The Sermon
Journal Date: May 9th, 2010 | Filed Under: Thoughts
Fifth Sunday of Easter
Acts 11:1-18 Ps. 148 Rev. 21:1-6 John 13:31-35
A sermon given by Pastor Elaine Hewes
Redeemer Lutheran Church May 2, 2010
On the front page of The Maine Sunday Telegram Outdoor section last weekend there was an article about Tait and Jax McKay and their father Kevin. (The McKays are members of Redeemer, and Jenn, Tait and Jax’s mother, is one of our education coordinators). The article, which covers much of the front and last page of the outdoor section, complete with five large color photographs, is entitled “Meet the fly boys of Eastern Maine,” with the accompanying caption, “When it comes to fly-fishing, Tait and Jax McKay – at just 10 and 7 years old – are the reel deal.” (Reel spelled r-e-e-l).
The article begins with this warning…. “Anglers who can’t double haul, be warned about fishing the waters in eastern Maine. A pair of diminutive fly fishermen are going to show you up. They are the McKay brothers, and they can cast like nobody’s business.”
The article goes on to talk about how Tait and Jax were taught to fish and to tie flies from the time they could sit on their father’s lap. When Tait was 3 his dad took him on his first fishing trip up to the Roach River near Greenville, starting the lesson by putting an old fly reel on a Batman spinning rod. Then he put short 20-pound monofilament test on the rod and a fly without a hook….
“I put a bunch of snacks on the bank,” Kevin says of this first fishing lesson. “Tait would cast and hit me on the head and get tangled up in my rod. Then he’d go up and eat some snacks and start over. Then if I hooked a salmon, I’d let him reel it in.”
Between them these two boys now have 11 years of fly-fishing experience. They also tie flies and sell them to fishermen who swear the McKay boys’ flies catch more fish than their own.
It’s a wonderful article about a father who is teaching his boys the art of fly-fishing. And I say the “art” of fly-fishing because toward the end of the article, it says this… “The way the McKay boys watch the fish rise and choose where to cast, it’s clear that fly-fishing is a part of their subconscious… The entomology and fish biology, the technique, pace and approach are things these guys get – without ever losing the carefree spirit of grade-schoolers.”
I say the “art” of fly-fishing because of what Norman Maclean writes in his book A River Runs Through It, about learning to fly-fish from his Presbyterian minister father at the junction of great trout rivers in western Montana. In the same way Kevin McKay teaches his boys to “strip, strip, pause….strip, strip, pause….” with their line, Norman Maclean says his father taught him and his brother to cast in a four-count rhythm, using their mother’s metronome to keep the beat.
It is in both cases a very precise and measured method these fathers pass onto their sons; a method whose purpose it is to catch fish. And yet at the same time, it seems to me that it’s always about more than catching fish. As Norman Maclean seems to say when he writes, “My father was very sure about certain matters pertaining to the universe. To him, all good things – trout as well as eternal salvation – come by grace and grace comes by art and art does not come easy.”
It is the “art” of fly-fishing that Norman Maclean and his brother learned from their father. It is the “art” of fly-fishing that Tait and Jax are learning from their father as well. In the same way our scripture texts for this morning provide lessons in the “art” of something else; something that lies at the very center of our being as Christians…..that thing called “love.”
Unfortunately we begin our lessons in the art of Christian loving at a disadvantage, as the word “love” has been so reduced, so domesticated, so aligned with the emotion of feeling, there’s hardly any chance for gaining a fuller, deeper sense of the word. And that is why our texts for this morning are so helpful in this regard….
Take our Gospel lesson for instance, as Jesus delivers to his disciples a new commandment on the eve of his passion and death saying, “I give you a new commandment that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Those of you who may have been at our Maundy Thursday service just a few weeks ago will remember this text. You may also remember that just prior to these words, Jesus practiced the command to love one another by kneeling at the disciples’ feet, washing them and drying them with a towel…. All of the disciples’ feet…. Peter’s feet (the one who would deny him three times); Judas’ feet (the one who would betray him); the feet of all the disciples, who over the course of the previous few years, had come to know who Jesus was, without ever really recognizing who Jesus was…. A bunch of “keystone cops,” as one theologian has called them… Totally undeserving of such tender love at the hands of their teacher and Lord. And yet, it is what Jesus showed them on the night before his suffering and death…. Hardly a love that could be dependent solely upon the emotion of feeling….
And then there’s Peter in our text from Acts, who is making his defense before the council in Jerusalem concerning his eating with the uncircumcised. In the lesson appointed for this morning Peter relates the story of his outlandish and “questionable” decision to baptize Cornelius and the members of his household, even though they were all Gentiles. Peter’s defense rests upon a vision he had while praying on a roof-top in Joppa; a vision that came to him three times of a large sheet descending from heaven full of animals that were deemed by Jewish law to be unclean, profane, forbidden to be eaten. As Peter relates the dream to the council, he explains that a voice accompanied the sheet full of animals, commanding him to get up, to kill the animals and to eat them.
Peter assures the council that he resisted that command at first, responding to the invitation to eat by insisting that he had never eaten anything profane or unclean; indeed, he said, such things had never even touched his mouth. But then, Peter continued, the voice in the vision responded to his refusal to eat by saying, “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.”
After which Peter recounted to the council the rest of the story…
- The arrival of three Gentile men sent by Cornelius to fetch Peter,
-The Spirit’s admonition to Peter not to make any distinction between these men and himself,
-Peter’s entrance into Cornelius’ house,
-Cornelius’ accounting of his own vision in which the angel of the Lord had told him to send for Peter in Joppa and to have him brought to Cornelius’ house so that Peter could deliver to him and his household a message by which they might be saved,
-The astounding news of the Spirit’s presence coming upon these Gentiles while Peter was giving his testimony,
-Peter’s recollection of his own baptism by the Holy Spirit, and his sudden recognition that this same Holy Spirit was now to be made available to those outside the parameters of Jewish ethnicity and law; Peter’s plea for such scandalous and outlandish inclusion coming with those beautiful and troublesome words, “If then God gave them the same gift that he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could hinder God?”
“When the council heard this,” says our text, “They were silenced…. And then they praised God saying, “Then God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life.”
“So what,” you might ask, “does this have to do with learning the art of Christian loving?” Here’s the thing; it is very difficult for us to understand how radical and revolutionary Peter’s dream was, and with it the subsequent decision to include Gentiles in the Christian community. For the Jews at the time, these Gentiles, those who ate profane food and who touched unclean things, were thought of as repulsive… repulsive….
To include such people in the community…. To love those who have been deemed repulsive is a tall order…. nearly impossible I would say….nearly impossible….just about as impossible as loving the one who will deny you three times, or the one who will betray you, or the ones who after endless months of knowing you never really come to know you at all…..
And yet in our lessons for this morning we hear the call to extend table fellowship to those for whom we may feel little love. And we hear Jesus say in the presence of his keystone cop kind of disciples, “I give you a new commandment that you love one another, just as I have loved you.” Jesus isn’t talking about the kind of love we hear batted around in the cultural lingo of our day. He isn’t talking about the reduced kind of love, the domesticated kind of love, the kind of love solely aligned with the emotion of feeling. He’s talking about a kind of love that is largely dependent upon the same two things Tait and Jax are dependent upon in learning the art of fly-fishing….
Both things beautifully named in the last paragraph of Norman Maclean’s memoir A River Runs Through It, as he writes, “Of course, now I am too old to be much of a fisherman, and now of course I usually fish the big waters alone, although some friends think I shouldn’t. Like many fly fishermen in western Montana where the summer days are almost Arctic in length, I often do not start fishing until the cool of the evening. Then in the Arctic half-light of the canyon, all existence fades to a being with my soul and memories and the sounds of the Big Blackfoot River and a four-count rhythm and the hope that a fish will rise.
“Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world’s great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs.
“I am haunted by waters.”
I think Peter, in his vision on the roof-top, saw that eventually all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. I think he saw that this river runs over rocks from the basement of time, and that under these rocks are words….and all of the words are ways of saying love. And then I think he became haunted by those words and by that river, and his heart caught fire for the gift of such knowing; the same kind of knowing that Jesus knew, that Jesus was, that Jesus is….
And then I think Peter figured out what Jesus was trying to say to his disciples on the night before his passion and death…. He figured out that all manner of art, from the art of fly-fishing to the art of Christian loving needs to be practiced. Because art doesn’t come easy. Peter figured out that it begins in the Arctic half-light of the canyon, where all existence fades to a being with one’s soul and memories and the sound of the Big Blackfoot River…. It begins with the blessed recognition that eventually all things merge into one, that there is no distinction between “us and them,” and that in order for such knowing to become real knowing, it needs to be practiced.
And so he did, teaching others the four-count rhythm of unconditional love, bountiful mercy, radical grace and scandalously open table fellowship…. The four count rhythm of Christian love, which must be practiced, and practiced, and practiced, and practiced, until finally the art of Christian loving becomes a part of one’s subconscious…. part of one’s heart and hands and voice and reason for being…
It’s the same practicing we do here at Redeemer, and from Redeemer out into the world. The four-count rhythm of Christian love…. Not because it’s a requirement for “salvation,” but because we have stood in the Arctic half-light of the canyon, and have seen that eventually all things merge into one, and that a river runs through it; a river called love. In the waters of that love we have begun to learn the art of casting its bright lure on the water, but we know, as Peter did, and Jesus did, that such art, such loving, does not come easy.
And so we keep practicing. We keep practicing, even when it’s hard and when our casts are out of rhythm and our line gets all tangled up, and we don’t know how to proceed, and we’ve almost given up all hope that a fish will rise….
In the odd coincidences of life, I will share a little learning that came my way just yesterday concerning the practicing of the art of Christian loving…. I had of course been mulling all week over these images of fly-fishing and the Arctic half-light of the canyon and the river that runs though it and Peter’s dream and Jesus’ commandment to love one another. I had already decided that my sermon would speak to the art of Christian loving; of its source in the river of God’s love and the necessity of practice in order for the depth of that love to be truly known.
And so on Friday night I went to Michael’s Bagaduce concert at the Blue Hill congregational Church with all of these images and thoughts in my mind. And I was eager to go, as the concert was to include the premier performance of Grammy-award-winning pianist and composer Paul Sullivan’s work “River.”
I was a little late in arriving, and was determined to get the same seat I’ve sat in while listening to Bagaduce concerts for the past 20 years. And so I parked close to the church, in the driveway of a building that has been a business, a house, a business, a house, back and forth over the years. I looked in the windows as I parked, assuring myself that the piles of papers and boxes stacked on tables meant it was a business again, and therefore closed on a Friday night.
The concert was extraordinarily beautiful. Not all community choral concerts are always extraordinarily beautiful. But this one was. Especially Paul Sullivan’s “River,” whose notes were sung and played with such passion and energy and beauty that everyone jumped to their feet when it was over to give a standing ovation. I said to someone on the way out, “That music is now coursing through my veins.” It was. It was every bit as beautiful as the Arctic half-light of the canyon, and for a minute I did see again that eventually all things merge into one…
So you might imagine how it might have felt in the midst of such euphoria to find a note on my windshield when I returned to my car. It was written on a small piece of white paper, in capital letters in red ink. It read “To 8878K” (which is my license plate number). “MY HOME IS NOT A PUBLIC PARKING AREA.”
Suddenly the Arctic half-light of the canyon disappeared. The river stopped coursing though my veins. It did not feel at all like all things merge into one. I crumpled up that repulsive note, and wanted to make a clear and definitive distinction between myself and whoever lived in that house that is sometimes a business….
But then I remembered about the practicing part of my sermon. I remembered the part about the art of Christian loving. I remembered that art does not come easy…. I remembered just a little bit about the river called love and the way it runs over rocks from the basement of time, even over the rock that is me. I remembered that sometimes the fish do rise. And so after I got home I smoothed out the crumpled up note and taped it into my journal.
And I decided to practice what I preach in the only way I know how to practice. And so yesterday morning I got up at 4:30 and made Swedish coffee bread. When it was done, I put in a basket along with a note and a little jelly jar of flowers. I drove into Blue Hill and put it outside the door of the house-that-is-sometimes-a-business.
The note said this….
May 1, 2010
Dear Person Whose Home is Not a Public Parking Area,
I am so sorry. Please accept this Swedish coffee bread (baked this very morning) and these flowers as an expression of my regret for disregarding the sanctity of your home. I did indeed wonder for a moment as I pulled into the parking spot outside your door if someone actually lived there. But I was in a hurry to get a good seat at the Bagaduce concert, and told myself that the building was home to a business, not to a person.
So then I went into the Congregational Church to hear the music, and was struck yet one more time by the astounding realization that beauty does indeed rise again and again, challenging my cynicism and inviting me to find ways of participating in its mystery. I left the concert with music coursing through my veins like rivers.
And then I found your note on my car, which led me to remember there are many kinds of beauty, all of them necessarily born of love…all of them so fleeting, so tenuous, so at risk of being co-opted, ignored, reduced, unfulfilled…
So what was I to do, having found myself on a Friday evening both touched by beauty and indicted by a little note that named my disregard for both love and its sister beauty? Only this – to see the truth, to name it, and to do some baking…a peace offering, offered in hopes that through it a little beauty will rise into your day as well.
Sincerely,
one who is still learning
(otherwise known as Elaine Hewes)
Were my actions through Swedish coffee bread and flowers totally born from love of the “Jesus kind?” Probably not. They seldom are. But I trust that God accepts my practicing anyway, however tangled and inept it might be. I trust that despite all the fumbles and failures any of us make in the art of Christian loving, God will continue to love us through it all, inviting us always to the Artic half-light of the canyon, where we remember once again that eventually all things merge into one by the power of love….
That’s enough words for today. (In the shallows the frogs are singing.) And there is fishing to do….. On a four count rhythm that doesn’t come easy, and even then, only by
