 Dr. William A. Ritter Senior Minister |
Wake
Watchers
Sermon:
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Among
the people who remain on my Christmas card list is a corporate
vice president of Weight Watchers International. Her husband
was a former colleague and, through him, we became good
friends. We have broken bread together on numerous occasions
and never once did she slip a
business card under my dessert plate. Although she
could have. Which is another reason I have nothing but respect
for the organization she manages. But
my title is “Wake Watchers,” not “Weight Watchers.”
And it is drawn from the world of boating, not the world of
dieting. I do not own a boat, nor have I ever owned a boat.
But I have a home in a northern Michigan neighborhood where a
lot of other people own boats….that home being on a harbor
which is connected to Grand Traverse Bay (and all of Lake
Michigan) by a channel. It is through that channel that boats
must pass in order to get from protected water to open water.
And stuck into the bank of that channel is a sign that reads:
“NO WAKE.” It means that when passing through you must cut
your engine, reduce your speed, and proceed in such a manner
that will send minimal amounts of water toward the shoreline
as a consequence of your forward motion. If that explanation
makes no sense, substitute the phrase “DON’T MAKE A
WAVE” and I think you’ll get the idea. You
see, the channel is narrow there….the banks are fragile
there….because the sand is in danger of shifting
there….meaning that even gentle wave action will contribute
to the narrowing of the opening there….shutting down summer
fun for everybody there. The
sign, of course, is all bark and no bite. It does not say what
will happen to anyone who makes a wake. Better are the marina
signs which declare (in big letters), “YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE
FOR YOUR WAKE,” and then spell out (in smaller letters) what
it could cost you should you fail to comply: your
money….your license….your thumbs….your firstborn child. Eventually,
of course, you reach the big lake where you can open the
throttle and move all the water you want. My brother-in-law is
into boats….owning three….including a performance boat
(sometimes called a “cigarette boat”) which he has named
“The Eliminator.” The only problem is that Higgins Lake,
while big by most standards, is only barely adequate to show
what Greg’s boat can do. As I told you after riding in it, I
loved every second of it, even as I was scraping the bugs from
my teeth. I mean, that boat makes both time and waves. But
Greg is every bit the neighbor that he is the sportsman,
meaning that he does not mix the word “fun” with the word
“foolish.” It
should not go unnoticed that wakes are “trailers”….in
the form of problems left behind by boats moving forward. I
mean, if you don’t look back, you might not even see them. But
what I want you to do now is look back with me to the near
northwest side of Detroit…. Noble School….sixth
grade….gym class with Mr. Brown. We are playing softball and
I am up to bat. Richard Barkholz pitches. I connect (mightily,
for a change). I mean:
I hit the ball Two
bases, at least. Maybe three. Yes, three. Safe at third. No
argument at all. Except from Mr. Brown, who called me out.
Why? For throwing my bat, that’s why. Against which there
was a rule. Apparently, when the ball flew, my bat
flew….endangering the catcher, the bench warmers, maybe even
Mr. Brown. What a shame. With open spaces and open bases in
front of me, I was called “out” for something that
happened behind me. Which I didn’t mean to do. All I wanted
was to ditch my bat and run. But that was the morning I was
introduced….in the sixth grade, no less….to the Law of
Unintended Consequences. One
of my favorite preachers (and most esteemed colleagues) is
William Sloane Coffin. I just read that Yale gave him an
honorary degree. Which is appropriate, given that Bill was the
chaplain of Yale while I was there (and has been a guest in my
home since I left there). As a speaker, Bill is fiery,
dramatic and prophetic. He speaks as one who has absolutely no
fear of congregational reaction. On some Sundays….in some
sermons….he has been known to “call a spade, a spade”
even as he is shoving it into your foot. And there are times
when I have no doubt he means to offend. Which
places him well within the biblical tradition. But which makes
people think twice before inviting him, don’t you see.
Concerning guest preaching invitations, Bill laughs and says:
“I blow in, blow off and blow out….leaving my host to
sweep up the pieces.” Which means that before issuing an
invitation, one has to make a calculation as to how many
“pieces” there will be and how much effort it will take to
sweep them. As
a guest preacher, I know I have created similar problems for
others….making waves, then moving on. Which is hard to
avoid. You can’t always tell what’s going to trouble
somebody’s waters…..and whether those waters could stand a
little troubling. I have even accepted invitations from folks
who have said: “I want you to come in and shake things up a
little.” But, once or twice, I may have exceeded
expectations. You’ve
got to watch your wake. One of the harshest discoveries I have
made about preaching is that I have to take responsibility,
not only for the fallout from what I say, but for the fallout
from what I didn’t say. That’s because you hold me
responsible for what you thought I said, because I opened a
verbal door through which I didn’t go, but you did. I mean,
if I dance you through a sermonic minefield, and I emerge
cleanly, but you get blown out of the water….I may be right
(in what I said) and you may be wrong (in what you heard), but
I still have to deal with the problems I create. It’s
funny, you know, but I keep running into people who describe
(in painstaking detail) all the baggage they claim to be
carrying from the past. I’m talking about things that were
said to them….things that were done to them….including
things that weren’t said and done to them which hurt them,
scarred them, screwed them up and weighed them down from that
day forward and forever more. “Baggage” is an “in”
word these days (as in “I’ve got baggage, he’s got
baggage, she comes with baggage, you know”). Gosh, we seem
to be carrying a lot of it. And,
in order for us to lug it, somebody had to load it. Whom we
can usually name….often through clenched teeth. With which I
have no problem. Or would have no problem, if we could also
recognize how much we may be loading on those coming after us.
For it is often those who carry the most baggage from the
previous generation who create the most carnage for the next
generation. So let’s talk about carnage. Wanda
and Walter Wonderful meet, marry and make a trio of little
Wonderfuls (ages 2, 4 and 7). But things do not remain
wonderful for the Wonderfuls. So they separate and divorce,
all the while pledging to love and nurture the Wonderful kids,
even though they have lost the ability to love and nurture
each other. Which they do, until Wanda meets Hank the Hunk who
woos her, wins her, and then wings her off to California
(because that’s where his “people” are living, and where
his “pot of gold” is waiting). Walter objects. Lawyers
object. Courts object. But Wanda and the kids are long gone.
“Movin’ on,” Wanda says. “Ain’t fair,” Walter
says. “Kids will adjust, they always do,” Hank the Hunk
says. Which may be true. But probably isn’t. At
Walter’s behest, I talk to Wanda. She resents my intrusion,
finally telling me that nobody can tell her how to run her
life. And she’s right.
No one can. At least, I can’t. But when you see
people (especially little people) getting swamped in the
backwash, shouldn’t somebody try to slow the boat down, at
least a little? Or
there’s this guy I know. Corporate type. Talented type.
Fast-track, hard-charging type. “A” type. Doesn’t stay
at one desk very long. Because somebody’s tabbed him for the
top desk before long. Which, when he gets it, may be wondrous.
Or disastrous. Because while he does well in each of his
assignments, there is a major mess when he leaves his
assignments. Fortunately, there’s a time delay on the mess,
so that it takes about a year to appear. Making it hard to
link to him. But it’s his. And the people with the mops know
it. You are responsible for your wake. In the book of Exodus, the Bible says: “I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers (and mothers, one suspects) upon the children of the third and fourth generation.” Which sounds incredibly harsh. I mean, why punish some kid for what his daddy or granddaddy did? And to be sure, Jesus later contradicts this notion. You remember the day. The disciples see a blind guy and ask Jesus: “Who sinned, Lord, this man or his daddy, causing him to be born blind?” To which Jesus said: “Nobody sinned. Don’t go there. Disconnect yourself from the notion that God works that way.” But
where do people get the idea that God works that way (“I’m
really ticked with you, so I’m gonna give it to your
kid”)? I’ll tell you why people think that way…..even
though God doesn’t work that way. Because life works that
way, don’t you see. It works that way all the time. Babies
born on crack didn’t take no crack. But their mamas did.
Sure as shooting up, their mamas did. And children beaten and
abused by their parents probably said a thousand times: “If
I’m ever lucky enough to have kids, no way am I going to do
this to my kids.” Yet they do it to their kids anyway. Not
because they want to. But because it’s what they know,
don’t you see. It’s what they grew up on. Meanwhile,
on dead-end streets, there are babies conceiving
babies…..babies delivering babies ….and babies raising
babies without any help from stay-at-home,
signed-on-the-dotted-line daddies, and the whole damnable
thing recycles itself every fifteen years. The system will
collapse completely, not if you withdraw the government (which
we do every few years or so), but if you withdraw the
grandmothers who are often the last thread of Christian
responsibility some families have. The
sins of the parents grow like tumors on the backs of the
children. No, God doesn’t want it that way. But life sure
plays out that way. So the next time you defend what you have
done…. are doing….or are getting ready to do…..by
saying: “Hey, Bill, it’s my business,” please don’t
take offense if I ask you (ever so pastorally, of course) who
is going to be hit by flying pieces of your “business,”
because they can’t get out of the way of your
“business,” because (for better or worse) life has placed
them in the wake of your “business.” You are responsible
for your wake. But
let’s move on. In fact, let’s tunnel from one end of the
Bible to the other. I said it again yesterday, speaking the
words over the ashes of a 91-year-old saint in a cemetery in
Southfield: “Blessed are those who die in the Lord from
henceforth; yea saith the Spirit, they may rest from their
labors….but their works do follow them.” Meaning what?
Well, several possibilities suggest themselves. Among them are
these:
According
to Roman Catholic doctrine, some people go to heaven, some
people go to hell, and some people (although they will reach
heaven eventually) have to detour through purgatory. The
theory being that while in purgatory, our sins (which we
didn’t quite put behind us before getting hit by the tomato
truck) will be burned away through suffering. Protestants
reject this for a couple of reasons. First, because we find it
hard to equate a graceful God with suffering and torment,
edifying though such torment might be. Second, because it was
once believed (in some Catholic circles) that cash laid on the
line by the living could shorten the time in purgatory
required of the dead. But
Wil Cantrell and I have been talking about purgatory of late.
One benefit of having a Duke intern on staff is that a minimum
of one hour per week of theological reflection is required
between the intern and the senior minister. And Wil and I
collectively think that we Protestants might have dispensed
with the notion of purgatory prematurely. What if purgatory is
not a place (like a holding tank or a mud room)? And what if
purgatory’s primary purpose is not torment and suffering
(however edifying), but maturity? Is it not possible that all
of us will pass through a purgatory of sorts….in varying
ways….for varying durations….in order that “the works
that have followed us” might be revealed, refined, even
purified. Is it not possible that we will all have to address
the accountability issue, during which our eyes will be fully
opened to everything we have done (good and ill), including
the effects upon others of everything we have done (good and
ill)….finally understanding it….the better to repent of
it….in order to be healed of it….for the purpose of moving
beyond it. Or as Fred Buechner once said: “Whichever side of
the grave you are talking about, life with God (apparently)
involves both growth and growing pains.” There is a special word Catholics use for the sacrament of bread and wine that is administered to the dying. It is called “viaticum”….which means (liturgically) “provision for the journey” or (colloquially) “one for the road.” After the funeral, families and friends have been known to gather for secular versions of the same sacrament. I suppose they are celebrating the “works” of the deceased. But they may also be celebrating the amazing graciousness of a God who will open the gates in spite of the “works” of the deceased. When it happens, there’s a name for such a post-funeral party, but I can’t (for the life of me) remember what it is. Oh yes, I can. It’s called a “wake.” Note: Interestingly, a number of people are beginning to rethink the question of purgatory. Fred Buechner’s contribution to the discussion can be found in the book entitled Wishful Thinking.
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