* * * 1 Doug King, unpublished paper for the Moveable Feast Austin, Texas: 2016, edited for context.

Transcription

1 Rev. Chandler Stokes Philippians 2:1-5 & 3:17-4:1 The Second Sunday in Lent February 21, 2016 Scripture Introduction Our Lenten series is called THE BAPTISMAL CORD, and we will be reflecting on the meaning of baptism as we make our way toward Easter. We have described THE BAPTISMAL CORD this way: In baptism it is as if a slender cord so slender as to not even be seen has been tied around our waists. And the risen Christ is at the other end of that slender cord, ever so gently, but insistently and continually, pulling us forward, guiding us to who and where we were created to be, pulling us through the tumultuous waters toward our Easter destination. 1 Our Scripture readings today are two from Paul s letter to the Philippians. In the first, Paul asks his readers to look to the interests of others, as Christ did. And in the second, Paul reminds his readers that they are citizens of heaven and entreats them to stand firm in that identity. Listen. Philippians 2:1-5 & 3:17-4:1 If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, 2 make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. 5 Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus. 17 Brothers and sisters, join in imitating me, and observe those who live according to the example you have in us. 18 For many live as enemies of the cross of Christ; I have often told you of them, and now I tell you even with tears. 19 Their end is destruction; their god is the belly; and their glory is in their shame; their minds are set on earthly things. 20 But our citizenship is in heaven, and it is from there that we are expecting a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. 21 He will transform the body of our humiliation that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, by the power that also enables him to make all things subject to himself. 4 1 Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my beloved. * * * After Karen and I graduated from seminary, we received a fellowship for overseas study, and, as part of it, we spent a short time in France, where we were, of course, surrounded by French speakers. Everywhere you went, on the trains, in the restaurants, in hotel lobbies, you heard one form of French or another. Our French wasn t that great, so we would only catch snatches of conversation, words or phrases, names. So, the patter around us was a pleasant sort of background music, rising and falling, ebbing and flowing a sort of stream of language. Most of the time, we were conscious that we weren t home. If our French were better, we might have had a sense of dual citizenship, but we weren t really home there. We lived with the ambient stress that can come in a foreign land, a sense of being out of place, not quite at ease. It s not so uncommon to live in two worlds 1 Doug King, unpublished paper for the Moveable Feast Austin, Texas: 2016, edited for context. Because sermons are prepared with an emphasis on verbal presentation, the written accounts may occasionally stray from proper grammar and punctuation.

2 at once. You can speak German while in America. You can speak Swahili while in France. But even if we speak both languages well, we aren t always at home in both places and sometimes we know it. When Karen and I were in France, over against the patter of French, something else was quite evident. If we heard English spoken, both our heads would snap around, and we d tune right in. We d hear every word. I ve heard that in a foreign land you can hear your mother tongue blocks away. That s something of what it s like to live crossing this tumultuous stream while being drawn across by the baptismal cord. In the stream we may be bilingual and speak the language of this world, but sometimes we hear the voice of our mother tongue, we catch the voices of our true home, and maybe we lift our heads toward that far shore. We have been imagining our journey in this life as crossing a river. As we opened our service, God says, When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you (Isa. 43: 2). You will go through rough waters. There is a powerful crosscurrent of inhumanity into which we are cast a crosscurrent of cruelty, of disrespectful, dishonorable speech, and of vile action like the six killed in Kalamazoo yesterday. And if we were once being drawn downstream, drawn into that pull, the baptismal cord catches us and pulls us inexorably across that current and toward the far shore that far shore, where the risen Christ holds the other end and insistently draws us near. It is that far shore where Paul would say we are citizens. In the first chapter of Philippians he says, Live as citizens worthy of the gospel of Christ. And here he returns to that metaphor to say, Our citizenship is in heaven. It is that identity to which Paul refers at the end, Stand fast in Christ in this way. This way, this gospel, that far shore that is our true home, and the language spoken there is our mother tongue. And we often recognize it, when we hear it. Over the last few years, when folks have felt called to join Westminster as members, we often hear about two expressions in worship that catch their ear. Lots of folks talk about the music, about what we do with children and youth, about our mission toward the community all of these. But above all, two things in the language of our worship seem particularly to prick up their ears: the Welcome and the Charge. These seem to be spoken in our mother tongue. When we hear them, we don t feel so swept along by the crosscurrents. The far shore seems closer, as if we could hear it: to be Christian is to welcome absolutely everyone; it is to go into the world in peace, to have courage, to honor all people, to strengthen the fainthearted and support the weak. These words seem to come from our homeland. When we hear them, they help us to remember home, or feel at home in some way. Of course, it s more than the words for us. Just hearing the words or feeling at home while in the raging crosscurrent is helpful, but we know it s not enough. It is a grace somehow to hear our mother tongue, but the real pull of the message is in the second text from Paul today. Our second Philippians reading might, at first, be a bit jarring, especially if you struggle with the Apostle Paul. There are some aspects of Paul that rub us the wrong way. Like here, where Paul says, join in imitating Westminster Presbyterian Church, Grand Rapids, MI Page 2 of 5 February 21, 2016

3 me. That sounds like arrogance; it s off-putting. But it s not really arrogance. This imitation is about Paul s being a teacher. This is the common way that the ancients taught. [They said,] Imitate me. 2 [Commentators remind us that Paul s] call to imitation should not be read as conceit but rather as testimony to the power of Christ. imitation was a pedagogical principle [of the time]. 3 The point in imitating the teacher was to move beyond mere intellectual teaching to something more comprehensive. It was about the pupil s acquiring the art of the teacher. Acquiring the art is not just about thought or language, but about behavior. So it may involve learning the language, but it goes well beyond that. Imitation is moving from picking up the language to, let us say, picking up the ropes. It is not only to speak as citizens but to live as citizens of that far shore. That clearly is part of the collateral blessing of worship. Note that we call the last portion of the order of worship, Going Out to Be the Church. The last gestures of worship here lead us out the doors to be the church in the world. And, although we may pick up these very words and learn to speak them, when we go out we seek to practice the art of the Teacher ultimately not Paul, but Paul s Teacher, Christ. So we go in peace, to welcome, honor, strengthen, support. In another letter Paul will call us not only citizens but also ambassadors of that far shore. We are called to pick up the ropes. If the cord around our waists is God s gift, then acquiring the art of the Teacher, picking up the ropes, is like hanging on to that cord, maybe even pulling on it a bit ourselves. Last week we talked about one of the strands in that cord as love. There is another strand here in our first reading from Paul. At Westminster we are engaged in a vision and mission process right now, and as we listen to the congregation, we are learning that people like their church here. This is a real haven for many: the sense of safety, the call to justice, the music, the worship, the open door there is a lot to celebrate. And when we receive new members, when somehow others are drawn to become a part of who we are, we feel even better. But we need to keep our eye on the ball, on that far shore, and our sense of holy discontent. We need to be careful. We can fall into the arrogance we thought we heard in Paul. Today s first reading from Philippians is about Christ s humility. Humility is an essential and tricky strand of the baptismal cord. One of my Franciscan professors once told me: When it comes to the Catholic orders, the Jesuits are so superior in academic discipline. And the Dominicans are so faithful in service to others, but when it comes to humility, we Franciscans have got em all beat. Humility is a gift you can t seek directly; it s a byproduct of emptying oneself. Our first reading said: Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that 2 Tom Are, unpublished paper for the Moveable Feast 2016: Austin, Texas. 3 Ibid. Westminster Presbyterian Church, Grand Rapids, MI Page 3 of 5 February 21, 2016

4 was in Christ Jesus And then the passage goes on to describe how Christ emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, and humbled himself. 4 My friend Tom told a story this year at the Feast about a humble man he knew at Riverside Church in Jacksonville. He said, David was overweight and dressed in a way that, as Carl Sandberg said of Abraham Lincoln, his clothes seemed to whisper, he put us on when he was thinking about something else. He said: David never called attention to himself. To my knowledge he never served on a board. He never joined a club. He never held a leadership position. He was never elected to anything. He was asked to serve on the worship committee and he said, I am so honored, but I know others would serve with greater quality than I. His resume could probably fit on an index card. All of this is true, but none of these are the reasons I say David was humble. Had Paul known David, he would have added him to the list of Timothy, Epaphroditus, and the apostle himself. David went to the hospital because he was experiencing shortness of breath. Within five days he had died of lung cancer. We held his service at Riverside Church. It was the largest crowd to attend any service during my ministry there. People stood outside when they couldn't get in. Everyone loved David. The thing about my friend David is that he was always glad to see you. He seemed genuinely excited when you came in the room, like he had been waiting all day for your arrival. I d say, David, how are you doing? Better now that I've seen you. I've wanted to talk with you, do you have a minute? Tell me about everything, he d say. You were always glad to see David because he was always glad to see you. I think that s what humility looks like. For the longest time, I have considered humility to be a posture of thinking less of myself. If conceit is glorying in myself, then humility is taking myself down a notch. But that s the wrong way to think of it. Humility is not thinking little of yourself; humility results from thinking highly of others. Humility is the fruit that blossoms when we see the beautiful, the faithful, the humanness of others. In humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus. The charge that we offer here on Sunday morning may be our mother tongue, but more importantly, our imitation of it can lead to genuine humility. What better way to describe looking to the interests of others than, strengthen the fainthearted, support the weak, help the suffering, honor all people? It s a key strand of the baptismal cord. And you know, we might also remember that before Paul urges the church to imitate Paul, he says not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal, but I press on [3:12]. Paul is still on the journey to resurrection. That is to be imitated. 5 That s how we can imagine our vision as a congregation: 4 Philippians 2: Tom Are, Moveable Feast. Westminster Presbyterian Church, Grand Rapids, MI Page 4 of 5 February 21, 2016

5 not that we have achieved the goal, but that we press on. That is how we are called to live in the crosscurrent, with our eye on that far shore, where the risen Christ draws us by the baptismal cord. I am grateful that somehow something of what we hear in this place sounds like our mother tongue somehow something here has turned our heads and we want not just to pick up the language but to pick up the ropes of that far shore. Our citizenship is there. We are held, we are linked to that far shore by a slender yet sure cord. And the one who holds it is the one who emptied himself, taking the form of a servant. If we are held by that sure cord, surely we can pull that rope ourselves. My friend Tom concludes: How else would we speak of the choice of God in Christ to empty and humble himself to take on human form... to humble himself, even to the point of death on a cross? It is not because he thinks less of himself, but because Christ sees that which is beautiful in you and in all. I don't have the creativity to imagine what life would be like if we all lived with that mindset, but I think Paul would call it heaven. 6 Sometimes that far shore is very, very near. Thanks be to God. Let the people say, Amen. 6 Ibid., adapted. Westminster Presbyterian Church, Grand Rapids, MI Page 5 of 5 February 21, 2016