1/16/2011 "Dawning Awareness" John 1:29-34
We used sections of Psalm 40, interspersed with the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., from his address "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence" at Riverside Church, New York City, April 4, 1967, exactly one year before he was killed. It was a speech to a rally organized by Clergy and Laymen Concerned about Vietnam.
Psalm 40:1-3
I waited patiently for the LORD;
he inclined to me and heard my cry.
He drew me up from the desolate pit,
out of the miry bog,
and set my feet upon a rock,
making my steps secure.
He put a new song in my mouth,
a song of praise to our God.
Many will see and fear,
and put their trust in the LORD.
Solo: "I Love the Lord, Who Heard My Cry" 362 (v. 2)
A few years ago there was a shining moment… It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor--both black and white--through the poverty program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. Then…I watched the program broken and eviscerated as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such….
Psalm 40:4-5
Happy are those who make the LORD their trust,
who do not turn to the proud,
to those who go astray after false gods.
You have multiplied, O LORD my God,
your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us;
none can compare with you.
Were I to proclaim and tell of them,
they would be more than can be counted.
HYMN (seated) "He Is King of Kings" HE IS KING 153 (v. 1)
We as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.
Psalm 40:6-8
Sacrifice and offering you do not desire, but you have given me an open ear.
Burnt offering and sin offering you have not required.
Then I said, "Here I am; in the scroll of the book it is written of me.
I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart."
HYMN (seated) "Somebody's Knocking at Your Door" 382 (v. 2)
Our only hope today lies in our ability to recapture the revolutionary spirit and go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal hostility to poverty, racism, and militarism. With this powerful commitment we shall boldly challenge the status quo and unjust mores and thereby speed the day when "every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight and the rough places plain."
Psalm 40:9-11
I have told the glad news of deliverance in the great congregation;
see, I have not restrained my lips, as you know, O LORD.
I have not hidden your saving help within my heart,
I have spoken of your faithfulness and your salvation;
I have not concealed your steadfast love
and your faithfulness from the great congregation.
Do not, O LORD, withhold your mercy from me;
let your steadfast love and your faithfulness keep me safe forever.
Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter--but beautiful--struggle for a new world. This is the calling of the sons of God, and our brothers wait eagerly for our response. Shall we say the odds are too great? Shall we tell them the struggle is too hard?... Or will there be another message, of longing, of hope, of solidarity with their yearnings, of commitment to their cause, whatever the cost? The choice is ours, and though we might prefer it otherwise we must choose in this crucial moment of human history.
*HYMN "We Shall Overcome"
SERMON
The night before he died, Martin Luther King, Jr. was addressing the striking sanitation workers in Memphis in a meeting at Mason Temple. His flight that day from Atlanta had been delayed by a bomb threat. The pilot explained to those onboard they were being held up by a bomb threat to their fellow passenger, Dr. King.
During the speech he recalled an earlier assassination attempt and read a letter from a 9th-grader at White Plains High School. She said, "While it should not matter, I would like to mention that I'm a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune, and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze." King went on to review everything he would have missed if he had sneezed.
Then toward the end of his speech, King evoked the last chapter of Deuteronomy, where Moses climbs Mt. Nebo and gains a view of the Promised Land which he knows he will not live to enter. King used language that seems to foreshadow his impending death:
And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers? Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life; longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. And I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land. So I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.
Was it that he had a premonition? Or did he live all his life with an awareness of the risks and a commitment to answering his call?
When John the Baptist says, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" we know he's using the metaphor of the Passover lamb… It's an image that, here in his baptism foreshadows Good Friday. In this season of Ordinary time, we're beginning to look toward Lent, when we survey the great mystery of the cross. However we interpret it, Holy Week is the pivot point of history. I am increasingly convinced that Jesus' death was a lived-parable in which he taught us the power of God's forgiveness. And I am sure it was supposed to be the last crucifixion.
There's been a lot of talk over the past 8 days about language and violence in our country. If you've read my blog, you know that I support all proposals to control guns, support families and individuals who are in need of help, and watch our words, so long as our proposals for change include ourselves and are not blaming someone else for our problems. As we observe the national holiday to remember the life and teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we need to do more than recall him as a dreamer. We urgently need to listen to his message of non-violence.
One of the young women in the church I served in NJ wrote in highschool that the person she'd most like to meet was Martin Luther King, because, she said, "He was passionate about what he believed in and stood up for it." I know that many of us can identify with her sentiment. But we have grown tired or even fearful of the passionate intensity of today's political and media rhetoric.
Where are the people who remember and stand up for King's message of active non-violence? Who will say it's just as true today as it was when he spoke at Riverside Church 44 years ago: America will never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam (or Iraq and Afghanistan) continue to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube."? Who will dare to articulate that war is an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such?
John the Baptist could be talking about Jesus, about Martin Luther King, and about us! Any one of us can make the difference, if we care about our faith and stand up for it. In his speech at the gathering in Tucson this week, President Obama said, " We cannot and will not be passive in the face of such violence. We should be willing to challenge old assumptions in order to lessen the prospects of such violence in the future." I want to say that one of the old assumptions we need to challenge is that more guns will not make us safer. That violence begets violence. "We may not be able to stop all evil in the world, but I know that how we treat one another, that’s entirely up to us."
Poet Elizabeth Alexander who chairs the African American Studies Department at Yale says, "African American experience is one way of telling the American story and…it's a profoundly centered way of telling the American story. …In fact, if you don't get it and if you move around it in some way, if you don't pass through it, [you] will profoundly misunderstand America."
In the end, we don't need to enshrine MLK in some pious tomb (adorning the graves of the prophets). Let him speak through his speeches, his sermons, and his deeds.
The same will be true for us. The dawning awareness that our life is limited is one of the wake-up calls in life that can prompt us to do the best we can today.
There’s an old Hasidic tale:
The rabbi asks: “how can we determine the hour of dawn, when the night ends, and the day has dawned?”
One of the students suggests that it is dawn when, from a distance, you can distinguish between a dog and a sheep. No, said the Rabbi.
Is it when you can look at a tree in the distance and tell whether it's a fig tree or a peach tree? “No,” the rabbi responds. “You know it is almost dawn when you can look into the face of a woman or man and see that she or he is your sister or brother because, if you cannot do this, then no matter what time it is, it is still night."
We have been privileged to host 15-20 brothers and sisters each night this week in the ESP… It's food and shelter for the homeless. And it's good and important work for us to be doing. But if it's the only thing we're doing, we know it's not enough. We know that Dr. King was right, that we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.
I heard a comment on the fast-disappearing coral reefs, that they may all be gone in 50 years. And I realized that I will certainly be gone in 50 years. And as far as PCMK is concerned, I will be finished my journey with you in far less than that. Let's do today what God calls us to do. And let our actions and our lives speak the truth that we were fully awake and shining with the glory of God. Amen.
I planned to play a song sung by Joe Carter (1949-2006) entitled "Let the Work that I've Done." But we were privileged to have a wonderful singer, Nicola James with us to sing a version of the spiritual live.
If you like, you can hear the song as recorded by Joe Carter by clicking here. Carter was a celebrated performer, educator, and traveling humanitarian who took the African-American Spiritual to audiences around the world, from Novosibirsk to Nigeria. Let's listen to his song and vow to make it our own… [click here]
--Jack Lohr, Interim Pastor
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