Sunday Nov 9th 2008

“BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE”

MESSAGE GIVEN BY JUDY CHAPMAN

Well, so much for “better late than never!”

This parable in Matthew’s gospel seems to be saying, “You snooze, you lose” as convincingly as many a modern day commercial.

In fact the first century Christian community had been taught that Jesus would physically return imminently – any time soon. Matthew urged his audience to be faithfully alert so they wouldn’t miss out on this happening, for, he said, no one knows the day or the hour when Christ would come again.

But Jesus’ hoped-for return was slow in coming. People were dying and Jesus had not yet come. Folks were starting to have serious second thoughts about what they had been taught about Jesus’ coming back. Meanwhile the church was encountering resistance from outside and conflict from within. It was a difficult time for the church. In that context, the leaders of the Christian community worked to keep hope alive.

In today’s world, many Christians operate with an understanding that Jesus is with us now and will be with us always. I have to say that some branches of Christianity are waiting for Jesus’ physical return, but most of us are not. Instead, we have come to rely on his presence with us in Spirit to keep the oil of faith alive in us so we are ready for the perplexing questions of life and death and life beyond death. We don’t have all the answers but we have a way, we have a community, and we have a presence who is Jesus. This is what gives us hope.

This is, of course, reducing the parable to a simple form that can be understood in our generation. It is helpful to do this because as it stands, our generation would have some serious difficulties with this parable.

For starters, we might have difficulty with a parable that purports to tell us about the Kingdom of heaven and yet includes such ungenerous characters as the “wise” young women who don’t share and the bridegroom who doesn’t give second chances. What’s with that? These characters’ words and actions seem completely out of sync with those of Jesus who urged us to be open-handedly generous and unceasingly forgiving.

One New Testament scholar, Dr. Vicky Balabanski, points out other difficulties with the parable. For example, the point of the parable is to “be on your guard” or “keep awake,” and yet all the young women, both foolish and wise, fell asleep. “And a further difficulty is the plausibility of the story itself – the lateness of the wedding feast and the oil sellers being open after midnight, for instance.” This is indeed a problematic text as we have it. (“Seasons of the Spirit, Congregational Life, Pentecost 2, p.88)

It seems apparent that if Jesus actually told a parable like this, it likely underwent much editing before it became the parable Matthew records. Or, since this parable is recorded only in Matthew’s gospel, it may also mean that it originated with Matthew’s community.

Regardless of its origins or editing process, in the context of Matthew’s gospel, it is a story about being the imminence of Christ’s return and the necessity of being prepared. It is about being prepared to face the final judgment and to enter the eschatological (or “end times”) banquet. (The wedding feast, you remember, is the symbolic representation of the “end times” banquet where Jesus imagined that all were invited. Matthew, on the other hand, apparently had trouble with the all-inclusive nature of Jesus’ invitation.)

In this context, the “oil” becomes a symbol of being prepared to do the will of God as expressed in the commandments of Jesus. Such symbolic oil, which refers to an individual’s preparations in terms of actions and attitudes, could not be shared. The “wise” ones could not share their oil with the “foolish” ones. It wasn’t enough for the community to be prepared; each person had to be prepared.

In our day we might say that if we are waiting for the “Kingdom of Heaven,” which is that idealized community where we behave as if God – or the Spirit of Love - were completely in control of the world, then we can’t wait for the person next to us to do the work of faith and action. We have to do it ourselves. If we want change, we need to be responsible for bringing that change; we need to be the change we want to see.

So, for example, if we want our church to be more focused on young families, or homelessness, or hospitality, or social action, or refugees or pastoral care, or spirituality or peacemaking, we have to be focused on those things ourselves. We have to be the change we want to see. We can’t leave it for someone else to do. If something is important to us, then we have to act on it.

The parable says that we are in charge of our own light – the light within us, the Spirit within us – which is made visible in our actions and attitudes. And Matthew’s parable suggests that our light isn’t something that can be lit once for all times. Rather, it is something that has to be rekindled on a regular basis. It requires constant attention. We have to attend to our own inner light.

So we might think about what causes the inner light that illumines our actions and attitudes to flicker and diminish. We might think about what helps us to reconnect with the light when we feel it has gone out.

Our Thursday Study group this fall is looking at various “wisdom practices” that keep us attentive to Spirit – to the light within. Some of the practices we have endeavored to embody are forgiveness, Sabbath, prayer, meditation, creating a home altar and being attentive to the lessons of the nature. Other wisdom practices we will follow over the next few weeks are surrendering to the inevitable, catching God’s vision for our lives, and offering ourselves in service to others.

Those are a few of the many ways to stay attuned to the Spirit, to invite Spirit – or the light – to live in us. And even though Matthew’s parable suggests that we are in charge of only our own light, I am going to suggest that there is more to the story than that.

I am going to suggest three ways in which we actually can and do share our light with each other: we relay the light; we hold the light; and we inspire the light.

When I speak of relaying the light, I am thinking about the line from “In Flanders’ Fields” that says “To you from failing hands we throw the torch. Be yours to hold it high.” The injured and the exhausted on the battlefield had no choice but to pass the figurative “torch” to those who still had the strength to continue their mission. They shared a common goal of liberating the oppressed, of fighting for freedom. Where one soldier left off - because of injury or death - another one picked up. And so the torch was relayed from one brave soldier to the next.

In my mind’s eye I see another more peaceful image of a similar thing. I see the Olympic Torch being carried across cities and countries and continents – each runner taking a turn holding the light for a time – and then passing it on to the next person in line. A relay is a way of going the distance – of accomplishing a goal - in a way that shares the burden so that no one person is overwhelmed or exhausted.

I see, too, generations of Christians who have passed down the stories of their faith, making them relevant in their own time and place. They have taught their children what is important to them; they have shared the source of their hope. All of these are examples of how people relay the light.

We also hold the light for one another. I am thinking about the times when our own faith is shattered by devastating events in our own lives. The times when we have lost a loved one much too soon; or we have been betrayed by someone we trusted; or we have lost our confidence or self-esteem because of a terrible mistake that we have made. When we cannot find our way back to the Source of Love, when we cannot stop crying bitter tears of despair, others in the community hold the light for us. They sing the songs of faith and point us in the direction of healing. They hold the light for us.

Thirdly, we can also inspire the light in each other. There is probably no clearer contemporary example of that than in America’s new President Elect, Barack Obama. In a time of economic disaster and amid mounting disgust for an unconscionable war in Iraq, Barack Obama inspired Americans to believe that change was possible. He inspired them to believe that together they could find solutions to economic problems, health care issues, global warming and peace. He inspired people to believe that no matter what their origins, or skin colour, they lived in a land of opportunity where all young children could dream big dreams and participate fully in society – even at the highest levels of leadership. That dream of radical inclusivity that we as a Christian community keep lifting up Barak Obama also lifted up – and inspired a whole nation. In fact he inspired nations all over the world. He brought out the “Yes, we can” attitude in all of us who dream of change. The result was what Michael Moore describes as a whopping landslide of hope in a time of deep despair.

That’s what it means to inspire the light in others.

And once we have been inspired, we still need to work together so we can go the distance, sharing the burden and holding the vision for each other.

So I agree with the writer of Matthew’s Gospel that we all need to do our own work in keeping our light burning bright. We all need to be the change we want to see.

But I would also say that when we do that, we will have more than enough light to share with others. Whether we relay the light, or hold the light or inspire the light, through our actions and our attitudes we can all be contributors to the light that will turn despair into hope, and suffering into joy.

We don’t have to wait until Jesus comes again. He is with us now in the way he left for us, in the community he inspired, and in the Spirit that gives us hope. May we keep that hope alive in our time and place. Amen