Almighty God, to you all
hearts are open, all desires known, and from you no secrets are hid: Cleanse
the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit, that we may
perfectly love you, and worthily magnify your holy Name; through Christ our
Lord. Amen.
That prayer, known as the Collect for Purity, begins our
worship each Sunday. It is, perhaps, one of most powerful and intimate prayers
that I know of. A version of that prayer dates back to the 11th
century, so it has quite literally been prayed for over a millennium. The form
that we have today has been in every Book
of Common Prayer since the first one was published in 1549. That is one of
the best parts of the Episcopal tradition- that our prayers have roots and when
we pray them, our voices join with the multitudes through the ages that have
prayed these very words. But anytime a prayer is so familiar, it can easily
become rote. Given the context of Psalm 139, this morning I’d like to consider
the depths of the Collect for Purity.
We live in an era of privacy concerns. Every time you go
to the doctor’s office, you sign a HIPPA form about how your personal
information will be protected. I get privacy notices from banks that tell me
how my information will be used. We worry about databases getting hacked and
having our personal information stolen. Whether you view him as a traitor or
patriot, the day that Edwards Snowden leaked the details of the NSA’s
surveillance program was the day the veil was lifted from our eyes. We live in
a world of big data, and you and I have become commodities by living in a world
of digital convenience. The response to this reality has been to push back
against these intrusions and demand that our privacy be respected.
But if you pay attention to that prayer, it becomes clear
that faith is not a private matter: all hearts are open, all desires known, and
no secrets are hid. In our world, privacy is, of course, just an illusion. But
it is an illusion that we, as a people, seem to want to have. By beginning our
worship with that prayer, we should have no illusions of privacy when it comes
to God.
As the Psalmist says, “Lord,
you have searched me out and known me; you know my sitting down and my rising
up; you discern my thoughts from afar. / You trace my journeys and my
resting-places and are acquainted with all my ways. / Indeed, there is not a
word on my lips, but you, O Lord,
know it altogether. / You press upon me behind and before and lay your hand
upon me. / Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot
attain to it. / For you yourself created my inmost parts; you knit me together
in my mother’s womb.” God is not a distant watch-maker in the sky or an aloof
puppet-master. We call God “father” because God is deeply personal and loves us
as a parent does their children.
In our world, you will pay a price for who you are. For
example, if you are extroverted, you will probably say more than you should.
And if you are an introvert, you might not say as much as you could. And so the
question becomes- will you pay the price for being true to yourself, or will
you pay the price of pretending to be someone you are not? That is, will you be
the person that God knows you to be, or will you be spend your energy putting
up a façade? God knows you; there are no secrets. As Jesus says, “the truth
will set you free.” Living in that freedom is hard because it makes you
vulnerable. When you are genuine, you risk being genuinely hurt. But when we
live behind a mask, we can always console ourselves by saying “they don’t know
the real me.”
Truth has always been something that is important to me.
And it always amazes me when people choose political or personal expediency
over living in the freedom of the truth. As we know, when we live a lie,
eventually we will either be caught in it, or the lie will become the new
truth, and often it is a truth that we would rather not live in. Speaking for
myself, I’d much rather be truthful and true to myself and pay that price than
pay the price for being someone that I’d rather not be. I’ve had this
experience at every church I’ve served, and some of you have commented that
some of my sermons are courageous. To be honest, I really don’t feel that
courageous; in my mind, I am simply preaching what I have discerned that God
would have me to say. The Gospel is about speaking the truth to power and in
love. And I’d rather do that than have to one day give an account for why I
didn’t.
One of the Deans of Virginia Theological Seminary in the
19th century said, “Seek the Truth: come whence it may, cost what it
will, lead where it might.” That may not be easy advice, but it is good advice.
Often we think of truth in terms of Greek thought, which is intellectual. We
think of truth as statements that are verifiably and factually correct. But the
Biblical understanding of truth is a bit wider than that. In Hebrew, truth is
about morality and relationship. Being truthful meant being steadfast,
reliable, or dependable. So when the Bible says that God is true, it doesn’t
mean that God exists, or is different than a false god, but rather it means
that God can be trusted. Today, we focus on the scientific understanding of
truth, and while that is a valid part of truth, we ignore the moral nature of truth.
In the Episcopal Church, we remember the saints of the Church on the day of their death, when they join the heavenly hosts. So, on April 4 we
commemorate Martin Luther King. But, as you know, Monday is the civic
recognition of MLK. King one said that “the day we see truth and cease to speak
is the day we begin to die.” Those are words to live by. Some of you have
likely heard of the horrendously tragic situation in the Diocese of Maryland.
The short version is that their Bishop Suffragan, who had a history of substance
abuse, killed a bicyclist, who was by all accounts a wonderful man and loving
husband and father. She hit him with her car, though he was in a designated
bike lane. At the time, she was texting and had a blood-alcohol level of .22,
nearly three times the legal limit. To make matters worse, she did not stop and
fled the scene, preventing lifesaving paramedics from getting to him sooner.
There has been a lot of ink spilled about issues of alcohol in the church, the
relationship between forgiveness and accountability, and the qualifications for
clergy. But what has frustrated me more than anything is the lack of truth
telling- both the factual and moral kind.
We went over a week between the accident and the district
attorney filing manslaughter charges against her. And in that time, she made no
public statement, the Diocese only made a statement that seems to have been
edited by a public relations firm, and we have yet to hear any real truth
spoken. Even the office of the Presiding Bishop has only commented that the
legal process needs to run its course. This is not a Christian response. Again,
as Jesus says, “the truth will set you free.” Speaking the truth is the only
way to find healing and forgiveness. Cost what it will and lead where it might,
the truth is the only path to salvation. Our truth lies not in judges or
juries, but with our Maker and Redeemer. I have been disappointed and
frustrated with our Church’s response to this situation because the truth, both
facts and trustworthiness, is being obscured. My prayer is for reconciliation and
redemption to be known by all.
What I find so amazing about the fact that from God no
secrets are hidden is that God loves us still. And not only does God love us,
but God uses us. Our reading from 1 Samuel this morning speaks to this. The
sons of Eli were not keeping the faith and were blaspheming God. God knew their
secrets and the impure desire of their hearts. But God wasn’t done with them.
No, God calls, repeatedly, to Samuel to go and speak a word of truth to Eli.
I’ve mentioned before my fondness for the preaching of
Methodist Bishop Will Willimon. He tells the story of teaching a class at Duke
Divinity School in which a student comes up to him after class and says “I’m
really sorry Dr. Willimon, my life has been hectic and I don’t have a paper to
turn in.” He responds, “You know, this is the third assignment that you’ve
missed. This really isn’t acceptable. In the congregation you can’t get up and
say ‘you know I really wanted to have a sermon for you today, but I got busy.’”
She stopped him right there, saying “You think I don’t know I’m inadequate and
ill-prepared for ministry? I know my faults better than you do. I have no idea
why God called me to go into the ministry, but God called and I’m listening.”
Willimon then comments that he knew immediately that she was right.
It has been said that God does not call the qualified,
but instead qualifies the called. Think about that- it’s something we see
throughout the Bible. Abraham and Sarah were too old to be the parents of a
great nation; Moses had a speech impediment and yet was called to go to Pharaoh
and demand freedom; Mary was a young, unwed girl when God told her that she
would bear a son; Paul was a persecutor of Christians when he was called to
become a leader of the Church. And you and I are part of that faithful lineage.
I’m not quite sure why God chooses to work through us- as imperfect,
doubt-filled, distracted, and fearful as we might be. But God does. One
theologian has said “It is not the church that has a mission… it is that God’s
mission has a Church.” St. Francis is known for praying, “Lord, make us
instruments of your peace.” And St. Augustine said “Without God, we cannot;
without us, God will not.” The fact that the Creator of the Universe trusts us
is a call to action. It’s amazing that God seems to have more faith in us than
we have in God.
And clergy are not the only group of people to be called.
By virtue of being created in the image of God and through your Baptism, you
are called to love God with your heart, mind, and strength; to care for
Creation; to work for the dignity and respect of all persons; to continue in
the apostles’ teaching, the breaking of the bread, and in the prayers; to love
your neighbor as yourself. And you can live out this call in the way you treat
you family, in the way you treat yourself, your customers, colleagues, and
people on the street.
Ghandi is reported to have once said “I like your Christ,
but I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”
If that is not an indictment, I’m not sure what is. This season of Epiphany, we
remember and celebrate the ways in which God is manifest to us and the world
through Jesus. But it does not stop there. As followers of Jesus, we are to be
God’s Epiphany to the world- the manifestation of God’s grace, redemption,
love, peace, and truth.
We give thanks that God knows us intimately and loves us
for who we are- that in God, we are free to be ourselves without feeling the
need to be someone we are not. We pray for the grace and strength to live in
the freedom of God’s truth and to see in ourselves the love of God. As we
remember God’s prophet, Martin Luther King this weekend, may we recall the
power of truth and have the boldness to speak it, even if when doing so is a
dangerous proposition. And may we respond faithfully to the call of God to be a
sign, an Epiphany, of God’s truth. Amen.
