Honoring Spiritual Parents

           

John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement, enjoyed and celebrated All Saints Day. In a journal entry from November 1, 1767, Wesley calls it “a festival I truly love.” On the same day in 1788, he writes, “I always find this a comfortable day.” The following year he calls it “a day that I peculiarly love.”

All Saints Day is an opportunity to give thanks for all those who have gone before us in the faith. It is a time to celebrate our history, what United Methodists call the tradition of the church. From the early days of Christianity, there is a sense that the Church consists of not only all living believers, but also all who have gone before us. For example, in Hebrews 12 the author encourages Christians to remember that a “great cloud of witnesses” surrounds us encouraging us, cheering us on.[1]

A sign on the Winchester cathedral in England says, as you enter the church, “you are entering a conversation that began long before you were born and will continue long after you’re dead.” To be a Christian partly means that we do not have to reinvent the wheel, morally speaking. We do not have to make up this faith as we go. The saints will teach us, if we will listen. Moreover, for modern, North American people, it takes a kind of studied act of humility to think that we actually have something to learn from the saints.

As Christians, God does not abandon us to the moment. Our faith is more than "contemporary" (literally: with the times). We do not invent the faith or the gospel anew in each generation. The words and lives of the saints guide and encourage. We learn to think with them. Think of the Christian faith as extended conversation with the dead, dialogue with the saints.

            As G. K. Chesterton said, one of the difficulties of modernity is that we keep talking about how free we are. We have freed ourselves from our past. All that does, said Chesterton, is that we have become slaves to that arrogant oligarchy of those who just happen to be walking about at this moment. Chesterton also said that being a “traditionalist” means a determination not to automatically dismiss any man’s opinion outright just because he happens to be your father.

            I am thinking of some fathers and mothers of the faith I have had. A pastor, a SS teacher, a youth leader, a few professors in college and even Seminary, have nourished me in Christian faith. I feel blessed. I honor them today. I honor by biological parents. I also honor those parents in the faith. They taught me the importance of a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. As much as I may have changed in my life, I do not want that changed. These persons always treated the Bible with honor and respect. We rarely discussed theories about the Bible, but we put it at the center of our attempts to understand what it means to follow Jesus today.

            The churches always need to be contemporary in the sense that they must minister to the needs and issues of the time. However, to do so does not mean we minister “with the times.” We must often minister “against the times.”

You check out the Ten Commandments, it says that thing about ‘honor your father and mother.’ This is our attempt to do that in just this small way. Because to be a Christian is to find yourself moving to a different rhythm, a different beat.

            Built right into Christianity is the courageous determination to be traditionalists, to sit with the saints, and thus participate in one of the most revolutionary activities of the church.

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[1] Joe Iovino at UMC Communicaitons

Love

Ruth Haley Barton, in Sacred Rhythms, says that when it comes to deciding what to do in any situation, we need to step back, pause, and remember that the primary calling of all Christians is to love. What would love call us to do in this situation? What would love do? Love is our deepest calling. John tells us of Jesus:  

Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. (John 13:1) 

She thinks that any decision that fails to ask the love question misses the point of Christian practice.

            I agree with her.

Yet, love does not solve everything. I find John Wesley intriguing on this point. He points out that even love in all its purity will not protect us from many mistakes.[1]  

1)      Many mistakes may exist together with pure love.

2)      Some may accidently flow from it. I mean, love itself may incline us to mistake. The pure love of our neighbor, springing from the love of God, thinks no evil, believes and hopes all things. Now, this very temperament, unsuspicious, ready to believe and hope the best of all people, may cause us to think some people are really better than they are. Here then is a clear mistake accidentally flowing from love. 

In this sense, “love” is not the only answer to life. We need the balance of other qualities, in particular wisdom, honesty, and discernment, in order to determine properly what God wants in a situation.

Clearly, we need one another. It is so obvious.  Or is it.  Do we really make relationships a priority?

Albert Schweitzer could say in his Memoirs of Childhood and Youth (1925, p. 87): 

When I look back upon my early days, I am stirred by the thought of the number of people whom I have to thank for what they gave me or what they were to me.  At the same time, I am haunted by an oppressive consciousness of the little gratitude I really showed them while I was young.  How many of them have said farewell to life without my having made clear to them what it meant to me to receive from them so much kindness or so much care!  Many a time have I, with a feeling of shame, said quietly to myself over a grave the words which my mouth ought to have spoken to the departed, while he was still in the flesh. 

            There is a little picture of a turtle on top of fence post.  The caption simply says, "If you see a turtle on a fence post, you know it had help." We need each other, more than we know.

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[1] John Wesley, Chapter 4 of Plain Account of Christian Perfection.

Finitude and Death

There is a beautiful little story about one of the Greek gods.  It seems that Zeus fell in love with a mortal woman.  Mercury told him, "Look, you are Zeus, you can do anything you want.  So why do you not declare a little war down in Greece, so her husband, who was a young general, will have to go off.  You can go down masquerading and make love to his wife."  Zeus thought this was a good idea, so he did it.  When he came back to the heavens, Zeus is very reflective on what the gods are missing by being immortal.  "She was saying, 'when I am young,' or 'when I am old,' or 'when I die.'  This stabs me Mercury.  We miss something Mercury.  We miss the poignancy of the transient, the sweet sadness of grasping for something we know we cannot hold." 

During the course of his travels, Gulliver came to the land of the Luggnaggians.  Among them was a group of persons who were born with a red spot on their foreheads.  They were very rare, only once in an age, Gulliver was told.  He was curious as to what that meant.  He was told that these were the immortals, those who would never die.  Gulliver was excited at this possibility.  He told them that if he were fortunate enough to be among this group, he would want to learn as much as possible, and then be a wise counselor to those who were ruling the country.  He would want to be of the greatest value to the race.  Gulliver was told, however, that these people were the most pitiable of their people.  Gulliver assumed that immortality meant eternal youth, and this was far from the truth.  These people aged like everyone else, and had all the physical and mental declines of old age.  When they reached 100 years old, their land was given over to their children, they became wards of the state, and were forced to live on a small amount of funds.  It was not long until, precisely because they were immortal, they no longer cared for anything.

            The story is told of a little boy whose sister needed a blood transfusion.  The boy had recovered from the same disease two years before.  Her only chance for recovery was to have a transfusion from someone who had recovered from the disease.  Since the boy had the same rare blood type and had recovered from the disease, he would be the ideal donor.  The doctor asked if he would be willing to do this.  At first, the boy hesitated.  His lower lip started to tremble.  But then he said, "Sure, for my sister."  The two were wheeled into a hospital room.  They were side by side.  They did not speak, but when their eyes met, the boy smiled at his sister.  He was so healthy, while she was very pale and sickly.  The nurse put the needle into the boy's arm, and the boy's smile faded.  He watched his blood flow into the tube.  When the ordeal was almost over, his voice slightly shaky, he said, "Doctor, when do I die?"  Only then did the doctor realize why the boy hesitated, and why his lip trembled.  In that brief moment, he made a great decision.[1]

I like the way John Wesley put it on his 85th birthday:  

"I have only to say: My remnant of days I spend to his praise, who died the whole world to redeem; be they many or few, my days are his due, and they all are devoted to him."

 

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[1] Robert Coleman, Written in Blood.