Sermon Sunday 6th February 2011
Today, one of our Lay Readers, Adrian Parkhouse, preaches based on the reading from Ephesians 1: 1-10.
The Purpose Drive Life: Formed for God’s Family:
“To the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.” Eph 1:1
1. This talk is rather like a detective story. So see how you do with the clues.
The date: 4th April 1968. The time: just after 6pm. The scene: a small motel. A man has emerged onto a first floor balcony. He is evidently killing time, waiting for a friend still inside their room. The noise? Perhaps a car back-firing in the nearby street?
2. This is the third of our series of sermons which prepares us for our Lent studies later in the Spring. Then, as a Parish, we are invited to join together in following the discipline of reading and considering each day of Lent the 40 short chapters of Rick Warren’s book The Purpose Drive Life - in which we are challenged to identify and examine what we regard as the reasons we live as we do – what drives us. The book suggest 5 reasons, 5 drivers, 5 “purposes”, for the Christian’s life and this introductory series is intended to provide a brief and personal comment on each of these purposes. Today my task is to speak on Purpose No.2 “You were formed for God’s Family”.
3. The city: Memphis, Tennessee; the motel: the Lorraine; the man on the balcony: Dr Martin Luther King Jr; the noise? No, not a car back-firing, but a shot from a Remington 760 sporting rifle. Its bullet has entered Dr King’s throat, pierced his spinal column and before the hour is out he is pronounced dead.
4. My regression into childhood continues: a few years ago, in my late-40s I could excuse the purchase of the Scaletrix I had never had; in much the same way, a little later, the miniature railway I had always craved; but a recent fascination with remote-controlled helicopters which crash constantly did begin to cause me some concern; and now, as if to confirm that the regression is something serious, I find myself reading late at night, under the bedclothes. Or at least the modern equivalent, plugging in my iPod and being read to.
One of the books downloaded is Selected Speeches and Sermons of Dr Martin Luther King. Why? Partly because I realised that part of one of his speeches was probably one of only two talks in my life that had lodged in my memory (except for odd phrases of Churchill) and yet I knew very little about the man.
And so now I know a bit more. How this son of a Baptist minister was a teenager who questioned his father’s faith, who went on to study sociology before going to theological college; how his first appointment to a church in Montgomery, Alabama, brought him into the centre of the increasingly active movement for civil rights for the black people of America; how he helped organise the year-long Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 (Rosa Parks), leading to a court ruling ending segregation on public transport in that city; how then he lead the new Southern Christian Leadership Conference which, under his influence, adopted the tactics developed by Ghandi against the British in India, non-violent protest; and how boycotts and strikes and marches and speeches by Dr King became an increasingly frequent occurrence in the years of the late-50s and early-60s as black people challenged the racist laws of the southern states and began too to question the history of the nation that had freed them from slavery but left them in poverty. How he became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (1964). And I know how he was threatened, his home fire-bombed, regularly imprisoned and, once, stabbed; how his message of rational but implacable criticism of the status quo won him enemies in government, while his commitment to non-violent means won him enemies among black-led groups wanting more definitive action.
And I listened to the speech I thought I knew, the “I have a dream” speech delivered to the crowds attending the mass “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom” in August 1963. And as I listened to more, I realised that there were certain themes which occur again and again in the sermons and speeches. I mention two that are relevant this morning: Dr King’s conviction that segregation was wrong was founded on the belief that we are created by God, not only to be equal before Him but also to be dependent on one another. Again and again he quotes John Donne, “No man is an island...”. And second that “dream” theme crops up often in his teaching – “the American dream” and then the Washington speech is given in various forms before the big march. But the reason I have laid this trail of clues is to lead us a “dream” sermon he preached on the 3 March 1968 – that’s a month before his assassination: a sermon with a poignant, prophetic title: “Unfulfilled Dreams”; a sermon based on the story of David and the disappointment at not being the one to be building God’s Temple in Jerusalem; a sermon delivered – and this is important for this morning – at Dr King’s “home church”, Ebenezer Baptist Church, Atlanta, Georgia, surrounded by people he had worshipped with and shared with for much of his 39 years (his parents included); and a sermon which is a confession, not of failure in his cause, but of the battle in his life between good and evil. It is an emotional sermon and he reaches his crescendo as he says: “I don’t know about you, but I can make a testimony. You don’t need to go out this morning saying that Martin Luther King is a saint. Oh no. I want you to know today that I’m a sinner like all of God’s children. But I want to be a good man. And I want to hear a voice saying to me one day “I take you in and I bless you, because you try. It is well that it was within thy heart””. - “You don’t need to go out this morning saying that Martin Luther King is a saint”
5. And more briefly, may I pick up another clue laid earlier: the other sermon which has stayed me was, oddly, on the same sort of theme. In about 1980 I listened to Rev David Prior, then Vicar of St Aldgates in Oxford, preaching on the tricky passage from Acts 5 concerning the lies told by the new church members, Ananias and Saphira. The message I took away from that sermon was revolutionary to me: that the Church was in business for sinners and was made up of sinners. Our “sainthood” – the saints to whom Paul wrote in the opening verse of our passage today – is – like rest of the blessings and plans which Paul sets out in his letter to a community that he knew well and loved dearly – our sainthood is a result of the grace of God. Not us but Him. The same message as in MLK’s “Unfulfilled Dream”.
6. So at last we are ready for the final scene – the denouement in the drawing room. Is everybody here? My admission of regression into childhood we can ignore as a red herring; and the dramatic opening we can treat as window dressing intended to attract attention. What you may not yet have fathomed is the link between that confessional sermon of MLK (and the message I have carried from my time at college) and Rick Warren’s second purpose – our being formed for God’s family. Or is it obvious? That the Church, God’s family is made up of you and me and people like us, people who are far from perfect, do not see ourselves as “saints” and for whom, as Warren describes it, a “place to belong” is the more important; especially a place which he explains can be a place where friendships can be honest and authentic, where sympathy, mercy and forgiveness are the common currency, together with honesty and confidentiality. He has more to say about practising “being church”, but his words on these matters encourage me to encourage you to the conclusion, if you had not already reached it, that, no matter what your history, looking at yourself with critical eyes, there can be no reason to conclude that you are not formed for God’s family - to be one of the saints.
Elementary? Amen.
The Purpose Drive Life: Formed for God’s Family:
“To the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.” Eph 1:1
1. This talk is rather like a detective story. So see how you do with the clues.
The date: 4th April 1968. The time: just after 6pm. The scene: a small motel. A man has emerged onto a first floor balcony. He is evidently killing time, waiting for a friend still inside their room. The noise? Perhaps a car back-firing in the nearby street?
2. This is the third of our series of sermons which prepares us for our Lent studies later in the Spring. Then, as a Parish, we are invited to join together in following the discipline of reading and considering each day of Lent the 40 short chapters of Rick Warren’s book The Purpose Drive Life - in which we are challenged to identify and examine what we regard as the reasons we live as we do – what drives us. The book suggest 5 reasons, 5 drivers, 5 “purposes”, for the Christian’s life and this introductory series is intended to provide a brief and personal comment on each of these purposes. Today my task is to speak on Purpose No.2 “You were formed for God’s Family”.
3. The city: Memphis, Tennessee; the motel: the Lorraine; the man on the balcony: Dr Martin Luther King Jr; the noise? No, not a car back-firing, but a shot from a Remington 760 sporting rifle. Its bullet has entered Dr King’s throat, pierced his spinal column and before the hour is out he is pronounced dead.
4. My regression into childhood continues: a few years ago, in my late-40s I could excuse the purchase of the Scaletrix I had never had; in much the same way, a little later, the miniature railway I had always craved; but a recent fascination with remote-controlled helicopters which crash constantly did begin to cause me some concern; and now, as if to confirm that the regression is something serious, I find myself reading late at night, under the bedclothes. Or at least the modern equivalent, plugging in my iPod and being read to.
One of the books downloaded is Selected Speeches and Sermons of Dr Martin Luther King. Why? Partly because I realised that part of one of his speeches was probably one of only two talks in my life that had lodged in my memory (except for odd phrases of Churchill) and yet I knew very little about the man.
And so now I know a bit more. How this son of a Baptist minister was a teenager who questioned his father’s faith, who went on to study sociology before going to theological college; how his first appointment to a church in Montgomery, Alabama, brought him into the centre of the increasingly active movement for civil rights for the black people of America; how he helped organise the year-long Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955 (Rosa Parks), leading to a court ruling ending segregation on public transport in that city; how then he lead the new Southern Christian Leadership Conference which, under his influence, adopted the tactics developed by Ghandi against the British in India, non-violent protest; and how boycotts and strikes and marches and speeches by Dr King became an increasingly frequent occurrence in the years of the late-50s and early-60s as black people challenged the racist laws of the southern states and began too to question the history of the nation that had freed them from slavery but left them in poverty. How he became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (1964). And I know how he was threatened, his home fire-bombed, regularly imprisoned and, once, stabbed; how his message of rational but implacable criticism of the status quo won him enemies in government, while his commitment to non-violent means won him enemies among black-led groups wanting more definitive action.
And I listened to the speech I thought I knew, the “I have a dream” speech delivered to the crowds attending the mass “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom” in August 1963. And as I listened to more, I realised that there were certain themes which occur again and again in the sermons and speeches. I mention two that are relevant this morning: Dr King’s conviction that segregation was wrong was founded on the belief that we are created by God, not only to be equal before Him but also to be dependent on one another. Again and again he quotes John Donne, “No man is an island...”. And second that “dream” theme crops up often in his teaching – “the American dream” and then the Washington speech is given in various forms before the big march. But the reason I have laid this trail of clues is to lead us a “dream” sermon he preached on the 3 March 1968 – that’s a month before his assassination: a sermon with a poignant, prophetic title: “Unfulfilled Dreams”; a sermon based on the story of David and the disappointment at not being the one to be building God’s Temple in Jerusalem; a sermon delivered – and this is important for this morning – at Dr King’s “home church”, Ebenezer Baptist Church, Atlanta, Georgia, surrounded by people he had worshipped with and shared with for much of his 39 years (his parents included); and a sermon which is a confession, not of failure in his cause, but of the battle in his life between good and evil. It is an emotional sermon and he reaches his crescendo as he says: “I don’t know about you, but I can make a testimony. You don’t need to go out this morning saying that Martin Luther King is a saint. Oh no. I want you to know today that I’m a sinner like all of God’s children. But I want to be a good man. And I want to hear a voice saying to me one day “I take you in and I bless you, because you try. It is well that it was within thy heart””. - “You don’t need to go out this morning saying that Martin Luther King is a saint”
5. And more briefly, may I pick up another clue laid earlier: the other sermon which has stayed me was, oddly, on the same sort of theme. In about 1980 I listened to Rev David Prior, then Vicar of St Aldgates in Oxford, preaching on the tricky passage from Acts 5 concerning the lies told by the new church members, Ananias and Saphira. The message I took away from that sermon was revolutionary to me: that the Church was in business for sinners and was made up of sinners. Our “sainthood” – the saints to whom Paul wrote in the opening verse of our passage today – is – like rest of the blessings and plans which Paul sets out in his letter to a community that he knew well and loved dearly – our sainthood is a result of the grace of God. Not us but Him. The same message as in MLK’s “Unfulfilled Dream”.
6. So at last we are ready for the final scene – the denouement in the drawing room. Is everybody here? My admission of regression into childhood we can ignore as a red herring; and the dramatic opening we can treat as window dressing intended to attract attention. What you may not yet have fathomed is the link between that confessional sermon of MLK (and the message I have carried from my time at college) and Rick Warren’s second purpose – our being formed for God’s family. Or is it obvious? That the Church, God’s family is made up of you and me and people like us, people who are far from perfect, do not see ourselves as “saints” and for whom, as Warren describes it, a “place to belong” is the more important; especially a place which he explains can be a place where friendships can be honest and authentic, where sympathy, mercy and forgiveness are the common currency, together with honesty and confidentiality. He has more to say about practising “being church”, but his words on these matters encourage me to encourage you to the conclusion, if you had not already reached it, that, no matter what your history, looking at yourself with critical eyes, there can be no reason to conclude that you are not formed for God’s family - to be one of the saints.
Elementary? Amen.
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