Expansive People of Grace
By Charles Rush
November 18, 2001
Lk. 17: 11-19
is is a true story. The famous painter Salvador Dali had a very serious eye ailment that threatened his sight. He went to see the leading specialist in Spain who treated his eye successfully and saved Dali's vision. Dali was overwhelmingly grateful and promised the physician that he would do a painting in his honor, which he did. It was a huge canvas, several yards by several yards. The main part of the painting was a huge eye with the cornea and pupil, massive in size. In the reflection of the eye, Dali had painted the reflection of the doctor, examining his eye, with the light in his hand, his physicians gear on.
The
painter, as you probably know, had quite an ego. He presented this massive
painting to the physician, unveiled it. The physician walked from side to side,
not saying much. Finally, Dali prompted him saying, ‘What are you thinking?'
The physician swept his hands broadly at the sheer size of the eye and detail
of the painting and said, “Actually, just now, I'm thinking just now that
I'm glad I'm not a proctologist.”
Salvador
Dali had a way of getting Dali in the middle of everything, even his gratitude,
as only he could. Genuine gratitude, however, is quite another matter.
A colleague of mine told me
about shared with me an experience from his early years as a pastor, visiting
two different women in the hospital who were both dying. One of them was in her
70's, a relatively prosperous woman, extensively traveled, educated, seemingly
influential in her community.
The
other woman was in her late 30's, three young children that had taken most of
her time in the past decade, also educated, of modest means, with a devoted
husband. They both went to the same large church in Texas.
The
seventy-year-old was acerbic, sarcastic, and angry. Often when her relatives
would come to visit her, she would comment to the Minister after they left how
these relatives had been a disappointment to her, usually accompanied with a
story that ended with some rolling of the eyes. She was bitter that she had
contracted this disease, irritated with all the procedures and chemotherapy
that she had to go through, and short with her physicians that they hadn't
figured out a cure. Week after week, this went on. Family members were
solicited to try to change her attitude to no avail. Everyone just shrugged
their shoulders as they left her room, saying, ‘that's Martha'. My colleague
said that family members visited, but it was short, perfunctory, and subconsciously
they just stayed away. Only her youngest granddaughter could bring a smile, a
baby. She was prickly all the way to the end.
The
thirty year old was on the same floor. She went through an equally elaborate
ordeal that was ineffective and she was very weak at the end of her life. My
colleague said he that what struck him about her was her eyes. Even when she
was tired, she was capable of radiating love and grace with her eyes. And her
touch- there was something warm and tender about her touch. At some point in
her treatment, the doctors told there that there was no more treatment left and
shortly afterward she began a series of short conversations, blessing people
really, though without ever saying so, telling them they were good and they
would be strong and productive, not to worry about her. It was very difficult
but very moving.
And
her graciousness was infectious to all those around her as well. My friend said
he was talking to her husband right at the time of her death, asking him if he
was frustrated and angry, maybe at God, for her relatively brief life and the
prospect of raising children alone. The husband said he had a lot of emotions,
to be sure, but then he added, “I never deserved to have her in the first
place. She lit up my life from the first day I met her. I'm just grateful for
the time we had together.”
How
is it, my friend asked, that two people from the same place, who attend the
same church, can have such different spiritual dispositions? Furthermore, how
can we cultivate that spiritual disposition of grace? How can we live out of a
sense of gratitude and grace?
In
our text this morning, Jesus walks by 10 people that are sick with leprosy, and
he heals all ten. Only one returns to give thanks and he is a Samaritan, not
even a full Jew. Presumably, Luke thinks the others were not grateful because
they were presumptuous about their entitlement as Jews. Jesus singles out this
one Samaritan that returned, and he blesses him. In effect, he says, “Live out
of the grace you have known, be grateful and gracious to those around you.” Return
to that disposition for spiritual health. Jesus doesn't tell him to do
anything religious: he doesn't have to say 10 hail Mary's, or go on a
pilgrimage to the Holy Land, or spend his life in celibacy, devoted to prayer.
He just blesses him, “you faith has made you whole (or healthy)”. Live out of
the blessing you have known. Be grateful and gracious.
It
is something we have to return to because there are a lot of other
forces that we could live from, many that seem to dominate us and control us,
if we aren't watching them. Fear, anxiety, desire for certain stuff, control,
anger, sexual libido. They are all out there, vying to be the central motivator
of our ego, all successfully in gaining control from time to time.
Most
of us are like a dog I heard about that somehow wandered onto the field of a
Kansas City Royals baseball game. None of the players or the umpires could
catch the dog, so they tried shooing the dog off the field. The dog went this
way and that, running to and fro. The players yelled at him, the umpires
hollered at him but the dog only became thoroughly confused, eventually
plopping himself down on third base where he refused to move. Apparently, a
sports reporter, covering the story wrote, “The problem was that the dog
could hear no dominant voice.”[i]
Most of us are like that too, if we are not spiritually intentional and return
our focus to what is important, we hear no dominant voice.
And
they are powerful voices too. Right now, a whole bunch of us are hearing the
voice of fear around us. Some of us are looking for work in an
environment that is not generally very promising, and if you are in
telecommunications, for instance, your whole field is tanking. But a whole
bunch of us are living in a background environment of fear in our companies, a
serious change of disposition from just a couple years ago. Just a couple years
ago top executives were encouraging people with bold imaginative plans,
praising those who dared to take risks. How quickly that environment has
reversed itself. With fear around us, people are hiding from responsibility,
blaming others, covering their backsides just to keep their jobs. Fear
permeates our background environment and it is not creative.
And
anger. Susan Lee wrote a piece in Friday's Wall Street Journal
about visiting the construction workers, police officers, and National Guard
that are cleaning up the site at the World Trade Center. “When pressed”, she
writes, “most people described their thoughts in terms of personal feelings,
using adjectives like ‘sickened' or ‘sad', but they said they felt good to be
helping out. Half admitted to crying each day after they left the site, but
they shrugged as they said it (That is a New York thing Susan); while the other
half said they had trouble sleeping because of their anger.”[ii]
Anger can be like that, just creep up, wend it's way into all facets of our
life and dominate us.
And
control. Listening this week to the sound of music playing in Kabul,
watching women smile unveiled, watching men get a shave, and to top it off,
watching a kid fly a kite (I'm still scratching my head trying to figure what
could be irreligious about kites)… At any rate, I guess the Taliban win this
week's award for letting control issues get the best of them. It was very
interesting to see the breadth and depth of joy at being released from control
to freedom- and who in the West would have known 2 months ago. The power
control is great and once under it's grip, the shadow of it's influence is long.
All these
dispositions vie with each other to pilot our egos. No, we have to return our
gaze to the disposition of the blessings in our lives around us, to find the
gracious spirit of living. It is all around us, but we have to return to it as
the dominant voice, the others being so loud in our lives.
I
recently had that blessing myself. My daughter is studying in France. I kept
talking about going to see her but I didn't think I could afford it, didn't
have the time, but it was a dream I had envisioned almost twenty years ago.
Things came together to make it affordable… so I went and met her in Paris. My wife wouldn't go, wanted me to go
instead, didn't want to fly together right now, etc.. So I went alone. I had
thought of this trip so many years ago, I had almost forgotten the dream, and
suddenly I was living it.
I
met my daughter and we walked straight to the Paris Opera House to see if there
were any possible tickets to anything. This was part of the dream too. Alas,
there were none. This was not right, so we walked outside dejected to see the
scalper dude. Two tickets left to the ballet Giselle that night, top
tier box, back row- so what. We got dressed and went. As fate would have it,
the people in the two rows in front of us didn't show for the curtain, so we
got to scoot down to the rail. As the lights went down, my daughter is in front
of me, I was watching her watch the ballet, thinking back to when she was a
baby.
She
had colic as a newborn and cried a lot at night. We had two children within one
year, so we took turns walking her at night (and I am not suggesting it was
50/50… it was not). I was learning Greek at the time. I would hold her over my
shoulder, burping her, with the Greek grammar book in my other hand, memorizing
Greek paradigms and Greek vocabulary: pistis, Basileia tou Theou,
dikaiosyne, skubala. Sometimes, if
she was still cranky, we would bundle up and walk in the snow. Her little eyes,
wide awake in the cold. She was the cutest baby in the world. I loved that
child.
And
I dreamed that one day, we would go some place far away, some place without
diapers, without colic, without Greek homework and student poverty, some place
like Paris- yes, Paris. I'm sitting there watching her watch the ballet,
so elegant, so grown up, so interesting to talk to… and she even knows French.
What a blessing to live to see this day. What a blessing to watch her bloom
before my eyes. We are surrounded by blessing. We have been graced. It
is only one voice out of many voices that command our attention, but
Jesus suggests that the spiritual challenge is to return to it as the
dominant voice and to live a life of gratitude blessing others and
reflecting the grace.
We
are entering into the holiday season, our families will be reuniting. My hope
for you is that, in the midst of the cacophony, in the midst of the
complication and peculiar dysfunction that makes your family… well, your
family, you will hear the dominant voice of grace and gratefulness. My hope is
that you can live out of that.
My
hope is that you can let it infuse your life. My hope is that you can be a grateful
and gracious giver. It is not easy in this environment to keep on that
voice but it is being done around us. I
was talking with someone recently about philanthropy in this anxious economic
environment. Their home had a family discussion about values and priorities.
They decided to keep their philanthropy steady. If other things needed to be
trimmed back, and they would, but they would continue to support the values
they have that matter.
My
hope is that you can be like that. And make no mistake, I hope you are generous
with your pledge to Christ Church. We need the money, let me be clear. But I
think this is a community that is worthy of your gift. I think of Christ Church
as a catalyst that generates a lot of blessing- people that lift up and
support each other, spiritual values that bless us and our children,
connections with missions locally and around the world that open up our minds
with a vision that is global. We need to support our programs, our mission
giving, our staff,- everything that makes community go. You have your pledge
cards at home. Turn them in with a generous number on them. And I know that for
some of you, this is going not going to be just cream off the top, it is going
to look more like a leap of faith. Living out of your gratitude has a way of
working out these things, even difficult things.
Robert
Fulghum attended a conference on the Island of Crete led by the renowned Greek
philosopher and politician Alexander Papaderos. At the end of the conference
with a score of other intellectuals, Papaderos led the closing session. He
closed by saying, “Are there any questions.” There was a silence. Fulghum
raised his hand and asked, “What is the meaning of life?” It brought a round of
laughter from all the intellectuals that were gathered. To their surprise,
Papaderos took out his wallet and pulled from it a piece of mirror that he
carried with him everywhere. He had found it as a child after a German
motorcycle had wrecked and he played with it from then on, illuminating the
dark. Papaderos said “As I grew older I learned that reflecting light is not
just a child's game. It is a metaphor for what I might do with my life. I came
to understand that I am not the light, or the source of the light, but I can
reflect the light. The light- truth, understanding, knowledge- is always
there, but it will not shine into the darkest places unless I reflect it. I
have come to understand this as the meaning of life.” That's not too bad for a
philosopher. We theologians would simply add that truth, understanding, and
knowledge, important as they are, must be delivered with the spiritual
disposition of grace, gratitude, and love. May you be filled with grace,
gratitude, and love. Blessings are all around you.
Amen.
[i] From Ray Leblanc Augsburg Sermons 3
(Augsburg Minneapolis: Gospels, Series C, 1994), p. 118.
[ii] Susan Lee
“More Than Zero” from the Houses of Worship article in the Weekend Section, Wall
Street Journal, (November 16th, 2001), p. 17.
© 2001 .
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