I saw is that my children, who have grown up in this congregation across twenty years, have participated in four out of five of those empowerment activities—or a variation on them—through the children’s, youth, and missions ministries of First Baptist Greenville. It’s not just the case that developmental asset #19 is “Religious Community: Young person spends one or more hours per week in activities in a religious institution.” Notice, by the way, that the asset says “spends one or more hours per week.” Not one or two a month. Not one or two a fall or winter or spring or summer. That’s not an asset. That’s a dalliance. The research suggests that it rises to the level of an asset when it reaches “one or more hours [or times] a week.” And in the case of this church, it’s more than just the “religious community” asset. When Bev and I brought our boys to this church—to Sunday School, choir, children’s activities, youth activities, sports activities, and missions activities—First Baptist Greenville was delivering additional developmental assets to our boys, helping us in our effort to bring up men instead of monsters. It is our responsibility as parents to get them here, whether they want to come or not. But when we exercise our parental responsibility, when we behave like grown-ups instead of teenagers ourselves, the ministries of First Baptist Greenville are delivering multiple developmental assets to our children. What I saw was a picture of Search Institute research at work and the gospel picture at work of family, friends and neighbors, travel, teachers and temple, and an individual sense of calling or mission all cultivating together—all becoming together—daughters and sons of God.
So, all those years I had it wrong. It’s not a crap-shoot at all. It’s true that there are outliers—inexplicable failures and unexplainable successes. But it is just as true that there is a bell-curve exercise, a body of work in the body of Christ that brings to bear the best of human understanding and the best of divine wisdom on bringing up sons and daughters, daughters and sons of God.
Research has also shown that one of the recurring occasions that families and communities have for cultivating developmental assets is mealtime. Wouldn’t you know it? The Bible beat the researchers to the punch on that one too. There is at the table always an opportunity for cultivating relationships and understanding and wisdom. It is to the Table of the Lord we now come with a commitment in hand to deepen our relationships and our understanding and our wisdom for bringing up sons and daughters of God: family, friends and neighbors, travel, teachers and temple, and an individual sense of calling or mission. Welcome to the Table of the Lord where we are all nourished and sustained to grow in wisdom and stature.
This material is Copyrighted © 2010 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. It may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeffrogers110@bellsouth.net.
Monday, May 17, 2010
Breakfast, Anyone?
John 21:1-19
Third Sunday of Easter 2010
Nutritionists tell us that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Not “breaking” your overnight “fast” but continuing it into your work day or your school day or your day off is a recipe for mental and physical disaster. Breaking your fast with a healthy breakfast—or not—affects your energy level, your concentration, your focus, your thinking, your problem-solving and your mood, not only until lunch but for the entire day. Would you believe that people who skip breakfast are more susceptible to weight gain than people who eat a healthy breakfast regularly? Studies have shown that “children who regularly ate breakfast had better standardized test scores, better behavior, and were less hyperactive than children who skipped breakfast” (http://nutrition.about.com/od/nutritionforchildren/a/dietandlearning.htm). If you feel yourself going like this right about now, chances are, you skipped breakfast—or you did the donut thing and the “sugar high” is wearing off. It turns out that Jesus’ words in John 21:12, “Come and have breakfast,” have been empirically validated as among the wisest words in all of Scripture. Breakfast, anyone?
It was only ten days ago that several hundred of us gathered in this room on Maundy Thursday to commemorate the Last Supper and the entirety of Jesus’ passion. This morning we commemorate the “last breakfast.” It was a simple affair. Some fish, fresh from the night’s catch, and bread freshly baked by an open fire. One of the favorite cookbooks in our house was published in 1984 in Jackson, MS. In August of that year, Presidential nominee Walter Mondale and his running mate Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman candidate for vice president, paid a visit to a farm in rural Hinds County, MS. Mississippi Agriculture Commissioner Jim Buck Ross was talking with Ferraro about new crops in the state, and he mentioned blueberries. Ferraro said, “I grow those.” Ross responded, “Do you? Can you make a blueberry muffin?” “Sure can. Can you?” Ferraro answered. To which Ross responded in a sentence heard round the campaign world, “Down here, men don’t cook.” Thanks to the brouhaha in the press created by that conversation, we have the Down Here, Men Don’t Cook cookbook full of wonderful recipes by Mississippi men. And can the men of Mississippi ever cook! At least some of them can.
We don’t have Jesus’ recipe for the bread or for the fish, either one; but there he is in John 21, cooking on an open fire early in the morning and calling to his errant disciples, “Come and have breakfast!” But what I’d like you to see in this morning’s gospel lesson that is at least as important as the wisdom of good nutrition and the folly of gender stereotyping is the invitation of the Risen Lord to you to break your fast. The disciples to whom Jesus called that morning as dawn was breaking had been called away from their boats and their nets years before. “Come, follow me,” Jesus had said to them, “and I will make you fishers for people” (Mark 1:17; Matthew 4:19). And so they left their boats and their nets and their homes and their families, and they followed. But things had not turned out as they expected. None of them could have known the road that was ahead of them when they responded in faith to Jesus’ call. None of us ever does. So when their expectations were confounded and their hopes were dashed and their faith was confused and their trust became doubt, they did the only thing they knew to do, and that was to go back to what they were doing before they ever met Jesus, before they ever heard his call.
It happens to all of us sooner or later. Expectations are confounded. Hopes are dashed. Faith is confused. Trust becomes doubt. All of us have our own spiritual equivalent of chucking it all and going fishing. That’s when we find ourselves in a spiritual fast, a spiritual desert, a spiritual no-man’s land, lost and alone and alienated from God and from our calling to be who God has created us to be. When you find yourself “at sea,” fishing around in your spiritual life and catching nothing, keep your eye on the shoreline. Because sooner or later, dawn will break, and you will see on the shore the glow of a small fire and the movement of a figure there whom you will not even recognize but who will call you to breakfast nevertheless. Because even when you are running from Christ and running from Christ’s call, Christ keeps coming to you and inviting you to break your fast, inviting you to fill your emptiness and satisfy your hunger. “Come and have breakfast,” Jesus says.
As it was in this morning’s gospel lesson, the breakfast table is set for Jesus’ followers again, albeit in a very different place in a very different way. But the invitation and the message of the Risen Christ this morning is the same as it was that morning long ago: “Break your fast!” Whenever your expectations are confounded, your hopes are dashed, your faith is confused, and your trust becomes doubt, you are always invited to fill your emptiness and satisfy your deepest hunger at the table that Christ has provided. Breakfast, anyone?
This material is Copyrighted © 2010 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. It may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeffrogers10@bellsouth.net.
Third Sunday of Easter 2010
Nutritionists tell us that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Not “breaking” your overnight “fast” but continuing it into your work day or your school day or your day off is a recipe for mental and physical disaster. Breaking your fast with a healthy breakfast—or not—affects your energy level, your concentration, your focus, your thinking, your problem-solving and your mood, not only until lunch but for the entire day. Would you believe that people who skip breakfast are more susceptible to weight gain than people who eat a healthy breakfast regularly? Studies have shown that “children who regularly ate breakfast had better standardized test scores, better behavior, and were less hyperactive than children who skipped breakfast” (http://nutrition.about.com/od/nutritionforchildren/a/dietandlearning.htm). If you feel yourself going like this right about now, chances are, you skipped breakfast—or you did the donut thing and the “sugar high” is wearing off. It turns out that Jesus’ words in John 21:12, “Come and have breakfast,” have been empirically validated as among the wisest words in all of Scripture. Breakfast, anyone?
It was only ten days ago that several hundred of us gathered in this room on Maundy Thursday to commemorate the Last Supper and the entirety of Jesus’ passion. This morning we commemorate the “last breakfast.” It was a simple affair. Some fish, fresh from the night’s catch, and bread freshly baked by an open fire. One of the favorite cookbooks in our house was published in 1984 in Jackson, MS. In August of that year, Presidential nominee Walter Mondale and his running mate Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman candidate for vice president, paid a visit to a farm in rural Hinds County, MS. Mississippi Agriculture Commissioner Jim Buck Ross was talking with Ferraro about new crops in the state, and he mentioned blueberries. Ferraro said, “I grow those.” Ross responded, “Do you? Can you make a blueberry muffin?” “Sure can. Can you?” Ferraro answered. To which Ross responded in a sentence heard round the campaign world, “Down here, men don’t cook.” Thanks to the brouhaha in the press created by that conversation, we have the Down Here, Men Don’t Cook cookbook full of wonderful recipes by Mississippi men. And can the men of Mississippi ever cook! At least some of them can.
We don’t have Jesus’ recipe for the bread or for the fish, either one; but there he is in John 21, cooking on an open fire early in the morning and calling to his errant disciples, “Come and have breakfast!” But what I’d like you to see in this morning’s gospel lesson that is at least as important as the wisdom of good nutrition and the folly of gender stereotyping is the invitation of the Risen Lord to you to break your fast. The disciples to whom Jesus called that morning as dawn was breaking had been called away from their boats and their nets years before. “Come, follow me,” Jesus had said to them, “and I will make you fishers for people” (Mark 1:17; Matthew 4:19). And so they left their boats and their nets and their homes and their families, and they followed. But things had not turned out as they expected. None of them could have known the road that was ahead of them when they responded in faith to Jesus’ call. None of us ever does. So when their expectations were confounded and their hopes were dashed and their faith was confused and their trust became doubt, they did the only thing they knew to do, and that was to go back to what they were doing before they ever met Jesus, before they ever heard his call.
It happens to all of us sooner or later. Expectations are confounded. Hopes are dashed. Faith is confused. Trust becomes doubt. All of us have our own spiritual equivalent of chucking it all and going fishing. That’s when we find ourselves in a spiritual fast, a spiritual desert, a spiritual no-man’s land, lost and alone and alienated from God and from our calling to be who God has created us to be. When you find yourself “at sea,” fishing around in your spiritual life and catching nothing, keep your eye on the shoreline. Because sooner or later, dawn will break, and you will see on the shore the glow of a small fire and the movement of a figure there whom you will not even recognize but who will call you to breakfast nevertheless. Because even when you are running from Christ and running from Christ’s call, Christ keeps coming to you and inviting you to break your fast, inviting you to fill your emptiness and satisfy your hunger. “Come and have breakfast,” Jesus says.
As it was in this morning’s gospel lesson, the breakfast table is set for Jesus’ followers again, albeit in a very different place in a very different way. But the invitation and the message of the Risen Christ this morning is the same as it was that morning long ago: “Break your fast!” Whenever your expectations are confounded, your hopes are dashed, your faith is confused, and your trust becomes doubt, you are always invited to fill your emptiness and satisfy your deepest hunger at the table that Christ has provided. Breakfast, anyone?
This material is Copyrighted © 2010 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. It may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeffrogers10@bellsouth.net.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Living Hope
Note: As the Easter season hurtles toward Pentecost, I am posting a sermon that I was recently asked to provide a copy of for someone who thought of it after this Easter's sermon on hope. Many thanks to the late A. A. Milne for hours and hours of joy with my children in the Hundred Acre Wood.
1 Peter 1:3-9
Second Sunday of Easter 2008
How do you face the future? How do you move into the future? As you confront the future—or the future confronts you, how do you face it? This morning, I’d like to introduce you to six friends of mine. Many of you already know them. Some of you are intimately familiar with them right now; some of you have been intimately familiar with them in the past. They are a group of friends who endure blustery days and swarms of bees, high waters and heffalumps and woozles. And each of them faces the future in a characteristic way that sometimes sounds a lot like us.
The first of them is a grey donkey. His head is always down; his ears flop low; and he’s constantly losing his tail. His name is Eeyore, and again and again, he says, “Woe is me.” Eeyore is constantly relying on his friends to find his tail and pin it back on him. Eeyore faces the future with complete confidence—that it will go badly. “Woe is me.” Eeyore is never afraid or anxious. Eeyore is never uncertain or concerned because Eeyore knows how things are going to turn out: badly. “Woe is me.” I know a few Eeyores, do you?
And then there is Eeyore’s friend, Rabbit. You know Rabbit. He cries, “Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!” as he scurries around his garden. “Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!” he says all the time. Rabbit is anxious and afraid because things could turn out badly. They could go badly. “Oh my! Oh my!” says Rabbit. I know a Rabbit; he’s a good, good friend of mine. On the outside, he’s a blustery kind of guy whom lots of people don’t like because he just seems so full of himself and always certain and sure that he knows what he’s doing, and he isn’t afraid to tell anyone and everyone about it. I wasn’t sure I liked him much, either, when I first met him. But, then after a while, I began to see that inside all of that bravado and bluster and certainty, there was a scared little bunny that was really saying, “Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!” Rabbit faces the future with anxiety and skittishness and fear.
And then, of course, there’s the irrepressible Tigger. “The wonderful thing about Tiggers is Tiggers are wonderful things.” Remember Tigger? You know Tigger! “Their tops are made out of rubber; their bottoms are made out of springs; they’re bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun. And the most wonderful thing about Tiggers is I’m the only one.” Ah, Tigger! So caught up in himself and the present moment bouncing from place to place to place to place. Tigger faces the future without even thinking about it. Whatever is coming, Tigger just bounces into it. Tigger doesn’t worry. The future will be the present soon enough. Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun. Those irrepressible Tiggers in our lives are full of boundless energy and constant irritation.
Woe is me! Oh my! Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun! Then there’s Piglet. Little bitty Piglet. Piglet is the kind of character many of us might not think to mention when we name our favorites from A. A. Milne’s wonderful world of children’s stories. Piglet is so quiet and unassuming, you might not notice him. In fact, the first time I preached this sermon, I didn’t mention Piglet. But someone came up to me afterward and said, “You know, you really should have talked about Piglet because Piglet always needs a boost from somebody.” How many of us need a boost into the future? We know it’s coming; we know it’s unavoidable, but we can’t step into it until somebody else gives us a boost. Once we get a boost, we’ll be all right. We face the future needing a boost.
Winnie the Pooh faces the future differently than Eeyore and Rabbit and Tigger and Piglet. The future for Pooh is always about whether or not there’s enough honey in that jar up there on the shelf for when his tumbly gets rumbly. Pooh never seems to see beyond the next meal. And that sometimes gets Pooh into some predicaments—and his friends, too. Complicating things happen to Pooh and his friends because all Pooh can think about the future is his next meal.
There is one more friend. His name is Christopher Robin. Christopher Robin is the one who steps into the friends’ story from the outside and brings with him the capacity and the capability to give all the other friends hope. Christopher Robin is the one who sees beyond the predicament of the moment; beyond the next meal; beyond the need for a boost; beyond the bounce, bounce, bounce; beyond the “Oh my!”; beyond the “Woe is me!” And in so doing, he lifts the spirits, the circumstances and the capabilities of all the other friends to hope for an outcome beyond the condition in which they find themselves when Christopher Robin steps into the story.
This morning’s epistle lesson, 1 Peter 1: 3-9, suggests to us that in facing the future, hope comes to us from an external agency, from someone else steps into our stories, into our lives, and who energizes us with a hope that looks beyond the world as we can see it, beyond our situation as we know it, beyond any future outcome that we can imagine to an outcome in this life and in the life to come that only God can imagine or create: "By God’s mercy, God has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ," 1 Peter 1:3 tells us. Hope, you see, is not something you can achieve; it is something you must receive. Hope is not something we can acquire or grasp or accomplish on our own, according to 1 Peter 1:3. Hope is a gift that comes to us from God when we are willing and able to open ourselves to the reality—the irrational and unexplainable reality—of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is the hope of the Christian faith. Hope in the Christian faith is not some wish for or work for or want. Hope is what we need when there is nothing else. Hope is a gift from God grounded in God’s mercy and energized by Christ’s resurrection. So a “living hope” comes to us from beyond.
But there’s another piece of this living hope that we need to see in 1 Peter 1. From the very beginning of talking about “living hope,” 1 Peter 1:3 says “us” or “we.” And when verse 4 turns to address the audience as “you,” it doesn’t speak to “you” as an individual. It addresses “y’all”—all of “us” together. If you’re not from around here, it’s to “youse guys” or “you-uns” or whatever they say wherever you’re from when they mean “more than one.” Living hope is not a solo act. All too often, when we lose hope or need hope or reach for hope or desperately wait for hope, we make the mistake of thinking that hope is a heroic act of individual virtuosity that each of us must achieve on our own instead of receive in the company of others. We make the mistake of pulling Eeyore out of the circle of his friends, and we say, “Woe is me!” all alone. We pull Rabbit out of his garden, and we say to ourselves, “Oh my! Oh my! O my!” in lonely isolation. We turn ourselves into some tenaciously singular Tigger who simply will not be denied; and we bounce ourselves and everyone around us into oblivion trying desperately to bounce the fear, the anxiety or the desperation out of our lives. We sit all alone waiting like Piglet for a boost that never comes because we have chosen to wait for it all alone. We make like a lonesome Pooh straining to reach the honey jar. 1 Peter 1:3-9 says that living hope comes to us in a context of us all, of “y’all.” Hope is not a solo act. Hope comes to us; we find hope; we live into hope in a community of others who sometimes are finding our tail for us and pinning it back on. A community of others who work together to pull us out of the tight spot we’ve gotten ourselves wedged into and we can’t possibly extricate ourselves by ourselves, a community of others who give each other a boost. We move in and out of conditions in our lives in which we are one of the friends or another in need of what the other friends bring to the party.
Obviously, 1 Peter 1 doesn’t know Pooh and his friends. But 1 Peter understands that a living hope is an act of community. It is an act of congregation because some of us are Eeyores and some of us are Rabbits; some of us are Tiggers and some of us are Poohs. Who am I missing? Piglet again? Piglet, poor Piglet, is just waiting for me to give him a boost. And some of us are to others of us like Christopher Robin. It’s our mutual role in this congregation to be a holy friend and to be wholly befriended as we pull each other along into the future. While one of those characters in particular may be our character type, at one time or another we find ourselves and our friends in a place that we haven’t been before. The Christopher Robin type might move through a passage in life by virtue of loss of family or spouse or health or a job where they’ve stopped being a Christopher Robin who brings in the capability and the perspective. Christopher Robin might become a Piglet and sit there waiting for someone like the person he or she used to be to give them a boost into the future. And who knows, it could be a Piglet who provides it! A living hope is an act of community that God gives us as a gift, and then we share it with one another as we pull each other through the blustery days and swarms of bees, the high water and the heffalumps and woozles that we all face.
We all face the future differently, but in our differences we face the future together with a living hope that comes to us as a gift from God through the Easter proclamation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Thanks be to God for the gift, and thanks be to God for each other as we face the future together!
This material is Copyrighted © 2010 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. It may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeffrogers110@bellsouth.net.
1 Peter 1:3-9
Second Sunday of Easter 2008
How do you face the future? How do you move into the future? As you confront the future—or the future confronts you, how do you face it? This morning, I’d like to introduce you to six friends of mine. Many of you already know them. Some of you are intimately familiar with them right now; some of you have been intimately familiar with them in the past. They are a group of friends who endure blustery days and swarms of bees, high waters and heffalumps and woozles. And each of them faces the future in a characteristic way that sometimes sounds a lot like us.
The first of them is a grey donkey. His head is always down; his ears flop low; and he’s constantly losing his tail. His name is Eeyore, and again and again, he says, “Woe is me.” Eeyore is constantly relying on his friends to find his tail and pin it back on him. Eeyore faces the future with complete confidence—that it will go badly. “Woe is me.” Eeyore is never afraid or anxious. Eeyore is never uncertain or concerned because Eeyore knows how things are going to turn out: badly. “Woe is me.” I know a few Eeyores, do you?
And then there is Eeyore’s friend, Rabbit. You know Rabbit. He cries, “Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!” as he scurries around his garden. “Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!” he says all the time. Rabbit is anxious and afraid because things could turn out badly. They could go badly. “Oh my! Oh my!” says Rabbit. I know a Rabbit; he’s a good, good friend of mine. On the outside, he’s a blustery kind of guy whom lots of people don’t like because he just seems so full of himself and always certain and sure that he knows what he’s doing, and he isn’t afraid to tell anyone and everyone about it. I wasn’t sure I liked him much, either, when I first met him. But, then after a while, I began to see that inside all of that bravado and bluster and certainty, there was a scared little bunny that was really saying, “Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!” Rabbit faces the future with anxiety and skittishness and fear.
And then, of course, there’s the irrepressible Tigger. “The wonderful thing about Tiggers is Tiggers are wonderful things.” Remember Tigger? You know Tigger! “Their tops are made out of rubber; their bottoms are made out of springs; they’re bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun. And the most wonderful thing about Tiggers is I’m the only one.” Ah, Tigger! So caught up in himself and the present moment bouncing from place to place to place to place. Tigger faces the future without even thinking about it. Whatever is coming, Tigger just bounces into it. Tigger doesn’t worry. The future will be the present soon enough. Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun. Those irrepressible Tiggers in our lives are full of boundless energy and constant irritation.
Woe is me! Oh my! Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun! Then there’s Piglet. Little bitty Piglet. Piglet is the kind of character many of us might not think to mention when we name our favorites from A. A. Milne’s wonderful world of children’s stories. Piglet is so quiet and unassuming, you might not notice him. In fact, the first time I preached this sermon, I didn’t mention Piglet. But someone came up to me afterward and said, “You know, you really should have talked about Piglet because Piglet always needs a boost from somebody.” How many of us need a boost into the future? We know it’s coming; we know it’s unavoidable, but we can’t step into it until somebody else gives us a boost. Once we get a boost, we’ll be all right. We face the future needing a boost.
Winnie the Pooh faces the future differently than Eeyore and Rabbit and Tigger and Piglet. The future for Pooh is always about whether or not there’s enough honey in that jar up there on the shelf for when his tumbly gets rumbly. Pooh never seems to see beyond the next meal. And that sometimes gets Pooh into some predicaments—and his friends, too. Complicating things happen to Pooh and his friends because all Pooh can think about the future is his next meal.
There is one more friend. His name is Christopher Robin. Christopher Robin is the one who steps into the friends’ story from the outside and brings with him the capacity and the capability to give all the other friends hope. Christopher Robin is the one who sees beyond the predicament of the moment; beyond the next meal; beyond the need for a boost; beyond the bounce, bounce, bounce; beyond the “Oh my!”; beyond the “Woe is me!” And in so doing, he lifts the spirits, the circumstances and the capabilities of all the other friends to hope for an outcome beyond the condition in which they find themselves when Christopher Robin steps into the story.
This morning’s epistle lesson, 1 Peter 1: 3-9, suggests to us that in facing the future, hope comes to us from an external agency, from someone else steps into our stories, into our lives, and who energizes us with a hope that looks beyond the world as we can see it, beyond our situation as we know it, beyond any future outcome that we can imagine to an outcome in this life and in the life to come that only God can imagine or create: "By God’s mercy, God has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ," 1 Peter 1:3 tells us. Hope, you see, is not something you can achieve; it is something you must receive. Hope is not something we can acquire or grasp or accomplish on our own, according to 1 Peter 1:3. Hope is a gift that comes to us from God when we are willing and able to open ourselves to the reality—the irrational and unexplainable reality—of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is the hope of the Christian faith. Hope in the Christian faith is not some wish for or work for or want. Hope is what we need when there is nothing else. Hope is a gift from God grounded in God’s mercy and energized by Christ’s resurrection. So a “living hope” comes to us from beyond.
But there’s another piece of this living hope that we need to see in 1 Peter 1. From the very beginning of talking about “living hope,” 1 Peter 1:3 says “us” or “we.” And when verse 4 turns to address the audience as “you,” it doesn’t speak to “you” as an individual. It addresses “y’all”—all of “us” together. If you’re not from around here, it’s to “youse guys” or “you-uns” or whatever they say wherever you’re from when they mean “more than one.” Living hope is not a solo act. All too often, when we lose hope or need hope or reach for hope or desperately wait for hope, we make the mistake of thinking that hope is a heroic act of individual virtuosity that each of us must achieve on our own instead of receive in the company of others. We make the mistake of pulling Eeyore out of the circle of his friends, and we say, “Woe is me!” all alone. We pull Rabbit out of his garden, and we say to ourselves, “Oh my! Oh my! O my!” in lonely isolation. We turn ourselves into some tenaciously singular Tigger who simply will not be denied; and we bounce ourselves and everyone around us into oblivion trying desperately to bounce the fear, the anxiety or the desperation out of our lives. We sit all alone waiting like Piglet for a boost that never comes because we have chosen to wait for it all alone. We make like a lonesome Pooh straining to reach the honey jar. 1 Peter 1:3-9 says that living hope comes to us in a context of us all, of “y’all.” Hope is not a solo act. Hope comes to us; we find hope; we live into hope in a community of others who sometimes are finding our tail for us and pinning it back on. A community of others who work together to pull us out of the tight spot we’ve gotten ourselves wedged into and we can’t possibly extricate ourselves by ourselves, a community of others who give each other a boost. We move in and out of conditions in our lives in which we are one of the friends or another in need of what the other friends bring to the party.
Obviously, 1 Peter 1 doesn’t know Pooh and his friends. But 1 Peter understands that a living hope is an act of community. It is an act of congregation because some of us are Eeyores and some of us are Rabbits; some of us are Tiggers and some of us are Poohs. Who am I missing? Piglet again? Piglet, poor Piglet, is just waiting for me to give him a boost. And some of us are to others of us like Christopher Robin. It’s our mutual role in this congregation to be a holy friend and to be wholly befriended as we pull each other along into the future. While one of those characters in particular may be our character type, at one time or another we find ourselves and our friends in a place that we haven’t been before. The Christopher Robin type might move through a passage in life by virtue of loss of family or spouse or health or a job where they’ve stopped being a Christopher Robin who brings in the capability and the perspective. Christopher Robin might become a Piglet and sit there waiting for someone like the person he or she used to be to give them a boost into the future. And who knows, it could be a Piglet who provides it! A living hope is an act of community that God gives us as a gift, and then we share it with one another as we pull each other through the blustery days and swarms of bees, the high water and the heffalumps and woozles that we all face.
We all face the future differently, but in our differences we face the future together with a living hope that comes to us as a gift from God through the Easter proclamation of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Thanks be to God for the gift, and thanks be to God for each other as we face the future together!
This material is Copyrighted © 2010 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. It may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeffrogers110@bellsouth.net.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)