2016_The Indestructible You.

“The Indestructible You”

Sermon Delivered By Rev. Dick Stetler – November 13, 2016

Centenary United Methodist Church

Psalm 118:5-24; Luke 21:5-19

Most of us are familiar with the enormous number of fires in California that dominated the news in recent months. Fires deliver a double disaster to homeowners that live there. Not only are their homes and the natural beauty consumed, but the loss of trees and shrubs exposes the ground to massive erosion during the rainy season.

A number of years ago a very unique episode was filmed by a man that had fastened his camcorder to a tripod during a mud slide. He was a single parent with his son. The two sat on a bank overlooking their home as the father was narrating what was happening. As a massive mudslide was oozing toward their home, the father said, "This is going to be incredible! We are witnessing what happens when the forces of nature overcome the creations of man."

As the mud and debris approached the porch, it slowly broke through the back door and windows. The father and his eleven-year old sat glued to the drama. Soon the house began to lurch and move from its concrete footers. The father said, "Watch this! Don't blink! There she goes." The two of them watched as their home slid down the hill and became shredded by the massive energy of the mud flow. Eventually, all that remained visible of their home was part of the roof and the chimney. The father exclaimed, "Wasn't that exciting!?"

While covering this story in the studio, a news reporter used the father's video while interviewing both of them. The discussion that followed was most interesting. When asked why he felt the destruction of his home was so exhilarating, the father said:

This was another lesson for my son. My wife died of breast cancer two years ago and I wanted to reinforce for Tommy a lesson we worked on together after she died. Throughout our lives, losses are going to happen to all of us.

In life, there are many things that we cannot control or change. Wishing that experiences would be different from what they are is energy that could be more wisely spent eagerly anticipating what will come next. Tommy and I know that we will always be fine as we ponder the many wonderful memories from living in our home. I wanted him to learn that what matters is how constructively we can deal with life's changes.

This morning we are going to consider the indestructible nature of the human spirit. That father had learned a remarkable way of understanding and interpreting life. There is a saying that captures this lesson rather well.

Never allow the tendrils of your heart to become so entwined around anything that you could not, in a moment's notice, release it with the knowledge that your spirit remains whole and complete just as it was on the day you were born.

In Luke's Gospel, Jesus is predicting horrible changes that his current and future disciples were going to encounter. Not only did he predict the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem that his disciples were admiring, but he also told them about the calamities that they would face in the future, e.g., earthquakes, famines, plagues and the occasional asteroid that ends its journey through space by impacting on the surface of the earth. (Luke 21:11)

Jesus knew that what he was teaching was radically different from what for centuries his people had been trained to believe. Replacing obedience to the Laws of Moses with a message describing the results from an inner-directed loving spirit would be too great a leap for the Hebrews. Jesus told his disciples that they would be greeted with an explosive, angry response. Jesus said,

You will be handed over to the authorities by your parents, your brothers, your relatives and your friends. Some of you will be put to death. Everyone will hate you because of me and what I am teaching." (Luke 21:16f)

Jesus further commented on a reality that goes to the core of who we really are as spirit-beings. After describing the judgmental, cruel and terminal consequences of being his follower, Jesus concluded by saying "Yet, not a single hair from your heads will be lost. Stand firm and you will save yourselves." (Luke 21:18f)

What did Jesus mean? How could some of his followers be killed and remain unscathed? Jesus' teaching became even more abstract by saying, "Remain confident and do not worry about how you should defend yourselves." (Luke 21:14)

If you recall from last Sunday's sermon, one of my former parishioners had a discussion with her deceased mother who was found sitting at the foot of her bed. Those moments with her mother instantly healed her from her emotional devastation. Among the words that her mother communicated to Lillian were these, "Honey, I am fine. Really." The life-force of spirit-beings will always remain unscathed even when their bodies are burned at the stake, stoned, crucified or killed in one of our wars.

This is the only conclusion that we can draw from Jesus' teaching. There is evidence that Lillian's mother used the same technique for appearing to her daughter that Elijah and Moses used when they appeared to Jesus and the disciples on the Mount of Transfiguration. (Matthew 17) Jesus also materialized in the form others would easily recognize during his numerous resurrection appearances.

If all of us could die for a period of time, experience the other side of the curtain and return to our physical forms, our lives would never be the same. We can only imagine how energized we would be to live fearlessly once we understood unequivocally that we will always be fine because our spirits are indestructible by design. This is what Jesus was communicating when he told his disciples, "Yet, not a single hair on your heads will be lost."

When hurricane Nicole swept over our island recently with her category 3 winds, she defoliated many trees and shrubs the way hurricanes always do. What is miraculous after the wind's destruction is that within weeks green shoots become visible. All of nature experiences resurrection from stark, empty branches to lush green foliage because not a hair on their head had been lost. Even the most powerful winds will not disturb the life-force within shrubs and trees. Neither will total destruction of our bodies disturb the life-force within us.

We experience emotions that become very persuasive. We care what happens. Our compassion for others inspires our desire for certain outcomes. We want the best for others and become disappointed when tragedies disrupt our life. Trees and shrubs do not feel and think. Their consciousness is linked to an unemotional resurrection-process that is automatic.

Last week, throughout Tuesday night and early into Wednesday morning, many of Lois and my closest friends and family members became emotionally distraught and depleted because of the outcome of America's elections. Very few people in the Democratic Party believed that a Trump victory was even remotely possible.

All the polls, the pundits and the mainstream media had Hillary elected. In fact, Newsweek Magazine was so confident that they printed 125,000 magazines featuring a cover of Hillary Clinton entitled "Madam President." However, the unthinkable, the unfathomable happened. Those that had invested their energy in a Clinton victory are still emotionally devastated. The United Methodist Church would have had one of their own as President.

Because the Clintons are United Methodists, they frequently attended Foundry Church in Washington, D.C. when Mr. Clinton was the President. Had Hillary been elected, the pastor at Foundry would have had the honor of ministering to the first woman in American history to be the President of the United States. There is no doubt that the hopes and dreams of Foundry's congregation were met with grave disappointment. We always need to remind ourselves of that quote mentioned earlier:

Those words are easy to say and we know the truth they contain, but we also realize that they are almost impossible to live with any consistency. However, after we recover from the pause in our song, we discover that we are creatures that heal from the inside out both physically and spiritually.

No matter how deep the wound is to our spirits, in time, our healing eventually comes. Resilience and flexibility are hard-wired into our physiology and spirit. We are virtually indestructible and our experiences of healing reveal this to us throughout our lives. This is who we are.

Yes, protesters that are unhappy with the results of the election have taken to the streets in many cities in the United States to work through their grief and enormous disappointment. As time marches on, their protests will be silenced by the oozing mudslides and the fierce winds caused by outcomes that a minority of people could not accept. Life's lesson will always be learned by pain or joy. We are always the ones who must adapt to conditions of life that we cannot change.

Think of how liberating it would be to live without fear. We were created with the potential to bounce back in spite of what shows up on the landscape of our lives. Even if our spirits cannot live with such peace and emotional control every day, Jesus illustrated personally from a cross that each of us could.