Sermon by the Rev. Caela Simmons Wood
First Congregational UCC of Manhattan, KS
October 23, 2016 - Psalm 84 and 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18
Once upon a time, I ran a marathon. This was back in my pre-kid days when I was less exhausted and could more easily find a spare 6-8 hours a week to train. One day, near the end of my training, I had a 20-mile run on my schedule. I carefully mapped my route through our town. I was at about mile 14 when I turned north into a part of town I didn’t know that well. Suddenly, this giant hill loomed in front of me. I’m trying to think of a hill here in Manhattan that seems comparable, but I can’t. It was big. Really big.
I stopped in my tracks at the bottom of the hill. If I turned around, I’d have to alter my route completely and my brain was too muddled to think through that. This was before I had a smartphone and I didn’t have an easy way to re-route my run. And I knew I really needed to get the full 20 miles in.
So I did the only thing I could think to do. I slowly walked myself up that hill, feeling a bit like I was dying the whole way, and then I kept going to mile 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. One foot in front of the other until I was finally home.
I really dislike running. Even when I was training for a marathon I hated it 98% percent of the time. Why would I spend all that time doing something that I disliked so much? For me, running a marathon was primarily a test of mental and spiritual endurance. I decided this was something I wanted to do before I tried to become a mother. I thought, “Being a parent seems pretty hard. But if I can run a marathon, I can do anything!”
And the skills I developed slogging it out day after day as I trained really have served me well as a parent. The endurance, fortitude, patience, and ability to just push through, putting one foot in front of the other, when life seems unmanageable and impossible….those are all skills that have really helped me as I’ve been formed into a mother.
The Psalm we read a few moments ago is a Pilgrimage Psalm, meant to describe the thoughts and prayers of ancient Jewish pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem. Our Jewish forebearers in the Ancient Near East had the practice of making three pilgrimages to the Temple in Jerusalem each year. The festivals were Passover, Shavuot, Sukkot. When Jesus went to Jerusalem at the end of his life, it was for the Passover festival.
Pilgrimages aren’t easy. They aren’t supposed to be. They require careful planning. As with any trip, you need to make sure someone can take care of your business while you’re away. Animals and fields still need to be tended while their owners are away. Pilgrimages aren’t necessarily safe. Travelers are are the mercy of strangers, relying on strangers to offer hospitality. Remember, they couldn’t just stop at a Hampton Inn back in those days. Nor could they text ahead to a cousin to make sure they were home. Mostly you just took off and hoped and prayed that strangers would house and feed you along the way. And mostly, they did.
What sustained these travelers? What convinced them to take on this arduous task? Well, I’m sure a big motivator was a societal expectation: “This is just what we do.” It was a part of Jewish life and culture. But I also remember the words of the Psalmist and can’t help but think that many pilgrims were motivated by a very real and earnest desire to encounter the Holy in Jerusalem:
“How lovely is your dwelling place, O LORD of hosts! My soul longs, indeed it faints for the courts of the LORD; my heart and my flesh sing for joy to the living God.”
So often, life becomes routine. Day in and day out we do the same thing. Those of us who are tied to the academic or 9-5 routine measure our lives in weeks. Monday comes again and again. Friday is a brief bit of joy. The weeks cycle through. And those of us on different schedules also have our routines. We make our coffee each morning, we read in bed before we turn off the light. Rhythm is a natural part of being human. Predictability can bring comfort.
And it also seems that there is often something within us that longs for more. A Pilgrim’s journey, while challenging, interrupts our lives - providing time and space for the Holy to break up our everyday routines in new and exciting ways.
We don’t have much of a tradition of Pilgrimage in 21st century Christianity. The expectation of Pilgrimage is still a big deal in many other faiths - just think of the annual Hajj for Muslims. But this idea of intentionally seeking out an arduous journey or task with a very specific destination in mind is not one that we often talk about in our tradition.
As least that’s what I initially thought. But then I read the passage from 2 Timothy and I realized we have something else that is very similar to this practice of going on a difficult spiritual journey with a holy destination in mind: the cross.
The Apostle Paul has had such an enormous impact on Christian theology. It’s really impossible to overstate his importance. I have mixed feelings about this because I do tend to think that some of the things Paul and his followers thought and taught about Jesus seem to not be firmly rooted in Jesus’s own life and teachings.
But one key part of Paul’s theology I’ve always found intriguing is his unrelenting focus on the cross. For Paul, the cross of Jesus Christ was absolutely central to understanding who God is and what God is attempting to do. Everything for Paul is seen through the lens of the cross. The cross was, for Paul, primarily about attaining salvation through suffering….not because Jesus’s blood is a substitution for ours but because, through his death, Jesus shows us how to live.
So if your brain is already wandering over into a freak out mode of “is she about to tell us Jesus died for our sins because something magical happened with the blood of Christ?” Let me just encourage you to just gently grab your mind and bring it back to center. We’re not going there. That is one way of understanding the power of the cross - and it may be one of the ways some of us here understand the cross, and that’s okay. But it’s not the only way and it’s not the way I’m going to be talking about today.
Instead, for Paul there seems to be a power inherent in the actual process of Jesus choosing the cross. There is power in Jesus choosing to intentionally take on difficulty and extreme suffering. There is power in attempting to fashion our own lives after Christ, seeking opportunities to journey to wholeness through suffering, not in spite of it.
This, of course, can quickly veer into dangerous territory. Because the Church has, all too often, encouraged people who are oppressed and abused to put up with horrific treatment by telling them Jesus wants them to “take up their cross” and follow him. I don’t think this is right. And I don’t think it’s what Paul was saying when he encouraged people to follow in the way of Jesus, which included suffering, in order to find salvation.
Instead, I think Paul was talking about a very delicate and deliberate dance of challenge and support as we try to walk in the Way of Jesus. That’s what we see in today’s passage from 2 Timothy. The author of this letter (who, incidentally, was most likely NOT Paul but attempting to capture that same spirit and message) says, “I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith.” They say, “You know, it hasn’t been easy. In fact, it’s been downright excruciating and lonely at times. But God has stood by me throughout the journey. God has never left me alone. And I believe God continues to save me, even now.”
There’s a balance there, of challenge and support. The challenges have been great, but the support has never wavered. It’s not easy to go on a pilgrimage. There are many unknowns and the task can be physically, mentally, spiritual taxing. But if we are lucky, we are also able to see the support around us - the community that goes along with us, the people who open their hearts and homes to us, caring for us along the way. And the destination is always there in our mind’s eye - calling us forward, step after step after step.
I wonder if it’s time to revive this spiritual practice of Pilgrimage? I wonder how our lives might be transformed if we took it upon ourselves to intentionally choose a challenging journey, with a specific destination in mind? I’m not necessarily thinking of an actual physical destination, though I suppose that could be possible for some of us.
I’m thinking instead of other ways we might intentionally choose a challenging path that leads to God. And on the eve of Pledge Sunday I’m thinking this week about my own financial giving. I’m wondering if I’m challenging myself enough. I know the support of my faith community is strong. I know I have companions on the journey. And I know that the practice of giving away my money in a substantial way can feel a bit like a pilgrimage. A bit like stepping out in faith, unsure of exactly where I’m heading or how I’m going to get there.
And then I think about Paul, and Jesus. And I find myself remembering that no one ever said following Jesus would be easy. In fact, they actually said the opposite. This work of becoming - growing, changing, transforming into the person God dreams for us to be. It’s not easy work. It’s supposed to be hard.
And so we give thanks that we do not go alone. We are surrounded by other travelers on the road. We travel with the light of Christ kindled within. We travel a well-worn path, marked by Pilgrims who have gone before. We can do hard things. Thanks be to God.
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