Loading...On Friday October 19, 2018, the water temperature at Geist Creek Lake was 61 degrees Fahrenheit. If you are keeping track of the temperature changes, that’s a whopping eleven degrees different than on Oct 12. Here’s the difference 11 degrees makes. When a swimmer who is learning how to acclimatize to cold water gets water up her nose in 72 degrees it feels annoying. When a swimmer gets water up her nose in 61 degree water it is cause for complete panic. This suffering marks the official start of my training.
After years of swimming and dreaming and planning, suffering is the remaining component to fulfill my purpose of swimming the English Channel in 2021. Thank you for listening to that.
The water has my attention now. I am listening to it like never before.
I am inviting you to come with me into some cold theological waters. For just a moment. If you start to feel panic take a deep breath then exhale.
Here we go: God’s plans and purposes are inseparable from suffering.
Some of you are using this opportunity to begin writing the grocery list for the things you need to stop for on the way home.
For those who are still with me, still breathing, let’s swim in this notion of suffering for a bit longer.
Here [on the wall behind me where hangs a crucifix] is [the depiction of ] what we mean when we say God is love. A man is executed for crimes of which he is innocent.
This crucifix is one image to which much of the world pays attention, regardless of whether the world is pledged to it or not. If you’ve ever driven from Louisville to Chicago, try and count the number of billboards with crucifixes on I-65N. What is so attention grabbing about a crucifix? And why have I never met anyone wearing a necklace with the charm of an empty tomb? Have you?
Paying attention, literally “listening to” is what the word obey means. And for the writer of the letter to the Hebrews obedience to, listening to, is the hope of our salvation. Because God, the Son, listens to God the Father, we are saved. When we listen to God the Son, we are included in God’s saving plans and purposes.
Let’s examine some of Jesus’ closest pals and the way they listen to Jesus. In the gospel reading, James and John are two brothers who want to be like Jesus. Don’t we all? Or do we? Look at this crucifix again.
James and John are listening to Jesus AND to the special voice they get to hear on the mountaintop. Their understanding of Jesus is of his mountaintop glory. Remember in Mark chapter 9 where they were all praying with Jesus and saw his clothes turn dazzling white while he was talking to Moses and Elijah. Then they heard the voice and saw the cloud. Glorious! James and John want a part of that!
Go big or go home! So they boldly ask Jesus the equivalent of we want to be like you, give us this glory when they demand: “Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.” And he said to them, “What is it you want me to do for you?”
Few voices have ever uttered such sacrificial words. Jesus essentially pledges: I will give you everything that is mine to give. And what Jesus has to give is suffering. The baptism and the cup of Calvary. Jesus describes his self-understanding this way: “For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.”
Brrr. If you need to warm up a little, listen to that same message in the words of French poet Paul Claudel: Jesus didn’t come to take away our suffering. He came to fill it with his presence (paraphrase).
Behind the dumpster of Prospect Park Apartment complex on Highway 42 is a drainage ditch. This is where I laid to rest Hollie, my son’s pet rabbit. The dwarf lop-eared Holland rabbit was a Christmas present last year and didn’t quite make her first birthday. On Friday afternoon I packed my chimney starter, lighter fluid, and a butane torch. When her cremation and prayer were complete, her final resting place was marked with a flat stone from Guist Creek and a small wooden cross my friend Kathy made. Hollie’s life was mostly spent in a cage in a dark room alone. The only other person who attended her funeral was a curious neighbor who came to investigate the flames. When I told him of their purpose he immediately exited the scene. He did not want to hear. Thank you for listening.
I can talk about money, politics. These topics are often inflammatory or grief inducing, or possibly as annoying as getting water up one’s nose. But for me they are measurable, tangible, finite. I either can or cannot control the variables surrounding them. And so I am also willing to listen when you want to talk about them.
But I cannot control anything about death and the circumstances surrounding it. I can only let it be. I can only sink in my seat when I hear the words Isaiah speaks about a father and a son: …. it was the will of the Lord to crush him with pain.
Where do I go with that kind of suffering? Forward. To read Hebrews.
The writer of this letter surely knew what Isaiah meant because the writer of Hebrews links obedience, listening with suffering.
Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered; and having been made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him, having been designated by God a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.
There is very little history about Melchizedek. In the book of Genesis, Abraham has just come from a mighty battle where his enemies were defeated. He offers the war booty to Melchizedek, the priest-king. In return Melchizedek gives Abraham bread and wine. Because of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, we are the bread and wine offered to a world just come from battle, where enemies may or may not be defeated.
St. James serves as a sacramental address of refreshment and nourishment. Look at the meal offered to the 150 people who attended trunk or treat on Friday night.
Saturday morning the vestry gathered for renewal and strength with the leadership of Senior Warden Eric Martin. Saturday night mutual resources were exchanged at the Trivia Night Fundraiser for the choir. Bread and wine might look like Laundry Love for those who get to have both clean bedding and clean clothes. Like Melchizedek, we are the place where those waging mighty battles come for reconciliation. St James is where those in the midst of hopelessness may come to claim hope. Like the obedient, cold, and shiverless body on the cross, we are the place suffering and glory meet. Thank you for listening.
