Sermon of the Week
The Lord’s Prayer:
To Whom do we Pray.

A sermon preached at The Kirk of Kansas City, Missouri, on September 30, 2018.
The first in a Multi-Part Sermon Series on The Lord’s Prayer

Scripture readings (which you may wish to read prior):
Exodus 3:1-5, 13-15
and Matthew 6:7-13

So a few months ago, I was on a plane returning from a meeting in Louisville.
It had been an uneventful flight
which was a relief, compared to the topics of the meeting
and I just vegged out a bit.

I read the news,
cued up a movie in my ipad
even closed my eyes for a bit. It was glorious.

After a few hours, I heard the sound and felt that gentle jolt
that marks the final moments of landing on a plane.

The landing gear drops.
The flaps fully extend.

And the plane seems to slow itself so much
that it is barely crawling through space
as it makes its way safely back to earth.

I don’t know how many airplane trips I’ve taken.

They number in the hundreds, most likely.
And I love to fly. As a kid, I marveled at the technology
that enabled tons of metal and glass to soar.

I didn’t want to be a policeman, or a firefighter. I wanted to be a pilot.
I’ve always enjoyed it.

So this wasn’t about a fear of flying or anything,
but I noticed something about myself, when I heard that sound and felt that jolt.

I noticed myself reciting the Lord’s Prayer:
Our father. Who art in heaven.
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done.
On earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom.
And the Power.
And the glory. Forever and ever. Amen.

Truth is, I’ve been saying that prayer, under my breath with lips barely moving
every takeoff and landing, for decades.

Sometimes I don’t know that I’m doing it.
But most of the time I do: I stop what I’m listening to
and I give myself a moment to center myself.
To remind myself of who I am,
 of whose I am I,
 of the God who loves me.

///
I thought maybe I was the only one with this little quirk,
but then I remembered back to that time
once, several years ago,
when I was bedside at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago.

This is a busy, urban, 670 bed trauma hospital,
and I was making rounds as a student chaplain
checking in on the patients in the wings
to which I had been assigned.

I was checking in on Eleanor, who had been a patient there for weeks
from well before I started my three month program.

She was in the “multiple acute conditions” area of the hospital
and that was pretty accurate
she was dealing with organ failure
liver, lung, pancreas
and, when I was visiting her, she was barely responsive.

She was awake, clearly.
Her eyes were open when she was not sleeping.
She could eat, even if with some labor.
She just was not communicating: no real eye contact, no words,
no sense that she heard or registered much of anything going on.

I spoke with her family, who were concerned, of course
and prayerful…glad that the spiritual care office
was there to be with them during this time.
They explained that Eleanor was Methodist
a member for more than 30 years at a church on the west side of Chicago.
I told her that the Presbyterians got along nicely with the Methodists.

This visit, Eleanor was alone,
except for the nurse who checked her vitals occasionally
or the orderly who came to straighten up the room.

And I was sitting next to her, talking with her a bit
to her, sure, but with her, I was hoping.
Even as she was looking into a blank space on the wall ahead.

I went through a few things: my latest conversation with her daughter
a word about the horrible snowstorm the city had the week before
that sort of thing
and then I took out a pocket bible
and flipped it open to offer a quick reading
before I would leave, write in her chart,
and move on to another patient.

I read her something, I don’t even remember what it was, really.
And then it was time to pray and conclude our visit…
And I started:

Our Father,
Whom art in heaven
Hallowed be thy name…

It was right about then that I noticed I wasn’t praying alone.
I looked up, and to my astonishment,
Eleanor was repeating the words of the Lord’s Prayer with me…
Thy Kingdom Come
Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven…

And she smiled. And a moment later, it was over.

After that prayer, she returned to her prior, quiet state,
at least for a few weeks, before she left for another rehabilitation hospital.
No other words, or eye contact, or much of anything.

But there was something about this prayer, these words, that comfort
that she could access, when all other words were gone.

And in that moment,
she felt, I felt, grace beyond measure…
a sure sense of God’s reliable presence
God’s love
That God was THERE, surrounding us with God’s love.

///
Some call this prayer the greatest prayer, or the prayer of prayers.
[Read more…]

Sermon of the Week
Words to Build a Life On:
Nothing Can Separate You.

A sermon preached at The Kirk of Kansas City, Missouri, on September 23, 2018.
The Twelfth and final in a Multi-Part Sermon Series

Scripture readings (which you may wish to read prior):
Psalm 139:1-18,
and Romans 8:26-28, 31-39

If you type in the phrase “Australian daredevil”
into your favorite search engine,
Bing or Google might answer back: Felix Baumgartner.[i]

Felix is rather extraordinary.

On Sunday morning, October 14^th, 2012,
exactly 65 years to the day that Chuck Yeager
first broke the sound barrier
in his experimental, rocket-powered airplane
Felix climbed into a helium-filled balloon
and took it up to a height of 128,100 feet.[ii]

Now, to put that into context for you,
128000 feet is several times higher than commercial airliners ordinarily fly.

In fact, the highest that a jet aircraft has ever flown,
according to extremetech.com, is 123,500 feet,
so this was 5000 feet above that.[iii]

By comparison, another daredevil, the film maker James Cameron
went to the so-called lowest point on earth that same year, in 2012
diving seven miles to the bottom of the Mariana trench in the Pacific Ocean.[iv]
Baumgartner’s balloon climb, when you do the math,
was three times higher.

Extremetech noted that the climb up was the cushy part.

He had a climate-controlled pod that was kind of like a race-car cockpit
made of fiberglass and steel
and a cage of something called chromium-molybdenum
to help protect the occupant from the -70 degree temperatures outside.

Pretty cool.

But on that Sunday morning, October 14^th, 2012
not only did Felix go up that high
but he also climbed out of that cushy climate-controlled pod
and fell back to earth.

How long do you think it takes to fall to earth from 21 miles above it?

It lasted 9 minutes and 9 seconds
with an astonishing 4 minutes and 22 seconds of that in what they call free fall
smashing the speed of sound
the way Chuck Yeager did, but Chuck had a jet engine to help him.

And then, thankfully, Felix pulled the cord on his massive parachute
and safely landed outside of Roswell, New Mexico.

Felix broke all sorts of world records with the stunt.
–Highest free-fall
–Highest manned balloon flight.
–If he had just held out 14 more seconds he would also have set the record for
the longest free-fall time ever,
but really, who can blame him.

You might assume that those records were going to stand forever
But no, just two years later, Google’s then vice-president Alan Eustice
Decided “hey, why don’t I try that”
And went almost a mile higher, 135000 feet,
and made his own incredible free fall.[v]

Now: I don’t really know why Felix Baumgartner or Alan Eustice
would do such a thing.

You’re not getting me near one of those balloons.

But I’m glad that they didn’t pass out,
that their parachutes opened,
that they survived.

I’m not sure it matters whether you’re talking about a zip line,
a paltry 100 feet or so above a cliff face,
or jumping out of your high tech pod 22 miles up there
the possibility of death was apparently not, to them, a deterrent and they jumped.

They had tested their equipment. They did the math and knew the science.
But still: any time you do that, it’s a leap of faith.
They trusted, and they jumped, and they made it.

On the Tuesday after Felix’s incredible jump
One newspaper asked its readers:
“what stunt would you do, if you knew you would survive?”[vi]

///
On the one hand, that’s an interesting question to think about.

What would you do?
Sky dive
Go diving in shark infested waters
Bungee jump
Buy a Harley
Go run off and live in the desert for a while
Wear a Chiefs jersey to Denver’s Mile High Stadium?

I think knowing that I would survive could give me courage, you know
and confidence
a sort of attitude: a different outlook on life.

It’s a helpful question:
What would you do if you knew you’d be ok?
How would you live your life differently?

Great.

And on the other hand:
sometimes I wonder about using such superlative illustrations
of humanity pushing the boundaries.

It is amazing, to be sure,
what some people do:
climbing to great heights
scaling amazing mountains. Such bravery is inspiring to so many of us.

Some people in this very congregation have done similar amazing things.

At the same time,
I’m not sure they’re THAT much more remarkable, in the end,
–than taking a deep breath and
walking through the threshold of your first adult job…
–or letting your kid get wheeled off to her first surgery
and not being able to do anything about it but wait…
–or waking up and getting out of bed
the first day after your spouse has passed away…
–or keeping yourself together, somehow,
after the pain of something horrible done to you resurfaces again.

That’s every much a leap of faith, I’m sure of it. [Read more…]