"From Illusion to Prayer'' a sermon delivered in Duke University Chapel by The Reverend Robert T. Young Minister to the University October 26, 1980 Sermon Texts: Psalms 39:1-12a I Thessalonians 5:12-22 Luke l8 : 1-14 I ' ------------------------------------------------------------- 1 ~- 1 I want to contend, with my contention based on the Word of God in our Gospel Lesson today, that there are some illusions we must destroy- illusions about ourselves, others, and God- if we are to know life- real life. Two men went to the Temple to pray. The Temple was for private meditation as well as for public, corporate prayer. In the time of Jesus, the devout prayed three times a day, &9:00a.m., at 12:00 noon, and at 3:00p.m. The prayer was considered more effective if it was prayed in the Temple. So, these two men were in the Temple to pray, one man a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. Both prayed. They then left the Temple. As Jesus tells the story, the tax collector "went to his house justified rather 'than the other; for every one who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted. 11 If praying is essential for the growth and development and nurture of the sp~ritual life; and, if being justified with God is the desirable, healthy, satisfying end we are to seek in our relation with God; then, what is it, why is it, what was it that in these prayer-experiences of these two men made the difference? Why was it one was justified and the other not? Why did one know the pleasure and presence of God a~ the other not? Why did one find in his prayer the grace of God and the other not1 Why, indeed, did one of them go back to his house justified, made one with God, at peace with God, in right relations to God, and the other not? There presumably are many reasons to be given. I think I know one very important reason, and I share it with you: One was living a life of illusion -about himself, about others, about God - and his prayer life reflected that~ The other had n~ illusion about who he was, about who others were, or about who God was - and his prayer life ref~ected that.
- 2 - The Pharisee was not just a man who lived in the first century. The Pharisee is every person. The Pharisee is you and me. The Pharisee is each of. us. The Pharisee lived a 1 i fe of illusion - illusion about who he was, who his neighbor was, and who God was. His illusion was that he was different from every other person; that he was better than his neighbors, above them, more fajthful nnd holy and religious than his neighbors; and, that he was doing what God wanted him to do. I think there is a lesson for us to learn from this par~ple. The lesson: That if we are goin9 to be justified with God, if we ar~. going tb. f.eel good about our relationship with others, if we are going to find wholeness of life for.ourselves, then we are going to have to destroy some illusions about ourselves,in -o,rder to pray., to know God,_, and in order to :be justified,: ;.. But, we must be. kin~ and ' ca~eful in our judgment of the Pharisee. Because~ the Pharisee was probably doing exactly as he had been ta~ght, exactjy what the religious leaders -had ~rained him to do and say, exactly what was the custom in those days. As a matter of fact, what he was doing and saying is not a whole lot different from what w~ say and do today.. Many of our. prayers sound very much 1 ike' this prayer of the Pharisee. Read over some d the prayers we have in the Chapel Bulletin week-after-week; think back of some prayers you have heard prayed by us ministers in this place; recal 1 some of your own pray ~ rs - written or spoken, silent or ou.t loud; and, see how 1 very muc!l: 1 i k~, the pr'ayer of.this Pharisee are our prayers.... Joachim Jeremias tells us, in his book R e discoverio~ The Pa-r.ables, of another prayer that _ as come dpwn to us from the Talmud of the first century AD= LiSten and see if' it does not sound fami 1 iar: 11 1 th?nk Thee, 0 Lord,. my God, that Thou has given me my lot wit~. those who sit in the house of learni.ng and not with those _who sit at the str e et-~orners; for I am early to work., and they are early to work; I am early to work in the wo'rds of the Torah, and they are early to work in things' of no consequence. I weary myself, and they weary themselves; I weary myself and prof'i't thereby, and they weary themselves to no profit. I run, and they run; I run towards the life of the age to come, and the.y run towards the pit of destruction. 11 0 r, to use again, the words of the Pharisee, ''I thank Thee that I am not like other men :."
- 3 - Familiar prayer. Words and ideas and thout]hts common to all of us. Thus, before we are too hard or too harsh on the Pharisee, I think we need to stop and see how very much like the Pharisee we really are- and our prayer life, our attitudes, our behavior, our actions reveal just that: ~hank you,god, for being my (~ur) God, for giving me (us) the good life, for givin~ me (us) a good education and money with which to get it and to enjoy all the other benefits that go along with it. Thank you, God, for putting me (us) in this good plac~ for filling us with plenty of good food, for clothing us with the very best and the very finest. We do work hard, we stay up late and get up early and use our mind and energies and talents to do the best we can, to learn ~11 we can, to earn all we can, to get ahead (as far ahead as we can) as much as we can.. I speak now very specifically to and of myself and to and of some others in this community whom I know and whose lives I share. Yes, we live under some illusions about ourselves~ about others, and about God that cause u~ t o pray: "Ye s, t hank You, 0 Go d, that we are not like others. We do work hard. Thank You, Lord, we are not like thoselazy, irresponsible, good~for-noth i ng welfare folks. We try. They don 1 t. We work. They don't. We give to You, to the church, to society. They don't. Other folks really are poor, trifling, unambitious. They just don't care, Lord. But, we do. We care, and we try. ''Yes, t hank You, Lord, for our University. We go to Duke University, Lord. It's a great University, one of the best. We're smart here, Lord. We study hard. We use our brains and our ambitions. We want to do. well~ Lord. We do do well, Lord. We are intelligent. Everyone knows that. We are succeeding, Lord. We will succeed, you know that, Lord. We're going to get ahead, because we're not like other folks, Lord. We have what it takes, and we're using what we have i n good, responsible, helping, supporting ways. You know that, Lord. We can hear You now, Lord. 'Behold those Duke folks. How they love one another - and how they love everybody else, too! 1 Yes, t hank You, Lord, for making \..St he way You ha ve and for putting us here in this place at this time and wi th one another. For, we really do care for one another. "And then, espec i a 11 y, Lord, we thank You for our country. For this land of the free and this home of the brave. This land where we al ways open our arms to receive and care for the poor and wretched and lost of the earth. We give so very much to help
- ~ - -., take care of the rest of the world. ' \"Je really do ' love our neighbors, Lord. We've been so very good to them. We help them. We build factories in their countries. We give them jobs. We really want them to get. along wel), Lord. ~e thank You, Lord, for this land of ours - ' a land of freedom and justice, where' good-will flows.among us, where we rea 11 y wan 't our friends and ne i!ghbo rs to do we 11 We really do live ' in a great and good land. Th~nk.,. You~ L6rd, that we do.not live in a poor, backward, starving land where there are. no minerals or resources. We love our. land. It's a good. land. 'It's not.like any other country on earth. Thank You, Lord, that we're not like any other. peoples on earth." The prayer of the Pharisee in. Luke isn't so strange to one's ears, is it? But, just as with the Pharisee, this attitude can ~eep us strong, arrogant, powerful, on top, out front, feeling the brightest and bes~- it will not save us!. - I have heard P~esident Tetr~. S~nford talk about how Duke University came from the.soil of this good Jand of the state'of North Carolina and it is here today because of the commitments and the concerns and the giving and the vision of the common folk of North Ca ro 1 ina. I think, we need to remind ourselves of that every once in a while. - It's 1 ike the. experi~nce Isaiah had in the Temple when he came into. a place, perhaps yerv similar to this one. He had an awareness of God's presence. There was nothing like the : prayer of the Pharisee of the prayers that I. have just uttered on the lips of Isaiah. All he could say when he came into the presence ~f God was: "Woe is me, for I am undone. I am a man of unclean lips- and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. ". Now, God can love a person, a people like that. Henri Nouwen, in his book Reaching Out, talks about four illusions we must destroy if. we are to find ourselves and have a significant relationship with God and with others. 1. We must destroy the illusion that we are immortal. Now, not many- if any- of us will ever say that we are immortal. We just act that way. We feel somehow or other deep. down inside that our lives are so important- my life isthat we will just go on forever. And, if I feel that way about myself- that I can make it in life on my own- that I will last forever, then, I do ~ot need God or others in any way at a 11.
... - s - 2. The second illusion we must destroy is that our lives belong to us. We do feel that way. We believe that. We act that way. "My life is my own- to be, to do, to live. I can do with it as I please.'' 'vie forget : All of life is a gift. It is by God's grace- by the creative power and love of God- that we are. It is through no effort of my own that life cam~ to me. Life is a gift, a precious gift, to you and to me. If, then, my 1 i fe and yours are gifts, they do not belong to us -except to use under the direction and guidance of the Lord our God. If my life belongs to me and I can do with it as I choose, then I can live just as I want with no accountability to God or to anyone. 3. The third illusion that must go is the illusion others can fulfill our wants and our needs, that other people are our property. Others around me are not my brothers and sisters, my kindred human beings, my neighbors. They are properties - things - possessions I can choose, use, abuse, and lay asi de. Other persons are here - around me - nearby - in this world to serve me and my needs. If that is how I feel about others, there is no possibility of a real relationship with others or with God. ; ' 4. The fourth illusion that must go is the illusion that the world belongs to me or to us as our own private property. Not only are other people on this earth to meet my needs, all of creation is here- not for me to en_joy and celebrate and rejoice in and own but it's all here to see that I have an d get what I want and need. This attitude has to do with everything from how I treat the air I breathe right around me to how I feel about the oil fields of I ran. If the world and all therein- is here for me and my purpose and I can do with it all as I choose, then there is no way I can relate to others or to God. There are some times and some situations in 'which no human power, no education, no government, no strength, no thing can save us - only the grace and love of God. It is absolutely essential for me- for us- to unmask our illusions of possessiveness and of immortality- accept death as our common destinyand accept the boundaries of others and of life as our common lot, then we wrll be able to reach o u t to Go d i n p r a y e r 11 lusions- about ourselves, about the world around, about o thers, about God - block us from real communion wi th God. Our prayer is not to be "Thank You, 0 God, that I am not like other women and men " That prayer, that a_tti tude, that illusion- and it is an illusion -will never get us anywhere!
... - 6 - Let's assume for a moment that to be justified, to be made whole, to be at peace with our neighbors, and at one with God - let's assume that to be justified is what we all truly, honestly, deep with'fn our very souls really want. If we do want to be justified, then it seems to me that God's Word says we are not going to be justi-fied by our differences, by our distinctivenesses, by our elitism, by ~ur arrogance or self-righteousness, by ourpr6umptiousne~s, by our set-apartness, or by our 11 l 1 m-riot-1 i'ke-you-ness 11 W~ wi l1 be justified by the grace of God and by an attitude that says we ident1fy with others, we are one with others. We will be justified, through. God, by our identification with the basic human needs, hopes; fears, doubts~ longings, sins, and realities of others- other nations, other Universities, and other human beings- and by our willingness to say, "1 - thank You, 0 God~ that I ain 'like others. We are :- all humant; - brothers and sister s - children of You are we all. we - laugh. We cry. We are afraid. - W.e ) celebrate. - We are happy. We are sad. We hurt. We long. We believe. We doubt. We are faithful. We are sinful. We all - 0 God, all of us- everywhere - long for pe~ce, for acceptance~ for wholeness, for affirmation, for meaning, for contentment and satisfaction and goodness and health and joy. We really are like one another, 0 Lord, we really are. Sinners all. God, be merciful to each of us, to all of us, sinners that we are. Send us all away from this pl ~ c o - send us -back to the.world 'justified'. Our separateness, our superiority, our self-righteousness will never save any of us. Perhaps, Paul as he wrote to the Corinthians will say it for us this morning; 11 For consider your call, my friemds; _not many of you were wise a ccording to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble.birth; but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the strong. God chose what. is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. God is source of your life in Jesus Christ, whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption; therefore, as it is written, let anyone who boasts, boas t of th'e Lord. (1 11 Corinthians 1:26-31.) Enough said! Amen. - '