November 9, 2008 - "The Family Cloister"

Crescent Hill Baptist Church
Louisville, Kentucky
Children’s Sabbath
Pentecost 26
November 9, 2008
W. Gregory Pope

SERIES: The New Monasticism
THE FAMILY CLOISTER

Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25; Psalm 78:1-7;
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18; Matthew 25:1-13


Adult Moment: The Family Cloister (I)

I want to ask everyone who has a child under 18 living in their home - parents, grandparent, aunt, uncle, guardian - to come down to the front for an “adult moment.”

We have spent this Fall looking at monastic spirituality as a model for our own spirituality and our life together as a congregation.

This morning I want us to think about our homes as monasteries, as family cloisters, places that nurture us as persons. One woman recently published a book entitled My Monastery is a Minivan because that’s where she spends most of her time with her kids running them from one place to another. And when she stopped to think about it, she realized some holy things happened even in her minivan.

Sometimes we may feel as if we are trapped in a cloister like a minivan or even our homes. We have duties and people we cannot escape. But I want us to take a moment together and think about how we can make our homes healthy places of growth and love for ourselves and our children. I also have a handout to give you that you can read and use as a guide. And a little later, I’m going to be talking to your kids about what they can do to help.

The Kentucky monk Thomas Merton said we are all beginners at prayer. Always we begin again. Today I want to give you that gift as parents.


No matter how old our children are, most of us look back at mistakes we’ve made and wish we could do some things over. I don’t know that any of us would want to start parenting over completely, but all of us I think would like a few do-overs. But parenting is on-the-job training.

And this morning I want you to give yourself permission to receive a fresh start, especially when it comes to some spiritual practices within your home. Your kids might think it’s a little weird. It may even seem odd to you. But if as a congregation we could support one another in making our homes a place of spiritual formation, I think we would be more satisfied with our task as parents.

Our scripture lesson this morning from the psalms commands us to teach our children the ways of God, to tell them what God has done in our lives. And they are to teach their children. The psalmist says that the purpose in teaching our children God’s commandments is so they will set their hope in God.

It can be hard to be a kid. And as you know, some things get even harder as you become an adult. It can be easy to lose hope.

(Give handout)

This handout that I’m giving you is based on a book by David Robinson, an Oregon pastor, entitled The Family Cloister: Benedictine Wisdom for the Home. Just as I have been taking The Rule of Benedict and seeking to apply it to our life as a church, Robinson has taken Benedict’s Rule and sought to apply it to the home.

I ask that you as parents talk about this together and then with your children, and perhaps even create a Rule of Life for your family.

I have been the abbot this Fall. The abbot is a symbol of Christ in a monastery. In the home you are the abbot. You represent Christ to your children.

Benedict instructs abbots to point out to the monks all that is good and holy more by example than by words.

There is no “do as I say not as I do.” But rather we say to our children, “Live as I live and learn from my mistakes.”

I encourage you Tuesday through Friday to use the daily Bible readings that follow the lectionary, the texts we will be using in worship that week. (Give them a copy). And then on Monday, talk about the previous Sunday.

And to those of you adults who do not have children living in your house, you can help in this place, in this larger family of God, teaching children in Sunday School, or loving them in the way that you talk to them, or supporting our ministries to children as you give.

Let us all take seriously scripture’s call to teach our children the ways of God.

Let’s pray.

(Pray for our children. Pray for ourselves as parents.)


Sermon for Children: The Family Cloister (II)

How many of you kids think your parents could use some help in how to be a parent? Anybody here got perfect parents? (No, there are no perfect parents. Only God is the perfect parent of us all.)

All parents need help. I’m a parent and I know I could use some help.

When we had our “adult moment” a few minutes ago I gave them some information with ideas about how they could become better parents.

Right now I want to talk with you about what you can do to help make your parents better parents, and what you can do to make your home a better place.

Anybody here feel that it’s tough to be a kid - to obey your parents, get good grades in school, clean up your room, doing chores? It is hard some times.

But I’ve been a kid (I still act like one at times) and I’m a parent right now of three children, and I can tell you that being a parent is much harder than being a kid. It really is.

That’s why I’ve given your parents some information that I hope they will choose to share with you.

What I want to ask you to do is take what they say seriously and to offer your ideas as to what can make you a better family.

Think about what you can be responsible for in your home that would help.

Let’s say for example, you’re 15 or 11, and your parents have gone crazy and now a 3-year-old lives in your house. They may need your help parenting the 3-year-old or doing things they don’t have time to do.

Or your parents may need to help take care of their parents, and you can help by doing things around the house.

It takes everybody in the family to make a house a loving home.

Your parents have a huge responsibility to take care of you. They are responsible to God for what they teach you and how they live before you. And all parents make mistakes. And this morning I’ve cut them some slack and given myself some slack, because God cuts us all some slack - it’s called grace. God forgives our mistakes, those things we have failed to do as parents and as children, and gives us a fresh start.

And this morning I want all of our families to have a fresh start. In some ways to begin again. And I want you to listen well to your parents, and I want your parents to listen to you, as each person in your family talks about how to make your family better.

Would you promise to do that for me? All right. Let’s pray.

(Pray for our parents. Pray for ourselves as children.)


Handout to Parents

Based on the book by David Robinson,
The Family Cloister: Benedictine Wisdom for the Home

FAMILY SPIRITUALITY

The family as the primary place for the shaping of a child - physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

We are sometimes tempted to leave all spiritual formation to the church.

But I want to encourage you as parents to take on some of that responsibility yourself.

As parents we are called to guide their spiritual development.

Ask yourself:

What kind of person do I want my child to become? And what am I doing to help shape that kind of person?

Am I teaching them they can have whatever they want? Or that there are limits?

Is their money/allowance for them to spend however they want? Or should we provide guidance and limitations on what they buy?

How are we embodying the simplicity of Jesus?

A good place to start with the answer as to what kind of person you want your child to become is found in Galatians 5 and the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control. And seek to teach them and guide them in those ways, allowing the Spirit to nurture those things in our children. And it begins by embodying them ourselves.

Teach them Benedict’s ladder of humility we talked about a few weeks ago (September 28 sermon. There are copies in the office and the narthex and online.)

Read the Bible daily together. Tuesdays through Fridays you may want to use the lectionary texts we will be using in worship that week. And then on Mondays talk about what they heard at church the previous day.


FAMILY DISCIPLINE

Every family needs rules and guidelines, knowing what is expected of them.

When we ignore the mistakes and poor choices of our children we are like a gardener ignoring weeds in the garden.

Work on a set of guidelines for your family. This could be something you could sit down together and work out. As a monastery has a Rule of Life, so could our families.

Work on ways to share responsibility in your home.

Limit time on phone, TV, computer, ipod for children and parents.


FAMILY HEALTH

It matters how we treat our bodies.
Pay attention to your diet and eat well.
Exercise as a family if possible.


FAMILY LIFE TOGETHER

Have a family schedule
Do stuff together
Play together
Talking about your life together, even your finances and your budget


FAMILY HOSPITALITY

Shape the home as a hospitable place for each other

Shape the home as a place of hospitality for others, making others (strangers, those in need) welcome in your home.

Make your home a welcome place for those children and parents whose families are broken.


FAMILY GROWTH

Understanding the home as a place of spiritual formation.
Are we growing more Christlike in our home?
Learn to confess to one another and to forgive one another.
Are we growing in our service and love to one another?
What can we do in our families to grow stronger and healthier?


Make some commitments as a family in all these areas.

September 28, 2008 - "Climbing Benedict's Ladder of Humility"

Crescent Hill Baptist Church
Louisville, Kentucky
Pentecost 20
September 28, 2008
W. Gregory Pope

SERIES: The New Monasticism

CLIMBING BENEDICT’S LADDER OF HUMILITY

Exodus 17:1-7; Psalm 78:1-4, 12-16;
Philippians 2:1-13; Matthew 21:23-32

We continue on our search to learn from monastic spirituality and the Rule of St. Benedict, thinking of the church as an abbey and monastery and ourselves as monks and nuns in the world.

Today the subject is humility. The longest chapter in St. Benedict’s Rule is on humility. Of all the words that he uses to describe the proper posture for a life that becomes the gospel, humility is the one word, the one trait that he comes back to again and again.

Benedict bases his writings on the words of Jesus who said,“Whoever exalt themselves shall be humbled, and whoever humbles themselves shall be exalted.”

The root of humility is the Latin word humus, which means “soil” or “earth.” To be humble is to be down-to-earth. It is an acknowledgment of our connectedness to the earth.

The temptation for Adam and Eve was to give up being of the humus - humble and human - and to become gods, the ultimate act of pride. This lack of humility and humanity was their downfall. Their story is played out in the life of every one of us, as people who struggle to be down-to-earth and avoid the temptation to act as if we were the divine center of the universe. If you examine human interactions that go wrong, whether in bitter arguments or wars, there is usually somewhere a lack of humility and an excess of arrogance. Humility is about our struggle to be fully human. [1]

Jesus is the model. In our text for today, Paul calls us to have the mind that was in Christ, who being in the form of God emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, humbling himself, becoming obedient even to the point of death. And because of his humility and obedience, God exalted him.

Humility is synonymous with Christlikeness. Jesus calls us to learn of him for he is gentle and humble of heart. The more we desire to become like Christ, the more we grow in humility.


Benedict’s Ladder of Humility

Benedict talks about humility using the image of a ladder. Drawn from the image of Jacob who had a dream of a ladder upon which angels descended and ascended, Benedict talks about ascending the ladder of humility

Benedict teaches us that “getting ahead” and “being on top” are not the marks of real human achievement. He says that in the spiritual life up is down and down is up: ‘We descend by exaltation and we ascend by humility.” The goals and values of the spiritual life, in other words, are just plain different from the goals and values we’ve been taught by the world around us. Winning, owning, having, consuming, and controlling are not the high posts of the spiritual life. [2]

There are 12 steps on Benedict’s ladder of humility. Written in the sixth century, you could call it history’s first 12-step method of spiritual growth. I have incorporated the twelve, narrowing them down to seven. I do not have time to do them all justice, but perhaps there will be enough here to help you see what authentic humility looks like.

It is important to realize that as we climb the ladder, the steps on the ladder do not cause progress, but measure it. Humility is an interior quality. [3]

The foot of the ladder is the beginning of the spiritual journey. And that’s where we start.

1. REVERENCE

The first step is reverence: to keep “the reverence of God always before our eyes” (Ps 36:2). It’s about living with a profound sense of awe and our whole being possessed by a deep reverence.

Benedict says the humble fear the Lord, and do not become elated over their good deeds; they judge it is the Lord’s power, not their own, that brings about the good in them. They praise the Lord working in them, and say with the psalmist: “Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to Thy name alone give the glory” (Ps 115:1) [4]

The first rung of the spiritual life is to recognize that God is God and we are not.

2. SURRENDERING OF OUR WILL TO GOD’S WILL

The second step is about surrendering our will to God’s will. The reverence toward God that marks the first step helps break our addiction to self-will and opens us up to an authentic receptivity of God. Benedictine sister Joan Chittister says, “If God is my center and my end, then I must accept the will of God, knowing that in it lies the fullness of life for me.” [5]

Benedict says of this second step: we love not our own will nor take pleasure in the satisfaction of our desires; rather we shall imitate by our actions that saying of Christ’s: “I have come not to do my own will, but the will of the One who sent me” (John 6:38).

In monastic language this is called the step of obedience. And it requires us to ask: “Who is my master?” with the realization that we cannot serve two masters.

This step is about renunciation of self-will. The dominance of self-expression in our contemporary culture makes this step sound strange.

Pride is so rampant in our culture through our desire to control; to control my day, my future, the other people in my life, to make sure that the world is put together the way I want it.

This step of humility is to pray with Jesus: “Lord, not my will but thine be done.” It requires an acceptance that the will of God is always to our benefit.

Our deepest spiritual experience is to feel utterly dependent on God and to want to submit ourselves to the divine will. The mystics talk about a point at which to soul becomes absorbed in God and seems no longer to have an autonomous existence. It is the goal of contemplation: a union of ourselves with God.

Obedience on the ladder of humility is the ability to submit ourselves to the wisdom of another. It involves a humility that acknowledges our incapacity to see the whole picture.

In a monastery this obedience to Christ is reflected in a monk’s obedience to the abbot. And the abbot’s task is not to impose his own will or to dominate others but to be a spokesperson for Christ. [6] That is why they are chosen carefully.

Joan Chittister says, “It is to realize that we are not the last word, the final answer, the clearest insight into anything. We have one word among many to contribute to the mosaic of life, one answer of many answers, one insight out of multiple perspectives. Humility lies in learning to listen to the words, directions, and insights of [others who just may be] a voice of Christ for me now.” [7]

This step brings us face to face with our struggle for power. It makes us face an authority outside of ourselves.

This is not a military obedience, but rather the obedience required for a family or community to be a place of love. This is a concrete way of setting aside our desires and is actually a profound expression of freedom. [8]

3. PATIENT ENDURANCE

The third step up the ladder is patient endurance. It is to embrace suffering knowing what Paul said, that in all things we are more than conquerors, overcomers, because of Christ who so greatly loved us.

It is with the mind of Christ that we learn to quietly embraces patience. We train our minds to look beyond present pain to ultimate realities.

This step is about holding on when things do not go our way. It is to realize that all things should be dealt with patiently, that overhasty responses are rarely helpful, even in a crisis. Patience is not about grinning and bearing things we hate. Patience is the attempt to live out in a positive frame of mind the difficulties that come from trying to love other people. [9]

4. RADICAL SELF-HONESTY / CONFESSION

Step four is the call to radical self-honesty and confession, refusing to conceal who we are, but having someone to whom you can humbly confess sinful thoughts that enter the heart, or any wrongs committed in secret.

Joan Chittister writes of this radically honest confession saying: The spiritual heart is a heart that has exposed itself and all its weaknesses and all its pain and all its struggles to one who has the insight, the discernment, the care to call us out of our worst selves to the heights to which we aspire. The struggles we hide, psychologists tell us, are the struggles that consume us. Benedict’s instruction, centuries before an entire body of research arose to confirm it, is that we must cease to wear our masks, stop pretending to be perfect, and accept the graces of growth that can come to us from the wise and gentle hearts of people around us. [10]

Confession, being honest about the negative parts of one’s life, can be a very positive experience. It is positive because it lets light into dark places. Far from making us feel guilty, admitting to a wrong we have done releases us from our guilt and enables us to move forward.

Another’s acceptance in the face of our confession may ease the way for me to see and accept myself as I am.

Mindfulness of our faults can be a source of joy because it reminds us of God’s mercy and how much God loves us. Humility’s distinguishing mark is a deep awareness of our own faults, a lack of complaint about the faults of others, and a constant singing of God’s praise in thankfulness for mercy. [11]

Humility is to be constantly aware of our moral fragility. [12]

This gets to the heart of humility, which is living in the truth, the truth within oneself, our relationships with others and with God. It is not about saying you are worse than you are or denying your gifts and abilities, but about facing the truth of who you are, the truth that we are incomplete without God.

Humility is the opposite of artificiality. Humility is the ability to see ourselves as God does.

Humility teaches us that our gifts are not of our own making. So we do not boast about them.

The gifts we receive are held in trust for the whole human race. They are not for ourselves alone. They are given for sharing. To deny one’s gifts is to deny others the benefit of sharing in their fruits. It is not humility but a waste.

What if John Claypool had said, “I really can’t preach,” and decided to sell insurance instead? That would not have been humility, but a tragic denial of the truth of who God created him to be.

So far we’ve climbed four steps up the ladder of humility: reverence, surrender, patience, and self-honesty.

5. YIELDING TO OTHERS / CONTENTMENT

The fifth step has to do with contentment that expresses itself in a yielding to others. It is to reach that place where we are content with what we’ve been given and content with our place in life. It is the place where we value others more than ourselves and give ourselves in service to others.

Benedict writes: “They should each try to be the first to show respect to the other” (Rom 12:10), supporting with the greatest patience one another’s weakness of body or behavior, and earnestly competing in obedience to one another. No [Christians] are to pursue what they judge better for themselves, but instead, what they judge better for someone else. [13]

This resonates with our text for today where Paul says, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.”

The humility expressed at this stage has to do with the lowering of our self-importance. It is reaching a mature place where we do not have to control people and events, especially in the community of faith. God wants us to grow out of the immaturity of self-importance. [14]

Humility is not the same as a low self-image. We need to be taught self-acceptance and an appropriate level of self-love. It’s about demolishing defenses and admitting the truth of my condition.

Humility brings a sense of solidarity with other human beings. Humility joins us with the rest of the human race. It is pride which causes us to believe we are not like others.

Humility’s opposite is a constant preoccupation with self. As we embrace humility, we realize we have nothing to prove, no need for big ambitions or positions. [15] The humble do not need lies or evasions to inflate their important in front of others or to buttress their self-esteem.

Humility is to be satisfied with a lower place for the purpose of giving honor to another. It’s about putting the self down and becoming good community and family members. [16]

Insofar as our lives are dedicated to pleasing ourselves, then they are doomed to frustration. The real delight in life comes from the acceptance of realities other than one’s own, especially the reality of the other person’s needs.

Humility means allowing one’s self to be formed by others, especially those in the faith community. [17] Think about those in this church or other churches have shaped you. Especially the two people whose lives we are remembering yesterday and tomorrow, Ed Thornton and Fay Leach.

One of the sages said: “I never met anyone in whom I failed to recognize something superior to myself: if the person was older, I said this one has done more good than I; if younger, I said this one has sinned less; if richer, I said this one has been more charitable; if poorer, I said this one has suffered more; if wiser, I honored their wisdom; and if not wiser, I judged their faults more lightly.” Community is the place where we come to honor the world. [18]

To be humble is to welcome wisdom from any direction, to open ourselves to it, to see criticism as an occasion for growth, to see the value of continued evaluation. [19]

It is better to ask the way ten times than to take the wrong road once, a Jewish proverb reads. This step of humility tells us to learn from what has been learned before us, to value the truths taught by others, to seek out wisdom and enshrine it in our hearts, to attach ourselves to teachers so that we do not make the mistake of becoming our own blind guides. It takes a great deal of time to learn all the secrets of life by ourselves. Our living communities have a great deal to teach us. [20]

Important, and often difficult, is to let go of my ambition and self-esteem, my self-assertiveness and self-sufficiency, my wish to be just a little different from everyone else. If through all this I learn to deal with my own limitations then I shall be able to deal with those of other people.

Step five: a yielding to others.

6. RESTRAINT OF SPEECH

The sixth step of humility calls for restraint of speech. The Rule says: We control our tongue and remain silent. As it is written: “The wise are known by few words.”

A good monk’s sermon on humility would be less than five minutes, I’m sure. So I’m not being a good monk or very humble this morning. But we’ve almost reached the top of the ladder.

Michael Casey writes, “Obedience and patience are humility in action, silence is humility in word.” [21]

Ecclesiastes says there is a time to speak and time to be silent. Humility is knowing when and erring on the side of silence.

Silence is not a virtuous end in itself. It is about the ability of silence to nurture the interior life.

Benedict considers chatter that simply fills empty time as a waste. Casey also says that nonstop talking can be a means of insulating oneself from the shock of the real. And that excessive conversation expresses and reinforces a lack of personal discipline in our life. It restricts our capacity to listen. Talking too much often convinces us of the correctness of our own conclusions. [22]

Benedict knows that people can waste a huge amount of time and energy complaining, grumbling, and gossiping maliciously. Benedict hates grumbling and forbids it above all other vices.

Benedict also warns of laughter, the kind of laughter that pokes fun, a mockery that undermines the honor of a person. None of this has any place in a good family, a good community, or a good workplace.

7. INTEGRATION AND TRANSFORMATION

The final step is a total humility in all that is said and done, in body and in heart. Casey calls it integration and transformation, a place where the outer and inner person are one. At the top of the ladder is the goal of perfect love that casts out fear, a place where there is delight in virtue and no fear.

With such humility, “there will be nothing left to fear - not God’s wrath, not the loss of human respect, not the absence of control, not the achievements of others greater than our own.” [23]

It is a call for the humility to say I need to change.

CONCLUSION

So there it is, the ladder of humility: reverence toward God, the surrendering of our will; obedience; the patient embrace of suffering amid hardships; self-honesty; contentment with what one is given; valuing others more than self; submission to others; speaking gently and with modesty; and the integration of transformation in a life of love - these are the steps that lead to humility according to Benedict.

It is about living in the truth of who we are. It’s about the capacity to receive the grace to change. It is to realize that we go up only by going down. As one writer put it: humility is a proper sense of self in a universe of wonders. [24]

So let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling, with a holy seriousness, remembering that it is God at work in us, enabling us both to will and to work for God’s pleasure.

___________________________

1. Abbot Christopher Jamison, Finding Sanctuary: Monastic Steps for Everyday Life, Liturgical Press, 2006, 95
2. Joan Chittister, The Rule of Benedict: Insights For the Ages, Crossroad, 1992, 63
3. Michael Casey, A Guide to Living in the Truth, Liguori, 2001, 43
4. St. Benedict, The Rule of St. Benedict, ed. Timothy Fry, Vintage Spiritual Classics, 1998, Prologue, 29, 30
5. Chittister, 66
6. Casey, 100
7. Chittister, 66-67
8. Jamison, 102
9. Jamison, 102-103
10. Chittister, 68
11. Jamison, 107-108
12. Casey, 77
13. St. Benedict, Chapter 72
14. Casey, 63
15. Andy Freeman and Pete Greig, Punk Monk: New Monasticism and the Ancient Art of Breathing, Regal, 2007, 114
16. Joan Chittister, Wisdom Distilled From the Daily, HarperOne, 1991, 166-167
17. Casey, 157
18. Chittister, The Rule of Benedict, 95
19. Ibid., 158
20. Ibid., 71
21. Casey, 159
22. Casey, 172-174
23. Chittister, The Rule of Benedict, 74
24. Ibid., 62

October 19, 2008 - "Holding Lightly: A Theology of Enough"

Crescent Hill Baptist Church
Louisville, Kentucky
Pentecost 23
October 19, 2008
W. Gregory Pope

SERIES: The New Monasticism

HOLDING LIGHTLY: A THEOLOGY OF ENOUGH

Exodus 33:12-23; Psalm 99; 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10; Matthew 22:15-22

Wayne Ward announced at our noon Bible Study class last Wednesday: “Pastor, I’m doing well with my vow of celibacy!” I don’t know if it was our discussion on rest or the sexuality of Jesus that prompted the remark.

I congratulated him and told him that this Sunday he would be given the opportunity to take a vow of poverty. But I quickly corrected myself and said, “What am I thinking, Wayne? You lived your life as a seminary professor. You took the vow of poverty a long time ago.”

I have heard several interesting remarks from you this fall as we have taken a look into monastic spirituality.

David Cook asked me a few weeks ago, “How’s life in the hood?” referring to the hood on my alb.

Others have wondered when I was going to wear the hood. Which caused others to fear I might then look like a member of the klan.

Someone asked me last Sunday if they should call me “monk” or “brother.” I said I was actually trying to serve as abbot. They said that didn’t sound too humble. And I said, “Well, I’ve been a pope all my life. As I see it, I’ve taken three steps down past cardinal and bishop in order to become an abbot, so I think that’s quite a humble move!

John Birkimer told me how the Solidarity Sunday School Class has been studying the monastic tradition this fall. He said he has actually read The Rule of Benedict and he noted that the qualifications for abbot are quite high. And they are. I told him not to take The Rule too literally. John can be so literal when it comes to matters of faith.

Today we are reflecting upon our relationship with money and possessions through the lens of scripture and how monasticism has embodied scripture in its practice of ownership.

This is the time of year when we consider our financial commitments to the church’s ministry and our life together. You are encouraged to bring your pledge card to worship next week, preferably filled out, and place it in the offering plate as an act of worship. If you need help filling it out, call me.

This season of commitment is not just about how much money we will give to the church next year, but is a time when we all are given the opportunity to reflect upon our priorities as they relate to money and possessions.

It is no secret that we are in a time of global economic turmoil. One might think it a terrible time to make pledges, but I think the opposite may be true. In times like these we are almost forced to evaluate our relationship with money and possessions. As people of faith it can be a time for us to step back from our culture’s message regarding money and possessions and see what scripture has to say about them. When things are going well, we usually don’t think about the differences in the messages between culture and scripture. When things are not going so well, we are often led to think and reflect and pray more about our lives and our priorities.

Paul begins his letter to the Thessalonians thanking them for their partnership in Paul’s ministry, which no doubt included financial help. He also spoke of their turning away from gods, which scripture often does. And it may be that in these days we are being called to turn from the gods of materialism and capitalism and financial idolatry, making sure our trust is not in Wall Street or the government but in the God who calls us to live together in a global community characterized by simplicity and generosity.

In our culture of over-consumption and greed I think we are being called to “a theology of enough.”

It is a theology that calls us to realize there is enough for everyone. And everyone receives enough when we share what we have with others.

It is a theology that calls us to realize that we have enough and we have to curb our collection of things and stop living beyond our means, borrowing more than we will ever be able to pay back.

It is an important word for us in a day when greed is no longer considered a deadly sin but a virtue. Perhaps we are rethinking that these days as we see where unchecked greed has gotten us.

Did you see this week that our national debt in excess of ten trillion dollars is so large it would require $86,000 per household to pay back! We have become an over-indulgent nation living beyond our means. We have lost a sense of enough.

We need to be reminded that growth in productivity and economy is not an inherent virtue. We live in a world of limited resources, and it is foolish for us to live as if it were otherwise.

Benedict writes in chapter 39 of his Rule: Nothing is so inconsistent with the life of any Christian as overindulgence. The Rule of Benedict devotes itself to the virtue of moderation. We are called to simplicity of lifestyle and generosity of heart, engaging in compassionate sharing with the needy of the world. Benedict calls us to remember that in that early Christian community, “Distribution was made as each had need” (Acts 4:35).

There are two words I want us to consider for a moment. They are likely not your favorite two words. But they are central to the gospel and monastic life. The first is renunciation. The second is detachment.

First, renunciation: the giving up of things. Not a popular word or activity in American culture. But at the heart of renunciation is giving things up in order to gain something greater. It’s about holding on to nothing beyond the necessary. [1] Renunciation in itself is not holy, but it creates a necessary space where the holiness of God can dwell and can reorder our lives.

Related to renunciation is the word detachment. Material things can be accepted as gifts of God, but they are also to be regarded with detachment. It is wrong to value or enjoy things, but we must not cling to them or guard them with our lives.

Benedict says that material things are sacramental. They are symbols that reveal the beauty and the goodness of their creator. Benedict says the monk will regard all utensils and goods of the monastery as sacred vessels of the altar. His is a very down-to-earth spirituality. There is no escape here into some interior spiritual life disconnected from the world.” [2]

But there must be a separation between who we are and what we possess.

I would call it “responsible ownership,” which is a common ownership

Benedict’s understanding of poverty was not like that of St. Francis. It was not a giving up of all things. In fact, poverty is not undertaken as one of the Benedictine vows. Benedict understood poverty as the common ownership of all things. By entering the monastery you are vowing to share with the community. Martin Luther said that goods are not goods unless they can be shared.

Benedict says that each monk is to receive all things that are necessary, but no private ownership. Private ownership was to be relinquished and every possession regarded as gift, received in order to be shared with others. No one owns anything privately; all is on temporary loan. And the reason is because community breaks down when “mine” replaces “ours.” [3]

Deprivation is not a Benedictine ideal. On the contrary, the point of Benedictine life is to live simply, joyfully, and fully. Benedict wants the monastic to have enough, to have it from the community and to avoid hoarding, accumulating, consuming, and conniving. [4]

Benedictine monks do “possess” their own clothes, alarm clocks, books, and other stuff. But they do so as a steward. In other words, the community is to benefit from what the monk has as his own. One group of nuns writes their names in their books, preceded by the phrase “for the use of.” Perhaps that is an invisible stamp we should put on all our possessions: a house, a car, a book, clothing. [5]

I think it’s stamped on the front of Glen Bellou’s truck. Glen’s story is shared in Accent, the missions material for CBF this Fall. Glen’s truck is used almost daily to take people to the doctor, to move furniture for someone, and to even make trips for a handful of people who have recently moved to South Dakota. Glen would have made Benedict proud!

Monasteries own cars that can be checked out for use. Perhaps we could do the same. Not just with cars but with other things - to hold them in common - items we need occasionally but do not need to own - things that we only use once or twice a year, we could share them with each other. My wife has a few tools at home in her tool box that I’m sure she would be willing to share and some she would like to borrow as she fixes things around the house.

Common ownership is a way of saying we are only stewards of all that we have. It all belongs to God and is meant to be shared. That is why we give a portion of our money to a common collection: to acknowledge that all we have belongs to God and together we can do more for others than we can do alone.

There is such a thing as responsible ownership - if we “hold lightly” what we own [6] and make all things available to any person in need. The Rule teaches us to cling to nothing, to hold everything - even the best of holy things - with a relaxed grasp. [7]

We are taught in our culture to think that to privately own our possessions and to do what we want with what we have is the defining mark of our freedom. Richard Rohr reminds us that saying no to yourself is the beginning of freedom. It is slavery to be driven by our need to possess, which in turn makes us anxious about protecting what is ours.

John Skinner says monasticism is not a removal from the world, but is instead about a separation from that which divides us - separation from wealth, from status, from exclusive relationships. [8]

St. Francis urged his brothers to rid themselves of land or possessions seeing that it only divided. Possessions are often the causes of disputes and sometimes violence. If we owned them we would be obliged to carry arms to defend them - and to do that would hinder us in loving God and our neighbor. Are there things that you hold on to and cherish that divide you from others? What things, what possessions, do we allow to get in the way of our love for God and those around us? [9] When those very things can be used and given to express our love for God and those around us.

Donald Nicholl says: “Once we realize that we own absolutely nothing . . . a weight is lifted from us and our hearts grow lighter . . . at least we have made a true beginning when we can gaze around at all the possessions, qualities and capacities that are supposed to be ours and recognize that they do not really belong to us.” [10]

In our gospel lesson for today we encounter a conversation that we are told is meant to trap Jesus. He is asked if God’s people should pay taxes to the emperor. Saying yes to taxes is never popular, especially when given to an oppressive emperor like Caesar. Saying no to taxes would make him guilty of treason for which he could be prosecuted. Jesus confounds them and confounds us with his response. After taking a coin in his hand with Caesar’s image upon it, he says, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and give to God what is God’s.”

This text has been used to justify the notion that faith in God has nothing to do with politics. But a closer reading of the text and of scripture as a whole, particularly the prophets, reveals that God calls governments to justice and compassion and peace and dignity for all persons.

Caesar’s coin bears the image of Caesar and so belongs to Caesar. Human beings, on the other hand, bear the image of God and so belong to God. We may pay taxes but we do not belong to the government. We are all God’s children, bearers of the divine image, and therefore belong to God. Our ultimate allegiance is not to race, nation, or political party. All that we are and all that we have belongs to God.

That is what monasticism seeks to remind us when it calls us to share all that we have with one another. Because ultimately nothing belongs to us. It all belongs to God and is to be used for God’s purposes.

Dennis Okholm tells of the time several years ago when Apple began producing personal computers. He said, “One day while a friend prepared a meal for me in her kitchen I was raving about the features of the latest Mac that I coveted. Finally she stopped peeling potatoes, looked up, and asked, ‘And how will this serve the kingdom of God?’ I never purchased that computer and I thanked her for her gentle reminder.” [11]

Monasticism calls us to a virtuous poverty that has one asking again and again throughout life: Do I really need this? Is more really better? [12] And how can I use what has been given me to serve the kingdom of God?

Monasticism calls us to heart of Christian discipleship, which is, in the words of Abba Antony from the third century: to prefer nothing in the world above the love of Christ. To hold lightly to what we’ve been given and in gratitude to God live simply and generously.

___________________

1. Linus Mundy, A Retreat with Benedict and Bernard: Seeking God Alone - Together, St. Anthony Messenger Press, 1998, 82
2. Esther de Waal, Seeking God: The Way of St. Benedict, Liturgical Press, 2001, 104
3. Elizabeth Canham, Heart Whispers: Benedictine Wisdom For Today, Abingdon, 1999, 42-43
4. Joan Chittister, The Rule of Benedict: Insights For the Ages, Crossroad, 1992, 147
5. Dennis Okholm, Monk Habits For Everyday People: Benedictine Spirituality for Protestants, Brazos, 2008, 46-47
6. Lonni Collins Pratt and Father Daniel Holman, Benedict’s Way: An Ancient Monk’s Insights For a Balanced Life, Loyola Press, 2000, 103
7. Joan Chittister, Wisdom Distilled From the Daily, HarperOne, 1991, 163
8. Andy Freeman and Pete Greig, Punk Monk: New Monasticism and the Ancient Art of Breathing, Regal, 2007, 111
9. Freeman and Greig, 111
10. As quoted in LC, 73
11. Okholm, 52
12. Mundy, 89-90

October 26, 2008 - "The House That Love Is Building"

Crescent Hill Baptist Church
Louisville, Kentucky
Pentecost 23
October 26, 2008
W. Gregory Pope

SERIES: The New Monasticism

THE HOUSE THAT LOVE IS BUILDING

Deuteronomy 34:1-12; Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17; 1 Thessalonians 2:1-8; Matthew 22:34-46

In a recently published parable of the church, [1] the chairperson of a church council received a letter which read:

Dear Tim,

I have been observing you and your season of leadership at [the church] for many years and thought it important to write to you at this time. I’ve watched your hard work in guiding [the church] out of a period of turmoil and challenge. You have endured a great deal and persevered with energy in creating a level of excitement and activity within the church. For all this I commend you and the other leaders who have worked with you.

I’m writing you to bring something important to your attention. You have lost your first love. You and [the church] have drifted away from the love of God and one another as your first priority . . . If this serious situation is not turned around, it will destroy the church’s credibility.

Fear not, Tim. All is not lost. I am writing to encourage you to lead a change that, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, can be accomplished. If you accept the challenge to restore love into the life of the church by reviving . . . passion and humility . . . you and [the church] will receive blessings beyond your imagination. The way back must start with you.

This letter is sent in love as always, with faith that what is required can be done.

(Signed) Your Truest Friend

Immediately, Tim thought it sounded just like the letter Jesus had written to the church at Ephesus in the Book of Revelation telling them that they too had lost their first love. But he also didn’t think too highly of anonymous letters, and so he tossed it in the wastebasket.

The letter was followed by a phone call by a fairly new member of the congregation, informing Tim that she had decided to look for another church. When he asked why she said it was several things really. She was known in the community for possessing incredible gifts that seem to be ignored at the church. She felt as if she had fallen through the cracks and did not sense the warm inclusion she did with the initial welcome to the congregation. She said, “I really want my church to feel like a place where I’m welcome and where people are genuinely glad to see me.” She said, “The bottom line is that this church isn’t exactly the most loving place in town. It doesn’t make me feel closer to God. Sometimes I go away feeling farther away from God than I did before I arrived.”

Tim apologized on behalf of the church and promised he would look very carefully into what she had said and would do everything he could to create a church where she would feel more welcome. He invited her to give them another chance. She said she would think about it and thanked him for how kind he had been to her.

As they hung up, Tim went to the wastebasket and retrieved the letter. He sat back in his chair. Wow! In one day, to read that his church had drifted away from the love of God and one another, and to hear that his church was not exactly the most loving place in town stabbed him right in the heart. Because he knew in his gut it was true. That amidst all the good things about his church they had lost the love that unites and defines them.

That letter could be sent and that phone call could be made to churches all over the world.

At the heart of the letter and phone call is the church’s failure to focus on the heart of the matter, what Jesus called the greatest commandment: to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.

As I read that story I wondered how true it is of us. Have we lost our first love? Have we drifted away from the love of God and neighbor as the heart of our life together? Amidst all the changes this congregation has endured, what is it that holds us together?

I truly cannot think of another congregation that has been faced with the number of changes and the significant scope of such changes as has this congregation. It is truly astounding. The whole identity of the church rooted in its relationship to the seminary, then watching the seminary change so drastically, and over 40 families with connection to the seminary moving on from this congregation to other places, not to mention the hundreds of students each year who found a church home here. Then a period of significant transition where we have been seeking to live into a new way of doing ministry. And then in February 2007, the gift of over 150 Karen Christians from the other side of the world come and seek to make their home with us. All of these things and more, the impact of which is hard to actually put into words - it’s enough to spin your head around a few times.

And yet, we’re still here. What is it that is holding us together? I’m not sure exactly, but I think there is something to be learned from that modern parable of the church with which I began. For within that parable lies the truth about every church including our own. Whether in a time of struggle or great success, the integrity of a congregation, what holds it together, is compromised if the uniting cord is not woven together by the love of God and the love of neighbor. The great commandment of Jesus must always and forever be the center of our life together.

And you know, there’s freedom and joy in that truth. Because it means you don’t have to be the biggest and the best at everything to be a successful congregation. The most important thing is to do everything possible to be the most loving place in town.

As all baseball fans know, this year brought to a close baseball’s most hallowed sanctuary, Yankee Stadium. As a beloved Red Sox fan, I cannot but acknowledge that Yankee Stadium (even more than Fenway Park and Wrigley Field) has been home to more baseball greats than any other place in the history of the game: Ty Cobb, Joe DiMaggio, Yogi Berra, Reggie Jackson, and the list could go on. But one player stands out above them all. Thanks to the unforgivable stupidity of Red Sox ownership in 1918, for $100,000 the Sox traded Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees, and did not win another World Series for 86 years. In those 86 years, the Yankees won 26 World Series, and Yankee Stadium became known as “The House That Ruth Built.”

In fact, until Boston won the World Series in 2004, it was believed they lived under “The Curse” for having traded the Babe to the Yankees. But “The House That Ruth Built” is closed now, and the Yankees are moving into the 1.3 billion dollar “House That Steinbrenner (the longtime Yankee owner) Built.”

The church is always “The House That Love is Building.” If anybody or anything else tries to build a church, it will never be what it was meant to be.

In First Corinthians chapter 13 we are told that without love all noble efforts are basically pointless and useless. However, with love, even the smallest of things can be great and profoundly useful. The point is that love must guide the lives and relationships of the church community. It must be love that unifies the church, love on the inside as members love one another, love on the outside as we make the love of Jesus known to the world, all of which is bound together by our love for God and God’s love for us.

How is love building this house?

I thought about you yesterday as my family and I paid a visit to a llama farm owned by the doctor who diagnosed my son Ryan’s heart condition when he was less than an hour old, and quite literally saved his life, riding in the ambulance with him from Baptist East to Kosair Hospital. To see her again, along with two other doctors who kept him alive through his first weeks of life, was yet another reminder to me of how you kept us (my family and I) alive during those days - feeding us, praying for us, loving us. And the way you continue to do so, rejoicing with us in his wonderful health and hyperactivity and high decibel vocal cords. Love was and is building a house for our life together.

And stories like that of how you have loved and cared for one another in times of crisis could be told countless times over.

There are the stories lived weekly of Bob Hieb and Tom Scott Jr. here at the church almost every Saturday repairing and renovating and building this house with great love.

And then every Sunday morning and afternoon, Allen Bartlett and Andy Bates and Glen Bellou and David Graves and Lewis Miller and Brent Williams picking up and taking home those who want to come to church with us but are in need of transportation. They are laying bricks of love.

And every week, Judy Johnson is sending a card or baking a cake to someone who is celebrating or someone is need of a helping hand. Bricks of love.

And Karen Scott organizing our exploding nursery every week, making sure children, from the first weeks of life, know that there is place for them in this House of Love.

And Nar K’Paw, spending almost every waking hour translating English and Karen for somebody all over this city, seeking to make life better for his people, and showing us all what it means to love. Brick by brick.

And Moneai Schnur who writes 5-10 notes every Wednesday night to those who are sick and grieving. Laying bricks of love.

And Steve Clark and Annette Ellard who inspire me every week with their tireless brick laying on behalf of refugees, pushing landlords to do the right thing, working with school boards, accompanying people to the hospital and sitting them through the middle of the night.

And like the hundreds of people who helped Ruth build Yankee Stadium, there are many others around here who go unnoticed, but who, brick by brick, are building this house of love.

In the giving of yourself and your resources, you provide space and opportunity for loving God through worship and spiritual formation. You provide space and opportunity to love our neighbors through a growing ESL ministry on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. And for tutoring young people in the youth room on Wednesday afternoons (work that local school teachers and administrators have noticed).

In your giving you help build Habitat houses throughout this city.

In your giving you support mission work all over the world and in our own community, feeding the hungry, providing heat for the poor and rent for the needy.

In giving you support a ministerial staff seeking to guide and serve this congregation to be the church God is calling us to be.

I am so pleased (and I know many of you are also, because I have heard you say so) that Jason Crosby and Andrea Woolley have joined our ministerial staff. They are doing wonderful work. I appreciate your willingness to call them, and I pray we will all give generously to support them and the work they are doing as part of our mission together.

When you give of yourself in love and service, this House of God grows larger in ways that cannot be measured.

And when you give your money to the ministry of this congregation you are doing much more than meeting a line item on a budget. You are building a house of love that is changing lives in ways we may never know.

As I ask you to give and pledge generously and sacrificially to the ministry of this congregation, I ask you to do so out of love for God and neighbor and world. Let this church continue to be “The House That Love is Building.” Even more so than it has in the past.

In a return to the modern parable with which I began the sermon, Tim decided that once the pastor returned from his sabbatical he would go public with the letter. He did and together they committed themselves a congregation to become the most loving place in town.

I wonder if we would make that same commitment. Continuing to do the wonderful things that are being done. But being extra careful that every word we say, ever look we give, every thing we do will be motivated by the desire to love God and one another.

Abbot Bernard, a Benedictine monk himself, is noted for using a metaphor that describes a community built by love. He calls us to see our lives more like a reservoir than a canal. Because the canal simultaneously pours out what it receives while the reservoir retains the water until it is filled and then overflows without loss to itself. Bernard was telling us to reservoirs, all of us receiving the love of God, holding on to it, letting it flow into every area of one’s life, and all the while letting it overflow into our family and community and church and all we meet! [2]

The church as reservoir. With a water reservoir just down the road from us, it might be helpful every time we drive by to think of our lives and our church and who we are called to be: a place where God’s love overflows into the community, and where we truly live as The House That Love is Building.

But it all begins in the reservoir behind me. The waters of baptism. In those waters we hear the words we cannot live without - that we are God’s beloved. And there we are bathed in the waters of God’s love. From there as we rise to walk in newness of life, dripping wet, we carry the water of God’s love with us, overflowing from our lives into the lives of others.

In this house of God, much love as been shared and expressed as our church family has been transformed in recent months with the addition of our Karen brothers and sisters. One Sunday a few months ago, David Cook was teaching in the Karen Sunday School Class and the idea came to him to create a prayer tapestry which you are about to see. (If you want to ahead and bring that up.) The names included on this tapestry are the names of Karen family members who are still in the refugee camps or in Burma or in other parts of the world. They are our neighbors too. And they are a part of the house God’s love is building. And as we enter into prayer this day we include these names that are before us.

The reservoir continues to overflow. Thanks be to God.
_______________________

1. Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges, The Most Loving Place in Town: A Modern Day Parable For the Church, Thomas Nelson, 2008
2. Linus Mundy, A Retreat with Benedict and Bernard: Seeking God Alone - Together, St. Anthony Messenger Press, 1998, 50

October 12, 2008 - "A Prayer-Shaped Life"

Crescent Hill Baptist Church
Louisville, Kentucky
Pentecost 22
October 12, 2008
W. Gregory Pope

SERIES: The New Monasticism

A PRAYER-SHAPED LIFE

Exodus 32:1-14; Psalm 106:1-6, 19-23;
Philippians 4:1-9; Matthew 22:1-14

Anybody here searching for some peace?

These are anxiety-ridden days. I know what Paul said in our text for today, but it is difficult to refrain from anxiety and to keep our minds only on what is excellent and honorable and good and true. It helps to know that Paul was no stranger to hard economic times and difficult life-situations. We may not always like what Paul has to say, but someone who lived a life like his, full of incredible hardship, we at least must listen to what he has to say, because they are not words spoken from an ivory pain-free palace, but words forged from the fire of a deep faith in God.

And as we continue our reflections on monastic spirituality, we also want to ask what we can learn from the monastery in relation to this text.

Bill Johnson and I were talking just a few days ago about how in these dark economic days the monastery was looking better all the time. To be a monk or a nun might make it a bit easier not to be anxious about anything. But even monks and nuns have worries. Far from being removed from the world, they carry the world in their hearts constantly in prayer.

As we try to discern a path to peace for our own lives, it is the witness of scripture and the church, including especially monasteries, that the journey toward peace is marked by a life that is shaped by prayer.

Don’t be anxious about anything, says Paul, but in everything with prayers and petitions make your requests known to God, and the peace of God which passes all understanding will guard your hearts and minds.

Paul is not speaking of a life that simply includes a prayer in the morning or at meals or in moments of crisis. This is a life immersed in prayer for the purpose of living in peace, no matter how difficult the circumstances.

And it is important I think to notice the thoughts of a prayer-shaped life. Notice Paul did not say, “Think about what is comfortable or secure or prosperous.” Which is what we usually seek in order to have peace. But rather he says to think on what is excellent and true and just.

Many of us carry doubts about prayer and whether or not it changes things. We pray and pray and pray for something good and it doesn’t happen, and so we wonder, “Why pray? What good is prayer? Does it really make any difference?” These are legitimate questions we have and we must continually ask them as we search the mysteries of prayer.

As we look to monasticism and some of the great writers on prayer throughout the history of the church, we find that prayer is not so much about changing the circumstances around us as it is about the change that takes place within us in spite of or because of the circumstances around us.

Writer and nun Joan Chittister says we pray “so that our minds and our hearts, our ideas and our lives, come to be in sync, so that we are what we say we are, so that the prayers that pass our lips change our lives, so that God’s presence becomes palpable to us. Prayer brings us to burn off the dross of what clings to our souls like mildew and sets us free for deeper, richer, truer lives in which we become what we seek.” [1]

Elizabeth Canham adds, “Prayer is work. Prayer is the context in which we confront our fears, recognize resistance, let go of demands for immediate solutions to life’s dilemmas, and learn to wait.” [2]

One monk writes: “Prayer is God’s abiding presence made real.” [3]

Monasteries have much to teach us about God’s abiding presence made real. They are governed by a rule of life centered in prayer and worship. They teach us that prayer is not meant to be an attachment to the life that we live; it is meant to be the center of the life that we live, permeating all that we do, considering our every activity, our every breath as prayer.

Prayer lies at the very heart of the Christian life; it holds everything together, it sustains every other activity . . . Praying can never be set apart from the rest of life, it is the life itself. St. Benedict did not ask his monks to take a vow to pray, for he expected prayer to be central in their lives, permeating whatever else they were doing. [4]

Devote yourself often to prayer, he writes. Prayer in the Rule of Benedict is appropriately discussed in chapter 8 immediately after the chapter on humility. Prayer is the natural response of people who know their place in the universe. [5]

The great purpose of monastic life and for every Christian life is to pray constantly, keeping the memory of God alive in your heart at every moment of the day and night; seeing God in everything and to be aware of God at all times.


Two Ways of Praying

How do we do that? As we consider a prayer-shaped life, I want to offer two ways of praying that may help us experience a continual awareness of God.

The Daily Office / Liturgy of the Hours

The first is called by many different names: The Daily Office, The Liturgy of the Hours, The Opus Dei, Daily Prayer, or Fixed Hour Prayer. It is the call to pray several different times each day so as to frame the day in prayer with praise and thanksgiving. It serves to make the worship of God the center of our life.

The heart of the prayer life proscribed by the Rule of Benedict is called the Opus Dei - the Work of God. It is the work we are to do for God and the work that God does in us.

The psalmist says, “Seven times a day I will rise to praise your name.” And so the early Hebrew faithful and the early Christians did just that. Some monastic communities still pray seven times a day. Others four or five times.

In the sixth century, Benedict scheduled prayer times during the day to coincide with the times of the changing of the Roman imperial guard. When the world was revering its secular rulers Benedict taught us to give our homage to God, the divine ruler of heaven and earth.6

Thousands of years before Christ, the people of God . . . made it their practice to rise up in the night or stop in their daily rounds to praise the name of Yahweh, to give thanks, to acknowledge God’s presence, to seek God’s blessing, and to offer themselves to God for God’s work here on earth. [7]

Praying the Hours is a Jewish, Christian, and Muslim tradition. Faithful Muslims stop four times a day - at work, at home, while traveling - and pray toward Mecca. There are Jews and Christians outside monasteries who do the same. This is a counter-cultural practice. To stop commerce, travel, conversation, even ministry for a short time in order to make a prayer offering to God. Our culture does not reward those of us who stop three of four times a day. But God does. God rewards the One who practices regular prayer with peace and with an intimacy of relationship that truly is the meaning of life. [8]

To make such offerings each day - morning, noon, evening, and night, or by whatever pattern that one follows - is to live inside the frame of the day that the Lord has made. It is a chance to recognize and to be grateful for the fact that, as least as far as you are concerned, God has indeed acted, and the world is indeed a new and fresh creation in which you can live and love and work and rest. [9]

The saying of the offices seven times is so that each stage of the day’s work may be appropriately offered to God. [10]

Each of the day hours (or times of prayer) begins with the verse, “O God, come to my assistance: O God, make haste to help me” (Ps 70:2)

Benedict instructs his communities . . . during the day, to recite brief, simple, scriptural prayers at regular intervals, easy enough to be recited and prayed even in the workplace, to wrench their minds from the mundane to the mystical, away from concentration on life’s petty particulars to attention on its transcendent meaning. [11]

Merton speaks of being attentive to the times of the day: when the birds begins to sing, and the deer comes out of the morning fog, and the sun comes up. The reason why we don’t take time is a feeling that we have to keep moving. This is a real sickness. [12] And it will not bring peace.

The Daily Office allows prayer to permeate everything we do. Returning to prayer throughout the day reminds us that attending to one’s spiritual life is as essential as the habit of eating meals. [13]

Monasteries have a bell that calls them to prayer. I love the sound of church bells that ring across a town. Thomas Merton says, “The bells break in upon our cares in order to remind us that all things pass away and our preoccupations are not important. The bells say: we have spoken for centuries from the towers of great Churches. We have spoken to the saints, your fathers and mothers, in their land. We called them, as we call you, to sanctity.” The bells are calling us all, and that echo we hear within is the sound of our longing to be with God. [14]

Ron Rolheiser suggests that we consider the alarm clock as a monastic bell calling us to prayer. A revolutionary way to think of the alarm clock. Not quite the beauty of church bells, but we can set our alarms to sacred music.

To give you an idea of what praying the daily office might be like, I want to share with you portions of prayers from a prayer book I sometimes use written by Robert Benson. [15]

Imagine rising in the morning with the words:

God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.
This very day the Lord has acted. May God’s name be praised.
Deliver us, Almighty God, from the service of self alone,
that we may do the work You have given us to do,
in truth and beauty, and for the common good.
In your tender compassion, the morning sun has risen upon us,
to shine on us, we who live in darkness,
to guide our feet into the paths of peace.
We will know your power and presence this day
if we will but listen for your voice.

And then pausing in the middle of the day to pray:

Drive far from us all wrong desires, Almighty God,
and incline our hearts to keep your ways.
Grant that having cheerfully done your will this day,
we may, when night comes, rejoice and give you thanks.

And then as the sun begins to set and the work day draws to a close to pray:

You made this day for the works of the light, Almighty God,
and this night for the refreshment of our minds and bodies.
Keep us now in Christ;
grant us a peaceful evening, and a night free from sin.

And then before we close our eyes in sleep to pray:

May the Lord grant us a quiet night and peace at the last.
Look down from on high, Almighty God,
and illumine this night with your light.
Keep watch, dear Lord, with all who work or watch or weep this night.
May the Lord guide us waking and guard us sleeping;
that awake we may watch with Christ
and asleep we may rest in peace.

Joan Chittister says that this night prayer, also known as Compline, is designed to do what we all need to do at night: (1) recognize that what we did that day was not perfect, (2) hope that the next day will be better, (3) praise the God whose love and grace brought us through another day, and (4) go to bed trusting that the God who sees our every action is more concerned with our motives than with our failures. [16]

One of the suggested scripture readings contained in the beautiful late-night service of Compline is the invitation of Jesus from Matthew 11: “Come to me you who are weary and carrying heavy burdens and I will give you rest.” What an appropriate way to end the day.

This way of praying is a re-focusing of our attention on God at specific moments. To do so makes a great difference to the quality and enjoyment of each day. For really the Rule is telling me that ultimately praying is living, working, loving, accepting, the refusal to take anything or anyone for granted but rather to try to find Christ in and through them all. For Christ is to be found in the circumstances, the people, the things of daily life. St. Benedict hopes that if we are continually aware of this we shall lift our hearts to God and in this way our whole life will become prayer in action. [17]

So the Daily Office.

The Jesus Prayer

There is also The Jesus Prayer that for centuries people have been taught to pray throughout the day. It is the prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me.”

In J. D. Salinger’s novel, Franny and Zooey, Franny is seeking to understand what is meant by the biblical instruction to pray without ceasing. She comes across the classic book The Cloud of Unknowing where the pilgrim in the story is on the same search. The pilgrim is introduced to The Jesus Prayer and invited to pray that prayer over and over and over again. To pray the Jesus Prayer, or as the pilgrim suggests, just repeat any name of God.

Franny decides to do the same. And she finds the experience rewarding. Her boyfriend at the time, Lane, is not so impressed. He wants to know the reward. And Franny says, “You get to see God. Something happens in some absolutely nonphysical part of the heart . . . and you see God.”
The idea is that sooner or later, the prayer moves from the lips and the head down to a center in the heart, and the prayer becomes automatic in the heart, right along with the heartbeat.

Franny’s brother Zooey tells her the only aim of the Jesus Prayer is to endow the person who says it with Christ-Consciousness. “When you don’t see Jesus for exactly who he is,” says Zooey, “you miss the whole point of the Jesus Prayer.” [18]

The life we are called to seek is a prayer-shaped, Christ-Conscious life, where every part of the day is immersed in prayer, where every heartbeat is a humble prayer for mercy, where our lives becomes prayer. So that our thoughts are filled with all that is good and noble and trustworthy and excellent. And so that the peace of God which passes all our understanding will guard our hearts and minds.

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1. Joan Chittister, The Rule of Benedict: Insights For the Ages, Crossroad, 1992, 89-90
2. Elizabeth Canham, Heart Whispers: Benedictine Wisdom For Today, Abingdon, 1999, 74
3. As quoted in Esther de Waal, Seeking God: The Way of St. Benedict, Liturgical Press, 2001, , 156
4. Ibid., 145
5. Chittister, 75
6. Chittister, 85
7. Robert Benson, A Good Life: Benedict’s Guide to Everyday Joy, Paraclete Press, 2004, 19-20
8. Tony Jones, The Sacred Way: Spiritual Practices For Everyday Life, Zondervan, 2005, 122
9. Benson, 28
10. de Waal, 150
11. Chittister, 85
12. as quoted in de Waal, 155
13. Dennis Okholm, Monk Habits For Everyday People: Benedictine Spirituality for Protestants, Brazos, 2008, 102
14. Benson, 29
15. Robert Benson, Daily Prayer: A Little Book for Saying the Daily Office, Carolina Broadcasting and Publishing, 2006
16. Chittister, 88
17. de Waal, 151-153
18. J. D. Salinger, Franny and Zooey, Little, Brown and Company, 1961, pp.36-39, 112, 170

November 2, 2008 - "True Holiness"

Crescent Hill Baptist Church
Louisville, Kentucky
All Saints Day / Pentecost 25
November 2, 2008
W. Gregory Pope

SERIES: The New Monasticism

TRUE HOLINESS

Revelation 7:9-17; Psalm 34:1-10, 22; 1 Thessalonians 2:9-13; Matthew 23:1-12

It seems dream-like this vision of heaven’s future given to John by the angel. It was said of the great Scottish poet, Robert Burns, that he could not read this passage without tears coming to his eyes; and we can see why.

John looked and saw a vision of heaven’s final victory over sin and death. He saw a great multitude, too many to number, a multitude too large for the human mind to count.

And the multitude is diverse. From every nation, race, tribe, class and tongue. It is so beautiful to hear Karen and English languages together when we raise our voices in song or prayer. It’s just a small taste of what heaven will be like.

Those who make up this diverse multitude are wearing robes - clean, fresh, white robes. And they are standing before the Lamb, the Lamb that taketh away the sins of the world, Jesus the Christ, and they are waving palm branches and singing:

Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb.

And their song is answered by the song of heaven’s perpetual choir singing:

Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God for ever and ever! Amen!

It’s even more beautiful than Handel, one of the white-robed multitude, could ever have imagined.

This heavenly choir is singing a song of joy and pure delight in the presence of God and the Lamb. Having come through life’s great tribulations, beat up by life’s demands, they have strived to live gospel lives of justice and peace in a world of greed and violence.

The voice of heaven says, “These are they who have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.”

“Washed in the blood of the Lamb.” That language may embarrass some of us. But we should be cautious about relinquishing the rich language of biblical metaphor. The Blood of the Lamb is our human poetry pointing to the self-emptying love of God acted out on the cross. It points us to the truth of grace: what we cannot do for ourselves, God has done for us. We cannot wash away the stain of our sin, nor can we rid the world of its sin, but Christ is the Lamb who taketh away the sins of the world. It is the truest form of holiness the world has ever known.

Our Gospel lesson this week from Matthew records Jesus’ rebuke of the scribes and pharisees for a false holiness. A piety that sits in the seats of honor and longs to be shown respect in public places and to be called by their titles rather than their names. They say the right things. They teach the right doctrine, but they do not practice what they teach. They make religion a heavy burden to bear, constructing a list of do’s and don’ts. Any helpful deeds they do, they do only to be seen by others.

But Jesus calls us to a life of secret servanthood, rooted in a holiness only God can give, a holiness grounded in a relationship with Christ, where God’s Spirit does the work of transformation within us, a transformation that will not be complete until the day we gather around the throne of God and the Lamb, wearing a white robe washed clean by the grace of God.

Saint Bernard explains how Jesus brought true holiness to him. He says: “[Jesus] is life and power, and as soon as he enters in, he awakens my slumbering soul; he stirs and soothes and pierces my heart, for before it was hard as stone, and diseased. So he began to pluck out and destroy, to build up and to plant, to water dry places and illuminate dark ones; to open what was closed and to warm what was cold; to make the crooked straight and the rough places smooth, so that my soul may bless the Lord, and all that is within me may praise his holy name.”

Whatever the cost, isn’t this the goal that all of us who bear Christ’s name share? And who can live in today’s world and not experience the hardening of heart of which Bernard speaks? We don’t want it to happen. But it does. Our hearts become infected by the violence, lust, greed, dishonesty, and materialism that rear their ugly heads daily. [1]

Flannery O’Connor wrote a short story inspired by this text from Revelation. The main character, Mrs. Turpin, is someone who occupied herself at night by naming the classes of people. At the bottom of the heap were most colored people, then next to them were the white-trash, then above them were the home-owners, and above them the home-and-land owners, to which she and her husband belonged.

Mrs. Turpin goes into a doctor’s office and finds herself thrust into the company of people she despises. Mrs. Turpin considered herself a good, respectable Christian woman and she silently thanks Jesus that he didn’t make her like the other people in the room, described in her words as “white trash,” “lunatic,” “ugly.” Her silent prayers were silent, but her attitude came through clearly in her conversation.

Suddenly, the young woman across the room Mrs. Turpin had silently called ugly attacked her and called her a “wart-hog from hell.” Mrs. Turpin felt the words driven into her heart; they tore into her as a conviction of the Spirit. She went home, out into her backyard, and as she gazed into the pig-pen she saw a vision. From the ground a brilliant swinging fiery bridge was raised from earth to heaven and along that bridge “a vast horde of souls were rumbling toward heaven.” O’Connor describes the transforming vision:

There were whole companies of white-trash, clean for the first time in their lives, and bands of blacks . . . in white robes, and battalions of freaks and lunatics shouting and clapping and leaping like frogs. And bringing up the end of the procession was a tribe of people whom she recognized at once as those who, like herself . . . had always had a little of everything and the God-given wit to use it right. She leaned forward to observe them closer. They were marching behind the others with great dignity, accountable as they had always been for good order and common sense and respectable behavior. They alone were on key. Yet she could see by their shocked and altered faces that even their virtues were being burned away. [2]

Mrs. Turpin had been given a vision as had John on the Isle of Patmos. As have we. And the vision is of a multitude of people from every nation, race, tribe, class and tongue, people battered and bruised by life’s tribulation, people guilty of evil and self-righteousness, yet all of them, including the twenty-five we have remembered today, wearing robes washed white in the Blood of the Lamb, smelling clean with the rays of eternal sunshine, singing and shouting, “Hallelujah! Hallelujah!”

And if we look closely we see among them our own “shocked and altered faces,” for we, too, have been invited to the heavenly banquet feast. Where we can worship God day and night with all the saints of all the ages. Tears of grief and sorrow wiped away. Drinking from the springs of living water that never shall run dry. Springs fed from the river of life that flow from the throne of God and the Lamb. Sheltered by the Shepherd who made us and died for us, risen so that we might have life in his name. And if that’s not good news to you, you haven’t heard the good news.

True holiness is the holiness that only Christ can bring, where even your virtues are burned away, and you are robed in white, dressed in the righteousness of God.

Did you know, did you know there’s a white robe ready for you, made just for you? Christ is holding it for you even now. What do you say? Come on. Put it on.
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1. Linus Mundy, A Retreat with Benedict and Bernard: Seeking God Alone - Together, St. Anthony Messenger Press, 1998, 29-30
2. Flannery O’Connor, The Complete Stories, 1971, 509