“Influencing The Future Anonymously”

Sermon Delivered By Rev. Dick Stetler – October 25, 2020

Centenary United Methodist Church

Palm 90:1-6; Matthew 22:34-40

 

    This morning we are going to speculate about a hidden potential of our influencing the future. The Psalm that Darlene read for us today is one of those that we could use for inspiration by reading the first six verses over and over again.  It was written by someone who had a vast imagination and communicated his thinking very clearly.

    This Psalm could really be separated from many others because of the author's understanding of God and the reality that God created.  Yet, the author of these influential words remains unknown. How many times have we been inspired by some quote only to find at the bottom the word Anonymous?

    One of the most influential books in the 17th Century was Pia Desidera written by the Lutheran Theologian Phillipp Spener.  He started a movement in the Lutheran tradition called Pietism.  The Church of his day had missed its mark in changing the direction of people's lives.  Like Martin Luther, Spener tried to get people back on track by giving them an image of what a changed life looks like. 

    Changed lives, according to Spener, were those who totally embodied the response that Jesus gave to a question asked by the Pharisees, "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?"   Jesus quoted from Moses' Law, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength." (Deuteronomy 6:5) Then Jesus gave them a second Law.  "Do not take revenge on others or continue to hate them, but love your neighbors as you love yourself."  (Leviticus 19:18)

    Historically, these words were attributed to Moses, but were they written by him? Jewish tradition says, Yes. Technically, the answer has to be No – because of  the vast differences in style, sentence structure, and hundreds of years of Hebrew history is why Moses was not the author. Who wrote the Torah?   The answer is that Biblical scholars simply do not know. In spite of being written anonymously, the words guided the Jews for most of their history.

    Most people have never heard of Phillipp Spener, but he was not seeking notoriety when he wrote his thoughts.  He knew that what was important was sowing his seeds of wisdom hoping that they might take root in the lives of people in the future.  He once said, "Sometimes God hides our successes from us, lest we see them and become proud."

    While taking my class in Church History in seminary, I became acquainted with Spener's teachings and how they lingered and influenced countless generations in the future. This man from the 17th century influenced my life.  Many of his quotes embedded themselves in my mind soon after I read them.

    All of us know the words Jesus used to answer the Pharisees.   What we can easily miss is the totality of what an anonymous writer was saying hundreds of years before Jesus was born.  Any person can say, "Yes, I love God!" What Spener was stressing was different from what such words communicate. 

    Spener was talking about a total energy-exchange with God's Spirit where an individual literally feels the presence of the other in ways that words cannot express.  Even though two spirits are separated by an entire dimension, they understand intuitively the other's presence within them.

    Think of it.  Such an energy-exchange is experienced by surrendering everything about ourselves.  It means giving up our emotions, thoughts, spirit, and strength. We call this love, but actually it is far more than our classical understanding of love. For many people such an energy-exchange is near impossible to achieve. Why is that?  People find it hard to let go of self, ego, or whatever someone wants to call their sense of self-importance.

    We need people to love us, God does not.  We want people to respect us and to treat us fairly, God does not.  We feel sad when others have marginalized us so that we feel invisible, God does not.  We have real needs to fit into our social network of friends, God does not. Our needs can become a barrier to the energy-exchange that Phillipp Spener was describing.

    To Jesus, his commitment to his divine encounter at his baptism was total.  Scriptural references tell us that he walked away from his vocation, his family, his social network, his inherited religious values and traditions, and his love of Yahweh, the care-giver of Hebrew history.  Jesus had merged with a Divinity of compassion and forgiveness for all people.  What was left of his world?  Not much of what he once cherished in this world.  What he exhibited came from what his spirit had embraced.

    Jesus had erased his personal needs, his history, and everything that made him a carpenter. All that was left was his ability to make God's Spirit visible every day.   Nothing else mattered but his desire to enable others to find the treasure that he had found. If no one noticed him, fine.  If historians chose not to remember him, fine.  If he gave up total control over his life, fine. (Matthew8:20) He trusted that if his words were to find their way into the future, it would not be by his effort but the energy of God's Spirit.

    Confucius became known as the first teacher in China. There can be little doubt that he also had an energy-exchange after having a divine encounter. He had an ability during Council meetings to sow his seeds in such a way that when solutions were found, they were the result of the group's vision. This near invisible creator became even more eager to continue to polish his ability to change the future anonymously.

    When people are ready to grow beyond where they are, the teacher may come in a form that they least expect. Sometimes a spiritual awakening comes like a burning bush for Moses, a profound baptismal experience for Jesus, or a blinding light and a voice for Saul of Tarsus.  However, it can also come from a chance meeting of two people that changes their lives forever.  An awakening can come from a stranger's words that appear to flip on a switch within them.

    Think about the first book of the Bible.  In the first chapter of Genesis, an anonymous author wrote these words:

God created human beings, making them to be like himself. He created them male and female, blessed them and said:  'Have many children so that your descendants will live all over the earth and bring it under their control.  I have given them all the animals and plenty sources of food.'  God looked at everything that he had made and was very pleased. (Genesis 1:27f)

    How could anyone presume to speak as though they were God? How did an anonymous author know what to say?  When human intuition and imagination become inspired by an invisible divinity, words develop a life of their own. As their ideas fly on the winds of time, they influence people living in the future.

    People can have a divine-encounter that lasts long enough to cause a creative wave of inspiration to flow through them.  They have gotten in touch with the Divinity within them.  George Frideric Handel created Messiah in 24 days.  Richard Bach wrote Jonathan Livingston Seagull in a very short period of time. Neale Donald Walsch wrote his first book called, Conversations With God as though no time had passed.  Just recently Carolyn Myss wrote a book entitled Intimate Conversations with the Divine. 

    The only way we can tell if such creators have had an energy-exchange with our Creator is to listen to Messiah, or read one of the books bearing a mystical title.   We are the only ones who can decide what happens to us as a result of our encounter with their words.  Long after their names are forgotten, the truth they created lasts.  How is this possible?  Spirit is the invisible vehicle that places words where they are needed.   Jesus wrote nothing but his words and teachings have survived.  What is impossible was made possible.

    John Wesley the founder of Methodism, was in the depths of despair when he attended a church meeting.  After listening to some anonymous person read the preface to Paul's letter to the Romans, Wesley wrote that he felt his heart strangely warmed.  Instantly, he became a changed man. This was one of those circumstances where, "When the student is ready, the teacher will come."

    God's love for us can come from the inspiration of people who were merely sowing their seeds.  They gave no thought as to whether or not anyone might be listening or reading.  God never leaves us without sources of guidance.  It is we who must pay attention to the clues that surround us. Historically, it has been the institutional Church that has tried to capture how inspiration comes to people through its doctrines, dogma, and study groups. 

    The truth is that very little comes from the realm of spirit without an energy-exchange with God's presence. Someone can say, "Yes, I believe in God with all my heart!"  Jesus gave us a look at how such a changed life may appear when he said:

The wind blows wherever it wishes; you hear the sound that it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. It is like that for everyone who is born of the Spirit. (John 3:8)

    All of us have times when we encounter a rough patch in our living.  The chances are good that the source of our trouble comes from our response to someone or a circumstance existing in the material world.

    The external world holds no solutions for spiritual uncertainty.  When we look to the things in the world, we find ourselves searching in a place that cannot deliver what it promises.  Like Jesus, we need to let go of that world, enter the wilderness of our inner world where we will find our Creator that is within us.  That mysterious place is the source of all genius.  

    Are we open to that path where our potential for an energy-exchange exists? It worked for Jesus; it most certainly will work for us. (Mark 1:12) We are spiritually fed by the cloud of witnesses in our past.

     

CONGREGATIONAL PRAYER

Loving and always present God, thank you for giving us the gift of our ever-evolving spirits.  We have grown wiser. We have learned that we reap exactly what we sow.  We have learned not to define ourselves by our failures. We have learned to mistrust our attractiveness, prosperity, and wealth as sources for our confidence. Such external aspects of our lives are constantly changing.  Inspire us to place our trust only in you for our eternal destiny. Help us to recognize that making visible our values and beliefs every day is our testimony to others that our faith works.  Amen.

     

PASTORAL PRAYER 

We come before you today, O God, knowing how many times our faith has transformed moments of pain into lessons of triumph.  Our reversals have taught us patience.  Hindsight has helped us to define the "why" of life's many unexpected changes. Loneliness has taught us that we need to give more of ourselves to others.  Boredom has provided us with the motivation to make more plans and set more challenging goals.   We thank you for equipping us with minds and emotions that have the ability to be open to the movements of your Spirit.  

Each time we achieve anything of value, it is because we have discovered how to use what you have given us.  We have discovered that the moments in life that have truly mattered were those when our trust in your love sustained us while our own abilities were weak, frail, and undeveloped.  May we always cherish the understanding that with you there is no mountain that we cannot climb, no darkness that can permanently surround us, and no misadventure that will not also leave us with valuable lessons.  You are there every step of our journey as we learn how to be more skilled at being the angels-in-the-flesh whom Jesus called, "My disciples."  

Continue to help us, O God, to create the atmosphere and environment where the people we encounter feel safe, secure, and loved just as they are.  Help each of us to be generous of heart and always eager to serve others.  We pray these thoughts through the Spirit of Jesus, the Christ, who taught us to say when we pray . . .