Preached by Winton Boyd on Sunday, November 7, 2010
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Many years ago, I shared a church building with a colleague who was a singer. He had a good voice, but he wasn’t in any choir. He wasn’t great – he simply liked to sing.
If he was around the church (which was a big, echo-ie building) you would know it because he was always singing. To himself, to try a new song, to make a point with the secretary, because he had learned a new African or Mexican tune…
In the time that I worked with him, the church had financial troubles, a beloved associate moved away, the old building started literally crumbling before our eyes, the boiler seemed to need attention every other day and his car was stolen twice. Through it all, he kept singing. Old hymns, new hymns, chants, popular music…he wasn’t great – but he just kept singing.
In the middle of a sermon, in the middle of a street, in the middle of a meeting with people of multiple classes and races –he’d break out in song. It sometimes took him a couple of notes to find the right note, but he was confident, joyful, assured. If anyone embodied the old shaker tune sung by the choir today – how can I keep from singing – he was the one. He wasn’t great, but he did keep singing.
As a young adult whose singing mostly took place in the shower, I was impressed with his joy and his audacity. He seemed more intent on sharing his joy with others than worrying about his singing, his choice of songs, or what people would think of this crazy, white guy who sang strange songs.
While one could say he lived in his own world, marched to his own band, he seemed to know something deep within that was contagious. It wasn’t his repertoire that drew people to him. It wasn’t his voice.
It was something about the source of his song that was compelling. He wasn’t an airhead, but one deeply committed to justice. He didn’t deny reality, in fact he was one of the best one-one listeners to those in crisis that I’ve ever known. His church wasn’t a raging success, but struggled for years for its very survival. Somehow, he lived with a source of joy that transcended all the things around him that could easily weigh any one of us down.
Maybe you know someone like that? Who’s joy and enthusiasm seems so genuine and contagious, regardless of the circumstances around them?
In a series on faith amidst crisis, living lightly – I’m drawn to this strange, but not so strange story from Acts 16. Paul and Silas are in Philippi encountering a variety of challenges – a slave girl who is being used by her owners to make money fortune telling, other religious figures who find the charismatic Paul and Silas and their message of God’s love threatening and disturbing. They are first attacked verbally, and then physically – the text says they were stripped of their clothes, beaten with rods, given a severe flogging – and then thrown in prison, feet fastened to the wall.
What makes this story enduring is not the beating, however. What makes the story live on into our time is their response to the beating and imprisonment. Paul and Silas, the text says, were praying and singing at midnight. Others were listening – maybe curious, maybe compelled by their faith, maybe wishing they would stop so they could sleep themselves…and there came an earthquake…Paul and Silas assure their captor that all the prisoners are still there – knowing he too would lose his life if they escaped. They continue to share their faith, treat him with compassion…
It is a fanciful story – and one we know to be true. It doesn’t matter if it is a literal story, if there was literally an earthquake and the breaking of chains. We know it to be true because we know in our own lives the power of a faith that emerges during life’s flogging, imprisonment, earthquakes and chaos. At times we may panic like the guard, at times we may stand by quietly like the crowd witnessing injustice, at time we may lack the words of love for others in their time of need – in short – we may lose our song. But deep within, we can also remember the Pauls and Silases who pray and sing, who live an uncommon joy, who bring us back to our created goodness.
What endures in this story about Paul and Silas, again, is not their actions. It is not their singing. What endures in this story is the source of their song, the source of their compassion. Tested and tried, they respond with grace, strength, and hope. Part of the reason we can let go of the literalness of the story is that most of it happened in the dark of night, literally behind closed doors. We know how the details of such a story expand and morph over time. We can let go of the literalness because we know that sometimes the details are less important than what motivates the story telling – a remarkable and outstanding act of faith. We are compelled by it, we are drawn to it, and we are encouraged in our own lives by this kind of joy and this kind of love.
However, we live in a time when personal joy and personal strength aren’t enough. We live in a cultural climate that is often quite ugly and corrosive. The rhetoric of fear and of hate shows up in all kinds of places. We can blame elections, corporate money, Republicans or Democrats, the Tea Party, racism or socialism. We can highlight the bullying of LGBT youth, the rejection of immigrants, the failure of nerve on the part of our leaders, the greediness of bankers or the failing of our educational system. The sources and symptoms of this fear and hatred abound. Like Paul and Silas, who started the day in Philippi as a normal day only to find it turn quickly to violence and hate spewing crowds, we too are at times caught by surprise by the intensity of other viewpoints, the harshness of public discourse, the real danger to many who are vulnerable.
Of course we are not the first to experience this climate – personally or socially – of challenge, anger and meanness. But, our times – especially after another contentious election marked by lies and disinformation – call forth from us all the singing, all the compassion, and all the joy we have available.
Some of you know that Tammy and Klara and I had the chance to join 200,000 of our closest friends last weekend on the Capital Mall in Washington at the Restoring Sanity rally promoted by John Stewart and Steven Colbert of Comedy Central. It was a self proclaimed effort to gather folks together who wanted to tone down the rhetoric of our political and media world. It was a sunny, mild day and DC was in all its autumn glory. Absolutely, the highlight of the day was the humor, cleverness, and goodness exhibited by the many signs we saw as people streamed in and out of the event.
Some of those included:
It appears that we disagree. Would you like some pie?
We are all immigrants
Someone said there would be cake! (My dad’s making me hold this stupid sign)
I fear school lunches
Free the House Elves
I have no problem paying taxes because I’m an adult and that’s part of the deal
I spell check my political rage
But my favorites were
Obama is not a brown skinned anti war socialist who gives away free health care – you’re thinking of Jesus!
My God loves everyone. That’s kind of the point.
As those in our party repeatedly took pictures of people carrying their signs, they seemed genuinely tickled that someone got their joke, appreciated their humor, and noticed their artwork. I was struck that in the midst of a high anxiety weekend, in the midst of harsh political rhetoric and in the wake of serious social trends that include hate crimes, increased poverty, rising unemployment and government gridlock – this rainbow colored crowd took a day to have fun, to laugh, to sing, and to hang out with strangers and friends. Back home, I’m sure most of those folks went back work, back to school, back to the soccer carpool and grocery checklist. They were teachers and social workers, small business people and hospice workers. They were Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, native American, agnostic and simply spiritual. They undoubtedly care about the economy, the environment, the poor, the Redskins or the Packers, the price of gas and the quality of their coffee. They run, work out at the y, ride bikes to work and do palates and yoga.
I’m not suggesting this event signaled the coming of the Messiah. But it was a reminder that in the face of hatred and anger, we need to return to the source of OUR SONG. It was a reminder that when we have been beaten down, imprisoned and discouraged – it is tempting to turn to rage and vengeance – but our faith tradition calls us to something deeper, something more lasting, something more life-giving.
Carrie Newcomer, songwriter and artist, wrote on her blog this week, “Hope may feel risky for disappointment can exact a cost. It is no small thing to live within our highest hopes. Yet, the hope we live is not based upon one event or another. A disappointment is momentary, our most worthy hopes for are for the long haul & may take more than one lifetime to realize.”
To live for the long haul, to live as people of faith in a world that seems to trample our values, means that we balance our concern and fear with gratitude and compassion. I keep remembering my friend – it wasn’t his song that stays with me, it was the source of his song, his practical, hands on faith.
We may not sing, but we can consider what takes us back to our most grounded, hopeful, faith-filled vision.
When we feel attacked or belittled – maybe that’s when we plant a garden to see life come forth as it always has.
When we hear reports of war and corporate malfeasance, maybe then we visit a homebound friend or tutor a child in reading.
When we feel overwhelmed with the direction of politics, we can cook a good meal, play games with a homeless child or write a letter to a long lost friend.
When the news drives us crazy, we can put on a good CD or play the piano.
In a culture of fear – the life of Jesus which compelled Paul and Silas calls us to hold on to our values with joy.
In a culture of hatred – the discipleship that marked their lives compels us to steadfastness and respect.
In a culture of dis-ease – the source of our faith reminds of hope, hope everlasting… Amen
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Today’s text from Acts 16
19 But when her owners saw that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the market-place before the authorities. 20When they had brought them before the magistrates, they said, ‘These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews 21and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe.’ 22The crowd joined in attacking them, and the magistrates had them stripped of their clothing and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23After they had given them a severe flogging, they threw them into prison and ordered the jailer to keep them securely. 24Following these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.
25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. 26Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were unfastened. 27When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped. 28But Paul shouted in a loud voice, ‘Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.’ 29The jailer* called for lights, and rushing in, he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. 30Then he brought them outside and said, ‘Sirs, what must I do to be saved?’ 31They answered, ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.’ 32They spoke the word of the Lord* to him and to all who were in his house. 33At the same hour of the night he took them and washed their wounds; then he and his entire family were baptized without delay. 34He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God.
