A couple of folks said they liked last Sunday's sermon. They must have been sleeping through it.
Everything is Holy Now
John Shuck
First Presbyterian Church
December 9, 2007
The wolf shall live with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah 11:6-9
Great Spirit,
Grant us the serenity…
To accept the things we cannot change,
The courage to change the things we can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.
That prayer, attributed to theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, is familiar to those in twelve step programs. Meetings are opened with that prayer because those who are in recovery from addiction know that finding personal serenity is the key to recovery. Regardless what is happening on the outside, what struggles we face, what problems are before us, discovering personal peace or serenity within is the path to spiritual maturity.
That prayer is not just for those who have found a path to recovery. It is for all of us. Finding serenity is not is about changing outside circumstances to fit our desires.
We will not find serenity when the world works the way we think it should.
We will not find serenity when things go our way.
Serenity comes from within ourselves.
When we try to put conditions on our serenity, when we say to ourselves, “I will be at peace, or I will be happy when such and such happens,” we will constantly find ourselves grasping, judging, demanding, and criticizing. We will find ourselves less and less serene.
When I was preparing to go to seminary, I went with my parents to the Southern Baptist church of my youth. The preacher said something that I remember again and again. He said when we imagine a peaceful scene, we may think of a pastoral meadow. A sunny day, 70 degrees, birds chirping (but not too loud), no mosquitos or flies to bother us, everything lovely and marvelous.
That is all very nice, but there is a more important image.
He asked to consider rather than a nice sunny, perfect day in the country, to think of peace as a raging storm with wind, hail, thunder and lightning. In the midst of this storm, we are in a cave, dry, safe, and looking out at it.
The true test of serenity is not when things are going well on the outside, but when we have found peace in the midst of a storm.
Some may ask, does this mean we never do anything to change outside conditions? Is this an excuse for being passive? Do we never work to end hunger, to work for justice, to confront those who hurt others or us? Do we never speak out?
To answer that question, we look at the second petition of the serenity prayer:
“Grant me the courage to change the things I can.”
We can be grateful for those people who found the courage change the things they could change. Serenity without courage is not a virtue. The flip side is that courage without serenity is not a virtue. As Paul wrote in what we call his first letter to the Corinthians,
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,* but do not have love, I gain nothing.
I Corinthians 13:1-3
A few years ago, when our denomination was struggling over an issue (when are we not struggling over an issue?), someone on the “other side” offered an image that I have not forgotten. He is a biblical scholar and I disagreed and still disagree with his position on this particular issue. But he said in regards to serenity and with the struggles we were facing as a church to imagine the ocean. He asked us to imagine the ocean on a stormy day. The wind and the waves are violent. But this storm is on the surface. The depths of the ocean are unaffected. On the surface is disturbance, but at the depths there is peace.
When I heard this, I have to admit, my reaction was one of dismissal. “Hmmph,” I said to myself, and probably to anyone else who I felt should listen to me. I was not in the mood to hear about peace at the depths of the ocean. I was in the mood for picking apart the arguments of my opponent. I was in the mood for a good scrap.
It took me a while to appreciate that wisdom. It took some time and some reflection to be able to hear it. Yes, the storms of life are real. We are in them. But they are on the surface. At the depths is peace. Deeper than our differences is a unity that cannot ultimately be shaken. Do we have the courage (which requires humility) to admit that?
Grant us the serenity…
To accept the things we cannot change,
The courage to change the things we can,
And the third line of that prayer is our guide:
“…and the wisdom to know the difference.”
If there is any task before us as a human race, that may be more important than any other, it is to listen for words from wisdom. Wisdom is personified in sacred scriptures as Sophia or the Wisdom Woman. She was with creation at its inception. She is the foundation or the depth of Creation itself.
We find her in the Book of Proverbs:
Wisdom cries out in the street;
in the squares she raises her voice.
21At the busiest corner she cries out;
at the entrance of the city gates she speaks:
22‘How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?
How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing
and fools hate knowledge?
23Give heed to my reproof;
I will pour out my thoughts to you;
I will make my words known to you.
Proverbs 1:20-23
Wisdom often comes from those we do not like very much. This is why our enemy or our opponent is often our greatest teacher. Through him or her we find our own shadow. Often we find our twin. That is of course if we are willing to listen.
Wisdom is that which helps us to know the difference between the things we can change and the things we cannot change. When you find that wisdom, will you let me know?
One of the reasons those who we have designated as saints, or leaders, or the wise, are such is because they know they are not. Spirituality or growth in wisdom is often imagined as increasing levels of awareness. Once we move up through one, the universe opens us up to more and more levels.
The wolf shall live with the lamb,
the leopard shall lie down with the kid,
the calf and the lion and the fatling together,
and a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
their young shall lie down together;
and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp,
and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den.
They will not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain;
for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord
as the waters cover the sea.
Isaiah 11:6-9
On one hand we do not arrive. On the other hand we continue the journey. We are not alone in this quest. Teachers of wisdom come to us in many forms and in many ways. Christmas is the Feast of the Incarnation. This is where we celebrate the divine within creation. It is a mistake to think of incarnation only in the person of Jesus.
Jesus was a sign of incarnation, of divine wisdom in all of creation itself. Jesus was a pointer to the wisdom and divine presence in all of us, in all that is. This is a change that I have had over the years. It is the recognition that all is holy. All is sacred. All is the divine presence. On the surface is disturbance, but at the depths is peace. It looks as though we are divided and separated. But Wisdom shows us differently.
I was introduced last week to a beautiful song. I close with its lyrics. I think it captures the essence of Incarnation, of the divine dwelling within. The title of this song is the title of the sermon. Serenity, courage, and wisdom depends upon the truth that all is sacred—everything is holy now.
When I was a boy, each week
On Sunday, we would go to church
And pay attention to the priest
And he would read the Holy Word.
And consecrate the holy bread
And everyone would kneel and bow
Today the only difference is
Everything is holy now.
When I was in Sunday school
We would learn about the time
Moses split the sea in two
Jesus made the water wine
And I remember feeling sad
that miracles don’t happen still
But now I cant keep track
‘Cause everything’s a miracle
Wine from water is not so small
An even better magic trick
is that anything is here at all.
So the challenging thing becomes
not to look for miracles
but finding where there isn’t one.
Holy water was rare at best
barely wet my finger tips
Now I have to hold my breath
I’m swimming in a sea of it
Used to be a world half there
Heaven’s second rate hand me downs
now I walk it with a reverent air,
‘cause everything’s holy now.
This morning outside I stood
And saw a little red-winged bird
Shining like a burning bush
Singing like a scripture verse
It made me want to bow my head.
and I remember when church let out -
how things have changed since then,
everything is holy now.
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