It’s good to be back! Last week, I was not here, but I did watch the video of worship online, and I must say that I’m impressed that you all, together, preached a longer sermon than I think I ever have!
I am grateful to Betsy and to all of you who were present last week for being here and participating in last week’s sermon, and I’m thankful that you allowed me to go and be present with Ginger and Zander and Paige in Arizona, to help lead the memorial service for Zander and Paige’s mom, Stacey.
Some of the thoughts I put together for last week’s service here led me to revisit the book of Ecclesiastes. Ecclesiastes is one of the most fascinating and intriguing books of the Bible. Rabbi Harold Kushner once called Ecclesiastes “the most dangerous book in the Bible.” I want to start by talking a little more about Ecclesiastes this morning.
The author of Ecclesiastes was a deep thinker. And the author of Ecclesiastes was not afraid to wrestle with ideas present in other scriptures, and to question those ideas. And that’s what makes Ecclesiastes so dangerous: it makes you think.
For example, in books like Genesis, where the stories of Abraham and Sarah and the generations that followed are presented, the stories show that God blesses the righteous and curses the unrighteous.
But the writer of Ecclesiastes observed the world around him, and he responded to the stories from Genesis by saying, “You know… that’s not how I see things… Often, it’s the wicked who prosper, while the faithful suffer or even die while still young.”
This is something that Rabbi Harold Kushner - whose own son died at the age of 14 - knows too well.
The author of Ecclesiastes wants to know: What’s the point of all this? Whether one is good or evil, death can come sooner than we expect…
Death came sooner than we expected for our dear friend Stacey, who was like a sister to Ginger. Death came way too soon for Hazel’s daughter Luci. Death comes too soon for a lot of good people. Children, even.
And we who survive are filled with grief.
Over the years, I’ve felt the call to learn about death and grief. Even when I was in college, before I really knew what grief was, I took a class called “sociology of death.” My friend Galen Goben, who is a Disciples pastor and the director of bereavement for Forest Lawn, has taught me a few things about grief over the years. And I’ve read more than a few books on the topic.
I just finished reading one such book: A Hole in the World by Amanda Held Opelt. It’s a brand new book written by the sister of Rachel Held Owens, a highly influential Christian writer who died a few years ago, very unexpectedly, at the age of 37.
About two-thirds of the way through the book, Amanda Held Opelt quotes Jerry Sittser, who writes that “Loss can diminish us, but it can also expand us…The soul is elastic, like a balloon. It can grow larger through suffering. Loss can enlarge its capacity for anger, depression, despair, and anguish…” but, it can also enlarge its capacity for “joy, strength, peace, and love.”
And this, for me, puts to words my own experience with grief. It’s what I felt when my parents died. As my soul expanded like a balloon, I found a greater capacity for sorrow and sadness - I experienced these things in ways I didn’t even know was possible. But I also experienced greater joy, greater love, and greater peace.
That, I didn’t expect. I didn’t expect to suddenly become aware of such wonderful blessings in the midst of such sadness. Yet never before had I been as aware of the love in my life as when I was grieving…
This passage we have today from the book of James is one I think about a lot. It says: “You do not even know what tomorrow will bring.”
I’ve been especially thinking about this passage since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. So many plans that we thought were set in stone were suddenly changed or canceled. And, yes, so many people died, many before their time.
And the deaths and the canceled plans have left us grieving… and we’ve learned to not take for granted the things we thought were certain, because nothing is ever certain.
When I get invited to an event, or asked to attend a meeting, I’ve stopped using the phrase, “I’ll be there.” I stopped using that phrase several years ago, even before COVID. Now, I say, “I plan to be there.”
It sounds more honest. Because I’ve had to change too many of my “yesses” into “noes” because of things like appendicitis, pandemic cancellations, and deaths. And too many events have been canceled on me for similar reasons.
Next month, Ginger and I are taking what I’m calling our “third annual attempted trip to New Orleans.” Me going to New Oreans is like Betsy trying to see William Barber. But who knows? Maybe this time it will actually happen. So far, so good. I’m feeling optimistic!
But nothing is ever certain.
When I was a college student at Chapman University, my history professor, Jim Miller, filled his lectures with colorful phrases; clean, colorful phrases, like, “Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise.”
It always made me laugh.
But now I get it. None of our plans for the future are a sure thing. We don’t know what tomorrow will bring. And it is arrogance to think we have that much control over our lives.
In contrast, it is humility - good humility - that says, “If the Lord wishes,” or, “Lord willin’ and the creek don’t rise.”
And isn’t humility a hard thing to learn?
Our congregation’s mission statement, based on Micah 6:8, is to seek justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God. I won’t say my understanding of any of those things is complete, because everyday I learn something new that adds to my understanding; and that’s especially true when it comes to walking humbly with God. That’s a lesson that I am for sure still learning.
I think of all the times I thought I was better than others. Better than other students in school. Better than other pastors. Now I realize I only thought I was better because I didn’t take the time to understand them. Or myself.
When I say “I plan to be there” instead of “I’ll be there,” it’s a way for me to acknowledge that maybe I don’t know everything; maybe I don’t know everything about how everything is going to turn out. Something might happen to prevent me from being there. I’ll do my best, but the creek might rise.
I might not even be here tomorrow. I expect to be; I hope to be. I’m making plans for tomorrow. But nothing is guaranteed. Tomorrow is not guaranteed.
So I don’t know for sure about the future.
But I do know about right now. This moment, right now, is real. And this moment, right now, is a gift.
And in this moment, right now, I am loved.
I may be dealing with grief. I may be frustrated because the plans I had made have had to be canceled or changed.
But right now, I am loved. I am surrounded by love.
And I have been given this moment, right now, as a gift. No other moment in time is promised to me, at least not in this earthly life, but I do have this moment right now.
And I can use this moment, right now, to spread God’s love.
I can use this moment, right now, to do the right thing.
James and Ecclesiastes weren’t the only biblical writers aware of how fragile and uncertain life is. The prophet Isaiah knew about the fleeting nature of life. He wrote: “All people are grass, their constancy is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, when the breath of the Lord blows upon it; surely the people are grass.”
The psalmist also knew about life’s impermanence. In Psalm 90, it says: “The days of our life are seventy years, or perhaps eighty, if we are strong…” Many people in biblical times died long before seventy or eighty. Many never made it out of childhood. Today, on the other hand, so many people do live to 70, or 80, or 90, or even 100.
But there’s that “if.” If we are strong. If we have good genes. If we are lucky, and cancer doesn’t kill us, or COVID, or depression, or diabetes, or a car crash.
So many “ifs.” So much uncertainty.
The book I’m reading now - now that I’ve finished Amanda Held Orpelt’s book - is The Gift of Years by Joan Chittister, who is an 86 year-old American Benedictine nun - although she wrote this book in 2008, when she was just a youngster of 72.
In that book, which is full of wisdom, she writes: “The modern world may be full of ‘retirement plans,’ but who can really plan much? And be sure of it? Life is not a straight line… It is, if anything, a spiral.”
She doesn’t mention it, at least not so far, but it makes me think of the line one follows when walking a labyrinth. You start on the outside, and follow the path to the center, but it doesn’t go straight to the center. It goes in and out and around and around, with many turns - sometimes turning you away from the center you’re trying to reach.
And you think: “The center’s right there! I should be able to just go straight there in no time at all!”
But life isn’t like that.
In the book of John, Jesus says: “Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.” So even if we do get to live to an old age, there’s no guarantee that we’ll be in control of things, that we’ll even be in control of our own lives.
So much uncertainty. So many unexpected twists and turns.
We don’t know what tomorrow will bring. We don’t know, for certain, which way our lives will go. We don’t know how many unexpected twists and turns there will be. We don’t even know if we’ll reach the destination we long for before our days come to an end.
But we do know that, today, we are alive. And today, we have the opportunity to do something great: we have the opportunity to love.
As I grow older, I’m learning that life is not about accomplishments or accolades. It’s not about arriving at the center. It’s about love. It’s about how well you have expressed love on every step of the path, during every twist and turn.
Have you loved? Have you expressed love? To those who are close to you, as well as to those neighbors who are strangers to you? How can the uncertainties and limitations of life motivate you to love more? To love more completely?
Sometimes life is messy, and sometimes life doesn’t turn out the way we want it to. But we always have that opportunity, to grow in love; to let love flow; to find new ways to express love.
No matter what changes may come; no matter how our plans get altered; no matter if the creek rises. We can always receive love, and we can always give love. Every step of the way.
Nothing is greater than that.
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