 Dr. William A. Ritter Senior Minister |
Get
a Life
Sermon:
Scripture: |
|
Would you
believe that all winter long we waited for the ice to melt,
and when it did, our beloved Red Wings drowned. Which leaves
hope hanging in the hands of the Pistons….or, more to the
point, riding on the knees of the Pistons….or, even more to
the point, riding on the knees of one particular Piston (the
most famous “Wallace” to come out of Alabama since
George). As
a team, our Pistons are tough and gritty, just like the city
they represent. They scrap. They fight. They claw. And they
can overcome big leads. What they find harder to do is hold
big leads. Lacking a true “killer instinct,” when they get
teams down, they can’t put teams away. More than once, such
teams have risen from the dead to make them pay. It
would, of course, be much too simple (and far too forced) to
say that the enemies of Jesus faced the problem long before
the Pistons. Although they tracked him down….nailed him
up…. finished him off….put him away….and then deployed
one or more soldiers at graveside to make sure he didn’t go
anywhere. Which sounds like overkill. But what do I know? It
does lead me to recall the earliest bit of doggerel I
memorized as a kid:
Don’t
ask for a footnote on that one. I can’t tell you from whom I
got it, let alone when, where or why. All I know is that when
creeping dementia keeps me from remembering which shoes in the
nursing home are mine, I will be able to recite those six
lines without missing a beat. Over
the years of my ministry, I have seen theories ride the subway
all the way from popularity to obscurity, suggesting that the
resurrection of Jesus was really a resuscitation….that he
couldn’t have died on the cross, because execution by
crucifixion commonly ended in asphyxiation, and usually took
three days while Jesus was “up and down” (as the golfers
say) in three hours. Such theories suggest that he either
slipped into a pain-induced coma or was drugged into a
chemically-induced coma (as a result of something stronger
than vinegar on the sponge that was hoisted to his lips by a
stick)….and that comatose, he gave the appearance of being
dead, but wasn’t. Which
makes for interesting reading, even though it makes his
executioners look like amateurs. Which they weren’t. They
did this for a living (macabre as that may sound)….meaning
that they did it often and they did it well. Concerning the
word “dead,” they not only did it, but knew it when they
saw it. Make no mistake about it, once they were done with
Jesus, nobody needed to shoot God’s dead boy, just to make
sure. Why
start such a lovely Sunday so graphically? So you don’t miss
the miracle, that’s why. Given an interfaith service
elsewhere, we weren’t open on Friday. So you may have missed
the news on Friday. That Jesus died on Friday. Dorothy Sayers
writes: “I find it curious that people who are filled with
horrified indignation whenever a cat kills a sparrow, can hear
the story of the killing of Jesus referenced Sunday after
Sunday and not experience any shock at all.” But what
Dorothy needs to understand is that when news is old, it’s
stale. This year’s Good Friday’s news had less to do with
Jesus hanging on a cross than with Laci Peterson and her baby
washing up on the California coast (now that the miracle of
DNA testing most assuredly proves it). Last
Tuesday night, we heard 55 of our kids sing and act their way
through a marvelous musical drama written by our own
Christopher Hall. Which included a number of square mirrors
(don’t ask, you needed to have been there). Over the course
of the production, the mirrors were assembled into sections,
and the sections were assembled into a cross. Kids were
singing and assembling in marvelous symmetry. Except for one
small problem. The right arm of the cross-piece would not stay
put….something about a pin that the kids couldn’t slip
into the proper slot. The four or five kids assigned to this
task struggled for what seemed like an eternity, while the
other 50 sang their hearts out. During which time, Doris Hall
overheard one of the struggling teens….a middle school
girl….say to no one in particular: “This cross is
annoying.” Well,
yes….it was. Annoying on Tuesday. Agonizing on Friday. I
mean, it could ruin your whole play….and your whole
day….if God let it. But
God didn’t. The same God who did nothing to stop it,
nonetheless did something beyond it. Gave Jesus a life,
that’s what God did. Not his old life. But a new life. Which
is where things get fuzzy for me, given that I have no
explanation as to how any of that happened. I have seen people
come out of surgery. And I have seen people come out of comas.
But I have yet to see anybody come back from burial. Yet,
there seemed to be….at least in the case of Jesus….enough
similarity between the life he previously had and the life he
now had, so that those who remembered him, recognized him. Which gives me confidence, given my old middle school fear (which has never completely left me) that the day might come when I will be asked to go some place and will recognize absolutely nobody. Every time my mother said, “Go, you’ll have a good time,” I countered by asking: “Who’s gonna be there?” To which she always said: “You’ll meet somebody.” Which was not what I wanted to hear. For I was more concerned with old, familiar faces rather than strange, new faces. And still am. I
have been quoting Maurice Boyd for several years now, sharing
his observation at funeral after funeral. Like a lot of
preachers, people constantly asked him if they could expect to
see their loved ones in heaven. Which would occasion (from
him) answers that were always overly long, overly theological
and overly obtuse. Finally, he could stand his own vagueness
no longer. So the next time a parishioner asked: “Dr. Boyd,
do you think I can see my loved ones in heaven?”, he
answered (very Jesus-like) with a question of his own: “Will
it be heaven if you can’t?” Which I then always follow by
saying:
Clearly,
I have just made a major jump, telling you of my belief that
the resurrection is not just about Jesus, but that it is also
very much about me. And that it is not just about me, but also
very much about you. And it is not just about me and you, but
very much about mine and yours. And not just about a narrow
version of mine and yours, but a version of mine and yours
drawn as widely as God is merciful. Not that I can prove any
of that. For I have never seen the Promised Land….not even a
glimpse. But I have heard the Promised One, and that is good
enough for me. Promise now. Pictures later. So
much for the future. It’s taken care of. Trust me. If that
makes you feel warm, secure and confident, it’s meant to.
But I did not come here this morning with the sole objective
of announcing that you have been granted tenure forever, but
to suggest that such a guarantee might have a significant
impact now. I
know there are many who argue that academic tenure is a
promise that leads to complacency and, when granted too
widely, condemns universities to mediocrity. Ah, but when
tenure works as it is meant to work, it leads to
out-of-the-box thinking, creative writing, innovative teaching
and courageous living, of the kind that makes scholarship
honorable, professors memorable and universities desirable.
Tenure may appear to be about security….but not the security
in which one hides, so much as the security in which one
thrives. Says
Paul to the Colossians: “If you have then been raised with
Christ”….and when you know Paul as I think I know Paul,
you know that Paul’s “if” is not so much propositional
as it is rhetorical, given that Paul knows that he has been
raised with Christ, even as Paul knows that you have been
raised with Christ….so, being thus assured, Paul says:
“Seek the things that are Christly.” In other words, put
on a new nature….a bold nature….a better nature….a
higher nature. In other words, “get a life.” And to you
who say, “But I already have a life,” Paul would answer:
“Don’t sell yourself short.” The
other night I was channel surfing as the clock plowed
relentlessly toward midnight. Which was how I happened upon a
rerun of Frazier (a show I used to like because of
Frazier’s father’s feistiness, along with Daphne’s
delightful accent). But this rerun offered a special treat, in
that it brought Frazier’s old buddy, Woody, from Boston to
Seattle, where (for one interminable evening) Frazier and
Woody swapped stories about the bar at Cheers, the gang at
Cheers, and the years at Cheers. Which was fine for a night.
But they did it again over lunch the next day….and over
dinner the next night….and over lunch and dinner the day
after that. By day four, Frazier was both bored and exhausted
with it all. But he pressed on for one more meal because, as
he told his brother Niles:
What
happens, of course, is that Woody is thinking the same thing
about Frazier:
I know.
Such things are matters of perception. But there isn’t a
week that goes by when I don’t see somebody nitpicking over
this….obsessing over that….straining at gnats….totally
overlooking camels….piling up molehills until, in their own
minds, they become mountains…. serving up glass after glass
of their finest whine….until I want to say: “Get a
life.” But I don’t. Because they wouldn’t take it
kindly. Nor would I have meant it kindly. Not that there
aren’t times when they may have wanted to say the same to
me. Well,
this morning I am saying it. And you shouldn’t take it
personally, given that I am saying it biblically. I mean, if
Christ has been raised….and if death has been
conquered….some of us really ought to live better than we
do. I
have never known what to make of those vividly-descriptive
near-death reports. You know the ones I mean. I am talking
about people who almost die but don’t. And they share some
remarkably similar stories of out-of-body
visualizations….rapid movements through narrow
tunnels….friendly confrontations with “beings of
light”….rapid rewinds of their earthly lives (as if in
cinematic review)….even the welcoming presence of those (who
the poet says) “We have loved long since, yet lost
awhile.” Do I hear those stories? Sure. Do I understand
those stories? No. Do I believe those stories? Yes. But why? Because,
to a person, the people who tell those stories live very
different lives following their experience….“different”
as in “better,” with the definition of “better” being
both theirs and mine. I guess when you skate up to the edge of
the abyss and see a bridge where you expected to take a
plunge, it colors your thinking. A
woman who was much too young to suffer a stroke, did. And
concerning her immobility, I said in my stupidity: “I guess
this will color your life.” To which she said: “Yes, I
rather imagine it will. But I retain the right to choose the
color.” And with a whole color palette to choose
from….which included green for envy, yellow for self-pity,
blue for depression, red for rage, and black for
despair….she selected silver for hope and gold for courage. *
* * * * “I
had a dream about you last night,” she said. “I am worried
about you. I feel a need to give you a hug. Would that be all
right?” She, a member of our choir. The date, Good Friday.
The time 1:00 in the afternoon. The place, the narthex of
Central Woodward Christian Church in Troy. So she gave me a
hug. And it felt good to be hugged (not to worry, my wife was
standing beside me). I
do not know what she dreamed. And I may not want to know what
she dreamed. But thinking about it later, I realized how much
I needed Easter this year….and how much I may have appeared
to the more sensitive among you as someone who needed Easter
this year. A hard winter. A harder war. A major purchase,
foretelling a changed existence. Watching too many cancer
sufferers waging their fight of their life. Preaching to a
sanctuary last Wednesday, packed with people wondering why a
fine young father suddenly ended his life. But
this is not a day for sorrowing. And this is not a day for
sighing. This is a day for singing. Maybe even shouting. So
I’ll say it to you: “Get a life.” Now
you say it to me: “Get a life.” And
let’s shout it to each other: “GET A LIFE.” Notes:
Among others, I am indebted to Peter Gomes for my title, to
James Kay for his creative suggestion that Easter is about
something more than my personal survival, to Maurice Boyd for
material already mentioned, and to Barbara Brown Taylor for
steering me into the path of Dorothy Sayers. Let the record show that the congregation shouted (with great energy) the appropriate response at the end of the sermon, which was followed by a thunderous rendition of Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus.”
|