The Living Stones of the New Creation

“The Living Stones of the New Creation”

Luke 18:9-14

First Presbyterian Church of Jamestown , New York

Fr. J.A. Ross Mackenzie, Priest-in-Absentia

October 28, 2007

“Not one stone shall be left on the other.” These words, put in the mouth of Jesus by the author of the Gospel, were intended to refer to the destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem in the year 70—“no other city has ever endured such horrors,” wrote historian Josephus, one of the survivors.

Not one stone left on the other. And in our time not one stone was left on the other of the Golden Mosque in Iraq .

And in our time the fall of the iconic Twin Towers killed nearly three thousand, not one stone left on the other.

And in the 9^th Ward of New Orleans, not one stone was left on another.

In the face of all such destructions, this is the only plan worthy of our attempt: which is to construct the living temple of the kingdom of God on earth, the three great stones of love, joy, and peace—loving at whatever cost; finding the joy that comes in the struggle; and making peace in confronting the great issues of our time.

# 1: Loving at whatever cost. The new commandment straight from Jesus—this is a command—is that we love one another at whatever cost.

I learned about that kind of love from Sykes and his mother, Alice. Sykes had broken down mentally in middle age, and when I came to know him he was a smoky-brown, toothless wonder with a warm, crazy kind of smile. He smoked twenty packs a day. He adored his Mama, Alice.

In her 70s, Alice had a stroke, and lay inert and unresponsive in a nursing home for a month. Sykes refused to visit her. He was physically sickened by the idea of seeing anyone in hospital. A friend of the family insisted he had to go. He finally came to her bedside, but refused to look at her. Alice was in a coma, had given no sign of recognizing anyone, least of all her own son. She had not moved for a month. “Sykes,” the friend said, “bend down and whisper something kind in her ear.” He turned away, and refused. “Say something nice, Sykes.” He bent down and shouted in a voice that could be heard back at the nurses’ station, “Mama! It looks like they scrambled your brains.”

Alice , still immobile, recognized the voice of the son she loved, raised her arm slowly, and let him kiss it. If ever I saw the love of God it was in a toothless wonder and the mother who adored him. “Love one another,” Jesus says.

So, April 26 2006, Liviu Librescu, a Holocaust survivor, threw himself against the door to protect his students from the Virginia Tech shooter. “Love one another.” So, September 11, 2001, Michael Benfante and John Cerqueira, trying to escape the North tower of the World Trade Center , spotted a wheelchair-bound woman. "We got to the stairwell,” they said, “and we carried her down, 68 stories down the stairs." It took more than an hour to get to the ground floor, they reported.

Love in action: that means we are ordered to show love towards every unmarried, pregnant woman looking for shelter; every minority child caged in the inner city; every adult with disability; every incarcerated breadwinner; any Jew still accused of killing Christ, every Muslim marked by racial slur, every gay branded as imperfect by the church; every houseless waif, every toothless wonder only a mother could love. “Love one another as I have loved you,” Jesus says. And it’s that kind of love this congregation shows, as witness your own marvelous record.

#2. To find the joy that comes in the struggle. I knew Annette Pashayan well, then professor of anesthesiology at the University of Florida . Her career ended in 1994 when she learned that she had metastatic breast cancer. Radiation and a bone marrow transplant were prescribed. The poems describe her disfigurement, intense suffering with high doses of radiation, and bone transplantation.

She listened to Glenn Gould play Bach and composed poetry. Referring to her increasing white blood cell count, the last lines of her poem go:

          Smug in my relative leukocytosis,
          washed in joy and delight,
          I smile, I glow.

The renowned Israeli composer, Ella Milch-Sheriff, whose sister had died of breast cancer, by chance read Annette’s poetry, and collaborated on a piece, called “Songs from the Edge,” which for mezzo-soprano and quartet. The world premiere was at Chautauqua Institution last summer.

“Annette, you got it, Baby! Excuse me, Dr. Pashayan.” And because you are a good Methodist, you know the words about Jesus in Hebrews 12: “who for the joy that lay ahead of him endured the cross.” That’s what joy allows. Hear 14^th century Julian of Norwich: “God did not say you will not be assailed, you will not be belabored, you will not be disquieted, but he said: ‘You will not be overcome…. He wishes us to trust greatly in him, and all will be well.’”

#3 Making peace. “Blessed are the peacemakers”—that’s Beatitude # 7. It involves three tasks to which we Christians are committed in the 21^st century.

The first is “to proclaim with a loud and decisive voice that peace is the only path which is just and marked by solidarity.” These words were spoken by Pope John Paul II, and they were well said. So all power to evangelicals such as Jim Wallis of “Sojourners” and Rick Warren of “The Purpose Driven Life,” who have insisted that to be a peacemaker in the 21^st century means to go beyond the narrow agenda of abortion, condoms, and homosexuality to broader issues like AIDS, global warming, world poverty, and war.

The Christian Church in the United States too often looks like the Republican Party at prayer or the Democratic Party in posture. The task of the church in this century is to free itself from its centuries’ long alliance and often subservience to the state and become what it has been at its best—the conscience and soul of the state.

Our second task is to show compassion to those who are in need, because peace in the Biblical sense means being a friend to the other—and that means (and this is straight Mathew 25):

· Showing compassion to the sick, therefore caring that the share of Americans who are medically uninsured increased by 2.2 million last year. Health care for the poor is an aspect of Christian compassion.

· Showing compassion to the imprisoned, therefore caring that one in 142 residents in this country are behind bars, the highest prison population in the world.

· Showing compassion to the stranger, therefore caring about immigrants, the overwhelming majority of whom do pay taxes, aren’t on welfare, do want to learn English, and didn’t cross the border illegally.

Finally, and at a very intimate level, to be a peacemaker means for each of us to take refuge in God—to find the inner peace that eludes us. And this is one of the thin places where we can sit still, breathe slowly, and lay down the burdens.

There’s a ballad from of old:

A poor lad once, and a lad so trim

gave his heart to her who loved not him.

And said she, “Give me tonight, you rogue,

Your mother’s heart to feed my dog.”

To his mother’s house went that young man,

Killed her, cut out her heart, and ran.

But as he was running, Look you, he fell,

And the heart rolled out on the ground as well,

And the heart as it rolled was crying so small,

“Are you hurt, my child, are you hurt at all?”

I’m pretty sure it’s true for you, but I need to hear the God of peace say that to me often. So just for a moment, close your eyes, if you will, and hold out before God that one hurt that is before you now. And in the silence, hear some words that will give us peace:

· “My yoke is easy, my burden is light.”

· “Abide in my love.”

· “Your pain will turn into joy.”

· “Peace I leave with you.”

· “Are you hurt, my child, are you hurt at all?”

That’s it.

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