SERMON PREACHED BY THE REVEREND DR. HAROLD T. LEWIS, RECTOR

CALVARY EPISCOPAL CHURCH, PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA

ON THE TWENTIETH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

18 OCTOBER 2009

“It shall not be so among you.” (Mk. 10:43)

   Back in the Middle Ages, when I was a student at McGill University, I lived in the diocesan theological college.  Most of the residents were seminarians, but about a dozen or so Anglican undergraduates (highly recommended, of course) were allowed to share quarters with those who were preparing for Holy Orders.  Meals at the College were fairly formal affairs --- jacket and tie required, and at breakfast and dinner academic gowns.  Grace, preceded by the appropriate versicles and responses, was offered, sometimes intoned, after which everybody sat down and dug in.   

  Owing to my friendship with the Senior Student, for whom one of the seats at the head table was reserved, I was, as often as not, seated there as well.  The other reserved seat was for the Principal, for those fairly infrequent occasions when he deigned to break bread with us.  One evening, having been assured that the Principal would not be in attendance, I sat in his seat.  But as soon as I had unfolded my napkin, Dr. Eric George Jay swooshed into the refectory.  I scrambled to rise, but the venerable cleric motioned me to remain seated, saying “Not to worry, Harold, I’ll sit somewhere else.”  He then made his way to sit, as it were, below the salt, with the hoi-polloi.  The mortification I suffered caused acute indigestion.  And, as you can well imagine, that incident led to a life characterized ever since by abject and self-effacing humility!

   Seats are important. They are not just someplace to sit; they are symbols of authority and power.  I remember being trained as an acolyte at St Philip’s, Brooklyn.  A reverence was instilled in us for the enormous oaken throne with a mitre carved on top, situated in the corner of the sanctuary.  It was dusted and polished weekly, but was only used by the bishop when he made his annual visitation --- and woe to the altar boy who presumed to sit on it!  In living rooms across the country, there is many an easy chair reserved for the paterfamilias.  Or go to a wedding reception and watch the guests feeling either very important or cast into outer darkness based on their table number, their distance from the bridal party, and whom they get to sit next to!

   In this morning’s Gospel, James and John, who, after all, were part of Jesus’ executive committee --- having accompanied him to the Mount of Transfiguration and participated in a few other important missions --- wanted power and authority --- and to us, their own word, glory.  First, they make a childish attempt to set Jesus up by trying to extract from him a promise that he’ll do whatever they ask.  Then, they ask --- no, they demand --- that they be given the right to sit at Jesus’ right and left. (I prefer Matthew’s version of this story, in which their pushy mother Salome makes the demand on their behalf!)  It’s a foolish request.  Jesus has just explained that he’s going to Jerusalem to suffer and die!

   But James and John don’t get it at all.  All they can envision is basking in Jesus’ glory and sharing his power.  Death and resurrection, betrayal and suffering mean nothing to them.  They want positions in power in the new government.  Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense.  So far as they’re concerned, all the other disciples can be kicked to the curb – even Peter.  James and John are nothing if not bold --- “no guts, no glory” guys.  They are living up to the nickname Jesus gave them when he called them: Sons of Thunder!  But bulls in the theological china shop that they are, they simply cannot fathom Jesus’ counter-question: “Can you drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”  They answer, “We are able,” (or as Democrats would say, “Yes, we can!”) but have no idea what they’re signing up for.

   For the past few weeks, Jesus has been giving us one lesson after another about discipleship.  About membership in the Kingdom.  One Sunday he told us that we have to be like a little child.  Last week, when the rich young ruler came to him, he told us that our wealth can be an impediment to our being effective citizens of the Kingdom.  Today he informs us that Christian disciples have different standards: “It shall not be so among you,” he tells the Twelve.  He says: “You know that in the world the recognized rulers lord it over their subjects, and their great men make them feel the weight of authority . . . But among you, whoever wants to be great must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be the willing slave of all.”

   Things haven’t changed.  We still haven’t learned to beat our swords into plowshares.  I am a member of the Baby Boomer generation who came along after World War II.  But the world has hardly known a day of peace since that great conflict.  Even as we speak, the United States is trying to extricate itself from its involvements in two wars!  And the church, far from being conflict-free, measures up all too often to Mr. Stone’s description: “by schisms rent asunder, by heresies distressed.”  We all lord it over somebody --- and the positions in which we find ourselves --- lording it over someone or being lorded over --- are all too predictable --- in the workplace, in the marketplace, even in our nation’s schools in which bullying, sometimes violent bullying, has become the order of the day.

   But I put it to you that although such behavior has been normative, or maybe because it has, we honor and admire those who, in our Lord’s words, are the willing servants of all.  We admire those who manage not to be self-seeking or ambitious.  Those who have authority but don’t abuse it.

   One of the more shameful chapters in Episcopal Church history --- and there have been a few --- concerns the existence of colored convocations.  They were made up of African American congregations in dioceses in which blacks were not allowed to attend or participate in the diocesan convention.  The last such convocation sat in Charleston, South Carolina in 1954.  When I was doing my research, I interviewed a woman who had lived through the changes. She explained to me that the integration process was gradual.  First, blacks were allowed to sit on the floor of convention and take part in the legislative process.  Next, the convention Eucharist was open to blacks as well as whites, without requiring blacks to sit at the rear of the church or in the balcony, as had previously been the custom. The most difficult problem, however, reported the eye-witness, was the convention banquet.  Not only was it unheard of for the races to dine together socially, but the problem was compounded by the fact that members of the Women’s Auxiliary (precursor to the ECW) by time-honored tradition waited on the tables.  For them to wait on colored guests would be unthinkable!  Things changed when one day, the bishop’s wife quietly and without fanfare donned an apron and set food before blacks and whites alike!

   A more famous woman known for never losing the common touch was her late Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.  She endeared herself to her subjects during the War by a) refusing to leave London; and b) visiting bombed-out sites in London’s East End, and c) stopping for a beer at the local pub.  Unfortunately, her daughter proved, in crisis, not to have the same instincts, holing herself up at Balmoral after the death of the Princess of Wales, insisting on mourning in private at a time when the people wanted her to mourn with them. (Queen Elizabeth did, of course, eventually leave Scotland for London, and made a speech on TV.  Later, the Royal Family hired a public relations firm to help them to better relate to the British public!)

   There are those who make Christianity a doom and gloom religion.  And those intent on doing so have more than adequate material.  They zero in on phrases about taking up one’s cross, about drinking the cup, and even about a willingness to die.  Such people make life on earth just a dreary dress rehearsal for the “real event” --- life after death, “where sorrow and pain are no more.”  But guess what?  Jesus didn’t spend his short life preaching to his disciples, and to us, about how to die, but how to live, about how to have life and have it abundantly.  Every vignette he shares, every parable that falls from his lips, gives us another example of what that life should be like.  Today’s lesson is the proper and reverent use of authority --- to lead without flaunting the authority entrusted to us.  In today’s lesson, we see a glimpse of a new community in which relationships are not governed by power and status but by service and hospitality for those without status, a community in which those who have been ransomed live for others!  This is what Jesus meant when he said to his disciples, “It shall not be so among you.”

   Let us pray:

      In hope that sends a shining ray

      Far down the future’s broad’ning way,

      In peace that only thou canst give,

      With thee, O Master, let me live.               AMEN.