Snuffed Out

"Snuffed Out"

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

October 29, 2017

at Bethany Presbyterian Church, Zuni, Virginia

Romans 12:11a-b

Matthew 5: 13-16

Revelation 2: 1-5 

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside our minds

Help us to be more than our lives

           For your eyes show us the way

           Your mind knows the truth

           Your being is the life.

Amen.

We’re continuing this morning with the Marks of a True Christian, where we have been studying what Paul said a True Christian should look like, should embody, the marks that would distinguish the Christian from the regular folks of his day, that would be the identifying factors, so they are not necessarily prescriptive, like laws would be, commanding how we should be living, but instead are descriptive of how people could be, living in the grace, no basking in the Grace of what Paul has set forth as the gift of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is the type of person made possible by the grace of Jesus Christ. So the challenge is each week to hold a mirror up to our faces, not to condemn ourselves for failing to live up to them, but instead inspire us to try, to seek, to get better, to improve, to keep fighting and driving ever onward, and upward, in these ways, And this morning the phrase from Marks of a True Christian is no different in its challenge to us, and in its importance within the life of our church, and that is, “Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit.” But before we go any further with it, I want to go back, like we always do and look at where we are going with this series, and of course also where we have been, so here are the Marks of the True Christian according to Paul, Romans 12: 9-21, again me reading from the New Revised Standard version for just this reading today, the other’s I have taken from NIV, so they will match the pew Bibles this morning. . . .

⁹ Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; ¹⁰ love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor. ¹¹ Do not lag in zeal, be ardent in spirit, serve the Lord. ¹² Rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer. ¹³ Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.

¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. ¹⁵ Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. ¹⁶ Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. ¹⁷ Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. ¹⁸ If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. ¹⁹ Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave room for the wrath of God; for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” ²⁰ No, “if your enemies are hungry, feed them; if they are thirsty, give them something to drink; for by doing this you will heap burning coals on their heads.” ²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

So do not lag in Zeal, and be ardent in Spirit. . . Before we start, I'd like to look at the words of our verse for this morning. Two words stand out because we rarely use them in our every day speech. One is "zeal" and the other is "ardent." Zeal is a little more familiar. The dictionary says that zeal is "eagerness and ardent interest in the pursuit of something." And there is that other word, "ardent," right in there. Now in the dictionary "ardent" is "characterized by warmth of feeling typically expressed in eager zealous support or activity" ^[2] And there is that word zeal, in zealous. Do you see why I kept this verse together intact? They are both talking about the same idea. The dictionary gave similar synonyms for both: fervor, fiery, hot. The Greek Root word for the word translated as ardent is the verb "leo," which means to boil. Literally "leontes" which is translated in the NRSV as ardent means boiling over as if out of control. Sounds a little bit also like the root for Lion, and perhaps that is a good image for our minds as well, and perhaps not the lion you may see lying in the shade in the zoo, or in the shade of the African Savannah, even, but the symbolic, mythical, lion, majestic, strong, true. . . of one mind, the lion on the hunt. . . intent, energetic, completely focused on the task. . . .

I’m going to read to you two different descriptions of churches both of which are written by those from the outside, voicing their perceptions of the goings on within the church. I want you to try to figure out which one is describing a Presbyterian Church and which one is not. The first:

The church has spread with its appeal focused especially on the common people. The churches are convened sometimes by mere enthusiasts, who, in these meetings read sundry fanatical books, and use long extempore prayers and discourses—sometimes by itinerant strolling ministers, and at present by a permanent preacher, who is well known to be intimate with known evangelical rabble rousers. Their sole purpose is to spread their religion to all parts of this colony, using emotional frenzy, undermining the true church at every step.[1]

Ok that is the first, here is the second.

The church is in a low state. A surprising negligence appears in attending on Publick worship; and an equally surprising Levity and Unconcernedness in those who attend. Godliness is not common. There is a general malaise in the congregation. The sermons are dull and thue people are contented by the stale teachings from the pulpit.[2]

Which is the Presbyterian Church as described in those two passages? Is the Presbyterian Church the one described as filled with emotional frenzy, or is the Presbyterian Church the one described as stale and dead? People on the outside never quite understand do they. Many look at Presbyterians today and stereotype us in certain ways. Frozen Chosen, perhaps?

But so do we, we do the same thing. Of course these are descriptions of our church and the elevate church right, the new and vibrant kid on the block, where all the young folks are going. . . I’ve heard it here, said, it’s just emotion, touchy feely, promise, Christmas, not Christianity, prosperity Gospel, Good Feeling stuff. . . and they might describe us in the way of the second, stale and dead, outdated and old. . . but the truth is these two descriptions are not from churches today, and yes one is Presbyterian, but in fact it is the first one. . . not the second, the vibrant one, the one that is described as a frenzy. . . now of course those are descriptions from an outsider, but how interesting the roles could be so reversed. . . at least for us. Yes the first is a description of what was going on in Hanover at the upstart Presbyterian Congregation at Polegreen, under the pastorship of the Rev. Samuel Davies. . . it was written by the Pastor of the other church being described, the Rev. Patrick Henry (the uncle and namesake of the liberty or death guy we know), who felt threatened by the upstart church, and though his church was state sponsored by the crown in the colony, and the others were dissenters, he still felt threatened, because his church had become stale and dead, as is described. It is interesting to think about, what accounts for the change? To get back on track, one church is not lagging in zeal and the other is, one church is ardent in the spirit and the other is not. Now why is this so important, other than the obvious, to answer that question let’s look at our Gospel and New Testament Lessons.

The first, out of Christ’s own mouth, in the Sermon on the Mount, as presented to us in Matthew 5: 13-16

¹³ “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.

¹⁴ “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. ¹⁵ No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. ¹⁶ In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

We’ve heard that before that the job of the church, the job of the Christian, the job of the disciple of Christ is to let our lights shine before others, so that they may see us and give glory to God. . . . our light to be lit and held up on a lampstand. . . and that brings us to our second reading, this one from Revelation. This John of Patmos’ letter to the church at Ephesus, one of the seven churches he writes to, to open up the book of Revelation.

2 “To the angel of the church in Ephesus write:

These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands. ² I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. ³ You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.

⁴ Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. ⁵ Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place

I was at a Presbytery Meeting one time, it was actually where I became a candidate for Ministry, you go through these stages, the first is Inquirer, and then Candidate, and each time you go before the whole of the Presbytery. It was nice because it was at the church of which I was under care, the church where I was a member, and they were “sponsoring” me for lack of a better term. . . there in Gloucester, which actually has since left the Presbytery, ironically, but at this meeting the speaker of the worship part, was talking about churches who have lost it. He was about church growth and church vitality, but he was talking about the churches that just didn’t make it. . . and he quoted this passage, and used it as a metaphor, that all churches have a candle, and little things happen over time that just snuffs out the light. . . it was funny my dad and I kept doing it for the rest of the meeting, any time that bureaucratic group think happened in the Meeting. . . we need funding for this, sshmmmffff, we’re cutting funding for this, sshmfff, there will be another mission study looking at how churches can do better at this, shmfff, a new committee must be formed to discuss whether or not the flag in the Presbytery office should be moved from the main hall to a more prominent place, shmmmffff. Awe who cares??? And it was just like most meetings where every cares, or at least wants to be heard, in the moment, but then after the meeting no one really cares at all, now that its over, oh well back to work, shmmmffff.

That Candle became the metaphor for the zeal of the church, the ardency of the spirit. . . but how does it happen, how does a church go from a zealous church to a church with a flickering lampstand, a candle in the wind. . . ?

I’m not sure, but I have my suspicions because I know what robs me of my zeal. One is when people are put in a box and not allowed to be themselves. If I were to hear those two descriptions of church from earlier, the live one and the dead one, I wouldn’t want to be either because I would want to defy the description. No that is not me, I am more than that. You can’t label me accurately, you can’t fence me in, there is more to me than that, because I’m always growing, learning, changing, by the experiences that I have, people are dynamic, and created by God as such. So any labels, descriptions, expectations, of me or other people, they snuff out my candle. . . I believe that individuals were created uniquely by God in His image, and God defies labels, so so should his reflection.

The next is similar. I don’t like it when someone is not allowed to live up to their potential. . . and it is similar to the other one because labels are one of the ways that people tend to stifle potential. I used to hate it when my students had over time developed understandings of their abilities and identities that were less than what they could have been. They had been taught, or led to believe that, this was all they could do, or less. . . which brings me to my third thing that snuffs me out, and that is when systems are put in place to make it so a person doesn’t have to live up to their potential. . . the creation of crutches that make excelling no longer necessary. . . One of my favorite poems gets at this. . . TS Eliots, Choruses from the Rock. . . it is so good, but this one part says:

They constantly try to escape

From the darkness outside and within

By dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good.

How true that statement is of our world. How many systems have we tried to create, so that no one would needs to be good anymore. . . and the cynical piece is, that what  it is saying underneat is that they cannot be good. . . they don’t have what it takes. . .  people can be better, but often we don’t let them be. . . because we make it so they do not have to be. . . I see this, and smmffff my candle of zeal goes straight out, or else I seek to fight it, and as long as I’m fighting against it, my candle burns, but when I give up and give in. . . smfff.

Now you may ask yourself, how does this happen in church, what does your pet peeve have to do with church, Pete. Now I think the same scenarios take place over time within a church. You get use to each other, and you get used to things as they are, and you don’t see them or each other as dynamic any more and you get used to the labels. You know each other so well so you put each other in boxes. Oh he’s just that way, or she’s just that way. . . smmmfff, and you create systems that sustain the life of the organization by creating as little conflict as possible, smmfff. Oh the Presbyterian Church is full of those, we have a big thick book of order, mostly designed to try and prevent old conflicts from happening again, but does it work, no, it just makes us fearful of conflict and robs us of our zeal. We stop challenging each other to be constantly changing and alive and vibrant, and supportive, because we are more interested in keeping everyone happy and safe,. . . and slowly the zeal of truly rising constantly to our potential collectively and potentials individually, in an ever upward growth pattern becomes stagnant. It happens in organizations and it happens in families, people get used to each other and they just expect each other to always be the same, or in some cases demand it. . . and as the people so goes the institution, flat. . .

The other way it happens is also connected. . . because the church takes on a label and an identity, and rather than being one of vitality it becomes one of holding on. Someone starts something, and it is their baby, they love it, they are fired up about it, and they do it well, but then they die, or move away, or stops,  and it of course needs to continue because its what we do here right, but no one else is quite as fired up about it. They try to keep it going but they aren’t them, and it becomes a burden. It becomes a must do instead of a want to do. . . and must. . . flows from the label, not the actual dynamic personality of someone, right. I am here, and so I “should” pick up the slack, as a church member, it is my duty. . . but your gifts and talents and interests are elsewhere, but what will happen to us if we let this thing go? What is our identity without it? This is the baggage that is constantly being built up, and it weighs a church down because it weighs its people down. Do you know the line that follows, the one about building systems, so that people will not have to be good. . . it is

But the man that is shall shadow

The man that pretends to be.

The man that is. . . who are you, not who do people think you are supposed to be, not what other people have been so you think you have to emulate, but who are you, stop pretending and be that, all else lowers your zeal. . . it is the deathnell of any church because a church is not the building, a church is not a steeple, a church is a people, and stagnant, pigeon holed shells, lag in zeal and are not ardent in the spirit.

It’s the bunny story that I read to the kids during children’s time. I don’t know how the clothes got on, but they are there, and you can’t be a bunny, until you take them off. . . and if you leave them, beware because danger is lurking.

This Sunday, today is Reformation Sunday because it was on October 31st that Martin Luther nailed his Theses to the door Whittenburg. He was reacting to the same situation. Over the years the Catholic Church had added things to what it meant to be a church, and what it meant to be a Christian, and Luther wanted to strip those things away and get at what it truly meant. He said not the works, but instead faith, not the priest, but the priesthood of all believers. Not tradition, but Sola Scriptura, only scripture. . . these principles he used to get back to what was essential to the faith, and the rest had to be stripped. . . and it was difficult, wars were fought. . . Calvin took it a few steps further, parallel to Luther in Geneva. . . and he added the idea to his Reformed faith saying, Ecclesia semper reformanda est, Reformed and always Reforming, knowing that churches and people have a tendancy to add things to themselves, that separate them from the light airy baggageless discipleship that we are called to. . .

What we need to do is get back to the essentials of what makes us. . . which is why I’ve been going through these Marks of a Christian. . . for they are challenging ways to get us to think about what the standard is, how it is impossible, and how we must dynamically be constantly fighting and moving upward, not to attain it, but to be constantly working. . . I want to read another part of the Choruses from the Rock for you. . . this is earlier when Eliot is talking about what the work of humans is, he says “the lot of man is ceaseless labor,” a never ending battle. . . he writes:

Let me show you the work of the humble. Listen.

In the vacant places

We will build with new bricks

Where the bricks are fallen

We will build with new stone

Where the beams are rotten

We will build with new timbers

Where the word is unspoken

We will build with new speech

There is work together

A Church for all

And a job for each

Every man to his work.

What life have you, if you have not life together?

There is not life that is not in community,

And no community not lived in praise of GOD.

Some people would say that we need to update the program here, appeal to younger audiences, pull out the pews, stop singing old and traditional hymns,, be more like Elevate. I disagree, absolutely and completely, because you will not get any closer to being yourself by trying to copy what they are doing down the street. It is not about them it is about us. . . and I believe to my heart that a church unapologetically doing what they are called to be, and being who they are, is a dynamic church, and it is dynamic churches that survive. . . one trying to be someone else will fail. . . one who is always shadows over one who merely pretends to be. . .

What is central to us as this community living in praise of God? What is essential? How can we get back to those basics, the are the questions and let the rest go, shed it like the clothes that has slowed the bunny, lay those burdens on Christ. . . There has been a repeated theme, week after week, have you noticed? It comes back to Faith, Gratitude, and Love. . . . Faith that God has made us, saved us, and is sustaining us through his Sovereign and perfect will, and therefore who he has made us to be is who we should strive to be, an no pretending else, for the next is Gratitude that, that Will is good for us, and better than we can do for ourselves in shaping ourselves, and how it all then frees us to only Love for those who we walk life with are just as created, with the same boundless potential, and though they be like us in someways are always completely unique.  . . Faith, Gratitude and Love, is a good place to start, why not leave the rest behind. It is of note that the church in Ephesus has their lamp stand removed simply because they lost their love. . It is essential. Without it we’re lost

And speaking of lost. The meditation in the bulletin from Paradise Lost, from the mouth of Satan of all characters, this his for once because he is alone in his thoughts if just for a moment becasue he doesn’t end here, but this is an actual description of remorse. . .and it echoes. . .

nor was his service hard.
What could be less then to afford him praise,
The easiest recompence, and pay him thanks. . .
. . . The debt immense of endless gratitude,
So burthensome, still paying, still to ow;
Forgetful what from him I still receivd,
And understood not that a grateful mind
By owing owes not, but still pays, at once
Indebted and dischargd; what burden then?

Remember when we were defining love, I said that it is a cup that never is empty, it is always running over. . . look here a grateful mind, by owing owes not, but still pays, at once indebted and discharged; what burden then? If we are truly living these essentials, our zeal shall never flag, and we shall ever remain ardent in the spirit. . .