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Sunday, October 3, 2010

Chapel in the Pines, Red Feather Lakes, CO

Pastor Dena Williams

19th Sunday after Pentecost

The Holy Gospel according to the Community of St. Luke in

the 17th Chapter

Glory to you, O Lord

The apostles said to the Lord Jesus, "Increase our faith!"

The Lord replied, "Since you have faith the size of a mustard
seed,

you could say to this mulberry tree,

'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you.

"Who among you would say to your slave

who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the

field,

'Come here at once and take your place at the table'?

Would you not rather say to him, 'Prepare supper for me,

put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink;

later you may eat and drink'?

Do you thank the slave for doing what was commanded?

So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered
to do, say,
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'We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought

to have done!'"

The Gospel of the Lord

Praise to you, O Christ

How much is enough?

The author of Second Timothy writes in a letter to his friend:

“I am reminded of your sincere faith,
a faith that lived first in your grandmother Lois
and your mother Eunice and now,
I am sure lives in you.”

I am glad this ancient writer of letters is so very confident

that a grandmother’s and mother’s faith lives on in their
children and grandchildren.
I like that idea.
I am concerned, though, about a couple things.

First of all,
not all of us had faithful grandmothers or mothers.
Many of us did.
Most of us, I think, can remember an aunt or grandmother or
mother,
a spouse or sister,
or even a woman not related to us—
a teacher or neighbor or pastor—
living or deceased--
a woman we think of when we hear the word faithful.
Can you think of such a woman in your life?

Who’s yours?
Do you have one?
Take a minute, would you please?
Turn to the person sitting next to you
and tell your friend who that woman was or is for you.
Who was that woman who was or is a model of faith?
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Go ahead!

Now it’s my turn.

My faithful woman was my Auntie Alice.
I’d like to tell you more about how important she was in my
life,
but weeping in the pulpit can be a distraction for listeners.
So, suffice it to say that my Aunt taught me most of what I
was to learn about love in my childhood.
I’m named for her—Alice Lorene, Dena Lorrene.
My granddaughter is named for her as well—Lyric Alice
How do I know she was a person of faith?

She really didn’t go to church from the time she was a child
until the last 10 years or so of her life.
Then she tried, for my sake, to go to the Lutheran church
in the little town where she lived,
but it was just too “Catholic” for her!
So she settled on the Methodist Church in Port Byron, Illinois.
She quickly became a much loved and appreciated
matriarch
in the congregation.
She was that sort of person.
We didn’t talk about faith much,
she and I, until near the end of her life.
She was always faithful, though, I know,
because she lived in loving relationship with herself and with
others.
Her loving ways revealed her faith.

Her faith—
I don’t really know how much faith she had.
I wonder . . .
Was it only a mustard seed’s worth?
Would that have been enough faith to support the no-
matter- what-love she extended to me, to others, to God?
Only a mustard seed’s worth?
I don’t really know.
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The writer of Second Timothy says that the faith of our

grandmothers, our mothers, our aunts,
lives in us.
He is sure that we have the sincere faith of our
grandmothers, our mothers, our aunts.
I don’t really know how much faith I have.
I wonder . . .
Is it only a mustard seed’s worth?
Is that enough faith to support the kind of love I show to
others, to God?
Only a mustard seed’s worth?
I don’t really know.

Do you wonder or worry about that?

About how much faith you have?
I do.
Nearly every day,
I wonder about my faith.
Maybe if I had enough,
I would never be anxious.
Maybe if I had enough,
I would share more love with others.
Maybe, if I had enough faith,
I would never be afraid or lonely or sad.

I wonder how much faith would be required for that,

to never be afraid or lonely or sad?

Whenever, in a sermon, the need arises to list really faithful

people,
public or historic figures that everyone knows,
I have a few favorites.
One of the faithful people I often list is Pastor Martin Rinkart.
Martin was a Pastor in Germany during the Thirty Years’ War.
He was the only Pastor who remained alive in his small town
during the plague.
Pastor Martin buried hundreds of people every day,
including his beloved wife.
In the midst of that grief and sadness and despair,
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he wrote the hymn:

“Now thank we all our God
with hearts and hands and voices.”
Pastor Martin was a man of sincere faith.
I think he had enough.
I wonder how much that was?
Was it a mustard seed’s worth?
Was that enough faith to sustain him in such a horrible time
of disease and war?

Another person I often list is Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Dietrich was a Pastor in Nazi Germany.
He was a member of a group of Pastors and congregations,
called the Confessing Church,
who openly resisted Hitler’s regime.
Pastor Bonhoeffer was also a member of an underground
group that plotted to kill Hitler.
That effort sent him to prison
and ultimately cost him his life.
Pastor Dietrich was a man of sincere faith.
I think he had enough.
I wonder how much that was?
Was it a mustard seed’s worth?
Was that enough faith to sustain him as he languished in
prison, as he was led to the gallows?

There are others I often list,

when I need to describe people of sincere faith:
Martin Luther King, Jr.,
Mahatma Ghandi,
Nelson Mandela.

Then, I try to think of women to list,

women of sincere faith.
I find some:
Mary, the mother of Our Lord,
Anne Hutchinson, the Puritan woman minister,
Sojourner Truth, a brave black woman preacher,
Rosa Parks, who refused to give up her seat on the bus,
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and . . .
and, of course . . .
a woman of sincere faith
who is always named in such lists,
a woman recognized throughout the world for her faith—
Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

Mother Teresa who left her home at the age of 18 and

devoted herself
to the care of the dying on the streets of Calcutta.
Although she would have preferred to remain unnoticed for
her work,
that was not to be the case.
For decades people all over the world,
people of all faith traditions,
people of no faith tradition,
have recognized her love and compassion for the poor.
She was and is admired for her genuine and selfless
devotion to those who were forgotten and ignored.
She and her Sisters of Charity literally walked the streets,
carrying the dying and starving—
men, women, children, and infants,
to a shelter where they could sometimes be tended back to
health,
but, where often,
the victims of severe poverty were simply kept warm and
clean and comforted as they died.

To those who encountered her,

Mother Teresa seemed always at peace.
She radiated joy in the face of the intense suffering she
experienced in the lives and deaths of those she cared for.
Here, surely, is the story of a person of deep faith,
a faith that you or I must certainly
never expect to know,
a faith that did, indeed, uproot and cast trees into the sea—
trees of misery and fear,
trees of loneliness and sadness.
Here, in the life of Mother Teresa
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we surely find an abundance of deep and abiding faith.

Mother Teresa died at the age of 87,

on September 5, 1997.
A book, released ten years later, in 2007, tells much of the
story of Mother Teresa’s life.
The title is, “Come Be My Light.”
It includes several hundred pages of her writing,
letters she wrote to her priestly advisors,
one of whom compiled and edited this book.
There is an overwhelming tone to the letters
written by this faithful sister.

Hear a typical paragraph from her writings:

“Now Father”, she wrote to a priest friend,
“since 1949 or 50”, when she would have been in her early
thirties,
“since 1949 or 50 this terrible sense of loss—
this untold darkness—
this loneliness—
this continual longing for God—
which gives me that pain deep down in my heart—
darkness is such that I really do not see—
neither with my mind nor with my reason—

The place of God in my soul is blank—

There is no God in me—

When the pain of longing is so great—

I just long and long for God—
and then it is that I feel—
He does not want me—
He is not there—
God does not want me—
Sometimes—
I just hear my own heart cry out—
‘My God’ and nothing else comes—
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The torture and pain I can’t explain—“1

Mother Teresa--
It seems that you wondered and worried too.
You wondered and worried about how much faith you had.
Just like us.
Nearly every day,
Nearly everyday for decades you wondered about your faith.

Maybe if I had enough, you wondered,

I would never be anxious.
Maybe if I had enough,
I would share more love with others.
Maybe, if I had enough faith,
I would never be afraid or lonely or sad.
I would not feel this inner darkness.

I wonder how much faith would be required for that,

to never be afraid or lonely or sad, to never know darkness?

I wonder.

We might imagine that Mother Teresa,

surrounded by deep, deep suffering,
must have given up on God.
How could a loving God permit such suffering?
No wonder, we think, that she felt emptiness,
felt as though God was not present to her.
No wonder.

Mother Teresa shared her fear and loneliness and sadness.

She shared her sense of darkness.
And over the years,
her closest friends helped her to an understanding.
She, you see, did not give up, on God.
In spite of the incredible misery surrounding her,
she did not give up on God.
1“Mother Teresa—Come Be My Light”, Brian Kolodiejchuk, M.C., editor, Doubleday,
New York 2007, p 2.
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She saw, instead, her inner darkness,

as a means for helping her understand the suffering of those
around her.
She saw her inner suffering as essential to her mission to
care for those who suffer.
She saw her sense of emptiness as necessary,
as the highest expression of her love for God
and for the poor.

Mother Teresa was a woman of sincere faith.

I think she had enough.
I wonder how much that was?
Was it a mustard seed’s worth?
Was that enough faith to sustain her as she lived
surrounded by decaying bodies,
forlorn souls,
deteriorating minds?
Did she have a mustard seed of faith?
Was it enough to sustain her?

Do we have a mustard seed of faith?

Is it enough to sustain us?
Do we have the sincere faith,
even a mustard seed’s worth,
do we have the sincere faith of our grandmothers, mothers,
aunts?

The writer of Second Timothy thought so.

And so do I.
Why? How can I be so confident that we have enough faith,
even the faith of a mustard seed?
How can we know that we have faith, enough faith to sustain
us in our times of suffering?
We know we have enough,
the faith of even a mustard seed,
because God promises to give it to us.

Faith is not something we generate within ourselves,

not something we need to hunt and gather.
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Faith is freely given by a God who loves us with a no-matter-

what love.
Do we have a mustard seed’s worth?
Is it enough?
Yes!
We have it and it is enough
because God promises to give us all we need.

God provided faith for our grandmothers and mothers and

aunts.
God provides faith for us,
the faith of Lois and Eunice and Alice and Teresa.
God provides faith for us,
only the faith of a mustard seed,
and, yes, it is enough.

Amen