I have a dream. Even the words stir a response down deep in the psyche of our nation. I know I’m a little early, but it fits, so stay with me. I have a dream. In a little over a week we will celebrate the memory of one who served as the conscience of the nation, who still serves as that call to self-examination and corporate confession. I have a dream. Martin Luther King Jr’s dream was about racial reconciliation, a world that judged not by the color of the skin but the content of the character. It was not just about rights, but about a fullness, a wholeness, about a Kingdom of God ordered world. Our former Bishop, Woodie White, writes an open letter to Martin every year around this time. To report how the dream is doing, or how we are doing with the dream. Over the years that I’ve been reading those letters he has written about joys and heartaches, about successes and failures, about strides forward and retreats backward. The issue is as volatile as the stock market in these early days of 2016. Thrilling highs and devastating lows, and a growing unease as to whether this is an issue we can ever resolve as fallible, but earnest human beings, as sinners in need of redeeming.
How fares the dream? What dream? Well, any dream, the dreams of a nation trying to learn to live as a community, the dreams of various peoples seeking inclusion, the dreams of families seeking solvency and security, the dreams of individuals - your dreams and mine - seeking solace and companionship, seeking meaning and purpose, seeking a love that defines and makes whole, that satisfies the deepest longings of our hearts. How fares the dream? The dream of the people of God to help individuals and peoples and nations shape those dreams to both ground them in reality and encourage them to reach higher, all the way to God’s heaven. How fares the dream and the dreaming?
Sometimes it feels like we’ve given up. That we’re stepping back. We’re out of the dreaming business and into the just getting by business. Seen the new commercial about settlers? For satellite tv I think. “We’re settlers, son, we settle for things!” We’ve stopped being dreamers and have become settlers. We’ve settled for what is. Oh, we complain, we shake our heads, we moan and even lament - good biblical precedent for that. But then we shrug our shoulders and say that’s just the way it is these days.
We try not to dream too much, because it hurts when it doesn’t happen as soon as we think it should. We hesitate to climb aboard the dreams of others preferring to wait and see how it works for them first, or even to run away because that dream isn’t fitting into our dreams, it’s too disturbing for the scaled down, safety first dream we’ve settled for. We caution our children, telling them not to dream but to find a job, to go to school not to explore possibilities and expand horizon and fall in love with learning so deeply that it will sustain them for the rest of their lives, but to find what works, what is marketable, what will pay the bills and ground them somewhere. Dreams are too flighty, better to stay low. Don’t fly too high and lose your wings in the heat of the sun, better to keep your feet on the ground and walk. How fares the dream?
What is the antidote to the fears that keep us from dreaming? That’s what we’re about this Epiphany season. Facing our fears. I’m not afraid, you say. Really? Good for you. You’re one of the few. Most of us are afraid of something - of getting older, of not having enough, or being ignored, or hurt, or ... well, too many to write here. There are fears aplenty. Named and unnamed. Acknowledged and just felt. What’s the antidote? Fear not!
It’s a proclamation. Fear not. It’s an announcement. A replacement for your fears. Fear not. Spoken by an angel about to turn the world upside down. Fear not, everything you thought was true turns out to be wrong. Fear not, the values you’ve learned to live by are killing you, killing the whole world. Fear not, the self you thought was the pinnacle of all that could be is lonely and empty and needy. Fear not, the solutions you have found for your unease in living in this world, are not going to help. Fear not. Because there is hope. There is salvation. There is a way to live that is centered, and content, and connected, and helpful, and full of joy. You haven’t even begun to dream of what could be. But you can. You could. Fear not.
Ephesians 3:14-21 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. 16 I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, 17 and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. 18 I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. 20 Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
A prayer for the church. That’s what we are calling this year of worship at Aldersgate UMC here in Fort Wayne, Indiana. These verses will become a touchstone for all that we do throughout the year. A prayer for the church. Or an invitation to dream. To dream what we could be. And to know that whatever we dream, it falls short of what God has in store for us. “Able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.” Far more. Than we can imagine. How fares the dream?
This is a prayer that Paul prays for us. For the whole church. OK, some argue that it isn’t Paul. That it was written after his death by a follower of his who kept his notes and adopted his vocabulary and his syntax, and his irritating speaking/writing habits. Who knows? I like to think it is Paul, who has seen it all. Seen us at our best and at our worst. Who loves us even when we aren’t lovable. And now he prays for us. Because he figured something out.
“For this reason” is an intriguing way to begin a new thought. For this reason. What reason? This one! Back up a bit and you find the reason. And that reason is that this grace thing spilled out across the borders we humans had drawn. It was like he was attending an Oprah taping: “You get grace, and You get grace, and You get grace! Everyone gets grace!!” And Paul claps his hands until they turn red and pauses to pray and sing. He catches the theme of grace for all and wraps it up in his prayer to completely. It’s a y’all prayer, not a you prayer. An all y’all prayer to be precise. This strength in the inner spirit is not an each, it’s an all. This indwelling Christ is in all, in the body of believers, not the exclusive property of each or any. Why tear down the barriers only to individualize it all again? The “you” filled with all the fullness of God is all of us.
We know this is true, despite our desire to make it individualized. We want our own spirit to be filled, we want our own strength, Christ in our own hearts. We want to comprehend on our own even that which is unknowable. And there is nothing wrong with that individual striving to receive and know and be known. But we know that our comprehension increases when we share it together. Our strength increases when we pool it together. Our awareness of the observation of the indwelling Christ is clarified when we look together, even into our own souls. I am not always the best judge of what is living in my own heart. Sometimes I need you to help identify what is going on inside of me. Sometimes I need your wisdom to help me face my fears.
Yeah, we came back there. This prayer, this prayer and doxology combo, is about facing our fears. About dreaming dreams that we can’t make happen. Dreams so big that only God can realize them. About not being limited by our limitations, our lack of vision, our fear of the future, our hesitancy. Because we know, not just assume or hope, but because we know that God is able to do far more than all we can ask or imagine. And to do it - here’s the kicker - to do it through us. Through the power at work in us. And what we do in response to this power, this coming to be, this dream becoming a new reality, is give God glory. To him, no, to Him, to God be glory in the church. In the church. The body. The community. All y’all. We’re about glory. Not our glory, but God’s glory. It is our reason for being. To worship. It is why we were created. We are most ourselves when we worship. No, wait, we are most ourselves when we REALLY worship. Worship in spirit and truth. Worship with our whole selves, our whole heart, body and soul. When we worship as though there was nothing else we could be doing in that moment, nothing else we want to do in that moment, nothing else that draws us but worship. I have a dream. A worship dream. A fearless dream. A dream of us giving God glory in a way that ripples out and changes the world. Because it also ripples in and changes us. Into an all y’all, strong and fearless, and comprehending the unknowable love of God. Being filled up so much it spills out across the lines we have drawn, and you get grace and you get grace and you get grace. WE get grace. Thanks be to God.
Shalom,
Derek
No comments:
Post a Comment