More Light. January 15, 2017: Epiphany II & Martin Luther King Memorial Sunday Tim Phillips, Guest Preacher at Newport Presbyterian Church

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Lily Chambers
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1 1 More Light Isaiah 49:1-7 January 15, 2017: Epiphany II & Martin Luther King Memorial Sunday Tim Phillips, Guest Preacher at Newport Presbyterian Church Isaiah 49:1-7 Listen to me, O coastlands, pay attention, you peoples from far away! The LORD called me before I was born, while I was in my mother s womb he named me. He made my mouth like a sharp sword, in the shadow of his hand he hid me; he made me a polished arrow, in his quiver he hid me away. And he said to me, You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified. But I said, I have laboured in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity; yet surely my cause is with the LORD, and my reward with my God. And now the LORD says, who formed me in the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him, and that Israel might be gathered to him, for I am honoured in the sight of the LORD, and my God has become my strength he says, It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Thus says the LORD, the Redeemer of Israel and his Holy One, to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nations, the slave of rulers, Kings shall see and stand up, princes, and they shall prostrate themselves,

2 2 because of the LORD, who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel, who has chosen you. More Light Greetings from your sisters and brothers at Seattle First Baptist Church and thank you for the warm welcome I have received here from your pastors, Roger and Janet, and from all of you. I am especially grateful to be here to honor the life and ministry of Doreen Meekhof. As I said on Friday night, given my interest in worship, I was moved by the description of the Meekhof Lectures that Doreen s final struggle with cancer became the occasion for a deepened experience of worship and that she made a special effort to be with the people of the church in worship. Thank you for whatever special effort you made to be with each other in worship today. I may not know why you are here. But I know why I am. I m here for the music. I have wanted to be in worship with Jennifer leading the music for a very long time. Because I just love how music pours out of here. Music is one of the things that deepens my experience of worship. I told our choir this year at the choir retreat that, when I m in worship, they are my pastors. It s their music that lets me worship when I have all that other stuff going on in my head. And I know I m not alone in that. One of my colleagues likes to tell pastors: No one ever goes home humming the sermon. Now maybe that s a little sad. But it s probably true. Music is especially important this weekend because what would the civil rights movement be without it? Dr. King s sermons and speeches were always punctuated with it. On Friday night we ended our time together singing: We Shall Overcome just as Dr. King ended his final speech as President of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in We Shall Overcome music attributed to an African-American Methodist minister and gospel composer, the Rev. Dr. Charles Albert Tindley. Yesterday morning we sang Lift Every Voice and Sing by the great African-American poet, James Weldon Johnson, the lines of which Dr. King also quoted in that 1967 speech: God, who by your might, led us to the light, keep us forever in the path, we pray. Or that gospel hymn by the father of black gospel music, Thomas Dorsey the hymn that was reported to be Dr. King s favorite and was sung at his funeral by Mahalia

3 3 Jackson: Precious Lord, take my hand, lead me on, let me stand; I am tired, I am weak, I am worn, through the storms, through the night, lead me on to the light You notice there is a theme here. It s about light. Now there is another hymn Dr. King references on several occasions that might be surprising. It s kind of stodgy and a little stuffy and probably wouldn t be something you would automatically associate with the Civil Rights Movement. Its lyrics were taken from a poem by James Russell Lowell, a white member of New England s privileged class, the son of a Unitarian minister, and an abolitionist who wrote his poem as opposition to the war with Mexico. The author knew that war was really just an excuse for the annexation of Texas and the entrance of yet another slave-holding state to the Union. So in 1845, he wrote: Once to everyone and nation, Comes the moment to decide, In the strife of truth with falsehood, For the good or evil side; Some great cause, some great decision, Offering each the bloom or blight, And the choice goes by forever, Twixt that darkness and that light. That may not be a hymn that comes immediately to mind maybe never comes to mind for that matter and especially not when you think about the Civil Rights movement. But here is this old hymn written by a privileged white guy that grabbed hold of Dr. King s heart in such a way that he quoted it several times throughout his public life. In 1957, when a bomb destroyed the Hattie Cotton Elementary School in Nashville because it allowed one black child to be enrolled, he quoted lines from: Once to everyone and nation comes the moment to decide. In 1967, when his colleagues were begging him NOT to link the Civil Rights Movement with movement for peace in Vietnam, Dr. King stood in the pulpit of Riverside Church and said: Once to everyone and nation comes the moment to decide. When he wrote his sermon about the painfully slow progress to end racial discrimination, he quotes lines from, Once to everyone and nation comes a moment to decide. There comes a moment in our individual lives and in our national life to decide between that darkness and that light. I think we have come to that moment again today.

4 4 The gospel lesson from John this morning is about being invited to make a decision to follow that one who is identified as that light that enlightens everyone. And I love the questions in that story. Two of John s disciples start following Jesus and Jesus turns to them and says: What are looking for? That s a great question. That s a great question to keep in mind and to keep asking as we follow this light that enlightens everyone. And the disciples respond with their own question: Where are you staying? That s also a good question to keep in mind. Where is it that this light that enlightens everyone is focused these days? And in the story you notice that Jesus doesn t tell them where that place is. He just says: Come and see. The moment to decide between that darkness and that light is sometimes an invitation to go somewhere to go some place you haven t been before and to have your eyes opened and to have your eyes opened to something you haven t seen before. I can imagine Jesus saying: Come and see. I dare you. And it was, for those friends, the moment to decide. It s the same kind of moment that faced the prophet Isaiah. This weekend we have been talking about the way our understanding of God and our spirituality evolve over time. There seems to be this movement from orientation where things make sense and we are confident in our lives and the world and in God. And then something happens and that orientation breaks down. Things don t make sense the way they used to. The old answers don t work anymore. We find ourselves feeling lost and DIS-oriented. But it s in that disorientation, painful and confusing and uncomfortable as it may be, that we might discover the potential for some new light to break into the darkness to help RE-orient us. And then you have a decision to make. We have some of that movement in the words of Isaiah this morning: Listen to me, O coastlands, pay attention, you peoples far away! The Lord called me before I was born, while I was in my mother s womb God named me And God said to me, You are my servant, Israel, in whom I will be glorified. This is orientation! God has called me! God has claimed me. It s been that way from the beginning and, by the way, in me, God is being glorified.

5 5 Now I realize how this sounds. Hubris comes to mind. But this is an important orientation. Dr. King knew that the first step in making that decision between that darkness and that light was to help black folks claim their identity as those who were made in the image of God. In the common language of today, if all lives REALLY matter, then Black Lives in particular - Matter. I know, in my work with Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender folks, that the first step in stepping out of the darkness into the light was to claim their inherent value as human beings. That might seem like a small thing. Maybe we take that for granted now. But if you have been led to believe that you are worthless, the process of claiming your value as a human being is no small thing. Back in the day, people said things like, God don t make no trash. We combed history to find our ancestors. We celebrated that first movie and that first kiss and the election of that first openly gay official. We needed to be oriented in a way that we could say, with Isaiah, God called me before I was born and named me in my mother s womb and God is glorified in me. Dr. King called it somebodyness. Some of the folks who did that important work were called More Light Presbyterians because there comes a moment to decide between that darkness of humiliation and that light of somebodyness. But, even if we can manage that orientation on some days, there are other days when that orientation doesn t work very well. Isaiah says: I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing. Do you have days like that? Days when it doesn t seem possible that your life could amount to anything? When it feels like you are living in a cloud of darkness? Even the great Martin Luther King had those days. In that sermon where he quoted those lines from Once to Everyone and Nation, he tells the story of all those great successes that ended in a Particularly strenuous day. Awakened by a threatening phone call, he couldn t go back to sleep I got out of bed and began to walk the floor. Finally, I went to the kitchen and heated a pot of coffee. I was ready to give up. I tried to think of a way to move out of the picture without appearing to be a coward. In this state of exhaustion, when my courage had almost gone, I determined to take my problem to God. My head in my hands, I bowed over the kitchen table and prayed aloud I am here taking a stand for what I believe is right. But now I am afraid. The people are looking to me for leadership, and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they will falter. I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I ve come to the point where I can t face it alone.

6 And it was in that dark moment that a new light broke in re-orienting and re-imagining of his life. Dr. King says that he Experienced the presence of the Divine as I had never before experienced it; I could hear the quiet assurance of an inner voice saying, Stand up for righteousness, stand up for truth; God will be at your side. Three nights later Dr. King s home was bombed. Strangely, Dr. King says, my experience with God had given me new strength and trust. There comes a moment to decide between that darkness of self-doubt and fear and that light of confidence and courage. It may be in that very moment that more light appears. For Isaiah it comes with a double entrendre: It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations Sister Joan Chittister makes use of this double meaning of light when she says: Do not make light of the serious; do not be depressingly serious about the lack of light. For Isaiah, that double meaning is that it is too light a thing too limiting to give his light only to his people. I am making you a light to the nations, God says. In other words, it s too small a thing for Isaiah to only see his life in the light of his family and his people and his nation. Isaiah is invited to come live in the light of something wider, something bigger, something deeper. Dr. King was very clear about the work of the Civil Rights movement. From the beginning Dr. King said the end of this work is reconciliation; the end of redemption; the end is the creation of the beloved community. The world is teaching us that it is too light a thing to think the future is only about our children. It s too light a thing to think that wisdom is only found in our own tradition. It s too light a thing to think that the measure of our lives is only about what we make and use and spend. To each of us there comes a moment to decide between that darkness of isolation that keeps us trapped in our own little world and that broader light that has the potential for the creation of beloved community where people are welcomed and affirmed, challenged and encouraged and freed to be the blessing they were always meant to be. When I find myself depressed and in despair because I think that my white privilege keeps me from ever having anything of value to offer this vision of beloved community, I remember James Russel Lowell, that white-privileged New Englander who wrote a 6

7 7 poem Dr. King kept in his heart words he used when schools and homes were being bombed; words he used when his was being pressured to focus his light only on justice and not to somehow dilute by speaking out for peace; words he used when his own moment came to decide between that darkness and that light. Once to everyone and nation comes a moment to decide. That moment is now. And the invitation is to not sell yourself short. It is too light a thing to think that your life is only measured by what you can see. Come live in the light. And today, if you hear that voice, do not harden your hearts.

A Light to the Nations. Meditation on Isaiah 49:1-6. Jan. 15, Merritt Island Presbyterian Church

A Light to the Nations. Meditation on Isaiah 49:1-6. Jan. 15, Merritt Island Presbyterian Church A Light to the Nations Meditation on Isaiah 49:1-6 Jan. 15, 2017 Merritt Island Presbyterian Church Listen to me, O coastlands, pay attention, you peoples from far away! The LORD called me before I was