Sermon preached by The Right Reverend Michie Klusmeyer
Bishop of West Virginia at
The Ninth Annual East End Parishes
Tuesday Night Lenten Preaching Series
at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Highland Park
March 9, 2010 at 7 o’clock in the evening
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
It is a great pleasure to be a part of your Lenten Program this year, and what a wonderful idea and ministry you are providing the good people of the Diocese of Pittsburgh. I am in awe of the names on the roster of preachers during this Season, and consider myself to be blessed to be numbered among them, and to be with you.
I bring you greetings and prayers from the Diocese of West Virginia – the Diocese that borders you on both your western and southern boundaries. Please know that, as the clergy availed themselves of Sandscrest, in Wheeling, you are always our welcomed guests there.
Given our past winter, that may not be over yet, the roads we travel are littered with potholes. Therefore, as there are many signs that read: “Construction ahead.” “Road Closed” “Detour” In Chicago, where I was before I came to West Virginia, it was said there are two seasons: Winter and Construction. Around the United States, it is normal to see signs such as these, as well. Some believe that construction takes place all year long. As bishops, traveling around dioceses, we see these too often. You see them also, I know.
This unwelcome announcement of ‘Construction Ahead” frequently greets each of us along the roads we travel. I don’t know about you, but construction signs make me feel unsettled. What inconvenience lies before me? How far out of my way will I have to go to get to my destination? How long will I be tied up in traffic? My irritation quickly turns into anger when I discover that four lanes have narrowed down to one, and I am now trapped in the slow-moving , bumper to bumper lane, accompanied by blaring horns, noxious fumes and angry fellow motorists. And along the way, I realize I get even more irritated, because there is nothing I can do about it!
When highway construction forces us to take a detour…sometimes over a stretch of unfamiliar road which seems more in need of repair than the route we had intended to use, we may notice ourselves having judgmental thoughts about those people who put those signs up.
If our journey is long, and the alternate route poorly marked, a detour can even produce a sense of panic and confusion: will we EVER find our way back to the original route? We feel lost, uncertain where we are headed.
But, “Road under construction” is a metaphor revealing a permanent condition experienced by all of us who would travel the road our Lord sets before us. The most ancient name for our word “road,” itself derives from a Sanscrit word meaning, “to carry,” “go,” or “move.” Its English descendent is our word – “way.” So “The Way” is the road we must travel; it has twists and turns, detours and perhaps potholes – whose ultimate significance and meaning may not always be clear to us.
The Diocese of Pittsburgh is on the way, which includes detours and unexpected bumps along the way. We don’t like being in the wilderness any more than our ancestors did. But the wilderness is a reality and probably a necessity.
Today we remember Gregory of Nyssa. Certainly the image of wilderness and the Way could be a part of his story. According to Lesser Feasts and Fasts, he was enchanted with Christ and dazzled by the resurrection. Enchanted and dazzled. I love that imagery. But it also says that he knew himself to be unfit to be the Bishop of Nyssa, Gregory declared his ordination as the most miserable day of his life.
Now to those on the COM or on the Standing Committee – have you ever met someone who believed themselves to be unfit for any ministry for which them presented themselves? I imagine that if someone came forward to the COM interview, and said, “the thought of my ordination to the (priesthood, diaconate, episcopacy – fill in the blank) makes me sick, and I want no part of it, but here I am anyway” would give an unqualified response from the COM that would take only a moment to formulate. NO! We don’t take people like that.
We look for self-assured and self-proclaimed leaders of the Church, to be our leaders of our beloved Church. No doubters allowed. No self-hesitancy permitted. But yet, our Church is filled with people that God has found fit, that have had either self-doubts, or doubts raised from their communities. Ambrose, happily serving as Governor in Upper Italy was chosen bishop when the crowds began to demand it. Fabian, a stranger in the midst of the crowd waiting for the election of a new Pope, had a dove light on his head, and the people declared that he was worthy!!!
Again, to the members of the COM or the Standing Committee – how about a candidate that comes before you, and declares that they are a fit person for ordination, because a bird landed on their heads? I guess I’ve heard stranger stories, but they rarely convince me. God takes the seemingly ordinary, and unsuspecting, and makes it worthy!
Scripture is filled with that imagery: God is not in the fire, or the earthquake, or the wind. God is in the still small voice. Amos, what do you see? I see a plumb line. A prophet formed from a herdsman and dresser of sycamore trees…sees in an ordinary building tool, an image of God coming to judge God’s people. God uses each of us, as ordinary, unassuming or as hesitant as any of us might be. God used the young woman, Mary to become the Theotokos. God uses you and me to be Christ’s hands, feet, voice and heart to this sinful and broken world.
Presiding Bishop Allen, at the 68th General Convention in Anaheim, CA in 1985, said, “Let me direct and reflect to you my observations of this Church in evangelism. Officially, of course, we endorse evangelism, but actually we are rather tentative about this function in mission. We’ve been known to talk ourselves out of being evangelists, by telling ourselves there were better uses of a Christian’s time, or that evangelism could be carried out without mentioning Jesus or the Gospel or sin or conversion. Someone used to describe this as being ‘starched and ironed without being washed,’ or they ‘expected to be drycleaned, but not converted.’” An old friend used to tell me that ‘we place minimal expectations upon our members, and they live up to those expectations.’ Don’t expect much – don’t get much!
We can easily talk ourselves out of doing Christ’s work, just because we know ourselves too well, and know ourselves to be unfit for the work that is set before us. “We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy table” says the 1928 Book of Common Prayer. And yet, the 1979 Book clearly has a theology that says, “we are worthy to stand before you.” Not because of who we are, but because of God’s salvific grace. We are made worthy through the blood of the everlasting Covenant – Jesus Christ.
As we travel the Way together, we are called to open our eyes of faith. We are called to open our eyes, to see with the eyes of faith, and to rise to the higher calling of Christ. “I press on toward the prize of the upward calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippeans 3:14)
Recently, I heard of a group of women in a Bible Study on the book of Malachi. As they were studying chapter three, they came across verse three, which says: “He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.” This verse puzzled the women and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God. One of the women offered to find out about the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible study.
That week, this woman called up a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn’t mention anything about the reason for her interest in silver beyond her own curiosity about the process of refining silver. As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were the hottest as to burn away all the impurities.
The woman thought about God, holding us in such a hot spot – then she thought again about the verse, that He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver. She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the hot fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left even a moment too long in the flames, the silver would be destroyed.
The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, “How do you know when the silver is fully refined?” He smiled at her and answered, “Oh, that’s easy – when I see my image in it.”
If today you are feeling the heat of the fire, remember that God has His eyes on you and will keep watching you until God sees His image in you – God’s image in the Diocese of Pittsburgh…until God sees the completion of how Jesus has transformed us. The mission for this Diocese will be complete, when we can all see the image of Christ reflected in what you do.
Amen.