A Sermon by Rev. Henley
There was a synagogue which was continually vandalized by a group who called themselves the Aryan Brotherhood. This “brotherhood” wrote horrible graffiti on the walls and sent the congregation hate mail. It was difficult to apprehend the vandals because the incidents were intermittent.
It so happened, that one of the men in the brotherhood, had a life-threatening illness. Neither his family nor his friends would or could help him. The rabbi found out about the man, and offered his help. He took the man into his home, cared for him, and took him to his many treatments and doctors’ visits.
The sick man could not believe the rabbi did all these things for him. Eventually, over time, they became friends. He sincerely regretted his past and with true remorse apologized to the rabbi and his congregation.
St. Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary use words.”
Southwest of Dallas, Texas, every summer for 13 weeks there is a camp for children with chronic and terminal illness. It is Camp John Marc and is on land donated by parents of a young boy who died from cancer. Each week is dedicated to a specific illness. Children with cancer, spina bifida, sickle cell, juvenile arthritis, heart disease, muscular dystrophy, and other life threatening conditions get to spend time with other children who have the same challenges as they do. Medical professionals and ordinary people volunteer to work with these children and youth. For most of the campers, there needs to be one-on-one care and attention. In 2008 there were 2,662 campers served by almost the same number of volunteers.
When the children with kidney disease come for their week, the dialysis machines are delivered, and Camp Marc becomes the largest Dialysis Center, well, just about anywhere, and the dialysis machines run twenty-four seven to accommodate these very special children.
The literature and website do not tell you that one man, a hospital administrator from the Fort Worth Children’s Hospital saw the need for this camp forty years ago, and his vision, courage, and determination are the foundation for this very special camp.
St. Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary use words.”
In the Gospel of John reading this morning, Jesus said, “… I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.”
What do we do, one-on-one, to preach the Gospel?
What do we do to bear fruit, fruit that will last?
What do we do to follow Jesus’ commandment to love one another?
Many of us here this morning, live our lives dedicated to bearing fruit, fruit that will last. We work for government agencies that make a difference in people lives—here and around the world; we work for non-profit associations that help the hungry, the homeless, the marginalized; we work for social service agencies and in the field of medicine; or other places that change people’s lives.
Not only do we work there five or six days a week, we work 40, 50, 60 hours a week.
We preach the gospel at all times and when necessary we use words.
Others of us have more secular work. We do not “preach the gospel with our everyday lives.” We look for opportunities to bear fruit, fruit that will last.
Whatever we do, as a people of faith, we are called to bear fruit; fruit that will last, fruit planted in love.
In the reading, Jesus said, “… so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name…” Did Jesus mean that if we live his commandment of love, he will give us material treasures that feed our ego and make us look good to others? No. He meant, that when the rabbi brought his enemy into his home, that whatever the rabbi needed to take care of this man, God would provide.
When Jesus said, “…the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name…” Jesus meant that when the Fort Worth hospital administrator began his mission to send critically and chronically ill child in the Dallas-Fort Worth area to a summer camp, God would provide.
In our reading this morning from the novel War and Peace, we hear a piece of Russian Prince Andrew’s story. At that time he was imprisoned. He knew he would be executed. And in this time dark time, his only thoughts were about love.
During the hours of solitude, suffering, and partial delirium he spent after he was wounded, the more deeply he penetrated into the new principle of eternal love revealed to him, the more he unconsciously detached himself from earthly life.
In this life the only thing that matters is love. First, love of the Infinite Source of All, which we call many names, and second, love of each other. The second love, though, is not the kind of love for others that is an attachment, that feeds our ego; the second love for others, whether it be a partner, a friend, a stranger, or an enemy, is the love that fills us with joy, hope, and a sense of well-being. It is, in some psychological theories, called unconditional love.
It is not self-sacrificing, self-denying love that requires us to diminish ourselves and risk our own well-being. It is the kind of love that bears fruit, that preaches the gospel.
For thousands of years, some religions, especially Christianity, has grounded faith in self-sacrifice “as Jesus demonstrated on the cross.” This has been an “excuse” for cultures and individuals to ask individuals to give up their own health and well-being to serve others.
Well, that is contemptible. Jesus DID NOT SAY WHEN HE WAS ON THE CROSS, I sacrifice myself for the greater good! He said seven sentences and I don’t hear any talk about “sacrificing:”
He said, father, forgive them, they do not know what they are doing. That is acceptance, inclusion, love of other.
He said to the two “sinners” on either side of him, I will see you today in paradise. That sounds as though sinners get to go to heaven, to me, what about you.
He then asked his beloved friend to take care of his mother. What loving son, who dies before his mother wouldn’t ask that. Then as you are I would do, when we are in pain, we ask, God, why have you forsaken me. Many a cancer patient, asked that.
And then, he said, “I am thirsty.” Anyone who has ever sat with a dying person knows that in the last few days or even hours, they want a drink of water. Every dying person I’ve ever sat with who was conscious, wanted a last drink of water.
And then, he said, it is finished and gave up his spirit. Followed by, father, into your hands I commit my spirit.
Jesus was on that cross because he believed in his gospel, he preached his gospel, and sometime he used words.
A colleague of mine in seminary had an urban ministry practicum. She had to work at a day shelter for homeless men. When she found out, all she could think about was, “What would it smell like?” Of course, a Caucasian woman from the suburbs who probably had at least one bath a day her whole life, would probably have some fear about the south side of Chicago and a ministry there. The fear manifested in wondering what would the place, the people smell like?
To her amazement, from the minute she arrived at the shelter, she was comfortable and the fear went away. “After I got there, no more silly fears,” she said.
What do we do, one-on-one, to preach the Gospel?
What do we do to bear fruit, fruit that will last?
What do we do to follow Jesus’ commandment to love one another?
Our jobs or our volunteer activities allow us to preach the Gospel. We bear fruit in many ways. But do we serve food to the marginalized, talk to them, shake their hands; are we truly present to listen to their stories. When have you put your hand on the shoulder of a homeless person and felt their bony shoulders because they never have enough to eat? Do we love them with joy, hope, and a sense of well-being for all of us?
As a people of faith, as a church, we need to do some one-on-one mission work. Let us find what that ministry would look like for our church. We need to bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that God will give us whatever we ask, whatever we need, to live Jesus love commandment.
Let us live St. Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel at all times and when necessary use words.”
Reading I
from War and Peace, Chapter XVI, by Leo Tolstoy
Not only did Prince Andrew know he would die, but he felt that he was dying and was already half dead. He was conscious of an aloofness from everything earthly and a strange and joyous lightness of existence. Without haste or agitation he awaited what was coming. That inexorable, eternal, distant, and unknown the presence of which he had felt continually all his life- was now near to him and, by the strange lightness he experienced, almost comprehensible and palpable...
During the hours of solitude, suffering, and partial delirium he spent after he was wounded, the more deeply he penetrated into the new principle of eternal love revealed to him, the more he unconsciously detached himself from earthly life. To love everything and everybody and always to sacrifice oneself for love meant not to love anyone, not to live this earthly life. And the more imbued he became with that principle of love, the more he renounced life and the more completely he destroyed that dreadful barrier which- in the absence of such love- stands between life and death. When during those first days he remembered that he would have to die, he said to himself: "Well, what of it? So much the better!" ...
[Yet he now realized] that he still valued life as presented to him in the form of his love for Natasha ... [He thought,] "Is it possible that the truth of life has been revealed to me only to show me that I have spent my life in falsity? I love [Natasha] more than anything in the world! But what am I to do if I love her?" .... Natasha drew closer to him. Her face shone with rapturous joy. "Natasha, I love you too much! More than anything in the world." ... Soon he ... shut his eyes and fell asleep. He did not sleep long and suddenly awoke with a start and in a cold perspiration ... He had still been thinking of the subject that now always occupied his mind- about life and death, and chiefly about death. He felt himself nearer to it.
"Love? What is love?" he thought. "Love hinders death. Love is life. All, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists, only because I love. Everything is united by it alone. Love is God, and to die means that I, a particle of love, shall return to the general and eternal source."
Reading II
John 15:9-17
[Jesus said:] "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another."
1. Luke 23:33-34 "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing."
2. Luke 23:42-43 "I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise."
3. John 19:26-27 When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, "Dear woman, here is your son," 27 and to the disciple, "Here is your mother." From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.
4. Matthew 27:46 "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
5. John 19:28 "I am thirsty."
6. John 19:30 "It is finished." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
7. Luke 23:46 "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." When he had said this, he breathed his last.