The Spotlight

Published on by Adam ThomasLeave a comment

 (Sermon for Sunday, September 16, 2012 || Proper 19B || Mark 8:27-38)

I put the guitar down on the wooden bench, dropped my right knee to the root-strewn ground, and produced the ring from my pocket. The green light that shone through the trees of the outdoor chapel glinted off the diamond and sapphires, a perfect analog for the light that I felt sure was bursting from my own chest. The last words of the song I had just finished singing clung to the hot, humid, late-July air and surrounded us with the most important question I have ever asked: “Leah, darling, will you marry me?” She nodded her head once, unable to find her voice. Then, after an eternal moment during which I could feel in the depths of my soul the momentum of our entire lives converging on that one point in time, she whispered the single word I longed to hear: “Yes.” My hand trembled so much that I had trouble finding her finger with the ring. And as we embraced, I realized something profound – profound and wonderful. I realized that I was no longer the main character in my own life.

For the first 27½ years of my existence, my chief concern, whether I acknowledged it or not, was me. I was Numero Uno, first in line, the Big Cheese. I was in the spotlight. Sure, I lived my life with a dollop of self-sacrifice, of serving the other at my own cost, but this behavior was much more garnish than entree. I was the main character of my life: the rest of the cast never really could rival me for my own attention. Then I met Leah and everything changed. Suddenly, not only did I desire to share the spotlight, I would have been excited to give the prime spot to her alone. A whole new world of service opened up to me that I don’t think I was ever aware of before. When we came together as a couple, I finally understood the joys of self-sacrificial love.

Looking back on those days two years ago, I chuckle at God’s sense of humor and rejoice in God’s providence. I can just hear God the Father saying to God the Son: “You know that Adam Thomas fellow? He’s my beloved child, he’s even a priest of the Church, but he just doesn’t get it. He doesn’t understand your words, Son, when you said to your friends: ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.’ ”

“You know what we should do?” says God the Son. “We should get him to Massachusetts so he can meet Leah Johnson. I think she will clue him in.”

You see, I spent 27½ years – that’s 93.2% of my life, by the way – trying to have my cake and eat it to. I tried to follow Jesus and remain the main character in my own life. But Jesus’ words and his own self-sacrificial love show us a different way.

Jesus says, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” We Americans are programmed to cringe at the thought of “denying ourselves.” We want giant SUVs that have great fuel economy. We want the beer to taste great and be less filling. We want to treat ourselves to chocolate desserts that don’t have any calories. We want to pursue our happiness, and we don’t seem to mind advertisers telling us just what our happiness should look like. These marketers know they will rake in so much more money if they continue convincing us that being the main characters of our own lives is the best way to live.

Until I met Leah, I bought into the hype. I’ll let you in on a secret: when I was in elementary school, my parents sent me to a session or two of therapy because of how awfully and brutally I insisted on getting my own way. The temper tantrums I threw if we didn’t go to the restaurant I wanted to go to were the stuff of legend. One of these tantrums happened on my mother’s birthday. While that behavior faded as I got older, I still succumb all too often to our me-first consumer culture. I’d be willing to bet that you do to.

But when we deny ourselves and stop striving to be the main characters, we no longer feel shortchanged when Jesus spins the spotlight away from us and shines the light on others. These others are always the ones that Jesus desires us to see: the ones who seem to us to be the ensemble, those brought in just to fill out the cast, the extras. In our film, these extras are those who have no roof over their heads or who have no money for food or who lay in the nursing home with no one to visit them. But in God’s film, these extras are the stars. When we insist that the spotlight stay on us, these others remain in the shadows, too unimportant to garner any attention. But when we follow Jesus Christ as he yearns for us to, we let go of our stranglehold on the spotlight and finally see those whom he would have us see.

And when we see in this way, when we notice those outside our own spotlights, something happens that the advertisers and marketing directors never prepared us for. We discover a latent desire that Jesus’ words planted within us when we were looking the other way. We discover the desire to be generous and welcoming to those who never enjoy the spotlight. We look the ensemble cast members in the eye and realize that we want to know their names and where they grew up and what their hopes and dreams for the future are. We turn out our pockets and volunteer our time and invite the stranger to become friend because by doing so we notice clearly the footsteps of Christ walking one step before us. We feel the life of Christ welling up from within us and connecting with the life of Christ welling up from within the other, who now shines in the spotlight.

Jesus Christ is always walking one step before us, but we don’t always walk one step behind him. We stray, we go off on our own, we set up camp rather than continue following. But even with all of our wilderness wanderings and our prima donna tendencies, he continues to stay one step away, calling us back to his path. His path is hard: the way of denial, of self-sacrifice, of cross-carrying. But his path is also the way of true joy.

When we walk down Jesus’ path, the spotlight is never on us, but on those around us, those walking with us. Now that God has blessed me with a partner to remind me that I am not the main character of my life, I have crept slowly and haltingly onto this path and found the joy of stepping out of the spotlight, the joy of generosity and welcoming and service. Perhaps you have, too. Perhaps, as we turn the spotlight on each other and on those Jesus would have us see, together we will notice, there marking the ground in front of us, the footsteps of Jesus Christ.

Go Towards the Light (September 14, 2012)

Published on by Adam ThomasLeave a comment

…Opening To…

Look upon me, O Lord, and let all the darkness of my soul vanish before the beams of your brightness. (Saint Augustine of Hippo)

…Listening In…

Night will be no more. They won’t need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will shine on them, and they will reign forever and ever. (Revelation 22:5; context)

…Filling Up…

Light expands to fill all the space it can reach; darkness finds no purchase where light is shining. Light allows us to see all the beautiful variety of the visible spectrum; darkness cannot steal away color where light is shining. Light warms us; darkness brings no chill where light is shining. The light of God shines into our hearts and out of our hearts, making us windows through which to see God.

And, after all that, light points the way home.

Perhaps, you are walking down your street at night and you notice that your mother left the porch light on for you. The lamp’s reassuring glow brings you to the safety and warmth of your own house. Coming into a dark house can be a scary proposition, but turning on even a single light changes the experience.

Perhaps, you are driving home from out of town. It is night. It is dark. And the headlights shine only so far in front of you. But they shine all the while: they shine far enough out in front of you to guide you all the way home. Is this not how our walks with God work, as well? Jesus Christ walks one step in front of us and we follow as best we can. Like the headlights, he shines just far enough in front of us to show where to put our feet. But he brings us home.

In the end, darkness never has and never will overcome light. God’s light shines in our lives, which prompts us to shine in the lives of those we meet. The old story says that when you die, you see a white light – the light that people say ushers you into heaven. But the truth is this: that white light doesn’t shine only when you are about to die. That light shines all the time. The Lord shines on all of us, and shines throughout our lives. The Lord shines on us as the sun and as the headlights and as the porch light. The Lord shines on us, pointing the way home to God.

…Praying For…

Dear God, thank you shining on me throughout my entire life. May I soak in your light and reflect it back to all those I meet. May I be a vessel of your holy light, aglow with your presence and aflame with your Holy Spirit; in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, knowing that you are a light that never goes out. You are always shining on the path that takes me home.

Stained Glass Windows (September 13, 2012)

Published on by Adam ThomasLeave a comment

…Opening To…

Look upon me, O Lord, and let all the darkness of my soul vanish before the beams of your brightness. (Saint Augustine of Hippo)

…Listening In…

God said that light should shine out of the darkness. He is the same one who shined in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ. (2 Corinthians 4:6; context)

…Filling Up…

We turn our discussion of light this week to a substance through which light shines. Have you ever wondered why churches have stained glass windows? You don’t see many stained glass windows in secular buildings or in private homes, and you certainly can’t find them for sale at Home Depot. No – churches pretty much have the market cornered on stained glass.

Leaving aside the fact that these windows are pretty and make interesting patterns of light dance across the floor, the purpose for stained glass has since medieval times been to tell stories. When most of the population was illiterate, the best way to teach the Bible was to tell it in picture form in the windows of churches. While some windows are purely decorative, in many the glass takes sunlight and bends it to tell a story. Each panel contains glass of various pigments and shapes, and strung together the light shining through shows scenes from Jesus’ life or images of the saints or other stories.

But I think that another reason that churches have stained glass windows is to remind the people who enter those churches that we are also a type of stained glass. Paul says that God shines in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ. God shines in our hearts.

Our hearts can be dim, dank places, but God’s light penetrates them and roots out all that darkness. When our hearts are bright, we can ask God to make us windows so that the light will shine forth from us. But we aren’t just any old windows. We are stained glass. God’s light shines from us each uniquely – our individual gifts and personalities and yearnings act as the panels of colored glass. Through these beautiful panes, God tells the story of how God is moving in our lives. So shine with the knowledge that God’s light has reached your heart. And be radiant.

…Praying For…

Dear God, thank you for shining your light in my heart. Help me to radiate that light forth from myself so that others may know that I am yours. Give me the grace to brighten the lives of all I meet; in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, knowing that you are a light that never goes out. You are always shining on the path that takes me home.

The Sky is on Fire (September 12, 2012)

Published on by Adam ThomasLeave a comment

…Opening To…

Look upon me, O Lord, and let all the darkness of my soul vanish before the beams of your brightness. (Saint Augustine of Hippo)

…Listening In…

This is the basis for judgment: The light came into the world, and people loved darkness more than the light, for their actions are evil. All who do wicked things hate the light and don’t come to the light for fear that their actions will be exposed to the light.Whoever does the truth comes to the light so that it can be seen that their actions were done in God. (John 3:19-21; context)

…Filling Up…

As we continue to think about light, I keep coming back to the same place: we humans have a tendency to speak of things from a human point of view. This is only natural, of course. But what we rarely take the time to notice is the fact that the human point of view is completely wrong sometimes. Here’s what I mean. You are standing out on your porch after dinner and watching the sun go down. The sky is on fire with yellows and reds deepening into purples and blues. You stand there transfixed until the last ray of light drops below the horizon.

That’s the human point of view. What really happened is this: You are standing out on your porch watching the effects as your little patch of the earth rotates away from the sun. The sky is on fire with yellows and reds deepening into purples and blues. You stand there transfixed until you spin fully away from the sun’s light.

So, in the end, there’s no such thing as a sunset. There’s only our perception of the sun dipping to the horizon. Like the sun, the light of the world (that’s Jesus for those of you keeping score) never goes down, never sets. The light of the world shines on us and into us and out from us all the time. We have the opportunity to walk in that everlasting light by living lives that reflect the truth, beauty, and grace of God. We also have the choice to turn our backs on the light and live lives of convenience, consumption, and degradation. The good news is this: the light of the world shines on us no matter which way we are turned. And the light warms our backs when we are turned away, beckoning us to turn around and walk in the light.

…Praying For…

Dear God, thank you for being the light that never goes out. Please shine on me and help me to reflect your light on all those I meet; in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, knowing that you are a light that never goes out. You are always shining on the path that takes me home.

Give Light to My Eyes (September 11, 2012)

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…Opening To…

Look upon me, O Lord, and let all the darkness of my soul vanish before the beams of your brightness. (Saint Augustine of Hippo)

…Listening In…

How long shall I have perplexity in my mind, and grief in my heart, day after day? How long shall my enemy triumph over me? Look upon me and answer me, O Lord my God; give light to my eyes, lest I sleep in death. (Psalm 13: 2-3; context)

…Filling Up…

Imagine that you are lying in bed and, for some reason – perhaps you accidentally set your alarm clock wrong or you have an early hockey practice – you wake up at about 5:30 in the morning. The diameter of the pupils of your eyes grows as your eyes adjust to the darkness of the room. There’s a tiny sliver of soft pre-dawn light sliding under the blinds on the windows – just enough light for pitch dark to soften to regular dark. You lie there trying to fall back to sleep. Sleep doesn’t return, so you try the trick of keeping your eyes open as long as you can in hopes that they will tire and close on their own.

Your eyes rove around your room, and you notice how different the walls and bookcases and trophies and posters look in the near darkness. Everything is there, exactly as you left it last night. But everything looks odd because the darkness has leached the color out of all the objects in the room. The first and second place trophies, usually distinguishable because of their blue and red colors are different only in height now. The clothes in your open closet look like hand-me-downs from the wardrobe department of a black and white film. The world as you know it faded to gray during the night.

“Give light to my eyes,” pleads the person who wrote Psalm 13. The psalmist knows that the world has no vibrancy, no vividness, no vitality without the wonder that is light. Without light, we have no hope of noticing the beauty of all the colors under the sun, all the paint that God brushed and scattered and sloshed onto creation’s canvas. It’s no wonder then that God created light first of all, perhaps because God knew that when we humans came along, we would need that light to live fully in this world. What a gift it is to be able to see all the hues of the flowers in a garden. What a gift it is to be able to tell the difference between football teams. What a gift it is to notice the subtle variations of color in a friend’s eyes. What a gift is light. And we never notice this gift until it’s not there.

…Praying For…

Dear God, thank you for the light with which you show the glory of your creation to your creatures. Give light to my eyes so that I might see all the things you would have me see in all the beauty and complexity that those things possess; in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, knowing that you are a light that never goes out. You are always shining on the path that takes me home.

Let Your Light Flood In (September 10, 2012)

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…Opening To…

Look upon me, O Lord, and let all the darkness of my soul vanish before the beams of your brightness. (Saint Augustine of Hippo)

…Listening In…

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…What came into being through the Word was life, and the life was the light for all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness doesn’t extinguish the light. (John 1:1, 3b-5; context)

…Filling Up…

This week we are going to talk about light. And by extension that means we’ll also talk about darkness. These are two images that appear over and over again throughout the Bible. The Gospel according to John uses them quite a bit to talk about people who are living the way that Jesus teaches (those who walk in the light) and to talk about people who are not (those who walk in darkness). Often, people are confused into thinking that light and darkness are equal, but opposite concepts. But John sees it differently – in the poetry of the prologue to the Gospel (part of which is quoted above), John says that the light shines in the darkness and the darkness can’t really do anything to stop it.

This poetic use of light and darkness illustrate a more complicated theological point about good and evil, which boils down to this. Good wins. It may not always look like the mostly likely outcome, but this is the claim that John is making. Think about these two examples.

First, you walk down a dark hallway and stop in front of a door. Inside the room all the lights are on. You open the door. Now, what happens? The darkness moves from the hallway through the open doorway, and enters the room, right? Of course not. The light from the room always floods into the dark hallway. Darkness doesn’t extinguish light. In other words, evil doesn’t win in the end.

Second, lighting a candle in a dark room provides a sphere of dancing light around the flame. Have you ever seen a ball of dancing darkness in a bright room? Of course not. Light always triumphs over darkness. John uses the language of light to talk about Jesus Christ because of light’s power to brighten the dark places of the world and of our lives. Stay tuned for more about light in the days ahead.

…Praying For…

Dear God, you bathe us in the light of your grace. Help me to open the doors of my soul and let your light flood in. Help me to ignite my spirit with your fire and take it to dark places; in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, knowing that you are a light that never goes out. You are always shining on the path that takes me home.

Offering This Breath (September 7, 2012)

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…Opening To…

Give yourself fully to God. He will use you to accomplish great things on the condition that you believe much more in His love than in your own weakness. (Mother Theresa)

…Listening In…

The LORD God formed the human from the topsoil of the fertile land and blew life’s breath into his nostrils. The human came to life. The LORD God planted a garden in Eden in the east and put there the human he had formed. (Genesis 2:7-8; context)

…Filling Up…

We began Monday talking about offering ourselves to God. This is a wonderful thing to do, but it’s also rather vague. So on Tuesday we went smaller and talked about offering this year: our goals and our plans for the foreseeable future. Then on Wednesday we talked about offering each day as a gift back to God who gave it to us in the first place. This brings with it a change in attitude: not my, but we (God and I) are going about this day together. Yesterday we went smaller still to each action and talked about the challenging practice of offering our actions to God before we take them.

With each day, our offerings got smaller, and I think, more difficult to give. It’s really hard to remember to give each action to God. What’s harder still is offering what we are talking about today: each breath. We’ve already given our lives – that is, the totality of who were are. This is offering on a macro scale. But offering each breath moves such giving to the micro scale. Like days tumbling out into years, our breaths tumble out into our lives, so focusing on each breath is another way for us to give ourselves to God.

But what does it mean to offer each breath? Seems a little too poetic to be practical, right? At first glance, perhaps, but consider this. “Respiration” is the act of breathing. The “spir” in the middle of the word also finds a home in “spirit,” as in Holy Spirit. This is not a coincidence. When we offer our breath to God, we participate in the life and movement of the Holy Spirit. With each breath, we inhale and exhale the grace of God given via the Spirit.  When we breathe in, the Spirit nourishes our souls just as the oxygen nourishes our cells. When we breathe out, the Spirit rushes forth from us to come in contact with all those we meet.

Therefore, every word we speak is borne on the wind of Holy Spirit. Doesn’t this thought make you want to train yourself only to speak the truth in love, only to allow words that build up to leave your lips? When we notice the truth of God animating us through our breath, we remember just what God made us for: to love God and neighbor and to bring God’s kingdom a bit closer to earth.

So the next time you breathe (and I bet you just did), remember the Holy Spirit is moving through you.

…Praying For…

Dear God, you breathed life into the first human in the garden and continue to breathe life into me. Help me to live out my life remembering that you are sustaining me and calling me to follow you more closely. In Jesus Christ’s name I pray. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, hopeful that I will have the desire and grace to give myself to you.

Offering This Action (September 6, 2012)

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…Opening To…

Give yourself fully to God. He will use you to accomplish great things on the condition that you believe much more in His love than in your own weakness. (Mother Theresa)

…Listening In…

Jesus said, “Be dressed for service and keep your lamps lit. Be like people waiting for their master to come home from a wedding celebration, who can immediately open the door for him when he arrives and knocks on the door.” (Luke 12:35-36; context)

…Filling Up…

Even more specific than the day ahead of us is the immediate action ahead of us. And while it is tenaciously difficult to remember to do this, we can offer each of our actions to God, as well as our lives, our years, and our days. To do so we have to install a new spiritual practice into our lives, one that adds a step to our actions.

Anytime we are about to take an action, we go through several steps. Our minds weigh various outcomes. Then we make a decision. Then our bodies grind into motion. Then we act. Sometimes these steps happen in the blink of an eye, like when reacting to a traffic light changing. Sometimes they are drawn out, especially if the action is some sort of life-altering one, like figuring out which college to go to.

Our new spiritual practice adds a step at the beginning of the whole process. Before engaging in the normal series of steps, give to God the action you are contemplating. Before we know if our actions are going to succeed or fail, before we know the consequences, if we pause and give them to God, then we actively invite God into the process that leads to the actions being taken. Rather than reporting to God after the fact, we become aware of God all the way through.

Notice how this will affect the kinds of actions we decide to take. An acquaintance is being bullied in the lunch room. You could join in the bullying or sit back and let it happen, or you could stop, give the impending action to God, and realize that neither of those choices is the kind of offering you desire to make to God. The tiny moment of offering the impending action to God might help you intervene.

When we take on this spiritual practice of mindfully and prayerfully giving our actions to God, we will find that God is so much more present in our lives. God will be no more present than God was before, but our awareness of that presence will be heightened. And our actions will more frequently conform to the life-giving way in which God yearns for us to walk.

…Praying For…

Dear God, you are always sending your will for me into my heart and soul. Help me to pause and discover that will before I act, so that I may invite you into all of my activities. In Jesus Christ’s name I pray. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, hopeful that I will have the desire and grace to give myself to you.

Offering This Day (September 5, 2012)

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…Opening To…

Give yourself fully to God. He will use you to accomplish great things on the condition that you believe much more in His love than in your own weakness. (Mother Theresa)

…Listening In…

My very being longs, even yearns, for the LORD ’s courtyards. My heart and my body will rejoice out loud to the living God! Better is a single day in your courtyards than a thousand days anywhere else! (Psalm 84: 2, 10a; context)

…Filling Up…

Remember what I said yesterday: the more specific we are in what we offer to God, the harder it is to give. We started with the notion of giving our entire selves to God, which sounds awesome and momentous and life changing – and it is. But at the same time, it’s also rather vague. I can say, “I give myself to you, Lord,” and I can mean it. But how does the giving change my life?

As it so happens, our lives work out to be a series of days: the single, still frames of animation that make up a motion picture. Looking back, I find it hard to remember individual days, seeing instead the movie of my memory. But those days must have happened, because, after all, this one is happening now.

Since it’s hard to remember individual days, we can fall into the trap of thinking they don’t matter or into the other trap of looking past them to the amorphous future. But God gives us each day as a gift in and of itself. We acknowledge and thank God for the gift by giving the day back to God. When we do that, everything changes. The hours of the day, the activities we choose to do, the words we speak to people are no longer ours. They’re God’s because we gave them back freely. Actually, they are God’s all along, but when we give them back we participate in that reality.

When we enter into this reality, our attitude changes. No longer is it “I’m going to do such and such” or “My time.” Rather, “We’re going to do such and such together.” It’s “Our time,” God’s and mine. What could be more comforting than knowing that we’re not facing this day alone? What could be more challenging than knowing that God yearns for us to act – not next week, not when we’re ready, but today – in ways that bring God’s kingdom closer to earth?

…Praying For…

Dear God, you are my companion even when I do not return that companionship. Help me to welcome you into each of the days that you have given me and show me the paths that we will walk together. In Jesus Christ’s name I pray. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, hopeful that I will have the desire and grace to give myself to you.

Offering This Year (September 4, 2012)

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…Opening To…

Give yourself fully to God. He will use you to accomplish great things on the condition that you believe much more in His love than in your own weakness. (Mother Theresa)

…Listening In…

You crown the year with your goodness; your paths overflow with rich food. Even the desert pastures drip with it, and the hills are dressed in pure joy. (Psalm 65:11-12; context)

…Filling Up…

Yesterday, we talked about the fact that giving our entire selves to God is actually easier than giving smaller bits of our lives to God. This seems paradoxical, but I think by the end of the week, you’ll see what I mean. The general rule here is this: the more specific we are in what we offer to God, the harder it is to give.

So first we’ll move through something less general than our entire lives but more general than most things – this school year. Giving an entire year of our lives to God is harder, I think, than giving ourselves to God because we can figure out pretty well the trajectory of the next year. We know the basic shape the year will take. Of course, there will be some curveballs, but that always happens. Offering a fairly known quantity to God takes more effort than offering the amorphous series of unknown events we call our lives. The former takes more effort because the offering involves planning.

Whenever you offer something to God (we’ll use “this year” as an example), ask yourself this series of questions. What does God yearn for me to do this year? How would this year look different if I were to offer it to God? At the end of the year, how will I have changed for the better because of God’s presence in my life?

Then bring each of these questions to God in prayer. Search your inner depths for the answers because God most often whispers to us from those depths. Then write them down. Stick them on your mirror or list them on the desktop of your computer screen. Offering this year to God brings with it this series of goals that you will have discerned through prayer. Use those goals to orient and prioritize your life for the next year. And at the start of the following year, do it again.

…Praying For…

Dear God, you are with me through each passing year for you are timeless and eternal. Help me to discern your will for me for the next year and give me the strength to live it out. In Jesus Christ’s name I pray. Amen.

…Sending Out…

I leave this moment with you, God, hopeful that I will have the desire and grace to give myself to you.