PLANTED BESIDE FLOWING WATERS Sermon by Paul R. Powell St. Charles Avenue Baptist Church, New Orleans Sunday, July 28, 2013 Some of you know how excited I get after attending the Hymn Society which was held this year at the University of Richmond, Virginia. What do we do at Hymn Society we sing, of course, but we also hear presentations on just about anything related to hymns and hymn singing. This year s emphasis was on how fifty years of post-vatican experience has shaped both Catholic and Protestant hymnody. Perhaps you are aware that Catholics have become great hymn singers since Vatican II, including many from the Protestant tradition. It is also true that increasing numbers of Protestants, including at least some Baptists, have developed more liturgical emphasis than in former times. In addition to our usual talks and sectionals, there is a public hymn sing held each day, usually in local churches. There is the attempt to explore local hymn singing traditions, but also to be inclusive of all faiths and styles. Hence, we had everything from the very liturgical, to Taize, to shape-note, to gospel, to contemporary. Although we as individuals may have very different views on what makes good hymnody, we also are as ecumenical and peace-loving a group of people you will ever find. For the most part, you don t even know what denomination or worship style those sitting around you prefer. Quite frankly, I do not think there is any other activity that brings Christians and other faiths together more easily and surely than hymn singing. Today s hymns are all taken from this year s festivals and morning prayer we sing for virtually everything including our business meeting. All three hymns were written by members of the Society who happened to be present, and all three authors are additionally Fellows of the Society, a group I am most honored to be a part of. Two of the three were named fellows at this year s meeting Ruth Duck and Sister Delores Duffner. The other was written by Carl Daw the immediate past executive director of the Society. As you have already noted or will at the end of this service, all are fresh texts written by living authors but set to tunes we already know and use. One of the groups which led a festival identifies themselves with what they call the re-tuning project. They take older hymn texts and set them to 1
something of a cross between praise and worship and rock music not my style but I applaud their efforts to use the richness of traditional hymn texts in a way that may reach younger Christians who have not had much exposure to traditional hymnody. You may know that Redeemer Presbyterian uses traditional hymn texts with a light jazz sort of accompaniment. There s room for all of us regardless of our preferred musical style, and it may be that the use of older texts fitted to new tunes and new texts to old tunes is a positive movement in maintaining a rich diversity of texts that are biblically-based, spiritually-enlivening, and thought-provoking which will aid in the renewal of meaningful worship which is more congregationally-driven and less entertainment-like. I chose today s title and theme from one of our sessions Planted Beside Flowing Waters. Not only is this a great theme concerning hymn-singing, but it is also a great theme for the Christian life. I suspect it is a play on that old spiritual, Like a tree that s planted by the waters, I shall not be moved. None of today s lectionary readings seemed to fit my theme, nor vice versa. However, the gospel lesson in which Jesus teaches us how to pray does perhaps teach us how to live as well. What does it mean to be planted beside flowing waters? First, it means that our faith needs to be firmly rooted. You remember, of course, the image of a house built on the sand that falls when beset by storms as compared to one built on the rock. Faith is so much like that and nowhere is that image more needful than in our worship of today. I have mentioned before how I think we as Baptists have failed in passing on our faith through educational efforts and to a certain extent by failing to continue singing our faith with the songs that shaped such much of our heritage the songs that were sung so often like those of B.B. McKinney and other Baptists who wrote songs that encouraged us to love Christ and love one another, to take the gospel to those who need it, to serve the Lord with gladness in our works and ways. Such hymns of Christian life and service have largely disappeared from our singing because we hardly sing anywhere or any time except on Sunday mornings. The hymns which you have been choosing for our mini-hymn sing at the beginning of the service are very likely songs embedded in your memories from childhood and youth, but how many of our children and youth will even be exposed to such hymns 2
and gospel songs when our educational programs have dwindled? These are the hymns that feed our faith, that enliven it, that motivate it to love God and to love one another. A tree, a hymn, that is planted firmly in the rich alluvial soil beside the flowing stream of God s grace and mercy cannot fail. Hymns have the power of shaping our faith and the more often we sing them the more they become a part of our faith experience. But that little word beside has a lot to say as well. Sometimes we think of faith as entirely one-way, more like a bayou or lake with still water. And there are biblical images of that, in particular Psalm 23 when the psalmist says that God leads us beside still waters. But that image also has something to do with fear. Sheep would not likely go near flowing waters they are just too fearful and skittish around movement. Sheep need still waters and that, too, is an image of faith if we are totally dependent upon God to remove our fear and replace it with faith. Faith has no fear of the movement of God s living waters, of God s Spirit continually interacting with us, beside us if you will, motivating us to live the life that God would have us live. If you read the passages about the Holy Spirit carefully you soon come to the conclusion that just as Jesus said, he has sent the Holy Spirit to be beside us and it is the power of God through the work of the Holy Spirit that makes faith possible and a living thing. Flowing waters have a tendency not to be stagnant as would be true of waters that stand still. And flowing waters means that there is a continual renewal of the nourishment that a tree planted beside these waters will need. Flowing water not only brings nourishment to fish and trees, but it also cleanses itself as it tumbles along, sometimes over a rocky bed. This is such a rich image as to need very little explanation or explication. But how does this apply more immediately to our own worship and church life as we eagerly await our new pastor? Perhaps there are some hints from this image. First, we need to re-focus ourselves on Bible study, Christian studies of almost every variety, and anything else that will keep us centered in our faith. Worship alone is not enough, fellowship alone is not enough, prayer alone is not enough. An hour on Sunday morning may be enough to keep you planted firmly in your faith, but I need more than that, and there is a 3
sense in which faith is never really complete until we hook up with God alongside other Christians. The epistle of James reminds us that faith without works is dead and in my opinion faith without study is just as dead. I don t know what the ultimate solution for faith education in our church is, but I do know that an uninformed faith is not likely to result in a progressive, activist, mission-oriented church. Second, I think we need to remember who we are. Our dearly departed friend Bob Dombourian said something at one of those congregational meetings where we were talking about a re-imagined future, and that was We are losing our identity. I couldn t agree more, because as we have dwindled down to so few members we are losing those connections to the past where this church was out there as some might say. There was a time when this church could be counted on to do what was right and for cutting-edge theology and in service. We often stood for the right in the face of strong opposition from our fellow Baptists and the Christian community at large. We were accepting of persons of all stripes no matter what their denominational background or anything else. We welcomed with open arms those who were seeking to know God and to serve God among fellow Christians of a progressive bent. Sadly, this is less true of us now than perhaps at any other time in our history, but numbers alone are not the problem. The more activist we become in the face of mounting opposition, the more likely we are to attract those seeking the kind of fellowship we can offer, but that means doing and not just believing in a progressive Christian experience. Third, we must change by absorbing the nutrients from flowing waters. That is, we must explore fresh new ways of living out our faith, living out Christ s call to us to serve where we are both in ways like other Baptists and Christians and in ways in which we might uniquely follow God s leading. We may need to make some changes in our worship and music styles, perhaps not radically but in fresh new ways of enlivening worship. That might mean a blending of musical accompaniment using both organ and other instruments alone or in combination, such as the guitar, or flute, or jazz ensembles while maintaining a commitment to hymns and service music rich in text and tune. I am most surely not talking about converting to an exclusive use praise and worship or rock or any other style, 4
traditional or contemporary, but rather a concerted effort to make worship come alive for all worshippers, young and old and in between. I realize, of course, that all of this is somewhat dependent on the new pastor s leadership, but we commit a grave injustice to God, our church and the new pastor if we merely sit back without becoming engaged! My prayer is that the new pastor will kick us into high gear and that we will indeed see a new day in our church, firmly planted beside flowing waters. I close today by quoting another new hymn, if you can call one written in 1980 new, with a title you may think you know, but a different hymn altogether: Will the circle be unbroken? Will the power of death prevail? Will the voices seeking justice be rejected and grow frail? Will revenge replace forgiveness? Will our pride replace God s peace? Will the innocents be victims and the violence increase? Will the words our God has spoken be revised or be ignored? Will the love that made and formed us be rejected for the sword? Will the God who cries: Forgiveness is the only way to peace be blocked out by cries of anger? Will the fighting ever cease? Here the body blessed and broken and the blood of Christ outpoured is the only food of freedom for the servants of the Lord. Here the stories shared at table call us all to peaceful ways: show Christ in all creation, show us love s the only way. Dear God make it so! AMEN. 5