"The Power of Being With God"
Living with God changes our lives.
Sermon Preached by
The Rev. Dr. Andrew Stirling
Sunday, February 4, 2007
Text: Mark 3:13-30
It was just over a year ago when I was privileged to be in Ottawa attending the National Prayer Breakfast on Parliament Hill. This is the coming together of clergy, religious leaders, politicians, dignitaries, diplomats and interested people to have breakfast, to pray for the nation and to listen to an inspiring speaker. I was thrilled to be there, not only to pray for the nation, but to meet with many old friends and colleagues from my Ottawa days, politicians I hadn't seen for a number of years, and diplomats from all over the world. It was a wonderful opportunity to pray, to eat, to talk, and to hear someone inspirational.
When I got there, I was surrounded by people who wanted to talk to me. I enjoyed conversations about life in Toronto, what our church is doing, current issues, the state of the church worldwide, and talking to friends about golf and the Ottawa Senators, God bless them! There were so many discussions and I looked forward to the best part of any such gathering - breakfast.
I waited and was finally seated at my table, only to be told by the maître d' that they had run out of food. I had nothing to eat! As the speaker spoke, my stomach grumbled and I made a little note to myself for future reference: “Stirling, always bring a banana!” It was just that with so many conversations, so many chats, so many issues, there was no time to eat!
In our passage from Mark's Gospel, Jesus had that problem - and more! We read that he didn't have an opportunity to eat because the crowds were pressing in on him. Wherever he went, word spread about his miracles, his healings, his wise teachings and nobody knew quite how to deal with this great man. He was becoming a superstar, and like many superstars, he was surrounded by the paparazzi of his day.
We read in Mark's Gospel that although Jesus went up to the Lake of Galilee (known as Gemnesaret), to find some peace and quiet away from the struggles of the big city of Jerusalem, even there he could not find peace and quiet and a meal. His fame was spreading everywhere. In typically graphic Mark fashion, he tells us that people were coming over, from Idumaea, Tyre and Sidon, which we now know as Lebanon, from Judea and even from the areas around Galilee to Jerusalem in the south to meet this Jesus, who was doing these incredible, marvellous and glorious things.
Jesus knew then that if he was going to get away from the crowds he had to go further than the lake, he had to go up on a mountainside. We encounter Jesus, in this morning's passage, taking his 12 most beloved disciples with him to that mountain. Jesus called the disciples because he knew that he needed to surround himself with people who would do the work, those who would carry on his mission. In fact, of the 11 verbs used in this passage, nine of them were associated with things Jesus did. In other words, Jesus initiated all this. He called each of the disciples, he appointed them and then he sent them into the world with the message of the good news that he embodies.
Not only that, he prepared the way for them to do great and glorious things. He gave them authority over demons and powers. He gave them the right to carry on his work and even though there are those who objected to what he was doing - his healing, his care, his love and those who believed he was doing more than an ordinary healer should do - Jesus understood that his work was the work of the Holy Spirit. He wanted the disciples up on the mountain to quietly reflect and pray with him in order that they might have the authority and the calling to carry on their ministry.
My friends, this is important because it is no accident that we who are here today baptizing children and babies in his name, do so precisely because he called those disciples. Those disciples created the link between Jesus and now. Those disciples were the source of information for the gospels that we read. Those disciples were the inspiration for carrying on the tradition that Jesus established when he took them up on to the mountain. When he went up there with them and he prayed with them and he empowered them, he was creating a link for future generations.
In his gospel, Mark adds a wonderful little clause, “They will be with him.” Jesus was not interested in some sort of formal agreement where they would continue the mission after his death and resurrection. He wanted them to live with him, to be with him, to learn of him. Mark includes this, and all commentators agree, that all disciples might realize that they have communion, they have a relationship with Jesus.
You see, when Jesus called those disciples, he wasn't just calling them in time and in place, he was calling all those who would follow him for generations to come. When Jesus went to the mountaintop and he called the 12, he was calling you and he was calling me. When Jesus went to the mountaintop to be alone, he gave them the power to do great things. So, too, he empowers us to do great things, if we will but be still and listen.
How are we to be with him? How? Did Jesus say to the disciples, “Oh, I just want you to hang around?” Or, did he say in a loose way, “I want you to have some kind of tenuous association with me?” No! He said, “I want to be with you, and I want you to be with me.” So how do we, more than 2,000 years later, be with Christ? How do we follow his example? How do we feel the power to be able to continue the witness and the message that he gave?
Some time ago, I read a really beautiful poem by John Rice. I don't often use poetry, but this is so good, because its five stanzas sum up what it means to be a disciple and how to follow Christ. The first stanza is just beautiful in its simplicity:
I had walked life's path with an easy tread;
I had followed where comfort and pleasure led;
And then by chance in a quiet place,
I met my master face to face.
Here is intimacy. Here is a sense of being with Christ. But, you will notice that he said he'd tried comfort, he'd tried the easy path, but in a quiet place he came face-to-face with God. It is no coincidence my friends, that when Jesus wanted to be with the disciples and give them something powerful, he took them away from the maddening crowds to a quiet place.
I was reading an article not long ago in the New York Times about the creation of a new radio station in New York. One of the problems that you have in creating a radio station in a noisy city is finding a building that can keep out all the noise. It really is a challenge! Noise, like light, can permeate all manner of cracks and barriers. Today, of course, there are sound boards and sound barriers and acoustic tiles and other wonderful things, but I remember what it was like when I first did work in broadcasting as a teenager at a BBC radio station in northern England.
My show was called “Teenage Talk.” It sounds kitschy now, but it was cool at the time, or at least I thought it was! (It didn't have many listeners, mind you, but we won't get into that!) They built this radio booth with incredibly thick walls, in City Hall. The greatest problem was keeping out outside and extraneous noises. I mean, there was glass, there were doors, there were windows, there were holes for the wiring, and keeping out all the noise was a real challenge, trust me.
They decided to test whether the booth was soundproof by locking me in it. They felt that if I, with my voice, couldn't be heard outside then it must be soundproof. So, I made the biggest racket you can imagine. I prattled on for ages, all alone. They heard nothing, but nobody bothered to tell me! I was screaming in there for more than ten minutes before they finally came in and said, “Oh, by the way, we can't hear you!”
It is amazing! You can't send out meaningful messages if you have extraneous noises interfering: So it is to be a disciple! There is the need for peace and quiet and for solitude. Mother Teresa said, “God is a friend of silence.” So it is with being a disciple. If we want to walk with Christ and follow Christ and hear Christ we need to be silent! Rice goes on:
With station and rank and wealth forgo,
Much thought for body but none for soul,
I have entered to win this life's mad race;
When I met my master face-to-face.
Who among us can say that our lives have not been a mad race at times? A mad race to hear more; a mad race to accumulate more; a mad race just because it is a mad race! For parents bringing up children, there is a real need to put the brakes on the mad race. There is a need to listen and to ponder, and not be driven by the empty sounds of empty vessels, which make the most noise.
To truly be a disciple means to stop the mad race once in a while: to stop this concern for body, but not for soul. Stop! See the Master's face! The disciples had to do it 2,000 years ago. Mad crowds and all the people who were gathered around were not bringing about the kingdom. The kingdom came when the disciples listened and were with Jesus:
I met him and knew him and blushed to see,
That his eyes were full of sorrow for me
And I faltered and fell at his feet that day,
When my castles vanished and melted away.
What a way to describe meeting Christ! All the things that we build up and think are important just evaporate.
I look around this church today and I think about the past two or three weeks and realize that there are some very sad people here because of the sudden deaths of their loved ones. I think about my only remaining uncle who died this week in England. His widow and my cousins are grieving. I think of all the castles that we build, all the tributes to ourselves, all the great and the glorious idols that we worship, but you know in the end, they are not really worth much. They fade away.
The castles we build, as strong as they are and as powerful as they are, are nothing compared to the love of God. Sometimes my friends, we need to search our hearts, as Rice says, “And I faltered and fell at his feet that day.” Sometimes there is a need for us to have a moment of introspection, to listen to our consciences and to the guidance of the power of the Holy Spirit.
Do you remember a number of years ago, cars were introduced that had voices come on to let you know when something was wrong? I think I mentioned a couple of years ago that Marial had one. A very deep male voice would tell her that her windshield washer fluid was low, or that her door was ajar. This was the “little man” in her life. Mind you, we got rid of him after a while, but that's another story!
A colleague of mine drove a car with a female voice, a very sweet female voice, but it was one of those voices that grew to be was a little irritating because it seemed to him that the nearer it came to catastrophe, the higher-pitched her voice became: “Your fuel is low! Your fuel is low! Your fuel is really low!” He finally got tired of hearing her crying out to him and did what any sane person would do - he unplugged her! He reached under the dash and he yanked the cord, and he drove off - for about two kilometres before he became stranded at the side of the road in Merrickville! He should have listened to her!
I think that is like our consciences. God gives us a conscience to be with him, to hear him, to listen to him, but what do we do? We unplug him and we run dry! We build our castles and they melt away.
Melted and vanished and in their place,
I saw naught else but my Master's face;
And I cried, O Lord, O make me meek;
To follow the marks of thy wounded feet.My thought is now for the souls of men;
I have lost my life to find it again;
Ever since alone in that holy place
My Master and I stood face-to-face.
John Rice realized that being a disciple means walking in the footsteps of Christ. It means walking where the wounded are and being with them as Christ is with us. To be with Christ is to walk with the wounded, to walk with the weak, to identify with them and to speak on their behalf. That is one of the great calls of discipleship.
So often, I think we become so numb to the wounded feet in this world that we are not sensitive or open to them. Sometimes I think, as I did when I woke up this morning, that a couple of hundred people getting killed in an explosion in Iraq is just another statistic, just a few more dead bodies being wheeled into a morgue in the middle of Baghdad. Sometimes, when the body of a soldier comes home, we say, “It's another soldier” hold a ceremony and forget about them within a week.
Sometimes, when we think of the wounded in spirit and in mind, we simply dismiss them as if they don't really matter. But Disciples of Christ walk with them. Disciples of Christ identify with them. Disciples of Christ speak for them, and ask for peace.
When we come face-to-face with Christ, and when we see the Master in that way, the whole point of reference from the top of that mountain changes. When those disciples stood up there with Jesus, and looked down on Galilee and saw the crowds gathered below, they knew that for the rest of their days and for time immemorial they would be with Christ and he would be with them. As disciples, let us realize in our hearts and in our lives what it means to be with Jesus. Amen.
This is a verbatim transcription of the original sermon.