Sunday Sermons

Roger is fantastic.  He is eighty-something, about my height (which means he's short!), he has these little glasses perched on the very tip of his nose.  He came to our informal church, dressed in a suit.  Everyone but me seemed to know him when he arrived.  Perhaps because of that reason, he and I started chatting.  

Adrian called us all together, so Roger moved to the front of the room and I moved to my blue plastic chair.  We meet in a primary school, which means my feet can rest on the floor when I'm sitting in these chairs.  Roger started off by getting out his Bible and after giving greetings, he said: "I know these days it's rather rude to come to speak at a church without a powerpoint presentation.  Well, I simply haven't got one!  You'll just have to use your Bible as your visual."  

I pulled out my Bible and my little black notebook with pink elephants on it.  It's tiny and looks rather silly for taking notes, but I like it and it's small.  It was a gift from someone, although at this point, I'm not certain I know who gave it to me!  However, it is well used for sermon notes, reminders, and anything else I need to jot down.

Roger asked if any of us knew Richard of Chichester.  We did not.  Roger went to explain that he was a Bishop in the 13th century.  He was a Bishop known because he championed the poor and stood up to the King.  He is given credit for a deathbed prayer.  Roger focused on the triplet of the prayer:

"O Merciful Redeemer, brother and friend, may I know thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, and follow thee more nearly."

We then looked to three passages in the Gospel of Luke to illustrate this.  Luke 10:25-37 tells of the Good Samaritan,  when Jesus was teaching about loving the Lord with all your heart and soul and mind and loving your neighbor as yourself.  Luke 10:38-42 shares the story of Mary and Martha.  In sitting at the feet of Jesus, Mary was choosing to know Jesus more clearly.  In Luke 11:1-13, the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray and Jesus taught them how to follow him more nearly.

I cannot recreate the sermon here, but Roger had some very interesting points I'd like to share.  

On Love, I wrote his words: "Loving is living and living is loving. And if someone stops loving, they stop living.  The more we love, the more we enjoy life."  He went on to share the story of Dirk Willems, a familiar story to me.  He was an Anabaptist in the 16th century who was tried and convicted.  He escaped from prison, but as he ran, one of the guards chasing him fell through ice and into the freezing river.  Dirk turned back and saved the man from the ice.  Subsequently, he was returned to prison and executed.  He loved his enemy enough to save him from death, even when it resulted in his own death. 

Roger went on to talk about his wife.  He told us, "Many years ago, two people stood in front of their loved ones and vowed, "I will."  I loved Faith then, but there is no way I could love her as much then as I do now.  I didn't know everything about her then.  Through the years, I learned many things about her I didn't know.  And she learned a lot about me she didn't know, and she told me so!"  A few sentences later, he brought it back to God, reminding us that this is another love relationship.  "God wants for us to turn to him and say, "I will."  He is always saying, "I will."  He was hanging on the cross saying, 'I will.'"    

In the story of Mary and Martha, we tend to shake our head at Martha.  How could she just be in the kitchen?  Yes,   Mary chose what was better.  But we very likely would do the same as Martha, and in fact, we often do busy ourselves rather than spend time getting to know God more clearly.  Roger pointed out, Mary was able to sit at Jesus feet, but when we read Luke 10:38, we see that it was Martha who welcomed Jesus and the disciples into the house.  Mary benefitted but Martha opened the door.  Mary does give us an excellent example of how to know Jesus more clearly and that is through sitting as his feet.  

Sitting at his feet includes wanting to follow him more nearly.  Roger commented that the disciples' request to be taught how to pray was the only time they asked Jesus to teach them.  That surprised me!  If Jesus were in human form before me, doing all these miracles and speaking these incredible words, I think I would just keep asking question after question.  However, then I stopped and wondered.  Would I?  Do I now?  There is also a fine distinction between asking a question and wanting to be taught.  Curiosity and teachability are not necessarily the same thing. How often do I react like I did as a small child, not wanting someone to do something for me but wanting to learn it myself?

"O Merciful Redeemer, brother and friend, may I know thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, and follow thee more nearly."