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LINKS TO THE SERMONS |
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| “More than one way…” A church secretary was reviewing the minutes of an Administrative Board meeting with a friend: “the meeting was called to order by the chair; there was a short devotional –should I say ‘then the Lord’s Prayer was prayed or the Lord’s Prayer was recited?” To which the friend replied, “Which did you do?” There is more than one way to say the Lord’s Prayer. You can pray it, recite it like a poem or just ramble through it without ever engaging the mind at all: like the little boy who told his friend that God’s name was Howard. “How do you know that?” asked the friend. “Because we say it in church every Sunday; ‘Our Father who art in heaven, Howard be thy name.” So, you can say the Lord’s Prayer without any understanding at all. I know that story is upsetting for those of you who always thought God’s name was Andy – you know, “Andy walks with me, Andy talks with me.” There is more than one way of doing things. There is also more than one way to be religious. A lot of what you have been doing in Confirmation class is heady stuff: what are the sacraments, who was John Wesley, how many books in the Bible, and so on? At the same time you were engaged in the mystery of faith, in sharing the sacraments, praying together, becoming the Body of Christ –rational religion and mystical religion. There are lots of ways of being religious. When I was in Hawaii, I had a confirmation class made up entirely of Tongan kids. I’ve been to the Kingdom of Tonga and I know that it is not only a Christian country but also about 80% Methodist. That’s thanks to the work of some English Methodist missionaries a couple of centuries ago. The problem is that descending generations are prone to becoming what I call cultural Christians; they are Christians because it’s part of being Tongan. A famous theologian named Harvey Cox calls such folks, nostalgic Christians. He says that most of the people in American mainline churches are that type; they are part of the church and the faith because they remember how important faith was to their grandparents. So, they continue the tradition to honor their memories. In my Tongan confirmation class I stressed the other way of being Christian – not piggy-backing on your parents or your culture but making it personal – choosing faith for yourself and engaging in a personal encounter with God through Christ. It was an eye-opening and transformative experience for those kids; after generations of cultural Christianity to discover a new way of being religious. That’s what happened to old Paul. He was a Jew, born into it and zealously committed to it by his own testimony. He said that if anybody had reason to boast of their religiosity, he had even more reason. Then he had that encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus; knocked him off his horse, knocked some sense into him, blinded him, gave him a new vision for a new way to be religious, changed his life – by most measures for the worst. He went from being respectable to being identified with that radical splinter group that didn’t even have a name yet – people called them people of the Way. But the members of that group weren’t sure they liked him and they sure didn’t trust him. For Paul to discover the new way of being religious started him down a road of hardship, trouble and suffering. He must have looked back longingly to the former days when he was respected and prosperous. But he says, “No, I count all that as loss (some translations say, ‘trash’) compared to the surpassing joy of knowing Christ as Savior.” He found another way of being religious and wouldn’t go back for anything in the world. That’s what happened to John Wesley: a preacher’s kid in a religious culture, went to a religious college to study theology – and was pretty good at it. Then he had an encounter with the living Christ and it introduced him to heart religion, a new way of being religious. When he wrote about it in his journal he didn’t even have language for it; it was outside the scope of his high-brow Oxford education. But after that he was changed and his ministry changed and his ministry changed the world. Happened to both Paul and Wesley in unlikely places, Paul on the Damascus road, and Wesley on Aldersgate Street, in London. He had just come from the evening service at St. Paul’s Cathedral, one of the largest churches in the world – prefect place for a grand epiphany. Didn’t happen there. On his way home he stopped by the Moravian meeting house – a little frame building that isn’t even there anymore – there is a plaque on a fence where it used to be. And what was happening there? A praise band? No. A powerful sermon? No. A moving prayer service? No. A guy was reading from the preface to Luther’s commentary on the Romans. Not reading from the Bible. Not reading Luther’s commentary on the Bible - reading the preface to Luther’s commentary. Can you say “Boring?” I’ve read some of Martin Luther’s writings and it’s all I can do to keep from going comatose. What an unlikely moment for God to move on the heart of the young preacher leaning against the doorpost. But he did. God chose that unlikely time and place to show Wesley a new way of being religious, and the rest is history. My experience came in front of Coleman’s Hardware Store. I wish I could tell you it was at a Billy Graham crusade or while listening to a great choir or while engaged in fervent prayer or while reading scripture – no, I was just walking down Main Street in Eudora Kansas. God entered my thoughts then entered my heart and everything changed. Faith was born, just a spark at first. All those hard adolescent questions were still there but so was an assurance that was beyond question. In a way it was cleaner for me because in didn’t come from a family with a religious culture. On the Sunday I was baptized and joined the church, I didn’t even tell my parents. They didn’t have much use for religion and I didn’t know how to explain to them that I had been introduced to a new way of being religious. It wasn’t a religion of rules and resultant judgments. It wasn’t about having the right answers to doctrinal question or having things figured out. It was more like a journey – journey of faith with the Spirit of Christ as constant companion, guide and friend. At confirmation you are asked to take responsibility for your own journey of faith, the journey that began at your baptism and was the responsibility of parents, godparents, friends, relatives and the church. Now you own the journey – just at a time when your minds are opening up to so many new things most of which are loaded with questions to ponder and struggle with. Some people will abandon the journey because there are just too many sticky questions regarding the whole God thing. But there is another way of being religious; Paul calls it a religion based on faith. Faith is trust – trusting the One who is the author and finisher of faith to stand with us in the struggle to understand things. Jesus said, it’s like being born again. You may never get it all figured out; in fact, as you go along the questions will get more troubling. But at the same time the assurance that your companion on the journey will never leave you and knows where the whole thing is going even if you don’t, keeps growing stronger, and deeper and more precious. Then one day you are like Paul; everything else is trash compared to the overwhelming joy of knowing Christ as your constant traveling companion on the journey of faith. I pray for all of you that you find that way of being religious |
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