June 17, 2007

"ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL"

Rev. Jim Petersen

First Congregational UCC Great Falls, MT

6-17-07

Text: Psalm 90; II Timothy 4:6-8

If brother John Wesley were here this morning, I am quite sure he would greet us with his traditional greeting, which went, "How goes it with your soul?" Or perhaps he would tweak it to the context of a congregation, and say, "How goes it with your household of faith?"

We, my Methodist brothers and sisters, are in a time of transition, and it is well to invoke the father of Methodism at times like these, of whom we can say, John Wesley, the same yesterday, the same today, and the same tomorrow, and ask ourselves, "How goes it with your soul?"

Next Sunday will be Rev. Dennis Reese's last Sunday with us, my colleague and your pastor for the past ten years, including we Congos in our wonderful shared facility. I hope you will all be here, and join us for the potluck to follow.

I find myself thinking of another quote as well. Not the one used in my sermon title, which is from William Shakespeare, of course, and apropos to our purpose for this morning, but actually a quote from Emily Dickinson, which I have used before, so I just threw in the Shakespeare quote to throw you off a bit.

In fact, I used this Dickinson quote in a similar situation, upon the departure of Earl Detweiler. Which tells you I have been around awhile. Earl was the 3^rd of the soon to be 7 Methodist ministers with whom I have shared this pulpit. Jim Petersen, the same yesterday, the same...

The quote I like is from poem #1196 in the anthology of Emily Dickinson works, an obscure little ditty put to poetic verse, which goes, "The capacity to terminate is a specific grace."

Forget the rest of the poem, it's more typical Emily Dickinson, which means I don't get, but this one liner I think has value for us, "The capacity to terminate is a specific grace." To offer it to you in context, the poem in its entirety goes:

"To make routine a Stimulus

Remember it can cease -

Capacity to Terminate

Is a specific Grace -

Of retrospect the Arrow

That power to repair

Departed with the Torment

Become, alas, more fair."

Would you like to hear it again? I can tell you, it won't help. But I do like our one line, "The capacity to terminate is a specific grace."

You'll appreciate "the capacity to terminate" is important for preachers. Like the story of the minister who was thinking about his sermon while shaving. When you're a preacher, you're always thinking about that next sermon.

When we're shaving, we're thinking about that next sermon. When we're driving the car, we're thinking about that next sermon. Which is why some of you tell highly exaggerated horror stories about riding with me. When we're talking to our wife, we're thinking about our next sermon. Leading to more horror stories. As a preacher we always have that next sermon on our mind.

So this guy is shaving, thinking about his next sermon, and cuts his thumb. The next Sunday in the pulpit he explains the bandage on his thumb. A few days later he receives a note from a parishioner that reads, "Next time you are preaching, think about your thumb and cut your sermon."

I think you will agree "the capacity to terminate is a specific grace."

Whatever the derivation of her poem Dickinson, in this one line, has captured a biblical truth about life, which from time to time is applicable to each one of us, preachers included. God only knows about the rest of the poem, but in her third line I believe Emily illuminates a helpful point. "The capacity to terminate is a specific grace."

You see, the Bible sees life as movement, as a pilgrimage for a purpose. The Old Testament is the story of a pilgrim people in movement toward a Promised Land, made possible through the

continual saving acts of God. The New Testament is the proclamation the Promise has arrived, in the person of Jesus that we might continue to journey towards becoming the people God intends us to be.

We, as human beings, are always in pilgrimage, like it or not, and largely we do not. We move from:

one stage of life to another;

one age of life to another;

one situation in life to another;

God help us, sometimes it seems we move from one crisis in our life to the next.

Life is pilgrimage. It is transition. It is change. Right? Isn't that your experience?

As the Greek philosopher Heraclitus (circa 500 BC) said: "You cannot step in the same river twice. Everything flows and nothing abides. Everything gives way and nothing stays fixed."

The faithful person is the one who is able to go with the flow gracefully, to conclude or bring to closure one phase in life, to set it gratefully behind, and then to move with hope and expectation into the future.

For such persons "the capacity to terminate is a specific grace," be it a job or a school or a location, be it a career or a relationship or lifetime. "The capacity to terminate is a specific grace." And it is essential to good health and clean beginnings.

Obviously not Emily Dickinson, but I think I catch the drift of this ditty. There are two kinds of people in life, have you noticed?

1) There are those who look back. At best they recollect the "good ol' days." At worst, they recount a litany of woes and sorrows. In either case they are stuck "looking back." Like Lot's wife, they are frozen pillars of salt.

Take Sarah Winchester, who preferred the illusion of permanence. Perhaps some of you have visited the Winchester House outside of San Jose, CA. Sarah was the wife of the founder of the firearms company, which bore their name, whose repeater rifle won the West and made the Winchesters multi-millionaires in a time when that was uncommon.

But it could not prevent tragedy. The Winchester's son died as an infant. Winchester died after 15 years of marriage, leaving Sarah a widow. And painfully aware of the capricious and transitory nature of life.

She consulted a spiritualist, who told her to keep building and never stop, for "the day you stop building, you will join your son and your husband in death," the spiritualists advised her, no doubt for no small sum.

So for 38 years, 24 hours a day, 7 days week, workmen restored, remodeled and added onto the Winchester House. Sarah Winchester's recipe for denying death and creating a pillar of permanence.

Concluding with a house of 160 rooms, including 40 bedrooms, 13 bathrooms, 9 kitchens, 40 staircases, and 10,000 windows. With one resident, Sarah Winchester, until she died.

She might as well have been a pillar of salt. Her home stands as commentary to her inability to get beyond the pain of her past and the fear of her future.

2) But there are those who look forward. Like the elderly man who when asked how he felt upon waking each morning replied, "How do I feel? Why, surprised!"

Each day is a gift from God, 86,400 seconds, and we get to decide how to receive it and how to spend it, or better yet, what to do with it and how to invest it.

To look forward takes faith, forgiveness and a generous amount of forgetfulness. Clearly it is not easy to flow with the river of life. But to stand in the stream and cling to the slippery rocks of permanence, collecting possessions as if to say the river is not flowing by is pretty foolish.

Life is change, changing seasons, changing shorelines, changing hairlines and waistlines. Changes in age, changes in relationships, changes in jobs, even changes in ministers, though blessedly, not too often. To say farewell to the past and embrace the future requires a "specific grace."

Jesus is speaking to his disciples in the Gospel of John in what is called the "Farewell Discourse." "I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away."

Jesus is telling his disciples he is going to leave them. They do not like it one bit. This creates a crisis for them. What are they going to do? Who will lead them? Who will they follow? But Jesus tells them, "it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Paraclete (Greek: Counselor or Spirit) will not come to you; but if I go away, I will send the Spirit...and the Spirit will guide you."

And so it is. The disciples' dark night of disappointment gives way to the dawn of a new day. The disciples' crisis of the cross becomes the Pentecost of the church. From the agony of death they are given new life, for just as Jesus foretold, a Spirit appears, a Holy Spirit, and this Spirit comforts, creates, encourages, and enables the birth of the greatest story on earth, the church. Born out of change.

Well, we are looking at some change around our churches. I do hope you will be here next Sunday to say farewell to Dennis. A few of us met Thursday night to brainstorm ways we might enliven our youth groups. We are looking at refashioning a Wednesday night youth program. Stay tuned. Or better yet, step forward.

I actually have some other ideas. There may be ways to do Sunday School more creatively and effectively. Our numbers are down enough in both churches, maybe it would make sense to do a joint Sunday School, at one or the other of the worship hours, which we could rotate, or maybe have in between what could be 9 & 11 AM services, with a Sunday School that could include a smorgasbord of adult offerings as well.

We could even do worship differently, perhaps the early service could be a joint alternative service, using our new projector more and more contemporary music, and the late service could be a joint traditional service with a combined choir, which would put our numbers back up into the 30s.

At the least, maybe we could have each preacher once a month preach at both services, thus liberating the preacher to spend more time in other ministries and not duplicate the hard work of preparing a sermon every Sunday of the month.

I'm just thinking out loud mind you, so if we do any of these changes, you won't blame the new

Life is change. This is not new. The oldest book on earth, not the Bible by the way, but the Chinese book, I Ching, means the book of change.

In a favorite children sermon of mine, appropriate for Father's Day, a little girl and her father are on a hike. They come to the top of a high hill, where they stop to take a rest. It is a beautiful sight. In every direction they can see the beauty of God's creation.

As they sit there catching their breath, they talk about many things. Then the little girl asks her father, "Daddy, how big is God's love?" The father thinks for a while, how to answer this honest theological question?

Then he says, "Well, my darling, look to the north as far as you can see. Then over yonder to the east as far as you can look. Then over here to the south and out there to the west. Look as hard and as far as you can see. God's love is bigger than all of that."

The little girl stand up and as her daddy suggests looks for along time in every direction, north,

south, east, and west. Then she turns to her father and says, "Daddy, if that's true, then we must be standing right in the center of God's love."

And this is true for each one of us. Always was. Always will be. Throughout the pilgrimage, over every hill and through every valley, wherever we wander, and however the sands of time shift beneath our feet, one fact of life remains: "we are, each one of us, standing right in the center of God's love."

Which fills us with the capacity to face endings gracefully and to embrace the future hopefully. God bless each of you on your holy journey. Have a great summer.