A Time to Build our Spiritual Muscles
Amidst heightened political tensions and uncertainty, we are challenged to use spiritual muscles that may not be familiar to us. How do we stay grounded together as we strive to bring compassion, peace and mercy as we stretch toward God’s vision for our world?
The Glimpses of Grace podcast is a ministry of Grace Episcopal Church in Gainesville, Georgia. We are passionate about supporting the spiritual growth of souls, and we hope these sermons and conversations meet you where you are and enrich your soul as we all continue to make meaning in the world today.
Glimpses of Grace on Spotify
Transcript
I have thought a lot these days about a story my grandfather told me as a child growing up in Arkansas near the Mississippi River. He told about how when he was younger, some cousins and friends realized they had never actually seen the river. They only lived thirty miles from it and they knew the great body of water flowed just over the horizon, but they had never seen it for themselves.
So, they all piled in a car one day, and drove there. They parked and walked down through the brush to the river bank and looked out at the enormous flow of the water that began somewhere far to their left and ended near a strange place to their right called New Orleans. They walked down to the water, took off their shoes, and put their feet in. And they looked at the expanse around them and at one another.
Then, as he told the story, they put their shoes back on, got in the car, and drove home, because it was all just too much. They drove back home with the river in their rearview mirror and went back to their lives.
Now, that’s where my grandfather ended the story, but of course stories work in mysterious ways. The truth is that, yes, they went back home. Some of them immediately went back to living the way they had always lived. They rejected the encounter and never wanted to speak of it. They had their own clear plans for how things should be and no tremendous body of water was going to alter their agendas.
I imagine others of them really struggled. They wrestled to push the experience down so they could fit back in with the crowd. Sometimes late at night I bet they would think back to that day’s adventure and dare to imagine what might be possible. They were torn between the encounter and the social conformity, as well as the sense of security and affirmation they feared stepping away from.
Others, maybe just one or two, always remembered being there that day, with the smell of the wet earth and the vegetation, even the fish. They remembered feeling the cool water on their feet, and they remembered smiling as they looked across the expanse to the land on the other side. They remembered closing their eyes and taking a deep breath and hearing the water lap on the sandy bank.
Their hearts were opened to something much larger than themselves, and their lives would never be the same. They had encountered the great flow of life that transforms the way we live in the world, and they were caught up in that flow from that day on. Their souls would be carried where that great flow always goes: straight to the heart of God, which is its beginning and end.
It’s always the question at hand, isn’t it: how will we receive the great mystery when we encounter it? How will we receive Wisdom when it reaches out to touch us? Will we open our hearts to it, knowing that it will transform the way we live in the world? Or will we quickly put our shoes back on, get in our cars, and return to our prior ways of life? Will we look down at the ground when we pass the others in the hallway who were also there that day at the river bank and silently pray that they don’t bring it up?
I have thought about this story these past two weeks, looking at today’s texts–and especially during these last few days as I struggle in my own way with where we are.
The context of today’s first reading is that some seventy or so years after they were taken to Babylon, King Cyrus of Persia allowed the Jewish exiles to return to their homeland. Not only did he allow them to return, but he helped fund the repair of the temple.
After they returned, they sought a fresh way of living and practicing their faith. Nehemiah was the governor who helped them settle, and Ezra was the priest/scribe who helped them spiritually readjust to their new life. They gathered the people and read to them from the texts, and the people appreciated this insight of Wisdom that allowed them to realign their lives with God’s presence. They received the Wisdom and changed their way of being.
The Gospel reading also focuses on an encounter, with Jesus reading in his hometown synagogue. Jesus stands among them and begins reading from the prophet Isaiah: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me…” The text today describes how they were amazed to hear this, with Jesus telling them “today this has been fulfilled in your hearing.”
At first glance, it seems they have received the Wisdom as well, but the portion that follows today’s assigned reading shows the full story: those gathered refused to accept a teaching that changed their way of life, and they drove Jesus out of the town and tried to throw him off a cliff to kill him.
So, we continue to struggle with this question of what we do when we encounter wisdom, when we encounter the living Spirit that calls us out of one way of being and into a new way. At certain times, the tension between prophetic voice and established power becomes very pronounced.
The social and political tensions continue to grow in our nation and around the world. Things feel so reactive, and it is difficult to know how to respond–but respond we must because the Gospel demands that we hold ourselves accountable to the deep teachings of Jesus Christ if we dare to call ourselves his disciples. It is to Christ that we pledge our loyalty, knowing that call will be lived out in the complexities of our lives.
In tense times, I notice in myself the pressure of not wanting to rock the cart too much, when it comes to preaching and teaching as your rector. I notice that creeping fear that someone will be offended and leave. I feel the pressure, and it is healthy to have a certain sense of pressure. It makes me aware, and it cautions me never to take for granted that we gather here for worship. But we–I–cannot be frozen by worry and fail to name what needs to be named–as best as we can.
I remember when I was first ordained and President Obama was first elected, and I laid the conversation around immigration at that time alongside the Gospel reading one Sunday only to be met on the front steps by a man who raised his voice and accused me of being a communist. A few people circled around to make sure I was alright, because he was very upset that I would ever dare to raise such a question in a sermon. I was shaking on the inside, being a new priest, and I worked to listen and politely suggested that it sounded like we had a great deal to discern and take into our prayers–and that I prayed this might be a community that could offer him a space to do some deep soul work, alongside the rest of us who were wrestling with what it meant to be disciples of Jesus.
And wrestle we are…
If we’re honest, we all prefer the arrangement where the political and social leaders we like stand tall and selected so-called religious leaders stand behind them pronouncing God’s blessing on the decisions they have already made, decisions marked by their perceived mandate to rule. Ever has it been the case that political leaders desire the spiritual imprimatur for their agendas, and any ‘side’ seeks those who can give their agendas a spiritual mandate. And we all want our ‘side’ to win.
The problem with this is that Jesus rejected such an arrangement with his entire being–and his resistance ended up getting him killed by the fusion of certain religious authorities and the imperial state. That is what Jesus spoke against and that is what killed him.
Our practice of faith–and the deep practice of the great wisdom traditions throughout the world–is grounded in discernment, that is, that we never blindly pronounce a blessing on decisions made from any perceived political or social leader (or in today’s language, influencer). We never tune our ears to whichever party or platform has the loudest shouts and merely follow that; rather, we tune our ears to that still, small voice of God that has always challenged the brute use of power at the expense of the most vulnerable. Discernment is a key element of religious life, and our monastic roots–a gift shared across many faith traditions–hold it as paramount for how we stay grounded.
In a practice of discernment, we tune our hearts to that deeper presence of God that flows through life, that encounter with the great flow, recognizing that God’s presence will sometimes–may often–challenge our assumptions and agendas. We prepare ourselves so that we can receive the wisdom of God, take it into our hearts, and live in a way that is more in alignment with God’s grace than our grasping.
Our practice of discernment holds us in the same tension we see in today’s texts, with the question of whether we will stand and receive the Wisdom of God or whether we will try to bind Christ and throw him off a cliff. We are always, it seems, at such a crossroads, and it is not easy. That is an understatement.
Here is a small practice of discernment that we can share, to try this out: If you will, look at your bulletin and you’ll find Grace’s Mission and Vision statements on the front cover.
Our Mission: Grace Episcopal Church is a congregation in communion with all that is in God, seen and unseen. We are led by the example of Jesus Christ and are empowered by the Holy Spirit to support each other through prayer, formation, worship, and service. Our Vision: We will welcome all with kindness, acceptance, and love, with God’s help. We are Grace, grounded in faith and relentless in compassion.
Here’s our practice: when we read the phrase “we welcome all with kindness, acceptance, and love, with God’s help,” what do we imagine we are saying? Do we imagine that we are “welcoming all” into this particular church? That we are welcoming all into our ways of thinking and believing? Do we imagine ourselves here, in a fixed position, just being part of this organization, opening doors so that others can come here and also be part of this? Do we place ourselves at the center and assume that the point, as it were, was that others come here?
Or do we “welcome all with kindness, acceptance, and love?” Do we see the difference? And, when we say or print on our signs “All are welcome,” do we think that is the final goal–just to welcome? Or do we understand that we are all welcomed into a space that should transform the way we actually live in the world? It is never our goal just “to welcome.” Our prayer is actually to nurture the transformation of our hearts so that our lives are realigned with that great flow of the Spirit. We are welcomed so that we can grow into the full stature of Christ.
Like I said in a sermon a couple weeks ago, I see the Church as a mirror that challenges us to see our growing edges, to use Howard Thurman’s term. In a mature Christian community, we each are called to do our spiritual work, trusting in the Spirit’s guidance, knowing that with growth comes change. In a community such as this, assumptions and agendas can be examined through the lens of the Gospel–if we dare.
Such a vulnerable practice is difficult, because we often don’t actually want to focus on what Jesus focused on; rather, we want to argue that Jesus focuses on what we want to focus on. Ever has this been the case that we want to claim a spiritual mandate for our agendas. So, we struggle to receive the Wisdom that God offers us, and the Church often fails to live up to its deepest call.
I know there are many who think the purpose of the church is to offer comfort. I would agree, and I have learned the hard way that seeking comfort without being honest in a situation isn’t actually comfort at all. That is avoidance and complacency.
True comfort is found when we honestly face the pressures of our lives and seek an awareness of the hope that transforms our hearts. This is the “peace that passes all understanding.” This is the psalmist’s vision to “be still and know” that God is not only present but is transforming our lives with the indwelling fire of the Divine Life. True comfort can only be experienced when we are willing to receive the Wisdom of the Gospel and allow our lives to be transformed. When we not only remember our encounter with the flow of the Spirit but take off our shoes and leap in the water, we will be fully alive.
This is some tough spiritual work, my friends, and all this makes me think of my time in junior high school. Not a pleasant memory in many ways. We were required to take physical education, and I dreaded it every week. At the first of the semester, the coach lined us all up and had us do a series of exercises to get a baseline of where we were. It wasn’t pretty. I did one pull-up on the bars. One. Don’t even get me started on the push-ups. And, when they tied a rope around me and told me to pull a bus tire down the track, I simply whimpered and sat down.
I looked around and realized that most of the kids in that class were in the honors program. Here we were, little nerdlings all gathered so far outside our comfort zone. When the coach added it all up, we had all failed the exam. Our baseline was oblivion. But rather than let us off the hook and say things like ‘well, you are all good at studying’ or something like that, the coach gathered us all up and told us that, yes, we were in pretty rough shape, but we had the semester to build our muscles. It turns out that we live in bodies, and we were going to learn how to do that.
Friends, we are being challenged to use spiritual muscles that we have not really used–at least some of us. Some of us on the team have used these spiritual muscles so much they are perpetually strained. They walk around with ice packs and prayer books. We catch glimpses of them massaging their sore legs under their robes.
We have now stepped into a collective intensive, an immersion experience that demands that we use our spiritual muscles to stretch towards God’s vision for this world. There is no doubt that we will stumble and slip off the bars and fall. We’ll sprain things and have to help each other walk. There will be tears (and weeping and gnashing of teeth). We will need to take time to rest and listen to guidance from those fortunate souls who, somehow, are experts on push-ups. But make no mistake about it: we all must do the exercises and get stronger. This is my prayer: that we can stay in it together, sharing our stories and opening our hearts to God’s daring dream for this world. I believe we can do it, because I believe it is what the Spirit yearns for most: that we can taste the waters of life and live fully in this world, doing what we can to bring compassion, peace, and mercy to a desperately struggling world.