St. John’s, Chuckatuck, VA
August 15, 2010 (Proper 15C)
Rev. Leslie C. Ferguson, Deacon
Isaiah 5:1-7; Psalm 80:1-2, 8-18; Hebrews 11:29-12:2; Luke 12:49-56
I would like to thank you for inviting me to be with you this morning; for giving me an opportunity to worship with you. I’d like to introduce myself; I am Les Ferguson and I’m a recent graduate from Virginia Theological Seminary. Before I attended Seminary I was an officer in the Navy for over 22 years. My wife, Kathy, and I relocated from Norfolk to Alexandria for school. We are looking forward to the next part of our journey, the places that God is leading us to.
I’m hoping to have a little audience participation this morning as the sermon progresses… you’ll see your part when it comes around.
What are some of the ways that we define who we are or how we identify ourselves? {{Wait for responses}} (If there aren’t responses offer any or all of the following: gender, sexuality, education, social class [although that isn’t often how we refer to ourselves but how we refer to others], medical conditions, racial or ethnic heritage, career or job, religion/denomination, sports/leisure activities we participate in – just about anything that sets us apart from the crowd). For instance I am the 2nd son of Mike Ferguson and Carolyn Muller; I am the first child in my family that got married; I am a marathoner; I am hard of hearing; I am retired; I am a Disabled American Veteran; and I am an Episcopal clergy person. Some of the ways I identify myself are direct and others are more inferred than stated (sexual preference, education, profession, religion, etc.) yet they are the ways that I am distinguished from those around me.
Is our identity the same thing as who we are? It may be easy for many to answer that question with a “yes” our lives truly define who we are. They describe us and how we’ve arrived at this place and time. However, it can be easy to get lost in our identity: those characteristics that others can readily see and appreciate; but are our distinguishing marks our identity – who we really are? I believe the reality is no – those identifying marks are not wholly who we are but are a simple means of distinguishing ourselves.
There are many stories about identity in today’s readings; how people define themselves both explicitly and implicitly. Looking at the Old Testament we see how Israel is self-defined: they rightly claim status as the chosen people of God; they affirm that they are children of the Covenant delivered to Moses; they’ve become residents in the Promised Land; and many of the Israelites believed they “had arrived.” But in all their identity they lose sight of what they’re supposed to be. They were called out of Egypt to be a people in a living and growing relationship with God. Yet over the years, as they’ve lost sight of their principle defining factor we hear today that they have, little-by-little, lost their self-awareness until they begin violating their promises to God. And the worst thing is they don’t even recognize their error.
Their descent began when they forgot their past; the providence of God in their lives from their deliverance from captivity in Egypt through their establishment as a community of God’s people in the Promised Land. In losing sight of their past they lose sight of יחוח and actually return to self-reliance and the worship of the Ba’als in Canaan. As they lost sight of their past they change the direction and nature of their future. They ultimately lose their homeland and their status – the things they have used since their foundation to identify and define themselves.
Yet, as we know, יחוח does not completely abandon the Israelites. יחוח steps back in with them and sends their deliverer; the one who will make the difference for them and for all who will come to believe through them and their relationship with יחוח; Jesus Christ, the Savior and Redeemer of the world. We’d hope that their restoration would make all things well – that would make for a fairy tale ending to the story. Alas, that’s not the case demonstrated by the Epistle to the Hebrews today. The new Christians begin to fall into the same traps the older Israelites did: they begin drifting back into their history – notably becoming focused on Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and the prophets. They lose sight of their new relationship with God through Christ. They appear to be tempted to move back to their comfortable and stagnant relationship with the God of their forefathers. They move away from their new life in Christ; away from the relationship highlighted by the Apostles and Paul. They stop growing and become fixed in place; not growing or deepening their relationship with God. They lose sight of their future by becoming focused on their past.
Channeling my mother a little… is there a limit on who we can be? My parents always taught me that I could do anything that I set my mind to; that I had choices in my life to make that define who I am. Is our identity limited to what we’ve always done or been? {Pause} Obviously no; people change, talents change, passions and desires change, and we evolve personally, professionally, and emotionally. That growth is part of what it means to mature and become more self-aware and self-differentiated.
I’ll confess that there is truth in what the philosopher George Santayana said, “Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.” As with those who have gone before us, our past has made us what we’ve become – but we aren’t our past. Our past shapes the people we are, for better or for worse, but it does not define us or what we can become. Yet, when we forget our past we lose sight of what makes us special; set aside by God, redeemed by Christ, for God’s special work in the world. Yet, when we focus on the past too much we miss God in the present.
But if we shift our focus solely to the future that God is calling us to we can (will) miss God in the present. Does that mean we should shift our focus from the past to the future – to the place that God is leading us (skipping over the work we have to do today)? I don’t believe that’s the message for us today. We are called to strike a balance between the past, the present, and the future. We are doomed to repeat the past if we forget it. Likewise, we cannot be wholly prepared for the future if we don’t make the most of the present – the situations that God calls us to in the here and now.
We need to remember that we are called and made special in our dynamic relationship with God. The relationship that is grounded on the past and what has helped shape us for today; the relationship that has been made special in Christ coming into our lives in the here and now; and the new and special relationship that God is calling us to in the future – both in this place and in our lives, individually and collectively. Are we guaranteed success? As we’ve seen, on our own we may have short term success but we will never fully achieve all that God calls us to. But we have been provided good guidelines to help us along the way. We are called to embrace the things that make us special: that we’ve worshiped in THIS PLACE since 1755; that our church and diocese affirms that we have been set aside for God’s work in this place; and that our humanity and hominess is something that provides an image of God to those who come into our midst. We have been invited through the years to invite others to share with us and help us refine the image of God present here and now.
We carry forward God’s message to our community by sharing the life of love that God has given us in Christ. We should feel empowered to share God with our neighbors, locally and globally; and not only in our words but in our relationship centered on but not flaunting our special nature in God. The challenge is to live our lives in an honest and consistent manner with who we have been, who we are, and who we envision ourselves to be in the future. Yet we cannot live a life that is unable to be human and fallible. Otherwise, we forget the hiccups we’ve made in the past, the things that have shaped who we are today.
How do we shape the future without forgetting the past? We accomplish this by not focusing on the past so much that the past prevents us from moving on to the future. How do we gauge our actions against the past and the future; the covenant with God in THIS place and THIS time?
We wait patiently for God… We remain open to the possibility that “someone else may have the right answer” even when we believe the “real” solution is both simple and obvious. All the while we challenge ourselves to see God’s presence in the here and now while leading us to the blessing of the future… We strive to recognize God’s presence in this place and time, in the past, and in the future.
Our challenges for today: we are called to make choices to seek and serve Christ in our lives. We are all called to carry forward the message of Christ’s redeeming love to others. We are called to honor where we’ve been but not more than where we are headed. That’s why we’re here today; that’s why we come to worship. That’s our calling in life.
No comments:
Post a Comment