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Momentum is one of those words that
either can be a “half-glass-empty” word or a “half-glass-full” word especially
when steering that “disciple-ship” of your journey. Last week was a whole
week devoted to recharging my spiritual batteries as well as being a part of
the spiritual formation, helping others in their faith. Helping others to allow
God's Word to be that lighthouse and free them from their chrysalis shell of
uncertainty to truly grow, was serving the Via De Cristo Cursillo this past
week. The moment I read this Sunday's Gospel I thought of the Toby Mac
song, 'Lose My Soul.' If you haven’t heard of it, it’s a contemporary Christian
song that includes a repeating verse: "I don't wanna to gain the whole
world and lose my soul." This is one of the lines that stuck out for me
the most. Money may seem to make our worlds go around but the truth of the
matter is what really makes the world go around is by the Grace of God. It is by and through the Grace of God, we
know our true purpose and our true place and have New life.
This segment we have of the Gospel
this week is just after the rich young man comes to see what more he needs to
do to "feel good" about being faithful. Perhaps the guy was seeking a
first century Joel Olsteen and thought Jesus would give him the answer he
wanted to hear? The rich man only saw piety, being pious, as a transaction.
This should sound familiar to a lot of where the world see service and gain
these days. Social justice in some fronts of practice has become “feel-good”
philanthropy over restorative justice which challenges us to really be
accountable to one another to help someone in need. The
problem here, is that the rich young man, in today’s Gospel, is much more
concerned about “having his cake and eating it too.” He's certainly not ready
to give up his money and possessions yet alone do much “work…” so is his “disciple-ship”
going to move forward much? I don't think so. Again, we get
challenged with the idea of Murphy's Law here by Jesus himself saying:
"...many who are first will be last and the last will be first." When
we get discouraged by being caught by that or feeling like we're under the
thumb of that kind of thing, we spin our wheels.
What is spinning one's wheels?
When I was younger I was successful at doing just that. I was also very
successful in not feeling encouraged in much of anything and I let other people
make me feel bad about my efforts. This past retreat, I allowed myself to
feel a little discouraged by other people who don't believe in women pastors.
You’d think I’d be so used to the “attitude” from both men and women, I
wouldn’t let it bother me, but it did bother me once again. I was able to shake
that off however by thinking of the bright light that other people bring into
your life to get you out of those patterns of thought. One of the other
spiritual directors in this last Cursillo weekend is a very talented artist in
his own right musically and wrote a song a number of years ago called 'Fail Forward.'
Here’s the refrain: "So fail forward. You won’t break. Fail forward. Crash
and burn ‘til it aches… Fail forward as many times as it takes. Always try to
make some new mistakes..."
This song has very witty “wisdom”
like statements sort of, in some senses nearing to what we're hearing in Psalm
119 and Ecclesiastes. This is the thought that we have for this day, little
thoughts of: will we be merely satisfied to eat, drink and be merry for
tomorrow we die...? This isn't to be taken lightly or frivolously, but that’s
our walking upon that fine line of what the world preaches and the Kingdom of
God tries to teach us. If you're a “half-glass-empty” person, as I was for a
number of years, you see a lot of yourself just failing forward and allowing
other people to help push you further into the mud of that thought. Yes,
Humanity can be very good at times it being "demotivating" but then
I've heard this as well at times that you can and will be own your worst enemy.
Serving this past retreat with a new dear friend I have out here, saw many
moments of blessing, of mutually being encouraging to one another to carry on
and serve.
For God all things are
possible, for us all things can be possible as well… This is not thinking
in human terms however. It is faithfully realizing who you are as a child of
Grace and promise, both saint and sinner. It's a matter of where our momentum
and priorities are placed. Probably perhaps a most favorite verse of mine is: “I
can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” We know that's from that
beautiful letter of Saint Paul's to the Philippians. But do we tap into that? Do
we allow that light of God to shine enough into us, through us and for us to
follow? Peter today sounds exasperated with Jesus: "You know, (he's
saying), "we gave up everything to follow you(!) (Geez, what more do you
want?!)" Peter left that last part out, but I’m sure you could hear that
in this text as well. As we know Peter was your everyday “blue-color,” first
century worker. He knew what a tough life was, He was no stranger to
persevering a hard life, but even Jesus' Gospel was too radical for him to
shake off those human tendencies or rebukes we like to make of the treatises
God challenges us with daily.
I don't think Peter realized just
what Jesus would be facing... The alternative text we have from the prophet
Isaiah is this beautiful summary or prophesy of Jesus suffering in serving through
the power of His death as a victory for all. I don't think we realize as well,
where we are in our commitment to being, becoming a freely responsible servant
of the Gospel. I don't think we realize
often enough how doing the “do's” of the Gospel takes a lot of stretching
ourselves, beyond ourselves for the love and sacrifice for others. Luther says
it himself: “Faith is a living, daring confidence in God’s grace, so sure and
certain that a person could stake their life on it a thousand times.” Let’s
face it, life is nothing but a series of challenges. We've heard that before,
we can either take on the lot we have before us or crumble in defeat to the
satisfaction of others.
Counseling has a lot of give and
take. This is both for the counselor and the counselee. Marriage
counseling has been very interesting to do. Recently I've almost overdosed on
performing it this past week. It's hard to talk to someone though, who wants to
keep going back to the answer that they like and makes them feel better about
everything that happened. You find yourself to continually point back to where
they need to spiritually dig and do the work to get back on track to what they
have lost, but just like the rich young man, they really just want an easier
answer. Wanting the easier answer, “having our cake and eating it too,”
frivolous gain... It is vanity. It is losing momentum on the path that we
really need to stay upon, follow. What a sad thought? Losing momentum,
losing encouragement, being demotivated, being discouraged, being resigned to a
life that you could, with God's help, begin to change for the better…The
smallest mustard seed yet of faith!
In a sea of clergy at this past
retreat sipping some late-night wine and talking about ministry; we all came to
the conclusion that the church is not living by the Gospel in motivating others
to persevere for a greater goal. The two variations of Hebrews that were of
thought for this Sunday are wound up around talking about Jesus as our high
priest and just what perfection in a Divine sense truly is, as well as what we
are subject to—our weakness or our strength we get through Jesus as our high
priest. We are subject to looking into that spiritual mirror of the law and see
where our saint /sinner selves are dealing with life. We are to listen where
the Gospel is aspiring our hearts to move forward. Moving forward is always
going to have those stumbling blocks things we either put in our own path or
just the human mindset does. So, is it fair to say that we do "fail
forward" or are we succeeding forward as disciples, children of Grace and
promise, who are in the world, but not to be of it?
The person I was counseling this
week cannot come to grips with not blaming themselves and see that there was a
much greater problem beyond themselves. I might have said several times to
them: it takes "two to tango" and the desire, the forbidden fruit of
infidelity had its roots with all people concerned. The person was much happier
to keep going back to blaming themselves and putting their spouse on a pedestal
as well as their family who fail to see something that was not being addressed
for many years. That's part of the problem of being co-dependent on others and
spinning your wheels about yourself in doubt and challenged faith. Leaning on
someone, but not looking inward yes, we could just say it's a human affliction
or we can see how God truly does strengthen us, can strengthen us to be able to
move mountains both spiritual and perhaps physical. Time and perseverance do
heal all wounds.
The Cross of Christ when you look at
the shape of the cross and you see the span and you think of his arms there...
as I said in one of my talks at the Cursillo weekend believing, receiving,
incorporating and sharing: you are sharing with your arms and your heart wide
open. That's very hard to take down those barriers that we all have within
ourselves to allowing God to work through us, tapping into those uncomfortable
things the Gospel daily challenges us with its radical selflessness, love and
commitment. We are weak, but God's Word is what keeps us strong. The
never-ending Psalm, Psalm 119 sounds like the psalmist love affair with the law,
but it does have elements of confessing: “… I Delight in your ways… with my
whole heart I Seek You. I will not forget Your Word.”
The Word of God is our compass and
our “disciple-ship” is led by the Light and love of Christ. The Holy Spirit is
to be guiding us at the helm of our lives. Ecclesiastes might have been a good
cynical wisdom writer, but he has some profound points for us and thinking or
choosing between whose wisdom we should really be guided by. The ruler of the
world with his empty promises gives us a lot of clutter and vanity that we
think can fill us up and motivate us for the journey ahead. When we toil for
having money make our worlds’ go around and merely eat and drink just for the
sake of merriment, self-satisfaction; what are we really doing to bring about
the kingdom of God, here and now?
The greatest treasure we will never
find is that pearl of great price that Christ gave of Himself for our
sake. Truly living into the “do's” of the Gospel is realizing that
lifestyle of Grace is tapping into that promise. It is taking a great leap of
faith. It is knowing that all things are possible because of Christ Jesus and His
gift of Grace to us. And I don't want to gain the world and lose my soul, I
want to be a self-sacrificing, accountable servant of His Gospel. Our
lives have lots of valleys and lots of mountain tops to climb, but the one
thing I have learned from coming down the mountain this past week is that
looking past those valleys of challenges in our lives that guiding light is our
greatest hope in our greatest momentum.
I'm sure this coming week is going
to have a lot more of the same counseling sessions and trying to help someone
who is not ready to have the momentum to really move forward in reconciling
their lives with their family and their spouse. Healing takes a long-time. The
pain here, is complex, the quote sins are complex as well. We do not live in a
cut-and-dry universe it is not black and white there are a lot of areas that
are gray. There are a lot of areas we may get lost in the wilderness of the
world seeking answers…. We just should never lose hope in fighting the good
fight of Faith. We need to be taking that big leap of faith and persevering beyond
ourselves for the sake of others and for a God who loves us beyond measure.
Let us pray,
Loving and Gracious Lord Jesus,
We thank You for all the things You
continue to try to teach us.
Help us come to understand the the
Murphy's Law of servanthood
May Your Grace continue to guide us
Steering our disciple-ship down the
path You need us to sojourn
We lift all of our concerns and
troubles to Your ever-flowing heart of grace and mercy
AMEN
October
21st, 2018; 22nd Sunday after Pentecost; Year B; Proper
24; SOLA Lectionary
Sermon
by: Reverend Nicole A.M. Collins
Psalm
119:9-16; Ecclesiastes 5:10-20; Hebrews 7:23-28; Mark 10:23-31
The link below is to this sermon's delivery at the Grace Hub
https://youtu.be/N7cloWnHxJk
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