August 21, 2016 – “Fearless Faith – Choosing to Love” from John Knox Kirk on Vimeo.
Fearless Faith: Choosing to Love
A sermon preached at The Kirk of Kansas City, Missouri, on August 21, 2016.
The second in a sermon series on Facing our Fears through a Life of Faith.
Philippians 1:3-11
and Exodus 2:1-10
The first church I remember is
Atlantic Presbyterian church.
It sits on the corner of Chestnut and seventh street,
just on the main city square,
across the way from the library and the county court house
in Atlantic, Iowa.
I was five or six when we moved there from Villisca, Iowa
and when you go from a town of around three thousand
to one of about eight thousand
its like moving to the big metropolis.
That church is like a lot of rural Presbyterian Churches
built in the 1860s or so
beautiful stained glass windows
wood pews that groans when you sit down
lots of dust that you can’t quite get rid of.
That church, and that town,
in the late seventies and early eighties
was a wonderful place to grow up,
and I’m glad that my foundation of life and faith
was rooted there,
it served me well, particular for when
I moved to Saint Louis
to start my teenage years.
That early church had a kids choir.
And I remember we used to wear these
tacky white shawl things, sort of like robes
with huge blue bow ties,
think the height of seventy’s fashion.
And I remember the first songs
that they taught us to sing.
We were so proud.
We stood, one Sunday morning,
maybe like this one
and we smiled,
and we kept our eye on the saint of a teacher
who was leading these 10 little kids
and when it was time, we’d sing:
Love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.
It’s just like a magic penny,
Hold it tight and you won’t have any.
Lend it, spend it, and you’ll have so many
They’ll roll all over the floor.
…
So let’s go dancing till the break of day,
And if there’s a piper, we can pay.
For love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.
For love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.
You can tell that I never had a career in music.
That song is a little Malvina Reynolds tune
called Magic Penny.
It suggested something that didn’t make a whole lot of sense,
not at the time.
My folks taught that I should save my money.
Be careful how I spent it, you know.
It was all valuable: the pennies, the dimes and quarters
the paper bills that, when given to the cashier
meant we could leave with our groceries or school supplies or medicine.
You work hard, and you keep track of what you spend
you make good choices on what you buy, needs verses wants,
you give a portion to good causes like the school bake sale or the church
and you save the rest.
Prudent common sense.
And then this song comes by
and throws the little kid into a spin:
Love is like a magic penny
hold it tight and you wont have any
lend it, spend it, you’ll have so many,
they’ll roll all over the floor.
///
Well, ok, childhood was confusing for a lot of reasons
not just because of a children’s choir song I learned in church.
But I listened, and I pondered
and I learned that they were talking about how the human heart
has this tendency, you know, to hold close to it
those things we care the most about
close—almost like a bear hug
so that it can’t get away
so that we can keep it safe and secure and unblemished
so we don’t lose it.
We human beings do that with all sorts of things.
Certainly we do that with our wealth and our possessions.
We do it with our beliefs and our ideas, too,
when we don’t want to listen to other points of view
or let the facts critique our positions.
Just look at the comment section on your favorite controversial
facebook post and you’ll know what I mean.
We also do this with certain ways we so carefully construe our identity
the way we present ourselves
the way we dress, the gadgets we carry
the causes we champion.
And we can do this with our heart, too.
///
Love is, at the root of it, an OPENING of the heart
to the care and the concern and the wellbeing and the freedom of another.
Love isn’t just desire.
Love isn’t just wanting a cure from loneliness.
Love isn’t about getting something so that we’re better or happier or stronger.
All of those are about ME, or about US
they aren’t about the one we love,
and love isn’t really about us, is it
love is about the other, the one we love
the one we care for.
Love may satisfy desire,
it does help provide companionship
study after study show how friendship and love
do indeed make us stronger and healthier and happier
but love isn’t about those things
and can’t be.
Love isn’t something we can store up
or keep in reserve so we can use it at the right time
its not something we can hold back now
and wait to spend when the opportunity presents itself
There is no love equivalent of buy low and sell high.
Love is love is love is love.
You orient yourself in a way that gives all your empathy and compassion
and concern and self to another, or you don’t.
Which, perhaps, is why it doesn’t work
like other things seem to work in this world of ours.
Where, on the one hand, we can talk about
prudent investment of our financial resources
with concepts like rates of return,
or acceptable levels of risk
or diversification of assets,
Love is something entirely different:
investment in love doesn’t seek out rates of return
it loves with reckless abandon
Investment in love doesn’t calculate beforehand the risk involved
and it doesn’t concern itself
with reserving some love from this relationship
and giving it to several others to spread out the danger
if the market goes south.
You have to take a risk when you open yourselves to loving,
at least if you’re going to love in a healthy, non possessive,
fully alive sort of way.
Love is like a magic penny
hold it close and you won’t have any
lend it, spend it, you’ll have so many
they’ll roll all over the floor.
///
We had a great time at our All Creatures Celebration yesterday.
Lots of dogs, a few cats, even a guinea pig or two.
Some pet treats and popcorn and demonstrations
and we had a blast.
One of the families that showed up had a newborn baby
and I mean newborn
his birthday was Wednesday
and he had that wrinkly, noodle-y look that newborns have
curled toes and hands
thought the sun was way too bright
I love seeing newborns.
They remind me, each time I get to see one
or, if I’m really lucky, get to hold one,
of what it means to love
to hold so much potential and possibility in your arms
this child, who will grow and learn
and make mistakes and break your heart
and forge lasting friendships
and fall in love
and experience heartbreak and hurt
all of this in such a tiny little bundle.
It never fails to remind me of the day our daughters were born.
Or what my parents must have thought the day I was born.
So much possibility.
So much risk.
Who in the world thought this was a good idea?
I have no idea what I’m doing.
What if I mess everything up?
How can I possibly give this child what she needs?
Truth be told, these are the foundational questions of love
not just of being a parent.
When you open your heart in love to another
to a child, or to your parent, or to your partner, or your friend
you’re asking the same sorts of questions.
Who in the world thought this was a good idea?
What if I mess everything up?
How can I possibly give this relationship what it needs?
And that is because it is risky to love.
It is hard. Selflessness is hard.
And when you take responsibility for caring for another
we don’t know how it is going to turn out.
–the one we love may leave us
–the one we care for may stop caring for us
–the one we extend compassion to may stab us in the back
–the one we protect may get sick or hurt or worse
Its risky to love.
But not only are we called to love anyway
we know it is better for us,
important for us to love.
///
This sermon series is exploring a fearless faith,
how God encourages us to give our fears to God
so that we can live more fully, more authentically
more truly.
And one of the areas where we are most often afraid,
it seems to me, is with those we love.
Some of us have been burned by relationships in the past
and aren’t sure we want to try another one.
Some of us love people who abuse or hurt us, who don’t share it
who manipulate us for their own ends
and we need to get out.
Some of us loved for decades,
and our loved ones are no longer with us.
Some of us have sent our loved ones off to college
or they’re grown and starting families of their own
and we worry and worry and worry.
Some of us are walking with a loved one
as they are experiencing really difficult medical problems
and are doing what we can to offer
care and compassion and support.
Love is hard.
Love is risky.
When we find it
Love is maybe the best thing in the whole world.
///
This ancient story from Exodus is so beautiful.
The story of Moses is one of the foundational stories of Judaism
told over and over again, every Sabbath
as the Jewish people marvel over how God freed the enslaved people
from the clutches of the pharaoh.
That story wouldn’t have happened if Moses hadn’t survived childhood.
And, as Exodus puts it, that was a real possibility.
The Pharaoh, seeking to extend his control by force
over the enslaved Hebrew nation
ordered that all newborn boys were to be killed.
In our reading today,
A young Hebrew woman bears a son
and cared for him as long as she could, for about three months
until it no longer was safe for her to do so.
So the mother did something inconceivable to me.
She found a basket made of paper
and she plastered it with tar so it would hold up in the water
and she took her son and she looked him in the eye
and maybe she kissed his forehead
and maybe she tucked him into his blanket
and she placed him in the basket and sent him down the river.
It was the only possible way that the child might live.
It was an incredibly selfless act of love, what that mother did.
And then there’s another
the daughter of the Pharaoh, who had come down to bathe in the river
who was working up a good lather when, lo, here comes this basket
made of paper with some tar keeping it afloat
and inside was this little bundle of toes and fingers
a twelve-week old baby boy.
And the daughter of the Pharaoh knew what this was: it was a Hebrew child.
And the daughter knew what the Pharaoh had said was to happen to these boys
and what this child’s fate would be…
And the Daughter offered an incredibly selfless act of love
and took Moses in.
She drew him up out of the water and took him in her arms
and looked him in the eye and maybe kissed his forehead
and she decided that this boy would have her protection.
And she named him Moses
and found his sister and the mother to help care for him
and just like that….the future of the Hebrew people was saved.
All because that mother chose to love
and because that daughter chose to love…
///
We have choices, every day
about how we go about our lives
doing this, or not doing that
keeping this or giving away that
saving these or spending those.
We also have choices, every day,
about how we open our hearts to others.
How we care for those who mean the most to us
we have choices there too
ways we act that can either deepen the bonds of love
or weaken them
decisions we make that open the door to reconciliation
or that close the possibilities all together.
And there’s not a one-size-fits-all teaching on how to do that
love is more like trial-and-error, where we’re learning on the fly
and hoping that we don’t mess it up too badly as we go.
But, here’s the thing:
God teaches us that love is at the root of all that is good and true and holy.
That this effort to care for another, and give selflessly for another
is somehow tied to our deepest possibilities for salvation and happiness.
And when God says: Do not Fear!
Somehow, that means the ability to trust that the loving thing to do
while it is hard
is the right thing to do.
///
I’ve included this passage from Paul to the Philippians today
because it is maybe my favorite passage of all the things Paul has written.
Its one of those things I never would have caught
not in a million years, if I hadn’t been given the chance to learn a little Greek.
Paul begins the letter with his prayers of thanksgiving to God,
but note how he talks about the nature of his relationship with his friends
in Philippi:
I thank God every time I remember you,
constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you,
because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now.
It is right for me to think this way about all of you,
because you hold me in your heart
for all of you share in God’s grace with me,
both in my imprisonment
and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel.
This phrase “because you hold me in your heart” is so amazing to me.
This phrase, “because you hold me in your heart,”
is actually rather…ambiguous in the Greek.
It is clear from the verb that “holding you in my heart” is what Paul is meaning.
But it is impossible to know, from the Greek, who is holding whom in the heart.
The translation I read from today has the Philippians holding Paul in their heart.
But the other five translations I checked for this sermon don’t all agree.
Others put it this way:
“It is right for me to feel this way about all of you,
since I have you in my heart….”
So, which is it?
Does Paul hold the Philippians in his heart,
or do the Philippians hold Paul in their heart?
This might seem like a rather trivial matter, but I want to suggest that it isn’t.
In fact, I like to think that Paul knew exactly what he was doing
when he wrote this phrase that way.
When we build relationships out of love,
this is exactly what we’re doing: we’re holding each other in the heart
I hold you
you hold me
we’re in this together, caring for one another
sharing our ups and our downs
offering the best of what we have,
selflessly, wantonly,
trying to do what is good and right and true for the one we love.
When this is done right, Paul says
it is a mutual love,
so I care for your well being and you care for mine
and it doesn’t matter much whether we mean
I’m holding you in my heart
or you’re holding me in yours
because, well, you get the point
that love is heart-holding, period,
and darn it we’re going to do just that
though the way get rocky
and the storms come and go
we’ll still love each other, rain or shine.
///
One of these days our daughters will ask for the car keys
and I’ll give it to them.
Not quite sending them down the river, no,
but a risky thing nonetheless.
They’ll fall in love, and I’ll fret whether the partner they’ve chosen is worthy.
One of these days my closest friends
will get sick with something they’ll not be able to shake.
One of these days my parents will need me to help care for them.
All of that is true. That’s what living is all about.
But I am so grateful to God for the chance to love
for these people who enrich my life
and fill my spirit
for these hearts to hold, these people who hold me.
And I pray that as each of us are given these people in our lives
we may celebrate the bonds of love
and give to God all of our fears
so that we can give love away more and more
magic pennies, rolling all over the floor.
May it be so. Amen.
—
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