A sermon by Rev. Henley
After my brother died, when we were cleaning out his home and packing up his clothes to give to the Purple Heart Veterans, we found a stack of cards from the Red Cross that showed how many quarts—gallons really—of blood he had given. I never knew my brother was so diligent about giving blood. He never said anything to me about it.
When I think of Paul’s words in Philippians, how we are to live humbly, do nothing out of selfish ambition, or vain conceit, be humble, and most of all, be a servant to others, I think of my brother serving others by donating all that blood to the Red Cross.
I believe we all try to live our lives with loving kindness and in some way serve others.
Paul’s words are almost the same Jesus’ words.
Hear the same words in Matthew 20:27, 28, Jesus told his followers, whoever wants to be first among you must become your servant, for the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others. And in Mark 10:44, 45, Jesus said, and whoever wants to be first among you must be the servant of everyone else, for the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others ... It was Jesus who washed the disciples feet on the fateful that night he was betrayed.
My vision of Jesus is a kind and loving person. Someone who may have gotten mad at times; didn’t he curse the fig tree? But he was also someone who did his best to practice loving kindness. That’s what Pema Chödrön was talking about in our reading today.
Each and everyone one of us has a loving heart. We may though, have a hard time getting in touch with that loving heart. Chödrön suggests that through diligence, through seeing our spiritual journey as a deepening exploration instead of a climb to the heights, we will find that loving essence of ourselves, and we will find compassion, connection to and companionship with other souls.
How do we live our lives in loving kindness?
Do you remember Jane Eyre? Orphaned as a young child, Jane has to live with her aunt and uncle and three cousins. She says that they did not love her, so she could not love them. They are cruel and hateful to her, especially after the uncle dies. Her aunt promises her husband to take care of Jane, but she breaks that promise and sends Jane to a girls’ school. She tells the malicious and brutal head master that Jane is a liar and willful child, not to be trusted, setting up Jane as a victim to be abused by the school master.
Within Jane though is a core of goodness, a loving heart. And no matter what other do to her, no matter how painful her life is, she refuses to abandon that goodness within. Alone, abandoned, alienated, she clings to that goodness.
We know that she went through some very dark nights. Yet, she grew up to be a teacher and served at the school until she left to be a governess.
When her aunt is dying, Jane is summoned, and her aunt confesses to the wrongs she has done Jane. And Jane, from the depths of her heart, says she forgives her aunt, “fully and freely.”
Fully and freely. After all the pain and abuse, she forgives fully and freely. She exemplifies the kind of person Jesus and Paul described.
What have our dark nights taught us? Have we gone deep enough to connect with our compassion for others? Have we realized, yet, that our loving heart is meant for companionship with other souls?
I believe we all try to live our lives with loving kindness. But are we kind and loving enough? Are there things in our lives that hold us back from showing loving kindness daily, hourly, moment-by-moment?
Fear is one thing. Fear of loss. Fear of abandonment. Fear of being alone. Fear makes us do ugly things sometimes. If we fear someone we love is going to leave us, instead of loving more—which we are afraid to do—we love less, trust less, which only makes our relationship worse.
If you watch the news, you’ll know that there is a lot of fear in our country right now. We are afraid gas will become scarce, we are afraid we will lose our retirement, we are afraid we will lose our jobs—the more we fear, the more we are going to hurt other people. During times like these it is more important than ever to be in touch with our heart and our capacity to live as Jesus and Paul asked us to live, showing loving kindness to others.
Habit is another thing that holds us back. We may be in the habit of rushing about our lives, running in to the grocery, ignoring the people around us, barely noticing the people who check our groceries. We may be in the habit of ignoring people we walk by, because if we catch someone’s eye, they, they might smile at us, and then we’d have to smile back—at a total stranger. We may be in the habit of ignoring people we walk by, especially the homeless, because if we catch their eye, they may ask us for money. We may be in the habit of watching the news and television, or reading, or listening to music, in our free time, and avoid prayer and meditation. We may be in the habit of working so diligently, that we don’t take the time to inquire how our co-workers and their families are doing. We may not show loving kindness often enough, because it is difficult to find the time to do, and we become overwhelmed, so we don’t do anything.
We may not show loving kindness often enough, because we are not in a loving place ourselves; we may be in the habit of avoiding any kind of personal growth because it is too painful, too painful.
Why not practice more loving acts of kindness. Why not be diligent about random acts of kindness. We need to discover deep within ourselves a deeper kind of loving compassion than we now know, not only for others, but for ourselves.
We do this with prayer, meditation, and paying attention to the pain we feel.
Paying attention to the fear we have, to our habits, to our connection to others.
If we were to die today, when our loved ones gather up our personal effects to give them to the needy, will they find evidence of our loving acts of kindness? I am thinking about what my family will find. What will your family find?
I believe we all try to live our lives with loving kindness. That is all Jesus asked of us. That is all Paul asked of the Philippians.
Readings
Reading I
Philippians 2:1-8 (Today's New International Version)
1 Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
5 In your relationships with one another, have the same attitude of mind Christ Jesus had:
6 Who, in the form of God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the form of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a human being,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
Reading II
“The Love That Will Not Die” from Comfortable with Uncertainty by Pema Chödrön.
Spiritual awakening is frequently described as a journey to the top of a mountain. We leave our attachments and our worldliness behind and slowly make our way to the top. At the peak we have transcended all pain. The only problem with this metaphor is that we leave all others behind. Their suffering continues, unrelieved by our personal escape.
On the journey … the path does down, not up, as if the mountain pointed toward the earth instead of the sky. Instead of transcending the suffering of all creatures, we move toward turbulent and doubt however we can. We explore the reality and unpredictability of insecurity and pain, and we try to push it away. If it takes years, if it takes lifetimes, we let it be as it is. At our own pace, without speed or aggression, we moved down and down and down. With us move millions of others, our companions in awakening from fear. At the bottom we discover water, the healing water of bodhichitta. Bodhichitta is our heart—our wounded, softened heart. Right down there in the thick of thins, we discover the love that not die. The love that is bodhichitta. It is gentle and warm; it is clear and sharp; it is open and spacious. The awakened heart of bodhichitta is the basic goodness of all beings.