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Caught Like Moths Around Manhattan's LightFebruary 17, 2008 Second Sunday in Lent I’m guessing that more than 95% of those present this morning did not grow up in New York City. There’s probably a few natives scattered around, but the overwhelming majority surely have their roots in other parts of this country or in numerous nations around the world. This means that most of you chose to come here. Some might say you had to come because your employer insisted on it. Still, that would mean you chose to stay with that employer. As rebuttal, you might insist that personal or professional financial matters made it imperative that you come. Playing devil’s advocate, I could ask whether those specific contextual matters chose you or you chose them. But whatever the reason, here you are in this pretentious, glorious city. Some came to school and stayed on longer than originally intended. Some thought a stint here in banking, law, medicine, or some other profession would set up their careers in another geography only to discover that the powerful seductiveness of the city can grow like kudzu, strangling old notions of a life’s direction. Many of you were prompted by a spirit of adventure – maybe most of you. Some came without a real portfolio other than sincere conviction that somehow the city held a promise about your future. I know there are many present today who came to sing, act, paint, dance, or otherwise unleash their creative energies. Some overcame great hurdles to get here – hurdles of money, family, language, culture and government. Some of you always knew the city had a part to play in your life adventure. You experienced it like a call on your life. Others have been surprised by the turns in the road that brought you here and surprised that you’ve stayed on. More recently, say, since the millennium flipped, New York City has been rediscovered as a surprisingly wonderful place to raise children. The pretense of the safety and supposed values found in suburban environments and more remote parts of the nation have been exposed as simply that – pretense. New York is now one of the safest cities in the world. So, adventuresome couples shock their relatives and friends with the news that city life has claimed them, for better or worse. And with twenty years of experience here under my belt, I’ve been struck recently by an emergent spirituality. I’ve been thinking that my work has never seemed more relevant, never more at the center of what increasingly matters for people. It’s in the air, if not in casual conversation, this hunger for faith in transcendent reality, even here in the great big, so-called secular city. In theory, there are any number of other places you might be – even wish you were – but you’re not. You’re here. And since this is a church, it occurs to me to ask if you think God had anything to do with this. You probably function from the perspective that not only are you the main actor in your own life drama, but you’re also the playwright, director, and producer as well. If so, has the script been written from this point forward? From here, do you know where you’re going? I suppose you might say, “Well after service I’m going to brunch.” Which is all well and good as far as it goes, but we’re asking a more substantial question. Where are you really headed? By what light do you travel? What matters to you most of all? What gods do you serve? And are you wanting something authentic and powerful on which to rely? Are you looking for faith, by any chance, the real kind that pierces through your cellular membranes into the very heart of your invisible essence? That might sound a little overwrought, I suppose. Still, as Edwin Searcy 1 points out, I think we are a people who mostly live each day somewhere between verse one and verse two of Psalm 121. That Psalm begins, “I lift up my eyes to the hills – from where will my help come?” The second verse answers, “My help comes from the Lord.” Searcy suggests there should be a long silence between these verses since most of us much of the time live our lives in that space. Where does our help come from, anyway? In last Sunday’s Times Magazine this advertisement caught my eye. The bold letters up top announce: “You just sold your company for $50 million. How quickly that feeling of euphoria can turn to fear.” Having captured your attention by touching the sensitive fear button, you squint to read the small copy down below: “Finally, you can relax. All your hard work and late nights just turned into more wealth than you ever imagined. You experience a feeling of euphoria. Then, just as suddenly, you experience a feeling quite foreign – fear. You realize that after years of knowing exactly what to do, you don’t even know where to start.” And so on. You quickly learn that what you need, where your true help comes from, is a certain wealth management firm. Notwithstanding this novelty ad was directed to a highly select group of people, I thought it was an apt metaphor for those of us who have been caught like moths around the light of Manhattan. Not that most of us have managed to amass a fortune, but most of us have stepped out to follow our own byway of the yellow brick road to Emerald City, the place where dreams supposedly can come true. And just as Dorothy and her sidekicks were dogged by fear in the land of Oz, so we are, which is why that famous story remains so iconic within our culture. As the ad makes clear, even amassing a fortune is no hedge against fear. Indeed, hitting the fear button becomes an exquisite marketing tool since, contrary to the ad’s conceit, most of us are fearful about something nearly all of the time, not just at the end of the line when our ship has finally landed. We don’t have mountains to look up to in our home town, but we do walk in deep canyons between towers scraping the sky and if your eyes are anything like mine, from time to time they drift upward taking in the dramatic manmade perspective and the thought crosses your mind, from where will my help come from? The lesser gods clamoring for your attention, selling their various wares and elixirs, some even moderately helpful, can’t touch the heart of your invisible essence. All of our scripture today concerns authentic faith. The short verses from Genesis set the stage for 4 billion people today. Jews, Christians and Muslims all look to Abram as spiritual forebear, as prototype in faith. Those few words hardly seem adequate for such an astonishing outcome. Abram, listening to the voice of God, left his own version of Kansas – the home of his parents and family – for a new place where he’s promised an astonishing progeny. He wouldn’t live to see the real result of his questing that we now assign to him thousands of years later, just long enough to realize the smallest of beginnings. He would have had faith about the rest of it. Nicodemus took a much shorter journey under cover of night, but he is clearly searching after that which could be reliably understood as the source of hopeful, reliable faith. Jesus’ cryptic words about being born from above, or born again, leave Nicodemus wanting more. And the mystery deepens when Jesus speaks of this as a spiritual matter, that is, a matter pertaining to the spirit of God that blows where it will. Nicodemus was a religious leader in his day. (Evidently even religious leaders want renewal of their faith, at least, I think, those with an authentic heart for truth rather than a simple reliance on rehashing pious platitudes.) Did Nicodemus receive what he was after? Was he reborn of the spirit from above? As John tells the tale, near the end of the gospel Nicodemus returns, re-introduced as the one who had come to Jesus by night, now laden with a hundred pounds of spices and perfumes. Together with Joseph of Arimathea they will prepare Jesus’ body for burial and lay him in the tomb. I suspect he was as well positioned as anyone to receive the startling gift that was given Easter morn. Nothing but spirit wind, I suspect, would allow anyone to receive that gift. And where does this leave us today? Well, as we said earlier all the life decisions you’ve ever taken have landed you here at this very moment. When looking out at everyone and imagining the remarkable yellow brick paths that brought each of you here I’m rather overwhelmed by the seeming complexity leading to this singularity in time. But in this specific moment each of us hears the same proposition that a life well-lived, a life tuned to listening for truth and properly oriented toward God boils down to the matter of receiving the gift of faith. Could be that you thought this spiritual quest was more complicated than this. It isn’t really. On the other hand, I know this sort of faith can seem elusive, even for those of us, like Nicodemus, who have been well-schooled in the religious arts. But here’s a very small discipline I recommend for each of you during this season of Lent. Intentionally walk with Jesus through his final days. Brood upon his words and actions. Sit in his presence. Listen. Take stock. Bracket your own agenda for the moment. Let God speak to you for a change. As part of your discipline repeat this short sentence: “Lord, increase my faith.” Let it become a repetitive mantra throughout your day. Let’s say that phrase together so you get the feel of it: “Lord, increase my faith.” And again, “Lord, increase my faith.” When you wake up in the morning offer that prayer. Say it out loud or silently to yourself when eating breakfast. Then again at lunch and dinner. Learn to have that short mantra at the ready in any other moment that occurs to you. There is no wrong time to say it. There are only right times. If you stumble upon the ad about fear and wealth management, let it remind you to say this prayer. When looking up in the Wall Street canyons, let it come to your mind. When doing the laundry, washing the dishes, saying good night to your children, brushing your teeth, let it come to your mind. Make it your Lenten discipline. Here’s an ironclad guarantee: If you follow this suggestion during these days of Lent with a sincere heart, come Easter morn, you will be ready like you never have been before to receive the astonishing gift of faith. You may yet discover that New York held a promise for you that you could never have imagined.... ____________________ Previous sermon: Ashes to Ashes • Next sermon: Thirsty All past sermons |
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