SERMON PREACHED BY
THE REVEREND DR. HAROLD T. LEWIS, RECTOR
CALVARY EPISCOPAL CHURCH,
PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA
ON THE FEAST OF SAINT MICHAEL & ALL ANGELS
24 SEPTEMBER 2006

 
 
 
"How awesome is this place!" (Genesis 28:17)
 
 
When we encounter Jacob in this morning's lesson from the Book of Genesis, he is on the lam. Jacob the Trickster was the nerdy guy who stayed close to home. His twin brother, Esau, was the ruddy jock who spent his time hunting and tilling the soil. One day, Esau comes in from the fields, famished and exhausted, to find that Jacob had whipped up some broth (or as the KJV describes it, "a mess of pottage.") Jacob convinced his brother to sell his right as the first-born son for that meal, and predictably, Esau wolfs it down. The intrigue of this dysfunctional family doesn't end there. Near the end of the life of their father Isaac, Jacob tricks his dad into believing that he was Esau, and received his father's blessing. Understandably, Esau says "Enough is enough already," and vows to kill his twin, so Jacob, aided and abetted by his mother Rebecca, gets out of Dodge with exceeding haste.
 
Jacob the despondent and apprehensive fugitive arrives at the place he would call Bethel, and, roughing it, makes a pillow out of a stone. Then he lay down and had a dream. Long before Freudian psychoanalysts began to charge money for interpreting dreams, dreams were one of the primary methods that God used to communicate truths to humankind. In this dream, Jacob sees a ladder which reached to heaven, and on it the angels of God were ascending and descending, doing God's bidding. This scene at Bethel is much beloved, and it has given us at least one hymn, but it is possible to look at it through overly sentimental lenses. This is not a conversion such as the one experienced by Saul on the Damascus Road. This is not a confessional experience such as Peter's revelation at Caesarea Philippi. No, this is a scene in which God's partisan grace is bestowed. Jacob, who would later be called Israel, was God's chosen one and must be strengthened for what lay ahead.
 
My friends, I believe that this passage speaks to us here at Calvary in a special and specific way. Ten years ago today, when I first mounted this pulpit, I said that I envisioned Calvary as an oasis, a place of refreshment, for everyone who comes to us, thirsty and parched from their respective spiritual deserts. Get ready for the onslaught, folks! The Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion are in very different places than they were a decade ago. "By schisms rent asunder, by heresies distressed" is not just a line in a hymn. Only Friday, the Primates of the so-called "Global South" have demanded that the Episcopal Church be divided into two jurisdictions, one "orthodox," one not. No less a personage than the Archbishop of Canterbury has mused out loud about a "two-tiered" Anglicanism, with "constituent" and "associate" members. (Sounds like a country club!) Some people will feel alienated, others, as our young people will say, will feel "dissed." And many of them, like Jacob, despondent and apprehensive fugitives, will beat a path to our doors and the doors of churches like ours, who dare to practice radical hospitality, and refuse to marginalize anyone because he or she fails to pass arbitrary litmus tests having to do with biblical inerrancy or sexual orientation.
 
Ten years ago, I expressed a hope that Calvary would be a place where the Gospel is preached unabashedly and where we will always worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. When Jacob proclaims "How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven" we see in his words a basic truth of the Hebrew people. To him, and to them, there was a gate of heaven because they believed there was a heaven in the first place. The supernatural enfolded the natural; the mystical was as real a concept to them as everyday events were. Jacob could say, to use the words of a great evangelical hymn, "My God is real, for I feel him in my soul." We at Calvary are like Jacob. We take seriously worshipping the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Week after week, through word and sacrament, symbol and song, we attempt to bring to Shady and Walnut a taste of the heavenly Jerusalem. We experience it ourselves and we share it with our children as well. We want to show them that there is more to life than the proverbial dog-eat-dog rat race of a world (if I may mix zoological metaphors) in which "money talks," a world in which even in the hallowed diplomatic halls of the United Nations one head of state can not only with impunity say that another head of state is the devil incarnate, but can add that the stench of sulfur can still be detected in the air after his departure.
 
When I think of children who have experienced the numinous, the magnum mysterium that is God in this place, I think of Christian Mazur. His was the first baptism I administered in this place. It was the infant Christian whom I cradled in my arms ten years ago and pouring water over his head made him a child of God and an inheritor of the kingdom of Heaven. And now he is growing into the full stature of Christ. When I listen to him sing, or watch him and his sister Claire painstakingly moving the communion cushion into place, it warms my heart to know that we have implanted in yet another generation the seeds of faith. When all is said and done, there is no greater joy in ministry. Successful capital campaigns, increased memberships and bigger budgets pale by comparison.
 
Finally, I expressed a hope a decade ago that the people of Calvary, whose patron saint is an angel, might learn to be angelic in their ministrations one to another. Actually that was a presumptuous statement; clearly the people of God in this place had learned that lesson long before the arrival of the fifteenth rector. How many times have I arrived at the home of a sick parishioner only to find a bouquet of fresh-cut flowers that Jean Robinson had just delivered from her garden? How many times have I visited the homebound to discover a refrigerator full of groceries that Mary Burdett had shopped for? How many of you know that Katie Wooldridge shops for and cooks dinners on a regular basis for the students at the Neighborhood Academy? The list goes on.
 
Now the real "finally.": There is an old Latin proverb (I suppose there are no new Latin proverbs, since it is a dead language) Sed quis ipsos custodes custodiet? ("Who will guard the guards themselves?") In other words: Who will look after the people who, nominally, at least, are the leaders? Or, in our context, "Who will pastor the pastor?" I want you to know that this past decade has been one of mutual ministry. You have ministered to me and Claudette and Justin in myriad ways. You have opened doors for us in this community.
 
You have provided both material and emotional support, well above and beyond the call of duty. When, as the spiritual says, I've been "'buked and scorned," you have been there for us, providing comfort and solace, defending us against our enemies. On those (not infrequent) occasions when I went out on a limb, you carefully assessed the situation, and used the appropriate apparatus to prevent me from falling and the tree from cracking under my weight. And I can never forget that when Claudette and I left for the beauty contest in Washington, trying to discern if I should be fitted for a mitre, you kept vigil with us, lived through the uncertainty and the apprehension and potential separation anxiety. But when the mitre didn't fit, you welcomed us back with open arms, and assured us that God had called us to this place, and that our work here was not over. In short, you have been our angels, going up and down ladders for us with alacrity, enthusiasm and grace. And for this I give you humble and unfeigned thanks.
 
Let us pray:
 
Life and strength of all Thy servants,
Brightness of the Father's light;
Men with Angels, earth with Heaven,
In Thy praise their songs unite.
 
Thousand thousand warrior princes
In thine Angel army stand,
Flames the victor Cross before them,
Grasp'd in Michael's dauntless hand.
 
God the Father, God Immortal,
God the Son, for us Who died,
God the Comforter, the Spirit,
Evermore be glorified [Hymns Ancient and Modern, No. 616]
 
AMEN.