Sermon preached by Rev. Lillie Mae Henley, 10 Dec 2006
There was an elderly couple who had been going to church together for nigh on forty years. The wife died, and the man quit going to church. Months went by, and when people called him or stopped by to visit, they encouraged him to come back to church. He said, simply, “I can’t go anymore without Ethylene.
Well, a new minister joined the church, and everyone told her about Samuel. They talked about how faithful the couple used to be, and how much they missed their friends. They wanted Samuel to come back, but he wouldn’t.
The new minister went to visit Samuel. He invited her in, and they sat down in front of a nice, warm fire. He didn’t say anything else; he just sat there quietly rocking. The minister took a fire iron and slowly pulled out onto the hearth a small piece of burning wood. The minister didn’t say a word, she just sat there and both of them stared at the small piece of burning wood. Soon, it burned out and grew cold. The minister still didn’t say a word.
After a while, she pushed the small piece of wood back into the fire and it immediately lit up and began burning. Some time passed. The minister then spoke, “Samuel, our church is a fireplace, and our people are the wood. When we are together, we burn bright, nourishing each other, creating warmth for others, and sustaining each other in love.
When we leave the fire, we become cold and useless. Why don’t you come back to church? We need you to help make our church brighter and warmer, and we certainly don’t want you to be like that piece of wood—burning out and growing cold!
Paul felt that way about the churches he founded and co-founded. We see in all his letters to the newly formed churches, a recognition that they were all grounded in Love. In our reading today, Paul, wrote to the Philippians, “And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more…” In writing to the Thessalonians, he said, “May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you.”
Whatever has been said, or can be said, or will be said about Paul, one thing is certain, he believed that if these new Christians would live out Jesus’ words of love, all obstacles would be overcome, all challenges could be faced, and each person would know the Kingdom of God. He believed in the power of love.
Howard Thurman, one of the finest preachers and theologians of the Twentieth Century said, Jesus founded the religion that “…brought God down out of the clouds and discovered [God] … as the main spring in the heart of man. Thurman wrote that his faith teaches him, God is, that God is near, and God is love.
Paul must have experienced the same Paul. It is Paul who suggested the true trinity of religion: “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
Love
Powerful
Nourishing
Sustaining Love
I’ve often thought we over-use and misuse the word love. We love this dress or our car. We loved Thanksgiving this year. We loved that movie last weekend. We love our home, and we love our friends, and we love our spouse.
How can four letters represent the broad spectrum of our feelings and values for things and people in our lives?
However, I have changed my mind about the word. I’ve decided that perhaps we are not over-using and misusing the word love. We just don’t have enough definitions in our English dictionary. After all, the Greeks have four different words to refer to different aspects of love. Other cultures, too, have multiple meanings for the word ”love.”
We do not lessen the meaning or impact of God’s love for us, or our love for God and each other, by saying we loved our vacation.
Paul wanted the love in the churches to “overflow” for each other and everyone else.
Why?
Because Paul knew that whatever else love might be or do, love sustains us.
Sustain
Maintain
Continue
Carry on
Keep on
It is love, God’s love for us, our love for God and for each other that sustains us.
How else could we live with another person for twenty, thirty, forty years, and sometimes, occasionally, not even like them, if it weren’t for love?
How could we fight with our sisters and brothers, and yet dare another person to even talk about them, little less fight with them, if it weren’t for love?
How could we go on after a loved one has died, if it weren’t for love?
Perhaps that is why many say, “God is Love.” We humans have absolutely no way to comprehend or to truly know that Creative Force of life. What better metaphor is there than love?
When we love, whether it is God or another, we know centeredness within.
If we love, then we act out that love as best we can.
But, Paul said, to let our love overflow.
What does “love overflowing” look like?
About twenty-five years ago, a young teen, fifteen, from a very Catholic, very large family had a baby girl. Her parents forced her to give it up, and she was a very unhappy young woman. She subsequently had emotional problems, simply because she could not get over losing her first child. Eventually, though, she married and had two children with her husband. But…she never forgot her first born.
In the state in which she lived, biological parents who had given up children could register so that if their adopted children were to ever look for them, they could be found. The adopted children are allowed to register, in case their biological parents were ever to look for them.
Well, this woman registered a month before her adopted daughter would turn eighteen. The adopted daughter registered on the day she turned eighteen. And it just so happened, that the same caseworker took both applications. Knowing she had a match, she facilitated their reunion.
It is amazing, because the biological mother went to another state to give her child up for adoption, but the daughter was adopted by parents who lived six miles from the mother. In fact, the daughter went to the same high school as her half brother and sister!
Once the two had been reunited, the daughter took her biological mother to the home in which she grew up. She said her adopted parents had something for her.
What was it? It was a trunk full of copies of report cards, awards, certificates, and anything else that could be copied. There were recital costumes, cheerleader uniforms, and prom dresses. There was anything and everything that could give the mother the story of her daughter’s growing up. But the best part of all, there was a letter, written several years before.
The adopted parents wrote her a letter thanking the biological mother for sharing her child and her love. They knew how hard it must be to give up a child, just as hard as not being able to have one, they were sure. So, it was a miracle they could adopt this young baby girl. And they wanted the biological mother to know, how very grateful they were for the opportunity to care for and bring up her daughter.
Who among us can demonstrate that kind of overflowing love?
Love
Powerful
Nourishing
Sustaining Love
Sustaining love is the kind of love we find in relationship with God and others.
Like the fire and the small piece of wood. Alone we are a cold, burned out piece of wood. In relationship we create a fire that can overflow with love.
This Advent, this Christmas season, we have an opportunity to let love overflow in our lives, in the life of this church, with our families, and with others. If we are not sure how that will look for our own lives, we can ask God to show us how to let our love overflow.
God bless and amen.